Interfaith Alliance – Free Speech – Press Release

islamoyankee

The Interfaith Alliance

For Immediate Release

September 26, 2006

Contact: William Blake, (202) 639-6370, ext. 113 (w), (202) 680-8765 (c)

House Vote Reduces First Amendment to Second Class Status

The Interfaith Alliance Denounces Bill to Limit Religious Freedom

(Washington, D.C.) Today the House of Representatives scheduled a vote on H.R. 2679, the “Public Expression of Religion Act.” The bill would eliminate damages and awards of attorneys’ fees for individuals or groups in successful cases brought to ensure their constitutional rights under the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. This bill would limit long-standing remedies available under civil rights law, 42 U.S.C. 1988.

The Interfaith Alliance President, the Reverend C. Welton Gaddy today issued the following statement:

“The Public Expression of Religion Act is an attack on the religious freedoms guaranteed to every American by the Constitution. If it passes, the House of Representatives will have closed the courthouse doors to ordinary Americans, including members of religious minorities, who seek the protection of their constitutional rights. This bill is another example of election-year tactics designed to manipulate religion for partisan political gain. We call on the Senate and President Bush to stop this bill and end the pandering to the Religious Right.

”We cannot allow Congress to open the door to picking and choosing which constitutional rights it wants to protect and which ones it wants to devalue. What is next? Can we imagine a day when citizens cannot go to court to protect their free speech rights?

“Religious expression is not threatened by the enforcement of the Establishment Clause, but is protected by it. The only way to ensure free exercise of all religious faiths is if ordinary citizens can raise challenges when governments try to impose one particular religious viewpoint on the people. Religious freedom as guaranteed by the First Amendment includes both the Free Exercise Clause and the Establishment Clause. One without the other would render religious freedom a hollow phrase.”

For more information on The Interfaith Alliance: www.interfaithalliance.org.

Technorati Tags: ,

Related Posts

Moses a Pharoah?

Oddly enough, I was just talking to someone about Akhenaten and the monotheistic religion he preached in Egypt. Now I find an article linking to a book suggesting Moses and Akhenaten were the same person. That means Moses was a pharoah. I want to do some reading on this topic, so if anyone has heard about other research, pro and con, I would appreciate it if you could send it my way. For a nice fictionalized account of Akhenaten, see Naguib Mahfouz. For a good, basic introduction, see Akhenaten and the Religion of Light.

David Campbell and Robert Putnam: Islam and American Tolerance – WSJ.com

David Campbell and Robert Putnam: Islam and American Tolerance – WSJ.com. Consider the experience of two groups that are perceived positively by Americans today: Jews and Catholics. Americans rate Jews and Catholics more warmly than they do mainline Protestants, historically America’s religious establishment, and evangelical Protestants, the single largest religious group in the country. At the end of the scale opposite Jews and Catholics are Muslims, Mormons and Buddhists.

Response from The Interfaith Alliance on Katherine Harris’s Comments

In light of US Senate candidate Katherine Harris’s comments on her bias against the constitutional provision of church-state separation and her support for the bogus claim that America was founded as a “Christian Nation,” The Interfaith Alliance offers the following to all reporters, editors, voters, candidates, and current elected officials: The Interfaith Alliance helps all Americans understand and appreciate the religious liberty clause of the Constitution. The founders of our nation believed that all Americans should have the right to worship according to their own beliefs, or not to worship at all. So strong was their commitment to religious freedom…

One thought on “Interfaith Alliance – Free Speech – Press Release”

  1. Thank you for letting us know about this outrage. It needs to be stopped by voting the neocons and republicans out of office as soon as possible.
    Ya Haqq!

Comments are closed.