Free Republic

PHILADELPHIA, PA, June 16, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – On Tuesday opening arguments were heard in a case involving the Cradle of Liberty Scout Council, which is challenging the city of Philadelphia's decision to evict the Council from a building that it built and has maintained since 1929. The city said it would carry through with the eviction unless the Council rejected the Boy Scouts of America's policy banning open homosexuals from membership.In the Boy Scouts of America v. Dale case of 2000, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled 5-4 that the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) were constitutionally permitted...

BAGHDAD – Two U.S. Soldiers here have spent nearly a year working to boost not only the capabilities of Iraqi firefighters but their standing and reputation in the community as well. According to Lt. Col. Gary Esson, the senior fire service advisor and a native of Joplin, Mo., and Spc. Michael Burris, a fire service advisor and Fayetteville, N.C., native, both with the 414th Civil Affairs Battalion, Provincial Reconstruction Team – Baghdad, the first step was to improve living standards inside Iraqi fire stations. "If there was an [American Base] closing, we would contact them for any furniture that they...

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court has let stand a ruling saying the Boy Scouts cannot lease city park land in San Diego because the group is a religious organization. The high court refused to hear an appeal from San Diego-area Boy Scouts.

Boy Scouts have traditionally earned belt loops and merit badges for outdoor pursuits like swimming, archery, canoeing and fishing. Today’s boys are spending a lot of time inside and on-line, whether it’s with MMORPGs like Runescape and World of Warcraft or interacting with a gaming system like X-Box 360 and Sony Play Station. The Boy Scouts of America have heeded the call and created a Video Games Belt Loop and Academics Pin for Tiger Cubs, Cub Scouts and Webelos: the ranks prior to officially becoming a Boy Scout The new badge requirements teach the boys how to be responsible...

PORTLAND, Ore. -- An Oregon jury's decision to award a man $18.5 million in punitive damages in his case against the Boy Scouts of America will likely be the first of many financial hits the Scouts will take as it prepares to defend itself against a series of sex abuse lawsuits. The jury on Friday ordered the Scouts to make the payment to Kerry Lewis, the victim of sex abuse by a former assistant Scoutmaster in Portland in the early 1980s. The case was the first of six filed against the Boy Scouts in the same court in Oregon, with...

ARIZONA DAILY STAR Bailey Stephen Harn, Eagle Scout Bailey Stephen Harn, 14, has earned the Boy Scouts' highest rank of Eagle Scout. Only 4 to 5 percent of youth who join Scouting earn this honor. Celebrating his achievement, an Eagle Court of Honor will be held at 10 a.m. May 1 at the North Stake Center of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, 939 W. Chapala Drive. Bailey is a member of Boy Scout Troop 232 of the Catalina Council, Old Pueblo District. An eighth-grader at Cross Middle School, he is the son of Steve and Wendy...

"Should the Legislature congratulate the Boy Scouts of America on the anniversary of the granting of its federal congressional charter despite the fact that this organization steadfastly continues to discriminate against individuals because of their sexual orientation or religious views?"

I wasn’t a very good Boy Scout when I signed-up at 6 years old. It wasn’t that I didn’t have fun traipsing around the woods — instead, I spent most of my time daydreaming about my brand new computer, a 1982 ZX Spectrum.

Despite the growing media consensus that Catholicism causes sodomy, an alternative view -- adopted by the Boy Scouts -- is that sodomites cause sodomy. (Assume all the usual disclaimers here about most gay men not molesting boys, most Muslims being peaceful, and so on.) It is a fact that the vast majority of the abuser priests -- more than 90 percent -- are accused of molesting teen-age boys. Indeed, the overwhelmingly homosexual nature of the abuse prompted The New York Times to engage in its classic "Where's Waldo" reporting style, in which the sex of the victims is studiedly hidden...

An Oregon jury found the Boy Scouts of America and the local scout chapter negligent today in a landmark case that accused the iconic organization of covering up alleged sexual abuse of several of its boy scouts for years. The Boy Scouts of America face charges of sexual abuse by scout leaders.The nine-member jury ordered the organization to pay $1.4 million in damages, and will now move into a punitive phase that could result in the Boy Scouts of America paying a penalty that could reach $25 million. That decision is not expected for weeks. ~ Skip ~ In the...

