June 1992

A Journal of Atheist News and Thought

James G.
Blaine
and the

Defense of
Public Education

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American Atheists, Inc.

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Alerican Atheist

A Journal

of Atheist

News and Thought

June 1992

Editor's Desk
R. Murray-O'Hair

Director's Briefcase
Jon G. Murray

Can an Atheist be jailed for refusing to

take an oath "So help me God"? Federal judges decline to answer that
question when asked to decide a case
on "A Duty an Atheist Has No Right
to Fulfill."

Ask A.A.
Cover art and design by
David Canright.

Talking Back

17

44

Christians like to say that the universe

must have a cause. But Atheists
would point out that believers are just
speaking "Of Uncaused Causes."

19

American Atheists Call National

Rally - Atheists hope to draw attention to their demands for state/church
separation and equal rights at the Republican National Convention. - 19
"Come to City Hall" - Religious organizations, mayors, and governors
urged citizens to come to city hall for
the National Day of Prayer. So American Atheists did - to protest the
mingling of state and church. - 21

The Amish as Exemplary Model:

Truth or Distortion?
Douglas Kachel

The Probing Mind

Frank R. Zindler

My Path to Atheism
Philip A. Stahl

Historical Notes

23

Being an altar boy led to this Atheist's

first step from Catholicism to disbelief.

Should government funds be spent

for religious schools? A nineteenthcentury presidential candidate just
said no to that idea.
June 1992

55

The American Atheist Library gets its

first home - just twenty years ago.

26

James Gillespie Blaine

Madalyn O'Hair

46

Breakthrough research has led the

American Atheist's own columnist to
show "How Jesus Got a Life."

A sociologist pokes behind the myths

surrounding the Amish.

Austin, Texas

Censorship just applies to printed

matter, right? Wrong. Moralists of all
stripes would like to limit our choices
of entertainment, health care, and
even beverages and food.

Keeping kosher and being kind to animals don't go hand-in-hand if one respects Muslim and Jewish dietary
laws.

News and Comments

Volume 34, No.6

Forcing Us To Be Good (Or Else!) 38

Conrad E Goeringer

Poetry

57

American Atheist Radio Series

Madalyn O'Hair

58

The difficulty Atheist witnesses once

had getting a day in court is the subject of "Disqualification and Atheists."

Me Too
29

61

The essay "Old Wine, New Bottle"

summarizes the history of every religion on earth today.

Letters to the Editor

62

Classified Ads

64
Page 1

AmericanAtheist
Editor
R. Murray-O'Hair
Editor Emeritus
Dr. Madalyn OHair
Managing Editor
Jon G. Murray
Poetry
Angeline Bennett
Non-Resident Staff
Margaret Bhatty
Victoria Branden
Merrill Holste
Arthur Frederick Ide
John G. Jackson
Frank R. Zindler
The American Atheist is published by American Atheist Press.
Copyright 1991 by American Atheist Press.
All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole
or in part without written permission is
prohibited. ISSN: 0332-4310:
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Manuscripts submitted must be typed,
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available upon request. The editors assume
no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts.
The American Atheist Press publishes a variety of Atheist, agnostic, and freethought
material. A catalog is available for $l.00.
All Christian Bible quotations are from the
King James Version, unless otherwise
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This magazine is printed on recycled paper.
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June 1992

American Atheist

Editor's Desk

Looking at two believers

(and a bunch of Atheists)
he biographies of religious persons are not the standard concern
of the American Atheist The histories and contributions of Atheist
heroes and heroines have been too well
suppressed for these pages to be routinely spent on the lives of the religious.
The Atheists and freethinkers of the
past who worked so valiantly for the liberation of the human mind must garner
recognition here - for who will more
appreciate their work than their fellow
nonbelievers?
Nonetheless we must sometimes
look at the lives of those not our own.
Whatever our hopes for the future, we
all live in a religious present - profoundly shaped and influenced not only
by institutions of faith but by the faithful
themselves. The lives of two such believers, both of whom have had a great
effect on the United States, are the
focus of articles in this issue.
First, Madalyn O'Hair, the grande
dame of American Atheism, presents
"James Gillespie Blaine." Blaine's name
is now obscured by a hundred years of
"politics as usual," but he was one of the
best-loved politicians of his time. Even
repeated charges of corruption did not
smother his popularity as he rose from
a state legislature, to the House of Representatives, to the Senate, and finally
to the Cabinet. Several times a presidential candidate, he served in public
offices for more than thirty years.
Blaine's political career was an interesting chapter in American political history, but what is most compelling to
Atheists is his continuing commitment
to separation of state and church. A selfproclaimed Christian, Blaine nonetheless sponsored legislation which would
have protected our public schools from
any sectarian influence. One of the most
fascinating aspects of his career is that
throughout his efforts to reserve public
funds for the exclusive use of public
schools, he never succumbed to or in-

R. Murray-O' Hair
Austin, Texas

dulged in the anti-Roman Catholic hysteria of his times. He concentrated instead on the need for a public school
system which would afford every child
an opportunity for education regardless
of creed. As some political forces in the
United States work to surrender the
minds of upcoming generations to private, religious hands, the story of past
efforts to ensure a nonreligious school
system is of increasing importance.
Most sectarian teachers yearning for
public funds wish to instruct students in
the life of another subject of this issue:
Jesus. American Atheist columnist
Frank R. Zindler would be quick to point
out, however, that that character never
had a life - just a biography. In "How
Jesus Got a Life," he tries to explain
how that life story was constructed.
The idea that Jesus was not a historical figure is not new to Atheists or theologians. For over a hundred years,
scholars have argued against the historicity of Jesus Christ. Holes have been
poked in the secular proofs by many of
our own, including, with humor and eloquence, Frank Zindler. But until now
few have approached the question of
how and why the myth of Jesus' lifewas
constructed. Whence the details of the
Christ-myth, if there was no Christ?
Frank Zindler has done much painstaking research on this question, planning to develop the results into a book.
As we await the completion of his work,
we may ponder his preliminary findings
in "The Probing Mind." His argument
for the Mithraic roots of the Jesus story
is thought-provoking. After reading it,
you will view the symbols of Christianity in a new light.
Unfortunately, in the United States
you willoften view those Christian symbols on public land or at government
events. Atheist activism on behalf of
state/church separation is the focus of
the "News and Comments" section of
this issue. In the past, Atheists have
most often appealed to the courts of the
land to shore up the besieged wall of
separation. Now a new generation of
June 1992

Atheist activists are taking their dissatisfaction with state support of religion to
the streets in public protests. After reading the news of recent American Atheist efforts, we hope that you will be inspired to join the "Atheists Are Citizens
Too!" Rally this August.
Sidewalk activism is sure to be an important part of the American Atheist
movement in years to come. But sometimes it is necessary to take our concerns to court - particularly when we
are summonsed there. In the "Director's Briefcase," Jon G. Murray updates
readers on the recent decision in a case
concerning Texas jury oaths. As longtime readers know, the Lone Star state
requires jurors to take an oath or affirmation "So help me God." As a result of
protesting such an oath, I was jailed in
1987. The resulting litigation has culminated in a decision that an Atheist jailed
for refusing a god-oath has no right to
sue to challenge that oath or to protest
the incarceration. Jon Murray untangles
the garbled reasoning which federal
judges used to come to that conclusion
and outlines the steps which American
Atheists will now take to correct the
jury-oath situation.
The problem of Atheists and oaths is
not a new one. For centuries, oaths prohibited Atheists from taking their places
in public offices, injury boxes, and in witness stands. "Disqualification and Atheists" is the subject of this issue's edition
of the "American Atheist Radio Series."
You willbe amazed at the perversions of
justice which occurred in this country
until recent times. Wills were voided
and murderers went free whenever a
witness did not hold a belief in a god.
Most states now allow Atheists to testify, though some still prohibit them
from holding any public office (candidate Clinton's Arkansas permits them
to do neither). It will take many more
years of activism in the courts and on
the sidewalks for Atheists to overcome
such discrimination. This magazine will
be on hand to provide the information
they need to do so. ~
Page 3

Director's Briefcase

A duty an Atheist
has no right to fulfill
t is the case, in every society of which
I know, that the "majority" does in
fact "rule." What I mean by that is
that the laws of a given society reflect
the majority's perception of what is right
and what is wrong. The norms of both
ethics and morality are defined by the
majority. Our country is no different.
The majority of individuals in the United
States have a belief in a deity of some description and in a future system of rewards and punishments in reference to
that alleged deity. It is not then surprising that certain aspects of our legal system would reflect that predominant belief system. This is not to say that any
portion of our legal system is founded
upon theological tenets, such as the
"Ten Commandments." One of those
aspects is the use of oaths or affirmations as a means of qualifying individuals
to take part in the legal system or to
serve as public officials.
The problem then arises as to the majority's handling of those in the minority
who do not adhere to the belief system
on which such legal qualifiers as oaths
and affirmations are based. What does
the majority do with those who will not
go along with the accepted custom or
rote behavior which has been institutionalized? That is the quandary in
which Atheists find themselves when
they attempt, willingly or under coercion, to interact with government. The
Atheist who attends a city council meeting' for example, is confronted with an
invocation which opens most every
such meeting in our society. The Atheist who must participate in courtroom
activities is confronted with a series of
oath or affirmation situations.

[I

What should the state

of Texas do with
Atheists appearing for
jury duty? Jail them or
dismiss them.
At least that's what a
federal court rules as it
finds a reason why the
issue is none of its
business.

A graduate of the University of Texas

at Austin and a second-generation
Atheist, Mr. Murray is a proponent of
"aggressive Atheism." He is an
anchorman on the "American Atheist
Forum" and the president of American
Atheists, Inc.

Jon G. Murray
Page 4

Reform by dissent
What should that Atheist do when an
oath is demanded of him or her by the
legal system? The Atheist has one of two
choices. The first choice is to act hypocritically and succumb to the process by
taking the religious oath or affirmation.
The second choice is to use the situation to protest the intrusion of religion
June 1992

into government. Such a protest must

reasonably take the form of civildisobedience. The variable in this case is the
extent to which the disobedience is
carried. That is determined situationally and spontaneously by the protester.
The extent of the disobedience also
varies proportionally with the level of
sincerity in which the protester holds his
or her principles (or beliefs, in the case
of a minority religionist dissenter).
All that members of a minority group
can do about a majoritarian rule with
which they disagree, in any context, is to
disobey it and then try to use the majority's reaction to that disobedience to
their best advantage in bringing the
issue into the public (or legal) forum in
an attempt to have the offensive rule
abandoned or modified in such a way as
to afford them a right of participation
without compromising their principles
(or beliefs).
This scenario has been oft repeated in
every society around the world by members of minority groups who seek to
change or modify the rules laid down under majority sentiment toward the end
of making their existence, in dissent, a
more pleasant one. Atheists are not
alone in the perennial conflict between
those who are in control of a given society and those who dissent from part or
all of the trappings of that control system.
Now let us, in this context, examine
the particular question of oaths or affirmations with regard to the participation
of an Atheist in the jury system in the
state of Texas. This problem has been
covered in prior issues of the American
Atheist, since it has been the subject of
continuing litigation since 1982.
We have here the present case of
Robin Murray-O'Hair, editor of this journal. Through an act of civil disobedience, she desired to precipitate a confrontation with both Texas and the federal government over the question of
the legitimacy of the inclusion of religious language in jury oaths or affirmations. As a result, she was jailed for her
American Atheist

Headlines buzzed when the news broke

that Robin Murray-O'Hair (left) had
been jailed for refusing to swear or
affirm. Unfortunately, most newspaper
and wire service reports overlooked the
fact that the situation did not involve
just one judge. Instead it revolved around
a state law requiring oaths and affirmations "so help me God."
refusal to take an oath or affirmation.'
Her actions have not achieved the desired result, because the state and federal legal systems have chosen to respond through a series of procedural
determinations which do not address
the merits of her arguments against the
oath and affirmation rules as they generally apply on a practical level to all
Atheists within the state of Texas.

atheist over oath

Austiniudgeiai\s
..r~

Religious rituals for Texas jurors

What are the facts? Those new to
American Atheist magazine willneed to
know to follow along on this issue. In
Texas one is summoned for potential
jury service by means of a jury summons card mailed to registered voters.s
The prospective juror is required to fill
in information spaces on that card and
bring it to a courtroom. One of the information spaces to be filledin by the summoned individual is labeled "religion."
For some years, American Atheists has
contended that the state has no right to
inquire as to any citizen's religion, or
whether or not a citizen even professes
a religion at all. Nonetheless, the Texas
courts have allowed that information
space on the jury summons card under
the rationale that it contains information
valuable to attorneys for both sides in a
given case, on the basis of which they
could exercise strikes of potential jurors
during voir dire.3 The fact that the jury
summons card contains an obviously

-For more background see the January 1988

issue (vol. 30, no. 1) ofthe American Atheist.

2Thismeans that ethnic or racialminorities,

amongwhom voter registrationisthe lowest
on a nationalaverage,wouldbe underrepresented on Texasjuries. Since minoritiesare
oftenoverrepresentedamongthose arrested
or chargedwithcrimes,this also means that
those ethnic or racial minority individuals
wouldstand a highprobabilityoffacingtrials
by classic "all White" juries or juries not
composed of "their peers."
3Thepreliminaryexaminationof a prospective witness or juror touching on his/her
competence.
Austin,Texas

unconstitutional inquiry is only the beginning of the problems attendant to

potential jury service for an Atheist in
Texas.
Once a citizen receives a jury summons card and shows up at the appropriate time and place, (s)he becomes
part of a pool of potential jurors. That
pool is sometimes as large as five hundred persons and in others cases as
small as a dozen or so, depending on the
population density of the county in
which the prospective juror resides.
When that pool of individuals is assembled, Texas Rules of Civil Procedure,
Rule 226, is applied. This instructs:
Before the parties or their attorneys begin the examination of the
jurors whose names have thus
been listed, the jurors shall be
sworn by the court or under its direction, as follows: "You, and each
of you, do solemnly swear that
you will true answers give to all
questions as .propounded to you
concerning your qualifications as
a juror, so help you God."
Please note that this statutory provision orders that jurors "shall be sworn."
This does not allow for any latitude on
the part of the court (the judge) in carrying out this order.
After this oath process, the individuals in the pool become ("graduate"
into) a panel of jurors. They are then
assigned in batches to diverse courts. It
June 1992

is from those panels of jurors that actual

juries of six, eight, or twelve (depending
on the type of the court and case) persons are chosen to hear evidence in a
particular case.
Once chosen the members of the jury
must be sworn again. Texas Articles
2151,2179, and Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, Rule 236, instruct that:
The jury shall be sworn by the
court or under its direction, in substance as follows: "You, and each
of you, do solemnly swear that in
all cases between parties which
shall be to you submitted, you will
a true verdict render, according to
the law, as it may be given you in
a charge by the court, and to the
evidence submitted to you under
the rulings of the court. So help
you God."

No alternative for the godless

Neither of these oaths is a "suggestion." They are both statutory mandates for the Texas judges to carry out.
Neither statute refers to the possibility
of an "affirmation" either. It is, however,
common practice in both instances to
offer an affirmation to a prospective
juror who refuses to take an oath. That
is, the wording of the truth-telling formula remains the same except the
words "solemnly swear" are replaced by
"solemnly affirm" or by just "affirm."
The closing phrase, "so help you God,"
is not deleted for the affirmant.
Page 5

Since the history of affirmations is

that they are for the benefit of religious
folk who do not want to "swear," chiefly
those of the biblical literalist stripe who
claim that certain sections of Scripture
demand that they not take "oaths,"?
that option is not an appropriate one for
the Atheist. An "affirmation" is just as
religious, by historical definition, as an
"oath." It is not a "secular" substitute for
an "oath." This means that Texas judges
routinely violate the statutory form of
truth-telling formula in order to provide
an exception for the religious. An affirmation offered without the closing
"God" phrase is also a violation of the
statutory mandate.

Different pledges for witnesses

There is also a contradiction to the
statutory mandate of a truth-telling formula for jurors when it comes to witnesses in the Texas court system. Texas
constitutional provisions provide that a
person called to give testimony (a witness) is allowed to be sworn without the
use of a "God" phrase, to wit:
No person shall be disqualified to
give evidence in any of the Courts
of this State on account of his religious opinions, or for the want of
any religious belief, but all oaths
and affirmations shall be administered in the mode most binding
upon the conscience and shall be
taken subject to the pains and
penalties of perjury. (Texas State
Constitution, Billof Rights, Article
1, Section 5)
Then along comes an Atheist. If the
Atheist cannot, in good conscience,
take either an oath or an affirmation
since they both contain a pledge to
"God," what is a judge to do? The
obvious answer is that the judge either
dismisses the prospective Atheist juror
(the easiest way out) or alters the truth-

4See Matt. 5:34 and James 5:12.

Page 6

June 1992

American Atheist

Most often Atheist prospective jurors

have just been dismissed,
that is, told they were free to go
and relieved of their obligation to serve on a jury.

telling formula for that individual. That

has been exactly the track record of
Texas judges with regard to Atheists.
Most often Atheist prospective jurors
have just been dismissed, that is, told
they were free to go and relieved of their
obligation to serve on a jury.

No dismissal for this Atheist

Suing a judge
On November 16,5 1989, a Section
1983 action was filed in the Federal
Court for the Western District of Texas
seeking damages and declaratory= and
injunctive? relief. (Section 1983 is the
part of the Civil Rights Act under which
citizens can sue in federal court and
recover attorney's fees if they prevail.)
The suit was filed against Travis County
Judge Guy Herman (the judge who had
found Miss Murray-O'Hair in contempt
and had ordered her jailed). The suit
was styled as a class action on behalf of
all individuals in Texas whose religious
convictions, or lack thereof, precluded
them from taking the juror oath. The
plaintiffs (that is, Miss Murray-O'Hair
and the Society of Separationists, Inc.8)
claimed that Miss Murray-O'Hair's First
(free exercise clause) and Fourteenth
(equal protection) Amendment rights
had been violated because she was imprisoned for refusing to take a religious
oath.

When summoned for jury duty in December 1987,Robin Murray-O'Hair was

not dismissed from jury duty. Instead,
the judge offered her first a standard
oath "so help me God," then an affirmation "so help me God," and finally an affirmation without "religious reference."
She pressed the point with the judge
that it was not within his authority to go
outside the statutory provisions to
fashion a truth-telling formula for her.
He was aware of this in that he insisted
on characterizing any truth-telling formula he offered her as either an "affirmation" or as an "oath." He did so to
attempt to stay within the statutory provisions. Miss Murray-O'Hair, however,
had him in a "catch-22" situation. In A prior attempt
order to swear or affirm her, he would to bring Texas to justice
I must digress at this point to fill in
have had to violate the statute, but she
refused to take a truth-telling formula some additional history. On August 11,
which was not within the statute. This 1987, the Society of Separationists had
forced him into a position of either dis- filed a similar suit on behalf of myself
missing her or finding her in contempt of (Jon Murray) and other central Texas
court, so he did the latter.
members of American Atheists who had
It is from that contempt charge and been dismissed from jury service when
they refused an oath or affirmation "so
her subsequent incarceration therefore
that both state and federal court actions help me God." Plaintiffs included its
were filed on her behalf. I must also say founder Madalyn O'Hair. The case was
here that at no time did Miss Murray- brought against the Travis County DisO'Hair say or imply that she was not
willingto serve as a juror and to perform
5This date just happens to also be this
all the duties of that office.
The state actions which Miss Murray- author's birthday.
O'Hair filed to protest her imprison- 6That is, asking the court to "declare" that
rights had been
ment were suspended, over a period of Miss Murray-O'Hair's
violated.
time, for a variety of technical and pro"That is, for the court to issue an order dicedural reasons. I will not, therefore,
recting Texas judges not to swear in further
deal with those here.
jurors with an oath or affirmation ending in
I will try to describe, from this point, "so help me God."
the ensuing three-year federal court 8Society of Separationists, Inc. is the "legal
struggle on this issue in a way which, arm" of the American Atheist General Headquarters.
hopefully, non-lawyers can understand.
Austin, Texas

June 1992

trict Court and the Texas attorney general, alleging a continuing pattern:
whereby they [Atheists] (1)respond
as requested for jury service in the
Travis County District Court, (2)
refuse to take a "God" oath, and
(3) are excluded by the presiding
Judge from jury service."
This prior suit had stemmed from that
fact that I had been denied jury service
in a Travis County district court because of my refusal to take an oath or
affirmation on May 18, 1987. The judge
before whom I appeared simply dismissed me from jury duty rather than
tackling the oath issue. That action was
filed under establishment clause 10 theory, which means that it claimed the
Texas court system "establishes" religion by denying participation on juries
to all those persons who will not swear
or affirm "so help me God." The district
court (lowest level federal court) dismissed that suit for "failure to make a
claim." That means that the court found
that there was nothing it could find in
either the Texas or federal constitutions
which explicitly spelled out that citizens
have the "right" to serve on a jury. Jury
service is, the court said, a "duty" imposed upon selected citizens but not a
guaranteed constitutional right which a
citizen could assert. Thus the court
ruled that we had not stated a claim on
which it could grant relief. On appeal,
the United States Court of Appeals for
the Fifth Circuit affirmed that finding of
the district court.'!

9Murray u, Travis County Dist. Court, No.

A-89-CA-I463 (W.O. Tex. Mar. 22, 1989),
unpublished opinion.
laThe "establishment clause" of the First
Amendment is the section reading "Congress
shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, ... "
llMurray u, Travis County Dist. Court, 898
F.2d 150 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, - U.S.-,
111S.Ct. 75, 112L.Ed.2d 49 (1990).
Page 7

Therefore, the Texas jury oath (affirmation) question could not be resolved
through litigation under establishment
clause theory. Under that theory there
has to be an explicit "establishment" of
government preference for religion by
rule, statute, or constitutional provision.
There was no specific "law" which
stated that a judge had to allow anyone
in particular to serve on a jury. He was
within the law to have dismissed me.

her free exercise rights had been violated in addition to her Fourteenth Amendment right to "equal protection of the
laws."
There is an aside to litigation brought
under free exercise clause theory by
Atheists. The First Amendment talks
about free exercise of religion. Since an
Atheist has no religion, how can one
claim any free exercise rights? Well, we
really can't as an entire class of citizens.

Getting back to Miss Murray-O'Hair's

suit of November 16, 1989, the district
court, after considering the facts, dismissed the Society of Separationists,
Inc. as a plaintiff and denied class certification. The court said it could not see
how the society could be injured since
an organization could not be called for
jury service, only an individual could. As
to the class certification, the court said

We then turned to the free exercise

clause= as a theory under which to proceed and for that effort we needed
someone whose free exercise rights had
been violated. When Miss MurrayO'Hair was jailed in December of 1987
for failure to take an oath or affirmation,
we had our plaintiff. Federal litigation
was initiated on her behalf claiming that

However, most courts have held (albeit

erroneously) that the tenets of Atheism
occupy the same position in one's lifeas
do the tenets of religion in a theist's life.
Therefore Atheists can be defined (for
the purposes of litigation) as having a
"religion" of no religion and have the
protection of the free exercise clause. In
other words, a litigant has to claim that
Atheism is a "nonreligious religion" in
order to assert a right under the free
exercise clause rather than the establishment clause of the First Amendment
in the courts. This is classic legal
doublethink.

that there was no indication that the

purported class (all Atheists in Texas)
was so numerous that joinder of all
members would be impracticable, which
is one of the prerequisites of federal
rules for establishing the existence of a
"class." The district court also found
that Judge Herman was immune from
damages.
The court found further that the earlier Murray v. Travis County Dist. Court
decision (involving Jon Murray in 1987,
explained above) was res judicata. That
is a Latin term meaning "a case that had
been decided," or in other words that

12The"free exercise clause" of the Constitution is the section reading, "Congress shall
make no law . . . prohibiting the free exercise
[of religion]."
Page 8

June 1992

No right to sue

American Atheist

There is an aside to litigation brought under free exercise clause theory by

Atheists. The First Amendment talks about free exercise of religion.
Since an Atheist has no religion,
how can one claim any free exercise rights?

the earlier case had already settled the

jury oath issue with regard to Atheists.
Finally the district court imposed Rule
11 sanctions. Under Rule 11, which is a
relatively new federal court rule, the
court can sanction the plaintiff if its interpretation is that the plaintiffs case
was "frivolous" in nature. Since the
court had decided that the prior 1987
case had settled the issue, it granted
those sanctions, which boil down to the
plaintiffhaving to pay all the defendants'
legal costs. The defendants failed to
submit a bill for those fees to the court
on time, however, so the sanctions were
later dropped.

Atheists need not swear

(at least according to one court)
On the basis of that district court
decision, Miss Murray-O'Hair and the
Society of Separationists appealed to
the United States Court of Appeals for
the Fifth Circuit. On August 28, 1991, a
three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit
court ruled 2-1 on that appeal. The circuit majority held that the 1987 suit
(Murray v. Travis County Dist. Court)
did not bar Miss Murray-O'Hair from
suing again over the same jury oath issue. The majority reinstated the Society
of Separationists, Inc. as a plaintiff but
affirmed the dismissal of the defendants
other than Judge Herman. Most importantly, the circuit court majority ruled
that Judge Herman had in fact violated
Miss Murray-O'Hair's
free exercise
rights:
We hold that the judge's actions
violated the potential juror's right
to Free Exercise guaranteed by
the First and Fourteenth Amendments. We grant a declaratory
judgment requiring a judge confronted with a similar refusal to
either dismiss the potential juror
without penalty or accommodate
such juror's constitutionally protected beliefs by allowing the use
of an alternative form of avowal
that both satisfies the scruples of
Austin, Texas

the juror and the requirements of

the judicial system. 13
The court went on to add to that determination in more depth by laying
down a formula for the future conduct
of Texas judges placed in the same situation as Judge Herman:
we declare that when a judge is
confronted with a prospective juror's refusal, on grounds of constitutionally protected beliefs, to
swear or affirm to answer voir dire
questions truthfully, the judge
should either allow the person to
withdraw from jury duty without
penalty or allow the prospective
juror an alternative that requires
him or her to make some form of
serious commitment to answer
truthfully that does not transgress
the prospect's sincerely held beliefs. The judge may require a prospective juror to state: (1) the specific basis for objection, and (2)
what form of serious public commitment would accord with the
prospective juror's constitutionally protected belief. The judge
may require any form of avowal
that "state[s] or symbolize[s] that
[the witness will]tell the truth and
which ... purports to impress
upon [her] the necessity for doing
SO."14 Nothing more may be compelled if it impinges upon sincere,
constitutionally protected beliefs.
It is not for the judge to determine
the validity or logic of the prospective juror's beliefs. Beliefs may be
rejected only if they are patently
insincere, bizarre, or not related
to the free exercise of religion. If
the prospective juror is unwilling

13Society of Separationists, Inc. v. Herman,

No. 90-8660, August 28, 1991 (5th Cir. 1991),
939 E2d 1207.
14United States v. Looper, 419 E2d 1405 at
1407 (4th Cir. 1969).

June 1992

to make a required avowal of the

type stated, the judge may impose
such penalty as may be provided
by law for refusal to perform jury
duty. IS
Finally, the circuit court found that
Judge Herman was absolutely or qualifiedly immune from suit for damages
and it declined to grant an injunction
against him.

The attorney general intervenes

The office of the Attorney General of
Texas was not happy with that decision
of the Court of Appeals of the Fifth Circuit. His office was of the opinion that
Miss Murray-O'Hair had to be forced by
the judge either to take an oath or an
affirmation or to submit to a truth-telling
formula that could be characterized as
an oath or affirmation and not given in
lieu of one as outlined in the circuit court
opinion in its formula for handling of
future incidents of this sort. The attorney
general argued that in the absence of an
avowal which could be characterized as
an oath or affirmation that the avower
would not be subject to prosecution for
perjury at a later date. Therefore, the
attorney general of Texas petitioned the
Fifth Circuit to rehear Society of Separationists, Inc. v. Herman en banc with
oral argument. That simply means that
he asked all fourteen judges who sit on
the Fifth Circuit to reconsider the decision of the smaller three-judge panel all
at once, in the same courtroom. That
petition was granted on November 1,
1991. The oral arguments before the en
banc court were held on January 21,
1992, and the court rendered a decision
on April 17, 1992.
That decision was twelve to two, with
the en banc court ruling that neither
Miss Murray-O'Hair nor the Society of
Separationists had "standing" to obtain
declaratory relief against Judge Herman.

ISSociety of Separationists, Inc. v. Herman

at 1218.

Page 9

Standing is an issue that plagues every advocacy group

which tries to bring First Amendment issues before the federal courts.
It is used by the courts as a means of dismissing cases
which they find too politically. charged to handle.
The en banc court voided the decision
of the three-judge panel which had said
that Judge Herman had violated the potential juror's (Miss Murray-O'Hair)
right to free exercise guaranteed by the
First and Fourteenth Amendments. The
grounds of this new decision were that
neither Miss Murray-O'Hair nor the
Society had any grounds sufficient on
which to "stand" before the court.

The problem of "standing"

Standing is an issue that plagues
every advocacy group which tries to
bring First Amendment issues before
the federal courts. It is used by the
courts as a means of dismissing cases
which they find too politically charged to
handle. Remember that allfederal judges
are appointed by the president and confirmed by Congress. They are political
appointees.
It is difficult indeed for me to try to define standing for you, the reader. Federal courts do not really even agree what
the concept of standing is. Various district courts and courts of appeal define
the concept differently. Here is what the
Fifth Circuit said about standing:
Article IIIof the Constitution confines the federal courts to deciding
actual cases and con troversies.16 . . . The rule that litigants
must have standing to invoke the
power of the federal courts is perhaps the most important doctrine
stemming from the case or controversy requirement. ... Standing defies precise definition [emphasis added], but at the least insists that the complained of injury
be real and immediate rather than
conjectural, that the injury be
traceable to the defendant's alleg-

16ArticleIII,Sec. 2, Constitution of the United States (in pertinent part): "The judicial
Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and
Equity, ... [and] to Controversies and between a State, or the Citizens thereof ... "
Page 10

edly unlawful conduct, and that relief from the injury must be likely
to follow from a favorable ruling."

