WINTER 2015 The Public Eye

Also in this issue: Meet the Patriarch of Polly Williams and the the Anti-Abortion School Privatization Movement Juggernaut editor’s letter

THE PUBLIC EYE Shining a Light on the Right QUARTERLY PUBLISHER Tarso Luís Ramos t this writing, the U.S. Congress had just begun its 2015 legislative ses- GUEST EDITOR sion. On conservatives’ wish list is expanding access to privately run Mariya Strauss charter schools, plus other means of privatizing public education. The COVER ART 114th Congress will consider other ways to roll back people’s rights. Of Meredith Stern Athe bills introduced in the first days, five would restrict access to abortion; two PRINTING would countermand President Obama’s 2014 executive actions to ease deporta- Red Sun Press tions; and one, CISPA (which Obama supports), would let the federal government EDITORIAL BOARD order corporations to hand over private user data. Frederick Clarkson We have perhaps become too accustomed to such curtailing of civil liberties and Alex DiBranco surveillance by our government. But despite all of the government’s surveillance Jean Hardisty of #BlackLivesMatter protestors, American Muslims, unionists, and other nonvio- Kapya Kaoma lent activists, it falls to us to monitor the Right. Tarso Luís Ramos Researching the Right remains a difficult job. PRA’s research staff and the jour- Rachel Tabachnick nalists who write for The Public Eye must listen to the words of anti-LGBTQ or anti-abortion speakers, attend conservative-voter conferences where right-wing The Public Eye is published by propaganda circulates, and sift through documents to find evidence that proves Political Research Associates someone is connected to a faction on the Right. We publish blog posts, op-eds and investigative articles in the hope that readers will heed our call to action. Tarso Luís Ramos Executive Director Our muckraking work continues to meet the need for activists and organizers to see and understand how the Right is undermining progress. We will continue to Theresa Blackman Operations Coordinator bring you the intelligence we have gathered about the Right and hope that you will share it widely and use it to build strategies for justice. Eric Ethington Communications Director It has been my privilege and pleasure to edit these two issues of The Public Eye. Inside this issue, you will find the type of unique storytelling, investigation, and Kapya Kaoma Religion and Sexuality Researcher analysis of the Right that is The Public Eye’s specialty. Mark Brown First, a dispatch from the school reform wars by PRA research fellow Rachel Finance Manager Tabachnick: the story of Polly Williams, an African American state lawmaker from Kassia Palys Milwaukee who helped birth the nation’s first school voucher program, and who Development Associate later became disillusioned by the profit-driven agenda of her wealthy conservative L. Cole Parke backers. Williams’ story illustrates how school privatization promoters are eager Gender Justice Researcher to partner with leaders who reflect the communities historically underserved by Mariya Strauss public schools—such as Black and Latino communities—so long as those leaders’ Economic Justice Researcher policies do not diverge from the privatizers’ agenda. Rebecca Suldan Next is PRA researcher L. Cole Parke’s debut investigative article, digging into Program Coordinator

the World Congress of Families (WCF), a global Religious Right network. While Fellows many Christian Right groups have claimed that being anti-LGBTQ and anti-abor- T.F. Charlton tion rights simply matches their “values,” WCF has a strategy to codify such ex- Frederick Clarkson clusionary “values” into the laws of nations. With a cadre of supporters inside the Spencer Sunshine United Nations, and a message that the “natural family” as defined by WCF is the Rachel Tabachnick only one that should be legally recognized, WCF has helped get laws passed in Rus- Interns sia, Nigeria, Poland, and Australia that could lead to persecution of LGBTQ people Kelsey Howe • Jacey Rubinstein

and women. Board of Directors Finally, journalist Robin Marty profiles Joe Scheidler, the octogenarian founder Dania Rajendra, Chair of the Pro-Life Action League. Scheidler is credited with inventing many of the tac- Katherine Acey • Janet Jakobsen tics used by the current anti-abortion movement to harass and intimidate women Hamid Khan • Maria Elena Letona and providers at clinics. Marty connects Scheidler’s 1980s blueprint with the tac- Scot Nakagawa • Zeke Spier tics that characterize today’s anti-abortion activism. Jean V. Hardisty, Ph.D. Please read and share these articles widely. As always, we welcome reader feed- Founder And President Emerita back, both in our pages and on social media. We hope you will use these long win- ter nights for gathering, strategizing, and recharging; we will see you in the spring. 1310 Broadway, Suite 201 Somerville, MA 02144-1837 Thank you for all that you do, Tel: 617.666.5300 [email protected] © Political Research Associates, 2015 Mariya Strauss All rights reserved. ISSN 0275-9322 Guest Editor ISSUE 81 www.politicalresearch.org letters to the editor

Where Conservative and Neoliberal “Feminists” Agree

was pleased to see Sarah Jaffe’s article (“Neoliberal Feminists Don’t Want Women to Organize,” Fall 2014) opening up a conversation on neoliberal feminism. PRA should take it further in considering the direct parallels with right-wing ideology. Right-wing anti-feminists, like Phyllis Schlafly, traditionally overtly oppose equality and insist that wom- Ien belong in the home. Conservative Christian teachings of wifely submission and male leadership underlie organizations such as the Promise Keepers, a Christian men’s fellowship, and the Quiverfull movement. But another brand of conservative women’s activism increasingly insists that individual women can make it whenever they choose—and is even bent on reclaiming the term “feminism.” Even if these conservatives osten- sibly take issue with Democrat Sheryl Sandberg’s emphasis on careerism in Lean In, their rhetoric and policy mirrors that of neoliberal feminism. Consider the remarks made at a 2014 conservative women’s conference reported on by the National Review, in an article entitled “The Next Generation of Conservative Women.” “We will reach parity when we want it, when we choose it,” said Penny Nance, CEO and President of Concerned Women for America, one of the largest Christian Right advocacy organizations. “Women succeed though op- portunity, free markets and hard work, not through dependence on the government or through socialist poli- cies,” asserted Katie Pavlich, a right-wing writer. Abby Scher [Ed. note: Scher is a former editor of The Public Eye] writes in “Post-Palin Feminism” that until the catalyst of Sarah Palin’s vice-presidential candidacy, the neoconservative Independent Women’s Forum (IWF) was “the lonely home of the ‘free market’ feminists who say the key issue is choice and women now have choice so why complain?” IWF touts the idea of a “limited government feminist” and decries feminists who argue wom- en face discrimination. “Like other conservatives, they see it as up to the individual to compete in the market, no matter what background or resources they bring to bear,” writes Scher. In January 2013, IWF spotlighted one of my former classmates, Emily Esfahani Smith, for its “Modern Femi- nist” feature. Former editor-in-chief of the right-leaning Dartmouth Review, Smith cites Who Stole Feminism as a favorite book. In it, author Christina Hoff Sommers declares, “American feminism is currently dominated by a group of women who seek to persuade the public that American women are not the free creatures we think we are.” While IWF refused to take a stance on “family values” issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage, the Christian Right organizations now taking up the “free-market feminist” theme dangerously merge these issues. Scher concludes, “This is in keeping with the efforts of both the Heritage Foundation and the Christian Right’s Family Research Council (FRC) in explicitly promoting a free market and ‘small government’ ideology among evangelicals and the Christian Right.” Keying off of Sandberg’s book, Carrie Lukas, IWF managing director, said that what women really need is for government to “lean out.” Lukas condemns all workplace regulations, including sick day and family leave requirements, as interfering with female employees’ ability to negotiate a flexible contract. For Lukas, it would be ideal if women’s success in the workplace relied purely on their assertiveness and choice. Yet without the support of collective action, many women lack leverage and power over their individual em- ployment situations. So whose legislative agendas are served by Lean In’s arguments? Jaffe accuses neoliberal feminism of “ignor[ing] class as a determining issue in women’s lives.” Such statements could as accurately apply to right-wing feminism. As Katie McDonough criticizes in Salon, Sandberg’s Lean In Foundation even celebrated as a trailblazer a Re- publican congresswoman who consistently opposes equal pay laws and reproductive rights. While McDonough claims this is “antithetical to the organization’s mission,” Jaffe’s explanation of neoliberal feminism makes intel- ligible the support for a female politician that slashes at women’s ability to succeed and thrive. On the topic of reproductive rights, an entire article could be written on how prochoice ideology fits into neo- liberal feminism, but I’ll leave that to another time. -Alex DiBranco New Haven, CT [Ed. note: Alex DiBranco is a current member of The Public Eye’s editorial board and is the former communications director at PRA.]

1310 Broadway, Suite 201 1. Alexa Moutevelis Coombs, “The Next Generation of Conservative Women,” National Review, June 26, 2014, Somerville, MA 02144-1837 http://www.nationalreview.com/article/381324/next-generation-conservative-women-alexa-moutevelis- Tel: 617.666.5300 coombs. [email protected] © Political Research Associates, 2015 2. Abby Scher, “Post-Palin Feminism,” The Public Eye (Winter 2008), http://www.politicalresearch. All rights reserved. ISSN 0275-9322 org/2008/12/06/post-palin-feminism/. ISSUE 81

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 1 BY RACHEL TABACHNICK

Opening Pandora’s Box Polly Williams’ Doomed Partnership with the Education Privatization Movement

Polly Williams, the Wisconsin African American lawmaker behind the nation’s first school voucher program, believed vouchers could help students of color in urban Milwaukee. Conservative donors and right- wing think tanks saw her program as opening the door to the privatization of public education. Education reform has come to mean different things to different people: from improving public education to privatizing it out of existence. Young students in Philadelphia in 2011 demonstrate support for privatization programs. Image via Pennlive.com. Photo used with the permission of PA Media Group ©2011. All rights reserved.

olly Williams, the “mother of students. Vouchers, once stigmatized expanded over time to employ “universal school choice,” passed away by their use in fighting integration of vouchers”, or vouchers for students of on November 9, 2014. The schools, are being marketed as the ve- families in all income brackets, and ulti- moniker dates back to the late hicle of a “New Civil Rights Movement.” mately the privatization of public educa- 1980s, when Williams broke Polly Williams became an instant ce- tion. Pranks with her fellow African American lebrity within the conservative-dominat- But by the late 1990s, Williams had and Democratic state legislators to part- ed world of school vouchers, although been pushed aside, just as she feared ner with conservatives on Milwaukee’s she did not share their privatization that students of color from low-income school voucher program, the first of agenda. Williams supported a limited families would be pushed aside by the its kind in the nation.1 The Milwaukee program targeting the city’s poorest fam- diverging agenda of her White conserva- voucher program was signed into law in ilies, sometimes referred to as “charity tive partners. Within a few years, Wil- 1990 by Republican Governor Tommy vouchers” or compensatory vouchers3 by liams was ridiculed by her former allies, Thompson.2 A quarter-century later, her conservative allies. Those allies saw described as “irrelevant” and no longer conservative pro-privatization funders an opportunity to use urban students of useful. and advocates continue to advance their color as a wedge to break down the alli- Nevertheless, upon her death, the free-market agenda as if it is the salva- ances defending public education. They school privatization leaders and organi- tion of the nation’s most underserved also viewed it as an opening that could be zations reclaimed her—memorializing

2 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 BY RACHEL TABACHNICK her for her role as a pioneer while omit- illuminate the elite networks that are as an economic incentive. She described ting her later disillusionment with the funding and paving the way for edu- the existing independent Black schools movement. cational policy to be radically altered as being the result of a social need, not Williams’ alienation from the move- along business models.5 a business venture. “If you put on it this ment she helped birth offers a cautionary idea that each kid will bring a certain tale for those who believe that vouchers, The neoliberal privatization move- amount of money, it will change that,” tuition tax credits for private schools—or ment has presented “choice” as a civil Ratteray warned.7 Her words proved pro- even quasi-public charter schools—may rights effort—and as the only option for phetic. offer a magic bullet to equitable- educa changing the status quo for these his- tion for underserved urban children. torically underserved students of color. It does so despite the preponderance of “SCHOOL CHOICES” OR evidence that, as the authors of one edu- OPPORTUNITIES FOR PROFIT WHOSE INTERESTS ARE SERVED? cational study from 2002 wrote, “school The term “school choice” encompasses a In 1995, Milton Friedman, an economist choice, on average, does not produce the broad range of programs, from charter and the intellectual dean of the school equity and social justice that proponents schools to vouchers. The more accurate privatization movement, stated, “Vouch- spin.”6 term, “private school choice,” refers to ers are not an end in themselves; they From the time of desegregation for- programs that use public funding to pay are a means to make a transition from a ward, disillusionment with integration or subsidize tuition for private school government to a market system.” School and the failure to improve education students. “Public school choice,” mean- privatization’s “New Civil Rights” theme in many urban communities led to the while, includes a variety of programs appears to be little more than a public re- development of “independent black that allow students to attend schools lations campaign that camouflages this schools.” These were neighborhood pri- outside their assigned district, magnet shift. Privatization advocates and their vate schools owned and operated by Afri- schools, and charter schools, the single funders have appropriated the language can Americans, often run on shoestring most rapidly expanding sector of choice. of civil rights and use the dissatisfaction budgets, and often featuring Afrocentric (Charters are technically public but are of underserved communities to promote or multicultural curricula. In 1984, Dr. independently operated, sometimes by the marketization of public education, Joan Davis Ratteray founded the Institute for-profit corporations, and are exempt an agenda that promises to leave many for Independent Education to organize from many state and local regulations. students of color behind. these schools, which numbered almost See related sidebar, “Monetizing Charter Our nation has “consistently and pur- 300 by 1990 and were attended primar- Schools.”) posefully underserved students of col- ily by the children of Black middle-class In the category of “private school or,” notes Julian Vasquez Heilig, Profes- parents. choice,” there are now approximately 40 sor of Educational Policy and Planning Polly Williams sent her children to one programs in 19 states, plus Washington, at University of Texas-Austin, in a 2013 of Milwaukee’s independent, nonsectar- DC, and state legislatures are continuing Texas Education Review article on the cur- ian, Black private schools. Hoping to to introduce bills for new or expanded rent reframing of school choice as a civil expand access for poor students whose programs. Advocates claim there is great rights issue.4 Heilig adds that the school parents could not afford the tuition, public demand, despite the fact that a choice movement depends heavily on Af- Williams advocated for a voucher pro- 2013 Gallup poll indicated that opposi- rican American and Latino leaders such gram that would be limited to the low- tion to the use of public funds for private as Williams. Janelle Scott, a professor in est income families and to nonsectarian schools is at 70%, its highest level ever the graduate school of education and the schools. She was, from the outset, con- recorded in that survey.8 African American Studies Department cerned that raising income caps and in- What’s more, as documentation ac- at the University of California-Berkeley, cluding religious schools within voucher cumulates showing that vouchers have writes in Critical Studies in Education programs would again leave behind the failed to improve education outcomes, about the tension between exposing the poorest students. privatization advocates increasingly drivers of privatization while simultane- Yet once Williams opened the door, point to the budget savings that these ously understanding the limited options the juggernaut of privatization began to programs supposedly provide.9 of underserved urban families: roll through—a movement that blames In addition to vouchers, the category teachers and teachers’ unions for low of private school choice now includes In raising questions about the lack educational outcomes of students in un- tuition tax credit programs, a legisla- of commitment to eradicating struc- derserved schools and fails to address tive maneuver that lets business redirect tural inequalities by the managers (or even rejects) the role of structural in- taxes owed to the state toward “schol- of choice, I do not denigrate the in- equalities in these same communities. arships” for student tuition at private dividual choices parents of color are Ratteray was also a school choice sup- and religious schools. These tax credit making for their children within the porter, and wrote a rousing op-ed in the programs, sometimes referred to as policy framework largely dictated by New York Times supporting it. However, “neovouchers” or back-door vouchers, an elite invested in privatizing public as the experiment in Milwaukee came to have received less public scrutiny than education ... What is important is to fruition, Ratteray grew wary of vouchers vouchers, even as they currently com-

