Personal liberty assaulted

I would like to respond to Donna Kuhn’s June 9 letter (“Religious liberty under assault”). Kuhn seems to feel that marriage equality is an assault on religious liberty. I disagree. I believe that the efforts by the religious community to impose their beliefs on all people, religious or otherwise, is an assault on personal liberty.

Kuhn laments the fact that citizens have to “expend energy to undo lousy legislation.” The other side to that argument is that the Defense of Marriage Act passed in 1998 over the veto of then-Gov. Gary Locke is lousy legislation. The church turned marriage over to the state long ago. Martin Luther, John Calvin and the early English Puritans all declared marriage to be a civil affair and a worldly matter (“History of Marriage in Western Civilization” and “Catholic Encyclopedia (1913)/History of Marriage”).

Marriages in early history were often nothing more than a business transaction in which the bride and groom had little or no voice. The issue of marriage equality should be decided by our legislators and judges with an eye to protecting the rights and freedom of all people, not by religious groups or popular vote.

Dustin Stum

Spokane Valley