Category Archives: Fundamental Rights

Divorce, Equal Protection, Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, Religious freedom, Substantive Due Process

Does Any State Have a Materially-Constitutional “No-Fault” Law? Yes, Surprisingly!

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by Standerinfamilycourt

Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!    –  Isaiah 5:20

What does a materially-constitutional “no-fault” divorce law look like?     Above all, for a unilateral divorce law to be constitutional, there must be no front-door (nor back-door) means to force a divorce on any unwilling spouse who has done nothing to seriously harm the marriage or family members: to the full extent that such harm is not objectively provable with hard evidence.    Beyond that, no spouse should be deprived of property,  parental rights, free association, free exercise of religious conscience, nor be subjected to arbitrary, vague charges that cannot be understood in advance sufficiently to avoid running afoul of them.    In other words, any law that removes these explicit fundamental Bill of Rights protections without regard to proof of marital fault, over which the defendant has had reasonable self-control, should be deemed unconstitutional on its face.

Additionally, notwithstanding abusive past judicial precedents such as Maynard v. Hill,  if the state law retroactively renders a contract unenforceable, this is a violation of Article 1 Section 10.    After 50 years of divorce-on-demand laws which changed the marital contract from enforceable to unenforceable in most states, this primarily impacts a dwindling number of marriages that were contracted prior to the mid-1970’s, since in virtually all states, licensed civil marriages undertaken after enactment of a state’s unilateral “no-fault” law are merely registered cohabitations, voidable at-will after a defined waiting or living-apart period.

Finally, there should be no violation of the separation-of-powers between the branches of government, as laid out in Articles 1 and 3 of the Constitution.    Most liberal, socialist schemes do indeed involve violation of the separation-of-powers between the legislative and judicial branches of government, or between the legislative and executive branches.     For example, when a Federal Judge or Justice proclaims a new fundamental right, such as “privacy” without undergoing the rigorous Congress-based, state ratification-based process of amending the Constitution, there has been a violation of separation-of-powers.    Hence, judicial precedents and subsequent legislation which rely on an alleged right to  “privacy” to legalize or expand abortion, overrule sodomy or adultery prohibitions, require state-paid contraception (and the like), would have been seen as constitutionally invalid by our nation’s founders.

Under this same principle,  a legislature may not pass a law that strips the judicial branch of its assigned powers under Article 3 (and its state constitution counterparts), by channeling matters through a court only for appearance sake, while reducing the role of the judges from discretionary to purely administrative.    Similarly, legislatures may not delegate powers reserved to them to another branch.    There used to be individual legislative divorces enacted as special laws in the legislature which fell into disfavor in case law.   Yet “no-fault” unilateral divorce laws are essentially legislative divorces in blanket form, with the states’ family courts administering them in a way that generally does not require judicial discretion.

When any state’s divorce statute eliminates objective fault-based grounds for divorce and declares that the court “shall” * grant a contested divorce upon administratively-valid petition, with no discretionary consideration of the facts in the case as they relate to allegations about undefined terms such as “irreconcilable differences” or “the best interest of the child / children / family”,  a violation of Article 3 has resulted.     Under this exacting standard, it is reasonable to argue that even mutually-consenting “no-fault” divorce is unconstitutional on these same separation-of-powers grounds, even though fundamental rights of neither spouse would be violated under a strictly consensual divorce law, whereas the fundamental rights of the children of the marriage, and the objective state interest in limiting the cost of services to families, might still be compromised.        (Hence, in this blog, use of the term “materially-constitutional” will refer to a state statute where the fundamental 1st and 14th Amendment rights of neither spouse is violated, and both spouses receive equal protection under the law, taken as a whole.)

* Existing Texas statute uses the term “may” instead of “shall”, but under the heavy-handed influence of the Texas Bar Association, their “family courts” consistently administer the law as though the judges have no independent discretion to deny unilateral divorce petitions.   Texas is presently considering HB922 and HB926 (formerly HB93 and HB65, respectively), which will remove non-consenting no-fault grounds, but leave all other divorce provisions except the very brief 60-day waiting period unchanged.   

Because of the high cost of serving (or mitigating societal ills from) broken families, a few states have experimented with opt-in “covenant marriage” laws (Arkansas, Arizona, and Louisiana) while maintaining all their regular divorce-on-demand machinery for those who don’t opt-in.  Since there are no 1st nor 14th Amendment protections for those who don’t opt-in at the time of the marriage, these states don’t qualify as having constitutional divorce statutes.    These states have extremely low rates of voluntary participation in these measures, and Arkansas in particular remains among the states with the highest divorce rates.

“Standerinfamilycourt” cannot possibly be familiar with key provisions of all of the various state divorce laws, though the “model” UMDA (Uniform Marriage and Divorce Act) provides a general roadmap,  and various state-by-state tables are available which capture the variations in how the “no-fault” model was enacted and / or implemented in any given state.     Not too long ago, a comrade in the effort to repeal unilateral grounds for divorce pointed out that there are two states,  Mississippi and South Dakota, with consent-only  “no-fault” grounds.    Knowing how deceptively the historical practices around “no-fault” laws have developed in the various states (sometimes, even despite well-meaning original statutes), and seeing the relative divorce rates in those states compared with other states,  SIFC was skeptical, and so, purposed to analyze both of these state statutes in detail to see to what extent this was likely to be true, as the laws were applied to real families.     Texas, for example, will not have eliminated forced divorce on “no-fault” grounds simply by passing HB922, because existing law will be unchanged in a crucial provision that allows either spouse to file (purportedly) fault-based grounds based on living apart for 3 years, even if the filing spouse has refused to live with the non-filing spouse (who did not consent to the separation and therefore was not actually responsible for the alleged fault).    Could there be a similar situation going on in Mississippi or South Dakota?

With somewhere between 75% and 80% of divorces nationwide opposed by one of the spouses, typically, a state’s divorce rate correlates with barriers to finalizing a divorce, such as the length of any waiting period or statutory living apart period required.    Yet, neither Mississippi nor South Dakota figure in the states with the lowest divorce rate — both states are pretty much “middle of the pack” in their rates of marriage “dissolution”.     Both states appear to have had their consent-based “no-fault” laws in place for a considerable length of time, not as a result of the sort of repeal that is being sought in Texas.    According to 2017 statistics from the American Community Survey,  South Dakota ranks 9th highest with a divorce rate of 13.59 per 1000 married couples of all ages.     Mississippi’s rate is somewhat lower, at around 12 per 1000 married couples, as compared to states with the highest rates at 17-19 per 1000, and states with the lowest rates at 5-7 per 1000 married couples.   If unilateral divorce is indeed restricted to fault-based grounds in these two states, why isn’t either state’s divorce rate in the lower ranges?

Why would South Dakota, for example, still rank only 33rd out of 50 states in protecting families, if unilateral “no-fault” divorce is restricted by statute ?    We’re about to find out.    Before looking at the state specifics, we need to reflect for a moment on the coercive power of the state bar associations in shielding the lucrative divorce trade, also in controlling all three branches of state government, and the degree to which the state budget benefits from Federal Title IV-D funds from court operating rules and from legislation that confiscates children from the families those courts have shredded.     Then we need to look at whether other provisions in the divorce law which deprive law-abiding citizens who want to keep their families together of their due process and fundamental rights are counterbalancing the consent-only provision.    There is also the religion factor, which layers over all of the other factors in law.   States with the lowest divorce rates (sadly) tend to have the smallest “conservative” Protestant and Jewish populations, and a typically-higher Catholic population.    Lastly, there is the dwindling marriage rate among younger citizens due to a law-driven deliberate preference for cohabitation, and ultimately causing the “per 1000 married couples” measures to disproportionately consist of divorced and remarried older citizens, especially in states where non-consensual “no-fault” grounds are the only grounds available.    The map below shows data for those age 30 and under, where Mississippi likely has a higher young marriage rate than South Dakota, and a bit higher consensual divorce rate in that young age bracket.

 

In a picture where there are many “moving parts”,  restricting to consent-only “no-fault” grounds most likely offsets other factors in keeping that state’s divorce rate lower than it would otherwise be, and improvements on other battle fronts (notably, the behavior and doctrine of the church) would catalyze with adopting a materially constitutional statute in lowering that state’s divorce rate.

Here is a summary table of the specifics of each state’s consent-only “no-fault” grounds, and surrounding statutes influencing the net degree of family protection.    Mississippi appears to have enacted its “no-fault” law in 1972, while South Dakota’s base “no-fault” law was enacted in 1976, and modified in 1985, possibly to add back the mutual consent feature.

Deep Dive – No Fault by Consent Only (version 1).xlsb

In this table (click on document to expand), red shading indicates provisions in the law defective enough to override all or most benefits from requiring mutual consent for “no-fault” divorce grounds such as “irreconcilable differences”.     Yellow shading indicates cautionary areas (“it depends”), and green shading indicates provisions that are materially consistent with Bill of Rights fundamental protections for the non-offending spouse and innocent family members.    Demonstrably, most of the green and none of the red is associated with key provisions in the Mississippi statute, making it the most protective toward rightful families, of all the family codes in the nation, whereas South Dakota has left a few “back doors” open, whereby a unilateral divorce may ultimately be obtained without an innocent spouse’s consent, if traditional back-up allegations are pursued to exploit longstanding vagueness of definitions in the statute, such as “mental cruelty”.

“standerinfamilycourt’s” Conclusions:  
Obviously we see the old adage, “the devil is in the details” when we take a close look at the consent-only “no-fault” divorce laws, with a critical eye to whether they nevertheless still effectively function as unilateral laws with delayed timing–by which people can still be manipulated by determined “family law” practitioners who, in the larger picture, continue to have an enormous financial conflict of interest with the true best interests of the family and the objective best interests of even the state.

South Dakota’s divorce statute is obviously better than that of 48 other U.S. states, but it still contains perverse financial incentives that boost the divorce industry at everyone else’s expense, and that encourage divorce coercion, because marital fault is not considered in either child custody (hence, still subjecting the citizens of the state to Title IV-D abuses) or in property division.   Additionally,  definitions of “abuse” as an alternative ground for divorce in the statute remain more vague than in Mississippi’s statute, which is a problem because “mental cruelty” has long been the next reliable “go-to” when other unilateral grounds are not available.    Finally, the provision for defaulted, implied consent in South Dakota creates a weaker law than in Mississippi, and opens the door for process service abuses, which is also a potential issue with Texas’ HB922, as currently drafted.

All things considered, Mississippi comes the closest of all 50 U.S. states to having a substantially constitutional “no-fault” divorce law that is only unilateral when it comes to fault-based grounds.     Among the best features of Mississippi’s statute:

->  No potential for abuse of a non-consenting spouse via default judgment provisions (rather than explicit appearance via joint petition, or service of process compliance).

->  60 day waiting period, even with written mutual consent.

->  Some consideration of marital fault in property division, if the consenting parties cannot agree, and the offended spouse would be at a disadvantage.

->  Strong consideration of marital fault in child custody decisions

->  Fairly explicit and actionable definition of physical and mental abuse, in terms of defining severity, extent, duration and other terms that in most states are vaguely defined by intention.    Limited “back door” available by resorting to cruelty allegations if “no-fault” fails to secure a “dissolution” decree.

– >The abandoner cannot allege “abandonment” nor “living apart” as back-door unilateral grounds, if unable to gain the non-offending spouse’s consent to the dissolution.

(Had the case against “SIFC”  been brought in Mississippi, instead of Illinois, it is highly doubtful the petitioner would have prevailed on any grounds.  Had the case been brought in South Dakota, the petitioner would likely have had to resort to false charges of “mental cruelty” in order to prevail, or there would have had to be a risky strategy of process service fraud leading to a default in-absentia judgment that could likely have been successfully challenged upon discovery.)

Why should it matter to take a deep look at what’s working in states like Mississippi, as we seek to repeal unilateral “no fault” grounds in additional states, such as Texas?    One big reason is to be prepared for the likely charge from the powerful “family law” lobby that these laws have not significantly reduced the divorce rate enough that the “threats” to women, gays, and abused spouses from repealing unilateral grounds for divorce is justified.    Looking at the above map, this will surely become a more prominent challenge if and when the movement begins to pick up steam–and purely emotional arguments can no longer carry the day, as they do today.    We need to be armed with facts that demonstrate exactly why having a constitutionally-defensible statute may not have had the impact we would hope for, especially as it relates to those “back doors” left open in some states.  The second reason is to clearly recognize and target other barriers to family preservation that lie outside the law — for example, immoral church practices, which might become more susceptible to reform under a tighter law.    The third reason is to gain important comfort that the state of Mississippi has managed to survive for 43 years, over the entire divorce-on-demand era, as the only state with a materially constitutional consensual-only “no-fault” law which powerful special interests have never succeeded in overturning in court based on “privacy” challenges.

Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.   –  Philippians 2:3-4

www.standerinfamilycourt.com
7 Times Around the Jericho Wall |  Let’s Repeal Unilateral Divorce!

 

citizenship, Divorce, Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, morality, Substantive Due Process

Was Maynard v Hill An Abusive SCOTUS Ruling? Is it Really Relevant Today?

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by Standerinfamilycourt

So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no [hu]man separate….Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way.    –  Matthew 19:6,8

And He said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” They said to Him, “Caesar’s.”   Then He said to them, “Then render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s; and to God the things that are God’s.”
– Matthew 22: 20-22

“When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…”
–  Declaration of Independence, 1776

This will be a long but important read.   Take it in manageable settings as necessary, but “standerinfamilycourt” worked hard to make the content very worthwhile to those who hope to see unilateral “no-fault” divorce abolished in our lifetime, and no longer a part of our grandchildren’s adult reality as citizens.    A special callout and thanks is in order to Matthew Johnston and Jeff Morgan for providing much of the expertise and content for this blog post.   My assessment, however, of these materials is independent, and these two gentlemen may not agree with “standerfamilycourt’s” take on every point discussed here.   I trust they will agree with much of it.

U.S. history is littered with ill-conceived and ideological Supreme Court decisions that have unjustly been applied for many decades afterward as controlling precedent, under the principle of stare decisis in a way that singles out entire groups of citizens for wholesale denial of their fundamental rights, often in defense of the Sexual Revolution.    Typically this happens because the original faulty decision itself denied due process to one of the parties.     The 1888 case, Maynard v. Hill, is in my view, one of those really bad decisions.   It  laid down two highly erroneous principles that eventually made the marriage contract unenforceable in the United States once the political climate ripened for toxic, Marxist legislation, in effect outlawing the permanent wedded union (as Jesus defined holy matrimony), almost a century before enactment of unilateral “no-fault” divorce laws in most U.S. states drove more nails into the marriage coffin.   Maynard v Hill is one of the key cases that has been relied upon by various state Supreme Courts to rebuff any and all 1st and 14th Amendment challenges to nonconsensual “no-fault” laws, as enacted since then.  This came despite the fact that many top constitutional attorneys today see these laws as unconstitutional in many different aspects.

First, this case unjustifiably removed the critical protection of Article 1 Section 10 of the U.S. Constitution from the marriage contract based on a very questionable rationale, to be discussed in depth below.

Next, this case asserted the superiority of the state’s claim of “publc policy” over the marriage relationship, above the private nature of the marriage contract between husband and wife, whereas any such claimed authority can only be traced back to a usurpation, from God’s perspective, by the 16th century Reformers who insisted that the state regulate holy matrimony.   This was authority that Christ told us God reserved to Himself, according to His law.   The state’s delegated role from the hand of God is to recognize and defend rightful marriages, not deign to create nor terminate them, according to Jesus’ pronouncement in Matthew 19:6 and 8.

Finally, the majority Justices upheld the actions of a territorial legislature (where there was not yet a state constitution), while operating under authority delegated to them by the U.S. Congress. This, while denying the accused, but possibly blameless, wife in another state her right to basic notice and procedural due process.   This legislature unilaterally divorced her from her husband in absentia, at his adulterous request which was not based on any legitimate grounds.   Indeed, at the time, there were no laws even defining grounds for divorce in the new territory.  This Supreme Court held valid a special law specifically passed to “dissolve” her marriage, despite the fact that in doing so, the territorial legislature deprived her of liberty and property without allowing her any opportunity for representation, or even serving her notice that they were taking this action.   She found out a few years later, according to the complaint in the case eventually brought by her heirs.

This case was brought by the Ohio covenant children of David and Lydia Maynard after both of their parents’ deaths, in an estate dispute over land that had been granted in Oregon territory (at the time of the ruling, the land had since become part of Washington state) to David after he abandoned Lydia under false pretenses in Ohio, and took up with another woman on his way out west.    The land grant apparently had strings attached, such that twice as much land was granted to a married couple, which then had to be cultivated for a period of time within a certain time window.    Shortly after securing both pieces of land based on his marriage to Lydia, he then requested his divorce be granted by the legislature.   David had grown extremely influential as a founder of Seattle, and had held considerable sway with the legislature by the time he made his request.   The divorce  was granted  upon his request, with documents external to the SCOTUS opinion showing that David accused his wife of adultery in his petition, and submitted hearsay letters from friends claiming to know individuals who had allegedly witnessed Mrs. Maynard in clandestine activities or compromising situations back in Ohio.    However, because he could not legalize his adulterous union with his mistress within the time window for perfecting the land claim, the Territory revoked the grant of the portion of the land that had been granted to David based on his marriage to Lydia.   In other words, Mr. Maynard’s attempted bait-and-switch scheme failed, and he suffered his just reward as a consequence.   It was the validity of the special legislative divorce, and of the land grant revocation, that the couple’s adult children were challenging, in part arguing that Article 1 Section 10 prevented the legislature of Oregon Territory from impairing the marital contract between David and Lydia by granting the divorce-in-absentia via special law aimed at that particular marriage, and without any notice to one of the parties being so assailed.

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.
( – Article 1 Section 10,  U.S. Constitution)

Since the facts of the case state that the legislature of Oregon Territory was operating under the temporary authority delegation by an act of the U.S. Congress in the absence of a state constitution…

“The act of congress creating the territory of Oregon and establishing a government for it, passed on the 14th of August, 1848, vested the legislative power and authority of the territory in an assembly consisting of two boards, a council and a house of representatives. 9 St. c. 177, 4. It declared that the legislative power of the territory should ‘extend to all rightful subjects of legislation not inconsistent with the constitution and laws of the United States,’

…it seems reasonable that Congress should not have been deemed to be able to delegate authority to a territory that they did not at least possess themselves, either to pass special laws which defeated the separation-of-powers already integral to the U.S. Constitution (Article 3), or to carve out a relatively untested exception to the Contracts Clause.   Yet, the authority to pass a special law granting a legislative divorce was justified by the majority, by relying on the history of U.S. states and territories who did not yet have a constitution who were following the English tradition of Parliament granting legislative divorces, and also upon the fact that various states were slow to transition from legislative divorces via special laws to a judicial procedure, in some cases even after a state constitution establishing separation-of-powers was ratified.   It seems natural, given that divorces were so rare in the 18th and 19th centuries, that change in this area would not have been a burning priority.    Eventually, however, many states constructed or amended their constitutions to require that divorces only be granted by a judicial process, a fact which the opinion acknowledges but dismisses on a very weak rationale, claiming that the historical reliance on legislative divorces justified the practice where there was not yet a state constitution, while completely ignoring the due process concerns that likely led to those provisions being adopted in various state constitutions.

With regard to the due process owed to Lydia Maynard, the 14th Amendment was not ratified until 1868, some 13 years after this legislative divorce was granted, but this was still 20 years prior to this landmark decision upholding the validity of the divorce-in-absentia for estate purposes.    The court completely failed to apply the provisions of the 5th Amendment, ratified along with the Bill of Rights in 1791, to secure Mrs. Maynard’s right to the most basic procedural due process,  including notice of the proceeding, which should have been more than justified by the fact that the territorial legislature was operating under delegated authority from the U.S. Congress.

“No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”
(- 5th Amendment, U.S. Constitution)

 

Quoting from the majority opinion:

“The facts alleged in the bill of complaint, that no cause existed for the divorce, and that it was obtained without the knowledge of the wife cannot affect the validity of the act.   Knowledge or ignorance of parties of intended legislation does not affect its validity if within the competency of the legislature.”

