More Puzzlement About “Focus on the Family” Involvement in Ohio
From the Ohio Roudtable regarding your publication
Dear Editor
      Your August 7 and 8 edition appears to be in error.
     The movement to amend the Ohio Constitution regarding marriage is an effort strongly backed by Focus on the Family and its "affiliate" in Ohio.
     That organization is Citizens for Community Values (CCV) located in Cincinnati. The amendment would not have reached the ballot without strong financial support and petition circulation by Focus on the Family. How could you have missed this connection?
     The Ohio Roundtable is not a family policy council nor has it ever been. We were founded as an independent public policy organization in 1980, years before Focus on the Family began its political efforts. We are not affiliated with Focus on the Family in any way. The fact that they list us as a source of information is not something we have the ability to always control.
     The Federal Marriage Amendment is not the property of Focus on the Family.
     Have your lawyers reviewed the language of the Ohio amendment? Are you certain it is something worth touting?
     We urge you to correct your publication for the sake of accuracy.

Thank you.
David Zanotti, President/CEO
The Ohio Roundtable
The Ohio Freedom Forum

Editor’s Response: Your letter leaves us more puzzled than ever. Upon reading about the tremendous success in Ohio, we had to wonder whether Focus was involved in this great feat which forbad civil unions as well as homosexual marriage. They do not usually get involved in civil unions, as we have sadly learned here in Massachusetts.
     So we searched their website to see if they had a “Family Policy Council” in Ohio. They listed two, one of which was your “Ohio Roundtable.” But you tell us that you are not affiliated with them “in any way,” and you do not have the ability to control that inaccurate listing. (As you know, your website mentions nothing at all about the Ohio Amendment and promotes the federal Amendment instead.)
     The other organization listed by Focus is “Citizens for Community Values,” which apparently is a valid “Family Policy Council,” which has a link to the group which made it all happen, “OhioMarriage.com,” but nothing else.
     As the lawyer who was one of the first in the nation in 2001 to help craft the language of an Amendment which also forbad civil unions, I empathize with your problem with the language concerning civil unions. And my comment made in good faith is to ask if your lawyers have anything better, because if they do, we should all know it. That is a very difficult assignment because the Ohio language looks good to me. No matter what you write, a liberal judge can make it say just the opposite, which is the trouble with ever relying on judges, as we have discovered here in Massachusetts. We must probably learn that we can’t do this by new legislation, but by installing honest and upright judges. That is critical.
     As to whether the Federal Amendment is the “property” of Focus, I am sorry to say that it is. No other family organization in the country wants it. They have all been coerced by James Dobson, starting with the firing of Atty. Ken Connor from Family Research Council two summers ago and the forced removal this spring of Sandy Rios from Concerned Women for America and the removal of Lou Sheldon, Traditional Values Coalition, from Dobson’s “Arlington Group” last month. Anyone who dares to disagree with Dobson is summarily dismissed.
     I wish you the best of luck in everything you do despite this one internecine squabble that is inevitable in every movement. I do believe that James Dobson has done a world of good, but the time has come for him to pass the mantle on to the next generation as he has always promised to do.