Attorney: PERA Could Stop ACLU Profits From Anti-Christian Lawsuits
by Allie Martin
July 3, 2006
(AgapePress) - - An attorney with the American Family Association Center for Law & Policy (AFA Law Center) says the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has gained windfall profits from its anti-Christian litigation, and it is time for the system that allows this to be changed.Recently, Rees Lloyd of the American Legion and a former staff attorney with the ACLU testified under oath before Congress about how the organization profits from its lawsuits attacking Christianity. Testifying in favor of Indiana Congressman John Hostettler's Public Expression of Religion Act (PERA), H.R. 2679, Lloyd noted that the ACLU's attacks have been launched primarily against the Christian cross but the liberal litigation group has attacked Judaism's Star of David as well, and has reaped millions of dollars in attorney fees by going after local governments that recognize America's religious heritage in any way.
The ACLU received half a million dollars from the Alabama Ten Commandments case, and $950,000 in attorneys fees in a lawsuit against the Boy Scouts. Steve Crampton, chief counsel with the AFA Law Center and a constitutional law specialist, says the ACLU is able to collect these fees because of an obscure provision of the Civil Rights Act, which PERA is designed to amend.
"It was really just the ACLU and its like organizations on the left that ever benefited from this provision," Crampton contends. He says the clause the ACLU is exploiting to attack religious expressions "was actually first placed into the law before any Christian groups ever existed."
Whenever the ACLU succeeds in one of its attacks on religious expression, the AFA Law Center spokesman notes, its attorneys often recover substantial attorneys fees. He says the threat of these enormous legal expenses has a chilling effect on the exercise of many groups' First Amendment rights. "It results in a situation where a lot of governmental entities refuse even to go to court," he says, "for fear they will then have to pay fees that they don't have the money to cover."
Crampton and other faith and family advocates believe Congressman Hostettler's legislation, if passed, could put an end to ACLU profits from anti-Christian litigation. PERA would do this by amending 42 U.S.C. sections 1983 and 1988 to prevent the use of the legal system in a way that extorts money from state and local governments and inhibits their constitutional actions.
Allie Martin, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
