Boy Scouts stay true to values

Jim DeSart
DM Staff Columnist

The Boy Scouts of America deserve to be applauded for their courageous stance in defense of the integrity of their organization.

The BSA has a long-standing policy against allowing practicing homosexuals to serve as Scoutmasters. As a former Eagle Scout and brotherhood member of the Order of the Arrow, I agree with this policy wholeheartedly.

The Boy Scouts of America, as a private organization, must have the right to establish its own membership standards. Scouting's message is undermined when prospective leaders like Mr. Dale present themselves as role models inconsistent with Boy Scouting's understanding of the Scout Oath and Law.

The Scouting movement was founded in England in 1908 by Boer War veteran Robert Stephenson Smith Baden-Powell. Known as "B.P.", Powell founded an organization that focused on the goal of training young men in the arts of woodcraft, camping and good citizenship. The most widely used edition of the American version of the Boy Scout handbook was written by William "Green Bar Bill" Hillcourt. The cover featured artwork by American icon Norman Rockwell. Any critic must turn to this edition as it the manifesto of American Scouting.

In it, Green Bar Bill was careful to include a section on sexual integrity. Hillcourts vision was to help prepare his scouts to eventually become responsible fathers. By definition, Hillcourt and the other American fathers of Scouting believed that homosexuality was not in keeping with their organizational values.

It is to this tradition that current Scout executives look when enforcing their own bylaws. Religious values are a hallmark of the Scouting movement. In the Scout Oath members pledge, "On my honor, I will do my best to do my duty, to God and my country. And to obey the Scout Law...." The last point of the Scout Law is "A Scout is reverent" The object of this reverence is God. In Bill Hillcourt's book the section on religious values is very clear that no Scout is a law unto himself. It seems that Mr. Dale and his supporters are attempting to exempt themselves from this part of the code.

The Boy Scouts are a volunteer organization. Other groups, based on free association, are free to decide what is and is not acceptable. Perhaps the Scouts saw a comrade in the battle for self-definition in the person of Pope John Paul II. Like the Scouts, John Paul II has also received harsh criticism from those who seek to replace Christian values with sexual license. In 1990, the BSA presented John Paul II with its Distinguished Citizen of the World Commendation.

As an organization based upon free association, the Boy Scout may decide what their moral code may be. Those who scream for "tolerance," must obey their own mantra and tolerate the Scouts.

Jim DeSart is a senior English major. He can be reached at

jjdesart@olemiss.edu.