Daily Archives: March 24, 2010

CBS: “Rep. Darrell Issa, the top Republican on the House Oversight committee, told CBS News Wednesday that he will call for a special prosecutor to investigate the White House if it does not address Rep. Joe Sestak’s claim that he was offered a federal job in exchange for dropping out of the Pennsylvania Senate primary . . . ”

The State: “With barely a whimper the state Senate approved a 24-hour waiting period for for an abortion Wednesday, amending a House-passed measure that was hotly debated last year.”

Miami Herald: “Public school teachers’ pay and certification renewals would be linked to their students’ test scores and it would be easier to fire them under a bill that passed Wednesday in the Florida Senate. The chamber also passed a bill that would expand a private school voucher program.”

Gizmodo: “Dell’s said to be joining Google in fleeing China in search of a ‘safer environment with [a] climate conducive to enterprise,’ potentially taking the $25 billion it spends on equipment and parts in China to India . . . ”

Christian Newswire: “. . . filed two years ago to protect the rights of citizens who pray and protest at the Planned Parenthood facility in Aurora. The settlement requires the City of Aurora to amend two ordinances claimed to be unconstitutional, mandates First Amendment training for Aurora police, and establishes a grievance process to handle disputes between the protesters and Aurora officials . . . ”

Citizen Link: “California has issued a joint resolution asking the IRS to defer to state law on how to treat the property belonging to registered domestic partners and same-sex couples. [AJR 29] does not have the strength of law, but conveys the Legislature’s opinion.”

Posted at WhiteHouse.gov The White House Office of the Press Secretary For Immediate Release March 24, 2010 Executive Order — Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act’s Consistency with Longstanding Restrictions on the Use of Federal Funds for Abortion EXECUTIVE ORDER …

Washington Examiner: “A Missouri Senate panel responded quickly Monday to the passage of a federal health care overhaul by voting to expand a state ban on abortion coverage for basic health insurance policies.”

Missouri abortion bills are SB747 and HB1327.
Senate: http://www.senate.mo.gov

Whidbey News Times: “The Oak Harbor City Council approved a trio of laws to ban public nudity, and license and zone adult entertainment within city limits after more than four hours of public comment and discussion.”

Radio Netherlands Worldwide: “Christian Action Network says the screening won’t go ahead as planned but Martin Mawyer says the decision isn’t embarassing for the group: ‘We understand that in this movement to fight Jihad and radical extremism in the Muslim world, there’s going to be a variety of people with different political viewpoints. Our viewpoint on homosexuality differs from Mr Wilders’ and I can understand he has some objections to our biblical views on homosexuality.’”

Miami Herald: “A bill endorsed by House lawmakers would prohibit those businesses from being within 1,000 feet of schools, parks, libraries, day-care centers or churches. The bill also would prohibit fully nude dancing or waitressing.” | SB 514 | Supplemental note on House substitute bill | HB 2633

Catholic News Agency: “The Peruvian bishops’ Committee on the Family, Childhood and Life criticized the government’s stubbornness in pushing the distribution of the morning-after pill, despite the fact that the country’s Constitutional Court ruled last year that the pill cannot be sold or distributed due to its abortifacient potential.”

LifeNews: “A top White House official defended the executive order President Barack Obama signed today supposedly nullifying the abortion funding provisions in the new health care scheme. The main Obama spokesman got testy with reporters, who challenged him on the details of the order . . . ”

NY Times: “. . . censorship had become more than a human rights issue and was hurting profit for foreign companies . . . The fallout from China’s restrictive Internet policies widened on Wednesday when a Internet services company, the Go Daddy Group, said it would halt registration of Chinese domain names.”

LifeSiteNews: “During a nail-biting session in Canadian parliament Tuesday, the Liberal motion which sought to force Prime Minister Stephen Harper to include abortion in the Canadian plan to address maternal and child health at the G8 summit was defeated in a narrow 144-138 vote.” | For background information see the ADF Alliance Alert compound tag: http://www.alliancealert.org/wordpress/tag/country-canada+global-sanctity-of-life/

The Christian Institute: “The Times reports that The Religion and Belief Consultative Group is on the brink of disbanding following what the Church of England called an ‘impasse’ in meetings between secularists and religious believers.”

