SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) — An Illinois judge ruled Thursday that the state can stop working with Catholic Charities on adoptions and foster care placements — something the state decided to do in July after the not-for-profit agency refused to recognize Illinois' new civil unions law.
In his ruling, Sangamon County Circuit Judge John
Schmidt said that no one, including Catholic Charities, has a legal right to a
contract with the state government. He did not address the more sensitive issue
of whether a state contractor that refuses to serve gays and lesbians is
violating the state's new civil unions law.
The state Department of Children and Family
Services ended $30 million in contracts with Catholic Charities in four church
dioceses in July, but Schmidt had temporarily reinstated them while he
considered the case.
Illinois authorities had said they were canceling
the contracts because Catholic Charities' practice of referring unmarried
couples to other agencies was discriminatory, a violation of the state's civil
union law. Catholic Charities argued it was exempt under civil unions and
another state law that protect religious practices.
Among its arguments, Catholic Charities said it was
entitled to a hearing over the canceled contracts because after 40 years of
annually renewed pacts, the organization had developed a "property
interest" in the work and should be able to object to state action.
Schmidt disagreed.
"Plaintiffs are not required by the state to
perform these useful and beneficial services," the judge wrote. The work,
he said, "is a desire of the plaintiffs to perform their mission as
directed by their religious beliefs."
A spokesman for Catholic Charities said the
organization's lawyers were reviewing the ruling "and considering next
actions."
A lawyer for the organization said in court
Wednesday that losing the state contracts would hurt not only Catholic
Charities' work, but those who want to be adoptive or foster parents in remote
areas of the state where the group is the only one working in the field.
A spokeswoman for the state attorney general, who
represented DCFS, said the decision "will allow the state to continue
focusing on what's best for the care and well-being of children."
Copyright
2011 The Associated Press.
