The U.S. Supreme Court declined to overrule two lower courts that prohibited Alabama from executing a prisoner using nitrogen gas. The state was set to execute Jeffrey Lee June 11 until a federal appeals court and a U.S. district judge…
The Supreme Court is betting on America’s amnesia
The U.S. Supreme Court’s latest voting rights ruling is dangerous not only for what it does legally, but for what it reveals nationally. It reveals how much historical amnesia now exists in the American bloodstream. A nation that still viscerally…
Black Churches Urge Congregants to Mobilize After Supreme Court Ruling
In the hours after the Supreme Court struck down a Louisiana congressional map and weakened protections given to minority voters under the Voting Rights Act, a bishop overseeing historically Black African Methodist Episcopal (AME) churches in Louisiana wrote a message…
Supreme Court further dilutes Voting Rights Act
The U.S. Supreme issued a 6-3 ruling April 29 severely limiting a key element of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that protects minorities from voting discrimination. In a decision split along ideological lines, the court made it more difficult…
Texas Ten Commandments law likely headed to US Supreme Court
Texas’ Ten Commandments law may be headed to the U.S. Supreme Court after an appellate court ruled it does not violate church-state separation under the U.S. Constitution. A majority of the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans…
There is no need for conversion therapy
The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to strike down Colorado’s ban on “conversion therapy” is a harmful setback for LGBTQ Americans. In the 8-1 ruling, the court has failed to recognize the well-documented harm conversion therapy inflicts, especially on vulnerable LGBTQ…
Supreme Court says conversion therapy is protected free speech
Evangelical therapists have a First Amendment right to engage in “conversion therapy” with LGBTQ clients despite solid medical evidence that such treatment is ineffective, according to the U.S. Supreme Court. In an 8-1 ruling March 31, the high court ruled…
No kindness, no democracy
Seventy-four years ago, on April 8, 1952, President Harry Truman went on national radio and television to announce he had issued Executive Order 10340, authorizing the United States government to seize the nation’s steel mills. Eighteen months earlier, China had…
Catholic bishops: Trump’s assault on birthright citizenship affronts Catholic teaching
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has filed an amicus brief in a case before the U.S. Supreme Court opposing President Donald Trump’s efforts to eliminate birthright citizenship, arguing to the majority-Catholic justices that doing away with it would undermine…
Supreme Court won’t hear McRaney’s appeal
The U.S. Supreme Court has denied Will McRaney’s final effort to hold the Southern Baptist Convention North American Mission Board responsible for his 2015 firing as executive director of the Baptist Convention of Maryland and Delaware. In a legal battle…
52 Baptist leaders sign amicus brief supporting McRaney
Fifty-two current and former Southern Baptist leaders signed an amicus brief sent to the U.S. Supreme Court Feb. 9 arguing in favor of Will McRaney’s case against the Southern Baptist Convention North American Mission Board. The signatories represent at least…
Connecting the dots from the unitary executive president
You, along with millions of other American citizens, may be wondering where those tense confrontations in Minneapolis came from. What brought those 3,000 ICE agents to the Twin Cities and the angry citizens into the streets? Many different streams of…