WHO SPEAKS FOR ATHEISM? The Problem of American Atheists, Inc.
Copyright By Howard Thompson, Editor of The Texas Atheist newsletter [Published in "Atheist Nation" before it ceased publication.] ---------------------------------------------------------------------
Atheism in America is poorly defined with little organization. We have less social and cultural infrastructure than even the smallest religious groups. This is not a slam at the earnest handful of atheist activists. It is a candid acceptance reality.
Atheism desperately needs effective public voices. We need informed, well-spoken people presenting our material realism in opposition to supernaturalism. We need honest, effective representatives building a positive public image for atheism.
But atheism has a problem. For thirty years Madalyn O'Hair was the most visible atheist. What Madalyn did and said WAS atheism to the public, and it was nasty. The disappearance of the O'Hairs in September 1995 gave hope that more positive atheist initiatives might develop.
That's why atheists should worry about the revival of Madalyn's American Atheists, Inc. under the leadership of Ellen Johnson, who assumed the office of President in a questionable Board of Directors meeting. Ellen Johnson is also a die-hard Madalyn fan who continues to present Madalyn as an atheist heroine. What atheism doesn't need is a continuation of Madalyn's negativity.
TWO PROBLEMS WITH AMERICAN ATHEISTS, INC.
First, there is reason to think that the election of new American Atheists officers and Members of the Board of Directors violated the AA corporate charter, by-laws and state corporation laws. The last thing atheism needs is an illegal group acting as the national voice of atheism from their new Washington D.C. offices.
Second, there is American Atheists' continued presentation of Madalyn O'Hair as an atheist heroine. It's bad enough that Madalyn's style and limited vision stifled positive atheist growth. Her disappearance also leaves serious questions about misappropriated funds and an IRS criminal investigation into money laundering. The last thing an atheist organization should do is to praise an obnoxious leader who may have taken followers' money.
The issue of atheist public representation is vital for the development of the atheist movement. If the public sees us accepting illegitimate leaders, then the public has an excuse to ignore our civil rights concerns, state-church separation concerns and arguments for materialism. If the public thinks atheists revere a foul-mouthed scam artist, then the public will dismiss atheism as just another nasty little personality cult.
ILLEGITIMATE LEADERSHIP
Presented here are key aspects of the argument that those currently acting as leaders of AA and other O'Hair corporations may be doing so illegally. This information comes from Texas public documents, news articles and talks with current and former AA members and employees. All descriptions below are in accordance with the facts available and in some instances reasonable deductions from those facts.
The basic arguments were presented as questions for American Atheists, Inc. in the May 1998 issue of The Texas Atheist. Additional detail was presented to AA in subsequent correspondence. AA was told that any response would be published. The only response was from David Silverman, AA New Jersey State Director, to the effect that the leaders were elected legitimately, with no supporting details offered. Several AA members have mentioned that AA policy is to ignore questions about the legitimacy of AA leaders.
MAKING THE CASE
American Atheists, Inc. was established in 1987 as a non-profit Texas corporation. The corporate charter establishes a controlling five-member board of directors. The AA board would have the power to appoint and remove corporate officers. Corporate by-laws defining details of corporate procedures were unavailable for review. The AA charter, by-laws and corporate activities would have to conform to Texas laws, federal laws and IRS regulations.
Papers filed with the Texas Secretary of State indicate that the three O'Hairs (Madalyn, son Jon and grand daughter Robin) filled three of the five AA board memberships at the time of their disappearance. The three O'Hairs also apparently held three of five board memberships as "lifetime" members on most or all of the O'Hair corporations. The O'Hairs had control over AA and their other corporations. Control, however, does not make the corporations the "personal property" of the O'Hairs, as asserted by some AA members.
The question for AA is simple. Are the people currently acting as leaders of AA elected to office by a legal board of directors in accordance with the corporate charter, by-laws and Texas laws in effect at the time the O'Hairs disappeared? In other words, was the early 1996 board meeting that threw the O'Hairs out of office and which established new board members and officers a legally called meeting conducted in a legal fashion? Any answers should address the following details.
1) Who were the two AA board members remaining when the O'Hairs disappeared? These board members are the only two people empowered to continue AA after the O'Hairs disappeared. Corporate officers only have authority as delegated to them by the board of directors.
2) When did their terms of office end? The remaining board members could not act if their term of office had expired.
