Easy… just declare yourself an athiest.
You see, Article 19 Section 1 of the Arkansas Constitution says:
No person who denies the being of a God shall hold any office in the civil departments of this State, nor be competent to testify as a witness in any court.
Of course this probably fails the religious test clause in the US Constitution. Turns out that Rep. Richard Carroll has submitted a bill to repeal the section. Ed Brayton wonders how this will go down:
… But I’d be willing to wager that one of two things will happen: either the legislature will refuse to pass the bill and put it on the ballot, or it will go on the ballot and the voters of Arkansas will reject it.
Why? Because I bet there are enough people in that state who still favor such an idiotic law and want it to exist even if it can’t be enforced. It’s a symbol of their belief in their own superiority to those evil Godless heathens. This will be interesting to watch. Anyone wanna take that bet?
I’m probably not as pessimistic as he is about the probable outcome. Then again, I’ve been disappointed by religious Americans before in their capacity to separate church from state.
More goodies from the same document:
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p>Article 2. Declaration of Rights.
§ 25. Protection of religion.
Religion, morality and knowledge being essential to good government, the General Assembly shall enact suitable laws to protect every religious denomination in the peaceable enjoyment of its own mode of public worship.
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p>Article 3. Franchise and Elections.
§ 5. Idiots and insane persons.
No idiot or insane person shall be entitled to the privileges of an elector.
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p>heh…
… the country would be in much better shape.
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Article 2, Section 25 seems to derive from the Northwest Ordinance which provides:
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I believe that similar language appears in the Constitutions of some of the states carved out of the old Northwest Territory (e.g., Ohio), but I don’t have the links to prove it.
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p>My view is that this kind of language is harmless and it’s a waste of money and political capital, and a needless provocation to culture warriors, to try to repeal it.
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p>TedF
…that atheists have such a hard time in the culture already, I might agree. But as is, I think that although it’s harm is negligible, its ensconced status in a constitution is reason enough for it’s repeal. It’s harm is not absolute, certainly, but it is contributory and constant so as long as it is tolerated in a document that is supposed to be an embodiment of the culture’s legal ideals. Put differently, how ‘abominable’ must an otherwise ‘harmless’ article’s values be before repeal is the right response?
Just to keep you guys in a lather.
Even the Golden Rule loses value.
There’s a spelling error. “Its” for “It’s”. Disqualified!
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p>I think you’re going to have to write the best comment of the day!
Now we know it’s a deflation. Even the Golden Rule loses value.
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p>god i’m brilliant! ;P
… rule wrong. Possessive uses ‘ but not for ‘it’? Are there people who excel in illogical rules of English that also manage to write logical computer code, and if so what planet are they from?
They write in Perl.
…even if it is (it’s) an exception. Except when used as a possessive an apostrophe means something has been left out and the apostrophe serves as substitute. For a possessive the apostrophe helps with context, but does not independently stand for anything.
I am better at than you – grammar. And spelling, as pathetic as my spelling chops are. And handwriting.
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p>Really, anything to do with writing. 😉
I can easily see a judge deciding the interest of justice for the party issuing the subpeona outweigh this provision. All the judge would have to do is have the subpeoned party affirm rather than swear sans Bible. After all, this was intended to be a prohibition on full participation not the protection of a right.
… but that’s because the article is already unconstitutional. It’d be nice to get a judge to rule it so on the record, however.
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p>I’m not sure how you get a judge to interpret it your way however. The terms of the article, “..denies the being of a God…” and “…testify…”, are pretty clear in their meaning. Having a judge affirm rather than swear doesn’t change one’s ‘category’ of being someone who ‘denies god’ and is ‘testifying’.
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p>I would argue that the ‘intention’ was to legally establish the testimony of atheists as suspect, not because of a ‘rights’ issue or because of a ‘swearing on the bible issue’, but because they are atheists. It is the criterion as stated, after all.
i just re-read the law, and something i missed the first time is that the law is concerned with people denying “a” god. so for example, if a christian denies “the being” of baal, who is a god by some peoples’ reckoning, is that person also forbidden from holding public office or testifying? i’m starting to like this law more and more, and only wish that i live in arkansas to see that it was applied with vigor.
… the testimony on that court challenge. 😉
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p>Better yet, you can make a convincing case that the trinity isn’t “a” god either. 😉
Otherwise they would have to say “all” gods. What struck me is capitalizing God because it seems they meant the term genericly. Negative wording (denies) does cause confusion at times, but I think we all know what they meant. Anyone who believes in a god (including multiple, once you believe in one you’ve fulfilled the requirement) is able to testify. As for the Trinity, that is considered by Christians to be three manifestations, but still one God.
They really boxed themselves in with that one – after all, every theist is an atheist about everyone else’s religion, and the atheist just carries that one step further in rejecting all belief systems.