California High Court Bans State Judges from Boy Scout Leadership

The California Supreme Court is forbidding state judges from being affiliated with the Boy Scouts because they say theprivate group discriminates against homosexuals.

It’s not discrimination against boys, though, that’s the problem: the organization has accepted the membership of gay Boy Scouts since 2013 . The state Supreme Court issued its edict because, they say, the Boy Scouts doesn’t allow homosexual Scout leaders to serve, according to an article in San Francisco Gate.

The state’s leading judicial body made its decision based on a recommendation from an ethics advisory committee. The Boy Scouts, as a nonprofit youth group, had had an exemption that allowed state judges to belong to it.

The high court’s decision reversed that carve out, which the Bar Association of San Francisco and other legal organizationshave wanted to overturn since 2003, San Francisco Gate said.

Judges with sons in the Boy Scouts were disappointed. The prohibition would elevate “gay rights above religious freedom rights,” one judge was quoted by San Francisco Gate, and another said it would interfere with judges’ rights to raise their children as they choose.

Affected judges have until next year to comply, or face possible removal from the bench.