April 15, 2005

-The following is an excerpt from the April 14, 2005 edition of USA Today, Blue Section.

Supreme Court Passes On Controversial Cases

Washington, DC-     The United States Supreme Court today reported it has declined to rule on two controversial recent cases.  The first, the infamous "Gay Bake Sale" case, has proven to be a hot button issue for the newly empowered Religious Right.  The case started innocuously in Branson, Missouri.  The Branson Gay Theater Artists League, an informal group of actors, performers, and hair and makeup artists who work at the numerous shows in Branson's theaters, staged a bake sale on June 3, 2004  to raise money for the Pediatric AIDS Research Fund during its national campaign drive.  The sale was held in the apartment parking lot of the group's president Kelly Kaufman.  The group had prepared hundreds of items for sale and had scheduled a slate of performances to attract crowds to the bake sale.  However, only two hours into the event at noon the local police arrived and shut it down.  Although Kaufman produced the appropriate permits for the sale, food preparation, and the public performances, Branson Chief of Police Billy Joe Flannery insisted on shutting the sale down citing it as an "immoral public gathering."  As the case become public knowledge, local minister the Reverend Joe Billy Preylady called for an ordinance to ban all "Gay Bake Sales" in the future, describing the events as "immoral and sacrilegious and an insult to America's traditional family values."  The Branson City Council, which is always sensitive to the city's public image in the conservative heartland of America, quickly passed the ordinance authored by Reverend Preylady.  It effectively banned what it terms "illegal or immoral alternative lifestyles gatherings for the purpose of selling baked goods."  Backed by a ruling from the American Civil Liberties Union, Kaufman announced a second Gay Bake Sale the next month to challenge the law.  As soon as the sale opened for business, Kaufman was promptly arrested in the possession of a tray full of two dozen devils food cupcakes and taken into custody by the Branson police.  Subsequently, an appeal to the Missouri Supreme Court in Jefferson City resulted in the ordinance being deemed unconstitutional, and the charges against Kaufman were dropped.  It was at this point that a national fundamentalist group, the Christian Coalition to Make You Live Our Way (the C.C.M.Y.L.O.W.) got involved.  National chairwoman and spokeswoman the Reverend Sissy Joe Sipwater called for a national constitutional amendment to ban all further Gay Bake Sales.  The proposed amendment very specifically defines "Bake Sale" as "the preparation and sale of cookies, cakes, pastries, and other baked items BY heterosexual men, women, or children for the sale of said items TO heterosexual men, women, and children."  The Reverend Sipwater is adamant in her beliefs.  "All too often ," Sipwater said, " we have seen the insidious insinuation of the unholy, evil Gay lifestyle into our beloved national institutions whether it be the sacrament of marriage, the Army, or the faculty of our local schools.  It is time for Christian America to put its foot down and put an end to these so called Gay Bake Sales that make a mockery of one of our nation's holiest traditions.  My grandmother held bake sales in our hometown of Spittle, Kentucky every third Saturday of the month to raise money to send Bibles and cigarettes to our armed forces fighting the Nazis and Japs during World War Two.  Her grandmother before her held bake sales to help make Confederate flags for the brave young men marching off to fight in the War of Southern Independence.  It sickens me to see a bunch of drooling deviants with their snickerdoodles and their angel food bundt cakes trampling this sacred American tradition."  Though supported by a coalition of ministers throughout the heartland, the United States Supreme Court has declined to review their case leaving their amendment in limbo for the time being.

    The second case passed on by the Supreme Court originated from Modesto, California and is the notorious "Housewife Sexual Harassment" case.  Activist group N.O.A.W. - the National Organization of Angry Women - has championed the case that takes the definition of sexual harassment in the workplace to a new level.  Cynthia Warton-Evans is a former paralegal.  She gave up her job and became a full-time homemaker when she and her husband, attorney Marvin Evans had their second child.  In March of 2004, Warton-Evans filed a civil suit claiming workplace sexual harassment.  She claimed that as a full-time homemaker her house is de facto her workplace and her husband, therefore, is one of her co-workers and falls under the same laws applicable in other work environments.  The suit states that Warton-Evans was "repeatedly subjected to a pattern of sexual harassment in her workplace."  The suit cites repeated instances of Mr. Evans engaging in inappropriate behavior such as "kissing the claimant on the cheek while claimant was preparing breakfast for the children" or "placing his arms around and hugging the claimant in an unwanted overly familiar and suggestive manner prior to leaving for work in the morning."  Warton-Evans claims that on many occasions Mr. Evans would engage in inappropriate, suggestive conversations, making statements such as "you look really cute in that new blouse" or "let's get a baby sitter tonight and go out on a date ."  During the ninety day period covered in the civil suit, the harassment reached its peak on the morning of Tuesday, February 28 when the claimant, Ms. Warton-Evans was in the communal workplace bathroom preparing for the start of her workday at home.  She reports that Mr. Evans who had been showering nearby "stepped out of the shower facing the claimant, dropped his towel, stood naked before the claimant, and said, 'You want some of this?'"  It was the straw that broke the camel's back, and later that very morning still emotionally distraught Ms. Warton-Evans consulted with her former employer, attorney Randolph Bankston, and began the process of filing the ground breaking sexual harassment suit.  The trial was contentious and lasted over three months with Warton-Evans' legal team producing a series of witnesses including friends and neighbors.  The witnesses reported seeing Mr. Evans on multiple occasions in their home kiss the claimant, hold her hand in an overly familiar fashion, and even on one occasion pat her bottom while hosting a fondue party.  On the stand in his defense, Mr. Evans seemed baffled by the whole case.  "She's my wife, isn't she?  So I kissed her a couple of times.  A couple of times I even took a shower in my own house.  Does that make it a federal case?"  Apparently the answer is "Yes" as the jury found for Ms. Warton-Evans on all twenty four counts of sexual harassment in the workplace.  Jury forewoman Mary Tannenbaum - a full-time homemaker herself - was frank in her assessment of Mr. Evans and his behavior.  "Some people just don't get it," Tannenbaum said.  "There is simply no place in today's enlightened society for the kind of systematic abuse that poor Ms. Warton-Evans was subjected to."  The other eleven jurors - also all women - agreed and awarded Cynthia Warton-Evans 13.9 million dollars in punitive damages.  A series of appeals to California higher courts proved unsuccessful for the defendant.  Faced with impending personal bankruptcy proceedings, Mr. Evans has charged his lawyer to send the case to the United States Supreme Court.  Yet the nation's highest court has declined to address his case leaving Mr. Evans faced with a future of poverty and humiliation at the hands of his wife.

    The Supreme Court made no formal comments about their reasons for declining to review the controversial "Gay Bake Sale" and "Housewife Sexual Harassment" cases.  However, Chief Justice William Rehnquist did comment briefly about the issues outside the court on his way to a doctor's appointment.  Still recovering from  thyroid cancer  and breathing uneasily through a tracheotomy tube, the eighty year old Chief Justice seemed irritable and testy when questioned about the cases.  "Are you nuts?" Rehnquist rasped.  "This is the stupidest crap I've ever seen.  The stupid liberal idiots are just as stupid as the stupid conservative idiots."