From: buckmr@RPI.EDU (Rondel K. Buckmire)
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: Legal Challenge to NJ GLB Rights Law
Date: 17 Apr 92 20:10:01 GMT

I got this off Rensselaer's ClariNet feed...

"Copyright 1992 by UPI.
Reposted with permission from the ClariNet Electronic Newspaper newsgroup
clari.group.gays.  For more info on ClariNet, write to info@clarinet.com or
phone 1-800-USE-NETS."


	TRENTON, N.J. (UPI) -- A conservative Presbyterian group sued the
state Wednesday, claiming New Jersey's ban on discrimination against
homosexuals could force religious organizations to hire, ordain and
marry sexual sinners.
	The federal civil rights suit contends that the law violates
constitutional rights to freedom of speech and religion and that it is
so broad that groups like the Presbytery of New Jersey of the Orthodox
Presbyterian Church could be legally bound to violate their principles.
Church officials are seeking an injunction to keep the state from
enforcing the law against religious organizations.
	``Under the statute, plaintiffs ... cannot deny communion to an
adulterer, or even to heterosexuals engaging in sex outside of marriage,
fornication or to persons who engage in homosexual or bisexual conduct,''
the complaint said.
	Lawyer Thomas Neuberger described the suit as a preemptive strike. A
homosexual rights group, using a similar San Francisco law,
unsuccessfully sued an Orthodox Presbyterian church that dismissed a gay
organist in 1980.
	``We want to make sure that the same thing doesn't happen here,'' he
said.
	The law is so vague that the church might face sanctions for sermons
or tracts denouncing homosexuality, Neuberger said. He also said that
adding sexual orientation to the notices the church, as an employer, is
legally required to post violates its freedoms.
	State legal authorities could not be reached for comment. But the law
excludes ``any institution, bona fide club or place of accomodation
which is in its nature distinctly private,'' as well as schools operated
by religious groups, and specifically says the only valid marriages are
those recognized by the state.
	The suit claims that even the parts of the law aimed at protecting
religious groups are unconstitutional.
	``For the state or its administrative agencies to judge and determine
what is and what is not a 'tenet' of a church or religious organization
unconstitutionally entangles the state in religious affairs and violates
the Establishment Clause's wall of separation between church and state,''
the complaint said.
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---
RON BUCKMIRE, 11 Colvin Circle, Troy, NY 12180-3735. 
vox:(518)-276-8910 fax:(518)-276-6920 buckmr@rpi.edu buckmr@rpitsmts.bitnet
"I don't understand how there can be regulated bigotry." -Mariah Carey
Newsgroups: soc.motss