Missing the Mission | 9/11, the U.S. Government, and Nonprofits
The September 11 attacks elicited, however briefly, a spirit of common decency that united Americans as nothing had in decades. There was real dialogue about the need to engage our fellow citizens humanly and humanely. Donations poured in to organizations set up to help victims of those horrendous deeds. Charities and foundations seemed poised to leverage the new wave of American civic-mindedness.
Yet according to a harsh new report from the nonprofit OMB Watch and Grantmakers Without Borders, “since Sept. 11, 2001, we have witnessed counterterrorism programs erode the freedom and ability of charities and their funders to carry out their missions and improve the lives of the world’s people. We believe that this is damaging civil society in the United States and negatively impacting the nation’s reputation and effectiveness on the global stage.”
That’s an awfully serious charge.
The authors write that the government’s view of “nonprofits as conduits for terrorist funding and a breeding ground for aggressive dissent” means that those organizations now “operate within a legal regime that harms charitable programs, undermines the independence of the nonprofit sector, and weakens civil society.” The report describes a massive overreaction by federal officials to a few isolated incidents of nonprofit malfeasance, leading to a crackdown that has weakened nonprofits’ ability to effectively carry out their missions.
After watching the Constitution get trampled by an ethically sketchy executive branch and overly compliant legislature who all seem to believe that we need to destroy liberty in order to save it, I sympathize greatly with the sector’s complaints. I also wish it luck in convincing the American public, which has allowed itself to be scared into submission, that the threat to nonprofits is real. It will need that luck. | 501(c)
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