Another Victory for our God-given Precedent Setting Strategy – The Gift from God That Keeps on Giving…and a defeat to remind us why we need to remain in the battle…

"WOW! What a summer of victory after significant victory God has provided. We are almost unable to keep up reporting all the GOOD NEWS to you. Yesterday, another critical win in Washington State.  Unfortunately, it was also dampened by a loss of an appeal there as well.

First the victory…

For over a half of century, the ACLU and its allies built a foundation based legal precedent upon legal precedent to systematically strip our nation of its religious heritage.  Now, because of your prayers and your support, ADF, with God’s grace, has turned the tables on the ACLU and its allies by helping establish an impressive track record of legal precedents that undo some of the damage that these groups – and years of Christian neglect – did to religious liberty.

Joshua Davey earned a Washington state-funded “Promise Scholarship” for low-and-middle income college students.  One of the qualifications for this scholarship was that the recipient had to attend an accredited college in the state.  Joshua chose to attend Northwest College, a state-accredited Christian college.  However, when Joshua announced that he was going to pursue a double major in Pastoral Ministries and Business Administration, the state took away his scholarship.  Why?  Because they claimed that state assistance towards obtaining a theology degree violated the so-called “separation of church and state.”  

With the assistance of ADF allied attorneys Stuart Roth, Kevin H. Theriot, and Gary McCaleb,Joshua filed suit against the state.  On July 18, 2002, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (the infamous Pledge of Allegiance case court) ruled in favor of Joshua and restored his scholarship.  Cited in the majority decision were THREE ADF-funded U.S. Supreme Court legal precedents,  ¹all building from the win in Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of University of Virginia.

We praise the Lord for this successful strategy to reclaim lasting religious freedom for all Americans!

And now the defeat…

A Washington state appeals court bizarrely ruled on the same day it is unconstitutional for the state to not include “sexual orientation” in “anti-discrimination policies” for public employees.  The court overturned a lower court ruling that had found no such “right” in the U.S. Constitution.  This is another troubling victory for radical homosexual activists.  Please be in prayer as we seek to stop the homosexual juggernaut.

 

¹The other two cases cited were Good News Clubs v. Milford Central Schools and the recent Zelman v. Simmons-Harris (the Cleveland school voucher case).