Below is a statement about the latest developments at Ave Maria School of Law.
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On behalf of a majority of the faculty of Ave Maria School of law, we write to express our profound sorrow regarding the deplorable treatment of tenured Professor Stephen J. Safranek at the hands of the administration of Ave Maria School of Law. Dean Bernard Dobranski has initiated the process to terminate Professor Safranek's tenure and the School has now suspended him without pay (as of September 15, 2007) during the termination process. We believe that it is critical to publicly disassociate ourselves from and condemn the administration's conduct.
The professed Mission of Ave Maria School of Law includes full adherence to Ex Corde Ecclesiae, which emphasizes respect for the dignity of every member of the academic community. In our view, the suspension and proposed termination of Professor Safranek does not adhere to this standard. Although we will not discuss the charges against Professor Safranek at this time, we will say that they are painfully thin.
Aside from the weakness of the charges against Professor Safranek, we are troubled by the disciplinary process that has led to the recent actions against him. The stated bases for these actions are a record of "findings" compiled by Dean Dobranski in connection with a series of alleged incidents for which Professor Safranek was ultimately "censured" or "reprimanded." In each instance, the Dean served as the sole arbiter regarding what acts constituted misconduct or "firing offenses" while repeatedly refusing to answer questions seeking clarification of his pronouncements. In nearly every instance, he or his at-will employees were the complainants or "victims" of Professor Safranek's alleged wrongdoing. The Dean served as the sole prosecutor, judge, and jury regarding whether vaguely defined offenses had occurred, usually refusing to even grant the "accused" any detailed information regarding the "charges" before conducting the "inquiry."
This flawed process has now culminated in the extraordinary action of suspending Professor Safranek without pay (as of September 15, 2007) through a vote of the "Executive Committee" of the School's Board. Although the suspension appears unjust in itself, the Dean's chosen procedures are absolutely lacking in even the veneer of fundamental fairness or due process norms. Indeed, the suspension occurred without deliberation by the full Board of Governors, without faculty consultation, without due process, and without any meaningful explanation as to why the circumstances satisfy the relevant standard of an "extraordinary" case. This abuse of this procedure has effectively stripped Professor Safranek, a husband and father of seven children, of the very security that tenure is supposed to afford faculty members at law schools approved by the American Bar Association.
In our view, these actions (and many others) reveal the extent to which this administration has betrayed the Law School's Mission. They further reveal how faculty members can expect to be treated at any law school created in Southwest Florida under the current administration and governing Board. Such a school is unlikely to respect the most basic elements of academic freedom and tenure,let alone dedicate itself to providing an integration of faith and reason designed to serve the Church and the broader community.
Notwithstanding this tragic turn of events, we remain committed to the service of our students and alumni, who provide the primary reason for the Law School's existence. For their sake, we intend to do everything that we can to renew the Law School's commitment to ABA Standards and, more importantly, to the teachings of the Catholic Church as envisioned in Ex Corde Ecclesiae.
We continue to ask for your prayers, your support, and your full participation in our efforts to heal our community and to return the Law School to the pursuit of its Mission.
Yours in Christ,
Richard S. Myers, Mollie A. Murphy, and Joseph L. Falvey, Jr.
I've been traveling for the past two weeks, which explains my lack of
posts. A couple of weekends ago I was in Cuba to meet with Oswaldo
Paya, a pro-democracy activist and the man behind the Varela Project,
an ingenious petition drive that sought to take advantage of a
provision of the 1976 socialist constitution to push for peaceful
political reform in Cuba.
During
my visit, we spoke at some length about the role of the Church in Cuba,
a topic on which I have posted in the past. Although Paya is a
committed Catholic, his opinion of the approach the hierarchy (both at
the Vatican and in Cuba) has taken towards the Castro government and,
by extension, towards dissidents in Cuba, was not a favorable one. The
Church has been so eager to avoid persecution in Cuba that it has bent
over backwards in recent years to avoid confrontation with the Castro
government and has distanced itself from dissident groups on the island.
This
is in some ways similar to the approach the hierarchy has often taken
towards repressive right-wing governments in Latin America. And it is
scandalous in both instances. Critics of the Church's political role
in Latin America have sometimes attributed its comfort with reactionary
regimes to its opposition to communism. But Cuba stands as a
counter-point. Here we have a fairly doctrinaire communist regime -- a
regime whose policies clearly contradict the Church's teachings on the
inhumanity of communism -- and the Church's stance is one of
accommodation. What seems to unite the Church's position, both in Cuba
and elsewhere, is a desire for stability and a fear of disrupting the
status quo.
I am not suggesting that the Church should involve
itself directly in a movement for political change in Cuba. There are,
however, many steps the Church could take short of direct political
engagement. The Church might, for example, provide dissidents with
access to means of communication, both within Cuba and between Cuba and
the outside world. I do not want to try to speak for him, but Paya
seemed clearly frustrated that one of the few private spaces in Cuba,
one of the few remaining independent institutions in an eviscerated
Cuban civil society, has essentially shut its doors to groups calling
for political reform on the island.
