Daily Archives: June 30, 2010

The Sun: “Jobless Miranda Lee, 40, says she has been left ‘half man, half woman’ after she underwent £60,000 of gender changing surgery but was refused an £8,000 breast augmentation.”

Blog of LegalTimes: “‘You have followed the pattern which has been in vogue since Bork,’ he said, referring to conventional wisdom that Supreme Court nominees have been hesitant to say much about their legal views after the nomination of the very substantive Judge Robert Bork failed in 1987. ‘It would be my hope that we could find some place between voting no and having some sort of substantive answers, but I don’t know that it would be useful to continue these questions any further.’”

New York Times: “Republicans on Wednesday stepped up their pressure on Elena Kagan to defend her decisions involving abortion and the ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the military, trying to knock her off her stride even as some of them conceded that her confirmation to the Supreme Court appears all but assured.”

Washington Post: “‘Solicitor General Kagan will be confirmed,’ Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the panel chairman, confidently declared during a break in the hearings.”

U.S. Department of State: “Secretary Clinton (June 14, 2010): ‘The 10th annual Trafficking in Persons Report outlines the continuing challenges across the globe, including in the United States. The Report, for the first time, includes a ranking of the United States based on the same standards to which we hold other countries. The United States takes its first-ever ranking not as a reprieve but as a responsibility to strengthen global efforts against modern slavery, including those within America. This human rights abuse is universal, and no one should claim immunity from its reach or from the responsibility to confront it.’”

The Elliot Institute Post-Abortion Review: “In increasing numbers, however, these pregnancies are ‘higher order’ with three or more implanted fetuses. ‘The international rates of triplet or higher order pregnancies after assisted reproduction are 7.3 percent at conception.’ In order to deal with such pregnancies, women must put themselves in the care of high-risk obstetrical experts who know the latest research on the new technologies used in the management of multiple pregnancies. One of these new approaches is known as Multifetal Pregnancy Reduction (MFPR)—a form of abortion in which the most accessible fetuses are terminated by a needle stab through the heart and the overall pregnancy number is reduced to twins or a singleton.”

USCCB: “The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee for the Defense of Marriage has launched a new initiative for the protection of marriage, entitled Marriage: Unique for a Reason. The initiative is to help catechize and educate Catholics on the meaning of marriage as the union of one man and one woman . . . The truth of marriage lies at the very core of a true concern for justice and the common good. Promoting marriage is crucial to the New Evangelization . . . Materials are online at www.marriageuniqueforareason.org and are available for purchase through www.usccbpublishing.org”

All Voices: “Serbian President Boris Tadic met with the representatives of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender organizations and expressed his support for the organization of the Gay Pride parade in Belgrade.”

LifeSiteNews: “When a European Christian pro-family group applied to join the Fundamental Rights Platform (FRP) of the EU’s Human Rights Agency, they did not expect to be denounced as promoters of ‘hate.’ The European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) objected to a statement by the Alliance of Romania’s Families (ARF) calling same-sex ‘marriage’ an example of ‘human degeneration,’ and denied their request for membership.” | European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights

OTZ [Google Translation]: “Homosexual couples should be able to marry [according to] the future plans of the state government [in Thuringia's state offices]. ‘We [will] end the Thuringian exceptionalism,’ said Interior Minister Peter Huber (CDU) on Wednesday in Erfurt.”

San Marcos Local News: “The board may approve or reject ‘abstinence plus’ curricula for the district’s middle school and high school students. The goal of the abstinence plus program is to reduce the number of students who have sexual intercourse and increase condom use among those who have sex.”

Baptist Press: “Without saying how she would rule on any specific church-state case, Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan said Wednesday that governments should have some freedom ‘to make religious accommodations’ in matters involving the Constitution’s Establishment Clause.”

Forum 18: “The three conscientious objectors to compulsory military service sentenced under the Criminal Code since such prosecutions resumed in November 2009 have faced different outcomes, Forum 18 News Service has learnt.”

The Christian Institute: “Doctors in Scotland are giving women abortion-inducing drugs in hospital before sending them home to have the abortion in a scheme critics have described as ‘grotesque’.”

