Veritas Rex

A Gathering Storm That May Ultimately Reach Indiana

The issue of marriage protection and preserving the importance of mothers and fathers in marriage is coming to a boil again this summer.    Next month, California clerks will begin handing out marriage licenses to homosexual couples following a court ruling that ignored state law and a popular voter-approved referendum defining marriage as only between one man and one woman.  As of today in just the San Francisco area 623 homosexual couples have booked appointments to get a marriage license. 
   
Unlike Massachusetts, California does not have a residency requirement which could place many state's statutes at risk should couples return to their home state and demand recognition of their California marriage. Some homosexual activists are already blogging about ways to nullify state and federal DOMA laws using California marriages.

The Liberty Counsel has also pointed out in a new court filing that California's courts have also swung the door wide open to polygamy, the unavoidable next step in the systematic dismantling of marriage.

Apparently, the Governor of New York couldn't wait for such a challenge. Gov. David Paterson (D) has already ordered all state agencies to revise their policies and regulations to legally recognize California and any other state or country's homosexual marriages.
   
The revisions are estimated to involve at least 1,300 incidents of marriage in state policies including everything from the joint filing of tax forms to the transferring of fishing licenses between spouses.  This is an issue that really should be decided by voters. It is clear that the Governor is trying to circumvent and undermine NY state law, which does not recognize same-sex marriage.  Under his liberal scheme, New York will be the only state that recognizes same-sex marriages from other places, but does not legally allow them.
   
As the storm gathers, the question remains as to what might happen in Indiana since the Democrat House leadership killed the marriage protection amendment. This makes it impossible to significantly protect our marriage laws until 2012 from any potential lawsuits created by the California or New York messes.

Reaganauts for McCain

Forgive me as this open letter to conservatives is now a few months old. But it has stuck with me for this long and if it's still with me after the thousands of pages of text I've read between now and then, well, I thought it was worth sharing. It's authored by some key figures from the Reagan Administration, including Peter Hannaford, who was with Reagan from his Sacramento days, and Frank Donatelli, who I got to know well in my former role where Frank still serves as Chairman of the Reagan Ranch Board of Governors. Enjoy.

A Memorandum for Our Conservative Colleagues

Some thirty years ago, we and thousands of other grassroots conservatives helped a man then deemed a "maverick conservative" take on the established order in Washington and the Republican Party.

continue reading

Refreshing Courage

I attended a high school graduation this past weekend and was very encouraged by what I saw (the high school will remain nameless as I know several ACLU of Indiana supporters frequent Veritas Rex).  I am proud to report that there are still places in this country where high school administrators do not bow before the golden calf of the ACLU.  This graduation ceremony at a public high school began with prayer, students who earned the right to speak at graduation were allowed to do so without having religious content censored from their speeches, but the best part was what the Superintendent had to say.

He used Jesus Christ as an example of a great leader (gasp!).  He was not politically correct.  He pointed to a local minister (who happens to be very theologically conservative) as an example of servant leadership in action.  He named names.  He gave examples.  He didn’t speak in vague platitudes as many do to avoid the ire of the ACLU.  He even spoke highly of our founding fathers (double gasp!) and inwardly I cheered! 

The great success the ACLU has achieved in silencing people of faith has come not through complete and total legal dominance.  Rather, it is one legal victory against Christian (their lawsuits are nearly always against Christians) religious expression in public schools and then a victory against a pastor, and then a community group, etc.  Their real success is not in the legal victories themselves, but in their silencing effect on the masses.  It gives me renewed strength to see public schools and administrators refusing to be silenced.  We need more of them.

Fathers?! We don't need no stinkin' fathers!

In the UK, women have won the right to children without fathers.  For a full explanation, read more here.

Single women and lesbian couples won landmark parental rights last night as MPs voted to remove the requirement that fertility clinics consider a child’s need for a father.

The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill will replace the rule with a “need for supportive parenting” after opponents were defeated in two votes by unexpectedly wide margins.

Read some articles on the importance of fathers here, here and here.  Has the feminist movement gotten so selfish that they no longer care about the child- only the mother?

MPs who backed the fatherhood amendments said the traditional family would be undermined. Iain Duncan Smith, who proposed enshrining the importance of a father and mother, said that the new law would amount to telling couples that “fathers are not important, or are less important than mothers”.

