The California Supreme Court is considering forbidding the state's 1600 judges from participating in the Boy Scouts of America. Canon 2C of the Code of Judicial Ethics bars judges from belonging to groups that discriminate based on race or sexual orientation. An amendment to that canon permits judges to participate in non-profit youth groups like the Boy Scouts. Several county bar associations, including Los Angeles and San Francisco, have petitioned the Supreme Court, asking that this amendment be revoked. They believe that membership in the Boy Scouts of America compromises a judge's impartiality when faced with a homosexual litigant or defendant. The Supreme Court is conducting a study to determine its course of action. A decision to eliminate the amendment would essentially require judges who are Scouts to leave that organization, or lose their jobs.
The Boy Scouts of America have faced a barrage of legal and economic setbacks since their dubious victory in 2000's Boy Scouts of America vs. Dale US Supreme Court decision. In the Dale case, the Supreme Court ruled that the Boy Scouts of America, as a private organization, could refuse membership to openly homosexual youths and leaders. The Boy Scouts consider homosexuality to be incongruous with their focus on traditional family values.
As an Eagle Scout, I consider it unfortunate that the organization that I love so much has such an antiquated view of sexual orientation. I don't consider the Dale decision to be a victory for anyone. I have several friends who in addition to being Eagles are also homosexual. They are some of the most admirable and upstanding men I've had the pleasure of knowing. I believe the Boy Scouts of America needs to seriously reconsider its archaic and narrow minded perspective, and realize that homosexuals can be positive role models.
In spite of this shortcoming, I believe my membership in the Boy Scouts of America has shaped me into the kind of person I am today. If I have done anything laudable in my life so far, it is because I've tried to be a good Scout. The Boy Scouts of America has been shaping young men better than me for almost ninety-two years. I'm afraid that too many people judge the Boy Scouts by the blemish of their exclusion policy and not the immense good they do. The Boy Scouts of America is not an organization dedicated to the exclusion of homosexuals, but rather to the shaping of good citizens and good leaders.
A decision by the California Supreme Court to prevent its judges from being members of the Boy Scouts of America is a threat not only to one of our country's oldest youth organizations, but to the Constitution itself. The First Amendment gives all citizens the right to peaceably assemble with other like minded individuals. Furthermore, our nation's highest court has upheld the constitutionality of the Boy Scouts' membership policies. For an arm of the government to force a judge to choose between his occupation and his constitutionally guaranteed right to assemble is farcical.
It is a sad trend in our country that what is politically correct often takes precedence over what is actually right. We, as a society, live in such abject fear of offending certain sensitive groups that we are willing to sacrifice our core principles. In our ravenous quest for diversity, we forget that if everyone could belong to every group, we would eliminate that which makes us diverse.
Churches regularly discriminate on the basis of religion. Same-sex high schools and colleges regularly discriminate on the basis of gender. We accept these institutions. The Boy Scouts of America, unfortunately, discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation. That doesn't make its members bigots. That doesn't make its members bad men and women. Most importantly, that shouldn't cost its members their jobs.
Tim Czerwenski is the editorial assistant for The Heights. He is a freshman in the college of Arts and Sciences.
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