December 15, 2006 - News

"...what a tangled web we weave, When first we practise to deceive! "
Sir Walter Scott, (1771 - 1832)

TBSE:

The English word plagiary comes from the Latin word plagium, meaning kidnapping.  It seems one of our lifetime-appointment Federal judges is guilty of directly assisting the ACLU with the kidnapping of our children's thoughts via what they are taught in government-run schools.

You may recall that a year ago Judge Jones issued an 'over the top' ruling that ordered a local school district in Pennsylvania to cease any mention of Intelligent Design theory.  While the ruling was strictly limited to that school district (i.e. it has no legal standing on any other school district, even in Pennsylvania), Judge Jones promptly hit the celebrity speakers' circuit, and appeared to be a self-made man who then went about praising his creator, namely himself.

It seems that Judge Jones is not the "brilliant scholar" the secularists said.  He is more of the academic version of a common thief, having taken much of his highly touted legal decision directly from the ACLU legal brief in the case.

A word-by-word analysis of Judge Jones' ruling, conducted by the Discovery Institute, (DI) a conservative think-tank located in Seattle, Washington, has revealed that key sections of the decision were lifted nearly verbatim in a "copy and paste" fashion from the ACLU legal brief in the case.1   In essence, the ACLU wrote the opinion and then the Dover school district taxpayers were ordered by Judge Jones to pay $1 million in fees to the ACLU.  According to DI,

"...nearly all of Judge Jones’ lengthy examination of “whether ID is science” came not from his own efforts or analysis but from wording supplied by ACLU attorneys. In fact, 90.9% (or 5,458 words) of Judge Jones’ 6,004- word section on intelligent design as science was taken virtually verbatim from the ACLU’s proposed “Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law” submitted to Judge Jones nearly a month before his ruling. Judge Jones even copied several clearly erroneous factual claims made by the ACLU. The finding that most of Judge Jones’ analysis of intelligent design was apparently not the product of his own original deliberative activity seriously undercuts the credibility of Judge Jones’ examination of the scientific validity of intelligent design."2 [emphasis in original]
 

Additionally, Judge Jones' academic theft is not limited to his courtroom.  DI has also compared portions of a commencement address Jones delivered and found it too, contained unattributed passages copied verbatim from a scholarly book.3, 4

Some have noted that it is not uncommon for judges to draw on lawyers' pleadings when writing opinions.  While this "everyone is doing it" argument fails to justify something wrong, Judge Jones carried this to a new level by copying almost the entire section on whether ID is science essentially directly from the ACLU—a practice discouraged by courts. Moreover, he did not directly acknowledge the source of the passages (the ACLU), and then publicly took credit, and in one case even accepted an honorary doctorate for having written them!

Any college student would fail any simple essay assignment if they copied (without giving original authors credit) the way Judge Jones did in each case.   Dickenson College, however, where Jones delivered a commencement address, gave him an honorary doctorate in law for his efforts.5    Shame on him.

Judge Jones has now impugned both his judicial independence and his integrity.  The American people deserve more than an appointed-for-life federal judge who rather than independently and impartially judging cases functions as a mouthpiece for the ACLU.   Given Judge Jones' disregard for judicial propriety, the disposition of the $1 million dollars to the ACLU should be investigated thoroughly and immediately as well.

The full press release by Discovery Institute on the Dover school case Kitzmiller v. Dover is copied below.  The full analysis of the decision including side-by-side columns showing the decision vs. the ACLU legal brief is located online (see footnotes).

Thank you.

Mark Ramsey

1Discovery Institute press release "Executive Summary", Dec 12, 2006 online at: http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/index.php?command=view&id= 3829&program=DI%20Main%20Page%20-%20Article&callingPage=discoMainPage

2 West, John G., and DeWolf, David K., "A Comparison of Judge Jones' Opinion in Kitzmiller v. Dover with Plaintiffs' Proposed "Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law", Dec 12, 2006.  http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/filesDB-download.php?command=download&id=1186

3 Commencement address by Judge Jones at Dickenson College, http://www.dickinson.edu/commencement/2006/address.html

4 Lambert, Frank, The Founding Fathers and the Place of Religion in America, (Princeton University Press, 2003)

5 Dickenson College "EXTRA", Vol 6, No. 18, May 16, 2006, http://www.dickinson.edu/cnExtra/detail.cfm?373

 

