News Intelligence Analysis
From the text of Dr. Dobson's Remarks
Restoring the Foundations: Repealing Judicial Tyranny
By Dr. James Dobson
The issue in Alabama is not simply about a 5,300-pound monument depicting the Ten Commandments in an Alabama courthouse. It is about the right of the people of that state, and indeed, the people of this entire country, to acknowledge God in the public square. Instead, the courts have taken away a fundamental right — a religious freedom guaranteed by the First Amendment. Moreover, the issue we face is whether these unelected officals will be allowed to eliminate all references to God throughout the land.
On August 28, 2003, Dr. Dobson was a keynote speaker at the "Restore the Foundation" rally on the steps of the state judicial building in Montgomery, Ala. The following is an edited transcript of the message he presented there:
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: Thank you, everybody. Thank you. What a neat thing to see you all. I just can't believe that you're here. I bring you greetings in the name of the Lord today. Pat said it’s over a hundred degrees here today. I believe it’s over a hundred and fifty. I just can’t believe that you have come here and stood in this hot sun in order to make a statement about what we all believe. And I know that many of you have been inconvenienced by coming here. Some of you have traveled a long way. Some of you used money you couldn’t afford. You had to take vacation days to be here. You have children at home. You have other responsibilities. Yet, you gave priority to being here, and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it. That poll that Rev. Pat Mahoney mentioned indicating 77 percent of the American people oppose the removal of the Ten Commandments monument from the courthouse is very encouraging. If there are 200 million adults in this country, that’s upward of 150 million people who are standing with you today.
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: I came here to remind us of what you already know, that it is very, very ironic that this event and this confrontation is occurring in Montgomery, where a little black lady, by the name of Rosa Parks, in 1955, had no power. She had no influence. She had no money. She was not a political leader, but she saw something that she felt was evil. Yeah, it was imposed on her and all black people by "the rule of law," that we've been hearing about this last week, but it was wrong. It was evil. She determined not to obey the order, because her people were being sent to the back of the bus.
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: I honor her today. She was a Christian woman, as you know. She had a deep faith in God, but the governor didn't help her. And the attorney general was not there for her, and the legislators ran for the tall grass, and the power-structure of the day did not offer its help. Nevertheless, Rosa prevailed, because she believed in the rightness of her cause. Therefore, we honor her and invoke her name here today, because in a very real way--
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: --in a very real way, we're in a great moral struggle of our own, a great moral struggle, because people of faith are also being sent to the back of the bus.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: And we're not going to go there.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: This great monument has now been put in the back of the bus, and it ought to be out on display where people can see it. But in a larger context, I would like to put this issue in focus from my perspective. That this struggle that we're involved in is not really about the Ten Commandments. It's not really about the monument. It is not even about that wonderful man, Judge Moore, who has had the courage of his convictions to put it on the line. It will cost him professionally, but he has been willing to suffer the loss. But there is something even more significant at play here.
This struggle is primarily a battle against judicial tyranny.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: The liberal elite and the judges at the highest level and some members of the media are determined to remove every evidence of faith in God from this entire culture. They are determined to control more and more of our private lives, and it is time that we said, "Enough is enough."
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: They want to redefine us as a nation and deny the spiritual heritage that brought us to this point. Our faith has sustained us through the wars that we've experienced and the crises that have come our way. We turned to God when we were bombed on 9/11. The churches were full. Historically, we have turned to God when we have had a need. (Looking toward the sky) And thank you, Lord, for a cloud that just came over.
Audience: (Laughter and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: Nevertheless, the liberal elite wants to eliminate God from the public square, and they're going to have a hard time doing it. On the United States Supreme Court building are three depictions to the same Ten Commandments and to Moses. The sergeant of arms opens every workday until now by shouting, "God bless the United States and this Court." That's been going on since 1777. But now, the revisionists would tell us that we're trying to do something that the Founding Fathers would not have approved of. I wish they could be here today. I think they'd have something to say on their own behalf.
