At the risk of appearing reasonable in the face of a situation that apparently calls for hysteria (not necessarily referring to anyone here), and at the greater risk of agreeing with randman, here are a few facts.
First,
here is the opinion of the Texas Supreme Court, and
here is the opinion of the Court of Appeals. A simple reading of those opinions shows that the children were removed because of insufficient evidence establishing an immediate threat of harm to the children that were subject to the suit, and because the child welfare officials did not properly follow all procedures before removing the children.
All of the children from the entire community were taken on the basis of an anonymous telephone report, and the fact that 5 of the underage girls were pregnant. While there is no doubt that these facts are a sufficient basis for investigating what is happening there, it's not enough reason to remove every child, including prepubescent girls and all the boys.
The Texas Supreme Court opinion does not mean that the state will simply drop the matter. The state can later remove some, or perhaps even all, of the children if further facts are developed during the rest of the investigation, and if proper procedures are followed.
I suspect that if the state had removed only the pregnant girls, or perhaps only the post pubescent girls, that removal might well have been upheld by the appellate courts. Of course, the local frenzy prevented such thoughtful action, replacing it instead with a witch hunt mentality.
I am by no means defending the positions or rumored activities of these religious wackos (please pardon my redundancy). But the fact that they hold out of the mainstream religious views is, or should be, irrelevant in determining whether to take their children. Pity that it wasn't.
Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin
We see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat
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