Box Turtle Bulletin

Alabama Presbyterians vote for marriage equality

In a rather timely decision, the central Alabama presbytery of the Presbyterian Church (USA) has voted to endorse changes in the church rules that would allow them to conduct same-sex marriages. (AL.com)

The Presbytery of Sheppards and Lapsley, a central Alabama group of churches affiliated with the Presbyterian Church (USA), voted 75-39 Thursday in favor of approving gay marriages.

They became one of about 38 presbyteries nationwide that have voted in favor of gay marriage, with 14 voting against. The change to the 1.8-million-member denomination’s official stance will become official if 86 of the 171 presbyteries vote in favor.

Now the Presbyterian Church is nowhere as dominant in Alabama as the Southern Baptists. But news like this does go a long way to dilute the But God Says! and Attack on Christianity! messages upon which anti-gay Christian rely so heavily.

Ironically, some of the supportive Presbyterians looked a bit askance at the impromptu ceremonies conducted this week.

Webster said he prefers that gay marriage in the church follow a protocol of the couple being members in a church and seeking pre-marital counseling before being married in a sacred ceremony in a church.

“It seemed frivolous and impetuous,” Webster said. “We would have dealt with it more seriously, with church members in the context of a church community. For us, it’s a worship service.”

And perhaps that’s one of the ways in which we know that society is on the road to full acceptance, when levels of establishment feel that you should follow the prescribed order, just like everyone else!

Mobile County Alabama ordered to issue marriage licenses

On Monday, Judge Carrie Grenade’s stay was lifted and marriage equality came to Alabama. But not to all of the state.

Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore ordered (apparently on his own imagined authority) and order commanding probate judges to refuse service to same-sex couples. Some probate judges followed Moore’s order and flouted the law, issuing marriage licenses to opposite sex couples but not same sex couples. And some chose to not issue licenses to anyone, citing conflicting orders.

Mobile County Probate Judge Don Davis was one who froze all marriage licenses. On Monday, he was sued by same-sex couples in Mobile County who wish to marry.

Today Judge Grenade specifically ordered Davis to open his office and issue marriage licenses to both opposite-sex and same-sex couples. (AL.com)

A federal judge in Mobile on Thursday ordered Mobile County Probate Judge Don Davis to start granting marriage licenses to gay couples, and he immediately took steps to do just that.
…
Less clear is whether other probate judges, who are not defendants in either case considered Thursday, would alter their position in the face of a new ruling by Granade. Marshall, the legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama, said he believes most probate judges will take their cues from Granade’s new order. For those who continue to resist, he said, same-sex marriage advocates will file new lawsuits naming them as defendants.

This will, undoubtedly, result in most probate judges issuing licenses. But I suspect some will be recalcitrant and fight tooth and toenail.

Dangerous Medical Experimentation on Teens

Laurie Higgins is the “Cultural Analyst” for the Illinois Family Institute, and she’s quite agitated about the state’s attempt to ban conversion therapy for teens.

…they want minors to be prohibited from even hearing any ideas that may be linked to their unchosen same-sex attraction, because such ideas undermine the unproven, non-factual, self-serving assumptions of homosexual activists and their highly politicized, Leftist mental health community allies.

Such a tizzy. Though I’m not sure exactly what it means. But Laurie clearly thinks it’s a bad idea.

The sponsors of this bill have marshalled an unimpressive array of claims from mental “health” organizations, all of which are loaded with biased and ambiguous language in support of an astoundingly totalitarian bill. If we have any really good critical thinkers and debaters in Springfield, they should be able to shred this bill in a floor debate.

Not just regular totalitarian, like in North Korea or the Soviet Union, but astoundingly so.

Now you might think Laurie is about to shred the bill with facts and careful analysis. But that’s not her style. Laurie would rather just ask questions of the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Kelly Cassidy. I’ve seen this just askin’ strategy before. It’s lazy and dishonest. Lazy, because it doesn’t require any evidence or even decent reasoning just to ask a question. Dishonest, because it leaves a gullible reader thinking a point’s been made even though nothing’s actually been said. The reader just fills in the missing answers with whatever the author insinuates.

The danger with this strategy, though, is that we can demolish simply by answering the questions. So let’s give that a try. Before we begin, though, let’s establish one thing. There is no evidence conversion therapy works, and a good bit of evidence that it can be harmful, so let’s call it what it is: dangerous medical experimentation on teens. That’s what it is, and that’s what we should always call it. Now, with that out of the way, first question: Read the rest of this entry »

Alabama Supremes’ response undermines Judge Roy Moore

In an article titled “Alabama Supreme Court punts on request for ‘clarification’ of Roy Moore’s marriage order”, AL.com reports that the Alabama Supreme Court has rejected a request.

The Alabama Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed a request by Mobile County Probate Judge Don Davis to clarify Chief Justice Roy Moore’s order instructing probate judges to ignore a federal court ruling allowing same-sex marriage.

And, indeed, they have. The jurists other than Moore (who recused himself) refused to provide any answer as to whether Davis and the other probate judges must follow Judge Grenade’s ruling and provide marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

However, AL.com’s next paragraph seems to contradict their headline.

The justices wrote that they do not have the authority to address the question.

That is not a neutral position. That is not a view that says, “Gee, we don’t know.”

The implications are clear and Davis, along with the other county officials, should be bright enough to see them. If the Alabama State Supreme Court does not have the authority to direct probate judges not to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, then surely the Chief Justice, acting alone, lacks any prerogative to do so.

The Daily Agenda for Thursday, February 12

TODAY’S AGENDA: Events This Weekend: Belgium Leatherpride, Antwerp, Belgium; Cologne Street Carnival, Cologne, Germany; Gay Mardi Gras, New Orleans, LA; Arizona Gay Rodeo, Phoenix, AZ; Sitges Carnival, Sitges, Spain.

