Rowan County Clerk Kim
Davis has sued Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear (Democrat) for targeting Davis
and other religious county clerks for unconstitutional discrimination. Liberty Counsel filed the lawsuit on behalf of
Davis in the current federal court case brought against her by the American
Civil Liberties Union … seeking to force her to issue marriage licenses in
violation of her conscience and religious freedom rights. “Governor Beshear is unlawfully picking and
choosing the conscience-based exemptions to marriage that he deems acceptable,”
said Mat Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel.
When Kentucky Attorney
General Jack Conway refused to defend Kentucky’s natural marriage laws after “pray[ing]
over this decision,” Governor Beshear did not command that he perform his
duties, but hired private attorneys to pursue the appeal.
Conversely, when the U.S.
Supreme Court (SCOTUS) ruled in favor of same-sex ‘marriages,’ Governor Beshear
commanded religious clerks to comply with new Kentucky marriage policy
regardless of their personal beliefs. In
a letter to Kim Davis and other county clerks, the Governor said, “Neither your
oath nor the Supreme Court dictates what you must believe. But as elected officials, they do prescribe
how we must act.”
“In no uncertain terms,
Governor Beshear’s policies and directives are intended to suppress religion —
even worse, a particular religious belief,” Liberty Counsel’s complaint points
out. “Thus, although Attorney General
Conway was given a pass for his conscience about marriage without any threats
of repercussion, clerks like Davis are being repeatedly told by their Governor
to abandon their religiously informed beliefs or resign.”
“Simply put, Governor
Beshear is making secularism a litmus test for holding office in Kentucky,”
said Mat Staver. “The governor is
forcing clerks like Davis to choose between following the precepts of her
religion and forfeiting her position, on the one hand, and abandoning one of
the precepts of her religion in order to keep her position, on the other,”
Staver concluded.
SCOTUS Justice Alito
predicted in his dissent in the Obergefell [same-sex ‘marriage’ case],
secularists are trying to “stamp out every vestige of dissent” by targeting people
of faith who do not agree with same-sex ‘marriage.’
Rev.
Dr. Kenneth L. Beale, Jr.
Chaplain
(Colonel-Ret), U.S. Army
Pastor, Ft. Snelling Memorial Chapel
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