Exfoleyating the House

From January, 1979 through January, 1980, when I began my seminary training, I was supervisor of pages for the Ohio House of Representatives in Columbus.

During my time in that position, there were rumors, never confirmed, that one of the female pages was involved in a relationship with a married male member of the House. And on two occasions, I had to reassign female pages who felt that male members made inappropriate sexually-tinged advances toward them.

But, unlike the high schoolers who make up the page program in Washington, the pages with Ohio's General Assembly are college students, some of them in graduate or law school. The average age of the pages I supervised was about 21, all of them above the age of consent.

Given the possibilities for exploitation, I always suspected that it was better that the pages with whom I worked were older than their Washington counterparts. Back in my State House days in Columbus, for example, twenty year old Rita (not her real name) felt no hesitation about telling me that Representative Downs (not his real name) had more than implied a desire to go to bed with her. I always wondered if high schoolers, intimidated by the powerful "role models" who made such advances would go to their supervisor as quickly as Rita had come to me. (Because she did, the House's then-executive secretary, Joe Summer made sure that Rita never had to interact with Representative Downs and our then-Speaker, Vern Riffe, as I understand it, let Downs have it with both barrels.)

Reports about the IMs between ex-Florida Congressman Mark Foley and at least one high school-aged page have me thinking that it might be time to refashion or rethink the Congressional page program. At the very least, caution should be taken so that no young person is ever left alone with an adult, whether that adult is a member or a staffer. Pages should work in two-person teams.

But more than measures like these, the House needs to be thoroughly ex-folyated. Any member of Congress who knew about Foley's activities has a lot of explaining to do!

Some bloggers are making much of the fact that Foley's sexual preference appears to have been of the homosexual variety. While it's true that the Bible takes a dim view homosexual practice, regarding it as a sin, that really isn't the core issue here.

One thing I've learned as a pastor over the past twenty-two years is that whenever powerful people use their power to manipulate the vulnerable for their own sexual gratification, it's wrong, no matter the orientation. Sexual manipulation, which appears to have been Foley's modus operandi, is always more about power than it is about sex.

[To read more about this developing story, go here, here, here, and here.]

THANKS: To Joe Gandelman at The Moderate Voice for linking to this post. One commenter thought that my suggestion that pages only work in pairs and never be alone with adult staffers and members was over the top. But, that suggestion is merely a variation on a set of practices employed by Billy Graham for five decades, one that has helped preserve his unquestioned integrity. As a pastor, I personally make it a point, unless it's absolutely unavoidable, never to be alone with a woman to whom I'm not related and, unless it's unavoidable, never to be alone with children except in highly visible areas waiting for their parents to pick them up or if I'm taking them home from youth activities. Trust is the coin of the realm, whether in politics, business, academia, public education, social service, or the Church. A willingness to go the extra mile to preserve it is always appropriate.