Andrew Schlafly Explained

Andrew Schlafly
Birth Name:Andrew Layton Schlafly
Birth Date:27 April 1961
Birth Place:Alton, Illinois, U.S.
Education:Princeton University (BS)
Harvard University (JD)
Mother:Phyllis Schlafly
Party:Republican
Children:2

Andrew Layton Schlafly (; born April 27, 1961) is an American lawyer and Christian conservative activist.[1] He is the founder and owner of the wiki encyclopedia project Conservapedia. He is the son of the conservative activist and lawyer Phyllis Schlafly.[2]

Schlafly was the lead counsel for the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons' efforts to bring the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act before the United States Supreme Court.

Early life and education

Schlafly is one of six children.[3] His great-great-grandfather August Schlafly was a Swiss immigrant to the United States. His father Fred Schlafly was an attorney, and his mother Phyllis (née Stewart) spearheaded the movement opposing the Equal Rights Amendment and was founder of the Eagle Forum.

Born and raised in Alton, Illinois,[3] [4] Schlafly graduated from Saint Louis Priory School and later received a B.S.E. in electrical engineering and certificate in engineering physics from Princeton University in 1981.[5] [6]

Career

Engineering

After graduating from Princeton, Schlafly briefly worked as a device physicist for Intel in Santa Clara, California until 1983, when he became a microelectronics engineer at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.[7] Schlafly later worked for Bell Labs before enrolling at Harvard Law School.[2]

Legal

Schlafly graduated from Harvard Law School in 1991 with a J.D. in the class that included future U.S. president Barack Obama.[1] From 1989 to 1991, Schlafly was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.[1] [8] [9]

After law school, Schlafly served as an adjunct professor at Seton Hall Law School.[2] In 1992, Schlafly ran as a Republican for the United States House of Representatives seat of Virginia's 11th congressional district; Schlafly came in last place in a field of five candidates in the primary.[10]

Schlafly was an associate for the Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz law firm in New York City before moving to private practice. Additionally, he is General Counsel at the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons and led its unsuccessful Supreme Court challenge to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.[11] [12] In 2010, Schlafly wrote an article for the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons about the economic effects of the legislation.[13]

In 2010, Schlafly took the role of lead counsel for a group seeking to recall US Senator Bob Menendez, a Democrat from New Jersey. The group, associated with the Tea Party movement, argued that the US Constitution permits a recall election for federal offices without explicitly so providing.[14] On November 18, 2010, the New Jersey Supreme Court rejected Schlafy's arguments, finding that the New Jersey provision violated the U.S. Constitution.[15] Later that year, Schlafly represented the group RecallND in RecallND v. Jaeger before the North Dakota Supreme Court in another effort to recall Democratic Senator Kent Conrad.[16]

Conservapedia

See main article: Conservapedia. Schlafly created the wiki-based Conservapedia in November 2006 to counter what he perceived as a liberal bias present in Wikipedia.[17] He felt the need to start the project after reading a student's assignment written using Common Era dating notation, rather than the Anno Domini system that he preferred. Although he was "an early Wikipedia enthusiast", as reported by Shawn Zeller of Congressional Quarterly, Schlafly became concerned about perceived bias after Wikipedia editors repeatedly undid his edits to the article about the 2005 Kansas evolution hearings.[18] Schlafly expressed hope that Conservapedia would become a general resource for American educators and a counterpoint to the liberal bias that he perceived in Wikipedia.[19] [20] [21] [22] The site has been accused of spreading misinformation on scientific subjects, such as HIV/AIDS denialism, the abortion-breast cancer hypothesis, climate change denial, relativity denial, and vaccine/autism connections,[23] [24] [25] and has advocated Young Earth creationism,[26] Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories[27] and conspiracy theories that the January 6 United States Capitol attack was staged. Additionally, it features extensive criticisms of atheism, feminism, homosexuality, and the Democratic Party.

