TheStatehouseFile.com

INDIANAPOLIS – The final sad absurdity of the proposed Indiana constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage put arch-conservative state Sen. Mike Delph, R-Carmel, in the position of demonstrating that even Karl Marx can be right upon

occasion.

“(German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich) Hegel remarks somewhere that all great, world-historical facts and personages occur, as it were, twice. He has forgotten to add: the first time as tragedy, the second as farce,” Marx once noted.

Marx could have been speaking of House Joint Resolution 3 – the proposed constitutional gay marriage ban – that started as a tragedy and, courtesy of Delph, ended as a farce.

The tragedy sprang from the nature of HJR 3. Its supporters made the argument that Indiana had to write into its fundamental law a ban on couples of the same gender entering into contracts to love and support each other – which is what marriage is in the civil sense – in order to preserve the institution of marriage and protect children.

Such an argument springs from a premise that at best misunderstands and at worst misrepresents what constitutions are and are supposed to do.

In the most basic sense, a constitution in a self-governing society is a contract that sets forth the terms under which a free people agree to be governed. As such, constitutions generally seek to preserve the rights and freedoms of citizens – not abridge them, as HJR 3 would have done.

In America, when we have used constitutions to curtail the liberties of certain citizens – say, African-Americans or women – the consequences of such repressive measures have been both costly and tragic.

Perhaps, over time, it was the sense that this constitutional amendment ran against the grain of the American experience by limiting freedom for some, but not all, citizens that encouraged many Hoosiers to think again. And their uneasiness produced enough political pressure to encourage first the House and then the Senate to alter HJR 3 enough to delay its adoption.

Tragically, though, the lawmakers didn’t come to their senses until Hoosiers had spent several weeks snarling at each other – and gay and lesbian citizens of the state had had to contemplate the possibility of perpetual existence as second-class citizens.

As the curtain closed on the tragedy, it was time for the farce.

Delph heard his cue.

After the Senate Republican caucus last week nailed the door shut on HJR 3’s last chance to find a spot on the ballot this fall, Delph, an HJR 3 supporter, took to Twitter to begin a marathon that began first as a tirade and descended quickly to a temper tantrum.

All through the weekend, Delph railed, with geometrically decreasing coherence, about God, country, natural rights and constitutional practice. He also lashed out at weak-willed church leaders, lily-livered legislative leaders, the media, liberals and any person, place or thing that didn’t seem inclined to see things exactly his way.  For good measure, he also threatened to kick – I’ll observe decorum – someone’s posterior.

As an added bonus, he called a press conference for Monday at which he promised big news. The big news turned out to be that Mike Delph was unhappy.

Really unhappy.

Really.

Really.

Really.

Unhappy.

(Nice to know. Thanks for sharing, senator.)

Delph could have used a point of privilege on the Senate floor to express his pique, but apparently decided that stamping his feet, waving his arms and holding his breath were more senatorial approaches.

Undignified as it was, Delph’s outburst did demonstrate a couple of things.

The first was that he outed the HJR 3 support movement without realizing it. The leading proponents of HJR 3 had taken great pains to separate their support from religious motivations, perhaps because they knew that making the measure a question of faith would create First Amendment problems.

When Delph belittled church leaders for not standing with him, though, he made clear just how much he and others expected Indiana state government to endorse and establish in fundamental law his and their idiosyncratic theology.

The second thing Delph showed was that Marx got at least one thing right.

HJR 3’s story started as a tragedy, but once the tragedy had abated, it was time to send in the clowns.

And there was Mike Delph, waiting in the wings.

John Krull is director of Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism, host of “No Limits” WFYI 90.1 Indianapolis and publisher of TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.