When the British Columbia government's polygamy reference case opened at the province's Supreme Court of Canada on Nov. 22, 2010, a stream of participants and witnesses, including representatives from the Canadian Coalition for the Rights of Children, REAL Women of Canada, the Christian Legal Fellowship, and academic experts, testified about the many harms associated with polygamy. Carolyn Jessop, who fled a Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FDLS) community in Utah with her eight children in the middle of the night, summed it up well: "Polygamy is not pretty to look at. It is nice that it is tucked away in a dark corner where nobody has to see its realities, because it's creepy."

But George Macintosh, the amicus curiae appointed to present the opposing argument, came out swinging. He characterized Section 293 of Canada's Criminal Code, which bans polygamy, as an overly broad and grossly disproportionate law rooted in Christian prejudices, a law demeaning to polygamists. Women in polygamous marriages anonymously testified that they were happy, that they'd made the right decision. According to the CBC, the B.C. Civil Liberties Association argued that "consenting adults have the right -the Charter protected right-to form the families that they want to form." And the Canadian Association for Free Expression maintained that the legalization of same-sex marriage in 2005 strengthened the individual's right to enter a polygamous marriage.

Read the complete story(Some news sites require registration)