While ugly confrontation between reproductive-rights advocates and abortion opponents is inevitable, an internecine fight has been brewing between warring camps of absolutists that oppose abortion under any circumstances versus those who advocate for incremental change or are willing to make exceptions in certain cases.

To be clear, good people of good conscience can and do oppose abortion and work to end the circumstances for it lawfully, respectfully and ethically.

But there’s also another faction — a minority to be sure — that will use any means necessary including encouraging and excusing violence. Proposed Amendment 48, under the aegis of Colorado for Equal Rights, serves as a catalyst to reignite those long-simmering tensions with absolutist supporters of the ballot measure — Colorado Right to Life, Operation Rescue/Operation Save America, Denver Bible Church and American Right to Life — fanning the flames against those they deem too weak to work toward truly outlawing abortion.

Yesterday, the Colorado Independent explored the ties between Dr. James Patrick Johnston, a key member of the Amendment 48 campaign team, and some of the most virulent paramilitary antiabortion groups in the nation — the Army of God, Christian Gallery and Minutemen United. Johnston has written tracts for these groups that defend the murder of reproductive health clinic staff under ultraconservative interpretations of Biblical law.

In the definitive book, Wrath of Angels: The American Abortion War, the authors detail the rise of Randall Terry of Operation Rescue, Joe Scheidler of the Pro-Life Action League and the Army of God’s Rev. Michael Bray — cohorts of Johnston’s whom he has praised on his many anti-abortion Web sites and in whose protests he has participated. Bray wrote the how-to manual on clinic bombings and “defensible force” tactics and holds some of the most extreme views in the antiabortion movement.

Besides links to violent national movement leaders, Johnston also has a history dating back to at least 2005 with the Who’s Who of Colorado abortion absolutists through confrontations and protests, speaking engagements, radio interviews, cross-posted articles on one another’s Web sites and now the ballot measure.

Those long-standing relationships were solidified in May 2007, when a coalition of conservative evangelical and Roman Catholic groups — the local absolutists along with Flip Benham’s Operation Rescue/Operation Save America, Human Life International and American Life League — paid for a series of controversial ads attacking James Dobson for not being anti-abortion enough ran in The Washington [D.C.] Times and Colorado Springs Gazette.

Johnston was one of the personal signatories.

A month after the ads appeared, Colorado Right to Life was booted from the National Right to Life organization, punishment for its sponsorship over an issue that split local and national anti-abortion factions. (Though all must be forgiven. Dobson recently endorsed the ballot measure despite the absolutists’ heavy involvement in the campaign — the very same crew who ran the critical newspaper ads last year).

Within months, a new group, American Right to Life, was established. Led by former Colorado Republican Party Chairman Steve Curtis and ex-Colorado Right to Life President Brian Rohrbough with the support of dozens of absolutist groups, the activists are now challenging National Right to Life’s position as the country’s leading anti-abortion organization. Johnston has been mentioned on several anti-abortion blogs as a founder of the group, as is Bob Enyart of the Denver Bible Church. The ARTL Web site does not list its members or board.

Some Colorado activists on the “personhood” campaign maintain their own direct relationships with national extremists without the need for a middleman like Johnston.

Scheidler of the Pro-Life Action League advised supporters of an ongoing protest against Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood that attracted Enyart and other Amendment 48 campaign staff who harassed construction company executives building the clinic’s new Denver administrative headquarters.

Emboldened by support from radical national anti-abortion groups, like Pro-Life Action and Operation Rescue West (the group that rose from the ashes of Terry’s bankrupted group), the local absolutists consolidated their power. They began to ingratiate themselves in the Colorado for Equal Rights campaign, then run solely by Kristi Burton of Peyton, east of Colorado Springs, her family and a few close friends on a shoestring budget. Enyart has spoken frequently about the measure on his radio show and organized petition drives. American Right to Life has issued affirmative public statements, as has Colorado Right to Life on behalf of the cause.

The absolutists also worked to overcome early stumbles in the campaign that alienated the Catholic Diocese and other prominent religious leaders who refuse to sign on to the measure. Mark Meuser, an early spokesman for Colorado for Equal Rights, made several statements to the press that the primary aim of Amendment 48 is to ban abortion and curb oral contraceptive access.

When opponents used those comments as the basis for legal arguments to the Colorado Supreme Court that the measure’s language violated the state’s single-issue rule, such direct language was immediately eliminated from the Web site and further public statements.

Burton herself even demurs on the subject, claiming that the measure is simply to add a legal personhood definition to the Colorado Constitution. Mentioning an abortion ban is now verboten.

