Category: same-sex marriage

Kim Davis Controversy: KY County Clerks Association Doesn't Have a Position on Marriage Licenses Without a Clerk's Name

Kim Davis is back to work today and media, protesters and a lesbian couple have been there too.
According to the AP, a deputy clerk, Brian Mason has assumed duties of handing out the marriage licenses. A lesbian couple did pick one up this morning with the phrase “pursuant to federal court order” in the place where the clerk’s name should be. Davis and her attorneys aren’t sure they are valid.
I contacted the Kentucky County Clerks Association last week to learn the organization’s position on leaving off a clerk’s name. Contrary to some media reports, the KCCA has not taken a final position on the matter, according to Bill May, spokesman for the organization.
While Davis doesn’t intend to interfere with what Brian Mason decides to do, she will not allow her name to be placed on a license which may mean the licenses aren’t valid in KY.
 

Kim Davis to Be Released from Prison with Order Not to Interfere with Same-Sex Marriage Licenses

According to CNN, Rowan County (KY) clerk has been released from prison with instruction from Judge David Bunning not interfere with deputies issuing same-sex marriage licenses.
The compromise appears to involve not requiring Davis’ to put her name on the license. Given the form of a KY marriage license, this should be possible. Note in the license below that the clerk’s name is typed in.
KY Marriage Lic Sign
 
According to the CNN report (and Mat Staver on Wallbuilders Live earlier today), Davis plans to stop licenses if they have her name on them. As you can see above, this license does not have her name on it. KY law appears to require the clerk to certify the accuracy of the license so there may be another impasse.
 
 

Which Same-Sex Marriage Related Action is Lawless?

The Supreme Court last week ruled 5-4 that the 14th Amendment required the states to recognize same-sex unions as legal marriages.
Today, the Family Research Council released the following press release:

Family Research Council Commends Texas Officials for Declining to Blindly Follow Five Justices
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton issued a statement calling the U.S. Supreme Court ruling an act of “lawlessness” and provided guidance that “county clerks and their employees retain religious freedoms that may allow accommodation of their religious objections to issuing same-sex ‘marriage’ licenses. The strength of any such claim depends on the particular facts of each case.”
Family Research Council President Tony Perkins issued the following statement in response:
“I find it refreshing and encouraging that state officials are declining to blindly follow five justices who have redefined society’s most fundamental institution — marriage. The Court got it wrong in their ruling and they got it wrong in thinking their edict would force Americans to accept same-sex ‘marriage’ and the corresponding loss of their most basic freedoms. States must ensure the government does not use this ruling to discriminate against those who continue to believe in natural marriage,” concluded Perkins.

The effect of the AG’s opinion appears to be to allow a clerk to avoid doing their duty while referring it to someone who doesn’t mind doing it, analogous to a pharmacist who doesn’t want to fill a script for a drug that might cause an abortion.
Paxton says the Supreme Court ruling was lawless, then he tells the clerks they may not have to comply.
I wonder if the Texas clerks who are fundamentalist Christians explore the sexual morality of the straight couples who request a license before issuing it. If licenses are issued to those who meet the various clerks’ standards, then I suppose Texas could have a hodgepodge of standards which vary from clerk to clerk. Surely, if the clerks’ religious beliefs about same-sex marriage can be honored then a clerk who believes people of different religions shouldn’t marry could decline to issue a license.
There is a word for when government officials decide to do what they want to do instead of what the law requires.
A.G. Paxton, what is that word?

Reaction to the Supreme Court Ruling Requiring Recognition of Same-Sex Marriages

In the most anticipated decision of the term, the Supreme Court this morning ruled that

The Fourteenth Amendment requires a State to license a marriage between two people of the same sex and to recognize a marriage between two people of the same sex when their marriage was lawfully licensed and performed out-of-State.

The decision is here.
Reaction was swift.
Russell Moore representing the Southern Baptists: Don’t panic, articulate a counter-cultural view of marriage. Watch:
[youtube]https://youtu.be/qsp59P1sFro[/youtube]
GOP presidential candidate Scott Walker: “I believe this Supreme Court decision is a grave mistake. Five unelected judges have taken it upon themselves to redefine the institution of marriage, an institution that the author of this decision acknowledges ‘has been with us for millennia.’”


Mark Woods writing for UK’s Christian Today asks readers not to worry. He writes:

So here’s a discussion starter.
It is entirely up to the state to declare what relationships it will recognise as marriage, and the Church should not have a problem with that.
It is entirely up to the Church to declare what relationships it will recognise as Christian marriage, and the State should not have a problem with that.
The state should jealously guard its prerogative from the Church, and ensure that it provides equality under the law for all its citizens.
The Church should jealousy guard its prerogative from the state, and ensure that it is never coerced into bringing its beliefs and practices into line with those of the majority if it doesn’t want to.
Evangelicals (and others) have got themselves into a knot because they think the state is trying to define Christian marriage. It isn’t; it can’t, and it never could. But the long history of Christendom has allowed Christians to think that the two are the same. Most Americans have always been keen on the separation of Church and state; well, now’s the chance to find out whether you mean it.


