Daily Archives: January 16, 2012

News from The Associated Press: A Polish court slapped a fine on a popular singer who bad-mouthed the Bible.

In October 2011, the New Mexico Republican Party filed a lawsuit challenging the
constitutionality of New Mexico’s new state campaign finance laws.

StarTribune.com: After our second child was born, we talked about having a third child. I wasn’t ready to have another child at that time and told her so. Unfortunately, my wife forged my signature on the clinic paperwork for the embryo transfers and never told me.

The New American: Jordan Lorence of the Alliance Defense Fund, the legal advocacy group assisting NYC churches that are being displaced, said the city appeared to be using the ruling against the Bronx Household of Faith as justification to ban congregations from other public buildings, particularly in the case of the NYCHA, which had informed several churches meeting in community centers that their short-term leases were no longer valid. “They can’t use the Bronx Household case as some kind of all-purpose permission slip to banish private worship services from every public venue,” Lorence said of the city’s efforts.

EuropeNews: new resolution introduced at the United Nations Human Rights Council has free speech advocates concerned about a potential backlash against religious minority groups. Previously introduced as Resolution 62/154, “Combating defamation of religion,” the piece was originally written to criminalize the criticism of religion.

Nyasa Times: University students from several constituent colleges in Malawi have been called up to mull over an idea on the need for Malawi to liberalize laws on abortion which is currently restrictive. The call was made after a panel discussion on abortion held on Saturday in Lecture Theatre One at Malawi College of Medicine which was [...]”

Telegraph: Pakistan’s Supreme Court began contempt proceedings against the prime minister for failing to re-open a corruption case against the president in a step towards a much feared constitutional coup.

The Independent: Lord Wallace of Tankerness QC restated the UK Government’s view that the “Scottish Parliament has no power to deliver a referendum on independence”.

LifeNews.com: An eye-opening nationwide survey from research analyst Kevin Quinely to the Susan B. Anthony List reveals that the groups Planned Parenthood targets—namely those under the age of 35, blacks, and lower-income people—are the least likely to support their government funding.

The Washington Post: Another Gingrich supporter, Jim Garlow, pastor of a San Diego megachurch, agreed: “There was never a consensus. All the people I know of who came supporting Newt left supporting Newt.”

Mark Steyn at National Review: Whether or not that’s what Rick Santorum said, it’s certainly the case that “demographic winter” makes Europe’s troubles all but impossible to solve. As you have observed, demographic decline doesn’t have to be an existential threat. The population of my town in New Hampshire peaked in the 1820 census and then dropped steadily until 1940, and we survived it because (unlike the latter-day US and EU) we hadn’t erected a system of government that depended on looting the future to bribe the present.

Austin Ruse at LifeSiteNews.com: On the negotiating floor, I approached a Muslim ambassador and said, “This session is going all night long and its going to be very tough going. And when it gets really hard, I want you to know that right over there,” and I pointed to a section of raised seats off to the side, “twenty Christians will be praying for you.” That night this man was a tiger in defense of unborn children.

Liberty Counsel: Judge suspects conspiracy between Eric Holder’s DOJ and abortion clinic to violate pro-lifers’ First Amendment rights

Christian Newswire: Ave Maria School of Law (AMSL) announced today details for the first-ever “Law of Life Summit” to be held at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. on Saturday, January 21, 2012 at 4:00 PM.

Mark Steyn at National Review: On the other hand, facing a very different electorate in Iowa, Paul pulled pretty much an identical share of the poll. It may be time for those of us on the right to consider whether it’s not so much the conservative vote that’s split but whether conservatism itself is fracturing.

Boston.com: Officials have disciplined a student at Cranston High School West for making online comments against an atheist student who recently won a legal battle over a prayer banner that had been displayed at the school.

The Persecution Times: On Tanzania’s island of Zanzibar, in one week-long stretch last month Muslim extremists destroyed two church buildings, Christian leaders said

The Christian Institute: Britain’s Security Service, MI5, has been included in a lobby group’s top 100 employers for homosexuals for the first time.

Weekly Standard (includes video):On the Sunday before the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett visited Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta to give a political speech, in support of her boss (Barack Obama) and congressional Democrats . . .

