If you choose to play football, don’t yell “Foul!” when someone tackles you.

civil: taking away rights
uncivil: complaining about those rights being taken away

I feel like I’ve seen this movie before.

I like that NOW neither side should be subject to erroneous information. That didn’t seem to bother them while they were financing ads filled with lies and misinformation, like that Prop 8 would affect school curricula, churches would be forced to marry gay people, and the ever favorite, “they’re recruiting our children.”

their supporters, inspired by the Constitution, can call for the boycott of the state of Utah, where this hate was fomented and bankrolled.

Sigh… as a non-LDS resident of Utah who donated to No on 8, I agree that they can call for the boycott of Utah but I think it’s painting with a broader brush than is needed.

From the Post article linked above:

online groups formed telling people to boycott Utah—where more than 60 percent of residents are Mormons, the church says—

If the boycotters conflate “Utah” with “Mormon”, and even “Mormon” with “bigot”, since I have Mormon friends who also opposed Prop H8, they need to check their math.

Attacking the Church’s tax-exempt status seems like a more directly effective strategy to me. As much as fearing the taxes themselves, I imagine the Church is not thrilled about the possibility having to open their books.

So the Mormons and the Catholics are perturbed about the reaction to their ignorance?

Wahhhh.

In fact, dial 1-900-WAHHHHH for the Pity Line; only $29.95 every 30 seconds.

And Xecky’s right; these organizations wanted to get involved in politics, so they should pay to play just like everyone else.

The hypocricy is simply stunning.  You know, after they wrote that press release, they high-fived each other.

I cannot help but think that the LDS deciding to take a high profile stand in favor of Prop 8 was a horrendously bad move. The LDS is very conservative and very retrograde, but, at the end of the day, I think the impression many people have of them is, “The LDS may believe crazy things, but they are nice, kind people with stable families who all seem pretty happy.” Sure, they have a lot of missionaries all over the US and all over the world, but most people generally regard them as fairly harmless. They thrive because no one regards them or their beliefs as threatening. However, publicly injecting themselves into the Prop8 fight is going to make people think that the LDS isn’t so harmless and benign after all and are going to start wondering what other policies they’re going to start pouring money into supporting.

Tax churches that engage in politics.  Isn’t that the law already?  Enforcement anyone?  In the meantime, mock the religitards and laugh at them.

Here’s something I think you guys will enjoy.  It’s my first ever
online poll:

Why did God abandon Palin and the Republicans in 2008?
http://thetimchannel.com/?p=242

Enjoy.

I think the impression many people have of them is, “The LDS may believe crazy things, but they are nice, kind people with stable families who all seem pretty happy.”

Having lived among the LDS folks for 30 years, I can vouch for this, both as a common non-Mormon opinion of Mormons and as being generally accurate. However, I make a distinction between the Mormon rank and file and the Mormon leadership, who are a buch of ancient throwbacks. Their ideas are old-fashioned even taking into account when they were born. I think we’ll see some pushing back on the Prop H8 kind of blatant bigotry from the younger set.

Shorter LDS:

Years ago, the government told us what to do with our marriages.  And we were treated as pariahs.  Now it’s payback time!

While I actively loathe the activities of my former church (haven’t been a member officially for three years and had my name removed from the church rolls) I am slightly bummed that people are calling for boycotts of Sundance. Sundance aren’t even owned by Mormons. (Robert Redford was not LDS, last I heard.) As Xecky said, attacking Utah is a much wider brush than needed. The majority of Mormons don’t live in Utah, even though Utah is known for being the headquarters of the church. The church has over 10 million members. Utah has not quite three million people and only about 60% of those are LDS. And only about half of that number would have been active members. There is a very very large non-Mormon minority in the state, and putting pressure on them for the activities of the LDS church is unfair, because they may not have stood with the Mormons on this issue. Many of them are actively standing with GLBT folk in the protests. Salt Lake mayor, Rocky Anderson, was at the prop-8 protests in SLC the other day. The turnout for that protest was over 3000, from what I heard. (Which by Utah standards is a decent sized protest. Not a lot of protesting tends to happen there.)

While I don’t think the Utah-specific boycott is a good idea, I do think the protests are a good thing though, as they give faces to Prop 8. In fact, I think the presence of gays and their supporters is a good thing….whereas the absence, as shown by a boycott, would only increase the insular feelings Mormons in the heart of Mormonland feel. More protests, more positive action from the gay community, more seeing gays in action, seeing gay charities at work, seeing gay efforts, personalising the struggle…..all that will help more than disappearing and taking your tourism dollars with you. Because if they can’t see you, they remain smug and isolated in their little “I’m right and you’re wrong” bubble.

I’m just glad I left the church so when I tell people that I came from Utah, and they ask, “Are you a Mormon?” I can say, “Nope. Not any more.”

I definitely think the Church should recieve flak for their actions—this is not the first time, they’ve pulled shenanigans. They organised against the ERA during the last time it was up. But because of the psychology of the Church culture—wherein it’s been taught to every LDS kid that Mormons were persecuted for their beliefs from day one—I think that the more effective way to combat their beliefs is to show them people who are different from themselves on a regular basis instead of letting them isolate themselves.

There is a very very large non-Mormon minority in the state, and putting pressure on them for the activities of the LDS church is unfair, because they may not have stood with the Mormons on this issue.

Yup. Collective punishment is stupid, whoever’s doing it and for whatever reason.

While I don’t think the Utah-specific boycott is a good idea, I do think the protests are a good thing though, as they give faces to Prop 8. ... I think that the more effective way to combat their beliefs is to show them people who are different from themselves on a regular basis instead of letting them isolate themselves.

Totally agreed.

“Dear Gays,
  Your “love” is unnatural and a sin for which you will suffer eternal damnation. Your desire to wed destroys hetero marriage and endangers children.”

But:

No one on either side of the question should be vilified, harassed or subject to erroneous information.

The mind boggles.

Shorter LDS: We want the governement to stay out of our churches ... so we are going to tell our followers that they have to vote the way we tell them to!

The LDS were the only church group that I saw helping people after Hurricane Ike. The inner city churches had free meals and such, but most inner loop areas of Houston were up and running by Monday or Tuesday. The suburbs suffered much more and the only chrurch group that came out to my gf’s area were the Mormons. They came with chainsaws and rakes to clear out people’s yards. Too bad they didn’t have a salvage logging truck. I hated to see all that good lumber go to waste

Still, however nice they were, I don’t see why it’s wrong to protest in front of their churches.

Now that the precident is set, of removing civil right from targeted groups by initiative, I wonder how the Mor(m)ons would react to a proposition that removes some civil rights from LDS members.

The more those assholes bitch and moan, the more we know that somebody’s doing something right. Let’s hope the pressure can be ratcheted up until the pigs are really squealing.

And fuck the idiots who think there’s something wrong with targeting TAX-EXEMPT (i.e. stealing money from MY POCKET) obscurantist bullshit-purveying outfits that have been ILLEGALLY screwing up our politics for years. If the rank and file don’t like it, GOOD. Let them start pressuring the ringleaders to knock it off.

Look, America is a Christian nation, and the people have a right to have traditional Christian notions of marriage refelected in law.

And since the Mormon Church is a heresy, they shouldn’t be able to get married either.  Heresy is a far worse sin than sodomy.

It is disturbing that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is being singled out for speaking up as part of its democratic right in a free election.

Since when do Churches have a right to participate in politics?

Once again, we call on those involved in the debate over same-sex marriage to act in a spirit of mutual respect and civility towards each other. No one on either side of the question should be vilified, harassed or subject to erroneous information.

Yeah, sure.

“Proposition 8 is not against any group in our society. Its sole focus is on preserving God’s plan for people living upon this earth throughout time,”

Is even possible to violate the Establishment Clause more blatantly than this!?

Proposition 8 probably is unconstitutional, but the possiblilty of having it ruled that way by the Supreme Court seems remote since the court is packed with conservatives.  What would the Mormon’s and Catholic’s think if a group of gay organizations got together and put forward a proposition to deprive them of their civil rights?  There was a reason for the establishment clause, to keep religious groups from enforcing their beliefs on the rest of us.  Now the media seems determined to put the blame on African American voters and other minorities.  The blame belongs on the people who fought and paid to pass it.

You can find their names and organizations and amount of money they gave here:  http://www.californiansagainsthate.com/dishonorRoll.html

I’d like to reassert what other people have said here.  Boycotting Utah is tarring with a particularly large brush.  Going after Mormons in general is like tossing a brick through a Pakistani deli after 9/11.  Seriously guys.  Don’t let the herd mentality overtake you here.

Not all Mormons are bigots.  Not all people in Utah are Mormons.  Attacking a whole faith only makes more radicals out of moderates.  See Also: US Foreign Policy, 2002-2008.

I am all in favor of going after the bastards who made this happen as hard and as brutally as possible.  And I am all in favor of stripping the Mormons of tax-exempt status.  They routinely meddle in real estate, politics and media.  They have no business being treated as an entity outside of politics in the eyes of the IRS.  At this point they are a gigantic real estate, media and financial conglomerate that does a nice sideline in the God business. 

But do please try to learn something from Bush with regards to strategy, and how you deal with a religion that is mostly made up of quiet, nice people who love their families and their crazy conception of God and adorable kitties and don’t really approve of the radical elements that claim the same faith but might side with the radicals of their own faith if you try to turn this shit into a holy war.

Think about the Methodists.  John Edwards and Hillary Clinton are Methodists.  But so are George Bush and Dick Cheney, and, let’s say for the sake of argument, Gary Glitter.  Would you support a boycott on all Methodist-related businesses?

WTF? Wait a minute. Prop 8 just removed an existing right from one specific group of people. There’s no way to whitewash this. There’s no spin that takes away the fact that religious institutions that backed Proposition 8 did so because of their faith—interferering with the laws of California.

