Posted on 09/02/2015 7:00:44 PM PDT by markomalley
The Kentucky county clerk who refuses to issue gay marriage licenses may be out of legal options as she heads before a judge Thursday. Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis will stand before U.S. District Judge David Bunning for refusing to follow an order by the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court refused her request Monday to stay its unanimous ruling that she provide any and all couples with marriage licenses.
Davis may face severe criminal or civil consequences for her actions. She could face hefty daily fines and even put in jail. As an elected official, Davis cannot be fired, but she can be impeached by the state legislature. A judge can also remove her and order another official to do her job.
“I never imagined a day like this would come, where I would be asked to violate a central teaching of Scripture and of Jesus Himself regarding marriage,” Davis said in a statement. “It is not a light issue for me. It is a Heaven or Hell decision.”
In a landmark decision in June, the Supreme Court ruled that the U.S. Constitution recognizes same-sex marriage. The case Obergefell v. Hodges effectively meant all states must recognize and issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Despite exhausting all available legal options, Davis has refused to comply.
Jonathan Turley, a professor of law at The George Washington University Law School, notes the judge could impose significant penalties on her.
“The most obvious is contempt of court,” Turley told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “Contempt sanctions can be levied as either a criminal or civil matter. The person can be threatened with jail or a court can impose a running fine.”
The fine against her could be very high. As Turley noted, it is very much up to the discretion of the judge. The severity often depends on whom it’s against and the nature of the case.
“There is actually a great range depending on the case,” he noted. “The daily running fine is generally larger for corporations and … are less common against government officials who are appearing in their official capacity.”
“Such fines against the government raise added issues,” Turley continued. “The court could also issue an order to a subordinate or to the city to circumvent the Clerk while potentially jailing the Clerk.”
“She has run out of options,” Turley concluded. “We live in a nation of laws. She appealed her case to the highest court without success. The court will now have considerable latitude in sanctioning further contempt of its orders.”
Davis maintains her appeals to the Constitution, the founding fathers, and God.
“It is a matter of religious liberty, which is protected under the First Amendment, the Kentucky Constitution, and in the Kentucky Religious Freedom Restoration Act,” Davis argued. “I want to continue to perform my duties, but I also am requesting what our Founders envisioned.”
The day after the court refused her request for a stay, gay couples went to the Rowan County Clerk office to get marriage licenses.
In front of a mob of reporters Davis still denied their request citing “God’s authority.” A heated argument followed, with the couples demanding they get their marriage licenses.
Under current U.S. law, God does not have the authority to overrule the Supreme Court.
Kentucky needs to protect its people from a lawless USSC action.
She'll run out of options when her God does.
Turley thinks she's cornered. Foolish, foolish man. In his Pilgrim's Progress, Reformation writer John Bunyan (not to be confused with the giant lumberjack) called this sort of thinking, and the chorus of voices like Turley's, the Vanity Fair. We call it "the Conventional Wisdom" nowadays, but Bunyan excoriated it as a kind of satanic temptation.
To select a more recent metaphor, Turley would have told Rosa Parks to just go back and sit in the back of the bus, the law being against her.
Guess libs don't have much use for civil disobedience if the cause isn't their own.
Shamelessly trolling for my own preferred outcome, I've invited gays on Salon to push their overabundant PAC money into a big pile and go buy Paraguay, and then turn it into the absolutely stunning gay society that they are convinced will make the rest of the world green with envy.
I still hope they'll go for it.
For instance, a nurse or doctor can refuse to perform certain procedures which violate their religious conscious such as performing or assisting in abortions or giving a blood transfusion (Jehovah Witness).
I don't see why she couldn't use that reasoning for herself only. She can't order others to stop issuing gay marriage licences.
I may be wrong completely here but it's worth a try.
then go to another clerk or driver’s license center.
All marriage licenses issued in that county must have her signature. She doesn't want her signature on a document licensing a sodomite "marriage"
She can cite Scripture (many, many passages) indicating that sodomite behavior is abominable. Giving sanction to that behavior would be formal cooperation in that abomination.
Can you perhaps cite Scripture (not just God's word, but any major religious texts) that assert that issuing a drivers license to an otherwise competent person would be a formal cooperation with evil?
How about if you wanted to get a permit to put an addition on your house and the city official denied you that?
This already happens. If a person, for example, wanted an addition on their house in order to accommodate religious worship, there are many examples where building permits were denied because they'd create a zoning problem.
Do you usually exercise your right to vote? Maybe you’d like to experience being told you can’t register to vote because some public official says that God told him you were a sinner.
My above question applies here: can you cite some religious doctrine that arbitrarily denies a person the right to vote based solely upon a religious rationale?
On the other hand, all this self righteous woman needs to do is perform the task she was elected to do and fill out some paperwork. No harm done.
You, FRiend, need to study up a little bit on the subject of moral theology, specifically, the concept of formal and material cooperation with evil.
Thank you - I didn’t know that.
Then the article wrongly asserts that the Supreme Court issued an order.
I admire this woman.
In after midnight zot
The unanimous ruling was the circuit court. We don't know how many Supreme Court justices voted to take her case other than it was fewer than four.
One quick clarification. She can’t order clerks in other KY counties to not issue licenses. She can and has ordered her staff not to issue them, under the principle that it’s still her name on the document.
Thats why the Federal Judge has summoned both her and her staff to appear before him this morning.
This is now more a test of wills than a legal or moral argument. The court can declare that the couples have a right to the licenses, but it doesn’t have the ability to force her to issue them. Only increase pressure on her using various methods until she acquiesces. Question is how much pressure will be enough to get her to break. IS there enough pressure to get her to break?
I think evangelical Christians are right to see her as their version of the lone guy facing down the Chinese tank in Tianamen Square all those years ago.
Huckabee is backing her completely, which is no surprise. Rand Paul issued sort of a tepid support for her. Cruz is supporting her. Fiorina is against. Jindal is supporting her. I don’t know about the rest.
Daniel 3
in particular, verse 18
“But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.”
Exactly.....they want to BEND her and others like her to their will.
If Kentucky was going to then they would have by now. The governor ordered her to issue the marriage licenses.
You can keep saying mind your own business,and I will keep telling you it IS my business-and the business of every decent institution,private or governmental.
Go back in your closet and STFU.
If they bring of Social Security benefits, then I would say, “Oh... so it’s about getting money from the government?”
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