Words mean things.
Problem solved.
FReegards!
Nathan Deal, governor of Georgia, says this can’t happen.
Our minister decided many years ago that he would not perform any weddings after beginning to see the writing on the wall. The church board decided shortly thereafter that they would not allow the church to be used for any type of community events.
Words mean things.
Problem solved.
FReegards!
Eh? That would be as absurd as forcing a Catholic charity to pay for abortions!
Progressives celebrate the "civil right movement" as their great victory and they are right about that - it caused the ascendency of the state over the individual.
This morning C-SPAN re-ran a talk George Will gave at the University of Illinois last month. I realize a lot of people on this forum have a low opinion of Will but it was a very good talk--ostensibly about Lincoln's reaction to the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 but ranging widely. He traced a lot of the bad developments to the Progressive Era and even further back to the "Slaughterhouse" decision of 1873. The courts have allowed cartels to deprive people not in the cartel of fundamental rights.
Two examples from Louisiana were (1) a black woman who had a talent for flower arrangements and was selling them through a grocery store until a state regulatory commission forced her to stop because she lacked a license for flower arranging (and didn't have the ability to get a license), so she died in poverty and (2) the case of the monastery that wanted to sell plain wooden caskets but was prevented by a regulatory agency (9 or 10 members of which were funeral directors) which requires anyone in the state who wants to sell caskets to earn 30 hours of credit to learn embalming and serve a year's apprenticeship--the monks had no desire to operate a funeral home or practice embalming, just to sell the caskets. This is what is called "rent seeking" and it is very widespread thanks to the courts.
"The First Amendment states, “Congress shall make no laws respecting the establishment of religion of prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Of course, the wording informs that this constrains only Congress — the federal government’s lawmaking body — not state governments [emphasis added]. But since the “Theory of Incorporation” (a judge-spawned rationalization) has applied the above to the states and, more significantly for the principled, since most if not all state constitutions offer the same religious protections, this isn’t relevant to our discussion here."
Regarding the, “not state governments” language above, it’s astonishing that the article did not mention the following clause emphasized below in the 14th Amendment (14A), the clause limiting the state governments concerning constitutional rights.
14th Amendment, Section 1: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States [emphasis added]; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
Note that 14A now limits the states with respect to regulating all constitutionally enumerated rights, whereas Congress is prohibited from regulating 1st Amendment-protected rights.
Also, regarding tho so-called, “theory of incorporation,” please note the following. The congressional record shows that John Bingham, the main author of Section 1 of 14A, had clarified that 14A applies all constitutionally enumerated personal protections to the states, not just those listed in the Bill of Rights. So I surmise that the Court’s theory of incorporation is a myth concocted by some bored justices.
"Mr. Speaker, that the scope and meaning of the limitations imposed by the first section, fourteenth amendment of the Constitution may be more fully understood, permit me to say that the privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States, as contradistinguished from citizens of a State, are chiefly defined in the first eight amendments to the Constitution of the United States." — John Bingham, Appendix to the Congressional Globe (See top half of 2nd column.)
Noting that the states have never amended the Constitution to expressly protect so-called LGBT rights, we’re seeing the high cost of low-information citizens with religious convictions not knowing their 14A protections.
More specifically, misguided, low-information, pro-gay activist state officials are wrongly using non-constitutionally enumerated gay “rights” to trump constitutionally enumerated rights, 1st Amendment-protected freedoms of religious express and speech in these cases.
The most disturbing part of what’s happening currently is the fact that the court has ordered mandatory “re-education” for those who ran the bakery.
I used to believe that sort of thing would only happen in a banana republic, or a country with an authoritarian government.
Oh, I guess it is after all.
Mark
What if they push this idea, and sue the Catholic Church for refusing to marry a "gay" couple. Will the Catholic Church have to forego any marriages, because they won't marry "gays"?
Think that day will never come? Who would have thought 30-50 years ago bakeries would be threatened with prison for not baking a wedding cake for homos? Or that there would be homosexual "marriages" period?