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95–779 PDF 2004

CENTERS FOR FAITH-BASED AND COMMUNITY

INITIATIVES: PROMISE AND PROGRESS

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIMINAL JUSTICE,

DRUG POLICY AND HUMAN RESOURCES

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

MARCH 23, 2004

Serial No. 108–194

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/congress/house

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

TOM DAVIS, Virginia, Chairman

DAN BURTON, Indiana

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

DOUG OSE, California

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

EDWARD L. SCHROCK, Virginia

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

NATHAN DEAL, Georgia

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan

TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

JOHN R. CARTER, Texas

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee

PATRICK J. TIBERI, Ohio

KATHERINE HARRIS, Florida

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland

LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California

C.A. ‘‘DUTCH’’ RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

JIM COOPER, Tennessee

——— ———

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

MELISSA WOJCIAK, Staff Director

DAVID MARIN, Deputy Staff Director/Communications Director

ROB BORDEN, Parliamentarian

TERESA AUSTIN, Chief Clerk

PHIL BARNETT, Minority Chief of Staff/Chief Counsel

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIMINAL JUSTICE, DRUG POLICY AND HUMAN RESOURCES

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana, Chairman

NATHAN DEAL, Georgia

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

DOUG OSE, California

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia

JOHN R. CARTER, Texas

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee

PATRICK J. TIBERI, Ohio

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California

C.A. ‘‘DUTCH’’ RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

——— ———

EX OFFICIO

TOM DAVIS, Virginia HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

J. MARC WHEAT, Staff Director

ELIZABETH MEYER, Professional Staff Member

NICOLE GARRETT, Clerk

TONY HAYWOOD, Minority Counsel

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on March 23, 2004 ............................................................................ 1

Statement of:

Lynn, Rev. Barry, executive director, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State; Holly Hollman, general counsel, Baptist

Joint Committee; Nathan Diament, director of public policy, Union

of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America; Rev. Wilson Goode, senior advisor on faith-based initiatives for Public/Private Ventures; and

Steve Fitzhugh, director, the House ............................................................ 13

Sherman, Dr. Amy, director, Hudson Institute Faith-in-Communities Program ............................................................................................................... 85

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Cummings, Hon. Elijah E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Maryland, prepared statement of ............................................................ 9

Diament, Nathan, director of public policy, Union of Orthodox Jewish

Congregations of America, prepared statement of ..................................... 56

Goode, Rev. Wilson, senior advisor on faith-based initiatives for Public/

Private Ventures, prepared statement of .................................................... 76

Hollman, Holly, general counsel, Baptist Joint Committee, prepared

statement of ................................................................................................... 44

Lynn, Rev. Barry, executive director, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, prepared statement of ....................................... 16

Sherman, Dr. Amy, director, Hudson Institute Faith-in-Communities Program, prepared statement of ........................................................................ 87

Souder, Hon. Mark E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Indiana, prepared statement of ............................................................... 4

(1)

CENTERS FOR FAITH-BASED AND COMMUNITY INITIATIVES: PROMISE AND

PROGRESS

TUESDAY, MARCH 23, 2004

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIMINAL JUSTICE, DRUG POLICY AND

HUMAN RESOURCES,

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Mark E. Souder (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Souder and Cummings.

Staff present: J. Marc Wheat, staff director and chief counsel;

Elizabeth Meyer, professional staff member and counsel; Nicole

Barrett, clerk; Tony Haywood, minority counsel; Denise Wilson, minority professional staff member; and Jean Gosa, minority assistant clerk.

Mr. SOUDER. The subcommittee will come to order. Thank you all

for coming today. This is part of a long series of faith-based hearings we have been having; many out around the country listening

to practitioners. The debate over the role of these State-based organizations and the provision of social services continue to be as heated today as it was 3 years ago when the President announced the

creation of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community

Initiatives.

Even as the debate continues, what we know for certain is this:

The need for social services will never be fully met. The government acting alone cannot begin to meet the needs of the countless

men and women who are facing addiction, homelessness, hunger or

illness.

Many faith-based and community organizations across our Nation understand that they have a duty to help those who are less

fortunate than they are. We are a Nation richly blessed not only

with government resources but also with caring individuals who

dedicate their lives to helping others. Through charitable choice

and the faith-based initiative, the government has recognized the

tremendous resource it has in its faith community and in its neighborhood-based organizations. These groups have the ability to

reach out to men and women that the government may never know

exists.

We know that for decades the government has worked with large

faith-based organizations like Catholic Charities and Lutheran SoVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:01 Oct 05, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\95779.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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cial Services to provide care to those in need. The faith-based initiative is designed to bring neutrality to the government grant system so that smaller community and faith-based organizations can

expand their capacity to help people in their communities that otherwise might be overlooked.

Neutrality toward all applicants requires that the government

partner only with secular organizations, in effect recognizing a

State-sponsored secularism. But it demands that government look

at the merits of each program. Is the program helping substance

abusers kick addiction? Is it helping a homeless woman find a job

or a home? Is the program making a difference in the life of a child

who has lost a parent to prison?

The government does have a responsibility to ensure that its dollars are being spent in a manner consistent with the Constitution.

This is why technical assistance in education are key elements of

the faith-based initiative. Every organization has a responsibility to

think carefully about whether a government grant is a good thing

for their organization before they apply. Organizations like the

FASTEN have produced training and educational materials for

faith-based and community organizations that include a list of

questions that organizations should think carefully about before

they decide to jump into the fray of competing for government

grants, as well as information on what due diligence will require

as they administer a grant. The White House also instructs potential applicants to consider carefully what a partnership with the

government will mean to their organization. In terms of financial

aid, I believe the most effective way that government can assist

faith-based and community organizations is through tax credits

and vouchers. These forms of aid reduce significantly government

intrusion into the daily operation of the provider, and puts the

choice of which program to use and where to send private contributions into the hands of men and women who need services and who

want to support a social ministry with their personal dollars.

For some time we have heard opponents of the government partnership say faith-based organizations have long had the ability to

partner with the Federal Government. All they need to do is form

a separate 501(c)(3) and conduct themselves as though they were

secular and there is no problem. But we are starting to see that

even if the faith-based organization takes the precaution of forming

a separate organization to handle those social services it desires to

provide, that everything may in fact not be all right. Catholic Charities is an organization that for decades has been held up as an example, even by critics of the faith-based initiative, of how government partnerships with faith-based organizations are working, because they held the service arm of the organization under a separate incorporated organization. Now the California Supreme Court

has said that because Catholic Charities offers secular services to

clients, the majority of whom are not Catholic and not directly

preach Catholic values, it is not a religious organization for the

court’s purposes and therefore must provide services contrary to

Catholic teachings. This intrusion into the right of an organization

to define its very identity should frighten leaders of all organizations, faith based and community alike.

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This case illustrates the danger we face when government attempts to intrude upon the right of a religious organization to define itself. Not all faith-based organizations hire only members of

the same faith, but the vast majority of faith-based organizations

desire to hire employees who embody the mission of that organization. It has been argued that if providing services to individuals of

all faiths does not alter the integrity of a faith-based organization,

neither should a requirement that a faith-based organization to

hire individuals of any faith. After all, critics say, the soup is still

served and the person is still fed. The argument is faulty. For any

faith-based or community organization to hire employees who are

dedicated to upholding the values of the organization is not discrimination but a basic right of liberty. Justice Brennan wrote in

Corporation of Presiding Bishop v. Amos, ‘‘Determining that certain

activities are in furtherance of an organization’s religious mission

and that only those committed to that mission should conduct them

is . . . A means by which a religious community defines itself.’’

The government is acting in an even-handed way when it permits all organizations it funds, religious as well as secular, to hire

staff devoted to their respective missions. Abortion rights organizations do not lose their ability to screen out pro-life applicants when

they accept government funds. In the same way, faith-based service

groups should not lose their religious staffing liberty if they accept

Federal grants. Keeping religious staffing legal is the only way to

ensure equal opportunity and effectiveness for all organizations

and to respect the diversity of faith communities that are part of

our civil society.

Today we will discuss a variety of viewpoints related to the faithbased initiative. We will discuss the legal questions that accompany the initiative and we will examine how the initiative is actually playing out both in a research sense but also at the most critical level, the neighborhood level. We will hear from two organizations that are living out the initiative on a daily basis. I know that

faith-based and community organizations are making a difference

in the lives of thousands of Americans. What we need to work toward is how best to structure the relationships between those organizations and the government. Our discussion today should be lively about how that can be accomplished.

Now I would like to yield to the distinguished ranking member,

Mr. Cummings.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Mark E. Souder follows:]

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Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for holding this important hearing on the legal and practical issues raised

by the President’s faith-based initiative and its implementation by

the Bush administration.

Let me just say from the outset, Mr. Chairman, that I along with

many Members of Congress, am concerned about discrimination. As

one who has personally experienced discrimination and who knows

the painful results of it, I think we have to, at every single juncture

where we see discrimination raise its ugly dangerous head, we

have to be very careful about it. And sometimes I think that we

become very confused about the good coming out at the expense of

the harm that may be done when a faith-based organization hires

only a certain race of people, a certain religion, because basically

the problem is that then they take my tax dollars and discriminate

against me, which is incredible. And so, this has been one, a major

issue for, I know, my good friend Bobby Scott of Virginia. We have

spent in the Congressional Black Caucus a phenomenal amount of

time on this. And I guess the thing that bothers me more than anything else is how, when we raise these issues, most of us, like myself being a son of two preachers and very much for faith-based efforts, very much, and for some reason when we raise the issue,

folks then say, oh, they must be against churches. Nothing could

be further from the truth. Nothing. As a matter of fact, all my life

I have seen churches, people reach in their pockets in churches and

do all kinds of things that government would normally have been

doing, and they do it over and over and over again. They do a good

job. But do not take my dollars, or those of the American people

and then use those very dollars to discriminate against me, or my

children, or any other American. And that is the crux of this situation.

You know, it bothers me that we make these arguments and I

will bet there’s not one Member of Congress that is against faithbased organizations doing what they do. It basically comes down to

an issue of discrimination. And so I have a problem. As I told a

group just on Sunday, a lot of times we look at the ends. We look

at the ends. And we say, yes, the person who was the addict has

been treated. We look at the homeless person and we say, yes, the

church, the faith-based organization, has done some wonderful

things for that person, and now they are up on their feet. But the

end don’t always justify the means, because if you come to the end

and you basically destroy the very principles of the Constitution

and what this country is all about, then I think that you have

chipped away at this wonderful thing we call a democracy. You

have given a foundation for discrimination and I think, therefore,

that the end certainly does not justify the means.

And so it is that I am looking forward to our discussion, but I,

you know, I didn’t even read my remarks because it just, it upsets

me so much that we on this side of the aisle, who have consistently

stood up for those things that are humane, consistently stood up

for those things that would help people get on their feet, consistently stood up for people who could not stand up for themselves,

consistently tried to make sure that tax dollars were distributed in

a way where children to reach their God-given rights, consistently

stood up for homelessness, consistently, for people so that they are

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not homeless, consistently stood up for all of those things that are

humane, then for the argument to be turned around to say that

you’re against discrimination. Then suddenly you’re supposed to be

against faith-based organizations.

