I can't beleive that no one has made this connection.
Lambda Lambda Lambda
Posted on 01/22/2003 5:38:45 AM PST by H8DEMS
(CNSNews.com) - A key Republican lawmaker in Virginia has threatened to block the re-appointment of a local judge because, in the lawmaker's judgment, the judge's personal behavior as a lesbian violates the state's sodomy law.
Homosexuality advocates are protesting the lawmaker's lifestyle inquiry, which they claim has nothing to do with Newsport News Circuit Judge Verbena Askew's qualifications.
Delegate Robert McDonnell (R-Virginia Beach) recently said Askew's homosexuality might prevent her from being sworn in for a second eight-year term. Virginia's "crimes against nature" law strictly prohibits anal and oral sex between consenting adults, regardless of gender.
Speaking as chairman of the Virginia House Committee on Courts of Justice, McDonnell reportedly said Askew's homosexual conduct "certainly raises some questions about the qualifications to serve as a judge."
Askew is the first female African-American circuit court judge in Virginia and one of 60 judges statewide whose terms expire this year.
According to Michael Adams, spokesman for the homosexual advocacy group, LAMBDA Legal Defense and Education Fund, Virginia's sodomy law "has nothing to do with whether Judge Askew is fit to serve as a judge."
Adams said Askew should be considered for re-appointment based on her tenure and history on the bench and not held to "extraneous things" such as Virginia's sodomy law, which he deemed a "pretext for discrimination" against homosexuals.
"It's a law that is used to persecute gays and lesbians, it's an inappropriate use of the state's power in a discriminatory fashion, and it's not just Lambda that thinks so," Adams said.
When LAMBDA filed a brief last week with the Texas Supreme Court to challenge a sodomy law in that state, Adams said, conservative organizations like the Cato Institute and Institute for Justice filed their own briefs on the same side of the argument.
LAMBDA's defense team is currently trying to overturn Texas' sodomy law, which could effectively strike down similar laws in 12 states, including Virginia's longstanding "crimes against nature" statute.
According to Adams, Virginia has invoked its sodomy law in recent years only to prevent homosexuals from adopting children and to discriminate against homosexuals involved in child custody battles. He could not recall any instance of the law being used against a heterosexual defendant.
But conservative legal expert Phil Kent, president of the Southeastern Legal Foundation, said the law is primarily enforced by police as a result of other illegal circumstances.
"Police aren't running around the country invading peoples' bedrooms just to see what's going on in there. These cases are occurring because warrants are being served, [and] they're going into the home with another warrant," Kent said. "You can't be doing anything else illegal in your home, whether it's drugs, homosexual sex or, conceivably, oral sex under that Virginia statute."
Kent said anyone under criminal investigation could be considered "fair game" under Virginia's sodomy law, including Askew.
When asked whether Askew had a criminal record that would merit such an official inquiry into her lifestyle, Adams said, "There is no indication that she has, as far as we know, been involved in any type of criminal prosecutions...under this law or any other law."
However, according to a recent report in the Hampton Roads Daily Press, a former Newport News Drug Court official did allege that she was propositioned by Askew. The city hired an attorney, who found the allegations to be invalid, but Askew's accuser reportedly persisted in her complaint, claiming she was still being harassed by Askew and that her supervisor and co-workers were failing to protect her. In 2001, the city of Hampton Roads paid the woman $64,000, including $10,000 to her lawyer.
Both Askew and her accuser reportedly signed a letter of understanding, which specified that neither woman could sue the other or make disparaging remarks about the other. Nothing in the woman's complaint against Askew suggests that the judge acted in violation of the state's sodomy law.
"I think that the members of the Virginia Legislature have every right to question her conduct," Kent said. "It certainly raises some questions about her qualifications to serve as a judge."
Kent said the state legislature has every legal right to rescind Askew's judgeship for the sole reason that she is a lesbian, and by definition, is in violation of Virginia's sodomy law.
Robert Knight, director of the Culture and Family Institute in Washington, D.C., added that people who are openly homosexual make their sexuality part of their identity.
"I don't think there's any homosexual without the 'sexual'. In other words, this idea of identity without actions is nonsense, it's non-existent," Knight said. "To forge an identity based on engaging in a wrongful activity such as homosexuality shows, at the least, lack of judgment."
In 1998, Kent said the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case of Robin Shahar, a woman who had her job offer rescinded because she was a lesbian. A Georgia appellate court had earlier ruled that the woman's civil rights were not being denied by the decision to rescind the job offer.
"The Bowers v. Hardwick case was the precedent-setting court decision that upheld Georgia's sodomy law," Kent said. "It was Mike Bowers who fired Robin Shahar, who he had previously given the job offer to in his attorney general's office. The reason was that her lesbian relationship violated the Georgia sodomy law."
