But a new generation of young, pro-life activists like Lila Rose is leading the effort to end federal funding of abortions. Rose founded her pro-life organizationâLive Actionâwhen she was fifteen years old. In 2011, she released a series of undercover videos exposing Planned Parenthood clinics for, among other things, its willingness to help a purported pimp secure illegal abortions for underage girls.
Rose's activism revealed the seamy side of an organization that portrays itself as a champion of women's health. It also drew new support for a long-time effort by Congressman Mike Pence of Indiana to eliminate Planned Parenthood's federal funding. In February 2011, the U.S. House passed an amendment by a vote of 240â185 to eliminate $330 million in taxpayer subsidies for Planned Parenthood. Though the measure was defeated in the Senate, it is the closest the pro-life movement has come to stopping the flow of federal dollars to the nation's largest abortion provider.
DEFENDING THE CROSS
a. The Mojave Desert Cross
In southeastern California, deep within the Mojave National Preserve, a cross has stood atop a remote outcropping of rock for seventy-five years to commemorate Americans killed in World War I. In 2002, a nearby resident filed suit claiming the cross, because it was located on federal lands, was an unconstitutional religious display. The Supreme Court in 2010 vacated that ruling, but shortly after its decision, the cross was torn down and stolen. Since then, the National Park Service has refused to allow the cross to be replaced.
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The fight to defend the cross has been led by a couple, Wanda and Henry Sandoz, who had previously lived near the memorial and are regarded as its unofficial caretakers. They earned this role after they befriended the late John Riley Bembrey, a World War I veteran who was among the group of veterans that had originally erected the cross in 1934. Before he died, Bembrey asked Henry to look after the monument. Henry agreed, and he set the stage for this protracted battle when he refused an official's request to dismantle the cross. “I told her not âno,' but âhell, no,'” Sandoz recounts.
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The Sandozes' struggle led to an act of Congress calling for a land swap that would have given the Veterans of Foreign Wars control of the memorial's land in return for a nearby five-acre plot of land donated by the Sandozes. Despite this act, however, the Obama administration has failed to restore the cross. In cooperation with the Sandozes, the Veterans of Foreign Wars have now filed a lawsuit to force the Obama administration to carry out the congressionally mandated land swap, so that the group can finally restore the cross.
Wanda Sandoz explained the stakes of the case. “We realize this country wouldn't be what it was without the
veterans,” she said. “To me, I know it sounds corny, but that cross out there in the middle of nowhere is as important to me as the Vietnam memorial. All your memorials in Washington, D.C., they're beautiful, they're impressive, they're wonderful, but they say the same exact thing as that cross is saying.”
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Founded in 1693 by British royal charter, the College of William and Mary is the second oldest institute of higher learning in the United States. Known as the “Alma Mater of a Nation,” it educated many of America's Founding Fathers, including Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe, and John Marshall.
Since 1732, the Wren Chapel has been a focal point of the William and Mary campus. Originally having served as a site for daily prayers and training for Anglican clergy, the chapel today remains a center of student life, hosting spiritual activities as well as major speakers, social events, and alumni weddings.
In the 1930s, a nearby Episcopal church donated its altar cross to the chapel, which the college permanently displayed on the altar beginning in 1932. In October 2006, the William and Mary president removed the cross from Wren Chapel, saying he wanted the chapel to be a “more welcoming place.”
A group of students and alumni immediately rebelled. Students Joe Luppino-Esposito, Ben Locher, Matthew Beato, and Will Coggin, along with alumnus Vince Haley, organized
SaveTheWrenCross.org
, an online petitionâeventually endorsed by more than twenty thousand peopleâdedicated to restoring the cross. The effort led to an avalanche of op-eds and editorials about the cross in student and local newspapers. Alumna Karen Hall started a companion SaveTheWren-Cross blog, which covered the growing backlash. With
members of the Virginia General Assembly as well as then-governor Tim Kaine denouncing the college's actions, the school reversed course and restored the cross to the chapel permanently.
As the
Wall Street Journal
reported a few months later in June 2007, the campaign's effects reverberated even after the administration's capitulation: “This experience has emboldened what might be called the William and Mary electorate. A new organization is now asking if the governing Board of Visitors should renew the college president's contract. That's normally a rubber-stamp affair, but now college executives are being forced to defend themselves against charges of poor financial stewardship.â¦The merits of these disputes seem less important than the fact that there is now earnest and public discussion about the performance of college administrators, who, like career government bureaucrats, are usually adept at avoiding accountability. Stakeholders are suddenly feeling empowered.”
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Similar to the Mojave Desert Cross, the Mount Soledad Cross is a 29-foot cross atop Mount Soledad in La Jolla, California. While a cross has been on the site since 1913, this specific cross was erected in 1954 as the centerpiece of a Korean War memorial. The cross has been at the center of an ongoing legal battle since 1989, when a California citizen sued the City of San Diego, alleging the cross violates the First Amendment and the California Constitution.
As the west coast regional director of the Thomas More Law Center, San Diego attorney Charles LiMandri has been in the forefront of the efforts to defend the cross since 2004. LiMandri's law office has donated more than $1 million in legal fees and other costs to the case.
In January 2011, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the cross unconstitutional, with Judge McKeown writing, “Overall, a reasonable observer viewing the Memorial would be confronted with an initial dedication for religious purposes, its long history of religious use, widespread public recognition of the Cross as a Christian symbol, and the history of religious discrimination in La Jolla.” LaMindri commented afterward that he was disappointed but not surprised by the decision: “I read it as being very political and agendadriven, as opposed to a real legal scholarly decision.”