Some of you folks just dont get it. Speeking as a RC. We are not stoping you from marrying. We are only saying that if you do so…it can only be with a member of the opposite sex.  The Church has allways taught morality. The same morality that has be put into law for thousands of years. Now you guys in a misguided attempt at social justice wish to have the law approve of a behavior disorder. I am here to tell you we are not having it. You may fool yourselfs…but not us. We are shocked that not only do you chose to wallow in filth, but you ask us to approve of it.

The churches, Dana, certainly do have a right to participate in politics in any way they like. Thing is, they can’t do so while keeping their tax-exempt status.

Thing is, it’s not a violation of the establishment clause at all.  Basically, the establishment clause prevents the federal government from setting up a Church of the United States, or designating any existing church as the official state church.  But people are free to vote for whatever or whomever they choose, for whatever reasons they wish.  Proposition 8 concerned a secular, state regulation, on a subject that virtually nobody thinks is outside of the state’s purview.

If you pass a law with the reasoning that it’s banning something because God wants it banned, that’s establishing a religion as law.

There is a very very large non-Mormon minority in the state, and putting pressure on them for the activities of the LDS church is unfair, because they may not have stood with the Mormons on this issue.

A few of them stood up for equality. Most of them stood at the sidelines and didn’t do shit. Too bad if they feel it in their pocketbooks. Maybe then they’ll have the courage to stand up.

Yup. Collective punishment is stupid, whoever’s doing it and for whatever reason.

You are factually wrong. Economic divestment works.

Shorter Michael: “The Law, in all its justice and equality, forbids both rich and poor alike from living under bridges and begging for bread”.

Michael doesn’t think gay people are real. they’re lying, just like all those autistic kids Michael Savage claims are faking it.

We are shocked that not only do you chose to wallow in filth, but you ask us to approve of it.

We only ask that you Roman Catholics and Mormons stop using state power to discriminate against the United Church of Christ, Unitarian Universalists, Metropolitan Community Church, Reform Judaism, and the Episcopal Churches who want to provide equal marriage services to all the members of their congregations.

You DEMONcraps better not try and take the tax-free status of the LSD and the Roman Catholic Empire away simply because they’re political organizations that are trying to force non-believers to live according to their rules.  I mean, my church, The Reformed Aryan Church of Butte, really rakes in the cash baby.  It’s all good!

By pressing for same-sex marriage, you are, in effect, agreeing with the principle of state recognition of marriage—and that means you are tacitly agreeing with the right of the state to define marriage.

As though marriage wasn’t already subject to state regulation and definition.

Dana, there are more people who support civil gay marriage than those who support complete elimination of civil marriage. It’s just prudent to work toward the nearer goal.

No, sorry, but it isn’t.  You may believe that to be the case, but people may vote for anything or anyone, for any reasons they choose.  Proposition 8 concerns not an establishment of religion but a state law regulating a secular subject.

Indeed. I can vote for a candidate because my religion tells me to, and that’s within my rights. I can vote against a measure because my religion tells me to, and that’s my right. However, having an amendment on the books that enshrines into law a particular religious view - that gay people are second-class citizens - is a violation of the Establishment Clause.

Tell me, are there any secular reasons for H8 to be law?

“Look, America is a Christian nation, and the people have a right to have traditional Christian notions of marriage refelected in law.”

Phoenician in a time of Romans on 11/08 at 01:38 PM

Let me correct you right there. The United States is a secular nation, composed of a variety of different cultures and religions, not a theocracy. Christianity may currently be the majority religion, but it should have no role in politics.

From the source itself: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”—United States Constitution

If they had intended for the U.S. to be based on Christian principles, I think they would have mentioned it in there somewhere.

The founders themselves were ambivalent about religion in government:

“What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the civil authority; on many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have they been the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty may have found an established clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not.”—James Madison

“Is uniformity attainable? Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one half the world fools, and the other half hypocrites.”—Thomas Jefferson

Want more quotes? Here you go:

http://altreligion.about.com/library/texts/bl_foundersquotes.htm

A religion does not have the right to impose its views on others. Equality belongs to everyone, regardless of what some religions may like to believe.

Some of you folks just dont get it. Speeking as a RC. We are not stoping you from marrying. We are only saying that if you do so…it can only be with a member of the opposite sex.

So, Michael, you’d have accepted the argument put forward by the state of Virginia when their ban on interracial marriage was challenged? They said, you know, we’re not stopping anyone from marrying at all! White people can marry white people and black people can marry black people!

Oh, and Dana:

The state cannot prohibit you from finding a priest who would perform a ceremony uniting you and any other person—or persons—in holy matrimony, as long as you chose not to seek a state marriage license, register said marriage with the state, or claim such unregistered marriage as a legal status on a document such as a Form 1040.  But once you attempt to involve the state in the recognition of a marriage, that marriage becomes subject to state regulation.

True. But why do you think it’s OK, then, for same-sex couples do be denied the legal rights that opposite-sex couples have?

ArtOfMe: PIATOR was being sarcastic.

“ArtOfMe: PIATOR was being sarcastic.”

Rebecca on 11/08 at 02:38 PM

Ah. I haven’t been here long, guess I jumped the gun.

Well, we’ll just leave that standing in case some religious wingnut comes in here claiming the same thing.

Let me correct you right there.

PiaToR was playing, but that was a good post for any other reader who might actually hold that misunderstanding, ArtOfMe. Thanks.

Rebecca, Rebecca…..don’t you understand that the Declaration of Independence would shatter if we actually followed the “pursuit of happiness’ clause?

Silly LIEbrals.

Tell me, are there any secular reasons for H8 to be law?

We filthy faggots are yucky! Secularly yucky!

Next on the ballot: motion to ban your parents from having sex after you’re born.

Rebecca, it doesn’t matter what reasons people had for voting for Proposition 8; they had the right to do so if they chose.

1) You seem to misunderstand the issue, Dana (I know, you understand completely, but you pretend not to, for purposes of rhetoric). The Mormon church itself was using its money, collected through tax-exempt donations, to impose its religious will upon the state. That tax-exemption is granted on the condition that the church not involve itself in politics.

2) Your premise is wrong anyway. The reasons for making a law or policy can make the law itself unconstitutional. See Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District.

Rebecca, it doesn’t matter what reasons people had for voting for Proposition 8; they had the right to do so if they chose.

As I have already stated, you can vote for something for whatever religious or non-religious reason you want. If someone voted for Obama because Jesus told them to, more power to them. But you cannot make your particular religion the law. That is the point of the Establishment Clause.

Oh, also.

Your question implies that only Mormons and Catholics voted for P8, yet Pam own articles tell us that it received a heavy vote from blacks, few of whom are Catholic or Mormon.  It is almost certain that some of the people who voted for P8 are atheists!

Not at all. I’m quite sure that most of the pro-H8 people, like most people in this country, are Protestant. Like nearly all black people.

Tell me, are there any secular reasons for H8 to be law?

(I shouldn’t have said “most” are Protestant - but a majority of Americans are.)

I’ll just continue to repeat my question until you answer me.

Tell me, are there any secular reasons for H8 to be law?

Rebecca, I suppose that if you researched through the different Christian denominations, you’d find fair unanimity of view that people should not appear nude in public.  Nor can I think of a reason why a man walking down Santa Monica Boulevard stark naked would cause a specific injury to any specifiable person.  Yet I have never seen anyone (seriously) contend that laws against public nudity must be unconstitutional, and they certainly haven’t been ruled to be.

Without comment on whether anti-nudity laws should exist:

If the only reasons for the laws were religious in nature, they could be ruled unconstitutional because of that. See Kitzmiller v. Dover

Because a majority of the voters wanted Proposition 8 passed.  That’s the only reason required.

Also wrong. See Marbury v. Madison

we cannot prohibit people from having religious motives in passing regulations deemed appropriate to secular subjects.

True.  We can, however, forbid churches - as tax-exempt organizations - from using their money and authority to campaign for specific political causes.  Preaching against homosexuality is vile bigotry, but it counts as preaching the tenets of their church and as such falls within allowable parameters for their tax exemption.  Donating money to the campaign for Prop 8 and telling their followers how to vote makes them a political entity, and thus no longer tax-exempt.  Very straightforward.

Tell me, are there any secular reasons for H8 to be law?

I’m a bit dismayed at how many of my fellow progressives seem to believe that tax-exempt organizations can’t be involved in “politics” at all.  This has always been false, as noted by no less an authority than Americans United for Separation of Church and State:

Supporters of these proposals say a change is necessary because clergy are afraid to speak out on political issues. But this argument is mistaken. The free speech rights of religious leaders are already broadly protected by the U.S. Constitution. Clergy can and do address public policy concerns, ranging from abortion, gay rights and gun control to poverty, civil rights and the death penalty. They may support legislation pending in Congress or the state legislatures, or call for its defeat. They may endorse or oppose ballot referenda. Indeed, discussion of public issues is a common practice in religious institutions all over America.

The only thing houses of worship may not do is endorse or oppose candidates for public office or use their resources in partisan campaigns. This restriction, which is found in federal tax law, is not limited to churches and other religious ministries. In fact, it is applied to every non-profit organization in the country that holds a tax exemption under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.

If you’re arguing that tax-exempt organizations can’t say anything about politics, you’re saying that churches (even including the Catholic Church) could not lobby against capital punishment, or that churches could not lobby for better child care, or better poverty programs, or for a living wage.

Tax-exempt 501(c)(3) status only prohibits partisan politics, and activities for or against a specific candidate.  No mater what you think of anyone’s motives on Prop H8, it was not a tax violation, or a violation of separation of church and state.  They are as free to argue against gay marriage as the Catholic Church is to argue against the death penalty.

That doesn’t mean your right to free speech is abrogated in any way, or that people shouldn’t question everyone’s motives, or that people shouldn’t be held responsible for their actions.  (Aren’t conservatives really big on the principle that people should be responsible for their actions?)  But you’re barking up the wrong tree on tax-exempt status.  Even if you wanted to change the law to prohibit this, you’d be hitting progressive causes and charities every bit as hard as you’d be hitting conservative causes.

