QUOTE OF THE DAY
“While someday a legislator may come along to serve longer than John’s nearly six decades on the Hill, his remarkable legacy of public service will remain unmatched.” Former President Bill Clinton, in a statement, on the retirement of Rep. John Dingell, a Michigan Democrat, at the end of his 29th full term Article, 3AEPA clout justices’ focus in climate case
WASHINGTON - Supreme Court justices Monday questioned whether the Environmental Protection Agency had authority to impose permit requirements on power plants and factories in a test of President Barack Obama’s climate-change agenda.
In a 90-minute session, the court heard arguments from industry groups and Republican-led states over one aspect of the agency’s effort under the Clean Air Act.
States and business groups say the permit rules ultimately may affect millions of facilities.
The EPA says it is avoiding that outcome, at least for now, by relaxing the threshold that normally triggers a permit requirement. The Clean Air Act generally requires a permit for sources that exceed either 100 tons or 250 tons per year of a particular pollutant.
The EPA’s biggest greenhouse-gas initiative, its proposed rules directly limiting emissions from power plants, isn’t at issue in the Supreme Court case. The Obama administration’s top Supreme Court lawyer, Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, told the justices that the permitting rules are an important complement to nationwide caps.
The court will rule by July.
Oklahoma marriage ban said to aid kids
OKLAHOMA CITY - Lawyers who are appealing a federal judge’s ruling that overturned Oklahoma’s ban on same-sex marriage said in a court filing Monday that legalizing gay marriage would harm children, undermine society and make traditional marriages unstable.
The Alliance Defending Freedom cited courts and anthropologists, saying children are better off in a home with a mother and a father.
U.S. District Judge Terence Kern ruled last month against Tulsa County Court Clerk Sally Howe Smith, whose office refused to grant a marriage license to two women who wanted to marry. Monday’s appeal is the first step in the process ahead of an April 17 hearing before the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver.
In its court filing Monday, the alliance said marriages should be about children, not adults.
“Marriage encourages mothers and fathers to remain together and care for the children born of their union,” the group’s 93-page filing said. Severing the link, it said, “would powerfully convey that marriage exists to advance adult desires rather than serving children’s needs.”Letter draws creationism-in-class flak
NEW ORLEANS - A letter to a newspaper has prompted the Louisiana chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union to ask the Caddo Parish School Board to investigate whether any of its teachers are illegally teaching creationism.
The letter that appeared on the editorial page of The Times of Shreveport was listed as written by Charlotte Hinson, who identified herself as a fifth-grade teacher. She said she presents both evolution and creationism and, when asked, tells her pupils her beliefs.
ACLU Louisiana Director Marjorie Esman wrote an open letter released Monday saying Hinson appears to be illegally promoting her religious beliefs in a public classroom.
School officials did not return a Monday morning call seeking confirmation that the author of the newspaper letter was a Caddo public school teacher.
Esman’s response notes a 1987 Supreme Court opinion striking down a Louisiana law that required schools that teach evolution to give equal time to creationism. The law was struck down as an effort to promote religion.
The teacher goes beyond her First Amendment right to freedom of expression if she does what she describes in her letter, Esman said.
Lower Mississippi open after oil spill
NEW ORLEANS - The Coast Guard on Monday reopened all of the Mississippi River between New Orleans and Baton Rouge though ships and other vessels must pass slowly near the site of a weekend oil spill.
About 31,500 gallons of light crude oil spilled into the river after a tank barge hit a towboat Saturday afternoon.
Petty Officer Matthew Schofield said the last 25-mile stretch downriver from the accident site was opened Monday afternoon. Forty miles from New Orleans toward Baton Rouge were opened earlier in the day.
The accident was at least the third in three years involving a towboat owned by Settoon Towing of Louisiana. Company attorney Alex Pucheu did not immediately return calls and emails requesting comment.
Front Section, Pages 4 on 02/25/2014