A top Internal Revenue Service official told a Christian group that “Bible teachings are typically affiliated” with the Republican Party as a rationale for denying its application for tax-exempt status.

The Texas-based Christians Engaged filed an appeal on Wednesday to the IRS’ denial, objecting to the tax agency’s assertion that it is partisan.

In a May 18 denial letter, IRS Exempt Organizations Director Stephen A. Martin said Christians Engaged is involved in “prohibited political campaign intervention” and “operate[s] for a substantial non-exempt private purpose and for the private interests of the [Republican Party].”

A “legend” at the top of the letter shows nine letters of the alphabet being used as shorthand to represent something. In this letter’s example, oddly, “D” represented “Republican.”

“Specifically, you educate Christians on what the Bible says in areas where they can be instrumental, including the areas of sanctity of life, the definition of marriage, biblical justice, freedom of speech, defense, and borders and immigration, U.S. and Israel relations,” Martin wrote. “The Bible teachings are typically affiliated with the D party and candidates. This disqualifies you from exemption under lRS Section 50I(c)(3).”

Christians Engaged first applied for tax-exempt status in late 2019. First Liberty Institute, a religious freedom public interest law firm, is representing the Christian group in its appeal.

The Supreme Court’s unanimous judgment was a clear win not only for Catholic Social Services but for First Amendment advocates looking for a strong denunciation by the court of blatant religious discrimination by the city government.

Even so, the court’s opinion was narrower than some advocates of religious freedom would have preferred.

The Catholic agency had asked the Supreme Court to overturn Employment Division v. Smith, a problematic 1990 opinion that has restricted the free exercise of religion for decades. The court instead found that this case fell outside the parameters of Smith and declined to reexamine the precedent.

The justices split 6-3 on whether the opinion in Smith should be overturned immediately.

Roberts’ 15-page opinion, which declined to overturn Smith, was joined by Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett.

Justice Samuel Alito penned a 77-page concurrence, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch, arguing that the court should overturn Smith.

Alito offered extensive textualist and originalist analysis of the Constitution’s free exercise clause, concluding that the “case against Smith is very convincing” because of how that decision “conflicts with the ordinary meaning of the First Amendment’s terms.”

In a separate concurrence, Gorsuch noted that the court’s failure to address the old opinion hands the Catholic agency a rather tenuous win. As Gorsuch explained, that opinion allows governments to restrict religious exercise through laws that are “neutral” and “generally applicable.”

In the Philadelphia case, the majority opinion found that the law in question contains a clause that made it not “generally applicable,” rendering the law’s restriction of religious freedom unconstitutional.

Gorsuch noted that “with a flick of a pen, municipal lawyers may rewrite the city’s contract” to remove the problematic clause and make the law generally applicable.

If this happens, Gorsuch said, the Catholic agency will find itself “right back where it started,” in danger of being shut down by the government and in a new round of litigation. For this and other reasons, Gorsuch supported Alito’s recommendation to overturn Smith.

But, as Justice Alito stressed in his dissent, there is an easy way around the court’s decision: eliminate the Section 3.21 exemption—an exemption the city never used. “If it does that, then, voilà, today’s decision will vanish—and the parties will be back where they started,” Alito explained.

And he is right. The case of Jack Phillips from Masterpiece Cakeshop proves the point. Justice Gorsuch highlighted this in his separate concurrence, which Justices Alito and Thomas also joined.

“After being forced to litigate all the way to the Supreme Court, we ruled for him on narrow grounds similar to those the majority invokes today,” Justice Gorsuch wrote. Specifically, in that case, “because certain government officials responsible for deciding Mr. Phillips’s compliance with a local public accommodations law uttered statements exhibiting hostility to his religion, the Court held, those officials failed to act ‘neutrally’ under Smith.”

However, “with Smith still on the books,” Justice Gorsuch added, “all that victory assured Mr. Phillips was a new round of litigation—with officials now presumably more careful about admitting their motives.” That is precisely what Phillips faces now, being fined and again hauled into court for refusing to craft a “gender transition cake.”

The time has long since passed for the high court to overturn Smith, and Justices Gorsuch and Alito’s concurrences, which Thomas joined, lay bare that reality. So, while yesterday’s decision was a win for CSC, it was not a victory for religious liberty.

Make no mistake, the new law is an overwhelming victory for Floridians and for all who favor free speech. Immediately following the passage of this law, opponents were quick to claim that this legislation will not stand in court because it is unconstitutional.

