While the presidential campaign moved on, Bob Jones University and its ultra-conservative religious beliefs continued to stick in the craw of certain politicians. With few persons in Congress willing to stand up and defend the university’s rights to maintain and publish its religious beliefs—however much they may have been out of the mainstream—BJU once again (BJU lost its tax-exempt status in 1983 because of its controversial stand on interracial marriage) became the target of government censure.
THE CONGRESSIONAL RESOLUTIONS
In late February 2000, as the national focus switched to other aspects of the presidential primary races, Senators Robert Torricelli and Joseph Biden, both Democrats, introduced Concurrent Resolution 85 to the Senate. A parallel resolution was introduced by House Democrats Joseph Crowley and John Conyers, and cosponsored by almost 60 other representatives. The resolutions roundly condemned Bob Jones University for its ban on interracial dating and its views on Roman Catholicism. The resolutions read:
“Whereas the Senate strongly rejects the practices of racism, segregation, and intolerance based on religious beliefs;
“Whereas the administration of Bob Jones University enforces a segregationist policy by prohibiting interracial couples on the Bob Jones University campus;
“Whereas officials of Bob Jones University routinely disparage those of other religious faiths with intolerant and derogatory remarks;
“Whereas officials of Bob Jones University have likened the pope of the Roman Catholic Church to a ‘possessed demon’ and branded Catholicism as a ‘satanic system and religion of the anti-Christ’;
“Whereas the Web site of Bob Jones University greets visitors with the university’s belief that Catholicism and Mormonism are ‘cults’; and
“Whereas senior officials of Bob Jones University have made openly racist remarks on many occasions regarding African-Americans and Asian-Americans:
“Now, therefore, be it Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring), That the Congress—
“(1) condemns practices, such as those prevalent at Bob Jones University, that seek to discriminate against and divide Americans on the basis of race, ethnicity, and religion; and
“(2) strongly denounces individuals who seek to subvert the American ideals of inclusion, equality, and social justice.”
On February 29 Senator Torricelli’s resolution was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee; the House resolution was likewise referred to the House Judiciary Committee. Senator Torricelli, forced immediately to defend the resolutions against charges that they were simply a political ploy intended to embarrass Republicans, asserted that they were a legitimate attempt to address Bob Jones University’s racial and religious views. According to Torricelli, the purpose was to send a message to BJU that its views are “wrong” and “inappropriate.” In a similar vein Representative Crowley noted in his remarks to the House that although BJU officials contended that they preached only “what is in the Bible” and what is within their First Amendment rights, he could not support “using a school to indoctrinate hate, segregation, and intolerance into today’s youth.”
Influential faith groups supported Congress’s action. For example, InterFaith Alliance, a clergy-led grassroots ecumenical coalition, supported the House and Senate resolutions. Reverend C. Welton Gaddy, InterFaith’s executive director, commented, “On behalf of the concerned people of faith, I urge members of the United States [Congress] to denounce any association of bigotry, discrimination, and intolerance with religious faith. . . . For Bob Jones University to foment bigotry in the name of Christianity is the height of hypocrisy, if not heresy.”
REASONS FOR CENSURE
But why this sudden outrage against Bob Jones University, a relatively obscure institution of higher education that opened in 1927 in Greenville, South Carolina? Why the resentment against university dating policies that had been in place since the 1950s? And beyond the more obvious political motives, what would cause so many senators and representatives to support an unprecedented official government sanction against a religious organization, just because its religious views were outside of the mainstream?
One possible answer is that the spotlight on BJU occurred at a time when Congress and the rest of the country were acutely sensitized to the horrors associated with hate crimes. Congress had only recently heard testimony on the need for hate crimes legislation. This had included detailed descriptions of the heinous murders of Matthew Shepard in Wyoming and James Byrd in Texas. The terrible impact on society of pre-judice in all its forms had been brought vividly to Congress’s and the public’s attention.
But what do hate crimes and the proposed congressional indictment of BJU have to do with each other? Very little, actually, but perhaps a great deal in the minds of BJU detractors. As Congressman Crowley noted in his address to the House when introducing the proposed resolution condemning BJU: “We have seen, all too often in the past year, the result of hate. . . . Hate propaganda may be free speech, but it must not be sanctioned by this body. We must loudly denounce it. As a nation, we have fought too hard and come too far not to end discrimination and bigotry based on race and religion.”