And so I don’t take a back seat to anyone with regard to being

a humanitarian. But part of that humanity is that you do not discriminate against people with their own money. And with that, Mr.

Chairman, I will submit my official statement for the record and

look forward to the testimony.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Elijah E. Cummings follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5

legislative days to submit written statements and questions for the

hearing record, that any answers to written questions provided by

the witnesses also be included in the record. Without objection, it

is so ordered.

Also ask unanimous consent that all exhibits, documents, and

other materials referred to by Members and the witnesses may be

included in the record, and that all Members be permitted to revise

and extend their remarks. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Now I would like to ask our first panel to stand. It is the custom

of this committee to swear in all the witnesses. If you will stand

and raise your right hands. Amy Sherman doesn’t happen to be

here, Dr. Sherman, does she?

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SOUDER. Let the record show that all the witnesses have answered in the affirmative.

OK, we are going to start with the Reverend Barry Lynn, the Executive Director for the Separation of Church and State. Thank you

for coming today.

STATEMENTS OF REV. BARRY LYNN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,

AMERICANS UNITED FOR THE SEPARATION OF CHURCH

AND STATE; HOLLY HOLLMAN, GENERAL COUNSEL, BAPTIST

JOINT COMMITTEE; NATHAN DIAMENT, DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC POLICY, UNION OF ORTHODOX JEWISH CONGREGATIONS OF AMERICA; REV. WILSON GOODE, SENIOR ADVISOR

ON FAITH-BASED INITIATIVES FOR PUBLIC/PRIVATE VENTURES; AND STEVE FITZHUGH, DIRECTOR, THE HOUSE

Reverend LYNN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Cummings.

President Bush’s faith-based initiative strikes at the very heart of

the separation of church and State in America. This is a system

which literally merges the institutions of religion and government

in the delivery of social services. It forces taxpayers to support religions with which they may not agree, jeopardizes the well-being of

the disadvantaged in America, and subsidizes discrimination in

hiring with public funds.

Speaking recently in New Orleans, President Bush expressed his

desire to fund programs that, in his words, save Americans one

soul at a time. There the President certainly sounded more like a

pastor than a President. And in fact, neither the Chief Executive

nor Congress were elected to convert people or to promote religion.

That is not your or their responsibility.

We continue to careen dangerously down the path of governmentsupported religion and Congress has a responsibility now to apply

the brakes. The Bush administration’s course is especially reckless,

given that prior practices already allowed faith-based groups to

work with government to offer social services of many kinds. These

groups merely had to comply with the same commonsense rules

that all publicly funded groups must follow. There was no distinction. There was no discrimination.

This initiative, however, presents three very specific problems

that I would like to address.

First, the initiative will lead to government-funded religious

evangelism. The President has repeatedly stated his desire to fund

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groups that permeate their programs with an all-encompassing religious element. In fact, he often argues that this religious component is exactly what makes these programs successful. However,

actions speak louder than words, and claims by this administration

that tax funds will not be used to promote the spread of religion,

frankly, at this juncture in the program, ring very hollow. His proposed legislative language forbids tax support being used for sectarian activities, but frankly I’ve come to believe that is mere verbiage that will not be enforced in any meaningful fashion. The potential recipients, by the way, of government largesse can see

through this ruse. Indeed, according to media reports, one recent

audience actually laughed when the President noted that they, of

course, couldn’t use taxpayer money to proselytize. They understood exactly what he meant. People in desperate need of social

services should not have to face the prospect of unwanted religious

coercion as the price of getting help from their government.

Second, this initiative will foster taxpayer-funded religious discrimination. The Federal Government has a decades-old national

policy of forbidding government funds to promote any form of discriminatory employment practices. Every poll I’ve seen shows that

the American people do not believe that faith-based groups should

be able to get tax dollars and then turn around and engage in discrimination when hiring staff to provide what, remember, are supposed to be non-religious services. The public apparently does not

want America’s civil rights laws placed on the chopping block in

the false name of a false form of religious liberty. And this is no

theoretical concern. As recently as last month, the Salvation Army

in New York was sued by former and current employees who allege

religious discrimination. Were the Salvation Army privately funded, of course, this would not be an issue. It is an issue, however,

because the Salvation Army in New York alone gets millions of dollars every year, courtesy of the taxpayer. Not surprisingly, those

taxpayers want transparency, accountability, and fundamental fairness.

Finally, the faith-based initiative encourages the government to

play favorites among religions and this indeed is a very dangerous

game to play, one which is very likely to increase interfaith tensions by spurring religious groups to engage in unhealthy forms of

competition for very limited tax funding. The administration, of

course, denies this as well, but already we have seen evidence to

the contrary. Nearly all of the money disbursed under various

faith-based initiative programs to date has gone to Christian

groups, including one grant to television preacher Pat Robertson’s

controversial Operation Blessing. James Towey, the Director of the

White House Office on Faith-based Initiatives, said last year that

Wiccan modern-day pagans are unlikely to get any aid because

they are a, ‘‘fringe group whose members lack a loving heart.’’

What is that if not rank bigotry on the part of a government official

administering this very program?

The preservation of separation of church and State and the idea

that we do not use tax dollars to discriminate are vital to the

American experiment. The faith-based initiative is a highly controversial experiment on our liberties. Our founders would know

exactly why it is wrong, as President James Madison would not

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even allow the government to give an Episcopal church here in

Washington official corporate status, noting that the church should

care for the poor. There was no tax money involved in that, but

even the symbolic union of church and State was too much for

President Madison. Churches, he said, don’t need authority from

the government to care for those in need. In his writings James

Madison, the father of the Constitution, bitterly denounced government funding of religion. He warned against the government employing religion as an engine of civil policy, calling it an unhallowed perversion of the means of salvation. Those strong words are

words that we should all remember as we discuss the faith-based

initiative.

For the last number of years I’ve worked with His Honor Mayor

Goode on a joint project started initially by Senator Rick Santorum

and former Senator Harris Wofford, and one of the things that we

agreed about that is so central to all of this discussion is that we

know there are people in need. That is not in question. The only

question is how to better deliver meaningful and responsive benefits to the people who are homeless, who are hungry, who are disheartened by their piece of the American experience. And I just

think it is absolutely unconscionable that the wealthiest country on

the history of the planet Earth is now facing a battle where some

religious providers are battling with other religious providers, all

of them battling with secular providers, to get the crumbs from the

budgetary table. That, I’d like to think every person on this panel

would agree, is an inexcusable moral disgrace for America. Thank

you very much.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Reverend Lynn follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Ms. Hollman, who is the general counsel for the

Baptist Joint Committee.

Ms. HOLLMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Cummings.

On behalf of the Baptist Joint Committee, a nearly 70-year-old religious liberty organization dedicated to the promotion and protection of religious freedom, I submit that the faith-based initiative is

riddled with legal and practical problems. Our concerns are not

new. We’ve actually monitored charitable choice and related proposals concerning the funding of religious institutions since 1995.

Nor are our concerns trivial. They are fundamental to religious liberty. They stem from our theology, our historical experience, and

our respect for the Constitutional standards that have long protected the religious rights of Americans.

From the founding of our country, Baptists have opposed the use

of tax dollars to advance religion. Why? Because we believe that

when government funds religion it violates the conscience of taxpayers who rightfully deserve to expect the government to remain

neutral in religious matters.

Government always seeks to control what it funds, and government subsidization of religion diminishes religion’s historic independence and integrity. When the government advances religion in

this way, it inevitably becomes entangled with religious practice,

divides citizens along religious lines and prefers some citizens,

some religions, over others. There’s an overarching problem here.

There’s an inherent conflict between allowing religious social service providers that receive government funding to maintain their

distinctive character, practice, and expression and enforcing a Constitutional prohibition against government funding of religious activities such as proselytization, instruction, worship. Either we risk

violations or we invite entanglement.

I want to address two specific legal issues. First, the initiative

as reflected in the December 2002 Executive order and guidance to

faith-based organizations purports to throw open the doors wide for

government contracting for any religious organization, regardless of

their character. It also disregards time-honored Constitutional protections. The initiative abandons the traditional religious affiliate

model, a model that allows religious organizations to partner with

government in ways that protect their integrity and avoid the risk

of government-funded religion. Under the administration’s new approach, the only restriction imposed by the establishment clause is

that government money cannot be used directly for inherently religious activities. The administration’s guidance casually explains,

don’t be put off by the term, inherently religious activities. It’s simply a phrase that has been used by the courts in church-State

cases. Basically it means you can’t use part of the direct grant to

fund worship, instruction, or proselytization. This simple advice

does not accurately reflect the law.

While there is no doubt that religious organizations can participate with government to provide social services, indeed there’s a

Supreme Court case going back to, I believe, 1899 that supports

that proposition. The Supreme Court has not held that any religious entity, regardless of its practice and expression, including

houses of worship, can receive government funding without violating the Constitution. Nor has the establishment clause been reVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:01 Oct 05, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00046 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\95779.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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stricted to this short list of violations for religious worship, instruction, or proselytization. These regulations simply do not capture

the full meaning of the establishment clause prohibition on government-funded religion. The regulations unnecessarily leave open

and, in fact, encourage the risk that government will fund programs with explicitly religious content and will promote religion.

The second legal issue concerns employment discrimination in

government-funded positions. The legal conflict between the Nation’s commitment to equal employment, non-discrimination and

federally funded programs, and the autonomy of religious organizations that arises in this faith-based initiative has been a major part

of the debate and one of the main reasons that the legislation

failed before Congress. Despite the obvious conflict, the administration’s guidelines give a false impression that religious discrimination in government-funded programs is not only legal, when the

only Federal case actually goes the other way, but it also gives the

impression, incredibly, that such discrimination is necessary in

order to serve people through these programs.

Title VII’s statutory exemption for religious organizations does

not mention, nor does the legislative history indicate, that the

drafters contemplated the exemption’s application in the context of

federally funded job positions.

Important practical consequences flow from these legal issues.

The core values of church-State separation, which protects religious

entities, and non-discrimination, are being eroded through changes

to administrative regulations. Churches and other religious organizations are enticed into acting in unlawful ways. The administration is inviting greater participation by faith-based organizations

and federally funded programs under rules that make them targets

for legal challenges. Religious organizations are being encouraged

to disregard non-discrimination laws and to proceed in ways that

compromise their integrity.

How can claims that the initiative is successful be taken seriously when so little is revealed about where the money is going and

how it is being spent? Without legally sound regulations and without real oversight, it is reasonable to assume that money will be

improperly used to promote religion and to fund employment positions restricted on the basis of religion.

Reports that government funding of religious organizations is increasing, such as the recent Washington Post article saying that

$1.1 billion was now being spent on religious groups, would be of

no consequence if adequate Constitutional safeguards were in

place. Alarm is warranted, however, when such money is being distributed without respect for our Constitutional safeguards and with

the implicit approval of government funding for the promotion of

religion and discrimination based upon religion. Thank you.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Hollman follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Our next witness is Nathan Diament. He is director

of public policy for the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of

America.

