Louisville Rally Calls for End to Democrat-Led 'Pattern of Discrimination'
by Allie Martin and Jody Brown
April 25, 2005
(AgapePress) - During a nationwide broadcast over the weekend, evangelical Christian leaders sounded the call for religious liberty, saying it's time for the U.S. Senate to stop filibusters against people of faith who have been nominated to the federal bench.An estimated 5,000 people filled Highview Baptist Church in Louisville, KY, on Sunday evening for "Justice Sunday: Stopping the Filibuster Against People of Faith." Event coordinator Family Research Council reports the simulcast also went into 61 million households in 44 states -- numbers that FRC president Tony Perkins describes as "an amazing response."
Why such a response? Perkins thinks it is because "people of faith" are realizing that actions in Washington -- in this case, a Democratic-led filibuster against President Bush's conservative, pro-life judicial nominees -- have a direct impact on their lives.
"It's time to bring some transparency to the process and it is time to give these nominees an up-or-down vote," the FRC president said before the broadcast. "This is not about faith, but a debate and fairness for people of faith, any faith."
Dobson and Colson
The event kicked off with retired Judge Charles Pickering leading the Pledge of Allegiance. Then a variety of speakers encouraged voters to contact their senators and ask them to vote to end filibusters on judicial nominees. Focus on the Family Action founder Dr. James Dobson said the unconstitutional use of filibusters to prevent Christians from serving as judges must stop.
"It's not right; it's wrong," Dobson said. "And I think this is one of the most significant issues we've ever faced as a nation, because the future of democracy and ordered liberty actually depends on the outcome of this struggle."
Dobson added that Christians have the right as citizens to seek a change in courts that seem "determined to redesign the culture according to their own biases."
Chuck Colson of Prison Fellowship Ministries said the Senate has been holding the judiciary "hostage" through filibusters that have stopped ten of President Bush's judicial nominees. Colson explained that America's founding fathers had good reason to establish a "balance of powers" in the nation's new government.
"[They knew] there had to be three co-equal branches of government -- otherwise, being disposed to sin as we are and believing in the fall [of man], there could be abuses," Colson remarked. "And so three branches of government were set up, all to be independent and to balance one another. [But] what the Senate minority is trying to do [now] is, by a filibuster, to seize what they lost at the ballot box and to prevent the appointment of judges."
Mohler: 'Pattern of Discrimination'
The president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville told those in attendance that there is a clear pattern of discrimination in the Senate against conservative, Bible-believing judicial nominees.
"This pattern of discrimination against those who hold deep convictions about human life and the institution of marriage must come to an end," Mohler stated, accusing those who are discriminating of blocking the constitutional process.
"They're saying we're just trying to speak on behalf of evangelical Christians. No, we're speaking as evangelical Christians," the seminary president said. "But I'm going to speak on behalf of former Alabama Attorney General William Pryor who, when he faced the Senate Judiciary Committee, was confronted by some who said they opposed him because of 'deeply held personal beliefs.'"
Mohler explained that Pryor is a Roman Catholic, and that is his Catholic beliefs to which his critics were referring. "Those are his deeply held personal beliefs," Mohler said -- then added this warning: "If it's a Roman Catholic attorney general from Alabama [being discriminated against] today, it could be you or it could be yours tomorrow."
Mohler says Christians have to be concerned about who's serving on the courts. "Religious liberty is on the line here -- because the courts also hold, by their constitutional role, a responsibility to defend our religious liberty," he explained. "But in far too many cases judges have constrained and violated our religious liberty -- and so now are some members of the United States Senate."
Frist Just Wants Senators to Vote
Never in 214 years had a judicial nominee with majority support been denied a straight up-or-down vote before the full Senate, until two years ago when Democrats began filibustering the president's nominees.
In a videotaped statement to the rally, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said he wants to call for a vote to stop Senate filibusters on the nominees -- and that in doing so, he is just asking senators to do their job and vote. The senator rejects charges that ending Senate judicial filibusters is radical. "I don't think it's radical to ask senators to vote," he said. "I don't think it's radical to expect senator to fulfill their constitutional responsibilities."
"Americans elects their senators to vote on the peoples' business; that is a senator's job: to vote," he continued. "If these senators were not prepared to fulfill their constitutional responsibilities, then why are they here in the first place?"
Frist said he will consider calling for a revision of Senate filibuster rules unless Democrats stop blocking votes on the nominees. Democrats call that the "nuclear option," but Frist said it is just democracy. "Only in the United States Senate could it be considered a devastating option to allow a vote," he observed. "Most places call that democracy."
The evangelical Christian leaders were joined by black clergy and Catholics at the rally in Louisville. But critics of the rally said it was inappropriate to hold it in a church. Rev. Nancy Jo Kemper, who heads the Kentucky Council of Churches, joined protesters against the event, saying that "religion and religious people are being manipulated to achieve political ends." Other participants in the protest said "Justice Sunday" did not represent the views of all Christians, and denounced Senate Majority Leader Frist for addressing the rally in a videotaped message.
Associated Press contributed to this story.
