What Do The Democrats Believe?

 

Religion and the Democrats. Two words which have taken a beating when uttered simultaneously in recent times. In this post, I am going to break a few ATB ground rules, least of which is linking to Duncan 'Open Post' Atrios Black, and tell you an amusing story about a fight involving Democrats and Religion which has ensued, spreading like bushfire (to coin a phrase) and involving some of the biggest names in the liberal Blogosphere.

It all began, a couple of weeks ago, with an Amy Sullivan article in the Washington Monthly.

Followed by some "Knee Jerk God Baiting" by Digby.

I wonder who all the religious candidates we've unfairly scorned in the past would be? Jimmy Carter? Bill Clinton? (and no, having affairs does not mean you are not religious, just a sinner.) Al Gore? John Kerry? They all go to church and profess to be believers. Are they just not religious enough? Now, it's true that the knee-jerk left doesn't much care for Joe Lieberman but that's not because he's a religious man. It's because he is disloyal and enables the right wing. (We knee-jerk left wingers do tend to be dismissive of right wingers, that's true.)

I recall scorning both Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon and neither one of them were particularly religious. Bobby Kennedy was a youthful hero and he was as catholic as they come. In fact, I'm having a hard time coming up with any consistent views on either side toward religious politicians at all. It would seem to me that this entire argument is nothing but a political football used to shut down criticism and advance a particular agenda without having to debate the issues on their own merits.

I hesitate to call this kind of lazy observation "religious correctness" because that gives the impression of an objection to rude derisive language about religion. This is something else. It's "God-baiting" designed to put any critic on the defensive if the person they are criticizing is religious. (The right, interestingly enough, is using this and its close cousin, race-baiting, very effectively these days. Nice to see people on "our side" helping them out --- again.)

Every secular "knee jerk liberal" has voted for religious candidates their whole lives. Indeed, it is impossible not to. You cannot get elected in this country if you do not profess religious belief. We have enthusiastically backed candidates who are from every religious tradition and from every region. Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton were both born again, southern evangelicals. We do not scorn religious candidates, period.

Many of us knee-jerk leftists are hostile to those who want to use the state to dictate the proper social attitudes of its citizens and interfere in their most personal, private decisions, that's true. I would scorn Pat Robertson and Sam Brownback's ideas no less if they were secular. It's the lack of respect for the division of influence between the private and public sphere's that is causing the problem.[...]

Who scorns who again? Perhaps some of these religious politicans could speak to the flock about giving some respect to the non-faithful. It's the Christian thing to do.

It then continued here with a post from Faithful Progressive:

He dissed Belief Net's Steve Waldman ("I'm so sick of this") for making the narrow point that: "...many liberals carry an elitist attitude toward evangelical Christians. Lerner's indictment is far more sweeping. Is he being unfair? I think a distinction should be made between the elites and the rank and file on this. The fact is that most Democrats are religious. But secular liberals, who made up about 16% of the Kerry vote [...] seem to have a disproportionate impact on the party's image and approach".

Here's the thing, Atrios: you may be "sick of" such talk, but the next election might well hinge on whether people adopt your dismissive tone or speak in a language that is at a minimum non-confrontational and preferably familiar to evangelical Christians. The sad truth is that some people won't listen to you at all if you don't frame issues in such a manner. Further, in the last month alone there have been three key stories about conservatives and moderates breaking from the grip of Christian right extremists. (Evangelical Climate Initiative; House Catholic Democrat statement that there is more to Christianity than abortion; distancing from Pat Robertson's comments.) Is this a process secular liberals want to encourage or not? Is this an opening back into some red states or not? Gov. Kaine's victory in Virginia demonstrated the political potency of showing respect for religious values in these areas.[...]

Ugh. That, of course, led to a lengthy and 'thoughtful' response by Digby.

Meanwhile, back at the headquarters, Duncan "my favorite post title is 'Wanker of the Day'" Atrios Black responds to a few of his literate readers who have been sending him hate mail regarding the issue:

[...]I'm not hostile to religion. I don't much care about religion. I'm not much interested in it. This isn't strange. Most people aren't much interested in religion other than their own, if that.[...]

I am sick of people who keep claiming that the Democratic party is hostile to religious people and controlled by secular liberals who are hostile to religion. If by "Democratic party" you mean "some people who post anonymous comments on the internet" you may have a point. Otherwise, the idea is ludicrous.

Do the Democrats have a perception problem about religion? Sure. We have a political party which has been claiming to be God's Own Party for decades. We have a mainstream media which equates Christian with Religious Right most of the time, and news anchors who don't think liberals can be "good Catholics." We also have some left-leaning Christians who seem to think this perception problem is due to hostility to religion by secular liberals who (see below) have no public presence. I don't understand this. People who perpetuate right wing talking points about Democrats always piss me off especially when they have no basis.

Secularism has essentially no representation in our media or politics. I'm sure there are secular politicians and media types, but few discuss it. No one gets on tv or writes newspaper columns or in any way participates in our contemporary mainstream political discourse and praises secularism or atheism or anything similar, and certainly not in a way which denigrates religious beliefs generally. Advocates for the separation of church and state are not advocating secularism, aside from government secularism, they're simply trying to defend freedom of religion.

After some major groveling directed at Black, mainly to do with being eternally grateful for the crumbs given by sheer virtue of linking to him, the liberal Faithful Progressive concentrates on a lengthy response: "First, can anyone read the comments to the last post and really think that the hostility of many on the left to religion in general is just a GOP Talking Point? If so, FP's gotta couple of other things to sell ya."