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 3 prise the largest private school choice should automatically raise red flags for son reduced the scope of his statewide programs in numbers of students. (See progressives. voucher plan for 1989 to include only related sidebar on tax credit programs.) “In retrospect, it seems strange that so non-sectarian schools in Milwaukee many liberals bought an idea that ema- County. Thompson assured voucher ad- SCHOOL CHOICE’S SEGREGATIONIST nated from conservative think tanks and vocates that once the bill passed, the pro- ROOTS conservative thinkers,” education schol- gram could be expanded. Before African American and Latino ar and anti-privatization activist Diane Polly Williams rejected Thompson’s 14 children became the focus of a multi- Ravitch wrote. plan, but she introduced a bill that would million dollar, pro-privatization public pass and be signed into law in April relations campaign, vouchers had a dis- WILLIAMS’ “UNHOLY ALLIANCE” 1990: the Milwaukee Parental Choice tinctly racist heritage. As author Kevin Annette “Polly” Williams was elected to Program (MPCP). (Thompson even held Kruse explains in White Flight: Atlanta the Wisconsin State Assembly in 1980 a symbolic re-enactment of the signing and the Making of Modern Conservatism, and served until 2010. She also ran the in one of Milwaukee’s independent Black vouchers were part of a deliberate strat- 1984 and 1988 Wisconsin statewide community schools.) egy in the 1950s and 1960s to circum- campaigns for Rev. Jesse Jackson’s presi- Virtually overnight, Williams became vent school desegregation: “In the event dential bid. In the late 1980s, despite in- the public face of the pro-voucher move- of court-ordered desegregation, school tense objections from her fellow Demo- ment, speaking at conservative bastions buildings would be closed, and students cratic legislators and organizations such like the Heritage Foundation, Hoover would instead receive grants to attend as the NAACP, Williams joined forces Institute, and the California State Re- private, segregated schools.”10 with conservatives to push through the publican Convention. Williams also gave “Massive Resistance” was the name nation’s first voucher program. high-profile interviews, including one adopted by the united effort of White From the 1960s through the 1980s, ac- on 60 Minutes and one with Rep. Newt leaders and politicians to prevent de- tivists and legislators proposed a variety Gingrich’s GOPAC, which aired on the 16 segregation. “Freedom-of-choice” plans of programs to provide public funding to Christian Broadcast Network. were used in several states to perpetuate Milwaukee’s independent Black private In his book Freedom of Choice: Vouchers segregation, as they allowed students schools, some of which were in serious in American Education, author Jim Carl to “choose” their school while, in effect, financial jeopardy. Activists in the effort noted that there was a moment when retaining segregated Black and White were largely liberal until the 1980s and it seemed that conservatives and liber- schools.11 1990s, when conservatives and religious als might converge in agreement on the Some locations followed through with leaders began to capitalize on the idea concept of compensatory vouchers. Carl their threats to close public schools. as a model that could open the door to a described it as a program “with attributes Prince Edward County, in Virginia, larger voucher program. originally championed by left-liberal pol- closed down its entire public school sys- In addition to her Republican allies in icy makers, free-school advocates, and 17 tem from 1959 to 1964. Prince Edward the state legislature, Williams’ partner- community activists from the 1960s.” only reopened integrated schools follow- ships with conservatives included the But, as Carl points out, “social conser- ing the Supreme Court’s 1964 ruling in Bradley Foundation and its former presi- vatives of various stripes did not wish Griffin v. County School Board of Prince -Ed dent Michael Joyce; former GOP Wiscon- to stop at nonsectarian, compensatory 18 ward County that Virginia’s tuition grants sin Governor Tommy Thompson, a cham- vouchers.” for sending white students to private pion of conservative welfare reform; and Likewise, it would not be long before schools were unconstitutional.12 George and Susan Mitchell, Wisconsin’s the agenda of Polly Williams and that of The privatization agenda was birthed leading pro-voucher advocates. (Wil- her conservative allies would diverge. by segregationists in the 1950s, but it was liams described these partnerships as an kept alive in subsequent decades by Mil- “unholy alliance” in an interview with THE ALIENATION OF POLLY WILLIAMS ton Friedman and sustained by wealthy the Heartland Institute, an interview Of all the partners in the “unholy alli- conservative donors (and the infrastruc- in which she was also described as the ance,” Michael Joyce and the Bradley ture built with their dollars). School “Rosa Parks of vouchers.”15) Foundation were among the most un- privatization became a key part of the In 1988, Gov. Thompson vetoed leg- likely allies for the African American “devolution” of government, advocated islation to increase funding for the Mil- community. The Bradley Foundation by conservative think tanks like the Heri- waukee Public Schools (MPS) and pro- had been a longtime funder of author tage Foundation, Manhattan Institute, vide additional teachers to reduce class Charles Murray, including his book The Cato Institute, Heartland Institute, and size—but he included a voucher program Bell Curve and its discredited theory of the 50-state network of self-described proposal in his state budget. The Bradley Black intellectual inferiority. For de- “free market” think tanks coordinated Foundation provided research, polls, cades, the Bradley Foundation has been through the State Policy Network.13 The publications, and a legal defense of the at the epicenter of reactionary policies, names of the major funders of school voucher program. including welfare reform, opposition choice, including the Bradley Founda- In an effort to make the plan more pal- to affirmative action, and claims that tion and the DeVos and Walton families, atable to Wisconsin legislators, Thomp- “moral poverty,” rather than structural

4 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 inequity, is the source of social ills in land Institute addressing education and build the myth of school privatiza- poor urban communities. The Bradley policy. Clowes later wrote a report for tion as a cheaper education alternative.24 Foundation has also provided millions Heartland responding to the lack of im- As Williams went public with her to the Heritage Foundation, Heartland provement in educational outcomes in complaints, the conservative backlash Institute, Free Congress Foundation, and the Milwaukee voucher program and dis- mounted. From 1990 to 1997, Williams other conservative think tanks.19 illusionment of some school reformers. received speaking honorariums and ex- In 1992, the Bradley Foundation col- Referencing Milton Friedman, Clowes penses totaling $163,000, more than laborated with Partners Advancing Val- called for a shift from “charity vouchers” any other Wisconsin legislator. By 2000, ues in Education (PAVE), a nondenomi- for needy students to universal vouchers. this figure had dropped to just $400.25 national organization founded from the Journalist Bruce Murphy, who pub- In 1998, Williams gave a frank inter- dissolution of the view for a chapter in Milwaukee Archdi- The Politics of School ocesan Educational Choice, co-written Foundation.20 Fund- Williams became the public face of the pro-voucher by a professor at Re- ed by Bradley and sev- movement, speaking at such conservative bastions gent University. Wil- eral Wisconsin busi- liams expressed her nesses, the program as the Heritage Foundation, Hoover Institute, and concern that school provided vouchers the California State Republican Convention. Yet as choice was becoming for students, includ- a program for middle- ing those attending Williams went public with her concerns about the class Whites who did religious schools, raising of income caps and universal vouchers, the not need public assis- and was designed to conservative backlash mounted. tance: “ratchet support for expanding the pub- The whites that pro- licly funded choice mote Reverend Floyd program.”21 To garner Flake (school choice Protestant and Jewish advocate in Jamaica, support, the new pro- Queens, New York) gram was not limited are out to replace to Catholics. In 1995, public education for Gov. Thompson fol- their own children, lowed through with not for blacks. I have his plans to gradually a black agenda for extend the program, black parents.26 and by the 1998-99 school year, 70% of Michael Joyce, of the students in the the Bradley Founda- MPCP attended reli- tion, had formerly gious schools.22 claimed that “the Williams was also Lord God” had led concerned about the him to support Wil- 27 raising of income liams. By 2001, caps for the voucher however, Joyce Polly Williams speaks about school choice programs in Wisconsin in 1998. program, as this grad- claimed that Wil- Photo by Meg Jones and courtesy of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. ually shifted funding liams had told him toward families who she didn’t much like were already send- White folks, and that ing their children to private schools. She lished a 2001 article about Williams and she kept referring to school choice as “a 28 objected to universal vouchers, stating, her growing disillusionment with Mil- Catholic movement.” Joyce added, “She “Eventually, low-income families would waukee’s program, wrote that Williams was poised to be and could have been the be weeded out due to the large volume of understood school choice as an experi- leader of school choice. But she stepped families wanting to participate.”23 ment. “Our intent was never to destroy aside and Fuller became the leader.” In a 2002 interview, Williams ex- the public schools,” Williams told Mur- Fuller is Dr. Howard Fuller, who re- plained the parameters under which she phy. Murphy, himself a former teacher placed Polly Williams as the African supported vouchers and which, by that and principal at one of Milwaukee’s inde- American standard-bearer for the move- time, had led to rifts with her former al- pendent Black private schools, describes ment. Fuller and Williams attended the lies. Ironically, the interview was with the conservative strategy as a “two-fer”— same high school, and later shared con- George Clowes, senior fellow at Heart- an agenda to eliminate teachers’ unions cern about the future of underserved

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 5 children in Milwaukee as well as their opposition to universal vouchers. What Are Tuition Tax Credit Programs? Fuller is a former superintendent of the Milwaukee Public Schools with a pre- Tuition tax credit programs, sometimes called neovouchers, are “private school vious history as a Black nationalist. In choice” programs.1 Individuals or corporations receive credit against their state taxes 1969, using the name Owusu Sadukai, for funding “scholarships” used to pay private school tuition (or to attend a public Fuller initiated Malcolm X Liberation University “as a way of providing Black school outside the student’s district). The largest corporate tax credit program in dol- students with a revolutionary alternative lars and in numbers of students is in Florida, where companies can receive a 100% to mainstream Black colleges.”29 credit against their state taxes for the amount given to the nonprofits, which distrib- In 1995, Fuller became the director of ute the tuition funds. the Bradley Foundation-funded Institute for the Transformation of Learning at Businesses are often lauded in local papers for their “donations,” but these contribu- Marquette University and founded the tions cost the company nothing in states with a 100% credit, and very little or noth- Black Alliance for Educational Options, ing in states like Pennsylvania, where a company is credited 75% for a one-year and also heavily funded by Bradley and by 90% for a two-year contribution (plus federal deduction). Claims of tax savings for Walmart heir John Walton.30 Fuller con- states have largely been based on one 2008 Florida report in which key figures af- tinues today to serve as a major spokes- fecting the calculation were admitted to be guesses by the authoring agency.2 person for school choice and is currently on several boards, including the Milwau- Most of the 14 states with tax credit programs do not require the participating kee Region Teach for America. schools to administer standardized tests or adhere to requirements on curriculum Meanwhile, by 2006, Williams had and teacher qualifications. The majority of these students attend religious schools shifted her efforts to supporting her (currently 81.5% in Florida). While many of these schools are excellent, a significant city’s public school system. She formed percentage use Christian fundamentalist curricula, (such as A Beka, Bob Jones Uni- the African American Education Coun- versity Press and other textbooks) that promote Young Earth creationism, hostility cil and worked with Milwaukee’s teach- ers’ union, the Milwaukee Teachers toward other religions, and revisionist history. Education Association (MTEA), and the Milwaukee Board of School Directors to Monetizing Charter Schools develop a strategic plan for improving MPS.31 Charter schools are technically a “public school choice,” but operated by an outside Following the election of Republican group that is not bound by some of the same local and state regulations as tradi- Gov. Scott Walker in 2010 and his efforts 1 tional public schools. Today charter schools are the fastest growing sector of school to dramatically expand the voucher pro- choice, with more than two million students attending over 6,000 charter schools. gram, Williams again vocally objected. “They have hijacked the program,” Wil- Charters were originally intended to foster innovative approaches to teaching in liams said in 2013.32 George Mitchell, a small, autonomous schools. Excellent charter schools exist; overall, however, char- major pro-voucher donor, immediately ters have failed to outperform traditional public schools. According to a recent study, responded, describing Williams as “ir- Pennsylvania charter schools covered less material in both math and reading than relevant” and saying he had had no deal- did traditional public schools (the equivalent of 29 days of reading and 50 days of ings with Williams after about 1994 or math).2 1995.33 “Polly was useful to the school choice movement because of her race Charter schools have become a primary vehicle for the monetization of education. and her party affiliation,” Mitchell told a Although most states require charters to be run by nonprofit organizations, many reporter.34 35 contract out the management of charters to for-profit companies, sometimes with Although Williams was discarded by little separation between the charter board and the for-profit management.3 In some her allies, her name and face were still cases, the buildings and facilities are purchased by the for-profit arm and leased back used throughout conservative media as to the nonprofit, or even resold by the for-profit to an investment company.4 Enter- an African American Democratic sup- tainment Properties, Inc., a publicly traded real estate investment trust (REIT), now porter of school vouchers. Sean Hannity lauded her in his 2002 book Let Freedom owns the buildings and/or facilities of 60 charter schools.5 According to an Ohio in- Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Lib- vestigation, 40 percent of that state’s charter schools pay lease to a for-profit entity eralism. In 2013, Jeanne Allen of the or out-of-state landlord. Rising lease costs are taking increasingly large percentages Center for Education Reform included of the schools’ budgets, with one school paying more than 80 percent of its total Williams on a list of “venerable Davids budget in lease to a for-profit entity.6 against the Goliaths of education.”36 Following her death in November 2014, Polly Williams was memorial-

