The county clerk in Rowan Co. Kentucky who refuses to issue marriage licenses to same sex couples despite the recent U.S. Supreme court ruling and a court order to do so is in the national spotlight.
Ironically, she has been married four times, twice to the same man, according to this profile of her in the New York Times. So much for the sanctity of marriage. Also, she was elected as a Democrat.
The ACLU has now filed a motion to have her held in contempt of court. The hearing is set for tomorrow. The U.S. Supreme Court has denied her motion for a stay of the district court's order to issue licenses to everyone who wants one.
She's entitled to her beliefs, but if her beliefs prevent her from doing her job she should resign. Even if she's held in contempt and thrown in jail, it presumably wouldn't disqualify her and she could continue doing or not doing her job from a jail cell. It must be as difficult in Kentucky as it is here to have a county official fired for dereliction of duty.
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This amazes me. I'm beginning
This amazes me. I'm beginning to think this could go on a while. It is hard work upholding the law of the land.
Not if the judge rules harshly
(in reply to bizgrrl)
Like he should.
The courthouse is not her church and God is not her boss at work.
A severe ruling would send whatever message these folks seem to need.
The judge has ordered not
The judge has ordered not only the clerk, but her entire staff to court tomorrow. My guess is that she gets cited for contempt and they get ordered to issue licenses.
She's already been ordered to
(in reply to Rachel)
She's already been ordered to issue licenses as required by KY law. She is defying that order. That's what contempt means, i.e., willfully disobeying a lawful order.
I predict the office (and perhaps the elected officeholder) will be fined a significant amount for each day the order is violated. Once the taxpayers start paying fines for this little adventure, something will have to give. She'll either respect the law or she'll be recalled or impeached.
What amazes me…
What amazes me is that people with extreme, possibly harmful, superstitious beliefs (like Davis) can be deemed trustworthy enough to hold public office, while atheists and agnostics, who are generally tolerant and peace-loving, are not.
Theocracy
(in reply to ArtWagner)
People who want a theocracy always assume it's their own theology that should rule the day.
This lady is a Pentacostal. According to Pew research, Pentacostals represent 3.6% of the population. Depending on which version of Apostolic Pentacostal she is, that group represents less than 0.3% of the US population. So why is it that her religious views should be the law of the land? They shouldn't. That's why.
If she were black
she'd be in jail already.
Nut Jobs LIke This Don't Belong in Government
No matter what party she is affiliated with, if she cannot do her job serving ALL the residents of the county, then she should be fired, recalled, or whatever needs to be done to get her out of office, because she sure as heck doesn't look like she is going to leave that job on her own. Furthermore, if she wants a job where she can be comfortable in her religious beliefs, then she should get a job with her church.
She needs to have a little integrity...
...and resign, if she can't do her job.
FWIW Articles have said that
FWIW
Articles have said that her mother had the County Clerk position who then hired her to work in the office. When the mother retired, this woman ran for the job and got it, then she hired her son, who will likely run for her seat when she vacates.
She has also ordered that no one in the office issue marriage certificates (or they are all as religious as she is, perhaps hiring folks from her church?). They will all appear before court tomorrow. I wonder how many will be willing to face a penalty, or will go against her order, or will they let the judge know they are under her orders.
They ought to summon
(in reply to B Harmon)
the local judge executive as well, who is empowered by the law of the Commonwealth (KRS 402.240) to sign marriage licenses in the absence of the county clerk. If that guy had the cojones that God gave a goose, and he asserted the power of his office appropriately, this would be a non-troversy.
Fines
Whatever fines are levied will be quickly raised by a go-fund-me campaign. If she is jailed she is a martyr. This is really a no-win situation.
As my son, who lives
As my son, who lives, works and goes to college in Rowan county,
"Kim Davis forgot to read this verse in the bible.
Mark 12:17
Then Jesus said to them, "Give back to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's." And they were amazed at him.
Marriage is no longer under God's definition and if she had true faith she would see that is his plan."
There are plenty of people in Rowan county, and Kentucky, who are embarrassed and angered by Kim Davis' actions and refusal to follow the law.
UPDATE: Davis found in
UPDATE: Davis found in contempt, sent to jail...
LET THE MARTYRDOM BEGIN!!
Or her position as an insignificant footnote history.
Here's hoping for the latter.
Or, Mike Huckabee could name
(in reply to Average Guy)
Or, Mike Huckabee could name her as his running mate.
(link...)
The ACLU was asking for fines, but the judge didn't think she would get the message, plus she would just get others to pay them through donations.
I saw a pretty good suggestion somewhere that the fines could have incuded all donations plus $1000 per day or whatever.
The opposite of religious freedom
(in reply to R. Neal)
What Davis wants is the opposite of religious freedom. Every religious person should get very nervous when government officials seek to use government power to advance their religious views. Given the hundreds of Christian denominations that split apart specifically over doctrinal disagreements, there is no majority religion in this country. Most may call themselves Christian, but they mean different things by it. Consequently, if Davis had her way and government officials were permitted to overrule civil law with their individual religious views, well, Katie bar the door. The result would be more like ISIS than the utopian Christian nation that so many seem to envision.
News release from TN Rep.
Reasonable Accomodation
(in reply to bizgrrl)
The law does allow for "reasonable accomodation", and courts have been using this for years to handle these sticky situations.
Take, for example, the Muslim flight attendant that doesn't want to serve alcohol. She has for some time now been able to work out with her fellow flight attendants and arrangement where she handles the food and sodas, and doesn't have to. It's been working, and it's a reasonable accommodation (until the airline stepped in and said it wasn't).
There's quite a bit of case law about people not wanting to work on Saturday. As long as the scheduling doesn't cause an undue burden on the employer, people are allowed reasonable accommodation for their religious beliefs.
In Kim Davis' case, she refused any reasonable accommodation. She could have let her clerks issue the licenses. She blocked that. And when a judge ordered the clerks to issue licenses, she issued a decree from jail that any such licenses issued would be deemed by her office to be illegal and invalid.
So, she fails the reasonable accommodation test.
This is amazing in how
This is amazing in how uninformed he and others like him are. Do they not know or care that the Supreme Court has said that states can't deny the freedom to marry? I think we will hear more of this nonsense in the months ahead.
Last night one of my friends
(in reply to Ann Malone)
Last night one of my friends was arguing that the SSM case was SCOTUS making law, which they have no authority to do.
However, they decided the case on Constitutional grounds, which they damn well DO have the authority to do. And if they "made law" in this case, they also made it in Hobby Lobby, Citizens United, etc. etc. etc.
These people don't care about the proper role of SCOTUS. They just don't like the decision; hence, they want to ignore it. Like Kim Davis wanting to keep her job and ignore part of her duties.
They're children.
A song about the situation.
(link...)
If you're a Twitter user,
If you're a Twitter user, don't miss the feed from Sitnexto Kim Davis.