The Washington Examiner by Joel Gehrke December 12, 2013
Sen. Mike Lee has authored a bill to prevent President Obama from using his executive power to push churches and other nonprofit groups to recognize gay marriage.
"It is concerning that we have people in this administration who think that religious liberties are just not that big of a deal," the Utah Republican told the Washington Examiner on Tuesday.
President Obama promised to respect religious liberty in his statement on the Supreme Court's June decision to overturn parts of the Defense of Marriage Act in Windsor v. United States.
"How religious institutions define and consecrate marriage has always been up to those institutions," Obama said.
Lee thinks federal officials could work around that promise by trying to revoke the tax-exempt status of churches that support traditional marriage.
"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual." Thomas Jefferson
"If people can’t trust not only the executive branch but also don’t trust Congress, and don’t trust federal judges, to make sure that we’re abiding by the Constitution with due process and rule of law, then we’re going to have some problems here." - Barack Obama, June 7, 2013