Poster by Christie Pedder of West Springfield High School in Fairfax County, Virginia, who received a Citation for Excellence in the 2003/2004 First Freedom Student Competition.   Courtesy Christie Pedder

First Freedom Awards

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2008 INTERNATIONAL RECIPIENT

Jakob Finci is the President of the Jewish Community of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the President of La Benevolencija, the Jewish cultural, educational and humanitarian society of Bosnia and Herzegovina. La Benevolencija currently provides aid to all citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina regardless of religion. Finci was elected the first deputy to the president of La Benevolencija in 1991 and has performed the duty of president since 1993.

In 1997, Jakob Finci became a founding member and President of the Inter-Religious Council of Bosnia and Herzegovina.  In 2000, Finci was elected Chairman of the National Coordinating Committee for Establishment of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in 2001 Finci was appointed Chair of the Constitutional Commission of the Federal Parliament. In May 2002 Jakob Finci was appointed and confirmed as the first Director of the State Agency for Civil Service.

Finci is Vice-President of FONEKO Association, a foundation for sustainable development in Sarajevo, and a member of the Association of Independent Intellectuals - Circle 99. Finci taught at the UN University on ECMIRP from 1988–1990 and since 2001 has been lecturing in interdisciplinary postgraduate studies at Sarajevo University.  Finci has been decorated several times for his public service, including the German Grand Cross of the Order of Merit and as a Knight of the French Legion of Honor.

2008 NATIONAL RECIPIENT

John Witte, Jr. is the Jonas Robitscher Professor of Law, and Director of the

Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University.  He is a specialist in legal history, marriage law, and religious liberty. 

Witte holds a law degree from Harvard University and has published 150 articles, 10 journal symposia, and 22 books. Recent books titles include:  Law and Protestantism: The Legal Teachings of the Lutheran Reformation; Religion and the American Constitutional Experiment; Modern Christian Teachings on Law, Politics, and Human Nature; and the Reformation of Rights: Law, Religion, and Human Rights in Early Modern Calvinism. Witte’s writings have appeared in ten languages, and he has lectured and convened conferences throughout North America, Western Europe, Israel, Japan, and South Africa. With major funding from the Ford, Luce, Lilly, McDonald, Pew foundations, Witte has directed two dozen major projects on issues of democracy, human rights, and religious freedom; sex, marriage, family, and children; and Christian Jurisprudence; and Jewish, Christians, and Islamic law. These projects have collectively yielded 150 volumes of new scholarships and more than 250 public forums. Witte also edits two books series for Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.: Emory University Studies in Law and Religion and the Religion, Marriage and Family Series.

 Witte has been selected ten times by the students at Emory University School of Law as the "Most Outstanding Professor" and has won dozens of other major awards for his teaching and research for universities and learned societies in North America, Western Europe, and Japan.

2008 VIRGINIA RECIPIENT

Charles C. Haynes is Senior Scholar at the Freedom Forum First Amendment Center. Haynes directs the First Amendment Center’s educational program in schools and addresses issues concerning religious liberty in American public life.

Haynes is committed to expanding the American public discussion of religion in line with First Amendment principles.  He is best known for helping schools and communities find common ground on conflicts involving religion and values in public schools. He was one of the principal organizers and drafters of a series of consensus guidelines on religious liberty in public education endorsed by a broad range of major religious and educational organizations. In 2000, the U.S. Department of Education distributed three of these guides to every public school in the United States.

Haynes holds a master's degree in religion and education from Harvard Divinity School and a doctorate in theological studies from Emory University.   An educator for 20 years, Haynes formerly taught world religions at Randolph-Macon College and social studies in both public and private secondary schools.

He was a former Executive Director of First Liberty Institute at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia.

Haynes is the author of numerous books and articles, including Religious Liberty and the Public Schools and Religion in American History: What to Teach and How, which was the winner of a 1990 Educational Press Award. Haynes is also co-author of Taking Religion Seriously across the Curriculum and Religion in American Public Life: Living with Our Deepest Differences. His column, “Inside the First Amendment,” appears in newspapers nationwide.