Daily Archives: April 28, 2010

Toronto Star: “The Canadian minister for international co-operation says G8 development ministers have agreed an initiative to improve child and maternal health in developing nations should leave room for countries to disagree on how they can contribute.”

“A Vancouver Catholic school teacher says she is being fired because she is a lesbian. And the BC Pride Education Network says Little Flower Academy dismissed Lisa Reimer because of complaints from parents, after the music teacher became a parent herself.”

On Top Mag (“gay advocacy website”): “Portugal’s President Anibal Cavaco Silva has 20 days to decide on a gay marriage bill. Wednesday’s official publication of the country’s Constitutional Court’s favorable ruling on gay marriage started the countdown.”

Buenos Aires Herald: “As for the same sex marriage debate, Rossi called for a special session to be held next Wednesday in order to discuss the controversial bill which allows it . . . the resolution which the Family and General Legislation committees have issued modifies the Civil Code and replaces the terms “man and woman” for general words implying no sex.”

Baptist Press: “Jordan Lorence, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), told reporters outside the court building, ‘The decision is favorable as far as it goes, but the Supreme Court didn’t go far enough. The box needs to come off that cross…. [T]he ACLU and its allies should not be allowed to eradicate and demolish religious symbols that acknowledge our religious heritage, acknowledge the sacrifice of our military heroes, based on the fact that one person is offended by what he sees there.’”

Evangelical Examiner: “Today, in a 5 – 4 majority opinion filed today, the United States Supreme Court ruled in favor of the continued display of a lone cross in the Mojave Desert memorializing veterans of World War I. Attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund, Advocates for Faith and Freedom, and the American Legion Department of California filed a friend-of-the-court brief in June 2009 that argued for the lifting of a court order which required the memorial to be covered up.”

CBS News, Political Hotsheet: “Jordan Lorence of the Alliance Defense Fund, a conservative Christian non-profit group, said that repeal would mean that military policy will for the first time be ‘at odds with the major tenets of the major religions represented in the armed services.’”

“An early sign of health care reform’s impact is Planned Parenthood’s decision to open a new Oakland County clinic within the next 18 months, adding to 15 locations, including Detroit, Warren and Livonia. Unlike other Detroit area centers, the new location is likely to include abortion services.” . . .

“Any woman seeking an abortion in Louisiana would first be required to undergo an ultrasound examination under legislation that cleared a Senate committee this afternoon after nearly three hours of testimony.”

Gerard V. Bradley writing at The Immanent Frame, a blog hosted by the Social Science Research Council: “Proselytizing is often criticized under the generic rubric of ‘interfering’ and even ‘attacking’ other religions, usually indigenous ones honeycombed with folk traditions. What sorts of behavior does the larger criticism refer to? And what are the pertinent norms for judging the validity of that criticism? . . . [I]f one thinks that religious liberty attaches to an established social order in which religion plays an important role, and if one credits reports that even peaceful encounters with articulated alternate conceptions of reality are ‘experiences’ of attempted ‘destruction,’ then one might well affirm some putative right to ‘non-interference.’ But then one will have drifted very far from a sound understanding of religious freedom—the understanding on offer in so many authoritative documents—and one will have abandoned its foundations altogether.”

Baptist Press: “Jordan Lorence, senior counsel for the Christian legal organization Alliance Defense Fund, said at a press conference that a change in policy would create a ‘crisis of conscience’ for chaplains and those they serve.”

WFMJ (AP): “A bill that would require Pennsylvania’s public schools to provide sex education to students is on its way to the state House of Representatives.” | HB 1163. Today’s Education Committee Roll Calls can be viewed here. | For more information on Pennsylvania and “sex ed” see this ADF Alliance Alert compound tag: http://www.alliancealert.org/tag/state-pennsylvania+topic-sex-indoctrination/

Chicago Tribune: “Teens who forward or post online racy pictures of their underage classmates would get juvenile court supervision that could result in mandatory counseling or community service, under legislation sent to Gov. Pat Quinn on Tuesday.” | HB 4583 | For more on this legislation see the ADF Alliance Alert compound tag: http://www.alliancealert.org/tag/state-illinois+topic-sexting/

The Daily News (AP): “Mississippi lawmakers on Wednesday sent Gov. Haley Barbour a bill to ban public funding for most abortions, a move that critics said is unnecessary because it repeats what’s been in state law the past eight years.”

“A final vote on the bill could come Thursday.”

