By Jeff Poor
Special to the Culture & Media Institute
February 17, 2009

Fears of a return to the Fairness Doctrine usually focus on conservative talk radio shows, like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity or Glenn Beck. But, often overlooked is the potential impact the Fairness Doctrine would have on Christian radio, specifically religious speech.

Since the beginning of February, three prominent former and current Democratic politicians have come out and vocally supported reinstituting the Fairness Doctrine. Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., said it was “absolutely time to pass a standard.” Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, came out with a similar message, saying, “We need the Fairness Doctrine back.” And former President Bill Clinton said, “You either ought to have the Fairness Doctrine or we ought to have more balance on the other side.”

But, the return would also harm religious speech according to a senior Republican senator, James Inhofe, Okla., and the senior vice president of the National Religious Broadcasters (NRB), Craig Parshall. Both are warning religious broadcasting is facing a threat.

According to Parshall, there are about 2400 full power radio stations with a Christian format in the United States. About 40 percent of people who regularly listen do so specifically so they can listen to “teaching, preaching and talk” formats, he said. Christian radio and television have a total reach of 75 million he claimed.

That could be threatened by the Fairness Doctrine, a policy began in 1929 that required broadcasters to balance political content with different points of view. However, in 1987 policy ended after determining other voices were being heard, which gave rise to modern talk radio.

But recently, after bold rhetoric from several Democratic politicians, the threat of a Fairness Doctrine, or a piece of like-minded legislation being signed into law, is becoming viewed as more of a reality. Its revival would not only have an impact on political talk radio, as many have alluded to, but on religious broadcasting as well.

Congressional Republicans Warn of Threat

Those warning shots from the left have raised the possibility of the Fairness Doctrine’s reinstitution, one that Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., says Christian radio isn’t immune to. According to the senior senator from Oklahoma, if the federal government had to enforce a “Fairness Doctrine,” in whatever form it may take in the legislative process, it could open the door to lawsuits by advocacy groups, like the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

“Religious messages are, often times, inherently political,” Inhofe said to the Culture & Media Institute. “Even when they are not, they could be considered controversial, and under the Fairness Doctrine as it once existed, controversial issues of public importance must be presented in an equitable and balanced manner. I am concerned that the ACLU and other liberal organizations will use this logic to file lawsuits against anyone who presents a message that they deem to be controversial. Though I believe these lawsuits would ultimately fail on First Amendment grounds, the chilling effect that the mere threat of a lawsuit will have on religious broadcasters could be substantial.”

Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., also warned the Fairness Doctrine would have an effect on Christian radio. She told an audience at a Family Research Council event last fall the reinstitution of the Fairness Doctrine would “potentially really hammer” the format.

“Over the last 20 years, conservative talk radio has done such an incredible job as far as getting out the message,” McMorris Rodgers said. “And although, ‘Fairness Doctrine’ may sound good, it’s just a clever title to say, ‘We’re going to shutdown conservative talk radio, and we’re going to potentially really hammer Christian radio, Christian television, and it’s very important to not allow this to move forward.”

She responded to a follow-up question about her remarks that day by citing her support of the Broadcaster Freedom Act of 2009, a piece of legislation introduced by several of her fellow colleagues in the House and Senate in January.

“I staunchly support our First Amendment rights and I will not compromise on the rights guaranteed to us under the Constitution,” McMorris Rodgers said to CMI. “I think the Fairness Doctrine effectively, and dangerously, mandates what can and cannot be said.  That is why one of the first pieces of legislation I cosponsored this year is the Broadcaster Freedom Act of 2009 which prevents the FCC from enforcing the Fairness Doctrine.”

One of the most outspoken members of Congress on this particular issue has been House Republican Conference Chairman Rep. Mike Pence, Ind., who was also a former radio talk show host. In a statement through a spokeswoman, he warned that it represented “an existential threat” to Christian talk radio.