National Review Online is hosting a symposium of sorts, responding to Anna Quindlen's claim that, with respect to the question of criminalizing abortion, “there are only two logical choices: hold women accountable for a criminal act by sending them to prison, or refuse to criminalize the act in the first place. If you can’t countenance the first, you have to accept the second. You can’t have it both ways.” Here is what I contributed:
In “How Much Jail Time,” Anna Quindlen contends that, with respect to the question whether abortion should be criminalized, “there are only two logical choices: hold women accountable for a criminal act by sending them to prison, or refuse to criminalize the act in the first place. If you can’t countenance the first, you have to accept the second.” No, you don’t.
The point of criminalization, after all, is not merely to put people in prison, or deter people from engaging in harmful behavior. It is, instead, to make a statement — a public statement, in the community’s voice — that certain actions, or certain harms caused, are morally blameworthy. It is simply not the case that time in prison is the only way, or always the best way, to convey this social judgment.
It is this judgment — and not the particular way it is expressed, or even the consequences that follow — that best distinguishes the workings of the criminal law from, say, the law that governs compensation for accidents. And, it is not “hypocritical” — nor, contrary to Ms. Quindlen’s suggestion, does it “ignor[e]” or “infantaliz[e]” women — to think that the law may, and even should, give tangible expression to our commitment to the dignity of every human person — including unborn children — in ways that do not require prison terms for women who have abortions, or that treat them differently from doctors who perform abortions.
Regular MOJ readers know that I am of the view that the freedom of the Church in China is among the most salient and important religious-freedom matters today. That said, here is an interesting interview with Cardinal Zen, conducted by Rafaela Schmid, posted over at the First Things blog. Among other things, Cardinal Zen discusses the Pope's recent letter to China's Catholics, and the future of the so-called Patriotic Association.
In response to my post (and Abby Johnson's comments) suggesting that a post-Roe abortion regime could focus more on providers than on the women obtaining abortions, Jonathan Watson suggests that the approach to punishment should borrow from the approach to punishing infanticide:
I do think that abortion is infanticide. I cannot see a reasonable legal argument for assigning a different punishment for ending the life of a human being at X point versus Y point, unless one argues as I have in the last paragraph of this letter.
Some arguments I have seen include:
1) A fetus is less of a person than an infant. Of course, one might argue that this would also entail different punishment for killing an adult than a child than an infant. I don't find this compelling, as it raises the possibility of being able to assign various individuals "personhood" based on arbitrary characteristics (race, nationality, and so forth).
2) The quickening argument, whereby killing the body before movement could be felt by the mother (or some similar argument), thus indicating ensoulment. The image and likeness to God, upon which true personhood ought to be based, is not limited I would say to any point during the developmental process. The quickening line of thinking was also abandoned by the Church once technological advances made determination possible that life was beginning on its own at conception.
3) A fetus has less of an appeal than an infant, as it doesn't physically appear human. I see the same problems inherent here as in the personhood argument in regards to the handicapped, old, and infirm.
Perhaps one could argue that the purpose of criminal punishment of this sort is based not on an object external norm (e.g., all killing is wrong, and therefore, killing a fetus warrants the same punishment as killing an infant, child, adult, etc.) but on internal subjective depravity ( e.g., a person should be more emotionally attached to a born infant), and therefore punished for the greater depravity of the act required to kill an infant than kill an unborn. But, this again makes hash of Catholic arguments in this direction.
On a related note, do you think that one can say that all life is deserving of equal protection of the law, and continue to argue that that life is receiving equal protection when the punishment for destroying that life at different stages is different? It's not something which I have considered before - is it possible that equal protection of two different people under the law might entail different punishment? Would that be the basis of hate crime laws?
I think one could argue that since it is the weakest who need the most protection from external law against physical violence that one could plausibly argue that fetuses and infants, the old, the handicapped, etc., deserve greater protection through deterrance via imposition of harsh punishments than others in society.
Thanks to all my MOJ-colleagues for all the great posts to which I returned today after a week in the Pacific Northwest. Unlike Greg, I have not been in Rome. Instead, on Sunday morning, I was here (on top):
Writing in Newsweek, Anna Quindlen believes that pro-choice groups have found a winning strategy:
Buried among prairie dogs and amateur animation shorts on YouTube is a curious little mini-documentary shot in front of an abortion clinic in Libertyville, Ill. The man behind the camera is asking demonstrators who want abortion criminalized what the penalty should be for a woman who has one nonetheless. You have rarely seen people look more gobsmacked. It's as though the guy has asked them to solve quadratic equations. Here are a range of responses: "I've never really thought about it." "I don't have an answer for that." "I don't know." "Just pray for them."
You have to hand it to the questioner; he struggles manfully. "Usually when things are illegal there's a penalty attached," he explains patiently. But he can't get a single person to be decisive about the crux of a matter they have been approaching with absolute certainty.