Kent said the bottom line in cases like those involving Askew and Shahar is that traditional morality must be upheld by all citizens, regardless of their sexual orientation.
"Lesbians can't do whatever they want, and neither can the rest of us," Kent said. "That's why there are laws on the books...and, when they're on the books, they shouldn't be undermined."
It qualifies them to be President, doesn't it?
Lambda Lambda Lambda
The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly. - Abraham Lincoln
I don't wish to discuss my personal life on the net........but I will say what I think without being too graphic.
This act is an unGodly pratice.....not what our bodies were make for.
I have never kissed my babies in the morning after doing you-know-what the night before!
10) Those who support this law probably still would support slavery too Retort used when Thomas Jefferson's view of sodomy laws is brought up
9) Those who support this law probably would have been in favor of segregation too or want to see homosexuals killed too. Insult supporters with an unfounded racism/violence charge
8) This is between consenting adults. Defeating the law in the Supreme Court by ruling that there is not "equal coverage" would force all states that have age discrepancies for homosexual/heterosexual age of consent to norm them to the same age (typically downward) meaning that adults and minors(under 18) would be legally able to participate in acts of homosexual sodomy together. alternate view Don't hear as vocal a support for the elimination of laws against prostitution, adultery, incest between 2 adults (and the marriage thereof), etc...
7) This law will force a presence of Big Brother in the bedroom When has this been the case? Are there routine entrapments? The men in this scenario conspired with a homosexual neighbor (who placed a fraudulent call) to be "caught" so that they could have a case to get the law thrown out in the courts.
6) What good is a law that cannot be enforced all the time? Plenty of laws are difficult to enforce and plenty of people are scofflaws. Hint: outlawing homosexual sex acts extends into a wide range of behaviors. It makes "public" sex acts easier to prosecute, if any sex is found to have occurred, the prosecutor does not need to find that the criteria of "public" sex has been met. Men and women aren't cruising for heterosexual sex in parks, bathrooms, and roadside rest stops. Women won't give it away, they'll charge for an anonymous sexual encounter and that comes with a solicitation charge. It also sets a barrier against homosexual "marriage".
5) I can do what I want in my home. Chances of being caught violating a law in your home may be slim to none but it does not change the illegal nature of the activity in our society of laws. Don't like the law, change it in the legislature or move to a state/country where it is not illegal.
4) It won't force a slippery slope that will force an overhaul of education, churches, health benefits, etc. Keep dreaming
3) The legislature has no ability to author laws that prohibit any behavior in the bedroom. The Supreme Court already determined that they do have this power. Guess what, the Supreme Court is human and can make errors in judgement, there are also activists at times legislating from the bench. No one is arguing before the courts that all laws against behavior in private should be thrown out; I don't even know that they could all be identified. The Supreme Court supported this type of law in the 1980s and it's what we have to live with. Don't like the laws? Let your congressmen know how you stand on the issue before they vote. If the laws are longstanding, find a congressman to overturn the law(s) you disagree with. The Supreme Court should not be doing to job of the legislature. Let the Supreme Court overturn this law and they'll find a "right" to homosexuality in the constitution somewhere. Thomas Jefferson supported laws against sodomy so it would seem that he believed that laws could prohibit bedroom behavior...
2) Oral sex with your wife is sodomy too. They can be addressed with different laws. Some places define "sodomy" as any genital-to-orifice contact that is not human male-human female complimentary copulation (meaning animal, oral, anal...). Because homosexuals do not have complimentary genitalia, by definition they can only partake in acts of "sodomy" with members the same sex. Note: Texas legalized heterosexual sodomy in 1973, but then don't let the facts get in the way of a quick post.
1) The law violates equal protection clause of the constitution. Men and women are free/prohibited to participate in acts of sodomy depending of the laws of their states. All men and all women are treated the same in regards to heterosexual sodomy. The question is: can homosexual sodomy be outlawed (male to male and female to female)? If 2 men could commit homosexual acts of sodomy but 2 women were prohibited from the same/similar acts, then there would be a violation of "equal protection".
After being charged with violating the Georgia statute criminalizing sodomy by committing that act with another adult male in the bedroom of his home, respondent Hardwick (respondent) brought suit in Federal District Court, challenging the constitutionality of the statute insofar as it criminalized consensual sodomy. The court granted the defendants' motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim. The Court of Appeals reversed and remanded, holding that the Georgia statute violated respondent's fundamental rights.
Held: The Georgia statute is constitutional. Pp. 190-196 .
