Protesters from the virulently anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kanas - the "God Hates Fags" folks led by Fred Phelps - protested at Walt Whitman HIgh School in Bethesda, Maryland on Friday. Why? Well, for one thing, the school is named after someone who wasn't heterosexual. Isn't that reason enough?

According to the Potomac Almanac:

When Whitman sophomore Ryan Hauck first heard about the scheduled protest at Whitman from a friend he thought it was a joke. Then he went online — the church’s Web site is www.godhatesfags.com — and saw just how serious the church is.

"I was just shocked just from the second I heard it and I knew I had to do something," Hauck said. "[It was] the hatred of the whole thing that shocked me. It’s not disapproval, it's outright hatred. It’s not something you would expect from people who would consider themselves a church." ...

[To help Hauck,] sophomore Amar Mukunda set up a Facebook group to generate support for [a] counter-protest.

According to the Washington Post, more than 500 students came out to stand up against anti-gay hatred. And it wasn't just students who did the right thing:

[A]t Whitman, the protesters arrived to palpable excitement. Faculty had spun the event into an interdisciplinary lesson. English teachers spent the day on Whitman's verse. Social studies teachers led a unit on tolerance. Math teachers fanned through the crowd, attempting a head count.

I am heartened to see school faculty and students coming together against anti-gay bigotry. And I'm grateful to live in a country where the First Amendment protects the right of even the most hateful people to speak and worship as they please.

If the National Organization for Marriage was attempting to position itself as a respectable group, they’ve been having a rough time of it lately.

First, they created the hilariously inept “Gathering Storm” ad which generated a blizzard of mockery.

Now, via Box Turtle Bulletin, we learn that they’ve announced that science fiction writer Orson Scott Card will serve on their board.

The problem?  He’s advocated the overthrow of the government as an appropriate response to pro-marriage equality decisions.

What these dictator-judges do not seem to understand is that their authority extends only as far as people choose to obey them.

How long before married people answer the dictators thus: Regardless of law, marriage has only one definition, and any government that attempts to change it is my mortal enemy. I will act to destroy that government and bring it down, so it can be replaced with a government that will respect and support marriage, and help me raise my children in a society where they will expect to marry in their turn.

Biological imperatives trump laws. American government cannot fight against marriage and hope to endure. If the Constitution is defined in such a way as to destroy the privileged position of marriage, it is that insane Constitution, not marriage, that will die.

One would like to believe that even NOM realizes that this kind of rhetoric is beyond the pale.  If so, they should be coming out with a statement disavowing Card’s views any minute now.  Or do they agree with him?

We’re waiting . . .

As we hope you’ve already heard, champagne corks are popping in Vermont where both houses of the state legislature successfully overrode the Governor’s veto of same-sex marriage legislation. And for those of us in DC, marriage equality is a step closer now that the District’s City Council enacted legislation to recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states.

We’re exceptionally proud of the fact that the legislation granting marriage equality in Vermont was co-sponsored by a member of People For the American Way Foundation’s Young Elected Officials Network, Representative David Zuckerman.

And he’s just one of the YEOs doing great work for LGBT rights nationwide. You can read about other members working hard for equal rights for all in the most recent YEO Newsletter.

People For the American Way Foundation's recent Right Wing Watch In Focus report documented the deceptive ways that Religious Right leaders blur the distinction between civil and religious marriage in order to convince Americans that marriage equality is a threat to religious liberty. Today's thrilling unanimous Iowa Supreme Court decision that it is unconstitutional to deny marriage to same-sex couples in the state included a powerful and respectful section on the same topic. Here's how it concludes:

In the final analysis, we give respect to the views of all Iowans on the issue of same-sex marriage—religious or otherwise—by giving respect to our constitutional principles. These principles require that the state recognize both opposite-sex and same-sex civil marriage. Religious doctrine and views contrary to this principle of law are unaffected, and people can continue to associate with the religion that best reflects their views. A religious denomination can still define marriage as a union between a man and a woman, and a marriage ceremony performed by a minister, priest, rabbi, or other person ordained or designated as a leader of the person’s religious faith does not lose its meaning as a sacrament or other religious institution.

The sanctity of all religious marriages celebrated in the future will have the same meaning as those celebrated in the past. The only difference is civil marriage will now take on a new meaning that reflects a more complete understanding of equal protection of the law. This result is what our constitution requires.

This week, People For Foundation’s African American Ministers Leadership Council is co-sponsoring the Harambee* celebration at Howard Divinity School. 