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The case is expected to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Although ordinary American citizens stand at the forefront of the new Bowling Greens, politicians occasionally do their part. One instance is the dispute over the newly built, $621 million visitor center at the Capitol building in Washington, D.C., which became part of the radical secularists' campaign to remove faith from the public square.
As part of their anti-religious crusade, radical secularists whitewash the central role that religious faith has always played in American life, recasting our history as a noble struggle by secularists against the dark forces of religion. This was apparent in the attempt to remove God from the Capitol Visitors Center. Upon its completion in December 2008, the center drew widespread criticism for its multitude of historical inaccuracies, the most blatant of which was a stone engraving of the incorrect national motto: rather than “In God We Trust,” the inscription read “E Pluribus Unum.”
To correct this and other inaccuracies, Congressman J. Randy Forbes of Virginia led 108 members of Congress in drafting a letter of protest to the Architect of the Capitol.
Thanks to Forbes' leadership, along with that of Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina, the engraving was corrected in late 2009. As Forbes wrote, “The efforts of the individuals that have joined in this issue have
enabled those visitors to experience a more accurate depiction of our nation's heritage written in stone. This win should serve as an example to Americans all across the country that because we believe, we stand, and because we stand, we can make a difference.”
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PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE IN WACO
Citizens of McLennan County, Texas, believed something was missing from the weekly meetings of their commissioners court; specifically, their elected officials needed to be reminded before every meeting whom they worked for. And so began a citizen-led effort to ensure that every weekly meeting began with a prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance.
The commissioners insisted they could not say a prayer or the Pledge until a new policy was adopted, and that would take time. So citizens took matters into their own handsâat one meeting, attendees spontaneously began leading the room in the Pledge of Allegiance. Soon, people like Toby Marie Walker of the Waco Tea Party began coming to the meetings every week to make sure that even without a new policy, the Pledge would be recited.
After two months of deliberation and debate, a new policy was finally approved. On July 13, 2010, for the first time ever, the McLennan County Commissioners Court officially opened its weekly meeting with a prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance.
RAISING THE NEXT GENERATION OF PATRIOTS
As American Exceptionalism comes under continued attack, now more than ever, America's youth need to be taught the values and the principles upon which our country was founded. Fortunately, local efforts are being organized around the country to make that happen.
Many of these efforts are led by the Vacation Liberty School, first started by Eric Wilson of the Kentucky 9/12 Project. The first Vacation Liberty School was held in Georgetown, Kentucky, where three dozen children, ages ten to fifteen, learned about the Constitution, the Founding Fathers, and the role of faith in our history.
According to the Associated Press, “The curriculum includes lessons like âequal rights, not equal results,' ârecognize men don't create rightsâonly God,' and âunderstanding falsehoods of separation of church and state.'” The report continues:
On Monday, the first night of Vacation Liberty School, the basement of Gano Baptist church was converted into a tyrannical kingdom meant to resemble colonial England where students were told they must suppress their laughter, sit apart from their friends and flawlessly recite “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.”
Against the urgings of a mock king's representative, the brave ones ventured through the rugged terrain of a maze of upside-down tables discovered an adjoining room with all the luxuries of the New World. There they could play basketball, toss beanbags and ride a teeter-totter while being showered with confetti as Neil Diamond's “Coming To America” blared over the speakers.
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Through interactive games and other methods, the project aims to instill an understanding of free enterprise, the Constitution, the Founding Fathers, and the role of faith in American history. Said Tim Fairfield, one of the teachers, “If we're going to take our country back, we've got to remember where we came fromânot only as adults, but we need to teach our children.”
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Since the program's launch in Kentucky, other chapters have started up in Ohio, Colorado, New York, Florida, and Missouri. This summer, Vacation Liberty School will be run by the St. Louis chapter of “As a Mom,” a nationwide network that describes itself as a “sisterhood of mommy patriots.” Committed to transmitting the values of our Founding Fathers, these mothers believe that “just as the American colonists discovered the principles of liberty through a variety of experiences and experiments involving societies and human nature, our children will discover these principles for themselves through our activities.”
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The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibits Congress from making a law “abridging the freedom of speech.” In 2008, Citizens Unitedâa conservative non-profit corporation dedicated to restoring our government to citizen controlâput to the test America's commitment to that prohibition.
At issue was Citizens United's effort to run TV ads and air a film critical of Hillary Clinton within thirty days of the 2008 Democratic primaries. The McCain-Feingold Act of 2002 banned such messages if they were corporate-funded, a law that Citizens United and many conservatives regarded as a clear violation of freedom of speech. As Citizens United president David Bossie explained, “The idea that the government must approve the content and timing of political speech upon threat of prison is inimical to America. Political speech, above all else, should be protected in this country.”
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Citizens United's challenge to the law was ultimately settled by the Supreme Court in the landmark case
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission
. In a 5â4 decision, the court sided with Citizens United and struck down part of the McCain-Feingold law. Writing for the majority, Justice Kennedy argued, “If the First Amendment has any force, it prohibits Congress from fining or jailing citizens, or associations of citizens, for simply engaging in political speech.” In his concurring opinion, Justice Scalia powerfully argued for a broad interpretation of the First Amendment, insisting it was written in “terms of speech, not speakers,” and “its text offers no foothold for excluding any category of speaker.”