defending the First Amendment against the Christian right ...

... because if Jews don't speak out, they'll think we don't mind

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Get Involved! Take action on current campaigns

These opportunities for action are listed newest first. If you know of important involvement opportunities that you don't see here, please let us know about them at catcher@jewsonfirst.org. (Click here)

Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism

Increase Access to Contraceptives Abroad

Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, in support of H.R. 4736, the Ensuring Access to Contraceptives Act, received by email May 21, 2006

A Global Gag Rule imposed by President Ronald Reagan, removed by President Bill Clinton, reinstated by the Bush administration prohibits US-aided family planning organizations from providing abortions, contraceptives or educating about preventing HIV/AIDS. This bill would free contraceptive supplies from the political restrictions set by the Global Gag Rule. Read more and take action

American Civil Liberties Union

ACLU of Pennsylvania campaigns for emergency contraception

March 2006

The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania has surveyed hospitals' policy of informing rape victims of the availability of emergency contraception and making it available. Their website has several suggestions for volunteer action on the issue. It also has this motivating information:

An estimated 25,000 women in the U.S. become pregnant following an act of sexual violence each year. If survivors of sexual assault were given emergency contraception (EC), it is estimated that 22,000 of these pregnancies could be prevented.

To go to the ACLU's campaign for emergency contraception, click here.

National Council of Jewish Women

Oppose Southwick Confirmation

National Council of Jewish Women, June 18, 2007

The Senate Judiciary Committee is expected to vote on June 21, 2007 on the nomination of Judge Leslie Southwick to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. Judge Southwick's record as a judge on the Mississippi Court of Appeals demonstrates his hostility toward civil rights. He wrote a separate concurring opinion in a case that asserted that a "homosexual lifestyle" could be used to deprive a parent of custody of her own child and he ruled that a state employee’s dismissal for calling a co-worker a racial epithet was unwarranted. Click here to take action.

Oppose Anti-Birth Control Appointment

National Council of Jewish Women campaign against confirmation of Eric Keroack, November 21, 2006

On November 16, Mike Leavitt, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, appointed Dr. Eric Keroack as the new Deputy Assistant Secretary for Population Affairs (DASPA). In this position, Dr. Keroack will oversee Title X, the nation's family planning program. For more than 35 years, the Title X program has provided high quality preventive care and family planning services to millions of Americans.

Currently, Dr. Keroack serves as the medical director for A Woman's Concern, six crisis pregnancy centers in the Greater Boston area that do not distribute, encourage the use of, or offer referrals for contraceptive drugs and devices. Dr. Keroack's views on family planning are extreme and far outside the mainstream, making him the wrong person to head the country's family planning program. Click here to write President Bush and Secretary Leavitt from the NCJW website.

February 2006. The National Council of Jewish Women is running a letter-writing campaign to legislators in opposition to religious discrimination in hiring for programs financed with faith-based funding. The NCJW's explanation is below. To take action, click here.

Federal law prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of religion. As partners with the government in providing social services, faith-based organizations have always followed the same anti-discrimination rules as secular social service agencies. The President's "faith-based initiative" would change the law to allow religious discrimination in hiring at agencies -- including faith-based organizations -- that provide social services supported by government funds. NCJW believes it is critical that any social service programs receiving federal funds follow civil rights laws, including those that prohibit religious discrimination in employment practices.

Americans United for the Separation of Church and State

Don't Extend the Temporary Emergency School Voucher Program!

Americans United for the Separation of Church and State

The federally-funded school voucher program was supposed to be a one-time program in response to Hurricane Katrina. However, it could be extended in the “Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act” (HR 4939) which the Senate will likely take up during the week of April 24th. Take action

National organization offers many ways to get involved

If you are interested in quick action, you can visit the Church-State Action page and write letters to legislators on such topics as faith-based funding. Click here for that page.

For longer-term involvement, click to Americans United's Get Involved page, which offers a number of ways to get active. (Click here.)

American Civil Liberties Union

Stop Congress from Stripping Power from the Judicial Branch

Congress is once again seeking to seize power from the judicial branch with highly controversial proposals that would prohibit all federal courts established by Congress from even hearing cases concerning the Pledge of Allegiance and the First Amendment. Click here to go to the ACLU's take-action page.

