Marriage, by Herbert Spencer, 1845

Earlier I wrote about not marrying a woman who I lived with for many years. I did not want a legal document, marriage license, to hold us together. I did not want the State to be a third party to our relationship.

I thought if we cared about each other we would stay together. I told her, and her mother, early in our relationship that I did not want to be married. I would take the relationship one day at a time. When either party was ready to end the relationship they were free to do so. No legal document should be required to keep us together. As a libertarian I don't believe one person should own another, in any form. Nor do I think any persons should require the permission and approval of the State to form a voluntary relationship.

I just read a letter written on marriage, by Herbert Spencer, in 1845, that says something similar. Since Spencer's letter, divorce has become
acceptable. Living together without marriage should also be acceptable.

Charles Tolleson

http://praxeology.net/HS-LM.htm

1. You agree I believe with Emerson that the true sentiment of love between man and woman arises from each serving as the representative of the other's ideal. From this position I think we may deduce the corollary that the first condition to happiness in the married state is continuance of that representation of the ideal; and hence the conduct of each towards the other should always be so regulated as to give no offence to ideality. And on this ground I conceive that instead of there being, as is commonly the case, a greater familiarity and carelessness with regard to appearances between husband and wife, there ought to be a greater delicacy than between any other parties.

2. There should be a thorough recognition on both sides of the equality of
rights, and no amount of power should ever be claimed by the one party
greater than that claimed by the other. The present relationship existing
between husband and wife, where one claims a command over the actions of the other, is nothing more than a remnant of the old leaven of slavery. It is necessarily destructive of refined love; for how can a man continue to
regard as his type of the ideal a being whom he has, by denying an equality of privilege with himself, degraded to something below himself? To me the exercise of command on the part of the husband seems utterly repugnant to genuine love, and I feel sure that a man of generous feeling has too much sympathy with the dignity of his wife to think of dictating to her, and that no woman of truly noble mind will submit to be dictated to.

3. The last important condition I hold to be the forgetting, to as great an extent as possible, the existence of a legal bond, and the continual
dependence upon the natural bond of affection. I do not conceive the most
perfect happiness attainable while the legal bond continues; for as we can
never rid ourselves of the consciousness of it, it must always influence our conduct. But the next best thing to destroying it is to banish it from our minds, and let husband and wife strive to act towards each other as they would were there no such tie.

If men were wise they would see that the affection that God has implanted in us is amply sufficient, when not weakened by artificial aid, to ensure
permanence of union; and if they would have more faith in this all would go well. To tie together by human law what God has tied together by passion, is about as wise as it would be to chain the moon to the earth lest the natural attraction existing between them should not be sufficient to prevent them flying asunder.