When We Say We Protect Our Neighbors, We Mean All of Them
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.
Oral Arguments Begin Today in Discriminatory Colo. Bakery Case
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."
South Dakota Attorney General Says Clerks Can Refuse Marriage License for Same-Sex Couples
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.”
Marriage Equality Just a Step Towards True Equality
Federal Judge Declares Marriage Equality Ruling Binding in Alabama
Mark Joseph Stern Sets the Record Straight About Oregon Bakery Anti-Gay "Gag Order"
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."
Lawyers Prepare to Defend Marriage Opponents
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."
Religious Orgs Seeking More Protections After Marriage Decision
Ca. Gov. Signs Vaccination Law Barring Religious Exemptions for Schoolchildren
From The Los Angeles Times:
"Adopting one of the most far-reaching vaccination laws in the nation, California on Tuesday barred religious and other personal-belief exemptions for schoolchildren, a move that could affect tens of thousands of students and sets up a potential court battle with opponents of immunization."
Supreme Court Reject Hold on Ruling Over Contraceptive Access at Religious Non-Profit Organizations
Abortion And Birth Control May Be on Supreme Court Docket Next Term
From MSNBC:
"By October, the highest court...may also decide to take a sequel to Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, the 2013 case in which the court struck down a regulation requiring employers to cover certain contraceptives and ruled that closely held for-profit corporations can opt out of certain laws with which they have religious objections. Religious nonprofits say the Obama administration’s opt-out form itself violates their religious consciences, although without disagreement in the lower courts, there is arguably less urgency there."
University of Notre Dame Loses Battle Against Contraception Benefit
Clerk’s Conundrum: Mo. Official Says She Will Not Issue Marriage Licenses To Same-Sex Couples Yet Still Wants To Keep Her Job
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.
State-Funded Discrimination: Adoption Edition
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.
Resistance Is Futile: Some County Clerks Say ‘I Won’t’ To Marriage Equality
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.
Troubled Consciences: Ga. Pharmacist Withholds Crucial Medicine From Miscarrying Woman
Georgia’s broad “conscience clauses” are under renewed scrutiny due to reports that a pharmacist refused to fill a prescription for a drug some abortion opponents don’t like. According to Brittany Cartrett, a Walmart pharmacy blocked her prescription for Misoprostol. Cartrett needed the drug to manage a natural miscarriage, but it is also often prescribed to induce medical abortions.
“She [the pharmacist] looks at my name and she says oh, well…I couldn’t think of a valid reason why you would need this prescription,” Cartrett wrote in a post on her personal Facebook page. Although she and her physician confirmed that the drug had been prescribed for a miscarriage, not an induced abortion, the pharmacist reportedly would not relent and told her, “I don't feel like there is a reason why you would need it, so we refused to fill it.”
More Than Marriage: Obergefell v. Hodges Is About Women’s Rights, Too
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.
RHNDA Rumble: Religious Groups Vow To Break D.C. Anti-Discrimination Law
A D.C.-based coalition of organizations that oppose legal abortion has announced it will not obey the city’s Reproductive Health Anti-Discrimination Act (RHNDA). In a letter released yesterday, the groups called RHNDA “unprecedented and illegal” and said they “will continue to resist” the law.
RHNDA, passed earlier last year by the D.C. City Council, prohibits employers from firing employees based on their reproductive health-care choices. That includes the use of contraception and fertility technologies, like in-vitro fertilization, in addition to abortion. It also protects employees who become pregnant outside wedlock, an act still considered sinful by many religious groups.
The Truth Leaks Out: Top Southern Baptist Official Admits Churches Won’t Be Forced To Marry Same-Sex Couples
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.