It’s important not to strike back wildly, but to focus efforts on areas that can persuade and create change.

I assume that, at some point, advocates will get another proposition on the California ballot, one to repeal that which was just approved.  That, too, would be subject to majority will, and who knows, it might win next time.

And if they, at the same time, proposed and passed an amendment that banned the LDS church from California, would you also be okay with that?  After all, that doesn’t involve creation of a state religion, so it doesn’t conflict with your interpretation of the First Amendment.

Tax-exempt 501(c)(3) status only prohibits partisan politics, and activities for or against a specific candidate.  No mater what you think of anyone’s motives on Prop H8, it was not a tax violation, or a violation of separation of church and state.  They are as free to argue against gay marriage as the Catholic Church is to argue against the death penalty.

You know, I think there’s an interesting court case here.  I really do.  The LDS church didn’t merely “speak” against the death penalty, they contributed millions of dollars and their efforts as an organization (as opposed to, say, individual deacons speaking at events or making sermons), and told their followers how to vote on a specific ballot item.  While that’s not partisan per se, I really think a case could be made.  That said, I don’t think it’s a case we can win, especially not if it goes to SCOTUS.  You’re probably right in your overall point that we’re better off sticking with the public shaming and boycotting.

I’m a bit dismayed at how many of my fellow progressives seem to believe that tax-exempt organizations can’t be involved in “politics” at all.  This has always been false, as noted by no less an authority than Americans United for Separation of Church and State:

That is the current judicial interpretation of the Establishment Clause, yes. That does not mean that it’s the only possible interpretation, or the right one.

If the good folks of Utah don’t like being boycotted for the actions of the LDS church they are welcome to change the actions of the LDS church, or leave Utah.

Arizona was boycotted for its refusal to recognize MLK day and it worked.

I personally don’t give a damn if it is too broad of a brush.  It is a much smaller brush than paying to remove the rights of people that aren’t members of your church or state.

SYFPH

Peace (to the other 49 states)
Corvus

I agree with those who say high profile targeting of specific businesses is a much more effective way to stick it to the Mormon Church than broad brush boycotts of the state or Park City. The Church of LDS holds equity in *lots* of businesses in Utah and elsewhere:

The LDS Church’s holdings were estimated, though never substantiated, by Time to be around $6 billion.

The LDS Church owns Brigham Young University, the Deseret News daily newspaper, Deseret Book Company, Zion’s Securities Corporation, Bonneville International Corp. (the country’s 14th largest radio chain), one of the largest cattle ranches in the United States and Beneficial Life Insurance Company, along with various travel and real estate endeavors. And it comes as no surprise that the church makes a lot of money from these businesses.

...

“The (LDS) Church is n significant employer in Utah,” Robson says, “including its headquarters operations, its educational system of BYU campuses, seminaries and institutes and its extended welfare system. Next to state government, the LDS Church is the largest factor in the economic base of Salt Lake City.”

The Church, as you might expect, is secretive about its business holdings, but one “Consequences of Bigotry” project should be using public records to identify them. If they do that, by the time Sundance rolls around in January people will be able to boycott businesses that provide cash flow to the Church. The same should be done regarding businesses where other “Yes on 8” churches and denominations have an equity stake. You take a dime of investment from thuggish theocrats, no business for you.

Encouraging investigations into whether the Church of LDS jeopardized its tax exempt status is another good “Consequences of Bigotry” project. Seraph is right that any challenge won’t get far, but even an official IRS investigation would make for a major headache for the bigots who run the Church.

Besides such “Consequences of Bigotry” projects, there should also be “Repealing Bigotry” projects focused on various legal ways to repeal or nullify discriminatory legislation and amendments like Prop 8, and “No More Bigotry” projects focused on “we are citizens” street protests, GOTV efforts, and outreach to otherwise progressive communities and orgs that have voted in favor of Prop 8 and similar laws for one reason or another.

Actually, while that doesn’t violate the establishment clause, it would violate the free exercise clause of the First Amendment.

Why, you’re right.  It’s almost like the Constitution was written to protect the rights of minorities from hostile majorities that might use the democratic process to oppress them. 

But I suppose that only applies to religious groups.  After all, they’re only large, wealthy organizations with influence over the community.  They must be protected from couples and families who want the same rights as other couples and families.

“Tax-exempt 501(c)(3) status only prohibits partisan politics, and activities for or against a specific candidate.”

Full text of 501(c)(3):

Section 501(c)(3) describes corporations, and any community chest, fund, or foundation, organized and operated exclusively for religious, charitable, scientific, testing for public safety, literacy, or educational purposes, or to foster national or international amateur sports competition (but only if no part of its activities involve the provision of athletic facilities or equipment), or for the prevention of cruelty to children or animals, no part of the net earnings of which inures to the benefit of any private shareholder or individual, no substantial part of the activities of which is carrying on propaganda, or otherwise attempting, to influence legislation (except as otherwise provided in section (h)), and which does not participate in, or intervene in (including the publishing or distribution of statements), any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office.

A case can be made that the Utah HQ of the Church of LDS was “carrying on propaganda, or otherwise attempting, to influence legislation.” Like Seraph says, its not a fight SCOTUS will want to take up, but an investigation into the extent of the Church’s activist advocacy of Prop 8 will cause a lot of well deserved grief for the Church hierarchy.

And my answer remains the same: because the majority of people wanted it.  No other reason is required.

You seem to think that if there is no secular reason, the law is invalid; it is not.

Grammar RWA told you why you’re wrong.  Rebuttal? 

No one is under any compulsion to justify his vote for anything.  If you voted for Barack Obama, any reason you chose is valid enough; the only requirement for you to have voted for Mr Obama is to have been registered to vote.  If someone voted for John McCain for the sole reason that he is white and Mr Obama is black, his vote is just as valid as any other.

All true.  Individuals have the right to vote as they choose.  However, the state does not have the right to enforce whatever law those voters might approve, if said law is unconstitutional.  Again, that’s the whole point of a Constitution: to protect minorities from the tyranny of the majority.

Awww, you gay DEMONcraps are going to force a Supreme Court decision on this, arent you?  Something along the lines of Equality= either gay marriage or the elimination of marriage as a legal definition, right?  You’re gonna force all of us to abandon holey matrimony just because we want you to be official second class citizens?  That’s not very nice.

Geez, and when Ohdamnit disbars the members of the court that played political games in the 2000 election, and then puts LIEbral judges in every seat, well that just won’t be playin fair!!!

But when it comes to same-sex marriage, rather than talking about the government prohibiting your actions, the case concerns whether the government is required to accord them a certain status.  Legally, that is a very different thing.

Tell me, are there any secular reasons for H8 to be law?

My best guess is that, if the question had not been on same sex marriage but the establishment of a domestic partners status (and yes, I know that the Golden State has some form of domestic partnership law), one which conferred the exact legal rights as does marriage in California, it would have passed overwhelmingly.  Given the existence of a partnership law already, Proposition 8 was far less about taking away rights than it was about the word “marriage” itself.  (I don’t know if there any specific differences in rights between married couples and domestic partners in California; if someone else can point them out, it would be appreciated.)

See, you keep coming back to this.  If the gays would just accept their separate-but-equal version of marriage, straight people wouldn’t be so uncomfortable and they’d get what they want.  The problem with that is that “separate but equal” never is.  We found that out the last time we tried it.

If the good folks of Utah don’t like being boycotted for the actions of the LDS church they are welcome to change the actions of the LDS church, or leave Utah.

How is that any different than the conservatives telling us for the last eight years that we should leave the US and not come back because we didn’t like Bush’s policies?

I did leave Utah and the LDS church nearly a decade back. Although there are days when I feel guilty because I think if I’d stayed, I could be a different viewpoint for my friends and family.

I still think a boycott of Utah specifically would be counterproductive for the reasons I mentioned above, namely, removing yourself from the immediate view of the culture bubble means that the people inside the bubble are exposed to nothing else.

If you want to support a boycott of Utah, what about a boycott of California? After all, it was 52 percent of their population that did the actual voting. Punishing the no-on-8 people in California for the actions of the other 53 percent makes as much sense as punishing the no-on-prop8 people in Utah. Maybe you’re right, and it will work. But blaming Utah for the actions of the LDS (many of whom also live in California, Arizona, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Wyoming, Colorado, and um, gee, the rest of the fifty states) is only about as accurate as blaming California for the actions of the LDS church. If Utah gets boycotted, California should be boycotted.

Or you could go by the names on this list: http://www.californiansagainsthate.com/dishonorRoll.html Or target things like Marriot, owned by Mormons. Or…..delicious idea….find Evergreen facilities and protest in front of them. (Evergreen is the LDS-based therapy association dedicated to over coming same-sex attraction. And their history is pretty vile.) If you wanted to boycott specific institutions in Utah, like the LDS-owned Crossroads Mall, that’s a better idea than boycotting the whole damn state.

I think people protesting in front of temples is great. Presenting the broad spectrum of the GLBT movement for the Mormons is a good idea.  I mouth off to my still-Mormon family about this stuff all the time, and not a one of them has a doubt as to where I stand on the issues.
Boycotting the state of Utah though? Not so effective, because first of all, it may still draw the support of the bigots on the other side. You may find more bigots moving to Utah if it becomes a haven of bigotry. As I said, sometimes I feel guilty for having left, because if I’d stayed, I could have been one more voice for the other side. (On the other hand, if I’d stayed, I’ve had limited job opportunities and probably gone insane from trying to deal with the issues the church gave me about my own authority and being a woman and so on.)

Sock it to the LDS all you like. The guys at the top of the food chain absolutely deserve it. But there are people—some of them even Mormons, like a few of my high school friends—who spoke out against Prop 8, and who live in Utah. The GLBT folk in Utah deserve support, not the rest of the world attacking their jobs and livelihoods. Donate to the Utah branches of the ACLU and Planned Parenthood and everything that makes the blinded Mormons twitch. (That’s what I’ll be doing, come my next paycheque.)

