Whether the issue is gay marriage or polygamy, both topics have earned headlines in recent years, and both involve religious entities demanding hegemony over the issue, in the case of gay marriage, or exemptions at the expense of women and children, in the case of polygamy. Polygamists are claiming a constitutional right to have multiple spouses, while fundamentalist Christians and Orthodox Jews are demanding that same-sex couples not be permitted to marry, for religious reasons.

The First Amendment grants all citizens, including religious believers, the right to contribute their viewpoints to public debate and to try to persuade leaders and fellow citizens that their views on social problems have merit; wisdom can be found in many corners. But they do not have a right in the United States to mold public policy solely according to their beliefs, and their beliefs alone. And legislators are not permitted to make public policy solely according to religious belief. These are First Amendment basics.

The hard legislative choices depend on a more broad-ranging inquiry than any one religious worldview encompasses (even when that perspective is shared by a large number of citizens). A complication in the debates over marriage in 21st-century America has been that few of our elected representatives seem to understand or are willing to shoulder their representative role, which demands significantly more than deference to religious entities or the enactment of their religious preferences.