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Title: Kentucky clerk still won't issue same-sex marriage licenses
Source:
Associated Press
URL Source: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/storie ... AULT&CTIME=2015-09-01-08-52-48
Published: Sep 1, 2015
Author: Claire Valofaro
Post Date: 2015-09-01 10:04:38 by cranky
Keywords: None
Views: 35971
Comments: 339
A county clerk in Kentucky has again refused to issue marriage licenses to gay couples, invoking her religious beliefs and "God's authority" - this time in defiance of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling against her. On Tuesday morning, Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis' office denied the licenses to at least two couples. At first, Davis was in her office with the door closed and blinds drawn. But she emerged a few minutes later, telling the couples and the activists gathered there that her office is continuing to deny the licenses "under God's authority." The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to intervene in the case, leaving Davis no legal grounds to refuse to grant the licenses. A district judge could now hold her in contempt of court, which can carry steep fines or jail time. As an elected official, Davis can't be fired. Davis asked David Moore and David Ermold to leave her office after they were denied a license Tuesday morning - the couple's fourth rejection. They refused, surrounded by reporters and cameras. "We're not leaving until we have a license," Ermold said. "Then you're going to have a long day," Davis told him. From the back of the room, Davis' supporters said: "Praise the Lord! ... Stand your ground." Other activists shouted that Davis is a bigot and told her: "Do your job." Davis has said her deeply held Christian beliefs don't let her endorse gay marriages. She stopped issuing all marriage licenses in the days after the Supreme Court legalized gay marriage across the nation. Two gay couples and two straight couples sued her, arguing that she must fulfill her duties as an elected official despite her personal religious faith. A federal judge ordered her to issue the licenses, and an appeals court upheld that decision. Her lawyers with the Liberty Counsel filed a last-ditch appeal to the Supreme Court on Friday, asking that they grant her "asylum for her conscience." Justice Elena Kagan, who oversees the 6th district, referred Davis' request to the full court, which denied the stay without comment. After Tuesday's denials, the rejected couples' supporters called the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed the lawsuit on their behalf. They asked that the attorneys file that day to have Davis held in contempt. Shortly after Davis' remarks in her office, the sheriff's office cleared the room and building of those gathered to support both sides of the issue. The two groups lined up on the lawn, on either side of the courthouse entrance to chant at each other. Davis' supporters have told her to "stand firm," while gay-rights activists shouted "do your job." Randy Smith, leading the group supporting Davis, said he knows following their instruction to "stand firm" might mean Davis goes to jail. "But at the end of the day, we have to stand before God, which has higher authority than the Supreme Court," he said. Ermold hugged Moore, his partner of 17 years, and they cried and swayed as they left the clerk's office. Davis' supporters marched by, chanting. "I feel sad, I feel devastated," Ermold said. "I feel like I've been humiliated on such a national level, I can't even comprehend it." 
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 270.
#1. To: cranky, *Religious History and Issues* (#0)
Wonder if these same activists know that doctors cannot be forced into giving sex change operations or even performing abortions and prescribing birth control pills. If I remember correctly, county clerks do more than issue marriage licenses. I also know this gay couple could go to another county and get a license. So why push someone to do something against their convictions?