Dana, I disapproved of Anna Nicole Smith’s marriage to that old geezer.  She and he still had the right to marry, even if she was just after his money.  Despite the marriage’s ickness (she even talked openly about oral sex with the old coot) nobody tried to take away my right to disapprove.  Disapproval is VERY different than legal equality, so your claim “If you subject a particular relationship to public approval, you run the risk that that relationship will not gain such approval” is bogus.  The Mormons really were reaching into the bedroom and ripping up the marriage license.

I think the public shaming of the LDS is appropriate because of the documents showing that the intention behind their anti-gay activism was to gain greater acceptance from the Christian right.  They saw how the political power of the Baptists and Catholics grew when they melded on abortion.  (Note that originally the Baptists approved legal abortion, now they are in anti-contraception territory.)

It needs to be shown that the Mormons becoming part of the political machinery of the right will come at a cost.

Oh for fuck sake, quit all the hand wringing and sweating. Fuck the legal mumbojumbo, fuck the “oh no’s, what if it gets worse!! Heavens!!” bullshit.

Put rubber down.
I’ll start. I’m doing a construction project in the spring in Idaho. I’ll cross off all of the Mormon owned, backed or managed operations from my supplier spreadsheet.
Done.
Look, even a family friend is crossed off. Does he really care personally about H8? No idea. but for sure he’s homophobic, and for sure he and his wife did nothing to protest the Church’s aggressive position. I’ll explain it to them, they’ll twitch about it and move on, and likely still tithe every week. But now they can explain the difference to their small son who is my son’s best friend.

Easy! Took five seconds, represents $50k-75k of which 10-20% is probably wages and profit to Mormons.

And really, the non-Mormons need the work too, so this net effect would really be more of a tax or additional tithing.

Someone upstream mentioned Arizona being boycotted for MLKjr recognition-refutation.  That was and remains an interesting case.  First, a governor proclaimed a holiday.  Then a second governor rescinded the holiday, citing financial reasoning (though it’s pretty clear he had just a few other reasons.)  Then there was a group that started a petition for a ballot initiative to replace the Columbus Day holiday with MLKjr Day.  This offended Italian groups and some others, who proposed some counterpetition for a different MLKjr Day.  Then boycotts start, including the NFL’s statement that Phoenix won’t get a Super Bowl without the holiday.  So, comes the election, there are two proposals and they both narrowly fail.  And some blame the NFL, which happened to be open for business at its main headquarters that year on—you guessed it—MLKjr Day and actually cited the proximity to the Super Bowl as its justification for that.  Then, some time later, another ballot proposal gets on the ballot and wins.

Arizona is still the only state that voted in an MLKjr holiday.

Oh, come on!! It’s not as though the Normans are a magic underwear cult or nuthin!!  I mean, whatever you do, don’t start questioning the validity of their “religion” jus cause they question the validity of YER existence!!

I mean, Arizona is still the only state where the people voted in an MLKjr holiday.

“See Kitzmiller v. Dover”

To borrow a term from the South, that’s “powerful dumb.” Pray, tell, how a ruling on teaching ID in a public school, which is binding only within Pennsylvania, relates to Prop 8 and gay “marriage.”

/r/ SRB Ostrollarius.

If all he’s going to do is say “UR STOOPIDZ” here and anywhere else he isn’t allowed to bark his hate without retribution, then he needs to learn the very real lesson that his childish name-calling has consequences.

The state cannot prohibit you from finding a priest who would perform a ceremony uniting you and any other person—or persons—in holy matrimony, as long as you chose not to seek a state marriage license, register said marriage with the state, or claim such unregistered marriage as a legal status on a document such as a Form 1040.  But once you attempt to involve the state in the recognition of a marriage, that marriage becomes subject to state regulation.

I’m glad you realise this, Dana.

Now, some religions don’t perform gay marriages.  Some religions do perform gay marriages.

The difference is that the first lot of religions are supported in law, and the second lot are not.

This is religious discrimination.  One religions view of marriage is enshrined in law, and anothers is not.

Now, discrimination is acceptable if there’s a good reason for it.  One that stands up to strict scrutiny in court.  This is why religions advocating human sacrifice are SOOL.

What is the secular reason for not allowing gay marriage, Dana?

But people are free to vote for whatever or whomever they choose, for whatever reasons they wish.

You live in a republic, not a pure democracy.  People’s rights, such as the right to religious freedom, are not up for vote.

Why should one religions definition of marriage be enshrined in law, but not anothers, Dana?

Explain to us why you support religious discrimination.

Let me correct you right there.

I’d prefer it if you waited until you read the bit about not letting Mormons marry because they’re heretics before correcting me…

Am I the only one who sees a deep deep irony when religious objections are cited in using secular power against gays (or other groups) from any non-Catholic religion?  Or is history just a forgotten subject?

<blockqoute>Once again, we call on those involved in the debate over same-sex marriage to act in a spirit of mutual respect and civility towards each other. No one on either side of the question should be vilified, harassed or subject to erroneous information.</blockquote>

To the churches: You first. Stop vilifying homosexuals . Stop lying to the general public. Tell your kids to stop harassing gender-nonconformative kids at school.

Once you treat your opponents with ACTUAL respect and civility, they won’t have anything to protest or complain about.

I’ll start. I’m doing a construction project in the spring in Idaho. I’ll cross off all of the Mormon owned, backed or managed operations from my supplier spreadsheet.
Done.

Uh, StayDaddy, I think discriminating against suppliers because of the owners’ religion might be illegal.  And while it’s technically legal to discriminate against hiring someone because of their politics, I don’t think that’s a winner for progressives in the long run.

Just what are they complaining about, anyway? Are crowds of LBGT protesters descending on churches with bullhorns and insulting signs, chanting and yelling at anyone who enters?

Or are they upset because people are on the verge of recognizing them for what they are: just another political lobby?

Now, some religions don’t perform gay marriages.  Some religions do perform gay marriages.

The difference is that the first lot of religions are supported in law, and the second lot are not.

This is religious discrimination.  One religions view of marriage is enshrined in law, and anothers is not.

Bingo.

Grammar cited the case of Kitzmiller v. Dover, an intelligent design case in which a Federal District Court judge held that the whole motive for the Dover Area School District in passing an intelligent design requirement was religious, and was unconstitutional.
The school district chose not to appeal the ruling; because the case never advanced beyond the Federal District Court level, its precedential value is extremely limited.  A similar case in another jurisdiction could be decided the other way, and that would be perfectly proper, legally.  It would require an appellate court decision to give Kitzmiller the status of a precedent.
Further, the six school board members who voted for intelligent design had expressed, personally, some religious motives.  When it comes to a small legislative body and a record of motive, such things can be pinned down.  But Proposition 8 was decided by the voters of California; do you have statements of rationale for the over five million people who voted for it?  Even if Kitzmiller had precedential status, the situations are very different legally.

While Kitzmiller per se has limited precedential value, the legal reasoning is tight enough and so well structured, I will be surprised if it isn’t cited in many other court cases. That kind of decision was a model of legal reasoning; no reason not to refer to it in other jurisdiction, even if the precedent isn’t binding.

Moreover, the LEGAL reasoning behind Kitzmiller is based on established law on the Establishment. That reasoning, particularly the impermisable religious motive (the Lemon test) is most certainly precedent that can be applied here.

To borrow a term from the South, that’s “powerful dumb.” Pray, tell, how a ruling on teaching ID in a public school, which is binding only within Pennsylvania, relates to Prop 8 and gay “marriage.”

It might help to actually read the case. Not doing so and making a comment is…“powerful dumb.”

Has anyone ever, including you, Dana, ever come up with a real reason why gay people should not be allowed to marry?  I mean a real reason.  Not the usual 1) its teh icky, or 2) my god says so and he’s bigger than yours.  Because really, both those reasons are totally lame and should have no place in law.

Look, whatever you DEMONcrats do, DON’T follow this link cause it makes Normans look completely crazy and gives info that they don’t want you to know about:  http://secweb.infidels.org/?kiosk=articles&id=367

The court held that the school board was attempting to establish a religious principle, not merely that the motives of the board members was religious.

Both mattered. Judge Jones held that the motivation behind the teaching of ID was pertinent to the court. Taken strictly at face value, “proponents of the IDM occasionally suggest that the designer could be a space alien or a time-traveling cell biologist,” but because the ID proponents themselves believed the designer was God, it violates the establishment clause. Yes, the Dover teachings violated the establishment clause for other reasons as well. But this religious intent was a violation, itself.

As to your protests that Kitzmiller doesn’t necessarily set precedent, it doesn’t necessarily matter. Any court can always cite any other court’s reasoning as example and separately affirm it without calling it precedent. And it was your assertion that “people are free to vote for whatever or whomever they choose, for whatever reasons they wish.” Kitzmiller is a counterexample, even if limited in scope; the reasons of individual voters probably cannot be brought to the court, but the reasons of the proposition’s authors can.

Grammar cited the case of Kitzmiller v. Dover,

To be a dick, I also cited Marbury v. Madison, because you so disingenuously asserted majority rule as a self-sufficient principle. A republican ought to know better. The intent and effect of any law has to be in line with certain protections of liberty of the minority. “More people want it this way” is not sufficient in a constitutional republic. I really cannot believe that bullshit came out of your mouth.

I think the public shaming of the LDS is appropriate because of the documents showing that the intention behind their anti-gay activism was to gain greater acceptance from the Christian right.  They saw how the political power of the Baptists and Catholics grew when they melded on abortion.

Anybody got a link to these documents?

Marriage = 1 man + 1 woman.

see, it’s very simple.

Comment by Larry blocked. [unkill]​[show comment]

Elevatin’ the dialogues.

“It might help to actually read the case.”

It is completely immaterial to gay “marriage.” Your inability to apprehend this is not my problem.

