A Florida city this week called on the U.S. Supreme Court to allow a 75-year-old cross monument to stand. The appeal came after a federal appeals court earlier this month reluctantly ruled against Pensacola, Fla. In a 3-0 decision in Kondrat’Yev v. Pensacola, a panel of judges on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said their hands were tied by precedent in upholding a decision that the cross on city property violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

In 2015, Arkansas inmate Gregory Holt was the first person in the United States to successfully invoke the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) to defend his religious liberty as a prisoner all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In Holt v. Hobbs, the high court unanimously ruled Holt should be allowed to grow a half-inch beard as a demonstration of his Muslim faith.

Congress passed RLUIPA in 2000, and though Liberties has often covered the “Religious Land Use” portion of the act, the “Institutionalized Persons” portion is seldom referenced.

The California Assembly on Friday temporarily shelved a bill banning so-called “conversion therapy” for homosexual and transgender adults. Opponents of Assembly Bill 2943 thanked its author, openly gay Democratic Assemblyman Evan Low, for withdrawing the bill that threatened Californians’ free speech and religious liberty rights.

In a surprise move, Evan Low, an openly gay California assemblyman and the author of a highly controversial bill banning “conversion therapy” for homosexual adults, pulled the measure from consideration Friday. The bill, known as Assembly Bill 2943, was expected to pass the Democratic majority Assembly on what was the last day of the legislative session and to be signed into law by Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown.

When the U.S. Supreme Court earlier this summer ruled in favor of baker Jack Phillips in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, the losing side should have learned not to treat someone, particularly Phillips, differently because of his or her religious beliefs. But these unelected state administrators didn’t, and they’ve set their sights on the Lakewood, Colo., baker again.

The Colorado commission that violated Jack Phillips’ religious liberty by trying to force him to make cakes for same-sex marriages is after the baker again. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled earlier this summer in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission that the state treated Phillips differently because of his Christian faith. Less than a month later, the Colorado Civil Rights Commission ruled against Phillips in a similar dispute stemming from his 2017 refusal to make a cake celebrating someone’s decision to change genders.

After ample spring rains came ample June rains, and another abundance of precipitation for my garden this year. I barely can remember such a summer, one without hauling the water hose. The garden produced tomatoes a month early and by July had us steadily busy with a bounty of produce and overgrown everything. The neighborhood flower farm thrives again, lush faces dancing above bushy stems on cool, damp morning breezes.