6 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 ized as the “mother of school choice.” national schools. Both Florida and Penn- indicates that vouchers failed to pro- In a post on the American Federation sylvania tout their tax credit programs as duce improved average educational out- for Children (AFC) website, Chairman providing an opportunity for minority comes, but exacerbated stratification Betsy DeVos described Williams’ legacy students to access a better education. and inequality.44 as living on in the lives of “hundreds of But instead of the Afrocentric curri- Although excellent private schools ex- thousands of children across the country cula supported by Williams and Fuller, ist, multiple studies have dispelled the who benefit from school choice.”37 That the A Beka and Bob Jones University cur- myth that private schools academically post, along with most media coverage of ricula used in many of these schools are outperform public schools on average.45 Williams’ death, omitted any mention of written with little regard for the heritage A 2006 study not only “[challenged] as- her later disillusionment with voucher of children of color. Their textbooks pro- sumptions of private school superiority programs.38 mote nonfactual and revisionist history overall” but also found substantial dif- as well as Young Earth creationism and ferences among various kinds of private THE BAD NEWS ABOUT “CHOICE” climate change denial.41 schools. The poorest performers were The school privatization movement has Most vouchers and neovouchers fund conservative Christian schools. brought together an odd array of political students attending schools with no curri- bedfellows. Some are drawn by the pros- cula requirements or public accountabil- THE “NEW CIVIL RIGHTS” BRAND pects of profiting from the conversion of ity. Georgia’s tax credit program, which In his 2003 book Voucher Wars, attor- education into a multi-billion dollar in- allows for donations from both individu- ney Clint Bolick recounts how he antici- dustry. Others are ideologues, opposed als and corporations, makes it a crimi- pated legal challenges to the Milwaukee to public education on either libertarian nal offense to track how that money is voucher program and contacted Polly or religious grounds. Yet another group spent. Georgia’s program also promised Williams to offer legal representation. is comprised of religious leaders, per- to designate scholarships for students Bolick describes Bradley Foundation haps not ideologically opposed to public in “failing public schools” from low so- president Michael Joyce as having been education but anxious to use vouchers or cioeconomic levels, but as a 2012 New wary of Williams but understanding the neovouchers to fill the desks of their own York Times article exposed, the program “necessity of their temporary alliance”; schools. Ironically, in some districts, has “[benefited] private schools at the he describes Joyce as pursuing school charter schools (see related sidebar) have expense of the neediest children.”42 In choice as “a ‘silver bullet’ issue: the type even drawn students away from private Georgia and elsewhere, these programs of program that could destroy a key pillar religious schools. are showing signs of re-segregating stu- of the welfare state.”46 Recently, more religious leaders have dents by both race and income. Many Bolick was known for his work against promoted privatization programs as a of the students subsidized by these pro- race-based affirmative action. - How way to save religious schools with dwin- grams were already enrolled in private ever, as the need grew for legal defense dling enrollment. The 2011 conference schools. of emerging school choice programs, of the National Leadership Roundtable of Michael W. Apple, a professor at Uni- Bolick turned his attention to it and co- Church Management, a Catholic organi- versity of Wisconsin-Madison School of founded the libertarian, public inter- zation, called for an aggressive strategy Education, says that universal vouch- est law firm Institute for Justice in 1991 to implement tuition tax credit programs ers, or voucher programs for which with seed money from David and Charles or neovouchers in all 50 states. Speaker all income levels are eligible, expose Koch.47 B. J. Cassin, founder of Cassin Educa- the privatization movement’s hidden Branding education privatization as a tional Initiative Foundation, told the au- agenda. “They want to minimize pub- civil rights effort has been a deliberate dience, “Think of the effect if all Catholic lic schools and eventually eliminate as strategy. In his book, Bolick describes schools, not just the ones that we men- many government services, public em- how he helped orchestrate the main- tioned here, had the ability to have this ployees and public institutions as pos- stream media’s first use of civil rights kind of revenue come in [from tax-cred- sible,” writes Apple.43 In Educating the language in defense of school choice its]; it changes the environment com- ‘Right’ Way: Markets, Standards, God, and while discrediting a voucher opponent as pletely.”39 Like many other promoters of Inequality, Apple argues that “placing “blocking the schoolhouse doors to mi- privatization, Cassin frames his agenda schools in a market does not interrupt nority schoolchildren.”48 In 2002, Dick as altruism: “We have a social justice is- the stratification of education, except for DeVos addressed the Heritage Founda- sue that we are presenting, and part of a very limited group of students. Instead, tion, emphasizing the need for his au- that is to eliminate the discrimination of as study after study has shown, existing dience (wealthy, white conservative do- the inner city kids.”40 hierarchies are simply recreated.” nors and activists) to remain behind the In Florida and Pennsylvania, the two International examples include Chile, scenes and have other faces as the public states with the largest private school where vouchers were part of the reforms advocates of school choice.49 choice programs (both are corporate tax initiated during the rule of Augusto Pi- As a 2001 Economist article spelled out, credit programs or neovouchers), many nochet and with the assistance of the the strategy of linking the privatization of the students who receive neovoucher “Chicago Boys,” economists trained un- movement to the wishes and activism of money attend fundamentalist Christian, der Milton Friedman at the University of “poor blacks, not rich whites” has helped conservative evangelical, or nondenomi- Chicago. Research on Chile’s program disguise the people actually behind these

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 7 campaigns.50 like one in 2013 in a local paper51 about a It will send public dollars to backwoods Another primary goal of the priva- minister and his wife who accepted $2.3 churches and ambitious entrepreneurs.” tization movement is to drive a wedge million in taxpayer funding only to close The marketing of both private school between two pillars of the Democratic their Lifeskills Academy abruptly during choice and public charters promises to Party: African American voters and the school year. Although their house escalate over the next two years, mas- teachers’ unions. The same Economist in Wisconsin was foreclosed, the couple querading as the best option for under- article, “Blacks v. Teachers,” touted this moved to a gated community in Flori- served children. This continues even as growing wedge. While the article may da, where they opened another school. traditional public schools are stripped of have been prema- funding, teachers, ture in celebrating art and music pro- the success of both grams, libraries, vouchers and char- Private school choice and public charters continue and more. In Re- ter schools, efforts to masquerade as the best option for underserved framing the Refrain: to drive a wedge be- Choice as a Civil tween Black voters children. As Julian Vasquez Heilig warns, “If you are a Rights Issue, Ju- and the teachers’ ‘choice’ proponent interested in civil rights—understand lian Vasquez Heilig unions have been closes with a warn- remarkably suc- that in markets there are winners and losers. In the ing about where we cessful. case of choice, the long-term losers in a large-scale may be headed: At the 2008 Democratic Na- market-oriented education continue to be historically So if you are a tional Convention, underserved students of color and special populations. “ “choice” proponent for example, a pre- interested in civil convention event rights—understand for the Democrats that in markets for Education Reform (DFER) essentially Available test results showed that in the there are winners became an hour-long attack on teachers’ 2011-2012 school year, only one student and losers. In the case of choice, the unions. At the DNC in 2012, Convention in their Lifeskills Academy tested profi- long-term losers in a large-scale mar- Chairman Antonio Villaraigosa, Newark cient for grade level in reading, and none ket-oriented education continue to be Mayor Cory Booker (now a U.S. Senator), in math. historically underserved students of 54 and Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson Polly Williams bemoaned the co-opt- color and special populations. (and husband of Michelle Rhee), head- ing of her voucher vision by national Heilig continues, “Moving our schools lined a screening of the fictional movie conservative figures, including Grover from the public sector to the private sec- Won’t Back Down, which promotes par- Norquist, William Bennett, and Lamar tor is a false choice.” ent trigger bills, a mechanism for re- Alexander (who was Secretary of Edu- The story of Polly Williams serves as placing unionized public schools with cation from 1991-1993). Now a U.S. a cautionary tale about the dangers of non-union charters. A model bill for the Senator, Lamar Alexander is poised to partnering with school choice donors, “Parent Trigger Act” and much of school take the helm of the Senate Committee politicians, and think tanks. Those con- choice and privatization legislation is de- on Health, Education, Labor, and Pen- cerned about the future of public educa- signed and promoted by the American sions (HELP). In early 2014, Alexander tion should not be fooled: the agenda of Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, introduced a bill in the Senate that would these players is about privatization and which coordinates with the State Policy redirect $24 billion of federal education market-based reform. Williams contin- Network and has become notorious for funding and incentivize states to use the ues to be used as the face of a movement promoting “stand your ground” legisla- money to fund 11 million school vouch- that never intended to fulfill her person- tion and propagating climate change de- ers for students in poverty. These could al vision. But once she opened the door nial. be used for private schools or even home- for her right-wing allies, it could not be 52 schooling. On her website, Ravitch closed. CURRENT TRENDS wrote simply: “Bottom line: the Alexan- Despite its failure to improve education- der plan will destroy public education in 53 al outcomes, Wisconsin’s voucher pro- the U.S.” Rachel Tabachnick is a fellow at Political gram is now 25 years old and continues In the same post, Ravitch quotes a Research Associates. Her research investi- to grow. Today, the program includes Pennsylvania Republican who warns gates the influence of the Religious Right on about 30,000 students and represents that Alexander’s package only includes policy and politics in education, economics, the second largest de facto school district $2,100 dollars per voucher, meaning the environment, and foreign policy. in the state. that the “School District of Record” must Characterized by instability and lack of provide the rest of the tuition. Ravitch accountability, Milwaukee’s voucher pro- continues, “Do not be fooled: this is not a gram has resulted in numerous stories conservative plan. This is a radical plan.

8 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 THEOCRATIC RUMBLINGS

BY L. COLE PARKE Natural Deception Conned by the World Congress of Families

From Russia to Nigeria to Australia, a seemingly innocuous definition of the “natural family” is quietly being used as the basis of new laws to justify the criminalization of abortion and LGBTQ people. Pushing this definition is the World Congress of Families, a network of conservative religious leaders from a variety of faiths—and their high-level government friends.

n November 2014, the Christian Responding to criticism following the a global legislative and public relations Right group World Congress of announcement that WCF will host its campaign against LGBTQ and reproduc- Families (WCF) found itself in the ninth international summit in Salt Lake tive rights. WCF has become a power unusual position of having to pub- City in October 2015, Stanford Swim (a player on the Religious Right by building licly defend itself. Unlike promi- WCF board member and major donor) bridges between U.S. groups and their in- nent advocacy groups such as the asserted that WCF’s political agenda and ternational counterparts and fostering a Family Research Council or Alliance De- ideology were being unfairly scrutinized global interfaith coalition of conservative I 1 fending Freedom, the Illinois-based WCF by local activists and media. religious orthodoxies. While Political Re- has seldom sought the spotlight, prefer- In fact, WCF’s activities and global influ- search Associates2 and other researchers ring a behind-the-scenes role in its cam- ence have received relatively scant public have monitored WCF’s attempts to rewrite paign to impose a narrow, Christian Right scrutiny. This is of concern because, con- international law using a narrow, Reli- definition of family as the international trary to Swim’s claim that WCF “does not gious Right definition of the family,3 until norm. spread fear,” the organization is leading recently, only a handful of gender justice

A children’s choir performs at WCF’s 2012 conference in Madrid, Spain. Photo via Flickr and courtesy of Hazte Oir.

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 9 groups understood WCF’s project. Through large international conven- from Chicago. It was founded in 1997 by That changed abruptly in June 2013, ings (its 2007 gathering in Warsaw at- conservative scholar Allan Carlson, who when global events forced WCF into the tracted nearly 4,000 participants7), currently serves as president of both or- U.S. activist spotlight.4 That month, Rus- smaller regional events, and closed-door ganizations. Carlson has authored nearly sia passed its now notorious anti-propa- meetings with government officials and a dozen books, including The Natural ganda law, which banned “propaganda religious leaders, WCF has woven a tight, Family Where It Belongs: New Agrarian Es- of nontraditional sexual relations to mi- powerful web of right-wing ideologues says, published in 2014 and dedicated to nors” and prompted a surge in violent and activists and has provided them with Pitirim Sorokin. (Sorokin is one of many attacks on LGBTQ people throughout the the tools to grow their numbers and ex- WCF links to Russia: the Russian-born country. (The law especially emboldened pand their influence. WCF’s success is conservative sociologist inspired much of a right-wing vigilante group, “Occupy especially evident in Russia,8 but its influ- Carlson’s understanding of the family9). Pedophilia,” which uses social media to ence also reaches other countries includ- The Howard Center was birthed from “ambush” gay people by luring them into ing Nigeria, Australia, and Poland—and the Rockford Institute, a conservative meetings and then assaulting them on international institutions such as the think tank devoted to “analyzing the dam- camera.5 Online footage of these horrific United Nations. age done to America’s social institutions attacks quickly went viral.6) With its doctrine of preserving what it by the cultural upheaval of the 1960’s.”10 News of the law, along with graphic regards as the “natural family,” WCF is Carlson joined the Institute’s staff in evidence of its impact, spurred American waging a campaign at local, national, and 1981, serving as its president from 1986- and European LGBTQ activists to action. international levels to ensure that male 1997. For many years, according to the Outraged Westerners launched a hast- dominance, heteronormativity (the belief Howard Center’s own website, the orga- ily conceived media counteroffensive, in that heterosexuality is the only accept- nization exclusively conducted research. which gay bar owners and their patrons able sexual orientation), and religious But in 1995, that began to change. emptied bottles of Russian vodka in the hegemony are core tenets of civil society. That year, Carlson was invited to Mos- streets; LGBTQ sports enthusiasts threat- “The WCF has created a cultural frame- cow by Anatoly Antonov and Victor Med- ened to boycott the 2014 Sochi Olympics; work, under the banner of the family, kov, sociologists at Lomonosov Moscow that is inclusive State University.11 His hosts were con- enough to appeal cerned about the demographic shifts they WCF maintains a regionally-based network of to a broad base,” were witnessing in Russia’s post-Soviet said Gillian Kane, era—popularly referred to as the “demo- allies, who tailor WCF’s messages to resonate senior policy ad- graphic winter.”12 As the country strug- with local communities and package the visor at Ipas, an gled to weather political turmoil and eco- international re- nomic hardship, the national birthrate “natural family” agenda in whatever way will productive rights was plummeting, alcoholism was on the most effectively hook their audience. All advocacy group. rise, and—correspondingly—so was the around the world, the “natural family” is a “But it is also so national mortality rate. narrowly writ that While significant demographic shifts solution in search of a problem. most of their ini- are underway in Russia and many other tiatives and argu- Western nations, ample research13 has re- ments don’t hold pudiated nativists’ arguments that these and the Human Rights Campaign, one of up under international law.” changes will result in “global catastrophe” the largest LGBTQ advocacy groups in the WCF, however, is gradually chipping (as WCF communications director Don U.S., mass-produced t-shirts proclaiming away at international laws designed to Feder has warned).14 What drives right- “Love Conquers Hate” in Russian. protect human rights, posing a direct wing concerns over Russia’s demograph- While the initial wave of outrage large- threat to LGBTQ people, women’s repro- ics are xenophobia and Islamophobia; as ly took aim at Russia and its political ductive freedom, single parents, mixed Russia’s overall population has plummet- leaders—LGBTQ magazine The Advocate families, and other family structures that ed, its indigenous Muslim population has named Putin its 2014 Person of the Year do not fit into the parameters of WCF’s grown—now comprising 21-23 million, and described him as “the single great- “natural family.” At best, those who are or about 15% of Russia’s total popula- est threat to LGBTs in the world”—it ob- deemed “unnatural” by WCF standards tion.15 Russia has also become an increas- scured the culpability of U.S. groups. could be excluded from the rights and ingly popular destination for immigrants Rather than being the brainchild of a few privileges granted to “natural families.” and refugees. As of 2013, according to the homophobic Kremlin insiders, Russia’s At worst, they could be fined or otherwise U.N. Population Division, Russia was sec- anti-propaganda law emerged from a punished by the state. ond only to the United States in its immi- years-long, carefully crafted campaign to grant population—the two nations have influence governments to adopt a - Chris ORIGINS AND AGENDA 46 million and 11 million immigrants, tian-Right legal framework, coordinated WCF is a project of the Howard Center respectively.16 by an international network of right-wing for Family, Religion & Society, based in What Antonov and Medkov meant leaders under the aegis of WCF. Rockford, Illinois, about a two-hour drive by a “demographic winter” was that the

