Posted on 06/08/2004 12:07:28 PM PDT by jdege
MINNESOTA: A judge plans to rule on a lawsuit by churches seeking to have the law stuck down.
BY MARIE MCCAIN
ST. PAUL PIONEER PRESS
ST. PAUL - Howard Johnson, a Minneapolis grandfather of 16, believes so strongly in his right to carry a concealed weapon -- even in church -- that he showed up in a Ramsey County courtroom Thursday to hear attorneys debate the constitutionality of Minnesota's handgun permit law.
"It isn't what you have that causes trouble; it's what you do that causes trouble," said Johnson, 66. "There is continuity in this law and the complaints (of those who oppose it) are not based in reality."
More than 30 religious groups and charities are suing to have the law struck down, contending it was attached improperly to an unrelated bill with a vague name. They also believe it infringes on the rights of religious organizations to ban guns from their properties.
The state wants the lawsuit dismissed.
After Thursday's 45-minute hearing, District Judge John Finley said he will issue a written ruling later.
Also in court were members of the Twin Cities chapter of the Million Mom March, a group opposed to the gun permit law. Dressed in various shades of pink, they wore buttons that said "Unarmed" and "More Handguns Do Not Make Us Safer."
"There are more guns in circulation now than ever," said Kate Havelin, chapter president. "We were sold a bill of goods (by the Legislature). People have a right to have guns in their homes to protect themselves. But I don't want your gun near me or my children. I don't want it at the State Fair. I don't want it at the grocery store. I don't want it at my kid's soccer game."
Filed in October, the lawsuit contends legislators used an "unusual parliamentary maneuver" to get the year-old law approved. It contends the plan was attached to a technical bill for the Department of Natural Resources that mentioned a need to train out-of-state hunters who have permits to carry their weapons.
"Ask any average, reasonable Minnesotan if these two issues connect and they'll say no," said David Lillehaug, an attorney representing those who oppose the law.
Roman Catholics, Jews and Protestants are among the religions and denominations represented in the lawsuit. Most of the churches are in the metro area, but the group also included churches from Duluth, Rochester, Northfield and Le Sueur. Charitable organizations such as the YWCA and Catholic Charities of St. Paul and Minnesota also joined.
"My clients believe the state must not cut corners with this kind of law," Lillehaug added. "This is a matter of accountability."
Assistant Attorney General Richard Varco, representing the state, countered there was no attempt to sneak the legislation by citizens. "There was no question about what the Legislature was debating," he said. "There isn't any fraud here. The Legislature knew what they were doing and nothing was snuck in."
This is the second church-based challenge to the handgun law. A similar lawsuit is ongoing in Hennepin County, where District Judge Marilyn Rosenbaum has granted a temporary injunction against enforcement of the law pending results of an October trial.
LOL!
"The way the law was passed was unconstitutional. "
Is this really true?
No. The Minnesota Supreme Court has ruled on exactly what the legislature must do to meet the constitutional requirements, and the legislature followed them exactly.
"The law requires specific language be posted to ban guns in a church."
What's wrong with that? If the state has a right to carry law and someone doesn't want guns on their property, how is anybody supposed to know? On the other hand, why should they have the right to override a state law in the first place?
The churches want to have the unique ability to forbid carry in their own special way. They claim to object to the posting language on religious grounds, and seek an exemption just for the churches - which gets awfully close to a violation of the establishment clause for my tastes.
We don't let churches use their own language on emergency exit signs, or on handicapped parking signs. I see no reason why they should get a unique exemption to the language on the no gun signs.
"The law does not allow churches to keep people from storing their guns in their cars, in church parking lots."
It seems pretty clear what the REAL issue is here. These groups oppose the concealed carry law - period.
What this is really about is keeping Lillehaug's name in the papers, as a preparation for his 2006 Senate run, while allowing his law-firm to scam the churches for a couple of hundred grand.
What is ELCA??
Evangelical Lutheran Church of America.
