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June 13, 2008
Americans United Challenges Florida Ballot Amendments That Would Undercut
Religious Liberty, Public Schools
Education And Civil Liberties Groups Assert That Tax Commission
Overstepped
Its Bounds
In Attacking State Constitution
Americans United for Separation of Church and State has joined litigation
in Florida
designed to remove two ballot amendments that would erase religious
freedom
safeguards
and harm public schools in the state.
The lawsuit filed today in Leon Circuit Court in Tallahassee aims to
remove
Amendments
7 and 9 from the November ballot. The amendments were put on the ballot by
the Taxation
and Budget Reform Commission, but Americans United and other civil
liberties and
education groups contend that the Commission lacks the authority to do so.
The amendments would permit voucher subsidies for religious and other
private schools
in Florida and eliminate the state constitution's language barring tax aid
to religion.
The result would be that houses of wor****p and religious schools would
receive massive
new streams of public funding. The measures were engineered onto the
ballot
through
backdoor political maneuvering by former Gov. Jeb Bush, an ardent advocate
of taxpayer
aid to churches and church schools.
"These dangerous proposals have no business being on the ballot," said the
Rev. Barry W.
Lynn, Americans United executive director. "The Tax Commission exceeded
its
authority
and placed deceptive amendments before the voters. The courts should not
allow this
to happen.
"Jeb Bush and his cronies are trying to pull a fast one," Lynn continued,
"and we cannot
let him get away with it."
Two of the plaintiffs in the Ford v. Browning case are Americans United
activists:
Rabbi Merrill Shapiro of Temple Beth Shalom in Palm Coast is vice
president
of Americans
United and the Rev. Harry Parrott Jr. of Penney Farms is president of AU's
Clay County
Chapter and serves on AU's National Advisory Council.
The lawsuit asserts that the Commission exceeded its authority by
approving
both ballot
amendments and that Amendment 9 is worded in a misleading manner.
Under the Florida Constitution, the Commission meets once every 20 years
to
discuss
budget and tax issues and has the power to place amendments on the ballot
dealing only
with that narrow set of issues.
The lawsuit asserts that in approving the ballot initiatives, the
Commission "exceeded
its authority under Article XI, section 6, of the Florida Constitution by
proposing
constitutional amendments that do not deal with the subjects of 'taxation
or the state
budgetary process.'"
In addition to Americans United, groups backing the lawsuit include the
Florida Education
Association, the Florida School Boards Association, the Florida
Association
of District
School Superintendants, the Florida Association of School Administrators,
the Florida ACLU,
the Anti-Defamation League and People For the American Way.
http://www.au.org/site/R?i=bX2hE1kZWtghl2CI7Bxh7g..
************************************************************
Americans United is a religious liberty watchdog group based in
Wa****ngton,
D.C.
Founded in 1947, the organization educates Americans about the im****tance
of church-state separation in safeguarding religious freedom.
************************************************************
Americans United Press Contacts:
Joe Conn, Rob Boston
www.au.org/press
************************************************************
The First Freedom First Campaign is a joint project of
Americans United for Separation of Church and State
and The Interfaith Alliance Foundation
If you haven't signed the petition yet, visit www.firstfreedomfirst.org.
http://www.au.org/site/R?i=SRX6jA3QpvCIXj8W2q7Qew..
************************************************************
Americans United for Separation of Church and State
518 C Street NE,
Wa****ngton, DC 20002
auactivist@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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