So why push someone to do something against their convictions? They are doing it on principle, and they will certainly win too. The woman is a public official America is a secular, pagan state, with secular pagan laws, one of which is the legality of slaughtering babies in the womb, and another of which is the constitutional requirement to treat gay couples the same as any normal couple when it comes to marriage. She is an agent of the state. She serves Caesar and takes Caesar's coin. Therefore, she must obey Caesar. If he conscience does not allow her to serve Caesar because of what Caesar demands of her, then she must stop taking Caesar's coin. She must resign her post and leave it. Before the issue was litigated before the Supreme Court, it was an open question, but now Caesar has spoken, very clearly. You cannot serve both God and Caesar on the matter of gay marriage. If you try to, you are breaking the laws of Caesar, and you will be punished by Caesar. Of course, Christians do not need to get married by the state at all to be married in the eyes of God. The state's license and sanction mean nothing, at all, in the court of God. Did a man and a woman consecrate themselves to the other before God, consummate the union, and keep to each other having no others? Then they are married. The state has all sorts of contracts and the laws that govern the relationship in its pagan ways, but Christians are not required by God to go through any licensing or formal ceremony to be married. You cannot serve both God and money, and you cannot serve both God and the American government either. There was a time when you could, sort of, but that time has passed. You cannot do so anymore, in the capacity of clerk. The proper answer is for her, and everybody else, to understand that state- sanctioned marriage is not marriage. Marriage is a spiritual union before God, a covenant that God consecrates. The state was permitted to come to that table, but the state has attempted to take over that table. In fact, neither the state NOR the Church is required to consecrate a covenant of marriage before God. All that is required is God and the two individuals who are marrying, and their following God's law of marriage. There is no marriage license requirement in God's law, and there is no requirement of a minister or a church service either. To the extent that the laws of men - both governmental and church - have become so oppressive as to try to cancel out the spiritual essence of marriage, those who follow God need to stop submitting to the laws of men - whether governmental OR ECCLESIAL - and marry before God. No witnesses are required either: that is a Christian and Jewish tradition only, not a commandment. That's the truth. Christians used to control American government. Trouble is, the Christians behaved very evilly - engaging in slavery, and in warfare, and in oppressive economic practices, all in violation of God's law. The Hypocritical Christian was (and is) the American standard, and hypocrisy utterly discredits the organized faith in the eyes of everybody. Those OUTSIDE the faith treat it as the joke that it IS, when it is hypocritical. And those WITHIN the faith make a public display but do as they please in public. Speak for Christ, actually QUOTE the law, chapter and verse, and Hypocritical Christians will scream at you. They will not be silent, repent and follow God. And so the Christian edifice rotted and lost power. Now, there is grasping at straws, trying to straddle an absurdity. Here's the truth: if a man and a woman who are virgins consecrate themselves to each other before God, in private, with nobody else present, and consummate the marriage sexually, and keep God's law, THEY ARE MARRIED. The Church says they are not, but God never ever gave the Church any authority to determine what a marriage is: THAT is established by God's law, not by human tradition. And the STATE has NOTHING TO SAY ABOUT IT. The proper thing for Christians to do today is to "shack up", in the eyes of the law and in the eyes of their churches, for life. No Church will marry people without a marriage license, but what the state gives is not a license to marry, for the state has no power to limit real marriage. Christians should ignore the state completely and get no marriage licenses. And that means that their Churches will not marry them, which is fine, because the Church marriage is nothing but a party and a ceremony. Christians should shack up for life and be faithful, wear rings and call themselves married, because THEY ARE. Play the game of licenses and churches, and you submit to Satan. And given this, the woman can keep her job, give out these fake licenses to anybody, but must herself hew to what "marriage" actually is - and it requires neither license nor ceremony. If she wants to immolate herself as a martyr, she can. The problem is that she is martyring herself for the principle that what the state offers is "marriage", and it is not. The state has no power to offer marriage. Marriage is a covenant between three: two people and God. Nobody else's permission is required, and nobody has to be present, or told about it, for it to exist.
She is not an employee of the state. She is an elected official which to me is key. She is responsible for duties on the authority derived directly from the people of her voting district (county) and it seems to me that any judge that would jail her would violate the separation of powers, undermining the will of the majority of county voters. The county voters are her "Ceasar", not any judge. She is committing no crime. If the county voters think she is doing poorly, they can vote her out of office in the next election. That's the "remedy", if one is needed.
We rejected such fascistic reasoning at Nuremburg.. Well put, and absolutely true. She could be 'impeached', I'd guess, but that would raise questions on the constitutionality of an impeachment over religious beliefs, that I doubt the courts would want to face.
Well put, and absolutely true. I saw this reply on another site. What is her crime? :----
Very good point
Very good point A point that her attorneys should be raising with higher courts. It's counterintuitive to our basic principles that when a constitutional issue is being raised, that a judge can jail the opposition for contempt..
It's counterintuitive to our basic principles that when a constitutional issue is being raised, that a judge can jail the opposition for contempt.. The did. The Supreme Court declined to hear the case.
I am unaware of any federal law in regards to marriage licenses since DOMA was struck down by SCOTUS. Perhaps you can also explain what law SCOTUS has enacted in regards to marriage licenses that is being defied. I was unaware that SCOTUS could enact Federal or State legislation as I understand that it is not part of their Constitutional authority. A point that her attorneys should be raising with higher courts. It's counterintuitive to our basic principles that when a constitutional issue is being raised, that a judge can jail the opposition for contempt.. We know that. Why do you support that arguably cowardly act? And, why do you support the alleged power of a judge to jail opponents for 'civil contempt' -- without a trial?