10 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 qualities and characteristics of what it In May 1998, at a planning session IRS filings reported total revenue of just means to be Russian were in danger of for WCF II (its second international con- $523,870.23) being redefined as something other than vening), a group of 25 religious leaders WCF also has a regionally-based net- White and Orthodox.17 Anxious to reas- including evangelicals, mainline Protes- work of allies to spread its agenda: The- sert whiteness and Russian Orthodox re- tants, Roman Catholics, Russian Ortho- resa Okafor, director of the Foundation ligious practice as fundamental qualities dox, Mormons, Muslims, and Jews came for African Cultural Heritage; in Mexico, of Russianness, Antonov, Medkov, and together to define their common cause: Latino leaders such as Enrique Gomez Carlson’s team at the Howard Center de- protection and promotion of the “natu- Serrano, board president of Red Familia termined that they needed to “use [their] ral family.” From WCF’s planning docu- (Spanish for “Family Network”); and in talents and resources to create new coali- ments: Russia, Russian leaders such as Alexey tions to promote the natural family world- Komov, director of external affairs of the wide.”18 The natural family is the fundamental Russian Orthodox Church. These allies They convened the first World Congress social unit, inscribed in human na- tailor WCF’s messages to resonate with lo- of Families in Prague in March 1997. ture, and centered around the volun- cal communities, packaging the “natural More than 700 delegates from 200 or- tary union of a man and a woman in a family” agenda in whatever way will most ganizations across 43 nations gathered lifelong covenant of marriage, for the effectively hook their audience. to forge a new interfaith alliance of con- purposes of: In Russia, for example, WCF manipu- servative religious orthodoxies, includ- ▪ satisfying the longings of the human lates deep-seated racial prejudices to ing Russian Orthodox, LDS (Mormon), heart to give and receive love; mobilize demographic winter anxieties. conservative Catholic, and conservative ▪ welcoming and ensuring the full In Africa, WCF exploits neocolonial con- evangelical participants, as well as a few physical and emotional development cerns, arguing that racist Westerners are Orthodox Jews and Muslims.19 of children; trying to abort Africa’s Black babies. All The WCF I convening produced more ▪ sharing a home that serves as the around the world, the “natural family” is fear. A declaration published at its con- center for social, educational, eco- a solution in search of a problem. clusion warned, “[C]ultural revolutions, nomic, and spiritual life; materialism and sexual permissiveness ▪ building strong bonds among the USING THE U.N. have resulted in a destruction and deni- generations to pass on a way of life that WCF considers the United Nations an gration of moral values … extra-marital has transcendent meaning; adversary and has chosen to fight for its relationships, adultery and divorce prolif- ▪ extending a hand of compassion to “natural family” agenda inside that in- erate leading to widespread abortion, il- individuals and households whose cir- stitution. In a 1999 address to the World 20 22 legitimacy and single-parent children.” cumstances fall short of these ideals. Family Policy Forum—an event organized The declaration specifically named “the by the now-closed World Family Policy With this collection of principles, de- United Nations, its N.G.O.s and agents” Center and hosted at Brigham Young Uni- signed to appeal to the broadest possible as key adversaries, claiming that the versity in Provo, Utah—Allan Carlson “traditional values” audience, WCF posi- U.N. and its allies had “pursued danger- outlined his plans: ous philosophies and policies that require tioned itself as an umbrella organization population control, limitation of family for groups and individuals around the It is time to bring to the United Nations size, abortion on demand, sterilization world (whether Christian or not) commit- and to other international settings the of men and women and have sought to ted to codifying highly restrictive crite- shared truth of history … It is time to persuade Third World countries to adopt ria for who counts as “family,” and who move this view of the family as the fun- such policies.” It condemned policies that does not. The policy statement identifies damental social unit to the very heart subvert “the legal and religious status of underpopulation as “the demographic of international deliberations, so that traditional marriage,” as well as those problem facing the 21st Century,” pro- it might guide the creation of laws and that promote contraception and abortion, motes “the large family as a special social public policies in our respective na- “state welfare systems,” comprehensive gift,” and regards “religious orthodoxy as tions. sexual education, non-marital cohabita- the source of humane values and cultural tion, “homosexual unions,” and single progress.” This focus on the U.N. was evident at the parenting.21 Well-known and well-funded Ameri- WCF II, convened in Geneva, Switzerland, This declaration constituted WCF’s can organizations such as Focus on the in November 1999. During the opening opening salvo in what has become an ex- Family, Family Research Council, Alli- plenary, Carlson noted that 51 years ear- tended campaign to interrupt trends to- ance Defense Fund (now called Alliance lier, delegates to the newly formed U.N., ward more expansive human rights at the Defending Freedom), Americans United meeting in the same hall, had approved U.N. by recruiting, influencing, and em- for Life, and the National Organization the Universal Declaration of Human boldening conservative delegates. WCF’s for Marriage signed on as dues-paying Rights (UDHR). He emphasized the lan- project at the U.N. is to form a consoli- partners, expanding WCF’s reach. (For all guage in Article 16, which declares, “The dated and increasingly powerful voting its influence, WCF remains small, with family is the natural and fundamental bloc prepared to take direction from U.S.- only five full-time employees and a mod- group unit of society and is entitled to pro- based right-wing leadership. est budget—the Howard Center’s 2012 tection by society and the State.”24

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 11 Carlson and WCF sought to co-opt the the “Protection of the Family” resolution, held in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1999. UDHR’s language into a public relations a resolution requiring the Council to host Slater writes that WCF “changed the di- push for a restrictive U.N. definition of a panel and produce a report on protect- rection of my life, as I learned about the family that could then be used to assail ing families.29 While the resolution itself assaults in almost every area of family life women and LGBTQ people through the (co-sponsored by WCF’s “natural family” and was instilled with the hope that if we U.N. and other international organiza- friends from Russia) has no immediate all worked together, we could effectively tions.25 policy implications, its potential prece- stop many of these attacks.”32 U.S. conservatives have long held sus- dent-setting language fails to acknowl- The so-called “attacks” Slater refers to picious, if not openly hostile, attitudes edge that, in the words of many progres- include comprehensive sex education toward the United Nations. The “signa- sive NGOs and delegates, “various forms curricula and policies to support con- ture campaign” of the Far dom distribution, access Right, anti-communist to abortion, and LGBTQ John Birch Society— Carlson’s work on the ”demographic winter” families. launched in 1958—seeks Later that year, Slater to get the U.S. out of the has proven to be particularly effective in co-founded FWI. Offi- United Nations. The JBS garnering favor with Russia’s conservative cially registered at the describes the institution U.N. as Global Helping as a “socialistic global gov- leadership. In Russia and other parts of to Advance Women and ernment” controlled by Europe, a combination of population anxiety Children (Global HAWC), 26 “global power elites.” and growing anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant FWI enjoys Economic and Historically, hostil- Social Council (ECOSOC) ity toward the U.N. often sentiment has offered WCF a favorable consultative status and went hand-in-hand with political context in which to advance its anti- is thus able to participate Cold War-era opposition in meetings on economic to Russia. Since the mid- abortion, “natural family” agenda. and social issues. Over 90s, though, WCF and the last 15 years, Slater other elements of the U.S. has taken on increasingly Right have taken a differ- prominent roles as a cam- ent approach. Following advances made of the family exist.” The UNHRC’s Rus- paigner and foil to human rights advo- in the fight for abortion rights and other sian-led conservative voting bloc saw to cates—in the U.S. and internationally, reproductive justice issues at the U.N.’s it that the more inclusive phrasing never including at the U.N., where she often International Conference on Population made it into the resolution.30 collaborates with Carlson and other WCF and Development in Cairo (1994) and Ultimately, that same conservative vot- affiliates. Beijing (1995), right-wing strategists be- ing bloc—including every African del- gan to see the U.N. as a key battleground. egate on the Council (representing 12 of FEAR OF A DARKER PLANET: Writing in 2006, researcher Pam Cham- the 26 affirming voices)—passed the reso- FROM NATIVISM TO NATALISM berlain described a “flocking to the U.N.” lution. WCF’s influence at the U.N. relies heavily in which “12 NGOs opposed to abortion Human rights advocates have expressed on its longstanding ties with Russia, one or comprehensive sexuality education … fear that the resulting panel and report of the five permanent members on the gained consultative status since the Cairo will be used to further marginalize diverse U.N. Security Council. Carlson’s work on and Beijing U.N. conferences in 1994. family structures, such as those led by the ”demographic winter”—the idea that All of them are associated with the U.S. single parents, grandparents, or LGBTQ abortion, birth control, homosexuality, Christian Right.” people. Commenting on the resolution, feminism, and other ”unnatural” devia- At the same time, WCF developed an af- Geneva Advocacy Director at Human tions have led to dangerous population finity for post-Soviet Russia, a country its Rights Watch Julie de Rivero said, “[I]t is decline and a crisis for the ”natural fam- leaders increasingly depict as a model of a travesty for the U.N. to ignore [the] real- ily”—has proven to be particularly effec- moral purity. Larry Jacobs, a strident op- ity” that “families come in all shapes and tive in garnering favor with Russia’s con- ponent of abortion and LGBTQ rights, had forms. Insinuating that different types of servative leadership. joined WCF in 2003 as managing direc- families don’t exist can do nothing but Carlson argues that declining birth tor.27 At a WCF gathering in Melbourne in harm the children and adults around the rates threaten the decline of civiliza- September 2014, Jacobs said, “The Rus- world who live in those families.”31 tion—Western civilization. As researcher sians might be the Christian saviors to the One of the primary leaders behind the and journalist Kathryn Joyce puts it, “The world; at the U.N. they really are the ones “Protection of the Family” resolution concern is not a general lack of babies, standing up for these traditional values of was Sharon Slater, president of Family but the cultural shifts that come when family and faith.”28 Watch International (FWI), chair of the some populations, particularly immi- Jacobs was referring to the U.N. Human U.N. Family Rights Caucus, and longtime grant communities, are feared to be out- Rights Council (UNHRC)’s June 2014 con- member of WCF. Slater traces the begin- procreating others.”33 Put another way, vening in Geneva. The council adopted ning of her political activism to WCF II, the demographic winter thesis cultivates

