Tag Archives: Supreme Court of the United States

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Religious Liberty: Some Unsolicited Career Advice for Kim Davis

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One of the jobs of the County Clerk in Rowan County, Kentucky is to issue marriage licenses to couples who meet the legal standards for such licenses. Recently, those standards changed, and now same-sex couples can license their marriages.

That new standard conflicts with Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis’s religious belief that marriage is only valid between one man and one woman. No problem. There’s a simple way to handle that situation. If she isn’t willing to do the job, she should quit the job.

Instead, Davis asserts that her religious belief entitles her to continue holding the title, and continue collecting her $80,000 annual salary from Rowan County’s taxpayers, without doing the job.

She stopped issuing (and allowing her deputy clerks to issue) marriage licenses two months ago after the US Supreme Court’s ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges. Not just to same-sex couples, but to everyone.

As of this writing, she continues to refuse to issue marriage licenses even after multiple courts have ordered her to do so and after the US Supreme Court has denied her appeals of those orders.

In a statement issued through Liberty Counsel, the Christian organization representing her in those appeals, Davis states that “some people have said I should resign, but I have done my job well. … It is a matter of religious liberty …. I intend to continue to serve the people of Rowan County, but I cannot violate my conscience.”

Not doing one’s job at all is not doing it “well.” Refusing to serve the people of Rowan County is not “serving the people of Rowan County.”

Religious liberty is an important thing. Important enough, I think, that we shouldn’t willfully twist its meaning.

No, religious liberty does not entitle Kim Davis to a continuing government position with a very nice paycheck for declining to do the job she was elected to do and promised to do.

Kim Davis is not a martyr for religious freedom. She’s a layabout, a no-show, collecting a paycheck for work she refuses to do. Martyrs make decisions on principle and accept the consequences of those decisions.

If the requirements of the job have become, as Davis calls them, a “Heaven or Hell decision,” then she should make that decision and act accordingly. She should resign her position as Rowan County clerk and go seek other employment —  employment which doesn’t conflict with her religious beliefs.

Thomas L. Knapp is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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An Explanation: What the Supreme Court Will Not Do to ObamaCare

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The US Supreme Court is expected to issue its ruling in King v. Burwell soon. At issue in the case is whether or not the Affordable Care Act, better known as “ObamaCare,” entitles people in states which have not established their own “exchanges” to federally subsidized health coverage.

Writing for the Associated Press, Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar worries that the court’s ruling “could wipe out health insurance for millions of people.”

Let me lay that fear to rest. No such outcome is possible, for the simple reason that the health plans addressed by ObamaCare are not insurance.

In fact, one effect of ObamaCare, as explained by Warren C. Gibson at the Foundation for Economic Education, was to outlaw health insurance entirely.

Insurance is a “hedged” bet. When you buy insurance — on your car, your home, your life or your health — you place a small bet (your monthly premium) that something really bad (a wreck, a fire, death or sickness) will happen. The insurance company places a large bet (the prospective payout on a claim) that no, that really bad thing will not happen.

You don’t want to win that bet. You pay $50 a month for car insurance so that IF you win your bet by having a wreck, you’re off the hook for a lot more than $50. The insurance company makes its money by carefully setting the odds such that it takes in more in small wins than it pays out in big losses.

ObamaCare is not a hedged bet against catastrophe. It’s a national system of mandatory pre-paid health care. You make a monthly payment in return for which you expect your every health need to be provided for.

We’ve been moving away from real insurance and toward pre-paid care since the early 1970s with Health Maintenance Organizations and Preferred Provider Organizations. ObamaCare brought three important new elements in:

First, you no longer have a choice. You have to subscribe to a pre-paid health service whether you want to or not. “Insurance” companies love that part. ObamaCare is a gigantic corporate welfare program.

Second, if you are a low-income American and your state has an exchange, you get a government subsidy to help cover your subscription payment (the Supreme Court is set to decide whether or not this also applies to federal exchanges in states that didn’t set up their own). The “insurance” companies love that, too (more money for them!).

Third, the “insurance” companies can’t turn anyone down. With real insurance, a pre-existing condition would be the equivalent of betting at blackjack after seeing the dealer’s hand. They don’t like that part nearly as much. It raises their costs. Which, in turn, raises yours.

If the Court rules against the Obama administration in King v. Burwell, millions of Americans will stop receiving health care subsidies. But not a single American will lose “insurance,” because that’s not what we’re getting in the first place.

What are we getting? Two things: Screwed and robbed.  Or: Government as usual.

Thomas L. Knapp is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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Marriage: How to De-Politicize the Culture War

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In the United States, same-sex marriage is de facto legal — based on a combination of court rulings and legislation — in 36 states, the District of Columbia and several American Indian jurisdictions.

The Supreme Court is widely expected to come down on the side of ending marriage apartheid nation-wide this summer. Even if it doesn’t do so in one fell swoop, the Constitution’s “full faith and credit clause” will make itself felt over time, if for no other reason that married couples move, then divorce.

Ireland’s late-May referendum may be a global bellwether. 62% of voters in that largely Catholic country brushed aside the objections of church leaders to legalize same-sex marriage.

Some social conservatives, particularly in the United States, seem to have finally got it through their heads that they’ve lost this battle; they want to move on. A few of them even have an inkling of the best way to go about doing so.

On May 19, Alabama’s Senate passed a bill that, if also approved by the House and the governor, would move marriage from the category of state-licensed activity to a matter of contract between parties. No ceremony necessary — if you want one, that will be between you and your church or other social group.

It’s about time! Libertarians have been suggesting this for decades.

With the state out of the business of defining and licensing marriage, that institution can evolve organically as people decide for themselves how to organize their lives.

People who want to marry can just consult a lawyer. Or, and I predict this will happen very quickly, legal services firms will make boilerplate marriage contracts available for inexpensive download, with selections of additional “drop-in” clauses to accommodate most reasonably common scenarios (property settlements in case of divorce, for example, as are handled with “pre-nups” now by some couples).

The Alabama bill, according to news accounts, specifies only two parties, but not their sexes. On the ground, those who want marriages of more than two parties will presumably be able to have workable contracts drawn up to accommodate their desires, neatly sidestepping (for e.g. polygamy) the decade-long political war we just went through over same-sex marriage. Presented with a facially just and valid contract, a court will likely honor and enforce that contract.

Will this approach get the state out of marriage matters entirely? No. Marriage contracts might specify arbitration instead of state court litigation in case of divorce, but when it comes to matters of child custody and child support, the state will probably assert a compelling interest to intervene as it sees fit.

But it’s a start. People are better than politicians at making important life decisions for themselves.

[hat tip for the Alabama story — George Phillies of Liberty For America]

Thomas L. Knapp is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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