Thread: House OKs bill to deny ACLU legal fees in religion cases

http://www.sbcbaptistpress.org/bpnews.asp?ID=24066

House OKs bill to deny ACLU legal fees in religion cases
Sep 28, 2006
By Tom Strode
Baptist Press
WASHINGTON (BP)--The House of Representatives has approved a bill to prevent the American Civil Liberties Union from collecting government funds when it succeeds at legal challenges to public expressions of religion.

Representatives voted 244-173 Sept. 26 for the Public Expression of Religion Act (PERA), with 26 Democrats joining 218 Republicans in the majority.

The effort to gain Senate approval of the legislation likely will be a difficult one. Congress is scheduled to recess Sept. 29 or 30, though it is expected to reconvene in November for a “lame-duck” session.

PERA would change a federal law that allows a court to award attorneys’ fees when it finds a government official or body has violated a person’s civil rights. The measure would no longer permit a judge to require government officials or entities to pay such fees in cases involving the First Amendment’s ban on government establishment of religion. PERA, H.R. 2679 in the House, would still allow a court to issue an injunction against the governmental policy or practice in such cases.

Rep. John Hostettler, R.-Ind., designed the measure to close what he considers a loophole that has allowed organizations such as the ACLU and Americans United for Separation of Church and State to collect attorneys’ fees when they win lawsuits challenging religious symbols on or religious groups’ use of government property.

“Because of PERA, Americans will have the opportunity to fight the systematic agenda of the ACLU and their minions to remove the vestiges of our religious heritage in this nation,” Hostettler said in a written release after House passage. “Patriots will have their day in court.

“Because of what we did today, veterans who choose to fight to keep their war memorials intact can do so without the threat of prohibitive attorneys’ fees.”

Mat Staver, chairman of Liberty Counsel, urged the Senate to pass the bill quickly, saying the measure would “encourage local government officials to stand up to those who would chisel religious symbols from our public buildings and wipe our religious heritage from the public square.”

Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, sent a Sept. 22 letter to Hostettler declaring the ERLC’s total support for the legislation.

The ACLU and Americans United both decried the House vote.

Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United, called the bill a “sop to the Religious Right” and a “repugnant affront to the civil rights of all Americans.”

Cases in which the ACLU and other organizations gained attorneys’ fees after winning legal challenges to religious expression and symbols include:

-- The ACLU was awarded nearly $800,000 in attorneys’ fees from the city of San Diego in its successful effort to prevent the Boy Scouts of America, which acknowledges God in its oath, from continuing to use Balboa Park, according to the pro-family organization Eagle Forum.

-- The ACLU, Americans United and the Southern Poverty Law Center gained about $540,000 from the state of Alabama in a successful challenge of the Ten Commandments monument displayed in the State Judicial Building by former Chief Justice Roy Moore, according to Eagle Forum.

-- The ACLU received about $63,000 in a successful attempt to remove a cross from the Mojave Desert World War I Memorial in California, according to the American Legion.

That case prompted a unanimously approved resolution by the American Legion in 2004 urging Congress to pass legislation to bar attorneys’ fees in successful suits calling for the removal or destruction of such symbols. It also pointed to a special concern of the American Legion -- the consequences for crosses, Stars of David and other religious symbols on veterans’ graves.

Hostettler, who had introduced similar legislation in four previous congressional sessions, gained a powerful ally this year in the American Legion. The country’s largest veterans organization, with about 3 million members, aggressively threw its influence behind the legislation. The effort included sending a 40-page document to all of the nearly 15,000 American Legion posts. The publication contained a blueprint for building local support for the bill.

Sen. Sam Brownback, R.-Kan., is sponsoring a companion measure, S. 3696, in his chamber.
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What ever the House does, the Senate will undo.

What ever the House does, the Senate will undo.

Sure seems like that. One step forward and then 10 back. The Senate manages to sabatoge every move or cloud it up with a bunch of "extra" things.

The effort to gain Senate approval of the legislation likely will be a difficult one.

I have come to the conclusion the Senate is a wash. Almost the entire senate needs to be voted out.

Its pretty clear that the Senate is alomst as big of an enemy to the US as terrorism and illegal immigration.
I don't have a lot of faith in the house either, and I'm convinced their latest actions are a desperate attempt to maintain their power hold. But the bigger picture is, at least the House is making an effort. The Senate can't do anything but bitch and moan and do their stupid liberal thing.
America needs to plan a peaceful march on D.C.
While I believe all of our phone calls, faxes, & emails may be making a small effort, I also believe that our government just considers all this action an annoyance. I really doubt they will sway from whatever backroom deals they have made.
There will come a time, and I believe its coming sooner than any of us may realize, but a time is coming very soon when the Constitution itself is "hanging by a thread", and we have some very serious choices to be made.
I don't mean to sound apocolyptic, but I think we would all agree that America is under attack from within, and I'm convinced more drastic measures may need to be done.