Critic of Darwinism Questions Judge's Use of ACLU 'Facts' in Anti-ID Ruling
by Jim Brown and Jenni Parker
December 15, 2006
(AgapePress) - - A spokesman for a leading intelligent design think tank is questioning why the judge who banned any mention of the theory from a Pennsylvania school district is not responding to a report that suggests he plagiarized a significant portion of his ruling from the American Civil Liberties Union. Earlier this week, the Seattle, Washington-based Discovery Institute released a report showing that Judge John Jones copied his ruling in the case of Tammy Kitzmiller, et al. v. Dover Area School District, et al. almost word for word from a document prepared by lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Jones has refused to address the report in the press.
Kitzmiller involved the first direct challenge brought in United States federal courts against a public school district that required the presentation of intelligent design (ID) theory as an alternative to Darwinian evolution as an explanation of the origin of life. The plaintiffs, represented by the ACLU, argued successfully that ID is a form of creationism and that the school district's policy therefore violated the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
Jones found in favor of the plaintiffs and, in his 139-page opinion, adopted much of the plaintiff's findings of fact and conclusions of law. Since the ruling, which effectively banned any mention of ID theory in the Dover Area schools, the judge had defended his opinion publicly and at one point commented in an interview with the Philadelphia Inquirer that he "assiduously tried to find the facts and apply the legal precedents to the facts as I found them."
However, Dr. John West, Discovery Institute's vice president for public policy and legal affairs, says now that the judge's largely copied ruling has been brought to the public's attention, it appears that "mum's the word." West says he finds it "very interesting" that throughout the whole year Jones has been speaking around the U.S. in various venues, discussing his decision, defending it, and even "attacking anyone who criticizes it."
The judge has even spoken "in some places apparently, from reports that I've heard, about how much time he invested in writing the opinion," the Discovery Institute spokesman notes. And yet, he adds, "now that the study comes out showing that the central part of [Jones's ruling] was taken virtually verbatim from the ACLU, he doesn't have anything to say."
The revelation that Jones' widely hailed ruling contained little original thought has put opponents of intelligent design on the defensive, West points out. So far, he says, the standard response from the Darwinists seems to be that "judges do this all the time -- and in fact, we don't want judges writing their own opinion because they don't know what they're doing."
What these evolutionists are suggesting, West explains, is that Judge Jones's "wholesale, uncritical copying" of the ACLU's supposed findings of fact in Kitzmiller is actually "the way it ought to be" in such cases. In fact, the intelligent design proponent notes, "there was one Darwinist on a Darwin blog who actually said something like that."
The Discovery Institute official says he finds these evolutionists' defenses "very illuminating." However, he insists that Jones's lifting of much of his ruling from the ACLU's documentation cannot and should not be considered model judicial practice.
If judges "rubber stamp" the proposed findings of fact from one of the parties without attribution, West contends, that action compromises the independent judgment they are expected to exercise in the case.
