H.R. 2679, the Public Expression of Religion Act
Pharyngula: The Special Favors for Fundamentalists Act of 2005
Our Republican overlords have taken one more step on the road to theocracy with the approval of H.R. 2679, the Public Expression of Religion Act. You can read the full text of the bill, but here’s the gist:
Notwithstanding any other provision of law, a court shall not award reasonable fees and expenses of attorneys to the prevailing party on a claim of injury consisting of the violation of a prohibition in the Constitution against the establishment of religion brought against the United States or any agency or any official of the United States acting in his or her official capacity in any court having jurisdiction over such claim, and the remedies with respect to such a claim shall be limited to injunctive and declaratory relief.
What this does is give religious organizations a special privilege, bestowing on them a small measure of impunity in breaking the law, all with the intent of discouraging citizens from seeking relief from violations of the prohibition against establishment of religion. It’s a curious thing: it’s basically saying that someone can be found guilty of law-breaking, but if they are carrying out their criminal activity in the name of religion, there is a whole class of punishments that cannot be applied to them, and specifically, lawyers working to prevent violations of church and state will not be rewarded for their efforts if successful.
There seems to be quite a lot of concern in the blogosphere as to whether an excerpt and link (absent qualifiers or disagreement) constitute endorsement. With that in mind, I’ll note that while I share PZ Myers’ concern on this question, I am not quite yet ready to chalk it up to “our Republican overlords” goose-stepping “to theocracy.” Nor am I convinced it is such a dire development. As it happens, Eric Rothschild, the Pepper Hamilton attorney who argued Kitzmiller v. Dover, is speaking in my community this Friday night. During Q&A, I will ask him what impact he sees from H.R. 2679. Specifically, if he and his firm had a Dover-like case next month, could and would they take it?
You call that agnostic?
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