Look, whatever you DEMONcrats do, DON’T follow this link cause it makes Normans look completely crazy and gives info that they don’t want you to know about:  http://secweb.infidels.org/?kiosk=articles&id=367

I <3 you, Rugged. Let’s herd sheep sometime.

It is completely immaterial to gay “marriage.”

Try reading, Mr. Troll. Wonderful thing.

Com’on folks, leave the children alone. Every child deserves 1 mother and 1 father.

…Now we know why McCain lost and Obama won. 

It’s an interview with a former KGB member from 1985 talking about the four steps that communism is taking to take over the US.  Demoralization, Destabilization, The Crisis and finally Normalization…

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/k28lN0XW6il8DalBt1

Heterosexual Marriage = 1 man + 1 woman.

Marriage = 2 adults + 1 legal contract

see, it’s very simple.

Fixed!

Com’on folks, leave the children alone. Every child deserves 1 mother and 1 father.

Because right now, every single family is made up of a mother, a father, and children.

And same-sex couples have absolutely *no* members of the opposite sex in their lives who will be a positive influence on their children.  Lesbians don’t have fathers, brothers, grandfathers, uncles, male cousins, male friends, or male spiritual leaders.  And they will send their kids to schools with only female teachers and counselors.

(This isn’t even going into the idea that single-parent families [for example] are clearly inferior to “traditional” families where one of the parents is abusive.  As long as both sexes are represented there, it doesn’t matter!)

Larry, there isn’t anything there that Machiavelli didn’t explain.

So why were your guys in on the plot?  You know, the destabilization and demoralization pieces???

“Try reading, Mr. Troll. Wonderful thing.”

Try reading for comprehension; it’s even better!

“Heterosexual Marriage = 1 man + 1 woman.

Marriage = 2 adults + 1 legal contract

see, it’s very simple.”

Really Dr. Kate? I can marry my sister? oh, isn’t that swell!

Com’on folks, leave the children alone. Every child deserves 1 mother and 1 father.

Do you suppot making divorce illegal, Larry?

Do you support not allowing sterile couples to marry?  Do you support not allowing marriage for any woman over menopause?

If not, then you’re a hypocrite as WELL as an idiot.

Really Dr. Kate? I can marry my sister? oh, isn’t that swell!

Dude.  There are some things we just don’t need to know about you.

Really Dr. Kate? I can marry my sister? oh, isn’t that swell!

You already have a relationship under the law with your sister, and marrying her would create a legal clusterfuck. An unrelated person of the same sex, not so much.

Com’on folks, leave the children alone. Every child deserves 1 mother and 1 father.

Except the kids in Arkansas who need foster homes. They deserve nothing, apparently.

Ahhh, I see it now.  Larry is a parody of a crazy wingnut.  Poe’s law is indeed powerful.

The same argument could be made concerning public intoxication, taking a dump on the courthouse lawn, or propositioning a cop online posing as a 12 year old.  Yet we have a collective, secular judgement that these things can and ought to be prohibited.

Dana, that’s yet another specious argument and false comparison.  The activities you mention are crimes- marraige is a right.  Those are also all crimes regardless of who does them- there is no law that forbids, say, public intoxication for some classes of citizens but permits it for others. 

Prop 8 denies full citizenship rights to a specific class of citizens.  That violates the 14th Amendment.  It does so to satisfy the beliefs of certain religions while denying the beliefs of other religions, which violates the 1st Amendment.

And “because the majority says so” is not, and never was, sufficient reason for a denial of rights to an entire class of citizens.  I really thought you’d be smart enough to know that.

Months before the Supreme Court ruling on Loving v. Virginia the Roman Catholic Church joined the movement, supporting interracial couples in their struggle for recognition of their right to marriage.

“Prop 8 denies full citizenship rights to a specific class of citizens.”

You can’t deny rights they never legitimately possessed in the first place.

“Leave the children alone”?!  As soon as two women can create a baby, your argument might gain validity.  As for two men, see The Life of Brian for a primer on the logic of that.

“Where’s the foetus going to gestate?  You going to keep it in a box?”

Proposition 8 concerned a secular, state regulation, on a subject that virtually nobody thinks is outside of the state’s purview.

Not nobody.  Me.  I think marriage is outside of the state’s purview.

I think marriage is a term that means whatever someone’s religion thinks it means.  A 55-year old with 12 “wives”?  Fine with me so long as all sex involved is between consenting adults.  However, civil unions certainly belong with the state since health insurance companies use civil union status to deny coverage.

I think California gays should propose an amendment to the effect that the word “marriage” cannot be used by the state to describe any kind of otherwise legal union.  Bypass the whole stupid debate since it seems obvious that the only reason people can’t stand gay “marriage” is a) “yucky” gay sex and b) they don’t want an egalitarian model competing with their fixed-and-unequal-social-roles model.

Uhmm - aren’t these same folks part of the conservative right, anti-choice division, that targets the private homes of contractors who build Planned Parenthood facilities - and now they cry foul - F*cking hypocrites.

What’s that expression, “The asses are masses?”

Still, the right to vote (and to have your vote count for something) is at the core of American democracy.

If the majority of the people in the affected state voted against gay marriage, then that is democracy in action. It doesn’t matter what so-called “progressives” whining across the country on a blog want. It matters what the people who reside in California voted for, and it looks like the majority does not accept the rights of gay people to wed. Big deal.

Look at the big picture: at least we’re inching out way out of the Nazi era.

If the majority of the people in the affected state voted against gay marriage, then that is democracy in action.

Foucault, it isn’t that simple.  I know that you are not native to the US, so I’ll explain it for you.  The US isn’t a “pure” democracy - the vote of the majority is tempered by the rule of law - ground rules that set limits on the power of a majority to control the minority.

In short, there are rules.  The concern is that these churches blatantly violated those rules in terms of their tax exempt status under the separation of church and state set forth in the bill of rights.  Churches are not taxed because of the establishment clause, but churches also have to stay out of campaigns as their part of that separation bargain.

Churches cannot tell their parishioners how to vote on campaigns for the same reason that any 501(c)3 chartered tax-exempt organization cannot advocate for political causes.  That’s why the advocacy arms of Greenpeace and the Union of Concerned Scientists are 501(c)4 organizations and donations to those groups are not tax exempt.

In other words, you cannot be an organization that attempts to lobby or control the government through advocacy of laws or candidates and retain your tax-exempt status.  That is a well-established part of the operationalization of the establishment clause in the modern legal cannon.

Thus the “majority not accepting the right to wed” IS a big deal if that decision was unduly influenced by organizations violating some very well regulated ground rules about influence given their tax status.  They need to either reincorporate as a 501(c)4 and have their tithes taxed, or STFU when it comes to telling their people how to vote and who to contribute to.

Larry, if you wingnuts weren’t so very obsessed with marriage=children, why would marrying your brother be a problem?  Why the hell should the state care, especially if it put him onto your private health insurance and got him of the medicaid rolls?

This is the bottom line, here in MA and elsewhere: Why should the state care who you marry?

All the justices in MA got to that was “religious blah blah blah children blah blah blah”.  In other words, a big zero from a secular legal point of view (children already were not an issue of marriage according to lengthy case law precedent on infertility and age).

Months before the Supreme Court ruling on Loving v. Virginia the Roman Catholic Church joined the movement, supporting interracial couples in their struggle for recognition of their right to marriage.

Months, you say?

If the RCC were guided by an eternal and infallible god, then they should have been on the right side of the battle centuries ago.

If the central purpose of government is to promote the general welfare, then the state must promote always what is best for society’s health, security, and long-term viability. This requires the state to make prudential judgments about various segments of our population: Those under 16 may not drive. Those under 21 may not drink. You must possess a high-school diploma to join the military. Information about paroled child molesters must be made available so parents can protect their children.

Some label these prudential decisions “discrimination,” but discriminating in such matters promotes the general welfare. The unique affirmation of heterosexual marriage operates under the same principle. Traditional matrimony is the foundation of society, and society should neither encourage nor recognize anything pretending to approximate it. Again, the reason for this relates to marriage’s primary purpose: The spousal union produces families, and such families are the building blocks of a stable society. Opening marriage up to different interpertations will destory marriage itself, it will become meaningless (see Sweden).

Granted, many marriages don’t produce children. Most soldiers don’t face combat and yet are still eligible for veterans’ benefits. But the state rewards each institution based on its ability to provide society with a valuable function. Governments favor historical marriage and seek to strengthen it in its policies because virtually everything that happens in society, for good or ill, can be traced back to families and family life.

In MA, the people didn’t get a say or a vote, it was blocked and radical Judges created their own legislation. Judical tyranny.

But the state rewards each institution based on its ability to provide society with a valuable function. Governments favor historical marriage and seek to strengthen it in its policies because virtually everything that happens in society, for good or ill, can be traced back to families and family life.

Then you should be strongly protesting H8, because it made certain families second-class citizens and made the children of those families into bastards. You should be strongly protesting Act 1 in Arkansas, which would rather leave kids in foster care (can someone give me the statistic on the number of kids that age out of foster care every year without ever having a home?) than let certain loving couples adopt them.

I find it amusing that you cite “judical [sic] tyranny” when judges gave certain citizens the same rights as other citizens without taking any rights away from the other citizens, and you don’t even have a word here for the mob tyranny that took civil rights away.

Maureen said:

Uh, StayDaddy, I think discriminating against suppliers because of the owners’ religion might be illegal.  And while it’s technically legal to discriminate against hiring someone because of their politics, I don’t think that’s a winner for progressives in the long run.
Maureen on 11/08 at 07:26 PM”

I would guess you are (mis)referencing Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
Of course, I am discriminating, just not in violation of the law. Lawyers sometimes like to call this “differentiating” to distinguish it from illegal discrimination.
Title VII does not apply to individuals choosing suppliers/contracts (code for purchasing goods and services) for a variety of reasons. And in any event it only applies to employers of 15 people or more and governments.