(a) The Constitution does not confer a fundamental right upon homosexuals to engage in sodomy. None of the fundamental rights announced in this Court's prior cases involving family relationships, marriage, or procreation bear any resemblance to the right asserted in this case. And any claim that those cases stand for the proposition that any kind of private sexual conduct between consenting adults is constitutionally insulated from state proscription is unsupportable. Pp. 190-191 .
(b) Against a background in which many States have criminalized sodomy and still do, to claim that a right to engage in such conduct is "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition" or "implicit in the concept of ordered liberty" is, at best, facetious. Pp. 191-194 .
(c) There should be great resistance to expand the reach of the Due Process Clauses to cover new fundamental rights. Otherwise, the Judiciary necessarily would take upon itself further authority to govern the country without constitutional authority. The claimed right in this case falls far short of overcoming this resistance. Pp. 194-195 .
(d) The fact that homosexual conduct occurs in the privacy of the home does not affect the result. Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U.S. 557 , distinguished. Pp. 195-196 .
(e) Sodomy laws should not be invalidated on the asserted basis that majority belief that sodomy is immoral is an inadequate rationale to support the laws. P. 196 .
760 F.2d 1202, reversed. [p*187]
BURGER, C.J., Concurring Opinion
As the Court notes, ante at 192 , the proscriptions against sodomy have very "ancient roots." Decisions of individuals relating to homosexual conduct have been subject to state intervention throughout the history of Western civilization. Condemnation of those practices is firmly rooted in Judeo-Christian moral and ethical standards. Homosexual sodomy was a capital crime under Roman law. See Code Theod. 9.7.6; Code Just. 9.9.31. See also D. Bailey, Homosexuality [p*197] and the Western Christian Tradition 70-81 (1975). During the English Reformation, when powers of the ecclesiastical courts were transferred to the King's Courts, the first English statute criminalizing sodomy was passed. 25 Hen. VIII, ch. 6. Blackstone described "the infamous crime against nature" as an offense of "deeper malignity" than rape, a heinous act "the very mention of which is a disgrace to human nature," and "a crime not fit to be named." 4 W. Blackstone, Commentaries *215. The common law of England, including its prohibition of sodomy, became the received law of Georgia and the other Colonies. In 1816, the Georgia Legislature passed the statute at issue here, and that statute has been continuously in force in one form or another since that time. To hold that the act of homosexual sodomy is somehow protected as a fundamental right would be to cast aside millennia of moral teaching.
This is essentially not a question of personal "preferences," but rather of the legislative authority of the State. I find nothing in the Constitution depriving a State of the power to enact the statute challenged here.
"They have objected to my behavior as a judge because I reference the moral foundation of the law when we talked about sodomy, when we talked about adultery, when we talked about separation of church and state. I go back to the legal history that we have here in Alabama, our court case precedents, and the foundations of law to show that these things comport with the Scriptures from which we get our moral foundation."
Gay rights organizations in Alabama and Washington, including Equality Begins at Home of Central Alabama, are calling for Moore's resignation, accusing him of using "right-wing rhetoric and far right religious dogma to justify homophobia and execution of homosexuals."
The effort is in response to the Alabama high court's unanimous decision to reject a lesbian mother's child custody petition. Moore wrote a separate concurring opinion, repudiating homosexuality on religious grounds, calling it "abhorrent, immoral, detestable, a crime against nature, and a violation of the laws of nature and of nature's God."
That the detestable and abominable vice of buggery [sodomy] . . . shall be from henceforth adjudged felony . . . and that every person being thereof convicted by verdict, confession, or outlawry [unlawful flight to avoid prosecution], shall be hanged by the neck until he or she shall be dead. 9 NEW YORK
That if any man shall lie with mankind as he lieth with womankind, both of them have committed abomination; they both shall be put to death. 10 CONNECTICUT
Sodomy . . . shall be punished by imprisonment at hard labour in the penitentiary during the natural life or lives of the person or persons convicted of th[is] detestable crime. 11 GEORGIA
That if any man shall commit the crime against nature with a man or male child . . . every such offender, being duly convicted thereof in the Supreme Judicial Court, shall be punished by solitary imprisonment for such term not exceeding one year and by confinement afterwards to hard labor for such term not exceeding ten years. 12 MAINE
That if any person or persons shall commit sodomy . . . he or they so offending or committing any of the said crimes within this province, their counsellors, aiders, comforters, and abettors, being convicted thereof as above said, shall suffer as felons. 13 [And] shall forfeit to the Commonwealth all and singular the lands and tenements, goods and chattels, whereof he or she was seized or possessed at the time . . . at the discretion of the court passing the sentence, not exceeding ten years, in the public gaol or house of correction of the county or city in which the offence shall have been committed and be kept at such labor. 14 PENNSYLVANIA
[T]he detestable and abominable vice of buggery [sodomy] . . . be from henceforth adjudged felony . . . and that the offenders being hereof convicted by verdict, confession, or outlawry [unlawful flight to avoid prosecution], shall suffer such pains of death and losses and penalties of their goods. 15 SOUTH CAROLINA
That if any man lieth with mankind as he lieth with a woman, they both shall suffer death. 16 VERMONT
8. Thomas Jefferson, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Andrew A. Lipscomb, editor (Washington, D. C.: Thomas Jefferson M emorial Association, 1904), Vol. I, pp. 226-227, from Jefferson's "For Proportioning Crimes and Punishments."
