To Hell in A Handbasket

We’re “going to Hell in a handbasket”. I’ve heard that “alliterative locution” used by people from all walks of life, all ages and all regions of the country. The phrase dates back to at least 1865 in a book entitled The Great North-Western Conspiracy In All Its Startling Details by I. Windslow Ayer.  Ayer was referring to the steadfast determination of the Confederate Soldiers held under deplorable conditions at the Union’s prisoner of war camp at Chicago, IL named Camp Douglas. What he said was were the Confederate Soldiers given half a chance, they would "...send their captors to Hell in a handbasket..." (For the record, slavery was wrong and so was Ayer – most of the confined Confederates just wanted to go home, the book is interesting nonetheless)

Since then, the phrase has come to mean someone is headed to certain disaster without effort or in great haste.

I read about a Supreme Court decision today that makes me think we’re not “going to hell in a handbasket” but rather, we’re going in a shopping cart, full speed, downhill, just as fast as those little wheels can turn.


Actually, it wasn’t officially a Supreme Court decision at all, it was a “non-decision”, known as Certorari Denied. To quote Rush’s song (the band, not the pundit) Freewill, “If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.” In effect, the Supreme Court said the case lacked sufficient merit for their august body to look at it.


Here’s the case, Boy Scouts v. Barnes-Wallace, 08-1222. Fundamentally, the American Civil Liberties Union, which generally is interested in none of the above, sued the Boy Scouts on behalf of a lesbian couple and an agnostic couple. The two couples felt the city of San Diego was violating the oft misinterpreted “separation of church and state” by leasing 18 acres to the Scouts. 18 acres that the Scouts have leased since 1918.


Wait, it gets much better. Neither couple had ever made any effort to visit the area in question, nor had either of their children expressed a desire to join the Boy Scouts. Hold it, I’m not done yet, the Scouts, who had been paying roughly $2,500 dollars a year for the right to use the space exclusively for a few weeks each year offered to make $1,700,000 dollars worth of improvements to the area and had already contributed $2,500,000 to the city owned aquatic center in Mission Bay. On top of all that, the Scouts only had exclusive use of the area for the few weeks of the year that they ran summer camp and allowed anyone to use the area the rest of the year.


The case has been going on since 2003 when the ACLU, sued in US District court. The presiding judge, U.S. District Judge Napoleon Jones Jr. “ruled in 2003 that the city failed to follow its usual procedures and engaged in “private, exclusive negotiations” with the Boy Scouts, culminating in a long-term lease of the park property.  Judge Jones found the lease violated federal law that prohibits government promoting religion, noting that belief in God was central to the Boy Scouts of America’s principles.”


Judge Jones got one thing right; a belief in God is a requirement to be a Scout. The most basic part of Scouting is the Scout Oath:

On my honor I will do my best

To do my duty to God and my country

and to obey the Scout Law;

To help other people at all times;

To keep myself physically strong,

mentally awake, and morally straight.

 
Every boy learns that oath as one of the first requirements to earn the title “Tenderfoot Scout”. Unfortunately he got the rest of it wrong.


Here is the entire "religious dogma" of the Boy Scouts:


The Boy Scouts of America maintains that no member can grow into the best kind of citizen without recognizing an obligation to God and, therefore, recognizes the religious element in the training of the member, but it is absolutely nonsectarian in its attitude toward that religious training. Its policy is that the home and organization or group with which the member is connected shall give definite attention to religious life.

Only persons willing to subscribe to these precepts …shall be entitled to certificates of leadership.

That’s it folks – recognize that we have a responsibility to God. If that makes them a religious organization and forbids them from using public property, we need to kick the House and Senate out of the Capital because they open with a prayer at every session – we’ve gone too far towards the politically correct lunatic fringe and the Supreme Court was wrong not to correct the District Court Judge’s idiotic ruling.