A simpler way of looking at how this works is to imagine that Sally is organizing a long anticipated wedding with her GF. She looks in the phone book, and finds many wedding subcontractors willing to provide many different services that she needs including venues, decorations, music and catering. She investigates further and crosses off all that are affiliated (owned, operated by supplied by or managed by) with churches who oppose abortion.
In your scenario, she is violating federal law and furthermore is violating “progressive” political philosophy.

Of course, that makes no sense. Sally is not required to allow the local Catholic Church to bid on her wedding function, let alone hire them.

If Sally opens her own catering business with 15 or more employees, she would be required to comply in her hiring and firing decisions, but only inside her own company/business. However, she also will remain exempt in her supplier decisions: ie she can refuse to purchase from farmer’s who are pro-life, including the local convent/monastery, even if their stuff is of the highest quality and virtually free. This is because she is not employing them under the legal definition of that term.

I believe “Sally” retains her Law-Abiding-Progressive-Citizen creds doing these actions, and in fact they would be elevated in my mind.
What say you?

I was simply pointing out the fact that it is not unconstitutional for California to restrict legal marriage to heterosexual couples.

It is, though.

But in performing marriages, churches perform a state as well as religious function.  The state issues the license for marriage, but the marriage contract does not enter into force unless the marriage is witnessed by an official empowered to witness the solemnization of the contract, and that empowered official may be a priest or rabbi or minister.  In performing a state function, the church could well be made liable to anti-discrimination laws if it refused to perform same-sex marriages in places where such are legal.

I doubt it, given that churches aren’t forced to marry anyone they don’t want to even in places where same-sex marriage is legal. Catholic churches don’t marry divorced people or childfree people, for example.

Anyway, the obvious solution would be to take out the role of officiant.

In performing a state function, the church could well be made liable to anti-discrimination laws if it refused to perform same-sex marriages in places where such are legal.

Please point to a case where a Catholic church has been sued, or a priest charged with a crime, for refusing to marry a Catholic to a Protestant woman who would not agree to raise their children as Catholics. I’d also be interested in seeing a case where an Orthodox rabbit was charged with a crime, or sued, for refusing to marry a Jew and a Gentile. If all you can dig up is the Moyer case (see below), you’ve already admitting you’re blowing smoke.

Funny how people like you have ignored the huge risk of criminal and civil liability that religious organizations face, right up until same-sex marriage came along. It’s almost as though no such thing existed and you’re making it up out of whole cloth.

The court case you cite, by the way, is not the church being sued for refusing to perform a same-sex marriage. It is about a priest claiming he was defrocked via fraud - that’d be a secular, civil matter - and the underlying disciplinary issue could have been any dispute over Church law. It didn’t have to be same-sex marriage, and same-sex marriage isn’t the core of this lawsuit. The fact that the court “tried the case at all” is not an exercise of state sovereignity over a church issue is either a bald-faced lie on your part, or a complete and probably willful misunderstanding of what the courts do.

In other words, Dana, churches are not subject to any more liability for following their precepts than they ever have been. You know this. You just want a little submission ritual from the queers.

Of course that should be “rabbi”, above. Rabbits aren’t even kosher, much less Jewish.

“LGBT people are born with those rights, just everyone else.” 

Merely asserting this does not make it true, I’m afraid.

“Ostiarius, Larry, and Dana — you’re bigots.  Familiarize yourselves with the term.”

I’m quite familiar with it:

BIGOT, n.
  One who is obstinately and zealously attached to an opinion that you do not entertain.

Hi Ms. Kate,

Thanks. I guess I am quite confused or unclear on the role of the church(es) in relation to Proposition 8. Someone told me that a certain number of signatures are required before a proposition such as this one can find its way onto a ballot, and I am curious about how many Californians actually need to sign on in order to have such a proposition placed on the ballot. I imagine that it was a fairly large amount.

I agree that religious groups who are tax exempt should not make it their project to influence voters, or use that tax exempt status to gather the signatures needed to get the ball rolling. I guess that is what the legal challenges to Prop 8 will need to establish? That the churches actively used their influence to make this an issue when it would otherwise have not been an issue?

I don’t care who gets married if they are consenting adults who have thought it over. I don’t see how gay peoples’ right to marry in California would have an impact on anyone other than the gay people who make that choice. But I also wonder how much of an influence these churches actually had on voters who do not belong to a religious organization, but who nevertheless oppose gay marriage?

I also recall Obama stating during that debate or talk with the faith-based minister tnat he supported civil unions between gay people, but not gay marriage. Was there a possibility to vote this way on Prop 8? I imagine that many religious people who are somewhat progressive would see gay and lesbian civil unions as a fair compromise?

The state has far more restrictions on marriage than you might wish to believe.  They are based on consanguinity, there are restrictions based on age (restrictions which can vary if the prospective bride is pregnant), and health.

Funnily, there is no DOMA for these restrictions. If a pedophile in Kansas knocks up his 12-year-old girlfriend and marries her with her mother’s consent, that is considered a legal marriage in every other state. If he packs up the family and moves to Los Angeles, his marriage will be recognized as perfectly legal. If she is his first cousin, and they move to a state where such a marriage is incestuous and void, that state will also recognize their marriage as valid.

Dana, of course a state can ban same-sex marriages. It just depends on what the state’s other laws say. If a state has no ERA in its Constitution, does not permit any kind of domestic partnership, limits adoption to married couples, and so on, it has a much stronger argument that its public policy supports opposite-sex-only marriage.

mythago: if you believe that my stated concern is superfluous, then why would you object to the specific protection for which I have asked?

Dana:  if your concern is not superfluous, then we need a broad law that exempts churches from liability for all their religious doctrines, not just for refusing to marry same-sex couples. If your concern is superfluous, then we don’t need your law.

If y’all consent to strong, hard protections for churches which refuse to perform same-sex marriages, my objections to state recognition of same sex marriages disappears.

I don’t think that’s an unreasonable request, but I have two caveats.

First, your hypothetical future indifference to gay marriage is completely useless to us; when the status quo is “no gay marriage,” indifference is functionally equivalent to your current opposition to gay marriage. To be interested in the offer, we would need your enthusiastic support of equal civil rights.

Second, your example of Moyer v. Bennison is a terrible one. Employment is a civil concern, and if a citizen is fired in violation of the law or in violation of an organization’s internal ethics code, that is valid territory for the courts to intercede. If Moyer had been fired from a business corporation for the same thing, his complaint could be heard in civil court. You are basically asking for churches to have special rights that other corporations do not have. Just because a citizen chooses to seek employment in a religious organization, that does not mean he has forfeited his right to turn to civil courts for redress.

Grammar RWA, it is an unreasonable request because it is specific to same-sex marriage. Dana apparently couldn’t care less about the possibility (nonexistent, but bear with me for the same of example) that a church would be forced to perform a marriage forbidden by its religious tenets - unless the violation was that it was a same-sex marriage. So he wants a specific, blanket exemption for that one refusal, but for nothing else. That’s rather odd, don’t you think?

The nice thing about the Internet is that it’s very easy to go back and look at what you actually wrote:

I have one, and really only one, concern. I want churches protected from criminal and civil liability if they refuse to perform a same-sex marriage.

I’m not seeing anything in there about protecting church doctrine in general. I’m also not seeing anything about why protecting churches has only now become a concern, as though the exact same issues did not exist prior to Proposition 8. Did it truly not dawn on you before now that, gosh, somebody might try to sue a church for not doing what it wanted to? Do you really believe that everything was settled law until the goddamn queers started making noise?

The fact that you haven’t been able to point to a single relevant case suggests rather strongly that your concern is superfluous.

If it is your position that the state cannot choose to bar same-sex marriages, then you are taking the position that the state cannot bar any marriages, including if I wished to marry one or both of my sisters.

Yeah, like how allowing someone to kill in self-defense means everyone can kill everybody at any time! And how banning people from urinating on the sidewalk bans them from urinating anywhere! (Boy, are *those* people unhappy!) And like how banning people from using their cellphones in the car bans them from EVER using cellphones anywhere! And—

...oh, wait, I just realized that that is actually a REALLY STUPID argument.

the Moyer case isn’t specifically on the subject

It has nothing whatsoever to do with “the subject”, specifically, the subject of same-sex marriage. Either you just figured that out (in which case, you don’t understand the law), or you knew that all along (in which case, you were being disingenuous).

Ostiarius -

“LGBT people are born with those rights, just everyone else.”

Merely asserting this does not make it true, I’m afraid.

Are you familiar with Loving v. Virginia?

Dana -

If it is your position that the state cannot choose to bar same-sex marriages, then you are taking the position that the state cannot bar any marriages, including if I wished to marry one or both of my sisters.

The polygamy argument, lovely. Do you want to be the one to totally overhaul inheritance law to make that feasible?
(Also, with my limited knowledge of inheritance law specifically, cousin marriage probably creates much less of a clusterfuck.)

“The only thing houses of worship may not do is endorse or oppose candidates for public office or use their resources in partisan campaigns.” you really think ‘partisan’ can only be so if the letter R or D is attached?

way to pwn yourself, matt.

Also, with my limited knowledge of inheritance law specifically, cousin marriage probably creates much less of a clusterfuck.

Don’t know much about inheritance law (read: anything) but I do know that more marrying of 1st cousins would *really* be getting us closer to what “real traditional marriage” is all about. And marrying of 12 year olds. And marrying non-consensually (you rape it, you bought it!), or without ever meeting, or purely for political/financial reasons… So yeah, “traditional” marriage can bite me.

And even in the height/start of the whole ideal “traditional” thing (1700-1800s Europe) marriage wasn’t as cut-and-dried as “man” + “woman”. Transpeople, for example, were often allowed to pick which gender they identified as by age 18-21, regardless of the gender they were raised as, and marry accordingly. (Once you picked a gender, though, you *did* have to stick with it; if you picked “male” you weren’t allowed to marry dudes, even if you were more *biologically* female or could even bear children. Which, yeah, hilarious. :p)

Transpeople, for example, were often allowed to pick which gender they identified as by age 18-21, regardless of the gender they were raised as, and marry accordingly. (Once you picked a gender, though, you *did* have to stick with it; if you picked “male” you weren’t allowed to marry dudes, even if you were more *biologically* female or could even bear children. Which, yeah, hilarious.

