Free Republic

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy on Wednesday likened controversy over the court's decision to allow gay marriage to public reaction over the 1989 ruling that said burning an American flag was protected free speech. Kennedy, who was the deciding vote in both cases, described how the reaction decades ago was critical at first but changed over time. His remarks at the 9th Circuit Judicial Conference were his first public comments since he wrote the decision last month that put an end to same-sex marriage bans in 14 states. Kennedy drew the comparison in response to a moderator's question about...

Little Sisters of the Poor. Courtesy of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. Denver, Colo., Jul 14, 2015 / 11:29 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Little Sisters of the Poor have reiterated their commitment to following their conscience as they care for the poor and dying, following a federal appeals court ruling that they must obey the federal contraception mandate. “As Little Sisters of the Poor, we simply cannot choose between our care for the elderly poor and our faith,” said Mother Provincial Sr. Loraine Marie Maguire. “And we should not have to make that choice, because it violates our nation’s...

The victory was brief. Last year’s Supreme Court victory for Hobby Lobby has little meaning today, because the Obama Administration has just circumvented the law to extend contraceptive benefits to all.And who’s paying for it? Why, you and I, of course, through our tax dollars! By Bryancalabro (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia CommonsThe case involving the Green family’s Hobby Lobby stores went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court; and last June, the Court ruled that some private companies can be exempted, on religious grounds, from an Affordable Care Act requirement that employer-sponsored health insurance policies must...

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg says that the liberal justices on the court try to speak with one voice when writing opinions as often as possible. "The stimulus actually began many many years before ... when the court announced its decision in Bush v. Gore," Ginsburg told NPR. The liberal justices were in the minority in the 5-4 decision, which resolved the issue surrounding the recount in Florida over the 2000 presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore, putting Bush in the White House. However, each of the four dissenting justices wrote their own opinions because they...

Despite repeatedly losing its cases over the Obamacare contraceptive mandate at the U.S. Supreme Court, the Department of Health and Human Services announced Friday that it will continue to force religious organizations to distribute contraceptives – including the “week-after pill” – to their employees. As a news release at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty states, the Obama administration has been handed “multiple losses in contraceptive mandate cases at the Supreme Court,” including the Hobby Lobby decision, and cases involving the Little Sisters of the Poor and Wheaton College. Last week, the Supreme Court ordered the Obama administration not to...

The clerk of Casey County, Kentucky is refusing to issue same-sex marriage licenses despite the order of Democrat Gov. Steve Beshear. During a private meeting, Beshear told county clerk Casey Davis Thursday that he should issue same-sex marriage licenses or resign, reports Kentucky.com. Davis said he is refusing to issue marriage licenses to gay couples because same-sex marriage is against his religious beliefs, and he is also refusing to resign his post. Prior to meeting with Beshear, Davis said he was willing to go to jail for his religious beliefs. “If that’s what it takes to express freedom of religion,...

The Supreme Court could not have been clearer when it ruled late last month that states may not refuse to marry same-sex couples. But in several states where the resistance to marriage equality has been most entrenched, government officials whose job it is to license or perform marriages continue to misunderstand, stall or flatly defy the court. However they justify these tactics, their conduct is illegal and they must stop. These public employees seem to forget that taxpayers pay them to do their job. If doing that job violates his or her religious beliefs, the best solution is to find...

Ted Cruz sparred with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews over his proposal for judicial retention elections during an interview on “Hardball” Wednesday night, at one point debating the judicial propriety of allowing ballots to be recounted in Florida during the historically close 2000 presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore. The Texas Republican senator and presidential candidate said he is “reluctant to call for elections,” adding that it “makes him sad” but that he has done so because “a majority of the justices are not honoring their judicial oaths.” “Is that the solution? Elections?” Matthews countered. “Look, if unelected judges...

...“I am reluctant to call for retention elections — it makes me sad,” Mr. Cruz, a 2016 GOP presidential contender, said Wednesday evening on MSNBC’s “Hardball.” “But I have done it because I believe that a majority of the justices are not honoring their judicial oaths.” Host Chris Matthews responded by saying that the Supreme Court seized the presidency in 2000 in halting the recount in Florida and that Mr. Cruz, who wrote in his new book, “A Time for Truth,” about his role in the 2000 recount, did not complain. “Those are great talking points. How many times did...

Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas), a Republican presidential candidate, sparred with MSNBC host Chris Matthews on Wednesday over whether the Supreme Court has become too “partisan” following the high court’s recent decisions on Obamacare and gay marriage.Though he’s done so in the past, Cruz said he’s reluctant to advocate for “judicial retention” elections every eight years. However, he also said he’s tired of seeing some of the justices “not honoring their judicial oaths.”Matthews later insinuated hypocrisy, accusing Cruz of “loving” it when the Supreme Court “seized the presidency in 2000” for former President George W. Bush during the infamous Florida recount...