TODAY’S AGENDA is brought to you by:

From The Calendar (San Antonio, TX), February 11, 1983, page 24.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
► Premiere of “Making Love”: 1982. Starring Michael Ontkean, Charlie’s Angels star Kate Jackson, and Harry Hamlin, Making Love opened in theaters as the first mainstream film to tackle homosexuality in a nonjudgmental way. That’s not to say that the story wasn’t without drama when Zach (Ontkean) and Claire (Jackson) dealt with a crumbling marriage as Zach struggled to deal with his attractions to other men. When he meets gay novelist Bart McGuire (Hamlin), their professional relationship (Zach was a doctor, Bart a patient who was in for a check-up) turned into a lunch date, then a dinner date, and then a full-fledged relationship, which over time, ends in a divorce for Zach and Claire. Claire handles the news badly, but over time comes to understand that gay people can live happy lives. The film’s happily-ever-after ending had the cautious feel of a made-for-TV movie, which critics hated. Gay critics, however, were overjoyed that the film was a positive portrayal where the gay characters didn’t all die in the end.

In real life however, the film demonstrated one significant difficulty in making mainstream movies about gay men: it seemed to confirm the fear that taking such a role would be career killers. Tom Berenger, Michael Douglas, Harrison Ford, William Hurt and Peter Strauss were all approached to play Zach; they all turned the role down. After the film’s release Ontkean and Hamlin had trouble living the film down. Hamlin’s promising career stalled for the next four years until he landed a role in NBC’s L.A. Law. Ontkean tried to prevent clips of his role from appearing in Vito Russo’s 1996 documentary The Celluloid Closet.

► San Francisco Mayor Orders Issuance of Same-Sex Marriage Licenses: 2004. It was a stunning announcement, when San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom declared that the California Constitution’s equal protection clause gave him the authority to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Between February 12 and March 11, 2004, an estimated 4,000 joyous couples lined up at City Hall to take part in what was quickly dubbed “The Winter of Love.” But the weddings came to an abrupt halt when the California Supreme Court declared that the mayor lacked the authority to bypass state law. All of those marriage licenses were voided, and same-sex marriage would remain unavailable until 2008 when the state Supreme Court found that “equal respect and dignity” of marriage is a “basic civil right” for all couples in California, gay or straight. That finding was overturned by California voters when they approved Prop 8 in 2008, which itself was ruled unconstitutional in 2010. That ruling was upheld by a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in 2012, and a challenge to the U.S. Supreme Court by anti-gay activists was rejected due to lack of standing in 2013.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAY:
► Philipp zu Eulenburg: 1847-1921. A close, personal friend of Kaiser Wilhelm II, Eulenburg had a tremendous influence over the younger Kaiser, and over Germany’s politics in general. Like virtually everyone else in positions of influence, Eulenburg married a Swedish countess in his twenties. Together they had eight children. But also like many others of similar outlook, his marriage did little to discourage his many liaisons with others in the Kaiser’s inner circle.

In 1900, Eulenburg’s brother was exposed as a homosexual. The Kaiser demanded that Eulenburg cut all contact with his brother, a demand that Eulenburg refused, though that refusal appears not to have affected Eulenburg’s career. That same year, Eulenburg was given the title of prince in recognition of Eulenburg’s valuable counsel and friendship to the Kaiser. That counsel included urging the Kaiser to exercise a more autocratic rule independent of the Reichstag. Eulenburg also retained his post as Ambassador to Austria-Hungary, which he had held since 1893.

But holding such a powerful and influential position in the Kaiser’s court made Eulenburg a political target. In 1902, Eulenburg resigned his Ambassadorship and withdrew from politics, pleading exhaustion, although we now know that the real reason was blackmail. That was at about the same time the Germany was rocked by revelations that German industrialist Friedrick Krupp was frolicking with young men in Capri and Berlin (see Sep 17). Eulenburg returned to the Court in 1906, where he again drew the ire of critics of the Kaiser’s increasingly autocratic rule and expansionist foreign policy. Eulenburg’s timing for his return wasn’t good. Between 1906 and 1907, six military officers committed suicide after being blackmailed, and dozens of soldiers and officers had faced courts marshall for homosexuality.

Maximillian Harden, publisher of Die Zukunft, struck the first blow agaisnt Eulenburg by outing him in an article printed in April of 1907. Harden also outed General Kuno von Moltke in the same article. At the Kaiser’s urging, Eulenburg and Moltke denied the report and charged Harden with libel. Moltke’s trial came in 1907. It didn’t go well for Moltke. His former wife, a soldier, and even sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld (see May 14) testified against him. The court declared that Molte indeed was gay and cleared Harden of libel. The Kaiser voided the verdict and demanded a new trial, which found Harden guilty. He was sentenced to four months imprisonment.

But the details from the first trial both shocked and disgusted Germany. When Eulenburg’s perjury trial came around in 1908 — he was charged for denying his homosexuality during the Moltke trial — the prosecution had lined up hundreds of witnesses. Forty-one testified against Eulenburg, including several who described watching him through a keyhole. Eulenburg collapsed in the courtroom early in the trial, and proceedings were suspended while he underwent medical treatment. It  resumed later that year with Eulenburg on a stretcher, but was suspended again due to his poor health. The case remained in limbo until the destruction of the German Empire in 1918, and it never resumed after that. Eulenburg remained in retirement, with no further contact with the Kaiser, until Eulenburg’s death in 1921 at the age of 74.

If you know of something that belongs on the agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

And feel free to consider this your open thread for the day. What’s happening in your world?