Except for their longtime Ohio anti-abortion comrade-in-arms, Johnston — who, to his credit, is much more open about the true aim of Colorado’s proposed law and his involvement in the cause. Says Johnston:

So even if this amendment passes — you need just leadership to enforce it, a judiciary that won’t overrule it — and if the judiciary does overrule it then you need leadership with the courage to defy that tyrannical law and enforce this good law in adherence to divine mandate to protect the innocent. So, this is only a beginning.

Other segments in this continuing series exploring Amendment 48:

Colorado personhood law backer linked to militant anti-abortion groups. Part 1: Shedding light on Amendment 48′s true intent

Origins of Personhood: Using ‘States Rights’ to Restrict Abortion

Origins of Personhood: The moral precedent of conception, religion and the law

The Johnston clan protesting at a 2005 American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists meeting. (Photo/Christian Gallery.com)

In the universe of antiabortion activism, a complex and sometimes toxic stew of passive pray-ins and endless letter-writing campaigns uneasily coexists with much more aggressive and violent means of ending abortion through patient stalking, clinic bombings and murder.

One man stands in the nexus between the mainstream factions that espouse the politically correct "love the sinner/hate the sin" mantra and the more virulent behavior inspired by strained Biblical justifications for killing said sinner.

James Patrick Johnston, D.O., is, by all appearances, a polite country doctor in south-central Ohio, husband and father of six children under the age of 10 with a new baby on the way. A self-avowed "life, liberty, and jobs" guy, he lost his 2007 bid for a seat in the Ohio General Assembly, where he ran on a plank of cutting taxes, expanding homeschooling and "making Ohio the first state in the Union to defy Roe v. Wade with a statewide abortion ban.”

Less obvious are his links to some of the most radical elements of the antiabortion movement — the paramilitary groups Army of God, Christian Gallery and Minutemen United that have been at the forefront of advocating for and celebrating violent clashes between anti-abortion forces and clinics.

The path leading from Johnston’s activism in poor Appalachian Ohio to the hotbed of wealthy religious conservatism in Colorado exemplifies the fluid interchange between the more radical antiabortion movement and those seeking to shield their past associations in order to appear more mainstream.

Kristi Burton, founder of Colorado for Equal Rights, the official sponsor of proposed Amendment 48, confirmed that Johnston, working from Ohio 1,300 miles away, is leading the group’s national outreach effort to doctors, pharmacists and others who share their philosophy.

Johnston, who founded the 30-member Association of Pro-Life Physicians (APLP) largely made up of doctors in central Ohio, is gathering endorsements from medical professionals from across the nation for the Colorado measure, which were announced on the campaign’s Web site recently.

He launched APLP in 2004 to "re-stigmatize abortionists in our society" based on his interpretation of pre-Hippocratic physicians in ancient Greece whom he claims euthanized and sexually assaulted their patients.

Thus far, Johnston has managed to convince 70 medical professionals and organizations — all with their own deep ties to antiabortion, anti-assisted suicide and oral contraception denial groups — to lend their names to the cause. However, only one Colorado physician is on the endorsement list: Edwin Anselmi, M.D., of Our Lady of Hope Medical Clinic in Centennial. Dr. Anselmi did not return calls seeking comment on this story.

For his part, in a recent interview, Johnston openly acknowledged what the campaign committee will not — that the goal of the proposed Colorado law is ultimately to ban abortion.

As a scientist I’m convinced that life begins at fertilization, or what is traditionally known as conception. I think it’s a travesty what’s taken place with the exploitation of unborn human beings through abortion. I wanted to see them protected in law. I think states need to take the initiative to pass laws to protect the unborn in their jurisdictions. This personhood amendment has the potential to be the first crack in the ban of the abortion holocaust. The first opportunity to protect the unborn in the United States. I’m excited about it. 

Despite his earnest assurances that "personhood" at conception is widely accepted as scientific fact, the subject remains at the core of intense debate among embryology experts. The Colorado Medical Society, Colorado Gynecological-Obstetrical Society and the Colorado Academy of Family Physicians representing 7,000 Colorado physicians aren’t so convinced. The three groups oppose the proposed law and have joined with the Protect Families Protect Choices – No on 48 campaign to block the effort.

Crystal Clinkenbeard, spokeswoman for the No on 48 group, wrote in a statement:

Doctors must have the freedom to use their professional judgment to provide the best possible treatment for their patients. ‘The moment of fertilization’ is not a medical definition of pregnancy, and there is not a readily available test to determine when fertilization has occurred within a woman’s body. Defining the term ‘person’ in the state constitution using non-medical language is a dangerous government intrusion into the sanctity of the doctor-patient relationship.

