Alliance Defending Freedom

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Podcast: CNN offers an old opposition-research file on Speaker Mike 'theocrat' Johnson

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Podcast: CNN offers an old opposition-research file on Speaker Mike 'theocrat' Johnson

Before we return to the never-ending saga of Speaker of the House Mike Johnson and his efforts to create a totalitarian theocracy that destroys democracy in America, let’s pause for a Journalism 101 case study.

Don’t worry, this is directly related to this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to tune that in).

Now, gentle readers, are any of you old enough to remember Marabel Morgan, the evangelical superstar who wrote “The Total Woman,” which sold something like 10 million copies? Morgan was an anti-feminist crusader clothed in pink (as opposed to something else) who had a knack for infuriating blue-zipcode elites. Here is a quick flashback, via the Faith Profiles website:

An editor at Time magazine once confided in Marabel Morgan that he came away from a cocktail party with high-heel marks all over his chest at the mere mention of her name.

And what heinous crime did Morgan commit that could provoke such a sharp reaction? Morgan wrote a book in the early 1970s that sold more than 5 million copies about how she salvaged her marriage. The widespread belief was that she proposed that women rekindle their marriages by such innovations as greeting their husbands at the door dressed in Saran Wrap or having sex under the dining room table.

Whee!

During my early 1980s religion-beat work at The Charlotte News, I ventured out to a suburban megachurch where Morgan spoke to several thousand fans. I left that meeting absolutely furious, my mind packed with outrageous punchline quotes from her (I had to admit entertaining) speech.

Driving back to the newsroom on deadline, I started figuring out what would be in the crucial first two or three paragraphs of the story. Then I realized that, if I followed my own prejudices, I was going to frontload this story with stuff that would fire up my editors and others who detested Morgan and her tribe.

Thus, I decided to attempt a story that opened with material that included (a) what Morgan said that I knew would appeal to her critics and (b) what she said that drew cheers and applause from her supporters.


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Surprise! Speaker of the House is pro religious liberty, which means he's ultra-conservative

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Surprise! Speaker of the House is pro religious liberty, which means he's ultra-conservative

Before diving into the valid religion-angle hooks in the life and career of Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, please allow me to address that “election denier” thing, since I am a pedigreed (nod to Religion News Service editors) #NeverTrump, #NeverClintonBiden voter.

Yes, I have closely followed election-denial issues from 2016, when the deniers were elite Democrats haunted by Russia ghosts. Ditto for 2020, when the deniers were Republicans, who kept losing court cases — even when the judges were selected by Donald Trump. I do think Big Tech efforts to cancel hot news stories affected the election (but maybe not, since the nation seems frozen 50-50 in red/blue concrete).

Truth is, I am more interested in Johnson’s First Amendment activism than I am in Trump stuff. “First Amendment,” of course, means religious liberty, free speech and freedom of association. Is Johnson concerned about religious liberty for all or for some? His legal career should include on-paper info on that.

Meanwhile, the mainstream coverage of his surprise election stressed his “anti-gay” work and related religious convictions. On X, I tweeted a question: “Does anti-gay rights mean pro-First Amendment?”

Everything you need to know on press views of that can be found in this double-decker headline at the New York Times, serving as a kind of editorial memo to the news industry as a whole:

For Mike Johnson, Religion Is at the Forefront of Politics and Policy

The new House speaker has put his faith at the center of his political career, and aligned himself with a newer cohort of conservative Christianity that some describe as Christian nationalism.

Obviously, “Christian nationalism” is currently one of the hot terms in journalism. Also, it’s clear that many journalists are concerned about the success that Alliance Defending Freedom lawyers are having at the U.S. Supreme Court and elsewhere. Again, there is a crucial question there: Is this First Amendment group winning victories for a variety of religious minorities?

The Times editors simply went with this, stating that Johnson spent time as a “lawyer and spokesman for the anti-abortion and anti-gay rights group Alliance Defense Fund.” Of course, that puts him in interesting company — with Times columnist David French (whose First Amendment work I have admired for two decades).

It’s important to know that Johnson declined a Times interview request. I think that he should have done that interview, with an agreement that he could post a transcript online. Would the Times have agreed? The speaker should test that.


