I’m just a bill. Yes, I’m only a bill. And I’m sitting here on Capitol Hill.
If you’re a child of the late 70s, you’re probably singing those words from Schoolhouse Rock in your head after reading that. But do you remember the conversation between the little boy and the bill at the beginning of the song?
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“When I started, I wasn’t even a bill; I was just an idea. Some folks back home decided they wanted a law passed, so they called their local congressman and he said, ‘You’re right. There ought to be a law.’ Then he sat down and wrote me out and introduced me.”
That “bill” was the product of the public’s right to petition their government. Clearly, though, not enough Boomers or Gen Xers in the Biden administration’s Department of Justice remember Schoolhouse Rock or paid attention during law school. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have issued a brazenly unprecedented subpoena to Eagle Forum of Alabama to intimidate it and suppress its right to participate in the legislative process.
In early 2020, Eagle Forum of Alabama, an affiliate of my organization, Eagle Forum, hearing concerns from citizens about the medicalization of gender dysphoria treatments, approached the Alabama legislature. In 2022, the legislature passed and the governor signed the Vulnerable Child Compassion and Protection Law to prohibit the use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for minors. It was quickly challenged in federal court. Biden’s DOJ has joined the civil case as an intervenor party. On Aug. 10, the DOJ served a subpoena on Eagle Forum of Alabama, even though it’s not a party to the lawsuit, demanding any material related to this law, known for short as VCAP.
We believe this subpoena is a violation of our First Amendment rights to speech, assembly, and petition. We are not alone. An amicus brief filed in support of the motion to quash the subpoena, signed by 35-plus organizations, individuals, and elected officials, reads, “In a transparent and flagrant violation of the First Amendment, the United States served a subpoena on Eagle Forum of Alabama with no legitimate purpose but instead to intimidate and chill the free speech, associational, and petitioning rights of an organization whose views are currently contrary to those of the United States Government.”
The DOJ subpoena, according to its own filing, “asked for 11 categories of documents [e.g. all communications, notes, records, speeches, emails] concerning the organization’s involvement in Alabama state legislation related to gender dysphoria and transgender persons. The United States’ requests sought to confirm their involvement in creating VCAP, as well as the basis for the legislation.”
Eagle Forum of Alabama has been completely transparent about its position on VCAP and on the fact that it educated lawmakers and citizens about the legislation during the three years it was considered by the Alabama legislature.
Everyone should be outraged by this shocking attempt to silence and punish those who hold differing views on matters of public policy. Yet the legacy media are silent. Imagine how the New York Times or Washington Post would react if the Trump administration had subpoenaed pro-immigration groups that sued over Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” policy or other groups that took public positions in opposition to those it favored.
Americans’ right to petition our government has a rich history stemming from the 1215 Magna Carta and the 1689 English Declaration of Rights that declared the king’s subjects were “entitled to petition the King without fear of prosecution.”
On this continent, the Massachusetts Body of Liberties in 1641 became the first royal charter to protect this right expressly, recognizing that “every man … shall have libertie to come to any publique Court, Councel or town meeting, and … present any necessary motion, complaint, petition, Bill or information.”
Thomas Jefferson cited violations by the English crown of this right in the Declaration of Independence: “In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury.” It’s no wonder that pesky First Amendment to the Constitution enshrines our right to speak freely, assemble, and petition the government.
The Supreme Court said it well in 1876 in U.S. v Cruikshank: “The very idea of a government, republican in form, implies a right on the part of its citizens to meet peaceably for consultation in respect to public affairs and to petition for a redress of grievances.” Biden’s DOJ should take note.
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Kristen A. Ullman is president of Eagle Forum.
