From Americans United's Wall of Separation blog:
"[Protect Thy Neighbor] hits the ground running today with its first initiative: AU’s Legal Department is sending a letter to every state attorney general in the country as well as every county clerk in the states of Texas and South Dakota reminding them that they have a legal obligation to give wedding licenses and otherwise provide service to all qualified couples, including those who are of the same sex.
From The New York Times:
"At issue was whether Jack Phillips, a Colorado bakery owner, had broken state antidiscrimination laws when he refused to make a cake for a gay couple’s wedding reception, citing his religious beliefs. With same-sex marriage now legal everywhere nationally in the wake of the United States Supreme Court ruling in June, his case is being closely watched as a test of the boundary between personal religious objections and legal discrimination.
From an Americans United press statement:
Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback today issued executive order 15-05, which purports to prohibit the state from discriminating against religious organizations that hold “the belief or moral conviction that marriage is or should be recognized as the union of one man and one woman.” What the order really does is sanction government-funded discrimination, says Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
From Raw Story:
"“I think I deserve some sort of relief that I took my oath to do this job to the best of my ability so help me God," Davis said. “I can’t go beyond what my conscience allows.”... The Casey County attorney said he respected the county clerk – but he said Davis was wrong about this issue.
From Americans United's Wall of Separation blog:
"The project is designed to counter the Religious Right’s stated intentions to undermine civil rights for LGBT people in the wake of the high court’s Obergefell v. Hodges ruling – and reclaim religious freedom as a democratic principle that protects everyone.
From The AP's The Big Story blog:
"The [Colorado bakery] case underscores how the already simmering tension between religious-freedom advocates and gay-rights supporters is likely to become more heated in the aftermath of the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark ruling last month legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide."
From The Advocate:
The Attorney General of South Dakota has taken the position that “country clerks in his state who oppose marriage equality on religious grounds can refuse to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, so long as another clerk in the office will issue the license.” And if every clerk in the county refuses to issue licenses, “the state itself could issue the license.”
From Slate:
"There is nothing in Avakian’s order that bars the Kleins from talking about the ruling. They can rail against it, march against its injustice, and pen Facebook screeds complaining about anti-discrimination law. What they cannot do is proclaim (publicly!) that their business will not serve gay couples."
From The Texas Tribune:
"After blasting the high court’s ruling, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, the state’s top lawyer, issued an opinion last week saying that federal and state religious freedom laws protect county clerks, justices of the peace and judges who opt out of issuing same-sex marriage licenses or performing same-sex wedding ceremonies because they believe it violates their religious beliefs.
But the opinion came with a warning: Be prepared to get sued."
The Religious Right loves a good sob story, and it seems to have found a great one courtesy of a Missouri courthouse clerk who fears she may soon be required to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
World Magazine, a publication affiliated with fundamentalist guru Marvin Olasky, recently detailed the story of Jennifer Schoenrock, a 56-year-old deputy clerk in Waynesville, Mo. Schoenrock is tailor-made for the Religious Right’s sympathy machine: Her husband is a disabled veteran, she has four (adult) kids, two grandchildren and is described as her family’s “breadwinner” with a salary of about $24,000.
World Magazine tells us that Schoenrock is facing a moral crisis. In November, a federal judge overturned the Show Me State’s ban on gay marriage, and if the U.S. Supreme Court upholds that decision in June, Schoenrock could be asked at some point to issue a license to a same-sex couple. And if that ever happens, her answer will be no.
This year’s saga of state Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) bills is nearing the end, but has not come to a complete stop, yet. We continue to monitor RFRA bills in North Carolina and Michigan. Meanwhile, many other bills are moving through state legislatures and have been introduced in Congress that would allow religious beliefs to justify discrimination in adoption placements by state-funded, private adoption agencies.
The Michigan, Florida, and Texas, legislatures have introduced bills this session that would allow state-funded child-placing agencies to discriminate in placement based on the agencies’ religious or moral convictions. Adoption agencies could refuse to place children in otherwise stable homes because the parents seeking to adopt are unmarried, previously divorced, a same-sex couple, or adherents to a religion not practiced by the child-placing agency. This result hurts the children and the parents. Such an outcome could mean denying a child a stable home that would be in his or her best interests. Furthermore, it results in state-funded discrimination against the parents, which should never be tolerated.
One week ago, the U.S. Supreme Court extended marriage equalitynationwide. So where are we now?
To no one’s surprise, leaders of the Religious Right and some of their political allies have been huffing and puffing. The U.S. Catholic bishops didn’t much like it either.
That was to be expected. To me, the more interesting question was how government officials would react. I don’t mean the governors of red states or would-be GOP presidents. I’m interested in the reaction of the people on the ground.
At today’s U.S. Supreme Court marriage-equality arguments, the focus will be on whether the states’ marriage bans impermissibly discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation. But the marriage cases also involve old-fashioned discrimination on the basis of sex.
In states without marriage equality, men can marry only women, and women can marry only men. These arguments have not received as much discussion in the cases so far, but they will be before the high court all the same. And they were discussed thoroughly by Judge Marsha Berzon in a concurring opinion in the Ninth Circuit marriage case, Latta v. Otter.
For years now, Religious Right leaders have been whipping up hysteria by claiming that, should marriage equality become the law of the land, conservative churches will be forced to host same-sex marriage ceremonies.
As arguments go, this one is just not very good. Several states have had marriage equality for years, yet no member of the clergy has been compelled to officiate at a same-sex wedding. As far as I know, no lawsuits like this have even been filed.
Nothing stokes the ire of my soul more than political blowhards and mouthpieces of the Religious Right who blatantly misrepresent millions of people of faith when they piously proclaim the evils of marriage equality in America.
Let me be perfectly clear: I am a Christian and have been since officially proclaiming so at age 10 in the oldest Baptist church in Charleston, S.C. Baptist DNA runs through my veins as the names of Roger Williams, John Leland and Walter Rauschenbusch are permanently etched into my personal and theological psyche.
Alabama’s probate judges are under an immediate obligation to issue marriage licenses to qualified same-sex couples, say the four civil-rights organizations that are representing same-sex couples in the state.
Pursuant to a May 21 order by Judge Callie V.S Granade in Strawser v. Strange, probate judges became obligated to obey the U.S. Constitution and issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples on the date that “the Supreme Court issues its ruling” in Obergefell v. Hodges. The ruling in Obergefell was issued on June 26, so Judge Granade’s injunction is now in effect.