Mr. DIAMENT. Thank you, Chairman Souder and Ranking Member Cummings, for the opportunity to address you today. The

UOJCA is a non-partisan organization in its second century of

serving the Jewish community and is the largest orthodox Jewish

umbrella organization in the United States, representing nearly

1,000 synagogues and their many members nationwide.

I’ll try to touch on some of the issues that have already been

raised and just summarize my written testimony which you have

before you.

First, a couple of legal issues. The first is the legality of government actions undertaken pursuant to the initiative under the most

recent interpretations of the Constitution. The second issue relates

to the religious liberty protections afforded to faith-based agencies

and their beneficiaries respectively.

But underlying both of these important legal discussions is a

more fundamental and philosophical discussion about the role of

religious institutions in American society and the unprecedented,

highly disturbing efforts to undermine the longstanding liberties

and protections afforded to these institutions.

Mr. Chairman and Mr. Cummings, there has been a good deal

of progress under the aegis of the faith-based initiative. But as is

often the case, there is a great deal of promise which remains to

be fulfilled.

First let me briefly comment about the progress. After President

Bush launched his initiative in the first month of his administration, I’d suggest to you it became a political Rorschach test, one of

those ink blot tests, with some projecting their worst fears upon it.

And in fact this initiative does raise complex and critical questions,

Constitutional questions and others. But this should really provide

an opportunity for cool-headed discussion rather than overheated

fear-mongering.

The debate, as you know, became so heated that the initiative,

which was previously a bipartisan initiative passed on bipartisan

votes in previous Congresses and which both Presidential candidates in the 2000 election agreed upon, became one that only garnered a narrow party-line vote in this House and was promptly

stalled in the Senate.

But, as you know, the legislative deadlock just transferred the

issue over to the executive branch, and they have undertaken important efforts which have resulted in significant progress. These

efforts have resulted in important reforms which have not only

opened up Federal grants programs which support social welfare

projects, but have also brought real equity into an array of critical

Federal programs throughout the government.

And I’d like to give you two brief examples.

The first is, in the year 2000, a severe earthquake struck the

northwestern United States and among the scores of damaged

buildings and homes was the Seattle Hebrew Academy. Like all

those who suffered, this school, a Jewish community school, applied

to the Federal Emergency Management Agency for financial disaster relief. Despite meeting every other eligibility criteria having

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nothing to do with religion whatsoever, FEMA denied the Hebrew

academy funds because of its status as a religious institution.

Many of us were shocked to learn about this FEMA policy. The

earthquake did not seem to discriminate when it knocked down the

office buildings and the houses and also knocked down the Seattle

Hebrew Academy, and we thought it was inappropriate for FEMA

to discriminate in its distribution of Federal disaster relief.

Thankfully, the equal treatment philosophy that animates the

faith-based initiative prompted the Bush administration to review

and then reverse by Executive order this policy of FEMA, and no

longer will religious facilities, whether they are schools, churches,

synagogues or what have you, be denied their equitable share of

Federal disaster aid should a disaster befall them.

A similar issue arose within the Interior Department. There’s a

program called Save America’s Treasures which was established in

1998 as a public-private partnership between the Interior Department’s National Park Service and the National Trust for Historic

Preservation, and they give out grants to assist historically

landmarked sites with their upkeep and preservation costs. But

prior to 2003, hundreds of religiously affiliated historic sites in this

country were ineligible to apply on the basis of their religious status alone. So whether it was the Old North Church in Boston, the

Touro Synagogue in Rhode Island, or countless others around the

country, they were ineligible for this program. This too seemed discriminatory and unfair.

The competitive, religion-neutral grants process is designed to

ensure America’s important architectural treasures are preserved

for generations to come. And a 2003 study by the National Trust

found the average historic congregation faces up to $2 million of repair costs just by virtue of being a historically landmarked facility.

Again the administration reviewed and reversed this practice, and

now religious landmarks are not given favored status over non-religious landmarks, but they are treated equally with their secular

counterparts.

Now, each of these policy changes is well grounded in detailed

legal analysis, some of which I’ll touch upon. But, more importantly, what’s at their core is that they understand that the Constitution’s Establishment Clause, its prescription against the establishment of religion, is not a license for government discrimination

against religions but an insistence upon government neutrality toward religion.

While some continue to contend that this understanding of the

Constitution’s religious clause is incorrect, these critics are in fact

outside the main stream of current Constitutional thinking, as evidenced by nothing less than the Supreme Court’s most recent rulings involving religious jurisprudence handed down less than 30

days ago. In this case, in the case of Locke v. Davey decided just

last month, the court reviewed a Washington State scholarship program which awarded scholarships to high school graduates based

upon religiously neutral criteria, and a student that had wanted to

attend an accredited Christian college and met all of the other criteria was denied his scholarship because he was going to major in

devotional theology. He sued the State of Washington and said the

Free Exercise Clause demanded that he be awarded his criteria.

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Now, in fact, the Supreme Court rejected this claim. It said the

Free Exercise Clause did not result in his being able to trump

Washington State’s Constitutional ban on the scholarship. But although the court rejected his claim, the claim by the student, all

nine justices unanimously endorsed the proposition that there is no

doubt that the State could, consistent with the Federal Constitution, permit recipients of a government scholarship to pursue a degree in devotional theology or engage in other religious activities.

I’ll briefly say that other recent Supreme Court decisions, whether it’s the 2001 case of the Good News Club v. Milford Central

School or the 2000 case of Mitchell v. Helms, all support this proposition that government neutrality toward religion is the central

animating principle of the establishment clause. And that is also,

I would submit to you, the central animating principle of the faithbased initiative.

I see I have run a bit over on time so I will wait for your questions to remark on the free exercise considerations with regard to

program beneficiaries and faith-based institutions, and I look forward to doing that.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Diament follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. And as I said at the beginning, all the full statements will be inserted into the record, and if you have additional

information.

Next we’ll hear from Dr. Wilson Goode, senior advisor on faithbased initiatives for Public/Private Ventures. Appreciate your distinguished leadership for many years in Philadelphia and thank

you for coming today.

Reverend GOODE. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and Mr.

Cummings. I’m delighted to be here and to really be a part——

Mr. SOUDER. You need to tap your mic on, I think. There’s a little button.

Reverend GOODE. You want me to start over again? Give me my

time back.

Mr. Chairman, and Mr. Cummings, I am delighted to be here

and to be a part of this distinguished panel. I have submitted a

more lengthy testimony, but I will just summarize mine and not

read it.

I speak in favor of faith-based initiatives. And I do so based upon

35 years of experience working with faith-based groups in order to

deliver services using government funds. Thirty-five years ago, as

a housing consultant working in Philadelphia, I was able to work

with 50 local congregations in that city to build more than 2,000

housing units that help low- and moderate-income families to alleviate their problems.

Second, I speak as a former mayor of the fourth largest city:

Philadelphia, PA. During my tenure as mayor, each year for 8

years we gave at least $40 million in contracts to local congregations and faith-based groups in order to help the homeless and the

hungry, those with AIDS, and help those to build housing for lowand moderate-income families.

And, finally, in the last 3 years I have worked with a group

called Public/Private Ventures and run a program called AMACHI.

I went to a local prison during my first year and found a grandfather, a father, and a grandson, all in the same jail at the same

time. And they met for the first time in jail. And the grandson,

when I was leaving, pulled me aside and said to me, I have a son

that I have not seen. And I guess I will see him for the first time

in jail.

The prospect of four generations being in jail is a problem that

we have faced, that we are faced with and that we try to address

through the AMACHI program. The AMACHI program is a faithbased program, a performance-based program, and a program designed to find volunteers from local congregations to mentor children who have one or both parents in jail. On any given day in

America, 7.3 million children have one or both parents either in jail

or under some type of Federal or State supervision. Seventy percent of those young people, children, will end up in jail themselves

according to a U.S. Senate report. We believed that intervening

with a partnership between Big Brothers, Big Sisters, and the

faith-based community was the best way to do so.

In the last 3 years, we have served more than 725 children, and

from those children, two-thirds of them have seen an increase in

academics, increase in their attendance at school, and a decrease

in their behavior in school. We believe that faith-based organizaVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:01 Oct 05, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00078 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\95779.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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tions have every right to participate with these funds and to be

provided these funds in order to begin to bring about a basic and

fundamental change in the lives of these young people.

This program now is in at least 25 other cities across the country, working with faith-based organizations, working with local congregations, finding volunteers, and the reason for this is that the

children are located in the zip codes where the churches are. And

therefore, we want to make sure that these zip codes where these

churches are and these young people are come together in order to

begin to solve these problems.

Just a final comment, and that is that as I have listened to my

colleagues speak on this issue, and I have listened to this for about

35 years now, and they have a good point. But I think a more fundamental point is that there are people out there every single day

suffering, and the secular community has not been able to meet

those needs.

I believe we need everyone, faith-based, secular, everyone else

out there, working in order to try and alleviate the social illness

that we find within our community. I’ve seen tremendous, tremendous results from this one program, and there are many others

that I can talk about during the course of the questions. Thank you

very much.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you for your testimony.

[The prepared statement of Reverend Goode follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Our next witness is Mr. Steve Fitzhugh, director of

the House.

Mr. FITZHUGH. Good morning. It’s been nearly 5 years since we

first opened the House. I can recall the motivation. I still sense it

and feel it every day as I drive through southeast Washington, DC.

As a national youth communicator, I have been in front of over a

million teenagers in America and abroad, while as a co-founding

president of the House I serve some of the most at-risk of these

teens in one of our countries most underserved communities: Anacostia, southeast Washington, DC. In fact, the risk factors are

many. The poverty level is high and the violence is always threatening.

The question became: How do we reach and impact the

unreachable? I have a colleague, Darrell Green, who does it but he

targets primarily elementary students. Another colleague and partner, Art Monk, he does it; but his students must have a certain

grade point average to qualify.

Who will provide a haven, a safe haven where any high school

student can come? The House began as that entity. We are a place

where any high school student can come and we’ll say, you are welcome. The House is a surrogate home in the community where 80

percent of the families are headed by a single mom. It is a place

not only for unconditional love and nurturing, but also a place for

life direction and purpose.

In my constant struggle to fund this project, a grant writer once

suggested that we remove certain barriers to funding, specifically

our ardent faith-based posture. She continued to inquire as to why

we have chosen not to amend our vision so we can enjoy more funding. I found myself digging deep for the answer, which became so

plain in time. We are faith-based because we have discovered that

it is not merely a new program or a new curriculum students need

most, but a new heart. We are hope merchants. We restore dreams

and invoke destiny.

Just ask Nina. Nina became so distraught, never met her father

till she was in high school. Her mom still struggles with substance

use and abuse. She was held back a grade in high school. She had

one brother murdered in the 10th grade, another brother murdered

in the 11th grade. But 1 day this wounded heart came into the

House. She encountered the House. And that’s what the House is,

an encounter. There’s a computer lab, a weight room, a fitness center, state-of-the-art recording studio, and dinner is served every

night. Our philosophy is simple: Create a moment for life change

and God can change any life in a moment. Nina changed. She went

to night school, caught up with her class, and last June she cried

when she walked from one edge of that stage to the other and accepted her high school diploma.