Exclusion of Atheists
as a one-time problem
Based on its definition of standing, the
en bane court picked up on a case from
California involving the use of chokeholds by city police officers in Los Angeles (City of Los Angeles v. Lyons, 103
S.Ct. 1660 [1983]) to show that Miss
Murray-O'Hair's "complained of injury"
was not "real and immediate." In the
Lyons case, police stopped a resident
for a traffic violation and applied a
choke hold to him. The victim obtained
a preliminary injunction prohibiting the
police from using that chokehold again
threatened by death or serious injury.
The Supreme Court reversed that injunction on the grounds that:
"past exposure to illegal conduct
does not in itself show a present
case or controversy regarding injunctive relief . . . if unaccompanied by any continuing, present
adverse effects."18 To obtain equitable relief for past wrongs, a plaintiff must demonstrate either continuing harm or a real and immediate threat of repeated injury in
the future . . . . Similar reasoning
has been applied to suits for declaratory judgments. 19 '
The en bane court therefore concluded that:
O'Hair lacks standing to obtain
prospective relief for the same

17Society of Separationists, Inc. v. Herman,

No: 99-8660, in the United States Court of
Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, en bane (April
17, 1992), pp. 4-5.
18Lyons, 103 S.Ct. at 1665 (quoting O'Shea
v. Littleton, 414 U.S. 488, 495-96 [1974]).
19Society of Separationists, Inc. v. Herman,
No. 99-8660, April 17, 1992, p. 5.
June 1992

reason that Lyons did. She suffers

no continuing harm as a result of
Judge Herman's actions. Nor can
she show a real and immediate
threat that she will again appear
before Judge Herman as a prospective juror and that Judge Herman will again exclude her from
jury service and jail her for contempt. ... Whatever the abstract
merit of O'Hair's complaint, it
springs from a lack of communication between judge and prospective juror that is inherently contextual and episodic.i?
In other words, the en bane court
opined that it was so unlikely that Miss
Murray-O'Hair would be called for jury
duty again in front of exactly the same
judge that she was not complaining of a
"real or repeated threat of repeated
injury."
The en bane court continued to make
three other points. First,
It is beyond our mandate to issue
prospective relief every time a
state actor arguably infringes a
constitutional right.21
That is, the en bane
want to be interjecting
affairs of the state courts
really compelling reason
ond,

court did not

itself into the
unless it felt a
to do so. Sec-

The Court has been reluctant to

superintend state judges in the
past. 22
That is, in past cases the Fifth Circuit
has resisted the temptation to interfere
in state court matters. And lastly,
Issuing a declaratory judgment
would support an award of attor-

2oIbid.,p. 6.
2IIbid., p. 8.
22Ibid.,p. 8.
American Atheist

The scenario played out

between Judge Herman and Robin Murray-O'Hair
has the potential of being repeated again and again
all over the state of Texas.

ney's fees against Judge Herman

under Sec. 1988. This is an "end
run" around a defendant's immunity. It is appropriate that we recognize the reality in determining
whether declaratory
relief is
warranted.P
That is, the en bane court was afraid
that Miss Murray-O'Hair could get
attorney's fees from Judge Herman if it
upheld that she had in fact been wronged
by his conduct and that would constitute her, in effect, having gone around
his immunity from suit as a judge.
In denying standing to the Society of
Separationists, Inc., the en bane court
also said:

/'

The presence of the Society of

Separationists in this suit does not
alter our conclusion. "An association has standing to bring suit on
behalf of its members when: (a) its
members would otherwise have
standing to sue in their own right;
(b) the interests it seeks to protect
are germane to the organization's
purpose; and (c) neither the claim
asserted nor the relief requested
requires the participation of individual members in the lawsuit."24 ... The Society fails the
first and the third requirements of
[this] test. 25

Disagreement in the court

In answer to those determinations of
the en bane court, with which we as
Atheists must sincerely disagree, I want
to turn to the opinion of the most fervent dissenter on the court, Judge Goldberg, with whom I agree in great part.
Judge Goldberg was one of two out of
a panel of three judges who had ruled for

23Ibid.,p. 9.
24Huntv. Washington State Apple Advertising
Comm'n, 432 U.S. 333, 343 (1977).
25Society of Separationists, Inc. v. Herman,
No. 99-8660, April 17, 1992, p. 11.
Austin, Texas

Miss Murray-O'Hair in the first Fifth Circuit decision= on this issue prior to
rehearing by the en banc court.
Judge Goldberg's retorts to the majority are so cogent that I feel that it is
best to let him speak for our side against
this latest adverse ruling. Let me run
through his dissent point by point. First
he states:
I adhere to the view that Judge
Herman trespassed upon O'Hair's
constitutional right to freedom of
religion when he excluded her
from jury service and jailed her for
refusing to "affirm" without first
proposing that she make a nonreligious, conscience-binding declaration of a commitment to tell the
truth. And because there is not
only a likelihood of recurrence,
but a statistical certainty [emphasis in original] that O'Hair and
members of the Society of Separationists willagain be summoned
for jury duty before Judge Herman, I find no jurisdictional impediment to their bringing this lawsuit
to challenge Judge Herman's practice.27
Given that there are hundreds of
members of American Atheists in the
greater Austin area, Judge Goldberg's
point about the "statistical certainty" of
the situation recurring is certainly true.
We must also consider the fact that jury
summons cards are sent to registered
voters in Travis County, Texas and that
Atheists, generally speaking, are members of the set of persons who are not
alone legallyeligible"voters" but who do
in fact get out and vote. Therefore, they

26Society ojSeparationists, Inc. v. Herman,

939 E2d 1207 (5th Cir. 1991).
27Society of Separationists, Inc. v. Herman,
No. 99-8660, in the United States Court of
Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, en bane (April
17, 1992), GOLDBERG, Circuit Judge,
dissenting, p. 1.
June 1992

are likely to be called for jury service.

Additionally, there is a problem with all
of the Texas judges who hold court outside of Travis County, Texas, who will
also face dealing with prospective jurors
who are Atheists (or agnostics). The
scenario played out between Judge
Herman and Miss Murray-O'Hair has
the potential of being repeated again
and again all over the state of Texas.
There are 254 counties in Texas in all
and that count adds to the statistical
certainty of a reoccurrence of a confrontation over this issue.

A continuing controversy
Secondly, Judge Goldberg argued:
The undercurrent of the standing
requirement is the notion that
courts should only adjudicate
those cases in which the plaintiffs
have a "personal stake in the outcome in order to assure that concrete adverseness which sharpens
the presentation of issues necessary for the proper resolution of
constitutional questions." The
plaintiffs in this "case" have a personal stake in the outcome and
the constitutional issues presented are razor sharp: the plaintiffs
are atheists [sic] who object to the
mingling of religion in governmental activities. They brought this
lawsuit based upon the practice
employed by Judge Herman of
Travis County Court - on more
than one occasion - [emphasis
as in original] requiring that prospective jurors make an "affirmation." Whatever one might think
of the constitutionality of Judge
Herman's practice ... no one
should doubt that this litigation
presents a case and controversy
within the meaning of Article IIIof
the Constitution."

28Ibid.,pp. 1-2.
Page 11

"But only these plaintiffs,

by virtue of their distinctive views about religious activities,
are threatened by Judge Herman's practice.
They are uniquely vulnerable to future injury."

Judge Goldberg is correct: another

Atheist came before Judge Herman not
long after his encounter with Miss
Murray-O'Hair and presented him with
the same quandary of refusing to swear
or affirm. Judge Herman dismissed that
individual. One of the majority's other
arguments was that Judge Herman's
regular duties do not include impaneling
juries since he is a probate judge, and
that this decreased the likelihood that
Miss Murray-O'Hair would ever be before him again in a similar fashion. Despite this assumption on the part of the
majority, Judge Herman was again, in
fact, called upon to take on the task of
impaneling juries and did run across another Atheist prospective juror. Also,
who else but an Atheist would have a
personal stake in the outcome of this
litigation? All of the religious minority
folks who feel they cannot "swear" an
oath are perfectly willingto "affirm" one,
being firmly pro-god. The Atheist, who
can neither swear nor affirm in good
conscience, is the ideal plaintiff to bring
this issue before the court and not alone
in the case of Miss Murray-O'Hair but
repeatedly.

"The shoes of the next guy"

Speaking directly to the majority's
standing argument and its reliance on
Lyons, Judge Goldberg lays out a flawless counterargument. I have emphasized certain key phrases in the following quote which deserve special note.
The majority's conclusion that
the plaintiffs lack standing rests
entirely on its application of the
Supreme Court's decision in Lyons
to the facts of this case. Simply
put, Lyons restates the proposition ... that past exposure to
harm will not, in and of itself, confer standing upon a litigant to obtain equitable relief "[a]bsent a sufficient likelihood that he willagain
be wronged in a similar way." ...
Lyons involved a challenge to a
chokehold maneuver employed
Page 12

by Los Angeles police officers.

The Supreme Court found no
standing to obtain prospective relief because the plaintiff, although
injured by the chokehold in the
past, could not establish a threat
of a similar injury in the future.
Pivotal to this conclusion was that
fact that the plaintiff could not distinguish himself from any other citizen as being a future victim of the
unconstitutional act. . . . In other
words, the plaintiff in Lyons was
no more likely than the next guy to
be injured again. . . .
O'Hair and members of the
Society of Separationists do not
stand in the shoes of the next guy.
Indeed, they are susceptible to injury precisely because they are not
like the average Joe: they are not
willing to conform to the popular
view that an affirmation is not a religious exercise. Thus, they are the
[emphasis in original] plaintiffs to
bring this action for prospective
relief. True, all citizens can expect
to be summoned to serve their duty as jurors. But only these plaintiffs, by virtue of their distinctive
views about religious activities,
are threatened by Judge Herman's practice. They are uniquely
vulnerable to future injury.29
Thank you, Judge Goldberg. In many
of its separation of state and church litigations, American Atheists has tried to
make the point that Atheists are uniquely qualified to complain of breaches in
Jefferson's "wall of separation." In many
cases, only an Atheist, given the religious underpinnings of our society, is in
a position to be the quintessential plaintiff in actions which involve challenges
to government encroachment into First
Amendment guarantees. This has been
particularly true in the case of establishment clause violations, but it is now also
29Ibid.,pp. 2-3.
June 1992

becoming apparent, as in the instant

case, with regard to free exercise clause
disputes.

Injury and innocent behavior

Still further on point against the majority's arguments based on Lyons,
Judge Goldberg opines:
In essence, the plaintiff in Lyons
was seeking redress based upon a
"chain of speculative contingencies: that he would be arrested
and provoke the officer to use
chokehold in an unconstitutional
"
manner ....
Unlike Lyons, the threat of future of [sic] injury in this case does
not depend on a "chain of speculative contingencies," but rather
on certain probabilities beyond
the plaintiff's control. We are dealing here with jury duty, [emphasis
in original] an obligation of citizenship. The plaintiffs can reasonably
anticipate similar encounters with
Judge Herman in the future when
they are summoned to serve as
jurors in Travis County. . . .30
Unlike Lyons, O'Shea, Ashcroft, Adams, Brown, Johnson
(5th Cir.), Schepp, Foster, Johnson
(9th Cir.), and Nelson,31 the plaintiffs in this case "do not have to induce a police encounter before
the possibility of injury can occur.
The [plaintiffs] are subject to constitutional injury based on completely innocent behavior .... "
(Emphasis in oriqinal)"
That is, Miss Murray-O'Hair does not
have to go out and violate the law in

30Ibid.,p. 4.
31These are all cases cited by the majority,
similar in fact situation to Lyons but from
various other geographical areas.
32Society of Separationists, Inc. ti. Herman,
No. 99-8660, April 17, 1992, GOLDBERG
dissenting, p. 10.
American Atheist

Miss Murray-O'Hair does not have to go out and violate the law
in order to become subject to another encounter with Judge Herman.
She only need to sit at home and await, completely innocently,
the receipt of a future jury summons.

order to become subject to another encounter with Judge Herman. She only
need to sit at home and await, completely innocently, the receipt of a future jury
summons.

The Society's right to sue

As to the standing of the Society of
Separationists, Inc., Judge Goldberg
had this to say:
In O'Hair v. White33 this court
concluded that the plaintiffs,
Madalyn Murray-O'Hair and the
Society of Separationists,
had
standing to challenge a Texas law
that infringed upon their right not
to be excluded from jury service
on religious grounds. The constitutional challenge was virtually
identical to the one pressed here.
The plaintiffs alleged that law required that they acknowledge the
existence of a supreme being.
Over two dissenting opinions, the
majority of the en bane court
found that the plaintiffs had standingto bring the lawsuit even though
the plaintiffs arguably could not
demonstrate a high probability
that they would be summoned for,
and excluded from jury duty. . . .
In Ciudadanos Unidos de San
Juan v. Hidalgo County Grand
Jury Commissioners34 this court

330'Hair v. White, 675 E2d 680 (5th Cir.

1982). In this case Madalyn O'Hair and the
Society of Separationists, Inc. challenged
the Constitution of the State of Texas, which
states in Article I, Section 4 of its Bill of
Rights:
"No religious test shall ever be required as
a qualification to any office, or public trust,
in this State; nor shall anyone be excluded
from holding office on account of his religious
sentiments, provided he acknowledge the
existence of a Supreme Being."
34Ciudadanos Unidos de San Juan v. Hidalgo
County Grand Jury Commissioner, 622 E2d
807 (5th Cir. 1980),cert. denied, 450 U.S. 964
(1981).
Austin, Texas

held that Mexican-Americans had

standing to obtain prospective relief from systematic exclusion
from grand jury service. . . .
Both O'Hair v. White and Ciudadanos compel a conclusion that
the plaintiffs in this case have
standing. O'Hair and members of
the Society of Separationists are
just as threatened by exclusion
from jury service as the plaintiffs in
those cases. The majority's effort
to distinguish those cases as involving either a "state law that on
its face arguably excluded atheists
[sic] from serving on juries" or
"jury selection system that [were]
consistently administered so as to
exclude [minorities] from jury service" is unpersuasive .... Standing to obtain equitable relief in any
[emphasis in original] case depends on the threat of future injury - in this case, as in O'Hair v.
White, the threat that the plaintiffs
will be excluded from jury service
because of their views on religion.
In O'Hair v. White and Ciudadanos
this court was necessarily satisfied
that the threat of future [sic] was
sufficient to establish the plaintiff's
standing to seek prospective relief. Surely the threat of future injury to anyone plaintiff in O'Hair
v. White and Ciudadanos was no
more "credible," "distinct," "palpable," "real," or "immediate"
than the threat of future injury
plaguing the plaintiffs in this case.
O'Hair and the Society of Separationists have standing to obtain
equitable relief.
From this conclusion, it follows
that the Society of Separationists
itself has the requisite "associational standing" to bring this lawsuit. . . . I have explained why I
believe that O'Hair and other
members of the association have
demonstrated a sufficient threat
of future injury to establish that
they have standing in their own
June 1992

right to challenge Judge Herman's

practice. That satisfies the first
prong of the Hunt tesP5 The majority does not dispute that the "interests [that the Society of Separationists] seeks to protect are
germane to the organization's purpose." ... So much for the second prong.
As for the third prong, the majority suggests that "the Society's
claim would require the participation of individualmembers ... [because] Society members' views
[may] differ as to the religious
nature of an affirmance." ... Even
ifthat bit of speculation were accurate - that members of the Society take differing positions on affirmations - associational standing does not require harmony of
member interests. . . .
It is also quite plain that in this
challenge to Judge Herman's practice of demanding an affirmation
as a condition of jury service, the
individual plaintiffs are not "indispensable to proper resolution of
the cause." ... The plaintiffsmerely seek a declaration that Judge
Herman may not exclude or incarcerate a prospective juror for refusing to affirm until he has proposed that the prospective juror
make a nonreligious, consciencebinding declaration of a commitment to tell the truth. "[T]he claim

35As noted previously, Hunt v. Washington

State Apple Advertising Comm'n was used
by the majority in this opinion to support its
position that the Society of Separationists
had no standing to sue on behalf of its members. The Hunt test is that an association has
standing to sue if (1) "its members would
otherwise have standing to sue in their own
right," (2) "the interests it seeks to protect
are germane to the organization's purpose,"
and (3) "neither the claim asserted nor the
relief requested requires the participation of
individual members [of an association] in the
lawsuit."
Page 13

The correct way to fix the jury-impanelling process

would be for all prospective jurors
to be offered a "truth-telling formula"
which is not based upon religious dogma.

asserted and the relief requested

affect the membership as a whole"
and therefore, "the claim does not
require individualized participation." _ ..
At least twice since Hunt, this
court has held that. the Society
had standing to raise constitutional claims on behalf of its members." As in those two cases, I
would find that the three-prong
Hunt test poses no obstacle to the
Society's associational standing in
this case."
That was a rather long quote from
Judge Goldberg of the Fifth Circuit, but
he did do an eloquent job of outlining
why the majority's en banc opinion in
this case was in error. The en bane court
should not have dismissed this case on
"standing" grounds. Ithought that it was
better to let a member of the Court of
Appeals for the Fifth Circuit tell why he
thought the case should not have been
dismissed, since his reasoning concurred
with my own and that of Miss MurrayO'Hair and her counsel.

The struggle to solve

a constitutional problem
In this case, American Atheists has
the same problem which it has encountered many other times over its twentynine-year history, and it is a problem
which is still unsolvable. There is a practice or policy (law, regulation, provision,
etc.) of government which on its face
promotes religion and in so doing is offensive to Atheists who are citizens and

360'Hair u. White and Murray u. City of

Austin, 947 E2d 147, 152 (5th Cir. 1991), the
latter case finding that, "because Murray
has standing, the Society, of which he is a
member, also has standing" to litigate the
constitutionality of the inclusion of a religious
symbol in the city insignia of Austin, Texas.
37Society of Separationists, Inc. u. Herman,
No. 99-8660, April 17, 1992, GOLDBERG
dissenting, pp. 11-16.
Page 14

taxpayers within that governmental system. The government practice or policy

may also exclude Atheists from some
right, duty, or privilege afforded to all
other citizens. The Atheists want to
challenge that practice or policy of government directly in a way in which the
ultimate result of the challenge willbe its
removal from the body of law or, in the
case of a practice, its cessation.
Therein lies the problem. Our legal
system has been set up and functions in
such a way as to require a complaining
party to show proof of specific and individual harm which a given practice or
policy does to them. It is virtually impossible to ask the court to rule on a given
practice or policy in the abstract, and
not related to a specific fact situation. It
is, however, that very type of ruling (an
"in general" one) which the Atheist desires. The Atheist must instead most
often settle for a ruling that is only applicable to a specific, and often exceedingly narrow, set of circumstances.
These rulings are also often geographically restrictive, that is only being enforceable within a single state or group
of states served by an appellate level
court. Only in the case of a decision by
the Supreme Court of the United States
can Atheists, or any other minority
plaintiffs, gain a universal application of
the change of government practice or
policy which they seek.

"How are you harmed?"

A good example of this process are
the protests against the phrase "In God
We Trust" on the coins and currency.
That phrase is offensive to Atheists, but
when we complained in the courts we
could not show how a specific individual
was harmed by using money on which
the offensive phrase was reproduced.
The phrase is indeed offensive to all persons who do not "trust in God." It is
quite another matter to show personal
(often monetary) harm to a specific individual plaintiff generated by the use of
coins and currency. An Atheist would
not lose his/her employment, be denied
June 1992

fair housing, have offspring harassed, be

denied the right to vote, have merchants refuse to trade with him/her, on
the basis of his/her dissatisfaction for
using money on which a religious phrase
is imprinted. It does no good, under our
present court system, for the Atheist to
merely submit that the presence of the
phrase on the nation's money violates
the spirit of the First Amendment and is
in fact an "establishment" of religion.
That type of approach is merely tossed
aside as the courts rule that the "purpose" of the phrase being on the money
is historical or "ceremonial" despite all
history to the contrary.

A rational approach to jury service

In the instant case, Atheists called for
jury service in Texas are offered, along
with all others, an oath which relies on
the presence of a divine being and a
post-death system of rewards and punishments administered by it to insure
that the taker willindeed "tell the truth."
In order not to assent to that oath, they
must interrupt the jury-impanelling process and ask for an alternative oath just
for them. This approach is wrong. The
correct way to. fix the jury-impanelling
process would be for all prospective
jurors to be offered a "truth-telling formula" which is not based upon religious
dogma. All prospective jurors could be
impanelled by simply taking such a
pledge altered to (in the case of Texas
Rules of Civil Procedure, Rule 226):
You, and each of you, do sincerely pledge that you will true
answers give to all questions propounded to you concerning your
qualifications as a juror, subject to
the pains and penalties of perjury.
Actual jury panels drawn from the
venire could be installed by taking such
a pledge altered to (in the case of Texas
Rules of Civil Procedure, Rule 236):
You, and each of you, do sincerely pledge that in all cases
American Atheist

The courts fail to acknowledge that the very same method of impaneling
jurors which Judge Herman employed on that fateful day in 1987
is also repeated by hundreds of judges statewide every day, year round,
in which Texas county courts at law are in session.

and esoteric argument of standing.

allother rights and freedoms which
Never in the five years of litigation since
we, as citizens of this great Nation,
have come to enjoy, and perhaps
she refused to be sworn or affirmed by
even take for granted. It is very
Judge Herman has the true merit of her
objection to the overall jury impanelling
disturbing to think that we would
process, and the like assumed objection
contort the doctrine of standing
of all other Atheists within the state,
and employ it as an evasive device
been addressed by any court.
for dodging sensitive constitutional questions [emphasis added],
This is the sad truth and a graphic exespecially when First Amendment
Instead of such a simple solution to ample of the failing of our legal process.
the "oath" problem, the courts insist How do we, as Atheists, get at the probrights are at stake .... Not surprisingly, courts have consistently
that the issue raised by Miss Murray- lem of a state legal system which has
O'Hair's act of civil disobedience in re- courtroom procedures based on religious
applied the standing doctrine liberally, not grudgingly, in the confusing to accept a standard oath or affir- tenets? The entire process of making
text of First Amendment litigation.
mation based upon a belief system, be people utter "magic words" which are
Standing is not a static concept.
relegated to an answer which only ad- somehow supposed to insure that they
Rather, it is an evolutionary docdresses her particular encounter with a willtell "the truth" based on their fear of
trine that continues to mature. AI
specific judge. This pulls Miss Murray- punishment by an ephemeral agent
though the doctrine appropriately
O'Hair out of society as a whole and outside of the court itself is childish and
restricts the flood of noxious litigaallows the court to look at her "prob- nonsensical. When an individual comes
tion, we must insure that it does
lem" in a "vacuum," as it were, disasso- along who knows this fact, (s)he becomes
not narrow the avenue for raising
ciated from the realities of the system an anomaly that the system does not
concrete constitutional claims. I
which induced it. On each and every know how to handle. When faced with
cannot believe that the Framers
level of the judicial ladder, Miss Murray- an anomaly, the system can either
would say that a federal court
O'Hair's case has been handled as ifshe ignore it (that is, dismiss Miss Murraywere the only Atheist in Texas and, for O'Hair from jury service) or force her to
lacks jurisdiction to hear a case
brought by a citizen who has been
that matter, the world. Every determina- comply (jail Miss Murray-O'Hair for
tion has focused on just her and a very contempt). In either case the system
jailed for her refusal to participate
in a religious exercise in connecspecific short exchange of words which remains just as invalid.
If we take the establishment clause
tion with the performance of a civshe had with Judge Herman of the
ic duty when that citizen can extheory approach in trying to attack the
Travis County courts.
Texas jury system, the courts say that
pect to be summoned again. This
court has historically opened its
jury service is a duty but not a right and
The failure of the court system
ears and hearts to the wailing cries
The courts fail to acknowledge that that therefore we have "no case or conthe very same method of impaneling troversy." If we take the free exercise
of those deprived of treasured
rights. I would hold that these
jurors which Judge Herman employed clause approach in trying to attack the
plaintiffs have standing to raise
on that fateful day in 1987 is also re- Texas jury system, we leave ourselves
their claims, and in so doing, prepeated by hundreds of judges statewide open to the court's confinement of the
every day, year round, in which Texas issue to a single individual, in an alleged
serve the reputation of this court
as an open, not a closed, circuit. 39
county courts at law are in session. onetime situation, and the rationalizaGiven that Atheists comprise 10percent tion that the incident is not likely to reof the U.S. population, one out of every cur soon so we supposedly have "no "No longer agents
of the Constitution"
ten prospective jurors would be offended, standing."
whether or not they said so, by the juryIn a press release issued by American
impanelling process on virtually a daily The basic issues at stake
Atheists following the release of the
In his dissent to the Fifth Circuit en Fifth Circuit en bane decision in this
basis within the state of Texas. This is
the transgression of First Amendment
banc decision in this case, Judge Gold- case, Robin Murray-O'Hair remarked:
berg wrote the following summary
rights on which Miss Murray-O'Hair's
act of civil disobedience sought to lay which hits the nail right on the head.
the groundwork. She now finds herself,
39Society of Separationists Inc. u. Herman,
This is a case about the First
some five years later, with her case
No. 99-8660, GOLDBERG dissenting, pp.
16-17.
thrown out of court on the philosophical
Amendment, the cornerstone of
between parties which shall be to
you submitted, you willa true verdict render, according to the law,
as it may be given you in a charge
by the court, and to the evidence
submitted to you under the rulings
of the court, subject to the pains
and penalties of perjury.

Austin, Texas

June 1992

Page 15

[t]his is not a decision, but a travesty. Riddled as it is with prejudiced remarks, it would be more
appropriate as a right -wing tract.
The continuing abuse of Atheist
rights in Texas should be remedied
by the Fifth Circuit, not sidestepped and ignored. This is a signal to all Atheists that the courts
are no longer agents of the Constitution but pawns of the religious.
To change the jury-oath situation,
we must now consider civildisobedience and protests.
Miss Murray-O'Hair went on to point
out the human factor in this controversy
which has been totally ignored by the
legal system:
Our office is constantly contacted by individual Atheists frightened by the prospect of being
called for jury duty. In the state of
Texas it is assumed that jurors are
religious. The Atheist is treated as
a freak and an outcast who must
interrupt normal proceedings to
beg for the right to be exempted
from a god-oath. This is a degrading experience for Atheist citizens.
"That this situation exists in the
adopted home state of the American
president [George Bush] is simply appalling," she noted, "But what is more
appalling is that judges would hide behind 'the letter of the law' to deny a
minority its rights."
Not a single news media source, hard
or soft (i.e., print media or electronic
media) carried Miss Murray-O'Hair's
sentiments on this issue - so unconcerned were they with the rights of
those outside of the accepted social
circle.

The future for Atheists in Texas

The loss of standing on the Fifth Circuit en banc level means that the precedent on this issue for the geographical
area covered by that circuit court
Page 16

(Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi) now

reverts back to the case which grew out
of my dismissal as a potential juror back
in May 18, 198740 on which a writ of
certiorari to the Supreme Court was
denied.
We shall now proceed with an attempt
to reactivate the state court litigation on
this issue which came to naught prior to
petitioning the federal court and, at the
same time, appeal the final determination of the Fifth Circuit on the narrow
issue of standing to the Supreme Court,
which willmost likely deny review.
In the meantime, I urge all Atheists
within the state of Texas to do as Robin
Murray-O'Hair did when called for jury
service. When you receive your jury
40Murray v. Travis County Dist. Court, 898
E2d 150 [5th Cir.], 1990.

summons card, refuse to fillin the blank

which calls for your "religion" and complain to the officer of the court to whom
you tender that card when you arrive at
the courthouse about the presence of a
question pertaining to religion thereon.
When the presiding judge asks for all to
rise to take the oath, you must interrupt
the procedure to ask for a secular statement instead of an oath or affirmation.
If you are dismissed or treated in any
wise other than previously dictated by
the three-judge panel decision of the
Fifth Circuit (quoted for you above),
please write to American Atheists with
a factual statement of your experience.
We can use information from any Atheist in the state of Texas as to how they
were treated, in any county, as an Atheist reporting for jury service as evidence
in this continuing litigation. Your cooperation willbe sincerely appreciated. ~

The Bible Handbook

by W. P. Ball and G. W. Foote
Do you not know what to say to the Christian
friend who keeps telling you about the certainties
of the Bible? Help has arrived! This clearly
referenced book will put the very words of the
Bible at your fingertips and enable you to defend
yourself from theists' simple arguments. Never
again will you be unable to refute Christians.
Sections of The Bible Handbook concentrate
on Bible contradictions, absurdities, atrocities,
unfulfilled prophecies, immoralities, indecencies,
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Automated order line: (512) 467-9525

June 1992

American Atheist

Ask A.A.

Kosher killings

however, in strictly forbidding any alcoholic beverages.

So what does all of this have to do
with cruelty to animals or inhuman
slaughter? Both Judaism and Islam require ritual slaughter of animals/In fact,
Orthodox Judaism regards the consumption of an animal that has been
not ritually slaughtered to be as "defiling" as eating a forbidden animal (for
Irene Brown example, a pig, horse, or camel). The
Michigan Jewish (Shechita) method involves a
butcher (Shochet) who is a devout Jew
Although Americans associate reli- who is licensed by a chief rabbi. A spegious dietary restrictions solely with cial knife is used to sever the windpipe
Judaism, in fact, most religions have in one continuous stroke backwards
and forwards. The Moslem (Halal)
laws and doctrines concerning food.
Certain foods may be forbidden alto- method requires that the name of Allah
gether, or may only be eaten in certain be invoked before an animal is killed.
combinations or when prepared a par- The object of slaughtering in both methticular way. Doctrines may also require ods is to drain the animal completely of
blood, which both Jews and Muslims
ritual fasts or proscribe the consumption of certain foods on certain occa- are forbidden to consume. According to
sions. For example, until recently Ro- the laws of both religions, an animal
man Catholicism forbade the eating of must be healthy and uninjured when
killed.
meat on Friday.
And that is where the controversy in
Judaism has a complex set of dietary
laws. These are based on the Mosaic Great Britain lies. Legislation controlling commercial slaughtering in Britain
Law found in Leviticus and Deuteronstates that animals "must be rendered
omy and postbiblical traditions. Some
foods are forbidden altogether (fish insensible to pain until death supervenes. " The usual method of doing this
without fins and scales, for example).
Meat and diary foods may not be is to stun the animal with a blow suffimixed. Blood may not be eaten, thus re- cient to stop brain activity immediately.
According to Muslim and Jewish groups,
quiring that the veins, the lymphatics,
however, stunning constitutes an injury
and the sciatic nerve and its branches
to the animal and therefore makes it unbe removed from an animal's carcass.
Pickles, wine, or beet soup may not be acceptablefor slaughter. It must befully
prepared by a woman who has not conscious when its throat is slit. Groups
been ritually cleansed after her men- such as the Royal Society for the Prestrual cycle. Special rules apply during vention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA)
and the British Veterinary Association
Passover.
Islam, a later religion, is derived from oppose religious slaughter without preJudaism and Christianity. Like the two, stunning on the basis that it causes pain
it regards the Old Testament as a holy and distress to the animal. Currently,
book. Unlike Christianity, it respects
religious groups are exempted from
the dietary prohibitions found in the British laws requiring pre-stunning. The
Mosaic law. Animals found dead may National Secular Society, a British
Atheist and freethought association,
not be eaten. Swine's flesh isforbidden.
Believers may not consume food offered opposes any special immunities from
or sacrificed to idols. Blood may not be the slaughtering laws for religious
groups.
eaten. Islam goes further than Judaism,
On page 7 of vol. 31, no. 10 of the
American Atheist ("Anticlericals, Secularists, and Atheists" by Jon G. Murray),
you state the Moslem community in
Great Britain is asking for Kosher food.
I thought only Jews (the orthodox kind)
eat "kosher foods," thus making animals suffer needlessly.

In "Letters to the Editor," readers give

their opinions, ideas, and information.
But in "Ask A.A.," American Atheists
answers questions regarding its
policies, positions, and customs, as
well as queries of factual and historical
situations. Please address your
questions to "Ask A.A.," P. O. Box
140195, Austin, TX 78714-0195.

Austin, Texas

June 1992

Page 17

On network and cable talk shows, American Atheist representatives usually

must respond to hostile questions and
accusations rather than communicate
the Atheist point of view. In response to
this situation, Madalyn O'Hair began
the "AmericanAtheist Television Forum"
in 1980. The idea paid off; more new
members learn about American Atheists through its television show than
through any other source.

Advertising American Atheists

I am curious about how most of the
members heard about American Athe
ists. I found about it by going to the library and looking in a book which listed
clubs and organizations.
There it was
under the A's. In spite of. being an Atheist for thirty-two years, I had never
heard of your organization prior to being lucky enough to find it in that one
listing.
I wonder how many millions of Atheists there are out there waiting to be
found. Trial ads in major newspapers or
magazines might be productive. Certainly, they couldn't refuse to run them.
John Howell
Iowa

The unfortunate reality of our presentday culture is that newspapers, magazines, and the electronic media can and
do refuse to take advertising for "advocacy" groups. They are all privately
owned and can be as selective as they
desire to be.
For over twenty years, American
Atheists has advocated that members
put small advertisements in local newspapers, or in magazines or journals to
which they ordinarily subscribe. It has
even furnished the artwork for such
ads. The return on these ads has been
very low and their placement in a newspaper is more for the education of the
Atheist trying to insert them thanfor the
result of their appearing.
We have tried small classified ads
offering a provocative book title, a free
sample of the American Atheist magazine, or free Atheist literature. The DialTHE-Atheist offers free literature to
anyone calling. The "American Atheist
Television Forum" also offers free sample copies of the magazine, often small
booklets or brochures, and always introductory packets of information. The
return is minimal.
When any of the Murray-O'Hairs or
any American Atheist spokespersons
appear on either television or radio,
Page 18

they have insisted that the address of

the organization be given and have usually given a pitch that persons should
write for further information. This produces a very small return. If we take the
example of Robert Sherman and his
ability to obtain publicity for Atheism in
the Chicago area, we find that he may
have had as much as $10 million in free
advertising in any given year and that
the membership in the organization has
not grown in the Chicago area because
of that.
Americans are deeply into "spectator" sports, "spectator" controversies,
"spectator" issues - they watch in a
superficial manner but they do not get
personally involved.
Another factor is cost. A full-page ad
in the New York Times, the Washington
Post, or any other large newspaper
would cost $30,000. Even in such small
towns as Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, or
Austin, Texas, the cost for one single
full-page ad is $6,000. American Atheists simply does riot have money like
that even for one shot. Yet repetitive
advertising is needed not alone in one or
two large circulation newspapers once
in a while, but in all newspapers in all
towns big and small in the nation.
Atheism is not a topic which excites
the general public in the United States.
Religion puts on the face of beneficence.
It lulls the average person into its acceptance. The cost to the taxpayer to continue religion is carefully kept a secret.
June 1992

The government at all levels - city,

county, state, and federal - subsidizes
religion with hundreds of millions of
dollars each year, gives religion a taxfree base, affords religion special privileges, and carefully guards religionfrom
any attack at any level whether on its
financing, its theoretics, its involvement
in government, or its theology. Think of
the Jim Bakker scandal or that of
Jimmy Swaggart. If you recall, not one
word of criticism was aimed at religion
per se. Only the character of Swaggart
and the financial affairs of Bakker were
found to be seamy. The recent attacks
on Scientology did not involve any criticism of Judeo-Christianity; Ron Hubbard and his organization were the villains. Religion is sacrosanct as far as
the media is concerned. God is in his
heaven and all is right with the world.
Yet Atheists such as yourself do find
us in listings in books in libraries (we try
to make it into every list there is), from
hearing us on radio or seeing us on television. Atheists do come in from the
"American Atheist Television Forum,"
from articles they read in newspapers
- but the tragic reality is that the number of Atheists motivated to do so is
small.
Our answer to the dilemma: we keep
on trying. And that is why American
Atheists is beginning a new round of advertising this fall, concentrating on alternative publications. Look for us in
your favorite magazines. ~
American Atheist

News and Comments

American Atheists calls

national rally
theists are citizens too!" is the

cry of a rally planned

A marshalling
for August 16 in Houston, Texas.

George Bush has

something to. learn
about the citizenship of
nonbelievers - and
American Atheists
plans to teach it to him
this August.

The news in this magazine is chosen to

demonstrate, month after month, the
dead reactionary hand of religion. It
dictates our habits, sexual conduct,
and family size; it dictates life values
and life-style. Religion is politics and,
always, the most authoritarian and
reactionary politics. We editorialize
our news to emphasize this thesis.
Unlike any other magazine or newspaper in the United States, we are honest
enough to admit it.

Austin, Texas

Scheduled for the day before the Republican National Convention opens in
that city, the event is meant to draw attention to discrimination Atheists face.
The rally will focus on anti-Atheist remarks made by President Bush and
members of his administration.
The official proclamation puts out a
call for the rally in stirring words:
Whereas George Bush stated
publicly that he does not consider
Atheists to be full citizens of the
United States; and
Whereas George Bush stated
further that he does not consider
Atheists to be patriots of the United States; and
Whereas George Bush has refused to apologize for these bigoted and prejudiced statements;
Therefore be it resolved that
the Atheist community of the United States of American does hereby call a meeting of protest.
AllAtheists are requested to be
present and accounted for in Houston, Texas, on Saturday, August
15, 1992, and Sunday, August 16,
1992, for the purpose of public
protest at the start of the 1992 Republican National Convention.
Though plans are subject to change,
the "Atheists are Citizens Too!" Rally is
scheduled for August 16. (The Republican convention is August 17-20.) American Atheists will sponsor lectures and
videos on state/church separation and
Atheism on August 15. Social events are
also planned, so that rally participants
have a chance to mingle, revving up
their spirits both off and on the protest
lines. By late June, over one hundred
Atheists had registered for the event.
American Atheists emphasizes that
the rally willnot be anti-Republican, nor
will the group endorse any candidate.
"Why we are concerned here," PresiJune 1992

dent Jon Murray says, "is that the political parties must demonstrate their
commitment to represent all the people
- regardless of their religion or lack
thereof." In recent years, the Republican party has taken on a distinctively
evangelical Christian tone, supporting
prayer in the public schools, vouchers
for religious schools, restrictive abortion laws, and generally seeking legislative support of religion. As Mr. Murray
points out emphatically, "Atheists have
been marginalized in the political process; their deepest concerns are simply
ignored."

Neither citizens nor patriots

The rally will center around a comment made by George Bush during a
news conference in Chicago, Illinois, on
August 27,1987. Robert Sherman, a reporter for the American Atheist, asked
him, "What willyou do to win the votes
of the Americans who are Atheists?"
Vice President Bush replied, "I guess
I'm pretty weak in the Atheist community. Faith in god is important to me."
The American Atheist reporter pressed
further, "Surely you recognize the equal
citizenship and patriotism of Americans
who are Atheists?" It was then that Mr.
Bush gave the surprising reply:
No, I don't know that Atheists
should be considered as citizens,
nor should they be considered
pa:triots. This is one nation under
God.
Robert Sherman was shocked to hear
an American leader make such a bigoted
comment. To clarify the issues, he asked
whether Mr. Bush supported separation
of state and church as a sound constitutional principle. The then vice president's
answer was, "Yes, I support the separation of church and state. I'm just not
very high on Atheists."
Despite an extensive letter-writing
campaign by Atheists around the nation,
a called-for apology has never been received. American Atheist leaders causPage 19

News and Comments

tically wonder if any other minority

would receive such a brush-off. What if,
for example, a campaigning national
official had stated that he doubted the
citizenship of Blacks, Muslims, Jews, or
Seventh-day Adventists?

"Absolutely nothing"
Other members of his administration
share Mr. Bush's prejudice. A longtime
concern of American Atheists has been
the exclusion of nonbelievers from veterans' groups. Many such groups require members to believe in a god or to
take an oath "So help me God." When
asked by Robert Sherman what he
would do to end such discrimination
against Atheists, Ed Derwinski, the secretary of the Department of Veterans'
Affairs, said that he would do "absolutely nothing." That was on December 23,
1990. On January 3, 1991,encountering
Mr. Derwinski on a second occasion,
Mr. Sherman rephrased the question:
What should American Atheists do to
have the Bush administration take an
interest in the problem of such discrimination against American Atheist veterans? This time, Mr. Derwinski's response was more specific:
What you should do for me is what
you should do for everybody. Believe in God. Get off our backs.
Americans Atheists has no intention of
getting off the backs of the administration when it comes to educating politicians and the public-at-Iarge. By sponsoring a rally shortly before the opening
of the Republican National Convention,
American Atheists willdraw national attent ion to the need for complete and
absolute separation of state and church
and for the end of discrimination against
Atheists.
Further information concerning the
"Atheists Are Citizens Too!" Rally is
available from the national office of
American Atheists at P. 0. Box 140195,
Austin, TX 78714-0195.- R. MurrayO'Hair ?fie
Page 20

What can I do to help

educate my community about Atheism?
A lot! Do you have cable television in your area? If so, there
may be a public access channel willing to broadcast the
"American Atheist Forum" to your community.
The "Forum" is a thirty-minute, weekly television program
which provides an in-depth analysis of state/ church separation
issues and current events of interest to the Atheist community.
It is one of the most popular cable access programs in the u.s.
and is currently broadcast on over 120 stations nationwide.
If the "Forum" is not being shown on your local access
channel, the reason is probably because no one has taken the
initiative to request that it be aired. If you think that there
should be an alternative view to religion being broadcast in
your area, here is what you can do:
1. Contact the program manager at your local cable access
station and find out if the station accepts outside programming. (A cable access station is not the same as a PBS
stanon.) If it does, tell the program manager that you would
like the "American Atheist Forum" to be aired. The program
is available on whatever format (3/4inch, YHS, Beta) the station prefers.
2. If the station is interested, and most are, the manager will

probably request a sample tape of the "Forum." At this point,

you should call or write American Atheist GHQand request
that a sample tape be sent to you. Be sure to specify the
correct format.
3. AAGHQ will promptly send you the "Forum" sample. You
should take the tape to the program manager and request
that the station review it.
4. Hopefully, the station will recognize its obligation to provide

both sides of this very important subject, and will decide to

begin airing the weekly "Forum" program.
5. We will send the tapes each month to either the station or
you, or a local person, to bring the tapes to the station once
each month.
For more information, write or call:
American

June 1992

Forum Coordinator
Atheist General Headquarters
P.O.Box 140195
Austin, TX 78714-0195
(512) 458-1244

American Atheist

News and Comments

"Come to City Hall"

[fJ

Religious groups and

government leaders
urged citizens to come
to seats of government
to pray. But some
uninvited guests
showed up for the
event:
American Atheists.

ongress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion," - it would seem plain that
this phrase prohibits the government of
the United States from setting up official
religious ceremonies. After all, what is
an "established religion" but a set of government-mandated or -sponsored religious beliefs and services?
But the First Amendment did not
stop thousands of state and city governments from organizing, promoting, and
supervising religious events this spring
under the guise of the "National Day of
Prayer." American Atheist protests accompanied two such city-sponsored
services in Texas.
In 1952, Congress gave the president
the authorization to designate a specific day each year as the National Day of
Prayer. No president since has failed to
do so. President Bush's proclamation
making May 7,1992, the National Day of
Prayer was issued on the "fifth day of
March, in the year of our Lord nineteen
hundred and ninety-two." Using distinctly Christian language, Mr. Bush reminded Americans to place their
. . . trust in the steady, unfailing
light that is the love of God.
Time and again, Scripture tells
us of the constancy of the Almighty.
Indeed, His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, wrote the Psalmist, and His Dominion endures
throughout all generations.
Mr. Bush went On to claim that the
success of the United States was due to
the continuing prayers of our leaders
and citizens. He also urged Americans
to "echo" a prayer of Solomon:

SUMMARY: Thousands of governors,

mayors, and other elected officials

around the nation organized religious
services to celebrate the National Day
of Prayer. American Atheists protested
the activities in two Texas cities.

Austin, Texas

The Lord our God be with us,

as He was with our fathers; may
He not leave us or forsake us; so
that He may incline our hearts to
Him, to walk in all His ways . . .
that all the peoples of the earth
may know that the Lord is God;
there is no other.
June 1992

Divine aid in Houston

Though President Bush's proclamation instructed Americans to pray in
their homes and places of worship,
many other government officials put
aside public grounds for the use of
prayer festivals. In Houston, Texas,
Mayor Bob Lanier and clergymen gathered on the steps of City Hall at noon On
Thursday, May 7, for a prayer session.
To emphasize the governmental nature
of the event, the mayor summarized
George Bush's proclamation. He also
told gathered theists that religious beliefs and "works" (a particularly Christian concept) were needed. More frighteningly, he revealed that he depends on
divine aid in city politics. Though Houston is one of the largest American cities,
with a diversity of cultures and problems, the mayor apparently does not
turn to community or political advisors
when confronting the day-to-day problems of the city. Instead, he said,
I can have no greater gift when
problems present themselves but
to close my eyes and . . . know
the willof God and then imperfect1ycarry it out.
Given the history of Christianity's treatment of religious minorities and Atheists, there is cause to be concerned by
such pronouncements.
In the past,
"god's will" usually meant readying the
rack and the stake for use.
At the accompanying protest sponsored by American Atheists, Jon Murray, president of the group, pointed out
the real purpose of the event: to promote religious belief. He was quoted by
the Houston Post as saying:
You've got the mayor of Houston here today endorsing religion.
You should not do this. These people could have held this rally anywhere, but they wanted to do it
here [city hall]. They wanted to
link their religion with this mayor.

Page 21

News and Comments

The dozen brave American Atheist

protestors present carried placards demanding separation of state and church
and a banner reading, "Legalize Atheism. Everywhere." They briefly interrupted the governmental exercise of religion by shouting "Separate Church
and State" when a rabbi was reciting the
opening prayer. Several times members
of the primarily Christian crowd tried to
block any view of the Atheist protestors.
American Atheists particularly tried
to point out what a waste of time the
prayer session was. Houston faces gang
problems, violent racism, gay-bashing,
an economic crisis, and raising unemployment. American Atheists emphasized that prayer would not liftany child
out of the ghetto - but adequate
schooling might.

unconstitutional nature of the National

Day of Prayer. Ellen Johnson, the Northeast Spokesperson for American Atheists, issued a press release noting that

"Nothing fails like prayer"

in Fort Worth

Admitting to incompetence

Members of American Atheists also

hit the picket lines in Fort Worth. There
Mayor Kay Granger and pastors from a
variety of churches urged citizens to return to god. But they were surprised to
receive some negative reactions from
some of those citizens. When David
Miller, the Tarrant County chairman of
the American Family Association, welcomed the group, he claimed that "We
are all one nation under God." The response from Atheist protestors was
short, quick, and loud enough to be
heard at the podium: "No, we're not."
The American Atheist members carried picket signs stating, "Nothing fails
like prayer!" and "No state-sponsored
religion." Local newspaper coverage of
their protest was excellent, with photographs that clearly showed the fact that
there were dissenters at this governmentsponsored religious service. Though
only a half-dozen American Atheists
were present, the Christians particularly had a disappointing turnout. In this
large metropolitan area, only one hundred persons came out to pray.
American Atheists representatives in
other areas also drew attention to the
Page 22

Since the president is sworn to

uphold the Constitution of the
United States of America, he must
not use his office to call the American people to engage in prayer.
His action encourages governmental officials at all levels to do
the same.
When our government gives its
imprimatur to religion, it not only
makes the 10percent of the nation's
populace who are Atheists feel like
outsiders, but it gives respectability to the activity of praying, which
it doesn't deserve.
American Atheists' Ohio spokesperson, Frank R. Zindler, minced no
words in his public statements on the
state-run religious spectacles. "God
didn't run for public office, people did,"
he said,
It should not be too much to expect officials to do their jobs by virtue of their own capabilities and integrity. Why should they need
supernatural support? Are they
admitting incompetence?
Mr. Zindler found the proclamation of
the Ohio governor, George Voinovich,
even more appalling than that of President Bush. In particular, he pointed to
the governor's command "Let us pray
[that] dependency upon God returns."
In his press release, the Ohio Atheist
activist also employed some of the
humor for which he is well-known in secular circles. Mr. Bush, he said, "wants us
to substitute the First Commandment
for the First Amendment." (The First
Commandment
reads, "Thou shalt
have none other gods before me.") But
turning serious, Frank Zindler continued, "The First Commandment outlaws
June 1992

freedom of religion; the First Amendment guarantees it."

A task force to bring

citizens to prayer
According to Donald Wildmon, president of the pro-censorship American
Family Association, about 2,500 city
halls nationwide were used to conduct
religious services on the National Day of
Prayer. In addition, many cities held sunrise services. The coordination between
private religious groups and state and
city government was extensive. One in
particular influenced the national character of these pray-ins. This was the National Day of Prayer Task Force of Colorado Springs, Colorado. The group
gave suggestions for specific prayers
and events for the day. It also developed
the theme of "Come to City Hall" for
this year's National Day of Prayer ceremonies.
It is telling that despite government
encouragement, advance publicity, and
church urgings, turnouts in most cities
were embarrassingly low. In Houston, a
metropolitan area of nearly four million
persons, a liberal estimate put the praying crowd at between three and four
hundred individuals. Perhaps American
citizens do know something that their
elected representatives do not - prayer
is useless. - R. Murray-O'Hair ~

We call it our "No Fish" sticker.

3"x3". Red and black on white. Stock
#3303. 12 for $2. Add $2.50 postage
and handling for orders under $10;
$3.00 for orders from $10-$19.99.
American Atheist Press,
7215 Cameron Road
Austin, TX 78752

American Atheist

The Amish as an exemplary

model: truth or distortion?

Motion pictures and

popular literature paint
Amish communities in
rosy tones. But for the
women and children
who must live there, life
is less than idyllic.

Dr. Douglas Kachel is professor and

chair of the Sociology Department,
Grand View College, Des Moines,
Iowa. He has conducted extensive field
research and published widely on the
Amish and numerous other minority
groups. Dr. Kachel grew up among the
Old Order Amish in southeastern
Pennsylvania and has continued to
conduct research among the Amish
communities in Iowa.
He received his Ph.D. from Iowa State
University. He and his wife have two
children.

Douglas Kachel
Austin, Texas

n an unrelenting stream the mass

media
in the United States bombard
[]
its citizens with the tragedies and failures of the culture, revealing a panorama of violence, corruption, family disintegration, and various indicators of
potential ecological catastrophe. While
the severity of these problems differs
according to whom and how the data is
interpreted, such maladies as drug
abuse, AIDS, homelessness, economic
and racial inequality, mental illness, and
alienation seem to be ever-present problems of the contemporary United States.
And ifthese problems were not enough,
we are told by various social analysts
that the accomplishments of our educational system and our economic productivity continue to erode, falling not
only behind the standards of the United
States of a generation ago, but also behind the recent successes of other industrialized nations. Meanwhile a seemingly polarized political system appears
unable to generate viable solutions and
continues to offer at best "more of the
same."
Many Americans react to the incessant exposure of these mounting social
problems by a range of behaviors "who cares" indifference, negativistic
cynicism, active support of reactionary
politicians, and so forth. Others search
for alternative values to those of the
dominant culture by finding short-term
answers in the promises of cult like
groups, New Age philosophy, or in often
romanticized subcultures such as Native
Americans, who are purported to have
in their traditional wisdom certain values
which, if adopted by contemporary
American society, would alleviate many
of its social problems. One group has received an inordinate amount of positive
attention from the media, particularly
when one considers its relatively small
size, and is almost always portrayed as
an exemplary model in contrast to the
rest of American society. This is the Old
Order Amish.
Countless feature stories in newspapers and magazines as well as freJune 1992

quent references to the Amish in books

on singular topics such as ecology or
family issues extol the Amish virtues.
Praised are their self-sufficiency and
self-reliance, a family and community
structure where all work harmoniously
for the good of the whole, an agrarian
economy which neither exploits resources nor pollutes, and a society
which is basically free of the problems
besetting modern American society.
These gentle, picturesque people with
their unique dress and quaint horse and
buggy transportation are portrayed by
the media as an idyllic group which has
somehow steadfastly resisted the alleged contamination and destructiveness of the modern, urban, materialistic
culture. The popular film Witness amplified this contrast between good and evil
- the Amish being portrayed in the film
as innocent, wholesome, and pure and
American society as a frenzy of violence, corruption, and debauchery.
One could argue that these stereotypical media contrasts of the Amish
with the larger American society are
highly selective in what is compared (or
what is omitted), resulting in a bias in
favor of the Amish. What is being presented by most social analysts and the
media is an unfair, slanted comparison
- the best of Amish culture is continually contrasted with the worst of American society. Failure to address the entire
range of both Amish and American cultures gives a distorted, untruthful view
of both sides. What then are some features of Amish culture which the media
rarely examine which most Americans
would probably find objectionable if not
abhorrent?

Individual expression
A few months ago I attended a regional recital for high school musicians, an
obviously select and talented group of
young Americans. The hours of work to
hone their individual talents, whether
instrumental or vocal, and the efforts of
the supportive and encouraging parents
must have been prodigious. Amish
Page 23

Creativity,
beyond perhaps a simple variation in a quilt design
or placing plants in an interesting arrangement in a flower bed,
would be conspicuously absent in Amish culture.

youth would never achieve this level of

individual endeavor, share with others
their developed talents, or feel the pride
of accomplishment. Nor would they receive any encouragement from their
elders to do so. Within the Amish
world, there is virtually. no freedom to be different, to show the
pride of accomplishment, or to
assert oneself for a unique individual goal. Individual rights, freedom
of expression and initiative, and
numerous privileges enjoyed by
Americans and perhaps taken for
granted would be rejected by the
Amish for the sake of religious ritualism and the preservation of
community traditions which are
enforced by what may be described as a benign herd mentality.
The great (and not-so-great) literature of the ages and the enduring music and art of the centuries
would be anathema in the Amish
world. A world without the likes of
Shakespeare, Dickens or Hemingway; without a Beethoven or
Mozart; devoid of Michelangelo,
van Gogh, or Picasso; lacking the
plays of Ibsen or the poetry of
Wordsworth and Robert Frost;
would be the sterile, simple world
of the Amish. This would be a
world furthermore without concern for, appreciation of, or any
developed sensibilities for the
genius in whatever endeavor no
matter how ennobling or inspiring.
In fact, creativity, beyond perhaps
a simple variation in a quilt design or
placing plants in an interesting arrangement in a flower bed, would be conspicuously absent in Amish culture.

