Lightstrider wrote:
This reminds me of this: A Muslim flight attendant says she was suspended from ExpressJet for refusing to serve alcohol, which is against her religious beliefs. She has filed a discrimination complaint with the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission.
http://www.rt.com/usa/314571-muslim-airline-alcohol-discrimination/
While I admire and respect the faith and dedication to one's religion, I think sometimes we can all take things a little too seriously. The law is the law, the people voted for same sex marriage, the people want alcohol, it's their business, it's your job.
The difference between Kim and that woman, however, is the fact that 1) following that woman's conversion and discovery that Islam prohibited her from serving alcohol, she worked out an accommodation with her management for another flight attendant to serve alcohol, while she did their job... essentially a duty switch, and 2) it wasn't the customers who filed a report against her, it was a fellow flight attendant. Further, the report that was filed wasn't even entirely in reference to her request for accommodation in serving alcohol; it also included the fact that she had started wearing a hijab with her flight attendant uniform (something which multiple courts have already ruled is to be allowed by the religious freedom accommodation acts) and that she had a book in "some random funny looking foreign language" (or something like that; which could have basically been anything). And of course they added the refusal to serve the alcohol to the mix. But the simple fact of the matter is is that there had already been accommodations put into place for the one qualm she had, by the airliner itself, and then they decided to revoke that accommodation. Now if they suspended her over the alcohol and hijab factors, then the airliner will lose their case. But if they suspended her over security concerns (ie, the book with funny foreign righting
somehow causing them to be concerned she might have become radicalized), then they may win their case. The media is just running with the alcohol line and ignoring the other factors, and as such, we can't know for certain the full extent of why she was placed on suspension.
Whereas with Kim, she was elected and swore an oath to uphold the laws. Kentucky law makes no provisions which allow one of the deputy clerks to sign marriage licenses in her stead, so there is no way for there to be some kind of accommodation made because as law currently stands, any marriage license which does not carry her signature isn't technically valid. Even Judge Bunning told the couples that they would have to risk their marriage licenses not being legally valid if they went ahead and got them following her imprisonment. That's something the state will have to figure out on a legal basis...how are they going to ensure all county clerks are issuing marriage licenses without infringing upon the religious rights. Clearly the majority of the deputies have no issue with issuing those licenses, so that looks like the place to start. As for her impeachment, it won't happen. She's in a predominantly conservative Republican, Christian dominated state. That makes up the basis for their Senate, which is who would have to do the impeachment, and they never will. They'll stand by her religious freedom to the end of time... And she'll never resign or budge. Meaning the only way, at least from where I'm sitting, that this issue will be solved is for state law to be adjusted so that marriage licenses can be signed by either title (such and such county clerk office [though I'm not convinced this will be satisfactory for Kim Davis]) or for deputy clerks to sign.
The tl;dr version of this: The difference is the airliner had made reasonable accommodations which they later decided to revoke based upon the complaint of a fellow employee which included more than just the alcohol issue, not the complaint of a customer. In contrast, Kentucky law does not allow for any kind of accommodation to be made wherein those marriage licenses are legal, meaning that Kim Davis in the only person people in that county can go to, and so her refusal to issue any marriage licenses does, in fact, infringe upon their constitutional rights.
