Another entrant appears in the Jesus-based pantheon of law schools. Louisiana College has announced plans to establish a new law school that will, in their words, "train and equip young men and women to view the practice of law through a biblical worldview." (That would sound innocuous if we hadn't heard this kind of thing before.)
The local paper reports on the press conference, where LC President Joe Aguillard spoke of future graduates who "will be Christian advocates in life and their law practice, protect Christian liberties and be Christian advocates in politics." The school will be named for Judge Paul Pressler, the leader of the ultraconservative takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention.
Yes. Christian liberties are in such danger. Frightening.
A look at the current state of Louisiana College shows what can be expected from its law school. With Aguillard's ascension as president in 2005 over faculty objections, the college has hewn tighter and tighter to the Southern Baptist party line, resulting in a turnover of nearly 70 percent among faculty.
Not all of the faculty members who left necessarily did so as a result of Aguillard’s presidency, his interpretation of the college’s mission, or any new policies. "I’m pretty sure the vast majority of those left for the same reasons I did," said R. Thomas Howell, who was the chair of history and political science at Louisiana, where he taught for 40 years, and now serves as history chair at William Jewell College, in Missouri. Like him, a vocal contingent of former professors and mainstream Baptists has been monitoring the college and decrying what they see as an unwelcome move toward a more conservative orientation that has placed basic academic freedoms in jeopardy.
"Education has been replaced by indoctrination," Howell said. "They’ve made it very clear that you will do nothing but advocate the fundamentalist position, or you’re not welcome there."
For Aguillard, a former member of the faculty, academic freedom has a specific meaning: It exists such that an institution determines who will teach, what will be taught, and who will be taught. "We had faculty teaching outside the institutional academic freedom policy," he said. Violating that policy, in other words, meant "teaching elements that didn’t reflect that the Bible is truth without any mixture of error."
A former LC student now attending law school doesn't see a bright future for the proposed law school:
As one who has attended law school, I would just like to express my amusement when I read that LC was considering establishing one. A law school will not flourish at LC, even for the right and righteous, under the current regime. Legal education requires strident questioning, non-judgemental analysis of all viewpoints, and sometimes the temporary suspension of one's hard and fast beliefs in considering a situation. This cannot happen in an environment devoid of academic freedom. How are professors supposed to teach key subjects with controversial or unsavory subject matter like constitutional law (Roe v. Wade or Lawrence v. Texas, anyone?), domestic relations (it's not just covenant marriages in the real world), or First Amendment (the whole essence is everything contrary to LC's new regime: free exercise and free speech)? While I love LC and got a great education there (before the Regime Change), I am thankful every day that I walk into First Amendment and my professor talks frankly and freely about prayer in schools, what constitutes religion, or even (gasp!) the constitutional dimensions of nude dancing. There has to be a serious change in the view of academic freedom at LC before a law school can grow, build a reputation, and turn out good lawyers.
The school anticipates enrolling its first class in 2009, just in time to provide graduates to Republicans running in 2012. After a year or two interning with political campaigns, expect to see new Pressler grads duking it out with Regents grads for top Washington jobs. They may not be able to tell you what International Shoe means, but they by-God know it was decided by those atheist activist judges!
Keep an eye on this place. I suspect their "scholars" will be hard at work whitewashing neoconservatism's reputation, erasing its history in an attempt to make us repeat it.