Daily Archives: May 18, 2010

Idaho Press-Tribune: “U.S. District Judge Edward Lodge Monday dismissed Nampa Classical Academy’s lawsuit against the state brought so the school could use religious texts in the classroom . . . NCA founder and board member Mike Moffett said today the school has not made a decision about whether it will appeal the court order. He referred questions about the lawsuit to the school’s attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund.” | Nampa Classical Academy v. Goesling, No. CV09-427-S-EJL (D. Idaho May 17, 2010)

“Alliance Defense Fund attorneys are considering all available options for appeal of a federal judge’s decision Tuesday to dismiss Nampa Classical Academy’s lawsuit challenging the Idaho Public Charter School Commission’s ban on the use of religious texts in its curriculum.”

The Michigan Messenger: “The controversial ex-gay ministry Corduroy Stone of Lansing will no longer be recognized by the Michigan Department of Corrections or allowed to operate within the Michigan prison system.”

Salon: “The author of a new memoir talks about the odd dynamics of lesbian motherhood and how it’s changing our culture . . . ”

Boston Globe (AP): “A bill to ban Muslim veils covering the face to be presented to France’s Cabinet on Wednesday calls for fines and, in some cases, citizenship classes.”

Baptist Press: “States increasingly are enacting legislation to opt out of a provision in the new federal health care law that would require coverage for abortion in ‘insurance exchanges.’”

Maragaret Somerville writes in the Montreal Gazette: “To privilege secularism, as its advocates argue should be done, is to contravene the liberty and equality principles of democracy and to prevent democracy functioning as it should – in short, it’s profoundly anti-democratic . . . ”

Blog of the Legal Times: “Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan’s answers to a background questionnaire have arrived on Capitol Hill. Click here to download a copy.”

Reuters: “Chancellor Angela Merkel has told Germany’s Ecumenical Church Congress (Kirchentag) in Munich that Christianity is a main foundation of the country’s values system. This is not a surprising statement in Germany, especially for the leader of a party called the Christian Democratic Union. But it’s not one that’s heard much in some other European countries, either because of a strict separation of church and state (like France with its laïcité) or some multicultural model (as in Britain) that plays down the majority religious heritage of European societies.”

Jakarta Globe: “In some of his strongest comments against terrorists yet, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono on Monday called on all Indonesians to join the government in combating terrorism and their plans to establish an Islamic state governed by Shariah law.”

SF Public Press: “Assemblywoman Fiona Ma, D-San Francisco, introduced the Separation Equality Act, AB 2700, sponsored by Equality California and the Conference of California Bar Associations. The bill consolidates the two processes and fees into one for divorcing same-sex spouses and domestic partners. Its other stated goal is to establish language clarifying that same-sex partners married outside of California are able to dissolve their marriages in California.” | AB 2700

FPC of West Virginia | Engage Family Blog: “It is more than obvious that stronger marriage protections are needed. Constitutional amendments voice the will of the people as they exercise their freedom to self-governance. In West Virginia I can only reiterate what Family Policy Council president Jeremy Dys has said time and again, ‘There is no legitimate reason not to let the people of West Virginia vote to define marriage.’”

The Times-Picayune: “By a vote of 23-67, the House opted to keep current law that makes sex education optional for each school district and concentrates the lessons on abstinence.” | HB 529

Arizona Republic: “For years, some Arizona cities have offered an insurance package to its employees that covered elective abortions. Now, with a new state law set to go into effect July 29, they will have to change their policies.” | SB 1305

Evangelical Examiner: “A simple letter explaining that there is no separation of church and state in the U.S. Constitution has convinced Arizona’s Mohave Community College agreed Tuesday–after receiving a letter from the Alliance Defense Fund–not to eliminate the opening and closing prayers from its nursing program’s pinning ceremony this year.”

BBC: “A teenage Jehovah’s Witness crushed by a car as it crashed into a West Midlands shop is thought to have died after refusing a blood transfusion . . . Joshua is believed to have told doctors at Selly Oak Hospital not to give him a blood transfusion on religious grounds.”

The Tampa Tribune: “Hillsborough County school board members will vote again today on whether to make Good Friday a day off for students next year.”

“Of the elites advocating invasive legal interventions, none is more exclusive than the American Law Institute . . . In fact, they propose radical changes that go to the root of the law’s understanding of the family.”

Durant Daily Democrat: “A private firm proposing a prison in Wakita with all born-again Christian staff and programming does not yet have the commitments for prisoners it needs to begin construction . . . The concept of an all-Christian private prison has drawn the attention of a Washington, D.C., civil liberties group. The group, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, sent a letter to the Oklahoma Department of Corrections asking it not to send prisoners to the proposed prison.”

