Kim Davis, Rightful Prisoner of Conscience

Davis, the county clerk in Kentucky who was jailed for contempt of court after defying a judge’s order to issue marriage licenses to homosexual couples, is in the wrong, inarguably: The proper course of action for a government official who has a moral objection to carrying out his public duties isn’t obstruction but resignation.

Jonathan Adler, writing in the Washington Post, reminded us of Antonin Scalia’s argument about the death penalty: If the justice believed that his official participation in the legal machinery of death was immoral, then he could not be a judge while capital punishment remained on the books. Scalia offers this position in contrast to the practice of Justices Blackmun, Brennan, and Marshall, who voted categorically to overturn death sentences in direct contravention of their legal duties. For the four and one half minutes they spent reading Adler’s article, our so-called liberals were at one with the jurisprudence of Antonin Scalia. Would that the moment had lasted.

Davis is a recent convert to something the New York Times calls “Apostolic” Christianity. Christian congregations without exception think of themselves as apostolic, but here is meant the Apostolic Christian Church of America, which is committed to Biblical inerrancy and prefers the poetical and errant King James Version. It is one of those great do-it-yourself American religions that make one grateful for the glacial conservatism of the Catholic magisterium, even (especially) during a Peronist papacy.

Doctrinal disagreements to one side, prison is an excellent place for a Christian.

It is also an excellent place for a patriot. Legally speaking, American marriage is debased: The “traditional marriage” we hear about from time to time simply has not existed as a legal institution in the United States for about 40 years. Under current law, marriage is a purportedly life-long union that is in reality rather less durable than a federal student loan; that being the case, extending marriage as a legal institution to homosexual couples is a peculiar hill to die on. I might have had more sympathy for a Los Angeles county clerk who declined to issue Zsa Zsa Gabor her ninth marriage license. Context matters. But the Obergefell decision is nonetheless illegitimate.

Every act of principled noncompliance with the law is a miniature Declaration of Independence, which is to say, a revolution in one person. There is an excellent history of that among our own patriots, from the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. to the great newspaperman R. C. Hoiles, who was threatened with prison by Franklin Roosevelt’s government for the ghastly crime of giving his employees a raise without federal permission, which was at the time illegal. (Rumor is that this was the last time the staff of an American newspaper received a pay raise.) The heroic example is that of Henry David Thoreau, who was put in prison for refusing to pay a tax in support of James K. Polk’s slaving and warmongering government. Prison, he wrote, is “the only house in a slave state in which a free man can abide with honor.” Thoreau was very annoyed to be set free when a benefactor paid the tax on his behalf.

The legal enshrinement of homosexual marriage is not slavery or its moral equivalent, nor is it Jim Crow, nor is it abortion, the definitive moral issue of our time. And a society that is to have the rule of law cannot abide very many revolutions in miniature, especially those conducted by the people we still describe, with almost-straight faces, as public servants. As much as one might admire Davis’s conviction, David L. Bunning of the District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky is right to put her in jail.

But maintaining that rule of law is a broader imperative, and Davis’s transgressions are trivial next to the entrenched criminality of the government that Judge Bunning serves: The Internal Revenue Service under the Obama administration was converted into a crime syndicate; Hillary Rodham Clinton is a rolling crime wave; the Justice Department is an enabler and protector of felons in high places; our law-enforcement agencies have been made into instruments of political intimidation, as in the matter of the ATF’s persecution of Jay Dobyns. There are many honorable men in the federal government, but there are no honorable federal officials, because one cannot honorably serve a dishonorable government. We may call Judge Bunning “His Honor,” but that is purely vestigial.

“Under a government which imprisons any unjustly,” Thoreau reasoned, “the true place for a just man is also a prison.” That we breathe the same free air as Lois Lerner, Eric Holder, and Hillary Rodham Clinton is a testament against us, that we may have a finer understanding of the distinctions necessary to republican self-government but lack the conviction necessary to act on it.

This author is an idiot. I’m really sick of people like this. Just go be a liberal if you don’t know that natural law and States’ rights trumps the decree of 5 reprobates.

