First, let's remember what the First Amendment says:
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 government for a redress of grievances.
That's rather meaty, but that hasn't stopped the new regime from attempting to re-design it.
Is religion under attack? Well, at the moment, there's no concerted effort to overtly violate the First Amendment on this issue, but there are some disturbing signs that the once-friendly atmosphere that supported, encouraged, and nurtured a religious sentiment might be on its way out.
For example, the President's new "Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Initiatives" has added "Neighborhood" to the office created by President Bush to help small faith-based programs compete with secular agencies in the race for federal grant dollars (of which, by the way, there are a lot more to be had in coming months, once the Stimulus Bill goes into effect.) This is in keeping with President Obama's Alinsky-style (you'll excuse the expression) "faith" in grass-roots initiative, and his near-deification of the community organizer.
For the president and his followers, "faith" is not the key to neighborhood sustainability; "community" is. In other words, where President Bush was constantly reminding us that government could not love you, and that only a human being, motivated by the love of neighbor that comes through faith, could minister to a person in need with "a cup of cold water and a kind word," the Obama vision is quite different.
Although he got his start in the churches of Chicago's South Side, he very quickly converted the power of faith into a political force, concentrating on the "Rules for Radicals" method of making demands on government. Where a normal faith-based institution centers on prayer and faith, the type of community organization Obama spent his Chicago time building sees faith as merely the tool by which to achieve community power.
In keeping with his belief that the government can easily replace (and is in fact preferable to) an institution of faith, the President has in mind to change the charitable donation rules so that people who fall into the category he determines to be "rich" cannot claim the full deduction for their charitable contributions. This will, no doubt, reduce the amount of money available to churches and charities--thus requiring Big Daddy government to step in and take over the functions of such organizations.
In re-shaping the new office, Obama is also planning to "review" the rules under President Bush which allowed religiously-based charities to hire people that agreed with their religious mission. The President and his staff believe these rules are unconstitutional and are planning to alter them so that religious organizations that compete with non-religious ones for federal dollars would be required to follow all the rules and regulations that ordinary businesses are susceptible to--including equal opportunity hiring rules that would force a church to hire someone who actively opposed the religious mission of the ministry.
In addition, most religious broadcasters believe that the "hate crimes" legislation pushed by the Administration will make it difficult to discuss the Biblical position on homosexuality over the public airwaves, to the point that even simply reading the Bible on air might be construed as "hate speech."
So, that's just a little on the religion part of the Amendment. What else is in there?
How about freedom of speech? How do we like that?
While the president has claimed that he is not interested in a revival of the Fairness Doctrine, and the Congress has legislatively closed off that possibility, the same day Congress voted on it, Dick Durbin got a different Amendment passed, which opened up the door to local content requirements that would, eventually, spell the end of national talk-radio programming--which is, in fact, its aim. The fact is that Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, Laura Ingraham, and others make the new Administration very very nervous.
Local content regulations would basically require that radio stations provide a specific number of hours in the day during which national programming would be pushed out by locally based programming.
But the fact is that Limbaugh and his compatriots are what make local affiliate stations profitable. Advertisers know they are getting millions of listeners, and they pay for the time. It is highly unlikely that audiences would stick around for local talent, especially if it were required to provide a "balanced" (which means "liberal") perspective. They would simply shut down all controversial programming, the national hosts would move to a pay outlet, like Sirius or XM, and the local station would revert to non-controversial music.
There is also the consideration that we could see a new effort to use the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE), passed during the Clinton Administration, which forbids protesters--as well as the volunteers that the pro-life movement calls "counselors"--from approaching women entering an abortion clinic. One could argue that this draconian legislation interferes with the pro-lifers' freedom of speech (as well as assembly).
Now, freedom of the press is also undermined by the "fairness doctrine" or any disguised version thereof. But these days it seems like it hardly matters any more. The "free" press has voluntarily enslaved itself to the current administration. Moreover, while it's not unconstitutional, we can look at the treatment of oppositional press persons during the campaign. If you recall, there were several incidents in which unflattering press treatment of the candidate was responded to with a stony wall of silence. Several reporters who had been less than complimentary to the Obama campaign were bumped off the campaign plane right at the end of the campaign, to make room for more friendly reporters.
What will happen to the press if they ever break free of their hypnotic attraction to the President?
We have yet to see an attack on tne freedom of assembly or petition--but, remember, it's only been a month.
Stay tuned for the next "Constitution Under Fire" report, "Disarming the Second Amendment."
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