In 2009, Schlafly appeared on The Colbert Report to discuss his Conservative Bible Project, a project hosted on Conservapedia that aims to rewrite English translations of the Bible in order to remove or alter terms advancing a "liberal bias".[28]

Dialogue with Richard Lenski

Richard Lenski, an evolutionary biologist[29] known for his work on the E. coli long-term evolution experiment, was contacted by Schlafly in 2008 regarding a set of results that showed one population of E. coli evolved the novel trait of being able to metabolize citrate. Conservapedia supports creationism and objects to evolution, so Schlafly disputed that bacteria could evolve via beneficial mutations. The correspondence was commented on across the Internet. Schlafly was criticized by Lenski on Ars Technica, among other sites, for not reading Lenski's paper properly, for not understanding the experimental data he requested, and for not taking notice of people on Conservapedia itself who considered the paper well researched.[30]

Trademark lawsuit against Saint Louis Brewery

In 2011, Schlafly led a lawsuit on behalf of the family of his activist mother, Phyllis, to block The Saint Louis Brewery from acquiring a trademark on the name "Schlafly". In 2018, the U.S. Federal Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of The Saint Louis Brewery.[31]

Personal life

In 1984, Schlafly married Catherine Kosarek, a medical student and fellow Princeton alum.[32] They live in Far Hills, New Jersey.[33]

