By Selwyn Duke

It gives new meaning to the term “shotgun wedding”: Government officials in New York have told an upstate farming couple that they must host same-sex “weddings” on their property — and because they refused to do so they must pay a $13,000 fine.

The hapless farmers are Robert and Cynthia Gifford, who have owned Liberty Ridge Farm in Schaghticoke, New York, for more than a quarter century. During much of that time at least, writes The Daily Signal’s Leslie Ford, they have opened “the farm to the public for events like berry picking, fall festivals, and pig racing” — and, sometimes, for weddings. This was never a problem until 2012, when, reports Ford, “Melissa Erwin and Jennie McCarthy contacted the Giffords [by telephone] to rent the family’s barn for their same-sex wedding ceremony and reception. Cynthia Gifford responded that she and her husband would have to decline their request as they felt they could not in good conscience host a same-sex wedding ceremony at their home.”

Unbeknownst to the Giffords at the time, however, the phone call was being recorded.

Read the rest here.