ACLU: “On Monday, a federal district court in Massachusetts ruled that an ACLU challenge to the government’s use of taxpayer dollars to impose religious doctrine on victims of human trafficking may go forward. The decision is a victory for women’s health and for the basic constitutional principle that federal dollars cannot be used to favor one religious perspective over all others . . . USCCB prohibits, based on its religious beliefs, grantees from using any of the federal funds to provide or refer for contraceptive or abortion services, We brought a lawsuit . . . ”

Financial Times: “Hillary Clinton, US secretary of state, on Monday warned Israel that its survival could be in jeopardy unless it reached a peace deal with the Palestinians . . . ”

RGJ.com: “Republican Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons is ‘directing’ Democratic Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto to join 14 other states in suing the federal government over health reform.”

Reuters: “The Pentagon, ahead of any repeal of the U.S. military’s ban on gays in its ranks, will likely announce steps this week that may soften the blow on homosexuals affected by the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ law.”

Herald Sun: “Justice David Harper described as ‘manifestly inadequate’ a suspended jail term given to pedophile Laurence D’Alessandro, who was found to have more than 14,000 sick images on his computer of children being abused. The Victorian Court of Appeal overturned the original sentence and jailed D’Alessandro, 24, of Mount Dandenong, for three years with a two-year minimum.”

Catholic News Agency: “The leader of the Holy See’s delegation to the United Nations in Geneva has advocated a form of religious freedom that does not require ‘complete secularization’ but sees religion as a ‘bridge’ to human rights. He also criticized laws against ‘defamation’ as vague and open to abuse targeting religious minorities.”

SKY News: “[David Cameron] suggested gay equality was a fundamental human right – and votes should be whipped – but then appeared to contradict himself . . . later told Channel 4 News: ‘No-one should be in any doubt that the Conservative party abhors homophobia, that we support equal rights, that we support civil partnerships, that we think that part of being a strong central right party in Britain today.’”

LifeNews: “In contrast with the campaign-style bill signing ceremony on Tuesday, the signing of the abortion executive order will take place behind closed doors where reporters will not be able to attend.”

BBC News: “Plans for civil partnership ceremonies in churches could result in some clergy being prosecuted, a former Archbishop of Canterbury has warned. In a letter to the Times newspaper, Lord Carey suggests ministers could face claims of discrimination if they fail to conduct the ceremonies.” | Lord Carey of Clifton’s letter is here.

Thomas Sowell writes at Real Clear Politics: “The voters will have had no experience with the actual, concrete effect of the government takeover of medical care at the time of either the 2010 Congressional elections or the 2012 Presidential elections. All they will have will be conflicting rhetoric– and you can depend on the mainstream media to go along with the rhetoric of those who passed this medical care bill . . . But the 2010 election may be the last chance to halt the dismantling of America. It can be the point of no return.”

How Appealing quoting the Blog of the Legal Times: “The Senate Judiciary Committee has suspended a highly anticipated confirmation hearing for Goodwin Liu, nominated for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, because of a little-used rule that constrains when Senate committees may meet.”

AP: “Indonesian police ordered the cancellation Wednesday of a conference of Asian gay activists, saying it could prompt violent protests by conservative Muslim groups.”

Baptist Standard: “Christian universities that maintain a strong faith commitment—while also holding to high academic standards—are swimming against the tide of secularism and performing a public service, ethicist David Gushee told a group at Wayland Baptist University.”

Tallahassee.com: “Leon County commissioners voted 4-3 tonight to move forward with an ordinance designed to give protection to the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. They gave tentative approval on an ordinance that would ban discrimination based on age, race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, disability, marital status, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation and physical characteristics . . . ”

Portland Press Herald: “A social service agency’s support for same-sex marriage has cost it local and national funding from the Catholic Church’s anti-poverty program . . . Officials with the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland and the Washington-based Catholic Campaign for Human Development say that Preble Street violated its grant agreement by supporting Maine’s ‘No on 1′ campaign last fall.”

Wall Street Journal: “Behind Google Inc.’s dramatic decision to shutter its China-based search engine this week was co-founder Sergey Brin’s change of heart about the compromises required to do business in a land that was increasingly reminding him of his native Soviet Union . . . ”

NY Times (Reuters): “Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan told Turkey’s judges on Tuesday they had no right to oppose constitutional reform plans that pit him against a secular elite alarmed by what it sees as growing Islamist influence.”

