Virginia may approve same-sex marriage

Virginia may become the first southern state to legalize same-sex marriage if a court there decides to overrule a current ban. If so, it would join Utah and Oklahoma in that situation and it illustrates once again how states and individuals have changed their views over time. It is expected that the plaintiffs will likely use the same arguments that were successful in the other two cases, using the US Supreme Court’s reasoning (including justice Scalia’s dissent against the decision) in last year’s Windsor case that the Equal Protection clause of the 14th Amendment required the state to treat all marriages equally, irrespective of gender. [Read more…]

Symposium on the Greece v. Galloway case

I will be part of a panel that will discuss the Greece v. Galloway case at an event that is free and open to the public. The actual title of the session is (for some obscure reason) Religion and the Constitution in Modern Life. It is interesting that although the topic is one involving constitutional law and is being held in the Law School under the auspices of American Constitutional Society, they have seen fit to invite a non-lawyer like me to participate. [Read more…]

Sean Wilentz’s attack on Snowden, Greenwald, and Assange

Reader JS has sent along a link to a long article in the New Republic by Princeton history professor Sean Wilentz ominously titled Would You Feel Differently About Snowden, Greenwald, and Assange If You Knew What They Really Thought?. Wilentz seems to imply that the three of them have some secret agenda that Wilentz has somehow managed to unearth that enables him to read their minds and bring to light their true intent. [Read more…]

Countering the idea of inevitable age-related cognitive decline

Everyone is aware of all the reports that suggest that our cognitive powers go into decline with increased age. As a result, as some of us get into our senior years, we can’t help but identify as symptoms of that mental decline every time we do not remember some thing that we think we should, or when it takes awhile to do something that we think we used to do faster. We may joke about having ‘senior moments’ but those jokes are accompanied by a twinge of anxiety as to whether they are precursors of more serious problems to come. [Read more…]

Prayer at government functions-5: Introducing the endorsement test

The Lemon test to judge whether violations of the Establishment Clause had occurred is not always easy to apply in concrete cases and some justices of the US Supreme Court have often expressed its unhappiness but others have opposed outright rejecting it. This is especially true of the second ‘effect’ prong which is hard to evaluate. Furthermore, the test was formulated in a case that involved legislative actions. What about situations involving government actions such as prayer and Bible readings and religious instruction in public schools, the display of religious artifacts such as the Ten Commandments on government property, ceremonial opening prayers at government functions, etc.? [Read more…]