12 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 racism and xenophobia in support of ex- Four months later, in October 2011, THE AFRICAN CAMPAIGN clusionary “natural family” policies. A the Russian Duma passed a law further In recent years, WCF has expanded its main objective of the WCF’s demographic restricting abortions to within the first 12 influence not only in Russia but also in scare tactics is to convert nationalism into weeks of pregnancy, with exceptions for Africa, where it works closely with pub- natalism, and thereby mobilize a larger cases up to 22 weeks in instances of rape lic intellectuals and conservative lead- anti-abortion, “natural family” base. (Na- or medical necessity. The new law also ers who act as spokespeople for WCF’s talism prioritizes human procreation, in- tacked on a mandatory waiting period “natural family” campaign. Perhaps most cluding public policies that reward birth- of two to seven days before an abortion prominent is Theresa Okafor, a leading ing children.) can be performed, a common tactic used anti-choice advocate in Nigeria and the This perspective is commonplace by anti-abortion activists in the United recipient of WCF’s 2014 Natural Family among WCF and its affiliates. Following States. Woman of the Year award. WCF’s 1997 congress in Prague, Cathy Russian leaders are by no means mere In Africa, debates over sexual health Ramey, associate director of the U.S. anti- pawns in the Right’s “natural family” and rights are frequently tied to issues re- abortion organization Advocates for Life campaign. Referencing a book on family lated to population. Development econo- Ministries, explained what she’d learned: genealogy authored by Aleksandr Putin (a mists generally agree that for economic “As native citizens reject marriage and distant cousin of President Vladimir Pu- growth in Africa to continue in such a way child-bearing, other non-native groups tin), Russian journalist Vladimir Shvedov that poverty rates decrease, birthrates will simply move in and replace the his- notes that extended families “are gradu- must drop significantly.43 U.N. reports toric population.”34 Speaking at WCF V, ally returning to the consciousness of our indicate that population growth in Africa John Mueller, a researcher at the Ethics much-suffering people,” because in Rus- is so high that the continent’s population and Public Policy Center—a neoconserva- sia as in any country, “the greatness of the is expected to more than triple by 2100, tive think tank in Washington, DC—ar- nation … is built upon the ancient foun- rising from 1.2 billion to 4.2 billion44—a gued that “fertility would rise and remain dation of the old families.”39 The coun- daunting forecast for a continent that also above the replacement rate, not only in try’s post-Soviet identity crisis has thus has the highest poverty rate in the world. the United States but also most other provided fertile ground for the vigorous (In Okafor’s native Nigeria, more than 60 countries, by ending legal abortion.”35 promotion of the “Russian family.” percent of the population lives in absolute In Russia and other parts of Europe, a Nonetheless, the U.S. Right’s influence poverty—up from 54.7 percent in 2004.45) combination of population anxiety and on these Russian debates is unmistak- Okafor, however, denies the need for growing anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant able. In 2011, the New York Times noted comprehensive sex education, contracep- sentiment has offered WCF a favorable that “contention over abortion [in Russia] tion, and access to safe abortions. She in- political context in which to advance its has begun to sound like the debate in the stead argues that Africa needs to rid itself anti-abortion, “natural family” agenda. United States.”40 And when President Pu- of the “negative cultures” being imposed Carlson and his network have fanned the tin signed a law in December 2013 com- on it from the West. flames of “demographic winter” anxieties pletely banning abortion advertising, Ste- Speaking at the World Public Forum throughout the region. ven Mosher, president of the Population Dialogue of Civilizations in 2012 (de- In June 2011, WCF hosted the Moscow Research Institute and a regularly fea- scribed by a local news outlet as “the first Demographic Summit, describing it as tured speaker at WCF events, was not the pro-family conference in Africa”), Okafor the “world’s first summit to address the least bit shy about claiming credit: “PRI explained her view—that poverty in Af- international crisis of rapidly declining has played a role in helping to turn Rus- rica is the result of corrupt governments, birthrates.”36 More than 500 people at- sia back to life,” he stated. “I participated poor resource management and distribu- tended, including Patriarch Kirill, head in the first [WCF] Demographic Summit tion, and “the sinister agenda to downsize of the Russian Orthodox Church; Russian at the Russian State Social University in and control Africa.” According to Oka- First Lady Svetlana Medvedeva; members Moscow in May, 2011. We talked with for, as Europeans face falling birthrates, of the Russian Duma; and a host of right- senior Russian leaders about the need to they feel “threatened” by Africa’s growing wing American scholars and activists. protect life. Not long thereafter, a law was population and economy and thus seek Within two weeks of the event, Presi- passed banning abortion of unborn ba- to promote contraception and abortion dent Medvedev—whose wife, Medve- bies older than 12 weeks.”41 among Africans.46 deva, had recently teamed up with the Alexey Komov, WCF’s representative in Okafor’s statements contrast sharply Russian Orthodox Church on a new anti- Russia, agreed, calling the WCF’s Demo- with demographic winter ideas that abortion campaign—signed a law requir- graphic Summit a “catalyst” for Russia’s Carlson and WCF promote in Europe, ing abortion providers to devote 10 per- anti-abortion movement. Komov, who Australia, the U.S., and elsewhere. This cent of any advertising to describing the organized the 2011 Moscow Demograph- highlights WCF’s cynical manipulation dangers of abortion to a woman’s health, ic Summit, was subsequently appointed of racial resentments within different and making it illegal to describe abortion to a position with the Department for Ex- political contexts. In Russia, WCF points as a safe medical procedure.37 This was ternal Relations of the Russian Orthodox to declining White birthrates and grow- the first new legislative restriction placed Church, further strengthening WCF’s ties ing numbers of immigrants, Muslims, on abortions in the country since the fall to Russian Orthodox leadership.42 and people of color to stoke White fears of Communism.38

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 13 of decreasing dominance over non-White criminalizing same-sex marriage.) proliferation of this strategy. Many of its and non-Christian minorities. In Nigeria, According to Okafor, the Global Family member organizations, including Alli- WCF plays to neocolonial resentments, Policy Forum for U.N. delegates hosted ance Defending Freedom and FWI, will be suggesting that Western nations are seek- by WCF-affiliate FWI in Gilbert, Arizona, in attendance. ADF announced in Octo- ing to restrict the growth and prosperity in 2011 was of particular importance, ber 2014 that it is “in the process of transi- of African nations by “downsizing” Black noting that it was there that the African tioning into an international religious lib- African populations through increased voting bloc—which unanimously voted erties organization.” The announcement access to abortion and contraception against adding more inclusive language added that ADF will soon be establishing and the “promotion” of homosexuality. to the definition of “family” used in the advocacy offices in Strasbourg, France, Whether rhetorically aligned with Eu- U.N.’s newly adopted “Protection of the focusing on the European Commission on ropean racism or African nationalism, Family” resolution—successfully “con- Human Rights; Geneva, focusing on the WCF’s solution remains constant: it of- solidated their positions.” United Nations Human Rights Commis- Where WCF has sion; and Brussels, focusing on the Euro- been successful in pean Union.50 persuading nation- Depending on the audience, WCF’s If WCF IX goes forward as planned, those al governments to strategy for promoting the “natural fam- who support LGBTQ rights and reproductive adopt its “natural ily” varies, but the impact of its campaign family” model, is the same across the globe: increased justice may see a surge of new legislative there has followed persecution of LGBTQ people, further assaults, at home and around the world. Yet increased persecu- restrictions on access to abortion, and an tion of LGBTQ peo- increasingly exclusionary definition of the event also provides a unique opportunity ple and decreased what kind of families deserve recognition to challenge WCF’s “natural family” campaign access to abortion and rights. With its far-reaching influ- and reproductive ence, streamlined structure, and ability right where it started, in the United States. healthcare. In Afri- to alter its message quickly, WCF is estab- can countries that lishing itself as a vanguard for the Right’s accept Okafor’s global anti-choice and anti-LGBTQ agen- fers its “natural family” campaign, know- WCF-endorsed narrative and political das. ing well that what follows may include agenda, we may see growing levels of pov- WCF IX provides a venue for WCF and restricted reproductive rights and the erty and—thanks to further restrictions other Christian Right leaders to continue criminalization or persecution of LGBTQ on comprehensive sex education and expanding their international influence. people. healthcare options—increased risk for If WCF IX goes forward as planned in As Political Research Associates’ Rev. transmission of HIV/AIDS and other STIs. Salt Lake City, those who support LGBTQ Dr. Kapya Kaoma has documented, the rights and reproductive justice may see a U.S. Religious Right has a long history BRINGING THE FIGHT BACK HOME surge of new legislative assaults, at home of promoting anti-choice, anti-LGBTQ Although it is based in the U.S. and has and around the world. “pro-family” ideologies in Africa (at the an entirely White, American board of di- However, the event also provides a expense of African women and LGBTQ rectors, WCF has held its previous global unique opportunity for activists to chal- people).47 But WCF was one of the first to convenings outside the U.S. But WCF IX lenge the expanding influence of WCF’s package its agenda in a U.N.-ready, poli- is scheduled for October 27-30, 2015 in “natural family” campaign right where cy-friendly format. The expansion of this Salt Lake City, Utah. The Sutherland Insti- it started, here in the U.S. “Keep in mind campaign from local and regional levels tute, a right-wing think tank based in Salt that the work of WCF is in response to to the international realm represents a Lake City (whose acting CEO and promi- positive legal gains made by the sexual grave threat to LGBTQ and reproductive nent right-wing philanthropist, Stanford and reproductive rights and LGBTQ com- justice globally. Swim, sits on WCF’s board of directors) munities,” said Kane. “There is ample Speaking at WCF IV in Madrid in will host the event, which is expected to room for human rights defenders to chal- 2012, Okafor noted that many of the re- draw about 3,000 people. lenge the WCF’s regressive agenda.” Ac- cent anti-abortion, anti-LGBTQ gains The theme of WCF IX is expected to be tivists who support reproductive justice made in Nigeria are thanks to network- “religious liberty,” which the U.S. Re- and LGBTQ rights should use this oppor- ing coordinated by WCF. She specifically ligious Right has been endeavoring to tunity to draw the public’s attention to the named Sharon Slater’s FWI as being “in- redefine as a sanction to discriminate in real policy agenda that this supposedly strumental to many of the victories we the public sphere (particularly against “pro-family” network is pushing. celebrate.”48 (Such “victories” include the women and LGBTQ people).49 U.S. Chris- repeal of a 2012 reproductive rights law tian Right groups have been testing simi- L. Cole Parke is the LGBTQ & gender justice in Nigeria’s Imo State, the enactment of lar “religious freedom” strategies over- researcher at Political Research Associates. a requirement that all condom packages seas. WCF, as an umbrella organization Their research and activism focuses on chal- include warnings indicating that they are for right-wing groups, is seeking to or- lenging right-wing propagators of U.S. cul- not “100% safe,” and the passage of a bill chestrate the coordinated, international ture wars both here and abroad.

14 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 BY ROBIN MARTY

Meet Joe Scheidler,Patriarch of the Anti-Abortion Movement

Joe Scheidler and his Pro-Life Action League pioneered many of the tactics that anti-abortion activists still use today. Robin Marty examines why these tactics have had such staying power—and what abortion rights advocates can do to stop them.

bortion has been legal— with restrictions—in all 50 states for nearly 42 years, and anti-abortion activist Joe Scheidler has been fighting to make Ait illegal again for just as many of them. Still comfortably ensconced in his Chi- cago home, Scheidler, at 87 years old, is father, “Godfather,” and leader to gen- erations of zealots. They continue using tactics Scheidler designed as they protest in the legislature, outside clinic doors, and even across the ocean, all with the goal of criminalizing—and removing ac- cess to—safe, legal abortion. Now that the anti-abortion movement has grown more powerful in the last few years than it has been at any point in the history of legal abortion, it is worth examining where Joe Scheidler’s archi- tecture is still being used—and where Joe Scheidler at the Pro-Life Action League’s offices in 2014. Photo by Wendi Kent. it might be decaying or vulnerable.1 Al- though the days of having a clinic door ics and terrorizing patients and provid- lished. Some of the book’s tips, like “con- physically blocked by human bodies or ers), or National Right to Life Committee duct a blitz”—coordinating a group of an- of having abortion providers picketed at (an umbrella group for the state and local ti-abortion activists to enter a clinic and their own homes are mostly a thing of the affiliates of the national pro-life- move refuse to leave until the police arrive, all past, today’s assault on legal abortion dif- ment). Still, PLAL has had a profound im- the while attempting to talk patients in fers only slightly from these methods. pact on the movement. Scheidler’s 1985 the waiting room out of undergoing abor- book, Closed: 99 Ways to Stop Abortion,2 tion—no longer can be legally attempted. AN ANTI-ABORTION PLAYBOOK became the handbook of those hoping But other tactics detailed in Closed, such Pro-Life Action League (PLAL), the an- to put abortion providers out of business as protests at hospitals, medical offices, ti-abortion advocacy group Scheidler with tactics ranging from creating mild or other businesses affiliated with -abor founded in 1980, may not have the name nuisances to outright harassment and tion providers, still happen with great fre- recognition of Operation Rescue (the borderline stalking. quency. Meanwhile, so-called “sidewalk militant anti-abortion group best known Those tactics haven’t changed much counseling” has become the signature in the 1990s for blocking abortion clin- in the 29 years since the book was pub- activity of choice for abortion opponents,

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 15 using scripts that are often based on the in 1986 by the National Organization for attended when she was not in jail. Don “Chicago-style” training method estab- Women and a large number of abortion Treshman, of Rescue America;11 Andrew lished by Scheidler and his colleagues. providers, declaring that a multi-state Burnett,12 of Advocates for Life Minis- Groups such as 40 Days for Life pro- activist network called the Pro-Life Ac- tries of Portland, Oregon;13 and Chris mote a constant clinic presence, in some tion Network (PLAN), also founded by Slattery,14 who was an Operation Rescue cases even at buildings that only refer for, Scheidler, was conspiring with other an- member in New York City before start- rather than actually offer, abortions on ti-abortion activists and groups in a plot ing a chain of crisis pregnancy centers15 site. Other organizations, either nation- to close clinics through “racketeering.” there; all attended or spoke at the yearly al or local in scope, trade the allegedly The racketeering charges never stuck, gatherings. silent (but often actually quite audible) but Scheidler’s “Godfather” moniker did, Francis (Franky) Schaeffer, son of evan- prayers for graphic signs, amplified street and although it evokes the Mafia’s history gelical theologian Francis Schaeffer, was preaching, and chasing of potential clinic of shady activities, he continues to claim not just a PLAN convention speaker; he patients and staff all the way to the build- it. worked closely with Scheidler and wrote ing’s entrance. PLAN, according to Scheidler, was a the foreword for the 1993 edition of These groups are also gaining the ad- coordinated effort to organize other anti- Closed. In his foreword, Schaeffer praised vantage in the courts. For years, local abortion groups from across the country Scheidler and his use of “direct action” buffer zones were able to provide an- el who were willing to take direct, physical against clinics, comparing him to Mother ement of protection for clinic patients action against clinics. Scheidler writes Theresa in Calcutta or Jesus driving the in some cities across the country. But in Chapter 68 of Closed, “Go National: money changers from the temple. “We the Supreme Court’s decision in June of Join the Activist Network,” that activists cannot wait for the ‘abortion problem’ 2014 to eliminate Massachusetts’ buffer are encouraged to work in national net- to be solved for us,” he writes. “Street by zone has led to new efforts to tear down works to move from “random picketing street, neighborhood by neighborhood, remaining patient safety areas, and to and sidewalk counseling” to “blitzes of we must fight this necessary battle until even bolder anti-abortion activity outside abortion clinics, picketing of doctors’ and legalized abortion is relegated to the bar- abortion clinics. clinic operators’ homes, vigils … a na- baric past, along with slavery and canni- Anti-abortion activists still document tional day of rescue … and a national day balism!” license plates at clinics,3 as Scheidler en- of amnesty for the unborn, during which Franky Schaeffer has since renounced courages in Chapter 60 of Closed. They efforts would be made to close down as his role16 in helping to forge the power- still gather in large groups, and while many abortion clinics across the country ful alliance of Catholics and evangelicals they may not physically block the clinic as possible.” PLAN’s national conven- in what is now the social conservative doors, they instead line the sidewalks on tions occurred annually from 1984 to movement, citing his belief that the lead- each side as near to the door as possible,4 at least 1997,6 and Scheidler credits the ers were more interested in winning and using their numbers and presence to bar Atlanta conference in 1987 as being the retaining Republican majorities than the entrance. They still write complaints birthplace of Randall Terry’s Operation ending legal abortion. about providers and clinics to file with lo- Rescue. When members met in 1994,17 it was cal departments of health, and they still Terry was just one of many anti-abor- to discuss how much violence is accept- wait on the streets to document a medical tion activists who attended yearly PLAN able when it comes to stopping abortion emergency on the rare occasion that an conventions who would eventually go and closing clinics. The battle lines were ambulance may be called to the building. on to block clinics and harass patients drawn at that Chicago meeting, as the co- and clinic workers, or worse. As part of alition began to fray over whether it was INSPIRING ACTIVISTS AND CRIMINALS PLAN, Scheidler introduced the idea of ever justifiable to commit murder18 to The inspiration for much of this activ- “regional directors” to coordinate their stop a doctor from performing abortions. ity belongs to Scheidler. Trained first as shared mission to end abortion. Start- While members of PLAN like Burnett in a Benedictine monk and next as a jour- ing with PLAN’s 1985 convention in Oregon supported the idea of “Defensive nalist, Scheidler began his anti-abortion Appleton, Wisconsin, he only welcomed Action,”19 Scheidler and others declined activism career first with Illinois Right attendees who espoused “militant” anti- to do so. to Life Committee and next with another abortion activism, according to James Scheidler’s book has a chapter called anti-abortion group called Friends for Risen and Judy L. Thomas’s book Wrath of “Violence: Why It Won’t Work,” in which Life. Scheidler claims he was forced out Angels: The American Abortion War.7 he explains how violence against an abor- of both positions due to his unwillingness Some of those attendees and their tion provider or building would make the to work with boards or wait for permis- close contacts would become the most movement look bad. Even so, he hedges: sion from others to engage in his activ- notorious and often jailed activists of “We must point out for the sake of proper ist stunts. Scheidler used his severance their time. John Ryan, the original “res- perspective, however, that no amount of pay to establish Pro-Life Action League, cuer” of St. Louis, Missouri, attended damage to real estate can equal the vio- where he could act on his own impulses the early conventions to explain his tac- lence of taking a single human life,” in without being curbed by anyone out of tics in clinic blockading, and eventually this case referring to abortion. fear of potential lawsuits. formed Pro-Life Direct Action League.8 He also frequently discusses, in both And lawsuits there were. Most famous- Joan Andrews, the movement “martyr” his writing and in-person remarks, about ly, Scheidler became the accused in NOW who served years9 in prison for criminal his continuing support for those who v. Scheidler,5 a class-action lawsuit filed trespass at clinics in multiple states,10 have used violence in the past. “We’ve