A partial list of the members of the "World Council of Churches".leaders of these "churches" push a political agenda outside and contrary to the teachings of the bible.
I believe this is the prophesied world church of The Revelation.
African Methodist Episcopal Church [USA]
African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church [USA]
American Baptist Churches in the USA
Anglican Church of Canada
Apostolic Catholic Assyrian Church of the East, N.A. Diocese
Canadian Council of Churches**
Canadian Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Canada
Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
Christian Methodist Episcopal Church [USA]
Church of the Brethren [USA]
Episcopal Church
Estonian Evangelical Lutheran Church Abroad [Canada]
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada
Hungarian Reformed Church in America
International Council of Community Churches [USA]
International Evangelical Church [USA]
Moravian Church in America
National Baptist Convention of America
National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc.
National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA**
Orthodox Church in America
Polish National Catholic Church
Presbyterian Church in Canada
Presbyterian Church (USA)
Progressive National Baptist Convention, Inc. [USA]
Reformed Church in America [USA]
Religious Society of Friends [USA] - Friends General Conference - Friends United Meeting
United Church of Canada
United Church of Christ [USA]
United Methodist Church [USA]
this is just North America
a full listing is here: http://www.wcc-coe.org/wcc/who/mch-e.html
Interesting little tale.
However, the villain here was not Garibaldi.
Prior to Italy's reunification, it, like Germany of roughly the same period, was broken into a number of independent duchies, kingdoms, etc. A good part of it was under the control of the polyglot Austro-Hungarian "Empire" in the North. Most prominent of these territories were the "Papal States". This was a stretch of territory running across the middle of the Italian Peninsula and centered around the City of Rome. It was directly ruled by the Pope as a secular AND religious leader.
During the mid 1800's there was a resurgance of Nationalist
sentiment throughout most of continental Europe. Average Europeans began thinking more along the lines of Nationalist states instead of artifical political entities centered around some Feudal overlord.
Just as France, an old and established nation-state was a fulcrum of opposition to German unification, the Papal States were a fulcrum of opposition to Italian unification.
Eventually, thanks to the efforts of Garibaldi and others, the various independent Italian States were dissolved, including the Papal States, and a unified Italy constructed, under the rule of the House of Savoy, a ruling family from what is now southeastern France but which was, in actuality, Italian at the time. The French received Savoy in return for not interfering with Garibaldi and the House of Savoy in their plans for unification of Italy. This was very similar to what Bismarck achieved in Germany.
Since Garibaldi had, in the process, eliminated the existence of an independent Papal State, the Pope excommunicated Garibaldi and all those patriotic Italians who were involved in the unification of their country.
Until realtively recently, all Popes from that time on clostered themselves in voluntary "exile" within the confines of the actual territory permitted them by the Italian Government, i.e. Vatican "City".
I would also like to point out that Papal Justification of control of actual territory by the Pope was in part based on a fradulent document called "The Donation of Constantine".
This fraudullent document alleged that Constantine the Graet, as Emperor of the Romans, the First Christian Emperor, and the rightful ruler of all of the Roman Empire, had withdrawn his capitol to Constantinople, and surrendered temporal control of the western part of the Empire to the Pope as his lawful successor in all things temporal there. This claims of Papal supreamcy in the temporal realm provided the Medieval Popes with significant authority in western Europe over the temporal rulers there.
This is NOT a theological issue, any more than the Methodists et al intruding into the realm of American foreign policy and domestic constitutional issues. Like the latter, it is a good example of why a secular state is a good thing, even though a secular state can ans should acknowledge Judaeo-Christian prinicples.
Nevertheless, I applause Possenti's marksmamship and chivalry, but alas, the Catholic Church, like most mainstream western Christian faiths has been so castrated by pacifism withn the ranks that I doubt aht any individual associated with firearms will be cannonized.
Personally, I like St. Iago Matamorros myself. St. George and St. Michael are pretty good also.
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