A new public-policy group called the National Institute for Reproductive Health wants to take this contradiction and make it the centerpiece of a national conversation, along with a slogan that stops people in their tracks: how much time should she do? If the Supreme Court decides abortion is not protected by a constitutional guarantee of privacy, the issue will revert to the states. If it goes to the states, some, perhaps many, will ban abortion. If abortion is made a crime, then surely the woman who has one is a criminal. But, boy, do the doctrinaire suddenly turn squirrelly at the prospect of throwing women in jail. . . .
The great thing about video is that you can see the mental wheels turning as these people realize that they somehow have overlooked something central while they were slinging certainties. Nearly 20 years ago, in a presidential debate, George Bush the elder was asked this very question, whether in making abortion illegal he would punish the woman who had one. "I haven't sorted out the penalties," he said lamely. Neither, it turns out, has anyone else. But there are only two logical choices: hold women accountable for a criminal act by sending them to prison, or refuse to criminalize the act in the first place. If you can't countenance the first, you have to accept the second. You can't have it both ways.
I agree with Quindlen that pro-life advocates need to work harder on articulating what the post-Roe world should look like. Understandably, though, the focus has been on changing a legal system where most regulation, much less criminalization, of abortion is a non-starter given the governing interpretation of the Constitution. I also assume that many within the pro-life community would favor government regulation to shut down abortion providers without requiring that women who obtain abortions be thrown in jail.
UPDATE: St. Thomas law student Abby Johnson laments:
Too bad those documentary folks didn't interview me -- I would have had no problem answering a question about penalties for women who have abortions. As you suggested, I think the most reasonable course of action is regulating providers rather than criminalizing women seeking abortions. There are plenty of reasons women shouldn't be criminalized for seeking abortions, not the least of which is that abortion is in many cases a last resort for women who see no feasible way of bearing and raising a child ... it's almost a "necessity" defense.
No one is arguing that women seeking abortions do so because it's fun, or because it's something they want to do. In many cases, they see it as the best of the available solutions to a very difficult situation -- and none of the alternative solutions are very palatable. Friends I've known who have had abortions did so because they were scared of the life-changing consequences of bearing children and of their ability to raise and provide for these children, and didn't have (or didn't think they had) the necessary support systems to be able to adequately care for and support a child. When our answer to these fears is to kill the child rather than find ways to assist in building adequate long-term support, we've failed not only the children but also their mothers.
Apparently there is a huge youth organization in Russia called Nashi, sponsored by the Kremlin, that encourages its members to procreate for the sake of the Motherland. The Daily Mail reports:
Nashi's annual camp, 200 miles outside Moscow, is attended by 10,000 uniformed youngsters and involves two weeks of lectures and physical fitness.
Attendance is monitored via compulsory electronic badges and anyone who misses three events is expelled. So are drinkers; alcohol is banned. But sex is encouraged, and condoms are nowhere on sale.
Apparently the national bishops conference plans to meet with Catholic members of Congress in an attempt to forge a bipartisan plan to withdraw troops from Iraq. Richard John Neuhaus, predictably, is not impressed:
One is inclined to the view that the bishops conference does not have the competence, in the meaning of both ability and authority, to forge, or serve as broker in the efforts of others to forge, worldly stratagems for the Middle East. It is not evident that the nation lacks legitimate political authorities whose task it is to deal with such matters. Nor is it evident that there is a bipartisan call for the bishops to help them do their job.
Kindly note that I have refrained from mentioning that the recent record of the bishops in governing the Church—where they do have competence (at least in the sense of authority)—is not so stellar as to warrant great confidence in their ability to conduct American foreign policy. Nor, be it noted, have I mentioned that no comparable initiative has been announced by the bishops conference to constructively engage the many Catholic members of Congress who reject and persistently work against the Church’s teaching regarding the protection of unborn children, a matter indisputably within episcopal competence and on which the conference has spoken words of admirable clarity.
In the Christian Century, Jan Linn objects to the recent Democratic presidential candidates' forum on faith and politics:
The issue is not whether Christians or members of any other religious group have the right to vote for candidates who share their faith and values. The question is whether the way Christians on the right and left are involved in politics undermines both our democracy and the faith communities they represent. With good reason many of us have believed that the Christian right has done so. I would suggest that any group that focuses on the faith of candidates as a qualification for public office will negatively affect government and religion, even if its agenda is one of social justice.
A forum on "faith, values and poverty" with leading candidates is appropriate in a presidential season. This forum showed that Democratic candidates, along with Republican candidates (who will appear in a similar forum in September), can be comfortable with issues of faith and public life, respect the separation of church and state, and show their own faith to be both personal and real while connecting it to broad policy issues like poverty, environmental responsibility, criminal justice, war and peace, the notion of the common good, the sanctity of life and healthy families (and thankfully not just the last two issues).
Our forum recalled the words of Lincoln, who warned us not to believe that God is on our side, but to worry and pray earnestly that we are on God's side. We might also heed the advice of the U.S. Catholic bishops, whose guidelines on faith and public life bear repeating. As Christians, they wrote, we are called to be political but not partisan, principled but not ideological, clear but also civil, engaged but not used.
