F. LaGard Smith, Professor of Law at Pepperdine University, has written another excellent book of the same stripe as Sodom’s Second Coming and When Choice Becomes God. [Not recommended is his book on baptism or his teaching on hell.] Made available this year by Marcon Publishers, the material is both fresh and pertinent, including references to the Oklahoma City bombing, the first Menendez brothers non-verdicts, and other recent events.
Smith sets the tone for his analysis in the introduction by asserting that the American Civil Liberties Union has overstepped its bounds in two areas: 1) defending even excessive immorality, and 2) attacking (instead of defending) the rights of Christians. Of the first, he writes that the basic goal of the ACLU will not be achieved until “it has won the final victory for personal autonomy. Personal autonomy for what? Not to put too fine an edge on it-for licentious behavior” (vii). Concerning the second point referred to above, the author states clearly that “the ACLU is the avowed enemy of the Church and virtually anything religious”; after citing an example of their intolerance, he asks, “How else does one explain the ACLU’s appalling disdain of religious free speech?” (vii). Truly, many of us have wondered for years if ACLU did not stand for Anti Christian-Liberties Union.
In chapter two, “The Jekyll-and-Hyde ACLU,” the author credits this organization with some of the outstanding accomplishments they have achieved in the field of civil liberties, affirming that all Americans owe them a great debt for focusing national attention on civil rights (22-23). But then on the Hyde side they have evolved into a group that supports “Kevorkian-like doctor-assisted suicide ‘as a legitimate expression of the right of control over one’s own body'” (25).
Some of the chapters devote themselves to the extreme immoralities the ACLU now defends. Concerning pornography, for example, they think that children have a right to view it. Smith, when establishing ACLU positions, usually cites directly from their own policy statements. On this matter, for example, ACLU Policy 4 (b) states: “Laws which punish the distribution or exposure of such material to minors violate the First Amendment, and inevitably restrict the right to publish and distribute such materials to adults” (90).
Worse than this policy is their defense of the publishers of child pornography. If someone produced a movie of a man raping a two-year-old child, the ACLU states: “the producer of the film should nevertheless be permitted to create the film, and distribute the film without any restriction whatsoever” (91). This policy is itself as heinous as the crime and is incomprehensible to any rational person. Considering their pro-abortion stance, Smith is correct in his assessment that “the ACLU is no friend to children, born or unborn” (93).
Several chapters are also devoted to the ACLU’s assault on religious freedom. The Scopes trial of 1925 undergoes a thorough review to set the stage for further events (197-99). Ironically, the ACLU solicited that trial to win academic freedom for evolution; now the same organization has participated in several cases to deny academic freedom to a presentation of Creationism. The final section of the book suggests ways to establish common ground between the two sides of the current culture war. Many of the suggestions make good sense, though one doubts their implementation. Even though the hardback edition is listed at $24.95, the material is well worth the cost.