Washington Post: “There is mounting evidence that Kim Jong Il is losing the propaganda war inside North Korea, with more than half the population now listening to foreign news, grass-roots cynicism undercutting state myths and discontent rising even among elites . . . ”

KOMONews.com: “The mother of a Ballard High School student is fuming after the health center on campus helped facilitate her daughter’s abortion during school hours . . . ”

Vancouver Sun: “Inflammatory right-wing pundit Ann Coulter took aim at a University of Ottawa administrator Monday night, saying an e-mail from the school warning her to use ‘restraint, respect and consideration’ when addressing Ontario students during a speaking tour this week made her a victim of a ‘hate crime.’”

Christian Law Journal: “The Mayor and Council Members of Gilbert, Ariz., unanimously agreed Monday evening that the town must not regulate Church services and ‘religious assembly’ in homes . . . Doug Napier with the Alliance Defense Fund, who is representing the church, was encouraged by the town’s response and said his clients simply want them to comply with constitutionally-protected religious freedoms. ‘If it’s a level playing field, we’re good with that. Because we’re going to be good neighbors. We’re going to be good citizens.’”

“To understand some of the big changes sometimes long term history affects the now . . . thats really the end of the Western Christian empire . . . . its the end of a whole system . . . ”

Catholic News Agency: “Opponents of a Washington, D.C. same-sex ‘marriage’ law are appealing a court order that denied a motion to prevent the law from going into effect . . . ‘The people have a right to have the final say on any law regarding marriage passed by the D.C. Council. The D.C. Charter makes that right clear, and officials should not be ignoring the right of the people to vote for or against the new definition of marriage fabricated by the council,’ said ADF Senior Legal Counsel Austin R. Nimocks.”

Deborah C. Peel writes at the Wall Street Journal: “In a January 2009 speech, President Barack Obama said that his administration wants every American to have an electronic health record by 2014, and last year’s stimulus bill allocated over $36 billion to build electronic record systems. Meanwhile, the Senate health-care bill just approved by the House of Representatives on Sunday requires certain kinds of research and reporting to be done using electronic health records . . . But electronic medical records won’t accomplish any of these goals if patients fear sharing information with doctors because they know it isn’t private.”

LifeNews: “The congressman who shouted ‘it’s a baby killer’ in reference to the pro-abortion health care bill during a Bart Stupak speech on the House floor is not backing down. Rep. Randy Neugebauer says he has no reason to acquiesce to Stupak’s demand that he apologize on the House floor for his comment.”

Howard Wasserman writing at PrawfsBlawg: “A new voice in the debate over legislation to overrule Iqbal and Twombly is the Alliance Defense Fund, an organization of ‘Christian attorneys and like-minded organizations’ that litigates ‘civil rights cases in defense of religious freedom, the right to life, and the natural family’ . . . ADF and ACLU are not incompatible on this issue, thus the ‘strange bedfellows’ theme is unfortunate. In fact, I would have fully expected these groups to agree that Iqbal is a problem and needs to be changed. Both are engaged in the same enterprise–litigating civil rights/civil liberties issues–and both must deal with Iqbal/Twombly and the burdens it imposes. Both must deal with its vagueness and the increased inferential power/discretion it gives district court judges.”

FIRE: “The Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) has achieved a reversal of course at Kingsborough Community College (KCC) in New York, where student Joseph Hayon was previously restricted from handing out literature on campus.” | ADF News Release

The Church Report: “A man who had been arrested after praying in 2007 at a public park was suddenly arrested again last week by Elmira police while his case is still on appeal . . . ‘Christians shouldn’t be punished for expressing their religious beliefs. It’s ridiculous to consider the act of peacefully exercising one’s faith in a public park to be ‘disorderly conduct’ worthy of a jail sentence,’ said ADF Senior Legal Counsel [Joel Oster]. ‘We are surprised at how eager the city was to arrest Mr. Raven again in light of his appeal. Now he will serve time in jail; however, we will continue to aggressively pursue his appeal in court.’”