CJAD: “Some legal experts say the province’s new bill on women with full religious face coverings will not actually ban them from government services. The Liberals are in the middle of passing a new law that they said would force any woman with a niqab or burka to show her face.”

NPR: The cheerful, charming Kagan so beloved by the students was not always in evidence elsewhere. Secretaries and faculty members alike have stories of Kagan screaming at people, slamming doors and chewing out subordinates in public — a trait that she is said to have carried with her to her next job as solicitor general. She’s a “yeller,” concedes one of her friends with a wry smile. (Law professor Mark) Tushnet, one of her admirers, puts it this way: “Her weakness as dean was that she really didn’t like people to disagree with her. But that’s not something you can do at the Supreme Court.”

GayPolitics.com: “The openly lesbian candidate, an ordained minister and former Denver school board member, was appointed Saturday by a vacancy committee to complete the term of Paula Sandoval, who resigned to serve on the Denver City Council.”

Seattle Times: “A Bikini barista who had faced a prostitution charge pleaded guilty Monday in Everett Municipal Court to working without an adult entertainment license and was sentenced to 20 days in jail.” | For more information see this ADF Alliance Alert compound tag: http://www.alliancealert.org/tag/state-washington+topic-sob-regulation/

LA Times: “Sullivan, writing for theAtlantic.com, argues it would ‘be bizarre to argue that a justice’s sexual orientation will not in some way affect his or her judgment’ on issues likely to come before the court, presumably such as same-sex marriage. The questions about Kagan arise, Sullivan wrote, because ‘we have been told by many that she is gay.’”

Life News: “Further analysis of the controversial memo Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan wrote for ex-President Bill Clinton on the subject of partial-birth abortion provides new concerns for pro-life advocates. It shows she regarded the ban on the abortion procedure as unconstitutional.”

Gallup: “Americans are three times more likely to describe the current state of moral values in the United States as ‘poor’ than as ‘excellent’ or ‘good.’ Americans’ assessment of U.S. morality has never been positive, but the current ratings rank among the worst Gallup has measured over the past nine years.”

NBC Chicago: “Laura Derbigney of Chicago has found herself in the middle of a custody battle between her Catholic husband and his Jewish ex-wife over how their 7-year-old son is cared for during paternal visits. A court order restricts Laura Derbigney and her husband, Nelson, from driving the boy in a car, allowing him to use electronics or to be fed pork and other foods as outlined in Orthodox Judaism.”

CNN: “A court in Malawi has found a gay couple guilty of gross indecency and unnatural acts, according to witnesses who heard the verdict Tuesday. Sentencing will take place May 20. The two young men face up to 14 years of hard labor.”

Jan LaRue writes at the American Thinker: Compare the qualifications for becoming an MLB ump with Kagan’s qualifications for the Court . . .

Williams Lake Tribune: “The president of the Williams Lake Gay Straight Alliance says she’ll risk suspension later this week in protest of School District 27 canceling an anti-homophobia event planned for this week at Columneetza Secondary School.”

ADF attorney Jordan Lorence appeared with ADF attorney David French, who served as the guest host of Reality Check Live.  They discuss the U.S. Supreme Court and the nomination of Elena Kagan. | MP3 43:51 mins | Posts related to the Kagan nomination through ADF Alliance Alert compound tag: Topic: Nominations + Court: US Supreme

All Headline News: “The Episcopal church formally ordained its second gay bishop over the weekend, a move expected to exacerbate deep divisions within the worldwide Anglican church.”

Wesley J. Smith writing at First Things | On the Square: “‘Presumed consent,’ as this approach is known, is already the law in several countries, and studies are mixed as to whether they meaningfully increase the organ supply. But even if such laws have added to the number of transplantable organs in countries like Spain and France, as seems to be the case, we are not (yet) Europe. We value individualism over collectivism, autonomous decision making over the imposed ‘greater good.’ Indeed, presumed consent laws could unleash a boomerang effect: Many would resent the new approach as government coercion over one of the most intimate decisions anyone can make and protest by taking the opt out option.”

George Weigel writing at National Review Online: “[T]he gravest question for our public culture is the question of whether what Father [John Courtney] Murray called the ‘American consensus’ — that ensemble of ‘ethical and political principles drawn from the tradition of natural law’ — still holds . . . If religiously informed moral argument is banned from the American public square, then the public square has become, not only naked, but undemocratic and intolerant. If, on the other hand, religiously informed moral argument is welcome in public life, then we have the possibility of rebuilding, not a sacred public square (a goal the Catholic Church rejected at the Second Vatican Council), but a civil public square, in which tolerance is understood in its true sense as differences engaged within a bond of civility formed by a mutual commitment to reason.”

