Daily Archives: December 31, 2009

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“The Irish Council for Bioethics is to close at the end of this month after a decision by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment to terminate its funding . . . ‘You would really want to question the wisdom of shutting down such a body in light of the Supreme Court ruling this week,’ [Dr Siobhán O’Sullivan] added, in a reference to Tuesday’s ruling on access to three frozen embryos.”

UPI: “Spain’s assumption of the European Union’s rotating presidency Friday is the first presidency under the EU’s new legal framework in the Lisbon Treaty.”

Arizona Republic: “Residents said this week that they had collected enough signatures to send the issue to voters, saying the temple at 5104 W. Pinnacle Peak Road is not a good fit for the neighborhood. City officials have said the coalition needs 9,800 valid signatures from registered Phoenix voters to qualify for a referendum. If there are enough certified valid signatures, the council will have to reconsider the matter at that time.”

LifeNews: “Jeff Laszloffy of the Montana Family Foundation told LifeNews.com, ‘Definitely not what we wanted, but not as bad as it could have been. While we would have preferred an outright reversal of the lower court’s decision, this ruling is a partial victory,’ he explained. ‘The fact that the Court did not find a constitutional right to physician assisted suicide is good for those of us opposed to this abhorrent practice.’”

LifeNews: “A Utah state legislator will promote legislation in the next session to help women be able to see an ultrasound of their unborn child before an abortion. When used in pregnancy centers, ultrasounds are credited with helping more than 80 percent of women to reconsider a decision to have an abortion.”

OneNewsNow: “A disappointment came to warriors against pornography, especially that which victimizes children as the high court refused to revive the Child Online Protection Act, which is designed to protect children from sexual material and other objectionable content on the Internet. Pat Trueman, special counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, disagrees with the court’s decision . . . In Iowa, the state Supreme Court declared the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional — an action which ultimately legalized same-gender ‘marriage.’ Alliance Defense Fund attorney Douglas Napier notes that one poll released around that time indicated that 62 percent of Iowans opposed homosexual marriage.”

NPR: “The Montana case has drawn wide national attention, with advocates for physician-assisted suicide weighing in on the side of Baxter and his doctors. Meanwhile, conservative groups like the Alliance Defense Fund and the Family Research Council sided with Montana’s attorney general against physician-aided suicide.”

ABC News: “An Oklahoma judge Friday put off until Feb. 19 any decision about an anti-abortion law that critics have said is ‘like undressing a woman in public.’ The law, which was to have gone into effect on Nov. 1, requires doctors performing abortions to ask the patient 37 questions — from her age to her marital status and financial condition — which would then be posted on a public website.”

Seattle Times: “The U.S. Supreme Court will decide by mid-January whether to consider the thorny issues surrounding public release of 138,000 signatures collected this summer as part of Referendum 71.”

The Oregonian: “A Coquille Indian Tribe law allowing same-sex marriage took effect this week, and two women plan to marry Sunday on the tribe’s Coos Bay reservation. Tribal member Kitzen Branting, 26, and her partner, Jeni Branting, 28, who now live in Edmonds, Wash., will become the first same-sex couple to legally marry in Oregon, though their marriage will be recognized only by the tribe.”

Salt Lake Tribune: “The fiduciary who oversees a polygamous sect’s property trust is asking a Utah judge to hold sect leader Warren S. Jeffs, a dozen sect members, FLDS firms and the community’s local governments in contempt for trying to intervene in the 4-year-old court case.”

The Times and Democrat: “An ‘alcohol inspection’ of a bar in Santee resulted in multiple charges against the owners and others early Thursday morning for illegal operation of an adult entertainment business and drug and liquor law violations.”

LifeNews: “The high court did not determine if the Montana constitution guarantees a right to assisted suicide but said nothing in state law or the precedent of the court prevented assisted suicide . . . The Montana Supreme Court received 19 amicus briefs, including one from attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund, a pro-life group who filed their brief in April.”

James C. Capretta & Yuval Levin writing in The Weekly Standard: “In the Democrats’ rush to pass some kind of health care legislation before public opposition overwhelms them, tactics have long since overtaken substance. Their only remaining goal is to pass a bill, any bill. As the endgame has unfolded, all eyes have been fixed on the unseemly process taking place in the halls of Congress: backroom legislating with rushed votes to minimize scrutiny and public review; secret deals with deep-pocket industries; outright and outlandish vote buying using taxpayer funds; procedural maneuvers to shut off debate and prevent meaningful amendments.”