NY Times: “For the first time in New York City, federal prosecutors have used the Freedom of Access to Clinics Entrances Act to secure a conviction in a case where access was blocked to a clinic that provides abortions . . . The men, Richard R. Dugan and Theodore A. Puckett, were each convicted on Monday of a single count of violating the act . . . ”

Speakupmovment.org: “Military chaplains who have volunteered to defend the liberties protected in our Constitution shouldn’t be denied those very same liberties. Watch Wednesday, April 28th at 2 p.m. EDT as distinguished military chaplains announce opposition to overturning ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” law.”

Tom Goldstein writing at the SCOTUS Blog: “I happened to be in the courtroom today for the argument in Doe v. Reed, which was Justice Stevens’ last argued case. Early reporting and commentary on the decision – with which I agree entirely – has been that the Court will affirm by a wide margin the Ninth Circuit’s refusal to grant the particular injunction now before the Court. But it does not follow, as some have thought, that the courts will in fact allow the lists of petition signatories to be released. In fact, I think there is a significant chance they will not . . . ”

UPI: “Legislation is being drafted to return icons and other religious art seized after the Russian Revolution to churches and convents.”

UPI: “A Manitoba man pleaded guilty to child pornography charges after a woman in the Philippines alerted police to explicit Internet photos, officials said.”

Virginian-Pilot: “A Virginia State Police directive issued more than a year ago that bars troopers who serve as chaplains from making specific faith references in public prayers they deliver while representing the law enforcement agency has been rescinded at the behest of Gov. Bob McDonnell.”

Washington Post: “Supreme Court justices appeared skeptical Wednesday about keeping secret the names of people who signed a petition to repeal Washington state’s gay rights law, suggesting citizens cannot always hide behind anonymity if they want to be heard . . . ”

AP: “Brown walked into a political train wreck Wednesday after forgetting to turn off his microphone. He described a loyal Labour voter as a bigot for asking about immigration, blamed advisers for a ‘disaster’ ahead of next week’s election, then rushed back to the voter’s house to beg her forgiveness.”

E. Christian Brugger writes at the Culture of Life Foundation: “Technology is now making possible interventions that in addition to a therapeutic aim are intended to augment healthy human capacities. There is a gradual but steady enlargement taking place in medical ideals from simply healing to healing and enhancement. We are all too familiar with ‘performance enhancing drugs’ in professional sports. But biotechnology promises to make possible forms of enhancement that go far beyond muscle augmentation . . .”

WorldNetDaily: “The U.S. Supreme Court today raised the bar for those who express an ‘offense’ because of the Christian faith, determining that the Mojave cross in California can remain on the knoll of rock where it has been for more than seven decades. ‘The ACLU and its allies should not be able to demolish war memorials based on the objection of one person who can’t seriously claim to have suffered harm from it,’ said ADF Senior Counsel [Jordan Lorence]. ‘Americans want memorials to our nation’s fallen heroes protected. Congress was doing just that when it transferred the land under this memorial to the veterans’ group that cares for it.’” | ADF News Release

CBC News: “Quebec parents opposed to a controversial ethics course are taking their fight to the Supreme Court of Canada. The Drummondville-area parents group is asking the top court to review their request for legal exemption that would allow schoolchildren to skip a mandatory ethics and religion class currently required to graduate. The course replaced Quebec’s previous religion class with a broader-ranging curriculum that touches on all major faiths practised in the province, including Protestanism, Catholicism, Judaism, First Nations spiritualism and Hinduism.”

The Christian Institute: “Parents who smack their children should be prosecuted for assault, according to bureaucrats from the Council of Europe. But family value campaigners are alarmed that ‘a vocal minority’ of activists are in danger of undermining the authority of parents to discipline their children.”

The Christian Institute: “Liberal Democrat plans to allow 16-year-olds to watch and star in pornographic movies have been condemned by furious mothers. Liberal Democrat plans to allow 16-year-olds to watch and star in pornographic movies have been condemned by furious mothers.”

The Christian Institute: “It is not ‘homophobic’ to say Christian B&Bs should be allowed to act upon their conscience over giving double beds to same-sex couples, a homosexual BBC presenter says.”

ADF Attorney Daniel Blomberg writing at speakupmovement.org/church: “With the support of ADF, a group of 41 chaplains from all branches of the armed forces released a letter that provides a detailed explanation of how repealing the so-called “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” law would censor chaplains and marginalize Christian soldiers. Since their letter speaks for itself, I won’t elaborate further on it. Especially when you could read two different explanations of the letter written by two of the chaplains themselves.”

NBC: “The lawsuit against Prop 8 took one teeny-tiny step forward today, as Equality California and the ACLU agreed to release a handful of previously secret emails that their opponents had demanded.”