These arguments provide quick soundbites and may sound legitimate for anyone who is not familiar with the Communications Decency Act of 1996. However, on their face, these arguments are simply untrue.

Under the Communications Decency Act (CDA), there is a provision for state-based legislation. Specifically, section (e), subsection (3), allows state legislatures to enforce respective state laws so long as they are consistent with Section 230 of the CDA. This is the case with Senate Bill 7072.

The state-based exemption component of Section 230 has practically been begging for a state to pass a law such as the one in Florida. It is evident that the issue of Big Tech censorship and content moderation is unlikely to be addressed federally. Hence, the solution lies in state-based legislation that challenges these practices. Naturally, Big Tech will counter with lawsuits. //

When this case is likely heard, the Supreme Court will be grappling with the complex question of whether these social media platforms maintain First Amendment rights as a corporation. And if so, do those rights supersede the First Amendment rights of American citizens?

This very same question was posed to lawmakers in Florida with each step regarding Senate Bill 7072. When the legislation was up for consideration in its assigned committees, and when it hit the floor of the House and the Senate, Florida lawmakers had to ask themselves the same question. Which comes first: The First Amendment rights of Twitter, Facebook, etc.? Or the First Amendment rights of their constituents?

Biden and the “Party of Women’s Rights” enthusiastically support biological males kicking the hell out of biological females in women’s sports. In effect, it’s a perfect “Animal Farm” parallel: “All females are equal. But some ‘females’ are more equal than others.”

The fact remains, women of American, your rights as a biological female have been usurped — with the blessing of Biden and the Democrats. Your former number-one place in line has been handed by so-called “progressives” to biological males. //

Of course, Biden’s directive forced religious institutions to violate not only their views but a core tenet of their faith, as well. Does this remind anyone of anything?

Remember when a 2015 Supreme Court ruling made same-sex marriage the law of the land? Remember also how same-sex couples promptly rushed to Christian churches and demanded to be married?

In contrast, remember how same-sex couples did not rush to Muslim mosques or Buddhist temples and demand to be married in either of those “houses of worship,” as well? //

Alliance Defending Freedom is representing College of the Ozarks in its legal fight. Senior counsel Julie Marie Blake said in a statement:

“The government cannot and should not force schools to open girls’ dorms to males based on its politically motivated and inappropriate redefinition of ‘sex.’

“Women shouldn’t be forced to share private spaces — including showers and dorm rooms — with males, and religious schools shouldn’t be punished simply because of their beliefs about marriage and biological sex.

Government overreach by the Biden administration continues to victimize women, girls, and people of faith by gutting their legal protections, and it must be stopped.”

Ted Cruz
@tedcruz
Nice that he can say that.

Daily Caller
@DailyCaller
Prince Harry Says America’s First Amendment Is ‘Bonkers’
https://dailycaller.com/2021/05/15/pri

Former solicitor general Ken Starr's new book, 'Religious Liberty in Crisis,' is an excellent and educational introduction to a complex topic, but fails to offer much reassurance. //

A federal lawsuit filed on March 29 against the U.S. Department of Education cites 33 current and former LGBTQ students at federally funded Christian colleges and universities for what the nonprofit Religious Exemption Accountability Project refers to as “unconstitutional discriminatory policies.”

According to the class-action suit, the religious exemption status of the 25 listed schools allows them to maintain discriminatory policies while receiving government funding. This suit, perhaps intentionally, follows the recent passage of the Equality Act in the House — effectively adding gender identity and sexuality to the groups protected under the Civil Rights Act — which is now with the Senate.

The lawsuit and the bill represent a significant escalation of attacks on religious liberty within the first 100 days of the Biden administration. Religious Liberty in Crisis: Exercising Your Faith in an Age of Uncertainty, by former solicitor general of the United States, Baylor University president, and dean of the Pepperdine University School of Law is thus well timed. Indeed, Baylor is one of the 25 schools named in the class-action suit (perhaps surprisingly, Pepperdine, which also has strong evangelical chops, is not). //

Starr recognizes these threats to religious liberty. His practical suggestions to combat them are threefold: get elected, vote your faith, and become a genuine friend of freedom. However, those with antipathies towards many forms of Christianity and other religious traditions believe it is precisely those religions that are the opponents of true freedom.

What is more important: one’s religious belief, which many characterize as simply a subjective choice; or one’s racial, sexual, or gender identity, which many define as a biological given? Or perhaps even more sinister, what if American civil religion finds its fulfillment not in some generic Judaeo-Christian ethic, but racial, sexual, and gender identitarianism?

