Support for Abortion Funding Should Sink Any Legislator’s Re-Election
Here is some bad news: Illinoisans who support the use of your money to pay for abortions have been calling their legislators asking them to support HB 40. A vote on this bill could come at any time.
The good news is that this legislation can be defeated, but your help and prayers are needed immediately. Your local state legislators need to hear from you and everyone you can encourage to call or email their legislative offices.
Here is part of a statement issued by Brian Burch, who is the president of CatholicVote.org:
“We have been following the developments surrounding H.B. 40, a new spending bill pending before the Illinois General Assembly that, if passed, would authorize the use of state dollars to fund abortion services for qualified Medicaid recipients. Should Governor Rauner sign the bill as it is currently written, pro-life voters will be left with no choice but to oppose his candidacy next year.
. . .
“We have been in conversation with pro-life groups around the state. The overwhelming consensus is that support for any legislation that would coerce Illinois taxpayers into directly funding abortion would disqualify him from receiving their support.
“The state owes $10 billion in unpaid bills, with tens of billions more in unfunded liabilities. Yet now politicians want to spend scarce state resources to pay for abortions. Rauner’s support of this reckless bill would rip apart the Republican Party and destroy any chance of his re-election.
“Let me be clear. If Governor Rauner signs the bill as written, we will urge our members along with every pro-life voter in the state to support an alternative candidate — or to abstain from voting for his re-election. And we won’t be the only group doing so.”
Those are some pretty tough words–words that the Illinois Family Institute and its sister organization Illinois Family Action applaud. We would like to see that threat extended to any member of the General Assembly that votes to use taxpayer dollars to fund abortions.
Cultural issues writer Laurie Higgins explains why IFI supports the position of CatholicVote.org:
IFI wholeheartedly agrees with CatholicVote.org’s commitment to opposing Governor Rauner’s re-election bid should he support HB 40.
There is no more critical human rights issue than the issue of protecting incipient human life from intentional destruction in the womb. The moral offense of legalized feticide is compounded when the hard-earned money of taxpayers is used to fund the killing of humans.
Neither the state of development, dependency status, imperfections, or location of human beings grants to other humans the moral right to end their lives. When the reproductive rights of women come into direct conflict with the right of their offspring to exist, the right to existence takes precedence in that it is a right of a higher moral order.
Any government leader who doesn’t recognize the intrinsic value and rights of all humans doesn’t deserve the support of citizens or public office.
We agree with this statement from eminent legal scholar Professor Robert George:
Maintaining and solidifying the pro-life…stance of the Republican Party is critical. That’s why tactical voting, including voting for bad Democrats over bad Republicans, is IN CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES (e.g., where the election of a Democrat does not jeopardize Republican control of a legislative house), morally legitimate and perhaps even advisable. We must not let the pro-abortion…movements strengthen their positions in the Republican Party.
We can make a difference, but only if our legislators hear from their pro-life constituents. We hope to convince enough of them not to vote for this big-government, big-abortion bill. We must prevent the sponsor of this legislation from getting enough “yea” votes to pass it.
Our failure to act with as much energy as the other side too often is the difference between victory or defeat–and in this case life or death.
Here is Cardinal Blase Cupich, the Archbishop of Chicago, weighing in on HB 40:
We have raised our voices in the past for those who have no voice, whether they be the
immigrant or the refugee, the poor, or the unemployed. We now need to speak for the children in the womb, who are the weakest among us.We need to let our elected officials know that taxpayers should not be forced to fund the
taking of human life. In fact, tax money should be used to fund prenatal services for the poor
and child care for working mothers, as well as expand health-care options for those in need.
Please join me in advocating for all life by urging your state representative to reject HB 40 and work instead to pass a budget that funds all essential services.
You can read Cardinal Cupich’s entire letter here, and the statement by CatholicVote.org President Brian Burch here.
Take ACTION: Please send a message to your state representative to ask him/her to vote AGAINST this pro-abortion bill. This legislation is HB 40 – a bill that would authorize the use of tax dollars to pay for abortions in Illinois through Medicaid and state government health care insurance plans. It is sponsored by State Representative Sara Feigenholtz (D-Chicago). This bill would reverse the current law which bans taxpayer funding of abortion under Medicaid.
Please also call your state representative during the week to make sure he/she knows how important this issue is to you and your family. The Capitol switchboard number is (217) 782-2000.
Pray for the ultimate demise of HB 40 and all anti-life legislation.
Are Progressives Targeting Minorities with Abortion?
Pro-life advocate Chris Iverson noted this fact in an article here at IFI recently:
The U.S. abortion rate is the lowest in recorded history! The Guttmacher Institute found that there were 14.6 abortions for every 1,000 women aged 15-44 in 2014. That’s lower than the abortion rate in 1973 (when the Roe v. Wade case was decided) and every year since then.
Republicans in Washington, D.C. are taking steps to defund Planned Parenthood and prevent the use of federal taxdollars for abortions.
Illinois Democrats are going in the opposite direction. State Representative Sara Feigenholtz (D-Chicago) has re-introduced legislation that would remove all prohibitions on taxpayer funding of abortions through HB 40. Here is the Illinois Citizens for Life:
For decades, Illinois has had a public policy of not paying for abortions under the Medicaid assistance program except for life of the mother. Court decisions have added “health” and rape and incest. The Illinois law went to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1979 and was upheld in its entirety in 1980.
Survey after survey has shown that a clear majority of Illinoisans, even those who say they are pro-choice, do not want their tax dollars paying for abortions.
