Alliance Defense Fund

Alliance Defense Fund attorneys filed an appeal Wednesday with the town of Gilbert’s zoning Board of Adjustment to overturn a decision banning churches from meeting, holding Bible studies, or having any other activities in private homes. The pastor of the seven-member Oasis of Truth Church received a cease-and-desist letter ordering him to terminate all religious meetings in his home, regardless of their size, nature, or frequency.

Attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund and Center for Arizona Policy have appealed an Arizona judge’s order to halt new state laws protecting the health and safety of women while a lawsuit filed by Planned Parenthood moves forward in state court. At the same time, a Tucson abortion facility represented by the Center for Reproductive Rights is making the rare move of dropping its federal lawsuit against the same laws after both a district and appellate court rejected its request for an injunction. The Bioethics Defense Fund and Life Legal Defense Fund are co-counsel in both cases.

A new law signed by Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal Wednesday fixes a poorly written state statute and prevents the state from intrusively regulating or closing down Bible colleges. Letters from the Alliance Defense Fund to officials with the Wyoming Department of Education on behalf of two Bible schools helped prompt the bill that led to the amendment.

Alliance Defense Fund attorneys secured a federal court order Wednesday that silences a city of Phoenix noise ordinance used to stop the ringing of church bells. St. Mark Roman Catholic Parish and Christ the King Liturgical Charismatic Church sued the city last September over its vague noise ordinance, which offers an exemption for ice cream trucks, but not for churches. The lawsuit came about after Bishop Rick Painter of Christ the King was sentenced to jail and probation last June for violating the ordinance by ringing his church’s bells as a traditional way of praising God.

Alliance Defense Fund allied attorneys and ADF attorneys secured a favorable settlement with the city of York Tuesday on behalf of two counselors who were kept from sharing their pro-life message with individuals in a public alley next to a Planned Parenthood abortion facility. Edward Snell and John McTernan, who were arrested and threatened with arrest, respectively, for exercising their First Amendment rights, were represented by ADF attorneys and allied attorneys in two separate lawsuits against the city of York.

After receiving a letter from Alliance Defense Fund attorneys, the United States Postal Service sent a response letter Monday stating that it is no longer enforcing a policy that was used to ban a Christian man from peacefully handing out religious tracts to receptive passersby outside a Michigan post office. A postal worker told Michael Shanton on the sidewalk in front of the post office that he would be arrested if he did not leave the area. ADF attorneys contended in the letter that the regulation prohibiting him from distributing religious literature was too broadly applied, and therefore violated his right to free speech protected by the First Amendment.

A federal judge issued an order Tuesday dismissing all claims against Shirley Dobson in a lawsuit alleging that government-issued proclamations encouraging citizens to pray are unconstitutional. Alliance Defense Fund attorneys filed a motion for summary judgment in the suit filed by the Freedom From Religion Foundation, and the court granted that motion. But it also granted FFRF’s motion, which allows it to challenge the statute permitting a national day of prayer.

Alliance Defense Fund Litigation Staff Counsel David J. Hacker will be available for media interviews following his arguments at a hearing Wednesday in a lawsuit spurred by a Los Angeles Community College District professor who called a Christian student a “fascist bastard,” accused him of offending others, and wrote “Ask God what your grade is” on the student’s speech evaluation after he spoke about his faith during a classroom speech.

Alliance Defense Fund attorneys have submitted an application to appeal the state’s conviction of a Christian arrested while praying in an Elmira public park during a 2007 ‘gay pride’ event. The status of the appeal is now in the hands of state’s highest court, the New York Court of Appeals. Earlier this month, a New York county court dismissed the convictions of three other Christians arrested and charged after praying at the same event.

Alliance Defense Fund attorneys will participate in three law school debates next week sponsored by campus chapters of The Federalist Society on the subject of the U.S. Supreme Court case Christian Legal Society v. Martinez. Attorneys with ADF and the CLS Center for Law & Religious Freedom, who are litigating the case, represent a student chapter of CLS, which Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco refused to recognize because the group requires its officers and voting members to subscribe to its basic Christian beliefs.

Alliance Defense Fund attorneys and allied attorneys Tuesday appealed the decision of a Colorado court to dismiss a lawsuit challenging $18 million in illegal state contracts awarded over the last year to a Planned Parenthood affiliate and a Boulder abortion provider.

Alliance Defense Fund attorneys filed an appeal Wednesday of a district court decision that prevents the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners from opening public meetings with prayer that may mention a particular deity. ADF represents the board in a lawsuit filed in 2007 by the American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for Separation of Church and State--a lawsuit that an overwhelming number of county residents have expressed they wish the county to fight.

Alliance Defense Fund and Stand4MarriageDC attorneys appealed a court order Monday that denied their motion to keep a D.C. marriage redefinition law from going into effect on the projected date of March 3. The attorneys represent Bishop Harry Jackson and other registered voters who are seeking to give the 59 percent of voters in the district who say they want to vote on the D.C. Council’s new law that changes the legal definition of marriage the opportunity to do so.

Alliance Defense Fund allied attorney David Langdon will be available for media interviews Wednesday after a hearing before the full panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit in River of Life Kingdom Ministries v. Village of Hazel Crest. The panel will hear an appeal of an earlier decision by a three-judge panel of the court denying an injunction that would have allowed a Hazel Crest church to meet at property that it had legally purchased.

Alliance Defense Fund attorneys appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court Thursday, asking it to reverse a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit that declared portions of a tuition tax credit program for students unconstitutional. ADF attorneys argue that the program--which allows state residents to claim a tax credit for donations to private organizations that provide scholarships to private schools--is constitutional because the program involves individual, private choices and funding, not government action or money.

Alliance Defense Fund attorneys filed a lawsuit Thursday against the Board of Education of Half Hollow Hills Central School District on behalf of a student who was told that school officials cancelled, without her knowledge, the Christian club she helps lead. School officials claimed that unspecified budget cuts and a lack of student popularity spurred their decision, even though the club had more than 55 student attendees last year and approximately 60 other student clubs, including the Gay-Straight Alliance and Amnesty International, were allowed to continue.

Alliance Defense Fund Senior Legal Counsel Austin R. Nimocks will be available for media interviews following his arguments at a hearing Friday in a lawsuit filed by Alliance Defense Fund and Stand4MarriageDC attorneys on behalf of registered D.C. voters. Bishop Harry Jackson and other registered voters appealed a decision by the D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics earlier this month that rejected a proposed referendum which would have allowed voters to have a say on the D.C. Council’s new law that changes the legal definition of marriage.

The Alliance Defense Fund sent a letter to President Obama and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates Wednesday expressing concern over the effects that any change in military policy concerning homosexual behavior would have on the religious freedom of chaplains.

Alliance Defense Fund Senior Legal Counsel Erik Stanley will participate in a debate Thursday at Stanford Law School on the constitutionality of Internal Revenue Service restrictions on the free speech of pastors. The debate is being co-sponsored by ADF and The Federalist Society at Stanford.

We are honored to inform you that on Wednesday and Thursday of this week, ADF President, CEO, and General Counsel Alan Sears will be the special guest of Dr. James Dobson on two of his final radio broadcasts with Focus on the Family, the global ministry he founded more than three decades ago to strengthen and defend the institution of the traditional family.