June 26, 2000
SBC warned of danger if Falwell interview airs
___WASHINGTON--The Southern Baptist Convention's tax-exempt status could be jeopardized if its Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission airs a radio interview with Jerry Falwell taped June 12, according to a church-state watchdog group.
___Americans United for Separation of Church and State Executive Director Barry Lynn said Falwell's comments made during a taping for the ERLC's nationwide "For Faith and Family" radio program were partisan. He said Falwell is attempting to help defeat Vice President Al Gore in the November presidential election.
___In a June 14 letter to ERLC President Richard Land, Lynn urged Land not to air the interview because "many listeners of the SBC-produced program would certainly conclude that his partisan agenda has the official endorsement of the Southern Baptist Convention."
___"The American people, I think, sense something right now--that we are about to lose America," Falwell said in the interview taped before a live audience in the SBC exhibit hall. "Ronald Reagan would not have been president unless Bible-believing Christians in 1979 and 1980 by the millions said, 'We've had enough,' and threw Jimmy Carter out and put Ronald Reagan in, to put it bluntly."
___"If we don't do the same thing Nov. 7 with Mr. Gore," Falwell said, "and get somebody in there to rebuild the moral values and fabric of this nation, we're going to be in the same mess or worse than we were in 1980."
___Lynn told Land: "I can understand that Falwell may have been more partisan in his interview than you had expected. If his comments had been broadcast live, the commission and the Southern Baptist Convention would probably not be held legally responsible for his opposition to the Gore candidacy.
___"However," Lynn continued, "since the program was taped for later broadcast, airing it now--knowing of its partisan content--could put the SBC's tax-exempt status in jeopardy. Accordingly, I am writing today to strongly urge you to refrain from airing this interview."
___Land called Lynn's letter a "threat" that will have no effect.
___"This is an attempt to threaten us and to engage in prior restraint of our speech," Land said. "We are not going to impose censorship on our guests, particularly not as a result of such threats."
___Land said the program's editing process "will in no way be influenced by what I believe any fair-minded person would perceive to be your heavy-handed attempt to intimidate our ministry and our freedom of speech."
___The 40-minute interview will be condensed to an 18-minute broadcast segment, Land explained, and will be handled in the "standard and customary editing process."
___"Barry Lynn's letter will have absolutely no impact whatsoever in our editing of Jerry Falwell's comments," Land said.
___Compiled from Associated Baptist Press and Baptist Press reports
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