To highlight the political divide of the 1960s, Bob Dylan wrote, “The line it is drawn, the curse it is cast, the slow one now will later be last,’” in his famous song “The Times They Are A-Changin.” The shifting of time will commence, with or without our adaption to it. Dylan would later explain that the title of the track wasn’t just a statement of fact but a feeling.

Perhaps this helps to explain why Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, has flipped his stance on gay marriage only after discovering that his son is gay. The reversal is no doubt a victory for gay rights, but I personally cannot hold sympathy for Portman’s switch. To support gay marriage only when it affects your family seems inauthentic.

Nevertheless, usurping a conservative belief from within the Republican Party may be a sign that the times are indeed a-changin’.

To be fair to Portman, President Barack Obama once opposed gay marriage as well before declaring his support of it 10 months ago. Then a senator, Obama, like Portman, allowed his Christian leanings to define his stance. Throughout the past four years, though, the president has really taken steps towards strengthening the gay rights movement (Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell).

Obama’s conversion and the results of the last presidential election provide an indication as to the direction our country is heading in, and as the results showed, it doesn’t seem to be in the Republicans’ favor. On Nov. 6, 2012, all four states addressing the legalization of gay marriage (Minnesota, Maryland, Maine and Washington) voted in support of gay rights, bringing the total pro-gay states to 10 (11 including District of Columbia).

Still, do we need the sons and daughters of all of the Republicans in Congress to be openly gay in order for them to finally see that they are on the wrong side of history?

The burden of proving the legitimacy of gay marriage to the Republican Party has been left up to the decisions of our judicial system. That’s unfortunate, because instead of adapting to the cultural changes of our country, the Republicans risk becoming the villains (or, perhaps the gay rights movement already views them in this light).

Instead of “feeling” the cultural necessity of change, I prefer to take the heavily analytical approach, which, I suppose, separates me from my pro-same-sex marriage colleagues. I don’t usually adopt the argument: “How could you deny a person the right to marry the person they love?” Instead, I tend to look at Supreme Court rulings for precedence on marriage as recognized by the constitution.

Many of the Supreme Court cases on the issue of marriage suggest that banning gay marriage should unconstitutional.

Take the case Loving v. Virginia (1967) as an example. Anti-miscegenation laws were once used to prevent interracial marriage in Virginia. The court found that “marriage is one of the basic civil rights of man,” and the “racial classifications were so subversive” that they would “surely deprive the State’s citizens of liberty without the due process of law.” Anti-miscegenation laws were found unconstitutional.

(As a side note, how did  Obama not support gay marriage in 2008, after likely studying this case in law school, which concerns a statute that would not have allowed his own parents to marry?)

Or, how about the 1974 Supreme Court case Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur, in which Justice Potter Stewart wrote, “This Court has long recognized that freedom of personal choice in matters of marriage and family life is one of the liberties protected by the Due Process Clause.”

There are plenty of cases that could be cited by our current justices. The decision will be a matter of legal precedent.

Even the scientific approaches, drawing from quantitative evidence, allow no significant opposition to same-sex partnerships. As the American Anthropological Association (the world’s largest organization of anthropologists) has detailed, there has been no evidence suggesting that civilizations or viable social orders depend upon marriage as exclusively a heterosexual institution.

Currently, there are 1,138 federal statutory provisions in which “benefits, rights and privileges are contingent on marital status.” So, to steal from the emotional argument I quoted above, how could we deny a person these rights and exclude him or her from receiving the same spousal benefits that a heterosexual couple enjoys?

Through his son’s courage, Portman is now directly feeling the changing of time, which has forced him to reconsider his political leanings. Other Congressmen and women, such as House Speaker John Boehner, won’t budge so easily. They won’t be swayed by “feeling” but by evidence.

As Dylan said, “The line it is drawn, the curse it cast.” I think our culture has drawn that line.

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Michael Glawe is a junior in mathematics and economics from New Ulm, Minn.