Papa is all
The Amish society is a deeply rigid
patriarchal society. Most Americans,
particularly women, would be repulsed
by the sharp sex-role divisions and by
the expectations placed on the Amish
wife and mother. All leadership roles whether bishop, preacher, or deacon Page 24

are held by men, most often by the older

men of the church community. At the
religious services, women enter the
building after the men and sit behind
them; when the service is over, the
"

or a verbal cue. Even when wives do

talk, they are often interrupted by their
husbands. An Amish wife never interrupts her husband when a stranger is
present. Moreover, when an Amish
couple is being interviewed, the
\1111\\
husband often speaks about the
family or farms as if the wife were
not present, virtually ignoring her.
Much of this female subordination
is based on what the Amish stress
and interpret from Scripture (such
interpretation is, of course, solely
an Amish male prerogative). Emphasized passages are:
But I would have you
know, that the head of every
man is Christ; and the head
of the woman is the man;
and the head of Christ is
God. (1 Cor. 11:3)
For a man indeed ought
not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and
glory of God: but the woman
is the glory of the man. (1
Cor. 11:7)
Neither was the man created for the woman; but the
woman for the man. (1 Cor.
11:9)

The approved position of women

in church is characterized by the
verse:
women leave last.. One can still see in
Amishland many incidents of a wife trailing a step or two behind her husband as
they walk down an aisle at a market or
along the sidewalk of a town. This dominance of the Amish husband and father
is best expressed in a phrase popular
among the Amish: "papa is all."
In my interviews with the Amish in
their homes, I have found that wives
rarely speak. They only do so when they
receive some sign of permission from
their husband, such as a nod of the head
June 1992

Let your women keep silence in

the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they
are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law. (1
Cor. 14:34)

The lot of an Amish woman

Amish women often seem physically
older than their chronological age would
indicate. Perhaps this is because they
wear no makeup or stylish clothes as do
other American women who pursue the
American Atheist

One can still see in Amishland many incidents of a wife trailing a step or
two behind her husband as they walk down an aisle at a market or along
the sidewalk of a town. This dominance of the Amish husband and father is
best expressed in a phrase popular among the Amish: "papa is all."

all-too-fleeting illusion of youth behind

their made-up facade. More likely,
Amish women are timeworn by the constant drudgery of physical labor and by
the large number of children they bear
and rear. One only has to attend one
Amish meal to get a feel for the domestic role expectations of the Amish wife
and mother. Allthree meal preparations
of the day are extensive, including much
daily baking of breads and pastries.
Cooking is done with a coal stove, and
since there is no electricity in Amish
homes, there are no electric appliances
to help in meal preparations. Furthermore, there is usually limited indoor
plumbing in Amish homes, so heated
water for washing dishes or for bathing
is prepared in kettles on the stove.
Clothes washing for the large family is
done mostly by hand or washing
machines which are crude by current
American standards. Clothes are hung
out on lines to dry. Ironing is done with
irons heated over the stove.
Amish women are also responsible
for the planting and tending of the family gardens, all canning of vegetables,
and helping out in the fields at harvest
time. When family members become ill
or when the elderly become incapacitated, it is the wife's duty to administer
to their needs. Only under extreme necessity would the Amish see a doctor or
venture to a hospital for aid. With an
average of six or seven children per family (ten or more is not unusual), often
only one year apart, the Amish mother
has virtually no free or quiet time. While
American women who are bound to
several demanding roles sometimes
refer to themselves in half-jest as "superwomen," the Amish housewife's roles
are at least equally demanding and perhaps beyond comparison. Furthermore, if Amish wives and mothers do
not find their role fulfillment in children
and in the home, they are unlikely to find
it anywhere else; there are few if any
career or educational options for wives
and mothers within the Amish community.
Austin, Texas

With educational opportunities and

growing economic independence, American women can opt for divorce if they
find their marriages incompatible with
their needs. Amish women who have
only eight years of schooling, as is customary in Amish society, and have no
substantial chance for economic independence must stay in their marriages,
dependent on their husbands under
almost any circumstance. While divorce
is almost nonexistent in Amishland (a
popular Amish-to-American contrast in
the media), this is to a degree the result
of Amish wives and mothers having only
limited opportunities to choose an alternative life-style. In addition, strong community pressure would also be exerted
on the Amish woman who might wish to
separate from her husband.
In terms of world openness and level
of sophistication, the Amish of today
have changed little from their sixteenthcentury German peasant heritage. The
Amish maintain an exclusive subculture
and are perhaps the most ethnocentric
population in the United States, believing that they and they alone are god's
chosen people, "a royal priesthood" (1
Pet. 2:9). The Amish justify the separation of their church community from the
world by their interpretation of various
scriptural passages. Two of these are:
Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what
fellowship hath righteousness with
unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?
(2 Cor. 6:14)
Love not the world, neither the
things that are in the world. If any
man love the world, the love of the
Father is not in him. (1 John 2:15)
Escape from freedom
The world is becoming smaller with
shared values, attitudes, and a growing
informational consensus, and we increasingly realize that the need to coJune 1992

operate among all world citizens and

nations is tantamount to survival. But
the Amish remain closed and resolute,
maintaining their traditional ways of separateness and religious superiority.
While the Amish can be lauded for
their self-sufficiency and self-reliance,
could they have existed and thrived
without the tolerance, accommodation,
and special status granted to them by
the laws of the United States? A toleration, one may add, that the Amish have
rarely shown for anyone whose values
and beliefs differ from their own.
Why then do the Amish continue to
have such a favorable image and serve
as a model for so many Americans? Perhaps many see in the Amish society
values they feel have been lost in the
hustle and bustle of a complex, urban,
industrialized society, that is, roots in a
secure, predictable, and stress-free
social environment.
Still, individualistic Americans accustomed to personal freedom and choices
would find living in Amish society unbearable, as they would if they could return to the provincialism of a rural village in nineteenth-century
America.
Perhaps most Americans do not want
the opportunity for freedom with all the
risks, insecurities, and potential for failure that it can generate. Was Erich
Fromm! right when he noted that most
Americans really don't want freedom
but want to "escape from freedom"? For
those wishing to escape from the freedom of individuality, the freedom of
choice, and the basic insecurities of
modern life,the absolutism and security
of group conformity manifested in Amish
society could, indeed, be viewed as a
positive alternative, especially for those
alienated from the vast opportunities
and rewards of the contemporary United
States. 00

lErich Fromm (1900-1980), psychoanalyst,

social theorist, and writer. The author of this
essay refers to Fromm's work Escape From
Freedom (New York: Avon Books, 1965).
Page 25

My path to Atheism
or those of us who are not born in hell. In this gruesome rendering, an
into Atheist families, the path to immense Satan - complete with bat
that enlightened state of mind wings, horns, scales and a pointed tailmust be forged with no small amount of gleefully plunged a pitchfork into the
courage and conviction: courage to bare hides of a man and woman trapped
meet head-on the distrust and jibes of beneath the grating atop a fiery pit.
Sister Mary Jean Claire, our current
family and friends, and conviction of the
mentor in the faith, exploited the class'
soundness of one's position to weather
the innumerable personal attacks from shocked sensibilities to the fullest.
religious bigots in the larger society. "Look closely at this picture, children,"
This, of course, is assuming
that the Atheist in question
has decided to "come out of
the closet" and dare to draw
attention to himself in the
media. I may be wrong, but
to my way of thinking, "quiet"
Atheists - those who prefer
silence and anonymity are largely responsible for
the success of the religious
zealots worldwide.
Ironically,my path to Atheism began within a dysfunctional familywhich only functioned when religious rituals
took center stage. Bickering
In this childhood nativity scene, the author kneels
at the far right.
and endless arguments were
the norm unless there was a
First Communion or confirmation in- her sugar-sweet voice enjoined us,
volving me or one of my four siblings. At "Now, I want you to think of yourselves
in the place of one or the other of these
other times, my parents orchestrated
two sinners. I want you to imagine that
family religious rituals, usually around
Christmas or some "holy day of obliga- fire burning every inch of your flesh, as
well as your soul, for all eternity. Forever
tion." In the accompanying photograph,
taken in 1953,the scene captured "angels and ever without stopping. Think of the
pain you experienced if you ever burnt
praying at the crib of the baby Jesus" actually my newborn brother Mike. a finger, and imagine it a million times
When we were a bit older, we were told worse and through your whole body to do "practice Masses," with one broth- with Satan stabbing you again and again
er emulating the priest and the other while you burn."
Having gained our attention through
two altar boys.
In the meantime, to ensure our prop- pure dread and terror, she got into the
er Roman Catholic indoctrination, we heart of the lesson: how to avoid mortal
were all enrolled in Catholic parochial sin. At the conclusion, we were told how
schools in Milwaukee. It was there that it was important to "bring others to the
the good nuns drilled into us the horren- one true faith, lest they perish in hell's
dous concepts of hell, heaven, and mor- eternal fire." I recall going to a Lutheran
friend after school that day, in a failed
tal sins. One of the most enduring
images from that time was a full-page effort to get him to convert and escape
color illustration, from a third grade reli- his otherwise certain eternal damnation.
gion text, depicting two sinners burning His scornful laugh amazed me, especially

[I

A science writer
describes his trip
out of the closet
and into the ranks
of activist Atheists.

Philip A. Stahl is a former Peace Corps

volunteer who has lived and worked in
Barbados, West Indies, for the past
twenty years. He is a solar physics
researcher and science freelance
writer who has published in a number
of academic journals, as well as
Astronomy magazine. For the past
several years, he has argued strongly
for Atheism as a "rational alternative
to religion" in the Barbados press.

Philip A. Stahl
Page 26

June 1992

American Atheist

After one early morning mass,

a number of communion wafers had been left over.
The priest gestured to my brothers and I (we usually served together)
and said, "You boys hungry? Grab a handful."

when I mentioned the "one true church."

Did he know something I didn't? A tiny
seed of doubt had been planted about
whether Roman Catholics had a lock on
absolute truth after all. My path to
Atheism had started, though I did not
yet even know what Atheism was.

Men of the cloth

As we entered our teenage years, my
two younger brothers and I were given
a choice by our father: become altar
boys (which entailed Saturday morning
practice in Latin) or do yard work. We
had moved to Miami, Florida, two years
earlier and still had not acclimatized to
the heat, so it was really no choice at all.
None of us felt religiously inclined, but
we were even less inclined to spend several hours pulling weeds and sweltering
under a merciless Florida sun. For the
next six years, serving at Sunday masses
and assisting at weddings and funerals
became our stock-in-trade. We also got
an insider's view of the men of the cloth
whom we served. After one early morning mass, a number of communion
wafers had been left over. The priest
gestured to my brothers and I (we usually served together) and said, "You
boys hungry? Grab a handful."
On another occasion, the priest we
nicknamed "Moneybags" called us into
the rectory after mass - an open donation envelope was in front of him, with
two dollars protruding. "This the best
your piss-poor family can do? Your old
man know what a tithe is? Does he
know how to calculate 10 percent of
something?" I informed him that our
father was currently unemployed and
we were a family with five children living
off my mother's teaching salary alone.
This amounted to about $6000 a year in
1961. "Moneybags"
was unimpressed:
"Save your hard-luck stories, will you,
kid? I want a full tithe in next week's
envelope or there'll be no more sacraments that your family gets from me.
And that includes last rites!" We never
did get to see if he would have made
good on that threat, as he was transAustin, Texas

ferred to another parish in three days. I

had placed an anonymous call to the
bishop's office regarding the conduct of
one mercenary padre.

Putting religion to the test

Being an altar boy also provided an
opportunity for other insights. By the
time I was fifteen, I had already begun to
question the transubstantiation
doctrine of the church, according to which
ordinary bread and wine when consecrated is "transformed"
into the actual
body of Jesus Christ. The earlier incident with the priest suggesting we "grab
a handful" of consecrated
wafers had
sown a seed of rationalist doubt. I reasoned that if such consecrated
wafers
had indeed been "transubstantiated"
a
priest would not suggest that they be
treated with callous indifference.
After one early morning mass on a
school day, I managed to smuggle out
several consecrated
wafers in a small
paper bag. Later that day, in chemistry
lab, we were doing simple starch and
protein tests. I had finished the lab early
and decided that some extracurricular
research might be in order. Two wafers
were broken up and then put into separate test-tube solutions for the starch
and protein tests. I have to say that the
results did not really surprise me; they
merely confirmed what I had suspected
all along - namely that the bread remained as pure starch; there was no
mysterious transubstantiation.
(As for
the wine, I had tasted that many times
after masses - since the priest would
often leave a little in the chalice. It was
definitely not bloodl)

The cup of knowledge

My increasing fascination with astronomy and, in particular, cosmology, paralleled my accelerating doubts concerning the supernatural. Research I did for
one science fair project proved to be a
valuable step in reinforcing my religious
skepticism. Two particular books which
led me to a complete reassessment
of
my religion were Sir Fred Hoyle's Fron-

tiers of Astronomy and Jagjit Singh's

Great Ideas and Theories of Modern
Cosmology. The first showed me that
the universe could continually create
and maintain itself without the need for
any divine intervention. The last chapter
of Singh's book supported my growing
conviction that god was an unnecessary
appendage at best, created by a bunch
of clerics who wanted to impose their
will on humanity. A particular passage
which captivated me in Singh's book is
the following:
When one has cut himself off from
God by a first sip from the cup of
knowledge, one will not rediscover
him by drinking from its dregs, no
matter how hard they may be
boiled. Like Voltaire's good Brahmin, he has no choice but to prefer knowledge in spite of its misery
to ignorance with all its accompanying bliss.
At the conclusion of my award-winning project on "The Structure of the
Universe," I knew I could never again
return to the state of being a docile believer. I simply could not reconcile the
majestic grandeur of the cosmos, its intricate workings, with the cartoon deity
portrayed in Roman Catholic teachings.
Given the untold billions of galaxies,
each with their hundreds of billions of
stars, why would any deity possibly care
whether a creature
on a backwater
planet ate meat during a certain rotation
or used his or her sexual organs in a particular way? It was anthropocentric
arrogance of a colossal magnitude to insist any deity could care - and if that
was so, why the need for a deity at all?

A highly improbable outcome

The seeds of skepticism, sown in my
high school years, came to fruition in my
first year in college. By the end of the
year, I had ceased believing in any deity.
A guest lecture that year given by JeanPaul Sartre at the Loyola University
Field House in New Orleans spurred me
Page 27

June 1992
.~

As I have discovered by my experience here,

the foremost problem in promoting an intellectual,
rather than emotional, debate is that the vast majority are not familiar
with basic concepts of evolution or modern cosmology.

on. I found Sartre's ideas of existentialism completely consistent with modern

evolutionary theory which states life on
earth emerged only after a succession of
random chemical events over billions of
years. Human existence, considered in
this context, was a freak accident a highly improbable
outcome arising
from. a confluence of the right chemicals, 'lightning discharges, and suitable
conditions. Quite possibly, the sheer
scale of the evolutionary odds rendered
humankind
and its inhabited
world
unil~f'in the cosmos.
In this sense, the only meaning in our
lives was the meaning we gave them none other. There is only one life to live
- the present one and only a fool would
not recognize that whatever good and
pleasure there is has to be sought now,
not in some mythical hereafter. Hell,
demons, angels, and god were all figments of childish imaginations, given
substance only by people's belief in the
hierarchy which holds them in thrall.
The victims of this charade, as I had
been, were dutiful mental invalids dependent on Holy Mother Church for
permission to use their brains and their
sex organs in a given way.

Coming out of the closet

It has been about twenty years since
then, and I now find myself living in an
island nation, Barbados, where it is said
there is "one church for every day of the
year." Here religion figures into everything, from the usual rituals of weddings
and funerals to dedication services for
trade unions, political parties, teachers,
policemen, or any other group. Most
meetings begin and end with a prayer,
and if you do not at least look the part
of a believer, you are regarded as some
kind of weirdo or at least a likely corrupter of public morals. Not going to church
might be tolerated to some extent, but
not believing in a god is tantamount to
treason.
Nevertheless, I have become engaged
in an ongoing press debate, in interludes
spanning the past five years, in which I
Page 28

have sought to show the fundamental

flaws in religion and the scientific reasons for rejecting various godconcepts.
As a college physics teacher, I have
often had occasion to refer to the principles of physics and the methodology
of science. My hope in doing this has
been to at least present the virtues of intelligent skepticism to the younger generation, even if the older are not receptive and are even hostile - for the press
reaction has been hostile to a large
degree.
In the most recent debate, which has
now gone on for four months, the newspaper editor informed me of a "tidal
wave" of letters from priests, rabbis,
teachers, Muslims, and "men on the
street." The debate, at one point, had to
be prematurely terminated since there
was no way to publish all the replies, and
many virulent telephone
calls were
directed at the editors of the two local
dailies for "giving so much prominence
to the views of an Atheist." It has once
again resumed, but in a somewhat diluted form - with only very brief letters to
the editor accepted on either side.
As I have discovered by my experience here, the foremost problem in promoting an intellectual, rather than emotional, debate is that the vast majority
are not familiar with basic concepts of
evolution or modern cosmology. The
local media have been very culpable in
this, as they have not gone out of their
way to publish educational science articles. Following a recent solar eclipse, I
received a number of telephone calls
from interested people who wondered
why so little astronomy information appeared in the newspapers. I had to tell
them that the editors and publishers
simply preferred politics and cultural
stories, thinking that astronomy "would
be of little interest." I have even volunteered to write astronomy and science
articles gratis, but this offer has up to
now not been accepted
by the two
newspapers here.
With this background of scientific ignorance, it is little wonder that Atheism
June 1992

appears alien to so many. Since there

are so few avenues open in the media to
challenge the tenets of religion on objective intellectual grounds, people seldom
get to see "the other side." To many
others, no amount of information would
help, no matter how objective or scientific. "God" is a given and does not require scientific evidence or proof.
Despite these drawbacks, I have no
regrets over initiating and continuing
the press debates. I have received telephone calls from a number of people,
some Christians who just wanted clarification, and others who were more supportive and appreciated having a different point of view. Some have informed
me that they have even clipped a number of my letters and articles out and
saved them, including one on "Materialism and Values," which was called "brilliant." A number of my own students
have also read and saved these articles,
using them as resource materials for
other courses. At least one media personality, who is also involved in the National Cultural Foundation, is trying to
organize a nationally televised debate
on religion and Atheism - with me representing the latter point of view.
At the college where I teach, Ihave also distributed literature from the American Atheist Press - mainly pamphlets
- around the staff room. From what I
have seen, it has been largely appreciated and read. Some teachers
have
even asked if they could retain some of
the materials. Another teacher, a Christian, became rather incensed and challenged me to a debate entitled "Demons
- Fact or Fable" in front of upper level
students. In the debate we argued the
concepts of "soul," "salvation" and the
alleged reality of "Satan" and "demons,"
as well as the historicity of the Bible
(which I strongly rejected). After the debate, I asked several students out of curiosity if they thought there had been a
clear winner. They replied: "What? Sir,
it was NO contest! You demolished Mr.
Phillips!"
(See "My path ... " page 64)
American Atheist

James Gillespie Blaine

Ii

A neglected savior of
the nation's public
school system is finally
recognized.

he history of Blaine is clear enough

and quickly told.
James Gillespie Blaine was born
on January 31, 1830,on Indian Hillfarm,
in West Brownsville, Pennsylvania. He
died in Washington, D.C., on January
27, 1893, at age sixty-two. And in between because he lived lies the story of
the continuation and protection of secular public schools in the United States
when once they were under attack, as
they are now, by religion.
For over thirty years Blaine was second only to the president of the United
States in importance and influence in
the nation. (See "Blaine in Brief.") His
career began when the nation had only
thirty-three states, continued during the
Civil War, and ended at a time when
forty-four states comprised the Union.
He it was who helped to midwife the
Republican party and who fashioned the
Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. He was in
the middle of the furor to keep tax money from religious schools and to encourage the taxation of the churches. Yet
this author could find no history books,

no encyclopedia, which even mentioned

the state/church separation efforts of
this man or how the issues convulsed
the nation. Today most of the states of
the United States have constitutional
provisions which preclude the use of tax
funds for religious education - adopting in the states what failed in the national Congress: the Blaine amendment.
In his presidential message to Congress in 1875, President Ulysses S.
Grant! warned:
The divorce between church
and state ought to be absolute. It
ought to be so absolute that no
church property anywhere, in any
state, or in the nation, should be
exempt from equal taxation; for if
you exempt the property of any
church organization, to that extent you impose a tax upon the
whole community.

Born on April 13, 1919,Dr. O'Hair

initiated the United States Supreme
Court case Murray v. Curlett, which
removed reverential Bible reading and
prayer recitation from the public
schools of our nation in June 1963. She
founded American Atheists in the
same year. Together with GORA she
founded the United World Atheists,
sponsor of the triennial World Atheist
Meet. A champion of freedom of
speech, freedom of assemblage,
freedom of conscience, and the right
to be free from religion, she is known
nationally and internationally as an
Atheist spokesperson.

Many of the states of the Union considered the feasibility of taxing the real
estate property owned by the churches
during this era. The nation was filled
with the news of it, and the tax support

-Ulysses S. Grant (1822-85), general and

commander of all Union forces (1864-65)
during the Civil War, eighteenth president of
the United States (1869-77).

Madalyn Q'Hair
Austin, Texas

Below:Blaine's birthplace in West Brownsville, Pennsylvania.

Below, right: James G. Blaine when he
was Speaker of the House.

June 1992

Page 29

Blaine in brief

So let us see exactly who and what

Blaine was.
Blaine was of the lineage of a revolutionary American family. His great
grandfather, Col. Ephraim Blaine, who
contributed $600,000 for the use of the
patriot army, had served from 1778 to

1782 as commissary-general
of the
Northern Department of the American
Army in the War of Independence. His
father, Ephraim Lyon Blaine, was a Presbyterian of Scotch-Irish descent; his
mother, Maria Louise nee Gillespie was
a Roman Catholic. Both were families of
considerable wealth, his father in fact
being one of the richest men in western
Pennsylvania. The land now occupied
by Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was once
that owned by his great grandfather, being sold to the Economites for $25,000 in
1825.
His family was wealthy enough to give
him an education, and he entered Washington College" in November 1843 when
he was thirteen years old. There he excelled in spelling matches and debates.
He graduated in 1847 at age seventeen
and began to teach in the Western Military Institute, Blue Lick Springs (Georgetown), Kentucky. There was only the
apprentice system in law but having an
interest in it, during this same time, he
was studying that profession. He did become a member of the bar and at one
time was a commissioned justice of the
peace.
He married Harriet Stanwood, a
teacher in a young ladies' seminary in
Kentucky, allegedly on June 30, 1850
(she died in 1903). However, in 1874 a report appeared in the Democratic Sentinel that their first son had been born
three months after the wedding. Blaine
simply retorted that he had two marriage ceremonies six months apart and it was left at that.
He later began to teach in the Pennsylvania Institution for the Blind (Deaf
and Dumb) at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he remained from August 1852
to November 1854. He wrote prolifically and often contributed to the Daily Inquirer newspaper in that city. In 1854,
following the death of their first child,
Stanwood Blaine, the young couple

2Robert G. Ingersoll (1833-99), agnostic, orator, and lawyer.

3Later Washington and Jefferson College in

Washington, Pennsylvania.

of religious schools was a matter of concern in every state, as well as at the nationallevel. The Roman Catholic church
- then seen by many as the ultimate
symbol of religious corruption - was
under attack from the Know-Nothing
party.
All of this is either glossed over or excluded from the history books of our
time even though it convulsed the nation, reached into every state legislative
body, and was a matter of concern for
all the citizens of the nation.
The effort to keep tax dollars from the
Roman Catholic school system was
general. A proposed amendment to be
added to the Constitution of the United
States was labeled "the Blaine amendment." The U.S. Congress fought over
it bitterly for ten or more years. And in
most states of the Union where state
constitutional amendments were also
sought, the amendments were known
by that name. That of Texas, where the
National Office of American Atheists is
located, is typical (see "Public Funds
and Sectarian Purposes").
It is inconceivable but true, that these
hard fought battles, all of which changed
the face of public education for over a
century, are totally ignored in the history books of the nation. The names of
the three persons (James G. Blaine,
Ulysses S. Grant, and Robert G. IngersolJ2)who were most probably responsible for this change are not even appended as footnotes or glosses in the
textbooks of the nation, in public education where the major battle was fought.

Climb to influence

Page 30

June 1992

American Atheist

moved to Augusta, Maine, which was

the home of his wife's family.There, still
in his early twenties, through the financial aid of his wife's two brothers, Jacob
and Eben Stanwood, both prosperous
merchants in Boston, he became part
owner and editor of the Kennebec Journal, the most influential leader of public
thought in the state. Subsequently, he
became editor of the Portland Advertiser in 1875.
This was during a period when the
country newspaper exerted great power in the formation of public opinion.
There was no such trade as journalism.
For the most part, persons interested
founded their own newspapers and
gained influence for it by the force and
lucidity with which they discussed the
political issues of the day.

"A practical Christian"

In respect to religion, Blaine had been
reared in the Presbyterian faith, although
his mother and her family had been devout Roman Catholics for generations.
After his marriage, he conscientiously
attended the Congregationalist church
of his wife's family. He seemed devoted
to this religion, going so far as to name
his second son, Emmons, after one of
the most rigid Calvinist ministers of the
time.
It can be said that although he was
skeptical of many religious ideas, he remained true to his Presbyterian faith
also. He had what he described as an interest in theology and became "a practical Christian" ten years after college.
In 1876, when a question concerned
with religion arose, he wrote as follows:
My ancestors on my father's
side, as you know, always identified with the Presbyterian Church,
and they were prominent and honored in the old colony of Pennsylvania. But I will never consent to
make any public declaration on
the subject, and for two reasons:
First, because I abhor the introduction of anything that looks like
Austin, Texas

a religious test or qualification for

office in a republic where perfect
freedom of conscience is the birthright of every citizen; and, second,
because my mother was a devoted Catholic. I would not for a
thousand presidencies speak a
disrespectful word of my mother's
religion, and no pressure willdraw
me into any avowal of religion, and
no pressure willdraw me into any
avowal of hostility, or unfriendliness to Catholics, though I have
never received, and do not expect
any political support from them."
There was a great religious "revival"
in 1857and Mrs. Blaine, it is reported,
"together with her husband" was a convert of that time. However, Blaine's later
history found him in the conventional
Congregationalist church once again.
Blaine's work on both news journals
quickly brought him public attention.
The governor soon sent him on a mission to examine the prisons and penitentiaries of other states with a view to improvement of those in Maine.

larly known as the "Know-Nothing"

(anti-Roman Catholic) party.
The Know-Nothing party was important in the decade before 1860and was
particularly powerful from 1852to 1854.
One of its primary objectives was to
keep public aid from religious schools,
particularly Roman Catholic denominational schools then being first introduced to the nation. The Know-Nothings
also refused to exclude the Protestant
Bible from the public schools as the
Roman Catholics then desired. It advocated the taxation of all church property
and cast much suspicion on foreignborn "agents of the papacy." At the
height of its popularity, it elected governors and members of state legislatures,

The Know-Nothing party

When the Whig party- went to pieces
following its endorsement of the Fugitive Slave Act, it took a crushing reverse
at the polls in 1852.At that time, Blaine
joined with the governor of Maine to organize the Republican party in that
state. The old Whig party drifted first
into the "American" party, more popu-

4Quoted in James G. Blaine, by Charles

Wolcott Balestier, a private letter dated 1876.
5The Whig party was formed in 1834 to protest against executive encroachment.
It
lasted about thirty years and during that
time became a champion of the national
bank and of the rights of Congress. It endorsed the older, purer civilservice. Its goals
were to maintain the republican character of
the Union, make the Union national, and to
develop a distinctively American type of civilization. It was primarily a party of big business.
June 1992

Page 31

Robert G. Ingersoll (right) delivered the

famed "Plumed Knight" speech nominating Blaine for the Republican presidential candidacy in 1876. Cartoonist
Thomas Nast of Harper's Weekly used
the image to mock Blaine in succeeding
years (below, center).

primarily in the four New England states

and in Maryland, Kentucky, and California. Additionally it was often close to
winning elections in six southern states.
In 1854 its victories were phenomenal:
its strength in Congress was almost
thirty-fold that of 1852.Blaine, just beginning his public career, necessarily was
very conversant with its politics.
Beginning with Massachusetts
in
1855, within about sixty years thirty
states adopted constitutional provisions
forbidding the granting of pubic funds to
any denominational or sectarian institutions. Much of this came from the sentiment of the anti-Catholic years. Although
reared in a home where his mother was
Roman Catholic, Blaine endorsed the
withholding of all public funding from
that church, retaining that position
throughout his forty-year politicalcareer.

After the election of Lincoln" to the

presidency in 1860, Blaine was drafted
into the army as one of the quota for
Augusta, Maine, and he paid for a substitute. He gave his help to the cause of
the Union in every possible way except
that of actual military service. He urged
others to enlist, facilitated the mustering, provided army clothing, and oversaw the movement of the troops of
Maine. He visited the hospitals to ameliorate the condition of the sick and
wounded and took steps for their relief.
During the congressional session of
1862, he urged emancipation, confiscation, and the employment of Negroes as
soldiers for the Union army. Later he
was to support the Reconstruction Act
for the South in Congress.
In 1862 Blaine was elected to the
House of Representatives of the United
States Congress, in which he served for
thirteen years (December 1863 to DeExcellent in debate,
cember 1876).He served three terms as
dexterous in controversy
Blaine was a natural politician. He had Speaker of the House, first being electearly shown evidence of literary capac- ed to that position in 1869.For ten years,
ity and political aptitude. He was excel- in reality, his history was the history of
lent in debate, dexterous in controversy,
the United States Congress. He served
and had organizational skills. His edito- on all principal committees.
rial work therefore was soon abanAlong the way Blaine was struck with
doned for a more active public career. the oratorical ability of a young man
He was first elected to the lower house from Illinois and in September 1867inof the Maine legislature in 1858(and re- vited him to come to Maine to take to
elected three times). He served for four the stump for a two-week speaking tour
years, from 1859to 1863,as its Speaker. on behalf of the Republican party. The
He also became chairman of the Repub- tour, which was made in 1868,was a maIican- (Maine) state committee in 1859. jor triumph and very quickly the young
For more than twenty years, he person- man, Robert G. Ingersoll, became a naally directed every campaign of this tional sensation.
party. Blaine served as a delegate to the
1856Republican convention at Philadel- The "Mulligan Letters"
phia which nominated John C. FreIn 1869, while Speaker of the House,
mont? for the presidency.
Blaine made a decision which saved the
land grant of the Little Rock & Fort
Smith railroad of Arkansas, under
6The Republican party we know was orga- which he sold bonds on commission. In
nized in the years 1854 to 1856, based priregard to this affair, he had written to
marily in the idea of restriction of slavery to
the Southern states. The name was formally Warren Fisher a number of letters
adopted at a Michigan state convention on
July 6, U\54.
7John Charles Fremont (1813-90), American explorer and soldier.
Page 32

.1

;;,,'-'0

i'qr,

r1C"'H"L

8Abraham Lincoln (1809-65), sixteenth

president of the United States (1861-65).
June 1992

American Atheist

Blaine used his great political popularity

to aid in the election of President James
A. Garfield (left) in 1880. As a reward, he
was made secretary of state in 1881.
which later came to be known (after
Fisher's bookkeeper, James Mulligan of
Boston) as the "Mulligan Letters." The
letters contained expressions open to
various interpretations,
and the Democrats of the era brought charges of corruption against Blaine in his relationship
with the railways. His defense was given
by himself. On June 5, 1876, in a brilliant
address before the U.S. House of Representatives, Blaine denied charges that
he had allowed the railroads to expect
legislative favors. In this stirring presentation, he read selections from the "Mulligan Letters" to the House members. It
was a coup de theatre. He received a
thunderous ovation and turned public
opinion in his favor. The Republicans
thought he was well-defended
and,
again, he was in the running for nomination to the presidency by that party.

Like a plumed knight

Despite the railroad fiasco, he was
put forward at the Republican convention of 1876, in Cincinnati, Ohio, for the
office of the president. Robert G. Ingersoll, a delegate to the convention from
Illinois, was the spokesman for his candidacy and delivered his nomination
speech. He described Blaine's speech to
the House as follows:
Like an armed

warrior,

like a

plumed knight, James G. Blaine

marched down the halls of the
American Congress and threw his
shining lance full and fair against
the brazen foreheads of the defamers of his country and the maligners of his honor.
Dubbed the "Plumed Knight" speech,
.it is still considered the greatest nominating speech ever made. Nonetheless
Blaine did not obtain the nomination. It
went instead to Governor Rutherford B.
Hayes? of Ohio by a slim margin (384-

9Rutherford B. Hayes (1822-93), nineteenth

president of the United States (1877-81).
Austin, Texas

June 1992

351 or 28 votes depending on the historian). The speech spread Ingersoll's

name before the land and he then began
to stump the country,
beginning
in
Maine, to speak for the Republican candidate: New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and 10wa.1O
Senator Morrill!' of Maine became
the secretary
of the treasury
under
Hayes, and on July 10, 1876, Blaine was
chosen by the governor of Maine to be
the U.S. senator
for that state for
Morrill's unexpired term.
This, of course, meant that Blaine
was to be the leading figure in the U.s.
Congress
during the Reconstruction
period after the Civil War. The Southern
states, which had seceded, had to be rehabilitated. A primary question was the
basis of representation
upon which they
should be restored to their full rank in
the political system. Blaine wanted representation of the South based on population instead of legal voters. At the
time, voting privileges in the North
varied and in the South the Blacks could
not vote. It was in January 1868 that he
introduced a resolution in relation to
Congressional
representation
which
was referred
to the Reconstruction
Committee and was subsequently made
the basis of the Fourteenth
Amendment. Ratified July 9, 1869, this amendment must be credited to Blaine.
He was a constant possible candidate
for the presidency of the United States.
He had been in the running in the 1876
Republican
convention
in Cincinnati
and had his hat in the ring in Chicago in
1880. On this second occasion, he lost

IOThiswas the single U.S. presidential race

which was contested since the returns from
Florida, Louisiana, Oregon and South Carolina elections were in dispute. Congress, in
joint session on March 2, 1877, declared
Hayes to be have been elected.
llLot Myrick Morrill (1813-83), governor of
Maine (1858-60), senator (1861-76), and secretary of the treasury (1876-77).
Page 33

the nomination to James Garfield.P but

assisted how he could toward Garfield's
election.
When in office, the new president,
James A. Garfield, immediately appointed Blaine to the office of the secretary ofthe state on March '5, 1881.Blaine
remained in that office, however, only
until December 19 (because of the murder of President Garfield by Charles
Lewis Guiteaul.P
It was, incidentally, Blaine who delivered the funeral eulogy of the president
in what is still designated as a masterpiece of oratory.