The former Tory leader said there was overwhelming evidence that children without fathers were more likely to have problems at school and with drink and drugs. He also questioned whether the existing law led to genuine discrimination, as many IVF clinics already treated lesbians and single women.

His criticisms were backed by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’ Connor, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, in an interview with The Times. “I think it strange that the Government should want to take away not just the need for a father but the right for a father,” he said.

The law will now be brought into line with the Human Rights Act. The Bill will also allow both partners to be recognised as parents when lesbian couples conceive with donated sperm, or gay men use surrogacy. At present, only the natural mother or father is automatically considered to be a parent when gay couples have fertility treatment.

For those of you who need an explanation of the title, click here.

Eric Turner's excellent article in the Chronicle-Tribune

We quote in it's entirety.

We should be very worried when the wishes of the electorate are willingly tossed aside by activist judges.

The California Supreme Court did just that when it ignored the will of a majority of Californians who believe that marriage should be between one man and one woman. The justices trashed a state law that was based on the results of Proposition 22, a 2000 referendum in which Californians announced they believe marriage should be between one man and one woman.

California’s justices decided to make legal what the people of California decided was counterfeit. The court stepped beyond its judicial role and legislated by fiat, making law rather than interpreting it.

This is why the fight to add the Defense of Marriage Amendment to the Indiana Constitution is worth the continued effort. We must turn to the constitution to reinforce the will of the people and protect it from relentless campaigns for social engineering.

What has appeared so logical for so long to so many — “marriage” means one woman and one man uniting for one lifetime — has been so aggressively threatened by political groups, special-interest groups and sympathetic activist judges that it is necessary to protect that idea in the constitution.

California Chief Justice Ronald M. George wrote that, given the historic, cultural, symbolic and constitutional significance of marriage, the state cannot limit its availability to opposite-sex couples.

Justice George has it backwards: The historic, cultural, symbolic and constitutional significance of marriage are exactly why its availability should be limited. Voting and citizenship, for example, have the same significance, and that is why they have limited availability.

Although there are plenty of reasons to cite Judeo-Christian tradition in defending marriage and limiting its availability, the idea of defining and defending the long-standing, traditional approach to marriage is worthy on other common-sense levels as well:

oIndiana already has a state law defining marriage as a union of one man and one woman. The law is based on millennia of accepted standards and has been shown to be reasonable and fair. More important, it has been shown to be constitutional.

But, as we have recently seen in California, all this can mean nothing in the onslaught of activist judges. The Defense of Marriage Amendment thwarts that onslaught.

oIf Indiana’s definition of marriage is trashed by activist judges, what stands in the way of other laws preventing other perversions of accepted Hoosier standards of decency? Once traditional marriage is felled, arguments against polygamy, adult-child marriages or even marriages between blood relatives become bolder.

oResearch throughout the years has shown that the mother-father model works best at establishing and maintaining stable families and well-adjusted children.

Twenty-seven states currently have a constitutional amendment defining marriage as one man and one woman. Florida citizens likely will make their state the 28th when they vote to ratify a marriage amendment this fall.

A strong majority of members of the House of Representatives — both Republicans and Democrats — signed a petition during the 2008 session, urging that House Speaker B. Patrick Bauer (D-South Bend) and House Rules Committee Chairman Scott Pelath (D-Michigan City) give Senate Joint Resolution 7, the Defense of Marriage Amendment, a hearing before the full House. The amendment was assigned to the House Rules Committee, and that is where it died, returning the amendment process to square one.

In order for this amendment to be added to the Indiana Constitution, it would have to pass two separately elected General Assemblies and then be approved in a statewide voter referendum on the next general election ballot.

Both houses of the General Assembly had approved SJR 7 once, and the Senate, early in the 2008 session, passed SJR 7 by a 39-9 vote. Had the House approved SJR 7 — and that was likely, since it passed the same chamber 76-23 in 2005 — Hoosier voters could have voted on the issue this November.

Now, the General Assembly must start the process all over again, but it is worth the effort to prevent activist judges from overruling the clear will of the people and putting asunder the sanctity of marriage.

Rep. P. Eric Turner represents District 32, which includes parts of Grant, Hamilton, Howard, Miami and Tipton counties. He is the assistant Republican leader.

Commentary: End the Welfare Marriage Penalty

From CitizenLink.com 5/28/08
by Sam Brownback and David Blankenhorn

Lawmakers have done little to address marriage penalties facing the poor.

