1:30pm
UPDATE: Kim Davis' contempt hearing will be held on Thursday, September 3 at 11:00am.
12:53pm
UPDATE: Kim Davis has released her statement.
10:57am
UPDATE: ACLU of Kentucky has filed a contempt motion against Kim Davis.
When we started this post, the Supreme Court had just denied Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis' plea for a stay of the preliminary injunction requiring her to begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. It was a cheerful post, a post rejoicing to see that justice system worked. The sun was shining, the Supreme Court stuck to its decision, and all was right with the world.
And then we saw this.
From Raw Story:
[Kim Davis] defied a U.S. Supreme Court order and refused to issue marriage licenses to two same-sex couples.
The top court ruled Monday evening that Kim Davis, the Rowan County clerk, could not be excused from following the law on religious grounds...
However, the clerk eventually emerged and said she would not issue the licenses to same-sex couples, and they asked under whose authority she could make that decision.
'Under God’s authority,' Davis said. 'I’ve asked you all to leave, you’re interrupting my business.'...
“I pay your salary,” said David V. Moore, who has attempted several times to obtain a marriage license from the clerk’s office. “I pay you to discriminate against me.”
As of today, the same-sex couple in this article, David V. Moore and David Ermold, has applied for and been denied a marriage license by Kim Davis four times. It is obscene that this is happening in 2015.
America is a nation of laws, built on a system of governance that has been honed for more than two centuries. "God's authority" does not and should not enter into the way we as a country treat our neighbors. Kim Davis' religion should serve as a tool to enhance her personal and spiritual life, not as a cudgel to punish those whose tax dollars pay her salary.
Kim Davis has defied the highest court in the land. What happens next will not be pretty.