Free Republic

More than 30 North Carolina magistrates so far have refused to perform weddings since the U.S. Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriages in all 50 states. But they’re not likely to suffer the fate of Kim Davis, the Tennessee county clerk who was recently jailed for her refusal. It turns out that taking this position is legal in North Carolina, according to CBN.com. Shortly after the Supreme Court’s June decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, which held that same-sex marriage is a constitutionally guaranteed right, the North Carolina legislature passed a law enabling officials to opt out of performing marriages altogether. The...

A Kentucky clerk who defied orders to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples was released from jail Tuesday, but her lawyer says she will continue to resist until officials find a way to accommodate her religious opposition to gay unions. Kim Davis emerged from the Carter County Detention Center to a swell of cheers from Christian supporters who'd been rallying outside the gates since she was ordered behind bars on Thursday. She later was introduced to the crowd to the song "Eye of the Tiger," raising her hands above her head and weeping on stage with her husband, lawyer and...

In a story that has received national coverage, a Kentucky County Clerk, Kim Davis, was found in contempt of court for her refusal to issue marriage licenses to a gay couple. She was jailed on Thursday. “My conscience will not allow it,” Davis, an Apostolic Christian, said to U.S. District Court Judge David Bunning. “God’s moral law convicts me and conflicts with my duties.” By way of background: Ms. Davis had been ordered to comply with the law and refused. The judge can’t fire her from her job, so citing her for contempt of court was the only means at...

For quite some time now I have stated that the same arguments that have been used in support of consensual gay marriage can also be used in support of consensual polygamy. With that in mind, I am also one of the few who has argued for some time now (long before Kim Davis appeared on the scene) against the dangers of religious sectarianism (i.e. pre-Cromwell RC times in Europe and also Cromwell using God's authority to close down the theaters, etcetera) and that the citing of scriptures in opposition to gay marriage can lead to or at least open the...

After five days behind bars, county clerk Kim Davis was ordered released from jail Tuesday by the judge who locked her up for refusing to issue marriage licenses to gay couples. U.S. District Judge David Bunning lifted the contempt order but directed Davis not to interfere with the granting of licenses by her deputies. The move came down just before Davis was to receive jailhouse visits from presidential candidates Mike Huckabee and Ted Cruz. Davis was thrown in jail on Thursday, becoming a hero among religious conservatives for the boldest act of resistance by a public official yet to the...

There is a much bigger picture in Kentucky. Forget that Kim Davis is a Democrat. Forget that she is a Christian. Focus on the issue of government (court) coercion of individual conscience. For the first time in our history, the court will now form your conscience for you or you will be removed from government service. The courts have given us a number of societal changes in recent decades from abortion to gays openly serving in the military. In each of these situations, though, what was changed was society's acceptance of a questionable practice. These things were now not illegal......

A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the release of the Kentucky clerk who was jailed for contempt last week after she repeatedly defied his order to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Kim Davis, the Rowan County clerk, “shall be released from the custody of the U.S. Marshal forthwith,” U.S. District Judge David Bunning of the Eastern District of Kentucky stated in an order. Judge Bunning warned Ms. Davis not to “interfere in any way, directly or indirectly, with the efforts of her deputy clerks to issue marriage licenses to all legally eligible couples.

LOUISVILLE, KY. — Presidential candidate and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee will join protesters at a Tuesday rally outside the jail where a Kentucky clerk is locked in a cell over her refusal to issue marriage licenses to gay couples. Huckabee plans a private meeting with Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, who was jailed by a federal judge Thursday after defying several court orders. Her lawyers spent Labor Day weekend filing appeals in an effort to force her release, but she remains there on a contempt charge. Huckabee, a former Baptist minister who often reaches out to religious conservatives, says...

Republican presidential candidate former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said on Friday during an appearance on Fox News that serial killers got better treatment by the American justice system than the Kentucky county clerk who was jailed for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Huckabee has been one of the most vocal presidential candidates to defend Rowan County, Kentucky clerk Kim Davis after she was jailed Thursday on contempt of federal court. The ex-governor brought up the comparison to serial killers during an interview on Fox's "America's Newsroom." "Jeffery Dahmer got bail, the Boston Stranger got bail, John Wayne...

After GOP Presidential candidate Donald Trump said that Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis should follow "the law of the land," and issue same-sex marriage licenses, evangelical preacher Franklin Graham has argued that what is made into law isn't always right. "He should know that just because something is made into a law, doesn't make it right. His Scottish Presbyterian ancestors may have been among those who had their heads cut off because they refused to recognize the King of England as head of the church," Graham said in a Facebook message on Monday, referring to Trump. "They believed that Jesus...