That unduly harsh statement may be true where public notice is posted for the intended enactment of general laws, but how could such a judicial statement have overridden anyone’s basic rights to due process with regard to notice and representation under the U.S.  Constitution?   They call these things fundamental rights for a reason!  It would have been enlightening to read the dissenting opinions of Stanley Matthews and Horace Gray, but unfortunately, this blogger was unable to locate the text for those dissents online without a subscription service.

With regard to barring the application of Article 1 Section 10 to the marriage contract, the majority opinion quotes this isolated statement  by Chief Justice John Marshall in Dartmouth College v Woodward (decided 1819), as follows:

“As was said by Chief Justice MARSHALL in the Dartmouth College Case, not by way of judgment, but in answer to objections urged to positions taken: ‘The provision of the constitution never has been understood to embrace other contracts than those which respect property or some object of value, and confer rights which may be asserted in a court of justice. It never has been understood to restrict the general right of the legislature to legislate on the subject of divorce.’ “

John Marshall, of course, was one of the nation’s founding statesmen who participated in the historic constitutional convention process,  himself becoming a delegate in 1788 to the state convention that had been formed to ratify it, so he should certainly have been an excellent authority on the original intent of Article 1, Section 10.    However, was the 1888 Supreme Court majority accurate in their presumption that Marshall was inclusively referring to unprovoked (unilateral) divorce, where the petitioner was actually creating the contractual breach he was seeking “relief” from, when the former Chief Justice made the statement upon which the 1888 court (very selectively) relied  to support their interpretation of the founders’ intent?   Or… was Marshall simply stating that Article 1 Section 10 was not intended to impair the authority of the legislature to regulate divorce on a fault-basis that is consistent with the innocent party’s fundamental rights, including property and causeless government non-interference with family sovereignty?

One historical source indicates that Article 1 Section 10 was actually added to the final draft after no discussion had taken place in the Constitutional Convention:

” [The post-Convention drafting committee] made at least one important change to what the Convention had agreed to;  {Rufus} King [of Massachusetts] wanted to prevent states from interfering in contracts.  Although the Convention never took up the matter, his language was now inserted, creating the contract clause.[24]:243

In light of this, it is at least possible that Marshall’s statement, delivered 30 years after ratification, was not coming from firsthand debate or interactions with the drafters or Rufus King, even though he had been a part of the larger ratification process.    There is at least some historical evidence that John Marshall did know King personally and continued to correspond with him in the years following ratification.

Chief Justice Marshall authored the majority opinion for Dartmouth College v Woodward, directly referring to the relevance to marriage contracts as follows:

“…it has been argued that the word “contract,” in its broadest sense, would comprehend the political relations between the government and its citizens, would extend to offices held within a State, for State purposes, and to many of those laws concerning civil institutions, which must change with circumstances and be modified by ordinary legislation, which deeply concern the public, and which, to preserve good government, the public judgment must control. That even marriage is a contract, and its obligations are affected by the laws respecting divorces. That the clause in the Constitution, if construed in its greatest latitude,would prohibit these laws. Taken in its broad, unlimited sense, the clause would be an unprofitable and vexatious interference with the internal concerns of a State, would unnecessarily and unwisely embarrass its legislation, and render immutable those civil institutions, which are established for purposes of internal government, and which, to subserve those purposes, ought to vary with varying circumstances.  That, as the framers of the Constitution could never have intended to insert in that instrument a provision so unnecessary, so mischievous, and so repugnant to its general spirit, the term “contract” must be understood in a more limited sense.  That it must be understood as intended to guard against a power of at least doubtful utility, the abuse of which had been extensively felt, and to restrain the legislature in future from violating the right to property. That, anterior to the formation of the Constitution, a course of legislation had prevailed in many, if not in all, of the States, which weakened the confidence of man in man, and embarrassed all transactions between individuals, by dispensing with a faithful performance of engagements….Those acts enable some tribunals not to impair a marriage contract, but to liberate one of the parties, because it has been broken by the other.When any State legislature shall pass an act annulling all marriage contracts, or allowing either party to annul it, without the consent of the other, it will be time enough to inquire, whether such an act be constitutional

It is important to note that neither the legislative act, nor the SCOTUS opinion refers to the charge of adultery that other sources indicate David Maynard tried to register with the legislature.  Marshall continues thusly at a later juncture in his opinion…

“Could a law, compelling a specific performance, by giving a new remedy, be justly deemed an excess of legislative power? Thus far the contract of marriage has been considered with reference to general laws regulating divorces upon breaches of that contract.  (Note: for the benefit of the innocent party is strongly implied here.)... But if the argument means to assert that the legislative power to dissolve such a contract, without any breach on either side, against the wishes of the parties, and without any judicial inquiry to ascertain a breach, I certainly am not prepared to admit such a power, or that its exercise would not entrench upon the prohibition of the Constitution. If, under the faith of existing laws, a contract of marriage be duly solemnized, or a marriage settlement be made (and marriage is always in law a valuable consideration for a contract), it is not easy to perceive why a dissolution of its obligations, without any default or assent of the parties, may not as well fall within the prohibition as any other contract for a valuable consideration.  A man has just as good a right to his wife as to the property acquired under a marriage contract. He has a legal right to her society and her fortune, and to divest such right, without his default and against his will, would be as flagrant a violation of the principles of justice as the confiscation of his own estate.”  
(Presumably, Marshall would have held the same true of David Maynard’s similarly-situated original wife.)

Marshall goes on in Dartmouth College v Woodward to confirm his personal uncertainty, even with his own superior and contemporary proximity to the founders, vis-à-vis the 1888 court, about the intent of Article 1 Section 10 to exclude or include the marriage contract:

“It is more than possible that the preservation of rights of this description was not particularly in the view of the framers of the Constitution when the clause under consideration was introduced into that instrument. It is probable that interferences of more frequent occurrence, to which the temptation was stronger, and of which the mischief was more extensive, constituted the great motive for imposing this restriction on the State legislatures. But although a particular and a rare case may not, in itself, be of sufficient magnitude to induce a rule, yet it must be governed by the rule, when established, unless some plain and strong reason for excluding it can be given. It is not enough to say that this particular case was not in the mind of the convention when the article was framed, nor of the American people when it was adopted. It is necessary to go further and to say that, had this particular case been suggested, the language would have been so varied as to exclude it, or it would have been made a special exception. The case, being within the words of the rule, must be within its operation likewise, unless there be something in the literal construction so obviously absurd or mischievous or repugnant to the general spirit of the instrument as to justify those who expound the Constitution in making it an exception.”

In light of the full context of what Chief Justice Marshall stated in that majority opinion, would it really be unreasonable to conclude that Justice Stephen Field was guilty of taking the portion of Marshall’s statement which he selectively quoted, materially out of context?     After all, for the Maynards, there was no general law in Oregon Territory regarding divorces, which is why a special law had to be custom-crafted under stealth, one that impaired the marriage contract which had been broken by the party requesting the divorce, not the “other” whom Marshall specifically pointed to the need to protect.     The Chief Justice indicated he was still fine with the parties themselves agreeing to annul their own contract by mutual consent (except that the matter was not yet legally “ripe” before his court), but in this 1853 Maynard instance, the party who was back home presumably honoring that marriage contract was deprived of notice of her husband’s hurried request to annul it legislatively.     Had Justice Field shown true deference to stare decisis, he would have addressed these highly relevant points raised by Marshall, some of which had now indeed become ripe for review with the case before the 1888 court.    Instead, it appears he stood Marshall’s very specific contrary guidance on its head by ignoring the portion that did not suit the court majority, for purely ideological reasons, under their conception of “public policy”.

The majority in Maynard went on to cite language in an earlier decision,  Butler v. Pennsylvania, 10 How. 402, where the question arose whether a reduction of the per diem compensation to certain canal commissioners below that originally provided when they took office, was an impairment of a contract with them within the constitutional prohibition; the court, holding that it was not such an impairment, said: ‘The contracts designed to be protected by the tenth section of the first article of that instrument are contracts by which perfect rights, certain, definite, fixed private rights of property, are vested. ‘It is also to be observed that, while marriage is often termed by text writers and in decisions of courts as a civil contract, generally to indicate that it must be founded upon the agreement of the parties, and does not require any religious ceremony for its solemnization, it is something more than a mere contract.”

Hold the phone!   Obviously, if it is a “given” that Object A is a recognized member of Group B, and a constitutional principle applies to all members of Group B, then it won’t do to claim that a particular constitutional principle naming Group B shouldn’t apply to Object A just because Object A has some additional qualities.   This is known as basic subset mathematics.

Further, the court used a circular argument which failed to take into account that the only element that would cause the marital estate vesting not to be “fixed” by the inherent indissolubility of the marriage bond is some sort of fault-basis, or barring that, their own failure to uphold the rule of law on behalf of the innocent spouse.    They were, in effect, arguing that the possibility that someone might unlawfully abandon their marriage (or, indeed, that a rogue territorial legislature might violate the Constitution by enacting a special law without legal notice against that innocent spouse)  “unvests” and “unperfects” the property rights that were conferred at the publicly-witnessed lawful wedding…(“I herewith plight thee my troth.”)

The majority in Maynard also had a considerable amount to say about “public policy”, most of it flawed and leaning too much toward social expediency, at the longterm expense of societal integrity.    This should sound very familiar to the readers of this blog, since it has been quoted ad nauseum by self-interested attorneys, jurists and legislators alike ever since–as if it came down from the mountain on stone tablets.    For example:

“…when the validity of acts dissolving the bonds of matrimony is assailed; the legitimacy of many children, the peace of many families, and the settlement of many estates depending upon its being sustained. ”

and…

“Many causes may arise, physical, moral, and intellectual, such as the contracting by one of the parties of an incurable disease like leprosy, or confirmed insanity, or hopeless idiocy, or a conviction of a felony, which would render the continuance of the marriage relation intolerable to the other party, and productive of no possible benefit to society.When the object of the relation has been thus defeated, and no jurisdiction is vested in the judicial tribunals to grant a divorce, it is not perceived that any principle should prevent the legislature itself from interfering, and putting an end to the relation in the interest of the parties as well as of society. If the act declaring the divorce should attempt to interfere with the rights of property vested in either party, a different question would be presented.”

Apparently, these Maynard Justices saw “public policy” as more of a concern as respects the fundamental rights of the subsequent family rather than of due process sustaining the fundamental rights of the original covenant family….“love the one you’re with”.    Evidently, the choice of an illicit relationship by the party seeking to morally and financially abandon their family joins all of these other selfish reasons why honoring marriage vows would be “productive of no possible benefit to society”, and “intolerable to the petitioning party.”    And in fact, the furtive act declaring the divorce did inevitably interfere with the rights of property vested in the innocent wife, if not in Oregon Territory, then back home in Ohio, whether that distant legislature intended this or not.

The intrusion on property rights from state interference without due cause upon the marriage contract is even more egregious in today’s society due to this malodorous precedent, with not only equity in homes and businesses at stake, but also employment-derived retirement assets as a “gray divorce” couple is at or near retirement age, or perhaps already retired.   Because of concealed dissipation to finance an extramarital affair in the period before the guilty party files for unilateral “no-fault” divorce, unequal IRA and 401K balances will be a growing problem that didn’t exist back when most states took marital fault into strong consideration in dividing assets.  In effect, many of today’s “family courts” are actually rewarding adulterous spouses for breaking up their own marriage, and transferring considerable wealth from earner to rival paramour, all while blaming the “Respondent” for choosing not to file their own petition – a clear religious freedom violation.    And wouldn’t you know it?  Quite ironically, there are divorce case precedents where solely for the purposes of dividing marital assets, the marriage contract is indeed deemed in a certain amount of doublespeak to be an “economic partnership”, by golly  –  MVR v TMR,  New York (1982) 115 Misc 2d 674

The last thing to re-examine in assessing this Maynard case for validity in the current marriage debate is whether, in light of ratification of the U.S. Constitution which was specifically drafted to address the many flaws in English Parliamentary law,  was the English parliamentary legal history–even continuing in the colonies as it did–still a reasonable basis upon which to hold the continued practice of legislative enactment of special laws constitutional?    After all, the Maynard majority acknowledged that several states had by that time incorporated specific prohibitions against special laws to grant divorces  into their constitutions and pointed those cases toward the judiciary for a reason: to assure constitutional separation of powers, protection of constitutional due process, and individual fundamental rights.   This trend therefore was far from something unknown to the majority, since they explicitly ceded this fact.   More likely, this constitutional advance in the various states was ideologically objectionable to them.   In the 1848 Ohio Supreme Court case, Bingham-v-Miller-1848 (1), we read concerning the general constitutionality of legislative divorces:

“The constitution confers no such power.  The legislature is not sovereign; nor are all of the departments of government combined.  The people, only, are sovereign.  Nor can the matter be helped by implication, for the [Ohio] constitution in express terms declares that ‘all powers not hereby delegated, remain with the people…The constitution confers no power to grant divorces; from whence then can the legislature derive it?   Not, like the British parliament, from sovereignty, because the legislature does not possess it; not from the constitution, because it does not confer it…

“The British Parliament is clothed, according to their notions, with sovereign power, and may do what they like;  many if not all the legislatures of the colonies, and the old states, possessed and exercised both legislative and judicial power… Our legislature is clothed with the simple power to enact laws, and do some other things expressly authorized by the constitution.  Beyond this, the legislature has no power at all.   To grant a divorce is not to enact a law at all;  an expression of the will of the lawmaking power that a marriage is dissolved is no law at all.   It is a decree, an order, a judgment but not a law …”

Surely, back in 1819, Justice Marshall would have been acutely aware of from whence our Declaration of Independence explicitly states that the people’s sovereignty over fundamental rights emanates, and this was clearly not the British Parliament (to mildly understate it).    On this basis alone, we can safely bet that legislative divorces and special laws would have been repugnant to Marshall’s  experience as a Constitutional founder, though he was reportedly a deist and didn’t have the strong Christian worldview of many of his peers.   And curiously, the majority opinion in Maynard cited several state-level cases in support of their conclusion from a variety of eastern and midwestern states including Pennsylvania, New York and Indiana but, very curiously, did not mention Bingham at all.   Perhaps the dissenting opinion did, given its very high relevance.

One thing we learn from this case is that denial of fundamental due process has always been an essential element of easy, sleazy divorce, even back in the late 19th century when Marxist elements were beginning to emerge and influence the policy-making elites.   Marshall’s voice, on the other hand, called back from the purer days in U.S. history before some of our intellectual elites began to succumb to Marxist ideologies – it would be interesting to note the extent the two dissenting Justices had vainly attempted to echo him.

All of this matters a great deal today, because anyone who looks at contemporary unilateral “no-fault” grounds for divorce, which prevail without mutual consent in 48 states as of this writing,  along with their their surrounding, implementing statutes, cannot help but notice that in reducing the judiciary function to an administrative, ministerial role, where there is to be no finding of marital fault in most states for any aspect of unravelling a family,  these laws amount to nothing more than the outlawed special laws of yesterday in blanket form,  implemented by running them through specialized courts for appearance sake, in order to masquerade as general laws that non-substantively purport to require a judicial function.    Yet, we all know that judges feel compelled by the law to accept the assertions in the petition and rule against the “Respondent” 100% of the time without regard to whether the allegation of “irreconcilable differences”, “irretrievable breakdown”, “insupportability”, etc. is factually true.   In an increasing number of these cases,  the pair has been successfully married for decades and suddenly became “irreconcilable” or “insupportable” according to the legal fiction.   In other cases, we have statistics that at least 5% of supposedly “irreconcilable” couples reconcile with each other, even after subsequent marriages to others.

One of the things the Bingham v Miller jurists did was try to manage the chaos resulting from overturning a law of this nature after decades of unlawful practice,  something the Maynard jurists openly declared that they lacked the fear of God and moral courage to do.

” To deny this long-exercised power, and declare all the consequences resulting from it void, is pregnant with fearful consequences. If it affected only the rights of property, we should not hesitate; but second marriages have been contracted, and children born, and it would bastardize all these, although born under the sanction of apparent wedlock, authorized by an act of the legislature before they were born, and in consequence of which the relation was formed which gave them birth. On account of these children, and for them only, we hesitate. “
– Justice Read, Ohio, 1848

We will be in substantially the same place with the rightful overturn or repeal of unilateral “no-fault” divorce and its effects, except that we will no longer have the legal label of “illegitimate” or “bastard” to contend with, since from about 1987,  U.S. law no longer makes much distinction in the rights of children born in wedlock or out– in a government that has quite clearly lost the moral ability to even define or implement “wedlock”.   Perversely, this will probably prove to be a silver lining for winding down today’s multiple remarriage mess.  The Ohio court stated it had no issue with the property effects reverting back to the status they were prior to imposition of each unlawful dissolution, but only had an issue with the legal and social status of the children of the subsequent union(s).    Although the case text doesn’t explicitly say this, the commentary on it states that the court held those subsequent unions to be  “valid” for the sake of the children.    Today we would ask, “which one(s)?”  However, by Bingham’s own legal theory, it is a serious question whether this Ohio court actually possessed the constitutional authority to do so en masse without actually rehearing any of the cases based on grounds, but it does not appear that this case was appealed any higher.    There was no way to declare all the marriages “valid” out of compassion without setting up a situation of concurrent, Muslim or Mormon style polygamy, in a moral space currently dominated by consecutive polygamy.   Something like this will be the aftermath of correcting the almost unspeakable separation-of-powers evil brought about by unilateral “no-fault” grounds statutes.  Theoretically, only the first marriage will be valid following such an event, but there are complexities even with that.

To conclude, we go back to the error of the Maynard court, and ask an interesting question:

Had the court made the right call on the issue of legislative divorces and special laws under the Article 10 theory that the Bingham court correctly laid out 40 years earlier,  would it have been strictly necessary to address the merits of the contract argument of Article 1 Section 10 applying to marriage, or would it have been wiser to declare that argument “moot” and thereby avoid setting a questionable legal precedent with regard to contracts, one that even John Marshall was uncertain of?   

Both questions had to be addressed once the wrong call was made concerning legislative divorces.   That fatal event turned into a blowtorch on the sustainability of “no-fault” flames, coming as it did at the SCOTUS level.  The Bingham court in Ohio importantly said this about the contract issue:

“Some eminent jurists have denied the power to the legislature, upon the ground that it is a law impairing the obligation of contracts, and therefore prohibited to the states by the constitution of the United States. We do not chose to place it upon this ground, because we believe that clause was inserted in the constitution for no such object, but as appliable to contracts of a wholly different nature.   And besides, I believe it not only consistent with the theory of our government, but that our happiness, interest, and safety require us to deny to the general government any possible power not expressly granted, or clearly conferred. It is to the state where we have the control, that we must look for the protection of our dearest rights; and I would be the last to surrender up any right to the general government, and especially so dear a one as that of our domestic relations. This is a matter of our own, and we will keep it so.”

It is clear that there was considerable difference of opinion on the applicability of Article 1 Section 10 to the marriage contract among “eminent jurists” long after Marshall.    Aside from the purism of the legal theory expressed in Bingham, this purism may actually become directly relevant to the constitutional wind-down of the blanket form of legislative divorces we are saddled with today.    For example, in the all-too-common case of someone thrice-“married”, but the law under which they or their civil spouse’s divorce (and therefore, their subsequent civil union) is suddenly declared void by SCOTUS, whose contractual rights prevail?   Aren’t the contract rights of the first spouse just as enforceable under Article 1 Section 10 as the third-and-current civil  spouse?    Perhaps not for marriages contracted after enactment of unilateral “no-fault” laws rendered the civil contract undertaken on the wedding day to be “at-will”, effectively mooting the contract argument that once existed for pretty much anyone under age 65 or so who didn’t first marry fairly young.