16 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 had trouble with other pro-lifers,” from one legislator’s office to another Christmas party. Scheidler told me this summer when I and all the time praying for her con- Both mailings came just months after met him in his office in Chicago.20 “We version. He attended her seminars and PLAL systematically and methodically had those who went off the deep end, encouraged his friends to fill up the pressured22 Dr. Chastine’s private prac- and then started shooting and bombing front rows at every lecture she gave. tice into severing ties with her. PLAL’s and all that stuff. We knew these people, He challenged her to public debates, tactics included protests, letters to other and we had meetings with them. We organized people to question her at businesses sharing the space, and threats even have met them after they get out of her talks, sent her pro-life literature, of more public actions against the build- prison, and so on. They’re ing if their professional still pro-life. They just relationships continued. went too far.” Scheidler and PLAL Scheidler and PLAL helped design tactics such helped design tactics such SHIFTING TACTICS as pressuring providers, blocking clinics, so- as pressuring providers, For himself, however, blocking clinics, so-called Scheidler prefers the called “sidewalk counseling,” and clinic pickets. “sidewalk counseling,” “direct action” tactics But even more current anti-abortion tactics, and clinic pickets. But he enthusiastically even more current, popu- embraced, such as like conducting public relations campaigns lar anti-abortion tactics, “blitzes.” Clinics had “exposing” Planned Parenthood, have roots in like conducting public great difficulty in fending relations campaigns “ex- off activists such as Scheidler’s work. posing” Planned Par- Scheidler, other PLAN enthood, have roots in members, and eventually Scheidler’s work. As Operation Rescue. During early as the 1980s, PLAL the 1980s and 1990s, smeared Planned Parent- clinic “blitzes,” “rescues,” hood as a “threat to chil- and barricading became dren,” and claimed the so common that organization had sinister eventually the federal aims in providing infor- government passed the mation about sexuality, federal Freedom of Access pregnancy prevention, to Clinic Entrances (FACE) and “contraceptive drugs Act, ensuring that anti- and devices.” PLAL also abortion activists could accused Planned Parent- no longer use “rescue”- hood of potentially giv- style tactics to keep clinics ing abortion referrals to closed and patients from Ann Scheidler, Joe Scheidler’s wife, helps run PLAL’s office and young teens without the consent of parents. passing through the organizational operations. Photo by Wendi Kent. doors. Such talking points While FACE was a blow echo in current cam- to PLAL, Scheidler’s man- paigns by Live Action,23 a ual still offered many other ways to shut and took every opportunity to try to youth-based anti-abortion and anti-birth down a clinic. Scheidler encouraged hos- get her to stop promoting abortion. He control movement that primarily engag- pital pickets21 for those facilities that ei- succeeded. es in hidden camera “gotcha” videos pur- ther offered abortion care themselves or porting to “expose” Planned Parenthood had doctors on staff that provided those Decades later, Scheidler’s advice for es- affiliates and other providers of- repro services at unaffiliated clinics. He devel- tablishing direct contact with those who ductive health care services. Live Action oped another chilling tactic called “adopt- perform or support abortion has been has been a leader in efforts to pressure ing abortionists,” his term for sending mostly discarded, but some of his ideas Congressional lawmakers into defunding cards to a provider or supporter’s home, occasionally reappear. In 2013, Dr. Cher- the family planning agency and works calling them to try to talk, dropping off yl Chastine, a reproductive health and with other anti-abortion conservative po- business cards at their offices, or, as he abortion provider at South Wind Wom- litical organizations like Susan B. Antho- suggested in his book, even what many en’s Center in Wichita, Kansas, received ny List,24 Students for Life,25 Americans would call stalking. two pieces of mail to her home address, United for Life,26 and others, including In one chapter of Closed, Scheidler both sent from Pro-Life Action League. PLAL. crows about an activist’s success in using The first was a letter from Joe’s wife Ann, “adoption” tactics: PLAL’s Vice President, asking her to meet THOSE GRAPHIC FETUS IMAGES for a cup of coffee to discuss why Dr. Today, Scheidler’s organization may be He accompanied her on lobbying mis- Chastine performs abortions. Later, she more the base of the anti-abortion move- sions to Springfield, following her received an invitation to the League’s ment than the face of it, but when it does

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 17 don its public face, it likes to use graphic tion Wars,28 author and anti-abortion the international pro-life youth confer- imagery. PLAL still commits to “counsel- activist Monica Migliorino Miller details ence was held in California37 with Youth ing” outside clinics in Chicago, as well as how she and Scheidler, along with a few Defence, PLAL, and others. training “sidewalk counselors” at yearly other activists in Chicago, would remove Speaking at this year’s event38 was national conventions, such as the one the remains from a dumpster behind a lo- Bernadette Smyth of Northern Ireland’s held in Minnesota, in 2013, or Alabama, cal clinic, after which Miller would take Precious Life. Smyth, who appears to in 2014.27 Its most public events, howev- them home to photograph.29 Later, they emulate Scheidler’s tactics in her own er, are the “Face the Truth” tours, which would take the remains to churches and country, once dismissed criticism of take place for one full week each year ask to hold burials, a ritual that has even- Scheidler’s activities, stating, “Joseph is during the summer, as well as for one day tually led to the National Day of Remem- not guilty of anything but saving wom- each month during the spring and fall. brance for Abortion Victims.30 en and unborn babies from abortion.”39 On a Face the Truth tour, members of In November of 2014,40 a judge found PLAL place large, graphic images of fe- PLAL’S WIDENING SCOPE Smyth guilty of harassing the head of the tal and embryonic remains along a street For all its influence and reach, PLAL re- Marie Stopes clinic in Belfast, Ireland. or public venue, ranging from abortion mains a rather lean operation. On its tax clinics to major sidewalks in downtown documents, it claims only about $1 mil- SCHEIDLER’S LEGACY lion31 in revenue Now, 30 years after Scheidler published in 2013, mostly the definitive handbook on how to close Thirty years after Scheidler published the from donors it an abortion clinic, there are fewer than chooses not to 800 abortion clinics left in the country. definitive handbook on how to close an disclose, and less Those clinics that remain have become abortion clinic, there are fewer than 800 than $13,000 in even more susceptible to harassment, sales from side- financial pressure, frivolous lawsuits, abortion clinics left in the country. Those walk counseling medical complaints, and massive anti- clinics that remain are still susceptible to tools and other abortion PR campaigns. anti-abortion ac- In other words, they remain suscep- harassment, financial pressure, frivolous tivism products.32 tible to almost every tactic Joe Scheidler lawsuits, medical complaints, and massive In the same year, first outlined in 1985. The defensive PLAL spent about stance of giving Kevlar vests to clinic pro- anti-abortion public relations campaigns. $450,000 on com- viders and forming clinic defense teams In other words, they remain susceptible pensation, not has had little positive impact. including ben- With the right to a legal, safe abortion to almost every tactic Joe Scheidler first efits, with over increasingly in jeopardy, the need to outlined in 1985. $200,000 of that proactively fight the evolving tactics of going to Joe, his the anti-abortion movement is critical. wife Ann, and In the 1980s and 1990s, the threat that their son Eric. The Scheidler and his cohorts posed to legal organization’s big- abortion access led to a federal lawsuit Chicago. The tours, which PLAL said it gest expenses are printing, shipping, and that managed to distract and hold off began in 2000, are similar to the Center postage (perhaps not surprising consider- the pro-life movement for more than a for Bio-Ethical Reform’s (CBR) Geno- ing the leaflets, pamphlets, large graphic decade. That lawsuit also led to the draft- cide Awareness Project, which mounts photos, and other materials PLAL uses in ing and passage of the FACE Act. Today, graphic aborted-fetus displays on cam- its events). abortion rights supporters must consider puses and universities, or those of Cre- Considering PLAL’s activism that pur- how to take similar bold action to exploit ated Equal, a newer Ohio campaign from posefully pushes the lines of legality, it is weaknesses in the anti-abortion move- Mark Harrington, formerly with CBR. surprising that it reported a mere $15833 ment and stop it from continuing to cut The goal of such projects, according to in legal expenses in 2013. off what legal access remains. Eric Scheidler, Joe’s son and the current PLAL’s influence in today’s legal -abor executive director of PLAL, is to make tion battle landscape isn’t felt only in the people recognize the realities of abortion. U.S. PLAL has long been supportive34 of Robin Marty is a freelance writer, speaker The tactic represents an escalation from Youth Defence, an Irish anti-abortion and activist, and the author of Crow After the early days of picketing at abortion group that “has been criticized by politi- Roe: How Women’s Health Is the New clinics, when Joe Scheidler and others cians for adopting the militant tactics of “Separate But Equal” and How to Change tried to stop patients from entering the American antichoice activists,” accord- That. Robin’s articles have appeared at building by handing out pamphlets that ing to Allie Higgins of Catholics for a Free Bitch Magazine, Rolling Stone, Ms. Mag- would often contain similar images. Choice,35 who also reports that Scheidler’s azine, Truthout, AlterNet, BlogHer, RH The images are of grisly post-abortion book is used as a handbook for activist Reality Check, and Care2.org, and she remains that Scheidler says are real. He tactics by the group. Eric Scheidler joined has spoken at trainings and conferences for often obtained the subjects himself. In the group in Ireland36 for an international NOW, NARAL, the National Conference for Abandoned: The Untold Story of the Abor- pro-life youth event in 2010. This year, Media Reform, and Netroots Nation.

