Monday, March 21, 2005

Who is Funding the Schiavo Court Battle?

Oh, the usual suspects:

Who is Funding the Schiavo Court Battle?

Millions of dollars have been spent by conservative political organizations that are using the Terri Schiavo case as a means to further their political agenda. This list of players comes from The American Journal of Bioethics :

According to the AJB article, the Schiavo lawyer, Pat Anderson "was paid directly" by the anti-abortion Life Legal Defense Foundation, which "has already spent over $300,000 on this case,' according to the foundation's Web site."

In fiscal 2002, organization expenditures exceeded receipts.

Life Legal Defense Foundation is a beneficiary of the Alliance Defense Fund, (ADF) a fundamentalist Christian group launched in 1993.

An 8 February 2005 article in the Palm Beach Post, headlined "State investigating Schiavo foundation," notes that ADF has spent "in the six figures" on the Schiavo case. In its IRS papers, it gives its purpose as "funding litigation that is going on to confront and challenge the radical legal agenda advocating homosexual behavior, defending parental rights, and to restore the Constitution's guarantee of free exercise of religion." It collected $15.7 million in 2003.

From the AJB article:

The Family Research Council, which uses its annual $10 million budget to lobby for prayer in public schools and against gay marriage, filed an amicus curiae brief in Bush v. Schiavo supporting Gov. Bush, at the same time its former president, attorney Kenneth Connor, was representing the governor in that litigation. Between 1992 and 2000, the council received $215,000 from the Bradley Foundation.

Posted by crimnos @ 7:30 PM