3) How do the AA by-laws handle replacement of lifetime board members who are not dead? Any board meeting to replace absent board members would have to conform to AA by- laws governing the situation, if any. A lifetime board member who is merely absent may not be legally replaceable.
4) Do the AA by-laws allow two board members to call a functional board meeting? If the by-laws explicitly prohibit less than a quorum of board members from taking actions to continue the corporation then AA might need legal actions beyond a board meeting. For example, the by-laws of the Society of Separationists, the O'Hair successor corporation to AA, say that two board members can call a meeting, but that they are then only authorized to adjourn.
5) Who controls AA if the three Murray-O'Hairs return and claim their board memberships? It is possible that the O'Hairs could legally reclaim control of their seven corporations and all of the monies accumulated in their absence. Remember, all reference to by-laws means those by-laws in effect when the O'Hairs disappeared, not any subsequent by-laws that a possibly illegal board may have approved afterwards.
Arnold Via, a former AA Vice President and AA board member is quoted in news reports as challenging the board meeting at which the current AA leaders were elected. This adds weight to doubts about the legitimacy of current AA leadership. [Later note: Arnold Via is also reported as filing a complaint with the Texas Attorney General protesting the illegality of how those currently acting as leaders of American Atheists, Inc. and other O'Hair non-profit corporations assumed power.]
POSSIBLE OUTS FOR AMERICAN ATHEISTS
Additional correspondence from the author to Dick Hogan, AA Texas State Director, described provisions of the Texas Non-Profit Corporation Act under which AA could probably have conducted board meetings that could have legitimately elected new board members, who could then have elected new corporate officers. Mr. Hogan was told how Texas law might allow AA to establish a legal board and officers even at this late date. [Later Note: Dick Hogan is now Treasurer for American Atheists, Inc.]
For example, Texas law lets less than a quorum of remaining board members fill board vacancies. However, if the AA by-laws are similar to the other O'Hair corporation by-laws cited, it may be that less than a quorum of AA board members are effectively prohibited from filling board vacancies. The situation is further muddied by the "lifetime" board membership status of the O'Hairs. One can imagine a court ruling that absent lifetime members do not constitute a board vacancy.
As it stands, AA leaders are acting as if they legally hold office. The legal reality is that their status will stand until such time as an AA member challenges them in a court action or by providing information to the Texas Secretary of State. Another possibility is that the IRS criminal investigation may challenge the legal status of AA and the other O'Hair corporations as a by-product of possible future legal actions. For example, one could imagine the IRS revoking tax-exempt status for some or all of the O'Hair corporations, thus generating a demand for back taxes on profits. Or, the IRS could seek the revocation of the corporate status of the O'Hair corporations so that past transactions could be treated as for profit sole-proprietorship activities of the O'Hairs, again generating a demand for back taxes on profits.
Until such time as there is a successful legal challenge, atheism is left in an embarassing situation. The atheist organization most publicly seen as representing all of atheism is headed by leaders who may have continued American Atheists illegally and assumed corporate offices illegally. That leaves atheism in the position of just waiting for the bad news to become a public scandal that damages all of atheism. It would be worse than the June 1, 1998 ABC Nightline show that examined the disappearance of the O'Hairs and up to $ 8 million in member contributions and bequests.
REPUDIATING MADALYN O'HAIR
[Later Note: Some information in this section is out of date subsequent to the arrest of two men apparently involved in what appears to have been a bizarre kidnap-extortion-murder plot to get money out of the Madalyn Murray-O'Hair, Jon Murray, and Robin Murray-O'Hair. The FBI has indicated that the gold coins Jon Murray got from a coin dealer were later in the possession of Madalyn's abductors, and then stolen from a storage unit rented by one of the abductors. Yup, it's bizarre alright, and all the pieces of the story really don't fit together very well.]
"She [Ellen Johnson] recently told the New York Times that the Murray-O'Hairs are, 'the most honest, decent people I know. I will go to my grave defending them.'" "If they misled us, abandoned us and stole money, they are crooks." Arnold Via, former American Atheists Vice President and member of the Board of Directors [Quotes from Houston Chronicle, 12/9/96.]
