The issue of same-sex marriage has polarized various factions in the American political arena and society. Typically, Republicans, the Religious Right, Evangelicals, and family advocacy groups are opposed to gay marriage. These groups have fought for a constitutional amendment that defines marriage as a union only between a man and a woman, ôMarriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a womanö (Let, 2004, p. 26). These elite groups have fought for the amendment due to increasing activism by gay, lesbian, and bisexual persons and groups and their advocates to legalize and recognize same-sex marriage. The Superior Court of San Francisco and the Supreme Court of Massachusetts have both declared a ban against same-sex marriage as a violation of constitutional rights of the individual. The Massachusetts Court held that ôexcluding gay couples from civil marriage violated the state constitutionö (Rauch, 2003, p. 88). These decisions have led to increasing factionalism between defenders of same-sex marriage and those who oppose it.
The conflict theory of social conflict maintains that social problems arise from the power struggle between the wealthy, powerful elite groups in society and less powerful groups for resources. With gay marriage, we see that the elite groups (the Catholic Church, Republicans, the Bush Administration, the Religious Right, etc.) have fought for a ban on gay marriage. Those in favor of gay marriage maintain that this determination to prevent same-sex marriage by elite groups represents an effort to rob them of their rightful privileges and benefits of the marriage contract. Indeed, the Constitutional Amendment favored by elites who oppose same-sex unions not only defines marriage as between only a man and a woman but it also addresses economic issues, ôNeither this constitution or the constitution of any state, nor state or federal law, sha
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