That’s fascinating. Can you recommend any reading on that?

I’ll have to check (learned it in a class!)

So, I checked and I guess it’s more applicable to hermaphrodites than transpeople (at least the part I found again) but still an interesting look at how gender can be fluid historically and how people were given some choice in their gender identity.

Basically we just got some info in lecture, but there’s a brief discussion of this in Michael Foucault’s introduction to “Herculine Barbin: Being the Recently Discovered Memoirs of a 19th Century French Hermaphrodite” pub. 1980 by Pantheon Books, NY (if that’s at all find-able…)

But yeah, I thought it was pretty cool! ^^

Grammar RWA, it is an unreasonable request because it is specific to same-sex marriage. Dana apparently couldn’t care less about the possibility (nonexistent, but bear with me for the same of example) that a church would be forced to perform a marriage forbidden by its religious tenets - unless the violation was that it was a same-sex marriage. So he wants a specific, blanket exemption for that one refusal, but for nothing else. That’s rather odd, don’t you think?

It sure is, now that you mention it.

Same-sex marriage seems to me to be the most probable area of concern, though it is not necessarily the only one.  Another area of concern could be a lawsuit against the Catholic Church for refusing to ordain women.

Huh. Now I’m not so sure I’m on board with you, Dana. See, I can’t think of any good reason why the Catholic Church should be allowed to deny employment or promotion to a person because of their sex or gender.

And I note your predictable lack of enthusiasm, likely shared by many of your fellow conservatives. Without that, I really can’t see what we’d stand to gain by offering churches legal immunity for discrimination.

Grammar: the Moyer case isn’t specifically on the subject, but is pointed out to note that the civil courts can entertain such internal church cases.  The Rev Moyer didn’t even lose his church; the parishioners kept him on as rector,

Did he or did he not lose wages? That was part of the claim before the court, and if he did, then this isn’t an “internal church case,” it’s a US citizen being (possibly unjustly) deprived of his livelihood.

“You can’t deny rights they never legitimately possessed in the first place.”

Well, we know where you stand as regards slavery as well, then.

Basically we just got some info in lecture, but there’s a brief discussion of this in Michael Foucault’s introduction to “Herculine Barbin: Being the Recently Discovered Memoirs of a 19th Century French Hermaphrodite” pub. 1980 by Pantheon Books, NY (if that’s at all find-able…)

Thanks!

Perhaps you do, but that’s not only very much a minority position, it isn’t even one to which the advocates of same-sex marriage agree.  In seeking the recognition of the state in same-sex marriages, they are specifically consenting to the state’s authority on the matter.

Right now the GLBT movement is regrouping and has several ways to go from here.  And some people seem to agree with me that the state should exit the marriage industry in favor of the civil unions industry.  I don’t think it’s a very minority position, it just hasn’t surfaced as a primary strategy.

As the USA is quite diverse in its laws and customs, it may be that it makes sense to push for marriages that allow gay couples in some states and civil unions only in others.  I expect that Obama and Congress in his first term probably won’t focus much on this issue simply because other issues are sadly so broken that they must crowd it out of the agenda at the federal level.  The states will be the hotbed for now.

Dana, at first blush I don’t see anything inherently wrong with your church thing, but the way it came up in discussion makes it seem more like you trying to throw obstacles in the way of legalizing gay marriage than you having a legitimate concern about protecting the rights of religious groups. This might not be the case, but when you first mention *only* protecting churches against the gays, and then retroactively expand this protection to cover lawsuits by women, etc… it seems a little contrived. Obviously, if lawsuits by these other groups haven’t been a problem before, there is no major super-pressing reason to oh-so-carefully legislate away lawsuits by gays. And ret-conning the argument to *pretend* that all lawsuits have always been a huge deal for you seems a bit ...well, unbelievable.

(Not speaking for mythago/anyone else though; they seem to have somewhat stronger opinions in this case!)

(And I reserve the right to find LOTS of things wrong with it at second blush!)

What I don’t understand is your continued objection.

Sure you do. You specifically said that legal insulation for churches that refuse to marry same-sex couples must happen before you will stop objection to state recognition of such marriages: If y’all consent to strong, hard protections for churches which refuse to perform same-sex marriages, my objections to state recognition of same sex marriages disappears.

I’m not sure what you mean, precisely, by “strong, hard protections”. Without knowing exactly what legal protections you propose it’s a bit hard to say yea or nay. That aside, as I keep pointing out to you, you didn’t lead off by saying that religions should have complete freedom to offer their blessings and rituals in a discriminatory fashion as they choose. You presented the proposed legal codification as a) applicable to same-sex marriage only and b) necessary before you would consider supporting legal recognition of same-sex marriages.

So surely you understand why your proposal really comes across not as a concern about government interference in private beliefs, but in wanting the gays to do a little submission dance before you deign to consider whether or not their marriages ought to be legal.

Also, when you say My concern isn’t the specifics of the case, but that the case wasn’t simply dismissed as not a proper subject for civil judicial review., it strongly suggests to me that you do not in any way understand the law, and therefore shouldn’t be pontificating about what it does or doesn’t permit. Are you really saying that in any lawsuit where both parties are members of the same church, the courts should refuse to even consider whether the lawsuit is something calling for secular judgment?  If a church sues a former pastor for embezzling money, do you think a court should refuse to hear that because how a church spends its money is none of the state’s business?

Obviously, if lawsuits by these other groups haven’t been a problem before, there is no major super-pressing reason to oh-so-carefully legislate away lawsuits by gays. And ret-conning the argument to *pretend* that all lawsuits have always been a huge deal for you seems a bit ...well, unbelievable.

Exactly. Which is why Dana et al have never been able to point me to a lawsuit where somebody filed a lawsuit saying a) I am legally able to enter into a civil marriage, b) my religion will not perform the marriage ceremony, c) therefore the government should force them to drop b). Much less such a suit that was successful. I’m dying to see one.

The fact that no such cases seem to exist (don’t you think the Prop 8 folks would have dug one up?) suggests rather strongly that the law already recognizes that private religious issues are none of the government’s business. When the church acts in the public sphere - say, running a restaurant - or when there is an argument that the church has broken secular law, then the state might get involved.

Dana, as far as I know any church can refuse to marry anybody for any reason whatsoever, like if you’re a catholic and divorced and want to get married, good luck finding a priest to do the ceremony.  It isn’t religious marriage that concerns me anyway.  Married couples have certain rights under the law that unwed couples do not. 

I don’t care what you do, who you marry, or which of the vast number of false gods you worship, you have no right to deprive me of any of my rights.  None of them.  I will boycott Utah and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints until hell freezes over, as well as any company which paid to have the civil liberties of fellow Americans stripped away. I don’t care if they gave one dollar or one and a half million, they are my enemies, and I am tired of this crap.

If I can’t have my seat at the table I’d just as soon burn the motherfucker and let the rest of you stand.

Here’s a bit more history:
“in late medieval France, the term affrèrement—roughly translated as brotherment—was used to refer to a certain type of legal contract, which also existed elsewhere in Mediterranean Europe. These documents provided the foundation for non-nuclear households of many types and shared many characteristics with marriage contracts, as legal writers at the time were well aware, according to Tulchin.

The new “brothers” pledged to live together sharing ‘un pain, un vin, et une bourse’—one bread, one wine, and one purse. As Tulchin notes, “The model for these household arrangements is that of two or more brothers who have inherited the family home on an equal basis from their parents and who will continue to live together, just as they did when they were children.” But at the same time, “the affrèrement was not only for brothers,” since many other people, including relatives and non-relatives, used it.

The effects of entering into an affrèrement were profound. As Tulchin explains: “All of their goods usually became the joint property of both parties, and each commonly became the other’s legal heir. They also frequently testified that they entered into the contract because of their affection for one another. As with all contracts, affrèrements had to be sworn before a notary and required witnesses, commonly the friends of the affrèrés.”“

In some ways, the whole idea of marriage, as opposed to some form of affrèrement, is religious so why does the state sanction it? That’s the question both sides need to answer before we can have a discussion. Here are my reasons:
—People in long term relationships are more stable and most societies love stability (as do most people to some extent).
—Children are needed for a society to continue and children living in stable, long term relationships usually do better.
—It makes many legal questions simpler–who has visiting rights, who makes decisions for a person when they are incapacitated, who inherits, …

I note that the middle reason does not seem to be the sole reason in the US. If it was, marriages that could not produce offspring would not be allowed and there would not be a separate tax deduction for children (perhaps the people would even be considered single until they produced children). Two of my reasons apply to same-sex marriages.

Thanks for the info, John, that’s really interesting.

Dana:

Am I to assume, from your statement above, that you have no problem with the state choosing to ban a certain form of marriage, even though some people would claim that such ought to be legal, and that the state is denying them their rights?

Since so far the only people we’ve seen publicly protesting the intolerance of polygamy are abusive fundamentalist men who view their often-child wives as property…

Polygamy has a much longer and stronger history in the world, and countries which allow it have managed to put together inheritance laws which deal with the subject.

...countries which are not the United States and whose systems do not apply here. Most of the time, countries where women have far fewer rights.

Most of the time, countries where women have far fewer rights.

In fundy-speak, that is known as a “win-win”.

My concern isn’t the specifics of the case, but that the case wasn’t simply dismissed as not a proper subject for civil judicial review.

Cry more, then. The case clearly was a matter for civil courts. Employment is a civil matter. Alleged fraud is a civil matter. Just cry more.