“Houben has biological offspring in Australia, Israel, Canada, Cyprus, Germany and Luxembourg, as well as at home in the Netherlands. His current tally of donor-conceived children stands at an eye-watering 62, with the 63rd on the way . . . ”

ADF Attorney Jordan Lorence writing at The Washington Examiner: “UC-Hastings claims that for the last 20 years it has required CLS and all student organizations to accept any student who desires to join under an ‘all comers’ policy. But this is a mirage. Hastings has never truly enforced its ‘all comers’ policy because it concocted the policy in mid-litigation to evade the withering truth that Hastings only required CLS to accept students who disagreed with its mission. The university could not produce any record of its ‘all comers’ policy until it announced it in March 2005 in court documents related to this case.”

“Has the president embraced bigotry? Or has he lied to the American people about his position on what marriage is and how it should be defined? … For what it’s worth, I think he is lying.”

FOX News: “J. Christian Adams, now an attorney in Virginia and a conservative blogger, says he and the other Justice Department lawyers working on the case were ordered to dismiss it. … Adams also accused Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez of lying under oath to Congress about the circumstances surrounding the decision to drop the probe.”

ACLU: “In response to civil liberties threats caused by the recent passage of Arizona’s racial profiling law, state-based American Civil Liberties Union affiliates across the country are issuing travel alerts informing individuals of their rights when stopped by law enforcement when traveling in Arizona.”

Associated Press: “A European ruling banning crucifixes in Italian schools should be overturned, nine European governments said in an appeal Wednesday. … The decisions of the court — an arm of the Council of Europe, the continent’s premier human rights watchdog — are binding on the council’s 47 member states and therefore have an impact far beyond Italy.”

Associated Press: “A decade after Vermont became the first state to recognize same-sex couples, it is one of five states that have expanded beyond civil unions to offer full-fledged same-sex marriage. But it’s still a hotly debated issue in many parts of the country. Voters in California and Maine overturned same-sex marriage, and 29 states have passed laws or constitutional amendments against it.”

Wall Street Journal / Law Blog: “Those arguing for resuscitation of the Privilege or Immunities Clause pinned their hopes on Justice Antonin Scalia and Justice Clarence Thomas, both known for their ‘originalist’ approach to constitutional interpretation. … in a separate concurrence, Justice Thomas boldly went where no justice has gone before: to the arms of the Privileges or Immunities Clause. He wrote: T]he text of the Privileges or Immunities Clause . . . command[s] that “[n]o State shall . . . abridge” the rights of United States citizens . . . the Clause establishes a minimum baseline of federal rights, and the constitutional right to keep and bear arms plainly was among them.’ … So what happened to Justice Scalia? In Barnett’s opinion, Scalia ‘doesn’t like unenumerated rights, and he’s afraid that the Privileges or Immunities will sanction unenumerated rights.’ Adds Barnett: ‘Perhaps he’s right to be concerned, but it certainly goes against his originalism.’”

LifeSiteNews: “U.S. House Minority Leader John Boehner pledged Tuesday to the 40th annual National Right to Life Convention (NRLC) that he would sign on to legislation, soon to be introduced by Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ), that would make the Hyde amendment barring taxpayer funding for abortion permanent law.”

LifeNews: “House Republican leaders John Boehner and Eric Cantor announced today they will sign discharge petitions promoted by Reps. Steve King and Wally Herger that would force votes in the House on legislation seeking to undermine the pro-abortion health care bill President Barack Obama signed into law.”

Human Events liveblog of the Kagan hearings is here. Contributors include Mary Harned and Dr. Charmaine Yoest of Americans United for Life (AUL is also covering the hearings at its own blog).

Wall Street Journal: “When the court returns in October, Justice Kennedy’s influence is likely to grow stronger still. With the retirement of Justice John Paul Stevens, Justice Kennedy will be the senior justice in cases where he differs with the chief justice and Justice Antonin Scalia. So when Justice Kennedy finds himself in agreement with the court’s liberals, he will be the one deciding who writes the opinion for the court.”

New York Times: “Ms. Kagan’s responses, during a long and sometimes tense day of parrying with members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, were similar to those of Supreme Court nominees past. But unlike her predecessors, Ms. Kagan wrote a 1995 article calling for judicial nominees to be more forthcoming. On Tuesday, minutes into her testimony, she backpedaled, saying she now believed it would be inappropriate even to answer questions that might ‘provide some kind of hints’ about her views on matters of legal controversy.”

