Congress targets ACLU over lawyers' fees

October 4, 2006

By MICHAEL McAULIFFE
c. 2006 Religion News Service

Religion and money are so closely linked in America that "In God We Trust" can be found on every coin that is minted and every bill that is printed.

Now, however, a bill passed by the House and awaiting action in the Senate seeks to remove money -- at least the awarding of attorneys' fees -- from cases related to public displays of religion.

The Public Expression of Religion Act, introduced by Indiana Republican John Hostettler, passed the House by a 244-173 vote on Sept. 26 after four failed attempts. A similar Senate bill has been introduced by Republican Sam Brownback of Kansas.

Supporters of the bills argue the legislation would prevent the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other organizations from manipulating an existing section of civil rights law to earn large sums of money from lawyers' fees.

Opponents counter that eliminating the awarding of attorneys' fees would prevent some people from being able to bring challenges when they believe there has been government sponsorship of religion. They say it would mark the first time a freedom protected by the Bill of Rights was not fully enforced.

"It's garbage, and people are being seriously misled by people with some other agenda," said Sarah Wunsch, the staff lawyer for the ACLU of Massachusetts.

Uproar over the ACLU being awarded attorneys' fees in cases challenging religious symbols, such as the attempt to place the Ten Commandments in an Alabama courthouse, has fueled the passions of many supporting the bills.

Paul Morin, national commander of the American Legion, fears the ACLU and others will one day challenge the presence of religious symbols such as a cross or Star of David that adorn headstones in veterans' cemeteries. "There's nothing that's going to be sacred anymore," Morin said.

The ACLU calls that supposed threat to religious markers on headstones a "red herring." In addition, the ACLU said it would vigorously defend the right of a veteran to have a religious symbol placed on a headstone.

The ACLU also contends attorneys' fees are reasonable in any case in which the government violates a citizen's civil or constitutional rights.

"Quite intentionally, the bill penalizes plaintiffs who can prove that the government has engaged in unconstitutional conduct," the ACLU said in a letter protesting the Senate bill. "Therefore, the legislation has the predominant purpose of promoting government-sponsored religion, and the effect of discouraging plaintiffs from bringing meritorious ... cases."

Rees Lloyd, a former ACLU lawyer who is an American Legion district commander in California, said the ACLU uses the threat of attorneys' fees as a bludgeon in its effort to cleanse public property of any symbols of national heritage that may be tied to religion.

Lloyd, a civil rights lawyer, said the ACLU "has become the Taliban of American secular liberalism" and "is pimping the law for profit."

Lloyd also said the question of how communities honor veterans should be decided by local elected officials and not federal judges, who are appointed to the bench for life.

"Who is a federal judge accountable to?" Lloyd asked. "No one. Absolutely no one."

Joining in the push to eliminate attorneys' fees is the American Center for Law and Justice, founded by religious broadcaster Pat Robertson. Colby M. May, senior counsel for the group's Washington, D.C., office, said the existing law "is being used as a political football by all kinds of interests" who feel they can make money off the statute.

"Our government is paying them," Morin said. "We. Me. You. The taxpayers."

But Joe Conn, a spokesman for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, alleged the religious right is seeking through the legislation to muzzle those who don't agree that America should be a Christian nation.

"It's an effort to control the courts in this country and have the courts reflect a fundamentalist viewpoint of Christianity," Conn said. "And that's pretty scary."

(Michael McAuliffe writes for The Republican in Springfield, Mass.)