In Kansas, Right Joins Left to Halt Bill on Gays

[RKP5637]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/17/us/politics/in-kansas-right-joins-left-to-halt-bill-on-gays.html?_r=0

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A bill that would have allowed individuals to refuse to provide business services to same-sex couples in Kansas because of religious beliefs met a surprising and quick end last week when conservative senators sided with liberal advocates in saying that the measure promoted discrimination.

The bill had passed the House, 72 to 49, last Wednesday and it appeared that it might also easily sail through the Senate. Both chambers are controlled by conservative Republicans who in recent years have passed some of the most conservative legislation in the country, whether on gun control, abortion rights or taxes.

Last year, the Legislature passed the Kansas Preservation of Religious Freedom Act, which protects residents from government burdens that may force them to break their religious beliefs. That bill stemmed in part from concerns that employers could be forced to provide contraception under the federal health care law.

The bill proposed in this year’s session seemed to go further in explicitly allowing any individual to raise a religious objection in refusing to recognize same-sex couples or provide them with services.

[pampango]

1. "The turn against the bill came as a welcome surprise to civil liberties advocates in Kansas and

across the country. “The public outcry by midweek had reached such a volume that the Senate just wasn’t going to be able to take it up,” said Thomas Witt, the executive director of Equality Kansas, a nonprofit group that fights discrimination and strongly opposed the bill. “I don’t know what surprised me more, the level of public involvement in this or the speed with which the Senate president basically ended the prospects for the bill.”

Opponents included the Kansas Chamber of Commerce, which said that the measure could lead to increased costs for businesses. The chamber took particular exception to a provision in the bill that said that if an employee of the government or “other nonreligious entity” objected to providing a service based on religious beliefs, the employer would have to find another employee to fill in or find some other way to provide the service.

Businesses were “not interested in getting into these guessing games as to someone’s intent and whether a strongly held religious belief is legitimate or not,” said Mike O’Neal, the president of the chamber.

Eunice Rho, the advocacy and policy counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union, said that while it was pleased with the developments, it remained wary of the potential for the measure to be resurrected. Similar measures to allow businesses to refuse services to gays are pending in South Dakota and Tennessee, Ms. Rho said."

Nice find, RKP5637. Thanks for posting.

[RKP5637]

2. YVW!