Law.com: “The two-member Tax Appeals Tribunal held that the routines performed nude or nearly nude by dancers at the Nite Moves club near Albany were largely learned from other dancers or on YouTube and the Internet, and are not the kind of carefully arranged and practiced patterns of movement normally equated with the art of dance. ‘We question how much planning goes into attempting a dance seen on YouTube,’ the tax appeals panel concluded in Matter of 677 New Loudon Corporation D/B/A Nite Moves, 821458.”

New York Post: “A New York hospital has admitted it was wrong when it disciplined eight nurses for refusing to participate in an abortion. Nassau University Medical Center on Long Island apologized to the nurses and said they did nothing wrong.”

LifeNews: “Florida senators today added an amendment to a health care bill that would allow women considering an abortion to see an ultrasound of their baby. Although abortion centers frequently conduct pre-abortion ultrasounds, they don’t necessarily give women a chance to see them. Sen. Alex Villalobos, a Miami Republican sponsored the amendment the Florida Senate approved on a 22-17 vote.” | HB 1143

The Samford Crimson: “[House Bill 432], Alabama’s first anti-human trafficking legislation, passed in both houses of the Alabama State Legislature merely hours before the 2010 legislative session ended on Thursday, April 22. The bill, which provides extensive protection for victims of labor and sex trade, will add Alabama to the list of 44 states that have strictly criminalized human trafficking under state law, according to the Polaris project.”

Topeka Capital-Journal: “The Senate narrowly rejected Wednesday a House bill that would have imposed state regulation of the adult entertainment industry in Kansas. A vote of 20-20, with Topeka Sen. Vicki Schmidt casting the deciding vote, prevented the measure from advancing to Democratic Gov. Mark Parkinson.” | SB 514

Fox News: “Republican Florida Governor Charlie Crist has decided he will run as an independent in the race to fill the Florida U.S. Senate seat, Crist allies tell Fox News. The official announcement is scheduled for Thursday at 5pm ET in St. Petersburg, Florida.”

LifeSiteNews: ‘[Mahoney's] replacement by someone from Opus Dei clearly communicates that Mahony has lost all practical influence in Rome and was not able to name his successor,’ wrote Farrow.”

ACLU: “The following can be attributed to Peter Eliasberg, managing attorney and Manheim Family Attorney for First Amendment Rights for the ACLU of Southern California, who argued the case before the Supreme Court in October: ‘Although we’re disappointed by today’s decision, we’re encouraged that the case is not over. We will continue to argue that the land transfer did not remedy the violation of the Establishment Clause . . . ‘

LifeSiteNews: “One of the access points that the document directs displacement site managers to is ‘the PROMESS warehouse in Port au Prince.’ LifeSiteNews.com (LSN) had reported shortly after the earthquake that, according to an inside source in Haiti, an enormous supply of condoms was taking up as much as 70% of the floor space in that warehouse and was preventing medical supplies from being unloaded, sorted, and distributed . . . ”

UKPA: “More than two million indecent internet images of children were circulated by 100 child sex offenders convicted in the past 20 months, an NSPCC investigation found.”

National Post: “If the federal Liberals were seeking a culture war, Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in finally putting his foot down this week by insisting Canada would not fund abortions in the developing world, seems prepared to grant one.”

NWCN: “The sources say Steve Fueston, David Ebert, and Leroy Christensen will plead guilty on Wednesday in U.S. District Court to charges of racketeering, money laundering, and promoting prostitution for their roles in a month-long federal criminal investigation into Rick’s and three other strip clubs they own – Sugar’s, Honey’s in Everett, and Fox’s in Pierce County.”

LifeSiteNews: “The University of Calgary is proceeding with individual non-academic misconduct hearings, which include the possibility of expulsion, for eight members of the Campus Pro-Life (CPL) student group regarding a pro-life display held earlier this month . . . ”

Washington Post: “None of the Securities and Exchange Commission employees caught using government computers to view pornography has been fired, the agency’s inspector general said Tuesday night.”

WSB Radio: “In a late night vote, the House approved [HB 571] that on its own allows some convicted sex offenders to appeal their registry requirements. It was amended to also include the provision dealing with teacher/student relationships after the Georgia Supreme Court ruled last year that current law on the subject wasn’t clear.”

Tony Mauro writes at the National Law Journal: “It was quite a morning for the First Amendment at the Supreme Court, as the justices handed down a major church-state decision and heard oral arguments in a case testing issues of free speech, the right to petition and the right of privacy. It was a historic morning for another reason: barring the unforeseen, it was Justice John Paul Stevens’ final day of hearing oral argument as a justice . . . ”

” . . . this is an important and necessary fight.”