Supporters of a Kentucky county clerk jailed for refusing to issue marriage licenses brought their fight to Northern Kentucky, protesting Monday outside the home of the federal judge who's jailed her for contempt.About two dozen people, including ministers from Kentucky and North Carolina, demanded Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis be freed, saying she shouldn't be compelled to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples because doing so would violate her Christian beliefs.After the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in June that state bans on same-sex marriage were unconstitutional, Davis halted issuing all marriage licenses. Two same-sex couples and two straight couples sued...

Attorneys for the Kentucky clerk who was jailed last week because of her refusal to issue marriage licenses to gay couples said Monday they have filed an emergency motion with a federal court that they hope will result in Kim Davis' freedom. The filing seeks to have Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear accommodate Davis' "religious conviction," and not compel her to grant licenses to gay couples, Liberty Counsel said in a statement. "The motion requests an injunction pending appeal for an exemption from the Governor's mandate that all county clerks issue marriage licenses," said the statement by Liberty Counsel, which is...

For the first time in American history a woman has been imprisoned by the government for merely exercising her Christian faith. War has been declared on Christ and His followers. And there’s no turning back. Anti-Christian persecution is the civil rights cause of our time. The cultural Marxists in power have seceded from our constitutional republican form of government, with its Judeo-Christian moorings, and have supplanted, in its place, a secular-socialist oligarchy. Like Union troops hunkered at Fort Sumter, faithful Christians are now exiles in our own land. Anti-Christian “progressives” have demanded unconditional surrender, and federal Judge David Bunning...

Kim Davis, the Democrat Kentucky county clerk who refused to issue same-sex marriage licenses because of religious objections, was ordered to jail for contempt of court last Thursday. She suggested a compromise of removing her name from the licenses, but Federal District Court Judge David Bunning wouldn’t even grant that reasonable compromise. Contrast this with Cathy Lanier, chief of the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia, refusing to issue concealed weapons permits to people unless they can arbitrarily show a “good reason,” nothing required by law. A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction in May stopping her from...

When the Supreme Court ruled by the narrowest possible margin that Kentucky's definition of marriage is unconstitutional, the court's decision was qualified by its assurance that religious freedom would not be jeopardized. "The First Amendment ensures that religious organizations and persons are given proper protection," the court solemnly intoned on June 26. In the Appalachian hills of eastern Kentucky, one brave woman is testing whether Justice Anthony Kennedy really meant it when he wrote those words. But the local federal judge for eastern Kentucky, David Bunning, has wrongly sent Kim Davis to jail for her beliefs, without respecting or accommodating...

Poor Kim Davis. Not only did the anti-gay marriage crusader go to jail in defense of what she believes to be a fight for religious liberty (she might want to bone up on her James Madison), but now she’s being attacked by one of the most vile pseudo-religious organizations ever to spawn. The Westboro Baptist “Church.”

We live in a fundamentally transformed America where Rowan County, Kentucky, Clerk Kim Davis is thrown in jail for refusing to issue a lesbian couple a marriage license in violation of her religious beliefs but San Francisco officials who violated the law, created a sanctuary city, and harbored an illegal criminal alien charged with the murder of Kate Steinle, are not? Kim Davis, we are told, is obligated as a public official under the law, as determined by the Supreme Court, which was not established to write laws to issue such licenses. But then are we saying Christians can’t be...

A Kentucky county clerk has appealed a judge's decision to put her in jail for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Attorneys for Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis officially appealed the ruling on Sunday. The three page motion does not include arguments as to why Davis should be released but amends Davis' earlier appeal of the judge's order. Mat Staver, one of Davis' attorneys, said the marriage licenses issued Friday are "not worth the paper they are written on" because Davis refused to authorize them. But Rowan County Attorney Cecil Watkins says the licenses are valid. Bunning said...

Can your religion legally excuse you from doing part of your job? This is one of the questions in the Kentucky County Clerk marriage certificate case. But it also arises in lots of other cases — for instance, the Muslim flight attendant who doesn’t want to serve alcohol and who filed a complaint on Tuesday with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission over the airline’s denial of an exemption. The question has also arisen before with regard to: * Nurses who had religious objections to being involved in abortions (even just to washing instruments that would be used in abortions); *...

Gov. John Kasich (R-Ohio) said on Sunday that state marriage clerks should issue same-sex marriage licenses even if they morally oppose the practice. Kasich added that government employees are responsible for obeying the law upon assuming their positions. “Now, I respect the fact that this lady doesn’t agree, but she’s also a government employee,” he said of Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, who is currently jailed in Kentucky for being in contempt of court after refusing to sign same-sex marriage certificates “She’s not running a church,” Kasich told host George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s “This Week.” “I wouldn’t force this on...