The Hill: “Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and John Kerry (D-Mass.) have turned to evangelical Christians in a last-ditch effort to move immigration reform and climate change legislation. Democrats are making a direct appeal to the GOP base by turning to evangelical Christian and other religious leaders, and there’s some evidence that the talks could be fruitful . . . ”

NPR: “The U.S. is giving $1.3 billion in military and judicial aid to Mexico to help Calderon’s battle against the drug mafias . . . An NPR News investigation in Ciudad Juarez — ground zero of Calderon’s cartel war — finds strong evidence that Mexico’s drug fight is rigged, according to court testimony, current and former law enforcement officials, and an NPR analysis of cartel arrests . . . In that border city, federal forces appear to be favoring one cartel, the Sinaloa (named after the coastal state in northwestern Mexico), which the U.S. Justice Department calls one of the largest organized crime syndicates in the world . . . ”

Related USA Today: Mexican president’s visit to focus on immigration

“The Congressional Budget Office estimates that legislation to provide fringe benefits for the same-sex partners of federal employees ‘would increase direct spending by $101 million over the 2010-2015 period and $310 million through 2020.’”

Interfax: “Finnish social workers warned Rimma Salonen at her last meeting with her son that she was not entitled to pray together with Anton, cross herself or talk to him about religion . . . In 2008, after divorcing Finn Paavo Salonen, Russian subject Rimma Salonen took their 5-year old son Anton to the Nizhny Novgorod Region. Several people, including the boy’s father, kidnapped the child from Rimma on April 12, 2009.”

ADF Attorney Tim Chandler writing at speakupmovement.org/church: “Recently, the Roman Catholic Church has come under fire after two of its schools, one in Massachusetts and one in Colorado, declined to enroll students who have same-sex parents. Not surprisingly, these decisions created a firestorm of public criticism and outrage, raising questions about whether churches should have the right to make these types of enrollment decisions . . . One of the most basic and fundamental principles of the First Amendment is that churches should remain autonomous and not have the government interfering with their internal affairs. But churches lose that freedom when the government imposes non-discrimination laws that intrude into religious matters, like operating a private school.”

The Hill: “Lawmakers may have little time for anything but election news Tuesday. It’s the new Super Tuesday, with races likely to tell incumbents whether voters are heading toward November thirsty for congressional blood . . . ”

Christian Science Monitor: “Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan lacks a paper trail. But her Senate confirmation hearing last year for solicitor general offers a preview of what’s to come.”

Marcia Coyle writes at the National Law Journal: “President Barack Obama last week presented U.S. Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan as one of the nation’s ‘foremost legal minds.’ But is the former Harvard Law dean actually scholar-lite? Some academic and political commentators questioned her slim body of scholarship given her 14 years in academia — eight as a teacher and nearly six as dean . . . ”

“An order prohibiting the removal of a child from a country without the noncustodial parent’s consent is enforceable under an international child abduction treaty, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Monday.”

ADF Attorney Casey Mattox writing at speakupmovement.org/university: “This is the second of a three part series on the story behind Widmar v. Vincent, the seminal Supreme Court decision protecting the rights of Christian student groups on campus, taken from an interview with Jonathan Williams, one of the plaintiffs in the case who is now a pastor near San Antonio, Texas. For more on how the case arose and the group’s decision to file its complaint see part I.”

Cristina Odone writes at the Telegraph: “While Muslims in this country enjoy the benefits of a society where tolerance is not only legal but culturally ingrained, Christians in a Muslim country (in fact several Muslim countries – being a Christian in neighbouring Iran is no picnic) must withstand wave after wave of attacks. How amazing if the new Foreign Secretary were to address this thorny issue . . . ”

Moheb Zaki writes at the Wall Street Journal full access via Google: “A few weeks ago in the coastal city of Marsa Matrouh, an enraged mob of some 3,000 angry Muslims gathered after Friday prayers. After the mosque’s imam exhorted them to cleanse the city of its infidel Christians, called Copts, they went on a rampage . . . ”

International Communion of the Charismatic Episcopal Church, Diocese of the Mid-South: “[A]n Arizona court Tuesday overturned the conviction of Bishop Painter in the wake of a federal court’s determination last month that the city noise ordinance under which he was convicted is unconstitutional when enforced against sounds generated in the course of religious expression, such as church bells. ‘Pastors and churches shouldn’t live in fear of being punished or penalized by the government,’ said [Erik Stanley]. ‘Certainly, no pastor should have to fear jail time for engaging in peaceful religious expression.’”

West Virginia Record: “On May 21 from 9 a.m. until 1 p.m. at the Law Offices of Robinson and McElwee in Charleston, the Family Policy Council of West Virginia (FPCWV) will host ‘Church and State AND Tax Exempt? Religious Freedom and Nonprofit Organizations in Light of Citizens United,’ a CLE designed to provide practitioners with the answers to many of the questions raised by the Supreme Court’s decision in this only-one-of-its-kind CLE in the State of West Virginia . . . Also, David Langdon, a national expert on the law of nonprofit organizations and campaign finance, and [Erik Stanley], senior legal counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) and lead attorney for ADF’s innovative project, ‘the Pulpit Initiative’ will speak.”

