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Dateline Sacramento (12/17/2009)

Dateline Sacramento
News with a View from the California Capitol
December 17, 2009
Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Decision Protects First Amendment Rights of Privacy
In a huge victory last Friday for Proposition 8 supporters, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeal’s Ninth Circuit unanimously ruled that proponents of same-sex marriage may not access the Yes on 8 campaign’s internal communications, reversing a district court’s order.  The Perry v. Schwarzenegger trial against Prop 8 is scheduled to begin on January 11, 2010.
The decision came in response to a pair of decisions by U.S. District Court Chief Judge Vaughn Walker, who had earlier overruled the objections of the Proposition 8 Legal Defense Fund. Until reversed by the appellate court, the campaign was under order to surrender to opposing attorneys a significant amount of e-mails, strategy memos and other private communications exchanged between the ProtectMarriage.com – Yes on 8 campaign’s leaders and vendors.
In the 38-page ruling, the appellate court agreed with Prop 8’s legal team, stating that Judge Walker’s orders violated First Amendment rights of political campaigns to protect internal exchanges from public review. In rare agreement, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Northern California sided with the Prop 8 Legal Defense Fund – defendant-intervenor in the case – writing an amicus brief of appeal to the circuit court.
The plaintiffs’ attorneys sought to obtain internal documents from the Prop 8 proponents in an attempt to find evidence that Prop 8’s passage was “the result of disapproval or animus against a politically unpopular group.” However, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal ruled that such disclosure is a step too far. Following are excerpts of the ninth circuit’s decision, written by Judge Raymond Fisher on behalf of the three-judge panel:
Where, as here, discovery would have the practical effect of discouraging the exercise of First Amendment associational rights, the party seeking discovery must demonstrate a need for the information sufficiently compelling to outweigh the impact on those rights. Plaintiffs have not on the existing record carried that burden in this case.
“Disclosure of internal campaign information can have a deterrent effect on the free flow of information within campaigns…Implicit in the right to associate with others to advance one’s shared political beliefs is the right to exchange ideas and formulate strategy and messages, and do so in private.”
Andy Pugno, General Counsel for ProtectMarriage.com, said the ruling proved that Proposition 8’s leadership was correct in fighting to protect the identities of prominent backers and the campaign’s winning strategy.
“It’s a fundamental feature of our system that citizens have a right to participate in campaigns without later being put on trial for their political beliefs,” Pugno said.
He also said the campaign would furnish the other side with literature and appeals that were sent to voters, “but we’ve drawn the line with internal discussions and strategizing.”
Chief Judge Walker will hear the case in his San Francisco courtroom. Both sides have filed hundreds of documents with the court outlining their respective arguments for and against Proposition 8, which was approved by California’s voters in November 2008, placing the traditional definition of one-man, one-woman marriage into the state’s constitution (Article 1, Section 7.5).
The Impact of the Recession on U.S. Marriages
In a recently released report by The National Marriage Project, 2009 State of Our Unions: Marriage and Money, the authors examine the effects of the “Great Recession” on the financial and emotional lives of married couples. 
The 2009 State of Our Unions specifically attempts to answer the following questions:
  1. How is the “Great Recession” affecting the institution of marriage, as measured by changes in marriage and divorce rates in the United States?
  2. How do family finances, specifically credit card debt and family assets, shape the quality and stability of married life in America?
  3. What can be learned during this stressful time about the division of labor (employment) for husbands and wives?
  4. Is the “Great Recession” likely to foster improved relationships of equality between husbands and wives?
The study is divided into two sections. The first section examines the challenges and opportunities the “Great Recession” creates for marriages. For example, the report concedes that Americans have come to view marriage primarily as a soul-mate relationship, “where emotional intimacy, sexual satisfaction, and individual happiness rank at the top of marital aspirations, especially for younger adults.” However, since the economic downturn, couples are relying more heavily on their marriage and family to make it through uncertain times. According to W. Bradford Wilcox, “The recession reminds us that marriage is more than an emotional relationship; marriage is also an economic partnership and social safety net.”
According to the study, while fiscal challenges can bring marriages and families together, unemployment, foreclosures, debt, and losses to retirement savings can bring significant troubles to marriage and family stability. “In the face of such pressures, some spouses have succumbed to heavy drinking, depression, marital tension, recriminations, and conflict, spiraling downwards in some cases to divorce.” Despite these potential problems, the report reveals that the current recession has resulted in a decrease in the divorce rate, and that marital stability may be on the rise.