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Upcoming U.S. Supreme Court case could be a huge religion-beat sleeper story

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Upcoming U.S. Supreme Court case could be a huge religion-beat sleeper story

The agenda for the U.S. Supreme Court term that began this month has zero cases involving the two religion clauses of the First Amendment.

That’s quite the change after the important religion rulings the past two years, not to mention religious conservatives’ and liberals’ agitation after the 2022 Dobbs decision, which overturned Roe , which had legalized abortion nationwide.

So religion-watchers may not be aware that the court soon takes up two potentially tectonic cases involving — would you believe it — small businesses that fish for herring off the New England coast and say they shouldn’t have to pay their federal monitors. The cases are Loper Bright v. Raimondo (docket # 22-451), newly combined Oct. 13 with Relentless Inc. v. Department of Commerce (docket #22-1219). Oral arguments could come as soon as January.

This gets into the weeds of administrative law, an area that normally does not set pulses pounding but here involves the hot political dispute over powers exercised by federal agencies. Conservatives assert that agencies have long been interpreting and enforcing laws in ways that Congress never intended or has never defined, thus usurping legislative prerogatives and violating the Constitution’s “separation of powers.”

Background: The two fishing companies seek relief by overturning the Court’s highly influential 1984 precedent in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council. This unanimous decision granted wide deference to federal agencies in “reasonable” interpretations, applications and enforcement of ambiguous laws passed by Congress.

The list of Loper briefs posted by the invaluable SCOTUSBlog.com shows the variety of interests that include 48 of the 50 states lined up on the two sides and the Republican U.S. House of Representatives, along with e.g. the AFL-CIO, American Cancer Society, Environmental Defense Fund, Gun Owners of America and e-cigarette industry.

You are waiting for the religion-beat angle?


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Podcast: Journalists need to ask if Colorado has 'good' and 'bad' religious preschools

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Podcast: Journalists need to ask if Colorado has 'good' and 'bad' religious preschools

I was never a Ronald Reagan fan, but — let’s face it — he would have to rank No. 1 among American politicians when it comes to having the “gift of gab.”

Thus, with a tip of the hat to the Gipper, let me make this observation: You know that there are church-state experts — on the new illiberal side (cheering) and on the old-liberal side (groaning) — who are watching recent events in Colorado and saying, “There you go again.”

This brings us to this long, long, wordy headline from The Denver Post that served as the hook for this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to tune that in). Read this one carefully:

Denver Archdiocese sues Colorado over right to exclude LGBTQ people from universal preschool

State’s non-discrimination requirements “directly conflict with St. Mary’s, St. Bernadette’s, and the Archdiocese’s religious beliefs,” the lawsuit says.

The Post team has, naturally, framed this case in precisely the manner chosen by Colorado officials, while paying as little attention as possible to recent decisions made by the (#triggerwarning) U.S. Supreme Court.

In particular, journalists may want to look at that recent decision —  Carson v. Makin. The key: The high court addressed the state of Maine’s attempts to give public funds to parents who sent their children to secular or religiously progressive PRIVATE schools, but not to parents who picked private schools that support centuries of Christian doctrines on marriage and sex (and other hot-button topics, such as salvation, heaven and hell).

Now, back to the Denver Post:

The Denver Catholic Archdiocese along with two of its parishes is suing the state alleging their First Amendment rights are violated because their desire to exclude LGBTQ parents, staff and kids from Archdiocesan preschools keeps them from participating in Colorado’s new universal preschool program.

The program is intended to provide every child 15 hours per week of state-funded preschool in the year before they are eligible for kindergarten. To be eligible, though, schools must meet the state’s non-discrimination requirements.


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Covering the 303 Creative decision: Why do reporters keep ignoring the fine print?

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Covering the 303 Creative decision: Why do reporters keep ignoring the fine print?

Judging from the recent coverage on the US Supreme Court’s decision on 303 Creative v. Elenis, you’d think that a pogrom against LGBTQ Americans is in process.

Many of the headlines came out and said that SCOTUS was allowing businesses to turn away gay customers, period. That’s false and that’s clear in the majority opinion. The truth was that you cannot compel people to create and deliver a message demanded by these customers if you don’t agree with that message (in this case for reasons of religious doctrine and practice).