One News Now (AP): “Google’s attempted detour around China’s Internet censorship rules was met with countermeasures Tuesday by the communist government, which blocked people on the mainland from seeing search results dealing with such forbidden topics as the pro-democracy movement . . . ”

One News Now: “New Jersey has an $11 billion budget deficit, and one of the ways Governor Chris Christie is proposing to deal with it is to cut family-planning spending. ‘This is good news for those of us who value life, because in New Jersey, Planned Parenthood dominates the network of family planning clinics,’ comments Marie Tasy, executive director for New Jersey Right to Life (NJRTL).”

Plainly put, the best predictor of a school’s performance is family performance — qualities of the families from which the students come.

CBN: “A group of scholars, social scientists, and psychologists are sounding alarm bells that pornography is much more harmful to society than most people think . . . ”

Breitbart carries the video.

CitizenLink: “Life advocates in Massachusetts will have to remain 35 feet away from abortion clinics after the Supreme Court rejected a challenge Monday to a Massachusetts law that prevents people from discussing the harms of abortion near the entrances of clinics . . . ‘Penalizing life advocates because they choose to exercise their First Amendment rights in a public place is unconstitutional,’ said ADF Legal Counsel [Tim Chandler].”

Findlaw (AP): “President Barack Obama plans to sign an executive order Wednesday reaffirming long-standing restrictions on federal funding of the procedure.”

Findlaw (AP): “When contentious decisions come down at the Supreme Court, Breyer and Scalia are almost always on opposite sides. On Tuesday, they tried to explain why their differing views of judging so often lead them to opposite conclusions when the topic is abortion, the death penalty, gay rights or physician-assisted suicide.”

Law.com (National Law Journal): “Five law school deans sent a letter to the Senate and House Armed Services committees late last week urging the repeal of the policy, which bars gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military. The letter was signed by University of California, Berkeley School of Law Dean Christopher Edley Jr., Stanford Law School Dean Larry Kramer, Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow, Yale Law School Dean Robert Post and New York University School of Law Dean Richard Revesz . . . ”

A man who had been arrested after praying in 2007 at a public park was suddenly arrested again last week by Elmira police while his case is still on appeal.

Religion, Democracy and the Public Schools
Michael J. Davis, 25 J.L. & Religion 33 (2010)

“The centerpiece of this examination is the author’s observation, and occasional participation, in a decade-long political battle in his home state of Kansas over antievolutionists’ attempts to influence the science curriculums in K-12 public schools. While recognizing that the battles often held the state up nationally in the worst possible light, the Part concludes that there were many positive outcomes that would not have occurred had the matter been judicially decided. Part V finishes the article with a brief look at which kinds of school prayer issues might benefit from a democratic rough-and-tumble process, and which are best resolved quickly and definitely by the federal courts.”

Putting Your Faith in God at the BMV: Indiana’s License Plate Controversy
Michael W. Nowak, 35 J. Legis. 17 (2009)

“Indiana has long boasted the honor of being the ‘Crossroads of America.’ But if one finds themselves traveling the roads of Indiana recently, they are likely to notice another slogan. In 2006, the Indiana Legislature passed a resolution regarding the issuance of new license plates in the state. These new plates proudly proclaim, ‘In God We Trust.’ The new license plates and their religious slogan have ignited a controversy within the state. It is not only the message that has come under fire, but also the way that a driver in Indiana acquires such plates. This Note will attempt to add some clarity to this ongoing debate. Specifically, it asks if the state of Indiana’s practice of selling license plates with the motto ‘In God We Trust’ without an additional fee for specialty plates violates Constitutional protections.”

A New Originalism: Adoption of a Grammatical Interpretive Approach to Establishment Clause Jurisprudence After District of Columbia v. Heller
Christopher A. Boyko, 57 Clev. St. L. Rev. 703 (2009)

“Just as Thomas Jefferson’s ‘wall of separation,’ perhaps the best known or most revered surrogate, is now imbedded in First Amendment jurisprudence in the sixty years following Everson v. Board of Education of Ewing, also imbedded are concepts of entanglement, endorsement, coercion, and neutrality– all surrogates for ‘establishment.’ While the Court has never attempted to create a textual surrogate for ‘religion,’ it has nevertheless recognized ‘symbolic’ surrogates such as crosses, menorahs, or manger scenes; ‘invocation’ surrogates, such as prayers and so-called moments of silence; ‘utilization’ surrogates, such as sectarian use of public facilities; or ‘funding’ surrogates, such as printing allowances or school vouchers. However, from the standpoint that ‘religion’ is itself not an ambiguous concept, the Court has never attempted to limit or expand its import beyond what it already would seem to encompass by implication.”

