Washington Wire
December, 2003 Vol. 5, No. 3

Congress has recessed for the balance of the year and the pace of work in Executive Branch agencies has slowed as well. This allows us the opportunity to update you on the OU/IPA’s activities in Washington since our last newsletter.

PRIORITY ISSUES

Support for Israel – In these critical days, the OU’s Washington Office is working in close concert with the broader pro-Israel community in support of Israel’s security and well being. In recent days we have been engaged in discussions associated with the “Geneva Accords.” The argument we are articulating with regard to this troubling initiative can be viewed at http://www.ou.org/public/statements/2003/nate26.htm Out of concern in OU circles over the Bush Administration’s approach to the Geneva initiative, OU President Harvey Blitz and IPA Director Nathan Diament met on December 4th (the day before Mssrs. Beilin and Rabbo came to Washington to tout their plan) with Mr. Elliott Abrams – Senior Director for Near East Affairs for the White House National Security Council. We presented our concerns to Mr. Abrams who reassured us that President Bush’s governing principles toward the Israeli-Palestinian issue remain those articulated in the “June 24” speech and in the “Road Map.”

We have also played a key role in bringing the recent troubling activities of the Ford Foundation under scrutiny. A recent press investigation by JTA revealed that Ford funded several Palestinian non-governmental organizations which played a key role in turning a 2001 U.N. conference at Durban into a forum for virulent anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism. Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY) has played the leading role in pressing Ford to investigate this matter and reform its procedures. We served the cause by bringing the matter to the attention of Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) who pressed the case from the Senate side of the Capitol. http://www.forward.com/issues/2003/03.11.28/news7.html

Education – We have continued to make progress in achieving greater equity for special needs children through the process of reauthorizing the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act (IDEA), the federal government’s primary funding program for special education services. We have been working over the past year with key staffers and allies toward improving IDEA’s treatment of special needs students in non-public schools. Too often, children with special ed. needs who attend religious schools are underserved by this federally funded program. We must improve the processes and accountability measures for ensuring that all eligible children, including those attending Jewish schools, receive IDEA funded services. Since May, we have built on the progress made in the House IDEA bill and secured language in the bipartisan Senate bill sponsored by Senators Judd Gregg and Ted Kennedy that addresses our concerns further. The Senate bill maintains the equity measures in the House bill and further bolsters the procedures which will ensure that public school officials cooperate with religious school communities in the context of special education services. Before adjournment, a unanimous consent agreement was entered into in the Senate to schedule action on this important measure for early next year. See more information about this issue at http://www.ou.org/public/Publib/speced.htm
We have also been involved in supporting a school voucher pilot program for Washington, DC. This measure, initiated by President Bush and supported by DC Mayor Tony Williams (D) has passed the House but encountered difficulty in the Senate despite having bipartisan support in that chamber. It is currently set to be passed as part of the final “Omnibus” spending measure to be finalized by Congress in early January.

Faith Based Initiative - For several years we have supported efforts to open federal social welfare grant programs to religiously affiliated charities on terms equal to those which are secularly affiliated. Legislation embodying this principle was enacted four times under President Clinton, but have been stalled during the Bush Administration. In recent months, President Bush has advanced this agenda through executive orders and agency regulation reforms. Most recently, this initiative resulted in the Touro Synagogue receiving a grant of $275,000 from the Department of the Interior to assist the landmarked synagogue in preserving aspects of its roof and façade. There is still much that should be done through legislation, however. To our disappointment, the bipartisan proposal known as the CARE Act (a package of tax incentives for increased charitable giving plus a $1.5 billion increase in federal social service grant funding) foundered in end-of-session Senate bickering despite having been passed overwhelmingly, albeit in slightly different forms, by both houses earlier in the year.

Religious Liberty - ‘WRFA’: To date, our perennial efforts to secure greater protections for religious people having their religious needs accommodated in the workplace have not succeeded under Republican or Democrat control of Congress. However, the Workplace Religious Freedom Act was introduced in the Senate in April (http://ou.org/public/statements/2003/nate9.htm) with Senators Rick Santorum (R-PA) and John Kerry (D-MA) as the lead sponsors and we are pleased to have built to a record number of senate co-sponsors of this bill (20) including, for the first time, Senators Hatch, Specter and Coleman. (To see a full list, please visit http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d108:SN00893:@@@N) We hope that this effort will finally be successful.

JUDICIAL DOCKET

On December 2, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case of Locke v. Davey. The OU, joined with other Orthodox organizations, in filing a friend of the court brief principally authored by Nat Lewin in this case in support of Josh Davey. To read the brief and an op ed on this important case, please visit the following links:
http://pewforum.org/school-vouchers/locke/NationalJewish.pdf
http://www.jewishtimes.com/scripts/edition.pl?now=5/25/1999&SubSectionID=33&ID=1775
The next major “church-state” case on the Supreme Court’s docket this term is a review of the constitutionality of the phrase “under G-d” in the Pledge of Allegiance. Consultations as to whether the OU/IPA will participate in this case are ongoing.

On November 18, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts issued its ruling in the Goodridge case directing the state legislature to pass a laws providing for same sex marriages in the Bay State within six months. The OU joined with Agudath Israel in filing a brief with the SJC urging them not to rule this way. The OU/IPA issued a statement of protest in the wake of the ruling – http://www.ou.org/public/statements/2003/nate22.htm In keeping with policies embodied in standing OU policy resolutions, we are participating in ongoing discussions as to how best to respond to the growing movement to recognize gay marriages in the United States.

IPA DINNER

On November 10, 2003, a gala dinner to benefit the IPA’s Congressional Internship Program was held in New York City. The dinner’s honorees were Lonny Kaplan and Betty Ehrenberg. The featured speaker at the dinner was U.S. Senator Rick Santorum who delivered a powerful address on the subject of religious liberty. You can watch Senator Santorum’s speech by visiting http://www.ou.org/public/statements/2003/santorum.htm

INTERNSHIP PROGRAM

It is application season again for our renowned Congressional Internship Program. For further information on the internship program please see, http://ou.org/public/interns/.
 
 

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