Way of the Dross: Persecution
LIMBAUGH, DAVID
Way of the Dross Persecution: How Liberals Are Waging War Against Christianity (Regnery, 416 pages, $27.95) Reviewed by Mark R. Levin TH FEDERAL COURTS interpreting the Constitution to ban the...
...If you're concerned about our culture, and if you The Boy Scouts have been the target of an unrelenting campaign to kick them out of public schools...
...Rather, Limbaugh explains how the Constitution came to be used as a weapon in the hands of those intolerant of religion...
...Limbaugh details case after case where Christian holidays and Christian symbols have been forced from public schools and other public places...
...That Sacred Bond of Brotherhood...
...Even references to God are frequently considered Equal Protection violations...
...Every conceivable idea is embraced, it seems, except Christianity...
...Persecution begins by exposing the fallacy underlying the legal assault on Christianity—the so-called "wall of separation" (or "separation of church and state") argument...
...He doesn't argue for the imposition of Christianity on public education, or other institutions...
...And God save institutions with religious—especially Christian—affiliations...
...The chief textbook was the Bible and class was held in either homes or churches...
...The Constitution is silent on education, which was left to the states under the Tenth Amendment...
...In its 2000 Santa Fe Independent School District v. Doe decision, it struck down a school district's policy allowing students to deliver public invocations before football games...
...58 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR NOVEBMER 2003 BOOKS IN REVIEW writes, even "[f]ifty years after the Constitution was ratified, the Christian influence remained dominant in schools, as evidenced by the presence of the Christian-oriented McGuffey's Readers, compiled by minister and professor William Holmes McGuffey, in schoolhouses throughout the land...
...Even in our military, Limbaugh uncovers our "culture's hypersensitivity toward non-Christians," which is used to perpetrate intolerance of Christianity...
...Way of the Dross Persecution: How Liberals Are Waging War Against Christianity (Regnery, 416 pages, $27.95) Reviewed by Mark R. Levin TH FEDERAL COURTS interpreting the Constitution to ban the posting of the Ten Commandments in public places, to purge "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance, and to prevent prayer at high school graduation ceremonies and football games, the recent American legal bias against Christianity was a subject crying out for a lengthy response...
...Wallace v. Jaffe, decided in 1985, held that public schools may not set aside a period of silence even if there's a mere suggestion students might use the time for prayer...
...Limbaugh explains how education in America originally consisted mostly of religious instruction...
...Moreover, the media and Hollywood, as Limbaugh explains, use their awesome platform to create and promote stereotypes about Christians, and perpetuate anti-Christian attitudes...
...Justice Hugo Black wrote, in part: "The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state...
...Limbaugh explains how key framers, like George Washington, were unapologetic Christians...
...In Persecution: How Liberals Are Waging War Against Christianity, David Limbaugh (full disclosure: he's a friend) ably documents the dilemma that the faithful are facing...
...Thanksgiving's Christian origins have been ignored...
...NOVEMBER 2003 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR 59 BOOKS IN REVIEW want to understand the war that is being waged in all corners of our society against our Judeo-Christian values, Persecution is a must read...
...The IRS has selectively revoked or threatened to revoke the tax-exempt tax status of certain churches whose clergy exercise their free speech and free exercise rights to speak out on political matters or for candidates who express their support for traditional Christian views...
...He describes how American soldiers were ordered not to wear religious jewelry or other religious symbols that might offend those we are liberating and defending in places like Afghanistan or the Middle East...
...In 1992, the Court held unconstitutional prayers given by clergy at graduation ceremonies...
...Rarely have I been so impressed with a book that tackles such a complex and extensive topic...
...On our college campuses, "[t]he attack on Christianity is seen not just in what is prohibited on campus, but also in what is promoted...
...When the topic under consideration is, say, Islam, homosexuality, or even pornography, students are urged to be open, diverse, accepting...
...Textbooks are purged of religious references...
...During Gulf War II, a post office refused to deliver Scriptures and religious comic books sent by a mother to her son for fear of violating a government policy, which stated: "Any matter containing religious material contrary to Islamic faith or depicting nude or seminude persons, pornographic or sexual items, or non-authorized political materials is prohibited...
...It prevented state tax revenues from being used to transport parochial students to their Catholic high school...
...And, of course, there's no seriously disputing the pro-abortion litmus test, imposed by a small cabal of Democratic senators, being used against judicial candidates who hold personal and religious beliefs against abortion—such as Miguel Estrada and William Pryor—from serving on federal appellate benches...
...For example, the U.S...
...that the First Amendment's Equal Protection and Free Exercise clauses were intended to protect religion, including Christianity, from the federal government, not ban religion from the public square...
...The line of school prayer cases is illustrative...
...After winning a rare 2000 Supreme Court decision in Boy Scouts v. Dale—upholding the Scouts' right to ban gays as scoutmasters under the First Amendment's Freedom of Association clause—the Boy Scouts have been the target of an unrelenting campaign to kick them out of schools and community centers, and to cut off all forms of public funding...
...And in the states, education was largely private...
...That wall must be kept high and impregnable...
...and that several of the states that ratified the Constitution, and later the first Ten Amendments, actually had official religions...
...In the 1962 case, Engel v. Vitale, the Court prohibited state-sponsored school prayer, even though it was nondenominational...
...We could not approve the slightest breach...
...As Limbaugh Mark R. Levin is president of the Landmark Legal Foundation...
...Supreme Court's 1947 decision in Everson v. Board of Education was the first in a long line of legal Constitutional reinterpretations which squeezed religion out of education...
Vol. 36 • November 2003 • No. 6
