Stat Rep. Cindy Noe, R-Indianapolis, is pushing a bill that would require couples planning to marry to take "premarital classes" on such things as communication, conflict resolution and parenting or else pay four times the standard fee for marriage license and certificate. This is either, A) Government going where it shouldn't be going or, B) a symbolic gesture that will have no real effect (I tend to lean toward the latter). Either way, it's a tedious waste of time. Others seem to think so, too:
Rep. Vanessa Summers, D-Indianapolis, raised the chief question of many critics who find it ironic that Republicans, who often want little interference from the government, would propose such a bill.
[. . .]
Rep. Wes Culver, R-Goshen, said the bill had good intentions, but he was concerned with government telling churches what should be taught in their marriage classes.
“It's 90 percent good,” he said. “It's 1 percent government getting their foot in the door.”
It's only 1 percent bad? That's just a little bit low, isn't it? Since a lot of marriage counseling for such classes is done by churches, and since this bill would establish the approved contents of the premarital classes, this would be a tad more than the "government getting their foot in the door." It would be getting a foot in the door and putting a hammer lock on whoever answers it. At least the measure uses a financial incentive instead of an outright requirement (except for those under 18, for whom the classes would be mandatory).
Noe is right that there is "a critical need for healthy relationships in Indiana," that divorce hurts children and that classes such these can lead to stronger marriages. If we look at statistics on people who have taken them, I suspect we'd find they do have a better track record for staying married than the ones who have not. But that's because the classes are entered into voluntarily. The people who take them have thought about the dangers of a union and are determined to try to head them off. That makes them the type of people more likely to have strong, stable marriages.
The bill takes the "build a better product by improving the raw materials" approach. But people who take classes to avoid a penalty are just as likely to resent them as they are to benefit from them, which wouldn't do a lot to increase the stability of the relationship. And, really, how much of an incentive is there? The standard fee is $18. Those who decline to take the classes would have to pay $72. How many people are going to go OMG, let's sign up now?
