Freedom Federation Takes Flight

A coalition of national groups committed to Judeo-Christian values launched the Freedom Federation on June 30, 2009 with the goal of promoting freedom and representing Christian perspectives on national issues such as abortion, health care, and hate crimes legislation.

Ironically, the speakers talked a lot about “justice”—but not justice as often defined on campus. “Everyone among us would intervene at any point [if] anyone were being accosted or mistreated because of their race or their gender or any other stereotype or…whatever might be,” said Rick Scarborough, founder of Vision International, at the press conference.

“We are against any kind of injustice, including religious injustice,” he said. “There’s a fear among many preachers that I deal with—our organization is of the pastor, by the pastor, for the pastor but in its current form we believe that hate crimes legislation is an infringement upon our freedom of religion.”

Critics of hate crimes legislation argue that applying harsher penalties based on a crime’s motivation involves criminalizing belief-systems. In contrast, supporters such as Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) argue such legislation aids police. “[The Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act] would combat acts of violence motivated by hatred and bigotry, but it does not target pure speech, however offensive or disagreeable, and it certainly does not target religious speech,” said Leahy during a June 25 hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Mat Staver, Dean of Liberty University’s College of Law also emphasized Christian-based justice at the press conference. “We believe that there is a duty that all individuals and communities of faith had to extend a hand of loving compassion and care for those in poverty and distress and the sanctity of life also includes the notion of justice, to do justice and to raise up those downtrodden and those who are poor,” he said. Staver then defined marriage “as a union of one man and one woman” and called it “the first form of government.”

The Freedom Federation issued its own “Declaration of American Values,” which Staver said included “values that transcend political parties, times and cultures” such as

• “the sanctity of life,”
• traditional marriage,
• “parental rights,”
• freedom of religion and religious worship,
• “moral dignity,”
• “the right to bear arms,”
• “the right to a secure checks and balances” in government,
• “national sovereignty,”
• “fair” immigration policies, and
• “economic freedom.”

Ken Blackwell, the Chairman of the Coalition for a Conservative Majority, argued that his faith supported limited government values. He said that “there were two Newsweek cover stories that at least advanced a point of view that needed to be countered, and I think the [Freedom] Federation begins to be a voice to this conversation;” the first article was “one in February that said that ‘we’re all socialists now.’ Well the heck we are.”

“This is not about the state, it is about the individual,” he argued. “It is time that folks who represent individual freedom give voice to this discussion and this civil debate,” he said.

Blackwell said the second Newsweek article that needed to be “countered” was “a mid-April cover story which said ‘The End of Christianity in America.’” He maintained that while not a Christian nation, America has a strong Christian heritage.

“We are looking for one that recognizes the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence has some meaning when it says that we hold these truths to be self-evident and that is a very polite way of saying ‘any idiot should be able to get this,’” he said, adding “and that all of us are, you know, created equal and that we’re endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights which means that our human rights are not grants from government as is the belief in socialist countries, but gifts from God, which is in keeping with our heritage.”

The stated reason for the federation was to mobilize grassroots on a national level on behalf of such issues without favoring a political party. However, Staver told this correspondent that the Freedom Federation would use preexisting infrastructure from national organizations who may or may not participate in any particular initiative. There is also no established mechanism for funding initiatives, representatives said at the conference.

Blackwell tried to sum up the atmosphere of the coalition as not about having “paid your dues,” but rather “do you have something to say, do you believe in something passionately and are you willing to get into a conversation with people [of like] views.”

Bethany Stotts is a staff writer at Accuracy in Academia.