NARAL Pro-Choice America

Stop Pharmacy Refusals!

NARAL Pro-Choice in support of the Access to Legal Pharmaceuticals Act, June 7, 2006

It should be simple: a woman walks into a pharmacy with her prescription and walks out with her medicine. Right? If only it were that easy.

Rogue anti-choice pharmacists across the country are refusing to fill safe, legal prescriptions for birth control. Some pharmacists lecture women, humiliate them in public, and refuse to hand back the prescription even after they refuse to fill it. This is outrageous – and it must be stopped. Click here to ask your federal legislators to support the Access to Legal Pharmaceuticals Act!

Join NARAL's campaign against phony abortion services centers

April 2006

Participate in NARAL-Pro Choice campaign for a federal law to stop fake abortion services clinics. Urge your member of Congress to support “Stop Deceptive Advertising for Women’s Services Act" Click here

Planned Parenthood

Add your photo or video to Planned Parenthood's "Wall of Protest"

April 2007

Planned Parenthood has put up a "virtual wall that represents the widespread opposition to courts and politicians invading the most personal healthcare decisions of women and their families." The wall will be used in a lobbying campaign. Click here to go to the Wall of Protest.

Pill Patrol: Planned Parenthood campaign to combat pharmacist refusal

March 2007: Identify pharmacies in your neighborhood that won't provide emergency contraception and take action with Planned Parenthood. Download the Activist Toolkit here (a PDF document) or click here to sign up.

Planned Parenthood also has a range of alternatives for action available on its Get Involved page. This is where you can join the "Roe call" to protect Roe vs. Wade. Click here.

SoulForce

Support the 2007 Soulforce Equality Ride

From the website of the Soulforce Equality Ride

What is the 2007 Soulforce Equality Ride? Homophobia is globally pervasive, and no community or school escapes its reach. In 2006, during the inaugural Equality Ride, participants traveled to nineteen schools and engaged students, faculty, and administrators in conversation about the damaging effects of homophobic doctrine, the false notion that lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender identities are sick and sinful. This year, the journey continues with fifty young adults going to thirty-two Christian colleges and universities. Two buses are taking the group on two distinct routes around the country in creative pursuit of social justice. In doing so, they are empowered to change countless lives. Love liberates the oppressed, redeems the lost, and resurrects the spirit.

Click here to learn how to support the Equality Riders or make a donation.

Los Angeles-area event: Fundraiser and Sending off Ceremony for Los Angeles Soulforce Equality Riders. Saturday, February 24, 2007, 7-10pm at the Armory Center for the Arts, 145 North Raymond Ave, Pasadena, CA. All are welcome. There will be food, music, art, and a short film made during last year's Ride. Four Equality Riders from the Los Angeles area will be hosting the evening.

Soulforce's "Right to Serve" campaign

Join or support young activists challenging the military's "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy. To find out more visit the website, www.righttoserve.org and www.soulforce.org. Or email to righttoservela@gmail.com.

Soulforce Asks You to Write a Letter of Encouragement to Pastor Ted Haggard

Soulforce, mid-November 2006

In response to the news that Rev. Ted Haggard has been dismissed by New Life Church and resigned as President of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE), Soulforce has urged the gay community to respond compassionately.

We acknowledge that many in our community feel legitimate anger toward Haggard and the NAE for their history of religion-based bigotry.

However, Haggard has now been referred to the same “spiritual restoration” therapy that has threatened the mental and spiritual wellbeing of so many gay men and lesbians. Continue.

Human Rights Campaign

Gay Americans in the crossfire

The Marriage Protection Amendment is really the Marriage Discrimination Amendment, because it’s taking away our rights.

By Joe Solmonese, president of the Washington, D.C.-based Human Rights Campaign, Washington Blade, May 19, 2006

We’ll be briefing and lobbying Congress on an almost daily basis. We’ll be engaging grass-roots leaders to be sure they make opposition known with their senators. We’re turning out religious, conservative and business voices to ensure nobody has a stranglehold on this fight.

BUT WE NEED you to join us. Read the op-ed and learn how to get involved.

Action to defeat anti-marriage amendments

A Fair Wisconsin Votes No (FairWisconsin.com) offers many options for action to defeat the anti-marriage amendment on that state's November 2006 ballot.