*Insert joke about British teeth here*

Bah!! Everyone should close the lid. EVERYONE I say!!

No one wants the toilet gaping open, waiting for someone to drop a toothbrush in it.

I'll get this started:

Gay marriage and civil unions degrade the sanctity, and recognition of society of the institution of heterosexual marriage.

Ok then.

No, England, you can't have a fifth amendment.

//not yours

Spousal immunity isn't part of the Fifth Amendment. It's a common law rule of evidence that began in England in the middle ages. Its purpose is preventing the law from damaging marriages. It applies to both civil and criminal trials, unlike the 5th Amendment.

Anyway, in conclusion, a man cannot be forced to testify against his wife.

/stop winking!

wow, why are people always getting rid of convenient little known legal loopholes, what are the people who make late night made for tv movies supposed to do without the materials they need so badly?

These days of high divorce rates and 6 month marriages maybe don't support the high-fallutin way we regarded marriage in the past.

RockIsDead

I am not a pious dickhole hypocrite of a Christian, but unless they have recanted the values of their religion (or intend to remain Christians albeit not pious, dickhole, hypocritical ones), then nothing has changed to lessen the supposed sanctity of marriage.

I never understood the whole business of not being forced or even allowed to testify against your spouse in court. Sure people who are married sometimes have a close realtionship and everything, but unlike say attorney client privileges or patient confidentiality I don't really see what the benefit of this might be for society. If people stop discussing the crimes they have comitted with their wives, this won't really hurt anyone and the state has no vested interest in keeping the marriages of such people intact.

I don't think this will fly with the European Court of Human Rights.

We may have to invade them.

/laces up combat boots

Interesting? Try asinine.

Loki-L

I for one don't believe that a couple who really love each other should be put in the position to testify against their spouse or face prison time. Sure, if they hate each other, then let them go ahead. But your lack of understanding would put many people in a position no one should be in.

OK, if the only thing that the police have is the testimony of the spouse they probably don't have enough to take the case to court and are desperate to apear that they are doing something.

Marnevell, did you RTFA?

First off marrying a witness mid trial to suppress testimony it a bit ridiculous.

And when it comes to child abuse then I have no problem with making the spouse testify. I have an ex-girlfriend that was raped repeatedly by her step-father from the time she was 6 to 16. Her mother knew about it but did not act on it. Well, actually I take that back, don't force the parent to testify, shoot them both in the head and take the kid away. Yet that brings up the issue of foster care and kids being separated from siblings and family only to be bounced around until they are 18.

New plan; no foster families. If you cannot get your life back together after a year, or if it is violent/sexual abuse or massive neglect then give the kids up for adoption, no more getting then back after mommy gets out of rehab or jail. One family, that's it. And nobody give me that adoption hurts the kid BS, I turned out fine, the only trouble I have had with the law comes from the fact that I have $300 in unpaid parking tickets on campus.

Well, that was a bit of a threadjack, back to the original point. It is not a blanket ban on spousal testimony privilege. The times when it will be forced make sense, at least to me. Still, I have to give mad props to the man who married the witness for ingenuity and working the system.

I Love Redhead Men

No one wants the toilet gaping open, waiting for someone to drop a toothbrush in it.

If you've got one of those disinfecting cistern blocks, or similar "active" system, your toilet bowl is probably more hygenic than your bathroom sink...

/Still not a pleasant thought though

Man_Without_A_Hat: I for one don't believe that a couple who really love each other should be put in the position to testify against their spouse or face prison time. Sure, if they hate each other, then let them go ahead. But your lack of understanding would put many people in a position no one should be in.

Well, in some ways this amendment would be an improvement then. At present, spouses have to choose, either refuse to testify, depriving the courts of relevant information and potentially leading to grave injustices (such as the case in TFA where a murderer walked free), or testify, "betraying" their spouse and potentially destroying their marriage. Make the spouse compellable and you remove the burden of this decision from them, they're no longer "betraying" their spouse, they simply don't have a choice.

Either way, I don't really see any good reason why spouses shouldn't be compellable if they have genuinely relevant evidence. I mean, really, just because they get along well and we wouldn't want to disturb that? If you're liable for something, civilly or criminally, I really don't see how your marriage should be a relevant concern. "Oh, yeah, he killed someone, but in order to punish him we might have to harm his marriage", or "Yeah, that guy did get drunk and cripple your kid in a car accident so he now requires constant care, but in order to make him pay for that care we might upset him and his wife, so tough luck". Really?

Or to put it another way, whatever happened to personal responsibility? If you did the offence, civil or criminal, you take the punishment. I'm all for civil liberties protection, but I don't see how that would apply here. After all, if you committed a criminal offence, nobody should suggest married people should be exempt from imprisonment because it might hurt their marriage, why should they get such special treatment at trial either?

In America it's OK to violate the 14th amendment as long as the couple you're talking about is teh ghey.

http://www.nps.gov/malu/documents/amend14.htm

"No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Man_Without_A_Hat

I for one don't believe that a couple who really love each other should be put in the position to testify against their spouse or face prison time. Sure, if they hate each other, then let them go ahead. But your lack of understanding would put many people in a position no one should be in.

What about parents testifying about their children? There is more than one mother who loves her child more than its father. Why shouldn't they be afforded the same privileges? What about other realtionships that have lots of love in them? Why do married couples get such a huge advantage over everyone else?

You might have a very close relationship with your neighbor or coworker full of mutual respect, but if he tells you where he buried the bodies there is no way you can legally keep from telling the courts on him.

