Religion & Law

FL: Protestors line up outside Planned Parenthood

Posted on September 13, 2010
ABC: "Armed with signs and rosaries, around 100 protestors lined up outside the Collier County Planned Parenthood office Monday."

NY imam says mosque fight worth the controversy

Posted on September 13, 2010
Reuters: "The proposed Islamic cultural center and mosque near the site of the September 11 attacks in New York was worth the controversy because it aired difficulties faced by Muslims in the United States, the center's imam said on Monday."

Vander Plaats: Court should have sent marriage issue to Legislature

Posted on September 13, 2010
Des Moines Register: "Former Republican candidate for governor Bob Vander Plaats said Friday he does not dispute the Iowa Supreme Court's authority to declare the state's one-man, one-woman marriage law unconstitutional. But Vander Plaats said the court overstepped its power because it failed to return the issue to the Legislature with an order to act: Either pass a law expressly allowing same-sex marriage, or submit it to voters as a constitutional amendment...

Trial opens for lesbian seeking return to military

Posted on September 13, 2010
Associated Press: "In an opening statement Monday, American Civil Liberties Union of Washington lawyer Sarah Dunne said former Maj. Margaret Witt was highly respected, and her dismissal ? not her orientation ? caused morale problems in her unit."

To access this complete feed in the blog feed reader login or register for free.

Indonesian president orders police to arrest those who attacked Christian group

Posted on September 13, 2010
Voice of America: "Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has ordered police to hunt down and arrest assailants who attacked Christians heading to a religious service. Some advocates for pluralism here say the president has until now done little to prevent religious intolerance at home, although he urged President Obama to prevent a Christian group from burning Qurans in America...

Obama urged to confront Islamic states on religious freedom

Posted on September 13, 2010
Patrick Goodenough writing at CNSNews: "At a time when religious tolerance is in the spotlight globally, President Obama should challenge Islamic governments to lift restrictions on religious freedom that target non-Muslim minorities, some activists say...

Delaware Senate contest will hinge on turnout

Posted on September 13, 2010
The Hill: "The Castle campaign is hoping for solid turnout Tuesday in and around Wilmington to help the centrist congressman offset more conservative primary-goers in the southern part of the state who may be backing Tea Party favorite Christine O'Donnell...

Clashes at anti-US protests in Tehran over Koran burning

Posted on September 13, 2010
Monsters and Critics: "Iranian students and police clashed on Monday during protests in northern Tehran against Koran burning in the United States. Hundreds of students from several Tehran universities, most of them holding a copy of the Islamic holy book, clashed with anti-riot police deployed in front of the US interest section of the Swiss embassy after the students tried to attack it...

David S. Broder: When JFK defused the Catholic question

Posted on September 13, 2010
David S. Broder writing in The Washington Post: "Fifty years ago today, John Kennedy gave one of the best political speeches I ever heard, a plea for religious tolerance that has strange pertinence now when a little-known minister had been threatening to burn copies of the Koran to strike a blow against Muslims...

Calif judge to stop ?don?t ask, don?t tell? policy

Posted on September 10, 2010
U.S. District Judge Virginia Phillips ruled Thursday that the prohibition on openly gay military service members was unconstitutional because it violates the First and Fifth Amendment rights of gays and lesbians.

Transvestites demand use of opposite sex bathrooms in Argentina

Posted on September 10, 2010
LifeSiteNews: "Argentinean transvestites are objecting to new legislation proposed to create a third bathroom for their use in commercial establishments, according to local and international reports. The proposed law, advanced by councilwoman Gimena Abonassar of the city of San Martín, is intended to protect women from men who enter their bathrooms dressed as the opposite sex, an increasingly common occurrence in certain countries...

Washington Post Editorial: Congress needs to stop stonewalling on federal court vacancies

Posted on September 10, 2010
Washington Post: "As the parties have squabbled, the number of "judicial vacancies" has more than doubled -- from 20 at the beginning of the Obama administration to 49. Backlogs have grown, as have workloads for sitting judges and legal fees for litigants...

National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association membership declines

Posted on September 10, 2010
San Francisco Chronicle: "A survey in the 1990 study said that only 59 percent of gay journalists were out in their newsrooms. By 2000, that number was higher than 90 percent . . . After peaking in 2006 with about 1,300 members, the NLGJA is down to 700 - shrinkage that is mirrored in other professional journalism organizations, union ranks and just about every other group that counts reporters and editors as members...

Haley Barbour on ?gay rights? and same-sex ?marriage?

Posted on September 10, 2010
Politico: "On a different issue, Barbour signaled how he might respond to questions about gay rights when he was asked about former RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman?s decision to disclose that he is gay. The governor recalled that he had worked alongside gays in his years in GOP politics ? 'no big deal to me,' he said...

Video game industry gears up for battle against Calif. law

Posted on September 10, 2010
Los Angeles Times: "Girding itself for its final battle, the video game industry will lay out its arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court on why California's ban on the sale or rental of violent video games to minors violates the developers' free speech rights...

NC: Thousands gather for Islamic Eid Prayer at state fairgrounds

Posted on September 10, 2010
NBC-17: "The largest gathering for Eid Prayer will be held in Exposition Center at the State Fairgrounds in Raleigh starting at 9 a.m. About 8,000 people are expected to attend the event."

