JEFFERSON CITY, MO—Saying the legislation would restore and protect religious freedoms that had been endangered in recent years by government action, religious liberty activists celebrated the passage Tuesday of a new Missouri law that grants the state’s small business owners the right to annul any marriage between a same-sex couple. “The religious rights of Missouri’s entrepreneurs have been disregarded for too long, but thanks to the Defense of Religious Freedom Act, now every shopkeeper in the state can legally invalidate any customer’s same-sex marriage if such a union violates the tenets of their faith,” said state legislator Greg Kirk, who explained that the bill allows proprietors to render null and void the marriage certificate of any wedded homosexual patron inside their place of business or within 100 feet of the storefront entrance. “This new legislation has nothing to do with any sort of prejudice against homosexuals; it’s about respecting the constitutional rights of citizens by giving them the choice of whether or not they wish to dissolve all legal ties of marriage between gay and lesbian couples whose unions stand in opposition to their deeply held convictions. It’s about protecting values.” According to sources, several state senators are also drafting a bill that gives Missouri citizens the right to cancel any woman’s birth control prescription if it infringes on their personal beliefs.

Advertisement