The other problem with American Atheists, Inc. is their continued portrayal of Madalyn O'Hair as an atheist heroine. AA President Ellen Johnson's praise of the O'Hairs was published months after $ 627,500 was reported to the IRS as missing from two O'Hair corporations and presumed to be in the possession of Madalyn's son John Murray. Let us not gloss over this point. Jon Murray converted $ 627,500 of member donations into gold coins during the O'Hair's last month in San Antonio. The gold vanished when the O'Hairs vanished.
This isn't the only money the O'Hairs are suspected of skimming from atheist corporations. The attorney who defended a San Diego freethought foundation from an O'Hair attempted take over agreed on the 6/1/98 ABC Nightline show that $ 8 million or more may have been taken over the years. He examined IRS Form 990 filings the O'Hairs made for their corporations to derive his estimate. The method used by Madalyn (the corporate Treasurer of record for the seven O'Hair corporations) was to shuffle funds around the corporations with the money apparently ending up in overseas accounts. No wonder the IRS is conducting a criminal investigation.
Johnson's loyalty sounds like the reverence cultists show towards cult leaders, even in the face of evidence that the cult leader exploited them. The simple truth is that by her own actions and words Madalyn O'Hair forfeited any claim to atheist heroism. Yes, Madalyn had a few hundred loyal followers. However, to the credit of atheist rationality and skepticism, Madalyn's few followers are vastly outnumbered by those who saw Madalyn for what she was.
Johnson's involvement with Madalyn's handling of funds raises an issue about Johnson's integrity or gullibility. In a rebuttal of the ABC Nightline show, Johnson described how she got atheist donations from a postal box and deposited them into the bank account that fed funds to a New Zealand account. Both accounts were owned by United Separationists of America, Inc., of which Ellen Johnson is also the apparent current president. This was the major account Jon Murray emptied to obtain the $ 627,500.
[Later Note: During the time Ellen Johnson was transferring donations from the United Secularists account in New Jersey, the O'Hairs may still have been under a San Diego court order to not transfer any assets or funds from their non-profit corporations. This court order came out of the Truth Seeker Company case, a Madalyn O'Hair attempt to illegally seize another organization, when Madalyn and Jon Murray refused to answer questions about where they had hidden the Charles E. Stevens American Atheists Library of 50,000 items.]
The stories told to me in Austin by those who had personal contact with Madalyn make one wonder how anyone could ever look to her for leadership. She was vulgar, rude and abusive to those around her. The O'Hairs engaged in frequent screaming matches at AA headquarters. The most frequently mentioned aspect of Madalyn was her dishonesty.
MADALYN ON ATHEISTS
"Madalyn ... has a totally contemptuous attitude toward human beings in general and the organizations' members in particular. In my diary I preserved a bit of dialogue spoken at a meeting at the Center on July 28, 1980. ... During the meeting Madalyn summed up her opinion of members with these cold words: 'I don't want to meet them. I don't want to associate with them. I don't want to have dinner with them. I just want them to send money. To this [Jon] Garth added, 'Yeah, fuck them. We'll do the fighting.'" [Madalyn Murray O'Hair: A Mouth that Roars, by G. Richard Bozart, published by The American Rationalist"]
MADALYN'S DEFECTION TO THE SOVIET UNION
"She attended meetings of the Trotskyite Socialist Workers Party in 1957. In 1959 she applied for Soviet citizenship. The following year, having gotten no response, she and her two children traveled to Europe on the Queen Elizabeth with the intention of defecting to the Soviet embassy in Paris. 'The Soviet embassy didn't know what to do,' William Murray told me. 'It was the first time they ever had anybody trying to defect to them.' Madalyn Murray and her sons returned to Baltimore in the fall of 1960. Almost immediately thereafter she filed her historic suit against the Baltimore schools. According to William, the suit was little more than a ploy to persuade the Soviets to accept her." [Saints and Sinners, by Lawrence Wright, published by Vintage Books, 1993, p.101.]