It’s fine to say that you can’t “unscramble eggs” or “you can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube”,  as we frequently hear with regard to biblically-illicit subsequent marriages, but if unilateral “no-fault” divorce and its parental and property effects are ultimately overturned on an Article 10 / Article 3 argument and separation-of-powers, millions of “marriages”, and probably the bulk of all currently-legal U.S. marriages under prevailing trends, will be voided.    If SIFC were a betting individual, the money would be on the current Justices rejecting the contract argument, not only out of stare decisis, but out  of pure practicality and widespread mootness, to considerably cut down on the enormous and inevitable chaos of conflicting claims.   There are purists among us who say that legislative repeal of unilateral divorce laws needs to take us back to 1969 (1958 for Oklahoma) based on this separation-of-powers constitutional principle, and not allow for even mutual petition “no-fault” grounds.   While that may wind up being the reality in a court result, this will be very unpopular to get through any legislatures where repeal rather than voiding would allow for a more orderly wind-down of divorce-on-demand.

Is what SIFC has just described too remote a possibility for concern? Don’t bet on that!     Legal challenges to pending unilateral “no-fault” divorce petitions have to-date been brought before county circuit judges in several states requesting a summary dismissal of the “no-fault” petition on Article 10 / Article 3 grounds, alleging that the court does not have subject matter jurisdiction to rubber-stamp divorces based on blanket legislative mandates that neither require nor permit a genuine judicial discretion.    When that summary judgment is typically denied by the “family court” judge, this then opens up a legal route of Federal challenge outside the usual self-interested state appellate system, and cuts costs for a pro-se challenger down to manageable levels, at least until success is achieved at the first Federal level where the judge’s immunity is successfully challenged because of the lack of subject matter jurisdiction.   At this point, the state AG and organizations like the ACLU will fiercely seek to defend existing laws and entrenched financial interests, probably hoping to empty their opponent’s purse before they prevail up the legal chain to SCOTUS.     This sort of Federal appeal is also available to those whose wrongful divorce has already been finalized against their will,  and for a few years thereafter, even following an unsuccessful state constitutional challenge on 1st and 14th Amendment grounds.   These circumstances increase the possibility that constitutional challenges can be brought in numerous states (hence, Federal circuits) by people who might have deep enough pockets to sustain them, and thereby increase the likelihood that SCOTUS will see a “Federal question”,  and ultimately agree to hear a case all nine justices would probably much rather not hear.   It is also possible that as these cases gather traction in the lower Federal courts, there will be a huge push to amend state constitutions to remove the defect being challenged, by carving out a specific delegation which allows the “family courts” to carry on as usual, much easier to do (and much harder to organize effective opposition to),  on the individual state level –when the other side has control of the money, the media and the popular culture.

Clearly there needs to be a strategic and proactive discussion among the movers and shakers in the marriage permanence movement about how the aftermath of successful constitutional challenge on this basis might be optimally managed, and what sort of strategic alliances need to be cultivated ahead of such a successful development, to have a chance of preventing unilateral “no-fault” divorce from reinventing itself on state constitutions, if so overturned.

(    For comic relief, juicy details and more of the humanistic, anti-family academic mindset concerning this case, SIFC recommends Steven H. Hobbs’ “Love on the Oregon Trail:  What the Story of Maynard v Hill Teaches Us About Marriage and Democratic Self-Governance” – 2003).

“By Me kings reign, and princes decree righteousness…”
– Proverbs 8:15
www.standerinfamilycourt.com
7 Times Around the Jericho Wall | Let’s Repeal Unilateral Divorce!
Connection of Unilateral Divorce to SSM, Divorce, Equal Protection, Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, Religious freedom, Substantive Due Process

Would a Ruling that Unilateral No-Fault Divorce is Unconstitutional REALLY Be “Legislating from the Bench” ?

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by Standerinfamilycourt

The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;–to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls;–to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction;–to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party;–to Controversies between two or more States;–between a State and Citizens of another State; –between Citizens of different States, –between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.
United States Constitution, Article 3, Section 2, Clause 1

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.    United States Constitution, Article 10

Two landmark cases of the Sexual Revolution in the U.S., namely Roe v. Wade – 1973 (depriving pre-born children of their fundamental right to life), and Obergefell v. Hodges – 2015, legalizing sodomy as “marriage”, were seen by conservatives and original constructionists (with a fair amount of justification, we daresay) as “legislating from the bench”.    An extra-constitutional fundamental right (to “privacy”) was established without actually amending the Constitution via Congressional and state legislative action as called for in Article 5.    Leading up to those cases, several other cases also turned on a judicially-presumed “right of privacy”, including Eisenstadt v. Baird – 1972 (establishing the right of unmarried individuals to purchase contraceptives) and Lawrence v. Texas – 2003 (declaring state laws against sodomy “unconstitutional”).      It should be noted that the fundamental right that is explicit in the Bill of Rights is the right to freedom of association, which came to be closely associated with a presumed “privacy” right which, even worse, has come to override the priority of other conflicting fundamental rights of impacted parties, in order to arrive at some of these activist, individualist decisions that don’t comport with balancing fundamental rights in a way that is best for society as a whole.

As for prioritizing the protection of fundamental rights that inherently conflict with one another, most reasonable people would concur with the principle:  “My fundamental rights end where yours take up.”     For example, a baby’s right to life was ruled in Roe v. Wade to unduly infringe upon a woman’s right to “free association”, but is that reasonable?    A homosexual pair’s right to “free association”, protected by local SOGI laws (Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity) was ruled to have priority over a wedding professional’s free exercise of religion in a matter before the U.S. Supreme Court last year with a landmark ruling in his favor delivered in June.

SCOTUS did (effectively) rule in 2015 that homosexual couples have a fundamental right to remain married, but our unilateral divorce laws continue to deny that same fundamental right to innocent heterosexual spouses who oppose the purported “dissolution” of their marriage as profoundly harmful to their immediate and extended families’ true best interests, and significantly infringing on the family members’ rights to free association and free religious exercise.  In fact, the Petitioner’s presumed right to “free association” with an adulterous partner, and “privacy” are treated as trumping their innocent spouse’s right to free religious exercise and conscience, as well as their right to protection of property with due process of law, along with their right to protection of decades of extended family relationships.    My right to bear arms must necessarily yield to your right to life if I misuse my fundamental right in order to advance my individual selfish interest at your expense.    And so forth.

Most immoral laws and court rulings indeed result from immoral prioritization of conflicting fundamental rights – a balancing that always has been unavoidable when it comes to the Bill of Rights protections.    It is popular (and ridiculously false) to claim that “you can’t legislate morality”,  but is that not precisely what laws against murder, rape, battery, larceny and defamation actually do?   Don’t discrimination laws of all types “legislate morality” ?

C.S. Lewis famously said,

“There is no neutral ground in the universe.   Every square inch, every split second, is claimed by God and counterclaimed by Satan.”

Indeed, if someone isn’t legislating morality, it certainly doesn’t leave just a neutral vacuum.     The evidence is all around us that somebody else is surely going to be legislating immorality –and in constantly increasing amounts,  to the corrosive detriment of the whole of society.    As the morality and sense of the good of the whole thereby disintegrates, the whole nation can go down to historic ruin because immoral laws can be exceedingly difficult to reverse no matter how much vile impact they’ve produced.

This concludes the long introduction to the topic at-hand.
Our U.S. Constitution and state constitutions were designed with an intentional separation-of-powers so that the three branches,  legislative, executive and judicial, historically operated with prudent boundaries; checks-and-balances on each other.    It wasn’t perfect, but it continued to pervasively function well over a long period of time —  until the Sexual Revolution hit in full force in the 1970’s.   In addition, the concept of Federalism served to set boundaries of balance between states’ power and the power of national leaders.     Unfortunately, both of these mechanisms in recent decades have worked together to make the erosion of equal protection in marriage laws enacted with unconstitutional statutory provisions increasingly difficult to counter or overturn, at least with regard to the heterosexuals who (after all) produce the children who become the next generation of citizens.

As we’ve seen since former President Obama swept into office in 2008, it’s been a far different story with regard to homosexuals, who achieved superior protections to all other citizens, and relaxation of those legal boundaries, vis-à-vis heterosexuals .   Homosexuals have typically not been required to undertake the expensive burden of taking marriage cases through all levels of the state courts before a lower Federal court would hear and rule on the case.    Homosexuals have often been extended special privilege in overturning a state marriage law that state judiciary authorities declined to review.    By contrast, heterosexuals in modern times have been forced to bear the expensive burden of exhausting all state channels of review, with SCOTUS being the first allowed Federal  engagement point of review.   The odds of getting a constitutional challenge heard there are approximately 90 to 1 as recently reported.     Reportedly, less than 1% of the 9,000 some cases submitted for SCOTUS docketing ever make it oral arguments.    Unless at least four Justices agree to hear the case, it will never be heard, and no reason need be given.   To make matters worse, the confirmation of Neil Gorsuch to the Court revealed that the Justices had been using a “vetting pool” of clerks, rather than having their own clerks read the cases, reducing the chances of a case which so fundamentally “takes on” the Sexual Revolution having its day in highest court in the land even more remote.    To his credit, Justice Gorsuch announced that he would be joining Justice Alito in breaking with that convenience.    Most recently, Justice Kavanaugh was mum on that issue, so presumably he’s using the “cert” pool, as the now-retired Justice Kennedy did.   That means liberal clerks still probably outnumber conservative clerks in that pool, but “standerinfamilycourt” digresses except to say that even the conservative clerks are going to have an ideological bias against the perception of “legislating from the bench”.

Unfortunately, the whole concept of “legislating from the bench”,  tends to be ideologically charged.   It refers to using courts to violate the constitutional separation of powers in Articles 1 and 3, also the interference with Federalism and states’ rights prohibited by Article 10.    Our constitutional republic is gravely harmed in the clear-cut cases of “legislating from the bench” where special rights have been created for a group of people in a case precedent that will in fact deny fundamental rights to everyone else in order to implement and enforce the same.    Our constitutional republic is equally harmed when an ideological majority uses the concept as an excuse to deny fundamental rights to a group of people whose state constitutions and the Bill of Rights is supposed to guarantee them.   The latter has historically been accomplished either through applying an inappropriate standard of judicial review, or wrongfully declining to hear such a case coming from a lower level.

For example, in 1986, Florida pro-se constitutional challenger Judith Brumbaugh related in her book, “Judge, Please Don’t Strike that Gavel on My Marriage”, that she managed to get her appeal of Florida’s unilateral “no-fault” divorce law docketed at the U.S. Supreme Court.    They ultimately declined to hear the case “for want of a Federal question”.    It was striking that Judith’s request for “cert” even got docketed.   This blog has documented many earlier challenges to unilateral “no-fault” divorce laws based on religious freedom and equal protection grounds, where the state appeals courts applied the rational basis standard of review, instead of the strict scrutiny basis that is constitutionally required when fundamental rights are being denied by a state statute.   The latter requires that the states prove a compelling interest in denying those fundamental rights, and that such laws be narrowly-tailored to meet that interest in the least intrusive way upon those rights.    What tends to happen is that SCOTUS will apply Article 10 first, and say there is no “Federal question” (unless conflicting results are found in lower courts in different circuits on the same issue) even when it is clear that not only is the Bill of Rights being violated, but the state courts are tolerating wholesale violations of Articles 1 and 3, and thereby compromising the separation-of-powers between the branches of government.    What’s really happening is the actual inverse of “legislating from the bench”,  that is, taking away true judicial discretion and validating a phony cause-of-action from the floors of the state legislative bodies, while being allowed to do it through what amounts to judicial collusion and self-dealing.

Although SCOTUS intervened twice in equal protection cases involving marriage or divorce between homosexuals between 2013 and 2015, the last heterosexual divorce case “standerinfamilycourt” could find that was heard appears to be in 1996 out of Mississippi, and it involved the termination of parental rights for a mother who had suffered a divorce to which she probably acquiesced.    (Mississippi’s “no-fault” law is the only one in the country that was comprehensively enacted in 1972 so as to not force divorce on a non-consenting spouse except on a fault basis.)   The matter at issue was not even the divorce itself, but her inability to pay the transcript costs that blocked her from fighting the termination of her parental rights at the request of her now-“remarried” husband.    There was already significant precedent for the costs of access to courts not to be permitted to deny access to her avenues of initial hearing or appeal.  That case was simply remanded back to the state on that very narrow basis.

In the landmark case, Loving v Virginia (1967) there were no such concerns with violating Article 10.    The Lovings had secured the help of the ACLU to fight the state’s anti-miscegenation laws all the way up through the state appellate system in a class action suit, until certiorari was requested and granted from SCOTUS.   However, neither was there any artificial requirement imposed by SCOTUS to wait for differing outcomes in other regions of the country, lest the spurious claim be made of “want of a Federal question”.    The Supremacy Clause (Article VI, Clause 2) ….

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

….makes such assertions highly questionable when Bill of Rights protections are being denied by state legislatures to its citizens.
The sequence of events in the Loving case, as laid out in the majority SCOTUS opinion:

“On November 6, 1963, they filed a motion in the state trial court to vacate the judgment and set aside the sentence on the ground that the statutes which they had violated were repugnant to the Fourteenth Amendment. The motion not having been decided by October 28, 1964, the Lovings instituted a class action in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia requesting that a three-judge court be convened to declare the Virginia anti-miscegenation statutes unconstitutional and to enjoin state officials from enforcing their convictions. On January 22, 1965, the state trial judge denied the motion to vacate the sentences, and the Lovings perfected an appeal to the Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia. On February 11, 1965, the three-judge District Court continued the case to allow the Lovings to present their constitutional claims to the highest state court. The Supreme Court of Appeals upheld the constitutionality of the anti-miscegenation statutes and, after modifying the sentence, affirmed the convictions. The Lovings appealed this decision, and we noted probable jurisdiction on December 12, 1966…”

Fundamental rights to stay married, and to live where they wished were on the line in this case that was decided unanimously by the Justices, two and a half years before unilateral “no-fault” divorce laws began to be enacted in the various states.   While it should never be the case, the ugly reality is that the changeable prevailing morality tends to drive landmark SCOTUS decisions and fundamental rights get some lip service, but tend to take a back seat.  For more on the constitutional challenges to unilateral “no-fault” divorce  that were decided at the state level under an erroneous standard of judicial review, but never heard by SCOTUS, please click here, and here.   Several of the gay marriage cases decided in 2014 cited the right to stay married.

If subsequent state legislation conflicts with a state constitution, there is no violation of Federalism for SCOTUS to enforce the state constitution where a state supreme court denied certiorari.

First-level state appeals are required to be heard, but are sometimes dismissed on technicalities, and hearings for state Supreme Court appeals can be declined without comment, simply based on the number of cases submitted, with “standerinfamilycourt’s” constitutional attorney advising that the state Supreme Court might hear perhaps 5% of the few thousand appeals submitted each session.   Given the influence-peddling on the state level for states that have an elected judiciary, which was ongoing both before and after the jaw-dropping Citizens United ruling by SCOTUS (money is “speech”), it is important, in theory at least, to have an unobstructed path to SCOTUS.    Appellate decisions at the state level, and demonstrably also by SCOTUS, are becoming almost uniformly ideological rather than independent, with the effect that constitutional checks-and-balances between the branches of government are becoming ever-weaker, and stare decisis (ruling by precedent) is pretty much a joke these days.   While in a rare instance there might be a favorable individual challenge where the ruling would be limited in its impact to the law as applied to just that case,  no state appellate court wants to invalidate 50 years worth of unconstitutional marriage dissolutions by admitting the laws are unconstitutional on their face, knowing the social chaos that would result, so these courts will be duplicitous in avoiding ever being put in a situation where they would have to so rule.    Some basis is going to have the be found for taking a constitutional challenge up through the Federal court system despite the long history of being barred from doing so by Article 10 arguments.

In one sense, given the long history of barriers and difficulty of getting any true appellate justice in 1st and 14th Amendment-based challenges to unilateral “no-fault” divorce laws, either on the state or Federal levels, the question of whether it would be “legislating from the bench” to declare them unconstitutional on this basis might seem like a moot or futile question.    However, if judges could be sued in Federal court because they ruled while having no true subject matter jurisdiction due to the Article 3 violations entailed in the statute, then this might suddenly become a very relevant question.    As this post is being written, the theory that state divorce statutes unconstitutionally strip judges of the discretion required by Article 3 is being tested in Federal court in several states.    As soon as some initial outcomes are available, the updates will be the subject of a future post.

Then I will draw near to you for judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers and against the adulterers and against those who swear falsely, and against those who oppress the wage earner in his wages, the widow and the orphan, and those who turn aside the alien and do not fear Me,” says the Lord of hosts.   “For I, the Lord, do not change; therefore you, O sons of Jacob, are not consumed.
– Malachi 3: 5-6

www.standerinfamilycourt.com

7 Times Around the Jericho Wall  | Let’s Repeal “No-Fault” Divorce!

 

citizenship, Divorce, Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, Lost culture, morality, Substantive Due Process

Dear Texas Lawmakers: A Guest Blog

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– by Kristi  Davis

Dear Members of the Texas State Committee on Juvenile Justice and Family Issues:

I came before you in March of 2017 to testify for HB93 for the repeal of no-fault divorce laws in Texas. My testimony can be viewed online on your website.

Now I would like to present to you an analogy to help bring better understanding of what you are allowing when you have allowed no-fault divorce to continue in our state.

You received your privilege of representing people of our state when those people exercised their privilege to vote and voted for you. You chose to run; they chose to vote. The result is the seat you are now sitting in. All this took place because there are rules in place to create a healthy environment for us to “do government”.

So please imagine this chaotic scenario:

What would you think if one of your constituents walked into the Capitol Building one day and declared that you were no longer their choice for office and must be removed?  This person is not just any constituent; this person voted for you.

And what would you think if they had the erroneous right and ability to remove you simply by making a subjective statement on how they no longer like this relationship you are now in, as voter and representative?

Imagine they could simply file a complaint at the information desk which would guarantee the issue be brought up on the House floor in front of everyone. There really is no need to discuss the issue on the floor, after all, because they need no reason for your removal.  And you will have no opportunity to object to their statement because your side of the story need not be heard. How can you defend yourself, really, when you have not been accused of doing any wrong? The situation has nothing to do with your work performance, anyway. It all comes down to their whims and singular feelings about your relationship. They no longer want you in your seat. That is all that is needed.

What if you wanted to keep your seat? After all, this one voter does not represent your whole constituency; others are involved!
I regret to tell you, the rules were changed years ago that allow one voter, any one voter, to remove you at any time for no reason other than their feelings, and there is nothing you can do to stop it. Once the voter objects, your job is gone and your career is over. The entire process can be completed in as little as two months’ time, because we wouldn’t want to inconvenience the public with the legal bill to defend your job.

Please remember: this voter also has access to everything you own and all your private information. They can walk into your office at any time and take your computer, read your emails, force your aides to speak against you, even take over your office and lock your door! They can force your aides to become their aides and work for their campaign to elect someone else in your place. You cannot stop it. But then again, why would you? Even though they voluntarily entered this relationship and chose to vote, you wouldn’t want to force someone to stay enslaved in this voter/representative relationship, would you?

This process could take place at any time, with any representative, as many times as a person would choose, ad nauseum.

Representatives could be shuffled in and out of office the whole session long. I know that making laws is why you are in office, that’s your job, but it’s ok if your job never gets done due to these personal whims of one person. Sure, the whole of the public would pay the price, but aren’t this individual’s desires more important? The courts say this is in the best interest of all your constituents, though years of research would say they are exactly wrong.

Would you think this public policy is not such a great one and needs to be amended or removed?

What would you do if the media folks showed up and opposed your efforts to change these policies? They would make a handsome living off broadcasting these voter objections at the Capitol, after all. But they would not say that out loud; instead, they will tell you that you are being selfish and old-fashioned. They would say that the law is now in the eye of the beholder, subject to redefinition by anyone living under it. Would you be “ok” with that?

Chaos.

Can you imagine this sort of logic applied to every area of law? If it can happen to the most fundamental and important of relationships- family ties, human beings- why not apply to it to everything else, because everything else is less important?
This matter could not be more serious.

