Religions > Atheism > 3 Important Developments Involving Law and Religion During The Summer
| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"" |
| Date: |
11 Sep 2007 06:14:24 AM |
| Object: |
3 Important Developments Involving Law and Religion During The Summer |
Three Important Developments Involving Law and Religion During The Summer
Of 2007
By MARCI HAMILTON
----
Thursday, Sep. 06, 2007
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/hamilton/20070906.html
[excerpt]
I took a short break from my column-writing duties this summer in order to
finish my forthcoming book. Looking back over the summer, I saw three major
developments in the area of law and religion.
The Supreme Court Narrows Taxpayer Standing in Establishment Clause Cases
From the moment that Justice Samuel Alito joined the Supreme Court in the
seat left by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's retirement, there has been
reason to be concerned that the Establishment Clause would become more
watered down than it already is. The open question was would he be an
"incrementalist" who chipped away at the separation of church and state bit
by bit, or would he take the most extreme positions taken by Justices
Scalia and Thomas. In June, we learned that the answer is the former.
The Court's decision in Hein v. Freedom from Religion ruled that taxpayers
do not have standing to challenge executive spending where the funds were
taken from "general" executive branch funds. (The Freedom from Religion
Foundation had challenged the White House's Faith-based Initiatives
funding.)
The marquee question in the case was whether Flast v. Cohen -- which
recognized that the values of the Establishment Clause permit taxpayers to
challenge government expenditures of funds for religious purposes -- would
be overruled. The implicit reasoning in Flast is persuasive: When the
government expends funds in favor of religious entities, there is injury to
the taxpayer whose taxes have been used to support another's religion. This
was the heart of the reasoning in James Madison's Memorial and
Remonstrance, where Madison argued that not even "three pence" of
taxpayers' proceeds should be used to pay Christian teachers in Virginia.
Justice Alito, joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kennedy, took
the position that although Flast should not be overruled, they would not
apply the principles of Flast to government funds that were taken from an
executive branch general fund. Rather, taxpayer standing would only be
permitted in situations where Congress had specifically designated the
funds be used for a religious purpose.
Not only is the reasoning incremental, it is also simply intellectually and
morally indefensible. The harm identified by Flast is certainly present in
Hein: taxpayers' funds were being used to support a religious mission. In
fact, the case creates an unattractive incentive for the executive branch
to curry favor with religious entities, by immunizing it from Establishment
Clause attack so long as it pulls funds from "general" accounts. That is
the kind of incentive to pander to religion that this Administration
especially does not need.
Justices Scalia and Thomas, in a principled, if utterly wrongheaded and
historically indefensible, concurrence would have jettisoned taxpayer
standing altogether. The 4-person dissent would have preserved Flast, as
is, and applied it to find standing in the case before the Court. When
combined with the three-person plurality, there were 7 votes for the
proposition that taxpayer standing in the Establishment Clause context
stands, but the parameters around Flast were definitely tightened.
Los Angeles Archdiocese Clergy Abuse Settlement and the Slow Release of
Church Documents
[snip]
California and Delaware Window Legislation
[snip]
[end excerpt]
***************************************************************
You are invited to check out the following:
The Rise of the Theocratic States of America
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocracy.htm
American Theocrats - Past and Present
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocrats.htm
The Constitutional Principle: Separation of Church and State
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html
[and to join the discussion group for the above site and/or Separation of
Church and State in general, listed below]
HRSepCnS · Historical Reality SepChurch&State
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HRSepCnS/
***************************************************************
.. . . You can't understand a phrase such as "Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion" by syllogistic reasoning. Words
take their meaning from social as well as textual contexts, which is why "a
page of history is worth a volume of logic." New York Trust Co. v. Eisner,
256 U.S. 345, 349, 41 S.Ct. 506, 507, 65 L.Ed. 963 (1921) (Holmes, J.).
Sherman v. Community Consol. Dist. 21, 980 F.2d 437, 445 (7th Cir. 1992)
.. . .
****************************************************************
USAF LT. COL (Ret) Buffman (Glen P. Goffin) wrote
"You pilot always into an unknown future;
facts are your only clue. Get the facts!"
That philosophy 'snipit' helped to get me, and my crew, through a good
many combat missions and far too many scary, inflight, emergencies.
It has also played a significant role in helping me to expose the
plethora of radical Christian propaganda and lies that we find at
almost every media turn.
*****************************************************************
THE CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLE:
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html
****************************************************************
.
|
|
| User: "SueDoeCyAnts" |
|
| Title: Attention Buckeye - You Missed a Big Red One |
13 Sep 2007 07:44:01 PM |
|
|
on Tue 11 Sep 2007 04:14:24a
posted
in news:i2uce3loklk9he8pp6ivmuraugk87rhsit@4ax.com:
Three Important Developments Involving Law and Religion During
The Summer Of 2007
By MARCI HAMILTON
----
=================================================================
The Party of The Potty Peepers Deconstructs over
H.R. 1592: The Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act
=================================================================
Praise the Lord, and Pass the Ammunition...
