Report from the Front: Charity begins where government stops.

July 11, 2003 -- The dangers of government involvement in civil society were seen this week in Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Washington, D.C. Connecticut's government allows its employees to have money deducted from their pay to go to charitable organizations. But the venerable Boys Scouts is not on the list. Why? A federal court has upheld an exclusion of the Scouts from the approved list because the group bars gays, which violates the state's anti-discrimination laws. One need not agree with the Scouts to see the danger of allowing governments to decide which politically correct groups get government favors.

In a related story, this week also unfortunately saw the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee restoring $100 million in funds for the federal government corporation AmeriCorps, which will send much of the money to the states so that a 20,000 young people can be paid to "volunteer" to do service to society. An Associated Press photo of young program supporters, shouting, fists raised, in front of the Rhode Island state house in Providence demanding full funding, eloquently illustrated how governments limit freedom and seduce the philosophically weak into the morality of thieves —" take it from the taxpayers and give it to us" - and altruists - "only if we help others are we moral."