Jason, by his own confession, his entire family is drug dealers

and murderers. Five years ago he was caught up in a game. His

goal was to have sex with a different virgin every day. Upon hearing him speak today of his values and goals and responsibilities as

a father, you could never imagine the conversation I had when I

initially met Jason before he encountered a faith-based program

called the House.

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There are others with similar stories, like Tabitha, Dominick,

Donnell, and Ruby. I had that story, too. I saw my mother die of

cancer. She was a chain smoker. My oldest brother, my hero, well

he died of cocaine abuse. I have a sister who abused drugs and is

now an invalid at 48. I have yet another brother who struggles

today with alcohol and chemical culture, all of these things that so

often ensnare young black men.

But how did I escape? How did I get the full scholarship to college? How did I end up in the NFL? How did I get the wife and

family I have today and the knowledge of what it takes to be a

man? I had an encounter with God. I discovered my purpose and

my reason for being, and it changed my life.

Students don’t care how much you know until they know how

much you care, and at the House we care. And so I brought with

me today one of our students, the hardest of the hard for us to

reach. Nobody would ever touch this guy. His name is Mike. I

brought him with me in memory through something I wrote about

him called ‘‘Destiny.’’ If Mike had just 2 minutes to share with you,

this is what Mike would say:

I can’t hardly see the light of day. Misery stay in my way. Still I dreamed to be

free, like them boys on my TV. But every day is just the same. I got nothing but

pain on top of pain. I can’t escape this hopeless dream. I open my mouth but cannot

scream, so here I am, me and my crew, not knowing what we ought to do. The

street’s our only road. No other life to use we told.

Poverty ain’t nothing new. That’s all I knew since I was two. Mom’s did the best

she could struggling down here in the ’hood. I’m steady hating that deadbeat dad.

Disappointment’s all I had. I gotta face the dreadful fact my daddy’s never coming

back.

Now I gotta be a man all on my own, yet they don’t want me acting grown. Street

soldiers popping is that glock, young ’uns dying up on my block. I’m scared to close

my eyes tonight cuz I’m feeling like something just ain’t right. Still I’m trying to

speak my heart. Too bad your fear keeps us apart. I can’t believe it till I hear it.

I can’t hear it till you tell it.

If the truth is what you preach, why don’t you help this brother reach my destiny?

Cuz I reminisce about all these scars. It’s like I’m in prison, they my bars. I’m

locked away from the joys of life. Am I destined for streets and strife? Am I ever

gon’ win a wife. Ever gon’ have the pain-free life, ever gon’ travel around the world?

Will I get another chance to raise my girl? Will I ever sleep without this hunger?

Makes me wonder, makes me wonder why I live in so much pain. Will I lose my

mind, will I go insane? And when I hear the final bell, will it be heaven, will it

be hell? Will I die when I’m in my prime? Can I ever renew my mind? Is there a

God that can forgive all the wickedness I did, because I can’t forgive my thuggish

self?

Got too much pride to cry for help. Facts too hard for me to admit, if it don’t fit

you must acquit. But if my record is true and right, I ought to be serving double

life. They should have throwed away the jailhouse key for the sins locked up inside

of me. No solution for my drama, I’m too old to run to mama. I want to change,

but how? Do I pray it? How many times I gotta say it? You got sight, why can’t

you see it? Without you, will I ever achieve it? My destiny.

So I choose to go on. Gotta survive, gotta stay strong. How many times I said

that’s it. How many times I wanted to quit. Like when Shorty broke my heart. I

was true blue right from the start. Why me, I had to plead. Gave love a chance and

still I bleed. Regret I wasted time. True that all the blame was mine.

They tell me today’s another day. They say it’s not too late to change. They say

I can still redeem my life. They say there’s a way to walk upright. But when I close

my eyes real tight, I’m still seeing demons in the night.

I’m ready to pay about any price just to get some peace back in my life. Like the

time when we was young, me and my homies, just having fun. Sometimes I wanna

go back when. Sometimes I wanna just start again. No more thug life under them

street lights. No more sadness, no more sin.

Wish you could help me find my way, ’cuz I’m living in fear of Judgment Day.

Even the clock’s my enemy, ’cuz everybody dying look just like me. It’s like my grip

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is about to slip. It’s like I’m down to my last clip. Darkened shadows, but they was

mine. Don’t let me die before I find my destiny.

Mike was the one that got away. He was murdered 3 days before

his 19th birthday. I never got to recite that poem to him that I

wrote about him. Those who are closest to the water have the

greatest sense of urgency for the need for a bigger boat. That’s

what they said in Jaws, ‘‘We need a bigger boat.’’ We need funding,

we need resources, we need tools to touch lives. Thank you.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you very much for your testimony and your

passion.

Doctor Amy Sherman has arrived. I need to swear you in as I

did the earlier witnesses. If you’ll stand and raise your right hand.

[Witness sworn.]

Mr. SOUDER. Let the record show that she responded in the affirmative. Doctor Amy Sherman is director of the Hudson Institute

Faith-in-Communities Program.

STATEMENT OF DR. AMY SHERMAN, DIRECTOR, HUDSON

INSTITUTE FAITH-IN-COMMUNITIES PROGRAM

Ms. SHERMAN. I have been asked today to provide some general

observations from the front lines about the impact of the faithbased community initiative, and with a couple of background remarks I will begin.

As has probably already been said, the initiative’s ultimate objective is to ensure that the disadvantaged receive the best services.

And it seeks to accomplish this through three principal means:

eliminating barriers in procurements policies; creating a level playing field for faith-based and community organizations to compete

on equal terms with secular groups; and better using and empowering and collaborating with grassroots and faith-based organizations. And the centers of the various Federal Cabinet departments

play key roles in advancing those objectives.

I think at least three key questions could be asked to help us assess whether they’ve done a good job. The first is, has the initiative

stimulated Federal administrative reform to knock down barriers?

Answer, yes. The Cabinet centers have been engines of administrative reform. They have reviewed departmental policies and identified barriers and proposed new regulations. Thus far, four agency

rules have been enacted and eight new ones are awaiting finalization.

Second assessment question: Has the initiative led to increased

funding of faith-based groups or new special projects? Answer, yes.

You can read the details in my written testimony.

Third. Has the initiative influenced State and local policies toward faith-based groups? I think this is important. If the vast majority of Federal social spending unfolds through block and formula

grants to States and localities, then the full promise of the faithbased initiative can’t be reached unless change occurs at the State

and local levels. So has it. And overall I would say that we have

seen an encouraging amount of change, but more progress is needed.

At the Hudson Institute we have conducted a couple of studies

that indicate that State and local governments do increasingly appear to be contracting with faith-based organizations. Also a major

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study by the Rockefeller Institute has identified 11 different ways

that States are engaged in reconstituting their relationships with

faith-based providers. And 50 percent of the States for which data

was available to the Rockefeller researchers had engaged in at

least 3 of those 11 types of activities. They also concluded that

more demonstrable activity has occurred in the States since 2001

than had following the passage of the charitable choice rules in

1996, which suggests that the administration’s efforts have indeed

enjoyed a degree of success in influencing State action. I think it

is also notable that 19 States and 180 mayors have established

faith-based offices.

Let me conclude by mentioning several practical consequences of

the faith-based initiative ‘‘on the ground’’ that I think are relevant

any assessment of the initiative.

The first is that clients have more options. Since faith-based organizations that previously had no history of government contracting are now serving as service providers, there is a broader network in place. It also means that people of faith can now turn to

faith-based organizations that share that faith to receive services.

Second, the initiative might lead to an increase in the quantity

of social service programs, for example, as a result of the activities

underway through the Compassion Capital Fund.

Third, government funding of faith-based organizations has

sometimes had the positive benefit of better connecting faith-based

groups to the broader network of social service providers. In that

way faith-based groups gain knowledge of additional resources in

the community and that enables them to better serve their own clients.

Fourth, increased participation by faith-based organizations in

public funded social service programs has led to the mobilization

of previously untapped human resources, which I think Mayor

Goode was referring to. Public officials around the country are discovering that collaboration with the faith sector is helping them to

provide more affordable housing, move more people from welfare to

work, and decrease youth violence.

Fifth, faith-based groups are in some instances serving as credible portals into needy immigrant communities and ethnic communities that government agencies desire to reach but don’t always

know how to reach.

And finally, increased government and faith-based collaboration

on the ground brings faith leaders and public officials into new relationships, fostering greater trust and dialog. That can be very important when potentially explosive issues like police brutality

erupt.

In short, I’d say that these new relationships fostered through

the faith-based initiative are strengthening social capital in local

communities around the country. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Sherman follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. I thank you each for your testimony and we’ll go

through a number of questions here.

First, because this has come up a number of times, I want to

clarify based on my perception and what we have said in our hearings and as we have moved through Congress, no faith-based organization that is receiving government grants, is practicing racial

discrimination because they come under that law, is that correct?

Does anybody disagree that the religious organization that practices racial discrimination could not get a grant?

Reverend LYNN. I am not 100 percent sure about that and I

haven’t been from the beginning, because if the religious tenet of

the organization, if someone believes in whatever their religious

viewpoint is that race discrimination plays a role in their theology,

I’m not convinced that they would not be able to make that claim

under the President’s program. Whether it would be successful, I

would hope not. But certainly, it’s not precluded from this, the language that I see in these program guidelines.

Mr. SOUDER. That’s certainly precluded in the laws that we’ve

passed in Congress. In other words, as an author of four of those,

I know we had working relations with Bobby Scott, specific clauses

that says in the ones in welfare reform and the others, that you

cannot practice racial discrimination. Now, there was a question if

somebody challenged that. But that’s a different matter because

that’s not being initiated by Congress. If somebody tried to practice

it, then the question would be with the court.

Mr. Goode. Reverend Goode.

Reverend GOODE. Yes. I think that anyone who receives government funds ought to play by the same rules all the other groups

play by, and certainly anyone who is a faith-based organization

ought to have the same criteria. In fact, when I go around the

country and talk with groups about implementing a faith-based

program, I tell them that the rules are all the same. The rules are

all the same for everybody.

What faith-based groups want is a level playing field, to be able

to participate on the same basis that anyone else participates in,

in terms of receiving money to help alleviate the suffering of people

in communities where these organizations are located. And that’s

the basis of my view. And if they discriminate, take the funds from

them. But don’t throw out the baby with the bath water.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Diament.

Mr. DIAMENT. If I could just comment on what Mayor Goode just

said. I think there are two ways to look at the question. One way

to look at the question is if you want to say it’s an equal treatment

principle, as Mayor Goode has just described; then you don’t frame

it in religious terms per se. But you can say, look, just like other

ideologically oriented organizations, whether it’s Planned Parenthood or the National Rifle Association or the Sierra Club or whoever, if they have an ideological philosophy that animates their organization, they are entitled to, and it’s protected by the first

amendment under freedom of association, they are entitled to hire

people that believe in their ideological philosophy. The NRA does

not have to hire people that believe in gun control. Planned Parenthood does not have to hire pro-lifers, and so on and so forth. So

if you want to frame it as an equal treatment question, then reliVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:01 Oct 05, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00102 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\95779.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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gious organizations should have the same freedom of association

rights as the NRA and Planned Parenthood and so on and so forth.

