I’m a lifelong conservative Republican, and I support a change in the United States law that would allow for partnerships between people — whether they would be between people of opposite sexes or people of the same sex — to inherit and receive the benefits normally received by spouses under federal law, including benefits employers normally give to spouses. This law would allow people to have their relationship recognized by the government and prevent people who happen to be in a financially dependent, same-sex relationship from losing a second source of income or their source of insurance due to their spouse dying.

This law would make declaring your relationship to the government as easy as updating your relationship status on Facebook, and the information about your sexual orientation would not have to be supplied to your employer. On the day you die, your employer would just check with the government to determine whether you have a spouse that they need to supply benefits to.

The dissolution of these relationships would also be left up to the two individuals involved in the relationship. There would be no lengthy court battles or long arbitrations. All it would take is one click of the mouse to end the relationship. Breaking up the mutual property would, however, be handled by the courts if necessary.

While this law is not marriage, it does recognize the fact that two people are in a long-term relationship where they are both mutually financially dependent. It also provides for people that are in cohabitation situations to receive some of the protections provided to people that are married under state law. It also allows for gay people or cohabitating adults, who have adopted or otherwise had a child, to have the same parental rights as married people.

Under this law, marriage would become a religious institution dictated by the moors of different religions. If you are Catholic, your marriage would take place in the Catholic Church and be recognized as a partnership under federal law. The same applies to Muslims, Jews, Hindus and any other religious group or denomination. The dictates of the contract are left up to the religion that you choose.

For those of you who are worried that gay people would lose out on the marriage thing, you should remember that religious groups have widely varying definitions of marriage. Some religions support gay marriage, while others oppose it. As always, it is up to individuals to determine which dictates they wish to live under and follow. It is not up to the government to determine what makes you happy in this arena. It is up to you as an individual.

For those of you opposed to this, I would like to ask you one question: Is it worth a gay person starving or suffering because he or she lost the benefits his/her partner provided them after the partner’s death? Whether you believe being gay is a sin or not, I don’t think any person on either side of this issue wishes those on the other side would have these horrible experiences. In some cases, this may be what happens if some people don’t have access to the benefits through their partner.

Also, whether you believe that gay people choose to be gay or not, is that choice worthy of them losing access to the benefits of their partner when their partner dies? When choices like that matter immensely to the individual and mean next to nothing for society, I don’t know that the punishment for any preference choice like that should be so dire.

Finally, let’s all be good libertarians and let religious congregations, faiths and individuals decide what is and isn’t marriage. As a collective, we should let the government recognize the present reality and the implications that it has for society. Let’s not disproportionally punish any one group over another.