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Dittoes. But notice this is from the National Review. Seems like everything that comes from there is liberalistic pukeage.

[[How many Clerks in liberal States issued Gay Marriage Licenses against the STATE LAWS, ]]

Why are none of these clerks who VIOLATED state law being put in prison?

Would be nice IF the ‘newspeople’ on Fox news would bring this up EVERYTIME a hypocritical liberal says “Laws matter Laws need to be upheld, Laws have meaning”

Fox news should be making a BIG stink over this judge applying the law selectively by NOT going after all those country clerks who issued licenses AGAINST state law when homo marriage was not allowed!

easily refuted, one is a constitutionally protected RIGHT, the other is NOT- Nowhere in our constitution is homosexual marriage a protected right- however, gun ownership IS a constitutionally protected right, and it is specifically mentioned in the constitution- and it IS a NATURAL RIGHT and a NATURAL GOD GIVEN RIGHT for a man to be able to protect himself and his family- it is NOT a natural right for two men or two women to pleasure each other under the guise of marriage

[[A better example would be a radical Muslim who works in the Department of Motor Vehicle and refuses to grant driver’s licenses to women based on some religious objection to women driving. ]]

What would the answer to that be?

[[I’m heartened that at least one other Kentucky clerk has joined her in refusing to issue licenses. More, please.]]

Federal law CAN be defeated IF enough stands band together in a massive concerted effort to uphold their state sovereignty by refusing to comply with an unjust federal law- it’s been done before (can’t recall just now, but several states banded together and refused to either comply or enforce a federal law, and said they would arrest any federal officer that tried to enforce the law in their state, and the government was forced to back down

Sadly we don’t have enough states with backbone that aren’t sold out and who don’t cower In the face of governmental BLACKMAIL (when the federal gov threatens to withhold state funding) any longer- almost all states have sold their soul to the evil one- money talks

The supreme court INVENTED a new amendment by claiming the constitution protects gay marriage and that gay marriage is a right

Kim davis was right to do what she did because the supreme court decision was a sham The supreme court’s job is NOT to create law, it is to uphold law- and the federal ‘law of the land’ is bogus and invalid because of this fact

Courts do NOT make law, and Kim therefore has NOT violated any legitimate law=- and infact she has UPHELD Kentucky law that says marriage is between a woman and a man only

What we are witnessing is judicial supremacy where the federal court believes it has the right to invent law, then enforce this unconstitutional law, and where the federal court and supreme court feel they are more important than natural law and state sovereignty

ONLY Kentucky has the authority to order Kim to issue licenses to gay couples should the state decide that is what she should do, or if the people of the state vote for gay marriage (California VIOLATED the will of the people several times by over-ruling the people’s votes against gay marriage!)

Federal courts have no right telling state clerks they should issue licenses because it is NOT the job of the government to do so, ONLY states have that right

I saw someone post @ Facebook that Ms. Davis has been married and divorced 3x, and that doesn’t fit the liberals’ version of a “Christian” woman. Not that they would have a problem with her alleged multiple divorces if she weren’t standing up for ‘traditional marriage.’

RE: I saw someone post @ Facebook that Ms. Davis has been married and divorced 3x,

It’s hard for liberals to understand the concept of redemption and repentance but It cannot be repeated enough -— her previous marriages and divorces occurred BEFORE she became a born again Christian and took her faith seriously.

These legal battles usually are as much PR as law. The fight is for the ‘principle’ rather than any individual involved. I.e., Norma McCarvey, Heller, or Lt.Col. Lakin. The individuals are usually people of principle who are willing to be the sacrificial lamb for the ‘cause.’ And, usually, lawyers act as producers to pick a sympathetic individual to be the ‘face’ of the issue.

A woman whose past doesn’t conform to “Christian values” doesn’t serve that purpose. (3x divorced, not once). I have no idea if the lib meme on this is true, have only seen it in the one place, but do wonder if the lawyers chose the right ‘face’ for the cause.

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