Federal Court Enforces Tolerance

Last week, a federal appeals court refused to uphold the parental and religious rights of two Massachusetts couples—
David and Tonia Parker and Rob and Robin Wirthlin—
whose young children were exposed to books that promoted homosexual “marriage” in their elementary school.

I met and interviewed the Parkers and the Wirthlins for FRC’s Liberty Sunday broadcast from Boston in October 2006 (and our “Critical Mass” DVD includes their stories). It’s amazing how cavalierly the court’s decision dismisses the evidence that school officials engaged in the deliberate indoctrination of children.

The school sought to coerce its students into accepting values that are way outside the mainstream and in direct contradiction to those of their parents. Yet the same courts that are trying to reinvent the family are encouraging the public schools to act as their surrogate.

A lawyer for the parents has vowed to appeal all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary. They could also sue in state court, given the blatant violation of a state law which mandates that parents be notified before any discussion of “human sexuality issues.”

Of course, since it was Massachusetts’ Supreme Court that legalized same-sex “marriage,” you can imagine what the families’ chances of winning would be! The federal court recommended the parents “seek recourse” through the legislative process.

But that is small comfort considering that when pro-family forces do succeed, as they did in Boyd County, Kentucky, judicial activists simply rewrite the democratic decisions to suit their political agenda. When family values clash with homosexual activism in the public schools, rulings like this one prove that parents’ rights continue to be wronged.

Tony Perkins is the president of the Family Research Council. This feature is excerpted from the update that he compiles for the FRC.

Tony Perkins
Tony Perkins heads the Family Research Council. This article is excerpted from the Washington Update that he compiles for the FRC.