Posted on 10/17/2009 11:54:04 AM PDT by big truck
NEW ORLEANS – Louisiana's governor and a U.S. senator joined Friday in calling for the ouster of a local official who refused to marry an interracial couple, saying his actions clearly broke the law.
Keith Bardwell, a white justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish in the southeastern part of the state, refused to issue a marriage license earlier this month to Beth Humphrey, who is white, and Terence McKay, who is black. His refusal has prompted calls for an investigation or resignation from civil and constitutional rights groups and the state's Legislative Black Caucus.
Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal said in a statement a nine-member commission that reviews lawyers and judges in the state should investigate. "Disciplinary action should be taken immediately — including the revoking of his license," Jindal said.
Bardwell did not return calls left on his answering machine Friday. Bardwell has said he always asks if a couple is interracial and, if they are, refers them to another justice of the peace. Bardwell said no one had complained in the past and he doesn't marry the couples because he's worried about their children's futures. "Perhaps he's worried the kids will grow up and be president," said Bill Quigley, director of the Center for Constitutional Rights and Justice, referring to President Barack Obama, the son of a black father from Kenya and a white mother from Kansas. Obama's deputy press secretary Bill Burton echoed those sentiments. "I've found that actually the children of biracial couples can do pretty good," Burton told reporters aboard Air Force One as it flew to Texas.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
That's quite a charge AJ.
Care to cite any specific examples???
So this guy is ‘elected’ claims he has been making this judgment for long time and word is just now getting out? This guy has been active for 34 years. Now the story does not say how many licenses he has rejected over his career.
So why has there not been any complaints registered, made public, or all .ell broken out until now? I AM NOT complaining there is finally a complaint, I do not understand how this action could take place over such a long period of time without any complaints.
Pfft, no kidding? What a shock.
Totally fabricated press event. The guy is probably an ACORN plant or a DNC mid-level apparatchik.
Gotta keep the template alive and force-feed everyone that blue pill!
Did Rahm issue him a KKK robe for the photo shoot?
It is not the responsibility of a justice of the peace to predict the future fate of offspring. He is not elected to be a marriage counselor. Whether he likes interracial marriages are not, he is obligated to preform the marriage rite according to state laws. If it bothers him to officiate interracial marriages, he should never have accepted the position. I have my personal opinions about interracial marriages, but one has to realize the differences between acting as an arm of the state and one’s personal opinions.
Only to the extent that I'm avoiding marriage, and that would be a convenient excuse.
The GF has a different melanin content to her lovely skin.
It's good to know that the sometimes GF doesn't read FreeRepublic. ;)
/johnny
Funny how people only define interracial marriage as black and white. I remember in the Army, there would be people who turned their noses up at black soldiers married too white women, but never said a word about a black OR white soldier married to an Asian woman, etc. If not married too your actual race and color, it basically becomes some type of interracial marriage. Knew lots of white GI’s married to Asian type women, I.E. Korean, Japanese, Thailand, and native Alaskan, Turkey, Arab, etc.
If he broke the law he should be fired.
Just like the clerks in San Francisco who broke the law and crossed out the gender-specific information on the marriage applications and allowed homosexuals to marry...illegally.
He claims that interracial children often have troubled upbringings. I agree that they have it so hard, the farthest one can aspire to go is President of the US, after all.
Lib trolls will undoubtedly look at the comments of these stories like these to “prove” that we are racist.
But as I look around I don’t see one comment defending this man.
I had to read it a few times. Worst headline of the day award. The intended meaning: "Many people are angry that a man wouldn't marry an interracial couple."
Agree 100%. I was just about to post exactly the same points you made, so you saved me the trouble.
Thanks, good post.
But as I look around I don’t see one comment defending this man.
...undoubtedly...these...“prove” that we are racist.
But as I...comment defending this man...
You have to think more like a professional journalist, see?
Asian men are cute, especially this one http://files.myopera.com/gilly551/blog/jet-li.jpeg
My wife’s most striking features are her hazel/green eyes against her dark mocha skin. A genetic quirk on her mother’s side of the family that goes back to an interracial relationship over a hundred years ago. Nothing new about interracial relationships. This guy has to get with the times.
Imho the JP has his personal views and the Letter of the Law cross-wired. If he doesn't want to do it, he should have recused himself, and sent the couple to another JP's Court, and not shown his ass backwards bigotry in 2009.
Flames Up...........bring it on....
I am honestly puzzled by the entire concept of hate based on skin color. There’s only ONE race involved here- human.
Now- if there is a TRUE ‘’mixed-race’ couple on this planet it would make BIG news.
Until there is a human/ something else factor- it’s ludicrous.
And this guy is an ignoramus. Entitled to his opinion-yes, but since when did a marriage license- or the lack of one- prevent interracial babies being born?
“But as I look around I don’t see one comment defending this man.”
Every comment I saw was ridiculing the government official.
But why should conservatives have to defend ourselves with these kinds of stories?
Conservatives hate racism; the real kind. We believe that everyone is created equal with a equal choice to succeed or fail.
What we dislike intensely; are programs that elevate people based solely on their race or skin color.
We are the color blind ones. Liberals like to divide and conquer, and take measurements of skin color.
I could care less about my neighbor’s skin color. But if a leader in the Democrat party wanted to buy a home on my block; I would honestly be tempted do anything legal to discourage it.
It’s not uncommon in threads about Barack Obama’s family (e.g., Michelle Obama’s appearance) to find remarks that have been removed by the moderator and if you catch them before they’ve been removed, they’ve almost always been removed because they are bigoted and cross the line. I’ve also had threads pulled by the moderators because they linked back to sites that, to give one example, advocated treating minorities as children to be handled because the site believed them genetically too stupid to ever succeed. Then there are the black-on-white crime threads and threads where some people like to assumed that any unidentified assailant is black or hispanic (in several cases, that assumption was wrong). When I see blatant racism, I push the abuse button and it often gets pulled. That it gets pulled does not change the fact that it gets put there in the first place. I’ll see if I can find you some current examples, though. They usually aren’t that hard to find.
They should have just gone to another judge.
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