Oklahoma lawmaker's "covenant marriage" bill would make it harder to get divorced

GOP State Sen. Dusty Deevers wants to trap couples in marriages they can't escape except in extreme circumstances

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A Christian Nationalist lawmaker from Oklahoma has filed a bill that would create a "covenant marriage” option for newlyweds. While the stated goal is to “strengthen the institution of marriage,” the actual consequences would be disastrous.

State Sen. Dusty Deevers pre-filed the bill, SB 228, last week for the next legislative session.

Dusty Deevers in a campaign video (screenshot via YouTube)

The “Covenant Marriage Act of Oklahoma” would allow new couples to sign a contract that reads as follows:

We do solemnly declare that marriage is a lifelong covenant made before God. We have chosen each other carefully and disclosed to one another everything that could adversely affect the decision to enter into this marriage. We have received premarital counseling on the nature, purposes, and responsibilities of marriage. We have read the Covenant Marriage Act of Oklahoma, and we understand that a covenant marriage is for life. If we experience marital difficulties, we commit ourselves to take all reasonable efforts to preserve our marriage, including marital counseling. With full knowledge of what this commitment means, we do hereby declare that our marriage will be bound by the laws of the State of Oklahoma on covenant marriages, and we promise to love, honor, and care for one another as spouses for the rest of our lives.

All of that sounds fine on the surface. That’s pretty much how all wedding vows work. Two people pledge themselves to each other and promise to work together to overcome any obstacles. (Easier said than done, but couples are allowed to believe this on their wedding day!)

If you want a covenant marriage, all you have to do is go through premarital counseling and sign this contract. Currently married couples can also convert their existing marriage license to a “covenant” one by doing the same.

So what’s the big deal?

A covenant marriage makes it ridiculously hard to get divorced.

According to this bill, the only way to end the marriage is if one spouse can prove “by a preponderance of the evidence” that s/he was the victim of:

1. Abandonment (for at least one year).

2. Abuse (physical or sexual).

3. Adultery.

That’s it.

If you’re no longer in love with the other person, too damn bad. You’re stuck.

If your partner has changed in significant ways that now go against your personal values—because they got red-pilled or changed religions, for example—oh well.

If you’re sexually incompatible, then you’re just stuck having horrible sex (or no sex) for the rest of your life.

And if your allegations of physical or sexual abuse simply aren’t believed by government officials—or you were prevented, by threat or otherwise, from telling anyone about it—there’s no way to leave your partner.

What if your partner commits one of the acceptable offenses? Even then, the bill requires marital counseling before a divorce can be granted, the only exceptions being in the case of abuse or a criminal conviction. That means a person would be forced to confront his or her spouse even if that would only make things worse.

But don’t worry. You might get some cash for taking Deevers up on this, because the bill says that couples entering into a covenant marriage should be given a special tax credit worth up to $2,500.

Given all these concerns, why the hell would anyone go through this (besides the money)?

Simple. It’s a way for couples—especially conservative Christian ones—to send a message that their marriages are stronger than everyone else’s. Just as some people view signing a prenuptial agreement as a red flag heading into a marriage, while others just treat it as a responsible move that they’ll hopefully never have to rely on, a covenant marriage could be held over someone’s head like a threat.

If any of this sounds familiar, it may be because the biggest proponent of covenant marriage is Rep. Mike Johnson. When he first became Speaker of the House two years ago, there were countless stories about his own covenant marriage.

Speaker Mike Johnson (screenshot via YouTube)

So how did these marriages even become a thing?

In 1997, in response to rising divorce rates, conservatives in Louisiana passed a law giving (straight) couples the option of a covenant marriage. The Johnsons, who were married in 1999, were among the most prominent couples to get hitched under the new law. They were also two of its biggest proponents. And why not? Johnson was a law student who helped draft the law, and he worked with Christian hate group leader Tony Perkins, then a Louisiana legislator, to get it passed.

“In my generation, all we’ve ever known is the no-fault scheme, and any deviation from that seems like a radical move,” the then-28-year-old Johnson said of divorce. “Because so few people have chosen covenant marriage in Louisiana, it seems like an unpopular choice. It’s not unpopular. It’s just unknown. Once the message is out there, a whole lot more people will choose it.”