What if the federal government forced couples to pay 20 percent of their annual income just to get or stay married? And suppose a couple could avoid this tax if they either got a divorce or never got married in the first place?

Does it sound like good public policy to force a couple earning, say, $60,000 a year to pay $12,000 just for being married?

That's more or less what we demand of millions of low-income Americans who receive government welfare benefits. For most couples on welfare, getting married is among the more expensive decisions they will face as newlyweds, because saying "I do" will reduce the benefits they receive, on average, by 10 percent to 20 percent of their total income.

We shudder to think what would happen to marriage in America if all of us, and not just the poor, faced such a pernicious incentive system.

Knowledge of the marriage penalty in poor neighborhoods is typically spread by word of mouth. This informal learning might actually increase the anti-marriage impact of the penalty, by convincing nearly all poor couples that they will lose income if they marry, even though some (due to the complexity of the regulations) would not.

In recent years, Congress has made substantial progress in reducing the marriage penalties paid by middle- and upper-income couples because of the tax system. But lawmakers have done little to address marriage penalties facing the poor through the benefit system.

Why should we care about this issue? For starters, consider the children. A wide range of studies have found that children whose parents are married are significantly less likely to use drugs, have emotional problems, drop out of school, or get into trouble with the law. Studies also consistently find that married adults tend to be happier, healthier and ultimately wealthier than their unmarried but otherwise similarly situated peers.

So when we penalize poor couples for getting married, we are giving them a strong incentive not to take advantage of an institution that would likely help them lift themselves out of poverty over time. Being married gives couples a greater capacity to build assets and economic stability, which could help get them off of welfare for good.

For these reasons, it's time to eliminate the marriage penalty for low-income Americans. Our proposal is simple: Don't make them pay it. We should allow newly married couples to continue to receive all of their benefits for the first three years of marriage, thus mitigating the marriage penalty currently paid by lower-income couples. This adjustment should give newly married couples a sufficient grace period to realize the economic benefits of marriage — and save some money to stabilize their financial situation — before government benefits cease.

When that day comes, the government's message to low-income Americans will have changed dramatically. We will be saying: Your marriage matters — for you and for all of us. We will no longer penalize low-income Americans who wish to marry.

Liberals ought to support this idea, because it means more money for the poor. Conservatives ought to support this idea, because it is pro-marriage, and because it may help to reduce welfare dependency over the long run. Everyone ought to like this idea because it could help reduce the suffering that so frequently accompanies family fragmentation and divorce.

What's the next step? We need to test this idea. In five or so lower-income communities across the country, we need local leaders and public officials to work together to design programs to reach out to low-income engaged and married couples, make sure they know that they will not pay a marriage penalty for the first three years of their marriage, and help them to calculate their savings from this program.

Ideally, such outreach programs would be one part — the financial part — of broader community-based efforts to strengthen marriage. The results of these pilot projects would be carefully evaluated by independent scholars. Do marriage rates increase? Does the well-being of women, men and children improve? If the answers are yes, this idea could be extended to the nation as a whole.

We believe that the time is ripe to transcend the usual partisan politics and implement a plan to stop penalizing lower-income couples who do the right thing — for themselves and their children — and get married. That's something all of us, regardless of political persuasion, should be able to agree on.

Sam Brownback, a Republican, is a U.S. senator from Kansas. David Blankenhorn is president of the Institute for American Values in New York.

Reprinted from The Wall Street Journal © 2008. Dow Jones & Company.  All rights reserved. Referral to Web sites not produced by Focus on the Family is for informational purposes only and does not necessarily constitute an endorsement of the sites' content.

To Be a Christian Politician . . . or Pesterer?

I am always heartened by election news. Without fail, it brings with it not only tables and charts of returns and exit polling but evidence of a Christian church voting as a body and voting for truth.

Now, that is not to say this church is dependably large enough to win a given election or even swing the outcome this way or that in any tactically recognizable way. And it is certainly not to say that this body of Christian voters is consciously organized in the way that a political faction or party would be organized, i.e., around personalities or issues.

Indeed, I join C.S. Lewis and other Christian thinkers in being alarmed at that very prospect.

Many years ago my pastor, recognizing a quarrelsome spirit, loaned me a small collection of Lewis essays entitled “God on the Dock.” One of those essays, “Meditation on the Third Commandment,” has since guided my thinking as a Christian involved in politics — especially in recent years as Christian groups have become more adept at political organization and therefore more tempted by it.

