The JFK Library and Museum in Boston
will award the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award today to
three Iowa Supreme Court justices ousted over the court's unanimous
2009 ruling which legalized gay marriage in the state.
Caroline Kennedy will present the three
justices with a sterling silver ship's lantern, a symbol of a beacon
of hope.
“Former Iowa Chief Justice Marsha
Ternus and former justices David Baker and Michael Streit were chosen
in recognition of the political courage and judicial independence
each demonstrated in setting aside popular opinion to uphold the
basic freedoms and security guaranteed to all citizens under the Iowa
Constitution,” the library said in a press release.
Gay marriage foes mounted a campaign to
remove the three justices in 2010.
The FAMiLY LEADER President Bob Vander
Plaats, who spearheaded the campaign to oust the justices, called the
award insulting.
“This is just another example of the
laughable nonsense coming from the far left,” Vander Plaats said in
an email to supporters. “I believe the JFK Library award given to
the judges is an insult to over a half million informed and
constitutionally astute Iowans who voted to remove the activist
judges.”
“If we allow the Judicial Branch's
Supreme Court to get away with making law and executing law to
redefine marriage, then it won't be long before they do the same
thing with property rights, the parental right to raise children, the
right to exercise the 2nd Amendment, and many other
God-given, constitutionally protected rights,” he added.