What a fool

[Dr Grump]

US judge quits after refusing to marry inter-racial couple

On another note, is a JP a judge in the US??

 

[Valerie]

United States

In some U.S. states, the Justice of the Peace is a judge of a court of limited jurisdiction, a magistrate, or a quasi-judicial official with certain statutory or common law magisterial powers.

The Justice of the Peace, or solicitor general, typically presides over a court that hears misdemeanor cases, traffic violations, and other petty criminal infractions. The Justice of the Peace may also have authority over cases involving small debts, landlord and tenant disputes, or other small claims court proceedings. Proceedings before Justices of the Peace are often faster and less formal than the proceedings in other courts. In some jurisdictions a party convicted or found liable before a Justice of the Peace may have the right to a trial de novo before the judge of a higher court rather than an appeal strictly considered.

The Justice of the Peace is also the judge to whom parties seeking a civil marriage can repair. While states generally recognize marriages applied for under any relevant statutes and officiated under a religious leader or equivalent authority with adequate witnesses present, a Justice of the Peace can typically oversee a marriage union directly.

Some states have special qualifications or unique features for the office.

Justice of the peace - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[JakeStarkey]

Yes, did I call this or what sometime ago.

And who was telling us that the judge would survive because . . . never had a real reason other than "because".

 

[Xenophon]

What a douche.

 

[David Duke]

This is ashame the Louisiana Justice of the Peace was forced to resign due to the pressures of todays harmful Political Correctness in politics. His refusal to marry a interracial couple because his own beliefs was not harmful in any manner. He was not a racist but was concerned about a mixed child growing up and the problems that child would deal with. All the mixed couple had to do is go to someone else to get married. The outrage at this good man by the media has gone overboard. Todays out of control liberal Political Correctness is ripping this nations morals, customs and traditional christian family values away from the foundation our nation was built upon that has made it great. Political Correctness is insuring the inner destruction of America and the traditional American Family way of life. His pressured resigning is a sad day in America and for the great State of Louisiana which I reside in.




(CNN) -- A Louisiana justice of the peace who drew criticism for refusing to marry an interracial couple has resigned, the secretary of state's office said Tuesday.
Keith Bardwell resigned in person at the Louisiana secretary of state's office, said spokesman Jacques Berry. The state Supreme Court will appoint an interim justice of the peace to fill Bardwell's position, Berry said, and a special election will be held next year to fill the position permanently.
Bardwell, a justice of the peace for Tangipahoa Parish's 8th Ward, refused to perform a marriage ceremony for Beth Humphrey, 30, and her boyfriend Terence McKay, 32, both of Hammond, Louisiana, and sign their marriage license. The two were married by another justice of the peace.
The couple filed a federal discrimination lawsuit against Bardwell and his wife, Beth Bardwell, on October 20, claiming the two violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
Initial reports were that Bardwell refused to issue a marriage license to the couple, but in the lawsuit Humphrey and McKay say they obtained the license from the parish court clerk's office and contacted Bardwell to see if he would perform the ceremony and sign the license to legally validate the marriage.
Humphrey wound up speaking by telephone with Beth Bardwell, the lawsuit said, and Beth Bardwell asked Humphrey if they were a "mixed couple." When told they were an interracial couple, Beth Bardwell said, according to the lawsuit, "We don't do interracial weddings," and told her the two would have to go outside the parish to marry.
Bardwell did not return repeated phone calls from CNN in October, but told CNN affiliate WAFB that he had no regrets about the decision. "It's kind of hard to apologize for something that you really and truly feel down in your heart you haven't done wrong," he said.
In addition, he told the Hammond Daily Star in an October story that he did not marry the couple because he was concerned for the children that might be born of the relationship and that, in his experience, most interracial marriages don't last.

"I'm not a racist," he said. "I do ceremonies for black couples right here in my house. My main concern is for the children."
Humphrey said in October that she wanted Bardwell to resign. "He doesn't believe he's being racist, but it is racist," she said.
According to the lawsuit, Bardwell estimated he refused to marry at least four other interracial couples in the past 2½ years.
"Defendant Beth Bardwell ... aided, abetted and conspired with defendant Keith Bardwell to deprive plaintiffs of their constitutionally protected civil rights," according to the suit.
No response to the suit has been filed, and it was unclear whether the Bardwells had retained an attorney. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages, claiming that Humphrey and McKay suffered emotional distress as a result of the incident.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has said he believed Bardwell should lose his license, and the National Urban League called for an investigation into the incident by the U.S. Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, saying in a statement that Bardwell's actions were "a huge step backward in social justice."
According to the Census Bureau, Tangipahoa Parish is about 70 percent white and 30 percent black.