Support it? I think the whole circus is irrelevant. Truth is, marriage is defined by God as being between a man and a woman deciding to couple for life, and then having sex. No minister, No license. No state OR church involvement. A marriage is created when a man and a woman decide their married and have sex. That's a marriage before God. God holds them to it: if they divorce and have sex with others, they are adulterers, and God throws them into hell at final judgment. So, marriage is perilous stuff. But the state ande the Churches have nothing to do with it. BECAUSE the Churches usurped power in this area millennua ago, the state then had purchase for its bogus "license".. The proper way out of all of this nonsense is for Christians to knock off the charade of needing either a marriage license OR a church ceremony. The clergy won't marry anybody without the state's license, because that's "against the law" and they don't want to lose their tax exempt status. All a bunch of moral compromise over a non-existent requirement. Christians need to simply avoid all of that, shack up for life, be married and act that way, and that is that. Let the gays go get the piece of paper.
It's counterintuitive to our basic principles that when a constitutional issue is being raised, that a judge can jail the opposition for contempt.. We know that. Why do you support that arguably cowardly act? And, why do you support the alleged power of a judge to jail opponents for 'civil contempt' -- without a trial ? Then why did you answer in support of the Supremes? You're not being truthful, old boy.. Why is that ?
Contempt is a matter of equity, not law. When the judge issues and order, he intends to be obeyed. When somebody defies him, he throws that person in jail. There are no further proceedings, or trial, or anything, until the jailed person obeys the judge. That's equity for you. Always has been that way.
It's counterintuitive to our basic principles that when a constitutional issue is being raised, that a judge can jail the opposition for contempt.. Yep, that's one of the reasons we declared our independence from despots that use "equity" to ignore our inalienable rights. Shakespeare was right. First, we should kill all the (fascistic) lawyers...
Trouble is, whether it's Shakespeare or Claire Wolf, it's easy to talk about killing, but when it comes down to it, very few are willing to actually do that (thank God). Jefferson, that old felon, wrote truthfully when he said in the Declaration that people are apt to suffer wrongs as long as they're sufferable. People are wise to do so, because when it gets to the actual killin', that rapidly turns into the killin' AND DYIN' part, and most folks who are keen on "stringing the bastards up" are less keen on being front rank troops in the effort, because the front rank of such movements has a 90% or so death rate. Truth is, hardly anybody in America is willing to die for some abstract concept of "the Constitution". The "Claire Wolf" moment isn't going to come, at least not from white constitutionalists. My suggestion? Stop focusing on toy law and focus on real Law, which is God's law. It's shorter, has fewer procedures, and doesn't need anybody's assent. And the favors that come from following it often come fast.
True. However, if the time comes that those wrongs are no longer sufferable, it will be a different game. And those that have dished out the wrongs, will be in for a shocking surprise.
That already is happening in places like Ferguson. It's never going to happen in white America.
Why is that?
I get the distinct impression he thinks white folks are sheep nowadays.
No. White people (and black and yellow and red) SHOULD all be sheep, following the Good Shepherd Jesus, turning neither to the left nor to the right. That would be ideal. They're not doing that. They're not sheep. What they are, is aging, and struggling to stay afloat, unable to cooperate with each other or agree on right and wrong, and relatively immoral. This is not the grounds on which revolutions are made.
Don't the words "As shrewd as serpents" and "Freewill" also apply to your interpretation...