HB 40 would remove this ban and require taxpayer funding of abortions for any reason throughout the full nine months of pregnancy. If this bill passed into law, the thousands of these abortions added [estimated at 15,000 or more each year] would be paid for only with state taxpayer dollars, since the federal government prohibits paying for abortions other than for life, rape and incest.
Pro-life lobbyist Ralph Rivera says that there would be no limit to the number of abortions a woman could have using tax-dollars, and the abortion could be for any reason through all 9 months of the pregnancy. There would also be no age restriction, so minors would be eligible for taxpayer funded abortions.
A large part of the targeted population in HB 40 is those who are covered under Medicaid. The website Illinois Health Matters provides a breakdown on the “Demographics of the Medicaid Population,” noting that “about 600,000 Illinois residents age 19 to 64 with low income became eligible for Medicaid.”
According to Illinois Citizens for Life, the year the Illinois Law was passed that prohibited taxpayer funding, “over 12,000 abortions were paid for under Medicaid with tax dollars.” Since the number of abortions was substantially higher when tax-dollars were used, it should be expected that more abortions will be performed once the restriction is removed. One question that follows is who is going to be having those abortions? Note these numbers:
- Blacks make up 30 percent of the Medicaid recipients in Illinois while they are 14 percent of the whole.
- Latinos make up 16 percent of the Medicaid recipients in Illinois while they are 16 percent of the whole.
- Asians make up 5 percent of the Medicaid recipients in Illinois while they are 5 percent of the whole.
Since 51 percent of the Medicaid recipients in Illinois are minorities, whether it is intended or not, the passage of HB 40 will increase the number of abortions in the minority community.
A bit of history is important here. IFI contributor Tami Jackson wrote in an article titled “Margaret Sanger’s Dream Come True: Eugenics by Abortion”:
[Margaret] Sanger was a nurse and a birth control advocate in the early 20th century. But more importantly, she formed the organization, American Birth Control League, which would eventually become Planned Parenthood.
. . .
[She] espoused sinister motives for advancing birth control and abortion: she fully endorsed eugenics for the betterment of race and society.
Sanger was a Darwinist who embraced a utilitarian view of human life, and proposed to rid our nation of the criminal element and “inferior races” through abortion and breeding programs.
Margaret Sanger was born in 1879 and died in 1966, so this issue is not new. Today, Sanger is seen as a feminist hero and the Democratic Party supports full funding for Planned Parenthood.
Take ACTION: Click HERE to send a message to your state to ask him/her to vote AGAINST this pro-abortion bill. Ask them to consider how abortion providers and eugenicists are promoting abortion to destroy the innocent pre-born human lives of black and brown babies.
Illinois Abortions Increased 3.5%
The Illinois Department of Public Health recently released updated statistics on abortions for 2015. The number of pre-born human babies aborted in Illinois increased by 1,384 in 2015 to a total of 39,856. The Illinois Abortion Law of 1975 (720 ILCS 510/10) requires the Illinois Department of Public Health to gather this information from all “health care providers statewide who performed pregnancy terminations.” Nationally, the number of abortions has been decreasing and that has been the general trend in Illinois until now. The Illinois data is available HERE.
Viable Or Nearly Viable Humans Aborted
There were 274 unborn humans aborted between 20 and 23 weeks gestation in Illinois during 2015. Unborn humans at that level of development are viable outside the womb or just days from being viable. They look like a tiny newborn at that age. That means on average each week, 5 viable or nearly viable unborn humans are aborted in Illinois.
What’s Not In The Report
This data includes surgical abortions and the abortion pill (RU 486), but it does not include the following statistics:
♦ the sale of abortifacient drugs and devices which result in newly created humans dying, including birth control, the patch, minipill, NuvaRing, Yaz, Yasmin, IUD’s, Plan B, and Ella.
♦ the number of unborn humans frozen in IVF clinics and how many of those humans died.
♦ data on embryonic stem cell research where newly created human beings are destroyed for the purpose of experimentation.
♦ information on the sale of organs and tissue from aborted humans.
Residences Of Mothers Summarized By Area
Of the abortions where the mother’s residence was reported
♦ 8.5% were from out-of-state
♦ 45% lived in Chicago
♦ 21% lived in areas of Cook County outside of Chicago
♦ 5% lived in DuPage County
♦ 4% lived in Will County
♦ and the rest were spread throughout the state.
Marital Status And Age Of Mothers
Of the abortions where the mother’s marital status was reported:
♦ 12 percent were married.
Of the abortions where the mother’s age was reported:
♦ 10 percent were below age 20
♦ 60 percent were 20 to 29
♦ 27 percent were 30 to 39
♦ 3 percent were 40 or older.
How To Save Women And Babies From Abortion
In 2016, pro-life groups reached 8.8 million views around Illinois with the bold message “Abortion Takes Human Life.” Come and build on that success in 2017 by attending upcoming pro-life overpasses and by donating to pro-life billboards at AbortionTakesHumanLife.com.
Take ACTION: Please click HERE to send a message to your state representative to ask him/her to stand strong for the unborn’s right to life and against any pro-choice legislation that may be introduced in the next few weeks or months.
Upcoming Event: Join thousands at March for Life Chicago 2017 as we come together from across Chicago, the Midwest and the U.S. to defend, protect and celebrate LIFE on January 15th!
