Getting the religious right wrong

By W. James Antle III
web posted December 5, 2005

Behold the all-powerful religious right.

Abe Foxman, longtime national director of the Anti-Defamation
League, recently warned that groups like Focus on the Family
and the Family Research Council were engaged in a "pervasive
and intensive assault" on the separation of church and state,
aimed at "Christianizing America." Former Sen. John Danforth
(R-Mo.) claimed last month that the Republican Party "has been
taken over by the Christian conservatives," and is currently
writing about on the subject (his publisher hopes it will "dilute the
meanness" in American politics). Even George Will complained
that the conservative movement "will rapidly disintegrate" if the
religious right tries to "conscript the government into sectarian
crusades."

Notice that religious conservatives don't merely participate in the
political process, they take over. They don't have issues, they
launch sectarian crusades. Expect to hear more tributes to the
religious right's power and intolerance as Supreme Court
nominee Samuel Alito's confirmation hearings approach.

Rev. Bob Edgar, head of the National Council of Churches, told
the Associated Press that Alito was nominated to please "the
radical religious right." Even before Alito was nominated,
religious conservatives were being blamed for Harriet Miers'
withdrawal. James Ridgeway alleged in the Village Voice that
President Bush abandoned Miers "just as his Republican
supporters in Congress were coming to her defense against the
Christian right." Robert Kuttner echoed in the Boston Globe that
religious conservatives "deserted [Bush] over Miers".

There's only one problem with this narrative: religious right
leaders were far more likely to support Miers than other
conservatives. Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, James Dobson and
Chuck Colson all endorsed her.

Inflating the religious right's political influence is a favorite game
of activist groups on both sides. Any time a small-town school
board gives short shrift to evolution or a county courtroom
displays the Ten Commandments, fundraising letters go out
advising that theocracy is just around the corner.

But these claims are often made by people who should know
better. If anything, religious conservatives see far less of their
agenda translate into public policy than their numbers and
electoral significance would predict.

According to the Pew Research Center, nearly four-fifths of the
28 million evangelicals who voted in the 2004 presidential
election supported President Bush. This is almost one-third of his
popular total. Factoring in other religious conservatives like
traditionalist Catholics and the values vote approaches 30
million.

What do they have to show for these numbers? Economic and
foreign-policy concerns regularly trump social issues in
Congress. And thanks to the federal courts, legislators can't even
deal with many of their concerns.

Abortion is still considered a constitutional right by a majority on
the Supreme Court—even though seven of the nine justices were
appointed by Republican presidents. This Court is at least as bad
from the Christian right's perspective on gay rights and only
marginally better on religious expression in the public square.

President Bush has endorsed a constitutional amendment
preventing gay marriage, but it is no closer to passage than the
amendments pertaining to abortion and school prayer backed by
his father and President Reagan. Howard Stern may complain
about censorious Christian conservatives seeking to impose
broadcast decency standards, but nudity and profanity are far
more common on the country's airwaves than a generation ago.

Some liberals have also noticed the discrepancy between the
religious right's fearsome reputation and minimal legislative
impact. Jonathan Chait claimed in The New Republic that
Republicans "give social conservatives symbolism and imagery
but little in the way of actual policy change." Thomas Frank
argued in his book What's the Matter With Kansas? that the
GOP exploits moral issues to keep voters in line they might
otherwise lose.

You don't have to agree with these writers' economic
analyses—or their implied endorsement of the old "poor,
uneducated and easy to command" canard—to suspect they
might be on to something. Far from being the dominant force in
American politics, the religious right actually gets back in policy
less than it gives in votes.

Social conservatives have had some successes, most notably
faith-based initiatives and the partial-birth abortion ban. Some of
their failures are the fault of religious right leaders themselves,
many of whom are gaffe-prone (think Pat Robertson) or lack
Beltway savvy.

The reality of the religious right is less frightening than the press
clippings would have you believe. Religious conservatives aren't
taking over America. They are still just taking their place at the
table.

W. James Antle III is an assistant editor of The American
Conservative and a senior editor for Enter Stage Right. The
views expressed above represent his alone.

Enter Stage Right -- http://www.enterstageright.com