Intelligent design
Main article: Santorum Amendment
In 2001, Santorum sought to amend the No Child Left Behind bill to include a provision affecting the teaching of evolution.[56][57] According to Santorum, his goal was that students studying evolution should hear "competing scientific interpretations of evidence," including "such alternative theories as intelligent design."[58] The provision came to be known as the "Santorum Amendment" and was written with the assistance of the Discovery Institute.[56][59] The Senate's approval of the amendment "was hailed by anti-evolution groups as a major victory and criticized by scientific organizations."[60][61][62][63]
The Santorum Amendment was not included in the final version of the Act made law, but similar language was included in the accompanying report of the conference committee.[60] The Discovery Institute and many intelligent design proponents, including two Ohio Congressmen, have repeatedly invoked this to suggest that intelligent design should be included in public school science standards as an alternative to evolution.[64][65] In a 2002 Washington Times op-ed article, Santorum wrote that intelligent design "is a legitimate scientific theory that should be taught in science classes."[66]
By 2005 Santorum had adopted the Discovery Institute's Teach the Controversy approach,[67] stating in an interview with National Public Radio, "I'm not comfortable with intelligent design being taught in the science classroom. What we should be teaching are the problems and holes, and I think there are legitimate problems and holes in the theory of evolution,"[68] a statement that mirrors the Teach the Controversy strategy, the most recent iteration of the intelligent design movement.[69] Santorum resigned from the advisory board of the Thomas More Law Center because he disagreed with the Center's role in the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District case, where the Center represented a school board that had gone beyond "teach the controversy" and had required the teaching of intelligent design.[70] Santorum wrote the foreword for the 2006 book Darwin's Nemesis: Phillip Johnson And the Intelligent Design Movement a collection of essays largely by Discovery Institute fellows honoring the "father" of the intelligent design movement, Phillip E. Johnson. When asked, Santorum stated that he believes in evolution within "a micro sense".[71]
2003 interview and Google bomb
Main articles: Santorum controversy regarding homosexuality and Campaign for "santorum" neologism
An interview Santorum gave to the Associated Press erupted in controversy when it outlined his views on homosexuality. The interview, dated April 20, 2003, had asked him his views on the sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests. Santorum said the priests were engaged in "a basic homosexual relationship", and said, "I have a problem with homosexual acts". He argued that the extended right to privacy ruled in Griswold v. Connecticut did not exist in the United States Constitution and that laws should exist against polygamy, adultery, sodomy, and other actions "antithetical to a healthy, stable, traditional family". Santorum said those actions were harmful to society, saying, "Every society in the history of man has upheld the institution of marriage as a bond between a man and a woman.... In every society, the definition of marriage has not ever to my knowledge included homosexuality. That's not to pick on homosexuality. It's not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be. It is one thing. And when you destroy that you have a dramatic impact on the quality".[72] Santorum later said that he did not intend to equate homosexuality with incest and pedophilia, but rather as a critique of the specific legal position that the right to privacy prevents the government from regulating consensual acts among adults (such as bigamy, incest, etc.).