My reaction is more along the lines of Mark Woods’ and Jonathan Merritt’s.
I sat in a meeting in 2005 at Catholic University where lawyers, theologians, and social scientists were strategizing about how to prevent this day. I recall a couple of the lawyers who were there opposing gay marriage saying that today was probably inevitable. Anyone who was paying attention over the last decade should not be surprised by the decision today.
I’ll have more to say about the decision once I have read it completely, but my impression is that the five justices see same-sex attraction as an enduring aspect of existence. The state has no compelling interest in requiring people to change it to marry, so the law requires equal recognition of bonds formed by two people so constituted.

SCOTUS Blog: We Probably Have Two More Opinion Days; No Same Sex Marriage Decision Today

I’ve been watching the Supreme Court blog a bit today. One of the bloggers there just wrote the following in response to this question “So – at the end of tomorrow’s session we’ll find out if there will be opinions or just orders on Monday?”

Tejinder
We’ll definitely know for sure then. But we predict already that there will be opinions on Monday. It’s customary, on the second-to-last opinion day of the Term, for the Chief Justice to announce that the remaining opinions are coming on the next day. He didn’t do that today, so we think we have 2 more opinion days.

So tomorrow or Monday, the news cycle will stop and focus on gay marriage. I intend to have a post on the decision as will nearly all other bloggers.
Many evangelicals have predicted doom and gloom if the Supreme Court issues a ruling in favor of gay marriage. However, I predict the sun will come up the next day and after a lot of weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth, not much will change. Same-sex couples are getting married and divorced now in most states. Heterosexual couples are still doing that too and will do it no matter what the Supreme Court does. Ministers who don’t want to officiate at same-sex marriages won’t have to.
They are here and I am pretty much used to it.
 

Salon on Mixed Orientation Marriages in the Middle of Same-Sex Marriage Case

digitalcoupleimageYesterday, Salon’s Tracy Clark-Flory examined mixed orientation marriages as a possible new political statement against same-sex marriage. The article was triggered by the amicus brief filed by a Utah attorney on behalf of some people in mixed orientation marriages. She also interviewed me for the article and I am quoted extensively.
While my survey results are still unpublished (I keep getting distracted), the study has helped inform my views on the subject. Some essentially same-sex attracted men and women fall in love with a member of the other sex. While most of these marriages deal with issues other couples don’t have to address, there are many who are quite satisfied with the arrangement. They are not of necessity loveless, passionless marriages. However, the vast majority of these people don’t develop attraction to the other sex in any general sense. The baseline attractions remain about the same. On average, the people I surveyed demonstrated more same-sex attraction, not less.
In my opinion, there is no political benefit for any side in these results and I hope “mixed orientation marriage” doesn’t become the new “ex-gay.” Ex-gay became a political weapon and the political demands turned ex-gay into a caricature. In my view, the experiences of these couples have no relevance to the Supreme Court’s deliberations.

Ben Carson: Being Gay is Choice Because Some People Do Gay Things After Prison

Dr. Carson, this isn’t brain surgery. Being attracted to the same or opposite sex isn’t chosen like you chose to speak outside of your area of expertise today.
On CNN, Carson told Chris Cuomo that being gay is choice and he knows this because of prison. Carson said:

Because a lot of people who go into prison go into prison straight — and when they come out, they’re gay. So, did something happen while they were in there? Ask yourself that question.

Some people do make a shift in prison but probably not “a lot.” One study I consulted found that about 17% of prisoners said they had shifted orientation from before prison to the time of the survey. Those prisoners were still incarcerated. Most of the switchers said they became bisexual. They should be surveyed when they leave prison; most will likely revert to pre-prison identifications.
More disturbing is Carson’s reliance on a clearly exceptional population. He should know better than to draw conclusions about all gays because of the exceptions in prison. He surely did not choose surgery techniques or medicines that way.

What do Dan Savage and AFTAH’s Mike Heath have in common?

They both support Ron Paul.

In a Slate article out yesterday, gay activist Dan Savage (the inspiration behind the It Gets Better campaign), defended Ron Paul in comparison with social conservatives like Rick Santorum, saying:

“…Ron [Paul] may not like gay people, and may not want to hang out with us or use our toilets, but he’s content to leave us the fuck alone and recognizes that gay citizens are entitled to the same rights as all other citizens. Santorum, on the other hand, believes that his bigotry must be given the force of law. That’s an important difference.”