WIBW: “A Kansas State Senator announced he still plans on trying to eliminate state funding for Planned Parenthood. Sen. Tim Huelskamp (R-Fowler) called such efforts a way to establish a responsible threshold for spending public dollars.”

“The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit issued an order Wednesday rendering a favorable decision to a Christian ministry that was blocked by the city of Chicago from using its property to help displaced Hurricane Katrina victims. ADF-allied attorney John Mauck represented the outreach in the lawsuit against the city and secured a ruling to claim its right protected by the U.S. Constitution to use its property, which has served as a community center for more than 80 years, for ministry purposes. ADF has provided funding for the case.”

National Catholic Register: “In the district, Georgetown University now provides benefits to one other member of an employee’s household, an attempt to avoid explicit approval of same-sex unions. That policy — dubbed the ‘San Francisco option’ — has already been quietly adopted by at least one Catholic health-care provider in the district. Archbishop Wuerl has rejected this approach as a legitimate solution to the impasse, and some legal experts think he’s right to force a more extensive debate on religious freedom.”

“The Supreme Court disagreed that the Montana Constitution guarantees the right. But it said in an opinion Thursday that ‘we find nothing in Montana Supreme Court precedent or Montana statutes indicating that physician aid in dying is against public policy.’”

Associated Pressa: “Mexico City enacted Latin America’s first law recognizing gay marriage Tuesday and said it hopes to attract same-sex couples from around the world to wed.”

Xinhua: “The Domestic Violence (Amendment) Ordinance 2009 will enable a party to a cohabitation relationship, whether of the same sex or opposite sex, to apply to the court for an injunction order against molestation by the other party.”

Religion Clause: “Here are my nominations for the 2009 Top Ten Developments in Church-State Separation/ Free-Exercise of Religion. The choices are based on the long-range implications of the developments on legal doctrines and on future of relations between government and religion . . . 1. U.S. Catholic bishops are at increasing odds with President Obama over abortion. Very public disputes, sometimes splitting the Catholic community, erupted over Notre Dame’s award of an honorary degree to Obama and over the USCCB’s insistence on strict language in health care reform bills to limit abortion coverage.”

Associated Press: “The push to legalize gay marriage in New Jersey could fail without a vote being cast by in the Legislature. While the likelihood of a vote has yet to be determined, opponents of gay marriage are preparing to declare the measure dead while advocates insist there’s still time to pass a law before the governor switch next month.”

Associated Press: “Republican attorneys general in 13 states say congressional leaders must remove Nebraska’s political deal from the federal health care reform bill or face legal action, according to a letter provided to The Associated Press Wednesday.”

Carl Tobias, Williams Professor at the University of Richmond Law School, writing at My San Antonio: “[T]he judiciary has 99 openings out of the 858 appeals and district court judgeships. These vacancies, which are 11 percent of the positions, erode the delivery of justice. When the 111th Senate’s second session returns in January, President Barack Obama should promptly nominate, and the Senate must expeditiously confirm, lower court judges, so that the bench will be at full strength.”

“The [9th Circuit had ruled] 3-0 that their disclosure might discourage participation in future campaigns and inhibit strategists from speaking candidly.”

“The ruling gives the woman, who carried the babies in an arrangement with her brother and his male spouse, the right to seek primary custody of the children at a trial in the spring.”

Associated Press: “The government of a restive Chinese Muslim region rocked recently by ethnic strife said Thursday it has adopted what appeared to be a sweeping law barring the spread of views deemed to threaten national unity.”

Associated Press: “A Korean-American missionary believed detained in North Korea walked into the country carrying a Bible, intent on preaching Christianity in a country that bans illegal worship – a bold move that may put him at greater risk of harsh punishment.”

James Pethokoukis, Reuters: “The act would reduce Medicare spending on hospital stays by $245 billion from 2010-2019, while increasing tax revenue by $113 billion. So on paper, Medicare’s hospital insurance trust fund would be some $358 billion to the better, boosting its long-term solvency. But the government then takes that $358 billion and uses it to pay for increased, non-Medicare healthcare spending — leaving $358 billion worth of IOUs in the Medicare trust fund. If not for that $358 billion shift, the act would worsen the deficit by $226 billion over the next ten years.”