INFLATING MEMBERSHIP NUMBERS
"American Atheists is still is (sic) relatively small group. ...Therefore, we always give optimal figures. It no lie to say that you have less than 1,000 members when actually you have 23. THAT is less that 1,000. When speaking of numbers always talk in terms of numbers of 'families' not 'people' on the mailing list. Never says (sic) 'members', but speak generally in terms of a 'mailing list'. If you are pressed for numbers of actual 'members' either say that you don't know or give them a percentage figure of the entire 'mailing list' generally. (Example: We always say at National that the National mailing list is about 70,000 'families'. If pressed, behond (sic) that we say that that figure breaks down roughly into 1/3 members, 1/3 subscribers and 1/3 general supporters.) If the media knew our acutual (sic) number of members or subscribers they will know that we do not have enough clout numerically to kept (sic) them from saying anything they like about us. Handbook for Chapter Directors (Actual circulation & membership of AA: circa 2,000 and dropping." [From: The Atheist Cult, by Fred Woodworth, 1997 edition, p. 11]
"Brian Lynch, the former treasurer of American Atheists, whom Madalyn fired for alleged sexual misconduct (he emphatically denies the charge), says that the actual membership is about 2,400, the highest total she's ever had. 'That's pretty pathetic considering that there are somewhere between eighteen and twenty-three million atheists in the United States and that when you mention atheism to most people, the only name they can think of is Madalyn Murray O'Hair a loudmouth who has a bad family life, communist ideas, and a negative personality. She's brought atheism into a position of intellectual disrepute, accomplishing in twenty-five years what churches haven't been able to accomplish in centuries. I think she ought to get a check from the Pope.'" [Saints and Sinners, by Lawrence Wright, published by Vintage Books, 1993, p. 114.]
MADALYN ON HOMOSEXUALS
"'To John Lauritsen: I am a female head of an American Atheists group. You are a cock- sucker. You like men and boys. You don't like women. We don't have cocks for you to suck. Also, we are not Marxists as you are. Form your own group of cock-sucking Atheist Marxists and be happy, kiddo; but don't count on me as an ally.' letter, May 20, 1976" [The Atheist Cult, by Fred Woodworth, 1997 edition, p. 11]
[NOTE: In the 1980's, some of the names appearing as incorporators for an atheist gay and lesbian group are also the same as names of those referenced as working for Madalyn in Austin. None of the Murray-O'Hair's names appear on the homosexual organization's incorporation papers. It is unknown if Madalyn knew gays were working for her or what her opinions about homosexuality may have been subsequent to the 1976 quotation.]
These few quotes of Madalyn's are among many that could be related. Given Madalyn's unexplained flight, apparently with member donated funds, given her rude and abusive opinions, given the harm she inflicted upon the atheist movement, one wonders why the current leaders of American Atheists, Inc. continue to portray her as an atheist heroine.
REFORMING AMERICAN ATHEISTS
It is bad enough to have Christians demonizing atheism as ultimate Satanic evil without our own "leaders" making us look even worse. No wonder atheism is a powerless ideology with a rotten public image and little organization. When we lack the courage to repudiate harmful leaders that probably took our money and ran, we lack self-respect and thus cannot expect any respect for our ideas.
American Atheists has it within their power to transform themselves into a legitimate organization that promotes a positive atheism. AA can seek legal advice for establishing a legitimate board of directors that can elect legitimate corporate officers. AA can have a firm of Certified Public Accountants conduct an audit of the seven O'Hair corporations, going back as many years as there are records, to confirm or deny allegations about the misappropriation of funds. The results of such audits should be provided to AA members and contributors. AA can revise their corporate charter to make board memberships elective positions by AA members. AA can repudiate Madalyn O'Hair's methods and words.
Those few actions carried to completion would indicate to atheists that AA is breaking with a dishonorable past and establishing a reborn organization based on openness, democracy and integrity. Anything short of these kinds of reforms should mean that atheists then know that American Atheists is not a legitimate, positive voice for atheism.
[Howard Thompson publishes a free e-mail newsletter promoting atheism in Texas. Send a Subscribe notice to gofreemind@aol.com to subscribe.]
SOURCES
1) The transcript of the ABC Nightline June 1, 1998 show. 2) "Setting the Record Straight," a report by Withers and Goulding Law Office published by Truth Seeker Magazine, April, 1995. 3) The incorporation papers for the Society of Separationists, Inc. which include materials likely to appear in later by-laws of American Atheists, Inc. 4) Corporation filing documents from public records at the Texas Secretary of State's office for the five O'Hair Texas non-profit corporations. 5) News stories published in Texas newspapers, including the Houston Chronicle and the San Antonio News-Express. 6) Personal correspondence and conversations with current and former employees and members of American Atheists, Inc.
Howard Thompson is editor of The Texas Atheist newsletter. You may contact him at gofreemind@aol.com.