As Pecknold observes: “The ‘Great Awokening’ is an attempt to give civil religion some real doctrines, real moral claims on lives. It’s both a parasite on the old underdetermined civil religion, and a brand new, bolder civil religion.”

Federal American law and jurisprudence have never sought to coherently and consistently define what constitutes legitimate religion — apart from such acts as once demanding that conscientious-objector emanate from belief in a “supreme being” — largely because of the influence of disestablishmentarianism and indifferentism. Perhaps that worked when the majority of Americans adhered to a shared, coherent ethical and cultural framework that owed its character to Christianity. Those days are increasingly behind us.

Classical liberalism, its adherents often argue, is designed to accommodate all religions and none. But, says Pecknold, “this amounts to a non-answer which insists on toleration while the Woke Hierarchy establishes its church.”

In an America increasingly antagonistic to many traditional forms of religious practice, especially those who are suspicious of the sexual revolution, it’s worth questioning the strength of our legal and jurisprudential levees against the progressivist flood. As a person of religious conviction, I confess I have my doubts.

The bill, passed by the GOP-dominated state Legislature Thursday and awaiting Gov. Ron DeSantis’ signature, would make it a crime to remove state political candidates from Twitter and Facebook, and would mete out penalties of $250,000 a day for any statewide candidate who is deplatformed.

Removing more local candidates would cost the company $25,000 a day.

The bill would also require tech companies to provide users with seven days’ notice that they are subject to being banned and allow them to remedy the issue. It would still allow them to suspend users for up to 14 days. //

While many on the right might be hesitant about supporting government action against Big Tech, others have pointed out that these companies have garnered a troubling level of power over American society. When a small group of people can control what millions of Americans see and hear, it is difficult to avoid state intervention.

In essence, these companies have amassed influence that puts them on par with the Fourth Estate and the government in their ability to sway public opinion. It has become apparent that the individuals who lead these organizations are not interested in using their power responsibly.

On Monday, the Supreme Court heard arguments in the key First Amendment case Americans for Prosperity v. Rodriguez, which centers on the State of California’s requirement that nonprofit organizations disclose their donor information to the state. Back in 2015, then-Attorney General Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) demanded that two conservative nonprofits, Americans for Prosperity (AFP) and the Thomas More Law Center (TMLC), hand over their donor lists. This demand threatened to reveal the identities of donors, potentially subjecting them to threats and harassment. //

“The justices appreciated very well that membership and donations to an organization are protected by a right to privacy in association, not just a right to associate,” Kathleen Sullivan, legal counsel for Americans for Prosperity Foundation, said on a press call after the oral arguments on Monday.

She noted that the justices cited many friend-of-the-court briefs written by ideological opponents of AFP and TMLC that nonetheless support these conservative organizations’ rights to donor anonymity. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) proved particularly noteworthy in this regard.

Many of the justices cited the key legal precedent NAACP v. Alabama (1958), in which the Supreme Court struck down Alabama’s order that the NAACP hand over a list of its members. Alabama issued this order during the era of segregation when the Ku Klux Klan held tremendous power in the state. The Court rightly upheld the NAACP’s organizational privacy.

“In particular, the justices seem to understand that what is not controversial today may be controversial tomorrow,” and that views that are now commonly-held were controversial in the past, Sullivan noted. //

Justice Clarence Thomas “explained that the government used confidential census data information to locate Japanese citizens for internment,” Bursch noted. “Sotomayor noted that donors may not have faith in California” because the state had leaked the records of more than 1,700 donors. //

When California’s lawyers argued that most non-profits would not object to providing donor lists, Justice Amy Coney Barrett said, “That’s not how the First Amendment works.” She noted that speech zones on college campuses may violate the First Amendment even if most students support speech zones.

