WACO, Texas (KWTX) – McLennan County Justice of the Peace Dianne Hensley, who was sanctioned for refusing to marry same-sex couples because of her religious beliefs, can sue the State Commission on Judicial Conduct for its public warning against the judge, the Supreme Court of Texas ruled Friday.
The court’s ruling reversed two lower court decisions, which said Hensley failed to exhaust her administrative remedies before filing her lawsuit against the commission.
While the court gave Hensley standing to sue the commission, it did not rule on whether Hensley is protected from sanctions under the Texas Religious Freedom Restoration Act and remanded the case back to the 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin to decide that issue.
Hensley told KWTX Friday that she was “thrilled” by the court’s decision. She said in a statement released by her attorneys from the conservative religious freedom group First Liberty Institute that she is “truly grateful to the Supreme Court for giving me the opportunity to continue to stand for religious liberty and the rule of law.”
Hiram Sasser, a First Liberty Institute attorney, said in a statement the ruling is a “great victory.”
“Judge Hensley’s way of reconciling her religious beliefs while meeting the needs of her community is not only legal but should stand as a model for public officials across Texas,” Sasser said. “This is a great victory for Judge Hensley and renews her opportunity to seek justice under the religious liberty protections of the law.”
After learning that Hensley was turning away same-sex couples who asked her to marry them, the commission issued a public warning against Hensley in 2019, saying her decision cast doubt on her ability to remain impartial as a judge.
The 3rd Court of Appeals affirmed 459th State District Judge Jan Soifer’s decision to dismiss Hensley’s lawsuit against the State Commission on Judicial Conduct. Hensley’s lawsuit initially was filed in McLennan County. However, it was transferred to Travis County after a contested hearing.
The lower courts dismissed Hensley’s case because she didn’t exhaust her internal appeal options. The courts granted the commission sovereign immunity, ruling the state governmental agency was protected from liability.
The Supreme Court opinion said Hensley is allowed to file a lawsuit asserting her Texas religious freedom claim without first appealing internally. The high court also ruled that the commission’s sovereign immunity claims don’t apply.
In a concurring opinion, Supreme Court Justice Jimmy Blacklock wrote the court should have ruled in favor of Hensley’s claims that being punished for not marrying same-sex couples violates her religious freedom.
The commission’s public warning against Hensley said she violated the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct by “casting doubt on her capacity to act impartially to persons appearing before her as a judge due to the person’s sexual orientation.” It also said she has refused to perform same-sex weddings since August 2016, despite the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision that established constitutional rights to same-sex marriage.
After the landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling, McLennan County judges were advised to either perform weddings for everyone or no one. Most justices of the peace opted out of weddings altogether, which also ended a decades-long tradition of a mass Valentine’s Day wedding on the steps of the McLennan County Courthouse. Hensley initially followed suit, but later started officiating at weddings between men and women.
Hensley, who took office in 2014, claims the commission violated her rights by punishing her for “recusing herself from officiating at same-sex weddings, in accordance with the commands of her Christian faith.” She also claimed “the commission’s investigation and punishment” of her placed a substantial burden on her free exercise of religion.
She contended in her appeal of the trial court’s ruling that the judge was wrong and the commission’s sanction was “absurd” because “disapproval of an individual’s behavior does not evince bias toward that individual as a person when they appear in court.” She charged that the commission “equated a judge’s publicly stated opposition to an individual’s behavior as casting doubt on the judge’s impartiality toward litigants who engage in that conduct.”
Under that reasoning, she alleged, “no judge who publicly opposes murder or rape could be regarded as impartial when an accused murderer or rapist appears in his court.”
Henley’s attorneys argued that in “order to ensure all residents of McLennan County had access to low-cost wedding ceremonies, at her own expense, Judge Hensley invested extensive time and resources to compile a referral list of alternative, local wedding officiants.”
The attorney said the list included a wedding officiant within walking distance of Henley’s office “who agreed to reduce the cost of the wedding to the same amount Judge Hensley received and who would do same-sex weddings within the same timeframe as Judge Hensley.”
Henley’s attorneys said their client’s “innovative referral solution provided wedding options after many public officials ceased from officiating any and all weddings.”
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