The U.S. Supreme Court tossed out any racially-based limitations on marriage in the landmark 1967 ruling in the case Loving v. Virginia. In the unanimous decision, the court said that under the Constitution, "the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State."
threads merged.

 

[QUENTIN]

Yeah, it was "political correctness" that he caved to. Not the fact that the job he chose to take requires him to set aside his own feelings on issues like race and adjudicate things impartially, following the law that fully decriminalized miscegenation in 1967.

Also, it's pretty funny to be concerned about the welfare of a mixed-race child in a country where they just elected one to the Presidency.

 

[critter]

This is ashame the Louisiana Justice of the Peace was forced to resign due to the pressures of todays harmful Political Correctness in politics. His refusal to marry a interracial couple because his own beliefs was not harmful in any manner. He was not a racist but was concerned about a mixed child growing up and the problems that child would deal with. All the mixed couple had to do is go to someone else to get married. The outrage at this good man by the media has gone overboard. Todays out of control liberal Political Correctness is ripping this nations morals, customs and traditional christian family values away from the foundation our nation was built upon that has made it great. Political Correctness is insuring the inner destruction of America and the traditional American Family way of life. His pressured resigning is a sad day in America and for the great State of Louisiana which I reside in.



(CNN) -- A Louisiana justice of the peace who drew criticism for refusing to marry an interracial couple has resigned, the secretary of state's office said Tuesday.
Keith Bardwell resigned in person at the Louisiana secretary of state's office, said spokesman Jacques Berry. The state Supreme Court will appoint an interim justice of the peace to fill Bardwell's position, Berry said, and a special election will be held next year to fill the position permanently.
Bardwell, a justice of the peace for Tangipahoa Parish's 8th Ward, refused to perform a marriage ceremony for Beth Humphrey, 30, and her boyfriend Terence McKay, 32, both of Hammond, Louisiana, and sign their marriage license. The two were married by another justice of the peace.
The couple filed a federal discrimination lawsuit against Bardwell and his wife, Beth Bardwell, on October 20, claiming the two violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
Initial reports were that Bardwell refused to issue a marriage license to the couple, but in the lawsuit Humphrey and McKay say they obtained the license from the parish court clerk's office and contacted Bardwell to see if he would perform the ceremony and sign the license to legally validate the marriage.
Humphrey wound up speaking by telephone with Beth Bardwell, the lawsuit said, and Beth Bardwell asked Humphrey if they were a "mixed couple." When told they were an interracial couple, Beth Bardwell said, according to the lawsuit, "We don't do interracial weddings," and told her the two would have to go outside the parish to marry.
Bardwell did not return repeated phone calls from CNN in October, but told CNN affiliate WAFB that he had no regrets about the decision. "It's kind of hard to apologize for something that you really and truly feel down in your heart you haven't done wrong," he said.
In addition, he told the Hammond Daily Star in an October story that he did not marry the couple because he was concerned for the children that might be born of the relationship and that, in his experience, most interracial marriages don't last.

"I'm not a racist," he said. "I do ceremonies for black couples right here in my house. My main concern is for the children."
Humphrey said in October that she wanted Bardwell to resign. "He doesn't believe he's being racist, but it is racist," she said.
According to the lawsuit, Bardwell estimated he refused to marry at least four other interracial couples in the past 2½ years.
"Defendant Beth Bardwell ... aided, abetted and conspired with defendant Keith Bardwell to deprive plaintiffs of their constitutionally protected civil rights," according to the suit.
No response to the suit has been filed, and it was unclear whether the Bardwells had retained an attorney. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages, claiming that Humphrey and McKay suffered emotional distress as a result of the incident.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has said he believed Bardwell should lose his license, and the National Urban League called for an investigation into the incident by the U.S. Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, saying in a statement that Bardwell's actions were "a huge step backward in social justice."
According to the Census Bureau, Tangipahoa Parish is about 70 percent white and 30 percent black.

The U.S. Supreme Court tossed out any racially-based limitations on marriage in the landmark 1967 ruling in the case Loving v. Virginia. In the unanimous decision, the court said that under the Constitution, "the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State."
threads merged.