Reuters: “A new United Nations report released on Tuesday calls for abandoning the U.S. dollar as the main global reserve currency, saying it has been unable to safeguard value.” | World Economic and Social Survey 2010

Politico: “The gay soldiers arrested outside the White House protesting ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ will announce today that they’re demanding that President Obama testify in their trial on minor civil disobedience charges . . . Their novel argument: Obama himself called on gay rights advocates to pressure him, so they were just following orders . . . ”

Associated Press: “Superintendent Beth Singer said in the letter e-mailed Tuesday that the district will clarify that elementary school-age students won’t be able to get a condom if they request one from the school nurse.” | For more information see this ADF Alliance Alert compound tag: http://www.alliancealert.org/tag/state-massachusetts+topic-contraception+topic-education/

Associated Press: “China threw open the gates of its secretive Central Party School on Wednesday, offering foreign journalists a rare but carefully scripted peek at the leafy campus where the country’s Communist elite are trained.”

Associated Press: “It is the third summer in a row that deadly protests have erupted, a symptom of the tensions permeating this Muslim-dominated Himalayan region, which has long chafed under Indian rule and is patrolled by hundreds of thousands of troops.”

Wall Street Journal / Deal Journal: “[T]he Catholic Action League of Massachusetts today asked the Archdiocese to call off the sale. At issue is a buy-out clause in the purchase agreement. That clause allows Cerberus, through its Steward Health Care System arm, to pay $25 million, or about 3% of the deal’s value, for the right to terminate the Catholic identity of the system “if it finds compliance with Catholic medical ethics to be ‘unlawful or materially burdensome.’ The group said that standard is defined as anything that would ‘jeopardize the welfare of its patients, employees, or the communities it serves.’”

Associated Press: “Spain’s highest court agreed Wednesday to study whether a new abortion law allowing the procedure without restrictions in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy is constitutional.”

Religion Clause Blog: “Yesterday the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals denied a panel rehearing and also denied an en banc rehearing in Newdow v. Roberts. The case is an Establishment Clause challenge to prayer and use of ‘so help me God’ in the oath at Presidential inauguration ceremonies . . . ”

Bloomberg BusinessWeek: “Delaware’s Roman Catholic parishes must share as much as $120 million with people sexually abused by priests, according to a ruling by the judge overseeing the bankruptcy of the Catholic Diocese of Wilmington.” | In re Catholic Diocese of Wilmington, Inc., (DE Bankr., June 28, 2010) | View in Google Viewer | Via Religion Clause

Religion Clause: “On June 18, thirty national organizations comprising the Coalition Against Religious Discrimination, sent a letter (full text) to the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee urging it to hold hearings on the current status of the Faith-Based Initiative.”

Religion Clause: “On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court denied certiorari in Morgan v. Plano Independent School District, (Docket No. 09-1131). (Order List.) In the case, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals found that rules adopted in 2005 by a Texas school district restricting the times and places at which students can distribute written materials are constitutional, at least on their face. At issue were students who wished to distribute religious-themed candy canes and tickets to church musical and drama programs.”

SCOTUSblog: “Partnering with PBS NewsHour, SCOTUSblog is again offering live coverage of Elena Kagan’s confirmation hearings before the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Both the NewsHour live video of the event, and our live-blogging narrative and commentary, will appear below. The session is expected to begin promptly at 9:00 a.m. Eastern.”

Townhall: “[Thomas Perez, President Obama’s Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights] now wants to modify this longstanding structure by creating a new ‘Policy and Strategy Section’ that would be comprised exclusively of ‘career’ attorneys. This section would not have any enforcement responsibilities, but would be entrusted with formulating all of the Division’s key ‘policy’ decisions on how to enforce civil rights laws and what the priorities of the Division should be on such hot-button issues as ‘racial profiling, immigration reform, and domestic compliance with international human rights obligations.’ This proposal is little more than a Trojan horse designed to frustrate future Republican administrations.

