The Declaration precedes the Constitution. “All men are created equal” is the necessary preface to “We the People.”
Equal rights and the consent of the governed are the principles that make self-government intelligible in the first place. Without them there are no real limits to what majorities can enact, including doing away with democratic rule. Once “all men are created equal” is dispensed with, once it is no longer held to apply to a certain group of people, what might limit the arbitrary rule of a few, or one, over other groups without their consent? The right to love and and marry, regardless of preference is a right, grounded in our basic equality. And no majority should be able to take that away.
In reading some opinions about how our leadership has recently been standing by their party-lines, during this election month, instead of defending the core value in the Declaration of Independence, points to a larger (less apparent) issue with society.