But Blaine made a fatal blunder. On

October 2, 1884 he invited six hundred
ministers to a hotel meeting, only to
have one, Rev. Samuel D. Burchard,"
characterize the Democratic party as
being one of "Rum, Romanism, and
Rebellion."l? Although Blaine did not
make the statement or coin the phrase,
it was later attributed to him since he did
not immediately repudiate it at the time
that Burchard delivered it. The Democrats used it like a hammer to cause
many Roman Catholics to withdraw
their support for him, and ultimately
Blaine lost the election to Grover C1eveland." That loss, however, was in New
York state where a rainstorm decreased
voter turnout and where Blaine lost by
1,040 votes. A change of 600 votes
would have elected him. Blaine remarked bitterly about this:

The Star Route scandal

Unfortunately, the Star Route easel!
developed next. Star Route mail delivery was a scheme for rural mail delivery
in sparsely populated areas beyond the
reach of the trains spanning the nation.
The mail delivery, of course, was under
the jurisdiction of the Postmaster General who theoretically awarded contracts under competitive bidding. Actually,the $6-millionworth of contracts for
the 9,225 Star Routes were awarded to
politicians and their friends. These, in
turn, were sublet or sold, and extremelygenerous profits were pocketed. Consequently a number of defendants were
finally charged with conspiracy to defraud the government. One of these, exSenator Stephen W Dorsey," was the
secretary of the Republican National
Committee which had played a prominent role in the Republican campaign of
1880in which Ingersoll had been the Republicans' main champion. It was the
12James Abram Garfield (1831-81), twentieth president of the United States (1881).
13Charles Lewis Guiteau (1840-1882), a lawyer, shot Garfield in the waiting room of the
Baltimore & Potomac R.R. in Washington
D.C., on July 2, 1881. He was found guilty
and hanged in Washington on June 30,1882.
14UnitedStates u. Stephen W Dorsey et al.
15Stephen Wallace Dorsey (1842-1916),
Union soldier and United States senator
from Arkansas (1873-79).
Page 34

Free Rum, Free Rome, but No Free Schools I

Another Thomas Nast cartoon.

longest criminal trial on record (two

years) and Ingersoll was the lead counsel
for the Republicans. The defendants
were acquitted. But Ingersoll, at a later
date, made it known that he was not
happy to have been involved in the case
as lead counsel.

As the Lord sent upon us an ass

in the shape of a preacher, and a
rainstorm to lessen our vote in
New York, I am disposed to feel resigned to the dispensation of defeat
which flowed directly from these
agencies.

There were 401 electors and 201 were

necessary for a choice. Mr. Blaine could
have won had he carried New York and
its 36 electors; the unfortunate remark
of the Rev. Burchard is credited with the
"Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion" loss of that state and - hence - the
Blaine was nominated by the Repub- loss of the election.
Blaine had, before this, been tholican party for the presidency in 1884 in
the Centennial Building in Chicago, Illi- roughly bound with Robert G. Ingersoll,
nois. Ingersoll, however, did not participate in this election. Although he attended the Republican convention, he 16Samuel Dickinson Burchard (1812-91),
did not hit the hustings for Blaine at all. Presbyterian minister.
It could well be that Blaine did not want l?Burchard's brief address closed with these
Ingersoll, the Star Route attorney, a sentences: "We [ministers] are Republicans,
symbol of a major political scandal, to and don't propose to leave our party and
identify ourselves with the party whose anteparticipate in the campaign. Conversely,
cedents have been rum, Romanism, and
Ingersoll was quite concerned when he rebellion. We are loyal to our flag, we are
perceived that Blaine was making an loyal to you."
appeal to the religious with a statement
18Stephen Grover Cleveland (1837-1908),
that "The State cannot get along without twenty-second president of the United
the church" in his speeches.
States (1885-89 and 1893-97).
June 1992

American Atheist

The last success:

Pan-American Union

-~~~i:~---::-~
~.~..

=-=,,--,-,~=-:::c..=""""'~~WE

This old-time secularist cartoon dramatizes a struggle still fought today.

visiting him in his home in Peoria, Illinois,
having Ingersoll stump the state of
Maine giving speeches for him, and visiting him in Washington, D_C Their families even vacationed together, The rupture between the two in 1884 was complete, so much so that Ingersoll represented Mrs. James G. Blaine Jr., in a
divorce action against Blaine's youngest
son.
History has been unkind to both
Blaine and Ingersoll. In most history
books the latter is simply ignored. In an
Oxford University Press history book
used in many American colleges and
universities,
Blaine is described
as
follows:
Yet he made no impression upon
American politics except to lower
its moral tone. He was assiduous
in cementing a corrupt alliance between politics and business. Deliberately and violently he fanned the
flames of sectional animosity, His
name is connected with no important legislation; his sympathies
were enlisted in no forward-looking
Austin, Texas

causes, His vision was narrow and

selfish, his ambitions personal and
partisan. 19
In 1888, Blaine was again asked to run
on the Republican ticket, but he - instead - recommended
the Hon. Benjamin Harrison-? of Indiana as the most
eligible candidate and one who would
make a good president. In releasing his
friends and supporters to vote for Harrison at the Republican convention, he
assured Harrison's nomination on the
eighth ballot. When elected, Harrison
immediately offered Blaine the position
of secretary of state, which he accepted
and for which he took the oath of office
on March 4, 1889_

19SamuelEliot Morison, Henry Steele Commager, and William Leuchtenburg,

The
Growth of the American Republic (New
York: Oxford University Press, 1980), vol. 2,

Blaine's big dream was a Pan-American Union toward which he worked during both his terms of secretary of state.
A congressional
resolution of 1888, in
fact, authorized the president to call for
such an organization and thus was the
Pan-American Union born. It was housed
in a magnificent building in Washington,
D_C, which cost $1,100,000, of which
Andrew Carnegie" contributed
threefourths. Blaine's (last) national strength
was exhibited in 1892. In that year, on
June 4 he resigned from the presidency
of the Pan-American Union. Immediately his supporters again sought his nomination for the presidency at the Republican National Convention. It was not to
be.
Blaine, whose health had been bad for
months, failed rapidly and died of Bright's
disease on January 27, 1893.

The church and state

forever separate
In regard to both Ingersoll's
and
Blaine's commitment
to state/church
separation, they are read out of history.
It is usually reported, when it is reported
at all, that in 1875 President Ulysses S.
Grant attempted
to secure a federal
constitutional amendment
on the subject matter of the Blaine amendment.
The story goes that President Grant, addressing the Army of the Tennessee in
Des Moines, Iowa in 1876, said:
Now, the centennial year of our
national existence, I believe, is a
good time to begin the work of
strengthening
the foundations of
the structure commenced by our
patriotic forefathers one hundred
years ago at Lexington. Let us labor to add all needful guarantees
for the security of free thought,
free speech, a free press, pure

p.142.

20Benjamin Harrison (1833-1901), twentythird president of the United States (188993).

June 1992

21Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919), American

capitalist and philanthropist.
Page 35

James G. Blaine and President Ulysses

S. Grant (right) shared ideas on state/
church separation which would be considered radical today. Together they
worked for a constitutional amendment
to fortify the wall of separation between
state and church.

morals, unfettered religious sentiments, and equal rights and privileges to all men, irrespective of
nationality, color, or religion. Encourage free schools and resolve
that not one dollar appropriated
for their support shall be appropriated to the support of any sectarian schools; that neither the state
or nation, nor both combined,
shall support institutions of learning other than those sufficient to
afford every child in the land the
opportunity of a good commonschool education, unmixed with
sectarian, pagan, or atheistical
dogmas.
Leave the matter of religion to
the family altar, the church, and
the private school supported entirely by private contributions.
Keep the church and state forever
separate. With these safeguards I
believe the battles which created
the Army of the Tennessee willnot
have been fought in vain. 22
This speech, allegedly, came out of
the blue. There is nothing in the history
of the time that would indicate that
Grant was continually pursuing the end
of state/church separation. The closest
one can find is a remark in passing that
Grant was "heretical."
On December 14, 1875, Blaine introduced the following resolution into the
House of Representatives, apparently at
the insistence of and in cooperation with
Grant.
Resolved by the Senate and the
House of Representatives, That
the following be proposed to the
several States of the Union as an
amendment to the Constitution:

22The Annals of America, (Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1968), vol. 10,
1866-1883, Reconstruction and Industrialization, pp. 365.
Page 36

Article XVI
No State shall make any law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; and no money raised
by taxation in any State for the
support of public schools, or derived from any public fund therefor,
nor any public lands devoted thereto, shall ever be under the control
of any religious sect, nor shall any
money so raised or lands so devoted be divided between religious
sects or denominations.
The resolution was referred to the
Judiciary Committee. On August 4,
1876, by a vote of 180-7 (with 98 not voting) the resolution was passed by the
House (with several slight verbal
changesl.P The resolution was read in
the Senate on August 7, 1876. Changes
were there proposed and the original
resolution with all the substitutions was
referred to the Committee on the Judiciary. This committee revised it significantly:
Article XVI
No state shall make any law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; and no religious test
shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust
under any State. No public property and no public revenue of, nor
any loan of credit by or under the
authority of, the United States, or
any State, Territory, District, or
municipal corporation, shall be appropriated to or made of use for

23Congressional Record: Containing The

Proceedings and Debates of the FortyFourth Congress, First Session; also Special
Session of The Senate, Vol. IV - House,
August 4, 1876,pp. 5190-2; Senate, August
7, 1876, pp. 5245-6; August 11, 1876, pp.
5453-62; August 14, 1876,p. 5580; August 15,
p.5595.
June 1992

the support of any school, educational or other institution under

the control of any religious or antireligious sect, organization, or denomination, or wherein the particular creed or tenets of any religious or anti-religious sect, organization, or denomination shall be
taught. And no such particular
creed or tenets shall be read or
taught in any school or institution
supported in whole or in part by
such revenue or loan of credit; and
no such appropriation or loan of
credit shall be made to any religious or anti-religious sect, organization, or denomination, or to promote its interests or tenets. This
article shall not be construed to
prohibit the reading of the Bible in
any school or institution; and it
shall not have the effect to impair
rights of property already vested.
Sec. 2_ Congress shall have
power, by appropriate legislation,
to provide for the prevention and
punishments of violations of this
article.
The final vote in the Senate was 2816 (with 27 absent or not voting). Unable
American Atheist

Left: The last photograph taken of

James G. Blaine.
Below, left: After a lifetime of politics,
Blaine died in his home in Washington,
D.C.

to muster the two-thirds vote needed,

the proposed amendment could not be
submitted to the states. In 1950, 70
percent of the states had special provisions against financial contributions
from public funds to parochial (denominational or sectarian) schools or institutions. Yet they provided exemption of
taxation for such schools, and later in
some instances and under specific conditions free bus transportation, free
textbooks, and even free lunches for
their pupils.
Until 1888 eleven more congressional
attempts were made to secure an amendment to the Constitution which would
specifically forbid government financial
aid to parochial and denominational
schools - even to set up more rigid
barriers between state and church.
The National Municipal League in its
third revision in 1933, of model state
constitutions, still had the following:
Sec. 10 [Aid to sectarian institutions] No public money or property shall ever be appropriated,
applied, donated, or used directly
or indirectly, for the use, benefit,
or support of any sect, church denomination, sectarian institution
or association, or system of religion, or for charitable, industrial,
education, or benevolent purposes not under the control of the
State.
Be that as it may, Blaine's dreams to
the contrary, he is in American history
remembered (or not remembered) for
the Blaine amendments in the constitutions of the states of the Union. As President Bush makes his push for "choice"
schools, financed by voucher or other
federal tax payment plans, in every state
the scheme willcome against the Blaine
amendments in each of the constitutions of the several states of the Union.
There is no way that we can theorize
this happy circumstance back to Robert
G. Ingersoll. In his numerous biographies, there is no recitation that he atAustin, Texas

tempted to assist in the cry to tax

church property or to keep tax money
from religious (read Roman Catholic)
schools. But, in each instance, in each
state, the "choice" plan willmeet the restriction of "no tax funds for sectarian
schools." To date, in the arguments
which are proposed by the federal Department of Education or those of proponents against "choice," there has
been no reference to these state constitutional provisions - simply because
no one realizes that they exist. ~

Bibliography .
Appleton's Encyclopaedia of American
Biography.
Balestier, Charles Wolcott. James G.
Blaine.
Beale, Harriet S. Blaine, ed. Letters of
Mrs. James G. Blaine. New York:
Duffield and Co., 1908.
Blaine, James Gillespie. Twenty Years
of Congress from Lincoln to Garfield,
with a Review of the Events which
Led to the PoliticalRevolution of 1860.
2 vols. Norwich, CT: The Henry Bill
June 1992

Publishing Co., 1884-86.

Cramer, C. H. Royal Bob: The Life of
Robert G. Ingersoll. New York: The
Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1952.
Dodge, Mary Abigail. Biography of
James G. Blaine. Norwich, CT: 1895.
Hamilton, Gail. Biography of James G.
Blaine. Norwich, CT: The Henry Bill
Publishing Co., 1895.
Larson, Orvin. American Infidel: Robert
G. Ingersoll. New York: The Citadel
Press, 1962.
McClure, J. B., ed. Life and Great
Speeches of the Hon. James G.
Blaine, including his early days; reminiscences of boyhood; his education;
public life; and his great speeches
.complete; including the "Currency
Question;" "Protection;" "Tariff;"
"Trusts;" "Address before the PanAmerican Congress;" etc. Chicago:
Rhodes & McClure Publishing Co.,
1890.
Morison, Samuel Eliot, Henry Steele
Commager, and William E. Leuchten burg. The Growth of the American
Republic. 2 vols. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1980.
Muzzey, David Saville. James G. Blaine:
A Political Idol of Other Days. New
York: Dodd, Mead & Company,
1934.
Ross, Shelley. Fall from Grace. Sex,
Scandal, and Corruption in American Politics from 1702to the Present.
New York: Random House, 1988.
Sherman, Thomas H. Twenty Years
with James G. Blaine. New York:
The Grafton Press, 1928.
Smith, Frank. Robert G. Ingersoll: A
Life. Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books,
1990.
Stanton, C. E. James G. Blaine, American Statesman Series. Boston, MA:
1905.
Stanwood, Edward. James Gillespie
Blaine. Boston: Houghtmifflin Co.,
1905.
Stokes, Anson Phelps and Leo Pfeffer.
Church and State in the United
States. 3 vols. New York: Harper &
Bros., 1950.
Page 37

Forcing us to be good
(or else!)
n July 1991,a jury in Chicago acquitted the Reverend Michael Pfleger of
criminal destruction of property in a
case involving defacement of advertising billboards. The display signs in question promoted alcohol and cigarettes.
Pfleger admitted his legal guilt, maintaining that he defaced three billboards
near his church only after companies
had ignored his requests to eliminate
them.

O
Censorship goes
further than
determining what one
can read. An expanding
circle of moralists
would limit our choices
of entertainment,
health care, and even
beverages and foods.

A resident of Tucson, Arizona, Conrad

Goeringer has been involved in
community politics and social issues
for over twenty-five years. He is a
regional representative for American
Atheists and was a plaintiff in legal
actions to remove prayer from Tucson
City Council meetings.
Mr. Goeringer is a rare book dealer,
with specialties in decorative arts,
astronomy, Southwest and general
Americana, and first editions. He is the
proud owner of a personal library of
over 6,000 volumes on history, politics
and astronomy and of a '69 Chevy.

Conrad F. Goeringer
Page 38

Pfleger's high profile and acquittal

highlight a growing movement of moral
vigilance now becoming fashionable
throughout the country. Religious leaders, especially those from ethnic minority neighborhoods, are taking a leading
role in protest groups opposed to the
"sin industry" - alcohol, smoking, sex,
gambling, and other related activities.
Last year in Texas, for instance, a government official was convicted of white-

Government concern over private morals is hardly new. This nineteenth-century

cartoon poked fun at censor Anthony Com strock. He is depicted as telling the
policeman, "Arrest them all - The laws of decency must be respected."

In court, he termed these advertising

devices "twenty-four-hour pushers" and
claimed that his actions drew attention
to the "saturation" of poor and minority
neighborhoods with ads promoting
beer, wine, liquor, and cigarettes. "This
is about children's lives and deaths and
the future of the community," the Roman
Catholic priest insisted, while adding
that the billboard industry had to "develop some moral responsibility."
June 1992

washing alcohol and tobacco billboards

in Black neighborhoods. A number of
"activist priests" recently targeted a
beer company which had planned to
market "Power Master," a malt liquor
beverage which they claimed was aimed
specifically at the Black community.
And there was another campaign against
a line of cigarettes with advertising targeted to young Blacks.
One juror in Pfleger's trial maintained
American Atheist

The effort to enforce ethics and morality

by banning certain types of publications
has attracted a wide of supporters over
the years. Right: This 1979 march of
"Women Against Pornography" included
feminists Gloria Steinem and Bella
Abzug. Right, below: In 1986 Attorney
General Edwin Meese (a Reagan appointee) called for sweeping new laws to suppress all pornography.

that the priest's vandalism was, in fact,

a "moral statement." The executive director of a regional advertising group
disagreed, saying that the acquittal
"opens the door for an awful lot of very
dangerous things . . . ."

Wages of sin
Despite rhetorical devices like appealing to the "lives of children" or "attacks"
on ethnic or other communities, Pfleger's
actions and rationales typify a larger, farranging, and dangerous characteristic
of religious movements - an impulse to
make others "do good." His billboard
terrorism is actually directed less at the
advertising industry than it is at those
who may see such promotional displays,
namely, poor Blacks. There is an implicit assumption that the mere presence of
such "powerful" messages constitutes a
seductive, nearly irresistible order - to
drink PowerMaster, smoke Kools, or engage in other activities which are out of
fashion or not "good." In this respect,
the deeds of the Reverend Pfleger and
other religious activists are far more
dangerous than any message conveyed
by a splashy billboard.
Social and political activism by religious figures in the United States during
the past ten years has often been associated with right wing fundamentalists.
Since the turn of the century, however,
even more traditional or sometimes liberal clergy were involved in campaigns
to eradicate everything from saloons
and houses of prostitution to a staggering range of books, magazines, plays,
and movies. Beginning in the 1950s, the
battle against moral laxness was linked
to the anticommunist mentality of the
cold war. What was perceived as a
weakening of the nation's moral fabric
was also presented as proof of a conspiracy directed from foreign capitals
like Moscow or Peking.
The Reagan presidency was a high
point for those conservative religious
movements which called for vigorous
legislation to eliminate one of the "sins"
- pornography. There were other tarAustin, Texas

gets as well, including evolutionists, situation ethicists, Atheists, secular humanists, drug dealers, and others. All these
constituted a well-entrenched enemy to
the fundamentalists; worse yet, these
individual groups were somehow linked
in a grand, yet murky, conspiratorial
design.
After the defeats by a liberal Supreme
Court in.the 1950sand early 1960s,there
were new arguments to employ in the
battle against perceived moral frailty.
Much of the fundamentalist argument
rested on the shaky premise that merely
seeing, reading, or hearing something
which was heretical, pornographic, or
sinful in some way, initiated a causal
chain of events culminating in debauchery and even violent behavior. There
was little need to distinguish between
the cheesecake of Playboy and the excess of Hustler, or even the underground of "kiddie" pornography. Reasoned questioning was quickly subsumed in an emotional swamp, with
appeals to everything from "community
standards" to protecting the safety of
children or the sanctity of the family.
But even in the early years of the
Reagan presidency, civil libertarians
could still thwart the censoring or banning of materials at appellate court levels; there was also a widespread notion
that a whole spectrum of behaviors what to read, write; see, or produce was a personal matter, not the province
of government or other institutions.
Worse yet for the fundamentalists
June 1992

were numerous reports by federal commissions on the extent, nature, and effect of pornography. These studies concluded that empirical proof for the
"grand conspiracy" hypothesis was
lacking. Pornography did not lead to
violence or the other behaviors predicted by the conspiracymongers.
By the mid-1980s, however, opposition to a number of "sins" had gained
new adherents and fashioned novel,
somewhat convoluted arguments. A
segment of the women's movement, led
by activists such as Andrea Dworkin,
abandoned the inherent civil libertarianism of the feminist cause to declare
that pornography, among other ills,
"exploited" and "oppressed" women.
Page 39

Her call to arms attracted a large number of liberals who had supported the
aims and purposes of the women's
movement. Pornography - with its objectification of women, its depictions of
male control, and its establishment of
"centerfold" standards. of beauty or
body shape - was, in and of itself, evil,
For some, it was a short leap from this
assumption to insisting that government should ban these materials for being degrading, exploitative, and contributing to violence against women and
children.
What emerged was a peculiar and at
times uncomfortable alliance between
many political liberals, segments of the
feminist movement, and Christian fundamentalists. Some feminists, while
condemning pornography, still objected
to using the state as a mechanism for
censorship. Others believed that boycotting stores which sold magazines or
theaters which ran objectionable films
was a workable compromise between
benign tolerance and outright banning. 1
Thus, the traditional libertarian arguments against censorship - especially
those which differentiated between individual thought and deed - were quickly sidelined as a new impulse for compulsory moral goodness emerged. Just
as the cold warriors of the 1950s feared
that viewing a "communist" movie like
Salt of the Earth or having access to the

Daily Worker somehow "caused" one to

become a Marxist pawn, the moral crusaders of the 1980s would view a wide
range of cultural materials as "causing"
improper social attitudes and violent
acts. The remedy to be employed in
both cases turned out to be the same government power. The moral majoritarians had new and enthused allies in
the quest for a clean and pure society,
even if for different reasons.
For those intent on engineering a
"good" social order, whatever it may
entail, the Rubicon had been crossed.
Personal quirks, tastes, preferences,
and habits were socialized. What you
read, wrote, performed on stage, or presented as art was viewed less as an individual right and more as a privilege or
sanction from legalauthority and various
pressure groups.

Sins past and present

The "sin industry" has been a convenient and profitable target for a number
of interests throughout our history. "Sin
taxes" on cigarettes and alcohol provide
billions of dollars in desperately needed
government revenue. In a time when
healthful living as defined by the surgeon general or the American Lung Association has become a near-faddish
pursuit, the fifty states and Washington
still cannot say no to the lure of additional money flowing from sin taxation.
State lotteries, the legal form of
gambling in many areas, serve a
similar purpose. Indeed, the
prospect of bulging coffers in
an era of budgetary cutbacks
has given new vitality to arguments on behalf of new, legal
"sins" such as prostitution and
marijuana, which can be taxed
just like beer and cigarettes.
With so much money being
generated by unhealthful, sinful
pursuits, we may not be able to
afford the prospect of full compliance with either the health
Los Angeles Archbishop Roger Mahoney opposed
department's or Father Pfleger's
the PBS broadcast of a film attacking the Roman
Catholic church's stand on homosexuality.
moral agenda.
Page 40

June 1992

We have also enjoyed another schizophrenic relationship with these "sins." In

many circumstances, these activities
are fun, pleasurable, and rewarding. Despite contemporary admonitions concerning dependency, for many people
the alteration of consciousness is at
times a priority. Early people fermented
beverages or ingested weeds, mushrooms, roots, or other substances to get
"high." We have no record of "drug
abuse" in such cultures, but we do know
that such activity has been almost universaL Sex has been important to everyone from the Victorians to the more
flamboyant Greeks and Romans, who
decorated their homes, pottery, and
other structures with explicitly erotic,
even "pornographic," motifs. (This recently caused difficulties for the editors
of the prestigious Biblical Archaeology
Review when the magazine featured a
photo spread of such pottery shards!)
Indians gambled and smoked weeds. In
all of history, throughout different cultures, the pursuit of excitement, risk,
pleasure, and sensual fun has been glorified in song, picture, and writing.
Early pagan religious systems often
appreciated and even embraced such
impulses. Much evidence suggests that
altered states of consciousness
or
sexual ecstasy was believed to transport
one beyond the plane of earthly, material
existence to reveal a "higher dimension."
Julian Jaynes suggested in his work
Origin of Consciousness/ that the orac-

"The debate is far from over, however.

Dworkin's crusade against smut has drawn
sharp criticism from many other feminists,
and her homilies against the male sex as being inherently oppressive have elicited disagreement even from militant lesbians. One
Lesbian erotic journal, On Our Backs, is as
sexually explicit as male-oriented pornography. And civil libertarians have pointed
out the bias in censoring Playboy, yet allowing homoerotic material for Gay men.
2Julian Jaynes, The Origin of Consciousness
in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1977).
American Atheist

ular rites at Delphi involved the use of

consciousness-altering substances. The
Greek mystics who practiced the Elysian
rituals and mysteries ingested a variety
of natural intoxicants, and the heretical
Gnostics conducted drunken orgies to
commune with the supernatural.
Institutionalized Christianity quickly
bifurcated the universe into the kingdom of god and the realm of Satan. The

an overt religious agenda. There was

also the explicit message that, as with
marijuana, alcohol use was simply the
first step down a path toward eventual
alcohol abuse.'
"Getting right with god," becoming
involved with religious movements, was
promoted as the alternative to the destructive life-style and consequences of
frequenting the bars, saloons, and
"dives," as the drinking establishment
was then labeled. There was also the
refrain that "demon booze" was the
bane of the American worker. The Ford
Motor Company promoted compulsory
dryness and welcomed the Great Experiment, claiming that this life-style in:2
creased profits and productivity. Other
~.
,,,;1,)
industries, especially in Detroit, quickly

