Merlyn_LeRoy

People might want to read my letter to the editor on this article: http://www.city-journal.org/html/10_2_letters.html To the editor: Heather Mac Donald's "Why the Boy Scouts Work" (Winter 2000) ignores a vital fact in the Boy Scouts of America's court loss in New Jersey: the Scouts accept charters from public schools and the military, yet claim to be "completely private." Private institutions can turn away those without the "right" sexual orientation or religious beliefs, but the public schools and other government entities that charter over 300,000 Scouts cannot so discriminate. If the BSA wants to spread their prejudices against people like me, they'll have to do it without the aid of my own government, which has no business running a youth group that rejects atheists. Brian Westley Via e-mail Typically, the BSA's practice of chartering their "private" groups to public schools is blamed entirely on the schools: Heather Mac Donald responds: Mr. Westley should address his complaint to the schools and military bases that sponsor Scout troops, not to the Scouts themselves. Accepting government sponsorship does not convert the BSA into an agent of the government; if anything, the opposite is closer to the truth. Sponsoring organizations agree to abide by BSA values and rules; if the government rejects those values, it does not have to support any troops. The government has never conditioned its sponsorship of the Scouts on their changing their moral code. Having failed to impose conditions on its original chartering agreements, the government cannot now demand a revision to the Scout Oath and Law after the fact.

The Keith Richardson case, currently being appealed to the IL supreme court, is about employment discrimination. http://www.bsa-discrimination.org/html/richardson-top.html Prairie_Scouter, the National BSA has said that ALL of their Packs and Troops have to exclude atheists, with no exemption for e.g. public schools that charter units. In other words, the BSA expects public schools to actually violate the civil rights of its own students. That's unacceptable. Public schools can't officially practice religious discrimination, even if they unofficially ignore it. Let me ask you this; what would happen if a boy in a public-school chartered Pack wants to join? What if a current member (who joined when he believed in a god) now says he's an atheist? I'll tell you what would happen; National BSA would yank his membership, and that public school is owning & operating a "no atheist allowed" private club. The school now has an unwinnable lawsuit on its hands. Do you think something other than the above would happen?

The reason the BSA is losing public school charters is not due to societal changes, it's that most people assumed the BSA was a public accommodation, and not a private, religious organization. That's due to the BSA's actions. And I can certainly question their honesty when they argue in court that they're a private, discriminatory religious organization while at the same time they're chartering public schools to own & operate their private, discriminatory religious clubs.

It's hardly a favorable reflection on their honesty when they have to be forced to do the right thing.

CubsRgr8 asks: Merlyn! What's your advice to EL? Quit or stay? Well, I don't consider the BSA to be an honest organization (given the way it expected public schools to unlawfully discriminate against atheists when it continued to issue charters to them after fighting court cases to keep atheists out), and it denegrates atheists as part of its official policy, so I would advise any member of the BSA to join a more honest and moral organization like e.g. Camp Fire or 4H.

t487scouter asks EagerLeader: You may have your mind made up that there is not a God and unbeknownst to you, you are also instilling this fact in your childrens minds. You may not want to explore different religions but why not allow your children to? Why do you assume EagerLeader does not allow this? Encourage them to attend church with a friend or even attend an evening church group. Assuming you have children, have you encouraged them to attend a meeting of a group of atheists like your state's branch of American Atheists?

OGE asks "Who here thinks Satan Worship is acceptable in the BSA?" Why wouldn't it be? As for animal sacrifice, Santerians practice it. Are they not allowed in the BSA now? Some Jews want the temple rebuilt and animal sacrifices to resume; should such Jews be kicked out of the BSA if that occurs? But by all means, keep kicking people out of the BSA for having "improper" religious views.

Dan writes: If the BSA allowed atheists to join how would you keep the Merlyn Leroy's out of your troop? I do not think you legally could. Sure you could; just have people in your troop like yourself who vociferously hate atheists. They'd probably start a new troop instead that doesn't prejudge people based on their religious views.

Fuzzy Bear writes: There is nothing that can be construed as being hidden about the ideals and goals of the BSA. James Dale didn't realize that the Boy Scouts didn't allow gays, because at the time the only rules keeping out gays were BSA internal memos that weren't available to the general public. Five years after the Dale decision, and there STILL isn't anything in the BSA's own registration material that says gays aren't allowed. I'd say that qualifies as a hidden ideal. The religious requirements also haven't been consistent; in 1985, the BSA kicked out Paul Trout for not believing in a god, but readmitted him later, even though his views hadn't changed. As for the government backing the BSA, that's also changing, of course.

Bob, it's pretty clear there IS no such rule. The BSA still doesn't state in any of its materials that gays can't join. James Dale didn't realize that gays couldn't join, because nothing stated that. And when I call you on the same sort of unwritten rules, you dodge the question on the irrelevant pretext that I'm not a BSA member.

Bob, why can't you tell me where this supposed "rule" is written? You say it's "readily available to members", but that's just dodging the question. You've claimed that a member telling you he's gay is actually violating a rule, a rule readily available to members; which rule? What's the wording of the rule? If you keep dodging the question, I'm sure some other BSA member can come up with the same rule, since it's readily available. Unless there IS no such rule.