Assembly Democrats killed a proposed resolution honoring the Boy Scouts of America. The measure died in the Assembly Judiciary Committee on a party-line vote. Three Republican voted to support the Boy Scouts — seven Democrats voted against the measure. According to the Los Angeles Times, Committee chairman Mike Feuer led the opposition – “citing the Scouts’ history of not allowing gays to serve in their leadership.”

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) -- Jurors on Tuesday found the Boy Scouts of America negligent and awarded $1.4 million to a former Portland man who was abused by an assistant Scoutmaster in the early 1980s, following a three-week trial in which secret Scout "perversion files" were used as evidence. The jury also decided the Irving, Texas-based Scouts organization was liable for punitive damages that will be decided in a separate phase of the trial. That would be in addition to the $1.4 million. The Scouts denied allegations of negligence and said the files actually helped them keep child molesters out of...

From the Boy Scout Handbook, Copyright 1965, BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA: New Brunswick New Jersey No. 3227 page.438. When you reach the age of voting citizenship you will know the true meaning of democracy and of liberty and will be able to carry out your duties to your country--obeying its laws, taking your place in the community. Be a thinking citizen--not a thoughtless one. Keep yourself informed on the happenings of the day--in your own community,your country, and throughout the world. Learn how your country, your own State, your city, town, or village are governed and find out how you...

Here's a link to some videos showing a new locomotive that helps the BSA commemorate 100 years of Scouting in America.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) -- The Boy Scouts of America call them "perversion files," internal documents used to track Scout leaders suspected of sexually abusing young boys, and they have became part of the public record in an Oregon lawsuit. A judge who had ordered the Scouts to release them received 1,247 files into evidence near the end of the day Friday - the third day of trial that began with a lawyer saying "you will be the first jury to see them." Attorneys Paul Mones and Kelly Clark won the release of files from 1965-85 to help them make the...

PORTLAND, Ore. — The Boy Scouts of America call them "perversion files," internal documents used to track Scout leaders suspected of sexually abuse young boys. On Friday they became part of the public record in an Oregon lawsuit. A judge who had ordered the Scouts to release them received 1,247 files into evidence near the end of the third day of trial... Attorneys...won the release of files from 1965-85 to help them make the case in a $14 million lawsuit against the Boy Scouts filed by a 37-year-old Oregon man. He was sexually molested in the early 1980s by assistant...

A civil trial that opened Wednesday in Portland will show that the Boy Scouts of America knew it had child molesters in its leadership for decades but kept the problem quiet, according to an attorney for one of the victims. The case, expected to attract national attention, centers on a Portland man who confessed to Scout leaders that he had molested 17 Scouts but was allowed to continue joining boys in Scouting activities.

In the media's eyes, the Boy Scouts of America are on par with bubble wrap - unimportant, disposable and something largely ignored unless someone wants to stomp on them. The Boy Scouts celebrated its 100th anniversary last month. And as an organization in which over 110 million Americans have participated, including film director Steven Spielberg, 211 current members of Congress and Presidents John F. Kennedy, Gerald Ford, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama - and given the positive characteristics often associated with Scouts - hard-working respectful and loyal - it's logical to think the media would love to...

A Nazi sympathiser living in Rome came up with the idea and it was quickly seized upon by officials in Berlin who saw it as the ideal opportunity to keep up with Allied activity in the city. The plan is revealed in MI5 reports held at the National Archives in Kew and which have now been declassified - and it comes just days after other files revealed how Germany had also tried to infiltrate the Boy Scouts. Operation Georgian Convent as it was called involved the purchase of a building in Rome by Michael Kedia, a Russian anti communist Nazi...

FREDERICKTOWN, Mo. (AP) - The top police officer in a remote eastern Missouri town was ordered to stand trial Monday on charges that he sexually assaulted two members of the Boy Scout troop he led after an investigator testified that the officer had confessed to the crimes. Kenneth Tomlinson II, 42, faces 16 counts of sodomy. Madison County Judge Robin Fulton set an arraignment date of March 18 following emotional testimony at the preliminary hearing, at which only prosecutors presented evidence. Fulton determined they had enough to warrant a trial. Tomlinson, who stands about 6-foot-2 and weighs well over 300...