Townhall: “Although the Bork inquisition was a largely partisan affair, the consequences have yielded a bipartisan sham. Republican and Democratic nominees alike are trained to say as little as possible and to stay a razor’s width on the side of truthfulness. … And that’s why Kagan should be the hero of this tale. She has vociferously argued that the ‘Bork hearings were great … the best thing that ever happened to constitutional democracy.’ … Alas, it doesn’t look like Kagan will be following the Kagan standard.”

Jonathan Adler writes at the Volokh Conspiracy: “Was ‘language purporting to be the judgment of an independent body of medical experts devoted to the care and treatment of pregnant women and their children’ actually ‘nothing more than the political scrawling’ of then Clinton White House staffer Elena Kagan . . . Powerline’s John Hinderaker thinks this is a ‘smoking gun’ and Kagan ‘has a great deal of explaining to do.’ Glenn Reynolds thinks this is ‘at least’ a scandal for ACOG, if not Kagan herself. If the allegations are true, it’s a clear example of the politicization of science by a Democratic administration (and further evidence that there are no clean hands on science politicization) . . . ”

ADF attorney Greg Baylor appeared on Fox News to discuss the Supreme Court’s ruling in Christian Legal Society v. Martinez. | MP4 2:24 mins

Institute of Education | National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance: “On average, charter middle schools that held lotteries were neither more nor less successful than traditional public schools in improving math or reading test scores, attendance, grade promotion, or student conduct within or outside of school. Being admitted to a study charter school did significantly improve both students’ and parents’ satisfaction with school.”

The Hill: “A debate is emerging in the Senate over key aspects of recently introduced cybersecurity legislation, including which agency should be in charge of protecting the country’s civilian networks and how much authority the president should have in the event of a cyberattack.”

The Hill: “Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) is fighting party leaders’ decision to name Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) interim chairman of the Appropriations Homeland Security subcommittee. … The subcommittee has jurisdiction over the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which will play an important role helping Gulf Coast residents recover from the BP oil disaster.”

EducationNews.org: “As the Obama administration and Congress move to phase out Washington DC’s Opportunity Scholarship Program, a new evaluation of the popular voucher plan finds widespread benefits for student participants, including significantly greater high school graduation rates. … Eighty-two percent of voucher students graduated high school, compared with 70 percent of students who were offered a voucher but chose not to use it, IES researchers found. The overall high-school graduation rate in Washington, DC is around 50 percent.” | Full report here.

Americans United For Life: “On June 25, 2010, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon signed House Bill 2081 into law, ensuring that a pregnant woman can use deadly force to protect the life of her unborn child. The new law is based on innovative AUL model legislation: the ‘Pregnant Woman’s Protection Act.’”

Phyllis Schlafly writing at Investor’s Business Daily: “Now that Obama is president, he has the power to nominate Supreme Court justices who will ‘break free’ from the Constitution and join him in ‘fundamentally transforming’ America. That’s the essence of his choice of Elena Kagan as his second Supreme Court nominee. She never was a judge, and her paper trail is short. But it’s long enough to prove that she is a clear and present danger to the Constitution.”

Heritage Foundation | The Foundry: “The Heritage Foundation has offered a great deal of research and analysis related to the current crisis. It can be found indexed here. Starting today, we will also highlight the top actions the federal government must take immediately to assist the citizens of the Gulf as they cope with this tragedy. As the government responds or acts on these actions, we will directly update this post online to reflect the news and add new actions as we deem appropriate.”

Anglican Mainstream: “The California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists (CAMFT) considers a proposal to deny membership to therapists and religious counselors who conduct Sexual Orientation Change Efforts (SOCE), and considers proclaiming SOCE to be unethical.” | NARTH

CCFON: “[David French], senior counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund, warned in his comments on the decision that this could leave unpopular student groups vulnerable to a takeover from those who do not agree with their beliefs.”

Dakota Voice: “[David French] has some helpful light to shed on this odd matter at the National Review. French is a senior counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund and the director of its Center for Academic Freedom, and the ADF was co-counsel for CLS, so he has considerable grasp of the case. He says this decision by the SCOTUS majority ignores an important reality (perhaps all reality?): ‘Distinct student organizations exist at the whim of the majority. If “all comers” can join, then the majority can override the speech of any student group. Thus the true marketplace of ideas exists by the permission (or, more likely, apathy) of the majority.’”

