Daily Archives: April 27, 2011

PrideSource: Students at the University of Michigan’s Law School are protesting the selection of their commencement speaker, Ohio Senator Rob Portman, because of his opposition to gay rights.

More than half of 750-plus government-run facilities have changed policies as result of ADF letters sent nationwide

LifesiteNews: Costa Rica must legalize in vitro fertilization or face penalties for alleged violations of human rights protected by international law, according to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

The Republican-controlled state legislature handed Daniels a huge victory Wednesday when the House voted 55-43 to give final approval to a bill creating the voucher program that would allow even middle-class families to use taxpayer money to send their children to private schools.

WorldNetDaily: The first U.S. Congress passed a law that began to define “natural born.” The Naturalization Act of 1790 rejected the condition of being born on U.S. soil and referred only to parentage: “The children of citizens of the United States, that may be born beyond sea, or out of the limits of the United States,” the Act states, “shall be considered as natural born citizens: Provided, that the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never been resident in the United States.”

Family Research Council: Yesterday, the Weekly Standard got its hands on a series of internal emails from the HRC, and it seems the group has been strong-arming U.S. law firms for a month, warning them to take the DOMA case at their peril.

Telegraph: Islamic fundamentalism is being allowed to flourish at universities, endangering national security, MPs and peers say.

Boston Globe: A New Jersey Islamic group is suing a town it says changed zoning regulations to prevent the opening of a mosque.

ADF attorney Steven Aden writes at LifeNews: By ignoring a tidal wave of legal authority that insists that unborn children are valuable and worthy of legal protection, CRR and Planned Parenthood may be setting themselves up to lose the war of public support, even if they win the next battle in the courts. And because law follows public opinion, Roe cannot stand when the ground of public support for – or acquiescence in – abortion on demand has eroded away underneath it.

Christian Institute: “Islamic clerics could be sitting next to Anglican bishops in the House of Lords as David Cameron studies plans for a multi-faith reform of the upper chamber. The move is being considered in response to calls to make the House of Lords entirely secular.”

LifeNews: Carol Tobias has been elected the new president of the National Right to Life Committee, one of the leading pro-life voices in the nationwide battle against abortion, euthanasia and anti-life bioethics practices like human cloning and embryonic stem cell research. Tobias sat down with Kathryn Lopez of National Review for a new interview, an excerprt of which appears below . . .

Reuters: Research scientists hit out on Wednesday at a European Court of Justice (ECJ) case they say could block development of embryonic stem cell-based therapies in Europe.

MLIve.com:Should city officials allow prayer events to be publicized through government mailings?
That is the question one Metro Detroit municipality is facing after being confronted by the nation’s “largest atheist/agnostic association.”

CFNews13.com: A house joint resolution that would ban public funding of abortion has passed in the Florida House of Representatives. CS/HJR 1179 passed by a vote of 82 to 3

National Review: DeMint spokesman Wesley Denton reiterated the senator’s interest in the position in a statement: “This is where the big policy battles are taking place that will determine the future of our country . . . ”

Nicholas D. Kistof at the NY Times: In fact, human trafficking is more similar in America and Cambodia than we would like to admit. Teenage girls on American streets may appear to be selling sex voluntarily, but they’re often utterly controlled by violent pimps who take every penny they earn.

How Appealing links to the ruling in Gonzalez v. Abeytia, No. 08-17094.

Mercury News (AP): “A federal judge has set a June 13 hearing to consider arguments over whether last year’s ruling striking down Proposition 8 should be set aside because of allegations that the trial judge may have been biased.”

The Republic: Curriculum-based student clubs to meet at Clovis High School during the school day — a policy change the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico said raised concern because it was done at the same time students proposed forming a Gay Straight Alliance.

BBC: The Republican governor of Nevada has appointed Congressman Dean Heller to replace a US senator resigning over a probe into his affair with an aide.

World Net Daily: PAfter this morning’s surprise release by the White House of what it claims is Barack Obama’s long-form birth certificate, an author challenging Obama’s legal eligibility to be president – whose upcoming book has become a No. 1 bestseller a month before its release – summarizes his response to the day’s events in two words: “Obama blinked.”

KARE (includes video): On Tuesday they announced their intent to seek a constitutional amendment defining marriage as a union between one man and one woman. “We think it’s time to take it to the people,” said Rep.Steve Gottwalt, R-St. Cloud.

NewJerseyNewsRoom.com: Texas-based organization Life Always is being sued by New Jersey mother Tricia Fraser for using her 6-year-old daughter’s image on a billboard some people have called racist and offensive

Tennessean: A complaint made by American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee on behalf of three Sumner County families accuses the county school board of promoting Christianity in violation of the U.S. Constitution.