Sanders is drawing massive crowds, just like Obama, and there is another common thread between Sanders and Obama — their socialist philosophy of governance. Now, I have to give it to Senator Sanders, he is man enough to admit what he is: he has “come out” as a Democratic Socialist. Obama .. rhetoric and writings proved he was, but if you dared to utter the words that he was a socialist, you were immediately branded racist. Even after comments such as “I think it’s better for everyone if we spread the wealth around” and “if you have a business, you...

Unfortunately, Nebraskans now have a spineless fedgov boot licking coward for a governor (Pete Ricketts - R) Compare this straight-to-the point language to the vague, effeminate Modernist BS we get today - both from the Vatican and from those in our various levels of government (Responses to each excerpted paragraph are bracketed by asterisks ***commentary***) Civil Disobedience and Sedition SPAIENTIAE CHRISTIANAE – On Christians as Citizens. Pope Leo XIII, January 1890 Encyclical From paragraph 2: ... if, in administering public affairs, it [government] is wont to put God aside, and show no solicitude for the upholding of moral law, it...

The world's largest Baptist university, Baylor, has dropped language in its sexual misconduct policy that punished those who engaged in homosexual acts, a change the socially conservative school said better reflects its values as "a caring community." Baylor, in the central Texas city of Waco, had been one of a handful of religious U.S. colleges and universities that allowed for the dismissal of students, and sometimes staff, for homosexuality. Baylor has removed "homosexual acts" as a punishable offense in its sexual misconduct policy, an official said on Tuesday. The policy also mandated disciplinary action for sexual assault, incest, adultery and...

The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family, and Property—TFP vehemently protests the “profoundly immoral and unjust”1 majority opinion of the United States Supreme Court in Obergefell v. Hodges which imposed same-sex “marriage” on America by judicial fiat. The sacred institution of marriage—established by God in Paradise for our first parents, Adam and Eve2, and which has been seriously undermined by the moral crisis devastating Western society since the sixties—suffered a tremendous blow on June 26, 2015. In the most powerful nation on earth today, five liberal judges reinterpreted the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution to discover that...

"The civil government does not define your ethic as a Christian. That's critical that we understand that..."

"Decisions of the Supreme Court that go beyond power delegated to the judicial branch or are contrary to the Constitution are null and void. To protect our constitutional republic, citizens, states, and the other branches of the federal government must resist any such decision." The Supreme Court looms large in American politics. In fact, many accept the claim—made by the Court and others—that the Supreme Court gets the final say as to what counts as law under our system of government. Judicial review is now bound together with the doctrine of judicial supremacy, crafted by Chief Justice Roger Taney in...

The Supreme Court’s abuse of its authority in the decision redefining marriage as an institution based on feelings rather than fact and sanctioning deviancy as a civil right was expected, but the surprise was its sentimental substitution of nihilistic narcissism for jurisprudence, expressed in an amorphous substitute for English diction. This passed a death sentence on Christian culture, just as Roe v. Wade sanctioned the deaths of millions of infants. As Christ rose from the dead, so can our nation, but only the cynic and the naïf will deny that the next steps will be attacks on Christ himself in...

Most Americans believe that the federal government stands absolutely supreme. Nobody can question its dictates. Nobody can refuse its edicts. Nobody can resist its commands. This is simply not true. Laws passed in pursuance of the Constitution do stand as the supreme law of the land. But that doesn’t in any way imply the federal government lords over everything and everybody in America.

We are a nation founded upon and (allegedly) governed by words. Beginning with – specifically, foundational-ly – the Constitution. Every syllable was by our Founding Fathers debated and carefully crafted. To ensure a limited, enumerated government, maximum freedom for We the People – and a document that clearly, concisely laid out these parameters. The Constitution is a “living, breathing document” - but with the amendment process as its only respiratory system. If you don’t like it – amend it. Otherwise, it is what it is – it says what it says. The Constitution established a system that also relies on...

The Supreme Court decision allowing gay “marriage” in the United States has upset all right minded Christians, and rightly so.It is pretty clear that the Supreme Court has rubber stamped a widespread rejection of Christian morality by a large segment of the American people.Not only has the Supreme Court ratified same sex “marriage” but they have overturned majority opinions of the people, set themselves up as arbiters of human morality, trampled on states’ rights, ignored not only historic Christian teaching, but the understanding of marriage held by all people at all times and in all cultures down through history.We’re right...