But really it goes one step further. It goes to the fact that the

architects of our modern civil rights laws, the framers of the Civil

Rights Act of 1964, they are the ones that put into that law the

unique exemption for religious organizations, having an exemption

from the regular categories of employment discrimination insofar

as religious faith or religious adherence is concerned. And obviously

the original impetus for that was so that a synagog shouldn’t be

subjected to a Federal lawsuit because they don’t allow Catholic

priests to interview and apply and interview for their pulpit positions. They should be entitled to just interview and hire rabbis and

not have to be threatened with a lawsuit for employment discrimination.

Insofar as this has been addressed on broader questions beyond

the pulpit, in the Amos case, which you, Mr. Chairman, mentioned,

all of the justices, all nine of them including Thurgood Marshall

and William Brennan, all believed that the Title VII exemption

was a direct and necessary corollary to the free exercise clause of

the first amendment. And that is why, quite frankly, it’s politically

useful for the critics of this initiative to wave the flag of discrimination in these debates, but it’s really inappropriate and illogical

because, I would submit to you and to Mr. Cummings with all due

respect, that it shouldn’t make a dime’s worth of difference whether

taxpayer funding is involved or not.

My understanding, and I would respectfully defer to Mr.

Cummings and others, but my understanding of the modern civil

rights movement in the 1960’s was that movement was not about

combating racial discrimination only in taxpayer-funded programs.

It was about lunch counters. It was about motels. It was about all

kinds of places of private accommodation. Anywhere the law could

reach to root out insidious racial discrimination was the goal of the

civil rights movement. They didn’t restrict themselves to taxpayerfunded religious discrimination.

So if in fact Mr. Lynn and others are correct, that this practice

of religious institutions enjoying the right to structure themselves

is the very same kind of insidious and objectionable and offensive

discrimination as was combated in the 1960’s civil rights movement, then they should be logically consistent. And they should

say, you know what? We don’t want to only ban when taxpayer

funding is involved. We want to go and order churches and synagogues and every other house of worship, whether they are only

working on their own congregants’ dollars and dimes or not, and

we’re going to order them to desegregate, we’re going to start busing people between houses of worship and so on and so forth, just

like we did to root out inappropriate racial discrimination.

We are going to remove tax-exempt status from all of these institutions of bigotry. But that is not what they are saying. I don’t

know if it is just tactical, because that is obviously not what most

people in this country would endorse or, in fact, they really do understand that there is a difference here. And the real difference

here goes back to what I said at the outset.

Religious groups are potentially the most fluid and open in our

society. They are concerned about what you believe and what you

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practice. So you have synagogues that can have Asians and Hispanics, you have churches that have Whites and Blacks and

browns, and so on and so forth. It is not about race, it is not about

ethnicity, it is about belief.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Lynn, I would like you to comment on that also.

Do you agree with the fundamental principle that Planned Parenthood doesn’t have to hire a pro-lifer, NRA doesn’t have to hire

someone who disagrees with them, an environmental group doesn’t

have to hire, if they get government funds.

Reverend LYNN. Of course. Well, I do think that people are hired

for jobs. That is to say, if someone is going to be in a federally

funded program at the National Rifle Association, let’s assume for

the sake of argument that there is such a program, obviously if the

person is a gun control advocate or one who wants to ban all guns,

it would not make sense for someone to promote a lawful point of

view.

Mr. SOUDER. Can I clarify that and make sure that we are on

the same page? If the NRA got, not an advocacy grant, but a grant,

say, to do training of gun safety where advocacy isn’t the issue,

would they still have the right of association to only have people

who agreed with their position to do something that wasn’t advocacy?

Reverend LYNN. Sure, because there is not a long history of discrimination as there is a long history of discrimination on the basis

of race, of religion, of gender in this country. They would have the

right to make those decisions. But, again the person would have to

be qualified for the job, and presumably that would make the most

likely person the most likely to be hired.

The difference in these programs is that, let us leave the race

issue aside for a moment, but all of the regulations, including the

legislation passed by this House in the old version of H.R. 7, would

effectively permit, just for the sake of argument again, a fundamentalist Christian group from putting on its job applications

‘‘No atheists or Jews need apply.’’ And it would be permissible,

under the theory that Diament has just expressed, for an organization to say, in order to maintain our integrity as a religious body,

we will discriminate.

And, in fact, we don’t have this as a theoretical program. A well

known psychotherapist in Georgia, for example, was refused to be

considered for a job by the Methodist Homes for Children in Georgia, precisely, and this is what he was told, and this is no big secret, because he was a Jew and they didn’t hire Jews.

I don’t think this is the kind of conduct that is consistent with

a responsible way to do Federal funding. If a religious organization

or any other organization receives Federal funding, I think it, at

a minimum, needs to abide by the basic civil rights principles long

fought for in this country, and I think there is a big difference between an ideological thought about gun control and the status of

your race, your religion, your national origin, and your gender.

Mr. SOUDER. Once again, I think it is really important that there

is a fundamental disagreement here, where my belief, and I believe

it has been expressed in the laws here and in the debate, is that

we are not debating race, gender or other discrimination laws, we

are debating religious questions.

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Nobody here is disputing that an Orthodox Jewish group that

has to hire a Baptist, in other words, that is a legitimate debate.

But raising the other questions are at best going to be court-decided. And the burden of proof is going to be on the court to argue

that, because the administration and Congress are not arguing that

those discriminations can be practiced.

Reverend LYNN. No. But, Mr. Chairman, the court has considered some of these issues. For example, in a privately funded

Roman Catholic school, there are a number of court opinions that

hold that a privately funded school can choose to fire a pregnant

single mother because that status is inconsistent with their moral

philosophy. That has been upheld because it was a privately funded religious group.

So the question is, if we are going to now treat publicly funded

religious groups in the same way, does that in fact mean that, it

appears on the face to mean, that now publicly funded groups can

discriminate on the basis of gender, if there is a religious hook on

which to hang that argument.

Mr. SOUDER. Of course, you are defining, because only one gender can become pregnant, that therefore that is discrimination by

gender, and not by a religious belief of not getting pregnant outside

of marriage. In that, it is important that we separate those two

types of things. In order words, that is exactly what the case in

San Francisco is dealing with on funding abortion, is an argument

on gender specific. Or, let’s say, it is at least indirectly related to

the argument that abortion and contraceptive devices are related

to gender discrimination as opposed to a moral discrimination,

which, of course, many religions don’t agree with.

Reverend LYNN. Well, Mr. Chairman, I agree with that. There

are two different issues. But I think that it is safe to say that the

courts have not looked at it necessarily that way but have looked

at it just as a matter of if the principle, the religiously based principle, says we do not want to have teachers who are pregnant and

not married, we can fire her. And those decisions have been

upheld.

With private funds, it is one argument. But once you start having public funds used for the purposes of, what I would consider

invidious discrimination, I think you have a whole change in the

moral and the Constitutional calculus that you need to apply in

this. I have to say the Catholic Charities case, I do not think, is

about the faith-based initiative.

California’s Catholic Charities did have its day in court. I believe

it lost 8 to 1. It argued that the California law exempting religious

organizations was too narrow and therefore violated religious liberty. The court did not agree with it. But that had really nothing

to do with the administration’s proposals, because even if the administration’s proposals became law, Catholic Charities would still

not qualify for an exemption under the reading of California law.

So that really I think is a red herring in the debate today or the

discussion today.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I want to thank all of you for your testimony. I

wanted to just go to Ms. Hollman, perhaps Mr. Lynn.

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As I was listening to Mr. Diament, and he raised the two cases,

the FEMA situation and the American Treasurer’s situation, can

you just comment on, you know, I noticed one interesting piece on

both of those cases. And I think you used the term ‘‘government

neutrality,’’ Mr. Diament.

And I was just, I mean, something that is sort of different about

those cases that I am sure you were making a different kind of

point, is this whole thing of, I guess, discrimination, say for example, in employment. A little different there.

But I would just like for you all to comment. I understand the

neutrality piece and everybody benefiting from government. I got

that. But I just want you to comment on those two cases, Mr. Lynn

or Ms. Hollman.

Ms. HOLLMAN. I can speak generally. I think Mr. Lynn can speak

to the FEMA issues probably more specifically.

The word ‘‘neutrality’’ is difficult, because on one level, it has

some truth and people can say that the court has applied a principle of neutrality. But it is not as broad, it is not as clear as it

seems.

At times, in order to treat religion neutrally, you have to recognize it and treat it differently. It is wrong to say that religion is

never treated differently. It is specifically, you know, specifically

treated differently in the first amendment, just as it is specifically

treated differently in Title VII, in this list of protected categories

that we talked about. It is not just like other ideologies.

So there is a basis for saying that religion can be treated differently from other secular enterprises. And as I understand the

change in law with regard to funding repairs for historic buildings,

or FEMA, or repairing after national disasters, you have had prior

law, interpretation of case law, that said that government is not required to fund the repair of buildings, just like it is not required

to build a synagog or church or school for an institution, even

though it needs the money. It is not required to repair that.

Now we have the administration that says, let’s look at this law

differently and see if we can allow the funding of that. And to do

that, they have to say they’re not funding anything explicitly religious, they are sticking to the building part of the program.

What is interesting is that those cases make the best—those examples make the best case for this neutrality principle. Treat everything the same. It is very different, I think, from what we are

talking about in the majority of the faith-based initiatives, where

there is a real risk of what is being funded actually having religious content, having the ability to promote a specific view of religion and advancing religious discrimination.

Reverend LYNN. Specifically, there are certain emergency services that have been provided by government historically and have

been permitted to go to religious institutions on the basis of kind

of an emergency claim. I can think, for example, of repayment to

churches that housed victims after a hurricane, or so on. So this

has been going for a long time and doesn’t represent nearly the

magnitude of the issue that is before us on those other programs.

Even in the comments that were published by various administration agencies, they seem to take a different viewpoint on this

issue of construction grants or repair grants for churches.

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The Save America’s Treasures Program is based, the funding of

certain historic buildings is based, on the idea that the law has

changed. There is an Office of Legal Counsel memo that says that

it has, although when you really look at it as I have done, it does

not make a very compelling case to overturn three big Supreme

Court decisions in the 1970’s that make it clear not only that government can’t—well, it makes it very clear that government cannot

provide funds if any part of the building that is being repaired or

constructed is going to be used for a religious purpose.

They don’t parse it up and say you can spend 30 percent of the

money if 30 percent of the tiles are walked on by religious people

and the 70 are not. They don’t do that. They just say it is a blanket

prohibition against using government funds for the construction of

religious buildings.

