I'm not sure how bad this is. I mean, it's bad, but if it's bad enough, it's guaranteed to end up in federal court as a civil rights/free speech/Establishment Clause case. Which the proponents of the law can't win.

The more desperate the homophobes get, the stupider they get. Hand them a shovel and encourage them to keep digging. At some point, they'll bury themselves.

My initial thought was that it "only" criminalized filling out the government documents. (Not that that's no small thing.) But if it also criminalizes private ceremonies in churches, even without the government paperwork, that's a huge, huge thing.

@1 - If it's enforced against private ceremonies in churches, it might be a good thing for both sides, and it will no doubt reinforce that that government has no say in what churches do behind closed doors, though government also has no obligation to acknowledge it.

I kind of hope some upstart firebrand Episcopalian priest and a brave same-sex couple invite a TV news crew and the local constable to their marriage ceremony.

"Come arrest us, bigots."

The opponents of same sex marriage have always ignored the principle that religious freedom should extend both to practices they support and practices they oppose. Until R-74 was passed there were many churches in this state which were unable to have the state recognize the religious marriage ceremonies they would perform.

But of course a high level of dissonance is laced throughout right wing beliefs and politics in America today.

Potential legal challenges aside, this governing body feels it has the authority to proscribe what religious activity is 'allowed', and what activity is criminal.

I don't want to make a slippery slope argument, but it seems that if this legislature thinks it can criminalize religious activity, it's only a matter of time before they feel they have the authority to criminalize membership or participation in religious organizations that flout such laws.

Interesting thought:

Although most of the Friends in Indiana are members of Evangelical Friends Churches, there are a few Quaker meetings of the pastor-less, unprogrammed, quietist type. And the way couples marry in an unprogrammed, pastor-less Quaker meeting is to stand up in front of the assembled worshipers at a meeting convened for the purpose, and declare their vows to each other. Everyone who witnesses the marriage gets to sign a lovely, engrossed certificate. (I've seen certificates with over 50 signatures -- it's enough to make you cry all in itself!) And, as far as that Meeting goes, the couple is married.

So, if this stupid law passes, how would Indiana deal with this? Jail the entire Meeting? That would be awesome theater, like something from the Middle Ages, with national exposure and impact!

If anyone in Indiana is planning a same-sex wedding in Meeting, please send an announcement to Brooklyn Meeting. I want to come be a witness and sign, too!

Let me get this straight, in the name of religious freedom Indiana is passing a law that would allow the State to throw in jail religious leaders who dare bless a same sex marriage? Well that makes a lot of sense.

By the way, this law is apparently from 1997. It was just updated recently because Indiana changed the classification system for felonies. It's still egregious and a violation of the Constitution, but it's not a new law.

Indiana was the place I went through and not to. And from what I saw, it's a wonder anyone would live there. So the more hostile they make the place, the more they hurt themselves.

Yeah, maybe, just maybe, the republicans, conservatives, and religious types will oppose this.

Yeah...

And maybe I'm a Chinese jet pilot.

OOOOOooooooo, looking forward to these court cases: protesting gay marriage license filers, and hopefully, pastors who perform equality weddings.

If I were a gay in Indiana, I'd be filling out those forms, tomorrow.

And bring a whole bunch of my filing friends with me.

Who predicts jury nullification? Say "Yay!"

Indianastan. One more place to avoid.

"knowingly solemnize" seems like a direct path to failure under the first amendment. If you're prohibited from respecting (in the legal sense) the establishment of religion, it seems difficult to ban a purely religious practice.

@6
That's a lovely and meaningful enhancement of a traditional signing of a marriage certificate.

Writing another check to the ACLU in 3...2...1...

In my recent 'net travels, I tripped over this old letter that seems worth sharing.

Rev. Jeff Miner's testimony, 2011.

Ah, THIS is what I was looking for.

OVYM Minute on Sexuality

OVYM is the umbrella group of the liberal* branch of Quakers in Indiana and adjacent states.

__________
* i.e. Hicksite, Unprogrammed, Quietist, Pastor-less.

Cutting your nose to spite your face?

Brooklyn Reader, Earlham College is relatively close to the Indianapolis media market.

And being a Hoosier native, especially given that both Mike Pence is the current Governor and the Indiana Democratic Party, is, well, not the most cohesive state organization around (their components tend to cover their specific turf well, they just don't always work well as a statewide organization), no, this latest turn of events doesn't surprise me.

They don't call it North Kentucky for nothin'. I got librul kin thar and they is outnumbered 100 to 1.

In order to protest this new law, right-wing Christians would have base their objections on principle, not prejudice.

See this? THIS is religious persecution. This is the state interfering with religious organizations' right to decide which religious rituals to perform and which beliefs to uphold. THIS is a failure of the separation between church and state.

NALTSBUYGELT
Not All Like That Supposedly But Usually Yes Goddamit Exactly Like That.

This is fantastic.

If it does anything, this totally unenforceable, unconstitutional, crap legislation only allows for folk like the ACLU to win in court.

The whole first half of Scalia's dissent in Windsor was about how the SCOTUS can only interpret law that is brought before them in a contested case [and as the executive branch was in agreement with the plaintiff, SCOTUS had stepped beyond its purview in ruling on the case].

So the Fundies [if they try to implement this shit in any real way] are only opening the door for a state, district, or federal smack-down, that might be unavailable if they weren't so cooperative in their own demise.

