Kentucky Clerk Kim Davis released from jail

From Newsmax

Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk who refused to issue same-sex marriage licenses, walked out of jail on Tuesday after the U.S. district court judge who found her in contempt said he was satisfied licenses were being issued in accordance with a U.S. Supreme Court decision.

U.S. District Judge David Bunning ordered her release after six days in jail, saying she “shall not interfere in any way, directly or indirectly, with the efforts of her deputy clerks to issue marriage licenses to all legally eligible couples.”

If she tries to interfere, “that will be considered a violation of this Order and appropriate sanctions will be considered,” Bunning said.

Davis was greeted by over one thousand singing and shouting supporters. “I just want to give God his glory,” an emotional Davis said in brief remarks to supporters after being released from jail.

“She will do her job good and she will serve the people as they want her to serve. She will also be loyal to God and she is not going to violate her conscience,” her lawyer, Mathew Staver, said, with his arm around Davis. She was also flanked by Republic presidential candidate Mike Huckabee.

Staver, the founder of Christian religious advocacy group Liberty Counsel, said Davis would continue to ask for an accommodation to remove her name and her authority from the marriage certificates.

Huckabee called her a “brave lady” for her willingness to go to jail for what she believed.

Another Republican president hopeful, Ted Cruz, was seen entering and leaving the Carter County Detention Center.

State Representative David Hale, a Davis supporter who was in the crowd, said he will push for legislation to take marriage licenses out of the hands of county clerks and move it to the Office of Vital Statistics.

Not everyone in the crowd was a Davis supporter.

“I am only OK with it if she agrees to do her job,” said Beth Baker, of Grayson.

As an Apostolic Christian, Davis says she believes a marriage can only be between a man and a woman. She has refused to issue any marriage licenses since the U.S. Supreme Court in June made same-sex marriages legal across the United States.

While she was jailed, the county’s deputy clerks issued marriage licenses to several same-sex couples.

Davis, who is 9 days shy of her 50th birthday, was ordered into custody by Bunning on Sept. 3 after continuing to defy his order to issue the licenses in accordance with the law.

Bunning secured the assurances of five of six deputy clerks who stated under oath that they would comply with the court’s orders and issue licenses to all legally eligible couples.

The deputies will need to file status reports every fourteen days to prove they are in compliance, the order said.

Davis, a Democrat, was elected to her position in November 2014 after 27 years as deputy clerk of Rowan County. She took over the office from her mother, who served for 37 years. Her son Nathan, a deputy clerk, was the only one not to pledge compliance with the judge’s orders.

Her faith became central to her life in the last four years, following the death of her mother-in-law, she said in a statement issued last week through her legal representatives, Liberty Counsel.

Grayson, a town in northeastern Kentucky, canceled school out of concern over increased traffic coinciding with dismissal time.

For more on this story on: http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/US-Gay-Marriage-Kentucky-The-Latest/2015/09/08/id/678585/#ixzz3lBfmdb37

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Kentucky clerk who refused same-sex marriage licenses to file appeal

From Newsmax

(AP) A Kentucky county clerk has appealed a judge’s decision to put her in jail for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

Attorneys for Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis officially appealed the ruling on Sunday. The three page motion does not include arguments as to why Davis should be released but amends Davis’ earlier appeal of the judge’s order.

Davis objects to same-sex marriage for religious reasons and stopped issuing all marriage licenses in June after the U.S. Supreme Court legalized gay marriage nationwide. Two gay couples and two straight couples sued her. U.S. District Judge David Bunning ordered Davis to issue the licenses and the Supreme Court upheld his ruling.

But Davis still refused to do it, saying she could not betray her conscience.

Thursday, Bunning ruled Davis was in contempt of court for disobeying his order and sent her to jail. Her deputy clerks then issued marriage licenses to gay couples Friday with Davis behind bars.

“Civil rights are civil rights and they are not subject to belief,” said James Yates, who got a marriage license on Friday after having been denied five times previously.

Mat Staver, one of Davis’ attorneys, said the marriage licenses issued Friday are “not worth the paper they are written on” because Davis refused to authorize them. But Rowan County Attorney Cecil Watkins says the licenses are valid. Bunning said he did not know if the licenses were valid but ordered them issued anyway.

Bunning indicated Davis will be in jail at least a week. She could stay longer if she continues to not obey the judge’s order. Bunning had offered to release Davis from jail if she promised not to interfere with her deputy clerks as they issued the licenses. But Davis refused.