“The American people cherish freedom, that’s why President Reagan repealed the so-called ‘Fairness Doctrine’ back in 1987,” Pence said. “This Depression-era government regulation would actually regulate the content of America’s airwaves and represents an existential threat to talk radio—and in particular—Christian talk radio.”

The Red Lion Case: Christian Radio and the Fairness Doctrine, a Historical Precedence

If you don’t study history, you’re doomed to repeat it. That’s a message many Fairness Doctrine opponents use when making the case that it is a threat to Christian radio. Christian broadcast was used as a the test case of the Fairness Doctrine that passed muster with the U.S. Supreme Court in the landmark 1969 Red Lion Broadcasting v. FCC case.

The Court ruled the FCC had the right to enforce the Fairness Doctrine where channels or frequencies were limited in this case. In the case, the Court ordered a station in Red Lion, Pa., WGCB, to provide “equal time” to an individual that had been attacked by Rev. Billy James Hargis.

An article by John Carmody in the April 2, 1975, Washington Post explained Hargis disparaged Fred Cook, a freelance writer who had been critical of former Republican presidential candidate Sen. Barry Goldwater, R-Ariz., a candidate Hargis supported. Despite claims the decision had some “tainted circumstances” surrounding its origin, Carmody said the case had a “chilling effect.”

“The Red Lion decision, upholding the power of the FCC in such matters, “chilled” the broadcast industry, which had long sought the same First Amendment rights of free speech accorded to print journalists, who are not subject to government regulation,” Carmody wrote.

That, as Inhofe explained to CMI, is a dangerous precedent that Christian broadcasters should be aware of.

“It deeply concerns me that any revival of the Fairness Doctrine will have a serious detrimental effect, not only on talk radio, but also on the willingness of Christian broadcasters to air political, and perhaps even religious, messages,” Inhofe said. “It is well known that the only radio station ever taken off the airwaves was a Christian radio station, WGCB in Red Lion, Pennsylvania. While in that particular instance the supposed ‘offense’ was a personal attack against the author of a political publication, the case is instructive for several reasons.”

Those reasons the where religious speech and political speech sometimes overlapped, Inhofe explained.

Where Political Speech Overlaps with Religious Speech

There are those who believe the government should be a secular institution, devoid of any trace of religion. However, that same expectation doesn’t hold true in reverse – that is, religious speech isn’t devoid of politics that shape this country’s policy, so says Craig Parshall, the senior vice president and general counsel of the National Religious Broadcasters.

“That really goes to the heart of why we’re concerned about this,” Parshall said to CMI. “A lot of our Christian broadcasters, members of our association, have a lot of what we call ‘teaching and preaching programming,’ which means they’ll get a program from national pastor on a certain issue – not that all issues that pastors talk about are controversial. A lot of them are just Biblical preaching on a wide variety of kind of life and faith issues.”

Parshall gave several examples of which the two intersect, from the hot-button issues of today to religious arguments that have been going on for thousands of years.

“Some specifically deal with current events – how God views marriage,” Parshall explained. “That’s going to upset the homosexual activists. How God views the sanctity of life – that’s going to upset the abortion activist. How God views national sovereignty – that’s documented in the New Testament, that’s going to upset the globalists. Who Christ is – that’s going to upset Muslims, who say that he was a prophet, but not a greater prophet than Mohammed.”

And, according to Parshall – the effects of a Fairness Doctrine-type law or regulation would have three First Amendments concerns.

“We’re going to get it from all sides and the way I see it, religious broadcasters have a threefold, kind of a three-legged stool basis for our concerns,” he said. “Number one, we have free speech concerns. Number two, we have freedom of the press concerns, because we’re journalists and broadcasters. And number three, we have free exercise of religion concerns. So, know matter how you look at it, we have a whole bundle of fundamental rights that we think would be detrimentally affected.”

A recent CMI study argues that the three main points in support of the Fairness Doctrine – scarcity of the media, corporate censorship of liberal viewpoints, and public interest – are myths.