And this entire discussion stemmed from Taylor defending the right of magistrates to refuse to perform marriage licensing duties under the dumb ass "Religious Freedoms" laws some states, including my own (despite Gubernatorial veto) have passed.
This ruling, and specifically Kennedy's reluctance to place narrow definitions of the "free exercise thereof" in his majority opinion, when, lets face it, it is kind of a really important thing to overlook for someone so well versed in the constitution, suggests to me, that, he knew full-well that this was going to cause a lot of problems with an actual enumerated right of freedom of religion. What he effectively said without parsing of words, was that, people of conscious are free to hold their views, free to share their views, but not free to practice their views outside the "appropriate" confines of there homes and places of worship. He basically spat on the free exercise thereof portion of the 1st Amendment. One might argue that freedom from religion is a valid argument in favor of public accommodation laws, but it goes much farther than just freedom of religion, IMO. The principle of the 1st Amendment was so important it became the very first enumerated right. The really liberal among us have been trying forever to whittle that down and until a few days ago have never really succeeded. The right to free speech, of association, and of religion and freedom of the press is NOT to be abridged by the government, not just for a little while, it means FOREVER and EVER!
American's have allowed their 1st Amendment freedoms to become less and less broad over the last few 100 years by this and that form of legislative action designed with the sole purpose to afford government some level of control, re: the commerce clause, separation of church and state, public accommodation, and many other abridgments that aren't called that, they're merely proper and necessary, and those narratives by an ever increasing dumbing of the electorate swallow it hook line and sinker. In political theory this is called
inching, or some have called it
nudging, but the concept is more fully understood when taken in totality. The truth is that we really don't have the freedoms and liberty once guaranteed to us because politicians and an all too willing electorate find that when someone kills someone with a gun, Oh damn now we need "regulations" to keep them safe, and on, and on, and on it goes. Freedom of speech, association, has seen the same inching over the last 100 years. Look at states rights.. Talk about the most egregious examples..
Gruber was right... American's as a whole are too stupid to know what's good for them.
Tim-