OneNewsNow: “Alliance Defense Fund has filed a lawsuit over a ban against a pro-life effort in Stayton, Oregon. … ‘He went to the police station and had a long conversation with some police officials there,’ [Jonathan Scruggs] accounts. ‘The police officials basically said, “We don’t allow any signs that are offensive, and your signs with the images of aborted fetuses are offensive. Therefore, we’re going to prevent them from being displayed, and we’re going to prevent your speech.”‘” | ADF News Release

Statesman Journal: “An Oregon man has filed a lawsuit in federal court against the city of Stayton for allegedly violating his right to display anti-abortion signs featuring images of aborted fetuses. … ‘Pro-life advocates shouldn’t be kept from expressing their beliefs simply because city officials or others may oppose their viewpoint or find it offensive,’ ADF Senior Counsel [Nate Kellum] said in a statement.” | ADF News Release

“Underlying the court’s reasoning is a dangerous view of the enormous breadth of government power. In the court’s eyes, students who want to meet in empty classrooms (rooms their tuition and tax dollars pay for) are receiving a government benefit, not exercising a fundamental right. In the court’s eyes, these ‘benefits’ (broadly defined) can be made contingent on forcing citizens to surrender their most basic liberties. … Not only is the court’s decision to equate the defense of fundamental rights with a quest for ‘special rights’ legally suspect, it has a pernicious effect in the public square.”

LifeSiteNews: “Several conservative groups say they consider the decision a major threat. These include the Family Research Council (FRC), which called the outcome ‘a massive defeat for religious freedom.’ … Yet other organizations appeared to disagree that the case would do much damage: the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), which helped defend the Christian group, said that the decision effectively upheld ‘an unusual university policy that forces student groups to allow outsiders who disagree with their beliefs to become leaders and voting members.’ … ADF Senior Legal Counsel [Gregory S. Baylor] added that the decision ‘doesn’t settle the core constitutional issue of whether nondiscrimination policies in general can force religious student groups to allow non-believers to lead their groups.’” | ADF News Release

Charisma News Online: “‘This is the first time in U.S. history where the Supreme Court has actually ruled that gender rights now trump religious rights, which means this is the beginning of the possible coming harassment and persecution of the church because it’s going to be clear that the true church will take a stand only on the Word of God,’ Engle, founder of TheCall prayer movement, said today. … ‘The Hastings policy actually requires CLS to allow atheists to lead its Bible studies and the College Democrats to accept the election of Republican officers in order for the groups to be recognized on campus,’ said [Gregory S. Baylor], an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund who is representing CLS.” | ADF News Release

Baptist Press: “A public university may deny a Christian organization official recognition under an uncommon policy that requires groups to accept all students as members regardless of their beliefs, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Monday. … David French, senior counsel for Alliance Defense Fund, wrote, ‘There’s no doubt that the decision is disappointing to those who cherish free speech and free association, but it is far more limited than it could have been.’”

San Diego News Network: “‘The court did not adjudicate whether the application of nondiscrimination policies to a religious student group is constitutional,’ [Gregory S. Baylor], senior legal counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal organization, told the LAT.” | ADF News Release

Florida Baptist Witness: “[David French], senior counsel for Alliance Defense Fund, wrote, ‘There’s no doubt that the decision is disappointing to those who cherish free speech and free association, but it is far more limited than it could have been.’”

The Hill: “The executive director of West Virginia’s Republican Party said Monday afternoon that the party is ‘examining its legal options’ after it was announced that there will be no special election this year to fill the seat of Sen. Robert Byrd (D), who passed away early Monday morning.”

Rasmussen: “A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that 31% oppose such drilling, and 20% more are not sure about it.”

“‘In Christian Legal Society, the Supreme Court definitively held that sexual orientation is not merely behavioral, but rather, that gay and lesbian individuals are an identifiable class,’ wrote Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher partner Theodore Boutrous Jr. in a letter (.pdf) to Chief Judge Vaughn Walker.”

State high court unanimously thwarts attack on marriage amendment adopted by voters

“Ominously, Justice Sonia Sotomayor joined the Breyer dissent – contradicting what she told the U.S. Senate and the American people last summer.”

The video is here.