Unquestionably, all Americans should be shocked and horrified at the senseless, brutal murders of Matthew Shepard and James Byrd. But is it appropriate for Congress to denounce the religious convictions of an institution like BJU under the misguided apprehension that those convictions may induce persons to imitate the heinous killings of an innocent man in Laramier, Wyoming, and another in Jasper, Texas? It takes no genius to comprehend the lack of any real connection. The reality of hate crimes hardly justified Congress’s action against Bob Jones University.
We might also consider that the House of Representatives’ controversial process of selecting a chaplain (a Catholic was eventually appointed) had something to do with Congress’s censure of Bob Jones University, given that much of Congress’s denunciation of BJU centered on the school’s anti-Catholic stance. Perhaps not so coincidentally, the uproar over the university’s principles and practices occurred at the same time that some House leaders were accused of holding anti-Catholic bias for their refusal to appoint a Catholic as chaplain.
The chain of events that lead to the House’s appointment of a new chaplain is revealing. After the announced retirement in 1999 of longtime House chaplain James D. Ford, House speaker Dennis Hastert named Reverend Charles Wright, a Presbyterian minister, for the job. There was nothing very remarkable about Hastert’s choice—except that he had formed a bipartisan advisory committee to weed through the 37 resumes submitted. The committee recommended three finalists. One was Wright; one was a Lutheran minister; and the third was a Roman Catholic priest, Reverend Timothy O’Brien. According to Hastert, the committee submitted three finalists’ names with no final ranking or recommendation. But according to House Democrats, the only candidate receiving bipartisan support was O’Brien. After interviewing the three top candidates with Majority Leader Dick Armey and Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, Hastert chose Wright. For almost four months thereafter a bitter fracas between House Republicans and Democrats ensued. The Democrats accused Hastert and House Republicans of anti-Catholic bias. Father O’Brien himself was quoted as saying: “I am convinced that if I were a mainline Protestant minister and not a Catholic priest, I would be the candidate.”
Finally, a little more than three weeks after the introduction of the joint resolutions condemning BJU for its anti-Catholic teachings, Reverend Wright withdrew his name from consideration. On March 23 Hastert named Father Daniel Coughlin, a Roman Catholic priest from Chicago. He had been recommended by Hastert’s friend Francis Cardinal George. During his announcement of Coughlin’s appointment, Hastert chided the House for turning “what was essentially a spiritual decision” into an opportunity to charge him with anti-Catholic bigotry. Hastert added that never during his tenure in Congress had he “seen a more cynical and destructive political campaign.”
WAS CONGRESSIONAL CENSURE PROPER?
Perhaps this rancorous House debate over the appointment of a chaplain, supercharged as it was with allegations of religious bigotry, somewhat explains—although it does not excuse—the political nature of the backlash by congressional Democrats against BJU. The same could be said for the pending hate crimes legislation—i.e., it might explain Congress’s censure of BJU, but it hardly justifies it.
Which leads us to the real question: Do the views of Bob Jones University, specifically its position on interracial dating and its negative views on Catholicism, merit Congressional censure? Doesn’t the First Amendment protect the university, a private institution, from government interference with its right to decide upon and proclaim its religious views, no matter how unpopular they might be to others? Doesn’t the free exercise clause permit the university to formulate and teach that interracial dating is unbiblical and that Roman Catholicism is a false religion? Isn’t it outside the scope of U.S. congressional representatives’ authority to castigate the religious beliefs of any religious institution?
Affirmative answers must be given to all of these questions. Bob Jones University’s controversial views should be protected, no matter how longstanding or deeply held. The school’s interracial dating policy was originally set because it believed that such practices were part and parcel of a much greater conspiracy to institute a one-world government and usher in the apocalyptic era of the antichrist. According to Bob Jones III, the current president of BJU, however, the rule was so insignificant a part of the university’s overall theology that it virtually never received any attention on campus. In fact, during a March 3, 2000, appearance on CNN’s Larry King Live, Jones announced that he had that very day told the school’s administrators to revoke the rule since it involved such a minor theological issue and was causing so much negative attention for the school, its students, and its graduates. Most Americans were no doubt pleased by this decision. But those who cherish religious liberty as a fundamental American right should be troubled at how the university was unconstitutionally pressured to repeal its policy.
