Agreed.Originally Posted by Traditional Conservative
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Agreed.
There is no spoon.
And I agree with this. If they are going to publish the names of the defendants, they should also make the *engaged couple* come tell their story. I want to hear from the couple bringing the complaint why they want to be married at the Hitching Post Wedding Chapel.
But here's the thing: I don't see anything on their website about faith tradition except they are staffed by both licensed and ordained ministers.
#NashvilleStrong
“I’m a doctor. That’s a baby.”~~~Dr. Manny Sethi
How much is gratuity ?
No minister should be forced to marry anyone . If the govt insists ,the govt should be dismantled.This is obvious.
That should be enough.
There is no spoon.
AGREE.
There is no spoon.
They didn't say. I've been married a long time, so I might be out of touch. We did give a gratuity to the minister who officiated for us, but it wasn't much. It is considered good etiquette and traditional to give the officiant something.
#NashvilleStrong
“I’m a doctor. That’s a baby.”~~~Dr. Manny Sethi
It seems gay rights trumps every other rights.
I gave mine $50 , but that was the going fee .
A for-profit business run by ministers is not the same as a church. There is not a single thing in that building that does not have a fee attached. Not a church.
I do not think anyone should have to perform a ceremony if it violates their faith, but they have a serious choice to make here. Either run their business by the same laws that govern every other business in that town or pay $1000 per day until they comply and maybe go to jail. They have three different rooms there. If they are using all three rooms at once, they probably have another person on staff. It's not just their problem if that's the case.
They should have thought about constitutional freedoms when the law was passed. Now they are in trouble and they want to make it about their faith. It was an issue long before now.
#NashvilleStrong
“I’m a doctor. That’s a baby.”~~~Dr. Manny Sethi
Obviously.
Just like people who sell unpasteurized milk have a choice, and people who meet in unauthorized churches in China have a choice, and people in the underground railroad had a choice.
The point is that the state is in the wrong for forcing them to make that choice.
Why this kind of stuff is even up for debate at RPF I will never know. Half of this forum actually supports liberty and the other half are just wasting our time...
For some people social liberalism trumps liberty.
Because progs get off on force. It's foreplay for the wedding night.
Why Not Force Somebody Who Hates You to Perform Your Wedding Ceremony?
http://reason.com/blog/2014/10/20/wh...o-hates-you-to
...Eugene Volokh, over at The Washington Post, stepped away from all the outrage and emotional responses to explore whether the city could force a minister to marry a gay couple, even through the mechanism of a for-profit business rather than a church. His conclusion is that they probably could not:
Read more analysis from Volokh here. He also weighed in on the Houston subpoena controversy from last week here.Friday, the Knapps moved for a temporary restraining order, arguing that applying the antidiscrimination ordinance to them would be unconstitutional and would also violate Idaho’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act. I think that has to be right: compelling them to speak words in ceremonies that they think are immoral is an unconstitutional speech compulsion. Given that the Free Speech Clause bars the government from requiring public school students to say the pledge of allegiance, or even from requiring drivers to display a slogan on their license plates (Wooley v. Maynard (1977)), the government can’t require ministers — or other private citizens — to speak the words in a ceremony, on pain of either having to close their business or face fines and jail time. (If the minister is required to conduct a ceremony that contains religious language, that would violate the Establishment Clause as well.)
I think the Knapps are also entitled to an exemption under the Idaho RFRA. The Knapps allege that “sincerely held religious beliefs prohibit them from performing, officiating, or solemnizing a wedding ceremony between anyone other than one man and one woman”; I know of no reason to think they’re lying about their beliefs. Requiring them to violate their beliefs (or close their business) is a substantial burden on their religious practice.
We can argue whether baking a cake or taking photographs constitutes putting a stamp of approval on a wedding or if it's just a neutral service (not that it should matter to anybody who supports freedom of association). But certainly a minister performing a religious ceremony, regardless of whether the context is through a church or business, cannot be reasonably argued to be providing something that is content-neutral.
For heaven's sake, folks, don't try dragging somebody in to marry the two of you who doesn't want to marry the two of you. It's supposed to be the happiest day of your life. Here's a suggestion: If you're thinking of cutting out a distant relative from an invite to your wedding because he is posting anti-gay-marriage stuff on his Facebook wall, don't ask somebody with the exact same beliefs to perform the ceremony for you.
Last edited by Lucille; 10-20-2014 at 10:19 AM.
Based on the idea of natural rights, government secures those rights to the individual by strictly negative intervention, making justice costless and easy of access; and beyond that it does not go. The State, on the other hand, both in its genesis and by its primary intention, is purely anti-social. It is not based on the idea of natural rights, but on the idea that the individual has no rights except those that the State may provisionally grant him. It has always made justice costly and difficult of access, and has invariably held itself above justice and common morality whenever it could advantage itself by so doing.
--Albert J. Nock
I can't imagine Coeur d'Alene is all that big a place, but this is the kind of thing that happens when people are complacent. This law has been on the books long enough that someone walked into the Hitching Post to test it. The law should never have been passed in the first place. But now that there is a law, we can't go screaming about a church-state divide, because this is not a church. It is a for-profit wedding venue. At minimum, $80 plus gratuity.
I don't know why the couple bringing the complaint has to have a wedding chapel. I don't know why they couldn't just file for their license and have a judge perform the ceremony. But they went to a public wedding chapel and asked for a reservation. They were declined. Now they have filed a complaint. A thousand dollars a day plus jail time seems like it isn't worth it. Seems a bit vindictive from the engaged couple's point of view, for sure. It's not all that great a venue.
But this is what happens when the government grants rights. They have to enforce those rights by violating the consciences of other people to make sure rights are upheld.
It's a sad mess.
I am going to say one more thing: A church does not have to host a wedding and the pastor doesn't have to perform a ceremony for anyone who walks in the door. Many pastors have criteria as to faith and premarital counseling. If I suddenly found myself single, my pastor would have the authority to decline to perform a ceremony for me with a new guy if he felt there was something wrong with it. This is why the protection of the church is specific.
What a lot of people don't know is that people who earn income from ministry are considered self-employed for tax purposes. They get hammered on taxes. The couple in our story are ministers, but they run a for-profit business where they can claim deductions. A pastor of a church can't do that. It's very complicated, but again, people have to know what they are doing when they make the choice to be in the ministry. The Bible calls it counting the cost.
Last edited by euphemia; 10-20-2014 at 10:21 AM.
#NashvilleStrong
“I’m a doctor. That’s a baby.”~~~Dr. Manny Sethi
Would it be the same if the people were ordained ministers and owned, say, and insurance company? Would they write a business liability policy for a same-sex couple involved in a sexual relationship? Would they write a business liability policy for two unrelated women who own a business together, but are not in a sexual relationship? What is the difference?
See, it all boils down to who sleeps with whom, and that's how the government gets invited into the bedroom.
#NashvilleStrong
“I’m a doctor. That’s a baby.”~~~Dr. Manny Sethi
Indeed. For a lot of people, actually.
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