"In South Carolina, Mr. BUSH was later criticized for an appearance at Bob Jones University, a conservative religious school; Mr. Ashcroft had appeared there to accept an honorary degree in 1999, saying later that he was not aware of the school's positions against interracial dating. Now some civil rights groups are raising questions about his racial attitudes, focusing on his role in denying a judgeship to a black candidate."
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"The son of an Assemblies of God minister and educator, Mr. Ashcroft has woven his private faith into his public life. In his 1998 book "Lessons from a Father to His Son," he wrote that he held voluntary daily prayers with his staff and anointed himself before each of his two terms as Missouri's governor. He did so again, using a bowl of Crisco oil, before being sworn in in 1995 as senator.
The act of anointment, he wrote in his largely autobiographical book, replicated the practice of "the ancient kings of Israel, David and Saul," who Mr. Ashcroft said "were anointed as they undertook their administrative duties."
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Religious Right Made Big Push to Put Ashcroft in Justice Dept.
Excerpts from an article by DAVID JOHNSTON and NEIL A. LEWIS
From: The New York Times
WASHINGTON, Jan. 6 — Within days of Senator John Ashcroft of Missouri's narrow re-election defeat by a candidate who died three weeks before Election Day, religious and conservative leaders began promoting him for a major position in a Bush administration.
James C. Dobson, a leading religious conservative and president and founder of Focus on the Family, a nonprofit organization in Colorado Springs, publicly described the defeated Missouri Republican as a national resource, and told reporters, "If I were president-elect, John Ashcroft would be one of the people that I would be trying to find a spot for."
President-elect George W. Bush and Vice President-elect Dick Cheney both regularly received calls from conservative religious leaders indicating their concern that the new attorney general be someone sympathetic to socially conservative positions, a Bush adviser said.
The conservative leaders also made their concerns known to Karl Rove, Mr. Bush's top political strategist. Among those who weighed in for Mr. Ashcroft was Dr. Carl Herbster, president of the American Association of Christian Schools, the Bush adviser said.
Although he has not been well known nationally, despite his brief exploration of a bid for the 2000 Republican presidential nomination, Mr. Ashcroft has long been a favorite son of the modern Christian political movement. For many years, a review of election records showed, he has received generous financial backing from its members.
In the 2000 election cycle, he received more political money from religious groups and clergymen than any other Senate candidate, although the total amount was relatively small given the millions in contributions he received for the campaign. And when Mr. Bush needed support from religious conservatives in the pivotal primary in South Carolina, Mr. Ashcroft provided a crucial endorsement.
In South Carolina, Mr. Bush was later criticized for an appearance at Bob Jones University, a conservative religious school; Mr. Ashcroft had appeared there to accept an honorary degree in 1999, saying later that he was not aware of the school's positions against interracial dating. Now some civil rights groups are raising questions about his racial attitudes, focusing on his role in denying a judgeship to a black candidate."
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"If confirmed by the Senate in hearings expected to begin this month, Mr. Ashcroft would reach the highest office ever attained by a leading figure of the Christian right. The appointment would place him at the head of the Justice Department, a sprawling government legal agency that is often at the front lines of the pitched battles over emotion-laden social issues like abortion, the death penalty, crime, civil rights and the selection of federal judges.
Mr. Ashcroft's deeply religious background helps explain both the impassioned support and committed opposition his selection has sparked — far more than any other nominee.
For the Christian right, he represents the triumph of one of its own; to his opponents, he represents a troubling, even dangerous mixing of public policy and religious fundamentalism. His record on issues central to Christian conservatives, especially abortion and judicial selection, will be critical in what is expected to be the most contentious confirmation fight facing the new administration."
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A review of Mr. Ashcroft's public record demonstrates how his deep religious commitment is intertwined with his outspoken support for the agenda of the religious right on a number of issues, including some he would have direct involvement in as attorney general. Among the issues he has tackled are abortion, the death penalty, gun control, homosexuality, prayer in schools, the judiciary and elimination of the National Endowment for the Arts.
In response, the conservative Christian movement has made Mr. Ashcroft its favorite politician, providing foot soldiers for his political activities and, most of all, financing his political campaigns.
It is not only issues like abortion and judicial selection that attract religious conservatives to Mr. Ashcroft. Some of these conservatives say they care deeply about civil litigation and hope that as attorney general he will pursue less stringent antitrust enforcement and that the Justice Department will not support state lawsuits against the gun industry or other assaults on industry.
Mr. Ashcroft's appeal to conservatives is such that as he contemplated a presidential run in 1998 and 1999, he got more money from organizations with a religious orientation than from any other source. His political action committee received what might have been the largest single donation in the presidential campaign: $400,000 from a direct sales company in Kansas City, Mo., the House of Lloyd, which espouses fundamentalist Christian values.
In November, even with enthusiastic support from religious conservatives, Mr. Ashcroft lost his seat by a narrow margin, fewer than 49,000 votes out of more than 2.3 million cast, to Gov. Mel Carnahan, who had been killed in the crash of a small plane. Mr. Carnahan's widow, Jean, was named to the seat."
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The son of an Assemblies of God minister and educator, Mr. Ashcroft has woven his private faith into his public life. In his 1998 book "Lessons from a Father to His Son," he wrote that he held voluntary daily prayers with his staff and anointed himself before each of his two terms as Missouri's governor. He did so again, using a bowl of Crisco oil, before being sworn in in 1995 as senator.
The act of anointment, he wrote in his largely autobiographical book, replicated the practice of "the ancient kings of Israel, David and Saul," who Mr. Ashcroft said "were anointed as they undertook their administrative duties."
In addressing the sensitive issue of how to blend religion and politics, Mr. Ashcroft has written that he has strived to balance politics and faith.
"It is against my religion to impose religion on people," he wrote in the book. But he added, "I also believe that I need to invite God's presence into whatever I'm doing, including the world of politics."
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Mr. Ashcroft also had a federal PAC, called Spirit of America, which received $10,000 each from Pat Robertson, the founder of the Christian Coalition, and his daughter. Federal election law limited gifts to the federal PAC, which raised $2.2 million, to a maximum of $10,000.
On every Christian Coalition voting scorecard — tallying votes on issues like abortion, education, budget and arts financing — since he entered the Senate in 1995, Mr. Ashcroft has received a 100 percent rating.
In his writings and speeches, he has emphasized that he views morality as integral to good government. When he was governor of Missouri and had the authority to choose judges, he seemed to have made a practice of trying to evaluate the moral mettle of judicial candidates.
In his two terms as governor, Mr. Ashcroft made a point of personally interviewing prospects, often asking them unusually personal questions. Two candidates interviewed by Mr. Ashcroft said that what they remembered most about their interviews was that the governor asked them pointedly if they had always been faithful to their wives.
Another judicial candidate said that Mr. Ashcroft asked him a question about abortion, but it was not clear whether the question constituted what has come to be called a litmus test — a question intended to weed out people who might not fit Mr. Ashcroft's view on the subject.
This person said that Mr. Ashcroft asked if he was prepared to enforce the abortion laws. "I thought that was a fair question," said this person. "It was one that you could simply answer yes to if you were pro- choice or pro-life." At the time the question was asked, Missouri had enacted some of the most restrictive laws in the nation for women seeking to have an abortion.
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Mr. Ashcroft's opposition to legalized abortion, with a 100 percent voting record in the most recent rankings by the National Right to Life Committee, is certain to be a flash point during his Senate confirmation hearing.
Mr. Ashcroft has a long history of support for the anti-abortion cause, as state attorney general, as governor and as senator. He is a hero to the anti-abortion movement, and anathema to supporters of abortion rights.
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In 1998, Mr. Ashcroft was a cosponsor of a proposed constitutional amendment that declared that the "unborn" had a constitutionally protected right to life "at every stage of their biological development, including fertilization."
Abortion rights groups said the practical effect would be not only to ban abortion, BUT ALSO TO OUTLAW MANY COMMON FORMS OF CONTRACEPTION.
Mr. Ashcroft's amendment provided for only one exception to the abortion ban — "medical procedures required to prevent the death of either the pregnant woman or her unborn offspring," so long as "every reasonable effort" was made to save both their lives.
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In the Senate, Mr. Ashcroft provided a reliable vote to prevent the use of federal dollars for abortions. In 1998, in a letter to the conservative publication "Human Events," Mr. Ashcroft declared that if he could pass but one law, "I would fully recognize the constitutional right to
life of every unborn child and ban every abortion except for those medically necessary to save the life of the mother."
nytimes.com |
