Marriage: a slightly libertarian perspective

Brian Ferguson has a long posting about a number of topics. This little nugget is buried near the end, and I'm afraid many of his readers might miss it:

The libertarian in me could support having the government get out of the "marriage" business altogether, with the concept of "marriage" to be replaced, for legal purposes, by a concept of civil union, which would primarily be an economic relationship, covering such things as rights of inheritance and survivorship, and assignment of entitlements under pension and health plans. Marriage would then be the province of religious bodies and would have no legal meaning, referring instead to a service in which the blessing of the creator, however envisioned, would be invoked for a couple entering into a union. The nature of the couples eligible for such blessing - homosexual or heterosexual - would be a matter for the members of individual faiths to decide, and the government (including human rights tribunals) would have no say in the matter.

And the Smithian in me is pretty sure that the more the government and the courts get involved in such things, the more likely they are to make a complete mess of them.

I note, once again, that he misspelled "gubmnt".

Update: For more, please see the thoughtful posting by Kip Esquire at A Stitch in Haste.