Doug Farrow at Touchstone: Why fight same-sex marriage? Even in America, where the outcome is not yet decided, there appear to be good reasons not to. The optics are poor and the mandate seems uncertain. Prospects for victory appear slim. Resources that might be reserved for more important fronts—abortion, for example—are squandered in defense of an institution to which our modern urban society is no longer committed. Industrial economies, reprogenetic technologies, and new ideas of autonomy—not to speak of new moralities—have called into question many of the assumptions on which that institution has always been based.

ClickOrlando (includes video): “Gay advocates call for county-wide registry.”

Doctors Lounge: In the study in the January issue of the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics, 78 teens with lesbian mothers living in the United States took an online survey about their quality of life. The researchers compared these with surveys completed by teens with heterosexual parents. | Study available for purchase online – abstract here.

Jonathan Turley at The Washington Post: Even as we pass judgment on countries we consider unfree, Americans remain confident that any definition of a free nation must include their own — the land of free. Yet, the laws and practices of the land should shake that confidence.

MaltaToday.com.mt: GRM to present political parties with position paper on legal framework for gay marriages.

MercatorNet.com: However, not everyone in the US is as sure as the President that his administration “continues to stand with all who are denied the ability to choose, express, or live their faith freely”. Just the day before, an open letter signed by leaders of some of the largest religious communities in the country voiced their concern that religious freedom is at risk in America because of the campaign to change the definition and meaning of marriage.

CBC News: A fetus’s gender should not be revealed until after 30 weeks of pregnancy, says an editorial published in the Canadian Medical Journal. This change in procedure for a fetal ultrasound — where the sex is usually disclosed to parents at 20 weeks — would help prevent female feticide, says Rajendar Kale, editor in chief of the CMAJ.

JusticeNewsFlash Release: A new piece of proposed legislation is aiming to allow students to play on sports teams according to their “gender identity” and not their biological sex, as well as have access to sex-segregated locker rooms.

MyFoxPhoneix.com: Kay Vergnetti and her husband Angelo raised their four children — it was time to travel, see Europe and go on cruises, but that all came to a screeching halt. “She remembers everything that happened that night at the altercation..every single thing,” said Kay. Child Protective Services removed their granddaughter Courtney from her mother and father after a violent fight. She was only 2½ years old.

LifeSiteNews.com: Mexico City’s secretary of health is expressing alarm at the growing number of teen pregnancies in the metropolitan area, according to the city’s Reforma newspaper.

Washington Examiner: Virginia Republicans are moving swiftly to consolidate their newfound power in the General Assembly by revamping a committee that for years had been a black hole for conservative initiatives, most notably any legislation that would impose restrictions on abortion.

Russell Wheeler at Brookings Institute: Overall, from President Jimmy Carter’s administration to that of President George W. Bush, confirmation rates for circuit nominees have declined steadily (counting someone who was renominated in the same or different Congresses as a single nominee). District nominees’ confirmation rates, though, have hovered around the 90 percent mark (President George H.W. Bush’s district judge figures are misleading +).

LA Times: Two principals targeted in MySpace attacks suspended the involved students, who sued on grounds of free speech and won. The issue has now been taken to the high court.

The Volokh Conspiracy: The National Law Journal reports on a recent panel at the AALS conference on the need for changes in legal education. Readers will recall that Judge Cabranes also spoke at the same conference on the same topic, and he urged a return to traditional doctrinal classes and a reduction in “law and” classes.

Guardian.co.uk: Last year the Church of England published a legal opinion that makes it quite clear that it believes it is legal to discriminate against John, not because he is gay, since he is also celibate, but because he is not in the least bit ashamed of being gay. That is what sticks in the craw of the conservative evangelicals who oppose him.

POLITICO.com: Think the Supreme Court is where the future of President Barack Obama’s health care law will be settled? Think again. The real verdict on the future of Obama’s signature achievement will come in November . . .

Religion Clause: In Malaysia yesterday, an appeals court held that civil courts have jurisdiction to hear a case brought by a woman who is challenging the validity of her conversion to Islam as a child.

Religion Clause: In Franks v. Nebraska, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2829 (D NE, Jan. 10, 2012), a Nebraska federal district court rejected a Title VII employment discrimination claims by a correctional officer who was not permitted to carry a pocket-sized Bible while at work in the Omaha Correctional Center.