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Morris County resident, son of famous activist, runs 'Conservapedia' website . The Star-Ledger. June 4, 2013. January 6, 2010. unsuccessfully ran in a Republican congressional primary in 1992 and also volunteered for [gubernatorial candidate] Steve Lonegan in 2009..
  2. Web site: Phyllis Schlafly Bio . Eagleforum.org . https://web.archive.org/web/20141006095626/http://www.eagleforumu.org/EAGLEFORUMU/INSTRUCTOR/VIEW.cfm?int_instructor_id=7&INT_COURSE_ID=23&bln_registered=1. October 6, 2014 . 2013-03-24 .
  3. Book: Critchlow, Donald T.. Phyllis Schlafly and grassroots conservatism: a woman's crusade. registration. Princeton University Press. Princeton, New Jersey. 2005. 978-0-691-07002-5. 32–33.
  4. Web site: Schlafly & Her Children. Mauney, Michael. The LIFE Images Collection. 1975. Getty Images. February 9, 2017.
  5. Web site: Hallowed Be Thy Name: A member of the Schlafly clan figures to do the Lord's work by cleansing the Bible of its "liberal bias" . Keegan. Hamilton. Riverfront Times. November 4, 2009. February 6, 2017.
  6. Web site: Bernstein. Mark F.. A Moment With ... Andrew Schlafly '81, on 'Conservapedia'. Princeton Alumni Weekly. June 4, 2013. February 24, 2010.
  7. Lee . D.J. . Becker . N.J. . Schlafly . A.L. . Skupnjak . J.A. . Dham . V.K. . Control logic and cell design for a 4K NVRAM . IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits . October 1983 . 18 . 5 . 525–532 . 10.1109/JSSC.1983.1051988. 1983IJSSC..18..525L . 41608960 .
  8. "Harvard Law Review Board of Editors, Volume 104, 1990-1991." From search of the Harvard Visual Information Access system, Record Identifier: olvwork365353.
  9. "Harvard Law Review Board of Editors, Volume 103, 1989-1990." From search of the Harvard Visual Information Access system, Record Identifier: olvwork390852
  10. News: THE 1992 CAMPAIGN: Primaries; Democrat Loses Arkansas Runoff . The New York Times. July 19, 2010. June 10, 1992.
  11. Web site: AAPS General Counsel Andrew Schlafly Discusses ObamaCare Lawsuit . Association of American Physicians and Surgeons. May 4, 2010. June 4, 2010. https://web.archive.org/web/20100604232426/http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/001011. June 4, 2010. dead. mdy-all.
  12. ObamaCare: Giant Meteor Scheduled to Strike in 2014. June 2, 2010.
  13. Schlafly. Andrew L.. ObamaCare: Not What the Doctor Ordered. Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. 15. 2. Summer 2010. 58–59.
  14. News: Burton. Cynthia. N.J. Supreme Court hears tea party's push to recall Menendez. June 4, 2010. The Philadelphia Inquirer. May 28, 2010.
  15. Isenstadt, Alex (November 18, 2010), "Court kills Robert Menendez recall push", Politico.
  16. News: Beitsch. Rebecca. Supreme Court hears arguments in recall of Conrad. October 31, 2010. Bismarck Tribune. October 20, 2010. https://web.archive.org/web/20101024111014/http://www.bismarcktribune.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/article_c7031eda-dc9c-11df-93c0-001cc4c002e0.html. October 24, 2010 . live.
  17. News: Simon. Stephanie. A conservative's answer to Wikipedia. November 2, 2007. June 22, 2007. Los Angeles Times.
  18. News: Zeller. Shawn. Conservapedia: See Under "Right". The New York Times. March 5, 2007. June 8, 2008.
  19. News: Conservapedia: Data for Birds of a Political Feather? . July 26, 2007. Siegel. Robert. NPR.org . March 13, 2007.
  20. News: Chung. Andrew . A U.S. conservative wants to set Wikipedia right. The Star.com . March 11, 2007.
  21. News: Johnson. Bobbie. Rightwing website challenges 'liberal bias' of Wikipedia. The Guardian. March 1, 2007.
  22. Web site: Goldsbrough . Susannah . How Mrs America's son is flying the conservative flag – and fighting Wikipedia's 'liberal lies' . July 22, 2020 . . October 24, 2021.
  23. Gefter . Amanda . Biever . Celeste . August 11, 2010 . E=mc2? Not on Conservapedia . live . New Scientist . https://web.archive.org/web/20150701065631/http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19303-emc2-not-on-conservapedia.html . July 1, 2015 . August 26, 2017.
  24. Web site: March 19, 2007 . Weird, wild wiki on which anything goes . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20070323193903/http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/article.html?in_article_id=41802&in_page_id=2 . March 23, 2007 . March 25, 2007 . Metro.
  25. News: Simon . Stephanie . June 22, 2007 . A conservative's answer to Wikipedia . . live . November 2, 2007 . https://web.archive.org/web/20110624100044/http://articles.latimes.com/2007/jun/19/nation/na-schlafly19 . June 24, 2011.
  26. News: Stöcker . Christian . March 6, 2007 . Wikipedia for Christian Fundamentalists: The Lord's Encyclopedia . . live . April 9, 2015 . https://web.archive.org/web/20150422224615/http://www.spiegel.de/international/wikipedia-for-christian-fundamentalists-the-lord-s-encyclopedia-a-469969.html . April 22, 2015.
  27. Book: Walker . Clarence E . The Preacher and the Politician: Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama, and Race in America . Smithers . Gregory D . University of Virginia Press . 2009 . 978-0-8139-3247-7 . 3 . Gregory D. Smithers . registration.
  28. News: A Neocon Bible: What Would Jesus Say? . David . Gibson . Politics Daily . October 7, 2009 . October 7, 2009. https://web.archive.org/web/20091008232724/http://www.politicsdaily.com/2009/10/07/a-neocon-bible-what-would-jesus-say/. October 8, 2009 . live.
  29. Web site: Richard Lenski | Home . Myxo.css.msu.edu . March 13, 2011.
  30. Web site: Arthur. Charles. Conservapedia has a little hangup over evolution. Technology Blog. The Guardian. July 1, 2008. June 4, 2010.
  31. News: Stempel. Jonathan. 2018-11-26. U.S. conservative Phyllis Schlafly's heirs lose trademark appeal over brewery. en. Reuters. 2021-07-03.
  32. News: Catherine Kosarek, Medical Student, Marries Andrew L. Schlafly, Engineer. June 5, 2010. The New York Times. November 25, 1984.
  33. Web site: Conservative Bible Project aims to rewrite scripture to counter perceived liberal bias. Associated Press/New York Post. December 4, 2009.

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