Staver called the contempt hearing “a charade” saying that Bunning had his mind made up before the hearing began.

Kentucky law requires marriage licenses be issued under the authority of the elected county clerk. Davis views issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples as a stamp of approval of something she believes is a sin. She has said she will not issue marriage licenses until the state legislature changes the law so the licenses can be issued under someone else’s authority.

The state legislature is not scheduled to meet again until January and Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear has refused to call a special session. Davis has refused to resign her $80,000-a-year job. As an elected official the only way she could lose her job is to lose an election or have the state legislature impeach her, which is unlikely given the conservative nature of the state General Assembly.

“She’s not going to resign, she’s not going to sacrifice her conscience, so she’s doing what Martin Luther King Jr. wrote about in his Letter from the Birmingham Jail, which is to pay the consequences for her decision,” Staver said.

Davis’ plight has reignited the gay marriage debate and the limits of religious freedom. Her imprisonment has inspired spirited protests from both sides in this small eastern Kentucky community known mostly as the home to Morehead State University.

Saturday, about 300 people rallied in support of Davis at the Carter County Detention Center where she is being held. Another rally is scheduled for Tuesday with Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee.

For more on this story go to: http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/kim-davis-to-file/2015/09/06/id/673855/#ixzz3l9pnZXgY

Why Can’t the Kentucky Clerk Get Bail?

By Greg Richter From Newsmax

Rowan County, Kentucky Clerk Kim Davis has been jailed without bail since Thursday for refusing to allow her office to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

Her attorney, Matthew Staver, says that even some people accused of murder are allowed to be free on bail while their trial is pending.

“This woman who hasn’t done any crime at all,” Staver told Newsmax on Sunday. “She’s being held without bail for an indefinite period of time. In fact, one of the U.S. marshals when they were directed by the judge to take her into custody told her he had never arrested somebody who had not committed a crime.”

GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee told ABC’s “This Week” Sunday that there is a double standard for liberals and conservatives when it comes to violating same-sex marriage laws. He pointed to former San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsome and President Barack Obama’s former Attorney General Eric Holder for allowing same-sex marriage when it was illegal, yet suffering no consequences.

But Davis, who says same-sex marriage violates her Christian beliefs, is in control of her own destiny, Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz tells Newsmax.

“She can get out immediately,” Dershowitz said. “All she has to do is resign her job … and say, ‘Look, I can’t do this in conscience. And because I can’t do it in conscience, I really can’t hold the job of being clerk.’ That’s the principled decision.”

Davis’ being able to continue to serve as county clerk while refusing to issue marriage licenses would be comparable to a conscientious objector, rather than declining to enter the Army, joining instead, then refusing to follow orders, Dershowitz said.

U.S. District Court Judge David Bunning has said he jailed Davis without bail in an effort to force her to comply on the U.S. Supreme Court ruling this summer legalizing gay marriage nationally. Allowing her to pay a fine wouldn’t have worked, Bunning said, because Davis has a large group of supporters willing to cover the cost.

Staver, Davis’ lawyer, is skeptical that Bunning ever even considered a fine – even though the gay couples seeking the original injuction against Davis specifically requested a fine and not jail time.

The temporary injunction ended at the end of the day August 31, Staver said, and at 10:30 the next morning a motion for contempt was filed. Bunning set a 1 p.m. hearing, allowing only a five-page response, when the rules allow for 20 pages.

When the hearing was held 48 hours later, Bunning already had the jailer – who had to travel from another county – in the courtroom ready to take Davis into custody.

“Then when he read he was going to confine her, he read from a prepared statement he had already written, and didn’t give civil penalties at a graduated rate,” Staver said. Jailing Davis was the judge’s intent “from the very beginning,” Staver said.

University of Alabama School of Law professor Ronald Krotoszynski Jr. tells Newsmax that he was surprised as well. A judge usually starts with a fine first, Krotoszynski said, before moving to incarceration. The exception is with journalists who refuse to give up their confidential sources.

Staver is appealing the decision to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, but Krotoszynski said he doesn’t expect to see the decision overturned.

Unless the Sixth Circuit finds the judge was “wildy inappropriate” in his ruling, it will stand, he said.

Staver feels differently, telling Newsmax, “This is just this particular judge who violates the rule of law to reach his desired end.”

For more on this story go to: http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/kentucky-clerk-bail-gay/2015/09/06/id/673857/#ixzz3l9twn8N8

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