August 25, 2013
By Tom Trinko
American Thinker
The New Mexico Supreme Court has ruled that the First Amendments does not apply to people who work for a living.
The First Amendment says:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Given that a person exercises his religion by living his life in harmony with his beliefs, any attempt by government to force people to commit sins is a clear and direct repudiation of the targeted individual's First Amendment rights.
Nonetheless, the New Mexico Supreme Court has found that a photographer who declined to photograph a gay "wedding" was at fault. One judge said:
[Some people] now are compelled by law to compromise the very religious beliefs that inspire their lives. Though the rule of law requires it, the result is sobering. It will no doubt leave a tangible mark on the Huguenins and others of similar views.... [I]t is the price of citizenship.
The flaws in this reasoning are so great that one cannot help but wonder if this is an explicit attempt to overthrow the Constitution.
The first glaring error is the Court's assumption that the New Mexico state legislature can make laws unconstrained by the constitutional rights of the citizens of New Mexico.
If a photographer can be compelled to take part in a gay wedding, why can't she be compelled not to eat fish on Friday or observe Ramadan? If "discrimination" against politically favored groups trumps all else and can be used to compel individuals to perform any action the government deems necessary, what rights do members of any group not favored by the government have?
Further, if Americans' First Amendment right to exercise their religion must bow to gays' rights, what's to stop a court from ruling in favor of a law that criminalizing speech that disagrees with gay assumptions? Once one part of the First Amendment can be ignored, there is nothing to stop the other parts from being officially ruled irrelevant when they conflict with the liberal agenda.
The proponents of so-called gay marriage continually sell their position by asking how changing the millennia-old definition of marriage will hurt the 98% of Americans who aren't gay. This ruling by the New Mexico Supreme Court is a clear example of precisely how redefining marriage can, and will, have a huge impact on all Americans.
The essential message of this case is that gays are demanding not just that marriage be redefined, but that all Americans bow to the new definition. Gays are not fighting not for the right to marry, but rather for all Americans to be forced to declare that the gay lifestyle is a good thing.
If this ruling stands, then the courts will have effectively nullified the Constitution and made Christians second-class citizens.
