By Paul Reno

A conservative group that has long supported President Bush pulled its endorsement of Supreme Court nominee John Roberts after it was revealed he advised a team of lawyers on a landmark gay rights case.

The group, Public Advocate of the United States, announced Aug. 11 it was no longer in support of Roberts, who must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate before joining the nine-member court, because of his work on the Supreme Court case, Romer v. Evans.

While working in private practice as a partner in the firm Hogan & Hartson, Roberts advised the team of attorneys trying the case, which sought to overturn a Colorado referendum that denied gays and lesbians rights. The court ultimately voted 6-3 to strike down the referendum, giving LGBT rights activists an important legal victory that has been crucial in other pro-gay cases.

"His actions not only cast doubt on his support of the American family, but also raise the possibility that Roberts will join the activist wing of the Supreme Court," said Eugene Delgaudio, the group's president. "In Romer v. Evans we saw another example of the radical homosexual lobby losing democratically and having to use the activist Supreme Court to force their agenda on the American people. It is now an unrefuted fact that Judge Roberts actively supported this act of judicial activism."

While Focus on the Family and other anti-gay groups have reaffirmed their support of Roberts, most LGBT rights groups remain opposed to his nomination.

The Human Rights Campaign executive director Joe Salmonese addressed the Roberts gay rights case revelation in an op-ed piece, where he wrote "the question of whether Roberts is personally anti-gay is not only hard to answer, it is the wrong question to ask É as we review documents from throughout Roberts' career, we are finding strong evidence that Roberts would vote with the far right wing of the court, and against protections for our community. It's not evidence that he's a bigot -- just clear, convincing evidence that for decades, Roberts has embraced a view that the court has no business protecting basic civil rights."

Justice Sunday II Targets 'Activist Judges'

Christian conservatives held their second "Justice Sunday" event Aug. 14, and renewed calls to stop judges from making decisions that favored LGBT rights. The televised event, which was subtitled "God save the United States and this honorable court," was held at the Two Rivers Baptist megachurch in Nashville, Tenn., and featured a host of conservative protestant and Catholic religious leaders, and Republican lawmakers, including the House Majority Whip Tom DeLay.

DeLay said in his remarks at the event that the Supreme Court's power to deem federal laws unconstitutional was up for debate.

"This fact, understood by every high school civics student, has been forgotten in recent decades by too many members of the American judiciary, including, most notably, the United States Supreme Court itself," DeLay said, using court decisions on gay rights, abortion, sodomy and government support of religion as examples.

Former Sen. Zell Miller, a Democrat, also spoke at the event, chastising the court for "remov(ing) prayer from our public schools" and because it "legalized the barbaric killing of unborn babies, and it is ready to discard like an outdated Hula-Hoop the universal institution of marriage between a man and a woman."

LGBT rights groups spoke out against the event, calling the rhetoric an attack on the U.S.' tradition of judicial independence.

"Once again, the forces of political and religious extremism gathered under the guise of standing up for 'justice' to call for tearing down the increasingly porous wall between church and state," said Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force. "And once again, a right-wing leader of Congress, this time House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, was there to attack the bedrock of our democracy, an independent judiciary. Their view on the role of the courts is stunningly regressive. But no one should be surprised: These are the same people who compared the justices of the Massachusetts Supreme Court to Adolf Hitler after the decision ordering marriage equality; who said judges who allowed Michael Schiavo to carry out his wife's wishes participated in a 'grisly killing'; and who have criticized the integration of women in the military."

Lutherans Back Away From Gay Clergy

A major protestant denomination voted Aug. 12 to deny gay clergy in committed relationships from serving their church. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) voted 503 to 490 on the measure, which would have allowed bishops to allow for exceptions to the church's overall ban on gay clergy in cases where an individual was in a confirmed monogamous relationship with a partner of the same sex.

The seventh-largest religious group in the United States, the ELCA has nearly five million members. The vote was taken at the church's assembly, which was held in Orlando.

The assembly also voted overwhelmingly to stay as one group despite the divide over homosexuality. The church also rejected any attempt to bless same-sex unions. LGBT rights groups expressed disappointment over the votes.

"Faith ... should be ... centered on unity and justice, not division," said Harry Knox, the Human Rights Campaign's religion and faith program director. "Today's vote is saddening to the many fair-minded followers of the church. But it's only a matter of time until the church realizes that keeping one group of followers separate from another does nothing to serve the greater good."

Military Discharges Gays Because of Online Profiles

Gay Web sites are reporting that members of the military who have online profiles with their sites are being thrown out of the military because of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. Since January, Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN), an advocacy group for gay and lesbian members of the military, has assisted 10 service members facing discharge for online profiles. The online outing cases represent 25 percent of the organization's total outings so far in 2005.

The 10 cases include a Farsi linguist, a doctor, an intelligence analyst and a communications officer. Three of the 10 have served in Iraq or Afghanistan, including Jeff Howe, an Army artilleryman who served two tours of duty in Iraq before being outed by a profile posted at Connexion.org, an online LGBT community site.

Gay.com/PlanetOut.com and Connexion.org have teamed up with the SLDN to release precautions for service members using online sites. Service members should not, the organization warns, access such sites using a military computer, post photos in online profiles, or use terminology or information which may reveal that the poster is a service member. "Being identified as lesbian, gay or bisexual in an online profile is 'telling,'" said SLDN Executive Director C. Dixon Osburn. "Many service members assume they are safe by using online sites, but that unfortunately is not true. Being out to anyone, at anytime, and anywhere -- including online -- can mean the end of a military career."

"I thought I was fine (using online services)," Howe said. "I didn't realize my personal ad was a violation of the policy."

Marriage Equality Case Continues in New York

An LGBT legal rights organization is taking its case that same-sex couples in New York should be allowed to marry to the next level after filing papers to have the decision heard in the state's appellate court.

Lambda Legal filed papers Aug. 8

to defend a lower court ruling that said same-sex couples should be allowed to marry in New York City. The city filed an appeal seeking to overturn the ruling earlier this spring.

"The city argues that the government has an interest in supporting heterosexuals who have children. But the city

doesn't explain why it's okay for the government to turn its back on thousands of New York children raised by same-sex couples, who must go without the protections that come with civil marriage," said Susan Sommer, senior counsel at

Lambda Legal and lead attorney on the case. According to the 2000 Census, there are 46,490 same-sex households in New York, with over 34 percent of the lesbian couples and 21 percent of the gay couples raising children in the home.

Lambda Legal filed the lawsuit in March 2004 seeking marriage licenses for same-sex couples in New York, arguing that denying them marriage violates the state constitution's guarantees of equality, liberty and privacy for all New Yorkers. The trial court issued its ruling in Lambda Legal's favor in February this year, which New York City decided to appeal. On March 31, New York's highest court

ruled that the case should be heard in the mid-level appeals court, where Lambda currently makes its arguments for marriage equality in the state.

In her February 4, 2005, trial court

ruling, Justice Ling-Cohan wrote that

barring "access to civil marriage denies plaintiffs something irreplaceable." The ruling

further stated that, "Similar to opposite-sex couples, same-sex couples are entitled to the same fundamental right to follow their hearts and publicly commit to a lifetime partnership with the person of their choosing."

In its Aug. 8 brief, Lambda Legal argued that the trial court was right when it ruled that barring same-sex couples from marriage was unconstitutional and denies them a host of protections that couples who are married enjoy. Lambda Legal argued that the city is wrong in basing its appeal on an outdated case that relied on the Book of Genesis to deny civil marriage rights to same-sex couples.