Tag Archives: Topic: Department of Justice

Lyle Denniston at Constitution Check: Article II, defining the “executive power” of the national government, says that the president “shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” But the Constitution itself is obviously one of the laws undoubtedly within the president’s care, and the presidential oath makes that a binding duty. What does the occupant of that office do if legal advisers claim that a law passed by Congress is unconstitutional? Does it still get “faithfully” enforced?

Blog of the Legal Times: Although stopping short of urging the U.S. Supreme Court to hold that gay couples have a fundamental right to marriage, the Obama Administration brief in the California same-sex marriage case charts a legal path towards the eventual undoing of all state gay marriage bans, said a lawyer for the challengers to that state’s ban.

SCOTUS Blog: Here was the government’s key argument why the Golden State’s ban on same-sex marriage fails the constitutional test the administration suggested: ”California’s extension of all of the substantive rights and responsibilities of marriage to gay and lesbian domestic partners particularly undermines the justifications for Proposition 8.”

World Net Daily: President Obama, who simply said his administration would stop defending the federal Defense of Marriage Act because he doesn’t like it, has admitted in a court brief that the law that says for federal purposes only marriage between one man and one woman will be recognized is constitutional. That’s from the Alliance Defending Freedom, a premiere civil and religious rights legal team that analyzed the Obama team’s filings in a challenge now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. [more]

The U.S. Department of Justice filed a brief Friday with the U.S. Supreme Court inUnited States v. Windsor arguing, among other things, that the federal Defense of Marriage Act is unconstitutional, but only under “heightened constitutional scrutiny,” as described in this legal analysis.

ChristianNews.net: According to Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which is at the forefront of the cases currently before the court, attorney generals from 19 states have filed joint briefs with the Supreme Court in favor of marriage remaining between a man and woman, and at least four legal organizations discussed the religious liberty concerns that the legalization of homosexual “marriage” would raise.

Star Herald (AP): “There’s a critical mass of states that have spoken out and believe states should continue to have the right to define marriage as between one man and one woman,” said Jim Campbell, legal counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom, which represents supporters of Proposition 8. [This AP report is widely distributed]

Washington Post: “There’s a critical mass of states that have spoken out and believe states should continue to have the right to define marriage as between one man and one woman,” said Jim Campbell, legal counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom, which represents supporters of Proposition 8.

The Republic (AP): An abortion protester has agreed to stay 25 feet further away from the entrance to a Pittsburgh abortion clinic to settle a U.S. Justice Department lawsuit which claimed she pushed two volunteers who were escorting women into the downtown facility.

Jordan Lorence appeared on the Zeb Bell Show to discuss the the case and other issues. | MP3 audio 11:53 mins

Breitbart: Notice that the administration goes beyond its argument that businesses have no religious freedom rights. The DOJ says that even if a business did have rights to religious freedom, the HHS mandate is not really a “substantial” ethical dilemma, and, in a sense, the government can decide what is a “substantial burden” and what is not.

Townhall: The Obama Department of Justice has shown surprising indifference to religious liberty by declining to follow the DOJ’s earlier repeated support for the right of religious groups to meet for worship services in New York City public schools during non-school hours.

The Daily Caller: As a freshman at Columbia University in 1970, future Attorney General Eric Holder participated in a five-day occupation of an abandoned Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) headquarters with a group of black students later described by the university’s Black Students’ Organization as “armed,” The Daily Caller has learned . . . Holder was then among the leaders of the Student Afro-American Society (SAAS), which demanded that the former ROTC office be renamed the “Malcolm X Lounge.” . . .

National Review has embedded the video. Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez refuses to confirm that the DOJ will not take any action to outlaw criticism of any religion.

Blog of the Legal Times: Senate Republicans have concerns about something in the background of Justice Department nominee William Baer, and this week they are considering taking the unusual step of discussing them in secret.

Boston Globe (AP): Federal authorities have identified a southern California man once convicted of financial crimes as the key figure behind the anti-Muslim film that ignited mob violence against U.S. embassies across the Mideast, a U.S. law enforcement official said Thursday.