“I DON’T CARE WHAT BANK OF AMERICA does,” fumed Lynn Martin at a meeting of the board of directors of Baytown Company, a San Francisco Bay Area firm that runs four different family-oriented restaurants and owns a string of six popular fast-food take-out establishments (called

“Tip-Top”). “We took a principled stand at the time,” she continued,

“and I don’t think there’s enough evidence to justify changing our minds now.”

Like a lot of local companies, Baytown supports various charitable causes in the Bay Area. The company has always figured that it had an obligation to give back more to the community than good food; besides, people in the Bay Area expect local companies to display a sense of social responsibility.

Among the groups that Baytown has always helped support is the regional Boy Scouts district. Not only did Baytown think the Scouts worthy of its corporate help, but giving to the organization seemed to fit well with Tip-Top’s all-American theme and with the family character of Baytown’s other restaurants.

A simple thing suddenly got complicated, however, when the San Francisco Bay Area United Way decided to pull $1 million in annual funding for the Scouts because of the group’s refusal to admit gays. Soon after that, Bank of America, Wells Fargo Bank, and Levi Strauss & Co. also decided to stop funding the Boy Scouts. A month later, Baytown’s directors resolved to follow suit.

“We were pretty clear at the time,” continued Martin,

“that we didn’t have any business supporting an organization that was perceived as discriminatory.”

“Not me,” said Tom Boyd. “I always thought that since the Boy Scouts are a private group, they can do whatever they want.”

“Well, maybe they have a right to discriminate if they want, but that’s not the point,” said Ed Framers. “The rest of us agreed with Lynn that as a company we shouldn’t be helping a group that discriminates. Of course, that was before everybody around the country started making such a fuss about companies’ stopping their funding of the Scouts.

We all know about those anti-gay groups demonstrating against the United Way and....

Discussion Questions 1. What do you think Baytown should do? Explain your reasoning. What business factors are relevant to your decision? What moral factors?
2. Are Baytown’s directors operating with a broad or a narrow conception of corporate responsibility?
3. Were Baytown and the other companies right to have withdrawn their support from the Boy Scouts?
Is there anything wrong with companies’ attempting to influence the policies of an organization like the Scouts?
4. What do you think explains Bank of America’s policy reversal? Is Lynn Martin’s cynicism warranted?
5. Scott Arming doubts that businesses have an obligation to support charitable organizations. Do they?