Religion Clause Blog: “Forum 18 reports that in Uzbekistan on Sunday, the police, National Security Service secret police, Tax Inspectorate, Fire Brigade, and Sanitary-Epidemiological Service all raided Church of Christ, one of the largest Protestant congregations in Tashkent.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Phi Beta Cons: “After ADF sent an informational letter to [Mohave Community College] outlining the governing law, the college restored prayer to the program . . . If Inside Higher Ed had asked us for comment on the story (next time, please call us . . . we don’t issue releases without evidence), they would have discovered we have a paper trail. Internal university documents show the invocation and benediction lined out of the program, and an internal e-mail clearly states that the commencement committee thought ‘church and state should remain separate’ and ‘apparently there is a legal precedence.’”

“The recovery of a healthy market and the restoration of healthy public morality are not two separate aims but two dimensions in the quest for human freedom . . . ”

NY Times: “‘We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam,’ Mr. Blumenthal said to the group gathered in Norwalk in March 2008 . . . There was one problem: Mr. Blumenthal, a Democrat now running for the United States Senate, never served in Vietnam. He obtained at least five military deferments . . . ”

When Government Expression Collides With the Establishment Clause
Martha McCarthy, 10 B.Y.U. Educ. & L.J. 113 (2010)

“On February 25, 2009, the United States Supreme Court rendered its widely watched decision in Pleasant Grove City v. Summum. Unanimously reversing the opinion of the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court upheld the city’s decision to reject a religious group’s request to erect a monument in a public park even though a monument with the Ten Commandments was already displayed. The Court concluded that the city’s decision as to which donated monuments to display represents government expression that is not subject to Free Speech Clause restrictions. The Court in this case avoided addressing 1) whether a city’s expression of its own views by allowing the display of monuments with religious content, such as the Ten Commandments, promotes religion in violation of the Establishment Clause, and 2) whether there is a legitimate justification for cities to display monuments of some religious groups but not others. Following a brief introduction and review of the recent Supreme Court decision, this article addresses the potential conflict between the government speech doctrine and the Establishment Clause and implications of this conflict for public schools.”

Exploring Free Exercise Doctrine: Equal Liberty and Religious Exemptions
Christopher C. Lund, 77 Tenn. L. Rev. 351 (2010)

“Commentators have long argued over the meaning of the Free Exercise Clause and the basic question it now poses: To what extent should society accommodate religious exercise by making exceptions to generally applicable governmental laws for religiously motivated behavior? Rare is it to find an absolutist on these issues. Few believe that religious exemptions are always appropriate; few believe that they are always inappropriate. The difficult tasks have been in drawing the line between appropriate religious exemptions and inappropriate ones, figuring out what types of doctrinal arrangements can best approximate that line, and deciding which levels and branches of government are justly charged with deciding these issues.”

A Permit to Practice Religion for Some but Not for Others: How the Federal Government Violates Religious Freedom When It Grants Eagle Feathers Only to Indian Tribe Members
Kyle Persaud, 36 Ohio N.U. L. Rev. 115 (2010)

“Part I of this paper examines the history and current state of religious freedom law in the United States as well as the government’s scheme regulating the possession of eagle parts. Part II looks at three federal appellate court cases in which courts issued contradictory rulings on the right of non-members to possess eagle parts. Part III analyzes the points of disagreement among the cases, and it proposes that courts uniformly adopt a standard which ensures that any person who wishes to possess eagle parts for religious purposes be allowed to do so.”

Kitzmiller’s Error: Defining “Religion” Exclusively Rather Than Inclusively
John H. Calvert, 3 Liberty U. L. Rev. 213 (2009)

“In Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, the court held that it was a violation of the Establishment Clause for a public school ‘to advise students of gaps/problems in Darwin’s theory and of other theories of evolution, including, but not limited to intelligent design,’ because the policy caused the state to endorse ‘religion.’ In reaching this conclusion the court did not define ‘religion’ functionally and inclusively as has the Supreme Court ‘[as] an aspect of human thought and action which profoundly relates the life of man to the world in which he lives.’ Instead, the Kitzmiller court implicitly used a narrow discriminatory or exclusive definition of religion that limits the scope of ‘religion’ to only beliefs in God. The discriminatory definition excludes from ‘religion’ and the burdens of the Establishment Clause non-theistic beliefs that relate life to the world materialistically through matter, rather than mind. If the Kitzmiller court had used the inclusive functional definition rather than the exclusive discriminatory definition, its result would have been different.”