All in the Family Research Council
DICARLO, RACHEL
All in the Family Research Council Mr. Perkins comes to Washington. BY RACHEL DICARLO "WERE IN REBUILDING mode," says Tony Perkins, the new president of the Family Research Council. "We're...
...Author bio goes here...
...His public service began with several stints in the Marines and included a spell as a policeman...
...Although seen at the time as a promising means of discouraging divorce, covenant marriage hasn't really taken off...
...But then, his career has never progressed in a straight line...
...He wants to raise the organization's profile, he says, by making it more responsive to the media on issues in the news, like gay marriage and abortion...
...Author bio goes here...
...Bauer had served in the Reagan administration, first in the Education Department, then as White House domestic policy chief...
...It affirms that marriage, "whether entered into within or outside of the United States, shall consist of the legal union of one man and one woman...
...Perkins has no Washington experience and knows few of the players inside the Beltway...
...Author bio goes here...
...Describing himself as a "diplomat" and a "risk-taker," Perkins, a former Louisiana legislator, says he means to restore the FRC to the position of influence it enjoyed as a pro-family lobbying force in Washington under the leadership of Gary Bauer, who left to run for president in 2000...
...Perkins's wife and their four children will soon join him in Washington...
...Perkins has ambitious plans...
...Center-stage right now is a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage...
...Part of its lobbying effort is a "Marriage Protection Pledge" being sent to every state and federal legislator in the country...
...He was in the Marine Corps reserves for two years while studying at Louisiana State University, then ran out of money and reen-listed full time until he could afford to finish his degree at Liberty University...
...Senate...
...Though the FRC has not endorsed any particular wording, it opposes civil unions as well as single-sex marriages...
...The polls showed him ahead...
...Perkins credits this legislation with a significant drop in recidivism in Louisiana...
...Only a tiny fraction of Louisiana couples chose it in 1998, the last year for which the state Vital Records Registry has posted statistics, and Arizona and Arkansas were the only states to follow suit...
...Such concerns have preoccupied him throughout his years in government...
...In 2002, Perkins kept a pledge to serve only two terms in the legislature and mounted an unsuccessful campaign for U.S...
...He sees Dobson's half-hour radio show, broadcast daily on over 2,000 stations nationwide, as "an avenue to reach people...
...This will not be easy...
...And Perkins aims to reestablish a strong relationship with Focus on the Family, the Colorado-based pro-family media empire from which the FRC spun off in 1983...
...Perkins plans a bus tour around the country next summer, holding issue-related events he hopes will be covered by the local media...
...It was a tough decision, he says, but he decided to bow out of the race for the opportunity to address a national audience on big cultural issues...
...He joined up once more in 1990 to serve in the Gulf War, but was assigned to work at the State Department...
...So far, about 100 legislators have signed, Perkins says, and the pace of signatures has stepped up since the recent court ruling in Massachusetts allowing same-sex marriages...
...We're planning on bringing back the FRC...
...Another of his bills, passed in 1999, encouraged prisons to make available to inmates—at no cost to taxpayers—faith-based activities designed to help them adjust to incarceration...
...Elected to the Louisiana House of Representatives in 1995, Perkins authored the nation's first "covenant marriage" law...
...At the time Perkins was tapped for the FRC, in August, he was shooting television commercials for his campaign for insurance commissioner in Louisiana...
...With a Republican Congress and a president in the White House who willingly signed a ban on partial-birth abortion and supports a constitutional amendment protecting the definition of marriage, even an ousider like Perkins may be able to accomplish a good deal...
...Other priority issues Perkins lists are greater latitude for prayer in public schools, a ban on late-term abortions, and judicial overreach...
...Couples who choose to enter a covenant marriage commit themselves to premarital counseling and, in case of marital breakdown, additional counseling before divorce...
...He also means to develop a greater national presence...
...Author bio goes here...
...Perkins also championed a law requiring state agencies to consider the impact their regulations have on families...
...They come to the capital at a moment when the family issues are as prominent as ever, but the politics surrounding them have changed...
...When he took over the FRC in YEAR, Bauer was a widely known political figure often seen on TV news shows...
...Perkins says he speaks with Focus on the Family president James Dobson almost every day...
Vol. 9 • December 2003 • No. 13