(Colonel's note: After I wrote this, I reflected on something I had heard during a visit to Washington, D.C. many years ago - each session of the Court begins with the Marshall entering the chambers and intoning this behest: "God Save the United States and this Honorable Court".  I confirmed that this is in fact the way every new session begins to this date and I wholeheartedly support the sentiment - that said, the Court needs to vacate their building, they're promoting religion)


As for the Scouts being an organization that promotes religion, I guess he missed the fact that 1/3rd of the “chartering organizations” or sponsors are civic and educational groups. He probably also missed that there is in fact at least one organization of every major flavor of religion in the United States from LDS to Jewish Synagogues to Buddhists serving as the chartering organization for the other 2/3rds. It only makes sense that churches would sponsor an organization that holds as a tenant a belief in God. However and this is a big however folks, a requirement for a belief in God isn’t establishing a religion. Nowhere in the camp was there a religious symbol, nothing in the scout emblems displayed had any religious connotation.


Every one of our last 19 Presidents has realized the value of Scouting (Theodore Roosevelt was already out of office in 1910 when the Scouts were founded but he was named the first and only Chief Citizen Scout because of his vigorous support). Our 34th President summarized the value of Scouting best:

“The Boy Scout movement merits the unstinted support of every American who wants to make his country and his world a better place in which to live. Its emphasis on community service and tolerance and world friendship promotes a speedier attainment of the enduring peace among men for which we all strive. By developing among its members both a spirit of sturdiness, self-reliance, and a realization of the need for cooperative effort in every major enterprise, the movement is a prime force in preparing tomorrow’s men for their duty to themselves, their country, and their world. Here in the United States, the Boy Scouts of America have accomplished much in its years of service. But today, more than ever before, we need expansion of its membership and influence.”

Dwight D. Eisenhower, US President 1953-1961


It's time to put on the brakes, climb out of the cart and start planning our course rather than just going along for the ride.  The Supreme Court should have heard the case and ruled for the Boy Scouts.  The case will now bounce back to the lower courts where, hopefully, more intelligent rulings can be found.


I’ve been involved with Boy Scouting for more than 20 years. Oddly, only two of those years were as a Scout. I wasn’t much of a Scout frankly, I wanted to camp and hike, the rest didn’t seem important.


Years later, I was asked to help run a Boy Scout Camp. That experience changed my life. For the first time, I understood what the Scout Oath and Law were about. At about the same time, I was leaving active duty in the Army to return to college as an ROTC cadet. That sense of duty and basic belief has carried me through the last 23 years. The groundwork laid in those two years as a Scout and the summer on the staff has made all the difference for me. Since then, I’ve served as a Scoutmaster, Assistant Scoutmaster, Merit Badge Counselor and just a dad driving the van. Scouting changes lives and that positive model is needed more now than ever in an age of “whatever”.


Want to avoid the "whatever" ethical standard in your boy? Try Scouting, he may hate it, that's okay, but he may get it and it just might make all the difference. He may find a meaning in the Scout Law that I didn't internalize till later.

A Scout is

 trustworthy,

 loyal,

 helpful,

 friendly,

 courteous,

 kind,

 obedient,

 cheerful,

 thrifty,

 brave,

 clean

 and reverent.

So what can you do if you'd like to support the Boy Scouts on this issue?  If your work place has a United Way Campaign, designate your donation to support Scouting. Consider a direct donation if not.  Volunteer to help a troop, you don't need to be Bear Grylls (an Eagle Scout by the way) or Clive Cussler (ditto - he found the Hunley), or Bill Gates (Eagle Scout) or any of the 39 Eagle Scout Astronauts, innumerable military or business leaders, sports stars or just "Average Joes" who have been Boy Scouts, you just need to be someone who recognizes that there is a God, and who wants to help.  Write a letter to the editor about the case or just talk about how you feel about the issue with your friends - maybe you'll find a kindred spirit who feels the same way and realize that there are others out there who think that values and character count.  Believe me, there are more of us than there are of the "whatever crowd". 

Trust me on this one, I'm a Boy Scout.


P.S. If you want to know what religious freedom really is, the freedom of religion the US Constitution is talking about, you can find it in the Bible, in the book of Joshua:


Joshua 24:15 - But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.


As ol’Bob Dylan said – But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed. You're gonna have to serve somebody. Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord…