Arlington Group

Arlington Group
Formation	2002 (22 years ago)
Founder	Donald Ellis Wildmon; Paul Michael Weyrich;
Purpose	Public policy advocacy
Location	Washington, DC, United States;
Chairman	James Dobson

The Arlington Group was a coalition uniting the leaders of prominent Christian conservative organizations in the United States.^[1] Founded in 2002 principally through the efforts of American Family Association President Donald Wildmon and Free Congress Foundation Chairman Paul Weyrich, the group sought to establish consensus goals and strategy among its members and translate its combined constituency into an overwhelming force within the Republican Party, particularly at its highest levels. Its membership and purpose overlapped to a high degree with the Council for National Policy; but the group is much more narrowly focused, choosing to emphasize such issues as same-sex marriage, abortion, and confirmation of like-minded federal judges.

The group had mixed success. While widely acknowledged to have the ear of President George W. Bush and his chief political advisor Karl Rove, and while generally successful in its efforts to coordinate the Christian Right, it also endured noteworthy embarrassments. In early 2005, it threatened to withhold support for the President's proposed Social Security reforms if Bush did not vigorously support a federal constitutional ban on same-sex marriage. This provoked a firestorm of unwelcome media attention, but failed to produce the group's desired result (despite the President's continuing support for both their specific and broader aims). And later, in October 2005, Arlington Group Chairman and Focus on the Family founder James Dobson became the center of a minor scandal after leaking assurances made by Rove to an Arlington Group conference call regarding the pro-life credentials of Supreme Court nominee and White House counsel Harriet Miers.^{[citation needed]} Miers withdrew her nomination later that month, largely due to reservations among conservatives.

Membership

The organization's deliberations were strictly off-the-record, and membership was previously held confidential, but the group launched a website in July 2006 which listed its member organizations.^[2] In March 2007, the home page was taken down; according to an article in The Boston Globe, it was "abruptly disabled earlier this month after the Globe began making inquiries".^[3]

Since each group's principal served as its Arlington Group "member", but some of the groups were headed by a single principal (e.g., Focus on the Family and Focus on the Family Action are both headed by James Dobson), the site's list was somewhat confusing; and members were not required to disclose their participation. However, the following organizations and individuals were identified as members as of 2006:^[2]

References

^ "Conservatives Using Issue of Gay Unions As a Rallying Tool (Published 2004)". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2023-04-06.
^ ^a ^b The Arlington Group - Members
^ Coalition seeks to reframe GOP race | Leaders of secretive group interview 2008 candidates

External links

Arlington Group website
"The Arlington Group", Paul Weyrich
"The Money Behind the 2004 Marriage Amendments" Archived 2014-05-22 at the Wayback Machine, Institute on Money in State Politics
Backers of Gay Marriage Ban Use Social Security as Cudgel, The New York Times
Religious Leaders Threaten Bush, The Washington Blade
Did Christian conservatives receive assurances that Miers would oppose Roe v. Wade?, The Wall Street Journal
ADL Urges Joint Effort Against Right

[1] "Conservatives Using Issue of Gay Unions As a Rallying Tool (Published 2004)". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2023-04-06.

[members2006-2] The Arlington Group - Members

[3] Coalition seeks to reframe GOP race | Leaders of secretive group interview 2008 candidates

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Membership

See also

References

External links