I’ll start with the Denver Post, in whose backyard the whole case developed.

First, a note to the Post editors: Underneath the headline (“Colorado wedding website designer can refuse gay customers, U.S. Supreme Court rules”) the subhead spells Justice Neil Gorsuch’s name wrong. Being that Gorsuch, the writer of the opinion, is very well known by locals — as he was a longtime Colorado resident before ascending to the high court — the Post might want to correct that.

The First Amendment allows a Colorado graphic designer to refuse to make wedding websites for same-sex couples, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Friday in a decision that could have a sweeping nationwide impact.

The high court ruled for Littleton graphic artist Lorie Smith, who said her Christian faith prevents her from creating wedding websites for same-sex couples. Smith, who runs the business 303 Creative, wanted to make wedding websites only for straight couples.

I skimmed the article and didn’t see anything about religious beliefs being the reason behind Smith’s decision until well into the piece.

Also, note that — once again, we’re talking about the printed content of the majority decision — declining to do same-sex wedding content is not the same thing as the ability to refuse customers, period.

She challenged Colorado’s public accommodation law, which says that if she offers wedding websites to the public, she must provide them to all customers. Businesses that violate the law can be fined, among other penalties.


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News coverage of LGBTQ issues enters mop-up phase in the religion marketplace

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News coverage of LGBTQ issues enters mop-up phase in the religion marketplace

It has been a big week for the ongoing LGBTQ+ story. Even as the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case about how much to tolerate personal dissent against same-sex marriage, the U.S. House, the House this morning passed nationwide codification of the gay marriage right that the Court enacted by 5-4 in the 2015 Obergefell ruling.

The new law effectively concludes phase one in the unusually rapid upending of a central societal structure dating from antiquity. The next few years, the media will be covering the mop-up phase facing religious groups and individuals that uphold traditional teachings about marriage, over against anti-discrimination assertions by government, Hollywood, corporate America and private actors.

The current Supreme Court case (303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, docket #21-476) involves a Colorado website designer who does not create pages that celebrate same-sex weddings — though she serves gay customers otherwise. Her free-speech claim is opposed by, for example, Reform Judaism, many liberal Protestants and other social liberals.

Observers figure that the Court, with a more traditionalist makeup than in 2015, will back this designer’s plea and ultimately look kindly upon further religious claims under the Bill of Rights. If so, the future conflict may focus on the Carborundum tactic as the LGBTQ+ movement grinds down conservatives’ energy, time and money in long-running legal maneuvers, meanwhile building cultural pressure to marginalize conscientious objectors as simple bigots.

An opinion-page complaint against religion’s “encroachment” upon society, posted by NBC News and written by Stanford University journal editor Marcie Bianco, neatly encapsulates where this culture war appears to be heading. This is the voice from the cultural left:

Dig a bit deeper, and what this act really represents is the inflexibility of our nation’s institutions and the national entrenchment — despite constitutional assurances to the contrary — of religion.


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Christian web designer at the Supreme Court: How reporters covered 303 Creative case

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Christian web designer at the Supreme Court: How reporters covered 303 Creative case

On the face of it, 303 Creative v. Elenis, a case heard before the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday, sounded unimpressive.

A Christian web designer living near Denver was suing her state civil rights commission for the right to create wedding web sites without having to include creative content about same-sex weddings in the mix. She hadn’t been approached by any gay couples yet — but because she might be, she launched a pre-emptive lawsuit with the aid of the Alliance Defending Freedom, a law firm with an impressive track record of 11 wins at the Supreme Court level.

Yet, the more I read about the case and the issues it was trying to raise, the more intrigued I got. And the hearing on Monday didn’t disappoint. It lasted some two and one-half hours, which is long by Court standards. Covering hour-long hearings at the high court is difficult at best; I can only imagine how tough it was for reporters to sift through 150 minutes of speech — and all the tangents that were involved — to sum up how the hearing went.

Which is why I am merely critiquing the first drafts of what I hope will be more in-depth articles as time goes on. I’ll start with how CBS covered the story:

The Supreme Court's conservative bloc appeared sympathetic Monday to a Colorado graphic designer who argues a state law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation violates her free speech rights by forcing her to express a message that conflicts with her closely held religious beliefs.