followed suit; soon private detectives

ruJ.hn drink POI SOH ?
(euphemistically called the "Sociology
~
.7
Department") reported to management
1
~~~, on who was not "part of the program."
f- :I
An extensive informant system was
Prohibitionists saw no middle ground encouraged within labor rank and file,
between use and abuse of alcohol.
and even within schools. Liquor-free
zones were declared around schools,
devil, "Adversary," was said to rule over reminiscent of today's antidrug camthe material world, tempting his victims paign,
with pleasures and rewards of the flesh.
While the "dry" movement talked
Christ, in surrendering his very life on about imagined or real abuses involving
the cross, symbolized the renunciation
alcohol, simple abstinence or moderaof this world, with its sensual lusts, in tion was not sufficient to satisfy the
deference to a spiritual hereafter. The appetites of the movement's religious
books of the Bible are replete with zealots. More important, voluntary selfstories warning of the "wages of sin." regulation at the individual level was not
Not surprisingly, Genesis admonishes
acceptable; the dry life-style had to be
the partaking of knowledge and the re- legislated. There was no percentage or
sultant "sin" of sexuality. Fifteen cen- margin of tolerance for those who might
turies after the beginning of the Christian era, Luther would wrestle with
tempting demons, although he too 3Cult movies such as Reefer Madness, used
in fund-raising efforts on behalf of marijuana
escaped into the embrace of his wife.

LI Q U 0 R ;",sAL[ 0 H 0 L

0)

AL[OHOL PoleoN'

From Eden to the saloon

Prohibition in America was not only a
disastrous, costly social experiment but
a benchmark in Christianity's effort in
this country to compel people to be
"good." "Dry" movements emphasized
the personal and social consequences
of alcohol abuse, while also conveying
Austin, Texas

legalization, poke fun at the public perceptions of certain intoxicants in past times.
And one prolegalization magazine, High
Times, ran photos of "drug czar" William
Bennett consuming his share of dry martinis
and puffing on tobacco cigarettes prior to
addressing a "drug war" law-enforcement
conference. One's intoxicants and sins of
choice are usually determined by the prevailing social and political norms.

June 1992

have wished to consume alcohol, even

in the privacy of their own homes. All of
this constituted part of a wider, more
embracing religious program. Booze
pushers, saloon hounds, and whoremongers were conveniently lumped into
the same bottle (so to speak); it was a
battle not only for the palate of America
but for the nation's spiritual salvation as
well.

Prohibition hangover
The result of the Great Experiment
has now become the stuff and history of
romantic legends. Corruption within
government was widespread; indeed,
listening to oral accounts of Prohibitionera survivors reminds one of our current battle against intoxicants of a different sort. "Wise guys" flashed rolls of
cash, drove huge cars, and projected
the tempting life-style of wealth, power,
and prestige. Many police and other lawenforcement
officials found payoff
money to be a welcome supplement to
their meager paychecks. And the lure of
the forbidden sustained a burgeoning
market for bootleg booze, whether from
the distilleries in Canada or a neighbor's
backyard still. Either way, the United
States simply could not be forced to be
good. The religious euphoria of Prohibition had turned into a massive day-after
hangover.
The notion that people could not be
trusted when exposed to the temptation
of vice persisted after the death of the
Experiment, though. What could not be
banned could be regulated; and what
could not be regulated could be somewhat contained in select ethnic communities. The nation's patchwork of fifty
different sets of rules which govern the
production, sale, and use of alcohol exists to this day, complete with some notorious blue laws which ban or regulate
booze on the Lord's Day. Prostitution is
legalized in some Nevada counties and
some counties of other states. Tobacco
use is heavily taxed, and warning labels
are affixed to individual packs and advertising billboards.
Page 41

The desire of religionists to use force and law to control the thoughts of others has
no borders. Left: In 1989,Muslims demonstrators in Paris shouted "Death to Rushdie" in protest of his novel, The Satanic Verses. Below: In 1988, Christians surrounded Universal Studios in California to demand the withdrawal of the film "The
Last Temptation of Christ."

It becomes difficult, then, to distinguish between the bullying of Molly

Hatchet and the Anti-Saloon League
and the dramatics of the Reverend
Pfleger and his cohorts decades later. In
both cases, rational argument and reliance on voluntary action were quickly
superseded by the creed that physical
force was justified by a higher, more

mannerisms, instruct them in our religious

values, and save them - from themselves. Those who insist today that the
Black community is "victimized" by certain advertising or products adopt a
similar posture: "We are here to protect
you from yourself by making sure you
are not exposed to harmful influences."
One consequence of this campaign to
force people to be good is that it ultimately erodes liberty for all, establishing
bad and usually unforeseen precedents
the results of which can emerge years
later. As well-intentioned as he may be,

noble, and holy purpose. There is also,

I suspect, a good deal of the residual
paternalism many Whites still have regarding Blacks, or anyone else of a different ethnic or group persuasion. Such
groups are frequently viewed as helpless children in need of our firm, more
enlightened protection and guidance
lest they fall into temptation and sin.
There was a sense during Prohibition
that the sensibilities of bourgeois AngloSaxon America could be grafted onto a
working class populated by Slavs, Irish,
or "white trash." We would dress them
our way, teach them our standards and

Father Pfleger is an authoritarian. He

says, "Do it my way - or else!" And the
"else" involves both the destruction of
the billboard and somebody's not having a choice in the marketplace. One
may go further. If destroying these select billboards is a "moral act," what
about blowing up a liquor store which
willnot close when somebody demands
that it do so? What about killing those
involved in the production, sale, or distribution of those things he, or some-.
body else, dislikes? How far do these
"moral statements" go? Where do they
end?

lesting Blacks. These cultural stereotypes endure today, albeit in different

costuming.

The tradition of intolerance

Accounts of exactly how these "sins"

-legal and illegal- impact our society,
how widely they are indulged in, and
what their long-term individual effects
may be vary considerably. There is an
inherent social bias to many accounts
depending on economic class, race, and
religious persuasion or nonpersuasion.
What is considered appropriate and
common in one nation may be taboo
and considered dysfunctional in another. European attitudes toward the "sins"
have generally lacked the obsessive
quality many Americans seem to display
toward these vices.

Bias in black and white

In our own country, it is ironic that ads
which portray Whites socializing over
Dewar's Scotch may be perceived as
having a sophisticated cachet; a similar
setting involving Blacks, however, is
considered by some to be "aimed" at
destroying a whole ethnic community.
Sam Spade characters have a romantic
ambience, puffing away on their cigarettes, but this mystique does not transfer to a Black or Hispanic teenager old
enough to fight in Operation Desert
Storm. This modern-day ambivalence
has its parallel in the Reefer Madness
era, when law-enforcement authorities
warned of cocaine- or marijuana-crazed
Black men raping White women, or seducing them so that "no White man
could satisfy them again." One does not
find,however, similarwarnings of Whites,
intoxicated on expensive liqueurs, moPage 42

June 1992

American Atheist

If the mere publication of a book is, in the view of some,

"sinful" and worthy of physical retaliation,
anything else in the commercial marketplace can likewise
be considered in need of a similar "moral statement."

All of this smacks of the situation of

Mr. Salman Rushdie and his controversial book The Satanic Verses. Recall
that Mr. Rushdie penned a once somewhat obscure novel which was quickly
seized on by the regime of Ayatollah
Khomeini and labeled "blasphemous"
(even after the book had enjoyed fairly
wide acclaim throughout literary circles
in the Middle East). Khomeini had found
a convenient foil to distract Iranians
from their domestic problems; and, of
course, what Muslim fundamentalist
could resist another battle with the
Great Satan, the United States, as a
bastion of harlotry, infidelity, and other
sins? Mr. Rushdie was made fair game
for every gun-toting Islamic fanatic.
Bookstores were bombed for carrying
the Verses; the publisher, Viking Press,
was threatened; and now even translators of the book have been made targets
of Muslim death squads.
Ifthe mere publication of a book is, in
the view of some, "sinful" and worthy of
physical retaliation, anything else in the
commercial marketplace can likewise
be considered in need of a similar
"moral statement."
The Reverend Pfleger has not killed
anyone in his campaign for social purity - but, I submit, he has done the
equivalent of those who blow up bookstores, burn "offensive" books, or pour
paint on magazine racks which sell
things they happen to find evil, sinful,
and wrong. In this respect, he (and
those religionists of his ilk)are like those
Islamic clerics who sought to keep everyone away from the blasphemous
writings of Mr. Rushdie. The same type
of paternalism exists in the Reverend
Pfleger's case. We might ask, Who really has the image of, say, Blacks as being
weak-willed, gullible, irresponsible children in adult bodies - purveyors of
"sin" products or self-appointed religious watchdogs? Is there to be a different standard for a White male who
sees a macho beer commercial during
the Superbowl and a Black who happens
to glance up at a billboard and sees a
Austin,Texas

pitch for malt ale?

And more: if a study indicates that
there are more billboards in a "minority
area," does this really demonstrate a
conspiracy to intoxicate the residents,
sell them harmful products, or give
them lung cancer? (What about a cigarette or liquor ad in The New Yorker? Is
this a conspiracy to destroy Yuppies?)
Or could it be that property values, zoning, and city ordinances make billboard
signage more prevalent in certain areas,
including not just Black neighborhoods,
but, perhaps, industrial areas adjacent
to freeways?

A bottom line on righteousness

Where does the zealotry of "forcing
people to be good" end? The question is
pertinent not just in the case of the Reverend Pfleger and his brush-wielding
imitators but for others who argue and
act on behalf of enforced goodness. We
talk about the "right to choose" in so
volatile an issue as abortion and "fetal
rights"; where is the "right to choose"
for somebody who wishes a drink, a
cigarette, or even an item of fattening
food? Is there to be one standard for
pregnant women, another for men?
One for White suburbanites, another
for Black ghetto residents?
Few people would argue that the
"sins" are universally beneficial, healthful, or "good" for you. That is not the
point. There are degrees of use ranging
from casual consumption to abstinence
in both individual and social contexts, all
the way to full-blownaddiction. We have
enjoyed a somewhat paradoxical, even
contradictory, relationship with the
"sins," from the enthusiastic to the outright xenophobic. Today the free and
somewhat careless use of terms like addiction, applied to everything from legal
or illegal drugs to even food, obscures
further an already complicated issue.
For the religious true believer like the
Reverend Pfleger, the dislike of the moment can easily be draped in the flimsiest rationales and excuses. It is a costuming which conceals a praxis to do
June 1992

the work of the Lord, to compel believer

and nonbeliever alike to follow a particular course of conduct, to "do good"
regardless of cost or consequences to
others. Ironically, these actions may end
up harming the very group they were
intended to help by perpetuating a stereotype of group or individual powerlessness in the face of temptation, and lack
of consumer sophistication when choices
in the marketplace are called for.
Those who force us to be good - to
abstain from a drink, to not see a particular movie, to not read a book, or to
not engage in some other behavior ultimately enjoy the authoritarian position in the overseer-follower relationship. In the case of the Reverend Pfleger,
we all know of the economic miasma
which plagues Black America - unemployment, lack of education, and discrimination. But treating members of
this (or any other) group as helpless children who need to be "protected from
themselves" and from the world around
them perpetuates the very stereotypes
which need to be abolished. Sanctioning
the paternalistic bullying of the Reverend Pflegers of this world, especially by
disguising it as a "moral act," erodes not
only the notion of morality but the concept of freedom and individual responsibility.
And that is not good for anybody. ~

"I brought 40u a real faith healing challenge."

Page 43

Talking Back

Of uncaused causes

This month's question:

How does an Atheist
answer the statement:
"The universe must
have a cause and that
cause is god"?

So you're having a hard time dealing

with the religious zanies who bug
you with what you feel are stupid
questions? Talk back. Send the
question you hate most and American
Atheists will provide scholarly, tart,
humorous, short, belligerent, or funpoking answers. Get into the verbal
fray; it's time to "talk back" to religion.

Page 44

Jim Hepburn, a writer and member

of American Atheists from California, declares:
You appear to have an emotional
problem, indicated by your trying to explain the inexplicable with an irrational
figment of your imagination. Have you
considered therapy?
Russell Stones, a commodities assembler from Illinois, takes the logic
a step further:
If the universe must have a cause and
that cause is gawd, then religion must
have a cause and that cause is persecution, and men of the cloth must have a
cause and that cause is censorship.
James Rienow, a university senior
from Wisconsin, opines:
The natural, rational response is that
god must have a cause also. If a religionist says that god doesn't need a cause
(and he/she will), then I must ask what
is easier to assume, that a universe is
self-caused, or that a universe is caused
by a god which is self-caused. Applying
Occam's razor to this, the former is the
appropriate assumption; the latter
makes another unbackable statement.
Another point, why do people assume
it was caused by a singular being? This
defies our common view of design and
designers.
The more complex a design, generally
the greater the number of designers. To
i1lustrate, a paper airplane is easily designed by one person. But a space shuttie requires hundreds of people to design. The universe is complex, and one
would think that to cause it, it would require many gods or engineers.
Another line of reasoning would be to
ask the religionist (theist), What can
exist in a void vacuum? Most will say
that nothing can. But scientists now believe that that is all that existed before
the universe, so how could a god have
existed?
Finally, with evil and unjust occurrences throughout the world, no one
can believe that if someone caused it,
June 1992

this someone is a just, benevolent being

worthy of worship.
Irene Brown, graduate student,!eminist and Atheist, puts it simply:
This reminds me of the goldfish who
said: "There must be a god, where else
would the daily bits of food come from?"
In this situation we might be perceived
as being "god." Fortunately, scientificallyminded human beings no longer have to
fillin the gaps of knowledge with superstition.
Herb Ault, a retired Florida schoolteacher, replies:
What do you mean by the word god?
Why must the universe have a cause,
and, if so, what is the uncaused first
cause that created your god?
While we are waiting for you to define
that one word god, one of the most absurd words in the language, along with
such words as freedom, justice, and
love, we could leave the country and return to find you still explaining, because
that one word, god, has been the center
of controversy in modern philosophical
thought for years.
For you to state that a god exists is to
make a metaphysical claim that cannot
be either true or false. No utterance
which pretends to establish the nature
of a transcendent god can possess any
literal significance.
So quite apart from the consideration
that the universe must have a cause, or
the other consideration that your god
would have to have an unexplained first
cause, there is not one shred of evidence
to support the existence of any metaphysical entities such as gods, and,
therefore, any such talk of gods is rhetorical nonsense.
Stephen H. Frey, a retired engineer
and born-again Atheist, gives his
view:
Ifthere was a "cause" of the universe,
it was accidental, and it was "caused" by
natural laws, and a mythical "god" had
nothing to do with it.
American Atheist

must have a cause, then God must

Ralph B. Shirley, a retired attorney
have a cause. If there can be anyfrom Washington, D.C., answers:
thing without a cause, it may just
No one has enough knowledge of the
as well be the world as God.
universe to say what it must have. To
say that its cause is "god" does not
Physicists and cosmologists now conprovide an answer, because that word is
struct theories that work backward to
nothing but a thought in a person's
imagination. It does not describe any- almost infinitesimal fractions of one second from the instant of Time Zero.
thing real on the earth or in outer space.
By the very fact of your god's non- What, if anything, exists before this
existence, you can attribute any power point is unknown. Nowhere in science is
to it without any fear of anyone finding there evidence for what we have defined
the god and proving that it does not as a deity, whatever that is.
have that power.
Your statement as to a cause could Kenneth J. Schmidt, a New York
musician and teacher, goes to the
have been given by a caveman, because
it requires no actual knowledge of the root of the matter:
Religionists' inability to comprehend
world we live in. Your statement is in the
realm of imaginary beings such as gods the unending universe forces them to
create a god and demand cause (and
ofthe volcanoes, fire-breathing dragons,
and ghosts. In short, it is the statement .effect). Infinity needs no such thing.
of an ignorant person.
Paul Keller, a supervisor at a MinneMilan Rafayko, a Kentucky Atheist,
sota regional treatment
center,
is succinct:
explains:
How can a pretend friend (e.g., god)
Bull.
be the cause of the universe?
Michael Ledo writes that he is a
According to conservation of energy,
health physics technician who enjoys the total quantity of energy in the universe never changes. Only the form of
expressing his opinion whenever
possible. His rejoinder is:
energy changes. Thus, the universe
Nietzsche said, "Convictions are always exists and has no "cause." Enmore dangerous enemies of truth than ergy is existence.
lies." The assumption that the universe
and life must have a purpose is not Chris J. Jackson, university student
based on any fact and is therefore a con- and part-time writer on philosophiviction.
cal and creative topics, asks:
Why must it have a cause? Is it not
more correct to say that you must have
Joseph R. Choate Ill, bookworm,
factory worker, and Jersey Atheist
a cause to be able to live in that unihas a quote up his sleeve:
verse?
The statement is both illogicaland unintelligible.The first part is a groundless
Frank R. Zindler, author of Dial-Anassumption, the second part irrational, Atheist Greatest Hits from Ohio,
period. The issue of "first cause" was points out another flaw in this stateaddressed back in 1927 by one of the ment:
The claim "the universe must have a
great minds of the century, Bertrand
cause" is an assertion requiring proof.
Russell (1872-1970). Let me quote:
To have scientific meaning, a claim must
The argument that there must be
be testable, at least in the imagination.
a First Cause is one that cannot
Can one conceive of a way to test the
claim "the universe was caused"? To
have any validity . . . . If anything
Austin, Texas

June 1992

detect a cause leading to the universe,

the tester would have to begin observations before the universe came into being. But the tester is a part of the universe, and it is contradictory to suppose
a part of the universe can be older than
the universe. Since the claim cannot be
tested, it is not even false: it is meaningless.
The assertion that "god" is the cause
of the universe is a claim requiring definition as well as proof. It too is untestable and meaningless. Ifwe can't observe
the universe being caused, how can we
observe who or what is causing it? Even
if we assume that which should be
proved - that "god" caused the universe - we still have no way of knowing (without observing) what the term
god means. Ifit just means "the cause of
the universe," it is empty of any extra
meaning, and we should simply call the
cause of the universe "the cause of the
universe." The word god adds nothing
useful. But ifthe word god means something more than "the cause of the universe," it entails yet other claims requiring proof.

'I?
Prove there isn't a god.
What's wrong vlith prayer in
public schools?
If evolution is real, how come
monkeys aren't (waiving into
human beings? .....
.
. d for

Page 45

The Probing Mind

How Jesus got a life

If Jesus never existed,

whence came his
biography?

Napoleon: Monsieur Laplace! I

have read with great interest your
Traite de mecanique celeste - all
five volumes - but nowhere have I
found any mention of the Good
Lord.
Laplace: Sire, I have had no need
of that hypothesis.
~r wor!d is an unstable place. Nations nse, and governments topple. Unbalanced people the world
around torture and kill each other for
the sake of religion or other groundless
causes. Earthquakes, volcanoes, and
wars periodically scourge our globe.
Continents drift about and collide with
each other, and oceans form and disappear. Even planet earth itself has the
wobbles. As it spins on its axis, the earth
is not stable. Like the center peg of a toy
top, the axis of the spinning earth slowly wobbles in a circle, tracing the surface
of a double cone in space (see Figure 1).
This motion of the earth's axis is called precession, and it is, I believe, a major component of the causes long ago
that led to the creation of Christianity.
The character now known as Christ, or
Jesus, was not born of a virgin; rather,
it was the product of an unstably rotating
earth. If the earth's axis did not precess,
the Christ character would never have
been invented. Christianity as we know
it would not exist:
In my forthcoming book Inventing
Jesus, I hope to demonstrate exhaustively the extraordinary chain of causes
and effects which led from a wobbling
earth to a divine biography - the socalled "Life of Christ." In this brief article, of course, I can do little more than
state and explain the major points of this
thesis and give a sampling of the evidence I have found to support it.

t+J

Formerly a professor of biology and

geology, Frank R. Zindler is now a science writer. He is a member of the
American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American
Chemical Society, and the American
Schools of Oriental Research. He is
the Ohio regional representative of
American Atheists.

Frank R. Zindler
Page 46

I. "Jesus Christ" never existed as a

historical figure.
It is a curious fact that the oldest components of the so-called New Testament, the letters believed to have been
written by one Saul/Paul, say almost
June 1992

nothing of any Jesus biography. Neither

Bethlehem nor Nazareth is mentioned
in these charter documents of the Christian religion. Only in the much later
Book of Acts is it claimed that Saul
(Paul) had an interview with "Jesus of
Nazareth."! The later the document,
the greater the detail of the Jesus story
presented.
There is no convincing evidence to
make one suppose that any of the surviving"Gospels" were written by eyewitnesses. Indeed, study of the Gospels
shows quite conclusively that they were
not. For example, the authors of the
Gospels of Matthew and Luke incorporate nearly the entire Greek text of the
Gospel of Mark, adding sayings taken
from yet another document (the socalled "Q-Document"), and generally
make the miracles recounted by Mark
even more miraculous. Had Matthew
and Luke been eyewitnesses,
they
would have written their own accounts,
without recourse to plagiarism.
Mark's Gospel, the oldest of the official set of four, contains errors of geog-

"This is in Acts 22:7ff, which alleges to be a

first-person account of Saul's conversion:
"Then 1 heard a voice saying to me, 'Saul,
Saul, why do you persecute me?' 1answered,
'Tell me, Lord, who you are,' 'I am Jesus of
Nazareth,' he said, 'whom you are persecuting.' My companions saw the light, but did
not hear the voice that spoke to me ... "
(New English Bible).
A contradictory, third-person account of
Saul's conversion can be found in Acts 9:4ff:
"He fell to the ground and heard a voice
saying, 'Saul, Saul, why do you persecute
me?' 'Tell me, Lord,' he said, 'who you are.'
The voice answered, 'I am Jesus, whom you
are persecuting ... ' Meanwhile the men
who were traveling with him stood speechless; they heard the voice but could see no
one ... " (New English Bible).
It would appear that the version in chapter 9 was taken from a document older than
that from which the chapter 22 account was
derived. The Nazareth tradition had not yet
been invented when the story in chapter 9
was put in writing.
American Atheist

. To pole of ecliptic

2~-1---...

/\
\

'-1.

I
I
I

\---I
\
I
\

cial set of four, contains errors of geographys and custom- that would not have
been made by an eyewitness. John's
Gospel, the latest of the set, is both too
late and too ethereal to be taken as a
biographical account at all- eyewitness
or otherwise. There is nothing about the
Gospels to make one take them seriously from a biographic point of view: there
is no good reason to think them other
than ancient examples of the art of fiction.
If the historicity of Jesus cannot be
supported by the New Testament writings, what about extra biblical sources?
Did any Greek or Roman or Jewish historians observe his career and write
about it? Not one.
Although Josephus," Tacitus," Suetonius.s and other ancient authors are
often cited as evidence for a historical
Jesus, it is clear that their accounts
(even if they could be proven authentic)
are derivative, not original. Josephus,

2An example of Mark's ignorance of Palestinian geography is found in the story he recounts about Jesus traveling from Tyre on
the Mediterranean to the Sea of Galilee,
thirty miles inland. According to Mark 7:31,
Jesus and his gang went by way of Sidon,
twenty miles north of Tyre on the Mediterranean coast! Since to Sidon and back
would be forty miles, this means that Mark's
messiah walked seventy miles when he
could have walked only thirty. Although
Mark seems unaware of the problem, the
translators of the King James Version seem
to have understood it quite well - adroitly
obfuscating their translation accordingly:
"Departing from the coasts of Tyre and
Sidon ... "
3Mark 10:12 tells us that a wife, if she divorces her husband and marries another, is
guilty of adultery. While this was possible in
some pagan societies, it was not an option
open to Israelite women.
4Josephus ben Matthias (ca. C.E. 37-ca.l00),
Jewish historian and general.
sCornelius Tacitus (ca. C.E. 56-ca. 120),
Roman orator, historian, and politician.
6Gaius Suetonius Tranquilus (ca. C.E. 69-ca.
122), Roman biographer and historian.
Austin, Texas

")
../1
I
I

is possible to show that there is no need

to hypothesize any historical Jesus. The
Christ biography can be accounted for
on purely literary, astrological, and com- .
parative mythological grounds. The logical principle known as Occam's razor
tells us that basic assumptions
should
not be multiplied beyond necessity. For
practical purposes, showing that a historical Jesus is an unnecessary assumption is just as good as proving that he
never existed.

II. Christianity
religion.

Figure 1.As the earth's axis slowly shifts

its orientation in space, it traces out the
surface of a double cone in space. Because of the axial wandering, the points
where the celestial equator (the projection of the earth's equator onto the celestial sphere) intersects the ecliptic
(the apparent path make by the sun
against the background of "fixed stars")
move also, shifting clockwise around
the ecliptic as seen from the northern
hemisphere. It takes 25,800 years for the
points of intersection to move all the
way around the ecliptic.

the oldest of these historians, was born

at least five years after the date of the
alleged crucifixion! There are no eyewitnesses. Moreover, the ancient nonChristian accounts of Jesus all were
written at a time when Christianity
already was a thriving delirium, and our
pagan authors can be taken only as
being witnesses of the state to which
Christian traditions had evolved in their
times, not as witnesses of a historical
Jesus of Nazareth.
There is no credible evidence indicating Jesus ever lived. This fact is, of
course, inadequate to prove he did not
live. Even so, although it is logically impossible to prove a universal negative, it
June-1992

began as a mystery

While modern Christianity trumpets

its message openly and to all, with little
regard for those uninterested in hearing
its "good news," it was not so in the beginning. A careful reading of the Pauline
Epistles and the Gospels (supplemented
by modern documentary
discoveries)
shows that Christianity began as a mystery cult, replete with initiations, secrets,
and multiple levels of indoctrination.
The word mystery (Greek, musterion:
'what is known only to the initiated') occurs twenty-seven times in the official
New Testament, and almost all of these
occurrences demonstrate the existence
of a secret infrastructure in the nascent
cult.
And the disciples came, and said
unto him, "Why speakest
thou
unto them in parables?" He answered and said unto them, "Because it is given unto you to know
the mysteries of the kingdom of
heaven, but to them it is not given."
(Matt. 13:10-11, King James Version)
The dangling verses now customarily
printed at the end of the Epistle to the
Romans (but placed elsewhere in various ancient manuscripts)
tell of "that
divine secret [musterion] kept in silence
for long ages but now disclosed ... "
(Romans 16:25,26, New English Bible).
Paul the mystagogue is very evident in
passages such as 1 Cor. 2:6ff:
Page 47

That there was indeed a secret Gospel and an initiation into the mysteries
of the religion now known as Christianity is dramatically attested by the
"Secret Gospel of Mark," found in a manuscript discovered by Morton
Smith in 1958 in the Monastery of Mar Saba southeast of Jerusalem.

Now we are speaking a wisdom

among those who are mature [i.e.,
ready to be initiated], that is, a wisdom which does not belong to this
age, nor the rulers of this age? who
are about to pass away; but we are
speaking God's wisdom in a mystery, wisdom which has been hidden and which God predetermined before the ages to contribute to
our glory. None of this world's
rulers knew this wisdom ... But
as it has been written, things that
no eye has seen and no ear heard
and that have not occurred to
human mind, things that God has
prepared for those who love him
- God indeed revealed them to
us through the Spirit . . . 8
1 Cor. 4:1 speaks of "stewards of the
mysteries of God."
Paul the would-be initiator of inductees into the mysteries peeks out at us
also from the third chapter of 1 Corinthians. "I could not speak to you as I

71tis difficult not to see this as a reference to

the end of the 2150-year-long astrological
Age of Aries, over which Mithra had reigned
as 'Time-Lord' or chronocrat. Paul was writing almost exactly at the time the Age of
Pisces was beginning, with Jesus as the new
Time-Lord. The Greek for 'the rulers of this
age' is archonton tau aionos toutou. This is
reverberant with both astrological and
Gnostic mysteries. In Gnosticism, the archons clearly are rulers of astrological derivation, and the aeons are both rulers and
periods of time. It is suggestive also, that the
church father Origen (ca. C.E. 185-ca. 254),
in commenting on this passage in Corinthians alludes to "the astrology of the Chaldeans and Indians" and "Magi" - Mithraic or
Zoroastrian astrologers (Origen De Principiis,
The Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 4, ed. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson [Grand
Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Co., 1982], pp. 335-6).
8William E Orr and James Arthur Walther,
The Anch0r Bible: I Corinthians (Garden
City, NY: Doubleday & Co., Inc., 1976),pp.
153-4.
Page 48

should speak to people who have the

Spirit," he tells his not-fully-pliant initiates:
I had to deal with you on the merely natural plane, as infants in
Christ. And so I gave you milk to
drink, instead of solid food, for
which you were not yet ready.
Indeed, you are still not ready for
it, for you are still on the merely
natural plane.?
Paul's Corinthians were still being fed
the superficial story; they were not yet
ready to be told the hidden meanings of
things, perhaps the fulltruth concerning
the symbolic, not physical, nature of
"Christ."
That there was indeed a secret Gospel and an initiation into the mysteries of
the religion now known as Christianity
is dramatically attested by the "Secret
Gospel of Mark," found in a manuscript
discovered by Morton Smith in 1958 in
the Monastery of Mar Saba southeast of
Jerusalem. The Greek text found by
Smith appears originally to have been
composed at the end of the second century by Clement of Alexandria. 10 Clement is replying to one Theodore who has
been upset by claims that there was a
secret Gospel of Mark which differed
from the canonic (official) version.
Clement tells him that indeed there is a
secret Gospel used by the Alexandrian
church for initiation into the Christian
mysteries. He gives several examples of
material present in the secret Gospel
but absent in the canonic one. One of
the more interesting "secrets" revealed
by Clement tells us:

raised him, seizing his hand. But

the youth, looking upon him, loved
him and began to beseech him
that he might be with him. And
going out of the tomb they came
into the house of the youth, for he
was rich. And after six days Jesus
told him what to do and in the
evening the youth comes to him,
wearing a linen cloth over his
naked body. And he remained
with him that night, for Jesus
taught him the mystery of the
kingdom of God. 11

Jesus rolled away the stone from

the door of the tomb. And straightW?lY, going in where the youth was,
he stretched forth his hand and

III. Christianity was derived as much

from Mithraism as from Judaism.
Understanding the origin of Mithraism is crucial to understanding the
origin of Christianity.
The mystery religion to which early
Christianity seems most closely related
is Mithraism. Mithra (also spelled
Mithras), a Graeco-Persian invention,
was born of a virgin on the winter solstice - frequently December 25 in the
