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Perhaps, but Russ Briggs feels no contempt. Briggs watched first one and then another son die during childbirth unattended by doctors or trained nurses; he left the Followers in 1981, after deciding to seek medical help for a back injury. Briggs supports the Oregon exemption-repeal drive, but despite being shunned by his former community, he bears no discernible rancor. "They're still believing in a faith, so there's no blame for them," he says. "Their children died, and they allowed it to happen because of a belief that they still have. That takes away the blame. It's only when you no longer have that belief that all the sudden it comes to you: How could I ever have done that?"
--Reported by Dan Kray/Oregon City