The report also examines the impact the economic downturn has had on American debt. Jeffrey Dew, one of the authors of the report, reveals several positive trends related to debt. First, while he explains that credit-card debt is generally toxic in a marriage, shared financial assets can also bind couples together. For instance, Dew’s research indicates that “couples with no assets were about 70 percent more likely to divorce over a three year period compared to couples with assets of $10,000.”
In addition to keeping more marriages together, the current recession is also having a positive effect on families with credit-card debt. The uncertainty is causing Americans to use their credit cards less often. Americans are paying down their debt. Credit-card debt peaked at $988 billion in 2008, and, in the past year, that number has decreased by $90 billion. 
According to Dr. Christine B. Whelan, there may be a silver lining in the current financial crisis. She points out that statistics indicate a more flexible attitude toward the traditional roles of fathers and mothers as they struggle make ends meet.
The Great Recession’s silver lining of increasing gender flexibility and equality is most likely to apply to better educated and younger Americans than to less educated older Americans. That is, young adults with a college education have the best chance at adaptation and change.
The stock market may begin to inch up slowly, but job losses and financial uncertainties will continue to have serious impacts on families for years to come. Among the most vulnerable are single-parent families and fragile cohabiting unions of the poor, and the most resilient will be the educated, dual-career couples who are able to adapt to more flexible family earning and caregiving arrangements. It is within this latter group that we can most hope for a boost for gender equality within marriage and a recognition that the American family can continue to thrive even when it is the wife and mother who is the primary breadwinner, and the husband and father who is the primary caregiver.
Finally, the report focuses exclusively on the “social health of marriage.” Below are some key findings:
Marriage
  • Marriage trends in recent decades indicate that Americans have become less likely to marry.
  • In the past ten years, the percentage of couples who consider their marriages to be “very happy” remains unchanged.
Divorce
  • American divorce rates are nearly twice that of 1960.
  • The divorce rate has steadily declined since its peak in the 1980s.
  • The probability of divorce or separation for a newly married couple is between 40 and 50 percent.
Cohabitation
  • The number of unmarried couples has increased dramatically over the past four decades, and the trend is continuing.
  • Most younger Americans now spend some time living together outside of marriage.
  • Unmarried cohabitation commonly precedes marriage.
Childrearing
  • The presence of children in America has declined significantly since 1960, as measured by fertility rates and the percentage of households with children.
  • Other indicators suggest that this decline has reduced the child centeredness of our nation and contributed to the weakening of the institution of marriage.
  • The percentage of children who grow up in fragile–typically fatherless–families has grown enormously over the past four decades. This is mainly due to increases in divorce, out-of-wedlock births, and unmarried cohabitation.
  • The trend toward fragile families leveled off in the late 1990s, but the most recent data shows a slight increase.
Teen Attitudes
  • The desire of teenagers of both sexes for “a good marriage and family life” has increased slightly over the past few decades. Boys are more than ten percentage points less desirous than girls, however, and they are also a little more pessimistic about the possibility of a long-term marriage.
  • Both boys and girls have become more accepting of lifestyles that are alternatives to marriage, especially unwed childbearing, although the latest data show a surprising drop in acceptance of premarital cohabitation.
Complexities of Modern Faith
This month some families will celebrate Christmas with advent wreaths and calendars; some families can’t wait for the arrival of jolly old Saint Nicholas; some will light candles in celebration of Hanukkah; and still others will celebrate the holidays with a mixing and matching of various beliefs. A recent holiday survey from a group called Interfaith Family.com found a majority of families planned to celebrate some aspects of both Christmas and Hanukkah. Many of these families, struggling with the complexities of faith and family, have found glossing over theology to be the solution.
A recent survey from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found that even elements of New Age and eastern thinking had been adopted by 65 percent of Americans – of all faiths. These families may attend worship services at more than one denomination or blend Christian tenets with mystical beliefs like reincarnation and astrology.  Large minorities of all faiths report experiences with the supernatural such as being in contact with the dead or ghosts. 
