Non Fluffy Wicca

Trial judge finds Florida gay adoption ban unconstitutional:


[JURIST] A trial judge in Key West has found Florida's law preventing gay and lesbian people from adopting children to be unconstitutional and has issued an order permitting a foster parent to adopt a 13-year-old boy. Judge David J. Audlin Jr. of the Monroe County Circuit Court ruled that the 1977 statute violates both the US Constitution and the Florida Constitution because it acts as a bill of attainder intended "to repress gay Floridians as a group" and violates the separation of powers doctrine by precluding judicial discretion. As part of the 67-page final judgment of adoption, released Thursday, Audlin wrote: The Court finds the foregoing facts to be true: (a) The fact that Petitioner is a gay man is irrelevant to his skills as a parent and his fitness to adopt. Irrespective of Petitioner's sexual orientation, it is in the minor's best interest to be adopted by Petitioner, (b) Floridians who are gay or lesbian are not for that reason inherently incapable of parenting an adopted child, (c) In view of the less restrictive alternative safeguards that exist, there is no need for categorical disqualification of all gays and lesbians in Florida from adoption to ensure that no child is adopted by an inappropriate caregiver, and (d) After having listened to and read the legislative history surrounding the enactment of SB 354, the Court finds that there was no non-punitive purpose for categorically excluding every single gay and lesbian Floridian from adopting children. The adoptive father and his partner have cared for the boy, who has learning disabilities, since 2001. Because they have been the boy's permanent guardians since 2006, the Florida Department of Children & Families has taken no position in the case. The Florida Attorney General's Office has likewise declined to intervene, although Audlin's order allows the state to appeal. The Miami Herald has more. The Key West Citizen has local coverage.

The Florida statute has undergone previous constitutional challenges based on legal theories not at issue in the Key West case. The US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit upheld it in 2005 as being rationally related to protecting children's interests, and the US Supreme Court declined to review that decision. Florida and Mississippi are the only US states which ban such adoptions, although the Arkansas secretary of state last month certified a ballot measure which would prohibit gays, lesbians and other unmarried cohabiting couples from becoming either foster or adoptive parents.

Posted by mikki at 01:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

First Amendment May Be No Shield For Santeria Worshippers:

Animal sacrifice for religious purposes may not be unconstitutional and may be protected by the First Amendment, but that doesn’t mean it’s a practice safe from laws aimed at preventing cruelty to animals. If the animal cruelty laws are not purposefully designed to suppress the religion known as Santeria or other religions where animal sacrifice is a ritual, then practitioners may still find themselves answerable to those laws.

For example, a situation noted on the Religion Clause Blog, Santeria worshippers are facing multiple charges over the improper treatment of animals in New York and New Jersey. Perez-Hernandez and his son Louis were charged with violating animal cruelty statutes because, according to a police investigation, the animals died from malnutrition. The two also face charges for unlawfully transporting more than 100 animals from a New Jersey farm without proper documents, the Lower Hudson Journal News reported. Authorities told the newspaper that the two were not being prosecuted because of their planned sacrifice of the animals in a religious ritual, but for violating Agriculture and Market laws that prohibit denying sustenance to the animals. In addition, the two were charged with subverting a town law against harboring farm animals in residential neighborhoods.

In 1993, the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated a number of animal cruelty and health safety ordinances in a Florida town on First Amendment grounds. Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy said the laws were not neutral, but were instead aimed at suppressing the Santeria religion. The faith, originating in the 19th Century, “teaches that every individual has a destiny from God, a destiny fulfilled with the aid and energy of the orishas,” Kennedy wrote. A primary form, the high court noted, of nurturing a personal relationship with the orishas is to sacrifice animals, such as chickens, pigeons, doves, ducks, guinea pigs, goats, sheep and turtles.

Those Florida ordinances were invalidated, because the Court concluded they weren’t really aimed at protecting animals or addressing safety concerns, but were all about suppressing Santeria animal sacrifices. “We conclude, in sum, that each of Hialeah’s ordinances pursues the city’s governmental interests only against conduct motivated by religious belief,” Kennedy wrote for the majority in Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah. “The ordinances ‘have every appearance of a prohibition that society is prepared to impose upon [Santeria worshippers], but not upon itself.”

Whether the Santeria worshippers in New York are exempt because of the First Amendment from the multiple animal cruelty and health ordinances has yet to be addressed. The Westchester Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals told the Journal News that religion was not the issue here. “Provide them [the animals] with the basics, even if you are to sacrifice them, is the proper way to do it,” Ken Ross, chief of the group’s law enforcement unit, said.     

Posted by mikki at 11:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

God Hates Phelps:

United States: Westboro Baptist Church suffered a small fire, which destroyed a garage and a fence. Members of the church think it was deliberate, though we at Prattle Towers are of the opinion that it's because God hates them.

Small fire strikes Westboro Baptist—The Wichita Eagle, 2nd August 2008.

Posted by mikki at 11:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Psychic’s Donation Not Accepted:


By Jesse Froehling



Last year, when Alexandra Chauran sought to teach her students at the Kent Phoenix Academy about the benefits of composting, she turned to the King County Solid Waste Division for help. Chauran ended up using the agency's curriculum to help her students start a vegetable garden and donate the fruit—or in this case veggies—of their labors to a local food bank.



After that experience, Chauran says, she wanted to get involved with KCSWD's Waste Free Holiday program, which solicits small businesses to donate their services at a reduced rate to be distributed as gifts during the holidays, in the hope that grandmothers and other gift-givers will replace ugly sweaters with experiences that generate less trash. Chauran, who left the Kent School District after last year, sought to donate her skills as a tarot-card reader, a crystal-ball diviner, and a tea-leaf reader to the program. She was turned down.



"Thank you for your application," Megan Sety of the division's Recycling and Environmental Services department wrote to Chauran on Aug. 11. "However, we are not able to include offers of this type because of their controversial nature."

Posted by mikki at 11:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)