It has nothing to do with politics it has to do with people rights. He resgin cause he knows he get won't get as many people. he is wrong. He has no right to deny someone no matter what the race is.

race should never be a factor and it needs to stop. no matter the color of hte kids will also be pick on.

kids and adults are just immature. every religion is different no point and bribing this into the position

 

[QUENTIN]

Todays out of control liberal Political Correctness is ripping this nations morals, customs and traditional christian family values away from the foundation our nation was built upon that has made it great.

What a fool.

As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion...

Now be it known, That I John Adams, President of the United States of America, having seen and considered the said Treaty do, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, accept, ratify, and confirm the same, and every clause and article thereof. And to the End that the said Treaty may be observed, and performed with good Faith on the part of the United States, I have ordered the premises to be made public; And I do hereby enjoin and require all persons bearing office civil or military within the United States, and all other citizens or inhabitants thereof, faithfully to observe and fulfill the said Treaty and every clause and article thereof.

Official records show that after President John Adams sent the treaty to the Senate for ratification in May 1797, the entire treaty was read aloud on the Senate floor, and copies were printed for every Senator. A committee considered the treaty and recommended ratification, 23 of the 32 sitting Senators were present for the June 7 vote which unanimously approved the ratification recommendation

The USA was NOT founded in ANY sense on the Christian religion.


Signed and ratified by the founding fathers in 1797, Article 11 of the Treaty of Tripoli clearly states that "The Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion..."

The following comment sums it up nicely:

So many in the Christian movement today argue that the United States was clearly founded as a Christian nation. This treaty clearly contradicts that notion as it constitutes one of the earliest acts and official statements of the newly createdgovernment.

I want to give some context to the timeframe in which the treaty was created and the parties involved with it's creation and signing. The treaty was created and written by the Washington administration and signed at Tripoli on Nov 4, 1796 during the final months of President George Washington's last term in office. It was submitted to the Senate on May 29, 1797 at the very beginning of the Adams/Jefferson administration and was signed and ratified by the United States of America on June 10th, 1797. The Treaty of Tripoli was the 11th international treaty signed by the newly founded United States of America.

The text of this treaty gives readers an incredible glimpse into the values and beliefs held by many of the actual founding fathers as it relates to the role of Christianity in founding our country and system of government. The treaty passed ratification unanimously after having been read aloud in its entirety on the Senate floor and copies printed and passed out to every Senator.

Little-Known U.S. Document Proclaims America's Government is Secular - The Early America Review, Summer 1997

"The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture, hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their history. Although the detail of the formation of the American governments is at present little known or regarded either in Europe or in America, it may hereafter become an object of curiosity. It will never be pretended that any persons employed in that service had interviews with the gods, or were in any degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; it will forever be acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason and the senses.

". . . Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind."

Even most Christians do not consider Jefferson a Christian. In many of his letters, he denounced the superstitions of Christianity. He did not believe in spiritual souls, angels or godly miracles. Although Jefferson did admire the morality of Jesus, Jefferson did not think him divine, nor did he believe in the Trinity or the miracles of Jesus. In a letter to Peter Carr, 10 August 1787, he wrote, "Question with boldness even the existence of a god."

Jefferson believed in materialism, reason, and science. He never admitted to any religion but his own. In a letter to Ezra Stiles Ely, 25 June 1819, he wrote, "You say you are a Calvinist. I am not. I am of a sect by myself, as far as I know."

Called the father of the Constitution, Madison had no conventional sense of Christianity. In 1785, Madison wrote in his Memorial and Remonstrance against Religious Assessments:

"During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution."

"What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the civil authority; on many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have they been the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty may have found an established clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not."

If indeed our Framers had aimed to found a Christian republic, it would seem highly unlikely that they would have forgotten to leave out their Christian intentions in the Supreme law of the land. In fact, nowhere in the Constitution do we have a single mention of Christianity, God, Jesus, or any Supreme Being. There occurs only two references to religion and they both use exclusionary wording. The 1st Amendment's says, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. . ." and in Article VI, Section 3, ". . . no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

Thomas Jefferson interpreted the 1st Amendment in his famous letter to the Danbury Baptist Association in January 1, 1802:

"I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and State."

America was not, in any sense, founded on "traditional Christian family values." We're a secular nation, always have been, thanks.

 

[Dr Grump]

Christ, the guy is a moron in anybody's language...