Audience: (Applause)
The National Archives building displays the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence. In order to see them, you have to walk past the Ten Commandments. In the Capitol Building in Washington, where I was yesterday, there are evidences of early faith in God throughout, in the inscriptions, in the statutes, in the art on the walls, and in the chamber of the House of Representatives.
Written behind the speaker are the words "In God We Trust."
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: Surrounding that chamber, are depictions of the great lawgivers down through history. They are all facing away from the speaker. They're all looking at the person in the center. Guess who's in the center?
Audience: (Shouts of "Moses")
Dr. Dobson: Moses is in the center.
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: He is the only one that is shown full-face, looking down on the Speaker and the representatives. The rest are looking to him, because our law is based on the Judeo-Christian system of values.
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: Throughout Washington, you see evidences of that. In Philadelphia, the Liberty Bell has a Scripture on it from the Book of Leviticus. The other examples are evident throughout the historic monuments and governmental buildings. If the ACLU and if the People for the American Way and if Americans United for the Separation of Church and State and all the other liberal organizations are going to accomplish their goal, they're going to have to sandblast half the buildings in Washington.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: And we’re not going to let them do that.
Audience: (Applause)
Ambassador Alan Keyes greets an attendee.
Used with permission of Tenney Olsen
Dr. Dobson: So, we are here today to defend the things we believe. Now why has this confrontation occurred in Montgomery? Why didn't the leftist organizations start with references to God in Washington? Why did they come down here to beat up on the people of Alabama? The reason is because they were afraid to do it elsewhere. That will be done later when the nation has been "softened up!" Thus, they have come to Alabama, and they think they can intimidate you. But we must not allow that to happen.
The question is, what is the legal basis for these attacks on religious faith? It is the liberal interpretation of the Constitution. Everything we care about is considered unconstitutional now. Everything that represents God or things that are holy are considered to be unconstitutional.
I checked yesterday with my research team. There are only two references to religion in the foundational document. The first refers to "securing the blessings of liberty for us and our posterity." Guess who the posterity is? That is us. Our Founding Fathers were talking about securing the blessings of liberty for our day. Where did the blessings of liberty come from?
Audience: (Shouts of "God")
Dr. Dobson: They came from God, so that's the first reference. The second, of course, is in the Establishment Clause, which has given such occasion for mischief by the Supreme Court. You know those historic words. I would like you to repeat them with me. Who is the Establishment Clause addressed to, as a place to start?
Audience: (Shouts of "Congress")
Dr. Dobson: Congress! Say it again!
Audience: (Shouts of "Congress")
Dr. Dobson: Let’s quote it together: "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion." Is the depiction of the Ten Commandments here in Alabama an "establishment of religion"?
Audience: (Shouts of "No")
Dr. Dobson: Can you get to heaven by keeping the Ten Commandments?
Audience: (Shouts of "No")
Dr. Dobson: No. They do not in any context represent an establishment of religion. Nor are they a church. The church-state argument is irrelevant to it. The Ten Commandments represent our historic spiritual heritage on which all other law is based.
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: Let’s look at the other component of the Establishment Claus: How has Congress made a law in regard to The Ten Commandments?
Audience: (Shouts of "No")
Dr. Dosbon: No! So tell me how does the Constitution provide the rationale for the federal government’s interference in the Alabama Judicial Building?
Audience: (Shouts of "It doesn't.")
Dr. Dobson: It's absolutely irrelevant. Let's read together the end of the clause: "or interfere with the free exercise thereof." The question is who is interfering with whom, here?
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: They've taken those simple words and twisted them to mean something the Founders had no intention of conveying. The separation of church and state is not in the Constitution. Liberals have had to contrive the basis for these things, and then they talk about them as though they were ensconced in the writings of our forefathers. USA Today published an entire article today extolling the separation of church and state and talking about how the Constitution supports it, but the concept is not in there. They have made up a law that has permitted them to remove God from the public square.