------------------------
Louie Gohmert (R-Texas 1st District)
<http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=2007
_record&docid=cr02my07-143>
On May 2, 2007, Congressman Gohmert got up and opposed The Local
Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act Of 2007, based largely
upon religious grounds.
The change in text from 'serious bodily injury' to 'bodily injury'
"...lowered the bar dramatically. There are some
jurisdictions that would say bodily injury can be
temporary, no matter how temporary. It can be
a touching, a pushing."
Louie then proposed The Night of The Living Tansvestites
as the horror scenario:
"if someone opposed to your position that, perhaps,
was having gender identity issues, like a transvestite,
got between you and your office, and there were numbers
of them, and you tried to get through to your office,
then, as has happened in other places, he may be inclined
now to go to the Federal Government, file a criminal
complaint for which you could be arrested, and that would
be bodily injury sufficient to rise to that level."
After a long stretch to how the law of principles could end up
reaching ministers, rabbis, and don't forget imams, Gohmert
reached for the big club: the non sequitur argument:
"Now, others say that's ridiculous, and it reminds me
a great deal of the debate in this House in 1935,
1936, on Social Security, when some stood here and said,
we don't want Social Security numbers because those will
one day be utilized as identification numbers. That was
roundly guffawed, this is ridiculous. This is simply a
number on a Social Security account. It could never be
identification. That's ridiculous. Others say, look, we
have a provision in here that says first amendment speech."
For the record: Louis Buller "Louie" Gohmert, Jr. was born August
18, 1953, in Pittsburg, Texas. My reckoning makes him 57, which
also indicates he was speaking with hyperbole when he said he was
reminded of events that took place in Congress almost two decades
before he was born.
-------------------------------------
Todd Tiahrt (R-Kansas 4th District)
<http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=2007
_record&docid=cr07my07-29>
Went for the code-phrase "special protected class". Todd has
shown he he has no trouble with singling out the special protected
class of marriage, and strictly defining that class as a union
between a man and a woman.
Tiahart then went for a double jeopardy angle:
"State and local laws already provide criminal penalties
for the violence addressed by the new Federal crimes
defined in H.R. 1592."
I wonder how Todd voted for the double whumping eco-terror
statutes.
Todd then angled off into an area I find most amusing
in all of this: a very uncontemporary Conservative view
of substantive due process:
"...there are Constitution questions concerning this
bill. The 14th Amendment affords equal protection under
the law to all citizens. H.R. 1592 defies this principle
by ranking victims according to nebulous categories like
"sexual orientation" and "gender identity" that are
based on behavior and are not easily definable."
Then Tiahart admits his Christian vision is at threat because of
a Hate-Crimes Bill:
"It is ironic that this bill came to the floor on the
National Day of Prayer. I am worried that this bill will
unfairly target people of faith. Under this bill,
Christians and clergy may be targets for prosecution if
their traditional teachings on sexuality are considered
an inducement to violence of people based on "sexual
orientation" or "gender identity" whether real or
perceived."
---------------------------------------------
Alcee L. Hastings (D-Florida 23rd District)
<http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=2007
_record&docid=cr07my07-33>
Congressman Alcee L. Hastings brought the issue into clear focus:
"The fact is, hate toward people in our country who are
deemed different remains copious and persistent.
What is not fact, however, is the campaign of mistruths
right-wing extremists with a megaphone have instigated
against this bill. They claim, for instance, that
passage of this bill will be used to persecute anti-gay
churches. To which I say, I don't know of any pastor or
minister who would advocate tying a man to a split-rail
fence, beating him brutally, and leaving him to die in
the cold of the night for no reason other than he was
gay."
----------------------------------------------
Mike Pence (R Indiana 6th District)
<http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=2007
_record&docid=cr03my07-81>
I saved Pence for last in my abbreviated analysis, because this is
the cream. On May 3, 2007, Mike Pence spoke, not just for himself
or his district, but for the House Republican conservative caucus,
The Republican Study Group, which Pence chairs.
In his opposition, Pence cites Jefferson's "Wall of Separation"
from Danbury baptist, as if it is the gold standard amongst
Conservatives:
"Thomas Jefferson said, famously, 'Believing with you
that religion is a matter which lies solely between man
and his God, that he owes account to none other for his
faith or his worship, that the legislative power of
government reach actions only, and not opinions,'
Jefferson went on to say, 'I contemplate with sovereign
reverence that the act of the whole American people
which declared that their legislature shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting
the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of
separation between church and state.'
Again, Thomas Jefferson, framing, as perhaps only he in
American history could, the issue that grounded
conservative concern in the hate crimes legislation
today, that legislative powers of government should
reach actions only and not opinions, and then reflected
on that as the core central logic behind the first
amendment protections of the freedom of religion."
Did you catch that? Not only is Pence willing to give great
credence to the Wall of Separation between Church and State, he is
claiming that a hate crime bill somehow violates the establishment
clause of the first amendment.
Excellent ordnance here,
and some big fat asses for targeting.
Enjoy!
.
|
|
|
|
|
Related Articles |
|
|