The faiths with which I’m familiar set codes of conduct for their adherents, not for the whole world. So why would Mormons care if Adam and Steve wanted the state to acknowledge their relationship as a marriage? How would it affect Mormonity either way? It wouldn’t.

Unless, as I have suspected, that a significant number of Mormon kids turn out to be gay. Then, instead of entering into Angels-in-America-type sham het marriages and producing little Mormons, the older generation might fear their gay kids might marry each other.

Boycotters might want to skip California and its 800,000 Mormons, about half the Mormon population of Utah (60% of Utahns).

I do think that same-sex marriage proponents should realize that they’re advocating a radical change, not just a substitution of a chocolate mate for a vanilla one,  and however just their cause, doing a little more outreach will reap the support of the average citizen. As I’ve said many times, even bigots hesitate before denying rights to their friends and neighbors. Attitudes ARE changing; the 60% vote against gay marriage in Prop 22 has dwindled to 52% today. But, an interviewee on Talk of the Nation today, a black lesbian from LA whose name I did not catch, criticized the pro-same-sex forces as being comfortably white, who unlike the Yes on 8 people made no effort to reach out to black folks. As she spoke I kept thinking that the black struggle for equal rights was qualitatively different from the gay struggle for equal rights. Moreover, I do not recall that black Americans owe a debt to gay Americans because of any help in the struggle for the right to vote, desegregating schools, and equal access to public accommodations. So I found myself agreeing that the pro-SSM forces should have done more outreach.

Is there any non-religious reason to deny gay couples the right, responsibilities, and title of marriage? One is irrational: resistance to innovation. The other is philosophical: to what degree should people’s relationships be governed by the state? Perhaps civil unions provide the right balance of government regulation and individual choice.  But considering that there is no gay anti-SSM force, this philosophical objection can be discounted.

Will grammar schools teach that there are same-sex marriages? I sure hope so, if only to reassure a little Billy that his desires are normal. I hope they also teach about divorced families, blended families, etc.

Is there a chance, down the line, that churches might be required to solemnize gay marriages? Up until Benitez v. North Coast Women’s Care Medical Group, I would have said no. There the Cal Supreme Court held that physicians who provided artificial insemination to straight couples could not claim that their religious faith prevented them to artificially inseminate lesbian couples, considering the physicians to be a public accommodation. Had they religious scruples against performing artificial insemination for anyone, the Court would not have forced them to. But as long as they provided it for some, they had to provide it at all.

Because churches perform marriages for some couples and not others, it’s conceivable that a future Cal Supreme Court might declare churches to be public accommodations and require them to perform SSM. This would be more likely if the church did not require the couples to be members or to formally adhere to their beliefs in order to be married.

State marriage is a legal contract.  Perhaps the state should handle that part, and not descriminate.  Then the religious marriage could be a separate issue left to the discretion of the individual faith communities.

I like this idea.

Is there a chance, down the line, that churches might be required to solemnize gay marriages? Up until Benitez v. North Coast Women’s Care Medical Group, I would have said no.

Hector, I thought I already explained this to Dana. Just because another court case has to do with discrimination against gay couples, doesn’t mean that it is TEH PROOF that courts will force churches to marry same-sex couples. Let me walk you through this:

1) A doctor is not a religious organization or a church.
2) Medical services are secular; religious rituals are religious.
3) Having religious beliefs does not make you a church.
4) Having religious beliefs does not entitle you to ignore any law in conflict with your religious beliefs.

Now, having grasped all that, I am eager to hear your explanation of why a court case that ruled “a doctor cannot use his religious beliefs as an excuse to discriminate in providing secular medical services” means “courts will be able to force churches to perform same-sex marriages”.

myth, I thought I explained why I thought that, like the inseminators, there was a slight chance that churches would possibly be considered a public accommodation by some future court. Picture a Vegas wedding chapel: church or franchise business?

1) Churches and religious organizations have no more rights to free exercise of religion than do their members.
2) Weddings combine secular and religious elements; when churches unite non-believers, whose religious beliefs are at issue? Only the officiant’s, just like the case of the inseminators.
3) Churches are no more than a group of believers.
4) Having religious beliefs does not entitle you to ignore any law in conflict with your religious beliefs—Yup.

Hector, you didn’t explain why you thought there would be a ‘slight chance’ that a ruling about a completely secular business would jump the rails. You cite a case but don’t really explain why it’s going to force the Catholic Church to marry two gay men.

Please point me to any case that finds that a religious entity is a “public accomodation”. You don’t seem to understand what that term means. If the Catholic Church runs Mary’s Coffee Shop, open to the public, that’s a secular business. If it operates a church, that’s not. The Church does not make its rituals available to nonmembers. Therefore, it is free to set its requirements according to the tenets of its faith.

The Church does not make its rituals available to nonmembers.

Of course they do, every time an interfaith couple gets married. Consider a less hardshell church, like the Unitarians (picture a rogue branch of Unitarianism that doesn’t already perform SS weddings).  I went to a lovely one in which a non-practicing Jew and a non-practicing Hindu were united [accidental joke] even though Unitarians are nominally Christian. Again, the only religious beliefs at issue were the officiant’s.

If the government can keep me from the Holy Sacrament of Peyote, they can make me perform SS weddings.

mythago: I’m not saying it’s a compelling argument. I’m just saying the argument can be made.

The argument that gays were not being discriminated against because gay guys could marry women and lesbians could marry men was not a compelling argument either, but it still got made.

I’m just saying the argument can be made

And the argument can be made that if we let homos marry, they’ll go around luring straight people into bed to give them Teh Gay. For fuck’s sake, “the argument can be made” is the lamest, most cowardly excuse to hide behind when you figure out that what you’ve just said is BS.

U-U churches do not sell marriage ceremonies to the general public. They do not run their churches as ordinary, secular businesses. (By the way, “The Church”, in a sentence discussing the Catholic church, clearly isn’t about Unitarians.)

You truly don’t understand the law if you think that Employment Division v. Smith has much to do with this.

Benitez Case Summary:http://www.lambdalegal.org/our-work/publications/facts-backgrounds/page.jsp?itemID=31987395

You truly don’t understand the law if you think that Employment Division v. Smith has much to do with this.

New law: Smith will not allow those whom the state authorizes to solemnize marriage to deny this basic civil right to same-sex couples, because the law is not specifically directed to religious practice—clergy being but one of five classes of those who can solemnize marriages—and because the law is otherwise constitutional as applied to those who solemnize marriages for nonreligious reasons, which comprises four out of five classes of state-authorized officiants.

—- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - — - - -  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Holding in Smith:

(a) Although a State would be “prohibiting the free exercise [of religion]” in violation of the Clause if it sought to ban the performance of (or abstention from) physical acts solely because of their religious motivation, the Clause does not relieve an individual of the obligation to comply with a law that incidentally forbids (or requires) the performance of an act that his religious belief requires (or forbids) if the law is not specifically directed to religious practice and is otherwise constitutional as applied to those who engage in the specified act for nonreligious reasons. See, e.g., Reynolds v. United States, 98 U. S. 145, 98 U. S. 166-167. The only decisions in which this Court has held that the First Amendment bars application of a neutral, generally applicable law to religiously motivated action are distinguished on the ground that they involved not the Free Exercise Clause alone, but that Clause in conjunction with other constitutional

Page 494 U. S. 873

protections.

California Family Code:

400.  Marriage may be solemnized by any of the following who is of
the age of 18 years or older:
  (a) A priest, minister, rabbi, or authorized person of any
religious denomination.
  (b) A judge or retired judge, commissioner of civil marriages or
retired commissioner of civil marriages, commissioner or retired
commissioner, or assistant commissioner of a court of record in this
state.
  (c) A judge or magistrate who has resigned from office.
  (d) Any of the following judges or magistrates of the United
States:
  (1) A justice or retired justice of the United States Supreme
Court.
  (2) A judge or retired judge of a court of appeals, a district
court, or a court created by an act of Congress the judges of which
are entitled to hold office during good behavior.
  (3) A judge or retired judge of a bankruptcy court or a tax court.

  (4) A United States magistrate or retired magistrate.
  (e) A legislator or constitutional officer of this state or a
Member of Congress who represents a district within this state, while
that person holds office.

In re Marriage Cases:

[T]he right to marry is a basic civil right guaranteed to all Californians, whether gay or heterosexual, and to same-sex couples as well as to opposite-sex couples.

New law: Those whom the state authorizes to solemnize marriage cannot deny this basic civil right to same-sex couples. Clergy will not be relieved of this obligation even if their religious belief forbids them to, because the law requiring officiants not to discriminate is not specifically directed to religious practice—clergy being but one of five classes of those who can solemnize marriages—and because the law is otherwise constitutional as applied to those who solemnize marriages for nonreligious reasons, which comprises four out of five classes of state-authorized officiants.

I still like the argument made a bit above: who the hell would want to get married in a church that hated them so much it took a court order to force a priest to perform the ceremony? Um, NO ONE. Problem solved. The Church’s incredible dickishness is it’s own protection against teh gays! A veritable triumph of staunch bigotry over imaginary problems!

Those whom the state authorizes to solemnize marriage cannot deny this basic civil right to same-sex couples.

Please see the First Amendment. Unless you are running the Marriage Shack 10-Minute Licenses While U Wait, you are not a ‘public accomodation’. By your logic, since you have a fundamental right to marry, if you propose to me, I am required to say “yes” or I am depriving you of your rights.

You’re spending a lot of energy on making an argument that “can be made” and you pretend not to subscribe to when it’s shown to be weak, by the way.

You’re spending a lot of energy on making an argument that “can be made”

You kinda threw the gauntlet down when you typed this: You truly don’t understand the law if you think that Employment Division v. Smith has much to do with this. Emphasizing truly didn’t persuade me, sorry.

Further, I suspect that if I told you you were full of shit, you might spend some energy proving I was wrong, too.

you pretend not to subscribe to when it’s shown to be weak, by the way.

Good lawyers are trained to argue both sides of an issue.  What’s your counterargument?