Persecuting the peaceful Amish has not been good for the image of Kentucky, but fortunately, last Wednesday, the state finally resolved the contentious safety triangle issue. Governor Steve Beshear signed a bill that allows the Schwartzentruber Amish to use strips of reflective white or silver tape on their buggies rather… Continue reading…
Compromising with the Amish, which has long been important in Pennsylvania’s Lancaster County, now seems to be taking hold in Kentucky too, where legislators are crafting a law that will respect Amish rights as well as general safety concerns. While most Old Order Amish have no problems with displaying the… Continue reading…
Compromising with the Amish, which has long been important in Pennsylvania’s Lancaster County, now seems to be taking hold in Kentucky too, where legislators are crafting a law that will respect Amish rights as well as general safety concerns. While most Old Order Amish have no problems with displaying the… Continue reading…
Kidder and Hostetler wrote a memorable article 22 years ago that discussed the Amish approach to working things out with local bureaucrats, thus liberating officials from their need to obey all the rules. A routine announcement last week in a local Pennsylvania newspaper—that some Amish want to build a school—prompts… Continue reading…
With a typical can-do attitude, some Amish families in Sturkie, Arkansas, decided to erect a new bridge to overcome the fact that their small community was divided by the South Fork River. Moses Borntrager, on whose land the proposed construction was to take place, learned that an old steel bridge… Continue reading…
Kentucky and Ohio officials are putting Amish people in jail, in the one state because they refuse to compromise their religious principles, and in the other because a few of them have been terrorizing people. Both issues have been in the news this past week. In late September, a judge… Continue reading…
The Amish in Carroll, Holmes, Jefferson and Trumbull counties, Ohio, have become increasingly upset in recent weeks because of aggressive, physical attacks by a break-away group who have religious differences with them. The dissident attackers have been cutting off the hair and beards of the men, and in some cases… Continue reading…
Three months after some Schwartzentruber Amish lost their case in the Kentucky Court of Appeals, they were sentenced to jail—for refusing to overlook their religious beliefs and mount orange triangles on their buggies. The story about a Graves County, Kentucky, judge putting people in jail for their religious convictions made… Continue reading…
October second marks the fifth anniversary of the horrifying shootings in the Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania, Amish schoolhouse, a tragedy that focused the attention of the world not only on another mass murder but also on the practice of forgiveness. Millions of people had a hard time believing that the Amish… Continue reading…
Ben Riehl, an Amish farmer in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, operates his farm, installs solar panels for extra income in his spare time, and has opened his home near the town of Intercourse as a bed and breakfast establishment. According to an article last week in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Mr. Riehl’s… Continue reading…