Illinois Family Spotlight: Listen to this week’s podcast: Part 2 — Monte Larrick and Dave Smith talk with pro-life hero Jill Stanek about “The Pro-Life Wish List” for 2017 in the new presidential administration.
Are Trigger Warnings Needed for Invocations?
In today’s “politically correct” America, it is evidently a possible offense to quote a former president and discuss the role of Christianity in the founding of the nation.
The State Journal-Register’s political reporter Bernard Schoenburg recently reported on an invocation given at a recent Sangamon County Board meeting in his column titled “Prayer at county board raises church-state question.” The prayer, delivered by board member Mike Sullivan is, according to Schoenburg “getting some attention and has come under some criticism.”
Sullivan’s prayer began:
“Lord in heaven, during this Christmas season as we celebrate the birth of your son, Jesus Christ, we are reminded that our country … was founded on godly principles by God-fearing men and women who believed in the Holy Bible and thereby set up a form of government for a God-fearing populace.”
You can listen to the entire prayer here.
(Note the enthusiastic “Amens!” after it.)
County board member Mike Sullivan also included quotes from founding father John Adams and from Noah Webster, who famously wrote in a letter to James Madison, “The Christian religion, in its purity, is the basis, or rather the source of all genuine freedom in government.”
Was quoting Adams and Webster what triggered the need for some to seek out a “safe space”? Was it how Sullivan introduced the Adams quote?: “Today Lord, as our country appears to be more and more divided between believers in your son Jesus Christ and non-believers…”
Or was it how he closed the prayer by asking those assembled to:
“humbly pray for the forgiveness of our sins and that our fellow countrymen will unite with us in inviting you into their hearts and souls making us one nation under God, thereby allowing the God of the universe to bless our country so it will be truly great again.”
“In the name of your Son, Jesus Christ, Amen.”
Board Chairman Andy Van Meter explained that it is “routine for board members to give the invocation,” and that the members “take turns giving the prayer as each meeting begins.”
“All are heartfelt,” Van Meter said. “Some are more articulate than others. We also have invited religious leaders from denominations not represented on the board from time to time as well. We do not presume to give guidelines. Tony is welcome to give the prayer any time.”
Tony DelGiorno, the offended board member who posted the prayer on Facebook cited his ancestors who were persecuted in America because of their Catholic faith and said, “I find religious elitism abhorrent to the 1st Amendment principle of religious freedom in a nation and a community that is made better by our friends of all faiths.”
It is unclear from Schoenburg’s article what, exactly, demonstrated “religious elitism” in the prayer, nor, exactly, how it is “abhorrent to the First Amendment” to exercise freedom of speech and to express one’s faith during an invocation.
Sullivan said that he didn’t mean to offend anyone with the prayer, and that he was “merely stating some factual history.” Evidently, to paraphrase John Adams, to some people “facts are scary things.” This sad tale is why prayer has never been more important — especially when it comes to the operation of our government.
End-of-Year Challenge
As you may know, IFI has a year-end matching challenge to raise $110,000. That’s right, a small group of IFI supporters are providing a $55,000 matching challenge to help support IFI’s ongoing work to educate, motivate and activate Illinois’ Christian community.
Please consider helping us reach this goal! Your donation will help us stand strong in 2017! To make a credit card donation over the phone, please call the IFI office at (708) 781-9328. You can also send a gift to:
Illinois Family Institute
P.O. Box 876
Tinley Park, Illinois 60477
Pregnancy Care Center of Rockford Wins Injunction
Temporarily Halts Illinois Abortion Referral Mandate
The First Amendment to the United States Constitution states:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
It seems that our nation’s founding fathers were not clear enough with their use of language in the First Amendment, which protects some of our God-given rights. That “make no law” thing is confusing for many, and that “abridging” business, well, that’s way over the heads of Leftists.
While the U.S. Constitution binds Congress, our state constitution binds our state government, and the spirit of the First Amendment is expressed using different words in our state constitution’s Bill of Rights.
Regardless, in Illinois, our governor and General Assembly have now taken up the task of telling people what they can’t say. Reparative therapy is now against the law. So anyone seeking help to escape unwanted same-sex attraction or gender confusion are going to have to find a state where therapists retain their freedom of speech.
In addition, they passed a law forcing pro-life counselors and medical professionals to violate their conscience by telling patients the benefits of abortion and going so far as to require them to give referrals, making them complicit in ending a human life. Here is Michele Bachmann speaking at an IFI event in September:
It is amazing to me that the law compels believers to say something they know isn’t true. Doctors, caregivers, people in pro-life centers — they’re forced, compelled, by a state entity, to share information that not only violates their moral conscience, but they know fundamentally, maybe even experientially in their own life — it is not only wrong — it will bring about death. And yet their government says they must say it. (Read more here.)
The Alliance Defending Freedom is reporting some good news on this latter front — the doctors and healthcare professionals at the Pregnancy Care Center of Rockford have been given a reprieve by a state court in the form of a preliminary injunction.
Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) Senior Counsel Matt Bowman commented on the injunction:
“Forcing pro-life doctors and pregnancy care centers in Illinois to operate as referral agents for the abortion industry in violation of their freedom of conscience is unconstitutional, illegal, and unethical. No state has the authority to compel health professionals, against their will and their sacred oath to “do no harm,” to promote abortion. We commend the court’s ruling which is a victory for free speech and the freedom of conscience.”
ADF reported that in its nineteen-page order issued Tuesday, “the state court noted that Pregnancy Care Center of Rockford raised sufficient questions as to whether the new law is either legal or constitutional as applied to pro-life doctors and pregnancy care centers.”