William Saunders The Federalist Society Engage Volume 12, Issue 3, November 2011: Religion can be an intensely personal activity. However, the idea that religion is only a private, personal devotion with no public political consequences is relatively new. For many nations in Europe, religion, in particular Catholicism, exerted an important influence over government and politics for centuries. The remnants of this influence still remain in anthems, oaths, and ideologies, not to mention architecture. However, with the rise of an ideology of “strict separation of church and state” in the European Union and the Council of Europe, it has been unclear how countries may incorporate their religious influences and histories into public life and expression. The case of Lautsi v. Italy in the European Court of Human Rights illustrates this struggle between secular ideology and religious faith and affiliation in the European context. The ultimate decision in the case acknowledges that “freedom of religion” need not result in, as the late Richard John Neuhaus put it, the naked public square.1

Feinberg, Jessica, Exposing the Traditional Marriage Agenda (January 9, 2012). Northwestern Journal of Law and Social Policy, Forthcoming. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1982025

The success of a social justice movement, especially with regard to issues upon which the public will be voting, depends in significant part on how the issues are defined or framed. Anti-same-sex marriage campaigns frequently urge voters to vote in favor of laws defining marriage as between a man and a woman in order to “protect traditional marriage.” Instead of framing the issue as a question of whether individuals of the same sex should be banned from marrying, anti-same-sex marriage campaigns often frame the issue as a question of whether traditional marriage should be protected from redefinition. This strategy has proven successful for anti-same-sex marriage campaigns. However, same-sex marriage opponents rarely have been challenged with regard to the meaning of “traditional marriage.” In exploring the history of marriage within the United States, it becomes clear that, contrary to the understanding of the term held by the general public, traditional marriage consists of much more than opposite-sex spouses. The requirements of traditional marriage also include permanence, gender roles, monogamy, and procreation. As it turns out, the leading anti-same-sex marriage organizations are well aware of these other requirements of traditional marriage and do a significant amount of work to protect them – work about which the public remains largely unaware. This Article argues that exposing the true meaning of traditional marriage and the leading anti-same-sex marriage organizations’ efforts to protect the other requirements of traditional marriage would be a helpful strategy for pro-same-sex marriage campaigns. Specifically, it would give same-sex marriage proponents an effective response to the argument that people should vote against same-sex marriage in order to protect traditional marriage and provide pro-same-sex marriage campaigns with a compelling new way to frame the issue.

Religion Clause: In India last week, the Delhi High Court, in response to a complaint about the noise from loud speakers at a temple and a mosque, placed limits on use of sound amplification by houses of worship.

News from The Associated Press: The number of Internet users in China has surged past 500 million as millions of new Web surfers go online using mobile phones and tablet computers, an industry group reported Monday.

News from The Associated Press: Top parties in Egypt’s incoming parliament are picking an Islamist as speaker for the first time.

NCPA Policy Digest: Cancer patients on Medicaid survive less time after their diagnosis than people with private or no insurance, data from Ohio show.

NOLA.com: Although charter schools continue to dwarf vouchers in terms of overall growth, voucher programs have rebounded on the national political and educational scene in the past year. In 2011, more than 30 states introduced bills that would use taxpayer dollars to send children to privately run schools, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. That’s up more than 300% from the previous year, when only nine voucher bills were introduced.

Washington Post: A judge upheld Indiana’s school voucher law on Friday, rejecting opponents’ arguments that the largest such program in the nation unconstitutionally uses public money to support religion. | Meredith v. Daniels (Ind. Super. Ct. (Marion Co.) Jan. 13, 2012)

OneNewsNow.com: While supporters of Newt Gingrich acknowledge Rick Santorum won the support of most evangelicals attending a weekend meeting in Texas, they say their candidate still has some important pro-family leaders in their camp.

Christian Civic League of Maine: According to a St. Michael’s School official, over 500 people—along with Governor Paul LePage—gathered at Maine Right to Life’s annual “Hands Around the Capitol” pro-life rally on Saturday. The group then walked from the school’s auditorium to the Capitol building where they joined hands and listened as bells tolled for the millions of babies killed by abortion.

ADF Attorney Steven Aden at Townhall Conservative: The basic components of a choice are easiest understood as a selection of one option out of the two or more options that are presented at any given time. Often choices are simple: vanilla or rocky road, for example. But sometimes they are difficult, especially if the choice in view carries life-altering—and perhaps even life-ending—consequences. One thing, however, is for sure—when only one avenue or one side is presented there is no real choice to be made.