Where do we draw the line? Where do you draw the line?
You may think my analogy sounds impossible, but that is what people of 50 years ago thought of the idea of a society where people dissolve marriage and family with the click of a button, literally.
If you do not stop this nonsense here, this analogy that sounds impossible today could be the way of life tomorrow. You are in the position to draw the line.

Let’s reestablish a healthy environment to “do family”; support healthy family relationships by requiring contested divorce cases to be brought for real reasons and every case to be heard thoroughly by a judge. If doing what is in the best interest of the children is really valued at all in this legislature, I implore you to leave hypocrisy behind and protect family by repealing unilateral divorce.

Most sincerely,
Kristi Davis
Texas Citizen
3-Time (Generational) Divorce  Sufferer under No-Fault Divorce in Texas

(    SIFC:   Kristi Davis testified on March 8, 2017 before this Texas Legislative Committee where at least three committee members actually derive income, either directly or indirectly, from unilateral divorce laws.   She has recently launched a blog page called  Healing and Repealing for Strong Family Trees – www.healingandrepealing.com  )

 

 

Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, Lost culture, morality, Religious freedom, Substantive Due Process

SCOWI’s For Sale – So Who’s Buying?

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by Standerinfamilycourt

The wicked accept bribes in secret [well…obscurity, anyway]
    to pervert the course of justice.     –  Proverbs 17:23

A bribe is a charm in the sight of its owner;
            Wherever he turns, he prospers.   – Proverbs 17:8

And you shall take no bribe, for a bribe blinds the clear-sighted and subverts the cause of those who are in the right.    –  Exodus 23:8

“standerinfamilycourt”  moved a couple of years ago, compelled by financial circumstances imposed by a “family law” court, to the neighboring state, where the cost of living is considerably less than the state of our now-sold marital residence.    This state has a news organization that believes in sponsoring and televising political debates between judicial candidates, in this case, for a 10-year re-electable seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court.   The politically-correct line about this office is that it is “non-partisan”.   However, one did not need to watch much of this debate to quickly identify the “liberal” and the “conservative” candidates, as it were.    The sad fact of our crumbling democracy and society is that many judicial decisions are made ideologically, regardless of the traditional lore, rhetoric and precedents to the contrary.

It also appears that in the last few years, the decisions are moving in the direction of becoming more ideological rather than less ideological.    According to the public interest organization, Justice At Stake, from 2000-2009, fundraising by state Supreme Court candidates soared to $206.9 million, more than doubling the $83.3 million raised in the 1990s.   Note that this measurement period ended just before SCOTUS handed down the landmark big money decision,  Citizens United v FEC, which is discussed below.   While this blog post is a fairly detailed discussion of the skunkworks in one  particular state, it is likely that any of the 20+ states with elected judges and justices will have the same special interest obstructions to true constitutional justice for the average citizen, to the extent that the remedy sought would conflict with the special interests of the donor class inside and outside that state.

Being a firm believer (from hard experience) that these days, there cannot possibly be “too much” light shed on the judiciary and on the dubious process of electing its “public servants”, this voting citizen dutifully watched the entire hour of debate very attentively, and was quite grateful, if woefully disheartened, at the rare opportunity to do so.   The dominant issue in this debate was, who all was buying the most influence, and from whom.     Some may “take issue” with the notion of a political donation being compared with a bribe, and in fact, many donations do not function as bribes.   The problem is with the concentration of those that are clearly so, in this climate of the past few years, where most of the integrity of the judiciary has been steadily evaporating to the point where most key decisions, especially those touching the Sexual Revolution are indeed ideological.     We in the marriage permanence community need to also keep ever-mindful that some of the most key decisions are hidden, and not even required to be published or justified with a stated reason:   quite notably, whether or not to even hear an appeals case brought before the highest court in the state.    

There have been calls for SCOTUS  Justices to have their life appointments curtailed, and even for them to be elected rather than appointed, especially in the wake of corrosive and overbearing decisions like Roe v. Wade,   Lawrence v Texas, Citizens United v FEC,  Employment Board v. Smith,  and Obergefell v Hodges.   which legalized all of the following by high court ideological fiat:

– abortion
– sodomy
– money as “speech”
– countermanding the 1st Amendment fundamental protection of free religious exercise on the state and Federal levels, leading to the need for individual states to adopt RFRA’s, which directly resulted in state-by-state inequality of that Bill of Rights protection
– gay “marriage”

As frustrating as these ideological travesties of justice were (some of the very worst of them conservatively-decided, by the way), a better solution needs to be found that does not hamstring or sabotage the separation-of-powers our founders so wisely designed-in.    My theory is that elected judicial candidates provide no advantage over appointed candidates, and may have effectively placed the latter for purchase by the highest bidder, especially in the wake of Citizens United, which declared inanimate greenbacks to be 1st Amendment-protected “free speech”.    That’s right, since 2010 the “green stamps” in the corporate and PAC wallets have been deemed more worthy of 1st Amendment protections by the highest court in the land than human Respondents in a unilateral divorce lawsuit (since SCOTUS has a long history of refusing to hear constitutional challenges of unilateral divorce laws in the decades since their state-by-state enactment).

As noted earlier by the organization Justice At Stake, most states which have an elected, term-limited judiciary created this special-interest situation long before 2010, and to be transparent, the big donors to these elective offices didn’t have many limits that the Citizens case materially changed (at least in Wisconsin), as we shall see in the process of breaking down the donor-categories and amounts given to these two competing “non-partisan” candidates in the state of Wisconsin.   As responsible citizens, however, we still need to be aware of the increasing potential for big money from in-state and out-of-state special interests to literally purchase a state judicial election, since the door has now swung wide open for them to do so:

The United States Supreme Court held (5–4) on January 21, 2010 that the free speech clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution prohibits the government from restricting independent expenditures for communications by nonprofit corporations, for-profit corporations, labor unions, and other associations.  –  Wikipedia

As recently reported by Matthew Rothschild -Wisconsin Democracy Campaign Executive Director,

“Before  [2015 legislative change], the most a candidate for the state supreme court could receive from all committees combined was $140,156. So the candidate could accept $140,156 from the Republican Party of Wisconsin, but then the candidate could not accept a single dime from any other committee.

“Now the sky is the limit. Political parties can now give unlimited amounts of money to candidates of their choice.

“To make matters worse, before the 2015 rewrite, the most that a rich individual could give to a political party was $10,000. Now a rich individual can give unlimited amounts of money to a political party.

“With both of these ceilings torn down, a billionaire could give $10 million to a political party, and that party could then turn around and spend that $10 million on the billionaire’s favorite candidate for the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

“This makes a mockery of the limits on direct donations to candidates for Wisconsin Supreme Court, which used to be $10,000 and now is $20,000 (itself a ridiculously high sum).”

So, whose bidding will the two opposing candidates be doing, once elected?     For those who didn’t take time to watch the debate video linked above, here’s a brief synopsis (financial figures are from the site Wisconsin Democratic Campaign, a follow-the-money disclosure site, as reported through March 11, 2018):

“Non-partisan” Progressive –  Rebecca Dallet*  (please click to enlarge detail)

*Note:  Dallet donated $200,000 to her own campaign, $35,000 more than her opponent’s entire fundraising result, to-date.   These funds have been excluded from the analysis for a fairer comparison of supporters.     Even so, her overall donated funds are more than twice her opponent’s.   Close to $200,000 alone has come from the practicing or retired legal community, easily 50% of her outside fundraising, with the biggest firm donors in the personal injury, energy or corporate practice areas.    Her other major special interest donor categories include commercial business interests in Real Estate, Banking and Non-Profits. All of the donations for Dallet in the “Political / Ideological” category were $500 or under, except for the Brico Fund – $5,000, which appears to be a feminist organization focused on girls, and more recently, environmental and “social justice” issues (excluding, of course, Bill of Rights protections of unilateral divorce Respondents and the right-to-life of pre-born citizens).

PAC contributions to or expended on behalf of Dallet appear to be immaterial, but tellingly there’s one special interest group who is spending significant money in her behalf based on a perceived need for her support:

Note:  the first group listed has expended 40% more in favor of her opponent’s campaign.   The second group has expended $116K and is the subject of heated controversy in the state, justifiably so.

Overall, about $32K or about  9% of Dallet’s fundraising came from out-of-state sources.    Note: On April 3, 2018, Dallet did emerge as the successful candidate in the General Election.

“Non-partisan” Conservative –  Michael Screnock (please click to enlarge detail)


Between 30 and 40% of Screnock’s coffers have been filled with donations from the active or retired legal community, but this is not as easy to gauge because Dallet’s retired donors were listed as such, example: “retired judge“, whereas Screnock’s retirees and public servant donors were not.    His largest direct campaign donor was his father, who is a currently-practicing family law attorney in Wisconsin, contributing just under the $20K current legal limit established in 2015 by the legislature.    A corporate law firm contributed another $15K.

Unlike the case with his liberal opponent, G.O.P. PAC contributions were significant and helped make “non-partisan” Screnock’s primary campaign financially competitive with Dallet’s mega-war chest.    About $5K or about 3.5% of Screnock’s fundraising came from out-of-state sources, compared with Dallet’s 9%.

The current controversy involving SCOWI (and specifically, candidate Dallet) is over the toothless Justice recusal policy, given the large campaign donations by a PAC interested in the state redistricting / gerrymandering activities.     As it stands, there is nothing except honor or integrity to compel a Justice to recuse themselves from a matter directly involving a campaign donor entity, even right after they have made a very large contribution.    What if a serious challenge to the constitutionality of the state’s unilateral divorce law came before SCOWI, and some of the Justices had taken campaign donations from the American Bar Association?  Or from the ACLU, or the Lambda Foundation?    Wisconsin reportedly has the weakest recusal policy in the country, so this begs the question of why?    If Justices recused themselves, as integrity truly demands, from cases involving the interests of large donors, would those campaign finance contributions continue to flow?   One good way to find out is to reform the recusal rules.

 

Have we structurally landed in a place where only certain citizens are entitled to constitutional fundamental protections, regardless of the liberal or conservative makeup of the court, specifically, those who don’t oppose the fee-rich business-as-usual operation of the Sexual Revolution?

So, how much impact has the Citizens United decision actually had on judicial campaign funding in Wisconsin?    Is there a reasonable way to measure?     For example, can we get an idea by comparing the reported campaign finances of Justices first elected before 2010, and re-elected in 2010 or after?

For each of the three sitting Justices first elected prior to 2010, then re-elected after 2010, an analysis similar to those presented above on the candidates was done, but contrasting the earlier election funding and donors with the most recent funding and donors.    This is also contrasted with the funding and donations for the 2009 last campaign of the only Justice who hasn’t stood for re-election since 2010 because her term isn’t up until next year.    A summary of observations and trends is given based on the individual analysis, for each Justice examined.    In all cases, the Justice’s personal funds donated to the campaign was removed and disregarded in the overall figures so that only external fundraising in considered in the analysis.   Those self-contributed figures also tell an important story, but need to be examined separately.

Chief Justice Patience Drake Roggensack*, 2003/2013
(Conservative)
Summary:  2013 fundraising was nearly six-fold versus 2003, or $688,000 versus $119,000.  In 2013, just under $38,000 (under 2%) was raised from out-of-state sources, and did include business interests, compared with a little over $16,000 (13%) in 2003.  Law firms and lobbyists (yes, I did indeed just say, lobbyists) accounted for 25% of fundraising in 2003, which was similar proportionally to 2013.  The next largest 2003 donor category was Manufacturing at 17% but reduced in 2013 to only 8% of the total figures.  After that, Banking, General Business, Construction, and Health Professionals each accounted for 10%-12% of fundraising in 2003 – and each of these reduced their share by roughly half of the 2003 totals (proportionally) in 2013 while actually donating 3 or 4 times as much in 2013 as in 2003.   Donors categorized as Political / Ideological interests, primarily “school choice”, donated 13% of the total in 2003 versus only 3% of the total in 2013.  Aside from the six-fold rise in campaign costs and fundraising, the other big trend in the post-Citizens United election was the dramatic increase, from 6% to 13%, in donations from the Retired/Homemakers / Non-Income Earners, only $6,000 in 2003 but $91,000 in 2013.  In other judicial campaigns in the state, this group tends to be dominated by retired attorneys and their wives.  The final observation is the emergence of eight new industries donating to the 2013 campaign that were not present in the 2003 campaign, none of which accounted for more than 3% each, including Agriculture, Defense, Education, Insurance, Institutional Health, Natural Resources, Real Estate, and Transportation.
Finally, it should be noted that Justice Roggensack was the first Chief Justice selected by her peers on the court following a law change (2015) that allowed it, instead of the role falling to the most senior justice, prior to that year. Roggensack’s last re-election fell two years prior to her selection as Chief Justice.   In perspective, her 2013 war chest almost twice that of first-time successful 2018 candidate Rebecca Dallet, and was more than four times greater than the unsuccessful 2018 candidate.  Both women donated about $200,000 to their own most recent campaigns.

Justice Ann Walsh Bradley* 1985 / 2015
(Liberal)
Summary:   Again, we see a $600,000+ campaign for 2015, versus only a $29,000 campaign in 2005.   Bradley donated none of her own funds to her 2015 campaign and only $500 to the earlier campaign.   Out-of-state funds, mostly from retired attorneys and spouses amounted to $12,000 in 2015 and none in 2005.    As was the case with the liberal 2018 candidate, Rebecca Dallet, law firms and retired attorneys made up approximately 50% of total outside donations in both the early and the more recent campaign.    As we also saw with the 2013 Roggensack campaign, several industries significantly ramped up their contributions, as did the labor unions and other liberal political causes in 2015.    Contributions by law firms seem to be escalating as an indirect effect of Citizens United in an effort to proportionally maintain their accustomed pre-2010 level of influence, with all the new special interests entering the campaign funding arena.

Justice Annette Kingsland Ziegler*  2007/2017
(Conservative)

Annette Zeigler’s initial SCOWI campaign costs apparently topped $1 million way back in 2007, and she contributed $840,000 to her own war chest, while raising over $500,000 from external donors.   Since she only raised $360,000 for the 2017 reprise, without having to contribute any further personal funds, it appears she was able to carry quite a surplus over from the prior campaign.    Still, her 2007 initial campaign was far more expensive than any of her peers to that point, and more expensive than any since.    Unlike most of her judicial peers, practicing attorney firms did not dominate her fundraising (just 8% and 9%, respectively), but there’s a strong likelihood that the retired, out-of-state legal community made up for it, and may have brought the legal community’s stake to something more like 25% or more in both campaigns.

The other Justice (Rebecca) Bradley was first elected in 2016 on a $900,000 campaign of which (rather oddly) nearly $200,000 was raised from retired and non-income-earning citizens, and Justice Kelly was appointed to fill an unexpired term, so their campaigns were not studied.    Dallet replaces a conservative retiring Justice Michael Gableman, elected in 2008, whose campaign was not studied, since Abrahamson’s 2009 campaign serves as the pre-Citizens United comparator.    Overall, his 2008 campaign ran slightly more than $300,000 of which only about 15% was funded by lawyers and lobbyists.   He contributed less than $1,600 to his own campaign, mostly in petty cash items of odd amounts.

Justice Shirley S. Abrahamson**, 1979/2009
(Liberal)
On the heels of  Annette Ziegler’s  $1 million + run in 2007, former Chief Justice Abrahamson raised nearly $1.3 million for her third (and by far, most expensive) re-election campaign in 2009, the year before the Citizens United decision was handed down by SCOTUS.    Of this, Justice Abrahamson contributed nearly $100,000 of her own funds that year.   Out of State contributions amounted to about $35,000, from mostly businesses and political interests. The term for this successful run expires next year, 2019.    This data indicates that rather than Citizens United being the cause of the ramp-up in special interest funding of judicial campaigns, this democracy-toxic SCOTUS decision may have, in part at least, been actually driven by these conditions.

(please click to enlarge details)

From this, we clearly see that the trend toward domination by law firms (and legal industry retirees) of the overall campaign funding had its explosion prior to Citizens United, especially for “progressive” candidates.    Could it have been that the landmark SCOTUS decision was a reactionary move on the part of the conservative Justices to this trend in Wisconsin and other major states?    There was an abundance of twists, turns, reassignments and re-arguments in this case, including (or possibly accommodating) a very controversial reversal of process by the conservative majority to broaden the scope of their ruling from the narrow question originally brought before them, and profuse, circular, contorted reasoning to justify doing so in the final Kennedy majority opinion, which could hardly be in reference to anything but the impact on judicial elections and the separation of powers overall.

There is certainly plenty of evidence in Justice Stephens’ dissenting opinion that the impact on judicial elections was indeed debated among the Justices:

“ And it underscores that the consequences of today’s holding will not be limited to the legislative or executive context. The majority of the States select their judges through popular elections. At a time when concerns about the conduct of judicial elections have reached a fever pitch, see, e.g., O’Connor, Justice for Sale, Wall St. Journal, Nov. 15, 2007, p. A25; Brief for Justice at Stake et al. as Amici Curiae 2, the Court today unleashes the floodgates of corporate and union general treasury spending in these races. Perhaps “ Caperton motions” will catch some of the worst abuses. This will be small comfort to those States that, after today, may no longer have the ability to place modest limits on corporate electioneering even if they believe such limits to be critical to maintaining the integrity of their judicial systems. …”

Quoting former SCOTUS Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s 2010 unofficial commentary (she left the court in 2006),

“[After Citizens United], we can anticipate labor unions’ trial lawyers might have the means to win one kind of an election, and that a tobacco company or other corporation might win in another election. If both sides open up their spending, mutually assured destruction is probably the most likely outcome. It would end both judicial impartiality and public perception of impartiality.”

Stepping back for a look at the “big picture”, it almost goes without saying that if massive special interest donations deliberately and intentionally (according to the SCOTUS majority) drive judicial elections, particularly dominated (as it apparently stands) from the practicing and retired legal community, calling these judgeships “nonpartisan” is a sham that borders on insulting the intelligence of the citizenry.    Indeed, “standerinfamilycourt” is a very new resident of Wisconsin, yet was able to reliably tell whether each candidate was conservative or liberal just by looking at the donor list.   Furthermore, the  “donor class” forking over the big money didn’t exactly get where they are today by personal oblivion and recklessness with their money.   If they didn’t firmly believe, despite the rhetoric and propaganda, that all judges and justices these days “legislate from the bench”,  and (even worse) uphold constitutionally-offensive legislation regardless of the merits of the case before them, they would keep their wallets and purses firmly zipped.   Even more telling is the staggering amount of money successful individual judicial candidates contributed to their own campaigns, particularly re-election campaigns, sometimes amounting to almost three times the amount that their entire first campaign took in from all contributors.  Who would do this if they didn’t realistically expect a serious financial return on those funds over the course of their 10 year term?

Indeed, the separation-of-powers damage left in Wisconsin in the wake of Citizens United is further exacerbated because SCOWI has installed some of the most toothless recusal rules in the entire country — and the majority on that bench has the final say, despite two enacted statutes intending otherwise.    A group of retired judges brought a petition in 2017 for reform of the recusal rules.  Emboldened by the constitutional hijacking in the Citizens United case, conservatives who control the Wisconsin court said the proposal would “interfere with the free speech rights” of those who run ads and engage in other campaign-like activity.

“I believe as a matter of law it cannot stand constitutional or structural scrutiny,” Justice Annette Ziegler said of the proposed rule. ,

“The petitioners here have asked us to do something that does not comport with the constitution as I view it.”     As she views it: that is, through the fouled lens of her nearly $1 million 2007 investment in her own career, upon which it “isn’t constitutional” to deny her the maximum pecuniary returns that the market will bear.  But Ziegler here goes a step further than even Anthony Kennedy, since the issue she so glibly applied Citizens United to is recusal: in so doing, is she not intrinsically saying that not only must the political bribes be protected as “speech”,  but the eventual effectiveness of the quid-pro-quo (from her contributors) must also be guaranteed through her own actual speech?   Is it rocket science to predict what would happen to the level of those donations if their degree of illicit influence was diluted?  It is against this kind of backdrop that the arrogance of the court is unmistakable in the further comment by the conservative majority that the petition for reform was “disrespectful” of the foxes guarding the henhouse.

