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Where the Christian Right Meets Neo-Confederacy [Updated]
By Frederick ClarksonWed Jan 04, 2006 at 01:53:02 AM EST
topic: section:Diary printable version print this story
"It may be tempting to see Roy Moore as an exception" I wrote in the current issue of The Public Eye magazine, about the man best known as 'the ten commandments judge,'
but his rise is reviving old coalitions. In 2004, his former spokesman and legal advisor, Tom Parker, was elected as an Associate Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court. At Parker's request, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas made the trek to Montgomery to swear him in. Exjudge Moore then also swore him in. "The Chief's courage to stand for principle over personal position inspired me and animated voters during my campaign for the Alabama Supreme Court" said Parker. "So, I have been doubly blessed to have been sworn into office by two heroes of the judiciary."  But Parker's politics has additional roots in the politics of the former Governor George] Wallace era.
He has ties to neoconfederate organizations such as the Council of Conservative Citizens and the white supremacist League of the South.
A January 1, 2006 op-ed by Parker from The Birmingham News, is currently posted over at the Alliance Defense Fund, a key Christian Right legal strategy organization. Parker starts out with a breathtaking assertion, by contemporary standards, regarding the Alabama Supreme Court's recent overturning of a death sentence of a juvenile.  He declares that the Alabama court should ignore the U.S. Supreme Court's ban on juvenille executions because it is "the unconstitutional opinion of five liberal justices on the U.S. Supreme Court," and is therefore not binding. He invokes the discredited notion of "interposition," which argues that the states may defy the decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court. But a diarist on The Daily Kos has an excellent analysis of Parker's piece, noting Parker's neo-confederate ties -- and neo-confederate legal theory. Here is a taste:

When Justice Parker calls for Alabama to interpose its authority on that of the Supreme Court, he not only flouts the Constitution, but he also proclaims his allegiance to the same lawless arguments which drove post-Brown resistence to integration.  Given his ties to white supremacy, this shouldn't come as a surprise.
Check out the whole piece.

In Parker's op-ed he also repeats a refrain I have heard from Christian Reconstructionist leaders of the Constitution Party, the third largest political party in the U.S. (Christian Reconstructionists generally believe in creating an Old Testament style theocracy based on what they call "Biblical Law.") Parker claims that decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court "bind only the parties to the particular case." So for example, since in thier view, like Parker's Supreme Court decisions apply only to the parties before them and do not constitute the law of the land, then Constitution Party candidates for president and vice-president argued in speeches and in a press conference after thier nominations that states should not view Roe v. Wade as the law of the land; that state or local officials should shut down clincs and prosecute doctors for murder. I wrote about this the following year in Eternal Hostility: The Struggle Between Theocracy and Democracy in 1997.

[Howard] Phillips and [Herb]Titus argued that Roe v. Wade and other Supreme Court decisions are unconstitutional and should be neither enforced nor obeyed. These decisions included overturning the "male only" admissions policy a the state sponsored Virginia Military Institute, and declaring unconstitutional Colorado's Amendment 2, which would have barred localities from enacting civil rights protections for gays and lesbians. Titus said that if he and Phillips were elected they would appoint federal district attorneys who would prosecute abortion providers on murder charges. Although a candidate espousing such views may never be elected, similar opinions are beginning to enter higher levels of public discourse."


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Where the Christian Right Meets Neo-Confederacy [Updated] | 6 comments (6 topical, 0 hidden)
Good to see this out in the open (none / 0)
I'm REALLY glad this is getting more exposure--I've been saying for months if people knew about the many, many links between the dominionist movement and outright racist and "militia" groups it would likely put serious hurt on the dominionist movement as a whole.

I myself have made a number of posts here regarding dominionism and its links to racist and militia activity.  The links with racism go all the way back to the birth of premillenial dispensationalism and the beginnings of dominion theology within the word-faith movement, but the two posts I've made of note on this are regarding a major dominionist church in Chicagoland (which also is heavily involved in the dominionist "homeschool" correspondence-school movement) and multiple groups like the Chicago Minutemen, Chaldecon and American Vision) as well as a plethora of links between dominionist groups (including the Family Research Council) and racist groups.

Of note, the major group that has monitored links between the dominionist movement and racism--the Southern Poverty Law Center--has actually listed several dominionist groups in and of themselves as hate groups.  Chaldecon, American Vision, and Family Research Institute are now considered hate orgs--and the SPLC is taking much more of an interest in dominionism as a result.

It should also be noted that dominionist groups have even indulged in one of the vilest forms of racism--outright Holocaust Revisionism.  This link notes how a book popular in dominionist circles--and actively promoted by the American Family Association, especially its state affiliates--claims that the LGBT population of Germany was not targeted in the Holocaust, and in fact claims the gay community were the very architects of it. :P

Seriously, I'd recommend contacting the Southern Poverty Law Center if you've any interest in documenting these links :3

by dogemperor on Wed Jan 04, 2006 at 08:56:18 AM EST


Where the Christian Right meets . . . (none / 0)
. . . full-blown psychosis.

Meet Larry Kilgore, who bills himself as a GOP challenger to Texas Governor Rick Perry.

On the issues, this "God-fearing man" who "loves God and others" supports execution for abortion, adultery and "homosexual acts," although illegal immigrants would be dealt with more leniently -- a minimum punishment of five lashes, a $3,000 fine & deportation.  

Kilgore boasts of endorsements from "Christians" such as Flip Benham and several others from OR/OSA , Dave Daubenmire of Minutemen United, and Dr. Patrick Johnston of Ohio's Constitution Party and even less savory affiliations.

Just when you think that nobody could be worse than Rick Perry . . .

by moiv on Fri Jan 06, 2006 at 02:13:28 AM EST

yes (none / 0)
He is running as an independent. I had heard about him and plan to write about him at some point -- unless you are of a mind to do it first!

by Frederick Clarkson on Fri Jan 06, 2006 at 03:58:16 AM EST
[ Parent ]
I have something else to do (none / 0)
before starting on Kilgore and his OSA/AOG friends, so I guess we'll see which of us gets around to him first. ;-)

BTW, I was scolded by a commenter on another site who claims to be politically well connected that it wasn't wise to "link" the "anti-choice" position with suppression of access to contraception in Texas, because that isn't the intention of those who are deliberately and repeatedly doing exactly that.

If they don't like being linked to it, they could always stop doing it.  

by moiv on Sat Jan 07, 2006 at 12:46:44 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Yeah (none / 0)
you gotta hand it to all those politically well connected folks. So umm, how are they doing in the area of the defense of reproductive rights in all that that encompasses?  

Seems to me that this person has bought the frame of the other side and would be "wise" to get a clue.

by Frederick Clarkson on Sat Jan 07, 2006 at 02:31:06 PM EST
[ Parent ]





confederacy (none / 0)
On my site www.livingston.net/wilkyjr you will find an article on the Old South and the Religious Right.  You will note the footnote to Chalcedon's magazine a few years back.  I still have the issue which suggests the real glory days of the Nation were the Antebellum South.  In my files I have several catalogues from a Reconstructionist/type publishing house for home schoolers.  It has several books on the "real" causes of the Civil War.  A war in which Rushdoony believed was a Unitarian North against a Calvanist South.  

by wilkyjr on Tue Jan 17, 2006 at 02:25:05 PM EST

Where the Christian Right Meets Neo-Confederacy [Updated] | 6 comments (6 topical, 0 hidden)
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(image: detail from Francoise Dubois' rendition of the Bartholomew's Day Massacre reveals the actual nature of religious warfare)

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