This whole protecting the marriage might have made sense in ages long past, when marriage was important and vital. In this day and age where divorces are common and no longer mean the end of the world for everyone involved it shouldn't be granted this much protection at the cost of everyone else.

The rationale behind spousal privilege is that healthy, stable marriages are beneficial to society as a whole. Communication is key to a healthy marriage, therefore individuals should feel free to confide in their spouses without worrying about potential legal repercussions. Spousal communication is considered so vital to society that we are willing to accept the occasional affront to the administration of justice that the privilege may create.

The same rationale applies to communication with priests, lawyers, and doctors. Whether this rationale is still 100% relevant today, I don't know (at least when it comes to priests and spouses).

/in no way saying that "healthy, stable marriage" = one man and one woman.
//have no interest in getting involved in a gay marriage debate

Loki-L

What about parents testifying about their children? There is more than one mother who loves her child more than its father. Why shouldn't they be afforded the same privileges? What about other realtionships that have lots of love in them? Why do married couples get such a huge advantage over everyone else?

You might have a very close relationship with your neighbor or coworker full of mutual respect, but if he tells you where he buried the bodies there is no way you can legally keep from telling the courts on him

This whole protecting the marriage might have made sense in ages long past, when marriage was important and vital. In this day and age where divorces are common and no longer mean the end of the world for everyone involved it shouldn't be granted this much protection at the cost of everyone else.

Society doesn't value friendship and coworker relationships enough to extend privilege to them.

As far as parent-child communications go, I have no idea why there is no privilege; there probably should be. In reality, however, I think that parents are rarely compelled to testify against their children. Juries and judges find it distasteful, and lawyers know that. Plus, if compelled to testify, parents will often perjure themselves in order to protect their kids. Given all of that, prosecutors will often try to find other evidence before relying on parental testimony.

I see your point that spousal privilege may be less important today than it was in the past, but it is so ingrained in the common law that it is not going anywhere anytime soon.

Every other year gay marriage just so happens to become a major national issue right around the fall elections.

You know the best way to solve the gay marriage problem? Ban marriage.

And gay people.

RamblingKey


I'll get this started:

Gay marriage and civil unions degrade the sanctity, and recognition of society of the institution of heterosexual marriage.

How?

/this debate is only interesting to me as a civil liberties question, as I plan to die alone

I am ashamed of you all! Scotland has a different legal system from England so
a: this has nothing to do with England
b: this has nothing to do with Britain

Here endeth your lesson.

JohnnyontheSpot: RamblingKey

I'll get this started:

Gay marriage and civil unions degrade the sanctity, and recognition of society of the institution of heterosexual marriage.

How?

As my extremely homophobic father has said, he feels that gay marriage degrades the sanctity of his marriage to my mother because there is no way that gays can love one another as much as heterosexuals and that since being gay is achoice and a mental defect, it isn't as holy and great as his marriage.

Many a screaming match over this one.

MrPerfectSU
At least in Canada, doctor-patient and priest-believer relationships are generally not privileged in court.

From what I remember, it's similiar in the US (i.e., it's easy to get around the privilege relating to those particular relationships).

ernst_k
Both doctor/patient and priest/penitent privilege exist in the US. The level of protection varies between state jurisdictions, but the privileges do exist. And, yeah, there are ways to get around the privilege, but that is true of all privileged communications. Even attorney/client privilege is not as ironclad as most people think.

Can anyone explain why the penalty for *not* testifying against anyone is not death by unga bunga....?

No one should be protected from testifying against anyone else. I don't see the value in it. You should be obligated to testify, and if you lie, you should be jailed yourself.

Legal farxperts....? Anyone....? Bueller....?

TheSignPost

The idea has been that it is unjust to make a person choose either jail (for contempt) or disloyalty to one's spouse. And since there is a high probability that any testimony forced against one's spouse will be unreliable (false), there is not much downside.

I'll let you farkers in on a secrets. They can't arrest a husband and wife for the same crime ;-)

/They can?
//I have the worst farking attorneys

Is it Britain doing this? Or just Scotland?

First it's "why didn't you put the seat down again afterwards?"

Then it's "Wy didn't you lift the seat in the first place?"

Fercryinoutloud, what on earth do women want ???

what kind of farking incompetent prosecutor can't get a conviction when the defendant marries the guy's ex (er, widow?!) mid trial and the killing was suppposed to be to remove the love rival?!

My idea of hell is me surrounded by a billion women, all complaining about the farking toilet seat.

I don't really see how forcing someone to testify in any case will result in a boon for the prosecuters (or defense), especially if it comes out in court that the witness was forced into it under threat from the legal system. It just opens it up to much to jury doubt about the witnesses credibility IMHO.

This is yet another bullshiat straw-man argument from government to expand their powers. They say that a parent whose child was harmed by the other parent can't be compelled to testify against the other parent??? Why would they need to be compelled? They can and should be screaming bloody murder. If a mother wants to protect her child, she can do so and there is no way to stop her. You see, what the article skipped, probably because the public officials omitted this point is that the spousal immunity privilege has to be voluntarily exercised by the party being questioned. Moreover, there is no parent-child privilege. The child can testify as well.

This is a solution in search of a problem. If it goes forward, it will only increase the already overwhelming power of government.

Why is The Herald incapable of making a page that renders properly with Firefox running on Slackware 10?

Die in a fire herald webmaster.