 

Solutions, Anyone?

As we’ve seen,  there is no longer any such thing as a “non-partisan” judicial election (if there ever was), just as there is no such thing as a “no-fault” divorce.    Both are political myths that the public swallows without much insight — until they and their family personally get burned.    Those states who have such systems, or have partisan elections, including Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Texas and Washington, have effectively waived the separation-of-powers check and balance, until they take action to adjust to Citizens United, and to any additional damage their legislatures may have done in response under the “guidance” that “money is speech”.      Twenty four states were reported as of 2016 to have an appointment system for selecting judges and justices and / or retention elections.   California, New York and Utah are among these.

 Justices should be appointed, according to Justice At Stake, at least at the top level, making it likely this would require some states to amend their constitutions.   The fact that lower appellate court judges (who are required to hear all appeals), currently know that big money is going to dictate who’s on the state’s highest court, and it inevitably reduces their independence and objectivity as they would normally seek to avoid having their decisions overturned can now predict ahead of time where they will not be overturned, just by who campaign donors were.   Ditto for trial judges further down the chain.

The policy think-tank, the Brennan Center contended in a 2010 white paper that the most effective national remedy for self-dealing, in a “money is speech” world, is public funding of judicial elections.  Wisconsin seems to be a classic case study in why this recommendation actually resolved very little.   That very year, Wisconsin enacted legislation doing just that.    A 2011 paper by The Brennan Center extols the reduction in such contributions afforded by the availability of public funds that resulted from the reform, which provided $400,000 to candidates voluntarily availing themselves of those funds, touting the 2010 contest between incumbent Justice Prosser and challenger Judge JoAnne Kloppenburg.   We’ve seen with several examples where actual partisan contributions in the seven-figure range in Wisconsin dwarfed that amount long before enactment of public financing.    After enactment, the availability of these modest public funds indeed reduced partisan donations from the typical seven figures to  the high six figures in most races that followed.    It seems a bit more of a stretch to argue that this modest result changed too much, in the scheme of things.  Citizens United, after all, guaranteed that the two systems must now coexist, and independent direct media spend by special interest groups favoring a candidate outside of campaign contributions can easily dwarf both categories.

Wisconsin media liberals have a different “fix” to tout, namely a sixteen year term with a one-term limit.    “standerinfamilycourt” fails to see where this proposal addresses any of the underlying evils that result from the current scheme.    Although sixteen years might reasonably occupy one half to one third of a jurist’s remaining career, will it improve his or her independence in a world where, even without re-election pressures, half of the funds that won the seat came from fellows in the legal profession?    Unlikely.

Judicial corruption amounting to the breakdown of constitutional separation-of-powers impacts the integrity of the biblical family more severely by far, and with far more lasting national consequence, than arguably any other area of life or commerce.    Unilateral family-shredding for profit is a sadly bi-partisan affair, since legal practitioners on both sides of the political aisle profit handsomely therefrom.    Law firms dominate the election funding process only  to a slightly greater degree for leftist jurists than for “conservative” jurists, and one does not need to favor a traditional family structure to still be deemed a “conservative”.    Finally, unlike virtually every other kind of constitutional violation under the sun, no-fault marriage “dissolution” cases are effectively cordoned off from recourse to the Federal courts unless there are homosexuals involved.

Given that the checks and balances in our constitutional republic functioned fairly well for the 200 years before the moral breakdown of society rendered it substantially less able to raise unselfish citizens who are motivated by the long term public interest, national repentance before God, and according to His standards, is likely to be a necessary part of reforms that will ultimately succeed.    When a nation persistently thumbs its nose at His commandments, He simply removes His hand of protection, and after many opportunities to repent, He finally gives them over to their own self-destructive ways.

The elders are gone from the city gate;
    the young men have stopped their music.
Joy is gone from our hearts;
    our dancing has turned to mourning.
The crown has fallen from our head.
    Woe to us, for we have sinned!
– Lamentations 5:14-16


www.standerinfamilycourt.com

7 Times Around the Jericho Wall |  Let’s Repeal No-Fault Divorce!

 

 

citizenship, Connection of Unilateral Divorce to SSM, Discipleship, Divorce, Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, Lost culture, marriage, morality, Religious freedom, Spiritual Warfare, Substantive Due Process

Heads Up, Alabama – Here Comes a Liberal, Anti-Family Trojan Horse!

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Wedding Cake Pulverized
by Standerinfamilycourt

On January 17, 2018, Texas MassResistance (an offshoot of a Massachusetts-based pro-family organization that does aggressive battle with the comprehensive LGBT political agenda)  posted an article to their Facebook page from AL.com,

Alabama Senate Passes Bill to Eliminate Marriage Licenses

with the following Facebook comments:

“It’s sad to see a state opt out of licensing marriage, but the truth is real marriage as a legal construct essentially ceased to exist with the legalization of gay marriage. It’s like removing the legal distinction between real money and play money. Real money means nothing once play money becomes legal tender– and everyone is made poorer– even counterfeiters– same story on gay marriage.

“Gays kid themselves if they think they their marriages are of the same substance as marriage prior to gay marriage. Put a drop of fine wine from a wine bottle into a bottle of sewer water and you still have a bottle of wine and a bottle of sewer water, but put a drop of sewer water into a bottle of fine wine and you have two bottles of sewer water. Things of higher value are diminished or destroyed altogether when mixed with things of lower value. Alabama’s move to eliminate marriage licenses recognizes that reality– MR-T”

With a few days’ delay, we noticed a re-post of this on the Facebook wall by a friend of our blog page who lives in Texas, and we commented to MassResistance on their page as follows:

FB profile 7xtjw  SIFC:
“There are two conscionable alternatives to dealing with civil law that no longer coincides with God’s law in any respect:

(1) pastors opt out of participating in the civil system as an agent for the state (example: the 2014 First Things Marriage Pledge)
(2) what Alabama is seeking to do

“Although some 800+ pastors from a wide variety of denominations had signed the Marriage Pledge by two months after Obergefell, nearly 3 years later, few have had the moral courage to make good on it. We have a pretty good idea why not — wrong motives, and the sudden delayed realization of what that might do to the ability of heterosexuals to do what God forbids and get a state “dissolution” decree.
So, that leaves Option 2.

“We humbly remind that God’s definition of marriage (Matt.19:4-6) has TWO non-negotiable elements, not just one – as the tone of this post strongly implies. Those elements are: (1) complementarity, and (2) indissolubility.   Hence, the adulteration of that wine bottle started to take place 48 years ago, not in 2015, two generations later.
Jesus said, “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and render unto God the things that are God’s”. He told us that Holy Matrimony does not happen except by God’s hand.  It’s therefore quite suspect that the Reformation humanists, Martin Luther in particular, saw fit to hand over to the state that which belonged to God in the first place. Count on God not to allow this issue to dissipate until His full definition of marriage is honored, and pastors from coast to coast repent of whining about sodomy-as-“marriage” while carefully preserving consecutive polygamy-as-holy-matrimony.

“It will be interesting to see, if this progresses to become law, how they continue to issue ‘dissolutions’. It’s probably pretty simple to substitute their affidavits for marriage certificates when it comes to finding another unilateral home invasion warrant, but how will they handle the gory details?  Option 1 would have denied them the piece of paper usable as such a “warrant” in a substantial number of cases.”

MassResistance gave a very gracious response to our comment, which we will leave the readers to reference on their own.

Of course, Alabama is the infamous state of dethroned State Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore, who was removed from the bench in 2016 on ethics charges because he issued an administrative order to lower court judges stating, “until further decision by the Alabama Supreme Court, the existing orders of the Alabama Supreme Court that Alabama probate judges have a ministerial duty not to issue any marriage license contrary to the Alabama Sanctity of Marriage Amendment or the Alabama Marriage Protection Act remain in full force and effect….”   citing the fundamental right of these judges to conscience protections and free religious exercise in declining to issue civil marriage licenses to homosexuals.   (Presumably, these same judges had no serious compunctions or religious conscience issues with issuing civil marriage licenses to would-be legalized adulterers in the years since 1975 enactment of Alabama’s unilateral divorce laws.   Moore is himself “married” to a civilly-“divorced” woman.)    Apparently, for all the smoke-blowing that ensued to remove Moore, his successor on the bench has not reversed the 2016 administrative order after almost two years, the lingering effect being as stated in the AL.com article:

“Under current law, Alabama probate judges are not required to issue marriage licenses and some, at least initially, declined to issue licenses to same-sex couples after the Supreme Court ruling.

“Albritton’s bill would take away any discretion by probate judges. The only requirement to make a marriage official would be to submit the documents to the probate judge.”

Take away the discretion of judges….does this sound familiar?   It should indeed!    This is exactly how brutal totalitarianism came to be injected into “family court” processes and procedures to implement unilateral divorce, without raising a whimper of public protest even though the 1st and 14th amendment protections were being stripped from millions of Americans in the process.    Legislating immorality has always been a stealth process — and in the past five decades, it has come to work flawlessly…intractably.

The gay “marriages” taking place in Alabama in this long interim have  only been enabled where LGBT-sympathetic judges are willing to issue the civil marriage licenses to same-sex couples.    Several counties are reportedly not issuing them at all.

SB13’s sponsor, Greg Albritton appears to be a liberal Republican, according to a 2016 voting scorecard published by the American Conservative Union, where he scored 58%,  the lowest of all of his GOP peers, and equaling the score of the highest scoring Democrat in the Alabama Senate.    His bill passed a fast-tracked and astounding floor vote of 19-1 in mid-January, and the ACLU published their analysis stating that they do not consider it a threat to liberal interests, so they are not taking a position on it.    This is a strong, red flag that the measure is not expected to be supportive of biblical, traditional families, since it is not drawing ACLU opposition.  The full text of SB13 (about 9 pages) can be read here.

At first blush, it should seem like a dream-come-true that the state might be giving back to God the authority over the holy ordinance that He never delegated to fallible, carnal men in civil government….

“So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no [human] separate”…..He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way. ”
– Matthew 19:6, 8

However, there is an ominous poison-pill:   it will no longer be necessary to have vows or a public ceremony should these bills become law.

Jesus pointed back to the first wedding in the Garden for the essentials of God-joined holy matrimony….

And He answered and said, “Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his FATHER and MOTHER and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?

 So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place.  The Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man.  The man said,

“This is now bone of my bones,
And flesh of my flesh;
She shall be called Woman,
Because she was taken out of Man.”

For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.

– Matthew 19:4-5;  Genesis 2:21-24

Elements present in the Garden wedding between Adam and Eve:   eligible partners without prior, estranged spouses still living, consent, vows, witnesses (Jesus and the serpent),  and God’s supernatural, instantaneous act of (Greek : sunexuezen) joining.

Elements absent in the Garden wedding:  civil paper and a human officiant.

We all know that the unholy 16th century transaction between church and state authority was a foul fruit of the humanistic Reformers, principally, of Martin Luther who sought access to that which God expressly forbid through Jesus Christ, namely, divorce via a man-made declaration of “dissolution”, rather than the physical death of a spouse.    What appears on the surface to be a “taking back” of authority from civil government is actually a mirage in the case of these bills.    The texts of these bills SB13 and (pending) HB162 both explicitly provide that there will be no change to the statute with regard to divorce or child “welfare” provisions.     Unless there is civil paper of some sort, no unilateral divorces nor totalitarian interference with parental rights would be possible.   Hence, a more controlled piece of paper on the front-end, is being swapped for a piece of civil paper with far fewer controls, but effecting all the same state intrusion into the sanctity of the home. The uber-liberal take on this makes for some interesting reading, as well.

In the absence of a requirement for a witnessed ceremony, documentation of consent, and vows,  the effect is that common law marriages are being given the same legal status as holy matrimony unions.    In other words, a second category of legalized, adulterous unions is being created that essentially legalizes fornication as well as adultery.     Absorbed into the longstanding moral vacuum of the contemporary church, the effect on marital stability will be devastating to family structure over time, in the same way that rampant “remarriage” has been.      To be sure, pastors will still require the traditional ceremony for the weddings they do, and will continue their evil practice of performing the same over the already married-for-life.    But equally sure is the fact that in addition to the legalized adulterers whom they now welcome into their congregations (no questions asked), they will be welcoming a new group of folks likewise not married in God’s eyes – those who have made no vows before Him.   As an added bonus, pastors will be relieved of the offense to conscience from signing civil marriage licenses that reflect an immoral civil standard.

STATUS , at this writing
Alabama Overview

The enacted result, should it come to pass:

– Win for the judges who no longer have a conscience conflict with their jobs (but still should, if they call themselves Christ-followers).
–  Win for the pastors whose threat of being sued by LGBT activists is significantly reduced, with the added bonus of avoiding any “heat” from their congregations for implementing something so controversial and “judgmental” as the Marriage Pledge.
– Win for the abusive Catholic dioceses that nationally grant 90% of marriage annulment petitions, the vast bulk of which claim “defective” original consent.
– Win for the heinous state bar association who have always looted the system since the enactment of unilateral divorce, and have purchased increasing political power with the confiscated proceeds, but who will now up their ante from the resulting increase in social and moral chaos.
–  Win for the homosexuals who seek to adopt, traffic in, and corrupt children, while gaining government and employer benefits.
–  Win for the LGBT activists (such as Tamra Metz and Masha Gessen) who openly admit the movement’s ultimate objective to destroy the institution of holy matrimony and traditional families.
–  Win for the shallow veneer of preserving religious liberty (until we stop and consider the denied religious liberty of the non-offending, non-filing spouse whose 1st amendment rights have traditionally been ignored by the system.)

Win-win for everybody, right?    Not exactly…major loss for covenant spouses, their children and grandchildren, and for God-defined holy matrimony, as well as for the already downward-spiraling sexual morality within the church.   A church full of papered-over adulterers, including behind the pulpit, is hardly ready to resume any authority over marriage the state gives back at this time.

WeRegret

Once again, the biblical covenant family is being thrown under the bus with the blind approval of all of all the above “winning” parties, and will now actually be in worse shape than their counterparts in neighboring states (until the easy-peasy-sleazy virus spreads to those states as well).    From the 1970’s until now, marriage seems to be becoming the ever more ridiculous, rambling  “house that Jack built”.

While MassResistance’s comments show they are less than enthused with this legal innovation,  where is the voice of the churches, or of Alabama’s family policy council?     To their credit, the Alabama Policy Institute has been at least tracking and timely-reporting on the bills during January (albeit, with exceptional brevity for such an impactful change – scroll all the way to the bottom of link)….but they do not appear to be taking a position, nor publicly recognizing the serious back-door dismantling threat to the institution of marriage itself.   Would that API would have at least reported who the one dissenting Senator was, and why Sen. Phillip Williams [R], who holds an 88% lifetime score with the American Conservative Union,  dissented.     Unfortunately, neither does the press do this.   It is clear that this legislation is all about facilitating sodomous “marriages” and protecting judges, and not about what’s best for the integrity of families or (ultimately) society.

Quoting Masha Gessen (2012):

“It’s a no-brainer that (homosexual activists) should have the right to marry, but I also think equally that it’s a no-brainer that the institution of marriage should not exist. … (F)ighting for gay marriage generally involves lying about what we are going to do with marriage when we get there – because we lie that the institution of marriage is not going to change, and that is a lie.

“The institution of marriage is going to change, and it should change. And again, I don’t think it should exist. And I don’t like taking part in creating fictions about my life. That’s sort of not what I had in mind when I came out 30 years ago….”

As is fairly typical for state FPC’s and changes to marriage laws (other than those ushering in gay “marriage”), no blogs or articles have been devoted to this topic since the September, 2017 introduction of the Senate bill.   General press coverage, on the other hand, has been favorable both on the Right and Left, with no significant criticisms and only vaguely- expressed concerns (“waving the white flag on marriage”, etc.), despite the radical social impact which legally and morally equating common law and God-joined marriages will undoubtedly bring, absent any coinciding reform of unilateral divorce laws.

The better solution?   Continue to regulate marriages per existing law, while pastors with the requisite moral authority, discipleship and courage opt-out of acting as an agent for states whose marriage contract does not reflect the vows being exchanged in the sanctuary.    Take the heat for the sake of the kingdom of God, pastors and judges!

The best solution?    Remove “irreconcilable differences” (and its equivalents) as a “ground” for divorce if there is no mutual petition for marriage dissolution, and divide assets and child welfare based on proven marital fault, thereby drying up both the demand for “marriage” between homosexuals, and the perverse, lucrative financial incentives that drive the legal machine.     (We have asked MassResistance -Texas whether they plan to support the re-election of Rep. Matt Krause, and support 2019 continued repeal efforts in Texas, but they declined to respond to this question.)

Prayer warriors, we have our work cut out for us.   Please start by praying that HB162 fails in the Alabama House of Representatives.   In the ten days leading up to Valentine’s Day,  look for a series of daily posts to Unilateral Divorce is Unconstitutional reflecting concrete ways the church can rapidly improve her witness to the world concerning rebuilding  a “culture of marriage”.   We believe these steps would prepare the church morally for the responsibility of taking marriage back from the state and reversing the 500 year old  Lutheran curse.

The infamous Trojan Horse allowed the Greeks to get in and out of the city with their treasure.    After they were out, the whole city burned to the ground.

Righteousness exalts a nation, But sin is a disgrace to any people.
– Proverbs 14:34

www.standerinfamilycourt.com

7 Times Around the Jericho Wall  |   Let’s Repeal Unilateral Divorce!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

citizenship, Divorce, Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, Lost culture, morality, Religious freedom, Spiritual Warfare

Does Abolishing “No-Fault” Have Parallels to Abolishing the Slave Trade?

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Amazing-Grace-movie-posterby Standerinfamilycourt

Do not rob the poor because he is poor,
Or crush the afflicted at the gate;
For the Lord will plead their case
And take the life of those who rob them.
– Proverbs 22:22-23

Do not err, my brethren. Those that corrupt families shall not inherit the kingdom of God. And if those that corrupt mere human families are condemned to death, how much more shall those suffer everlasting punishment who endeavor to corrupt the Church of Christ, for which the Lord Jesus, the only-begotten Son of God, endured the cross, and submitted to death! Whosoever, ‘being waxen fat,’ and ‘become gross,’ sets at nought His doctrine, shall go into Hell. In like manner, every one that has received from God the power of distinguishing, and yet follows an unskillful shepherd, and receives a false opinion for the truth, shall be punished.”
–  St. Ignatius of Antioch, “Epistle To The Ephesians,” c. 105 A.D.

This blogger can still recall reading  Harriet Beecher Stowe’s famous novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin to our children many years ago, while absolutely sobbing at the scene where two slave families were about to be cruelly pulled apart in a commercial transaction and sent to different plantations, with absolutely no respect for the God-joined holy one-flesh bond of matrimony between the two covenant husband and wife entities, and their God-ordained bond with their covenant children.

” ‘Mas’r aint to blame, Chloe, and he’ll take care of you and the poor’ … Here he turned to the rough trundle bed full of little woolly heads, and broke fairly down.  He leaned over the back of the chair, and covered his face with his large hands.   Sobs, heavy, hoarse and loud, shook the chair, and great tears fell through his fingers on the floor: just such tears, sir, as you dropped into the coffin where lay your first-born son;  such tears, woman, as you shed when you heard the cries of your dying babe.   For, sir, he was a man, and you are but another man.   And, woman, though dressed in silk and jewels, you are but a woman, and, in life’s great straits and mighty griefs, ye feel but one sorrow!

” ‘And now, ‘ said Eliza, as she stood the door, ‘I saw my husband only this afternoon, and I little knew then what was to come.  They have pushed him to the very last standing place, and he told me, to-day, that he was going to run away.  Do try, if you can, to get word to him.  Tell him how I went, and why I went; and tell him I’m going to try and find Canada.  You must give my love to him, and tell him, if I never see him again,’ — she turned away, and stood with her back to them for a moment, and then added, in a husky voice, ‘tell him to be as good as he can, and try and meet me in the kingdom of heaven.’  “

Centuries of this cruelty not only offended God, but had severe consequences on the nations involved, such that the regime eventually confronted God’s hand of long-awaited justice in abolishing that offense against humanity.   More importantly, because of a small band of godly saints who were faithful and long-suffering to carry out their Holy Spirit assignments, retaining their resolve and their trust in Him in the face of overwhelming opposition, God’s more severe judgment on at least one nation (and probably two nations) was averted.

