The latest Gallup poll shows that Americans' trust in the judiciary has fallen to an all-time low. Trust in the judicial branch of government dropped eight points just in the last year, which saw major decisions including the redefinition of marriage by the U.S. Supreme Court. When polled, only 53 percent of Americans said that they have “a great deal” or even just “a fair amount” of trust in the third branch of government.
Brian Mason, the deputy clerk who agreed to issue marriage license to same-sex couples, has accused his boss of violating a federal court order by altering the forms. According to Mason's lawyer, Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis replaced the previous marriage license forms with forms that did not include her name, Rowan County’s name, or any reference to a clerk or deputy clerk.
The Alabama Supreme Court on Friday refused to recognize an adoption by a lesbian of her female partner's three children granted by a Georgia court in 2007. Alabama has the authority to determine who may adopt based on the best interest of the child to be adopted, Alabama Justice Tom Parker wrote.
Texas is now recognizing same-sex common law "marriages." Sonemaly Phrasavath was recently acknowledged as the "legal spouse" of Stella Powell, who died of colon cancer in June 2014. Phrasavath will receive one half of her late partner's estate; the other half will go to the Powell family.
President Barack Obama is nominating longtime Pentagon official Eric Fanning to be the Army's new secretary. If his nomination is confirmed by the Senate, Fanning, a civilian, would be the nation's first openly homosexual leader of a military service.
The U.S. government says it will begin using the term "sexual rights" in discussions of human rights and global development. The statement at a U.N. meeting this week comes after years of lobbying from groups who have argued that the U.S. should show global leadership on the rights of people of all "gender identities" and "sexual orientations."
Public businesses in Illinois must serve same-sex couples, an Illinois judge ruled Thursday. The ruling was related to a complaint made against Timber Creek Bed and Breakfast by a same-sex couple that was denied service in 2011.
While most of the the Republican presidential candidates have defended Kim Davis, George Pataki has something else to say: "I think she should have been fired, and if she worked for me, I would have fired her."
Kentucky County Clerk Kim Davis lost another appeal to delay issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, marking the latest in a mounting stack of rejected appeals.
Doritos unveiled bags of rainbow-colored corn chips on Thursday in support of the It Gets Better Project, an organization founded to "encourage" homosexuals who've been "bullied." The rainbow chips are only available to those who donate $10 to the It Gets Better Project.
Two Tennessee lawmakers filed the "Tennessee Natural Marriage Defense Act" on Thursday. The bill says that no state or local agency may enforce the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling, or any other decision that might allow same-sex "marriage."
Mike Huckabee doubled down Wednesday on his defense of the Kentucky clerk briefly jailed for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, stating that such accommodations were instead made to Muslim radicals, including Guantanamo Bay detainees.
MONTGOMERY, AL — Following the Emergency Petition that he filed to the Alabama Supreme Court yesterday, Probate Judge Nick Williams filed a Memorandum to support the Petition that stated: "This Court is not obligated to follow a lawless decision because that decision is not the law." "Surely,” Judge Williams argued, "the founders did not intend for there to be arbitrary and unchecked power in one branch of the federal government, with the other branches and the States powerless to act."
MONTGOMERY, AL - On Wednesday, Washington County Probate Judge Nick Williams filed an Emergency Petition to the Supreme Court of Alabama in light of the recent jailing of Kentucky Clerk, Kim Davis. Judge Williams asked the Court for an order declaring the efficacy of the Court’s previous order upholding and enforcing the Alabama Constitution and Alabama’s marriage laws, notwithstanding the decision of the Supreme Court in Obergefell v. Hodges. Judge Williams requested that the ruling include free exercise rights for himself and others in Alabama as protected by the First Amendment of the United States Constitution and Amendment 622 of the Alabama Constitution.
Alabama Probate Judge Nick Williams filed an emergency petition with the Alabama Supreme Court today, asking for "declaratory judgment and/or protective order in light of the jailing of Kentucky Clerk Kim Davis." The court is in conference today.
Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore spoke last week at Eagle Council 2015, an event hosted by Eagle Forum. After reading Martin Niemöller’s poem about Nazi Germany, entitled: "First They Came For The Socialists…," Moore applied it to the recent persecution of Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, "Ladies and Gentlemen, we can say the same thing today. They came for the bakers, I didn’t bake cakes. They came for the florists, but I didn’t deal with flowers. They came for the little clerk down in Kentucky by the name of Kim Davis, but I’m not a clerk, I have nothing do with issuing licenses. Then they came for me, and nobody was left."
TROY CITY, Ohio — Some parents of children at an Ohio school were outraged after the school decided to allow a girl who identifies as a boy to share a bathroom with boys. Troy City Schools hosted a parent and community meeting last Thursday that brought out strong opinions. One parent, pro-life advocate Bryan Kemper, told WDTN, “I think that gender-neutral restrooms should be provided for all students who don’t want to go into one or the other, but my children, my sons, should not have to worry about a female walking into the restroom with them, and my daughters should not have to worry about a male walking into the restroom with them.”
A recent ABC News/Washington Post poll, conducted by phone Sept. 7-10 among a random national sample of 1,003 adults, found that 74 percent of respondents believe that equality under the law is most important, while only 19 percent said that religious beliefs should come first. Furthermore, 63 percent of those surveyed said that Davis should be required to issue marriage licenses, compared to 33 percent who disagreed.
South Carolina is paying approximately $215,000 in legal fees to two couples who challenged the state's constitution, which defines marriage as between one man and one woman, in the federal courts. Same-sex couples sued in federal courts in Charleston and Columbia for the right to be "married" or for South Carolina to recognize their "marriage" performed out of state.
When asked by Megyn Kelly how he would protect people like Kim Davis as president, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee responded, “Well, first of all I would make sure that we recognize that the law and the Constitution is explicit on the First Amendment guarantee of religious liberty. There is nothing in the Constitution whatsoever that gives the federal government jurisdiction over marriage, and that was one of the points that the dissenting justices made. The majority had to come up with this whole idea of the federal oversight of marriage out of thin air. There’s nothing in the law, nothing in the Constitution. We’ve got a federal government that is out of control."
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Florida's court clerks are going to start using new marriage and divorce forms that contain the word "spouse" instead of "husband" and "wife." State officials on Monday began sending the new forms to county clerks. Clerks asked for new forms after Florida officials stopped enforcing the state's same-sex "marriage" ban in January.
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Plaintiffs in the U.S. Supreme Court case that attempted to redefine marriage filed paperwork on Friday to seek more than $1.1 million from the state of Ohio as compensation for costs they accrued fighting the state's marriage law. The legal team from private practices and organizations including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund have also asked for U.S. District Court Judge Timothy S. Black to boost the plaintiffs' reimbursement an extra 50 percent beyond their fees and expenses. Similar claims are being filed in Texas, Michigan and Kentucky.
Kim Davis, the county clerk in Kentucky who was jailed for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, is back to work today — saying she will neither authorize such licenses nor stand in the way of her deputies if they wish to do so. Flanked by Rowan County Sheriff's deputies and her son, Nathan — a deputy clerk who has also refused to issue same-sex licenses — Davis said she loves God and her job but won't authorize the issuing of marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis said Monday that she will not interfere with her deputies if they keep issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, but she declared they will not be authorized by her and questioned their validity. It was Kim Davis' first day back in the office after spending five days in jail for refusing to follow a federal judge's order. "I don't want to have this conflict. I don't want to be in the spotlight. And I certainly don't want to be a whipping post," Davis said, reading from a handwritten statement outside the courthouse where she works. "I am no hero. I'm just a person that's been transformed by the grace of God, who wants to work, be with my family. I just want to serve my neighbors quietly without violating my conscience."
Republican presidential candidate and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said Thursday that since Arkansas hasn't changed its laws to accommodate same-sex "marriages," county clerks could rightfully withhold licenses from same-sex couples. Huckabee didn't say the clerks should flout the court decision, but said they should "follow the only law they have in front of them." Current Gov. Asa Hutchinson and Attorney General Leslie Rutledge have told Arkansas clerks to comply with the June U.S. Supreme Court's same-sex "marriage" opinion.