Litigation Report: Ten Commandments & Protecting Pro-Lifers

This is an update regarding some of the current litigation underway at the ACLJ.  As you can see, we have a number of cases involving the protection of the conscience rights of pro-life medical personnel and yes, once again, the issue of the Ten Commandment.

ACLU of Ohio v. Judge James DeWeese,  U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit

The ACLJ is representing an Ohio Common Pleas Court judge charged by the ACLU with violating the Constitutions Establishment Clause. Judge DeWeese hung on the walls of his courtroom in Mansfield, Ohio, a poster designed to illustrate his legal philosophy. The poster features two columns of principles or precepts intended to show the contrast between legal philosophies based on moral absolutes and moral relativism. The judge used the Decalogue as symbolic of moral absolutes, and a set of statements from sources such as the Humanist Manifesto as symbolic of moral relativism.

The U.S. District Court held that DeWeeses display of the poster violates the First Amendments prohibition against laws respecting an Establishment of Religion and issued an injunction against DeWeese, ordering him not to display it. Our brief to the court of appeals is due in early December and we expect an oral argument date some time early next year.

This case is just the latest episode in the ACLUs crusade to sever public life from its Judeo-Christian roots. DeWeeses poster simply sets forth the legal philosophy of those who framed the Constitution, contrasts it with the relativist approach that has more and more come to replace it, and shows the inevitable results in the increase of crime and moral breakdown the judge sees in his courtroom on an daily basis. It is ironic that the ACLU, and all too often the courts themselves, believes that it violates the Constitution for a public official to endorse the legal philosophy of those who adopted the Constitution.

Summum v. City of Pleasant Grove, Utah,  U.S. District Court, District of Utah

Following the ACLJs 9-0 victory in this case at the U.S. Supreme Court earlier this year, where Summum lost its free speech claim to force Pleasant Grove City to erect a new age monument in its park, the case was remanded to the federal district court in Utah, which permitted Summum to amend its lawsuit to allege a new claim.  Summum now claims that Pleasant Groves decision not to allow Summum to erect its monument in the same park where the city displays a Ten Commandments monument violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. We have filed a Motion for Summary Judgment and Summum has moved for a Preliminary Injunction.

Morr-Fitz, et al. v. Blagojevich, et al.,  Illinois Court. of Appeals, 4th District

The ACLJ is representing two Illinois pharmacy owners who are challenging that states regulation mandating that all pharmacies stock and sell all forms of abortion-causing drugs. Our clients have a religious objection to selling Plan B and other abortifacient drugs.  This case has already been to the Illinois Supreme Court, which reversed a lower courts decision that our clients lacked standing to sue. On return to the trial court, we were successful in obtaining first, a temporary restraining order, and most recently, a preliminary injunction against enforcement of the regulation.

The State of Illinois has appealed the granting of the injunction and so we are headed back to the Court of Appeals in Springfield, Illinois.

Brent Beams v. Walmart, Inc.,  U.S. District Court, Southern District of Ohio

Our client is an Ohio pharmacist who lost his job with Walmart when he refused to agree with a company policy that prevents pharmacists from even requesting an accommodation of their religious objections to dispensing certain abortion-causing drugs. We believe that Walmarts policy in this regard is in direct violation of Title VII, the main federal statute protecting employees against religious discrimination in employment. Employers are not free to exempt themselves unilaterally from the provisions of Title VII, which requires employers to make a reasonable accommodation of an employees religious beliefs and practices unless to do so would cause the employer an undue hardship.

The case is in the discovery stage with a jury trial scheduled in federal court in Dayton, Ohio in November, 2010.

Heather Williams v. Target, Inc., U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Missouri

The ACLJ is representing a Missouri pharmacist who was fired by Target for refusing to participate in the dispensing of drugs with an abortifacient mechanism of action. Williams had worked at Target for five years without incident at the time she was fired.

The case is in the discovery stage with a trial scheduled in St. Louis, Missouri in October, 2010.

Baker and Griffith v. City of White Settlement, Texas, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Texas

Our clients are prolife sidewalk counselors and picketers who have been threatened with prosecution for carrying anti-abortion signs in a public right of way. Baker and Griffith, along with others, have for years maintained a presence outside the West Side Clinic in White Settlement, a city near Fort Worth, Texas. In September, for reasons still unclear, they were told by city officials that their picket signs were offensive and that, if they continued to display them, the men would be prosecuted under a local ordinance banning portable signs.  This is an egregious violation of our clients free speech rights under the First Amendment. We have sued the city in federal court and are awaiting the citys response.  We are prepared to seek a preliminary injunction in the event the city persists in this outrageous attempt to suppress the constitutional rights of our clients.

We'll keep you posted as these cases unfold and as always, stay tuned to Jay Sekulow Live, our daily radio broadcast, for the very latest on our legal work in defending religious freedom.