Tagged: Indiana

A U-S District judge has ruled against atheist organization the Center for Inquiry in its bid to strike down Indiana’s marriage statute as unconstitutional.

Marriage in Indiana is a two-step process: receiving a marriage license and making the marriage official.  The state’s marriage statute specifies who can perform that second step – the clergy of any religious group and certain government officials like mayors and judges. 

Indiana’s private sector added 7,700 jobs last month and lowered its unemployment rate to 8%.

The unemployment rate fell 0.2% in October, the largest single month drop since April.  It also marked a decrease for the second consecutive month after gaining or holding steady for six months. 

The Indiana Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a lawsuit challenging the state’s school voucher program Wednesday, but at least one analyst says the challenge is facing an uphill battle.

Earlier this year, Marion Superior Court Judge Michael Keele denied a school voucher challenge that was brought by teachers and parents and backed by the Indiana State Teachers Association.  The Supreme Court decided to take the case on appeal directly, rather than allowing the state Court of Appeals to hear it first. 

Indiana’s private sector lost nearly 6,000 jobs in September, the first decline in nearly a year.  Yet the state’s employment rate also fell for the first time since April.

Indiana’s unemployment rate had gone up or held steady for five months while, at the same time, the private sector created jobs. 

Last month, that trend changed as the unemployment rate fell to 8.2%.  University of Indianapolis economist Matt Will says while September’s jobs report isn’t positive, it also isn’t time to panic. 

As Governor Mitch Daniels’ official portrait was unveiled Tuesday, he says he hopes the accomplishments of his administration will far outlast Hoosiers’ memory of him.

The portrait shows Daniels standing in his office, without a suit coat, leaning against a chair and holding a pen in his hand.  Lafayette native Richard Halstead, one of 43 applicants, was commissioned by the Indiana State Museum to paint it. 

Halstead says Daniels had only one request – that the painting not be artificial or unnatural.