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to attend one of the panels we sponsored, “Homophobia in the Black Church.” It was, if I do say so myself, pretty great.

The event is part of AAMLC's ongoing work to target homophobia in the Black Church.  And while it would be nice to say that everyone was in complete agreement on the subject, that would also be a little dull. That wasn’t a problem yesterday.

Instead, there was a rich and respectful conversation about homophobia, sexuality, history, theology, and the role religion to plays in our Democracy. (Which stands in stark contrast to the deception and fear mongering that the Right has used to exploit divisions on the issue.)

The panel was moderated by Rev. Tony Lee, Senior Pastor of Community of Hope AME Church in Temple Hills, MD, and featured:

• Rev. Dr. Kenneth L. Samuel, Senior Pastor of Victory for the World (Stone Mountain, Ga.) and Vice Chair of the African American Ministers Leadership Council
• Donna Payne, Associate Director of Diversity, Human Rights Campaign
• Rev. Byron Williams, syndicated columnist and pastor of the Resurrection Community Church in Oakland, CA.
• Rev. Dr. Ronald Hopson, psychologist and ordained minister. Dr. Hopson holds a joint appointment as a professor with the Howard University Department of Psychology and the School of Divinity.
• Rev. Osagyefo Uhuru Sekou, Fellow in Residence at the Brooklyn Society for Ethical Culture

We had a sizable crowd, but if you weren’t able to attend, fear not: we’ll be releasing a transcript of the event in the near futures, and the conversation will be continuing throughout the year.

(* - "Harambee" is the Kenyan tradition of community self-help.  In case you were wondering.)

The New York Times has a short interview of former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, and it’s interesting to see all the topics she doesn’t want to talk about.

Whom did you vote for in the presidential election?

Come on, is this about my Web site?

She dodges a question about Harriet Miers and declines to call herself a feminist, but one thing O’Connor doesn’t hold back on is her desire to see another woman appointed to the Court.

It was better for me when I was joined at the court by a second woman. When I was there alone, there was too much media focus on the one woman, and the minute we got another woman, that changed.

Makes sense.

Diversity on the Court—in all its many forms—was a big topic at our recent Beyond the Sigh of Relief panel. Take a look if you haven’t already.

News reports state that David Hamilton, a federal district court judge in Indiana, will be President Obama’s first judicial nominee. He will apparently be nominated to serve on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.

I am just learning about Judge Hamilton. In 2005, according to the New York Times, "he made news by ruling that the legislature was prohibited from beginning its sessions with overtly Christian prayers. The decision drew widespread criticism in the legislature and across the state."

I can only imagine.

The overwhelming majority of Indianans are Christian. I’d venture to guess that very few of them have ever lived in a society where theirs was a minority religion, and where the government officially promoted a religion that condemned theirs. The experience of their lives is one where they are comfortably in the majority.

As a Jew who grew up in conservative Texas, my experience is different. I know how it felt in elementary school when public school teachers imposed their Christianity upon the classroom. Officially-sanctioned Christianity regularly made it clear that I was an outsider in my own society: I did not belong.

That is but one of the many excellent reasons that the Founders wisely adopted the First Amendment’s prohibition of the establishment of religion by government. But it’s the one that first occurred to me as I read about the Indiana legislative prayer case.

It is important that judges as a group reflect the diversity of America, so the bench is filled with jurists with a wide variety of life experiences, ranging from the top to the bottom of the social ladder. But that does not excuse the individual judge from being able to step outside their own life experience and recognize that what is not a problem for them can be a severe problem for someone whose life has been different. That is an essential quality for a judge. It’s what made the Brown v. Board of Education decision so different from Plessey v. Ferguson, even though both cases were decided by all-white Courts. Similarly, it’s what made 1976’s Craig v. Boren (establishing a higher level of scrutiny for legal sex-based classifications) so different from 1872’s Bradwell v. Illinois (upholding the state’s prohibition against women attorneys), even though both cases were decided by an all-male Court.

Perhaps Judge Hamilton’s ability to step outside his own experiences helped him decide the legislative prayer case. Either way, he clearly was willing to enforce the First Amendment and clear Supreme Court precedent in a case where he knew that he would be condemned by many people in his state. He put the law over ideology. That’s another quality needed in a judge.

This is an encouraging first judicial nomination from President Obama.