Applicants are likely to succeed on the merits of their free exercise claim; they are irreparably harmed by the loss of free exercise rights “for even minimal periods of time…”

This language seems to emphasize the “supremacy” of free exercise claims in the view of the five-Justice majority. This may be why CJ Roberts chose to not join the majority, as it goes against his incrementalist approach to developing new Court precedent. I predict the five Justices in the majority will return to this sentence in future cases on a host of religious freedom matters that are currently the subject of litigation around the country, many of which involve clashes between the constitutionally grounded religious free exercise right, and statutorily based “civil rights.” //

First, this was not a decision on the “merits” of the case now pending in the Ninth Circuit. What was under Supreme Court review was the refusal by the Ninth Circuit to grant an injunction against enforcement of the California restrictions while the case is pending before the Ninth Circuit. The question was whether California would be allowed to enforce the restrictions in place while it defended the case on appeal after the restriction had been upheld by a district court judge in San Jose. The Ninth Circuit had declined to issue an injunction while the matter was being reviewed, and late on Friday the Supreme Court reversed that decision and ordered that the injunction be issued while the matter is pending review. //

The Ninth Circuit panel looked at the prior decisions of SCOTUS which evaluated similar gathering venues and allowed occupancy under other types of regulations — churches v. shopping venues — and concluded its task was to compare the impact of the California restriction on in-home religious activities with the impact on in-home non-religious activities. Since both were similarly burdened by the California restriction — unlike the churches v. shopping venues in earlier SCOTUS decisions which were unequally burdened — the Ninth Circuit concluded the restrictions on in-home services would survive constitutional scrutiny.

But this approach failed to give sufficient importance to the constitutional foundation of religious free exercise. It’s not that the Ninth Circuit was defending California’s restriction, the Ninth Circuit simply drew the wrong conclusion from prior SCOTUS’s orders as to what analytic framework it should employ. In some respects this is a product of the fact that the Supreme Court has developed this body of law via the “shadow docket” and not in one comprehensive majority opinion on the issues being decided.

The court does not exist to have its reputation protected. It exists to uphold the Constitution, something Roberts should probably become more acquainted with. //

Adam Liptak
@adamliptak
Justice Kagan, dissenting: "The law
does not require that the state equally treat apples and watermelons." //

In other words, Kagan believes the state can have completely arbitrary, discriminatory rules which reward certain sectors while cracking down on religious gatherings. Movie sets with cafeteria tents are fine. Black Lives Matter protests are gravy. But having your neighbor over to pray for you? Kagan believes the state can send you to jail for that based on its own whim. It’s tyrannical, but we are at a point where nothing surprises me anymore. //

Refr
2 hours ago
Funny that a man so concerned about the SCOTUS's reputation and legacy has done for more damage to both since he's been on the bench. //

mlmorrison44
2 hours ago
One small step from--
Justice Kagan, dissenting: "The law does not require that the state equally treat conservatives and progressives. //

acrucesalus mlmorrison44
2 hours ago
Apples and watermelons. Does that also mean the state also doesn’t have to treat blacks and whites the same? Or Asians and Hispanics the same? How about people with disabilities? Can they be treated differently from non-disabled? Not to mention the sexually confused vs heterosexuals.
What is that meme every love loves so much? It’s settled law? Until it isn’t apparently.
These justices have as much sense as a watermelon.

“No amendment to the Constitution is absolute. You can’t yell ‘fire’ in a crowded movie theater and call it freedom of speech. From the beginning, you couldn’t own any weapon you wanted to own.”

This is what the government politicians say, right before they are about to impinge on your rights. The phrase about yelling fire in a crowded theater is often used by people trying to curb speech without really understanding the context in which it was used. It was in non-binding dicta in a case that was then later overturned so it was never a binding thought on anything. So when people use it, it reveals they’re not aware of the law.

From The Atlantic:

As Rottman wrote, for this reason, it’s “worse than useless in defining the boundaries of constitutional speech. When used metaphorically, it can be deployed against any unpopular speech.” Worse, its advocates are tacitly endorsing one of the broadest censorship decisions ever brought down by the Court. It is quite simply, as Ken White calls it, “the most famous and pervasive lazy cheat in American dialogue about free speech.”

“Lazy cheat” excuse to impinge on your rights.

In a unanimous ruling, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said that Shawnee State University violated Prof. Nicholas Meriwether’s rights of free speech and free exercise of religion by punishing him for resisting school rules that forced him to address students in the terms of their choosing.

Meriwether, a philosophy professor and devout Christian, sued Shawnee State, claiming that its mandate to use terms that conflict with biology infringed on his religious belief that gender is fixed from the moment of conception.

The court’s decision, written by a judge appointed to the bench by President Trump and issued Friday, upheld Meriwether’s argument.

“The First Amendment interests are especially strong here because Meriwether’s speech also relates to his core religious and philosophical beliefs,” Judge Amul Thapar wrote in a 32-page decision. //

“To accede to these demands would have required Dr. Meriwether to communicate views regarding gender identity that he does not hold, that he does not wish to communicate, and that would contradict (and force him to violate) his sincerely held Christian beliefs,” the lawsuit reads.