“Christian” accommodation of so-called “no-fault” unilateral divorce has taken Christ’s church in the western world into the deep pit of serial polygamy in just two generations.   And what, exactly, do we mean by “serial polygamy” in this comparison?     Quite simply, it is using man’s immoral civil laws to reject the spouse God joined us to, in order to “marry” another while the rejected spouse lives  – something that Jesus called ongoing adultery at least five separate times in canonized scripture.     There are many excuses offered up for this, and there are even more numerous luminary “men of God” who will tell you it’s okay under “God’s grace” based on some man-contrived excuse.      However,  God repeatedly said, in Old Testament and in New Testament times. it is not okay, nor is it without horrible consequences for families, church and nation.

Those harsh, inevitable generational consequences don’t “sift” through the humanistic web of excuses in order to selectively apply themselves according to the Westminster Confession-sanctioned “exceptions”.   Those consequences ultimately come from the hand of God, as thistles and thorns in the Garden; from the One who entertains none of the human excuses.    He is the One whose hand individually creates each one-flesh union as an inseverable entity, Who then covenants unconditionally with that individual entity, then declares that they will never be two again in this life.    This universal indissolubility of holy matrimony is why Jesus called all non-widowed remarriage adultery — the original parties are still married in God’s eyes, and anyone else subsequently posing as “married to” either of the two original covenant spouses are bearing false witness to the world while they are  defiling their vessels.   Pastors who perform “weddings” where there is an estranged, living spouse on either side are therefore violating the Third Commandment by misusing the name of the Lord to attribute to Him a vain act.

Though only one spouse wants out of the  holy matrimony covenant of their youth, a scene similar to the slave sale in Uncle Tom’s Cabin is played out in “family courts” across the land on a daily basis, forcibly pulling covenant spouses from each other, and  children from one of their parents (and it’s usually the most responsible and moral of the two, due to the perverse financial incentives involved), while attempting also to tear and sever the God-joined one-flesh entity created by His hand.   Both spouses and their children are literally reduced to being treated as the chattel property of the prevailing legal regime, with an inexcusable motive to illicitly accrue profit to various parties who are external to the victimized families.

Near the start of SIFC’s post-decree journey through a constitutional appeals case,  amidst outreach efforts to others in the marriage permanence movement,  the establishment of social media pages to advocate for the full repeal of unilateral divorce and to urge profound moral reform in the church, there was also the very influential opportunity to read another book, Amazing Grace by author Eric Metaxas.   This is the story of British Member of Parliament, William Wilberforce, who became an unusually strong, spirit-led Christ-follower in the days shortly after being elected to the House of Commons.     Thanks to the author’s vivid capture of the details of Wilberforce’s spiritual awakening, we see the arduous journey which followed to build a movement, in the name of the Lord, that ran counter to both the entrenched church and equally-entrenched legal system interests,  and like today,  this threatened some extremely powerful, wealthy economic interests in both institutions.

Metaxas makes it possible to see the strong parallels of the story of this journey to abolish the slave trade with the struggle we are currently in, to abolish all the church and legal system trappings, along with the special economic interests that are adverse to the kingdom of God, and adverse to the God-established “kingdom” and constitutional rights of covenant families.    This book not only deeply inspired this blogger, but in a very real sense, it provided strong insight into the nature of the battle that lay ahead.   This book is a really good read for everyone in the marriage permanence movement, and our blog post about it will hopefully be an interesting, thought-provoking introduction.

( FB profile 7xtjw  SIFC note:   At the present time, author Eric Metaxas adheres to his Eastern Orthodox upbringing which teaches that holy matrimony is dissoluble under some circumstances including adultery.    He aligned strongly with Donald Trump in the 2016 U.S. presidential elections and with the political forces of social conservatives who consider unilateral divorce to be an undesirable thing, but not necessarily the central moral issue of the day, nor an intrinsic religious freedom violation.    He most likely would be surprised to read of his contribution to the marriage permanence movement through the book he has written.   He is in a covenant marriage himself, by true biblical standards. )

There were many prevailing obstacles to justice in America and England in the late 18th century that are remarkably similar to roadblocks the “stander” community, and others who advocate the abolition of the vile practice of serial polygamy, must successfully confront today, and must skillfully navigate through.    As with Wilberforce and the broad coalition he helped to form,  skill wasn’t everything, because he “battled not against flesh and blood, but powers and principalities and dark forces in the spiritual realm“,   just as the apostle Paul warned in Ephesians 6.    God’s hand, and awaiting God’s timing were also necessary, so this abomination was very much “prayed down” and “fasted down”,  while the visible events were unfolding by God’s hand in the circumstantial realm over a long period of time.    The encouragement that SIFC would like to leave with readers is the historical evidence that evil, seemingly impossible “mountains” are indeed picked up and thrown into the sea by the hand of God, in response to the faithful prayers, and advocacy efforts of His saints; efforts taking many forms but working together in key ways orchestrated by Him.

So, what all was going on back then to misappropriate the word of God so as to prop up the immoral slave trade?  How did it resemble the backdrop to today’s moral slide of the church and society so that it broadly institutionalized the sin of marrying another while having a living, estranged true spouse, following man’s divorce (that which Jesus clearly and consistently called ongoing adultery)?     Let’s take a look:

  1. Entrenched religious beliefs prevailed that had no true scriptural basis.   England had been a mix of Druid and Catholic rituals for centuries before the Reformation, with Catholicism gaining the upper hand by medieval times.    By the time Wilberforce came of age, it had been about 250 years since Henry VIII had established the Church of England, which retained many characteristics of the Roman Catholic church, despite key doctrinal differences, coming to be known as “High Church” because elaborate liturgy was retained from Roman Catholic liturgy, where the congregation was able to continue worshiping  rather passively rather than pursue true discipleship.    One of the key doctrinal differences between the Church of England and the Rome Church, of course, was the profound disagreement over marriage, both its indissolubility as a sacrament (or not) and the propriety of civil jurisdiction rather than church jurisdiction over it.     Born, as the new Protestant doctrine was, out of a mix of the lusts of Henry and the humanism of Erasmus,  in this particular instance, rightly-divided scripture was still on the side of the Catholics.    However, it was the Anglicans who happened to be and remain in power by 1648 and beyond.   

That said, adherence to Catholicism was still strong in Britain, including belief that priests can absolve sin without the actual cessation of that sin.   Salvation is believed to be imparted by repeated communion rather than a taking up of one’s cross to follow Christ.   Because of the belief that only nuptials between two baptized partners are to be considered “sacramental”, and hence indissoluble,  it is likely that slave marriages were considered dissoluble as best benefitted the trade.

Meanwhile the Westminster Confession of Faith was drafted and ratified in the British Parliament in 1648 just a little more than 100 years after Henry formed the Church of England.   Many aspects of the WCOF were an extrabiblical overreaction to various heresies of Roman Catholicism, while other aspects were appropriate responses to genuine errors in RCC doctrine or to abusive practices that arose in the 300 years just prior, resulting in biblically-supported truth mixed with biblically-unsupported heresy in the total doctrines of the WCOF.

For example, Chapter 3 affirms the Reformed doctrine of predestination: that God foreordained who would be among the elect (and therefore saved), while he passed by those who would be damned for their sins. The confession states that from eternity God did “freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass”.
By God’s decree, “some men and angels are predestinated unto everlasting life; and others foreordained to everlasting death.”
As with the Catholics, this doctrine did not promote much soul-care for the Negro slaves, and is biblically unsupported, since there is a distinction between God’s fore-knowledge and fore-ordination.

The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.  – 2 Peter 3:9

Chapter 17 presents the doctrine of the “perseverance of the saints”, which holds that it is impossible for those effectually called to “fall away” from the state of grace or, in other words, lose their salvation.  This doctrine, in effect, allowed for the powerful to oppress the helpless, without concern that God would ever hold them accountable, since Jesus  was claimed to have died for their future sins.    As has become the case today, it is popular “wisdom” to claim that people have no hope of living a holy life, so the purpose of grace is to attribute Christ’s righteousness to a passive worshiper who may continue on in their transgressions.     In proper context, the term “perseverance of the saints” (referred to several times in the book of Revelation),  actually means quite the opposite of what is declared in the WCOF.    Scripture repeatedly shows that this perseverance means bearing up under persecution without becoming apostate in response.    Just as the WCOF has the effect of deadening the conscience to proclaiming Christ’s standards for lifelong marital faithfulness as being “too high” to realistically attain in the 21st century,  the Confession had the effect of deadening the conscience of those involved in the slave trade to the sanctity of all human families.

“Now the parable is this: the seed is the word of God.  Those beside the road are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their heart, SO THAT THEY WILL NOT BELIEVE AND BE SAVED.   Those on the rocky soil are those who, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no firm root;  THEY BELIEVE FOR A LITTLE WHILE, AND IN TIME OF TEMPTATION THEY FALL AWAY.   The seed which fell among the thorns, these are the ones who have heard, and as they go on their way they are choked with worries and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to maturity.   But the seed in the good soil, these are the ones who have heard the word in an honest and good heart, and hold it fast, and bear fruit with  perseverance.”    –  Luke 8:11-15

Finally, the pivotal Chapter 24 covers Reformed teaching on marriage and divorce. Marriage is to be heterosexual and monogamous (if consecutively so). The purpose of marriage is to provide for the mutual help of husband and wife, the birth of legitimate children, the growth of the church, and preventing “uncleanness”,  according to the confession.   The confession discourages interfaith marriage with non-Christians, Roman Catholics, or “other idolaters”.   In addition, godly persons should not be “unequally yoked” in marriage to “notoriously wicked” persons.  Incestuous marriage, defined according to biblical guidelines, is also prohibited.  (Heretical parts V and VI hold that the only grounds for divorce are “adultery or willful abandonment by a spouse.” )     Jesus and the prophet Malachi, however, held that men are delegated NO authority to dissolve an unconditional covenant to which God remains a party, nor to sever the one-flesh entity God’s hand created.   Only physical death does that, according to the apostle, Paul.   Hence, any discussion about “grounds” in the WCOF becomes utterly moot before the unchanging marriage  law of God, and Henry, self-proclaimed as the first Head of the Church of England, is exposed as the wicked serial polygamist he actually was all along when measured against the biblical standard.

While great atrocities were involved in capturing slaves and transporting them across the ocean, after which they were often cruelly warehoused and their diseases masked until sold, it is clear that slave traders who forced apart one-flesh spouses, and “family court” judges who do so have much in common.  This is true both morally, and in the consequences to society, as well as to the eventual fate of the whole nation due to the resulting corruption of the progeny of those impacted.

The 2007 film version of Amazing Grace  opens with a narrative graphic which reads, “by the late 18th century over eleven million African men, women and children had been taken from Africa to be used as slaves in the West Indies and American colonies …   The slave trade was considered acceptable by all but a few.     Of these, even fewer were brave enough to speak against it.”

By comparison, between 1970 and 2015 (roughly one-tenth of the elapsed time since the commencement of that trade up to Wilberforce’s day), more than three times as many U.S. families had been forcibly “dissolved” in the “family courts” of the 50 states.   Likewise, all but a few of the Christian citizens of these states considered this practice morally acceptable (and fully effectual in God’s eyes despite much scripture to the contrary).    A small but increasing number of these few began to  develop the courage of conviction to suffer the immense social and economic costs of speaking against it.   

2.  The church was profoundly corrupt and slowly dying.    A church that is founded on heresy, expressly in order to facilitate (and propagate forward) sexual sin, as the Church of England indeed was, is doomed and dying from the outset, unless true revival comes along to rescue it.     So is today’s “mega-church” established for much the same purpose, to concentrate wealth and power in the hands of those living in open defiance of God’s laws which they disagree with, while having a cover of what in those days was called piety, and in our day would be called “evangelicalism”.   In far too many of these mega-churches, “church discipline” is called out on the wrong party, such as the repenting prodigal who would leave an adulterous, legalized union to return to his or her covenant family,  and far too many churches are led by men and women who are themselves living in legalized adultery with someone else’s God-joined, one-flesh partner rather than with their own.    The scriptures forbidding even this are re-interpreted to “permit” the abomination of consecutive polygamy in the clergy, rendering any protest against LGBTQ(xyz) excesses, instantly hypocritical.    Hence, the literal “husband of one [living] wife”, understood perfectly and consistently practiced by “less-sophisticated” saints for centuries,  of late becomes “one-woman man” (until tomorrow, at least)  in our contemporary bibles.   God’s amazing sense of humor used adultery matchmaker Ashley Madison to debunk that notion a couple of years ago.   How many of those “one woman man” pastors were removed as a result?

But  as it turns out, revival did come and rescue the corrupt Church of England during Wilberforce’s life, and as it happened, God through various circumstances brought several key people into his life while he was still a boy.    Though he was born and raised in the northern province of York, family hardship brought him to live by the age of ten with a wealthy, aristocratic aunt and uncle in Wimbledon, near London, who were close to George Whitefield and other figures of the first Great Awakening.    Author Metaxas describes the conditions in the English church of Wilberforce’s young manhood thusly:

“One’s ‘spirituality’ was confined to one’s rented pew.    One attended one’s church and one stood and one kneeled and one sat at the proper times and did what was required of one, but to scratch beneath this highly lacquered surface was to venture well beyond the pale and invite stares and whispers and certain banishment.   Wilberforce was from the beginning as serious as he was charming and fun-loving, and his sensitive and intellectual nature was now, at Wimbledon, for the first time fed something far more satisfying than the niceties – the thin gruel and weak tea of High Church Anglicanism.”

So then, what historical forces reduced Christ’s English bride to such a debased state, some 200 years after the Reformation?    Unfortunately, the sad answer seems to be — the Reformation itself.    We’ve already visited the  heretical elements of this church’s creed adopted in that same Parliament 100 years earlier than Wilberforce’s day, which formed a rotten foundation upon which those “rented pews” actually sat.

My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism.  For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes, and say,  “You sit here in a good place,” and you say to the poor man,  “You stand over there, or sit down by my footstool,” have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil motives?   Listen, my beloved brethren: did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him?   But you have dishonored the poor man.  Is it not the rich who oppress you and personally drag you into court?   Do they not blaspheme the fair name by which you have been called?
–  James 2:1-7

While today’s spiritual deadness is clearly driven by the pursuit of sexual immorality that has gained the near-universal complicity of contemporary church leadership,  the spiritual deadness of that day was driven by the bloody, mutual, church leader-led violence between Protestants and Catholics which had given Jesus a truly bad name, and had turned people off to religion altogether, creating this ritualistic veneer that was not allowed to go too deep.     The violence, in turn, was driven by the clergy’s thirst for retaining (or gaining) power over the population, causing religious opponents on both sides to be martyred, and causing a series of wars between the “saints”.      (In “standerinfamilycourt’s”  happier days with evangelical friends and intact covenant family, the oft-played board game “Risk” was jokingly dubbed “Evangel” due to the conflict between Christ’s way of building the kingdom of God versus the counterfeit that had taken hold as an evil fruit of the Reformation where Protestants returned Catholic violence and persecution in-kind. )     Of course, all sinful departure from Christ’s methods, be it sexual or be it violent power-grabs “in the name of Jesus”, leads to a hardening of hearts, we are warned, and this leads to falling away (apostasy), notwithstanding Chapter 17 of the WCOF.    Certainly, Christian-on-Christian violence must have had a devastating and dehumanizing effect on British society in Wilberforce’s day.     Are there not “rented pews” today in the evangelical church?    Is a fee not paid today by the legalized adulterers in the post-unilateral divorce world to occupy seats as an illicit pair or “blended family” that faithful 1 Corinthians 5 church governance would have otherwise denied them unless they severed those faux ties?   Paul, after all, said “do not even eat with such….I have decided to turn [him / them] over to satan, that [his / their] soul(s) may be saved in the day of the Lord.”

Britain formally sat under a false state religion, as she still does today.   By failing to maintain her sexual purity, hence her sovereign biblical family structure,  America and other western nations today also sit under a state religion that is not formally acknowledged but is nevertheless very real in asserting its antichrist power over all of society.    That state religion is secular humanism.    And secular humanism just loves to play “dress up” these days in Baptist, Pentecostal and mainline “Christian” garb–and even Catholic frocks, of late, in the form of Chapter 8 of Pope Francis’ Amoris Laetitia.

3.  A tiny (deemed) “cult” slowly became instrumental in moving the culture.    The evangelical aunt and uncle who took Wilberforce in as a boy was (providentially) childless, which made the young man the sole heir to their homes and fortune when they “graduated to heaven”.    This put great financial assets into his hands, as well as influential and powerful friends of godly character into his life.  He was best friends from university days with William Pitt, his agnostic contemporary who eventually became Prime Minister.      Wilberforce came to faith, and received Spirit-led discipleship as a young MP  under the direct influence of Whitefield, the Wesleys, and ex-slave trader, the Rev. John Newton.    All true disciples of Jesus come to understand that every scrap of time, treasure and talent that God pours into a life ultimately belongs to Him, loaned, as it were, for the purpose of building up the kingdom of God.    As did the three biblical slaves with the varying number of “talents” given by their master, we will one day give an account for our stewardship of these resources.   Instead of suppressing truth to those under our care for ill-gotten gain, and appeasing the ungodly resource-holders to build our own vast empire (without the slightest regard for these souls), we are expected to invest what we already have been given into helping deliver as many souls as possible safely into the doors of the great banquet hall where the wedding supper of the Lamb is to be held.    Wilberforce understood this, as did the other Spirit-led instigators of the First Great Awakening and the abolition movement.

It wasn’t long before Wilberforce felt led to sell his inherited properties and use the proceeds to establish a highly visible home church community, known as the Clapham fellowship,  on his friends’ adjoining properties, where true discipleship under the ministry of a community chaplain was fostered in the suburbs of London.    It also wasn’t long before the entrenched interests were derisively labeling the community of believers Wilberforce led, a “cult”.    Why was Wiberforce’s  physical community of believers so influential ?    “Standerinfamilycourt” believes it is because he established a very visible spiritual organism within that compound-based community, much like the 1st – 4th century church, where everyone could see the Christ-centered life walked out again.    Some 300 years before the internet could make the same sort of thing visible online, and draw like-minded but geographically dispersed people together for conferences,  this visibility from such a community was very important to influencing culture, by example.

(FB profile 7xtjw  SIFC note:The tiny Spirit-led wing of the body of Christ in that day was dubbed “Methodism”, which was an ecclesiastical slur.    We all know what eventually happened to “Methodism” in our day, following the Second Great Awakening,  and what in our day has even happened to Pentecostalism, as it followed “Methodism” in becoming the “Church of Thyratira” in the late 20th century, who today labels the interfaith community of covenant marriage standers–which is largely virtual due to the commonplace shunning of outspoken members by conventional church bodies, having its own pastors and lay leaders therefore, a “cult”.)

4.  The oppressed victims of the system were utterly dehumanized.   In the book, pages 96-100 detailed the inhumane conditions in which hundreds of captured slaves were chained together and packed into the lower airless holds of a slave ship with inadequate sanitary provisions, little food and no potable water.    These conditions culminated in the deplorable tale of the insurance fraud that was carried out on the high sea in 1781 aboard a Jamaica-bound slave ship named the Zong.   It was routine for any human dying aboard a ship to be buried in the ocean, whether a slave or not.  However, in this instance so many slaves were becoming ill that more than 100 live slaves were thrown overboard in order that insurance proceeds would replace the lost revenue from the slaves that had expired due to inhumane conditions.    The public exposure from the foiling of that fraud in English court the next year turned out to be a small amount of good out of a massively tragic crime against humanity.     A Cambridge protégé of Wilberforce’s, a young man named Thomas Clarkson, served as the “cub reporter” in documenting facts and evidence against the slave trade:

“He climbed aboard slave ships and measured the spaces allotted for the slaves; he purchased the ghastliest instruments of restraint and torture, from manacles and shackles to thumbscrews and branding irons.  There was a device to pry open the mouths of slaves who refused to eat. ”
(Page 116).

