Posted on 09/09/2006 6:54:19 PM PDT by Jay777
An atheist mother represented by the ACLU complained that allowing Boy Scouts to recruit in public schools on the same basis as other groups discriminated against her atheist son who attends Portland public schools. In today's decision reversing a lower court decision, the Oregon Supreme Court emphatically concluded that "nothing that occurred in any public school program, service, or activity was discriminatory at all.""Giving Boy Scouts equal access is not discrimination," said Scouting spokesperson Robert H. Bork, Jr. "It is the law."
"The First Amendment and two federal statues require that Boy Scouts be given the same access to school facilities as other youth or community organizations," said Boy Scouts' attorney George A. Davidson. If the lower court's decision had been upheld, "every school district in Oregon would have been in jeopardy of losing federal funding."
Read more details at BSALegal.Org
This is a ridiculous lawsuit in the first place. I feel bad for the judges that had to listen to the arguments in this one. It seems to me that it was a "no duh" equal access case, and the Oregon Supreme Court came to the same conclusion. Thank goodness this case was dealt with using common sense.
Listen to the ridiculous response from the executive director of the Oregon ACLU.
David Fidanque, executive director of the Oregon ACLU, said the ruling turned on a technical definition of what constitutes discrimination in the schools.In theory, he argued, a hate group such as the Ku Klux Klan could make a presentation in an Oregon school about joining, and it would not be discrimination as long as it didn't mention it restricts membership to white people.
(Excerpt) Read more at stoptheaclu.com ...
THIS should cheer everyone up.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1698312/posts?page=1
Plan to cut ACLU money pipeline advances
Posted on 09/09/2006 4:44:06 AM PDT by Man50D
A plan that would cut off the pipeline of taxpayer money that now flows into American Civil Liberties Union coffers has been advanced by the House Judiciary Committee.
The Public Expression of Religion Act, introduced by Indiana Congressman John Hostettler, now will move to the full House for a vote, he said in his announcement this week.
"This is a big victory for Americans who care about our rich religious heritage in this country," he said. "There is a lot of excitement about this bill."
It has been vigorously supported by the American Legion, where Commander Rees Lloyd described it as "a long overdue victory for justice, freedom, democracy, and the First Amendment."
The American Legion has fought for reform of the attorney fee provisions of federal law which the ACLU has exploited to reap millions of dollars in taxpayer-paid attorney fees in Establishment Clause cases," Lloyd's statement said.
He said the ACLU has used the threat of the fees as 'a club' to bludgeon local elected bodies into surrendering to the ACLU's "secular cleansing demands."
The plan came about after the ACLU, "the Taliban of American liberal secularism," according to Lloyd, sued to tear down a cross on a rock outcrop erected by veterans as a memorial to World War I veterans in 1934 in the remote Mojave Desert.
Officials noted someone would have to drive 11 miles off the highway "to be offended" by the cross.
There had been no complaints against the memorial in 60 years, until the ACLU sued to have it removed, and then asked for and got $63,000.
"The American Legion," said former American Legion National Commander Tom Bock, "is in full support" of the plan. He said it would take away the authority of judges to award attorney fees to the ACLU in lawsuits under the Establishment Clause.
The law, approved in 1976, originally was to help individual citizens bring lawsuits against state officials who had deprived them of their constitutional rights. However, Hostettler believes it has been abused by groups like the ACLU, who claim any public official who expresses religious beliefs or displays a memorial with religious imagery, like the crosses at Arlington National Cemetery, is promoting the "establishment of religion."
For example, in 2001 Iowa county officials removed a Ten Commandments monument from a courthouse lawn rather than face the attorney's fees threatened. And in 2004, Los Angeles removed a tiny cross from the county seal when it was threatened with those fees.
Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback has similar legislation pending in the Senate.
In an endorsement of the plan, the American Legion quoted Thomas Jefferson:
"The germ of dissolution of our federal government is in our federal judiciary; an irresponsible body, working like gravity by night and by day, gaining a little today and a little tomorrow, and advancing in its noiseless step like a thief … until all shall be usurped from the States, and the government of all be consolidated into one."
One such case that currently is grinding its way through the court system involves the Mt. Soledad Veterans Memorial in California.
The ACLU has been fighting to remove that for 17 years, even though 76 percent of the people in San Diego where it is located want it to stay.
David Fidanque, executive director of the Oregon ACLU ... argued, a hate group such as the Ku Klux Klan could make a presentation in an Oregon school about joining, and it would not be discrimination as long as it didn't mention it restricts membership to white people.
Get out. The KKK is a 'Hate Group'?!?!? Since when? And what's he mean it's only restricted to white people? That's patently absurd.
(mocking ACLU for comparing the BSA to the Klan. So NO hissy fits please)
I went to a fundraising dinner for my congressman last night. I wish I had had the presence of mind to bring this up with him.
I think I'll attend his next dinner so I can collar him and ask him about this.
Thanks for reminding me.
YES, this is good.
LOL! hehehe!...Its' been a good week w/ this and the HR passing the provisions regarding NGOs' repeated (frivolous :) assaults on "Mainstream Social / Religious" organizations. :D
BUMP
So the Anti American CLU compares the Boy Scouts to the Klan.
Amazing.
Saw / read that yesterday....cuttin' the purse strings. :)
Gotta love this!!!!
It just dosen't get better than this.
"Suppose they decided being a black kid was a basis for not being a
scout, either. Would they still be allowed to recruit at schools? What does
believing in a Sky God have to do with learning to pitch a tent? Is the BSA
teaching self-reliance or religion?"
Having dark skin has nothing to do with belief, and, in fact, large numbers of African Americans believe in your "Sky God". The Boy Scouts are a private organization and can set such requirements.
To change the subject, I personally practice Buddhist meditation, and believe in attempting to purify myself from within as much as I am able in order to comprehend what is without. It's amazing how much the outer world can change once you yourself change from within. I have no problem with sincere Christians because they are attempting to do the same through devotion to their ideal (Jesus). My impression is that you comprehend religion in the most literal and physical terms. I would encourage you to take a deeper look. A number of atheists find the eastern religions interesting. It's just a suggestion.
As someone else on this thread stated, I lifted it from right here on FR.
"glad to see someone appreciated my work"
I'll remember to credit ya when I use it! Good work.
One evening I was walking down the beach at a resort in Turkey. I came to a sunken pit like a basketball court. Right in the middle of it was something that looked like what I learned in my Boy Scout days as a "Council Fire." On my return to the hotel I passed the place again, and this time there were several young men in scout uniforms standing around the thing. Yes, they were Turkish Boy Scouts, probably Muslim to the last one, and I still know now to recognize a Council Fire when I see one.
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"An atheist mother represented by the ACLU complained that allowing Boy Scouts to recruit in public schools on the same basis as other groups discriminated against her atheist son who attends Portland public schools."
The ACLU must be running out of ideas for frivelous lawsuits, because now their arguments don't even make sense. How is it discrimination to OFFER students membership in an orginization that is slightly religious. If it was MANDATORY then their argument would hold water, but don't say it's discrimination when your kid is allowed to be within 50 feet of someone who believes in God.
It's freedom OF religion, not freedom FROM religion. (And yes I did get that off a T-shirt, but it's true nonetheless.)
ACLU is the most dangerous legal hate group in this country.
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