@24 It's like Boehner spending millions to defend DOMA. If he hadn't, the court would not have been able to rule against it. So they screwed their own bigoted stupid asses.

@21, if they don't protest it, then the religious conservatives have proven that they have no principles. Here's a clear cut case of religious interference by the government. But of course they had no problem abandoning their "freedom of religion" banner when the 9/11 mosque was being debated, so I won't hold my breath.

It's like when Republicans in Louisiana voted to allow religious schools to get public funding, and then freaked out when they realized that it allowed non-Christian religious schools to get funding too. Freedom of religion for Christians and nobody else.

@27 Freedom of religion for one particularly hypocritical type of Christian and nobody else.

TFTFY

It's satisfying when the fundies do something this obviously actionable; obviously prejudiced is apparently fine, but with this you can foresee the judicial backfire.

As an ex-hoosier, I assure you that this is a very popular law in the Mississippi-of-the-Midwest. Governor Pense most assuredly has a closet full of white sheets suitable for midnight rides on queer luvin' churches who dare to give Jesus a butt-hurt by solemnizing a same sex wedding.

@25, Pope, exactly. I thought Scalia's reasoning [as regards the limits of the Judicial Power] were fine--except that he totally glossed over the fact that there was a dully appointed defendant [5 out of 9 justices seemed to give BLAG standing as far as I understand]. So if the judiciary should be limited to only contested cases brought before it, we just need the bigots to keep pitching fits.

The idiots keep climbing into the ring to get knocked out.

@24: Yes. People make unconstitutional laws all the time. A recent fracas in Indiana arose from the legislature's efforts to strip Planned Parenthood of funding for everything (preventive health care, birth control) because of their involvement in one thing (abortion). I protested then, and I'll protest this, but the reality is that the legislators don't give a damn about protests by the minority -- the only thing that shuts this shit down is the justice system striking down clearly unconstitutional laws. That will happen . . . in the case of the Planned Parenthood defunding, as I recall, there was an immediate injunction, and then the law was not allowed to stand. In this case, it make take longer and perhaps may require some brave people to put themselves out there for prosecution. The legislators are obviously not thinking logically, which is all to the good.

http://www.bilerico.com/2013/07/slow_dow…

Not a new law, the existing charge is actually reduced to a lesser offense, and typing the correct sex after the name of the person in the "wrong" slot would be sufficient to show that there is no intent to provide fraudulent information (especially given the civil disobedience/protest aspect of matters)

Indiana does suck when it comes to marriage equality, but hasn't actually gotten worse since 2003.

Dear Christians with a perpetual victimization complex, this is what illegal restrictions of religious liberty actually look like. Jailing religious officiants for refusing to perform same-sex weddings would also be illegal and unacceptable. Refusing to impose a particular hetero-restricted, religious definition of marriage on all citizens or not allowing employers to control how employees spend their money or use their health insurance or who they fuck is not, in fact, a violation of religious liberty - it's a protection of it.

For all who have supported the hatred of the gays and others led by the Churches, now you are seeing the consequences. Now, the church in charge of the state ie: the church this Governor belongs to, is running this state. Your right wing Governor that you put into office wants to take your churches freedoms away. You understand that Governor Pence wants his church to have rights and only churches that believe his way should have rights. All other churches are threatened with jail if they don't believe the way our prejudiced Governor and his church believes. Governor Pence doesn't believe that your church should get to have same freedoms and options of beliefs as his church. Why? Because his church doesn't respect your church. I will tell you, I have always hated churches and their thievery of land and preaching of hatred. I am also a firm believer that churches should be taken out of the non-for profit category. They cost communities millions in property taxes. They have their attorneys write legal documents so that churches don't have to pay property taxes on buildings such as theatres, recreational facilities, and apartments. They encourage families to throw their gay children into the streets and you people continue to believe that our lord actually would enjoy and accept that behavior. In closing to all of you who have supported this theft, where has it gotten you but a cold heart and church going governor who hates your church. Have a great day you deserve what the hatred of this governor is going to try do to your church. You conservatives will then befriend the GLBT community to get the votes to kick him out. All I can say to that is sorry for your luck.

It's old news, I just didn't see it until now after following Trudy et al and the usual assholes replies, and I have to say, did any of you look to see what laws were on Indiana's books?

Did any of you assholes even look up or know the framework for classifying offenses (such as felony and misdemeanor)

The only way to fight and ultimately win against wrongful oppression/discrimination is to educate the public. You dumb motherfuckers are only serving to confuse the public, and every time you report things as "facts" when they are not, you are not supporting anyone's rights to liberty nor freedom.

A person's ability to exercise freedoms and know life lived with liberty demands that those boundaries be clearly stated, and in ways which citizens can understand.

Our framework is not codified, in the computing sense and they aren't written in code in order to make them ambiguous.

They are written so that assholes and manipulators cannot obfuscate boundaries of Stated Law. So that even when a non-respecting asshole and a rapist manipulator -- which are so often the dominant character traits of journalists, con-artists, and in some cases even the grammarian -- typically the ones whom do not respect written language, they cannot pick apart laws by any twisting of words, or exaggerations

You are not wrong for pissed off at the people who continue to try to trample your rights, I would be pissed too, I am pissed, but I get equally frustrated when intelligent people choose ignorance, and that is what you are doing when you present some idiots fears and opinions, without first verifying facts from reputable sources.

Your idiot journalist friends and neighbors, are not reputable sources