Kentucky clerk’s defiance shakes truce in culture wars

WASHINGTON — Kim Davis did more than register a protest when she went to jail last week after defying a federal court order to issue marriage licenses to gay couples.

Davis, the clerk in Rowan County, Kentucky, also helped unravel an uneasy détente in the nation’s culture wars that had prevailed since the Supreme Court declared a constitutional right to same-sex marriage in June.

Some Republican presidential aspirants rushed to the defense of Davis, a Democrat, and other public employees who say sanctioning same-sex marriage undermines their religious freedom.

Davis, 49, who has said she attends her Apostolic Christian church “whenever the doors are open” and who cited “God’s authority” in turning away gay couples who sought to marry, has emerged as a heroine to religious conservatives, many of whom feel deeply aggrieved by the Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision on same-sex marriage, in Obergefell vs.