A whole lot more people did not, in fact, choose it.

As Slate noted at the time, only two other states followed suit (Arizona in 1998 and Arkansas in 2001) and under 2% of married couples opted for the more stringent contract. Most couples were perfectly satisfied with their traditional marriage vows.

That didn’t stop the Johnsons from continuing to praise it with their Holier-Than-Thou attitudes:

… He told the AP he was trying to persuade all of his friends to convert their marriages. According to NOLA.com, the Johnsons became “the poster couple” for covenant marriage. Just a few months after the AP article, Mike and Kelly were on Good Morning America, talking to Diane Sawyer about being among the few such couples in the country. When Sawyer asked Kelly about her decision, Kelly, charming and smiling, made the idea seem romantic.

If it works for them, so be it.

The obvious problem with this kind of “heightened” marriage contract, though, is that it assumes people go into marriages with one foot already out the door. That’s not how it works. Most people take their marriage vows seriously, certainly at first. They have every intention of staying together for life. The fact that no-fault divorce is an option doesn’t bother them because they don’t believe they’ll need it.

But, of course, some people eventually do.

They don’t always leave because of abuse, adultery, or abandonment. Many leave because they’re not happy, or they’re not compatible, or they have serious disagreements.

Those are legitimate reasons to walk away from a relationship!

When Johnson pushed for covenant marriages in 1997, the Washington Post posed this concern after the law was enacted:

Already, for instance, churches in Louisiana are organizing covenant marriage "weekends" devoted to couples who want to renew their wedding vows by taking advantage of the new marital option. That kind of encouragement from pastors, friends, relatives and, of course, fiancees could constitute a form of emotional blackmail, critics contend, in which a reluctant man or woman is pressured into a covenant marriage, and later resents it.

And as the children of divorced parents will often tell you, they were far better off after their parents ended their relationship than they were when the two unhappily co-existed. Remaining in a bad marriage is awful for anyone trying to leave. It can lead to “depression, PTSD, and suicidal ideation.”

Again, it’s not that any of these people get married thinking about how to take the exit ramp. It’s that life happens. Situations change. When that happens, everyone is better off knowing there’s a way out, as difficult as it may be.

A covenant marriage might sound nice in theory, but it’s a horrible idea in practice. It’s especially dangerous in conservative Christian circles where Purity Culture norms often pressure people to get married young, before they really know each other and sometimes before they really even know themselves.

If you’re in a broken marriage, you shouldn’t have to wait for abuse or abandonment. You shouldn’t have to air your personal laundry in a courtroom in order to get out. The option should be available to anyone who needs it.

But just as with abortion rights, conservative Christians don’t want other people to make choices they may disapprove of. By creating a contract that sounds like a more serious marriage, who knows how many couples were trapped in a union they wished to escape? Johnson said his covenant marriage works because his wife has “stayed with me this whole time.” The implication, however, is that she might have left had their marriage contract been a tad bit looser.

That’s a marriage built on paperwork, not love.

All of this may be irrelevant. I don’t really care if other couples choose a covenant marriage for themselves. Their life. Their decision. But it ought to remain symbolic and managed by religious institutions, not the government.

What’s also concerning is that it’s possible a national version of this law could emerge with the new Republican trifecta. Given all the ways Republicans have tried to control marriage over the years, opposing interracial marriage, refusing to protect same-sex marriage, allowing child marriage, making it harder to get divorced would be right up their alley. The irony that the next president is on his third marriage would be lost on them.

It’s not that anyone would be forced to sign a covenant contract if Deevers’ bill became law. The problem is that the sort of people pressured to sign it may be the same people who, one day, are most in need of a way to break free.

Deevers, by the way, has previously vowed to “abolish pornography.” He has sponsored bills to criminalize sexting anybody other than your spouse and treat abortions as homicide. He has also said parents who use IVF are “waging an assault against God.”

He proposed a similar piece of legislation last year to ban divorces on grounds of incompatibility. It didn’t go anywhere; now he’s rebranded it as the “covenant marriage” bill.

He’s a Christian Nationalist who fantasizes about living in a theocracy. He doesn’t care who gets hurt in the process.

Incidentally, a similar covenant bill has also been filed in Texas.

(Portions of this article were published earlier)

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