And then there is the chair of the board of the Americans for Truth About Homosexuality, Mike Heath. He is currently the Iowa State Director for Ron Paul’s campaign. Obviously, he too is a Ron Paul supporter but in his former positions, he has a record more in alignment with Rick Santorum than Ron Paul. Heath was lauded in an AFTAH article as being the only person in history to successfully turn back two state gay rights laws (in Maine in 1998 and 2001).

Maybe Heath has changed his views. Heath has not yet replied to my email asking what he thought of Savage’s characterization of Ron Paul’s views.

Having examined a sampling of Paul’s writings and looking at who is endorsing him in Iowa, I think Savage is only partly correct about Paul. I agree that Paul wants the federal government to leave gays alone. State government, however, is another matter. Paul criticized the Lawrence v. Texas Supreme Court decision because he believes the state has the right to make laws concerning sexuality.

In Ron Paul’s version of the world, gays would be free from interference from Washington, DC, but if Iowa, or Texas, or South Carolina wanted to recriminalize homosexual behavior, then Paul would support their right to do so.

As it turns out, the strange bedfellows are not limited to those on the opposite ends of the culture war. If there is a candidate favored by Christian reconstructionists in the GOP field, it would have to be Ron Paul. Recently, Paul was endorsed by a prominent Christian Reconstructionist pastor in Iowa, an endorsement touted by Paul on his website.

More on why Paul is attractive to Christian reconstructionists will come in a post later today.

Related:

What Does Ron Paul Really Believe About Gays?

FOX News covers PFOX effort to get ex-gay books in school libraries

PFOX (Parents and Friends of Ex-gays) gets a little national face time with this article on the FOX News website. It seems they can’t get anybody to take their books. Here are the books they want school libraries to include:

  • Parents Guide to Preventing Homosexuality by Joseph and Linda Nicolosi
  • You Don’t Have to Be Gay by Jeff Konrad
  • My Genes Made Me Do It! by Neil and Briar Whitehead
  • Gay Children, Straight Parents: A plan for family healing by Richard Cohen
  • This Side of Jordan by Bill Kassel
  • Marriage on Trial by Glenn Stanton and Bill Maier

PFOX complains that explicit books involving sexual descriptions are in libraries so these books should be too. That is comparing apples and oranges it seems to me. The libraries are not rejecting these books over their explicit nature, but rather due to the lack of published reviews of their suitability for a K-12 audience.

I think the books should be included in the libraries but am not persuaded to this position by the rationale of PFOX. Their position seems to be: you have a bunch of bad books already, why not include a few more? I would rather lobby for the removal or at least restriction of sexually explicit books, rather than use the existence of the books as a basis for adding more books.

My thinking is that students who want to research sexual orientation and the controversies surrounding the issue should have access to some pro-change books simply for the sake of research. Unless one has access to primary sources, one cannot do high quality work. I favor a system where parents help decide on what books can be restricted. The books PFOX wants included could be placed in a religion section or some reserve section where parent or teacher permission is needed to check them out. Libraries could include disclaimers such as a notation in Richard Cohen’s book that he was expelled from the ACA. On balance, I suspect that the books would not be looked at much.

As usual, in this article there is a doozy from Regina. She is quoted as saying:

Griggs also says, as a woman with an ex-gay cousin and a gay son, her goal and that of the organization’s is not to “cure” homosexuals. She says it is to promote tolerance of those who have left that lifestyle.

“It’s almost an attack on us as an organization merely because we want to allow people to have all the information on both sides,” Griggs said. “We aren’t out there forcing people to do anything … they have a right to know all of the facts to determine for themselves.”

“Therapy is not the issue — tolerance is,” she added. “Expect more lawsuits nationwide.”

A look at the list of books should cast doubt on these statements. Earlier in this article, Griggs is quoted as saying:

PFOX Executive Director Regina Griggs says the group just wants anyone struggling with unwanted same sex attractions to know all of the options available to them.

These books (with the exception of Stanton and Maier’s book) are all about changing orientation or preventing homosexuality. Having presented at a PFOX conference in the past, I can tell you that the conference was not about tolerance, but all about change of orientation. Therapy was always the issue, specifically reparative therapy.

Today's forecast: 100% chance that today's top stories will involve a Supreme Court

Obama announces his SCOTUS pick at 10:15am (est) .
California Supreme Court announces ruling on Prop 8 appeal at 1:00pm (est).
CNN and USA Today is reporting that Obama will nominate Sonia Sotomayor. If true and if confirmed, she will be the first Hispanic justice. She was nominated to the federal bench by George Bush I. Her wikipedia entry already has the news.
Got any other news you want to drop today? I wouldn’t advise it. I think these two stories may push North Korea to #3.
UPDATE: 5/26/09 – Prop 8 is upheld and but 18,000 current same-sex marriages will continue to be recognized. The ruling in .pdf is here.