The truth of the matter is that the ACLU crusade against religion is a crusade against the core religious and moral values that have essentially been the software of the success of American freedom. The smokescreen under which this operation takes place is an illusion that for every religious symbol purged, we produce a more neutral and fair country. This is anything but true. Nature abhors a vacuum, and the purge of one value amounts to its replacement with another. In this case, traditional values of right, wrong and personal responsibility are displaced by relativism, materialism and, ultimately, the product of both of these, nihilism.
The civil-rights movement was defined by religion and moral passion. It was led by a black Christian pastor who never could have weathered the storm of daily death threats without being driven by a deep personal faith. His most famous speech, standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, was laced with references to God and faith and a coming together of God's children.
As the civil-rights movement became politicized by ACLU-type liberals, values and personal responsibility were displaced by victimization politics. The result has been a social catastrophe in the African-American community. Thanks again to ACLU-type liberals, public schools that black children are forced to attend have purged all traditional values from education and, as a result, children have no clue why they are there and what the point is in education. These children are already most likely severely disadvantaged by coming from broken homes, also the product of the political purge of traditional values.
We now pay tribute to a great American president, Ronald Reagan, who inspired our nation with the vision of Puritan leader John Winthrop of a "city on a hill." Traditional values are woven into the fabric of America. African-Americans have paid a dear price for unfortunate moments in American history when they were not viewed as part of that fabric.
Let's not confuse a free and tolerant society with one with no moral underpinnings. Those moral underpinnings make it all possible.
(Star Parker is president of CURE, the Coalition for Urban Renewal and Education ( www.urbancure.org ). She is author of "Uncle Sam's Plantation: How Big Government Enslaves America's Poor and What You Can Do About It.")