As an example, according to ADF, the ruling states:”Why must the State, which licenses and regulates those who provide the objected-to services, rely on the very people who object to the services to be the source of information about them?”
Click here to read the order of the state court granting preliminary injunction.
Upcoming Event: Join thousands at March for Life Chicago 2017 as we come together from across Chicago, the Midwest and the U.S. to defend, protect and celebrate LIFE on January 15th.
Illinois Family Spotlight: Listen to this week’s podcast as Monte Larrick and Dave Smith talk with pro-life hero Jill Stanek about what the pro-life movement can expect over the next few years in a Donald Trump administration.
End-of-Year Challange
As you may know, IFI has a year-end matching challenge to raise $110,000. That’s right, a small group of IFI supporters are providing a $55,000 matching challenge to help support IFI’s ongoing work to educate, motivate and activate Illinois’ Christian community.
Please consider helping us reach this goal! Your donation will help us stand strong in 2017! To make a credit card donation over the phone, please call the IFI office at (708) 781-9328. You can also send a gift to:
Illinois Family Institute
P.O. Box 876
Tinley Park, Illinois 60477
Baby Jesus Goes to Springfield
Get your DVD copy of Michele Bachmann’s IFI 2016 banquet presentation for any donation of $15 or more (includes shipping and handling). Your donation will help fund the work and ministry of Illinois Family Institute.
Click the button below to donate. Once we receive the donation we will snail-mail you a copy (or multiple copies) of this DVD.
Make Illinois Great Again? Run for Office
Illinois’ April 4th consolidated election is just a few months away…and Christians are needed to run for local offices.
The Illinois Family Institute is completely dependent on the voluntary contributions of individuals just like you. Without you, we would be unable to represent our Christian values in Springfield or fight the radical agenda being pushed by the godless Left in our culture.
Please consider chipping in $25 or $50 to support our work to stand boldly in the public square.
Click HERE to make a tax-deductible donation.
To make a credit card donation over the phone,
please call the IFI office at (708) 781-9328.
More Questions About Dubious Illinois Human Rights Commission
Yesterday, I wrote about the profoundly unjust decision of the ideologically imbalanced three-member panel of commissioners from the Illinois Human Rights Commission who decided that Christian bed and breakfast owner Jim Walder should pay $80,000 for refusing to rent his facilities to a same-sex couple for their civil union ceremony.
In that article, I questioned both the lack of ideological representation on the panel, which included two homosexual activists and no conservatives, as well as on the full 13-member commission. I questioned whether the commission is skirting the law that prohibits more than 7 members of the same political party from serving on the commission by identifying 2 of its members as Independents when in reality they are Democrats.
There are yet more questions about the political composition of the Illinois Human Rights Commission, this time about Commissioner Hermene Hartman who is identified as one of the five Republicans serving on the 13-member commission.
Hartman is the publisher of Chicago “lifestyle publication” N’DIGO.com. Her bio on Huffington Post describes Hartman as “one of the most significant and influential Black women in American publishing….N’DIGO, was founded in 1989, as a weekly lifestyle publication for progressive readers.”
Hartman was a Democrat until Bruce Rauner ran for governor and began disbursing money in the black community, which included, according to the Chicago Tribune, paying Hartman “$10,000 per month for her outreach efforts.”
After Rauner’s victory, he appointed Hartman to the Illinois Human Rights Commission, where the Chicago Sun Times reports Hartman earns “$46,960-a-year…accompanied by personal insurance perks.”
Interesting fiscal tidbit: The Better Government Association (BGA) reports that “Commissioners devoted an average 12.9 hours per month to official state business for the fiscal year 2011.” That comes out to approximately $322 per hour—on average.
The BGA explained that “Time commitments varied widely, from an average of fewer than seven hours per month to 20 hours.” Those who work 20 hours per month make a paltry $207 per hour, while those who work 7 hours per month make $594 per hour. Not bad, not bad at all. Perhaps those workers who are fighting for minimum wage increases should take a gander at what some state employees make in impoverished Illinois.
Hartman endorsed Hillary Clinton in the recent election. Maybe Hartman has converted back to the Democratic Party. If “Independents” Terry Cosgrove (a homosexual activist and pro-feticide fanatic) and Patricia Bakalis Yadgir, and “Republican” Hermene Hartman are all, in reality, Democrats, the Illinois Human Rights Commission is in violation of state law that limits the number of commissioners from the same political party to 7.
My math-challenged pea brain thinks there may be up to 9 Democrats serving on the commission that will decide whether to subordinate constitutionally protected religious liberty to homoerotic privilege.
If you haven’t let Govenor Rauner’s office know what you think of this feckless ruling and the corrupt IHRC, please do so now.
Take ACTION: Please click HERE to contact Governor Rauner to express your opposition to his appointments of Democrats Hermene Hartman and homosexual activists Duke Alden and to urge him to investigate the Illinois Human Rights Commission’s efforts to circumvent the law prohibiting political imbalance on the Commission.
Listen to this as a podcast HERE.
The Illinois Family Institute is completely dependent on the voluntary contributions of individuals just like you. Without you, we would be unable to represent our Christian values in Springfield or fight the radical agenda being pushed by the godless Left in our culture.
Please consider chipping in $25 or $50 to support our work to stand boldly in the public square.
Click HERE to make a tax-deductible donation.
To make a credit card donation over the phone,
please call the IFI office at (708) 781-9328.