AG_Metaxas_Photo2.jpeg

It is unfortunate that the opportunities to expose in great detail the atrocities that routinely go on in “family courts” across the land are few and extremely costly.    Nevertheless, there are a few of us with either  the financial means or  time and pro se determination to resist the system,  allowing our case to go to trial for that very purpose.     Most county courthouses will not allow non-lawyers to take cell phones past a security checkpoint, yet in trial we will use the time (sometimes days) sitting in court to take notes on other cases we may observe, and some of us will go to the expense of obtaining the electronic transcript from our own case.     In the book, “Stolen Vows” by Judy Parejko (2001),  the author chronicles the abuses she observed as a court-appointed mediator.    Other authors such as Stephen Baskerville have written powerful books and articles exposing details of the corruption under which families are legally shredded.   In two blog pieces we shared in 2014 from The Public Discourse, a mother relates how she was stripped of her children for the noxious purpose of awarding custody to her homosexual husband and his same-sex partner.     Similarly, another article in the publication tracked the commonly-occurring instances of children being stripped from a blameless father who didn’t want the divorce and custody given to the mother whose live-in boyfriend committed violence and molestation of the children, in a cruel mockery of their “best interest”.    The dehumanization is well-captured in this crass excerpt from an appellate opinion handed down in an early constitutional challenge of the “no-fault” law:

“The state’s inherent sovereign power includes the so called ‘police power’ right to interfere with vested property rights whenever reasonably necessary to the protection of the health, safety, morals, and general well being of the people.  The constitutional question, on principle, therefore, would seem to be, not whether a vested right is impaired by a marital law change, but whether such a change reasonably could be believed to be sufficiently necessary to the public welfare as to justify the impairment.”
Walton v Walton, California (1970-1972)  28 Cal. App.3d 108

5. Massive economic interests were also deeply entrenched.    Although King George III was a devout Christian and had genuine concerns about the slave trade, the Crown had substantial revenue interests in the sugar plantations of the British West Indies, as did the Church of England herself.      Powerful members of Parliament had personal revenue interests either in the plantations or in profits from the slave trade or related maritime industries.   Port towns like Liverpool and Bristol were heavily dependent on the trade, much like some of the state capitol cities that would suffer economically today from a likely much-smaller government complex that would result from ceasing the societally-corrosive practice of forcing families apart without provable just cause.     In addition to this, it should sound quite familiar that the atrocities, as soon as documentation of horrifying details began to be publicly exposed, would be propped up (as an argument against doing the right thing and abolishing them) by playing one jurisdiction off against a neighboring jurisdiction.   It was argued that abolishing the slave trade in Britain would be a boon to the slave trade in France.    Ignored was the fact that a powerful moral example would be advanced (with accompanying publicity) by repeal in one or two states to start, and that societal,  as well as fiscal benefits– in the contemporary instance, would be reaped by the repenting jurisdiction(s).    The difficult but successful solution for Wilberforce’s allies was to relentlessly work the issue in both Britain and France.

Similarly,  the unilateral divorce industry amounts to more than $100 billion a year, directly benefitting members of the Bar, and a vast army of court mediators, social workers, mental health professionals, book-sellers, and even ministries.    This financial boon for a few, at the expense of society as a whole, comes at a cost of $200+ billion a year in transferred social costs to all taxpayers,  state and Federal.  These well-heeled political interests virtually own the press and have the means to  easily flood the media with emotional pleas for “abuse victims” whom, they moan, will be “trapped in abusive marriages”  if they should ever be forced to prove with tangible evidence that their marriage is abusive.     These misleading articles largely go unrebutted, due to entrenched interests even within the “faith, family and freedom” ministries and family policy councils in various states across the land.  The vast majority of these ministries decline to become involved in the repeal of unilateral divorce or the defense of its religious free exercise victims, either in prioritization of funding or in their public media output, even when there is a repeal bill active in their state legislature.    For example,  the family policy group, Texas Values (affiliated with James Dobson’s organization, Family Policy Alliance)  sent their president to testify before a 2017 legislative committee that they supported repeal, but not one written word was publicly released to refute the barrage of negative press against HB93 in that state.    All of the financial resources instead went toward battling issues like transgender bathroom bills, remarkably seen as more of a threat than the laws that directly order the literal shredding of families.     Although this reluctance to publicly advocate for the repeal of unilateral divorce laws may have varying factors based on the political climate and carefully-built political relationships in each state, the common issue seems to be a fear that large donors could be offended by marriage permanence efforts meaningfully impacting heterosexual family policy, as well as the false belief that there is likely not enough funding available through millions of small, passionate donors to offset such feared losses–despite the million or so new families decimated each year by forced divorce who would love to donate regularly to an organization showing true commitment to engaging their cause in a meaningful way.

Just imagine if the abolitionist movement had consisted of donation-based provincial councils tasked primarily with all the issues of managing the evil fallouts of the slave trade on society, who deemed abolition too unreachable a goal, so that they busied themselves with promoting legislation to increase the size of the slave berths aboard the ships, install more porta-potties, only allow slave traders to take people who didn’t have minor children in the hut,  et cetera– and doing so while reporting in to a Church of England board (who at the end of the day was financially-invested in preserving the trade).    If one can imagine this, our description seems quite analogous to the apparent relationship between some of these state FPC’s and Dobson’s Focus on the Family organization.

(FB profile 7xtjw  SIFC note:  As of the date of this writing, “standerinfamilycourt” has met two of the executive directors of state family policy councils face-to-face, and has hopes of meeting several more in the coming months and years to learn as much as possible about their constraints, to be of service where mutually beneficial, and to encourage them to diversify their donor base to include those in our movement, so that they can act more boldly in the marriage permanence realm.)

6.  God put together quite a colorful and diversely-tasked team.
When the Most High hears the cry of the afflicted and establishes His timeline for deliverance, everyone involved can count on divine appointments taking place.    He started assembling the abolition team when its most visible “champion” was just a small boy.   He began by tapping famous figures of the first Great Awakening in Britain, leading some slave traders to repentance and restitution, and surrounding those with born-again relatives in Wilberforce’s extended family.   To these, He added Christian attorneys, writers, artisans, poets, former slaves and doctors.  Wives of aristocrats opened their homes to bring these co-laborers together and make strategic introductions across an overseas network and even across social classes.  Each of these called individuals providentially contributed their gifts to the overall effort,  some prominently and some in the background.    Much like some in the marriage permanence movement who today create striking memes that drive home a point in social media, even the famous potter Josiah Wedgwood was tapped into service to create the iconic badge-like image “Am I Not A Man and a Brother?”  that found its way onto all sorts of popular items that were sold at the time.

In a very similar way,  the Lord has been bringing together 21st century artists, writers, bible scholars, linguists, in-place and displaced pastors, seminary professors, legal students, researchers, meeting organizers, videographers, conservative thought leaders and lecturers, courthouse monitors, conference hosts, legislators, constitutional attorneys and family policy directors to carry out a diverse range of divine assignments,  coordinated by the hand of God to one day topple the “Jericho Wall” of unilateral divorce.    Many of these groups of the like-minded would not interact with or even be aware of other groups if He also didn’t divinely provide individuals to form a bridge between them, yet He’s using some individuals to facilitate that very necessary function as well.    Instead of stately mansions where figures are invited and introductions are made, He is using technology and alternative media platforms to bring diverse co-laborers together.

7.  Reeking, shameless hypocrisy was the order of the day in the established church.     We have already described above, the profound moral decay in the Church of England, and the reasons behind it.    Here we will focus on some of what it took to break through that in the famous scene from the movie that was based on the book.    The majority of the power holders in the British Parliament were at least nominal members of the Church of England, while the handful of actual Christ followers who were influenced by the leadership of John Newton, the Wesley brothers, and George Whitefield formed house churches  such as the community at Clapham, which also had some wealthy and influential members in addition to Wilberforce.    They lived by godly example,  using large amounts of their wealth for the public good,  and maintaining sexual purity in their relationships, which really stood out in society, while they maintained warm friendships with the “lukewarm”, those who derisively called them “Methodists” and accused them of being a “cult”.     At an opportune time, Wilberforce and his Clapham peers arranged the famous boat tour of the harbor, complete with stringed quartet, wine and appetizers and full ballroom regalia.    This grand party was soon assaulted with the pungency of that which they would have much preferred to remain insulated from, as the party barge Reliant suddenly pulled up beside a slave ship called the Madagascar that evening.    No longer could the British ruling class and their consorts feign ignorance of the dehumanization and shipboard death that was taking place, literally under their noses.     This event, occurring in the middle of the 20-year abolition battle, required the development of quite a few well-networked allies of the cause in high and low rank in order to pull such a scene off.

Two events occurred in 2017 that could prove significant, and might be somewhat analogous to that unsavory boat party.     Repeal bills to redefine “no-fault” divorce back to its originally-intended (or at least, publicly-advertised) contours were introduced in two southwest states.    Partial repeal attempts had occurred in Michigan in 2006 and Iowa in 2013 but without much publicity that wasn’t rabidly oppositional.     What made the 2017 effort a bit different is that instead of a family policy ministry sponsoring the bills, one was introduced by an actual constitutional attorney-turned-legislator, and he brought a parade of constitutional attorneys to the committee podium who testified to the constitutional violations that riddle current law, which suitably-framed the testimony of the family victims of unilateral divorce who also testified.    This time, the hours of this testimony have been captured and posted to you-tube, through the efforts of local marriage permanence activists.     This is a bit remarkable because the family-shredding industry has been accustomed to a thick shroud of darkness whenever their empire is threatened.     Also remarkable is that every one of the churches in both states were so occupied with “rebuilding a culture of marriage” in their congregations, that none of them saw any worthwhile involvement in seeing that either bill to end the forced divorces of their members might come to an embarrassing Republican-dominated floor vote, letting them both die for this session.

Then in August, the Southern Baptist-allied Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood introduced The Nashville Statement, a manifesto taking dead aim at all the incarnations of homosexual practice, while odiferously looking the other way at prevalence of clergy-condoned (and clergy-practiced) serial polygamy that has destroyed the family structure in the evangelical church, hiding the destruction behind an adulterous thin veneer through which mass shootings, child-trafficking and transsexualism is all-too-prone to puncture.    There have been earlier manifesto campaigns in recent years, but this one was quite ill-timed, driven primarily by visceral reaction to the bathroom bills, but while unresolved memories were still fresh before the American public of the infamous serial polygamist, Kim Davis’ tone-deaf declaration in 2015 that she would “lose her soul” if she dared insult the holiness of God by issuing marriage licenses to homosexuals.   That had been an event which had suddenly reduced  the Leftist press to quoting scripture on major network newscasts.   Though the Who’s Who of the evangelical and Catholic worlds vigorously endorsed and signed the 2017 manifesto (which brazenly declared condoning homosexual practice as profoundly inconsistent with following Christ),  the CBMW has received scathing and voluminous public criticism as well as negative press coverage from both the scornful Left and the God-fearing Right.     (From this blogger, “standerinfamilycourt”, the celebrated and learned seminarians on the board of CBMW received a book called “One Flesh” by Joe Fogel, and a frank, admonishing letter.)

Meanwhile, in the Roman Catholic Church, which has been so historically important to all moral reform of family laws, the release of Pope Francis’ Amoris Laetitia was causing deep despair and bewilderment among Christ-following Catholics over the Pope’s bid to liberalize clergy practices toward remarriage adulterers in those congregations, by liberalizing even further the vile practice of “annulment” and to allow those civilly “married” to the covenant spouses of others to take communion — a direct affront to Paul’s admonition about receiving the body and blood of Christ in an unworthy manner,  and of his further admonition that no unrepentant adulterer will inherit the kingdom of God.    The hypocrisy involved with Amoris was the preposterous chorus of Vatican “assurance” that changing church “practice” was not tantamount to changing church “doctrine”.      Since the only ministry with a national voice to publicly support the two unilateral divorce repeal bills was the Catholic-founded Ruth Institute,  we can only hope that this unfortunate and significant turn of events cements the desire for close alliance with our like-minded “cult” of evangelicals in the marriage permanence movement.

8.  Prayer and fasting was just as important as activism, if not more so.  The great John Wesley wrote Wilberforce twice, the first time near the start of his abolition journey, and also a few days before Wesley passed away.    Wesley wanted to be certain that Wilberforce understood that he battled not against flesh and blood, but powers and principalities; dark forces in the heavenly realm.     He put Wilberforce on prophetic notice that there will be demonic opposition at every turn, but urged him to persevere.    Much of the reason that abolition took as long as it did once the organized campaign was underway can be attributed to intervening events and demonic distractions, but still the battle was the Lord’s.

The current battle seems to boil down to an unrelenting conflict between the choice to surgically-excise the disease itself or manage the symptoms to reduce human suffering and impacts on society.    There is a widespread assumption that the disease itself is inoperable, and an almost irresistable temptation to hold to a form of godliness but deny His power.    These are strongholds which  the Lord will use the fasters and the faithful prayers in our movement to pull down supernaturally.

9.  Bringing (and keeping) a diverse coalition together was a key role that Wilberforce played as a leader in the movement.    As described earlier, God Himself started the process of bringing the abolitionist movement figures together two or three decades ahead of Wilberforce signing on, but He appointed key individuals (including Wilberforce) to build it to “critical mass” and keep it together over the arduous period of time needed to sustain a successful effort.     He seemed to provide a clear focal point to the various constituencies (which included Quakers, Anglicans, “Methodists”, just to use the diverse religious interests as an example) to what God wanted, and this took a lot of integrity, often very unpopular integrity.     At the end of the day, Wilberforce had the humility to overcome his own discouragement at setbacks to pull it off without backing down.    He had a thick skin, which is a quality almost as rare as focus and integrity, but indispensable because of the need to also manage the criticism or reluctance of insiders.

At the present time, if there is a Wilberforce-like individual to galvanize the factions and constituencies in the movement, it’s likely that this person is still developing and emerging.   Those who presently have the insight to visualize how the like-minded groups can and should be working together are obscure and seem not well-placed at this time.    There are bridges to build between the traditional Catholic leaders, who have a national voice but presently insufficient political power, and the small body of enlightened evangelicals in the movement who part company with the “reformed” evangelicals on the moral validity of non-widowed remarriage.   There are traditional differences to manage over side issues like the authority of the Pope and the validity or morality of “annulment” versus the evangelical principle of sola scriptura where scripture plainly forbids both doctrines.   Many of the national voices for divorce reform would prefer to focus on households with minor children, while setting aside the issue of ongoing 1st and 14th amendment violations against grandparent marriages which full repeal would rectify, and they have differences with those in the movement who consider divorce-remarriages immoral (as Jesus plainly did) due to valid, temporal concern for the children born of legalized adultery.

State legislators are emerging with a courageous vision for repeal, but perhaps are not yet well-enough connected with those who can lend them effective support, especially in the area of getting churches onboard with outright repeal efforts.    Far too few churches of any type are involved on the state level, and a great many erroneously believe that God “instituted” or “provided for” divorce.    The majority of “standers” and those who have repented of adulterous “marriages” are estranged from their churches, either by their own choice not to sit under deceived leadership, or because they’ve been formally or informally shunned for being perceived as a
“sower of disunity”.   In response, many such individuals in the movement do not consider contemporary church structure (what they derisively call the “pulpit / pew hireling model”) to be biblically or morally valid.

Many in the movement also do not think political activity of any type is of God.    State family policy groups tend to be underfunded and perhaps in need of diversifying their support.    The politically-connected national voices are sympathetic to repeal, but constantly get distracted by the symptoms of the disease, particularly each new emerging horror from rabid, militant homosexualism.    Other allied groups are the Parents’ Rights groups who want legal relief from these onerous laws, but aren’t necessarily in the repeal camp, and the divorced-and-remarried activists sympathetic to repeal efforts who are somehow finding the grace to work with the celibate “standers” who do not consider those subsequent civil-only unions biblically valid.   We each need to faithfully keep doing our perceived, assigned roles and keep praying to God for the break-through that pulls all of it together effectively.     Even a celibate, faithful stander who is not engaged in any other activity at all, except to serve others, makes a very loud statement to this culture, if they are consistent and are doing it out of a godly motivation.   

10.  It took decades of unrelenting effort and dedication to prevail.   As witnessed by a quote from the book,

“The line between courageous faith and foolish idealism is, almost by definition, on angstrom wide.    Wilberforce was quite right that a flame had been kindled and would not go out until it had done its work, but he had no idea that it would be twenty torturous years in the burning before its work was done.   And if the ‘work’ in question was not the abolition of the slave trade but the abolition of slavery itself, the flame would continue burning for another forty-five years.”
(Page 122)

…abolition of such a profoundly immoral institution was carried out on many battlefronts and required decades to bring about.    

By comparison, the dastardly and covert political events that stripped U.S. families of their most basic fundamental rights to liberty, property, free religious exercise, free association, right to jury trial when civilly accused, both procedural and substantive due process, and equal protection under the law, occurred less than 50 years ago.    The hope is that technology and God’s hand will accelerate the formidable process of overthrowing the regime, and that incremental reform efforts will fall by the wayside as time-wasters.    In the past ten years, there have been full or partial repeal efforts in at least four states, including Michigan, Iowa, Texas and Oklahoma.   The early efforts were abandoned, but hopefully the latter efforts will persist and gain support as various groups gain insight in how best to work together.    Only God could pull off the task of full repeal in all 50 states, but that’s no excuse not to work toward it in faith, with our eyes firmly fixed on the Almighty.   If a few states repeal, momentum can certainly be gained, but opposition can be expected to grow more fiercely as well.    As with ending the slave trade, the renewed moral authority of a chastened and repented collective church is going to be crucial, and there are many tactical steps the organized church could take to hasten the political process.    (This last topic will be covered in a future post.)

Recalling the wicked false analogy drawn by the LGBT movement to justify their immoral, totalitarian political aims by (invalidly)  comparing their vision to the U.S. civil rights movement, “standerinfamilycourt” has made these parallels with much fear and trembling before the Lord, trusting that this particular analogy is utterly valid, and is actually like-for-like.    May God’s will be done for our covenant families and for our morally-ravaged nation.

Your kingdom [must] come.   Your will [must] be done on earth as it is in heaven.   – Matthew 6:10

(FB profile 7xtjw SIFC: translation of this famous portion of the Lord’s Prayer is from Dr. Wilbur Pickering’s  The Sovereign Creator Has Spoken (2013), which is the only contemporary English language translation on the market today that is not based on the relatively incomplete Alexandrian manuscripts,  sexually-licentious 1880’s transcription work of Westcott and Hort [the “Standard” bibles], and tainted subsequent bible translation committees, often staffed with universalists and homosexuals.)

 

 

www.standerinfamilycourt.com

7 Times Around the Jericho Wall  |  Let’s Repeal Unilateral Divorce!

 

citizenship, Divorce, Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, Lost culture, Spiritual Warfare, Substantive Due Process

Knickers (and Facts) in A Twist over Repeal of Texlahoma “No-Fault”

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TheDunlapsby Standerinfamilycourt

It has been an exciting spring legislative session in the southwest this year, as young lawmakers in Texas and Oklahoma have introduced common-sense bills curbing non-consenting unilateral divorce, and as both bills have recently made it out of their committees fairly intact.    The liberal press has been shrieking and howling its disapproval, especially in Oklahoma, where the measure also ends the perverse economic incentives from unilateral divorce by restoring stiff marital fault penalties to property division.