It's been a 41-year struggle. Started in 1962 with what ruling?
Audience: (Shouts of "Prayer")
Dr. Dobson: Prayer in schools. That was the first shot. And in 1963, they removed Bible reading from the public schools, and most of use sat in silence. Christians are a people who reverence the law and believe in the rule of law. Christian people are law-abiding people, so we said nothing. And the liberals were on a roll then. They removed voluntary prayer from the schools, and then banned prayer at graduations. In the 1980’s, they required the State of Kentucky to take down the Ten Commandments from its bulletin boards.
And it's gone from one thing to the other until it reached a low point last year when a doddering old judge, Goodwin, of the 9th Circuit in California ruled that school children could not say the Pledge of Allegiance, because it contained those "offensive" words "under God." Everybody was shocked by the audacity of that decision. It was terrible, and in fact, it scared members of Congress half to death. They came stumbling out of the Capitol building, trying to get to the microphones to say they were opposed to Judge Goodwin’s order.
Senator Daschle was one of the first ones to get to the microphones. "This is a wrong decision," he said. But ever since then he has been working tirelessly to preserve that kind of leftist judiciary and keep conservative men and women from being confirmed to the US Senate, who have been nominated by President Bush. It is time for us to let the Democrats know that their filibustering is unacceptable to us.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: Did you know that Thomas Jefferson was worried about the development of a small oligarchy (which is government by a few) that would gain judicial power and be beyond the reach of the other two branches of government.
When I was in the fourth grade, back in the days when they taught history--
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Media coverage at the Alabama Judicial Building.
Used with permission of Tenney Olsen
Dr. Dobson: --I was sitting in class one day, and my teacher went to the board, and she talked about the principle of checks and balances between the three branches of government. She explained how the Founding Fathers were concerned about the dangers of unleashed power, and that they wanted to assure that no one could gain too great a measure of control. They put within the Constitution the responsibility in the Congress to check the courts. But the Congress has totally abdicated that responsibility, and what we have now is the kind of oligarchy that Thomas Jefferson was worried about.
You know something else I discovered yesterday? Jefferson and Franklin both submitted designs for the Seal of the United States, and they both suggested depictions of Moses. This makes Judge Myron Thompson’s order regarding the monument absolutely unfounded in the law.
I've been out there in Colorado Springs and Washington and other places. I've seen CNN — thank you for being here. I've heard FOX News; I've heard the various news media as they've described this event in Montgomery. They’ve totally missed the point.
Audience: (Shouts)
Dr. Dobson: They’ve described it as the work of an out-of-control judge who has a personal motive or ambition in defending the monument. I don't know how losing his job can be interpreted as an expression of ambition. The media have not understood it at all, and that's why I came here, to say to you, it's not about the Ten Commandments. It's about everything else.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: It is mostly about the unelected, unaccountable, arrogant, imperious judiciary appointed for life that is determined to make all of us dance to their music. That is not the way a democracy is supposed to function.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: We need to go to the Congress and demand--absolutely demand--that they rein in this runaway court.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: It's not just about removing God from the public square. Look at what they've done to us. In 1973, the Roe v. Wade decision was an outrage. We followed the rule of law, despite our agitation about the ruling. So we worked within the system. Now, thirty years have gone by, and 40 million babies are dead, and they're still being murdered.
More recently of course, the Supreme Court struck down Nebraska's law that would have banned partial-birth abortion. Thus, full-term healthy babies are being delivered to the tops of their heads. The child to be killed is kicking and squirming, fully brimming with life, then they put a cannula or a tube into the back of the head and suck the brains out. The majority of this immoral Supreme Court ruled that it is unconstitutional to stop the killing of those babies.
