The Washington House passed the bill on a 55-43 vote. The state Senate approved the measure last week. And Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire is expected to sign the measure into law next week.
Democratic Rep. Jamie Pedersen, a gay lawmaker from Seattle who has sponsored gay rights bills in the House for several years, said that while he and his partner are grateful for the rights that exist under the state’s current domestic partnership law, “domestic partnership is a pale and inadequate substitute for marriage.”
It is almost certain this will be challenged at the ballot box in November, so freedom has an uphill battle to fight in Washington this year. Apparently a lot of people think the sky is going to fall is gay people have the same freedom as straights.
Maine and Vermont are currently the only states which allow inmates to vote. A number of other states have laws allowing those convicted of felonies the right to vote after release or after probation is over. Still, several states don’t allow it no matter what. Commit a felony at 18, serve 3 years, and you still can’t vote at 85. The Supreme Court has ruled that the constitution allows this in the 14th Amendment, but the scenario I just gave would seem to at least violate the 8th Amendment. But that may be changing in Washington based upon a federal decision.
The 2-1 ruling by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday overturned the 2000 ruling of a district judge in Spokane. That judge had ruled that Washington state’s felon disenfranchisement law did not violate the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and dismissed a lawsuit filed by a former prison inmate from Bellevue.
The two appellate judges ruled that disparities in the state’s justice system “cannot be explained in race-neutral ways.”
I’m not sure I find the reasoning here very convincing. These laws do disproportionately affect minorities, but that would seem to be an issue of law enforcement in the first place, not voting rights. One could say bans on ex-cons carrying guns also disproportionately affect minorities, but that doesn’t mean the ban should be overturned.
There is one caveat to that, however. Some states (especially in the south, surprise surprise), specifically did institute these laws to disenfranchise black voters. I’m not sure how a court decision could tease everything out, but it would seem that the appellate court’s reasoning would apply to those states.
But under all this is a more important question: Why aren’t felons allowed to vote? Isn’t the goal to rehabilitate prisoners? Don’t we want to better integrate them into society? Even for lifers, don’t we want them to be a part of a process that isn’t self-destructive and destructive to the lives of other prisoners (and prison officials)? If anything, voting should be encouraged for felons. Disallowing their votes seems to be nothing more then petty revenge, not something remotely helpful to either the prisoners or society.
An atheist sign criticizing Christianity that was erected alongside a Nativity scene was taken from the Legislative Building in Olympia, Washington, on Friday and later found in a ditch.
An employee from country radio station KMPS-FM in Seattle told CNN the sign was dropped off at the station by someone who found it in a ditch.
C’mon. Disagree in harmony. I hope no atheists, agnostics, humanists, Jews, Muslims, whathaveyou do this to any Christian display – or any other display, for that matter. It’s petty and juvenile. No group deserves to have its property damaged or stolen, regardless of the justification.
Washington State has recently granted permits for three displays in its Capitol building. One is a “holiday tree”, the other a nativity scene, and the third a sign from an atheist group which reads as follows:
At this season of
the Winter Solstice
may reason prevail.
There are no gods,
no devils, no angels,
no heaven or hell.
There is only our natural world.
Religion is but
myth and superstition
that hardens hearts
and enslaves minds.
Okay, fair enough. The state is allowing permits for displays which are privately funded. Assuming there isn’t profanity or pornography involved, there is little reason to deny a group a permit. Washington, being the generally progressive state it is, of course, allowed the display. We can all disagree and do it in harmony, no?
No.
Billo is a mook. Around 1:45, he goes on to say Christmas is a federal holiday honoring Jesus. Actually, Billo, Ganulin v. United States, 532 US 973 (2001) found that Christmas had been so sufficiently secularized that its status as a federal holiday was permissable. In other words, had they found the point of the federal holiday, in its modern form, to endorse Jesus, they would have taken away its holiday status.
Billo next goes on to rhetorically ask if it is necessary that a sign be placed next to the likeness of Martin Luther King Jr for people who disagree with his religious views. There’s a disconnect. We celebrate MLK’s civil rights movements, not his religion. The holiday is to honor his achievements, not his Christianity. Beside that, yes, if one group has a right to obtain a permit for a display on public property, so do other groups. This doesn’t mean they have the right to put their display where they please – the KKK cannot put a sign in front of a bust or portrait or whathaveyou of MLK. Just the same, no group would be allowed to do that.
Asked whether he was bothered by the atheist display next to his Nativity scene, Wesselius said, “I think the Nativity scene will speak for itself.” But he added, “I appreciate freedom of speech and freedom of access. That’s why they’re in there, and hey – you know, that’s great.”
This man, from the original article, has the correct attitude and outlook. We can disagree, but we can do it in harmony.
For the Sake of Science 