One News Now: Jeremy Tedesco of the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) says the Clinton administration was the first to send religious guidelines to thousands of public schools. “Every administration since then has also re-promulgated them essentially, and they’re really great guidelines for school districts on what is allowed,” he notes. [more]

ParagouldDailyPress.com: Noble said he had not responded to the letters pending legal advice. He said the Rutherford Institute and Liberty Counsel had volunteered to help the school district in the matter and the Alliance Defense Fund had sent a list of court cases that might be applicable to the situation.

Alaska Dispatch: The ADF also notes that the current exemption “does not even adequately protect religious organizations.” “Rather than exempting all acts of a religious organization, the exemption only applies when the challenged conduct is ‘reasonably calculated to promote the religious principles for which it is established or maintained,’” the ADF observes. “This type of exemption requires courts to determine whether the challenged conduct is sufficiently connected to the organization’s religious mission.” This will require judges to “evaluate sensitive religious matters outside their legitimate scope of authority,” the ADF adds

CNN (includes video): Jordan Lorence, an attorney from the Alliance Defense Fund, which has been fighting the policy for two decades, said that all legal avenues had been exhausted and that the only way to stop the ban was for Bloomberg to use his executive authority to change the Board of Education policy and allow religious groups to rent space in public schools. “We benefit the community. Why can’t we meet like everybody else? Why do you think that empty school buildings are better than having churches that are helping poor people that are helping people get off drugs, get out of crime and tutoring students of all faiths?”

LifeSiteNews: “He said this isn’t a case of religious liberty, which is simply not true,” Jim Campbell, who represented the resort and serves as litigation staff counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), told LifeSiteNews.com. “What this case involves at its core is the rights of a religious group to use its property in a way that is consistent with its religious beliefs.” Campbell said most people will find Metzger’s belief that the state can force a religious facility to violate its conscience “a very scary concept. If that is a principle of the law, then essentially the government can cast aside religion if it deems something more important.” Campbell called Metzger’s ruling “an error of Constitutional law.”

Prof Life Blogs: Today, on behalf of the adult stem researchers it represents, the Jubilee Campaign’sLaw of Life Project and their co-counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund and Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, filed their opening Appellants’ Brief asking the United States Court of Appeals to “reverse the district court’s judgment in favor of Defendants, reverse the grant of Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment and the denial of [Appellants'] Motion for Summary Judgment, and remand with directions to enter summary judgment for [Appellants].”

Examiner.com: However the response was: “The government should not be able to force a private Christian organization to use its property in a way that would violate its own religious beliefs,” said Jim Campbell, a litigation staff counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund. “Religious groups have the right to use their private property in a way that is consistent with their beliefs. That right, protected by both the New Jersey and U.S. constitutions, obviously trumps any law enacted by the state’s legislature.”

Manasquan.patch.com: When asked if they would appeal the decision, the association’s attorney, Jim Campbell, of the Alliance Defense Fund based in Scottsdale, Ariz., said his client was discussing “all options.” Campbell added that he still believed that the association was on the right side of the law. “The government should not be able to force a private religious organization to use its property in a way that would violate its own beliefs,” Campbell said by telephone on Friday. “That’s why Ocean Grove is asserting its constitutional rights and that’s why Ocean Grove ultimately believes that the law is on its side.”

One News Now: Jim Campbell, an attorney representing the church, said the decision may be appealed. He said, “The government should not be able to force a private Christian organization to use its property in a way that would violate its own religious beliefs.”

DNAInfo.com: More than two dozen church leaders and supporters were arrested Thursday in The Bronx as they protested a ban on religious organizations using schools for worship services . . . “Is this going to be part of Michael Bloomberg’s legacy, he drove out churches?” asked Jordan Lorence, senior counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), a Christian organization that provides legal counsel to preserve religious liberties. “Why Is New York City the only large school district in the nation to have a policy against worship services in schools?”

Washington Times: It’s official: Congress ended its least-productive year in modern history after passing 80 bills — fewer than during any other session since year-end records began being kept in 1947.

Independent: It’s a girl, a film being released this year, documents the practice of killing unwanted baby girls in South Asia. The trailer’s most chilling scene is one with an Indian woman who, unable to contain her laughter, confesses to having killed eight infant daughters.

ABC News: Jon Huntsman will drop out of the Republican presidential race on Monday, a campaign spokesman told ABC News.

The list of petitions is here.