Julian calendar. Being a solar deity,
Mithra was worshiped on Sundays;
after Mithra had become amalgamated
with Helios, he was depicted with a halo,
nimbus, or glory around his head. In
some cases it has been difficult to tell if
ancient images were intended as depictions of Mithra or Jesus. The leader of
the cult was called a pope (papa) and he
ruled from a "mithraeum" on the Vatican
Hill in Rome. A prominent iconographic feature in Mithraism was a large key,
needed to unlock the celestial gates
through which souls of the deceased
were believed to pass. It would appear
that the "keys of the Kingdom" held by
the popes as successors to "St. Peter"
derive from Mithra, not from a Palestinian messiah. The Mithraic priests wore
miters, special headdresses from which
the Christian bishop's hat was derived.

91 Cor. 3:1-3, New English Bible.

lOTitusFlavius Clemens (ca. C.E. 150-ca. 211),
prominent early church father.

llMorton Smith, Clement of Alexandria and

a Secret Gospel of Mark (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 1973), p. 447.

June 1992

American Atheist

NORTH CELESTIAL POLE

-..

a
-.-.

."

';~
,.i.

'

Perseus

(The Latin name for this Phrygian/Persian hat was mitra - which also was an
acceptable Latin spelling for Mithra!)
The Mithraists consumed a sacred meal
(Myazda) which was completely analogous to the Catholic eucharistic service
(Missa, or Mass), Like the Christians,
they celebrated the atoning death of a
savior who was resurrected on a Sunday. A major center of Mithraic philosophy was Tarsus - St. Paul's hometown - in what now is southeast
Turkey.

IV. Mithraism and Christianity have

their origins in astrology and astronomy.
In 128 B.C.E. the Greek astronomer
Hipparchus of Rhodes (fl. 146-127 B.C.E.)
discovered the precession of the equinoxes (see Figure 2). Because the earth's
axis is tilted approximately 23.5 away
from a line perpendicular to the plane of
its orbit around the sun, the sun appears
from the northern hemisphere to follow
a path in the sky (the ecliptic) which for
six months of the year is above the
celestial equator and below it for six
months. (The celestial equator marks
the points on the "celestial sphere"
which are directly overhead as seen by
a person living on the earth's equator.)
Twice a year, as the sun appears to
move along its ecliptic path, it crosses
the celestial equator. When the sun is at
these points - the so-called vernal
(spring) and autumnal equinoxes - the
durations of day and night are equal.
Because the earth wobbles as it spins
on its axis, the north and south poles of
its axis do not always point to the same
spots on the celestial sphere. As a consequence, the equinoctial points become
displaced with respect to the so-called
fixed stars - including the stars forming
the twelve zodiacal constellations.
When Hipparchus discovered that the
vernal equinox had been displaced from
Taurus into Aries, he or some of his disciples felt that they had detected the
labor of a hitherto unknown god. (Many
Greeks felt that each natural phenomeAustin, Texas

Aquarius

SOUTH
CELESTIAL POLE

Figure 2. Viewed from the earth, the universe of stars seemed to the ancients to
be attached to the great "celestial sphere" which had the earth as its center. The
"celestial equator" is the projection of the earth's equator upon the inside of the
sphere. The circle of the ecliptic is the path which the sun appears to follow against
the background of "fixed stars." The zodiac is a belt of sky, extending 9 above and
below the ecliptic, which can be divided into twelve zones of equal size, each characterized by the presence of a particularly prominent constellation. The moon and
visible planets all appear to move within the confines of the zodiacal belt. The equinoctial points are the two places where the equator intersects the ecliptic, at an
angle of approximately 23.5. Around 128 B.C.E., Hipparchus of Rhodes discovered
that the position of the equinoxes was not constant. He determined that the vernal
(spring) equinox had once been in the constellation Taurus but had, by his day,
moved ("precessed") almost all the way through the constellation Aries. At the beginning of the Christian era, the vernal equinox moved into Pisces.

non or physical force was actually the

working of a particular god.) For astrological reasons, this new god was identified with the ancient Persian god
Mithra. The mystery religion known as
Mithraism thus was born." Mithra was
installed as a Time-Lord or chronocrat,
the god who would rule over the Age or
Aeon of Aries.

12Forthis modern understanding of the late

and astrological origin of the Mithraic religion, I am heavily dependent upon the writing of David Ulansey, especially his little
book The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries:
Cosmology and Solvation in the Ancient
World (New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989). .
June 1992

By the time Hipparchus and his Stoic

colleagues understood that the vernal
equinox had moved from Taurus into
Aries, the equinox was almost out of
Aries as well. Very soon it would move
into Pisces, and a new Time-Lord would
be needed. Just as movement of the
equinox out of Taurus had been symbolized as the sacrifice of a bull,13so too,
the movement out of Aries would come

13Aglance at Figure 2 willshow that the constellation Perseus is located above the constellation Taurus. Mythologically, Perseus
became amalgamated with Mithra, and the
physical ascendance of Perseus over Taurus
suggested that Mithra-Perseus had killed the
bull.
Page 49

This Palestinian visit from the Magi could have been the catalyst
that triggered various Jewish groups - and perhaps some non-Jewish
groups - into thinking that the messiah whom they had been awaiting
had already come and had not been noticed.

to be symbolized by the sacrifice of a

lamb. The first symbol of the new-age
religion, the religion reigning in the age
of Pisces, significantly, would be the
fish." (The cross, apparently, was originally the Greek letter chi (X), which reminds us of the intersection of the celestial equator with the ecliptic.)

v. The Magi mentioned in the second

chapter of Matthew's Gospel were
Mithraic astrologer-priests, probably sC,Pl4tslooking for the new TimeLord who was to rule the "new age"
of Pisces.
The Mithraic clergy involved actively
in the astrology of the cult were known
as Magi(Greek magoi), and are depicted
as wearing Phrygian (pseudo-Persian)
caps such as Mithra is supposed to have
worn. It is my thesis that some of these
Magi, realizing that the age of Mithra
was drawing to a close (the equinox
would move into Pisces some time during the first century C.E.), would have
left their cult centers in Phrygia and
Cilicia, in what is now central and southeast Turkey, from cities such as Tarsus
to go to Palestine to see if they could
locate not just the King of the Jews, but
the new Time-Lord, the ruler of the new
age of Pisces. (Pisces was considered to
have special connections with the Jews.)
It is significant, I believe, that early depictions of the Magi's visitation of the
Christ Child (including one in a church
at Bethlehem) showed them wearing
Phrygian (Mithraic) caps.
While it is clear that the story of the
Magian visitation found at the beginning
of the second chapter of Matthew's
Gospel is more fairy tale than history
(how does one follow a star?), it seems

14Veryearly in the history of Christianity, the

fish symbol received a non-astrological interpretation by means of a clever acrostic.
The Greek word for fish, ICHTHUS, can be
formed from the first letters of each word in
the motto fesous Christos Theou Uios
Soter - 'Jesus Christ, God's Son, Savior.'
Page 50

there is a kernel of historicity in it. I believe, however, that the Greek text has
been misunderstood with regard to the
point of origin of the Magiand just where
they were when they saw the star that
triggered their trip. The King James
Version tells us of "wise men from the
east," who "have seen his star in the
east." Modern translations tend to have
the wise men see "his star at its rising."
The Greek word for 'east' used in these
two passages is ana tole and it can indeed refer to the east or to the rising of
a heavenly body. But it can also be the
name of a place - Anatolia. Anatolia
could signifyeither the peninsula of Asia
Minor (i.e., the area now called Turkey),
or a particular province of Phrygia. It
thus appears that Matt. 2:1-2 should
actually read:
Now when Jesus was born in
Bethlehem of Judaea in the days
of Herod the king, behold, there
came Magi from Anatolia to
Jerusalem,
Saying, Where is he that is born
King of the Jews? for in Anatolia
we have seen his star, and are
come to worship him.
This Palestinian visit from the Magi
could have been the catalyst that triggered various Jewish groups - and perhaps some non-Jewish groups - into
thinking that the messiah whom they
had been awaiting had already come
and had not been noticed. Lest this
seem too farfetched, it should be noted
that even in our own sophisticated age
notices of Christ's "second coming" are
of regular occurrence. It is not irrational
to suppose that somewhere right now
there is a small cult which believes that
Jesus is back on earth. IS
It.is clear that the people who wrote
the New Testament believed in reincarnation and "redivivus appearances" of
such characters as Elijah. This would
have made it fairlyeasy for a Magian visit
to convince people that their messiah
had already appeared. A particularly ilJune 1992

lustrative example is found in Matthew's

Gospel: 16
Jesus ... asked his disciples,
saying: "Who do men say that the
Son of Man is?"
And they said, "Some say John
the Baptist; some, Elijah; and
others, Jeremiah, or one of the
Seers."
He says to them: "But who do
you say that I am?"
And Simon Peter, answering,
said: "Thou are the Anointed, the
Son of the Living God!"
And his disciples put a question
to him, saying: "Why then do the
scribes say 'Elijah must come
first'?"
Now, Jesus answered and said
to them: "Elijah indeed comes
first, and will restore all things.
Now, I say to you, Elijah has come
already, and they did not recognize him, but have done him as
many injuries as they could. Thus
also the Son of Man is destined to
suffer by them."
Then his disciples understood
that he said this to them about
John the Baptist.
Similar cases of "events" of cosmic
significance occurring unnoticed are

ISOn August 6, 1991, the supermarket

tabloid National Examiner carried a front-page
notice: "Vatican Report, Jesus may be back
on earth." The article itself, on page 9, reported that "Stunned scientists and religious leaders believe Jesus Christ has returned to Earth!" There was some uncertainty, however, whether the second coming
had come about in a biblical manner or
whether Christ had been cloned scientifically from blood spots in the Shroud of Turin.
Considering the large numbers of people
who read this paper, it is all but certain that
there are some people who will believe its
extraordinary tales.
16Matt. 16:13-16; 17:10-13, my translation.

American Atheist

No written works of Mithraism are

known, since like other mystery cults, it
centered around a secret known only to
persons initiated into its rites. Most of
our knowledge about it is derived from
the iconography of its temples. A central
element in them was the depiction of
Mithra sacrificing a wild bull (Taurus).

found in the Gospels of Thomas'? and

Luke:
Gos. Thorn. 51: His disciples
said to him, "When willthe repose
of the dead come about, and when
willthe new world come?" He said
to them, "What you look forward
to has already come, but you do
not recognize it."
Gos. Thorn. 52: His disciples
said to him, "Twenty-four prophets
spoke in Israel, and all of them
spoke of you." He said to them,
"You have omitted the one livingin
your presence, and have spoken
only of the dead."
Lk. 17:20-21: Being asked by
the Pharisees when the kingdom
of God was coming, he answered
them, "The kingdom of God is not
coming with signs to be observed;
nor willthey say, 'Lo, here it is!' or
'There!' for behold, the kingdom
of God is in the midst of you."

VI. The Jews were ready for the

Magi when they came to visit.
During the last two centuries B.C.E.,
the Jews were awaiting a messiah, and
were making checklists of passages
from the Old Testament which they
fancied described the who, where, why,
and how of the person who would be
their messiah. The actual texts from the
Old Testament were often taken completely out of context, distorted, and
misquoted, and there was little respect
for the tenses of verbs. (A particularly
egregious example of such scripturetwisting methodology can be seen in the
Gospel of Matthew.)
The messianic checklists that different groups had been keeping would
have been reinterpreted after the visit of
the Magi:instead of telling what the mes-

17Helmut Koester, Ancient Christian Gospels: Their History and Development (Philadelphia: Trinity Press International, 1990),
pp.124-5.
Austin, Texas

siah would do, they came to be interpreted as a record of what he had done.
News that the messiah had already
come would spread rapidly. The fact
that no one had noticed the first coming
was the reason the myth of the second
coming had to be invented. Nothing
actually had been accomplished by the
first coming - except on paper!
An example of such a checklist has
been found among the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Scrolls scholar Theodor Gaster tells us
about
a catena of fiveScriptural passages
attesting the advent of the Future
Prophet and the Anointed King
and the final discomfiture of the
impious. The first four are taken
from the Pentateuch, and include
an excerpt from the oracles of
Balaam. The fifth is an interpretation of a verse from the Book of
Joshua. An interesting feature of
this document ... is that precisely
the same passages of the Pentateuch are used by the Samaritans
as the stock testimonial to the
coming of the Taheb, or future
'Restorer.' They evidently constituted a standard set of such quotations, of the type that scholars
have long supposed to have been
in the hands of New Testament
writers when they cited passages
of the Hebrew Bible supposedly
confirmed by incidents in the life
and career of Jesus.l"
June 1992

VII. Gnosticism helped to reinterpret the checklists and other preChristian literary creations, as documents pertaining to the life of the
unnoticed messiah.
Before the so-called New Testament
was completed, the leaders of the primitive Christian church had to do battle
with a "heresy" called Gnosticism. The
Gnostics were persons who believed in
gnosis, a type of introspective knowledge. According to Kurt Rudolph, a
leading authority on Gnosticism, gnosis
is
knowledge given by revelation,
which has been made available
only to the elect who are capable
of receiving it, and therefore has
an esoteric character.l?
It is now known that Gnosticism is older
than Christianity, and an argument can
be made that Christianity is a Gnostic
heresy, rather than the other way around
as traditionally taught.
Through "revelation" Gnostics and
others could decide not only that their
checklists should be reinterpreted, but

18Theodor H. Gaster, The Dead Sea Scriptures, 3rd rev. and enlarged ed. (Garden
City, NY: Anchor Books/Doubleday, 1976),
p.363.
19Kurt Rudolph, Gnosis: The Nature and
History of Gnosticism (San Francisco:
Harper & Row, 1985), p. 55.
Page 51

Two early symbols of Christianity were

the lamb and the chi-rho cross, as seen
on this sixth-century sarcophagus.

even that materials completely unrelated to Christianity were actually filled

with hidden knowledge of Christian significance. This is extremely important
from a psychiatric point of view, for it
allowed the authors of the messianic
biographies to feel guiltless of fraud, despite the fact that there was little if any
truth in their products. All that was
needed was for some person, perhaps
one who had fasted too long, to have a
very strong feeling - possibly the result
of a dream, autosuggestion, or even hallucination - that knowledge was being
communicated to him from another
world. Thereafter, even a list of gardening tools could be transmogrified into a
religious document of great profundity.
The Gnostic library discovered at
Nag Hammadi in Egypt provides some
examples of how non-Christian materials could have been appropriated for
Christian purposes. The so-called "Apocalypse of Adam," a non-Christian fantasy composed of Jewish elements, follows the same general outline and contains many of the same components as
does the birth narrative found in the
twelfth chapter of the Book of Revelation in the New Testament. It is clear
that both stories are derived from a
common mythological source - a
source that Gnostic principles allowed
to be adapted for Christian use by "St.
John the Revelator."
The "smoking gun" of revelation-inthe-making also has been found at Nag
Hammadi, and it is most instructive for
anyone wishing to understand how nonChristian materials could have been
transmuted into the documents now
found in the New Testament. James M.
Robinson, the editor of the Nag Hammadi materials published in English, tells
us that
The Nag Hammadi library even
presents one instance of the Christianizing process taking place
almost before one's eyes. The
non-Christian philosophic treatise
Eugnostos the Blessed is cut up
Page 52

somewhat arbitrarily into separate

speeches, which are then put on
Jesus' tongue, in answer to questions (which sometimes do not
quite fit the answers) that the disciples address to him during a resurrection appearance. The result
is a separate tractate entitled The
Sophia of Jesus Christ. Both forms
of the text occur side by side in
Codex IIl.2

VIII. Jesus had to get his names

be/ore he could get his lives.
Before Jesus could be given a biography, he had to receive a name. Actually,
he received several names and, as we
shall see, all of his names were really
titles. Thus, the name Jesus of Nazareth
originally was not a name at all, but
rather a title meaning (The) Savior,
(The) Branch. In Hebrew this would
have been Yeshua' Netser. The word
Yeshua' means 'savior,' and Netser
means 'sprout,' 'shoot,' or 'branch' - a
reference to Isa. 11:1,which was thought
to predict a messiah (literally, 'anointed
one') of the line of Jesse (King David's
father): "And there shall come forth a
rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a
branch shall grow out of his roots . . . "
While this reference to a branch from
Jesse will doubtless seem obscure to
modern readers, it would not have been
obscure to ancient Jews such as those
who composed the Dead Sea Scrolls
(and wrote a commentary on Isa. 11:1);
nor would it have been obscure to the

early Christians. According to the

church father Epiphanius, who was
born on Cyprus around C.E. 315 and
wrote a treatise against "heretics," the
Christians originally were called Jesseans, precisely because of the messianic
tie to Jesse."
Although for speakers of Hebrew and
its close cousin Aramaic the meaning
and prophetic significance of the title
The Savior, The Branch would have
been clear, after it had been wrestled
into Greek as Iesous Nazoraios or
Iesous Nazarenos, its titular significance must soon have been forgotten.
The Iesous part came to be a simple
name (Jesus in Latin) of the Tom, Dick,
or Harry sort. The Nazoroios part,
however, was misperceived as being
derived from the name of a place - the
imaginary village of Nazareth - much
as the word Parisian can be derived
from Paris.
And so, Yeshua' Netser came to be
Jesus of Nazareth - a name of the
Jimmy-the-Greek sort, a name thought
to contain information on a person's
place of origin. (There may have been
an intermediate Wizard-of-Oz period,
combining a title with a place name: The
Savior of Nazareth.)
At the turn of the era, there was no
place called Nazareth, and it is not entirely certain that the place now called
by that name was inhabited during the
period in question. The name appears
neither in the Old Testament nor in the
large "intertestamental" literature. Nor
is it found in Josephus, despite the fact
that he names several dozen towns in
Galilee - a place where he conducted
military maneuvers. As far as I can tell,
the place presently called Nazareth received its name from an imaginative
Jessaean some time at the end of the

21J._P.
Migne,Patroiogiae Cursus Compietus,
20JamesM. Robinson, The Nag Hammadi
Library, 3rd rev.ed. (SanFrancisco:Harper,
1988),pp. 8-9.
June 1992

etc., Series Graeca Prior,PatroiogiaeGraecae

Tomus XLI, S. Epiphanius Constantiensis in
Cypro Episcopus, Aduersus Haereses (Paris

1863),columns 389-390.
American Atheist

Two fish (symbolic of the Age of Pisces)

with an anchor shaped like a cross are
seen in a detail from an early fourthcentury tombstone (below). Early in the
history of Christianity, the fish also was
connected with baptism and served as a
Greek acrostic for the phrase "Jesus
Christ, Son of God, Savior."

second century or early third century.

At the turn of the era, however, Nazareth
was as mythical as the Mary, Joseph,
and Jesus family that was supposed to
have lived there.
It is interesting to note that archaeologicalexcavations of the oldest JewishChristian churches in that town have revealed branches as a prominent decorative motif (shades of netser!) as well
as zodiacs - some even surrounding
the chi-rho symbol'" of Christ, exactly
as zodiacs have been found surrounding images of Mithra. Further, the ruins
of the baptistries bear evidence that initiation rites in early Christianity were
every bit as interesting as those in Mormonism before the recent bowdlerization.
Like Jesus of Nazareth, the "name"
Jesus Christ also began as two titles. As
we have seen, the Jesus part of the
name really is the title Savior. But what
of Christ? The Greek word christos
means 'anointed,' and is the equivalent
of the Hebrew word meshiah. Thus,
Christ and Messiah are equivalent
terms, both referring to the peculiar Israelite practice of anointing their kings
and high priests with oil. (The Greeks
oiled their athletes instead.)
IX. Jesus got his lives from other
people and other literatures.
There are at least fivedifferent Jesuses
described in the New Testament: the
one which the Apostle Paul "met" during an epileptic seizure on the road to
Damascus, and the four palpably different messiahs chronicled in the canonic
Gospels. The biographic dimensions of
the Pauline messiah are so meagre that
little need be said about him. But what
of the tales told by the four evangelists?

22Theletters chi (X)and rho (p) are the first

two letters of the Greek word Christos, and
have been superimposed upon each other
to form a sort of cross, a symbol still prominently employed by the Roman Catholic
church.
Austin, Texas

Much of the biographic material

found in the New Testament is merely a
reworking of material taken from the
Greek Old Testament, the Septuagint.
A considerable part of the narrative

:~ =. :

: <: .-':; '..~..::..;:

structure of the Gospel of Matthew (and

also of Mark, his source) can be thought
of as a fleshing out and adaptation of a
messianic checklist such as I have hypothesized would have formed the nucleus for a messianic biography. Over
and over again, events and circumstances both trivial and important are
recounted by Matthew and followed by
the refrain "that it might be fulfilled
which was spoken by the prophets . . . "
While this refrain does not appear in
Mark's narrative, it seems clear that the
story skeleton used by Mark had been
constructed from a checklist of Old Testament "prophecies" that would have to
be fulfilledby the messiah.
The many "sayings of Jesus" (/ogia)
recounted in the Gospels would, if they
could convincingly be derived from a
single personality or source, be strong
evidence that a historical Jesus once
existed. But such is not the case. A
group of prominent Bible scholars, styling themselves "The Jesus Seminar"
and sponsored by the Westar Institute
in Sonoma, California, recently completed their six-year analysis of all the
/ogia and reported that at least 80 percent of the sayings were not authentic!
June 1992

That is to say, they were able to find explanations for their composition which
did not require a historical Jesus.23 And
what of the other 20 percent? Allwe can
say is that their true origins are unknown.

It has not been proven that they come

from a man called Jesus.
To trace all the elements of the Jesus
biographies to their sources willrequire
a very large book. Here I can give only
a few examples of how some material
became incorporated into the braid of
literature that has come to be known as
"The Life of Christ."
The healing miracles probably derive
from the testimonies given by persons
who thought themselves to have been
cured by the Greek god Asklepios
(Asclepius in Latin). The venom with
which the early church fathers attacked
the cult of this pagan god indicates a
close rivalry between the two cults and
a certain embarrassment among Christians repeatedly being told that Asklepios had already done all of Jesus' tricks
and had done them better.

23The rules of evidence employed by this

team of scholars, along with their reasons
for accepting or rejecting a particular logion,
can be found in The Gospel of Mark Red
Letter Edition by Robert W. Funk and
Mahlon H. Smith (Sonoma, CA: Polebridge
Press, 1991).
Page 53

It yet remains to go through the entire New Testament to extract all the
materials supposedly containing information on the life of Christ and to
trace them to their sources. It remains also to sort out which of the
characters in that book are historical and which are fictional.

Early in the development of the biographies, "Jesus" became identified with

the "Son of Man" character who figures
so importantly in late Old Testament
books and apocryphal writings, such as
the Book of Daniel and the Book of
Enoch. This allowed for large-scale accretion of literary material. It is interesting to note that the Son-of-Man literature underwent considerable evolution
from its beginning up to its amalgamation with the Christ character. Originally, in Hebrew and Aramaic, the phrase
son of man simply signified a human being - i.e., not some other species of animal. Later, it came to symbolize Israel
the nation. Much prophetic literature referring to the Son of Man is actually referring to Israel the nation. (Israel was,
after all, a nation of human beings; the
goyim or 'nations' were not considered
fullyhuman.) Then, the term was individualized once again and was identified
with the awaited messiah. Finally, it was
grafted - with all its accumulated literature and associations - onto the Jesus
vita.
Some of the Jesus biography was
derived from pre-Christian Gnosticism,
and some material was incorporated
from Hellenic-Jewish wisdom literature.
Some items, such as the doctrine of the
logos ("the Word") came from the Stoic
philosophers. The saying "to give is
more blessed than to receive" (Acts
20:25) is actually an ancient Greek
aphorism.e' The saying in Matt. 11:17,
"We have piped unto you and ye have
not danced," derives from one of Aesop's
fables!" The saying that "wheresoever
the carcass is, there the eagles will be
gathered together" (Matt. 24:28 = Luke
17:37)is attested by a number of Greek
(Lucian." Aelianus'")and Latin (Seneca.P

24Koester, Ancient Christian Gospels, p. 63.

25Arnold Ehrhardt, The Framework of the
New Testament Stories (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 1964), p. 51-3.
26Lucian(ca. C.E.120-ca. 180),Greek satirist
and rhetorician.
Page 54

Martial," and Lucan-") antecedents."

As a final illustration of how easy it
was to put words into Jesus' mouth, we
may consider a passage in Saul/Paul's
first letter to the Corinthians. In the
ninth verse of the second chapter, he
quotes a yet-unidentified "scripture":
But as it is written, Eye hath not
seen, nor ear heard, neither have
entered into the heart of man, the
things which God hath prepared
for them that love him.
In the Gospel of Thomas (actually a
collection of sayings or logia, resembling
the Q-Document from which Matthew
and Luke drew supposed sayings of
Jesus), this is reworked as logion number 17and attributed to Jesus himself:
I shall give you what no eye has
seen and what no ear has heard,
and what no hand has touched,
and what has never occurred to
the human mind."
The same saying was adapted by the
author of the Q-Document and found its
way into the official New Testament as
Matt. 13:16, 17and Luke 10:23, 24:
Blessed are the eyes that see what
you see and the ears that hear
what you hear . . . many prophets
and righteous men have desired to
see what you see and did not see
it, and to hear what you hear and
did not hear it. (Material in italics
found only in Matthew's version.)"
27Claudius Aelianus (ca. C.E. 170-ca. 235),
Roman rhetorician.
28Lucius Annaeus Seneca (ca. 4 B.C.E.-ca.
C.E.65), Roman statesman and philosopher.
29Marcus Valerius Martialis (ca. C.E.4O-ca.
103), Roman poet.
30Marcus Annaeus Lucanus (C.E. 39-65),
Roman poet.
31Ehrhardt, Framework, p. 53-8.
32Koester, Ancient Christian Gospels, p. 58.
33Koester, Ancient Christian Gospels, p. 59.
June 1992

It yet remains to go through the entire

New Testament to extract all the materials supposedly containing information
on the lifeof Christ and to trace them to
their sources. It remains also to sort out
which of the characters in that book are
historical and which are fictional. The
twelve disciples, for example, appear to
be zodiacal figures, but John the Baptist
may have been real. St. Paul almost
certainly was real, but St. Peter probably
was not. The Virgin Mary and Joseph
were invented for their roles, but Pontius
Pilate was not.
Much work remains to be done to put
the chroniclers of Christ out of business,
although a surprising amount of it was
done already a century or more ago, but
now is lost or difficult to retrieve. This
fact has prompted the popular writers
Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and
Henry Lincoln to comment:
Each contribution in the field of
biblical research is like a footprint
in sand. Each is covered almost
immediately and, so far as the general public is concerned, left virtually without trace. Each must constantly be made anew, only to be
covered again.34
It is time now for the vacuum that is
Christ, not the footprints of scholars, to
be filled in with sand. It is past the time
when mythical beings should be taken
seriously. The time has arrived for biblical scholars to stand upon the same
solid foundation on which the Marquis
de Laplace stood when questioned by
the Emperor of France. When asked
about the historical Jesus, all should be
able to reply: "I have had no need of that
hypothesis." ~

34Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and

Henry Lincoln, The Messianic Legacy (New
York: Henry Holt, 1986), p. 9.
[Manuscript received November 19, 1991.]
American Atheist

Historical Notes

100 years ago

Some of the most famous names in
Atheist and freethought history gathered in Newcastle-on-Tyne, England, on
Sunday, June 5, 1892. The event which
drew them was the annual Secular Conference, sponsored by the National Secular Society, England's leading freethought organization. Among those
present were Robert Forder, C. Watts,
J. W. Gatt (later arrested for blasphemy), and G. W. Foote. Representatives from most of the branches of the
society were in attendance.
The group's president, G. W. Foote,
opened the meeting by reviewing membership and donation statistics for the
past year. Over 1,074 new memberships
were received from 1891 to 1892 - a rise
of 280 over the previous year. In addition, twelve new branches of the organization had opened during the year. A
vigorous course of lectures were maintained throughout the country. Foote
also outlined the society's efforts to extend freedom of speech and to abolish
blasphemy laws. According to his report,
the activities of the group extended to
Australia, where several officers oversaw
lectures and meetings.
40 years ago
The June 1952 Liberal, a freethought
journal published in Philadelphia, sharply
criticized two recent Supreme Court
decisions. The first to draw its wrath
concerned the "Illinois Group Libel
Law." A precursor of modern "hate
laws," this statute made it a crime to
exhibit in a public place any publication
which "portrays depravity, criminality,
unchasity, or lack of virtue of a class of
citizens, of any race, color, creed or religion" or which "exposes the citizens of
any race, color, creed or religion to contempt, derision, or obloquy." The Illinois
state supreme court interpreted a violation of the act as criminal libel. That is,
the defense by truth of the utterance
was not available unless the act was also
shown to have been made "with good
motives and with justifiable ends."
Austin, Texas

George W.Foote (co-author of The Bible

Handbook) chaired a convention of
freethinkers and Atheists in England
one hundred years ago.

In Beauharnais v. Illinois, (343 U.S.

250 [1952]), the Supreme Court upheld
the statute. The editor of the Liberal
pointed out the danger of such a law:
Under such a law anyone inIllino is may be jailed or fined for making comments or criticisms of the
tenets or policies of any religious
organization. Suppose someone
says or writes that Joseph Smith's
story of being shown buried gold
plates which he translated as the
"Book of Mormon" is a Whopping
big fib and that the book is itself
simply nonsense, purporting to be
the history of a people who inhabited America before the Indians. If
this person were prosecuted at
the request of the Mormons living
in Illinois, he could be jailed under
this law notwithstanding that he
might call all the scientists from
the University of Chicago to testify that he was right.
Or, suppose he said that the
claim of the Roman Catholic HierJune 1992

archy that a priest, by saying a few

words, can change bread and
wine into flesh and blood, is silly.
He again would be guilty of "group
libel" and even though he summoned the best chemists of the
land to analyze the bread and wine
after the priest had put the hocus
pocus on it, and they testified that
absolutely no change had taken
place, he could be thrown into
jail. ...
Certainly the Liberal is not in
favor of persons or organizations
that advocate discrimination against
any religious or racial group, or
that they be denied equal rights.
The danger in such a vague law
lies in its interpretation. In the
hands of reactionary judges, who
may themselves be partisan to
some group, any critic could fare
badly indeed.
The Supreme Court also earned the
Liberal's criticism for its ruling in Zorach
v. Clauson (343 U.S. 306 [1952]), a decision concerning the "released time" policy in New York. Under this program,
children were "released" from public
school during classroom hours in order
to attend religious classes off school
grounds. No supervision of the religious
classes or teachers occurred, but the
public schools kept records of the students' attendance at religious schools.
The Liberal's editor soundly lambasted the Court's logic in this decision,
predicting that:
Having gotten their one hour,
like the camel who got his nose
into his master's tent and soon
had his head and neck in, they
[religionists] will clamor for more
time as soon as possible.
It should be noted that it was in Zorach v. Clauson that Justice Douglas
made his regrettable comment, "We are
a religious people whose institutions
presuppose a Supreme Being."
Page 55

A little, two-bedroom house in Austin

was the first building the American
Atheist Library had to call its own. The
library had previously been sheltered in
the American Atheist Centre.

35 years ago
