A Nation Like No Other (22 page)

Less than a decade later, the Court concluded in
Lawrence v. Texas
that a Texas law banning homosexual conduct, while “firmly rooted in Judeo-Christian moral and ethical standards … further[ed] no legitimate state interest which can justify its intrusion into the personal and private life of the individual.”
¹⁴

But Justice Sandra Day O'Connor was more explicit in a concurring opinion, arguing that “[m]oral disapproval of a group cannot be a legitimate governmental interest,” and equating “moral disapproval” of a group with a “bare desire to harm the group.”
¹⁵
This was a radical assertion with enormous consequences for American jurisprudence. As Justice Scalia pointed out in dissent, “This effectively decrees the end of all morals legislation,” including “criminal laws against fornication, bigamy, adultery, adult incest, bestiality, and obscenity.”
¹⁶

Lower court opinions in the wake of
Lawrence
reveal continuing confusion surrounding the basic question of whether laws can be based on moral considerations. While some courts have concluded that, after
Lawrence
, “public morality likely remains a constitutionally rational basis for legislation,”
¹⁷
others have found the opposite and struck down, for example, a federal law banning the distribution of obscene materials and a Texas law prohibiting the sale of sex toys.
¹⁸

These conflicting decisions provide some telling insights about radical secularism. First, something has gone wrong when courts question whether widespread public judgments rooted in Judeo-Christian morality and centuries of American tradition are a legitimate basis for making law. The entire corpus of thought left by our founding generation, including both public and private correspondence, indicates they would have been appalled by the proposition that public morals were not a legitimate state interest.

Second, the logic of radical secularism not only displaces traditional moral judgments, it affirmatively condemns them. As Justice Scalia
pointed out in his dissents in
Romer
and
Lawrence
, once morality is no longer a legitimate state interest, relying on moral considerations in lawmaking becomes a form of bigotry akin to racism.

Finally, radical secularist thinking is ultimately sectarian and partisan. It turns the coercive power of government against the Judeo-Christian tradition that animated America's founding, and indeed, the advent of Western civilization. Traditional moral reasoning is displaced and stigmatized in order to make room for unelected judges' arbitrary moral views. As a Texas judge recently observed in dissenting from one such affirmation of radical secularism, “The Court ignores that by creating morality-based, non-textual rights it does nothing more than substitute its own moral compass for that of the People.”
¹⁹

The balancing of individual rights and the public's interest in morality has always been, and will always be, a difficult question. These issues have traditionally been subject to public debate and decided by the people's elected legislators. But with radical secularism becoming established as the judiciary's guiding ideology, that debate is being taken from the people and lorded over by enrobed activists whose moral compass is drastically at odds with that of the vast majority of their countrymen.

The recent decision by President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder not to defend the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in federal court is yet another example of the abandonment of the rule of law.

In February 2011, Holder informed the congressional leadership that Obama had decided to cease defending DOMA in the courts because the president believes the law is unconstitutional. According to Holder's letter,

The letter expresses the following logic: if lawmakers engage in “stereotype-based thinking” when they vote for a law—as Holder and Obama claim was the case with DOMA supporters—then that law is unconstitutional.

This novel understanding of constitutional law becomes even more ludicrous when one realizes that the ostensibly bigoted thinking they found objectionable was
Judeo-Christian morality
. This was further clarified in a footnote to the letter that described what constitutes supposedly unconstitutional thinking:

Here, President Obama and Attorney General Holder essentially argue that Judeo-Christian morality cannot serve as a legitimate source for American lawmaking in general and for defining marriage in particular, since Judeo-Christian morality is, for them, “precisely the kind of stereotype-based thinking and animus the Equal Protection Clause is designed to guard against.”

This may seem like a strange position for Obama to take, considering that in his book
The Audacity of Hope
he alludes to his religion as the reason for his own opposition to same-sex marriage.
²²
Then again, Obama has stated that his position on this issue is “evolving.” That apparently means he now believes that supporters of traditional marriage are mere bigots, that the Constitution demands the legalization of same-sex marriage, and that he believes this so strongly that he can violate his duty to uphold laws passed by Congress. But because most Americans still support traditional marriage, he lacks the audacity to simply say what everyone already knows—that he supports gay marriage and believes the courts should impose it.

With their letter, Obama and Holder have registered their support for radical secularism as the established church of the United States. Believing themselves to be part of an enlightened political class, they use state-sanctioned radical secularism as a means to diminish the influence of Judeo-Christian morality, which they regard as a collection of bigoted superstitions. As a result, believing Christians and Jews are stripped of their rights to freely exercise their faith and to participate equally in the political process.

Radical secularists resent religion for many historical, philosophical, and psychological reasons. But in light of their quest to impose their will upon the judiciary, the federal government, and ultimately the American people, they primarily begrudge religion for one reason: because faith reminds us of the need for humility, and of the limits and dangers of men who wield power.

In 1998, the Iowa legislature passed a law defining marriage as between one man and one woman. In 2009, all seven judges of the Iowa Supreme Court found the law unconstitutional.

Believing otherwise, Iowans banded together to reclaim the authority seized by their rogue judges. Led by groups like Iowa for Freedom, an organization formed by former gubernatorial candidate Bob van der
Plaats, Iowans launched a campaign to remove the three judges who were on the ballot in a retention election in November 2010. On Election Day, all three judges were defeated. Like the Founders, Iowans understood that the best safeguard against threats to the rule of law is an informed, active citizenry.

Americans everywhere should follow the example of the people of Iowa. We cannot be mere spectators as radical secularists and judicial supremacists undermine our system of government and the Judeo-Christian morality that inspired its architects.

If these groups continue chipping away at the rule of law, the biggest victims will be the weakest elements of society. Without the rule of law, the strong can still defend their interests through bribes and personal connections; it is the average person and the weak and the poor who are left with no recourse and come most firmly under the boot of arbitrary rulers.

Unbeknownst to the aggressors, however, three of our carriers, all that remains of our entire carrier force in the Pacific, are waiting to attack. On the USS
Hornet
, the Torpedo 8 bomber squadron stands ready to launch. Only hours before, the planes' crews were filmed smiling, grinning, and posing next to their aircraft, eager for a chance to prove themselves in combat. After a scout plane reports that the enemy carrier
fleet has been located, Torpedo 8, along with other bomber squadrons and some fighter jets, takes off to its rendezvous with destiny.

After launch, with their fighter escorts and the other bomber squadrons having become lost in the clouds, the pilots of Torpedo 8 spot their target—including carriers that had launched the deadly attack on Pearl Harbor six months ago. But there is no support and no cover. The wall of flak from all the ships is aimed straight at them, while from every direction the legendary Japanese
Zero
fighter aircraft come diving in for easy kills.

The Japanese exult in their easy victory.
Zero
pilots return to their ships, eager to have yet more American flags painted on the side of their planes to celebrate their kills. And yet, amidst all the celebration and laughter, it is reported that one Japanese commander stands silent, stricken. Turning to his staff, he proclaims, “My God, the Americans have Bushido.”