RFRA: Post-Fix, Post-Mortem

I have been sick this week.  So, blogging has not really been on the forefront for me, but I have been keeping track of the whiplash surrounding the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

The quick recap is that after a national shaming, in which the Republican controlled House, Senate, and Governor's Mansion feigned shock, even though they had been warned and had seen it on a much smaller scale in other states, those same "leaders" went back to the drawing board to "clarify" the law.  I put leaders in quotes because Democrats were not allowed to come to the table, because the Republican supermajorities are so vast.  The interesting thing is that businesses, specifically Eli Lilly and Salesforce, we the vocal proponents here, and their loud, economic voices drowned out the culture warriors like Eric Miller and Micah Clark.  In the end, we got LGBT protections against religious beliefs codified into Indiana law for the first time, and while it is not perfect, it is a great step in the right direction.  It is most certainly not something that anyone would have foreseen as an end result of this debacle.

The biggest step forward is that these same businesses have indicated that they will be lobbying the 2016 session to get sexual orientation and gender identity added to the protected classes of the anti-discrimination law of the state.  The biggest change the "fix" brought about was to negate the language in the original law that trumped local human rights ordinances.  It was never a sure thing it would have, though it probably would have ended up in the courts, but 11 municipalities offer these protections.  In these areas, LGBT are protected fully now.  However, in the rest of the state, those protections are really only extended to everyone in the cases of religion, though one would argue that there is really no other way someone would discriminate, but I suppose there could be some wiggle room.  The "fix" also didn't address healthcare and education, and it just kind of makes things a jumbled mess, though obviously better than where we began.

My fear is that the short attention span of the casual political person will screw us over again, though I realize 2016 will be a tempest year from the Presidential race on down to Governor and every member of the Indiana House of Representatives.  We need very high turnout to not only win the Governor's race but to hopefully chip away at some of these supermajorities.  I'm not crazy enough to think that the Democrats could retake the house, but if they get to a point where Republicans have to negotiate, it will make things a lot easier for everyone.

Those issues can rest for a little bit because the 2015 elections still need to happen, though the Democratic Party needs to be locating viable candidates right now.  The issue facing us right now is repairing the damage done to Indiana in the thoughts and minds of people in the United States and all over the world.  This quiet, mostly level headed state, has been branded a land of bigotry, and after 20, if not 30, years of hard work to make Indianapolis a place for people to have conventions and large sporting events, that reputation is in jeopardy due to our very shortsighted Governor Mike Pence.  I love Indiana, and I am tired of it being a national punchline.  Unfortunately, I think it is going to be for many years to come.