The suit claims that “the number of potential gender identities is infinite” and that there are over 100 “different options currently available.”

School officials countered by saying that respecting students’ pronouns is a part of Meriwether’s job, and therefore not protected by the First Amendment. //

Meriwether’s win on appeal, handed down by Thapar, who was rumored to be one of the attorneys on the list to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg on the Supreme Court, allows him to recoup damages for the school’s decision to reprimand him.

“Nobody should be forced to contradict their core beliefs just to keep their job,” his attorney John Bursch, a lawyer with the conservative Alliance Defending Freedom, said of Meriwether’s case.

Leaked Federal Report Concludes That Preserving Freedom of Speech Online Does NOT Cause So-Called 'Hate Crimes'
By Michael Thau | Mar 03, 2021 5:45 PM ET

(AP Photo/J. David Ake, File)
Breitbart got their hands on an unreleased report that the U.S. Department of Commerce sent to Congress in January which found zero evidence that online free speech causes so-called “hate crimes” —or, translating Orwellian newspeak to English: crimes against those in the upper echelons of the neo-liberal intersectional hierarchy committed by those belonging to lower castes.

But, whatever you want to call it, violence is violence. And one can understand why Breitbart’s sources say they “suspect that bureaucrats and establishment politicians with a vested interest in the “hate crimes” panic are trying to suppress it.” //

But the data from which the report draws this conclusion is so straightforward and compelling that it’s even crazier that no one considered it before

Apple released the first iPhone in 2007. Since then, the gradually increasing ubiquity of smartphones by itself has massively increased the amount of chatting people do online.

Factor in the general increase in internet access and prevalence of email, social media, and a host of other new ways to converse online, and there’s no question that doing so has positively exploded over the past decade.

Yet from 2009 to 2019, federal data indicates that we haven’t seen any concomitant increase in the number of “hate crimes” reported. It’s remained stable despite the vast increase in online speech.

Moreover, the report doesn‘t mention that one would expect ‘hate crime’ numbers to have increased even independently of the explosion of online communication given how much more aware of the concept we’ve become in the last decade. //

But the fact that the numbers reported remained stable during a time of expansive internet growth and markedly raised awareness is about as close to “Boom, QED, Game Over” as you’re going to get.

Finally, this report turns out to be an update of one from 1993 that also drew the very same conclusion. //

https://www.slideshare.net/AllumBokhari/ntia-hate-crimes-report-january-2021/1

Van der Veen stressed—when addressing the issue of what Trump did or didn’t do while the riot was occurring—that the House’s single article of impeachment is for incitement and not for anything else.

“To claim that the president in any way wished, desired, or encouraged lawless or violent behavior is a preposterous and monstrous lie,” van der Veen said. “In fact, the first two messages the president sent via Twitter once the incursion of the Capitol began were ‘Stay peaceful’ and ‘No violence because we are the party of law and order.’ The gathering on Jan. 6 was supposed to be a peaceful event. Make no mistake about that.” //

Schoen complained about a lack of due process for Trump, including the House’s impeachment and the Senate’s trial.

“The hatred that the House managers and others on the left have for President Trump has driven them to skip the basic elements of due process and fairness,” Schoen said.

A bigger problem was the lack of opportunity for Trump’s lawyers to review the integrity of the evidence, he said:

On Wednesday of this week, countless news outlets repeated the Democrat talking point about the power of ‘never-before-seen’ footage. Let me ask you this: Why was this footage never seen before? Should the subject of an impeachment trial, this impeachment trial, President Trump, have the right to see the so-called new evidence against him?

More importantly, the riot and the attack on this very building was a major event that shocked and impacted all Americans. Shouldn’t the American people have seen this footage as soon as it was available? For what possible reason did the House managers withhold it from the American people and President Trump’s lawyers? For political gain? How did they get it? How are they the ones releasing it?

late on Friday the Supreme Court handed down an order granting the application for a preliminary injunction by a California church blocking enforcement of the order by California Governor Gavin Newsom that prohibited any indoor gathering for purposes of religious services.

The order was somewhat fractured, as there were multiple parts of the California order under review, and the Court granted the application but denied them as to others. The Justices in the majority – the six conservatives – were not unanimous in their views on each part of the order, enjoining some but allowing others to remain in place. The three liberal justices would have allowed the entire order to stand. //

This is not a final decision on the merits of this case. The case has been accepted by the Supreme Court for argument and decision this spring. The decision last night only concerns the extent to which the lower court decision is allowed to remain in force pending a determination of the case by the Supreme Court on the merits.