And indeed the comments of the Department of Housing and

Urban Development, recently published, do indicate that even in

that instance the administration would agree with me, or at least

in part with me, that government funds cannot be used to build

buildings.

When it comes to these very controversial matters like the construction projects at the Old North Church or the California Missions, I recently testified against an earmark grant in the Senate

for $10 million to California Missions.

Here are Missions, 19 of which are active congregations, Roman

Catholic congregations, 1 of which is 2,500 congregants. It seems

to me that when you combine that with the millions of visitors to

those California Missions, it is really not the goal or responsibility

of taxpayers to provide repairs to windows or icons out of tax dollars for active congregations.

So we have opposed the funding of active congregations, repair

of their windows, repair of their walls, not because we don’t care

about history but because we also care about the historic principle

that government is not the ultimate collector of the plate collections from the taxpayers to fund these buildings. So I think the

gentleman, Mr. Diament, is wrong in his sweeping interpretation

of these laws.

Mr. CUMMINGS. But even if your—what you just said—so I guess

you would not have a problem if in front of the church there was

a monument that was put up over 125 years ago and it became a

part of the American Treasurer’s portfolio to be repaired. That is

a little different than the stained glass windows in the church?

Is that a distinction there?

Reverend LYNN. I think that is an important distinction. Some

people have used it. We have never, to my knowledge, filed any

lawsuits or objections, particularly in those instances where properties are landmarked by the government. They didn’t even want

to be landmarked, they were landmarked, and they have all kinds

of new responsibilities. It is not effectively a religious icon, it is not

a religious artwork, it is not housing a congregation, it simply is

on church property. That I think is a very different Constitutional

issue.

Mr. CUMMINGS. To Mr. Fitzhugh, I appreciate what you said. I

was just sitting here thinking about when you were speaking. And

you too, Mayor Goode, Reverend Goode. I can understand—I have

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this saying that we have one life to live. This is no dress rehearsal,

and this is that life.

And I think that when we see what we see—I live in a neighborhood that produces the kind of young men that you just talked

about. And I guess the most compelling argument is that we need

to be about the business of saving lives and helping lives become

all that God meant for them to be.

Trying to—in other words, that same guy, like Dr. Ben Carson,

who practices medicine in Johns Hopkins in my district, here is a

man who could have easily been in a penitentiary. But because he

had certain opportunities and guidance and a turn in his life, he

is now one of the most—probably ranks within the top 10 neurosurgeons in the world.

So I think we will always have a fundamental argument about

how do we make sure that we do all we can for our fellow men and

women as we live?

But on the other hand, as I said in the opening statement, I

think we have to be very careful that when we save that person

or help them get to where they have to go, that we still have an

institution in this country where they can continue to thrive and

that respects other people’s rights.

And so it is tough when you have to face what—like you said,

Mayor, where you see this every day. You see the lives end up

being destroyed. You end up saying, is there something I can do

to help?

So I think that we have come up with solutions. It is just that

we don’t want the solution, part of the solution, to be discriminating against folks with their tax dollars. I mean I think you kind

of agree with me, I think.

Reverend GOODE. Well, I really don’t.

Mr. CUMMINGS. That is good.

Reverend GOODE. I really want to just say this——

Mr. CUMMINGS. But do you understand that I understand your

passion and Mr. Fitzhugh’s passion? I really do.

Reverend GOODE. I was the chief executive for 8 years; well actually that, plus city manager for 4 before that. So for 12 years I had

responsibility to provide services to people. And from a chief executive point of view, my job was to try and alleviate as much suffering as I could.

And so I used institutions within that city, including local congregations, because I needed them to deal with the problem of

homelessness. I needed them for shelters, I needed them for AIDS

hospices, needed them to help feed the hungry people in the city,

and any other agencies that could do what they could do in those

neighborhoods.

So from a practical point of view, I went to those agencies. And

my life has been spent basically doing practical things—and I love

to spend my time delving into the legal and research and all of

those issues, and I love people who do that. But that is not what

I do. What I try and do is find a workable, practical solution to a

problem that is eating away at the hearts of communities where

people live.

And along the way, there will be issues of discrimination, there

will be issues of fairness in some issues. But at some point, we

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have to stay really focused on how can we get moneys from foundations, from businesses, from government, into the hands of people

who are going to, in the end, want to help to alleviate the suffering

of people in these communities.

One last point. That is, that I grew up in the South. I was a

sharecropper. I know about discrimination. I hate discrimination.

And we could put a face of discrimination on this. And we could

have good sound arguments on both sides. And I think that there

will be some folks who will discriminate. But I think, sir, that we

can do a whole lot of good to a whole lot of folks without discrimination.

And I think that those who discriminate ought to be dealt with.

But we also ought to use the resources, in my view, to help those

who need it, and deal effectively with those who discriminate.

Mr. DIAMENT. If I can make a brief comment on the practical

point. I have been involved in this issue for quite some years. And

what is most disappointing to me is the tragedy of the opportunity

that was missed to get at what Mayor Goode has talked about

here. And what I mean about this here is the tragedy of the fact

that what was a more or less bipartisan initiative in previous years

and an opportunity in the last Congress, in the year 2000–2001, to

not only spur greater partnerships with government and community and faith-based groups on this issue, but actually it was an

opening for what I believe was an unprecedented coming together

of Republicans and Democrats, an infusion of new dollars in an unprecedented way into some of these social welfare programs in a

way that, quite frankly, a Republican administration and a Republican majority in Congress may not have otherwise been prepared

to do. But there were clear indications and public statements by

the President and by Republican leaders in this House and the

Senate that they were prepared to put more money on the table.

Because we all agree there is not enough money on the table. We

all agree that just redividing the pie is the wrong thing to do. The

pie has to be made 3 times, 4 times, 10 times bigger than it is for

the social welfare programs.

There was a moment when folks could have come together, we

could have pressed ahead in hashing out, negotiating some of these

tough Constitutional and other civil rights issues and moved ahead.

And the tragedy of partisan politics is what befell this initiative.

And, if I may, the one appeal I would make to you, Mr. Cummings,

and to Chairman Souder and to others is, probably not this year

because it is a very political year, but at some point we should

come back to this. And we should come back to this in a spirit of

hope rather than cynicism, and of discussion rather than debate,

and find a way to put both resources on the table and also empower new partnerships and really get to the people that Mr.

Fitzhugh and Mayor Goode have been talking about.

Reverend LYNN. Mr. Cummings, by the way, I think I did miss

that moment when anyone was talking seriously about refunding

programs tenfold for those in deepest need, although I would love

to go back to that moment, because I think that is exactly what we

need.

The other problem, and I have sat, Mr. Chairman, through a

number of these hearings over the past few years, repeatedly tryVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:01 Oct 05, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00109 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\95779.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ing to find answers that would justify the need for continuing this

discrimination possibility in government funding, and again this

morning, very moved by what Mr. Fitzhugh talks about in his program.

But why is it important, perhaps it isn’t for him, that he only be

allowed to hire Christians to serve the dinners, or to train young

people to use that recording studio in his facility? Why is it important that it be hiring on the basis of religion as a guarantee that

comes with that funding?

I simply don’t understand why Methodists should be expected to

change the sheets in a homeless shelter differently than non-believers, or Jews or Hindus. It is not part of my common experience in

working in any of these facilities or with any of these groups at

risk. It doesn’t make sense.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you.

Mr. SOUDER. I want to make a statement because you have referred to that before. And I have tried to be very cautious as we

worked through this. And I realize there are fundamental Constitutional questions involved. I realize there are. I apologize for not

saying ‘‘swear or affirm’’ in the oath this morning, because I always

affirm an oath, probably for different reasons than you do, but I

grew up in a very small separatist denomination and have great

skepticism about how we approach these types of issues.

But we have a lot of diversity in America. And what I don’t understand is your last statement that you don’t understand where

people of deep faith are coming from, whether they be Christian or

Orthodox, Jew or Muslim, who believe that when they are motivated through their own means to go out and help other people,

that their mission is comprehensive, and that serving the soup or

providing housing for somebody is a manifestation of that. That

manifestation isn’t uniquely Christian, Muslim, Jewish or any religion, because you are providing the soup.

But you represent an organization in providing the soup that in

fact, as a Christian, I believe reflects the glory of Christ. And if

somebody in that organization doesn’t reflect that glory of Christ

or doesn’t reflect the principles of the Muslim faith or the Jewish

faith, it undermines the broader thing that motivated you to get involved anyway to give the soup, to provide the housing.

Now, that is why I asked the question in relationship to the NRA

or other groups, that if an NRA group is providing gun safety

training that isn’t ideological, but underneath it, if they have people in their organization that don’t share their views, if there is an

environmental group that maybe is just conducting a bird hike, but

has somebody wearing a T-shirt or advocating the killing of bald

eagles for dinner, is not likely to be someone that the organization

wants to be affiliated with.

And those who have deep faith believe that their organization

should reflect that faith, not in who they serve, not with government funds to proselytize, but that the people in that organization

reflect a shared association value. You granted that for secular

groups. Why can’t you understand that passion in the different religious groups?

Reverend LYNN. Well, I certainly understand the passion.

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Mr. SOUDER. But just a minute ago you said you didn’t understand why they felt they needed to have people delivering the soup

of a shared association value. You just made that statement.

Reverend LYNN. Well, yeah. But I do think religion is different,

and I think it is more powerful than ideology. I think as a consequence, that is why the framers of the Constitution treated religion differently. They said it was in some circumstances more protected, and other circumstances more—we had to be more careful

about subsidizing, precisely because it is unique. It is not like your

thoughts on gun control, or tree hugging, or any other issues. This

is what matters the most.

And my problem is trying to figure out why all of these groups

that we have been talking about and you have been discussing for

years now, most of them don’t want to take that final step and say,

we would never really hire someone who wasn’t a believer. Why

can’t we get the funding to those groups willing to play by the civil

rights rules? And if there are people that say, look I just can’t live

with that. I think you had one witness in the last 4 years who said

that, then maybe we should deal with the funding for the 98 percent of the other folks and just say, look, the Constitution, rightly

or wrongly 200 years ago, we decided you can’t get the funding.

Then we would find the resolution. We would find a way to implement the dozens of suggestions that were made in the group

that Senator Santorum set up that Reverend Goode and I were on.

We could do all of that without violating anyone’s Constitutional

rights. We just have to have the will to do it. We have the capacity

to do it.

Mr. SOUDER. We have, understandably, a deep disagreement in

vision, including what the Founding Fathers meant between religion and giving certain advantages to the Episcopal Church. The

wall of separation was to protect Evangelicals like myself from the

State, in forcing church schools, funding the home of the Episcopalian pastor. It was not meant to say if there was even competition.

Now, that is a Constitutional difference in how we interpret

Madison, how we interpret Jefferson, and so on. But there are two

schools of thought on that, not one universal accepted thought,

which is what we battle through.

But I want to move to a couple of other questions, and I want

to reinforce one thing that Mr. Diament said. And that is, I don’t

think we are ever in danger of increasing anything tenfold. But I

think there was a goal of many of us, and I can speak deeply from

personal experience, when we were trying to work and did successfully pass a number of these things under the Clinton administration.

