Unconventional Sources

There’s a simple, positive protest going on in Hawaii at the
Hawaii Gay Marriage Bureau

No, same-sex marriage is not yet legal in Hawaii, but it ought to be, and it may well soon be. There’s a case in the courts right now challenging the constitutionality of the heterosexual exclusivity of marriage rights in Hawaii. Marriage is a legal status conferred by the government, and so it ought to be provided equally to all couples. That’s what the Constitution of the United States of America requires. Look it up.

So, while the Hawaii Gay Marriage Bureau cannot yet officiate over legally recognized marriages, it can help people perform protest marriages. Also, the mere existence of the bureau gives us a looking glass view into the world as it ought to be.

An American has to have been determined to be ignorant not to know what’s happened to the Constitution of the United States of America under President George W. Bush. The individual rights that are guaranteed by the Constitution have been thoroughly violated by the Bush White House, which announced that the Constitution’s rules were merely suggestions that would need to give way before the needs of the moment. It was declared that the President is above the law, and above the Constitution itself.

Torture and Big Brother spying programs against peaceful Americans were begun. The power of arbitrary imprisonment without a trial or even habeas corpus was announced. Freedom of speech and assembly were curtailed. Church and state were mixed.

Now, Barack Obama is becoming President of the United States. Will all that change? Will the Constitution’s authority be restored?

Unfortunately, restoring our constitutional rights isn’t as simple as electing a new President. President Obama will have the same powers as President Bush, and it’s up to Obama, and to the Congress, to pull back presidential power so that the Constitution can regain its proper place.

Will Barack Obama act to bring the Presidency back under the law? Will President Obama respect the Constitution?

It looks uncertain. For all his talk of change, the closer that Obama gets to the Oval Office, the more reluctant he sounds about cutting back on the authoritarian powers established under George W. Bush. Obama suggests that secret torture prisons may not be closed, espionage against Americans may not end, and church and state will continue to be mixed.

We cannot simply trust President Barack Obama to obey the Constitution. We need to do our duty as active citizens, and push Obama to bring the White House back under control.

That’s why, on Inauguration Day 2009, there will be a Pro-Constitution Inauguration Demonstration. The parameters of this political demonstration are simple: On the parade route, outside the Department of Justice, at the southwest corner of 9th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, at noontime (plan to get there early to really get there on time), Americans who love the Constitution will assemble in a place reserved with the cooperation of the National Park Service. They will come with small signs, buttons, t-shirts, etc., with messages urging Barack Obama to comply with his Oath of Office, and uphold the Constitution.

More information about the 2009 Inauguration demonstration for constitutional rights.

Earlier this morning I wrote about the lawsuit to remove Rick Warren from the Constitution. Rick Warren’s involvement in performing an official government Christian religious ritual is a clear defiance of the Constitution’s guarantee of freedom from religious tests for public office, as well as a violation of the separation of church and state.

There’s a related resource that I left out of the article, though: A petition by atheists to remove Rick Warren from the Inauguration, not just because Warren’s activities establish government religion, but because Rick Warren has been an opponent of the Constitution’s promise of equality under the law, campaigning for a new theocracy in which only Americans who believe in his God are allowed to become President.

All in all, this Rick Warren seems to be a nasty extremist.

The Freedom from Religion Foundation has sued to remove Christian rituals and theological tests for public office from the 2009 Inauguration of Barack Obama to the position of President of the United States. This lawsuit has many Christian groups infuriated.

Why? Do these Christian groups really believe that their religion will fall apart unless it gains official sanction from the government? Is their God a government dependent?

It’s nonsense for right wing religious groups to claim that a ritual invocation of Christian spirits by a Creationist preacher like Rick Warren and the phrase “so help me God” are an important part of the presidential inauguration process. The truth is that for most of American history, there was no invocation prayer and no use of the phrase “so help me God” in the Inauguration.

Abraham Lincoln didn’t need it. George Washington didn’t need it. So, why are these right wing Christians so upset about a lawsuit that would merely return the Inauguration to its historical roots and constitutional foundation?

It seems to me that they’re really afraid of is the Constitution and American history. They’re trying to change America, not celebrate it.