Arkansas A.G. Stands Up for Religious Liberty

Religious Freedom, , ,

We have written repeatedly about states around the country trying to force bakers, photographers, florists, and others to participate in same-sex ceremonies despite these individuals’ religious convictions about marriage.

In many cases, states are alleging that declining to participate in a same-sex wedding runs afoul of the state’s civil or criminal anti-discrimination laws. One of the more high-profile cases involves Arlene’s Flowers in Washington State.

Yesterday Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge announced she was co-filing an amicus brief in support of Arlene’s Flowers. Below is a press release from her office.

LITTLE ROCK – Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge is leading a 13-state coalition in filing an amicus brief in the Supreme Court of the State of Washington, urging the court to protect the religious conscience rights of its citizens. The attorneys general believe this case has national implications and that similar cases may arise in their states.

“This country has a rich history of protecting the rights of conscience and the free exercise of religion,” said Attorney General Rutledge. “Unfortunately, these rights have recently come under a sustained and coordinated assault even though they are the very reason many came to this country in the first place. Along with my colleagues, I am urging the Washington Supreme Court to recognize that the actions of the defendant are not discriminatory or unlawful but rather reflect sincerely held religious beliefs that should be accommodated in our pluralistic and tolerant society.”

The case involves an owner of a flower shop (Ms. Barronelle Stutzman) who declined to create a floral arrangement for and oversee its placement at a same-sex wedding based on her religious beliefs. She is being sued by the State of Washington under its discrimination law and unfair business practices act.

Stutzman has served this particular client for years, considered him a friend and remains willing to serve him in the future, but she simply believes based on her religious beliefs that she could not participate in and create a flower arrangement for the same-sex marriage.

The attorneys general conclude in their brief that “Our history encourages a public square with many voices, all trying to persuade others of their views. But Respondents want all the voices either to agree on one view or to be silent. Because that runs counter to America’s history of free speech and religious exemptions — which are embedded in Washington’s Constitution — Amici respectfully urge this Court to rule in Appellants’ favor.”

Arkansas is joined in filing by attorneys general from Alabama, Arizona, Louisiana, Nebraska, Nevada, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, Utah and West Virginia and the governors of Kansas and Kentucky.

We applaud Attorney General Rutledge and her office for taking a stand for religious liberty and rights of conscience.

You can read the amicus brief here.

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Heritage Foundation: Gender Politics Force Judge to Fight for Her Job

Marriage,

My_Trusty_GavelOur friends at the Heritage Foundation have highlighted a case unfolding in Wyoming that has a judge fighting for her job–simply because of her traditional views on marriage.

In 2014 Judge Ruth Neely was interviewed about “administrative challenges of the recent legalization of same-sex marriage in Wyoming.”

Heritage Foundation writes,

The result of the interview Dec. 5, 2014, was a relatively short newspaper story, but it sparked an investigation of Neely’s fitness for office. A year and a half later, she is asking the Wyoming Supreme Court not to remove her from two separate judgeships—nor to enforce a fine of up to $40,000.

All this without a local citizen filing a complaint against the judge, who is active in her Lutheran church, and without her ever being asked to officiate at a same-sex wedding.

You can read the full story here.

Photo Credit: By Brian Turner (Flickr: My Trusty Gavel) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

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Federal Officials Stumping for Transgender Agenda in Commencement Addresses

Transgender, , ,

Vanita_GuptaWe have written extensively about government overreach in the areas of education and public health; the Obama Administration is reinterpreting federal laws to force schools to let biological males who claim to be female use girls’ restrooms and locker rooms at school. The administration also is forcing hospitals and doctors to offer “gender transition” services–something that flies in the face of many doctors’ professional and conscientious convictions.

In between all of this, federal officials also have been stumping in favor of gay and transgender activists at school graduations.

The head of the federal Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, Vanita Gupta, told New York University School of Law graduates on May 19,

And we see this gap [between what laws guarantee and what people experience] in efforts to deny LGBTI individuals – especially transgender men and women – the respect they deserve and the protection our laws guarantee.  And let me add this – efforts like House Bill 2 in North Carolina [requiring people to use  public restrooms corresponding to the sex listed on their birth certificates] not only violate the laws that govern our nation, but also the values that define us as a people.

Earlier, on May 14, she told University of Minnesota Law School graduates,

Even after the Supreme Court’s landmark gay marriage decision last year in Obergefell v. Hodges that guaranteed all people ‘equal dignity in the eyes of the law,’ we see new efforts to deny LGBTI individuals the respect they deserve and the protection our laws guarantee.  And let me add this – efforts like House Bill 2 in North Carolina [requiring people to use  public restrooms corresponding to the sex listed on their birth certificates] not only violate the laws that govern our nation, but also the values that define us as a people.

On Monday, May 16, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch gave the commencement address at the University of Pennsylvania School of Law, in which she said,

[F]rom Bunker Hill to Appomattox and from Seneca Falls to Selma; from the Emancipation Proclamation to the 19th Amendment and from the civil rights laws of the 1960s to Obergefell v. Hodges [which legalized same-sex marriage nationwide] – we have won these and so many other victories only because people of good will and moral conviction refused to stand aside when there was more to be done.

U.S. Attorney General Lynch’s words effectively equate the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to nullify state marriage laws nationwide with the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, and Assistant Attorney General Gupta seems to think it is patently un-American to believe men should use the men’s room and women should use the women’s room.

In the eyes of this administration letting people use the restroom of their choice is not some minor issue; it is a civil right. That comes as a surprise to many people, considering the many other problems plaguing the world today, but these officials’ words and actions seem to be clear indicators of the federal government’s priorities.

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