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Westboro Baptist Church to continue to challenge laws banning funeral protests

March 13, 2014 By Jessica Machetta

A state law that forces funeral protesters to stay 300 feet from has been upheld by the Federal District Court for the Western District of Missouri, but that won’t stop members of Westboro Baptist Church from picketing, nor will it keep them from filing suits that claim the law is unconstitutional.

Westboro in KCMO“The latest ruling was a teeny tiny skirmish in a bigger war,” said Margie Phelps, eldest daughter of Westboro’s leader, Fred Phelps. “The bigger issue that’s being litigated and will probably make its way back to the Supreme Court — either out of Missouri or Nebraska — is whether we’re going to gut the first amendment.”

Margie Phelps and her sister, Shirley Phelps-Roper, have led the legal challenges to the law, claiming it infringes on a right to free speech. The ACLU agrees with them.

“And by that I mean start putting massive distances between big mobs that are out engaged in patriotic pep rallies outside these death events and this little church with its picket signs with an opposing message, that’s really what the battle is,” Margie Phelps said. “And of course that’s against the backdrop of a bigger battle, which is the soul of this nation.”

She said the law is prohibitive because it allows certain groups to gather outside of funerals, but not others.

“It’s a misnomer that they’re there to block us,” she said. “That’s an urban legend that’s been perpetuated by the media. Long before we ever started going out with picket signs to these death events — for at least two years — these bikers and military and citizens were piling up en masse outside these events with a ‘God Bless America,’ flag something approach.”

Margie Phelps said members of the Westboro Baptist Church finally decided that their counter message would create balance.

“It is not a blessing for your young son or young daughter to come home in little pieces in a body bag,” she said. “So we joined the discussion. They’re not there to block us. They’re there to rage against God for what he’s doing to their soldiers.”

Now, she says, the question for the United States Supreme Court is, do they hate the church’s message so much that they will keep piling hundreds of feet onto where church members are allowed to picket.

“Meanwhile, everyone else and their uncle and their dog can be right outside the front door,” she said. 

Margie Phelps said as long as there is a first amendment, and the United States claims to be a nation of laws, members of the Westboro Baptist Church will continue to carry its anti-gay message to venues it deems appropriate.

“When you pass laws against us and they become prohibitive in how they’re applied, we’ll challenge the laws and hold your feet to the fire of your own laws,” she said. “But more important than that, you can put us a million feet away and we’re still going to stand out there with signs and work with social media that was invented for us, and in every lawful way, put these words before this generation’s eyes, because that’s our duty.”

Filed Under: Crime / Courts, Legislature, News Tagged With: LGBT, Religion, Westboro Baptist Church

House Committee hears LGBT nondiscrimination bill

March 13, 2014 By Mike Lear

A Missouri House Committee has heard debate on legislation that would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the state’s Human Rights Statute’s definition of “discrimination.”

Representative Kevin Engler (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Representative Kevin Engler (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

The proposal, HB 1930, would specify that the statute covers unfair treatment based on race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age as related to employment, disability or familial status as related to housing. It makes discrimination based on a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity an unlawful discriminatory practice.

The bill, HB 1930, is sponsored by Representative Kevin Engler (R-Farmington), who tells the committee discrimination still happens.

“If you don’t believe that, I’d ask the members when they’re on their spring break this next week, go and ask your friends, “Did you know that Missouri is one of a handful of states that still has it on the book that if you as an employee admit to being a homosexual, you can be fired for just cause. You can’t claim unemployment because it’s for just cause,” says Engler. “They will be shocked.”

Among those testifying against the legislation were the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries of Missouri.

Chamber General Counsel Jay Atkins tells the committee the Chamber has a number of members whose company policies include protections for the LGBT community and it encourages that to grow among its members.

“But there is a dramatic difference,” Atkins told the committee, “between having such policies as a matter of policy in the workplace, and creating an entire new cause of action that exposes all Missouri employers to further liability under employment law.”

Chamber board member and Governmental Affairs Director for Monsanto, Duane Simpson, says at the board’s last meeting, Chamber Vice President of Governmental Affairs Tracy King said the chamber has no official position on the Missouri Nondiscrimination Act. 

AIM President Ray McCarty echoed the concerns Atkins outlined about creating a new statutory protected class and the line of lawsuits that could come with it.

The Missouri Catholic Conference also testified against the legislation. General Counsel Tyler McClay told lawmakers his organization’s objection to the bill is not with how it would apply to housing or employment, but with how it deals with public accommodations.

“There needs to be space in the law,” McClay testified, “There needs to be space for people to say, ‘I can’t, as a matter of conscience, participate in a same-sex wedding ceremony, for example.”

