Sam Brownback: “I understand Senator McConnell will be closing today's session. I wanted to finish with a point I made earlier today. I…”

“I understand Senator McConnell will be closing today's session. I wanted to finish with a point I made earlier today. I have talked about other countries and what took place when they redefined the institution of marriage. And it has a great deal of difficulty for this society. It results in fewer marriages. There was a letter released 2 years ago that was addressed to parliamentarians around the world debating same-sex marriage. It was done by a group of five Dutch scholars. This is one of the countries I have cited that has redefined marriage, saying that it can be same-sex unions. They were raising concerns about gay marriages and the negative effect on the institution of marriage in the Netherlands. It was published July 8, 2004, in a leading Dutch newspaper: There are good reasons to believe the decline in Dutch marriage may be connected to the successful public campaign for the opening of marriage to same-sex couples in The Netherlands. The letter signatories came from several academic disciplines, including social sciences, philosophy, and law. The scholars cautioned against attributing all of the recent decline in marriage to same-sex unions. There are undoubtedly other factors which have contributed to the decline of the institution of marriage in our country. Further scientific research is needed . . .…”