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III.)
BJCPA Advocates Abortion Rights Indirectly 1.
According to Mr. Tichenor: “Dunn has spoken and voted in opposition to
AU’s pro-choice position on abortion during several AU board meetings,
including the time when AU filed an amicus curiae brief on the Webster
case.” Such a defense,
however, is of little significance considering Dunn’s previous statements, his
choice of allies and the BJC’s systematic opposition to the Religious
Right’s pro-life position. What is
significant, is Tichenor’s concession that AU is indeed a “pro-choice”
organization. In a December 13,
1990 letter to the Word and Way
editor, Tichenor “assures” Missouri Baptists that AU has never taken a
position relative to abortion, pro or con.
His defense of AU includes the above mentioned Webster
case. The full text of that letter
follows:
“In response to the letter in the November 22 issue of Word and Way
on the alleged ‘pro-choice’ position of Americans United for Separation of
Church and State, I would like to share the following information.
In filing of an amicus brief in the Webster case, AU took no position
relative to the issue of abortion. That
brief stated, ‘Americans United takes no position on the question of whether
public funds or facilities should be utilized to provide abortions or the
regulation of abortions….This amicus brief will only address the specific
question of whether the Missouri statute here in question (1.205 RSMo. 1986)
violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States
Constitution.’ Nothing in that
friend-of-the-court brief gives an endorsement to the practice of abortion or a
pro-choice position. Having attended the annual conference of AU each year since
1985, and having served on the National Advisory Council the past six years, I
can assure Missouri Baptists that AU has never taken a position relative to
abortion or choice, pro or con.” (See the list of AU
pro-abortion positions in our BJC flyer) 2.
In an attempt to down-play the AU-BJC ties, Tichenor writes: “The BJC
has no official or even unofficial relationship with AU that provides any basis
for an assertion that the BJC is supporting directly or indirectly abortion
rights through AU.” The question arises then, what does it take to constitute an
“unofficial” relationship? Tichenor
makes this statement in light of the fact that the BJC was the primary founder
of AU and in its early years, AU operated out of the garage of the BJC.
As mentioned earlier, BJC executive director J. M. Dawson, served as
AU’s executive director until the organization could hire its own.
Nor has there ever been a time since AU’s founding in 1947 when the BJC
was not represented on its boards. Some
of the members of AU’s governing board that have served on the board (or
staff) of the BJC during Dunn’s tenure include: Cecil
Sherman, coordinator of the CBF; Brent
Walker, BJC general counsel; Jeanette
Holt, associate director, Alliance of Baptists; Babs
Baugh Morrison, Coordinating Council, CBF; Phil Strickland, executive director, Texas CLC; Foy
Valentine, board member, Interfaith Alliance and past president of AU; Lee
Berg, professional associate for Government Relations, National Education
Association; Rosemary Brevard, BJC
staff; Earl Trent, National
Ministries, American Baptist Churches, USA; Marvin C. Griffin, Pastor, Ebenezer Baptist Church; R.
G. Puckett, former executive director of AU and editor of the North Carolina
Biblical Recorder; Jimmy Allen,
former president of AU and CBF “founder”;
Stan Hastey, executive director, Alliance of Baptists; and of course,
W. B. Tichenor, former moderator of the CBF of Missouri.
(Cynthia Holmes, also a former moderator of the Missouri CBF, serves on
the 15 member AU board of trustees with James Dunn) 3.
At the 1997 annual conference of Americans United, C. Welton Gaddy was
elected president of the church/state organization.
Gaddy has long been a leader in the SBC moderate movement, serving
currently on the CBF coordinating council. (See The
Struggle for the Soul of the SBC, edited by Walter Shurden, published by
Mercer University Press, for more information on Gaddy)
Other CBF Coordinating Council members who have
served on the governing board of AU include: John Baugh, Texas; Bruce Prescott,
Texas; John Hewett, North Carolina; John Hughes, Missouri; Cynthia S. Holmes,
Missouri; David Sapp, Virginia; and Cecil Sherman, the former coordinator of the
CBF. Former AU president Jimmy
Allen was a “key figure” in the early formation of the CBF in 1990-91.
(Fellowship News, May 10, 1998, p. 10) 4.
It should also be noted that AU’s pro abortion position has been a
public position. Even in his
fund-raising letters, AU executive director Barry Lynn openly points out that
“the Religious Right is wrong…when they try to…deny women reproductive
freedom.” (Undated
AU fund-raising letter by Barry Lynn. MBLA
received the letter July 1998.) In an interview with a homosexual magazine, Lynn
reaffirmed the positions stated by BJC leaders years earlier.
He stated: “I believe every American has a right to promote any idea in
the public arena, but that the government is strictly forbidden from
incorporating explicitly religious views into secular laws.
Someday, I expect to see even the Supreme Court viewing anti-choice
legislation and sodomy laws as unconstitutional, because they enact particular
religious views into statutory form.” (GayToday@ www.gaytoday.badpuppy.com/garchive/interview/060198in.htm)
(Also
see sections I.3-6) 5.
Mr. Tichenor also points out that the “BJC has no official or
unofficial relationship with PAW [People for the American Way] that provides any
basis for an assertion that the BJC is supporting directly or indirectly
abortion rights through PAW.” He
does concede however that Dunn did “serve on its board for a brief period of
time.” (Dunn actually served one full three year term on the PAW board). Tichenor also failed to mention that the current president of
PAW serves on the board of the BJC or that both PAW and the BJC, along with AU,
were among the seven organizations singled out for special thanks and
acknowledgments in the extreme pro-abortion, pro-homosexuality and
pro-pornography How to Win training
manual. (This
issue will be dealt with later in section IX)
PAW’s involvement in AU has also included several PAW staff and board
members serving on the governing board of AU.
(See
section IX.4 for PAW’s support of partial-birth abortion.
See section XVI for BJC’s relationship to PAW.)
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