As is so typical of liberal grandstanding and industry lobbying, we’re hearing not of the millions of fathers whose fundamental right to protect and raise their children is being severed though they’ve done nothing objectively wrong,  nor of the adulterers sailing off with the unconscionable award of the innocent spouse’s retirement funds after a decades-long union which is suddenly deemed “irretrievable” by the court.   Instead we are hearing about the classic “abused poor woman” who will now find it harder to get a divorce because she might now have to actually prove the abuse with (gasp) evidence thereof.    As one of the expert witnesses giving testimony in Texas accurately pointed out to committee members on March 8, lawmakers cannot legislate to the extreme case (13:00),  as the liberals would like, but must do what’s best for society as a whole.

Rep. Travis Dunlap is a young lawmaker from Bartlesville, OK who was elected to the state house from his trade as a piano tuner.    Though he does not have the constitutional law background that his Texas counterpart has, he probably drafted the more effective of the two pieces of legislation in actually rolling back the abusive “no-fault” regime.    According to media accounts,  the original HB1277 drafted by Dunlap made it impossible for a court in Oklahoma to grant a divorce for “incompatibility” (the equivalent of “irreconcilable differences”) if the couple met one of three criteria:

– married for more than 10 years, or
– had a living child under age 18, or
–  a partner involved objects to the divorce.

A committee modification allows petitioners who fall into one of those categories to have a divorce granted by the court for “incompatibility”, but they must first go through an educational program about the impact of divorce.   Previously, petitioners only had to do that if they had a child under age 18, and the educational program was focused on the impact of divorce on children.    While this does not seem a particularly helpful modification from the standpoint of constitutional protections,  this bill has a very important strength that the Texas bill lacks:  it restores marital fault to the property settlement that results, as follows,

  “However, where the court finds by a preponderance of the evidence that one spouse caused the dissolution of marriage by committing at least one of the grounds for divorce, other than incompatibility, listed in Section 101 of this title, the court shall award only one-quarter (1/4) of the marital property to that spouse and the other spouse shall retain the remaining three-quarters (3/4) of the marital property…….

“Upon granting a decree of dissolution of marriage, annulmentof a marriage, or legal separation, where the court finds by apreponderance of the evidence that one spouse caused thedissolution, annulment or separation by committing at least one of the grounds for divorce, other than incompatibility, listed in Section 101 of this title, the court shall order that party to paythe other party’s expenses, including attorney fees.”

Perverse and unjust economic incentives play such an enormous role in the abusiveness of existing family laws,  and so drives the egregious behavior of the divorce industry “professionals” who have far more interest in shredding families than defending them, that no reform is likely to be sustainable without addressing this, as the Oklahoma bill has nicely done.    As a direct consequence, Rep. Dunlap has predictably drawn the venom of the state Bar and the unrelenting scorn of Oklahoma’s leftists in the press.    The committee vote was 7-5 on February 27, to refer the bill on for a floor vote which must occur by the May 26 end of the Oklahoma 56th legislative session.   The Senate sponsor of the bill is Sen. Josh Brecheen of Coalgate, Oklahoma.   Unlike Texas, Oklahoma does not have a strong family policy council any longer,  and videos of the committee testimony do not seem to be available.      One recent article says this, “Dunlap, who represents District 10, said he now does not expect the bill to see a vote in the House but is interested in continuing his efforts. ”     We hope and pray that Rep. Dunlap  does just that.

Rep. Matt Krause’s Texas bill was the subject of an earlier blog post.   That bill, which simply eliminates no-fault grounds where there is not a mutual-consent petition has been favorably referred by a 4-3 committee vote on April 12, and must somehow achieve a floor vote by the May 29 end of the legislative session.     This bill does not address several onerous provisions that would remain unchanged in the Texas Statute which could effectively still result in a contested dissolution being granted to an offending spouse over the moral objections of the non-offending spouse, including this provision:

Sec. 6.006. LIVING APART. The court may grant a divorce in favor of either spouse if the spouses have lived apart without cohabitation for at least three years.

Often, the innocent original spouse who does not believe in marriage dissolution because of scriptures such as Matthew 19:6 and 8, Romans 7:2-3 and 1 Cor. 7:10-11 and 39,  has non-cohabitation forced on them by the offending spouse, and has little or no control over this circumstance, especially if the offending spouse is in an adulterous relationship or has a history of physical abuse of household members.    This should therefore not be left under the sole control of the offending party if unilateral divorce is to be eradicated, and constitutional protections balanced.    We should also  note that the [unchanged] “cruelty” ground  contains this phrase which still refers to “insupportability” but does not objectively or measurably define “cruel treatment” :

The court may grant a divorce in favor of one spouse if the other spouse is guilty of cruel treatment toward the complaining spouse of a nature that renders further living together insupportable 

(Apparently, rogue  attorneys and “abused poor women” can restore “insupportability” simply by alleging cruel treatment under sec. 6.005, which this bill still does not, for all purposes, make them actually prove under its ongoing vague definition — how novel!)

In the unlikely event that Texas HB93  achieves a floor vote by the end of the session, there’s no question that there will be some back doors left wide open to unilateral divorce, but the period of time required will be lengthened.    If it dies  in the 85th session  without being voted on, we hope it will be re-introduced next session with some of these issues further addressed.

We covered a list of practical actions Texas and Oklahoma citizens can take to support these bills in the last blog on this topic, but let’s run through a few briefly again:

(1) Call the state capitol and ask for a floor vote:
Joe Straus
Speaker of the House (Texas)
(512) 463-1000
(512) 463-0675 Fax

Charles McCall
Speaker of the House (Oklahoma)
(405) 557-7412

(2) Engage your church and pastor – ask for a few minutes to talk to the congregation about the religious freedom and due process issues with the so-called “no-fault” system and how it has led to every other kind of  immorality, from same-sex attraction to the high abortion and suicide rates.    Explain that citizen engagement is needed at the grass roots to counter the overwhelming divorce industry lobby and liberal press.   If they sent busloads of the faithful to the state capitol 2 or 3 years ago to combat gay “marriage”,  challenge them on why this isn’t every bit as weighty a matter to the church’s families.

(3) Call Texas Values and ask what they are doing to support HB93. (Unfortunately, we’re not aware of a functioning family policy council in Oklahoma at this time).

(4) Sign a petition if you get a chance.   The Ruth Institute has one for Texas that can be found here.

(5) No matter which state you call home, please take time to call and write to encourage Reps. Krause and Dunlap.     Pray for them, and let them know it.

NeverGiveUp

Divorce Reform, Repenting Prodigals and Covenant Marriage “Standers”
While there is broad agreement in the marriage permanence community that repealing unilateral divorce is best for the future of our nation, many of us have either already been unjustly divorced and seen our spouse remarry adulterously  (by biblical standards, that is – since we, their true spouse in God’s eyes, are still alive), or others of us have come to biblical conviction that we had wrongfully “married” someone else’s divorced spouse, and needed to exit that union to be right with God.    So, though meaningful reform of the unilateral family-shredding machine remains a long shot with plenty of deep-pocketed, well-connected opposition,  we should look at where such reforms leave our wandering spouses who need to exit those immoral, civil-only  unions and rebuild their covenant families.    The subsequent divorce rate is significantly higher for legalized adultery resulting from the divorce culture, and it escalates with each round of serial polygamy under easy divorce laws.    Just how hard will divorce reform make repentance from remarriage adultery under the two bills being considered ?    Here’s an analysis for each:

Oklahoma, under HB1277:   Mutual-consent petitions continue to permit no-fault grounds, but if the adulterous union produced a minor child or has lasted at least 10 years, an education class must be attended before dissolution can be granted.     It is likely that a repenting prodigal exiting the adulterous remarriage will leave 75% of the marital assets with their ex-spouse unless that spouse has committed a serious, provable offense against the marriage.     Assets can be replaced, but souls certainly cannot.    Even so, assets brought in from the “dissolved” covenant marriage (very importantly including retirement accounts) are not considered part of the marital assets of the subsequent faux marriage and would not be forfeited by decree, however the repenting spouse would also likely have to absorb all the legal costs of getting free of their legalized adultery.     Waiting period:  180 days.

Texas, under HB93:  Mutual-consent petitions permit insupportability grounds but if the subsequent spouse does not consent and the repenting prodigal separates in order to end the practice of adultery (as he / she must do regardless), then after one year the now-abandoned spouse may file a fault-based petition which will be granted upon evidence, or they may agree to a mutual-consent petition sooner, and if HB65 also passes, the waiting period will be 180 days.   Alternatively, if the repenting spouse moves back in with their covenant spouse,  grounds of adultery are then available to the now-abandoned subsequent spouse.  If the non-covenant still declines to file a grounds-based petition, the repenting prodigal may file after 3 years of continuous separation on the basis of non-cohabitation.    Assets would be divided on the same basis as current law but this  would not include any assets brought from the prior covenant marriage.

“Standerinfamilycourt” always encourages mutual petitions rather than dragging anyone into a pagan court (1 Cor. 6:1-8)  in the process of repenting of an adulterous remarriage, as a growing number are doing these days upon learning the biblical truth on the matter.     If prayer doesn’t produce a consenting, mutual petition, repenting prodigals can always take comfort in the biblical fact that no state has dissolved the marriage of their youth in God’s eyes, nor was the subsequent “remarriage” ever considered valid in His courtroom.    They are free to resume their union without the state’s blessing and are not actually in sin if they do so.   The Lord will then sort out the legal matters in His own way.

‘So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate’….He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way.“     Matt. 19:6, 8

And Jesus said to them, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”   Matt. 12:17

(SIFC:  Would like to give a shout-out and thanks to Bai MacFarlane of Mary’s Advocates, who has established contact with Rep. Krause’s office and has provided some of the not-yet-posted details needed to complete this post.)

www.standerinfamilycourt.com

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Divorce, Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, Religious freedom, Spiritual Warfare, Substantive Due Process

Will They Do It? Another State Attempts to Repeal Unilateral Divorce

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KrauseFamilyby Standerinfamilycourt

It appears that the first major effort since 2006 by a state legislator to roll back so-called “no fault” (unilateral divorce) has been underway since the last session of Texas legislature, sponsored by Rep. Matt Krause, recently re-elected to a third term.

Rep Krause is the son of a Baptist pastor who attended Liberty University School of Law and is a constitutional attorney who opened up a branch of the Christian legal defense firm Liberty Counsel in Fort Worth, TX.  The  Krauses have four young children and are in their mid-thirties.

From a December 28 post by a local news service:

A one-page bill, filed by Rep. Matt Krause, R-Fort Worth, will make it harder for couples to separate, by ending [the “ground” of]  “insupportability”

FB profile 7xtjw SIFC: (“insupportability” is functionally equivalent to the civil charge of  “irreconcilable differences” in most other states.  Liberal bias in the press coverage often deceitfully implies mutuality in the assessment, by paraphrasing in terms like  “the couple can no longer stand” to live with each other.)

Per the Texas Statute, as currently enacted:

Sec. 6.001.  INSUPPORTABILITY.  On the petition of either party to a marriage, the court may grant a divorce without regard to fault if the marriage has become insupportable because of discord or conflict of personalities that destroys the legitimate ends of the marital relationship and prevents any reasonable expectation of reconciliation.   Enacted, 1997

At some point between the original 1970 enactment of unilateral divorce in Texas and 1997, there was a re-write of the statute which Judy Parejko described in her 2001 book, “Stolen Vows”,  where the provision for mutuality in the petition was surrepetitiously  taken out of the enacted language.    From Day 1, the members of the Texas Bar refused to implement the law on that enacted basis, until they finally succeeded in changing it, just prior to the time that attorney Ed Truncellito brought his failed constitutional challenge of the false language in a 2000 case.    FB profile 7xtjw

The local article continues:

Krause says ending no-fault divorces would keep the family together as well as add protection to the spouse who might not want to split up.

“There needs to be some type of due process. There needs to be some kind of mechanism to where that other spouse has a defense,” said Rep. Krause, who filed the same bill last session.   He hopes lawmakers will pick up the issue earlier in the 2017 Legislative session.

He also filed a bill to extend the waiting period for a divorce from 60 days to 180 days.

MKrauseFB_post

What would a successful effort by Rep. Krause mean to the community of covenant marriage standers, also to repenting prodigals, in the highly unlikely event that this attempt to repeal “no-fault” (unilateral, non-consenting) divorce succeeds in Texas?  As is all too typical in the liberal press, this local article was written in such a way as to misinform the public on both sides of the issue.
Success is actually highly unlikely, especially without ardent support from the churches of Texas, who are more likely to ignore the bill, or give it only tepid support.   We attempted to contact Rep. Krause through his Facebook page, to ask him if he at least had the support of his state family policy council, but he did not respond:

We would like to follow the progress of your bill, Rep. Krause. What is the bill #, if we may ask ?

Another question: are you familiar with what author Judy Parejko wrote in her 2001 book, “Stolen Vows” about the original statute language in Texas,and the contrary way it was implemented?

Are there any Family Policy groups supporting you at all?

Thanks, and Godspeed! 
“standerinfamilycourt”

We must nevertheless keep praying for the coast-to-coast repeal of unilateral divorce.    The bill before the Texas legislature, introduced by Rep. Krause is HB93, whose progress can be followed here.    It is telling that its sponsor would like this bill to come up for a vote “earlier in the 2017 session.”    That’s because he had to re-introduce it, since it failed to be brought to a vote in the prior session.

 

TX HB93_2017

Texas does indeed have a family policy council:

Texas
Texas Values
Jonathan Saenz, President
900 Congress, Ste. 220
Austin, TX 78701
Phone: 512-478-2220
info@txvalues.org
txvalues.org

The 85th Texas Legislature is dominated by Republicans in both the House and the Senate, so grass-roots citizen efforts to support this bill would appear to be fairly effective, notwithstanding the stiff, well-financed opposition that is likely to come from the Texas Bar Association and the ABA.    We would strongly encourage our page followers living in Texas to take several practical steps to give this bill a chance for enactment:

–  go to your pastor and make sure he is aware of this bill.   It seems to be getting some publicity, but mostly biased and unfair publicity.   Ask him to contact Texas Values and state legislators in support of it.   Make sure your pastor understands the connection between unilateral divorce and gay marriage / threats to religious liberty, and that “Respondents” to a unilateral divorce petition were the very first Christians to lose their religious liberty on the altars of the Sexual Revolution.

– contact Texas Values yourself, and ask them to support the bill with publicity spend and legislator contacts.  To their extreme credit, their page does call out unilateral divorce as an issue.    To their discredit, a perusal of their page shows that they’ve not done a blog piece on the bill from the time it was filed in November, 2016 to-date.   (You may also need to point out the religious liberty issue to them, and remind them of what was documented in the early constitutional challenge cases by actual Texas judges in the 1970’s.

– do the obvious and keep pressure on your state legislators to support the bill.   The other side will most certainly be doing so.

– re-share this post, and ecourage everyone you know to do the same.

– maintain supportive contact with Rep. Krause through the link to his page that we provided above.   Pray for him, and let him know it.

For now, we just make a few practical point-outs:

(1) If this succeeds, it’s a necessary matter for full repentence as a nation (and more importantly as a CHURCH) to help stay God’s hand of judgment on this nation at its true root.

(2) The last state to make this sort of attempt was Michigan in 2006. Despite the lonely backing of the Family Research Council, the effort was defeated by heavy, well-funded opposition from the Michigan Bar who argued that people would simply cross state lines to get their “blameless” divorce, saddling the state later on with administering it. (Ironically, most of the fee revenue to attorneys comes for years after the divorce if there are children involved — so this argument, while true in its first point was spurious and dishonest in its totality – just like this article.)

(3) Make no mistake, unless there is an option preserved for MUTUALLY ending a civil-only marriage by agreed peitition with agreed terms (only), this will make it infinitely more costly to repent of an adulterous or sodomus union entered into with someone else’s spouse. Imagine going into family court with a formal charge of adultery saying “I’m the adulterer, and she is as well, because only death dissolves her original covenant marriage, not the State of Texas, Your Honor.” (No 20th-21st century judge has ever cared that the bible makes it clear that remarriage is an ongoing state of adultery, as Jesus repeated in the same words at least 3 recorded times, and that dying in this state is a matter of heaven-or-hell, as Paul stated at least twice.)   There was a time when our judges did know this, and when they ruled accordingly.

(4) Repenting prodigals under Texas jurisdiction will need to be prepared to live apart from their noncovenant, counterfeit mate immediately, and for 3 years thereafter if the forced unilateral clause is removed without replacing it with a true mutual “no fault” petition — which (contrary to the bias of the local article), NO state has ever had.
(**Except for Texas, as noted above, but only on the statute books, not in practice or interpretation).
Hopefully, repenting prodigals will realize that man’s law is inferior to God’s law and that the latter is all that is required to live morally and righteously with their true, God-joined spouse. — Expect legal hiccups for the covenant family and fiery censure from the apostate church in the meantime! Here’s where the voice of true Christ-followers in the marriage permanence community is going to need to be more grounded and resolute than ever.

(5) No state is likely to gain any traction on this issue until the neighboring states do. And that’s unlikely until the church stops performing adulterous weddings or signing civil marriage licenses, thereby boycotting the culture of serial polygamy and all of its entrenched instruments including state “jurisdiction”.

Currently, fault-based divorces in Texas must fall into one of six categories: adultery, cruelty, abandonment and a felony conviction, living apart for at least three years or confinement to a mental hospital.    Rep. Krause was also quoted on January 8 by Maria Anglin of the San Antonio Express-News as saying he’d like for the three years to be reduced to one year if the petition alleges abandonment – in our opinion, not an improvement since most experts say that the average length of an extramarital infatuation is two years.   Texas is one of the few major states that still offers fault-based divorce, with Illinois repealing all fault-based grounds in 2015 in a profoundly immoral overhaul of its “family laws”.

We will do our best to establish contact with Rep. Krause and with Texas Values, so that we can keep you informed of progress.

www.standerinfamilycourt.com

7 Times Around the Jericho Wall  |   Let’s Repeal No-Fault Divorce!

Church Discipline, citizenship, Connection of Unilateral Divorce to SSM, Discipleship, Divorce, Equal Protection, family law, Fundamental Rights, Lost culture, marriage, Marriage Restoration, morality, Religious freedom, Spiritual Warfare

Let’s Take an AUTHENTIC Stand for Marriage, Christian Right

4 Comments

NatMarriageWkby Standerinfamilycourt

February 7 – 14 is National Marriage Week.
During this week, there will be much going on that is vital and valuable to our nation, but there will be no getting away from the fact that in the corrupted culture of contemporary evangelicaldom, it will be “finders keepers”, and millions in faux “marriages” which are not holy matrimony, will be encouraged to stay there at the peril of their very souls.  The excellent organization, Breakpoint.org promotes it in this audio link dated January 5, 2017.

Talking about marriage “permanence” is politically acceptable to this crowd, but it will not resolve the nation’s problems because it will not touch the root issue.   Rather, the message needs to be around the far more relevant and offensive topic of holy matrimony indissolubility, according to Matt.19:6,8 and Luke 16:18. This needs to be in the heaven-or-hell terms that Jesus and Paul unflinchingly cast it.

Some crucial topics not likely to be on this year’s agenda:

– When will pastors stop performing weddings that Jesus repeatedly called adulterous (and tell the congregation why) ?

– When will pastors stop signing civil marriage licenses that reflect the only unenforceable contract in American history, and which since 1970, in no way corresponds to Christ’s Matt. 19:4-6 definition of marriage?

– When will pastors stop smearing and stigmatizing the growing stream of true disciples of Jesus Christ who are coming out of adulterous civil unions in order to recover their inheritance in the kingdom of God?
[1 Cor. 6:9-10; Mal. 5:19-21-KJV)

– When will repealing unilateral divorce in all 50 states become as high a moral priority as outlawing the slave trade, or repealing Roe v. Wade, or ending sodomous “marriages” ?

Given what Jesus and Paul both had to say about remarriage adultery (repeatedly by each), true revival when it arrives, is going to look horrifying to the organizers of National Marriage Week, but it will be pleasing to God.   The horror will not be due to the repenting prodigals, but due to five decades of false, hireling shepherds not doing the job the Owner of the fold gave them to safeguard souls first, and then covenant families.

ignatius-antioch

www.standerinfamilycourt.com

7 Times Around the Jericho Wall  |  Let’s Repeal No-Fault Divorce!