| (i) | Same-sex marriage is not unknown to certain African traditional societies.[1] |
[14]These propositions point our way. At issue is access to an institution that all agree is vital to society and central to social life and human relationships. More than this, marriage and the capacity to get married remain central to our elf-definition as humans. As Madala J has pointed out, not everyone may choose to get married: but heterosexual couples have the choice.[2] The capacity to choose to get married enhances the liberty, the autonomy and the dignity of a couple committed for life to each other. It offers them the option of entering an honourable and profound estate that is adorned with legal and social recognition, rewarded with many privileges and secured by many automatic obligations.[3] It offers a social and legal shrine for love and for commitment and for a future shared with another human being to the exclusion of all others.
[15]The current common law definition of marriage deprives committed same-sex couples of this choice. In this our
- ↑ Satchwell v President of the Republic of South Africa 2002 (6) SA 1 (CC) para 12, per Madala J.
- ↑ Satchwell v President of the Republic of South Africa 2002 (6) SA 1 (CC) para 16.
- ↑ See Harksen v Lane NO 1998 (1) SA 300 (CC) para 93, per O'Regan J (Madala and Mokgoro JJ concurring) (‘marital status is a matter of significant importance to all individuals, closely related to human dignity and liberty’) and compare Dawood v Minister of Home Affairs 2000 (3) SA 936 (CC) para 30, per O'Regan J for the Court (‘such relationships have more than personal significance, at least in part because human beings are social beings whose humanity is expressed through their relationships with others’).
para 138 and para 107, per Sachs J.