18 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 endnotes

Polly Williams, p.2 ment-virginia/closing-prince. 31. Action Plan to Improve Milwaukee nomics 90 (2006), 1477–1503, http:// 13. Fred Clarkson, “Exposed: How the Public Schools: 2007-2012 (2007), www.columbia.edu/~msu2101%20/ Right’s State-Based Think Tanks are http://www.milwaukeepartner- HsiehUrquiola%282006%29.pdf; and 1. Williams’ program is described as shipacademy.org/pubs/mps_strate- Patrick J. McEwan, Miguel Urquiola, the first voucher program in the- na Transforming U.S. Politics, The Public Eye (Fall 2013), http://www.political- gic_plan_7-26-07.pdf. and Emiliana Vega, “School Choice, tion, but it was preceded by programs Stratification, and Information on used by states to fight desegregation. research.org/2013/11/25/exposed- 32. Patrick Marley, “Past school how-the-rights-state-based-think- voucher advocate rips Gov. Walker’s School Performance: Lessons from In 1964, the Supreme Court found Chile,” Economia (Spring 2008), http:// county and local tuition grants and tax tanks-are-transforming-u-s-politics/. Plan,” Journal Sentinel, May 16, 2013, http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/ www.columbia.edu/~msu2101/McE- credits used to fund White students in 14. Ravitch is quoted in Adam Bessie, wanUrquiolaVegas%282007%29.pdf. private schools to be unconstitutional. “G.E.R.M. Warfare: How to Reclaim news/207753841.html. the Education Debate From Corporate 33. Daniel Bice, “School choice advo- 45. Christopher Lubienski and Sarah 2. The program that passed was add- Theule Lubienski, Charter, Private, ed to the Budget Amendment Bill by Occupation,” Project Censored 2013 cate George Mitchell blasts ex-lawmak- (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2012), er Annette Polly Williams,” Journal Public Schools and Academic Achieve- Democratic Senator Gary George, but ment: New Evidence from NAEP Math- drawn from previous bills authored by 289. Sentinel, May 29, 2013, http://www. jsonline.com/watchdog/noquarter/ ematics Data (National Center for the Polly Williams. Pro- and anti-voucher 15. “The Model for the Nation: an ex- Study of Privatization in Education, activists and education scholars credit clusive interview with Annette Polly school-choice-advocate-george-mitch- ell-blasts-ex-lawmaker-annette-polly- Jan. 2006), http://www.ncspe.org/ Williams. See John F. Witte, The Mar- Williams,” Heartland Institute, Aug. publications_files/OP111.pdf. ket Approach to Education: An Analy- 30, 2002, http://news.heartland.org/ williams-b9922201z1-209452781. sis of America’s First Voucher Program newspaper-article/2002/08/30/mod- html. 46. Bolick, 23. Bolick points out that (Princeton University Press, 2000). el-nation-exclusive-interview-annette- 34. Bice, “School choice advocate.” Gov. Tommy Thompson was, not coin- polly-williams. cidentally, pursuing welfare reform at 3. Matthew J. Brouillette, “Vouch- 35. George Mitchell continued his the same time. ers,” School Choice in Education: A 16. Jim Carl, Freedom of Choice: Vouch- critique on the blog Right Wisconsin: Primer for Freedom in Michigan (Macki- ers in American Education (Santa Bar- “Williams was instrumental in getting 47. Bolick, 35. nac Center, 1999), http://www.macki- bara: Praeger, 2011), 117. the original program to Gov. Tommy 48. Bolick, 27. nac.org/2081. 17. Carl, Freedom of Choice, 32 Thompson’s desk. But from that day 49. Rachel Tabachnick, “Strategy for forward Williams was, directly and in- 4. Julian Vasquez Heilig, “Reframing 18. Ibid, 133. Privatizing Public Schools Spelled Out the Refrain: Choice as a Civil Rights Is- directly, an opponent … The addition by Dick DeVos in 2002 Heritage Foun- 19. Erica Lasden, Community Voice or of religious schools to the program dation Speech, Talk to Action, May 3, sue,” Texas Educational Review Vol. 1 Captive of the Right? The Black Alliance (2013), pp.83-94, http://txedrev.org/ evoked her racial and religious big- 2011, http://www.talk2action.org/ for Educational Options (People for the otry … She complained that ‘whites’ story/2011/5/3/12515/58655. wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Heilig_ American Way, July 2003), http:// Reframing-the-Refrain_TxEdRev.pdf. and ‘Catholics’ were going to take over www.pfaw.org/sites/default/files/ the program.” For more, see George 50. “Blacks v teachers,” Economist, 5. Janelle T. Scott, “A Rosa Parks mo- file_237.pdf. Mitchell, “Where the Journal Sentinel Mar. 8, 2001, http://www.economist. com/node/526704. ment? School choice and the marketi- 20. “The Lynde and Harry Bradley Fails, Again,” Right Wisconsin, May zation of civil rights,” Critical Studies in Foundation and School Choice,” Cen- 21, 2013, http://www.rightwisconsin. 51. Erin Richards, “Leaders of closed Education, 54:1 (2013), 5-18. ter for Strategic Philanthropy and Civil com/perspectives/208281431.html. Milwaukee voucher school are now 6. A.S. Wells, J. Slayton, & J. Scott, Society Teaching Case, Sanford School 36. Jeanne Allen, “A Nation at Risk No in Florida,” Journal Sentinel, Jan. 15, (2002). “Defining democracy in the of Public Policy, Duke University, Jan. More,” Center for Education Reform, 2014, http://www.jsonline.com/ neoliberal age: Charter school reform 2007, http://cspcs.sanford.duke.edu/ https://www.edreform.com/wp- news/education/leaders-of-closed- and educational consumption,” Ameri- sites/default/files/BradleyChoicefi- content/uploads/2013/04/ANation- milwaukee-voucher-school-are-now- can Education Research Journal 39:2 nal_0.pdf. atRiskManifestoFINAL.pdf. in-florida-b99185323z1-240384541. (2002), 337-361. html. 21. Bolick, 45. 37. “American Federation for Children 7. Mark Walsh, “Black Private Mourns the Loss of School Choice Pio- 52. “Alexander Proposes 11 Mil- 22. “Milwaukee Parental Choice Pro- lion $2,100 “Scholarships for Academies Are Held Up as Filling gram,” Wisconsin Legislative Audit neer Annette ‘Polly’ Williams,” Ameri- Void Seen as ‘Response to Desperate can Federation for Children, Nov. Kids,” Jan. 28. 2014, http://www. Bureau, Feb. 2000, http://legis.wis- help.senate.gov/newsroom/press/ Situation,’” Education Week, Mar. 13, consin.gov/lab/reports/00-2tear.htm. 10, 2014, http://www.federationfor- 1991, http://www.edweek.org/ew/ release/?id=b52ee7f7-d826-4677- 23. “The Model for the Nation.” children.org/american-federation- articles/1991/03/13/10180005.h10. children-mourns-loss-school-choice- ad4a-0a8e94130ac3. html. 24. Interview with Bruce Murphy, pioneer-annette-polly-williams/. 53. “Lamar Alexander Proposes Dec. 12, 2014. 8. “Which way do we go? The 45th 38. Rachel Tabachnick, “The Right’s Sweeping Voucher Legislation,” annual PDK/Gallup Poll of the Public’s 25. Bruce Murphy, “The Rise and Fall School Choice Scheme,” The Public Eye Jan. 28, 2014, http://dianeravitch. Attitudes Toward the Public Schools,” of Polly Williams,” Urban Milwaukee, (Summer 2012), http://www.political- net/2014/01/28/lamar-alexander- Gallup, Kappan 95:1 (Sept. 2013), Jun. 27, 2001, http://urbanmilwau- research.org/2012/08/01/the-rights- proposes-sweeping-voucher-legisla- http://pdkintl.org/noindex/2013_PD- kee.com/2001/06/27/murphys-law- school-choice-scheme/. tion/. KGallup.pdf. the-rise-and-fall-of-polly-williams/. 39. See the publication on the 2011 54. Vasquez Heilig, “Reframing the 9. Jeff Spalding, The School Voucher 26. Hubert Morken and Jo Renee For- conference, “From Aspirations to Ac- Refrain.” Audit: Do Publicly Funded Private School micola, The Politics of School Choice tions: Solutions for American Catholic Choice Programs Save Money? Friedman (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, Schools,” p. 41. Tuition Tax Credits, p.6 Foundation for Educational Choice 1999), 205. 40. “From Aspirations to Actions,” 41. (2013), http://www.edchoice.org/ 27. Alex Molnar, “The Real Lesson of Research/Reports/The-School-Vouch- Milwaukee’s Voucher Program,” Edu- 41. One of many examples is Bishop 1. Kevin G. Welner, NeoVouchers: er-Audit--Do-Publicly-Funded-Pri- cation Week, Aug. 6, 1998, archived at Victor Curry in Florida, a vocal advo- The Emergence of Tuition Tax Credits for vate-School-Choice-Programs-Save- https://web.archive.org/web/*/http:// cate of the state’s corporate tax credit Private Schooling (Lanham: Rowman & Money-.aspx epsl.asu.edu/EPRU/articles/EPRU- program. The school run by his minis- Littlefield, 2008). 10. See Kevin Kruse, White Flight: 9708-38-OWI.doc. try includes 120 students with tuition 2. Kevin Welner, “How to Calcu- Atlanta and the Making of Modern Con- provided by the program and uses A late the Costs or Savings of Tax Credit 28. “The Rise and Fall of Polly Wil- Beka curricula. servatism (Princeton University Press, liams.” Voucher Policies,” National Educa- 2007). 42. Stephanie Saul, “Public Money tion Policy Center, http://nepc.colo- 29. Greensboro Truth and Reconcili- Finds Back Door to Private Schools, rado.edu/files/NEPC-PolicyMemo_ 11. “Virginia’s ‘Massive Resistance’ ation Commission Final Report, May to School Desegregation,” Univer- New York Times, May 21, 2012, http:// NeoVouchers.pdf. 25, 2006, p. 77, http://www.greens- www.nytimes.com/2012/05/22/edu- sity of Virginia’s Digital Resources borotrc.org/pre1979_labor.pdf. Also for United States History, http:// cation/scholarship-funds-meant-for- see Larry Miller’s review of Fuller’s needy-benefit-private-schools.html. Monetizing Charters, p.6 www2.vcdh.virginia.edu/xslt/serv- recent autobiography for Fuller’s ex- let/XSLTServlet?xml=/xml_docs/ planation of why he partnered with 43. Michael W. Apple, “Cannot vouch solguide/Essays/essay13a.xml&xsl=/ for vouchers,” FightingBob.com, Apr. 1. Multiple Choice: Charter School prominent conservative think tanks Performance in 16 States (Center for Re- xml_docs/solguide/sol_new. and funders, accessible at https://mill- 11, 2004, http://www.fightingbob. xsl§ion=essay. com/article.cfm?articleID=200. search on Education Outcomes (CRE- ermps.wordpress.com/2014/11/21/ DO), 2009), http://credo.stanford. 12. “The Closing of Prince Edward howard-fuller-autobiography-no- 44. See Chang-Tai Hsieh and Miguel Urquiola, “The effects of generalized edu/reports/MULTIPLE_CHOICE_ County Schools,” Virginia Historical struggle-no-progress-a-critique-3/. CREDO.pdf. Society, http://www.vahistorical.org/ school choice on achievement and 30. Community Voice or Captive of the 2. Valerie Strauss, “A dozen prob- collections-and-resources/virginia- Right? stratification: Evidence from Chile’s history-explorer/civil-rights-move- voucher program,” Journal of Public Eco- lems with charter schools,” Washing-

WINTER 2015 Political Research Associates • 19 ton Post, May 20, 2014, http://www. Russia’s annexation of Crimea from 23. U.S. Department of the Trea- June 1997, http://www.lifeadvocate. washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer- Ukraine. But the event actually went sury, Internal Revenue Service, org/5_97/cover_s.htm. sheet/wp/2014/05/20/a-dozen-prob- ahead as scheduled, only slightly dis- Form 990, (Washington, DC: 35. John D. Mueller, “How do na- lems-with-charter-schools/. guised by the use of a different name: 2012), http://www.guidestar.org/ tions choose ‘demographic winter’? Is 3. Noah Pransky, “Charter schools “Large Families and the Future of Hu- FinDocuments/2013/541/788/2013- America doing so?” Remarks to The making big profits for private compa- manity International Forum” (held on 541788267-0a1444bd-9.pdf. World Congress of Families V, Panel nies,” WTSP, Aug. 22, 2014, http:// the exact dates that WCF VIII was origi- 24. “World Congress of Families,” The on “Family and Demography”, Amster- www.wtsp.com/story/news/investi- nally scheduled). Howard Center for Family, Religion dam, Netherlands, Aug. 11, 2009, ac- gations/2014/08/21/charter-school- 9. John Ballyntyne, “A third way? & Society, http://profam.org/THC/ cessible via http://worldcongress.org/ profits-on-real-estate/14420317/. Allan Carlson’s vision of a family-cen- xthc_wcf.htm. wcf5.spkrs/wcf5.mueller.htm. 4. Marian Wang, “Charter School tered economy,” News Weekly, Nov. 25. In contrast to WCF’s anti-LGBTQ 36. World Congress of Families News, Power Broker Turns Public Education 8, 2005, http://newsweekly.com.au/ definition of family, Amnesty- In Jan./Feb. 2012, Vol. 6 No. 1, http:// Into Private Profits,” ProPublica, Oct. article.php?id=3576. ternational argues that Article 16 of worldcongress.org/wcfnl/wcfnl.cur. 15, 2014, http://www.propublica.org/ 10. “John A. Howard Ph.D.,” http:// the UDHR—which also states, “Men pdf. article/charter-school-power-broker- profam.org/people/xthc_jah.htm. and women of full age, without any 37. Sophia Kishkovsky, “Russia En- turns-public-education-into-private- 11. Allan Carlson, “On the World limitation due to race, nationality or acts Law Opposing Abortion,” New profits. Congress of Families: Presentation to religion, have the right to marry and York Times, July 16, 2011, http://www. 5. “Public Charter Schools List,” EPR the Charismatic Leaders Fellowship to found a family. They are entitled nytimes.com/2011/07/15/world/ Properties, http://www.eprkc.com/ Jacksonville, Florida,” Jan. 12, 2005, to equal rights as to marriage, during europe/15iht-russia15.html. marriage and at its dissolution”—can portfolio-overview/public-charter- http://profam.org/docs/acc/thc. 38. “Russia Passes First Anti- schools-list/. acc.020112.wcf.htm. be interpreted as a prohibition against discrimination based on gender or sex- abortion Law,” SIECUS, July 2011, 6. Catherine Candisky and Jim Sie- 12. According to Devin Burghart, vice ual orientation. See: “Marriage Equal- http://www.siecus.org/index. gel, “Charter school’s lease deal scru- president of the Institute for Research ity,” Amnesty International, http:// cfm?fuseaction=Feature.showFeature tinized,” Columbus Dispatch, Oct. 12, & Education on Human Rights, “De- www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/is- &featureid=2018&pageid=483&pare 2014, http://www.dispatch.com/ mographic winter is a relatively new sues/lgbt-rights/marriage-equality. ntid=478. content/stories/local/2014/10/12/ phrase that describes the old alarmist 26. “United Nations,” John Birch Soci- 39. Paul Goble, “Putin Family Values,” charters-lease-deals-scrutinized.html. ‘birth dearth’ concept—the idea that The Interpreter, Apr. 17, 2014, http:// we’re facing declining birthrates which ety, http://www.jbs.org/issues-pages/ united-nations. www.interpretermag.com/putin-fam- is supposed to portend all sorts of cata- ily-values/. Natural Deception, p.9 clysmic events.” See Bill Berkowitz, 27. Prior to joining the WCF staff, Ja- “Right-Wing Groups Use Decline of cobs served as president of Healthy 40. Sophia Kishkovsky, “Russia En- acts Law Opposing Abortion.” 1. Stan Swim, “World Congress of White Birthrates to Stoke Fear of Ho- Beginnings, a conservative Christian Families does not spread fear,” Salt Lake mosexuality, Feminism and Abor- pregnancy center with an explicit anti- 41. Steven Mosher, “Russia Consid- Tribune, Nov. 9. 2014, http://www.sl- tion,” AlterNet, June 29, 2010, http:// choice agenda targeting “disadvan- ers Banning Abortions as Abortion trib.com/opinion/1793725-155/fami- www.alternet.org/story/147352/ taged young women … experiencing Decimates Its Population,” Life News, ly-wcf-families-congress-law-munson. right-wing_groups_use_decline_of_ unplanned pregnancies.” During his Dec. 23, 2013, http://www.lifenews. com/2013/12/23/russia-considers- 2. Jennifer Butler, “For Faith and white_birthrates_to_stoke_fear_of_ tenure there, Jacobs told a local news- banning-abortions-as-abortion-deci- Family: Christian Right Advocacy at homosexuality,_feminism_and_abor- paper that his dream was to spread mates-its-population/. the United Nations,” The Public Eye tion. the Healthy Beginnings model nation- (Summer 2000), http://www.politic- 13. Nancy Folbre, “The Underpopula- ally, using faith-based grants made 42. World Congress of Families News, alresearch.org/2000/09/01/for-faith- tion Bomb,” New York Times, Feb. 11, available under President Bush’s ad- Jan./Feb. 2012. and-family-christian-right-advocacy- 2013, http://economix.blogs.nytimes. ministration. Instead, WCF has given 43. See, for example, Steven W. at-the-united-nations/#. com/2013/02/11/the-underpopula- Jacobs the opportunity to spread his Sinding, “Population, Poverty and anti-choice agenda globally. See: Pe- 3. Kathryn Joyce, “Missing: The tion-bomb. Economic Development,” Jan. ter Bronson, “Angels in Lab Coats,” En- 2008, http://www.cgdev.org/doc/ ‘Right’ Children,” Nation, Feb. 14, 14. Don Feder, “The Cultural Roots quirer, Aug. 19, 2001, http://enquirer. 2008, http://www.thenation.com/ar- of Demographic Winter,” Rhodes events/04.07.09/Population_Poverty_ com/editions/2001/08/19/loc_bron- and_Econ_Dev_Sinding.pdf. ticle/missing-right-babies. Forum, http://rhodesforum.org/ son_angels_in.html. popular/4082-the-cultural-roots-of- 44. “World Population Prospects: 4. In August 2014, the Human 28. Brian Tashman, “World Congress Rights Campaign—America’s largest demographic-winter. The 2012 Revision,” United Nations, of Families Praises Russian Laws Department of Economic and Social LGBTQ political advocacy group—pub- 15. “Russia’s Growing Muslim Popula- ‘Preventing’ Gays from ‘Corrupting lished a report describing WCF as “one tion,” Stratfor, Aug. 8, 2013, http:// Affairs, http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/ Children,’” Right Wing Watch, June 3, index.htm. of the most influential American orga- www.stratfor.com/image/russias- 2013, http://www.rightwingwatch. nizations in the export of hate.” See: growing-muslim-population. org/content/world-congress-families- 45. “Nigerians living in poverty rise “New HRC Report Exposes The World 16. See: United Nations Department praises-russian-laws-preventing-gays- to nearly 61%,” BBC, Feb. 13, 2012, Congress of Families,” Aug. 25, 2014, of Economic and Social Affairs, http:// corrupting-children. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-af- http://www.hrc.org/blog/entry/ex- rica-17015873. According to UNESCO, www.un.org/en/development/desa/ 29. J.Lester Feder, “U.N. Human posed-the-world-congress-of-families. population/migration/publications/ “Absolute poverty measures poverty in Rights Council Adopts Resolution On relation to the amount of money need- 5. “Hunted: The War Against Gays in wallchart/index.shtml. ‘Protection Of The Family,’” BuzzFeed, Russia,” http://www.hbo.com/docu- 17. Katheryn Joyce, “Review: Demo- ed to meet basic needs such as food, June 26, 2014, http://www.buzzfeed. clothing, and shelter.” See “Poverty,” mentaries/hunted-the-war-against- graphic Winter: The Decline of the com/lesterfeder/un-human-rights- gays-in-russia#/. Human Family,” The Harvard Divin- UNESCO, http://www.unesco.org/ council-adopts-resolution-on-protec- new/en/social-and-human-sciences/ 6. Benjamin Bidder, “Viral Vigilan- ity Bulletin (Spring 2008), http:// tion-of-t#.vqye5d3N9. themes/international-migration/glos- tism: Russian Neo-Nazis Take Gay kathrynjoyce.com/articles/review-de- 30. Jay Michaelson, “At the United sary/poverty/. Bashing Online,” Spiegel Online Inter- mographic-winter-the-decline-of-the- Nations, It’s Human Rights, Putin- 46. “Theresa Okafor: Looking to the national, Nov. 14, 2013, http://www. human-family/. Style,” Daily Beast, June 26, 2014, spiegel.de/international/europe/rus- 18. “Frequently Asked Questions,” Future: Overpopulation or Global http://www.thedailybeast.com/ar- Depopulation,” YouTube, Dec. 19, sian-skinheads-abuse-gays-and-post- The Howard Center for Family, Reli- ticles/2014/06/26/at-the-united-na- video-to-social-networks-a-933549. gion & Society, Jan. 9, 2007, http:// 2012, https://www.youtube.com/ tions-it-s-human-rights-putin-style. watch?v=1Lp7-D2u6qk. html. profam.org/THC/xthc_faq.htm. html. 7. Austin Ruse, “World Congress 19. Jennifer Butler, “For Faith and 47. Rev. Dr. Kapya Kaoma, American 31. J.Lester Feder, “U.N. Human Culture Warriors in Africa: A Guide to of Families Pledges Solidarity with Family.” Rights Council.” Europe,” Catholic Family & Human the Exporters of Homophobia and Sex- 20. “A Declaration From The World Rights Institute, http://t.c-fam.org/ 32. Sharon Slater, “The Fam- ism (Cambridge: Harvard Bookstore, Congress of Families To The Govern- en/issues/marriage-and-family/553- ily Watch,” Apr. 2, 2012, http://www. 2014). ments of the Globe,” The Howard world-congress-of-families-pledges- familywatchinternational.org/fwi/ Center for Family, Religion & Society, 48. “WCF VI-Madrid 2012-Conquistas solidarity-with-europe. newsletter/0573.cfm. del movimiento provida y profamilia Mar. 22, 1997, http://worldcongress. 33. Kathryn Joyce, “Missing: The 8. In 2014, plans were well underway org/WCF1/wcf1_declaration.htm. en el mundo. Theresa Okafor,” You- for WCF’s next major convening—WCF ‘Right’ Children.” Tube, July 10, 2012, https://www.you- 21. “A Declaration From The World VIII—to be held in Moscow, Septem- 34. Cathy Ramey, “A World Views tube.com/watch?v=FGS12eVZq1Y. Congress of Families.” ber 10-12. In March, however, WCF Conference: Prague’s international 49. Jay Michaelson, Redefining Re- announced that it was canceling the 22. Allan Carlson, “On the World Con- Congress of the Family focuses on ligious Liberty: The Covert Campaign event purportedly due to concerns over gress of Families.” cultural disaster,” Life Advocate, May/ Against Civil Rights (Political Research

