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Current Events from a Science Perspective

This is a continuation in the series  Who Is ALEC ? and Academic Freedom and Democracy – ALEC Style, as it is important to keep the light on ALEC. On the surface, the American Legislative Exchange Council provides model legislation for state and national legislatures. Its membership boasts 300 corporations and special interest groups, and about 2000 state legislators, governors, US Congressmen, and US Senators. ALEC sponsors meetings where corporations and their representatives entertain our legislators and help craft “model legislation”. From the corporation’s viewpoint, it is “dream legislation” – and ALEC is the organization that helps their dreams come true. What corporation wouldn’t want legislation designed to limit liability, provide subsidies, weaken regulations, criminalize whistleblowing, lower taxes, provide an edge over competing technologies, or to transfer public funds to them by privatizing education, health care, workers comp, public pensions, and prison systems?

About 1000 model bills are available from ALEC. Legislators can copy the bills, change them to disguise their source, and present them as their own. Most voters, the press, and even legislative colleagues often do not realize that the legislation came from ALEC. ALEC’s hidden hand was exposed when a Florida lawmaker introduced a resolution urging “Congress to Cut the Federal Corporate Tax Rate” that carelessly included ALEC’s mission statement. Sponsoring ALEC legislation insures politicians they will receive support for reelection campaigns. ALEC’s legislation is supported by biased research, talking points, and slick ads to convince voters that the politicians are really looking after their best interests. 

 The press, average citizens, and small business owners are excluded from ALEC by steep fees and screening to insure harmony with ALEC’s mission. An elaborate system insures that information cannot be obtained by Freedom of Information Act requests. Much of ALEC’s secret activity is coordinated through Americans for Prosperity, a Libertarian think tank, which now has offices in all 50 states. ALEC takes great pains to keep secrets, as several corporations have withdrawn when their participation was discovered. Clearly, transparency and full, honest disclosure is need.  However, ALEC has 401(C)3 status, which makes it tax exempt and allows it to hide its agenda and the identity of donors. Although ALEC claims it is not a lobbying group, it is hard to see how claiming they are “coaching” and “educating” legislators exempts them from laws requiring disclosure of lobbying activities.

ALEC’ s most shameful activity is attempts to suppress the votes of those not likely to support its agenda – the poor, the elderly, minorities, college students, and working people. Paul Weyrich, the founder of ALEC, once explained why, saying “our leverage in the elections goes up, quite candidly, as a number of voters go down.” One of ALEC’s favorite tactics is to accuse detractors of being leftists or liberals to discredit them with religious groups and Conservatives. However, the network of think tanks and donors that support ALEC are not Conservative, but Libertarian, and their low regard for the for the truth  or the poor or is hardly Christian.  Citizens United gave corporations a large voice with their money, but it could not give them a heart or a soul.

 According to  Bill Moyer , ALEC is undermining our democracy. The strength of the United States is its unity. Corporations, through ALEC , Libertarian think tanks, and the far right wing of the Republican Party, are working to destroy that unity so they can escape regulation and avoid taxes. We live in a country with enough resources to insure that every citizen has food, shelter, medical care, education, and an opportunity to contribute back to society. That won’t happen as long as our legislatures are willing to let some citizens go without so others can have more. The best situation is a balance in power between business, labor and government. However, modern-day Libertarians want to give all the power to businesses, claiming that businesses making decisions in their self interest will lead to the most good for everyone, but the reality is that it makes the most good for the already wealthy.

Academic freedom is one of the cornerstones of our educational system, so who could be against it? Representive Gus Blackwell introduced into the 2013 Oklahoma legislature HB 1674, called the “Scientific Education and Academic Freedom Act”. But there was something strange about the bill, as science teachers in Oklahoma already have a system ensuring  academic freedom. And, the bill only insured Academic freedom in four areas which Representative Blackwell deemed controversial, specifically “biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming, and human cloning”. Mr. Blackwell’s education and expertise is in religion and business administration, so it’s unusual that he knows what is controversial in science. Oklahoma scientists and science educators were almost unanimously opposed to the bill as it is their opinion that there is virtually no scientific controversy on the core facts of global warming and evolution.

The bill allowed “teachers to help students understand certain information about scientific theories; disallowing State Board of Education, district boards of education, and certain administrators from prohibiting teachers from helping students understand certain information about scientific theories.”  Perhaps the bill would have been more aptly named the “Freedom from Accountability Act”. Apparently Mister Blackwell had not thought this through. It would also shield any science teacher, no matter of what religion, who wished to introduce their beliefs into their science classes. The bill even had an emergency clause providing that it be enacted immediately with a letter sent to school officials informing them of the decision. And, why is this now an emergency? The bill passed Oklahoma’s education committee by one vote, but fortunately for the quality of science education in Oklahoma, the 2013 session ended without it coming up for a vote. But, you can be sure it will be back.

The unusual nature of this bill can be understood as similar bills, with almost exactly the same wording, have been introduced in about 20 states. It is one of the “model bills” being promoted by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). ALEC is composed of over 300 special interest groups and corporations such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, pharmaceutical companies, and Koch Industries. They sponsor conferences where their representatives  meet with state legislative members to collaborate on “model bills” and to draft legislation favoring their special interests. ALEC now has over 1000 “model bills”, many of which seek to limit workers rights, limit corporate liabilities, oppose environmental regulations, cut taxes, oppose universal health care, and to privatize such things as education, workmen’s compensation, and the prison systems.

Though mainly supporting corporate interests, the legislation often gives a nod to religious groups and to conservatives to win their support. The state legislators take the “model bills” back to their respective states, often as their own work. It also carries an understanding that by sponsoring the bill, they will receive support for their reelection campaigns. ALEC has 501(C)(4)status as a charity, which makes it tax exempt and hides its motives and the identity of its donors. Although ALEC claims it is not a lobbying group, it is directly lobbying our state Congressmen while getting around laws that limit lobbying and require disclosures of lobbying activities.

Representative Blackwell is a member of ALEC and, according to Source Watch, used state funds to attend their meetings. His interest in the bill was probably to introduce creationism into science classes, but adding climate change to the “controversy” list aligns with the interests of the fossil fuel companies. A leaked document from the Heartland Institute, a Libertarian think tank funded by fossil fuel interests, showed that introducing doubt about climate change into science classes was one of their goals.

Bill Moyer recently had a program on how ALEC is undermining American democracy. Although ALEC claims to promote capitalism, it is actually the citizens who pay. Not only do many politicians attend their meetings at state expense, members of ALEC get a big tax break for their lobbying activities and our taxes still pay for privatized state functions.  Sourcewatch lists 25 Oklahoma legislators as members of ALEC and Governor Fallin was once ALEC’s woman of the year, which means she favored the needs of large corporations and of the wealthy long before she became governor. We just saw a number of ALEC sponsored laws make their way through the Oklahoma Legislature, much to the detriment of ordinary citizens.

(c) 2013 J.C. Moore