Representative Stephen Webber (D-Columbia) calls McClay’s position “indefensible.”

“I think it’s pretty much impossible to pull out a legal argument that allows what you want to have happen without defending segregation,” Webber tells McClay. “I know you don’t want to support segregation … but your argument does.”

Appearing in favor of the bill were PROMO, the Missouri Attorney General’s Office and Monsanto.

Governor Jay Nixon (D) expressed support for nondiscrimination legislation in his State of the State Address in January, when he observed that such a bill was passed in the Senate in 2013 but didn’t reach his desk. 

Nixon said in his address, “Let’s get it done this year.”

Engler tells the committee he wants the language to become part of a larger bill dealing with multiple business issues.

Filed Under: Legislature, News Tagged With: Jay Nixon, Kevin Engler, LGBT, Missouri Chamber of Commerce, Missouri House of Representatives, Missouri Nondiscrimination Act, MONA, Stephen Webber

Nixon calls for end to discrimination against LGBT

January 21, 2014 By Jessica Machetta

Gov. Jay Nixon last year vetoed a bill that would make it more difficult to file suit for discrimination in the workplace.

Conversely, the legislature failed to pass a measure that would make it illegal to discriminate against an employee based on sexual orientation.

In his state of the state address, Nixon said, “We need to end discrimination against LGBT Missourians in the workplace. No Missourian should be fired because of who they are or who they love.”

“Last year, the Missouri Nondiscrimination Act passed the Senate with bipartisan support, but failed to get to my desk. Let’s get it done this year.”

Filed Under: News, Politics / Govt Tagged With: gay, LGBT

ACLU, Congressman Clay, PROMO say Supreme Court decision to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act is a historic victory for civil rights (AUDIO)

June 26, 2013 By Jessica Machetta

The American Civil Liberties Union says the U.S. Supreme Court decision to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act is a historic move in the advancement of civil rights.

The ACLU of Eastern Missouri in St. Louis says the decision states very clearly that the federal government will no longer discriminate against lesbian and gay couples for unfair treatment under the law. ACLU executive director Jeffrey Mittman says the Supreme Court acknowledges that states that recognize the rights of two people who are in love to make a responsible commitment to one another should be granted those same rights under the federal government.

St. Louis area Congressman Lacy Clay says the decision is a historic turning point that advances full equality for all.

“The high court has affirmed that equal protection under the law applies to every American,” Clay says.

West Central Missouri Congresswoman Vicky Hartzler disagrees. She says marriage should be between a man and a woman, and that children need a mom and a dad.

“Today the Court got it wrong,” she says. “The activist ruling on the Defense of Marriage Act ignored the votes of a bipartisan majority of Congress. This alarming precedent disempowers Congress from making national policy with respect to marriage. We must work to defend the rights of Americans to make marriage policy. We should work to promote the truth of marriage between a man and a woman. It is wise public policy upholding the reality that every child needs a mom and a dad, and society benefits when they do.”

President Obama says he applauds the decision.

“This was discrimination enshrined in law,” Obama says. “It treated loving, committed gay and lesbian couples as a separate and lesser class of people. The Supreme Court has righted that wrong, and our country is better off for it. We are a people who declared that we are all created equal – and the love we commit to one another must be equal as well.”

“This ruling is a victory for couples who have long fought for equal treatment under the law; for children whose parents’ marriages will now be recognized, rightly, as legitimate; for families that, at long last, will get the respect and protection they deserve; and for friends and supporters who have wanted nothing more than to see their loved ones treated fairly and have worked hard to persuade their nation to change for the better,” he says.

He says he’s directed the Attorney General to work with other members of his Cabinet to review all relevant federal statutes to ensure this decision, including its implications for Federal benefits and obligations, is implemented swiftly and smoothly.

 

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel says Defense Department officials will move forward in making benefits available to all military spouses.

“The Department will immediately begin the process of implementing the Supreme Court’s decision in consultation with the Department of Justice and other executive branch agencies,” Hagel says. “The Department of Defense intends to make the same benefits available to all military spouses — regardless of sexual orientation — as soon as possible. That is now the law, and it is the right thing to do. Every person who serves our nation in uniform stepped forward with courage and commitment. All that matters is their patriotism, their willingness to serve their country and their qualifications to do so. Today’s ruling helps ensure that all men and women who serve this country can be treated fairly and equally, with the full dignity and respect they so richly deserve.”

Obama adds that “when all Americans are treated as equal, no matter who they are or whom they love, we are all more free.”

AUDIO: Jessica Machetta reports (1:06)

Filed Under: Crime / Courts, News, Politics / Govt Tagged With: ACLU, Clay, gay, Hartzler, LGBT, military, Obama, Supreme Court



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