Category: Courts

February 16, 2015

Alabama Judge Roy Moore Hates Same Sex Marriage Enough To Violate His Oath Of Office

file photo of Judge Roy Moore with his 10 Commandments monument
Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore in happier times when he thought he could force his religion on others

Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore is no stranger to violating his oath of office when it comes to his religious views. This time the line he’s drawn is same-sex marriage. He hates it. In an interview he tried to equate same-sex marriage with slavery to describe how wrong it is. This is why we need separation of church and state. Religious views shouldn’t trump civil rights or federal court decisions.

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December 25, 2014

Using Zoning Laws To Protect Religious Privilege

photo of the inside of a strip club
I’m sure there are plenty of believers in a strip club

One tool local governments use to protect religious privilege are zoning laws. They are regulations that spell out what people can and can’t do with their property. Many zoning regulations specifically spell out protections for religious property like churches while other zoning laws are used more subtly like getting a Zombie Nativity removed.

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November 21, 2014

Group Starts Petition To Remove Ohio’s Religious Exemption For Child Abuse

image of Bible and stethoscope

Did you know that many states, including Ohio, have religious exemptions for child abuse written into law? Short of killing the child, parents and people having custody of children can harm the health or safety of the child, by violating a duty of care, protection, or support – like refusing to get proper childhood vaccines or in the extreme, refusal of medical treatment for the child – as long as the abuse is due to the person’s religion. There is a new group collecting signatures on an online petition to get that exemption removed.

Here is one of the religious exemptions:

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November 13, 2014

Vandalism Is Not The Best Way To Deal With Church And State Violations

image of the Athens County Ohio Courthouse

Ohioan Eliot Kalman intention was good but his actions in protesting an obvious church and state violation was wrong. Kalman put large stickers over a church directory in a county courthouse. While law breaking can sometimes help draw attention to civil rights violations, vandalism is almost never a good way to protest. Damaging property doesn’t win you any friends and makes the people who are the target of the protest more defensive.

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October 6, 2014

The John Freshwater Saga Is Now Officially Over!!!

photo of John Freshwater
John Freshwater

The long drawn out saga of John Freshwater, the Mount Vernon Ohio middle school teacher who was fired for injecting his religious beliefs into his science classes, is officially over after the US Supreme Court refused to hear his appeal from a 2013 Ohio Supreme Court ruling that upheld his termination. Now he can move to the Bible and Chicken Dinner circuit playing the ‘martyr’ he believes he had become.

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October 4, 2014

Look Out! Pulpit Freedom Sunday Is Nigh!

logo for Pulpit Freedom Sunday event

This Sunday, October 5th, Alliance Defending Freedom’s Pulpit Freedom Sunday will take place. They claim it’s about religious freedom when in fact it’s about creating a lawsuit they can use to try and get tax regulations against electioneering by churches tossed out as unconstitutional. Finally, this year they might get their lawsuit.

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