House Committee Passes Bad Bill Permitting No-Fault Divorce in Arkansas

On Tuesday the House Judiciary Committee passed H.B. 1697 by Rep. Ashley Hudson (D – Little Rock), Rep. Andrew Collins (D – Little Rock), and Sen. Greg Leding (D – Fayetteville).

This bad bill permits no-fault divorce in Arkansas.

Under current law, couples in Arkansas can divorce in cases such as infidelity, abuse, following a lengthy separation, and other circumstances.

H.B. 1697 would permit divorce due to irreconcilable differences, discord, or conflict of personalities regardless of if the husband or wife is at fault.

Arkansas already has a high divorce rate. We should pass laws encouraging people to stay married rather than making it even easier to end marriages in our state.

The bill now goes to the entire Arkansas House of Representatives for consideration.

No-Fault Divorce Legislation Filed

On Thursday Rep. Ashley Hudson (D – Little Rock), Rep. Andrew Collins (D – Little Rock), and Sen. Greg Leding (D – Fayetteville) filed H.B. 1697.

This is a bad bill permitting no-fault divorce in Arkansas.

Under current law, couples in Arkansas can divorces in cases such as infidelity, abuse, following a lengthy separation, and other circumstances.

H.B. 1697 would permit divorce due to irreconcilable differences, discord, or conflict of personalities regardless of if the husband or wife is at fault.

Arkansas already has a high divorce rate. We don’t need to pass laws making it even easier to get a divorce.

Instead of passing laws helping people end their marriages, what if we took steps to encourage couples to work through their differences? Wouldn’t policies like that do more to help families than no-fault divorce legislation?

Read The Bill Here.

Justices Thomas and Alito Speak Out on Obergefell and Religious Freedom

John Stonestreet, Radio Host and President of the Colson Center for Christian Worldview.

On the first day of its new term, the Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal from Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk who refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples following the Obergefell decision, which mandated same-sex marriage on the nation..

Justices Thomas and Alito, while agreeing with the court’s denial of appeal, issued a remarkable accompanying opinion stating bluntly that Obergefell has had “ruinous consequences for religious liberty.”

Because of Obergefell, wrote the Justices, believers in traditional marriage are easily labeled “bigots, making their religious liberty concerns that much easier to dismiss.”

It’s a conflict putting lives and livelihoods at risk, and it must be addressed.

Or, as Justices Thomas and Alito put it: “By choosing to privilege a novel constitutional right [to same-sex marriage] over the religious liberty interests explicitly protected in the First Amendment… the Court has created a problem that only it can fix.”

Sounds like a gauntlet has been thrown.

Copyright 2020 by the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. Reprinted from BreakPoint.org with permission.