So, what would a shrewd serpent of faith do? Well, first he would know the law, of God. Marriage is described in Genesis: one man, one woman, before God, sex = married, for life. There is no rite, no ritual. So, from a religious perspective, and from the true meaning of what marriage is, that, and only that, is marriage. God never added a thing to it - no rite, no requirement for clergy, or witnesses, or permission of anybody else. Men never liked that - because children following their own will can mess up dynastic plans. Guess what, dad, God never gave you the authority to impose your dynastic dreams on your children's genitals. There is plenty of force evident in the Bible stories, buying and selling people, all of that, but God does not sanction it. So, the TRUE answer is that this thing of the state called a "marriage license" is properly called a "benefits license". Two people can pay for this license, and it entitles them to tax advantages and survivorship advantages. Since they're already married anyway, and have paid taxes into the kitty for these things, there is no spiritual reason NOT to pay for the benefits license and get financial and legal subsidies from the state. It's advantageous. But there is no religious crisis created when the state decides to give those benefits to gays too. The religious crieis comes from the tolerance out unmarried sex. All sex that is not between married people is sin: heterosexual or homosexual fornication or adultery (masturbation is merely an uncleanness that abates with the setitng of the sun). The state is secular, not Christian, and does not punish sexual liberty. It gives the benefits license to couples, gay or straight. It has the word "marriage" written on it, but they may as well write "immortality" on it: men cannot define these words, they're defined by God. Therefore, the shrewd serpent of faith will recognize that most of the people who buy the benefits license have already been married for a long time. They committed to each other in private and had sex long ago: they're married. They don't think they are, because of traditions, but they are. They haven't had the meaningless ceremonies yet, which make them think they're married, but they are, in fact, already married. On the other hand, the gays who come in to get the franchise, or adulterers - people who are "remarrying" after divorce (divorce does not actually exist before God - so these "remarriages" are really just open and notorious declarations of a permanent, public state of adultery, with benefits) - these people are just paying money for a benefits license. That's all it really is. It is very much like Paul and meat sacrificed to idols. He knew that the idols have no power, and that it's superstition and untrue, and THEREFORE there really is no such thing as "meat sacrificed "to" an idol", there was just delusion on the part of the people doing the sacrifice. Therefore, Paul knew that it was perfectly licit for him to eat that meat - it's just meat. But other people, superstitious Christians, who might see it and who might not have the capacity to realize that idols are fake so meat sacrificed "to" them is just meat...their faith might be shaken by seeing an apostle eat meat "sacrificed to" an idol. So Paul urged caution, so as to not become a stumbling block. Davis' proper position is: these marriage licenses are misnamed - they're not really licenses to marry, they're receipts for the purchase of tax benefits. And she should issue them, because she's not really participating in gay marriage, any more than Paul was adoring an idol by eating meat from the marketplace sacrificed to the idol. The idol isn't real, and therefore the meat is not tainted. Just because the people doing the act THINK they are channelling other gods doesn't mean they ARE, because the other gods do not exist. People who know that do not have to incovnenience their own lives, at all, because of other people's delusive superstitions. Paul knew that meat was meat, and that somebody "sacrificing it to an idol" was nonsense. And Susan Davis knows, or ought to know, that marriage is a man and a women committing to each other and having sex before God - that is a marriage, nothing else. These "marriage licenses" are misnomers, idols that silly people declare. They're not real. They don't do harm. The harm is done by the illicit sex these people are having. That is the sin. But issuing or not issuing the license isn't going to stop the sin: nobody is waiting on a marriage license in order to have gay sex, or most straight sex either for that matter. The shrewd serpent of faith would shrug her shoulders, laugh at the idiocy, sell the benefits licenses that have "marriage" stamped on them, and focus on her church and tell the Church that it should be marrying people without these fake licenses. That's the proper answer. Do not destroy yourself because pagans are nuts. Remember what is true, and ignore the pagan nonsense as you go about your business. When Paul was hungry, when he was not in the company of other Christians, he ate meat from the marketplace without a care as to whether it had been "sacrificed to idols" or not. Because the idols are not real, and therefore the sacrifices are not real, and the idiots performing the sactifice can neither make the meat holy through the power of a god who isn't there, nor render it unholy either, through their own stupidity. It's just meat. A "marriage license" isn't REALLY a license to marry at all. It's a misnomer chosen by pagans for silly pagan reasons. Davis should ignore the nonsense, sell the pagans their pieces of paper if they want them, and take home the paycheck to her family, where it is needed. That is the correct answer. She chose a far less shrewd one, so she's sitting in a jail cell on a principle that is protecting against, well, selling things of no significance. It's too bad, but I do hope she sees it through. She wasn't subtle as a serpent, so now she's going to have to deal with a lot of unneccessary crap. I hope she endures and, in the process, causes millions of Christians to lose their faith in the legal system and constitutional structure of the United States. That is the good that can come out of this martyrdom: Christians can be aroused to see that the USA is an evil country with a bad system of law and government, and to lose their loyalty to it, and transfer that loyalty to God and their families, where it belongs.
I'm pretty sure he meant to use his teachings in wise manner, stick up for what you believe in not be a wimp like some want to interpret... Sometimes the "inconvenient way" is the only way to get things done, she's gonna try and bring this to a head and let the chips fall where they may. I would say she is counting on support from those that feel the same way she does. She may lose but I don't think that is going to matter as long as it opens the eyes of the public as to what is "really going on" in the government... She is fighting for her and everybody else in this country to maintain their religious rights. As other people have brought up in this and other threads there are things (abortion, birth control) that are the law of the land and those laws are being ignored by those who have deep religious convictions, this one "SHOULD" be too and she knows it!!!