9. Laws of the State of New-York . . . Since the Revolution (New York: Thomas Greenleaf, 1798), Vol. I, p. 336.
10. The Public Statute Laws of the State of Connecticut (Hartford: Hudson and Goodwin, 1808), Book I, p. 295.
11. A Digest of the Laws of the State of Georgia (Milledgeville: Grantland & Orme, 1822), p. 350.
12. Laws of the State of Maine (Hallowell: Goodale, Glazier & Co., 1822), p. 58.
13. Laws of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: John Bioren, 1810), Vol. I, p. 113.
14. Collinson Read, An Abridgment of the Laws of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, 1801), p. 279.
15. Alphabetical Digest of the Public Statute Laws of South-Carolina (Charleston: John Hoff, 1814), Vol. I, p. 99.
16. Statutes of the State of Vermont (Bennington, 1791), p. 74.
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Being judged by a pervert is horrible. |
From the Santa Barbara News-Press
Judge Hall to change expected guilty plea
1/17/03
By HILDY MEDINA
NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER
A Santa Barbara County judge accused of driving with a blood alcohol level more than twice the legal limit has decided to change an expected misdemeanor guilty plea now that prosecutors are also charging her with two felony violations, including brandishing a gun to prevent a witness or crime victim from calling police.
Superior Court Judge Diana R. Hall was prepared to plead guilty to a misdemeanor DUI charge stemming from her arrest last month, said her attorney, William Gamble.
But with the Santa Barbara County District Attorney's Office now seeking four misdemeanor counts -- driving under the influence, driving over the legal limit, battery on a spouse or cohabitant, drawing or exhibiting a weapon -- and two felonies, including destruction of a telephone, Mr. Gamble says the judge will plead innocent to all six counts at her arraignment Jan. 23.
"I was trying to signal the DA that we would go with a guilty plea, to make it go faster," said Mr. Gamble. "Now there are other charges. You don't divide the pleas. It's not the way you do it."
The 52-year-old judge was charged a week ago with two felonies and four misdemeanors in connection with her drunken driving arrest Dec. 21. Earlier in the evening, authorities said, during a fight with her companion of four years inside their Santa Ynez home, Judge Hall allegedly pulled a handgun on the woman. She also allegedly smashed the telephone when the other woman tried to call authorities.
The charges were filed shortly after the judge was pulled out of the Lompoc Superior Court's criminal division and transferred to the civil law department in Santa Maria. While Judge Hall waits it out and trains for her new civil assignment, the court system is scrambling to find available jurists to fill unexpected vacancies.
Judge Hall will not be assigned cases during this period, according to court officials.
Note by Inspectorette: She is going to continue receiving her $140,000/year salary.
"We're trying to get an assignment for the next month. We're anticipating that Judge Hall will not be on the bench in February." said Darrel E. Parker, assistant trial courts executive officer.
Under the code of judicial conduct, if Judge Hall is convicted of a felony she will automatically be removed from the bench. Finding a replacement, should that be necessary, could take up to a year or more, say legal experts.
It is not known when Judge Hall, who will continue to be paid during her absence from the bench, will resume her judicial duties.
"We're going on a week-to-week basis," said Mr. Parker.
5 posted on 01/17/2003 12:15 PM CST by Inspectorette (Gay used to mean happy :-()
An Ohio native, Judge Hall graduated cum laude from California State University, Northridge, in 1972. She then attended the University of La Verne, College of Law, receiving her J.D. degree with scholastic honors.
Prior to her appointment to the bench, she served as a Deputy District Attorney for thirteen years. Judge Hall was first appointed to the Municipal Court, Santa Maria Division, by Governor Deukmejian on December 20, 1990. In August 1998 she was elevated to Superior Court Judge.
An avid golfer and bicyclist, Judge Hall is involved in several community activities. She is an advisory board member for the Salvation Army. She is also involved with the drug DARE program in conjunction with the Santa Maria Police Department, serving as a guest speaker at local DARE graduations for various schools. She also served as past president of the Rotary Club of Santa Maria South.
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