Homosexuals & Corrupt Illinois Human Rights Commission vs. Christian Business Owner
A three-person panel of commissioners from the 13-member Illinois Human Rights Commission (IHRC) has decided not to review the egregious decision of IHRC administrative law judge Michael Robinson in the discrimination complaint filed by homosexuals Todd and Mark Wathen against Christian bed and breakfast owner Jim Walder.
In 2011, the now “married” Wathens, inquired about renting the Timber Creek Bed & Breakfast facility in Paxton, Illinois for their civil union ceremony. Because of his religious beliefs about the immorality of homoerotic activity and relationships, Mr. Walder informed Todd Wathen that he would not rent his facilities to Mr. Wathen and his partner for a civil union ceremony.
The Wathens then filed a discrimination complaint with the IHRC—a kangaroo-esque tribunal committed to normalizing homoeroticism through quasi-judicial means.
Last spring, Judge Michael Robinson issued his order which would require Mr. Walder to do the following:
– Pay $15,000 each to Todd and Mark Wathen as compensation for their emotional distress arising out of the issue.
-Cease and desist from violating the Human Rights Act by denying same-sex couples access to its facilities and services for marriages and civil unions.
-Offer the Wathens access to the facility, within one year, for an event celebrating their civil union.
-Pay the Wathens’ attorneys $50,000 in fees and $1,218 in costs.
Mr. Walder’s attorney, Jason Craddock, filed an “exception” which was reviewed by the three commissioners who have decided that Judge Robinson’s decision should stand.
If you’re not angry yet, here’s some information that may raise your hackles.
- All of the Illinois Human Rights commissioners are appointed bureaucrats—not elected.
- Only one of the three commissioners who reviewed the Walder case is an attorney.
- Two of the three commissioners who reviewed this case are homosexual activists: Terry Cosgrove and Duke Alden.
- Homosexual activist Duke Alden was appointed to the Illinois Human Rights kangaroo court by Governor Bruce Rauner.
Here’s a bit more information on homosexual activists Cosgrove and Alden:
- Terry Cosgrove was inducted into the Chicago Gay and Lesbian Hall of Fame in 2014. He is also a passionate and unrelenting foe of the right of preborn babies to be free from extermination. He is president and CEO of pro-feticide Personal PAC and “has lent assistance to NARAL, Planned Parenthood, NOW, National Pro-Choice Resource Center, Voters for Choice, Women’s Campaign Fund and the Emergency Abortion Loan Fund.” Cosgrove was also “honored” with the dubious “Freedom of Choice” award by the Chicago Abortion Fund. Cosgrove was appointed by former Governor Pat Quinn after donating $400,000 to help fund Quinn’s victory over Bill Brady.
- Rauner appointee Democrat Duke Alden is the chairman of Howard Brown Health, an “LGBT” health and social services organization. Alden served on the host committee for a “Presidential Debate Viewing Party” for “Chicago’s LGBT community to cheer on Hillary Clinton.”
The third commissioner on the panel was Patricia Bakalis Yadgir, a Quinn appointee whose husband is Director of Communications and Senior Policy Advisor for Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White and whose father is former state comptroller, former state superintendent of education, and former Democratic gubernatorial candidate Michael Bakalis.
Here’s where it really gets interesting. State law prohibits more than seven members of the same political party from serving on the IHRC. Currently there are 6 Democrats, 5 Republicans, and two “Independents.” And who do you think the two “Independents” are? None other than (no snickering) Terry Cosgrove and Patricia Bakalis Yadgir.
In reality, therefore, there are 8 Democrat and 5 Republican commissioners on the IHRC. And there were no Republicans on the panel reviewing the complaint against the Walders.
So, after learning a bit more about the commissioners who made the decision on the Wathen’s complaint, can anyone read this statement from the Illinois Human Rights Commission with a straight face:
The Commission provides a neutral forum for resolving complaints of discrimination filed under the Illinois Human Rights Act….Our primary responsibility is to make impartial determinations of whether there has been unlawful discrimination, as defined by the Illinois Human Rights Act.
Here are just a few comments about marriage, homoeroticism, and the plight of Christian owners of wedding-related businesses on which the intellectually slothful among us might spend some time ruminating:
- Marriage has an intrinsic nature central to which is sexual differentiation and without which a union is not in reality a marriage.
- The law cannot change the intrinsic nature of marriage. The law can no more transform intrinsically non-marital unions into marriages by issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples than it could change cats into dogs by issuing them dog licenses.
- When homosexuals say they are attracted only to persons of their same sex, they are implicitly acknowledging that men and women are fundamentally different. Therefore, a union composed of two people of the same sex is fundamentally different from a union composed of two people of different sexes.
- A union composed of two people of the same sex is the antithesis of a marriage. It is an anti-marriage. The ceremony that solemnizes such a union is an anti-wedding. The cake that is served at the anti-wedding reception is an anti-wedding cake. The floral arrangements adorning an anti-wedding reception are anti-wedding floral arrangements.
- Neither Mr. Walder nor any of the florists, bakers, wedding-venue owners, or photographers who have been sued by petulant homosexuals have refused to serve homosexuals. Rather, they refused to create products or provide services for a type of event for which they have never created products or provided services and one which violates their religious convictions. In fact, many of the Christian business-owners who have been sued have served homosexuals on many occasions—an inconvenient fact for Leftists.