BJU’s strong rhetoric against Catholicism and the pope is considerably more longstanding and deeply held. Its view that Roman Catholicism is a false religion dates to the university’s founding in the 1920s. Its view may be out of the mainstream now, but it is not so different from the standard Protestant line of a generation or two ago. Certainly the university’s views are deplored by many today. Such views are hardly “politically correct.” But while few persons of faith across the United States would agree with the university’s anti-Catholic views, they probably would agree with the institution’s right to hold those views, since all religious groups’ right to espouse their own religious views depends upon a similar right. Suffice it to say that the First Amendment’s provisions on religion mean nothing if they do not mean that government, including Congress, is prohibited from interfering with the particular religious beliefs of American churches and religious institutions.
Not content to let the congressional sanction end the matter, Representative Crowley, sponsor of the House resolution, sent a letter to Bob Jones III on March 27 signed by him and three other House colleagues expressing concerns about Reverend Ian Paisley’s participation in a Bible conference at Bob Jones University. The 74-year-old Paisley is the head of the Free Presbyterian Church and leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, and has been heavily involved in the Northern Ireland political scene for more than 30 years.
The letter requested that the university sever all professional contacts with Paisley and terminate his membership on the BJU board of trustees, adding: “No American university should have a relationship with such an anti-Catholic bigot and opponent of peace in Northern Ireland.” Crowley’s letter continued: “Because of recent events in Washington and across the country, Catholics in America understandably have grown concerned about a retreat in tolerance toward all religions. . . . The sense of outrage in the Irish and Catholic American communities over your continued relationship with Reverend Paisley requires you to take action on this issue.”
Speaking before the House, Crowley expressed bewilderment and shock at Bob Jones III’s response, which tersely began: “Dear Congressman Crowley: It is no business of yours whom Bob Jones University invites to speak at its Bible conferences. This is a free country. We’re just as entitled to our religious beliefs as you are to yours. The fact that we have speakers whom you personally differ with does not make us bigots. Your bigotry and intolerance, however, have been amply displayed in your March 27 letter, which makes unwarranted and intrusive demands of us.”
Representative Crowley, sponsor of the House resolution condemning BJU, apparently found no merit in Jones’s position. He told the House: “Our country is founded on free speech, but it is also founded on religious freedom and tolerance. No institution, especially one of higher learning, should promote religious intolerance.” Remarkable! It would seem that Representative Crowley has elevated his brand of tolerance above religious freedom, and finds it impossible to tolerate intolerance in others, even when the intolerance arises out of the constitutionally protected free exercise of religion.
Bob Jones III decided to take his fight for religious freedom to the American people. In an open letter addressed “to the nation,” posted on the BJU Web site, he responded to the joint congressional resolutions: “This attack ought to offend and frighten every freedom-loving person. What other religious belief will find itself in the gunsight of the U.S. Senate next? Will it be:
• Islam’s doctrines with regard to women?
• Roman Catholicism’s doctrine that the pope is infallible?
• The belief in Judaism restricting the marriage choices of their adherents?
Would you desire to see them persecuted by the Senate, by presidential candidates, or by the media because their beliefs are not yours and may even offend you? We wouldn’t! . . . Thoughtful American citizens, Christian or otherwise, should see that religious freedom is the core issue in this entire matter. To speak in defense of Bob Jones University does not align anyone with our beliefs, but with the cherished principle of religious freedom guaranteed by our Constitution.” On this point the BJU president got it right.
A DISAPPOINTING PERFORMANCE
By the time of the November 2000 elections the House and Senate resolutions still had not been put to a vote by Congress. Whether or not the full House and Senate will someday vote on the resolutions is anybody’s guess. But the mere introduction of resolutions disparaging the religious freedom of Bob Jones University by some of the nation’s leading legislators is disappointing indeed.
Nearly 50 years ago the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted the universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 18 of that document states: “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.” The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees these same freedoms. Bob Jones III and the university that he leads have the right to manifest their religious beliefs in their teachings and practices, even if the overwhelming majority of citizens find those beliefs repugnant. Toward that end, it seems that some of our nation’s leaders need to expand their understanding of tolerance to make sure that it includes protection of religious freedom for everyone—even the intolerant.
Derek H. Davis is dierctor of the J.M. Dawson Institute of Church-State Studies, Baylor University, Waco, Texas, and editor of the Journal of Church and State; Susan Kelley-Claybrook is a graduate student in church-state studies at the Dawson Institute.
|
TOP LEVEL
Past Issues
Printer-friendly page
Send this page to a friend