American Civil Liberties Union

As a former police chief of numerous Oklahoma towns, including Seminole, Clinton, Blackwell, Owasso, Bethany, and Chickasha, I have seen officers disciplined for a variety of insubordinate acts. During my 35 years in law enforcement, however, I have never had to discipline an officer for refusing to carry out an assignment because he objects to the faith of the individuals he has been ordered to serve. Indeed, no officer serving under me has claimed that right because every law enforcement official knows that refusing orders on these grounds would not only amount to insubordination, but would also violate the oath sworn by all officers to uphold the U.S. Constitution. That oath requires that as, police officials, we serve and protect all members of the community, regardless of faith or belief.

Remarkably, there are only 16 states that currently have workplace non-discrimination laws that are fully inclusive of LGBT people. This leaves LGBT people vulnerable to workplace discrimination in well over half of the country–an unacceptable situation that must be changed.

To address this, last week, the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) was reintroduced in Congress. The legislation would prohibit employment discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in most American workplaces, a critically important step towards full equality for LGBT people.

Students at Hugoton High School in Hugoton, Kansas, are set to finally learn the “truth about dinosaurs” next week—at least the truth as the Creation Truth Foundation sees it. The religious organization, which advocates for “a return to all of [the] realities of Biblical Creation,” is scheduled to conduct several mandatory school-day assemblies about dinosaurs for all students and teachers on Tuesday. The ACLU of Kansas & Western Missouri and the ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief learned about the planned assembly yesterday afternoon and sent a letter today demanding that the public school district cancel the event.

Should local officials be able to start their meetings with prayers that endorse a particular faith? North Carolina State Rep. Michele Presnell thinks so, with one tiny caveat: the faith endorsed must be her own. When asked by one of her constituents whether she would be comfortable with a prayer to Allah before a public meeting, Presnell responded, "No, I do not condone terrorism."