- The term “sexual orientation” should never have been added to anti-discrimination laws or policies. It is a rhetorical invention of the Left contrived to conflate heterosexuality and homoeroticism. Heterosexuality and homoeroticism are not flipsides of the sexuality coin. In any objective sense all humans are heterosexual in that their anatomy and biology are designed for heterosexual activity. Homoeroticism is a disordering of the sexual impulse.
- Unlike other legally protected classes that are objectively constituted and carry no behavioral implications (e.g., race, sex, nation of origin), homoeroticism is constituted by subjective feelings and volitional sexual activity. Therefore, homoeroticism is a condition about which humans have every right to make moral judgments.
Mr. Walder has two remaining options: He may file an appeal to have the case reviewed by the entire ideologically imbalanced 13-member IHRC or file an appeal with an appellate court. Let’s hope he and his legal counsel don’t stop now.
Take ACTION: Please click HERE to contact Governor Rauner to express your opposition to his appointment of Democrat and homosexual activist Duke Alden and to urge him to investigate the Illinois Human Rights Commission’s efforts to circumvent the law prohibiting political imbalance on the Commission.
Listen to this as a podcast HERE.
The Illinois Family Institute is completely dependent on the voluntary contributions of individuals just like you. Without you, we would be unable to represent our Christian values in Springfield or fight the radical agenda being pushed by the godless Left in our culture.
Please consider chipping in $25 or $50 to support our work to stand boldly in the public square.
Click HERE to make a tax-deductible donation.
To make a credit card donation over the phone,
please call the IFI office at (708) 781-9328.
‘Lame Duck’ Tax Increase Debated While Both Parties Struggle with Basic Math
Now that the possibility of a tax hike passing with the help of “16 lame duck” legislators is not going to happen, Republicans cheer and Democrats lament, right? Not necessarily.
According to our state’s constitution, the governor has a lot of power when it comes to preparing the state’s budget, and, in fact, is constitutionally bound to present a balanced budget every year. Long-time Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan has no such constitutional requirement.
Several Republican Illinois legislators have long assumed that Bruce Rauner would willingly sign a tax increase as part of a budget deal with Madigan. Those aren’t the headlines Rauner wants going into 2018’s gubernatorial election, however, so a super-majority Democrat controlled General Assembly doing the dirty work without the need of his assistance would have been ideal. And, of course, Democrats raising taxes again supplies a terrific weapon for all Republican campaigns.
Except that now, as Rich Miller reports, the Democrats won’t be doing Rauner that favor. So it’s back to the status quo, which really isn’t the status quo in that the numbers don’t stay the same, they continue to get worse.
Neither party has offered an honestly balanced budget in many years, and Governor Rauner, as chief executive, might possibly be blamed for the little things — here are just a few facts from the Illinois Policy Institute article “Illinois’ $204B Debt Crowding Out Payment for Social Services” (we have put them into bullet points for easy reading):
- Illinois will spend $1 billion more on annual debt payments than it will on human services in fiscal year 2017.
- Social service agencies in Illinois, such as The Center for Youth and Family Solutions, on average wait almost a year to get paid for the services they provide to the state’s low-income families, disabled and seniors. Many agencies have closed their doors, unable to pay their employees and rent.
- Illinois is sitting on a mountain of debt worth $204 billion.
- Illinois spends so much on debt that those costs now consume almost 18 percent of the state’s general fund budget.
- Illinois’ backlog of unpaid bills is what often gets the most public attention. While significant – the money due to vendors reached $9 billion in November – it only makes up a small part of Illinois’ total debt.
- The real burden lies in Illinois’ $28 billion in bonds and its $111 billion unfunded pension liability. The $139 billion total is double what it was just 15 years ago.
- Another $56 billion is owed on government-worker retirement health insurance liabilities.
- Combined, these debts all add up to $204 billion. And that’s the rosy scenario. If more realistic investment-return assumptions are used, Illinois’ pension debt nearly doubles.
- Unfortunately, the state has just $79 billion in assets to meet its $190 billion obligation, leaving a $111 billion hole for taxpayers to pick up.
So is raising taxes a solution? Fiscal conservatives understand the answer is “no” — the Illinois Policy Institute’s Ted Dabrowski recently laid out the ABC’s:
For many, tax hikes look like the only solution to Illinois’ fiscal woes. But tax hikes will only make things worse. Illinoisans are already burdened with some of the highest taxes in the nation, including the highest property taxes of any state.
As a result of Illinois’ dysfunction, the state is bleeding people and its tax base. Between July 2014 and July 2015, approximately 300,000 people left Illinois for good and only 200,000 moved in, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. This resulted in a loss of 105,000 residents on net to other states – an all-time high for Illinois. Tax hikes will only chase more residents away.
So what is the solution? Fiscal conservatives understand that, too — again here’s Ted Dabrowski:
The only way to keep Illinoisans here is to bring fiscal sanity back to the state through major spending reforms that bring Illinois’ budget in line with what ordinary Illinoisans can afford.
Fiscal sanity? Spending reforms? Uh, yes, and maybe that’s a nicer way of saying it than the plain truth — which is that Illinois needs to cut its spending by many billions of dollars if it is to ever make the budget math work.
Since Democrats have no wish to cut spending, and Republicans completely lack the ability to draw up a genuinely balanced budget and then sell it successfully to the people of Illinois, it’s a good bet we’ll just see more of the same. The budget can will be kicked down the road into the 2018 election year when tens of millions of dollars will be spent by each party trying to portray the other side as the villain.
