Alliance Defending Freedom, an Arizona-based Religious Right powerhouse, has urged Slovakia’s constitutional court to allow anti-gay activists to place a referendum on the country’s ballot that would reinforce the current bans on same-sex marriage, adoption, and domestic partner protections and add a provision making it harder for schools to offer sex education.
The National Law Journal reports:
The court is considering a petition seeking a referendum submitted by the Slovak Alliance for Family. The measure calls for a vote on four questions:
· The definition of a marriage as a union of one man and one woman.
· A requirement that adoptive parents be married.
· Prohibiting registered partnerships between gay and lesbian couples.
· Permitting parents to opt out their children from sex education classes taught at public schools.
"The people of Slovakia should have the freedom to preserve marriage and family if they so choose," said Alliance Defending Freedom senior legal counsel Roger Kiska, who filed an amicus brief with the court. "This referendum will allow Slovaks to affirm current Slovak law and important social values, which is perfectly acceptable under the Slovak Constitution."
The opt-out of sex education classes, however, is not existing law.
More than 400,000 citizens signed the petition supporting a referendum, according to Roger Kiska—more than the required number of signatures. However, Slovak President Andrej Kiska asked the Constitutional Court to review the measure because of a provision in the country's constitution that forbids holding a referendum to change "fundamental rights and liberties."
In June, Slovakia became the seventh EU country to ban same-sex marriage. Alliance Defending Freedom has a hefty budget for Europe, spending more than $750,000 on its European programs last year.