President George Bush is attempting
to make "school choice" a campaign
issue this fall, but his idea was a topic of
controversy many years before he entered the White House. Bush advocates
direct payments to parents to spend at
the schools they choose. One of the
early attempts to siphon taxpayer money to private schools (the majority of
which are religious) entailed giving parents income tax deductions for the
money spent on private schooling. This Humanist, published in Philadelphia,
idea of "tuition tax credits" is still updated its readers in its June 1962
issue:
advocated by many.
Paul Blanshard, the noted critic of the
The Murray case has been filed
Roman Catholic church, took the entire
in the Supreme Court for considconcept to task in the Mev/June 1957
eration. No doubt it willbe considissue of The Humanist, calling it "the
ered in the October term. Mrs.
most serious threat to the principles of
Murray, basing her arguments on
church-state separation" in that time.
Constitutional grounds, has a very
He particularly decryed an amendment
good chance of winning this most
to Internal Revenue Code introduced
important case. The Society will
by Representative Gerald Ford of Michdo all in its power to aid her in
igan. It stated:
every possible way.
For purposes of this paragraph,
The decision in Murray v. Curlett, as
payments of tuition by the taxthe case was styled, was handed down
payer for the attendance of his
the following year - in favor of the
children at a primary or secondary
Atheist plaintiffs. And the Free Humanschool conducted on a religious
ist was as good as its word, supporting
basis by an organization orgathe Murray family before and after the
nized and operated for religious
decision.
and educational purposes shall be
treated as a contribution or gift by
20 years ago
the taxpayer to such organization.
After a long struggle and a lawsuit, the
Blanshard warned that "the next step Internal Revenue Service granted a taxbeyond such a bill is exemption from all exemption to the Charles E. Stevens
public school taxes for those who pay American Atheist Library and Archives,
Inc. on May 30, 1972.This was the first
tuition to sectarian schools."
time in the history of the United States
that any organization with the word
30 years ago
About three decades ago, Atheist and Atheist in its title was given a tax exempfreethought journals frequently featured tion.
In addition to the sweetness of this
articles and reports on "Baltimore
school prayer case." An admitted Atheist victory, the library had acquired its first
woman, Madalyn Murray, had chal- facility.It was described in the April 1972
lenged the practice of Bible reading and issue of Poor Richard's Reports Newsprayer recitation in Maryland public letter, issued by the Society of Separaschools and was actively pursuing her tionists, the Atheist organization based
case through the courts. The Free in Austin, Texas:
Page 56

June 1992

[The library building] is, as is

our American Atheist Centre, a
house. It is five rooms, which lend
themselves to conversion to an office. It is in a business zoned district which is now being improved,
in Austin. It housed a lighting fixture store, and was really incredibly dirty.
Help was at hand, however. According to the Newsletter, when the Texas
state convention was held that year, the
"fifteen hearty souls (excuse the expression)" who attended, spent much of
their time painting, scrubbing, cleaning,
and renovating the building. In the three
short days of the meeting, it was ready.
After the initial cleanup was done, the
founder's husband, Richard O'Hair,
made all the wooden shelves for the library and the "staff" (founder Madalyn
O'Hair, her seventeen-year-old son Jon
Murray, and a secretary) varnished
them.
With all of the moving and cleaning
done, according to the Newsletter, the
Charles E. Stevens American Atheist Library officially opened on June 1, 1972.
10 years ago
Finnish Atheist spokesperson Erkki
Hartikainen visited the United States
from June 15to June 30, 1982. A former
mathematics teacher and then secretary of Vapaa Ajatteliga, a national Finnish Atheist organization, Mr. Hartikainen
visited chapters of American Atheists
and attended the national Summer
Solstice picnic in Indiana. ~
American Atheist

Poetry

"When You Care Enough

to Send the Very Best"

Summer Certainty
There are clouds today . . .
immaculate white ones.
They pattern themselves diversely
in abandonment of "cause."

When I was six

I sent a letter to Santa
And mailed a Hallmark Card
To the baby Jesus ... First Class.

Truth?
I rouse from the blue fascination
of puff-balled sky:
No sign of rain
No chance of storm
Not a hint of divinity.
Angeline Bennett

"IS GOD DEAD?"

- Time magazine
That
is
probably
as
close
as
Time
magazine
ever
came
to
telling
the
truth.

T. Dunn

Biblical Logic

Matthew Behling

Business as Usual
A nonreligious man
was very lucky indeed,
for he amassed a fortune
with gratifying speed.
All of his investments
seemed to nearly double,
and he lived the better life
without a bit of trouble.
A preacher came to visit
when he was near the end,
begged him to leave his fortune
"to the Lord, who is my friend.
You have no kith or kin,"
said he, as smooth as glass,
"Why don't you do it now
before your judgement's passed?"

Well, He never answered

But Santa did.
I got six pairs of underwear,
A Lone Ranger cap gun,
Two Green Lantern comic books,
And a box full of Legos.
Did I mention
The cap gun?

if god is omnipresent
then
why is hell the absence of god
three equals one
and
one equals three?
Aristotle would have a fit
Ian A. Wood

If You Were He
If you were He could you subdue the urge
to zap each pious, tiresome soul who chants
a dreary hymn of praise? Would you not purge
the earth of fawning, righteous sycophants?
Could you abide the childish tunnel view
that credits you with all the good and light
yet sees no fault and fails to censure you
for any ache or grief that fills the night?
If you were He would you feel grave remorse
when musing on the cruel and bloody scenes
of holy wars you tacitly endorse,
your banner gracing each side's war machines?

This wily,weakened gentleman

gave his answer, already bored "You'll have it when you show me
a receipt, signed by the Lord."

If you are He, sleep well, absolved of shame:

your maker, man, must bear the sordid blame.

Marguerite Bell

William N. Nesbit

Austin, Texas

June 1992

Page 57

American Atheist Radio Series

Disqualification and Atheists

man recently said to me, "Atheists have never had anything to
fear in America. There just really
never were any Atheists in America."
Frank Swancara, a retired attorney
living in Denver, Colorado, has written
a book 1 about what Atheists have had to
fear in America, and every instance is a
documented legal case_
Do you know that in a few states
there are laws or legal decisions on
cases not considered abrogated or
overruled to the effect that one is disqualified as a witness in a court if one
does not believe "in a future state of rewards and punishments"2 or some theological equivalent?
Actually, until very recent times, this
has been the law.Some judges along the
way have realized that to enforce such
laws or to follow such decisions was to
contravene the equal protection clause
of the Fourteenth Amendment to the
federal Constitution, as it applied to the
witness or to the party on whose behalf
he proposed to testify, but most of the
courts and judges proceeded to disregard that equal protection clause.
Let's see the situation. There is a 1918
case from Arkansas- which says that a
nonbeliever in "future rewards and punishments" or a nonbeliever in divine
retribution who openly and honestly
admits his opinion is disqualified as a
witness or holder of a public office.
Such a nonbeliever was on the horns
of a dilemma, for a Virginia court said of
him:

A belief in an afterlife
of rewards for theists,
poses a "this life" of
punishment for
Atheists.

When the first installment of a

regularly scheduled, fifteen-minute,
weekly American Atheist radio series
on KLBJ radio (a station in Austin,
Texas, owned by then-President
Lyndon Baines Johnson) hit the
airwaves on June 3, 1968, the nation
was shocked. The programs had to be
submitted weeks in advance and were
heavily censored. The regular
production of the series ended in
September 1977, when no further
funding was available.
The following is the text of "American
Atheist Radio Series" program no. 161,
first broadcast on September 20,1971.

Madalyn Q'Hair
Page 58

The proscribed man may suffer

in his property, or in the persons of
the members of his family. His
goods may be stolen, his dwelling
broken into by the midnight robIFr'ank Swancara, Obstruction of Justice by
Religion (Denver: W H. Courtright Publishing Company, 1936). Alllegal citations in this
reprint are taken from this book.
2Arkansas Constitution, Art. 19, sec. 1.
3Mueller v. Coffman, 132 Ark. 45, 200 S.W
136 (1918).
June 1992

ber, or burned by the incendiary;

his child may be beaten, or his wife
murdered before his face, and the
offender escape because of the incapacity of the injured man to give
evidence against him."
Let's take a West Virginia- case: Noah
Norton executed a paper which he
thought was his last will and testament.
One of the three parties requested to
act as a witness was Ebenezer Robinson. The willwas contested. The person
contesting the will testified that Robinson, the required witness, did not believe
in "a future state of rewards and punishments." The executor of the willoffered
to prove by Robinson himself some matters of opinion which would tend to
qualify him, but the court rejected this
offer for the man to testify on the theory
that he could not be believed in what he
might say. Thus a way was paved for disqualifying any person. If anyone could
be brought in to state that the proposed
witness did not believe in hell, he could
not even speak for himself on the matter.
The Supreme Court of West Virginia
agreed, and the Supreme Court of
Errors of Connecticut justified such
practice:
It would seem to be incongruous to admit a man to his oath for
the purpose of learning from him
whether he had the necessary
qualifications to be sworn. The objection is, that a person offered as
a witness can in no case be sworn,
because he does not believe in the
obligation of an oath, or is an atheist. It would be strange, that the
court should immediately admit
this man to his oath to ascertain
this fact.s

4perry's Case, 3 Gratt. (44 Va.) 632, 644

(1846).
5State v. Hood, 63 WVa. 192, 59 S.E. 971
(1907).
American Atheist

The murderer appealed on the basis

that the boy "showed himself incompetent in his answers relative to
his knowledge of God and his providence."
The appeals court reversed the conviction and the murderer went free.

Nonreligious witnesses were disqualified not because of any prior "blasphemous" utterances or any Atheistic opinions, but merely because their opinions
did not conform to the requirements of
the common law. The Supreme Court of
Illinois, in 1856, held Mr. Ira Aldrich
"incompetent" as a witness after noting
that at the trial he said:

self incompetent in his answers relative

to his knowledge of God and his providence."? The appeals court reversed
the conviction and the murderer went
free.
The most bizarre case was in 1882. A
man was indicted, tried, and convicted
for forcibly raping a female child of age
eleven years. The Supreme Court of

I don't believe in the existence of

a God, particularly;
can't say
whether I believe it or not; I have
no belief either one way or the
other; there may be a God and
there may not; never made up my
mind on that subject; I don't believe there is a God who punishes
for perjury, either in this world or
any other; I don't believe anything
about it; may be and it may not; I
have no opinion about it. 7
Ben Wells was not permitted to testify
in a case in Charlotte, North Carolina,
in 1929, concerning the identity of the
persons who had flogged him. He was
simply held disqualified to testify at all
because of the following question and
his answer thereto:

Question: Do you believe that if

you would tell a lie that God would
punish you either in this world or
in the hereafter?
Answer: No, I don't; but I won't
tell a lie because of my own convic-

Alabama reversed the rapist's conviction on the ground that the child was disqualified as a witness simply because, in
the court's own words,
she manifested an entire want of
instruction as to the nature and effect of an oath, 'of all religious training, and utter ignorance of the existence of a Supreme Being, "the
rewarder of truth and the avenger
of falsehoods."l0
In his book, Swancara

notes that:

tion.f

Ed Williams, a husband and father,

was killed by a man whom a jury afterward found guilty of manslaughter,
in
South Carolina in 1925. James Williams,
his eight-year-old son, testified for the
state at the trial. The murderer appealed
on the basis that the boy "showed him-

6Curtiss v. Strong, 4 Day (Conn.) 51.

7The Central Military Track R.R. Co. v.
Rockafellow, 17 Ill. 541 (1856).
8New York Times, Sept. 17, 1929, p. 23.
Austin, Texas

The early Alabama reports contain many cases illustrating and

applying the religious barbarity in
the law. Parents desiring to secure
the conviction of one charged with
rape upon their child found it expedient to coach the alleged victim
on theological matters before the
trial. Accordingly, one may find in

"State v. Abercomie, 130 S.C. 358, 126 S.E.

142 (1925).
loBeason v. State, 72 Ala. 191 (1882).
June 1992

a report the following:

"She said ... that they told her
before she was summoned as a
witness in this case, 'that she was
sworn to tell the truth; that if she
would tell the truth, and be good,
she would go to Jesus when she
died.' "11
The court held in this case that this
seven-and-a-half-year-old
child was a
competent witness. A few days before
that opinion was filed, the same court
held incompetent
a boy of the age of
fourteen years because he made the following frank statement: "I do not know
what will become of me when I die, if I
swear to a lie."12
But let's try Arkansas in 1910. A man
was convicted of murder in the first degree on good evidence. The supreme
court of that state reversed the judgment for conviction because a ten-yearold-witness for the state answered, "I
don't know," when asked, "If you was
[sic] not to tell the truth, what would be
done to you?" If the question was to
refer to a future state, it was certainly
ambiguous, but the court said:
The child must . . . also have a
due sense of the obligation of an
oath, by which is meant, as we deduce from the authorities,
...
that the promise to tell the truth
must be made under "an immediate sense of the witness' responsibility to God, and with a conscientious sense of the wickedness of
falsehood. "13
In 1859, a witness
court" because of
Christian jurist ever
when it was obvious
ing traversed.

was "hissed out of

his nonreligion. No
came to the rescue
that justice was be-

11McGuffv. State, 88 Ala. 147,7 So. 35 (1889).

12McKelton v. State, 88 Ala. 181,7 So. 38 (1889).
13Crosby v. State, 93 Ark. 156, 124 S.w. 781
(1910).
Page 59

In 1921 the Supreme Court of Maine ruled that the assumed disbeliever
in punishments and rewards in afterlife
does not feel bound and impelled to tell the truth when a witness,
even though complying with all the formalities of an oath or affirmation.

The courts which held that Atheists

were not "entitled to credit" in giving
testimony unhesitatingly admitted evidence of insane persons who had been
educated as Christians. Thus we find an
American court in Massachusetts citing
with approval an English case where a
witness, who was permitted to testify,
was brought into court from a lunatic
hospital and labored under the delusion
"that he was possessed of twenty thousand spirits.?"
It is suggested that the nonbeliever or
Atheist could have relieved himself of,
or could have avoided, the legal disabilities by steadily practicing the hypocrisy
of professing the required religious beliefs, or by concealing his true opinions.
Indeed, it was only last month that an
Atheist talked to me in Minnesota. He
was going in for a divorce and his attorney had cautioned him to just take all
oaths without objecting and to keep his
mouth shut about his Atheism if he
wanted to get his divorce.
No one asks a theist (god believer) or
Christian to do that. Why should we?
Yeteven this deception would be denied
to us, as I quote a Massachusetts judge:
Where a man is called as a witness, in a court of justice, and
questioned upon his belief, he is
not only permitted, but bound, by
every consideration of moral honesty, to avow his unbelief, if it
exists."
By sometime in the late 1800s, some
constitutional and statutory provisions
- in most states - removed this disability of the non theist to testify, so
wouldn't you know that Atheists were
then attacked on their "credibility"?
In 1921the Supreme Court of Maine
ruled that the assumed disbeliever in

14Kendall u. May, 10 Allen (Mass.) 59, 63

(1865).
ISCom. u. Kneeland, 20 Pick. (Mass.) 206
(1834).
Page 60

punishments and rewards in afterlife

does not feel bound and impelled to tell
the truth when a witness, even though
complying with all the formalities of an
oath or affirmation. In 1925the Supreme
Judicial Court of Massachusetts ruled

In fact, I have myoid Bouvier's Law

Dictionary20 here on my desk. I used
this when I was a student at the Warren
G. Harding School of Law, at Ohio
Northern University, in 1946. The first
definition given in this book for an oath
IS

the credibility of witnesses can bg

affected only by evidence of their
disbelief in the existence of God.16
In a 1929a trial judge said in an opinion
in North Carolina:
If I believed that life ends with
death and there is no punishment
after death, I would be less apt to
tell the truth.'?
Even the father of written law, Blackstone," wrote that "all moral evidence
. . . all confidence in human veracity,
must be ... overthrown by total infidelity." Of course, in his time, no avowed
Atheist dared to be found and therefore
could not offer any reputation concerning veracity.
Yetan associate judge of the Supreme
Bench of Baltimore wrote in 1935 that
some of the most shameless lying to
which he ever listened was done by rival
groups of religious trustees in a contest
over the control of a church property.'?
But still, we have many old law dictionaries which say that an oath is:
a religious asseveration, by which
a person renounces the mercy,
and imprecates the vengeance of
heaven, if he does not speak the
truth.

16Allen u. Guarantee, 253 Mass. 152, 148

N.E.461 (1925).
17LiteraryDigest, Nov. 9,---1.929,
p. 22.
18Sir William Blackstone (1723-1780). His
Commentaries on the Laws of England is a
classic exegesis of law; it is from this that the
quote is drawn.
19Joseph N. Ulman, "Perjury in the Courts,"
American Mercury, May 1935.
June 1992

An outward pledge given by the

person taking it that his attestation or promise is made under an
immediate sense of his responsibility to God.
Have any of you ever read the constitution of the state of Texas, the state in
which we have our American Atheist
Center? Let me read Article 1, Section
4 of the Bill of Rights to you.
No religious test shall ever be
required as a qualification to any
office, or public trust, in this State;
nor shall anyone be excluded from
holding office on account of his
religious sentiments, provided he
acknowledge the existence of a
Supreme Being.21
Then, of course, in Article 16,it states
that each officer in this state (Texas)
whether elected or appointed, shall, before entering upon the duties of his
office, take and subscribe the oath
prescribed by Article 16,Section 1 of the
Constitution. And, of course, that article says that the person will faithfully
execute the duties of his office, "So help
me God."
Now, what was it that the man said to
me? "Atheists have always had equal
rights in America." Oh, come now! ~

20Bouuier's Law Dictionary (Cleveland:

Bank-Baldwin Publishing Co., 1946).
21This constitutional provision was later
challenged by American Atheists in the case
O'Hair u. White (Civ. No. 4-78-CA-220).
After seven years of litigation, in 1984 (thirteen years after this program was broadcast),
it was held to be unconstitutional.
American Atheist

MeToD

Old wine, new bottle

III

Over thousands of
years the trappings of
religious belief have
shifted and changed.
But have the results?

"MeToo" is a feature designed to

showcase short essays written by
readers in response to topics recently
covered by the American Atheist or of
general interest to the Atheist
community.
Essays submitted to "Me Too" (P.O.
Box 140195, Austin, TX 78714-0195)
should be 650 to 1500 words.

Austin, Texas

as any historian ever made a serious, scholarly attempt to calculate how many millions of human
beings have been slaughtered for the
love of "the one true god"? Or how
many more millions have been driven
from their homes, brutalized, or put to
the sword, because they were "religiously inferior" and, not coincidentally,
militarily inferior?
Since the beginning of recorded history, the bloody game has been played.
Sometimes the players are different, or
perhaps over the centuries the oppressed becomes the oppressor; but
other than the sword being replaced by
the automatic weapon and missile, little
has changed. The conquerors see themselves as "smiled upon by god." They
"do god's work" when they invade and
subjugate the nonbeliever. For this, they
say, "god loves them."
There has been another constant in
this endless slaughter down through the
millennia: the clergy. There has always
been an anointed intermediary with the
deity. The deity has varied - though he
has always been "the one true god" as has the intermediary. This holy person, both feared and esteemed for his
intimacy with god, has had many titles,
but he (or she) has always been there to
inspire, to direct, and to make god's
wishes known.
Shamans, medicine men, druids, witch
doctors, oracles, and priests: they and
others of their profession have consulted the stars, cast bones upon the
ground, imbibed hallucinogens, inhaled
sulphurous fumes, and studied the
warm, bloody entrails of eviscerated
animals. Why have they done this? Because, the holy men assured, god chose
these methods to reveal his message
(through the interpretation of the intermediary) to his favored people. Then,
blessed by the holy man and reassured
by his message from "the one true god,"
the members of "the one true religion"
eagerly went forth to ravage (in his
name) their supposed religious and/or
ethnic inferiors.
June 1992

Their victims, of course - unaware

of their inferiority, and then despoiled of
freedom, land and lives - found that difficult to understand. After all, had they
not prayed to their "one true god"? Had
their Holy Men not assured them, after
interpreting his message, that their
cause was just? Why did he forsake
them?

As we look back over thousands of

years, it all seems rather foolish: the religious righteousness, chauvinism, and
nationalism of the ancient peoples. But
what has changed? Today the inhabitants of the area known as the "Middle
East" seethe with the same hatred and
attitudes of ethnic and religious superiority as did their ancestors. Other than
more efficient weapons, the only discernible difference from the ancients is
that all the adversaries are now literate:
they read the printed word. The modern
holy man, in his role as god's intermediary, no longer claims to read god's instructions in the stars or the reeking entrails of a disemboweled animal. He
reads them in a book. Every religious
faction now has, in addition to their "one
true god," the "one true book of god's
laws."
Will our successors on earth a thousand years hence see any real difference
between those who found justification
for their brutality in the stars, animal
guts - or books?
- Anthony Wickel
New York
Page 61

Letters to the Editor

All this from a cap?

What a joy! True freedom!
That's what I felt when I placed your
beautiful American Atheist hat on. February 15 was the date that I wore it for
the first time while traveling. I visited
Queens, Brooklyn, and Manhattan via
bus and subway. It was the first time I
wore anything endorsing Atheism besides a tiny button.
I happen to be a Black New Yorker
and you probably know that the Black
community is saturated with churches
and all those mindless fundamentalists.
But now since I own your hat, I can reo
mind them and all New Yorkers that it
is nice to be truly free: Iwillbe an Atheist
until death. I will place more orders for
your books and other great products.
Eugene Charrington
New York

accumulate four billion dollars. What

that could do to provide affordable
housing that has become so scarce!
And Hubbard's "Scientology" outfit
has been stuffing more into its bag of
tricks. It formed its own commission (in
order to conceal the source) to intrude
its own food and drug administration to
"protect" consumers. So it invented a
case against the drug Prozac, an antidepressant that has proven effective
without the side effects of other drugs.
It has nationwide campaigns to frighten
people against this drug, saying it will
cause memory loss and trigger violent
behavior. Why? Because Scientology
opposes any psychiatric drugs, since
these drugs compete with their own
programs to do the same thing.
Well, I could go on but I willstop here.
Anyway, with more I could be duplicating what the American Atheists have
been telling us all along.

Religion and politics

:~:~"~~n~~OI!C
"no"n.

IJSA

}""

"Letters to the Editor" should be either questions or comments of general

concern to Atheists or to the Atheist
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Page 62

I would like to air my currently most

gnawing beefs. Though the situation is
reflected in the federal government and
the individual states, I willgive the exampie of California. The governor proposes to cut welfare and Medicaid payments and deny relief to the able-bodied
after six months, whether they can find
work or not; cut relief to the disabled;
and do nothing for the homeless and the
mentally ill. Where are the churches in
all this? They can be found begging and
conniving to get the government or anybody else to support their charities and
their schools and to be exempted from
all obligation to pay their share of taxes
to support the government rather than
to take money from it.
I recently had a run-in with the Mormon church. They bought the apartment
building I had been living in for sixteen
years with the intention of tearing it
down for a parking lot or church library.
The Mormon church, I have heard on
television and in the newspaper, has
property in all of the fifty states, with
profitable businesses on which they
have not paid taxes, enabling them to
June 1992

Helen E. Johnson
California

Flash! Noncitizens pay tax

While I am sending this along, I was
just wondering. I am in the process of
doing my taxes. If President Bush does
not consider me and my fellow Atheists
as full citizens, am I responsible to pay
taxes? Probably I am, but I was just
wondering.
Marc Edelstein
New York

The first Atheist in America

Iwant to thank you for preserving and
promulgating the history of Atheist
thought in this country through the
Charles E. Stevens American Atheist
Library and Archives. American Atheism has a long history indeed. It goes
back to the very dawn of our nation.
The winter of 1609-10 was the "Starving Time" at Jamestown, Virginia, the
first permanent English settlement in
America. It saw the population shrink
from five hundred to about sixty as a
American Atheist

result of sickness, Indian errows, and

malnutrition. The starving settlers ate
their dogs and horses and then the mice
and snakes found about their fort. Some
even resorted to cannibalism. At this
point,"a man threw his Bible into the
fire and cried out in the market-place,
There is no God in heaven' " (Lyon
Gardiner Tyler, England in America:
1580-1652 [New York: Haskell House,
1969], p. 86). This Englishman was the
first American Atheist of record.
Gary C. Grassl
Maryland

A battle won
I was able to convince my Rotary
Club to stop having invocations at the
start of their meetings. Acquiring some
American Atheist Press publications
midway through the seven-month battle
gave me lots of good ammunition.
Keep up the good work!
Karl Hadley, M.D.
Washington

Rewriting history
A whileago I bought Joseph McCabe's
book History's Greatest Liars. What a
delightful volume! It is a pleasure to encounter a historian who cares so much
about the truth! I value his devotion to
scholarship.
Many Americans cannot even place
their own country on a world map, so I
realize that the McCabe book is not for
everybody. But those who do care

about the history of the European tradition may find much "new" information
in the McCabe book. I put "new" in
quotes, because the information is actually quite old. It only seems new to us because so much of our history has been
whitewashed.
I read about the burning of "pagan"
libraries that took place in A.D. 389 all
across the Roman Empire; I read about
the massacre of the Albigensians and
Waldensians, in which hundreds of
thousands were killed by a 400,000strong papal army; I read about the
Thirty Years War, in which 10 million
were killed; I read about a thousand
years of papal tyranny, opulence, and
corruption; Iread of the contrast between
Roman freedom and medieval serfdom.
McCabe makes it clear that these massacres, wars, and book burnings were
not just random occurrences. Rather,
they were the result of religious totalitarianism. Many of those who died
stood on the side of freedom, tolerance,
and rationality. This history is relevant
to us today, for we too have our book
burnings, our holy wars, and our totalitarian religious mindset. I often saw the
Holy War against the Evil Empire as a
kind of "Nuclear Inquisition," in which
the United States, with god on its side
and on its coins, achieved "Victory" by
threatening to subject the Commie Her-

etics (and the rest of the world, too, of

course!) to a sort of "nuclear auto-dafe." Historians a thousand years from
now willperhaps see the Renaissance as
no more than an intermission in a Middle Ages that continues right up to the
twenty-first century!
We both agree that religion is generally harmful. Someday, I hope to convince you that the harm is caused not by
imagination, but by belief. Imagination is
an essential mode of perception which
we cannot afford to hand over to the
religionists; belief is just a form of selfdeceit. Don't throw the baby out with
the holy water!
Charles Obler
Virginia

Praying agnostics?
I happened to see a bumper sticker
which read: "DyingAtheistsPray Faster."
My only comment is that if that person
were to start praying, he or she wasn't
a true Atheist in the first place. The
pope tells his parishioners the same
thing should they oppose any of his infalliblepreachings. What's good enough
for the Roman Catholic church is good
enough for us Atheists. There's no such
thing as a part-time Roman Catholic or
an almost-Atheist. Those people are
labeled "agnostics." The bumper sticker
should have read: "Dying Agnostics
Pray Faster."
Gerald Lunderville
California

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My path ...
(Continued from page 28)

Atheism is indeed a lonely position

when you have no fellow Atheists to
support you. However, what is most important is that, lonely or not, Atheists
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This we cannot allow. ~
June 1992

American Atheist

suggested

American Atheist
introductory reading list
~
Literature on Atheism is very hard to find in most public
and university libraries in the United States - and most of
the time when you do find a book catalogued under the
word Atheism it is a work against the Atheist position.
Therefore we suggest the following publications which are
available from American Atheist Press as an introduction
into the multifaceted areas of Atheism and state/church separation. To achieve the best understanding
of thought in
these areas the featured publications should be read in the
order listed. These by no means represent our entire collection of Atheist and separationist materials.

1. Why I Am An Atheist, including a history of materialism, by Madalyn

#5416

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Atheists with All of the Answers by Jon Murray and
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3. The Case Against Religion: A Psychotherapist's View

by Dr. Albert Ellis. Stapled. 57 pp. #5096

4. What on Earth Is an Atheist! by Madalyn

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288 pp. #5412

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5. An Atheist Speaks by Madalyn O'Hair. Paperback.

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6. All about Atheists by Madalyn O'Hair. Paperback.

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$8.00

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pp. #5097

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pp. #5094

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9. Ingersoll the Magnificent by Joseph Lewis. Paperback.

342 pp. #5216

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10. Essays on American Atheism, Vol. I by Jon G. Murray.

Paperback.

349 pp. #5349

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II. Essays on American Atheism, Vol. II by Jon G. Murray. Paperback. 284 pp. #5350
$10.00

12. Essays in Freethinking, Vol. I by Chapman

Paperback.

229 pp. #5052

Cohen.
$9.00

13. Essays in Freethinking, Vol. II by Chapman

Paperback.

240 pp. #5056

14. History's Greatest Liars by Joseph

McCabe.

back. 176 pp. #5524

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$9.00
Paper$6.50

15. Atheist Truth vs. Religion's Ghosts by Col. Robert G.

Ingersoll.

Stapled. 57 pp. #5156

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16. Some Reasons I Am a Freethinker by Robert G. Ingersoll. Stapled.

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Financing Schools. Paperback. 273 pp. #5500
$5.00
18. Sex Mythology

by Sha

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Stapled.

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19. Women and Atheism,

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O'Hair.

55 pp.
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The Ultimate Liberation by

Stapled. 21 pp. #5420

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20. Ages of Gold and Silver and Other Short Sketches of

Human History by John G. Jackson. Paperback. 331
pp. #520 I

$14.95

21. Christianity Before Christ by John G. Jackson.

back. 238 pp. #5200

Paper$9.00

22. The Bible Handbook (All the contradictions,

absurdities, and atrocities from the Bible) by G. W. Foote, W.

P. Ball, John Bowden, and Richard M. Smith. Paperback. 372 pp. #5008
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Amendment I
Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise
thereof; or abridging the freedom of
speech, or of the press; or the right
of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the governmept
for a redress of grievances.

No State shall make any law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; and no money raised by taxation in
any State for the support of public schools, or derived from any public fund therefor, nor any public
lands devoted thereto, shall ever be under the
control of any religious sect, nor shall any money
so raised or lands so devoted be divided between
religious sects or denominations.
- Article XVI, "The Blaine Amendment,"
Introduced to the House of Representatives by
James G. Blaine on December 14, 1875