While most adults express a belief in or report experiencing at least one eastern or New Age spiritual element, white evangelical Protestants are the least likely to do so. While 10-15 percent of evangelical Protestants include non-biblical beliefs in their theology, that percentage drops with high levels of church commitment. From the general population, however, 24 percent of adults believe in reincarnation, and 23 percent accept yoga as a spiritual practice. Twenty-six percent believe spiritual energy can be found in an inanimate object, 25 percent believe in astrology, and 16 percent believe in an “evil eye” or that certain people can cast spells to harm others.  
According to the same Pew survey, nearly three-quarters of Americans say they attend religious services at least a few times annually. Of that, 38 percent claim to attend weekly, and 34 percent attend a couple of times a month or a few times a year. Roughly half of those who do go to a religious service, go to the same place each time, whereas the other half regularly or occasionally attend another place. 
Interfaith marriages are common in the United States, and the Pew survey found that couples with differing faiths tend to attend services less frequently than those with the same faith. Four-in-ten (or 43 percent) of interfaith couples say they seldom or never attend religious services compared to 21 percent of those who practice the same faith. 
The postmodern world system of today has led many individuals to discard truth in favor of a tolerance that rejects dogma and absolutes. Systematically, society has rejected truth – with its moral and religious standards – and is falling prey, not only to a jumbling of conflicting beliefs, but to a host of New Age and “eastern” philosophies and faiths. 
Culture today focuses on a nonjudgmental attitude, not limited to one truth, where all viewpoints and beliefs are to be accepted. Yet Christianity is a religion of black and white truths, bound up in the truth claims of God. As such, it is being rejected as intolerant and unacceptable. Commenting on the Pew survey, Albert Mohler, quoted in USA Today, said, “This is a failure of the pulpit as much as of the pew to be clear about what is and is not compatible with Christianity and belief in salvation only through Christ.” 
Surely the Pew survey provides a wake-up call to reverse the trend and focus on the truth of a biblical worldview, a systematic view of reality based on truth – not feelings or experience. In the Truth Project, Focus on the Family provides an excellent small-group, DVD-based curriculum on a biblical worldview. CFC offers training seminars throughout the state. Upcoming leader seminars will be in Roseville on January 9, 2010, in Orange on January 16, 2010, and in Livermore on January 30, 2010. Consider starting the New Year at one of these trainings. See CFC online for more information.
Local Links
RIVERSIDE – Last October Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law an annual day honoring homosexual icon Harvey Milk. Now public school officials are grappling with how to “commemorate” Milk in their classrooms. Read more in the Press-Enterprise.
CORNING – The campaign to remove prayer from local government meetings has reached the City of Corning. Corning city council meetings will no longer open with an invocation. Read more in the Corning-Observer.
SANTA ANA – On Monday a federal judge denied the awarding of $391,150 in attorneys’ fees and court-related costs to lawyers defending high school teacher James Corbett. Corbett was sued by a student for his anti-Christian classroom rhetoric in violation of the U.S. constitution. Read more in the Orange County register.
SACRAMENTO – Under Proposition 11, which passed last year, a new commission of 14 individuals will be chosen and tasked with redrawing California senate and assembly district boundaries. The application process for prospective members began Tuesday. Read more in the LA Weekly.
Truth Project Opportunities
RIVERSIDE – California Family Council continues to expand its offerings of the acclaimed Truth Project group leader training seminars. Training in biblical worldview is a prerequisite to living out authentic Christianity in today’s postmodern culture, with its subjective claims of truth. 
The next Truth Project group leader training seminar:
Saturday, January 9, 2010 8:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Host Church: Adventure Christian Church
6401 Stanford Ranch Road
Roseville, CA 95678 (Placer County)
Saturday, January 16, 2010 8:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Host Church: Covenant Presbyterian Church
1855 Orange-Olive Road
Orange, CA 92865 (Orange County)
Saturday, January 30, 2010 8:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Host Church: Calvary Chapel of Livermore
545 North L Street
Livermore, CA 94551 (Alameda County)
Proyecto La Verdad Group Leader Training Seminars:
Spanish Language
Saturday, February 6, 2010 8:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Host Church: Santa Maria Foursquare Church
709 N. Curryer Street
Santa Maria, CA 93458 (Santa Barbara County)
For more information on attending or hosting a seminar, call the California Family Council at 951.354.8362 and ask for Trudy. Register online for seminars at: www.californiafamily.org.
 
 
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