Doing battle with the Army of God  
Johnston denies that he belongs to the Army of God, a notorious group established in the 1980s whose members have been involved in inciting and perpetrating clinic bombings, arson, Anthrax scares and kidnapping. The group circulates a how-to "manual that supplies detailed instructions for attacking abortion clinics, manufacturing bombs and cutting off the hands of abortion doctors," according to Source Watch.com.

Patrick Johnston, right, (and an unidentifed man) at a 2005 Columbus, Ohio-area abortion protest organized by Operation Rescue West and Minutemen United. (Photo/theoconia.blogspot.com)

Johnston claims that he asked that his commentaries be removed from the Army of God Web site. Two of his tracts, a response to "Justifiable Homicide — A Covenantal View of Justice" and "What the Bible Says Should Be Done to Abortionists: How America Pollutes God" are still accessible in cached versions of the site.

Immediately following an interview with Colorado Independent, Johnston followed up in an email:

I only ask that you not mention the so-called “Army of God” in your article because it would be harmful to the Personhood cause and those felons get way too much attention from journalists who only mention them to discredit authentic pro-lifers who disagree with them on the issue of force.

Johnston also claimed that the Army of God has "since written articles condemning me in the most vehement of terms, particularly because of my condemnation of Paul Hill and my reluctance to condemn all hormonal contraceptives as abortifacient." Johnston, however, did not provide proof of any split save for a 2004 commentary written by Jonathan O’Toole at Christian Gallery.com, a site that formerly hosted the Nuremberg Files — a notorious "hit list" detailing clinic physicians and their addresses that was shut down by court order.

To be sure, the relationships in the radical antiabortion movement are convoluted and memberships appear to be quite fluid. Army of God, Christian Gallery and Minutemen co-mingle at the same anti-abortion protests, as Johnston confirmed as the circumstances for getting to know various members of these groups.

He argues that his medical degree and ministries make him a target for others who espouse violence in the movement seeking validation for their own beliefs. Yet, none of his writings on his own site or others expressly disavow or criticize attacking clinic staff or fomenting criminal behavior.

One tract that directly contradicts Johnston stands out.

Shortly after Paul Hill’s Sept. 3, 2003, execution by lethal injection at the Florida State Prison, fellow anti-abortion crusader, Ron McRae of the conservative Street Preachers’ Fellowship, wrote a meandering 34-page Bible verse-infused refutation of Hill and his supporters’ religious justifications for killing the doctor and clinic escort and wounding the escort’s wife.

The Army of God posted a point-by-point counter-argument by Johnston refuting McRae’s positions, which remains on the current Web site:

McRae: Paul Hill did God no service when he murdered Dr. Britton and his 74 year friend. The life of Christ is never manifest to the world by a Christian killing a lost sinner, regardless of how depraved.<

Johnston: YOU WOULD NEVER SAY THIS TO CONDEMN ONE WHO USED LETHAL DEFENSIVE FORCE TO STOP AN ASSAILLANT [sic] FROM KILLING ALREADY-BORN PEOPLE.  WHY THIS DISCRIMINATION AGAINST THE PREBORN?

The undated Johnston reaction does not appear on any other anti-abortion movement Web site — only at the Army of God, which hints that it was likely written specifically for the site.

The Paul Hill commentary also does not appear in active or archived versions of Johnston’s own Web sites for APLP, Right Remedy.org or this site’s precursor, The Ministry of the Johnston Family, Ohio Abortion Ban.org and Stop Columbus Killing.net — which posts photographs of central Ohio clinic patients, staff and security escorts and their license plates much like the court-shuttered Nuremberg Files site.

Johnston’s views on meting out justice to those who are involved in abortion get a little stickier when he tries to toe the line of polite company. Again, he claims that he doesn’t support violence but his political views as a high-ranking member of the ultraconservative Ohio Constitution Party draw from a crazy-quilt ideology of vehemently opposing taxes while vociferously supporting a Biblical worldview.

But the Bible is also clear that until society does justice for those being exploited, discriminated against and slaughtered then God will not extend mercy to our country. So I’m not only a strong advocate of protecting the unborn, I’m also a strong advocate of the government treating the unborn justily [sic] through the administration of justice.

That "justice" means the death penalty, as Johnston has also advocated for in other writings promoting the view that gays and lesbians should be put on trial for capital crimes.

Tomorrow: Fanning the radical anti-abortion flames in Colorado.