KAGIN NAMED AMERICAN ATHEISTS NATIONAL LEGAL DIRECTOR Attorney Edwin Kagin has been named as the new American Atheists National Legal Director. A native of South Carolina, Mr. Kagin served in the United States Air Force, and later attended the University of Missouri. He earned his J.D. from the School of Law at the University of Louisville in Louisville, Kentucky. As an attorney, Mr. Kagin has frequently litigated on civil liberties and constitutional issues. He has been a member in good standing of the Bar of the Supreme Court of the United States since 1975. He was a founding member in 1991 of the Free Inquiry Group, Inc. (FIG) of Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. He is also a prolific writer, and in 2003 contributed to Kimberly Blaker?s book ?Fundamentals of Extremism: The Christian Right in America.? In 2005, a collection of his essays, poems and opinion columns was published in his book, ?Baubles of Blasphemy.? Mr. Kagin, along with wife Helen Kagin, a retired anesthesiologist, founded Camp Quest, the nation?s premier camp for Atheist, Freethought and other nonbelieving youngsters. The couple was named ?Atheists of the Year? by American Atheists in 2005. Edwin Kagin also serves as Kentucky State Director for American Atheists. He is an outspoken public critic of religious intrusions into government, and a frequent speaker and debater at local and national events. He has appeared on hundreds of radio and television programs, sparring with such prominent religious right advocates as Michael Medved. He ran prominently, albeit unsuccessfully, as the ?candidate without a prayer? for the Kentucky Supreme Court (1998) and the Kentucky State Senate (2000). As Legal Director, Mr. Kagin will help supervise and plan First Amendment and related litigation on behalf of the organization. His appointment replaces Duane Buchholtz, who has served as the AA National Legal Director since 1996 and is retiring from that post. (AMERICAN ATHEISTS is a nationwide movement that defends civil rights for Atheists; works for the total separation of church and state; and addresses issues of First Amendment public policy.)
Sounds like a good thing to me. Congrats, Kagin.
Get god off our money.
Good choice.
It is never easy to be a professional and an atheist. I don’t hide my atheism, but I don’t set out to antagonize judges who are “believers” because it would harm my clients’ interests.
Any doubts about that statement can be eliminated by the CV of Counsel Kagin.
As the son of a physician and an attorney – in the same gender arrangement of Counsel Kagin’s – I can say that the two have, no doubt, had interesting professional lives.
This job might well be a nice cap to 31 years + of the practice of law. Or, it could lead to as nasty and end as M.M. O’Hare experienced. You can never know what the loonies will do.
You are a brave man, counselor.
We might share my favorite motto: Nihil curo de ista tua stulta superstitione.
Yikes, Darrow. After reading your note I felt so deflated. It really is a brave move on the part of Kagin to accept such a post, but I cringed when I read about the possiblity of a nasty ending like O’Hare experienced. You’re right, and it’s painful to realize how we as atheists walk on egg shells in this country.