Most recently, the Justices have ruled that homosexuals have the constitutional right to practice sodomy. Writing for the majority was Justice William Kennedy, whom I consider to be one of the most dangerous men in this country.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: Somebody ought to tell him he could be impeached.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: It would help if he just knew that. And the worst part about that decision is that in his rationale for the sodomy decision, he said we had to look at "customary law." Nevermind the fact that our Constitution states that we are endowed by the Creator with certain unalienable rights. Forget that now our rights are going to be determined by European and Canadian law. I just returned from Europe, and I'm telling you, that is a very pagan place. Is that where we're headed --- that our rights are not dependent upon God, but will be drawn from other countries that have not shared our historic beliefs for hundreds of years? That's what Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Justice Kennedy have implied in their decisions and in their interviews and speeches.
What that probably means is that the majority on the court appears to be headed straight as an arrow for the sanction and supposed constitutionality of same-sex marriage.
Audience: (Shouts of "No")
Dr. Dobson: That is what will happen if we don't get involved. It is wrong, and we must oppose it.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: It will destroy the family and bring down this nation if a family can consist of gay marriage or "group marriage." If marriage means everything, it ceases to mean anything. We must stop this movement in its tracks.
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: The first place to slow it down is the Federal Marriage Amendment. Congress needs to give that message to the Court.
Audience: (Applause)
Dr. Dobson: Work for it. Call your members of Congress. Remind them of where they got their power and that they could lose it. Write to the newspapers. Call the talk shows. Use your influence. You can't sit this one out, because the time is very short. I'm absolutely convinced of that. This country could very easily be like Canada is today, where you can't even preach the first chapter of Romans. That's coming here and a whole lot more if we don't get in and fight it.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: There was a time when I was younger when it stung me to be called a "right winger." There was a time when I didn't want to take that heat. There was a time when I wanted to say what I needed to say, but then I tried to keep my head down. I've got to tell you. Those days are over.
Audience: (Shouts and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: All right. Other speakers coming. I've got to ask you some questions. I would like you to talk to me. Here we go. Do you think it's time to limit the power of the oligarchy?
Audience: (Shouts of "Yes")
Dr. Dobson: Do you believe the redefinition of marriage will undermine and threaten its legal underpinnings?
Audience: (Shouts of "Yes")
Dr. Dobson: Are you fed up with the courts tampering with the schools and warping the minds of kids?
Audience: (Shouts of "Yes")
Dr. Dobson: Do you want kids to say the Pledge of Allegiance every day?
Audience: (Shouts of "Yes")
Dr. Dobson: Are you going to make these convictions known in the wider public square?
Audience: (Shouts of "Yes")
Dr. Dobson: Are you going...this one may be a little tougher, are you going to oppose any legal action taken against Judge Moore?
Audience: (Sustained and emotional shouts of "Yes" and Applause)
Dr. Dobson: You may have to do it, because the judicial people believe they have him by the neck. I believe that God has another plan.
Audience: (Shouts of "Yes")
Dr. Dobson: Finally, are you ready to say, "Enough is enough?
Audience: (Shouts of "Yes")
Dr. Dobson: One of my great heroes is Winston Churchill. I've got his memorabilia all over my office. I have a big portrait of him in my office. (I wonder if the court would like to take that down.) I love what he said during Britain’s very darkest hour, when it looked like there was no hope against the Nazis. He said, "We will never, never, never, never, never give up." God bless you all.
Audience: (Thunderous Applause)
Can you see now why this is such a critical battle — a battle that's about far more than a single monument? The larger issue is that the unelected, unaccountable judiciary, who are appointed for life, have become so powerful that no one can rein them in or challenge their determination to recast this country, except the Congress. If we fail at this moment of destiny, we will become a secularized nation like Canada or the continent of Europe, whose laws are based on secular humanism, or worse, on post-modernism, which holds that there is no truth, no basic right or wrong, nothing good or bad, nothing evil or noble, nothing moral or immoral. Law then will be a whimsical standard that shifts with the sands of time. This is where the courts are taking us, and Justice Roy Moore is courageously standing against that. Won't you please join with me in supporting his cause?
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