20 • The Public Eye WINTER 2015 Associates, 2013), http://www.politi- arrested-at-jersey-anti-abortion-pro- http://www.priestsforlife.org/re- People,” Catholics for a Free Choice, calresearch.org/2013/03/21/redefin- test.html. sources/monica. 2005, http://www.thefreelibrary. ing-religious-liberty-the-covert-cam- 15. Cynthia L. Cooper, “N.Y. Launch- 30. Robin Marty, “Let’s Get Visceral: com/Recruiting+the+next+generatio paign-against-civil-rights/. es Probe of Crisis-Pregnancy Cen- Anti-abortion Activists Plan Memo- n%3A+how+conservative+groups+in 50. World Congress of Families News, ters,” Women’s E-News, Jan. 31, 2002, rial Services for Unborn Fetuses, fluence+and...-a0136262288. Nov. 2014, Vol. 8 No. 7, http://world- http://womensenews.org/story/ Complete with Tiny Coffins,” In These 36. Eric Scheidler, “Eric Visits Ireland congress.org/files/9414/1582/4595/ health/020131/ny-launches-probe- Times, Sept. 13, 2013, http://inthe- to Encourage Pro-Life Youth,” Pro-Life WCF_News_November_2014.pdf. crisis-pregnancy-centers. setimes.com/article/15615/lets_get_ Action League, Nov. 12, 2010, http:// 16. Frank Schaeffer, “How My Dad visceral. prolifeaction.org/hotline/2010/viva- and I Helped Create the Tea Party GOP 31. Pro-Life Action League, Guide lavida. Pro-Life Action League, p.15 and Terrorist Extremism,” Patheos, Star Report, p.2, http://www.guid- 37. Kristina Garza, “Best Conference Nov. 15, 2014, http://www.patheos. estar.org/ViewPdf.aspx?PdfSource=0 Yet,” Survivors of the Abortion Holo- 1. See, for example, Janet Reitman, com/blogs/frankschaeffer/2014/11/ &ein=36-3081086. caust Blog, Nov. 12, 2014, http:// “The Stealth War on Abortion,” Roll- how-my-dad-and-i-helped-create-the- 32. “Pro-Life Action Store Products,” www.survivors.la/blog/2014/11/12/ ing Stone, Jan. 15, 2014, http://www. tea-party-gop-and-terrorist-extrem- Pro-Life Action League, https://pro- best-conference-yet. rollingstone.com/politics/news/the- ism. life-action-league-store.myshopify. 38. “Program Schedule,” Survivors stealth-war-on-abortion-20140115. 17. Tamar Lewin, “Death of a Doc- com/collections/all. of the Abortion Holocaust Blog, 2014, 2. Joseph M. Scheidler, Closed: 99 tor: the Moral Debate–Abortion Doc- 33. U.S. Department of the Trea- http://www.survivors.la/-program- Ways to Stop Abortion (Charlotte: Tan tor and Body Guard Slain in Florida; sury, Internal Revenue Service, schedule. Books, 1984). A Cause Worth Killing For? Debate Form 990, (Washington, DC: 2012), 39. Anne Donald, “Guardian of Splits Abortion Foes,” New York Times, 3. Robin Marty, “Tracking License p.10, http://www.guidestar.org/ the Right to Life,” The Herald Scot- July 30, 1994, http://www.nytimes. FinDocuments/2013/363/081/2013- land, Nov. 19, 1999, http://www. Plates at Abortion Clinics? It’s Not Just com/1994/07/30/us/death-doctor- Happening in Texas,” Talking Points 363081086-0a0988d5-9.pdf. heraldscotland.com/sport/spl/ab- moral-debate-abortion-doctor-body- erdeen/guardian-of-the-right-to- Memo, Aug. 18, 2014, http://talk- guardslain-florida-cause-worth.html. 34. Angela Nagel, “Why American ingpointsmemo.com/cafe/tracking- Pro-Life Dollars Are Pouring Into Ire- life-1.261598. license-plates-at-abortion-clinics-it-s- 18. Joe Scheidler, “Paul Hill Execut- land,” Atlantic, Jan. 9, 2013, http:// 40. Henry McDonald, “Anti-Abortion not-just-happening-in-texas. ed,” Pro-Life Action League, Sept 5, www.filmyboxoffice.com/news/why- Activist Found Guilty of Harassing 2003, http://prolifeaction.org/hot- american-pro-life-dollars-are-pour- Belfast Marie Stopes Boss,” Guardian, 4. Robin Marty, “Running the line/2003/30905. Gauntlet,” Politico, June 11, 2014, ing-into-ireland.html. Nov. 19, 2014, http://www.theguard- http://www.politico.com/magazine/ 19. Adam Guasch-Melendez, “Grand 35. Allie Higgins, “Recruiting the ian.com/uk-news/2014/nov/19/ story/2014/06/abortion-supreme- Jury Won’t Issue Indictment for Next Generation: How Conservative abortion-activist-guilty-harassing- court-mccullen-v-coakley-107739. Abortion Conspiracy,” The Public Eye Groups Influence and Enlist Young belfast-marie-stopes. html#.VHyonWTF_38. (Spring 1996), http://www.publiceye. org/ifas/fw/9603/conspiracy.html. 5. National Organization for Women, Inc. v. Scheidler, 510 U.S. 249 (S.C. 20. Robin Marty, “On the Sidewalks 1994), No. 92-780. of a Chicago Clinic: A battle about how to End Abortion,” Clinic Stories, 6. “PLAN holds 1997 Convention http://www.clinicstories.com. in Milwaukee,” Life Advocate, Nov./ Looking for more analysis of Dec., Vol. XII No. 9 (1997), http:// 21. Andrew Fegelman and Jean www.lifeadvocate.org/11_97/nation. Latz Griffin, “Public Funds’ Use htm. Key to Abortion Fight,” Chicago Tri- right-wing trends, strategies, bune, Dec. 16, 1992, http://articles. 7. Judy Lundstrom Thomas, “Wrath chicagotribune.com/1992-09-16/ movements, and leaders? of Angels Descends,” Interview with news/9203240474_1_anti-abortion- Anne Bower, The Body Politic, Vol. 7, pro-life-action-league-cook-county- No. 11, Dec. 1997, 17. hospital. 8. Josh Glasstetter, “Todd Akin Ar- 22. Robin Marty, “Working As an rested on May 9, 1987 with Radical Abortion Doctor in the Town Where Political Research Associates has got you covered. 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Brian Caulfield, “Joan Andrews www.sba-list.org/suzy-b-blog/top- Bell Freed on Unsupervised Parole,” 12-reasons-defund-planned-parent- National Catholic Register, Apr. 5, hood-now. 1998, http://www.ncregister.com/ site/article/joan_andrews_bell_ 25. “Live Action and Students for Life freed_on_unsupervised_parole. of America Release Winner of “Tell Congress” Video Contest,” Expose /politicalresearchassociates 11. William Booth, “Doctor Killed Planned Parenthood, Mar. 15, 2011, During Abortion Protest,” Washing- http://exposeplannedparenthood. ton Post, Mar. 11, 1993, http://www. net/newsroom/press-releases. washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/nation- al/longterm/abortviolence/stories/ 26. “Planned Parenthood Exposed gunn.htm. Partners,” http://plannedparenthood- exposed.com/partners. 12. “Advocates for Life Ministries to Close,” Ms., Nov. 29, 1999, http:// 27. Anne Scheidler, “Scheidlers @PRAEyesRight www.msmagazine.com/news/us- Headline at Fourth Annual National wirestory.asp?id=1195. 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The Art of Activism Spotlighting the efforts of artists and organizations who are engaged in the struggle for social justice and are helping build the movement through their work.

When Meredith Stern (whose artwork is 1990s and early 2000s didn’t seem to also featured on the front cover) chooses welcome her art. “It seemed that within where to live, she embraces the “act lo- activist circles, art and culture were dis- cally, think globally” ethos. That’s why, missed as unnecessary,” she explains. once she put down roots in Providence, “But art does play a role in promoting Rhode Island, the printmaker and collage ethics, as a moral compass, and a reflec- artist began naturally forming collabora- tion of society and the people within it. tions with fellow artists for social justice. How,” she recalls thinking, “do I contin- A member of the JustSeeds artists’ collec- ue to make work that has a life, that has tive since 2007, Stern has contributed to a place?” a variety of books, posters, group shows, Stern says she believes that with the and collaborative projects all focused on rise of Occupy and Black Lives Matter, the struggle for justice. social justice movements are beginning “Ever since college I’ve been involved in to make room for art. “I’m pretty excited organizing at the same time as art. I see that people are starting to see art and cul- art and culture as an integral part of hu- ture as part of social movements. To see man life,” Stern says. Stern enjoys making that it’s all connected,” she says. things such as posters and smaller prints When asked what she might turn to that people might use in their everyday next in her art, Stern’s answer is clear: lives, rather than for a gallery show that “Teach Resistance” (2012), by Meredith “Institutional racism is so massive. The might be seen by a handful of folks. She Stern. Linoleum block print with spray only way that our society is going to move aims to spread her posters’ messages wide- paint stencils. A tribute to the sit-in forward is if we head-on address institu- ly, but her larger project is to rebuild the protests that started in Greensboro, NC. tional inequalities.” Stern is taking part cultural wing of social justice movements. in a collaborative project, Bridge to the Stern has had a lifelong connection to grassroots activ- Gulf, that links climate change and poverty with the lived ism, but couldn’t understand why the movements of the experiences of people in the Gulf states.

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