George Rebane
Indiana’s new law providing for the practice of religious freedom is not really a new law at all, but joined at the hip with bipartisan legislation – Religious Freedom Restoration Act – passed in 1993 and signed by President Clinton. That law clarified and underlined the Constitution’s provision for not letting government define religious preferences and practices. Indiana’s legislation abets what 19 other states already have on their books.
But for me the real question is the freedom to practice what you believe and what is taught by your faith. The Constitution guarantees such freedoms as long as they do not deny others the practice of their equally guaranteed freedoms. And most certainly Indiana’s law will not prevent its LGTB contingent from doing their thing that includes getting supportive services from numerous suppliers who are ready, willing, and able.
If I operate a legal business, I want to have the maximum latitude in choosing my suppliers, determining my inventory, hiring my workers, and servicing my customers. I want my competition and customers to drive my business decisions, not the state. And that includes deciding to whom I will sell or not. I can see the state entering this equation only for national security considerations – e.g. if I invent a super weapon, I may not sell to anyone I choose.
Indiana’s law will clearly allow business owners to discriminate among their potential customers based on their religious beliefs; to deny that is ludicrous. But so what? Businesses can already deny service for numerous less salutary reasons – ‘No shoes, no shirt, no service.’ And that still is not the important point here.
Some on the Left argue that since a business is registered/permitted by the state, it is in some way a public utility and must cater to all of the public. That argument leads directly to the removal of the last vestiges of private property. And violating that side of the Bastiat Triangle (q.v.) first weakens and then collapses the remaining two – liberty and security in your person. The state will then constructively own us lock, stock, and barrel – a sought after conclusion to the organization of society as held by many (most?) progressives.
So encourage the LGTB folks to buy their wedding cakes from the many who will gladly supply them. And if some merchant refuses my patronage because I am a Christian, or an immigrant, or …, let them – I will go somewhere else.
Finally, Indiana did not have to pass their religious freedom law since it already exists in the US Code. In the furtherance of states’ rights, all states should pass an amendment to their constitutions that simply allows them to practice prosecutorial discretion in the enforcement of any federal law they deem is not being adequately enforced by the federal government. That would handle all such cases and many more (including border security and illegal aliens). I submit this latter recommendation to the several states as part and parcel of the Rebane Doctrine.
[3apr15 update] Some thoughts on what is a religion since the comment stream below seems to have trouble defining it in an acceptable manner that relates to the events most recently brought up in Indiana. The subsequent discussion then has gone off the rails since people in this day and age seem to have no common understanding of what is a religion, especially of the kind that are considered legally when discussing church and state issues.
I am not interested in getting into a nitpicking contest with readers who insist on having special purpose, and/or exotic definitions of the term. Instead the following offering hopefully covers the bases of what mainstream America thinks about when they are asked to consider a person’s religion, as opposed to a recently fabricated, unique, and/or ad hoc belief system shared by one or a very few, and no one else.
A religion is a belief system that has the following attributes –
1. Holds that a human being is transcendent in that his complete being exceeds the common space and time dimensions in which we observe him;
2. That there exists a higher being or intelligence that gave rise to the observable universe, a being (call it God) that is deserving of continuing recognition, supplication, and gratitude – in short, of being worshipped through both formal and informal proceedings;
3. That this higher being (God) has communicated with Man through natural acts, favored prophets, and even personal incarnations to establish its bona fides and to prescribe ways in which we would please and displease it.
4. That these communications have been gathered, disseminated, and passed on through succeeding generations in a canonical form referred (informally aka ‘scripture’) the content of which is attributed to God himself, or to God-inspired intermediaries;
5. That it contains a formal structure of communal worship (aka liturgy) during which the adherents of the religion gather to acknowledge their common beliefs, and give visible and unambiguous glory to their God.
6. That it contains certain specified communal procedures or acts that serve to define transitions in the relationship of its adherents to God and/or to each other within the blessings of their God. These are known as sacraments – e.g. baptism, marriage, last rites, etc – and often serve to distinguish one religion from another.
7. Its validity does not lend itself to disproof by the accepted means of falsification as required of scientific knowledge, therefore religious knowledge is by definition unscientific.
We can add attributes to this list with the liability that it then becomes too confining, and rejects belief systems that are commonly acknowledged as being religions. Number 2 above comes close to this when considered in the light of, say, Buddhism and Taoism. The main point here is that this definition does not allow for Sam, Sally, and John to meet on Monday, spend the week cobbling together some of the above attributes, and on Friday announce that they are devoted adherents of their newly concocted religion which should then be given equal consideration in society’s resolution of religious issues.
rebanesruminations.com 
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