Jonathan Adler at the Volokh Conspiracy: According to some accounts, King & Spalding was persuaded to drop its representation of the House of Representatives in litigation over the Defense of Marriage Act due to pressure from one of the Atlanta-based firm’s largest clients: Coca-Cola. If this is true, it raises some interesting legal ethics questions that the good folks at the Legal Ethics Forum have been exploring . . .

Eugene Volokh has this post at the Volokh Conspiracy: Harvey Silverglate on the ACLU and Free Speech [Bumped to Include Response from ACLU’s Steve Shapiro, and Reply from ACLU Critic Wendy Kaminer].

Orin Kerr at the Volokh Conspiracy: One of the unfortunate aspects of the Paul Clement departure from King & Spalding — unfortunate, at least to me — is the extent to which it may signal a growing divide in Washington appellate practices between “conservative” firms and “liberal” ones . . .

Baptist Press: Attorneys for the Alliance Defense Fund, Cooper and Kirk, and the Law Office of Andrew Pugno are representing ProtectMarriage.com.

Christian Examiner: The Alliance Defense Fund, which has several attorneys working on the case, said Walker’s actions created an unfair playing field on several key points and should have “disqualified himself because an objective observer might reasonably have questioned his impartiality due to his 10-year-long same-sex relationship, his failure to disclose that relationship at the outset of the case, his failure to disclose whether he has any interest in marrying his same-sex partner, and his unprecedented and irregular actions throughout the lawsuit.”

Reuters Legal: For the proponents of the ban: Charles Cooper, David Thompson, Howard Nielson, Nicole Moss and Peter Patterson of Cooper and Kirk; Andrew Pugno of the Law Offices of Andrew P. Pugno; Brian Raum and James Campbell of the Alliance Defense Fund.

California Catholic Daily:
The ProtectMarriage.com legal team, including Alliance Defense Fund attorneys, explain . . . “The American people have a right to a fair judicial process, free from even the appearance of bias or prejudice,” said Andy Pugno, general counsel for ProtectMarriage.com and one of more than 2,000 attorneys in the ADF alliance. “Judge Walker’s 10-year-long same-sex relationship creates the unavoidable impression that he was not the impartial judge the law requires. He was obligated to either recuse himself or provide full disclosure of this relationship at the outset of the case. These circumstances demand setting aside his decision.”

St. Petersburg Times: With budget talks between the House and Senate strained, Senate budget chief J.D. Alexander extended an olive branch to House Speaker Dean Cannon on Monday: committee passage of Cannon’s overhaul of the Florida Supreme Court.

AP: “The bottom line is this case, from our perspective, is and always will be about the law and not about the judge who decides it,” Jim Campbell, a lawyer with the Christian legal defense group Alliance Defense Fund, told The Associated Press in August.

San Francisco Chronicle: Will a circumcision ban in San Francisco make, um, the final cut and appear before voters this November?

ADF attorney Doug Napier on the Hugh Hewitt Show.| MP3 audio 5:39 mins | Decision Points: An Evening with George W. Bush | Thousands of children’s educations saved at U.S. Supreme Court | Victory for academic freedom: 4th Circuit says professor’s speeches, columns protected by First Amendment

ADF attorney Jim Campbell appeared on the Zeb Bell Show to discuss the Utah Highway Patrol Cross Memorials. | MP3 audio 14:43 mins

Catholic Culture: An effort to amend the Act of Settlement, which bars any Roman Catholic from succession to the British throne, was blocked by an intervention from the Church of England, the London Daily Telegraph reports.

NY Times: Strange as it sounds, groups representing atheists and secular humanists are pushing for the appointment of one of their own to the chaplaincy, hoping to give voice to what they say is a large — and largely underground — population of nonbelievers in the military.

SCOTUS Blog previewed the argument here and summarizes the argument here. | Nevada Comm. on Ethics v. Carrigan, 10-56 . . .

AP: One in four children in the United States is being raised by a single parent – a percentage that has been on the rise and is higher than other developed countries, according to a report released Wednesday.

AP: Entrepreneurs could face new challenges under a government plan to modernize Chinese industry that would expand the dominance of state companies in coal mining, steel and other fields.

AP: A lesbian cadet who resigned from West Point last year has been rejected for readmission to the academy even as the military moves toward repealing its “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.

AP: China will maintain the strict family planning policy it imposed a generation ago to keep the birth rate low and the economy growing, President Hu Jintao said in remarks before new census data are released.

AP: When she initially pitched the idea for Thailand’s first lesbian movie, it was quickly shot down. Producers called the premise distasteful and said movie viewers would find the story line disgusting.

A lawsuit in which Planned Parenthood was recently found to have violated an Ohio informed consent law has been “resolved and dismissed,” according to the Alliance Defense Fund allied attorney who filed the suit.

AP: The text of President Barack Obama’s remarks Wednesday about the release of his long-form birth certificate, as provided by the White House . . .

Unable to win passage of same-sex marriage legislation this year, Rhode Island’s openly gay House Speaker Gordon D. Fox has thrown his support to civil unions.

