Friday, June 21, 2013
By: Jonathan Imbody
Esteemed
colleagues who focus on religious liberty issues are
uncharacteristically divided regarding the Supreme Court's decision
yesterday that struck down as unconstitutional a government requirement
that recipients of grants to fight human trafficking and AIDS provide
assurance that they oppose prostitution, which spreads AIDS and human
trafficking.
Some
legal advocates who focus on religious liberty issues had filed briefs
opposing the "prostitution pledge" provision. They reasoned that its
allowance would let the government unconstitutionally dictate the
ideological views of any organization that receives government funding.
These groups understandably feared strengthening the Obama
administration's attacks on religious liberty, buttressing local
governments' attacks on pregnancy centers through speech requirements,
and squeezing out campus student groups that decline to conform to
university dogma on social issues. The groups reasoned that even the tax
exemption status of charitable groups, seen (oddly) as a form of
government subsidy, could be jeopardized if groups opposed the social
policies of the government
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