But as we worked with then-Governor Bush as he was running

with Steve Goldsmith and Senator Santorum and I, we talked

about this. And one of the political dilemmas that we face here,

bluntly put, which isn’t usually talked about in public, and I would

like Reverend Goode, would you rather be referred to as Mayor

Goode or Reverend Goode?

Reverend GOODE. I got promoted to Reverend.

Mr. SOUDER. OK. Well, I want to get your reaction to this statement. Because part of the problem with this faith-based initiative,

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and I appreciate that the administration has moved forward. Mr.

Diament’s statement triggered this for me.

For years, Bob Woodson hammered on me as a staffer and then

as a Member about the zip code test which you referred to; people

living in their zip code. And the problem that we have is that

many, if not almost all, government grants are going to organizations that were not neighborhood based, community based, were

not particularly in low-income, minority areas. Black, and Hispanic

often are disproportionately represented, and the dollars weren’t

going to those groups.

And many of those most effective neighborhood organizations

were faith-based. The problem that we had as Republicans is our

Members don’t represent those districts. And so when the Republicans are in the majority, we tend to represent, for the most part,

the few of us—I represent Fulton, IN, it has 230,000 people, so it

has the traditional low-income area that, often at least, say twothirds are different minority groups, are obviously White, poor people as well even in an urban center—but that most of our Members

represent predominately suburban and rural districts. So it was

very hard to get kind of traditional support for dollars in their districts.

And when we talked about the difficulty that this initiative was

going to have, the question is we had a moment in time where a

number of Republicans, partly because their Presidential candidate

was advocating this and many of us said this is the right thing to

do, because we need to get the dollars leveraged and down to

neighborhood groups that are based in largely urban districts that

we don’t represent.

And we ran into this buzz saw of arguing, not about racial and

sex discrimination, but really homosexuality and religious preferential hiring that could lead you into a variation of the sex discrimination question. And those issues have exploded this category.

Now, I want to ask as a practical matter of someone who has

been directly involved in this program, have you seen an increase

in dollars that have gone to neighborhood-based organizations, that

are Black and Hispanic based, that would have been different in

Philadelphia and other places around the country? Because to me,

one of the fundamental challenges of this system is are we accomplishing what many of us who supported faith-based initiatives, because I am not saying Pat Robertson doesn’t have a wonderful

group, I don’t really know. But that wasn’t the primary target of

what we were trying to do with this initiative.

And I would like to hear for the record what you think is being

accomplished through this initiative and are the dollars getting to

where we intended the dollars to go?

Reverend GOODE. There is no question at all that there has been

a significant increase in funding of neighborhood-type groups, African American, Hispanics, Asians, throughout the country.

I have had the opportunity to travel in the last 5 months to 25

cities that have received funding, and have watched them struggle

with getting those programs off the ground. And they are getting

them off the ground and are beginning to move.

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So if the question that you posed to me is, is there an increase

in funding to groups who never before received funding at the

neighborhood level, the answer is absolutely yes.

Mr. SOUDER. Dr. Sherman, I know you have researched this and

you have worked with a number of the States and have been doing

some statistical things. Do you agree with Reverend Goode?

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes. In our study of 15 States, yes. We identified

the recipients of government contracts, faith-based organizations

that were regulated by the charitable choice rules. And we discovered that among congregations that have received these dollars,

more of them were minority-dominant congregations than White

congregations. So we have seen that as well.

And also over 50 percent of the organizations that we discovered

in the 15 States, had received government funding for the first

time only since the passage of the charitable choice rules, and often

only since the faith-based initiatives. So we definitely have seen a

correlation between groups that previously were not receiving these

types of dollars, we have seen an increase in those organizations

since the administration’s efforts.

Mr. SOUDER. I am one who has been concerned about the money

going directly to churches as opposed to separate 501(c)(3) organizations. Have you seen—spart of this initiative was supposed to

help train organizations that may not have CPAs and attorneys in

their congregations to try to set up such organizations. Have you

seen that also through the initiatives?

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes. Actually I would say that despite the fact

that the original charitable choice rules did allow for the funding

to come directly to congregations, and we have not in our research

discovered any particular problems with that, nonetheless most of

the people that are associated with capacity building and training

efforts, encourage congregations, even though they are not required

to do that, to go ahead and set up a separate 501(c)(3), because it

makes the accounting issues simpler. It protects them from audits

and the like.

So we haven’t seen in our research any instances of it being

problematic if the congregations didn’t set up one, but it has definitely been the case that most of those that are involved in the

types of training initiatives such as those funded through the Compassion Capital Fund really encourage congregations to take that

step as just an extra safeguard.

Reverend GOODE. I would just add that for 35 years I have urged

local congregations to form a 501(c)(3), set up a separate corporation, don’t get the morning offerings mixed up with the government

funds. And I think that is the perfect way to do it, in my view. And

I think that when you don’t do that, that you are really skating on

very thin ice. It may be legal, but it is not practical from my point

of view, just in terms of bookkeeping. It is in terms of, separating

out the church’s money from the government’s money.

Reverend LYNN. Mr. Chairman, and Mr. Cummings, I think that

part of the question is: Is more money going to a certain kind of

institution? That is question No. 1.

I think there are two other questions. Have more people been

served overall? And, then, were they served better? I think that is

where the data is lacking. You know, when people start to tell me

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about new programs getting money, the first question in my mind

is where did that money come from. Was it taken from someone

else?

There was a very controversial case—I am sure you are aware

of it. In Boston, a homeless shelter for veterans was told it would

have to cut its beds by 50 percent. It was a well-established, longserving program. The faith-based office said, well, don’t worry, the

money is going to go to North Carolina and Utah. But, of course,

I don’t know how veterans in Massachusetts were supposed to get

to those other facilities.

I use that story all over the country in debates and discussions.

Eventually they changed their mind and gave that Massachusetts

organization back its money. But it seems to me that if there are

homeless veterans in three places, we are not able to say ‘‘job well

done’’ unless we are serving all of them; not taking one, and serving—taking its money and using it for somebody else.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Fitzhugh, I understand that you have an appointment. I wanted to ask a question to you before you go, if you

have time, and then you are excused if you need to go. We may go

a few more minutes yet.

You heard Mr. Lynn’s comments earlier. Then you heard some

of my comments. Let me first ask a question. Do you accept government funds? Are you getting any faith-based grants at this time?

Mr. FITZHUGH. We actually got an appropriations, D.C. Appropriations Committee’s funds.

Mr. SOUDER. You understand that with those funds you can’t directly proselytize? Was that explained to you in the process?

Mr. FITZHUGH. These are earmarked for renovations.

Mr. SOUDER. And do you feel that in the renovations of the building, which basically is a secular activity—the building doesn’t proselytize, may attach a sign to it—but do you feel that your mission

would be compromised?

One of the delicate things nobody really likes to talk about here

are that in every community, in every church, from counseling and

from what, you know, but it hasn’t been proven in a court, there

are allegations; I know partly because people don’t like to turn in

neighbors. You can’t do certain things in the church; so-and-so may

be abusing his wife, so-and-so may be a drug dealer, everybody in

the congregation knows that, or at least thinks they know that.

And it would undermine the mission of the church if that was revealed.

Many times there are different rules set in churches, more stringent than the societal rules, because they believe it is important to

have a strange statement from that denomination about how they

approach things, or their approach.

I know I have been with a Member up in Newark, NJ. There are

kinds of standards. They have don’t wear a hat here. Other people

have other types of guidelines to try to put discipline in when they

are with high-risk populations, that under Federal rules if you

didn’t have a religious exemption would have to be basically someone who has been found guilty in a court before you can act; which

may or may not ever happen.

The question is, could you function and fulfill your full mission,

or would be interested in the dollars if, in fact, you had to take

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anybody who walked in, who was qualified for a particular job such

as painting on the wall, which may be anybody, as a staffer of your

organization? Would that change your mission or your goals?

Mr. FITZHUGH. I think one of the things that we are challenged

with and what we face on a regular basis, I have heard a lot of the

testimony today. And for me and what we do, we have limited staff.

We have already buried four students so far this year.

We have already seen a number of unwanted pregnancies. We

have already been surrogate parents for a number of displaced students. One of the strengths of what we do is that we as a team

present young people with an opportunity at what we call life. And

for us that life is getting a handle on their own individual purpose

and destiny in life. And as a team, we have wrestled with, we have

talked about our vision and our mission and how do we acquire

funds.

If someone, Mr. Cummings mentioned earlier that a lot of people

in church reach in their pocket and pull out money and do a great

many things. We just have found that in urban America, donorbase-supported work is a progressive idea to give to those kind of

ministries. We are always strapped for funds.

I would think that it would be a compromise to what we believe

if we would present to students inconsistencies in what we are saying as a collective voice about what they can accomplish in life and

who they are, if there are persons who mince those words with us.

So as it relates to the moneys we just received for our renovations, we believe that there is a whole generation of young people

today who are unreachable, nobody wants to deal with. Teenagers,

urban teen-age kids, people are afraid of them. That is our target.

And we realize they live in a media-dominated world.

So we have a recording studio and we are building a TV studio

and we are building a dance studio. And hopefully we will be able

to love on these students. Hopefully we will be able to give these

students a sense of identity, a sense of self-worth, and hopefully we

will have a consistent voice in that.

Quite frankly, I don’t think it will compromise my program if the

guy who is nailing the nail doesn’t believe what I believe, or if the

guy who is laying the brick doesn’t believe what I believe. Just

build my building, renovate my building.

But when it comes to our program staff, we believe it is important to have a collective voice.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you. Mr. Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I just want to thank you before you leave, Mr.

Fitzhugh, for what you are doing. And it is very important. And,

again, we are trying to figure out the balance here. And there is

absolutely no doubt that programs like the one you have are essential. Probably not enough of them.

And I was just thinking maybe some of us in Baltimore need to

look at your program and see what you are doing, because we have

a lot of unreachables. And we just found out, we were just looking

at our stats—50 percent of all the kids that get to the 9th grade

don’t graduate through the 12th. Then we see something like a 30

to a 38 percent illiteracy rate even with people who graduate,

which means that we have a lot of people who are in trouble. And

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these are the ones that—you know, I am talking about folk who—

the ones who graduate, at least they stayed in school.

But again, as I said, we in the Congress wrestle with where we

fit in history and how our actions will be viewed years from now,

and at the same time we want to make sure that we say to people

to even go into the history, to go into the future.

But I really do appreciate what you have said and thank you

very much. I hope to visit your program. I want to do that.

Just one question. Do you—I assume—does the House house people? In other words, do they come and visit or what?

Mr. FITZHUGH. The House is after school, 3:15 to 7:30. We looked

at doing some emergency shelter because we have had so many

students who have had emergency shelter needs. But if our students found out that we were sponsoring emergency shelter, all of

our students would be an emergency, because they love the experience of being in a place where they are endeared and they are

loved.

So, no, we don’t house. The school is out at 3:15. Kids are at the

door at 3:16. And we have to shoo them away at 7:30 to get home

before it is gets crazy again.