Today, the Supreme Court dismissed the appeal by Ali al-Marri, who has been in federal custody in South Carolina since January 2002 when Bush designated him as an enemy combatant, claiming that he was an al-Qaeda sleeper agent. The order was in response to the Obama administration’s important move last week in filing criminal charges against al-Marri after 9 long years of detention without review by Bush, a move which transformed al-Marri’s detention to a criminal matter that will be heard in the normal course through the federal courts. He’ll now have the right to a speedy trial, be able to confront his accusers, the right to the effective assistance of counsel – the whole shebang.

The Obama administration’s decision to take this bold step shouldn’t go unnoticed to those of us who have been staring in paralytic shock over the last 8 years during which the Bush administration did whatever it wanted to foreign nationals and citizens alike in its “war against terror”. Bush even deemed as unpatriotic the notion that a federal court could ever review what the president does or why during a time of war – however, unconventional that war may be – thereby delivering a one-two punch to the constitutional principles of freedom of speech and separation of powers. Both of these, by the way, were swiftly decimated by Bush lawyers as revealed in the recently disclosed OLC memos.

In this case, the new administration correctly did what some have been saying all along – if there is evidence of wrongdoing, charge the individual with a crime and allow him to be tried in a civilian criminal court. The government has the tools to prosecute suspected terrorists and has done so in the past. It is clear that our courts can address the real concerns of national security, even during times of war, without reversing decades of due process jurisprudence. 

I couldn’t resist the urge to get in on the rush. (I know, I know.) The latest in the Limbaugh saga: he’s invited President Obama on his show for a “one-on-one debate of ideas and policies.” Although I suspect President Obama would never entertain Rush’s tomfoolery, I thought I’d compile some of Rush’s greatest hits, as recorded by PFAW Foundation’s Right Wing Watch, in case such a conversation were to ever take place. Besides, a little oppo research never hurt – although I’m certain there’s plenty of folks on the job.

I mean, you take a look at the average Democrat voter registration drive, you can take for every hundred thousand voters they register, the cumulative IQ would probably be less than a pencil eraser. So when it comes time for the election, half of them can be fooled in saying, "No, it's not Election Day. It's tomorrow, Wednesday." And they show up on Wednesday to vote when the polls are closed, and the Democrats claim a trick has been played on them. That's how stupid some of their voters are.

Today, at an event sponsored by the First Amendment Center and the Supreme Court Fellows Program Alumni Association, Justice John Paul Stevens, the Senior Associate on the Supreme Court, moderated a discussion with the authors of a new book, The Great Decision: Jefferson, Adams, Marshall and the Battle for the Supreme Court, Clifford Sloan and David McKean. The Justice gave only a brief introduction before the authors spoke about the book and answered questions. Justice Stevens first spoke about his initial exposure to Marbury v. Madison in law school. He jokingly reminisced about the length of time spent on the case, stating that his teacher spent the first six weeks of a constitutional law class devoted solely to the intricacies of the case. He voiced his admiration for the case, calling it fascinating, and agreeing with the assertions by the panelists that the case is “the cornerstone of the Constitutional system.

He then moved on to an issue that, while he admitted was not directly on topic, was very important, the separation of powers. Marbury solidified the independence of the judiciary as a separate branch of government with its own powers. Stevens strongly believes in this and voiced concern that the wall between the executive and the judiciary is weakening. He recalled that when he was sworn in as a justice, his ceremony was performed in the Supreme Court which he viewed to be strongly symbolic of the separation between the political appointment process and his judicial post. Since that time, however, the practice changed and is now performed in the White House. He has boycotted the past four swearing in ceremonies, as he believes that the judiciary should be strongly separated from the political branches, beginning with the swearing in. Stressing the symbolism of the place and manner of the oath, he voiced hope for a change in this process with the next appointee.

Again focusing on the importance of separating the judicial branch from the political process, Stevens questioned the authors about the impeachment of Justice Chase from the Supreme Court shortly after Marbury was decided. Essentially, the opposition party in the House of Representatives sought to impeach Chase because they did not agree with his decisions politically, and used the impeachment as a retaliation against the Court. Chase was eventually acquitted, establishing the doctrine that judges may not be removed due to a dispute over their political preferences or political disagreement with their decisions.

Those looking to for a discussion focused on Stevens's thoughts on the issue might have been disappointed.  Through out the event Stevens was largely content to listen to the panelists. When he spoke he showed his vast knowledge on the subject area, but remained in the role of moderator and gave much of the spot light to the panelists.