The Illinois GOP has just launched yet another crusade to make Democrat House Speaker Mike Madigan as the chief villain. Here’s a better idea. Since Madigan knows how to win, Republicans should work on converting him into a Republican fiscal conservative. With Madigan’s political and communications skills, Illinois can then get back on the right track. Who knows, with Madigan’s abilities and Illinois’ potential, our state might soon be competing with states like Texas for businesses and experience the growth levels it once enjoyed.
Take ACTION: Click HERE to send an email to your state representative and to Governor Rauner to urge them to do the hard work of cutting the waste and bloat in Illinois government instead of constantly looking for new ways to tax the people. The size of government is the problem!
Here are just a few recent headlines for your reading pleasure:
State Budget Deadlock Continues To Harm Social Service Organizations
Illinois’ Billions: Pension Debt and Unpaid Bills Total More than $140B
State of Illinois’ Pension Debt Jumps to $130 Billion
Social Services in Illinois Say Situation Still Bad With Temporary Budget
The Illinois Family Institute is completely dependent on the voluntary contributions of individuals just like you. Without you, we would be unable to represent our Christian values in Springfield or fight the radical agenda being pushed by the godless Left in our culture.
Please consider chipping in $25 or $50 to support our work to stand boldly in the public square.
Click HERE to make a tax-deductible donation.
To make a credit card donation over the phone, call the IFI office at (708) 781-9328.
IL Legislators Want to Spend Taxes on Abortions
Our state lawmakers are returning to Springfield this week for the second half of their Lame Duck Veto Session and they may vote on an abhorrent bill to use our tax dollars for abortions.
We need you to urge your state representative to oppose HB 4013!
Take ACTION: Please click HERE to send a message to your state representative to ask him/her to vote AGAINST this pro-abortion bill.
You can also contact your state representative during normal business hours by calling the Capitol switchboard at (217) 782-2000.
Please act today! It’s a matter of Life and Death!
Save the Date! Feb. 18th Worldview Conference
We are excited about our third annual Worldview Conference featuring world-renowned theologian Dr. Frank Turek on Sat., Feb. 18, 2017 in Barrington. Dr. Turek is s a dynamic speaker and the award-winning author of “I Don’t Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist”
Join us for a wonderful opportunity to take enhance your biblical worldview and equip you to more effectively engage the culture: Click HERE to learn more or to register!
Voter Guides Are Going Quickly – Order in Bulk Today!
Early Voting and Vote by Mail are already well underway and the printed IFI Voter Guides are going fast! In case you’re not aware, early voting has been proven to win elections for conservative candidates! And every vote is valuable!
You can request a Vote by Mail application by calling our office (708) 781-9328.
If you haven’t yet placed a bulk order for Voter Guides, please give us a call at the IFI office today at (708) 781-9328 or click HERE to email us your order.
These non-partisan Voter Guides comply with IRS guidelines and are legal for churches to distribute. Or you may simply want them to pass along to neighbors, co-workers and family.
It’s critical that people be informed voters when they cast their ballots in this General Election. Dozens of candidates are running for federal offices, including President of the United States, U.S. Senate and U.S. Congress. Many more candidates are running for seats in the Illinois House or Illinois Senate in Springfield.
We are coming down to the wire. The election is only one month away. So don’t delay. Call us at (708) 781-9328 or email us today.
Background
Do you and your friends know where the state-wide and federal candidates stand on same-sex marriage, conscience rights, tax funding for Planned Parenthood, expanded gambling, comprehensive sex-education and religious liberty? These Guides will be the only source of information for many to make an informed decision.
But thousands of other Illinois citizens don’t know about the IFI Voter Guide. You can help provide them with this critical information, in the cause of good government, to make informed choices about all the state and federal candidates on the ballot.
We want Illinois citizens to have access to the IFI Voter Guide and we need your help in getting it into the hands of as many voters as we can, so order a dozen or more and give them to your friends, family and co-workers.
Americans have been given incredible blessings and freedoms; and as a result, we have a responsibility to participate in elections. Thank God we have an opportunity to cast our ballot for men and women whose values represent our own.
With your participation, together we will make a great impact in the state of Illinois and our republic, one vote at a time.
Our get-out-the-vote campaign is up and running. We are distributing the IFI Voter Guide to hundreds of churches, civic groups and tea party organizations. Will you financially support our endeavor to educate Illinois voters and promote family values? Donate today.
Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan Wants Boys in Girls’ Restrooms and Showers
In an astonishing act of hubris, abrogation of local control over education, and obsequiousness to Barack Obama, Obama-handmaiden Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan has filed a “friend of the court” brief” (i.e., an amicus curiae brief) begging for Illinois to be subject to Obama’s illegal command that public schools allow boys in girls’ restrooms and locker rooms and vice versa.
Following the “guidance” from Obama’s Department of Education via the Office for Civil Rights to integrate sexually all restrooms and locker rooms in government schools, eleven states led by Texas filed a lawsuit in late May requesting that an injunction be issued to stop the implementation of Obama’s “guidance.” This lawsuit includes a 1975 quote from current U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg who said that “‘[s]eparate places to disrobe, sleep, perform personal bodily functions are permitted, in some situations required, by regard for individual privacy.’”
Then leftist attorneys general stepped in on behalf of not only their own states but all 50 states to insist on having the federal government rob citizens in every state of their right to decide if they want their local schools to have coed, sex-integrated restrooms and showers for children and teens.
The brief Madigan signed describes concerns of those states opposed to Obama’s diktat as “speculative and inaccurate claims of harm,” adding that “respecting the civil rights of transgender individuals will cause Plaintiffs no harm. Their allegations of safety risks are unsupported hyperbole.”
