AU PROFESSOR'S BOOK ABOUT RISE OF NEW CHRISTIAN RIGHT RECEIVES NATIONAL HONORS

A recent book on the conflict between church and state in America's courts has won a national award for its author, Steven P. Brown, an associate professor of political science at Auburn University.

Brown's book, "Trumping Religion: The New Christian Right, the Free Speech Clause and the Courts," won the Franklyn S. Haiman Award for Distinguished Scholarship in Freedom of Expression from the National Communication Association. The annual award from the nation's largest group of communication scholars recognizes ground-breaking research and writing in the social sciences on the subject of free speech.

Brown, who teaches constitutional law at Auburn, avoids choosing sides in his analysis of one of the most divisive issues in American politics over the past quarter century. Instead, he presents a detailed analysis of the extent to which federal courts have set the stage for and then been drawn into heated political battles between liberals and conservatives over separation of church and state in the public sector.

The book, published in 2002 by the University of Alabama Press, examines the counteroffensive that five major public interest law firms have mounted since 1980 in response to restrictions placed by the U.S. Supreme Court on religious expression in the public sector in the 1960s and '70s. Those restrictions, which ended nearly two centuries of accommodating religion in the public sector, came at the behest of the political left such as the American Civil Liberties Union, prompting political and religious groups on the right to organize and fight back in the courts.

"Conservative religious interest groups began organizing to oppose the ACLU because they felt that no one was standing up for their rights," said Brown, who holds a Ph.D. in government from the University of Virginia.

After failing to persuade federal courts to relax their rulings against officially sanctioned religious expression in public schools, a conservative coalition of law firms, including the American Center for Law and Justice, also known as the ACLJ, began winning cases with arguments and strategies that the ACLU had long claimed as its own: freedom of speech and freedom from discrimination.

Rather than claiming rights under the establishment and free exercise clauses of the U.S. Constitution, the conservative groups staked a claim to the freedom of speech rights under the First Amendment. They argued those rights in the courts and, more often, before school boards and local governments when test cases presented themselves. More often than not, Brown said, the mere threat of legal action was sufficient for the conservative groups to achieve their goals.

"Conservatives argued that they have the same rights as anyone else to organize and express themselves in public institutions," said Brown. "In a number of cases, they have prevailed in the courts with the argument on behalf of the free-speech right to self-expression."

But, he added, "The downside is that this is the same argument used for liberal causes. Gay rights groups, for instance, use the same argument in their attempt to organize and express themselves in the public sector."

Thus, despite winning victories in court, the conservative religious coalition created a precedent that has aided liberal causes that are anathema to many religious conservatives.

To succeed in politics and the courts, conservative religious groups adopted some of the same organizational, fund-raising and political tactics that had been successful for liberal groups in the 1960s and ‘70s, and the result has been the same. "Powerful interest groups, in general, tend to be excessive in their rhetoric, and they play political hardball," he said.

"Unfortunately, an environment in which no one is willing to compromise is not good for political dialogue," he added. "Most people are in the middle on these issues, but the ones at the ends of the political spectrum carry on the dialogue."

Since both the conservative groups and their liberal opponents are well-financed and are absolute in their views, they frequently carry their battles from the political arena to the courts, especially when one or the other believes it can achieve results quicker there.

"There is a danger that the free speech issue could cheapen religion, especially if you have to make the argument that religious expression is just another form of expression," Brown said. "Under that circumstance, you could win the battle but lose the war."