Five justices endorsed the "most favored nation" theory of free exercise—that the presence of ANY secular exemption to a law triggers strict scrutiny when that law is applied to religious exercise. This is basically the end of Employment Division v. Smith.https://t.co/IEQd9IWM4a

— Mark Joseph Stern (@mjs_DC

Jason Willick
@jawillick
A fundamental divide: conservative judges are more likely to defer to legislators; liberal judges to experts. //

Yes, conservative judges do defer to the protective confines of the constitution and not the arbitrary and unaccountable edicts of the “experts.” Every atrocity in human history has had an “expert” standing beside leadership endorsing the action about to be taken. The idea that we should hand over our governance to “experts,” making them preeminent to the actual Constitution is an idea so insane that it makes me think a national break-up might actually be a good idea. How does a country even survive with so many of its citizens holding such a position?

But really, what does the fact that all the liberal judges on the court agreed with the ban say? I think it says that we are a few Supreme Court appointments by a Democrat away from having absolutely no liberty at all. If a state can simply decide you can’t go to church, then what is left, exactly? Because they can dang sure declare an “emergency” and arbitrarily decide you don’t get to have guns either. They can certainly suppress speech under that standard for the greater good as well. //

For every Never Trumper out there who didn't think Trump's term was worth it, had he not been elected, SCOTUS would have decided last night that a state can just stop people from going to church while allowing celebrity book signings. Your decorum wasn't gonna save you. https://t.co/YSStLCWMnS

— Bonchie (@bonchieredstate)

The action taken by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign is a blatant attempt to chill the exercise of First Amendment rights by the press and by any individual who decides to share the story or those views. I realize this last sentence is probably written in vain, but her action should be condemned by other Members of Congress and clear guidance given that no such action should ever be taken by any elected official in the future.

Jonathan Turley
@JonathanTurley
I fail to see how having a "community-approach" to censure is so much better than a corporate approach. https://foxnews.com/politics/twitter-unveils-birdwatch-a-community-driven-approach-to-misleading-information Majoritarian limits on free speech are nothing new. Indeed, that is the point of free speech protections. You do not need to protect popular speech.

My main concern is still Twitter's expanding censorship of material deemed misleading. The use of community input will be part of this broader effort to identify material deemed misinformation and remove it.

...Birdwatch will encourage groups to organize objections to tweets and build the case for removals, flags, or warnings by Twitter. Who is watching the birdwatchers? These people already have their own Twitter accounts to offer opposing viewpoints.

trsoli
@trsoli
Replying to @JonathanTurley
Sounds like a shift to crowdsourcing to get around any “editorial” type activity coming from the corporation itself to keep its exemption.

Over two centuries ago, on June 18, 1812, Jefferson Democrats declared war on Great Britain. At that time, Jefferson Democrats controlled 107 of 143 congressional seats, 26 of 34 senate seats and Thomas Jefferson’s hand pick successor, James Madison, was president. Meanwhile in the city of Baltimore a Federalist publisher named Alexander Contee Hanson lived. Hanson owned one of the most powerful Federalist newspapers in the entire nation, the Federal Republican. //

During the war of 1812, Federalists opposed the war as they believe it was manufactured by the Jefferson Democrats to further that party’s political interests. As soon as war started, Alexander Hanson used the Federal Republican to denounce Madison and the war. Within days, a mob of Jefferson Democrats destroyed the newspaper’s office including the printing press. //

No sooner had the citizens of Baltimore heard of Hanson’s return than they planned a second mob attack. This time, though, Hanson was not going down without a fight— he brought over seventy men into his office to assist him. Among the men defending Hanson were revolutionary leaders Henry “Light Horse Harry” Lee, father of Robert E. Lee, and General James M. Lingan. //

Lee and Madison were classmates at Princeton. They had a long-standing friendship. Since Lee was one of the nation’s foremost military experts, Madison may have asked Lee to come out of retirement to assist in the defense of his country. Lee had provided Madison advice on how to prepare the country’s defenses. Because the mob, in its frenzy, sought to silence Hanson and publish his supporters, it may have altered the course of the War of 1812. If, for example, Madison had the experience of Lee by his side, the British would never have captured and burned Washington, D.C.