The sex of humans cannot change. Boys who wish they were girls remain unalterably boys no matter what chemical, surgical, or sartorial changes they make. And boys have no “civil right” to invade the private spaces of girls.
The suggestion by Madigan et al. that claims of harm are “speculative and inaccurate” requires a definition of “harm.” If “harm” is defined solely as physical assault, the risk is low and posed primarily by boys pretending to be girls. But certainly when boys have easy access to girls’ private facilities the risk is not nil.
Under the Obama diktat, all that’s required for a boy to use girls’ private facilities is his claim to be “transgender.” No parental confirmation needed. No medical diagnosis required. No treatment of any kind required. All that’s required is for a boy to claim that he is “trans” or “bi-gendered” or “gender-fluid,” which I guess means he can float fluidly between those binarily fixed facilities until such time as leftists complete their revolution to destroy all public recognition and accommodation of sex differences. On that day, all restrooms, locker rooms, shelters, and hospital rooms will be coed—and not just for those who reject their sex.
Moreover, not even a “medical” diagnosis of “gender dysphoria,” surgical mutilation, and cross-sex hormone doping can turn a boy into a girl or vice versa. And none of these alchemical protocols justify allowing objectively male or female students into opposite-sex facilities.
But harm is not limited merely to physical assault. Included in the concept of “harm” is the violation of modesty and privacy that takes place when unrelated persons of the opposite sex intrude into restrooms and locker rooms. It is likely that Orthodox Jews, Muslims, theologically orthodox Christians, and even some secularists would find these experiences harmful. For those who know that biological sex per se has profound meaning and is the source of feelings of modesty and the desire for privacy, seeing unrelated persons of the opposite sex partially or fully unclothed as well as being seen partially or fully unclothed by unrelated persons of the opposite sex constitutes harm.
Though it’s incomprehensible to morally deadened leftists, many—perhaps most—men and women prefer not to urinate or defecate in stalls with unrelated persons of the opposite sex doing the same in the stall next to them. These feelings of modesty derived from sex differences are the very reason we have separate restrooms in the first place. What possible difference should it make to girls if the boy in the stall next to them wishes he were a girl or not? Being forced to do their business with unrelated persons of the opposite sex in the neighboring stall also constitutes harm.
Madigan et al. are justifiably concerned about the safety of cross-dressing boys using sex-appropriate restrooms. Now that parents and administrators allow boys to wear lipstick, dresses, and Victoria Secret lingerie with their penises taped down to school, they have put these boys at risk in boys’ locker rooms and restrooms. But the solution to the problem leftist created must not include allowing these boys into girls’ restrooms or locker rooms, or to room with girls on overnight school-sponsored functions as Obama’s diktat requires.
The only reasonable accommodation of such tragically disordered thinking (or egregious rebellion) is single-occupancy facilities. If boys who wish they were girls have the purported right to use facilities with only girls, then surely girls have that right.
The federal government—largely controlled by liberals—has been gobbling up vast swaths of American cultural life, including the education of our children. In so doing, leftists are imposing their subjective and arguable assumptions about, among other things, sexuality on other people’s children as well as violating the 10th Amendment which makes clear that public education is the purview of states—not the federal government:
“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
Liberals make the specious argument that federal intrusion with regard to sex-integrated restrooms and locker rooms is warranted just as it was warranted with regard to racial integration of schools. But that comparison is based on the absurd comparison of the behaviorally neutral condition of race to the disordered subjective desire to be the opposite sex accompanied by futile behavioral choices in the service of pretending to be the opposite sex. For an analogy to be sound, there must be points of correspondence between the analogues. What precisely are the points of correspondence between race and sex-rejection?
In order to impose his radical sexual revolution on our nation’s children, Obama—master violator of the Constitution and the separation of powers—is attempting to unilaterally and illegally change the definition of the word “sex” in Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to include the rhetorical contrivance “gender identity” (i.e., subjective feelings about one’s sex). And apparatchik Lisa Madigan is helping.
Parents, notify your school administrators and your children’s teachers that under no circumstances may your child or teen use restrooms or locker rooms with persons of the opposite sex, and under no circumstance is your child or teen to be required to use opposite-sex pronouns when referring to any student, staff, or faculty member.
SB 1564 Is Now In Gov. Rauner’s Hands
In an effort to expand abortion services in our state, Springfield lawmakers have sent Governor Bruce Rauner SB 1564. This radical proposal would coerce medical professionals to violate their consciences by forcing them to refer patients for medical procedures they find morally objectionable such as abortion, sterilization and certain end-of-life care protocols. (Read more HERE.)
Take ACTION: Governor Bruce Rauner has this legislation on his desk now, and he has sixty days to decide to reject it or sign it into law. We need your help to urge him to veto this ominous proposal. No American should be forced by the government to violate his or her deeply held convictions.
Please call Governor Rauner’s office numbers and let his administrative assistants know that you want him to VETO this tyrannical bill. Encourage him to uphold conscience rights for Illinois medical personnel. Here are the office numbers:
(217) 782-0244 — Springfield
(312) 814-2121 — Chicago
More ACTION:
- Click HERE to send an email message to Gov. Rauner to urge him to veto SB 1564.
- Pray that Gov. Rauner is wise enough to protect conscience rights.
- Contact like-minded family and friends and let them know that they should speak out against this radical proposal. Also, share this on Facebook and Twitter.
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