 

 

FOR RELEASE DEC. 12, 2006
Press Contact: Anika Smith
Discovery Institute
(206) 292-0401 x. 155
asmith@discovery.org
 

"Masterful" Federal Ruling on Intelligent Design
Was Copied from ACLU
 

Seattle -- The key section of the widely-noted court decision on intelligent design issued a year
ago on December 20 was copied nearly verbatim from a document written by ACLU lawyers,
according to a study released today by scholars affiliated with the Discovery Institute.
"Judge John Jones copied verbatim or virtually verbatim 90.9% of his 6,004-word section on
whether intelligent design is science from the ACLU's proposed 'Findings of Fact and
Conclusions of Law' submitted to him nearly a month before his ruling," said Dr. John West,
Vice President for Public Policy and Legal Affairs at Discovery Institute's Center for Science
and Culture.

"Ironically, Judge Jones has been hailed as 'an outstanding thinker' for his 'masterful' ruling, and
even honored by Time magazine as one of the world's 'most influential people' in the category of
'scientists and thinkers,'" said West. "But Jones' analysis of the scientific status of intelligent
design contains virtually nothing written by Jones himself. This finding seriously undercuts the
credibility of a central part of the ruling."

The study notes that, while judges routinely make use of proposed findings of fact, "the extent to
which Judge Jones simply copied the language submitted to him by the ACLU is stunning. For
all practical purposes, Jones allowed ACLU attorneys to write nearly the entire section of his
opinion analyzing whether intelligent design is science. As a result, this central part of Judge
Jones' ruling reflected essentially no original deliberative activity or independent examination of
the record on Jones' part."

Jones' copying was so uncritical that he even reprinted a number of factual errors originally made
by ACLU attorneys.

For example, Jones claimed that biochemist Michael Behe, when asked about articles purporting
to explain the evolution of the immune system, responded that the articles were "not 'good
enough.'" Behe actually said the exact opposite: "it's not that they aren't good enough. It's simply
that they are addressed to a different subject." Jones' misrepresentation of Behe came directly
from the ACLU's "Findings of Fact."

Again copying from the ACLU, Jones insisted that "ID is not supported by any peer-reviewed…
publications." But, in fact, the court record contained evidence of several such publications.
The study, titled "A Comparison of Judge Jones' Opinion in Kitzmiller v. Dover with Plaintiffs'
Proposed 'Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law,'" was co-authored by West and law
professor David DeWolf and is available from Discovery Institute's website at
www.discovery.org/csc.

West noted that "those who thought the Dover decision would end the debate over Darwinian
evolution were obviously wrong. That debate is just as vibrant and vigorous as it ever was, and
Darwinists know it." West cited a recent New York Times report about a gathering of scientists at
the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in November where there was "a rough consensus" that
the theory "of evolution by natural selection" was "losing out in the intellectual marketplace."
"A year after Dover, it's the Darwinists who seem filled with gloom, not us," said West,
highlighting several positive developments over the past few months:

***In June, South Carolina adopted a science standard requiring students to learn how
"scientists… investigate and critically analyze aspects of evolutionary theory."

***In September, legal scholar Francis Beckwith, whose support for the constitutionality of
intelligent design is well-known, was granted tenure at Baylor University after an effort by
Darwinists to deny him tenure backfired.

***At the end of November, the Ouachita Parish School District in Louisiana enacted a policy
that protects the academic freedom of teachers to objectively cover scientific criticisms of
Darwinian evolution as well as the evidence in favor of the theory.

***Next year, an honors student at the University of North Carolina who was recently named a
Rhodes Scholar will be teaching an undergraduate seminar on the evidence for and against
intelligent design.

"As we made clear from the beginning, Discovery Institute opposed the Dover school board
policy because attempts to mandate intelligent design are counterproductive," said West. "At the
same time, Darwinist efforts to use the courts to restrict open discussion of evolution offend free
speech and academic freedom. We are delighted that the Darwinist attempt to muzzle the debate
has failed."

Discovery Institute is the nation’s leading public policy center that defends the rights of teachers
and students to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of Darwinian evolution. The Institute has a
national program to defend the rights of scientists, teachers, and students who are being
threatened because they dare to raise critical questions about evolution. For more information,
visit www.discovery.org/csc.
 

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