After the public
backlash that arose from the Religious Freedom law in both the states of
Indiana and Arkansas yet another state is seeking to create similar designed
policy into their state laws. Recently, the House of Representatives in the
Florida legislature passed a bill that would allow private adoption agencies to
turn away gay couples on moral and religious grounds. The vote passed the House
by a margin of 75-38. This bill was a response by Conservatives to an effort
last month by the House to “to take an unenforced gay adoption ban out of state
law”.
The bill, according to conservative republicans, “wasn't about discrimination, and said gay couples would still have dozens of agencies
— state agencies and those not faith-based, for example — that didn't object to
gay adoptive parents”. However, those on the other side of the room saw this
bill as something completely different. Referring to the same intentions that
the Religious Freedom laws of Indiana and Arkansas, Democrats saw this bill as
a way to legalize the discrimination of homosexuals based on religious grounds.
“‘When we come in and we start using scripture to begin to discriminate against
individuals, I have a problem with that,’ said Democrat Rep. Shevrin Jones of
Broward County. ‘Yes, protect the religious institution, but I say to those
religious institutions as a man of faith, if it’s your ministry, do your
ministry and take care of the children’”.
There is very little reason to think that this bill will
be passed by the Senate next week. The main reason for this assumption is that
the Senate already voted down a bill that would have struck the gay adoption
ban from state law. The language between the two bills is too similar and will
meet similar ends.
The issue that is brought to the forefront with this bill
is whether free exercise of religion under the 1st Amendment is
being further protected with this law. As we have seen in class, the Supreme
Court has taken the approach of disallowing certain policies which would be
discriminatory towards religious freedom of exercise. The best example would be
Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City
of Hialeah. While this Supreme Court decision dealt with an animal
sacrifice due to religious preferences, it established a certain precedent in the
Court. This precedent became that without a compelling state interest and a
narrowly tailored response, the state cannot impose restrictions on an
individual’s religious preferences.
For the Florida bill, the state understands that the
compelling state interest is to protect private adoption agencies from being
denied free exercise of religion through disallowing them to deny gay couples
adoption privileges. On the face, the bill would create a law which protects religious
freedom of exercise. However, the underlying tone is that of discrimination against
certain individuals based on religious grounds. It is due to this understanding
that the bill should be seen as unconstitutional.
The Free Exercise Clause should be protected as long as
the exercise being committed does not discriminate or harm the rights of
others. So if I made the claim that I would refuse to provide a service to
those of Islamic faith because their code of conduct under Sharia law does not
coincide with the guidelines laid out by the Ten Commandments, I would have committed
a breach of the Free Exercise Clause. The same must apply towards homosexual
couples being denied the ability to adopt children from private agencies due to
the agency’s religious ideals. These laws in Indiana, Florida, and Arkansas
have illustrated that discrimination has found a new tool in order to
accomplish its goals. This tool is the Free Exercise Clause. The rational for
this clause has taken on a vastly different meaning then from its original
intentions. As such, our society needs to reaffirm this meaning through action
by the Supreme Court to strike down laws such as these if they come to
existence. Through established precedent, laws such as this Florida bill would
never get the hour of time on the floor of the House to even be discussed.
Through not only the proposed Florida bill but the Religious
Freedom laws in Arkansas and Indiana, do you think that the idea of free exercise
of religion could begin to lose its original intention and instead be used as a
tool for discrimination based on religious grounds? If so, do you believe there
is any way to resolve this conflict?
Here is a link to the
article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/religion/florida-bill-would-let-some-adoption-agencies-refuse-gays/2015/04/09/784e74a2-defd-11e4-b6d7-b9bc8acf16f7_story.html
2 comments:
If the adoption agency is a religiously based organization, I believe that the bill is completely valid in allowing the agency to choose who gets to adopt a child based on their religious beliefs. I understand the concerns with the bill and additionally why it may not pass the Senate, but I believe that as a concept the idea behind the bill is sound. I think that it is more important to consider the burden that would be imposed on the adoption agency by letting a family whose beliefs they don’t agree with adopt a child, as opposed to the burden that would be opposed on gay couples who would simply be able to find a different adoption agency that is not religiously based.
I agree with Mackenzie above in that we must not make the religiously affiliated adoption organization act against its beliefs. Same-sex couples have other organizations including state-run agencies where they could adopt children. I am not too familiar with the criteria for adoption but could imagine that Jewish perspective parents could be turned away from adopting a Catholic orphan because their views are not the same as the child's or the orphanage housing the child. In my eyes there is nothing wrong with this.
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