Religion Clause: In Osman v. JFC, Inc., (MN App., Dec. 29, 2009), the Minnesota Court of Appeals affirmed the denial of unemployment benefits to 22 Somali Muslims who were fired from their jobs at a poultry processing plant after they refused to comply with the company’s break policy.

Arizona Republic: “Many taxpayers will recommend that their money go to specific students as scholarships; many tuition groups will honor those wishes. But these taxpayers, and the school tuition organizations that give out the scholarships, may be running afoul of federal tax law.”

Wall Street Journal: “Malaysia’s High Court Thursday ruled that local Roman Catholics can resume referring to God as Allah in Malay-language publications, in a decision that appeared to partially halt the steady Islamization of the majority-Muslim nation in recent years . . . the government can appeal to a higher court where the ban can be reinstated.”

Christian Examiner: “The [Manhattan Declaration] was drafted by a group of Orthodox, Catholic and evangelical Christians to make a common statement on the sanctity of human life, marriage as the exclusive union of one man and one woman, and religious liberty and freedom of conscience. ‘Rarely before have so many American Christian leaders, from across the theological spectrum, come together in one accord to stand in support of religious liberty, life, marriage, and the family,’said Alan Sears, president of the Alliance Defense Fund. ‘It’s a great privilege for me to join with Orthodox, Catholic, and evangelical Christians in adding my signature, as an individual, to this historic document, and I hope others will join in support of this effort.’”

Christian Examiner: “Planned Parenthood has dropped a lawsuit against a former clinic director who quit her job after viewing an abortion by means of an ultrasound machine . . . ‘Like so many Planned Parenthood lawsuits, this lawsuit was baseless, so we are pleased that it has been withdrawn,’ Steven Aden, senior legal counsel for ADF, told BP News Service.”

WORLD Magazine: “In New Mexico, the New Mexico Civil Rights Commission found a Christian photographer guilty of discrimination for refusing to photograph a same-sex commitment ceremony. Julea Ward is filing a lawsuit against Eastern Michigan University after the university dismissed her from its counseling program because she would not affirm homosexual behavior. According to the Alliance Defense Fund, the right of conscience—the liberty to reject participating in abortion or supporting same-sex relationships—may be the next big religious liberty issue.”

LifeNews: “A pregnancy center in rural eastern Arizona that serves a predominantly native American population was severely burned in what appears to be an arson attack. The Living Hope Women’s Center clinic has closed indefinitely as a result of a fire that gutted a portion of the building on December 20.”

Legal Studies Research Paper Series, University of Wisconsin, No Altars: An Introduction to Islamic Family Law in US Courts (December 16, 2009). Univ. of Wisconsin Legal Studies Research Paper Series. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1524246

“American judges have been judging Muslim divorces in state courts for years, creating a body of case law that not only involves Islamic family law doctrines, but also reveals interesting insights about American Muslim marriage practices generally. This article reviews the holdings in some published cases, exploring questions of overlapping jurisdictions (state and religious law), and how enforcement of Islamic contract-based claims such as the mahr (bridal gift) have fared in American courts. The article draws from interviews with lawyers, social workers, and imams who have advised American Muslims negotiating the process of marriage and divorce in the United States. A brief survey of relevant literature, as well as so me suggestions for future practice, is interwoven in the presentation.”

Neil James Foster, Freedom of Religion and Discrimination – Two Important UK Cases (December 23, 2009). Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1527327

“Two recent UK cases deal with the question of how the freedom of religion right interacts with laws prohibiting discrimination on the grounds of race or sexual orientation.”

Todd E. Pettys, Sodom’s Shadow: The Uncertain Line between Public and Private Morality (December 26, 2009). Hastings Law Journal, Forthcoming. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1528446

“This Article begins by arguing that the divine accountability thesis illustrates human beings’ deeply ingrained tendency to regard their political communities as discrete moral entities, individually deserving of punishment or reward. Drawing from the work of Ronald Dworkin and others, the Article then argues that the divine accountability thesis has an influential secular counterpart, consisting of two widely shared perceptions that, taken together, compose what this Article calls the integration thesis.”