Replies

Some have complained that the signers of the Open Letter to Dr. James Dobson did not give him sufficient time to respond prior to publication of our public letter. Dr. Dobson runs a $150 million dollar enterprise, and has worldwide celebrity status, and as such (understandably), few Christian leaders can pick up the phone and talk to him. And when a leader makes public statements that are untrue, there is no biblical requirement that a correction must first be private. But regardless, the signers have published this letter only after an intensive two-year effort to reach Dr. Dobson personally with a warning about this PBA travesty. On June 29, 2005, we sent four men to Focus headquarters and they presented a lengthy warning in-person, meeting with James Dobson’s V.P. of Public Policy Tom Minnery and with Dr. Dobson’s judicial analysts. One result of this meeting was another meeting with a Focus staff lawyer, James Odom at the private El Paso Club, which meeting he characterized as private, but during which we urgently addressed our concerns. Another result was a personal letter written by Tom Minnery suggesting that perhaps he would invite us back to Focus to present our concerns to another group of staff. Also, a far less confrontational open letter to Dr. Dobson was published two years prior to the current letter, warning Focus that “today’s abortionists simply use a different method on late-term babies” other than PBA, and that a PBA ban will “not cancel a single abortion as a result.” Also, on May 15, 2007 we sent three Federal Express letters to Focus president Jim Daly, to Focus Institute president Del Tackett, and to Dr. Dobson, offering them a chance to discuss the matter with us prior to publication. The cover letters stated, “We plan to run the enclosed Open Letter as a full page ad in a Colorado newspaper and a condensed version in a national Christian magazine, signed by pro-life ministries including American Life League, Operation Save America / Operation Rescue, Denver Bible Church, and Colorado Right To Life. If you would like to discuss this with us before publication, please call Bob Enyart of DBC or Brian Rohrbough of CRTL.” Focus never called. They didn’t call CRTL. They didn’t call HLI. They didn’t even call Judie Brown at American Life League. Our open letter reveals our efforts to reach Dr. Dobson, and specifically quotes from his own personal reply to our concerns, showing that we have in fact reached him. Replying to a letter raising these concerns which was mailed to his home address, Dr. Dobson responded on Focus letterhead and included a hand-written note, dated Feb. 24, 2006, actually defending decisions of judges who rule to kill the innocent, as long as they bow to process. If this tragic development does not distress any particular Christian, then no defense of the form of our criticism will matter. In 2000, federal judge Samuel Alito voted to keep PBA legal in New Jersey, and Dr. Dobson (along with FRC’s Gary Bauer, etc.) commended him for that ruling because Alito was merely following “the long-established principle” of “precedent.” But there is an older legal precedent which the pro-life industry has relegated to a second-tier authority, Thou shall not murder. Over the years the pro-life movement has slid to where it now advocates the legal theory of the defendants at Nuremberg. And very few care or have even noticed. Dr. Dobson’s tragic claims are only the most public indication of a thousand particulars that show the pro-life movement has adopted moral relativism and legal positivism, which principles inherently spell continued death for the unborn.