Browne C. Lewis, Incubator or Cultivator: Defining the Role of the Surrogate (March 16, 2010). Cleveland-Marshall Legal Studies Paper No. 10-187. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1572887

“The availability of reproductive technology makes it possible for one woman to supply the genetic material to create the child and another woman to gestate and give birth to the child. This division of labor has required courts to have to adjudicate maternity. A few state legislatures have enacted statutes designating the legal mother of a child conceived as the result of a surrogacy arrangement. In other jurisdictions, the courts must decide whether the surrogate or the contracting woman should be recognized as the child’s legal mother. In order to accomplish that purpose, courts have relied upon several different tests. As a result, the woman who gives birth may be deemed the legal mother in one state. In another jurisdiction, the woman who contributes the genetic material used to create the child may be adjudicated as the legal mother. These conflicting results are not in the best interests of the child, the contracting couple or the surrogate.”

An Imperfect Vocabulary of Religious Liberty
Marci A. Hamilton, 25 J.L. & Religion 221 (2010)

“Nussbaum’s central thesis about free exercise is that it exists for the purpose of protecting minority religions from the majority. She borrows the language of racial discrimination to talk about religious liberty, assuming (1) there is a majority religion (there is not); (2) minority religions cannot defend or represent themselves in the political process (despite the fact that small, cohesive groups do quite well in the legislative process); and (3) accommodation of religious conduct is needed to end inequality (it actually increases inequality).”

Of Permission Slips and Homophobia: Parental Consent Policies for School Club Participation Aimed at Gay-Positive Student Groups
Ian Vandewalker, 19 B.U. Pub. Int. L.J. 23 (2009)

“Gay-positive student groups, often called ‘Gay-Straight Alliances’ (‘GSAs’), have become more and more common in the nation’s high schools in recent years. They are a way for all students to show their commitment to equality and their acceptance of others, regardless of their sexual orientation. They may also function as a support group for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and questioning youth trying to come to terms with the intolerance they face from peers, family members, and their broader communities. The need for such support is vividly shown by the strident opposition from parents and social conservatives that often accompanies students’ efforts to form GSAs. One way schools react to attempts by students to form such clubs is by requiring that parents consent before students can participate in school clubs. These parental consent policies are facially evenhanded in that they apply to all clubs and do not single out GSAs. The context of their adoption, however, usually reveals that they are uniquely directed at the gay-positive groups, whose founding motivated the policies. Despite their evenhandedness, parental consent policies can be challenged under the federal Equal Access Act of 1984, which requires that student groups get ‘equal access’ to school resources.”

Celebrating the Differences That Could Make a Difference: United States v. Virginia and a New Vision of Sexual Equality
Courtney Megan Cahill, 70 Ohio St. L.J. 943 (2009)

“This Essay will proceed as follows. Before considering the role that Virginia could play in shaping marriage equality arguments and marriage equality jurisprudence, Part II will first examine the no-differences paradigm that has informed the social, cultural, and legal understanding of same-sex marriage. To that end, it will provide examples of the way in which (1) the public has conceptualized gay marriage as but a same-sex version of its heterosexual counterpart and (2) advocates for marriage equality have tended to collapse same-sex relationships into their cross-sex counterparts for the purpose of securing an even-handed distribution of the right to marry by the government.”

Toward a Progressive Perspective on Justice Ginsburg’s Constitution
Marc Spindelman, 70 Ohio St. L.J. 1115 (2009)

“Conservative criticisms of [the dream of liberal judicial activism]-and the doctrinal realities it yields-are well known. Less familiar are challenges to it from the political left. But there are political progressives who believe that a Justice’s willingness to govern us by constitutional rule is not the best measure of judicial success. A better metric, they think, is found in judicial modesty and even judicial inaction, especially when they are keyed to leaving politics open to progressive law reform. Viewed in this light, the light of progressive constitutionalism, a new perspective on Justice Ginsburg’s constitutional jurisprudence takes form.”