Showing posts with label bill of rights. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bill of rights. Show all posts

Friday, April 17, 2015

Hallelujah ~ Tennessee Tries (And Fails) To Make the Bible the State Book

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At least once a year, someone in the Tennessee Legislature writes a bill to make the Holy Bible (King James Version Only) the State Book, and they will literally swear on a Bible that this is Constitutional because they are protecting their own religious freedom.

I mean, why not? It's not like Tennessee has anything else on the agenda, like passing Medicaid for the poor, or solving school funding problems. Oh, wait ...

There are people in the TN Legislature who have apparently never read the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the Constitution. Amendment I states unequivocally:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

From Nashville Public Radio
. . . the state's attorney general, Herbert Slatery, released an opinion Tuesday that stated the proposal violates both the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the Tennessee Constitution. In fact, Slatery said, the state prohibition on government involvement in religion is actually stronger than at the federal level, barring not only the establishment of a church, but also preference for any "mode of worship."
Several lawmakers warned of legal challenges if the proposal passes.

But support for the proposal has come from across the political aisle. The most passionate on Tuesday was a Democrat, Rep. John DeBerry of Memphis. He said Christians have become "too accommodating" toward people of other faiths, and the bill represents a chance for them to stick up for their beliefs.
"Won't you stand for something? Stand for something, and stop falling for everything."
DeBerry's speech drew a standing ovation. But even some religiously conservative lawmakers are opposing the proposal.

Rep. Jeremy Faison (R-Cosby) says it demeans the Bible and goes against the principles laid out by the nation and state's founders.
"They knew better than to enter in the personal relationship with God with the portion of the laws that govern us."

Tennessee has another sacred book anyway - the Tennessee Blue Book, which is handed out to visitors to the Capitol and school children across the state. It lists the current members of State Government, but also fun stuff like pictures of the state flag, the state flower (iris), the state wildflower (passiong flower), the state animal (salamander), and the state bird (mockingbird). Luckily for our state, even some Republicans think it is silly or even disrespectful to list the Holy Bible alongside the state salamander.

We could just make the Tennessee Blue Book the State Book.

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My own feeling is that the Bible wasn't written in Tennessee, so why should it be the state book? Obviously our red-state Legislature isn't going to choose Al Gore's book on global warming, but how about the famous All the President's Men by Robert Penn Warren? Nope - too cerebral for Tennessee, where most wouldn't know the author's name. But there's the blockbuster Roots by Alex Haley - everyone's heard of Roots, right? Never mind - that's a black experience book, and any bill that puts forth a black writer is going to be tabled anyway. The beloved Christie by Catherine Marshall might work because it's so religious, but then, the author was Presbyterian and not Evengelical enough. How 'bout something by Cormac McCarthy, James Agee, or Wilma Dykeman? Oh wait - some of those books have ideas that might not jive with the Holy Word of God. Cormac McCarthy has some bad words and sex, and Wilma Dykeman wrote an early book about family planning - can't have that. And James Agee went to Hollywood and wrote "The African Queen" - no Africans, please - they might be related to that Kenyan in the White House. Don't remind us.

Anyway, Governor Haslam was probably going to veto the Bible Bill anyway, but luckily for him the state Senate killed it yesterday. A blessing for everyone. Amen. At least until next year when they bring it up again, because they always do.



































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Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Justice Scalia ~ Supreme Bigot ~ with Updates

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From Huffington Post
Speaking at Princeton University, Scalia was asked by a gay student why he equates laws banning sodomy with those barring bestiality and murder.

"I don't think it's necessary, but I think it's effective," Scalia said, adding that legislative bodies can ban what they believe to be immoral.

. . . Some in the audience who had come to hear Scalia speak about his book applauded but more of those who attended the lecture clapped at freshman Duncan Hosie's question.

"It's a form of argument that I thought you would have known, which is called the `reduction to the absurd,'" Scalia told Hosie of San Francisco during the question-and-answer period. "If we cannot have moral feelings against homosexuality, can we have it against murder? Can we have it against other things?"

Scalia said he is not equating sodomy with murder but drawing a parallel between the bans on both.

Then he deadpanned: "I'm surprised you aren't persuaded."

Hosie said afterward that he was not persuaded by Scalia's answer. He said he believes Scalia's writings tend to "dehumanize" gays.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Other quotes from Scalia
Via the Daily Princetonian

On the Bill of Rights:

Every tinhorn dictator of the world has a bill of rights.
With the right structure, you will preserve freedom even
without a bill of rights. If you don’t have the right structure,
even a bill of rights will not save you. They are just
words on paper unless the structure of the government prevents
the centralization of power in one party or one man.

On Checks and Balances:

God bless gridlock.
It’s the principal protection of minorities.


On the Constitution:

The text is what governs...I don’t care what their intent was.
We are a government of laws, not of men....