The essay boils down to these few points:

• When Christians set about forming a political faction or party they necessarily exclude other Christians who disagree with the means the faction champions.

• It is likely that on the full political field this faction or party will find itself a minority of a minority.

• Such a minority must form alliances with other minorities, alliances with those who are at best ambivalent about our Savior’s death on the Cross and Resurrection.

• And even if we are particularly skillful at this game, we end up with a political faction that is “christian” only in that it’s officers have a powerful incentive to claim to be followers of Christ. Worse, by calling itself a Christian this or a Christian that, the party unavoidably implies that those who disagree with it are un-Christian.

Would Lewis, then, leave us sitting around waiting for the lions to get hungry? Not necessarily. He has three specific and coordinated alternatives to modern political parties (“secret societies of murderers and blackmailers,” he calls them).

The first and best, or course, is to convert our neighbors one-by-one toward the eventual realization of a Christian majority or, in the end, a Christian unanimity.

Another would be to simply witness to those persons currently at the head of political factions, parties, nations or even empires (the Constantine strategy).

Yet another would be to form interdenominational “Christian Voting Societies.” Such a society might write letters such as the ones that fill the encouraging and inspiring pages of Veritas Rex. Or it might draw up more formal letters of assurances about political means and ends, assurances that members of the society would vow to extract from office-seekers as a condition of support.*

“So all it comes down to is pestering (legislators) with letters?,” asks Lewis in conclusion. “Yes: just that. I think such pestering combines the dove and the serpent. I think it means a world where parties have to take care not to alienate Christians instead of a world where Christians have to be ‘loyal’ to infidel parties.”

“Pesterer in Chief” has a good sound to it. Nominations are open.

* Indiana is blessed with many organization of both types. My favorite model, though, is the Brazilian “samba society.” Its members not only write letters about pressing community problems but learn to dance — and at the end of the year, win or lose, they get to ride in a colorful parade.

Faith and Politics: State Representative Woody Burton

How much impact should an individual’s faith have over public policy?
A substantial amount.  I believe that elected officials have the right to make faith-based decisions, particularly if they were elected based on their faith and character. 

Is an individual’s faith relevant as an issue in Elections?
Yes.  In 1988 during my first election, a voter asked me directly whether or not I was a man of faith.  She was basing her decision on my answer, and I do understand that many voters are interested in this aspect of a candidate because it speaks to their character and integrity.

Faith and Politics Series

You'll be seeing some articles on VR in the next few weeks from a number of contributors- all on the topic of faith and politics.  It's part of a series of articles that we are soliciting from a number of individuals on the topic.

Stay tuned.

Faith and Politics: State Representative Dave Cheatham

How much impact should an individual's faith have over public policy?
Any public official should have as a top priority the goal of serving God and living a life as a witness for Jesus.  All decisions we make in whatever we do should be directed to that ultimate goal.  In government service it becomes a question of how we serve God by helping make the lives of people better.  Government is an institution created by God to serve certain purposes-to punish what is wrong and to commend what is right.  That should be part of our service.  However, government should not be used to favor a particular religion over another as long as the religion is a legitimate faith with the belief in God.  Cults and other pseudo-religions are not really religions in my mind.

Is an individual's faith relevant as an issue in Elections?
An individual's faith is relevant in Elections in that Elections should be a part of our lives like anything else we do to serve God.  That should mean that we shouldn't lie, slander the character of others, engage in half-truths, or make promises that we know we can't keep.  We should discuss ideas and not other people.  Personal attacks and negative campaigning should never be a part of any campaign.  I'm sorry as a society that we have stooped to doing that.  We must remember in the long term, God is in control and he has purposes beyond whether we win or lose an elections.

How would you define "Separation of Church and State?
Separation of Church and State means that Government should stay out of affecting religious belief and should not restrict an individual's faith.  Government may and should restrict certain religious practices that are harmful or dangerous to the health, or safety of society.  But still, people should be free to have their own beliefs.  It is a one-way street.  Religion and faith should be able to affect government policies and practices, but government should not interfere with legitimate religions.  Restricting prayer in school and the reading of the Bible and the Ten Commandments was never intended to be the affect of the 1st amendment.  Government has over-stepped their authority.  Government's relation to religion should be one of "benevolent neutrality."