I think the other thing is that one of things that we try to do

with our students, and we recognize that not only do they need a

safe place, they also need to get a handle on their life track. And

there is a way in which we can communicate that to this population.

People talked at one time about their being an unchurched generation. And at one time, you know, we had a conversation among

some of young ladies who were in certain situations and unwanted

pregnancies, and young men who were not taking care of responsibilities.

Well, these kids, you know—I have a young lady now who is

pregnant. And my thought is, she is still a baby. But her mom was

on crack when she was pregnant with her. And so we have digressed to the point now where we have the students who really

don’t have any mother at home, training that is helping them. So

we are trying to build the creative means by which we can support

every facet of these students’ lives. They have very, very complex

issues.

We have had a lot of success because of our creativity of how we

can communicate to this population. And I have a friend, a colleague in Chicago, who just started the House/Chicago. They meet

once a month for a big event and during the week for smaller

events. He said he has never seen this many kids turn out.

But he has taken the elements of what we do. We found ways

in which, creative ways, in which to get students plugged into activities, and along the way we realized we don’t have to hit them

over the head with a Bible, we don’t have to force anything down

their throat. Most of these students want to be valued, want to be

encouraged, want to be directed, want to be loved, and want to be

pointed in the right direction. And we don’t know how that is going

to unveil for all, each and every student.

But the least we can do is, like I said, to create a moment for

life change. Now, it might come at a midnight walk at a camp.

That might come after school when you take a kid to get a cheeseVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:01 Oct 05, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00116 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\95779.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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burger. That might come when he is sitting down recording music

or rapping a song. That might come in the sewing class we had.

A lady said, I know how to sew, and we started a sewing class,

called ‘‘Making Stuff.’’

I don’t know where that moment is going to come. But I think

we have an obligation to find that moment. And I can’t get the vision, the image of that movie Jaws out of my mind. When that police chief saw that shark for the first time, he said, ‘‘We need a bigger boat.’’ I don’t care what kind of boat it is, we need a bigger

boat. And I am looking to the mouth of the shark. I have seen

things I had no idea I would ever see, and I have witnessed what

these students are carrying that I had no idea that they were carrying these kinds of secrets.

And there are institutions that are making an impact in those

areas. And I think our challenge, as you mentioned, we have to

find out how we fit right here. But we have an obligation to find

that bigger boat; whatever that boat is, we have to find that boat

for the welfare of this population.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much. Thank you.

I just want to move now to Ms. Hollman. Ms. Hollman, you said

something. I know you have to go, Mr. Fitzhugh, thank you very

much. We really appreciated it.

Ms. Hollman, you said something that really triggered a thought

in my mind that I guess I should have figured this out long ago.

One of the things that we see over and over again that we don’t

seem to suffer here in this country, is this warning throughout the

world based upon religion.

And you said something. You said, we want to be careful that we

do not divide our citizens along religious lines. And it is interesting

that in our country we don’t have, we don’t see what we see around

the world. I mean, I know this is a much broader question than

what we are, I guess, kind of dealing with here, because we are

dealing with where the rubber meets the road here.

But is that a concern of yours, that eventually you can get there

by this, what I call erosion, or the path we may be taking ourselves

down? Are you following my question?

Ms. HOLLMAN. Yes, I am. I think that is a real danger. And that

is why we continue to say these things over and over. I think about

it every time I hear someone say, what this initiative really is

about is funding what works.

And I think—what has worked in America? And I think the first

amendment has worked. I think we can look at the way we treat

religion in this country as something that has been good for religion, so that religion has flourished and we have lived in relative

peace with a tremendously diverse population of religious beliefs.

I think some of the examples that you will see in the written testimony kind of point to how the faith-based initiatives can divide

us along religious lines. Some of it was talked about today in how

this is part of the political process. You have political people deciding which groups should be funded, which are essentially favored.

And that is something that we have avoided, and I think it is

something that we should be proud to have avoided and we have

probably saved ourselves a lot of conflict that other places haven’t.

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Mr. CUMMINGS. You know, Mr. Diament, and then this will be

my last comment, you know you said something. And I think it is

directly corrected with what Ms. Hollman just said. I think that we

would be naive if we did not realize how much politics plays in all

of this.

And I am not saying that you have been naive, because I think

you hit this golden opportunity, then it kind of slipped away. But

it is interesting that as I move around the country campaigning,

and I go into African American communities, and I see something

happening that is very interesting. And that is that there are areas

that I normally as an African American would have been welcome

to speak on behalf of a Democratic candidate, but because a church

has received certain funding, I think, OK, I can’t say—I check out

the history—and usually this is the case—and they give credit not

to the Democrats but to the Republicans for the faith-based initiative stuff.

The next thing you know, I am not welcomed to speak. I don’t,

and it is very interesting. And I think that if—and so, you know,

when you talk about this division based on—when you and Ms.

Hollman talk about division on religious lines, I guess what happens is government creeps in, creeps into the faith-based arena,

and it gets a little murky there.

Because I guess some of those folks are saying, look, you know,

I think you, Mayor Goode, alluded to this, about how there are

groups that have never gotten any funding before and now they are

getting funding.

We see, in my own State of Maryland, there is an article in the

paper this morning that talks about how our Governor wants to establish an office of faith-based, but doesn’t want to tell what it

does. And the legislature is saying, OK, we can do that, but at least

tell us what it is going to do, like every other department.

And I just don’t, I mean, I think there are so many—this thing

becomes like a web after a while. And I don’t know where this

leads to. I think that we have to be very careful that we protect

the Constitution, because as Ms. Hollman has said, we know certain things work. We know that.

And we know—I think sometimes when we compare what happens in other countries around the world, we also see what doesn’t

work. And so we have a lot of competing interests, a lot of competing concerns and priorities. And I just think that we have to continue to try to wade through this so that we come out with the best

result in the end.

But you know, the bottom line still remains, I think, this whole

concept of one life to live and how you do that in the now, but, at

the same time, protecting your future. So I just want to thank you.

I don’t know if anybody has any comment on what I just said,

but I really appreciate all of you and I really thank you for your

testimony.

Reverend GOODE. I just had one point. And that is this; that you

raise the issue of politics. And I would only simply say this: that

a long time before the current President was in office, a lot of us

were working on faith-based initiatives. And I don’t think that the

idea involving faith-based institutions with the solving of problems

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of people in neighborhoods started 31⁄2 years ago. It started way before that.

In fact, my own experience, going back to 1968, when I was going

around the local churches, filling out applications for 221(d)(3) and

204 and 203 applications and 2 applications to get housing for local

churches who only had an idea that they wanted to do something

about a vacant lot in that neighborhood. We are able to take that.

And really with 50 separate congregations, we probably did using

the 501(c)(3), about 2000 housing units between 1966 and 1978.

So I would only say to you that I know this is an election year.

But we also have to be practical in terms of how are we going to

help the people who live in our neighborhoods, in our zip codes,

and I have opted from my own point of view to be practical about

this and take the money from the government because it’s really

my money, too. I mean, you know, every time I see my pay check,

I know it’s my money too and I want to have a say in how my

money gets spent.

Mr. SOUDER. I want to thank each of you for your testimony.

We’ll probably have some additional written questions to draw this

out because we have been doing a series of faith-based hearings

where these issues, the legal issues come up. Generally speaking

we have had almost 50/50. We have had hearings in Charlotte and

San Antonio and Chicago and Colorado and Los Angeles, and practitioners disagree on where they would draw the lines on how to

do it. We’ve mostly been trying to draw out what the activity at the

grass roots level is on the faith-based, but this is going to be our

defining hearing as far as some of the legal issues. So we may have

some additional written questions. I appreciate that each of you

have been major players in different parts.

Clearly the faith-based initiative hasn’t brought the religious

conflict in America. All I have to do is find five Baptists in any city.

They’ll be in three different branches, at least, if not five, and I believe that we can at least reach consensus in a narrow frame, if not

the fundamental part of direct government funding, and we need

to build where we can find the consensus and then continue to debate at the edges.

For example, in my opinion, and I want to state this for the

record, the more important part, as I implied at the beginning, was

the $500 credit which went down to $50 or some ridiculously low

sum, and that we had a compromise worked out with key players

that would have been able to move that earlier if we’d have focused

on that part. And we need to be looking at how to make nonitemizers eligible to put their money into these churches and avoid

some of the direct confrontation by at least agreeing on that. We

had worked out compromises on the training that Bobby Scott and

Chet Edwards and Jerry Nadler and Barney Frank and others who

have been critics would allow those funds and would have supported if we can keep it out of the political arena, that to train

faith-based organizations with their discrimination of association

hiring intact as long as they weren’t applying for government funds

with that. But even that kind of consensus is going to breakdown

if this becomes too political.

Then at the margin, we have accepted as we have moved these

pieces of legislation, sometimes as we moved a number of them to

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the chagrin as I accepted things like ‘‘clear break,’’ if there was

going to be a prayer it had to be at least 5 minutes before the start

of a program. It couldn’t feel any pressure, maybe even farther

from that, that there had to be a secular alternative. I know that

there are disagreements as to what is the distance you can have.

In my opinion, for example, in the first faith-based initiative we

took out Head Start and some programs at least in distant areas

where you wouldn’t have choices. I think the majoritarian Christians, unlike those of us who came up in more smaller denominations, don’t think of this as Christian being the minority and how

would we feel if a seniors lunch program or a Head Start program

you had to bow to Allah at the beginning, or you had another religion that isn’t majoritarian. And we need to work through those

sensitivities.

At the same time, that all said, I still am concerned that there’s

not an understanding of the opponents of what passion motivates

people to give extra time, extra contributions, and how many of

these resource challenged groups, even if they can take nonitemized deductions, even if they have leaders like Reverend

Goode, aren’t going to be able to get the dollars they need and that

these faith-based institutions whose integrity is critical in these

urban areas should have access, if they’ll follow the rules and if

they’re trained and if they have a 501(c)(3) for these funds.

It started in the areas of homelessness and AIDS, because nobody else would do it. And when this was done under Jack Kemp,

and in the early 1980’s there weren’t a lot of questions because nobody would take care of people with AIDS, except for Christians

who weren’t afraid if they got it and they died their life would be

ended because they had an after life. So nobody was asking a

bunch of questions. And I still think that this idea that there is

this kind of a giant secular position excludes and discriminates

against some of us. But we need to be careful, those who argue for

this faith-based initiative, that we don’t suck religion in and that

we protect the minority rights, because I don’t think, from most of

the consensus, that most Americans would agree with something

that was said by Ms. Hollman, and that is all it takes is to look

around the world and see that religious intolerance is a huge problem. And if the faith-based initiative exacerbates or promotes religious intolerance, it is not good either. But there also ought to be

tolerance of those who do have deep faith and want to participate

in the public arena without discrimination. And that balance is

what we are trying to work through.

So if any of you want to submit additional comments with this

hearing, respond to the questions, this is hopefully going to be a

good forum to carry that through. I thank each of you for your public debate and for your research. And with that the hearing stands

adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 12:13 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

[Additional information submitted for the hearing record follows:]

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