The Constitution is not an organism;
it’s a legal text for Pete’s sake!
It means today what it meant when it was adopted.

[The idea of a] living constitution is incredibly seductive.
...I don’t know how we got to this stage....
At the end of the road is the destruction of the Constitution.
Unless you give [the laws] the meaning of those
who enacted them, you’re destroying democracy.

From NJ.com

Our statutes don’t morph. They don’t change meaning
from age to age to comport with whatever the zeitgeist
thinks appropriate. When you read Chaucer, you try to
figure out what the words meant when they were put down
on paper. It’s the same thing with the law.

If the constitution is not an ordinary law but rather this
empty bottle into which each generation is going to pour the
liquid that it desires, why should the bottle be filled
by nine unelected judges? Why would you think these nine
unelected members have their thumb on the pulse of people
so they know what the evolving standards of decency are?

If you think the proponents of a living constitution want
to bring you flexibility, think again. They want to bring you
what a constitution is designed to bring, which is rigidity.
They want society to do things their way
now and forever, coast to coast.
My constitution is a very flexible one. There’s nothing in it
about abortion and since there isn’t, it’s up to the citizens.
Things change by democratic choice. The Supreme Court doesn’t
have to abolish the death penalty. If the feelings of society
come against it, it will be abolished by the states.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


You go, Duncan Hosie '16, for standing up to this bigot.
~ comment by DISGUSTED on the Daily Princetonian

Reading about this question has made me never prouder to be a Princetonian.
Thank you, Duncan, for having so much courage and bravery.
~ comment by wow on the Daily Princetonian

Scalia's response to Duncan was condescending and conceited. I wish Duncan had pushed back. To compare murderers (who kill people) to gays (who are just trying marry people they love) is bizarre. Also, Scalia didn't really address whether it was necessary to prove his point to compare murderers to gay people. Other originalists don't do that.
~ comment by Scalia's Response Sucked

Well. Seems like Scalia just recused himself from the upcoming Prop 8 and DOMA cases.
~ comment by BrillWolf on Huffington Post

What do you expect from a man to considers the modern Roman Catholic Church to be too liberal and permissive?
~ comment by Cannonball Taffy O'Jones on Huffington Post

Isn't this why we are a land of laws and not a land of "moral feelings"?
When will Cardinal Scalia get that through his thick skull?
~ comment by revko Post

Scalia is a legal Lilliputian who will go down in history as one of the worst justices of all time.
~ comment by Greenchilistew on Huffington Post

Scalia is Just a Bigot
Wrapping opposition to same-sex marriage today or interracial marriage then in a religious blanket--or, in this case, a fancy jurisprudential one--is not okay. It was bigotry then, and it's bigtory now, pure and simple. And Scalia is a bigot, or at least those views expressed above are bigoted views. A hundred years from now, or even less, this will be clear as a bell, and people like Scalia will sound just as ignorant as the old racists do today.
~ Michael Tomasky on Daily Beast

At this point, it is time for Scalia to step down because it is clear that he has no intention of adhering to the Constitution, the founding philosophy behind the Constitution, the writings and musings of any of the Founders, and the spirit of the law. He has already judged every case that will come before the Court, and that means that he cannot effectively do his job as an impartial jurist. At that point, he has failed his oath of office and failed the Constitution.
~ Bridgette P. LaVictoire on Lez Get Real

I think this guy has a really serious God Complex and needs a thorough mental evaluation...I'm not kidding.
~ comment by Rip Arrowood on Think Progress




As I have written in a prior New York Times column, Scalia is attempting to divide citizens with such arguments and he has been remarkably successful when it comes to gay and polygamy cases. In his dissent in Lawrence v. Texas, Justice Antonin Scalia said the case would mean the legalization of “bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery, fornication, bestiality and obscenity.” It is Scalia parade of horribles. However, it also equates homosexuality with crimes like bestiality which occur without the consent of the victims.
Of course, Scalia does not answer how the right to criminalize immoral acts has been previously used to prosecute marriage of mixed race couples. He repeatedly refers to the slippery slope once the Court strikes down morality legislation, but never discusses his own slippery slope of criminalization for any acts deemed immoral by a majority of citizens.
~ Jonathan Turley, Law Professor and Legal Scholar

Scalia is still clinging tenaciously to his “ew, gross” vision of homosexuality — and working with all his might to prove that the great love of his life, the Constitution of the United States of America, agrees with him. In October, he eye-rolled at a lecture, “Homosexual sodomy? Come on. For 200 years, it was criminal in every state.” It must be difficult to find himself, a man appointed back in the glory days of Ronald Reagan, to be on the increasingly smaller, losing side of the culture war. To be the great and powerful Antonin Scalia, facing off against a measly college freshman, and to come across so defensive, so hollow and so very, very wrong. It’s called reduction to absurd. Scalia’s living it.
~ Mary Elizabeth Williams on Salon.com
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