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WASHINGTON, Sept. 2 /Christian Newswire/ -- Liberty Counsel filed a Petition with the U.S. Supreme Court, requesting review of a ruling that permits the Florida Bar's involvement in controversial issues unrelated to the practice of law. In this case, the issue is homosexual adoption, but the Bar should remain neutral on matters outside the regulation of attorneys and the legal profession. The Petitioners include Liberty Counsel, Anita Staver, President of Liberty Counsel, and Scott Dixon, an affiliate of Liberty Counsel. The Florida Supreme Court said that the Bar's Family Law Section is "voluntary" and any mandatory membership dues were "de minimus" (minimal).

In 1947, Congress abolished "closed shop" unions, which allowed unions to require membership as a condition of employment. "Agency" or "union" shops are permitted so long as objecting members are not forced to pay for ideological causes unrelated to collective bargaining. Objecting members are not required to pay a membership fee but only a lower administrative fee that cannot be used for issues outside of collective bargaining. There is no "de minimus" exception to the First Amendment. Any use of mandatory membership dues on ideological issues violates the rights of objecting members. Mandatory state bars are like the "closed shop" unions abolished by Congress. Attorneys must be members in order to practice law. Bars are the gateway to the legal profession. At a minimum, state bars must abide by First Amendment law governing "agency" or "union" shops. Mandatory membership dues may not be used to finance political or ideological issues outside the regulation of lawyers or the legal profession.

When the Family Law Section of the Florida Bar filed an amicus brief arguing that Florida's law banning homosexual adoption should be struck down, it stepped into a controversial political question that has divided its members and which has nothing to do with the purpose of the Bar. The Bar creates, controls, and partially funds the Family Law Section. The Section may file a brief only with the approval of the Bar. In 2004 and 2005, the Bar prohibited the same Section from lobbying against the same law. In 2004, the Bar prohibited the Elder Law Section from filing an amicus brief in the Terry Schiavo case on the right to privacy, because that is outside the purpose of the Bar. The Bar Standing Rules 8.10 (a)(3) and 9.50 (a)(3) state that a section may not lobby or file an amicus brief on an issue that "carries the potential of deep philosophical or emotional division among a substantial segment of the membership of the bar."

Mathew D. Staver, Founder of Liberty Counsel and Dean of Liberty University School of Law, commented: "A state bar must not become an adversary against its members because it holds the key to employment. The gatekeeper to the legal profession offends the First Amendment rights of its members when it becomes an advocate for or against ideological causes outside the regulation of the practice of law. If a state bar can force lawyers to fund ideological causes having nothing to do with the legal profession and tape the mouths of objecting members, then the First Amendment has been rendered meaningless."