During oral arguments in the case known as 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, the court seemed to move closer to resolving a question it has left unanswered since 2018, when it narrowly ruled in favor of a Colorado baker who refused to make a cake for a same-sex wedding: whether states like Colorado can, in applying their anti-discrimination laws, compel an artist to express a message they disagree with.

An editorial comment: It's a minor annoyance that the plural “they” is used for a singular “artist.” Just write “he or she” for heaven’s sake.

One issue with reporting on this case is that it takes a ton of backstory to explain that this case isn’t just about a web designer, but also a cake designer-baker in a previous Supreme Court case.


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Celebrities rule: How should reporters assess the name fame game in religion?

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Celebrities rule: How should reporters assess the name fame game in religion?

As of the 2022 midterms, the United States had 49 million registered Democrats and 39 million registered Republicans, according to estimates from WorldPopulationReview.com.

Recent National Basketball Association and National Football League annual attendance combined came to 39 million. And last week, a religious leader named Timothy P. Broglio took charge of a U.S. organization with 67 million members.

Timothy who? That would be the archbishop who is the newly elected president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, who will lead the church in the U.S. through the 2024 election season and on the 2025. If you think his task is placid, note this liberal jeremiad — care of National Catholic Reporter — about his election.

Weeks before, Kristen Waggoner became a prime culture wars figure.

Kristen who? This evangelical attorney is the new president of the Alliance Defending Freedom, a legal non-profit that represents religious conservatives in matters like LGBTQ disputes, as in this critique of the Democrats’ marriage act. Her ADF is branded a “hate group” by the equally controversial Southern Poverty Law Center.

Point being that important leaders within segments of American religion are generally far less prominent than athletes, entertainers, politicians or tech billionaires. Publicity usually falls to clergy who run purchased-time broadcasts, utter political sound bites or are trapped in scandals.

Think Pat Robertson.

Things were different not so long ago when Billy Graham, and Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders, were titanic cultural and media personalities. In an earlier time (so to speak), Time magazine would devote a cover story to Christian thinkers C.S. Lewis (1947) or Reinhold Niebuhr (1948, written by Whittaker Chambers). Presbyterian bureaucrat Eugene Carson Blake (“Can Protestants Unite?”, 1961) or U.S. Catholic Cardinals Spellman (1946) or Cushing (1964).

Since the media and the Internet are meshuga over lists (is this David Letterman’s doing?), how about a well-reported article, not about our American era’s Top 10 religious celebrities, but which ones exercise the most influence, seen or unseen?


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Podcast: What's the SCOTUS story? New Colorado case focuses on free speech, not religious liberty

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Podcast: What's the SCOTUS story? New Colorado case focuses on free speech, not religious liberty

Here we go again?

That’s a logical question, in light of the news that — once again — church-state activists on left and right are preparing for more U.S. Supreme Court arguments involving the state of Colorado, a traditional Christian believer, LGBTQ rights and the First Amendment.

That was the news hook for this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to tune that in). But to understand that conversation, it really helps to dig into a key passage or two in the majority decision in that 2019 SCOTUS case focusing on Masterpiece Cakeshop and the Colorado Civil Rights Commission (full text .pdf here).

So, all rise. The writer is, of course, then Justice Anthony Kennedy:

The laws and the Constitution can, and in some instances must, protect gay persons and gay couples in the exercise of their civil rights, but religious and philosophical objections to gay marriage are protected views and in some instances protected forms of expression. While it is unexceptional that Colorado law can protect gay persons in acquiring products and services on the same terms and conditions as are offered to other members of the public, the law must be applied in a manner that is neutral toward religion.

The result was one of those narrow decisions much beloved by Chief Justice John Roberts.

Then, what you hear in this next passage is the sound of Kennedy punting the crucial religious-liberty decision in this First Amendment case into the mists of the future:

The outcome of cases like this in other circumstances must await further elaboration in the courts, all in the context of recognizing that these disputes must be resolved with tolerance, without undue disrespect to sincere religious beliefs, and without subjecting gay persons to indignities when they seek goods and services in an open market.


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