DADT in Reid?s hands

Posted on September 10, 2010
The Advocate (Warning: may include ads promoting homosexual behavior): "Fearful that delaying action on 'don?t ask, don?t tell' until after the midterms could potentially kill the measure for the year, repeal advocates are pushing Senate majority leader Harry Reid to schedule a Senate floor vote on the defense funding bill in September...

Planned Parenthood report shows abortions up 6 percent, adoptions down

Posted on September 10, 2010
LifeNews: "The new Planned Parenthood figures show it did 324,008 abortions in 2008 -- a 6.1 percent increase over the 305,310 abortions it did in 2007 . . . While abortions are on the rise at Planned Parenthood, adoption referrals declined to just 2,405 -- a 51 percent drop since 2007...

Canada: ?Upholding gay blood ban awkward, but correct?

Posted on September 10, 2010
Matt Gurney writing at The National Post: "While it may be impolitic to say it, men who engage in sex with men are indeed a high-risk group for the transmission of HIV/AIDS, relative to society as a whole. That responsible, healthy gay men should be denied the chance to donate blood on this basis is certainly unfair and no doubt hurtful, but is still justified...

Australia: Adoption service welcomes same-sex adoptions as opponents vow to fight

Posted on September 10, 2010
Sydney Morning Herald: "Barnardos Australia, which has been at the forefront of child welfare for than 120 years, has embraced the legislation passed in the NSW Parliament allowing adoption by same-sex couples and will proceed with three adoptions in line with it ...

?A huge Muslim problem: inbreeding?

Posted on September 10, 2010
Bryan Fischer writing at AFA's Rightly Concerned: "Nicolai Sennels is a Danish psychologist who has done extensive research into a little-known problem in the Muslim world: the disastrous causes of Muslim inbreeding brought about by the marriage of first-cousins...

Home schoolers victims of U.N. treaty

Posted on September 10, 2010
OneNewsNow: "The U.S.-based Home School Legal Defense group fears a U.N. treaty is causing increasing problems for home schoolers in various countries. The latest example involves four families in Botswana who have been ordered to send their children to public school...

Fla. pastor, imam at odds over Koran-burning deal

Posted on September 10, 2010
OneNewsNow: "Imam Muhammad Musri said he was clear on Thursday when he told the Rev. Terry Jones that he could set up a meeting with planners of the New York City mosque, but insisted he never promised to shift the location. Jones announced after the meeting -- with Musri at his side -- that they had a bargain and that he would call off the Quran-burning for Saturday, the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks...

Churches and whole villages being torched doesn?t receive the attention of one Koran in the U.S.

Posted on September 10, 2010
Mark Tooley writing at The American Spectator: "Tragically, whole Christian villages overseas can be torched by Islamist mobs and not receive 1 percent of the global limelight that the possible destruction of one book has extravagantly received." See also: Quran Burning Controversy Reveals Perilous Plight of Persecuted Christians Overseas

Michelle Malkin: The eternal flame of Muslim outrage

Posted on September 10, 2010
Michelle Malkin writing at Townhall: "Pardon my national security-threatening impudence, but when is the 'Muslim world' not ready to 'explode'? . . . When everything from sneakers to stuffed animals to comics to frescos to beauty queens to fast-food packaging to undies serves as dry tinder for Allah's avengers, it's a grand farce to feign concern about the recruitment effect of a few burnt Korans in the hands of a two-bit attention-seeker in Florida...

?John Roberts, the accidental Chief Justice?

Posted on September 10, 2010
Linda Greenhouse writing at The New York Times / Opinionator: "Had [Justice O'Connor] anticipated that the chief justice would not serve out the next Supreme Court term, she told me after his death, she would have delayed her own retirement for a year rather than burden the court with two simultaneous vacancies ...

Napolitano uses the ?t? word in reference to Al Qaeda

Posted on September 10, 2010
Politico: "Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano will mark the ninth anniversary of 9/11 with a speech Friday in New York vowing to keep up the fight against terrorists and to 'to enlist the nation in its own collective security.'"

Napolitano use the ?t? word in reference to Al Qaeda

Posted on September 10, 2010
Politico: "Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano will mark the ninth anniversary of 9/11 with a speech Friday in New York vowing to keep up the fight against terrorists and to 'to enlist the nation in its own collective security.'"

Questions for Imam Rauf from an American Muslim

Posted on September 10, 2010
M. Zuhdi Jasser writing in the Wall Street Journal, "Questions for Imam Rauf from an American Muslim" [full text via Google News]: "Imam Rauf and his supporters are clearly more interested in making a political statement in relation to Islam than in the mosque's potential for causing community division and pain to those who lost loved ones on 9/11...

USC Law: U.S. Supreme Court preview, Sept. 20

Posted on September 10, 2010
USC Law: "USC Law is presenting the third annual 'U.S. Supreme Court: A Preview,' featuring distinguished legal scholars Kathleen Sullivan of Stanford Law School, John Eastman of Chapman Law School and Rebecca Brown of USC Gould School of Law . . . The panelists will discuss and debate the upcoming U...

Bloggers, promote your law blog by nominating your blog for inclusion in USLaw.com's Law Blog Directory and RSS Reader. Benefits described.