You still haven't told me where this supposed rule is written.

Bob White writes, apparently in response to " If they tell you (or someone else in scouting) that they are gay...": hmmm Maybe they should follow the the rules and not tell me. Where is that particular rule written?

Hunt writes: On the other hand, I'd be interested in reading Proud Eagle and NJCubScouter hash out whether the Jamboree benefits the government enough to avoid Establishment Clause problems. Hmm, are you saying the government could, say, ignore the civil rights of Jews if it benefitted the government "enough"?

Hey Eamonn, either your real name is Rees Lloyd, or you just plagiarized his rant from American Legion magazine without giving any indication that you were quoting someone else.

Hey Ed, show me another group that discriminates against atheists like the Boy Scouts do while getting government largess and yes, I certainly will go after them. NJCubScouter, I don't know what the supreme court would do; this ruling seems to have more to do with the federal statute covering the jamboree, and not the military's involvement per se.

Yes, the ACLU sees a problem with the government directly funding a supposedly private, discriminatory religious organization, and the nasty old courts are actually agreeing.

Here's the main part of the Jamboree ruling: The Jamboree statute is neither neutral nor is the aid it provides the result of the "genuinely independent and private choices of individuals." First, it is not offered to a broad range of groups; rather it is specifically targeted toward the Boy Scouts, which, as this court has already concluded, is a religious organization from which agnostics and atheists are excluded. Second, the aid is not based on the "independent and private choices of individuals." Rather, the aid is provided directly to the Boy Scouts pursuant to the singular choice of Congress to provide a significant amount of aid (almost $8 million in 2005) to the BSA Jamboree to the exclusion of other possible recipients. Given the Supreme Court's focus on neutrality in approving government aid to religious organizations and the Jamboree statute's complete lack of neutrality in allocating aid, the court finds that a reasonable observer would conclude that the Jamboree statute conveys a message of endorsement of religion. As such, the court finds that the aid provided by the Jamboree statute violates the Establishment Clause. Barnes-Wallace, 275 F. Supp. 2d at 1276 (finding that lease provided to Boy Scouts for city park was not result of religion-neutral process and thus violated Establishment Clause).

You also need to see what the DoD is NOT saying. Those remarks from December came after the announced settlement with the ACLU for military bases to stop chartering BSA units. Notice that Rumsfeld and the DoD never say that the military is going to go back to chartering BSA units. This federal court decision is more recent, and the ruling strikes down the statute authorizing DoD support of the Jamboree as unconstitutional. Both are based on the fact that the government can't violate the first amendment, so more legislation like Frist's bill won't help, because legislation can't overrule the constitution.

It's certainly on-topic in issues and politics; Jamboree support was ruled unconstitutional due to the BSA's religious discrimination. And what's wrong with Rocky & Bullwinkle? It's a funny & literate show. "Merlyn LeRoy" is a pun on Paramount director/producer Mervyn LeRoy from the 1930s. "Boris Badenov" is a pun on "Boris Godunov", a Russian czar best known from Moussorgsky's opera.

This article mentions that last month, a federal court ruled that the DoD's support of the Jamboree is unconstitutional: http://www.wqad.com/Global/story.asp?S=3157488 Defense Department says it will support Boy Scout Jamboree CHICAGO The Department of Defense has notified a federal court in Chicago that it will support this summer's Boy Scout Jamboree. The support will continue, despite a ruling last month that the department's usual aid to the national scout meeting is unconstitutional. The Defense Department argues that the March 16th order isn't final because the judge has yet to rule on two other challenged programs. The dispute stems from a 1999 lawsuit. The American Civil Liberties Union claims the department's sponsorship of the Scouts violates the First Amendment. A-C-L-U spokesman Edwin Yohnka says his organization's goal was to end the practice of the government's direct funding of the Boy Scouts over the long term.

Ed Mori writes: You sure that isn't a private school that's chartering that BSA unit? Yes Ed, I know that Fred Goodwin's Cub Scout Pack 2003 is/was chartered by Blattman Elementary, a public school in San Antonio, TX. And by you trying to get the BSA kicked out of all public schools & military bases, you are tromping on my civil rights! No Ed, the government can't discriminate on the basis of religion by chartering Cub Scout Packs that exclude atheists. Removing all such charters upholds the civil rights of all public school students and military dependents on bases. Plus, of course, they aren't being "kicked out", they're being treated equally, finally. Think the ACLU will take my case? No Ed, because your civil rights haven't been infringed.

Hey Fred, it takes ridiculous amounts of chutzpah to twist a story about a BSA Youth Protection chairman who's into child porn into a slam against the ACLU. The ACLU has no problem with laws against child porn, and your dishonest rhetorical question only emphasizes your complete disregard and lack of comprehension of civil rights, given that you've defended your school chartered pack excluding atheists.

Hey, correcting errors is now "sowing dischord"

You don't need scare quotes around "dishonest"; the BSA has clearly been dishonest, as earlier ACLU lawsuits illustrated that government charters were unlawful, but the BSA continued to issue them anyway.