Dallas / Fort Worth Local News

DALLAS (AP) ― After a nearly two-year losing battle, some Methodist ministers and professors Wednesday mounted their final, all-out fight to try to stop George W. Bush's think tank from being built as part of the presidential library complex at Southern Methodist University.

They pleaded their case to 290 delegates in the church's South Central Jurisdiction. The delegates are scheduled to vote on a smaller church group's decision last year to allow SMU to lease land for the project.

"We have faculty and research fellows who represent a wide diversity of ideological and political views; that's what strengthens a university. That's what builds its academic reputation. That is undermined when you have on the campus an institute that actually promotes one particular ideology," said Valerie Karras, associate professor of church history at SMU's Perkins School of Theology.

They don't oppose the Bush presidential library and museum, but SMU officials say the public policy institute cannot be separated from the project.

Opponents say the think tank would not meet SMU or church rules because it would not be used for educational or religious purposes and would be outside the university's control.

They also say its goal of promoting the Bush administration's policies -- such as the Iraq war and harsh interrogation techniques of military prisoners -- conflicts with church teachings.

But SMU officials say the library complex is a done deal. In March 2007, the Methodist church's mission council -- a smaller body that votes on important issues cropping up between the jurisdiction's meetings every four years -- gave its blessing for SMU to lease the land for 99 years to the Bush Foundation.

The agreement has already been signed, and SMU continues working with the Bush Foundation, which will manage construction and raise money for the project. SMU was officially named the site for the library complex in February, more than a year after it was chosen as the lone finalist.

"The Methodist community continues to be true to its tradition of having many views ... and we respect all points of view," Brad Cheves, SMU's vice president for external affairs and development, said Wednesday. "The mission council spoke, and the process was followed. The real winners of this are the students, faculty and community of SMU and Dallas. We continue to be honored that SMU was chosen."

Opponents hope the jurisdiction, meeting this week in Dallas, will vote whether to approve or overturn the Bush library issue Thursday. But that may not happen because the College of Bishops earlier said the mission council's decision was final.

If delegates are denied a vote, they may be able to appeal to the judicial council, the church's highest lawmaking body that could decide whether the proper procedures were followed -- not on the library issue itself. That body likely would not make a decision until its fall meeting.

If the judicial council decided the procedures were not followed, the delegates would be able to vote on the Bush library complex issue, but it's unclear when that might happen.

The fight has been long for some professors and ministers, who have garnered more than 12,000 signatures on an online petition launched some 18 months ago.

William McElvaney, a retired professor in SMU's Perkins School of Theology, first brought attention to some grumbling when he and a colleague wrote a campus newspaper article entitled "The George W. Bush Library: Asset or Albatross?" in the fall of 2006.

As part of a recent public relations campaign aimed at stopping the project at SMU, opponents sent letters to all jurisdiction delegates and created a Web site called "What Would John Wesley Do?" -- referring to the church's founder.

McElvaney and the Rev. Tex Sample, a Phoenix minister, said that although more people who learn about the institute express their opposition to it, they still have work to do to stop the project.

"I think we've got an uphill fight," Sample said.

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