There are no replies to Comment # 270. End Trace Mode for Comment # 270.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/LatestDavis has said her deeply held Christian beliefs don't let her endorse gay marriages.
#2. To: redleghunter (#1)
(Edited)
I also know this gay couple could go to another county and get a license.
#4. To: Vicomte13 (#2)
She is an agent of the state. She serves Caesar and takes Caesar's coin. Therefore, she must obey Caesar.
#7. To: Pinguinite, Y'ALL (#4)
She is an agent of the state. She serves Caesar and takes Caesar's coin. Therefore, she must obey Caesar.
She is not an employee of the state. She is an elected official which to me is key. She is responsible for duties on the authority derived directly from the people of her voting district (county) and it seems to me that any judge that would jail her would violate the separation of powers, undermining the will of the majority of county voters. The county voters are her "Ceasar", not any judge. --- She is committing no crime. If the county voters think she is doing poorly, they can vote her out of office in the next election. That's the "remedy", if one is needed. --- Pinguinite.
Vicomte -- she will be haled into court and fined or jailed from contempt, suspended from her job and ultimately released for it.
#85. To: Pinguinite, Vicomte, nolu chan, Y'ALL (#7)
Pinguinite --- She is not an employee of the state. She is an elected official which to me is key. She is responsible for duties on the authority derived directly from the people of her voting district (county) and it seems to me that any judge that would jail her would violate the separation of powers, undermining the will of the majority of county voters. The county voters are her "Ceasar", not any judge. --- She is committing no crime.
Vicomte -- she will be haled into court and fined or jailed from contempt, suspended from her job and ultimately released for it.
Perhaps you can explain what federal law is being defied? I am unaware of any federal law in regards to marriage licenses since DOMA was struck down by SCOTUS.
Perhaps you can also explain what law SCOTUS has enacted in regards to marriage licenses that is being defied. I was unaware that SCOTUS could enact Federal or State legislation as I understand that it is not part of their Constitutional authority.
#86. To: tpaine (#85)
Perhaps you can explain what federal law is being defied? I am unaware of any federal law in regards to marriage licenses since DOMA was struck down by SCOTUS. Perhaps you can also explain what law SCOTUS has enacted in regards to marriage licenses that is being defied. I was unaware that SCOTUS could enact Federal or State legislation as I understand that it is not part of their Constitutional authority.
#88. To: Dead Culture Watch, Y'ALL (#86)
#93. To: tpaine (#88)
A point that her attorneys should be raising with higher courts.
#98. To: Vicomte13 (#93)
Perhaps you can explain what federal law is being defied?
The did. The Supreme Court declined to hear the case.
#112. To: tpaine (#98)
Why do you support that arguably cowardly act?
#114. To: Vicomte13 (#112)
The did. The Supreme Court declined to hear the case.
Support it? I think the whole circus is irrelevant.
#130. To: tpaine (#114)
It's counterintuitive to our basic principles that when a constitutional issue is being raised, that a judge can jail the opposition for contempt..
#133. To: Vicomte13 (#130)
Contempt is a matter of equity, not law. When the judge issues and order, he intends to be obeyed. When somebody defies him, he throws that person in jail. There are no further proceedings, or trial, or anything, until the jailed person obeys the judge. That's equity for you. Always has been that way.
#137. To: tpaine (#133)
Shakespeare was right. First, we should kill all the (fascistic) lawyers...
#176. To: Vicomte13 (#137)
" people are apt to suffer wrongs as long as they're sufferable. "
#181. To: Stoner (#176)
However, if the time comes that those wrongs are no longer sufferable, it will be a different game. And those that have dished out the wrongs, will be in for a shocking surprise.
#193. To: Vicomte13 (#181)
" It's never going to happen in white America. "
#207. To: Stoner (#193)
#208. To: CZ82, Stoner (#207)
I get the distinct impression he thinks white folks are sheep nowadays.
#239. To: Vicomte13 (#208)
#260. To: CZ82 (#239)
As shrewd as serpent, and freewill do very much apply.
#270. To: Vicomte13 (#260)
(Edited)
Replies to Comment # 270.
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