IndyStar.com: “An attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund, which opposes abortion, issued a legal opinion Monday saying that cutting off funds to Planned Parenthood would not jeopardize Indiana’s Medicaid dollars.”

Real Clear Politics (video): Donald Trump tells the press they are protecting President Obama.

Education News: When the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights launched its investigation of Yale University based on a complaint of “a sexually hostile climate,” it also launched a national civility debate, the USA Today reports. Now, after a string of incidents at schools from Rutgers to UCLA, universities are launching efforts to bring common courtesy and professionalism back to college campuses.

AP: Montana’s state House and Senate have passed a bill aimed at slashing the number of medical marijuana users and eliminating large pot businesses in the state.

Delaware Online: Douglas Napier, senior attorney for the Alliance Defense Fund, which advocates for traditional marriage, was among those who spoke against the Delaware bill in Dover. He does not see strong protections for employees who do not want to be part of civil unions. ”It is forcing clerks in the state to violate their religious liberties and conscience to perform civil-union ceremonies if they are asked,” Napier said. “Constitutionally protected freedoms should never be threatened by politicians who are doing the bidding of a very small group of activists — and this is exactly what happened when the Legislature imposed this counterfeit marriage bill on Delaware.”

NCPA Policy Digest: Due to declining production at existing wells and bureaucratic delays on new wells in the Gulf of Mexico since the Deepwater Horizon oil rig blowout in 2010, the federal government is forfeiting revenues of more than $4.7 million per day.

Jim Campbell at the Speak Up Movement Church Blog: Last week, Americans United for Separation of Church of State accused the Alliance Defense Fund of working at “cross-purposes” by defending, in a petition recently filed with the U.S. Supreme Court, the Utah Highway Patrol Association’s secular use of roadside crosses to memorialize fallen troopers who died while serving the people of Utah. AU’s alleged outrage, its spokesperson claimed, stemmed from its unfounded assertion that the Alliance Defense Fund tried to “secularize [the] Christian symbol” of a Latin cross through its legal arguments.
But the truth is . . .

Russell Nieli at Public Discourse: While often hostile to the Calvinist Christianity in which he was reared, David Hume’s essay “Of Polygamy and Divorces” offers a vigorous and well-argued defense of marriage arrangements as they existed in England and many other parts of Europe from the early Middle Ages through most of the 18th century. His arguments have great relevance for us today as we struggle to cope with unprecedented rates of divorce and unprecedented ease of both entering into and exiting marriages and other intimate procreative relationships. His arguments against polygamy are also important as that practice seems to be undergoing something of a resurgence in parts of the southwest, with renewed interest in the popular culture.

Rasmussen: A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that only 11% of voters think the taxpayers are getting a good return on that investment. Seventy-two percent (72%) disagree and say taxpayers are not getting their money’s worth.

The Hill: The American Chamber of Commerce in China said in its annual report that there is an emerging pattern of Chinese industrial policies that favor domestic companies while stifling foreign competition, including regulations related to indigenous innovation, licensing, standards, government procurement, competition law and intellectual property enforcement.

The Hill: House Democrats have requested to review the contract between members of Congress and the lawyer that Republicans plan on hiring to defend the Defense of Marriage Act.

HSLDA: Members of HSLDA since 1998, the Pepperdins asked us for help. HSLDA Senior Counsel Scott Woodruff prepared a letter to the Cornell admissions department explaining that parent-issued diplomas satisfy all federal requirements for financial aid. He pointed out that no state imposes requirements on the parental issuance of high school diplomas, and urged them to quickly clear up the issue.

HSLDA: . . . On April 20, 2011, the Supreme Court of Mississippi ruled in favor of HSLDA’s motion and vacated the order by Judge Walker. HSLDA succeeded in protecting the privacy of homeschoolers from this flagrant misuse of judicial power and blatant violation of the separation of powers set up by the Mississippi and federal constitutions.

WorldNetDaily: The results are from a WND/WENZEL Poll conducted for WND by the public-opinion research and media consulting company Wenzel Strategies . . . It found that 65 percent of all respondents objected to teaching elementary school children that homosexuality is a “normal alternative lifestyle.”

Pacific Justice Institute: Attorneys for Pacific Justice Institute, who represented plaintiff and youth pastor Matthew Snatchko, noted, however, that the settlement is consistent with a California Court of Appeal decision last August that criticized the mall’s rules that attempted to limit consensual conversations between mall patrons. The court held in favor of Snatchko.

CNBC: The warning over the debt limit is the strongest yet to come from Wall Street, highlighting growing nervousness among investors about the US political system’s ability to forge a consensus on fiscal policy.

AZ Republic: Responding to critics’ relentless claims, President Barack Obama on Wednesday produced a detailed Hawaii birth certificate in an extraordinary attempt to bury the issue of where he was born and confirm his legitimacy to hold office. He declared, “We do not have time for this kind of silliness.”