Chicago Tribune: “State Rep. Deb Mell said she wants nothing more than to marry her partner of nearly six years in her home state of Illinois. Mell — who six years ago turned to her father, Ald. Richard Mell, 33rd, to help her put a public face on families where a member is gay — plans to announce her engagement to Christin Baker on the House floor Wednesday.”

Politico: ‘Most of you covered me. All of you voted for me,’ Obama joked last year at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner. But even then, only four months into his presidency, the joke fell flat . . . And at the very moment many reporters feel shut out, one paper — The New York Times — enjoys a favoritism from Obama and his staff that makes competitors fume, with gift-wrapped scoops and loads of presidential face time . . . ‘These are people who came in with every reporter giving them the benefit of the doubt,’ said another reporter who regularly covers the White House. ‘They’ve lost all that goodwill.’ . . . Gibbs said at one of his briefings, ‘This is the most transparent administration in the history of our country.’ Peals of laughter broke out in the briefing room.”

Sherry F. Kolb writes at Findlaw: Earlier this month, the State of Nebraska passed a law, scheduled to go into effect later this year, prohibiting all abortions after the twentieth week of pregnancy, with some very narrow exceptions. The express reason for selecting twenty weeks as the cut-off point was that some experts say that this is when a fetus begins to experience pain. The new measure represents a significant development in the evolution of pro-life theory. The line that is drawn, between permissible and impermissible abortion, is sentience. It is not conception, or viability (which was the focus of Roe v. Wade), or ‘quickening,’ but sentience, the capacity to suffer and experience pain. The decision to draw this line – between non-sentience and sentience – as the basis for an abortion prohibition, has important implications for debates about nonhuman animals, and for linking some objectives of the anti-abortion movement with those of the animal rights movement. It also provides an occasion for reflection among those who oppose and those who support a woman’s right to terminate her pregnancy . . . ”

ADF attorney Jordan Lorence appeared on the Roland Letner Show to discuss CLS v. Martinez.

The MP3 runs approximately 23 minutes.

ADF attorney Mike Johnson on Grassroots America hosted by George Stephenson to discuss the National Day of Prayer litigation.

The MP3 runs approximately 24 minutes.

ADF attorney Greg Baylor appeared on Chris Fabry Live to discuss Christian Legal Society v. Martinez.

The MP3 runs approximately 15 minutes.

“The 22-week infant later died in intensive care at a hospital in the mother’s home town of Rossano in southern Italy. The mother, pregnant for the first time, had opted for an abortion after prenatal scans suggested that her baby was disabled. However the infant survived the procedure . . . ”

The Optimist: “Joel Oster, senior counsel to the Allied Defense fund, spoke out against the ruling. ‘The National Day of Prayer provides an opportunity for all Americans to pray voluntarily according to their own faith,’ he said. ‘It does not violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, and this decision should be appealed.’”

Jennifer Roback Morse writing at the Ruth Institute Blog: “A new group is forming for pro-life law students. Advocates for Life is sponsored by Americans United for Life, and hopes to have chapters in law schools across the country . . . The idea was hatched by Fiedorek and several other participants in the Blackstone Legal Fellowship, an annual summer school for 110 second-year law students put on by the Alliance Defense Fund . . . The Alliance Defense Fund’s Matt Bowman says Advocates for Life will be a powerful ally in the ADF’s own efforts to ‘educate the next generation of lawyers in the best legal arguments for the protection of innocent life.’”

The Baptist Bulletin: “A federal judge in Arizona has struck down a Phoenix noise ordinance against sounds generated by religious worship, reports WorldNetDaily. ‘Churches shouldn’t be targeted and punished for ringing their bells as a public expression of faith that’s been done for centuries,’ said Erik Stanley, senior legal counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund. The noise ordinance had contained an exemption for ice cream trucks to blare their promotions.” | ADF News Release

God and Country: “The Alliance Defense Fund has previously stated its position that the ‘repeal’ of DADT would ultimately result in untenable conflicts between the moral, religious positions of military Chaplains and the new policy. The ADF is now publicizing a 6-page letter signed by 41 ‘distinguished’ Chaplains opposing the policy change.”

Regent Law Family Restoration: “Despite this ruling, President Obama, at the urging of the Alliance Defense Fund, will issue a prayer proclamation to allow Americans to pray together nationally.”

Brown Pelican Society of Louisiana: “Speaking of the President’s military preferences, FRC is teaming up with the Alliance Defense Fund tomorrow to host a joint press conference on the repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.’ You can watch by live webstream as we expose the threat to military chaplains. Click here for more information.”