In protest of the remarks, Dan Savage launched a contest among his readers in May 2003 to coin a new word "santorum" with an unflattering sexual definition, and followed this with a Google bombing campaign to spread the new term. Since 2004, Savage's Google bomb has regularly been the top search result for Santorum's surname, leading to what commentators have dubbed "Santorum's Google problem".[73][74] Santorum has characterized the campaign as a "type of vulgarity" common on the Internet.[74] In September 2011, Santorum unsuccessfully requested that Google remove the definition from its search engine index.[75]
Controversy regarding Catholic sex abuse
In 2005, a controversy developed over an article Santorum wrote in 2002 to a Catholic publication. In it, he said that liberalism and moral relativism in American society, particularly within seminaries, contributed to the Roman Catholic Church sex abuse scandal. He wrote, "...it is no surprise that Boston, a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism in America, lies at the center of the storm."[76] The comments were widely publicized in June 2005 by the Philadelphia Daily News by columnist John Baer. He told readers, "I'd remind you this is the same Senate leader who recently likened Democrats fighting to save the filibuster to Nazis."[77] In Massachusetts, Santorum's remarks were heavily criticized, and on July 12, 2005, The Boston Globe called on Santorum to explain his statement. The newspaper reported that Robert Traynham, Santorum's spokesman, told him, "It's an open secret that you have Harvard University and MIT that tend to tilt to the left in terms of academic biases. I think that's what the senator was speaking to." A spokesman for Mitt Romney then Governor of Massachusetts, also rebuked the comments. Senator Ted Kennedy (D-Massachusetts) delivered a personal rebuke to Santorum on the Senate floor, saying "The people of Boston are to blame for the clergy sexual abuse? That is an irresponsible, insensitive and inexcusable thing to say."[78]
Santorum has stood by his 2002 article and to date, has not apologized. During the controversy, he said the statement about Boston was taken out of context and that the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee had targeted his article, written three years earlier, to coordinate with Kennedy's speech against him. Santorum continued to agree with the broader theme of a cultural connection, saying that it is "no surprise that the culture affects people's behavior. [...] the liberal culturethe idea that [...] sexual inhibitions should be put aside and people should be able to do whatever they want to do, has an impact on people and how they behave." He again agreed with the premise that it was "no surprise that the center of the Catholic Church abuse took place in very liberal, or perhaps the nation's most liberal area, Boston." He recalled mentioning Boston because in July 2002, he said, the outrage of American Catholics, as well as his own, was focused on the Archdiocese of Boston.[79]
Privacy
Santorum has frequently stated that he does not believe a "right to privacy" exists under the Constitution, even within marriage; he has been especially critical of the Supreme Court decision in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), which held that the Constitution guaranteed the aforementioned right, and on that basis, overturned a law prohibiting the sale and use of contraceptives.[80] He has described contraception as "a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be."[81]
NWS and ethics
Main article: National Weather Service Duties Act of 2005
Santorum introduced the National Weather Service Duties Act of 2005 to "clarify the duties and responsibilities of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration[3] and the National Weather Service (NWS), and for other purposes".[84] This legislation, if enacted, would prohibit the NWS from publishing weather data to the public when private-sector entities, perform the same function commercially. At the same time, Santorum said that the National Weather Service needed to be a robust organization capable of predicting serious weather conditions.[85] The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association was galvanizing support to lobby against this bill,[86] but it never passed committee. Opponents of the bill suggested it was corporate welfare, where the private weather service companies, which often receive data from the National Weather Service, would be enabled to charge government and military agencies for that information.[86] The motivations surrounding this bill were controversial, as AccuWeather, a commercial weather company based in Santorum's home state, stood to profit from this legislation, and Accuweather employees had contributed at least $5500 to him since 1999. The liberal advocacy group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, subsequently listed Rick Santorum as one of its "most corrupt politicians", citing the bill as one of several reasons.[87] In September 2005, Santorum criticized the National Weather Service for its evacuation warnings given for Hurricane Katrina, saying they were "insufficient" and said the public suffered "serious consequences" when they fall short of "getting it right."[88] He also suggested that people who ignored warnings and rode out the storms should have been penalized for not following government warnings.[89] After criticism,[90] he backtracked from his remarks and said that people who couldn't have evacuated on their own would not be penalized.[90]
Santorum added a synthetic-fuel tax-credit amendment to a larger bill introduced in the Senate by Chuck Grassley, the Iowa Republican who headed the Senate Finance Committee. Time Magazine called this tax-credit scheme "a multibillion-dollar scam."[91] The amendment was inserted in the Tax Relief Act of 2006, which provides aid for Hurricane Katrina victims and sets new policies for tax-exempt groups.
ACLU suit
In 2005, four young women were ejected from a bookstore in Wilmington, Delaware, where Santorum was scheduled for a book signing, after they were overheard expressing opinions critical of the senator. The American Civil Liberties Union filed suit, which was settled in 2007. As a result of the settlement, the Delaware State Police were required to pay legal fees for the plaintiffs and provide training to officers on free-speech rights. The Santorum staff members who requested the ejection were required to apologize and to relinquish their salaries for the event $2,500.00 to the plaintiffs in damages. A police official stated that while they had not violated the women's First Amendment rights, they "decided to settle the matter to avoid the cost of prolonged litigation."[92]
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