Congress.org: “Dozens of retired military chaplains are asking that the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell law be left intact, OneNewsNow reports. The group organized by the Family Research Council and Alliance Defense Fund sent a letter to the president Tuesday.”

OneNewsNow: “‘Forty-one retired chaplains expressed concern that changing current military policy regarding sexual conduct is going to have a very dangerous effect on chaplains’ and soldiers’ religious liberty,’ reports [Daniel Blomberg], litigation counsel with the ADF.” | ADF News Release

NY Times: “In January, the southern part of Sudan is to hold a referendum on whether to secede from the north. That is a hazardous prospect, given that the south has much of Sudan’s oil reserves and that Sudan has already fought a lengthy north-south civil war that killed two million people.”

WorldNetDaily: “Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, says he sees more and more limits being placed on what is ‘politically correct’ for Christians to do . . . He was speaking at Impact 2010, a rally jointly sponsored by the Family Research Council and the Alliance Defense Fund. The purpose of the seminar was to encourage Maine’s pastors to be active in the public arena.”

CitizenLink: “A federal court has ruled that a New Jersey teen should not have been prevented from taking part in the national Pro-life Day of Silent Solidarity . . . [David Cortman said] ‘This particular school has the highest teen pregnancy rate in the state, and the highest teenage abortion rate in the state, and this young lady was being a faithful witness.’”

Politico: “‘We are deeply concerned that these changes would threaten the religious liberty of chaplains and service members,’ the chaplains said in their letter, circulated Tuesday by the Family Research Council and the Alliance Defense Fund.”

Family Research Council Press Release: “Family Research Council President and Marine veteran Tony Perkins will join Alliance Defense Fund Senior Counsel Jordan Lorence at a news conference Wednesday in Washington, D.C. The event will announce the release of a letter to President Barack Obama and Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates, signed by more than 40 retired military chaplains.”

Lyle Denniston writes at the SCOTUS Blog: “Justice Antonin Scalia, using history, sarcasm and political taunts, laid down a barrage of objections Wednesday to a plea that the Supreme Court create a new constitutional right of anonymity for individuals who sign petitions to get policy measures onto election ballots. When he was finished, the strong impression was that it might be exceedingly hard to gather a five-vote majority to establish such a right, even though the plea got the fervent support of Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr., and some implied help from Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr. The oral argument was in John Doe # 1, et al., v. Reed, et al. (09-559).”

In a 5–4 decision, the court determined that an act of Congress transferring the land under the memorial to a veterans’ group was constitutional and additionally noted that “the Constitution does not oblige government to avoid any public acknowledgment of religion’s role in society.

Religion Clause Blog: “In Council for Secular Humanism, Inc. v. McNeil, (FL App., April 27, 2010), a Florida appellate court in an Establishment Clause case, by a 7-7 vote, denied a motion for en banc review of a decision by a 3-judge panel. However the 3 judges did file an amended panel decision and certified to the state Supreme Court as a matter of great public importance the question of whether the ‘no aid’ provision in Florida’s constitution prohibits the state from contracting with religious organizations for the provision of faith based transitional housing for inmates . . . ”

Religion Clause Blog: “In Nepal, as law makers approach the May 28 deadline for completing a draft of a new constitution, tensions increase over whether the country will remain a secular state. In 2006, Parliament passed a resolution providing that the country would no longer formally be known as a Hindu nation. . . ”

Religion Clause Blog: “Reacting to last week’s online threats to the creators of South Park over their depiction of the Prophet Muhammad in a bear costume (see prior posting), Seattle artist Molly Norris created a poster promoting May 20 as ‘Everybody Draw Mohammed Day,’ sponsored by a fictional group, Citizens Against Citizens Against Humor . . . ”

Robert Knight writes at Townhall: “The University of California Hastings College of the Law case, which the U.S. Supreme Court heard on April 19, has its share of absurdity, but what’s missing is outrage.”

Digital Commons at the U. of Georgia School of Law (includes video): “‘Noah’s Curse and Paul’s Admonition: Civil Rights, Religious Liberty, Gay Equality’ is the title of the University of Georgia School of Law’s 106th Sibley Lecture to be delivered by Yale Law School Garver Professor of Jurisprudence William Eskridge Jr. His presentation will take place March 18 at 3:30 p.m. in classroom A of the School of Law. Admission to the event is free, and all are welcome to attend. Should equal rights for gay people give way to liberties for religious people? According to Eskridge, a similar question was posed a generation ago – Should equal rights for people of color give way to the liberties of religious people? His lecture will explore this controversial parallel and its implications.”