So, do the Democrats indeed have a perception problem about religion?

The Left Leaning agenda, I would argue, is radical at it's very foundation, whereby the goal is to reform the very value system upon which the government was established. And, as I recall, the Founders wrote a great deal about the fact that if America ever ceased to be a religious society, freedom, and the republican ideal, would fail, because the citizenry would lack the moral virtue to keep it all going.

The framers of our highly successful form of government declared that individual rights are maintained and tempered through individual responsibility, they demanded the confrontation of evil and wrongdoing with the aggressive use of force, and were adamant concerning the freedom to pursue and propagate religion without the encumbrance of government, which, by-the-way, was the original intent of the separation of church and state doctrine. We who lean right simply want to preserve those precepts. We see these as fundamental to our success as a culture and as a nation.

The Liberal left conveniently fails to comprehend the "E pluribus unum" motto. What they really want is for the "many" to remain "many"; or, more accurately, to break down the "one" into "many" without any common culture, moral cohesion, or civil society to bind them. I of course, am familiar with that model from the Balkans, where it worked so very well, ahem (!). My culture has also been under the Turks for 500 years, and we are still reeling from the problems.

If you were to check US law up until the late twentieth century, you would see that religion- Christianity-was also an integral factor in law. For instance, the U.S. Supreme Court case of Church of the Holy Trinity vs. U.S.(1892) cited 87 historical precedents in its conclusion that, "Our laws and institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teachings of the Redeemer of mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise. In this sense and to this extent, our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian."

The position of the left collapses the moment one takes a look at empirical historical evidence from the 18th and 19th centuries, particularly actual law and governmental practice. Washington, Jefferson, et al, the supposed ACLU Separationists, for some odd reason never objected to the recitation of Christian prayers in school or at official governmental functions, the use of the New England Primer in schools, the use of public lands and buildings for religious events etc.

The left fails to understand that the broad-minded tolerance of the Fathers went hand-in-hand with their desire to actively encourage all religious faith: the proof is in the pudding. Again, I challenge anyone to actually examine American laws and governmental practices of the 18th and 19th centuries- you're in for a real shock. Historical reality makes Jerry Falwell and any other bogeyman of the left look like a real ACLU member by contrast...

Again, the proper relationship of government and religion as conceived of by the founders was to further the cause of religion (not looking too kindly on atheism) and enable its free and untrammeled expression. Yes, these men would have disapproved of "moments of silence" in schools- but only because these were men who approved of and allowed actual Christian prayer- sometimes delivered by Christian ministers and priests, no less- in schools, government assemblies etc.

To pretend otherwise by the left is false; it is an Orwellian revision of history, and absolutely no foundation for their scurrilous accusations which range from assertions that the Founding Fathers did not promote a religious society, to accusing them of being deists.

Since the Gore defeat in 2000, left-liberals in the US have turned away from identity politics. You could say that this was one of the few unambiguous intellectual victories of American conservatives, except that devotees of Old Left class politics provided much of the ammunition. At first, the multicultis blasted the likes of me as crypto-racists or, worse yet, crypto-conservatives, but Bush hatred ended all of that, and we became simply the all incompasing Bushies.

The problem for the left is that their agenda has one giant obstacle: Our National Heritage. To overcome this obstacle they will have to rewrite history ... which is being accomplished at a level that should alarm all Americans. They have to rewrite or reinterpret law ... primarily through activist judges, and they have to replace mainstream religion with Human Secularism, which is hostile to the idea of God, denies individual responsibility, and would have America adopt a culture of personal indulgence.

The Anchoress has an excellent discussion joined by CBS's Dick Meyer in her comments section; instigated by Meyer who is wondering whether political ruminations are worth putting to paper, or is political debate a futile and dead thing. In her argument, she draws in religion, which has of course "got rather co-mingled with politics, especially for those who have been worshiping at the altar of political correctness, which has it's own list of commandments and sins. [...] so many on the left, their leftiness is their religion..."

More discussion on Dick Meyer from The Moderate Voice, Power Line, and  ShrinkWrapped

Memeorandum features my post here (cool new layout with photos) and so does Salon's Daou Report in Blogging from the right (const. changed & updated)

Linked to Mark Noonan,  @ B4B who is featuring Senator Feingold attempting to get support to censor the President, whoops did I say the President, I meant the democrats. More @ Hugh Hewitt, Captain's Quarters, Althouse, Decision '08, Flopping Aces, Sister Toldjah, The Moderate Voice, Unclaimed Territory, California Conservative, The RCP Blog, Below The Beltway, Daily Kos, Big Lizards, TigerHawk, YARGB,  Iowa Voice,  Gina Cobb, Confederate Yankee, Gateway Pundit, The Strata-Sphere, 

Rick Moran's Carnival of the Clueless. 

Comments

[M.A.]

What does any of that have to do with the liberal approach to religion?

Look, most Democratic politicians are religious. They have to be, because America won't elect non-religious people. But no liberal can possibly accept the current conservative approach to religion, which is to write religious doctrine into laws that apply to everyone.

If your faith informs your political beliefs, that's fine, and that's part of American tradition. But if your religion's doctrine tells you that abortion is murder or that gays are icky, why should that have any effect on me, someone who doesn't follow your religion? The liberal position is that laws should be based on things we can all agree on, rather than things that cannot be proven (which is what faith is). And the conservative talking point "religion in the public square" is simply an evasive way of getting around the fact that conservatives want to write specific points of religious belief into law -- something that no civilized person can agree with; as we have seen in many Middle Eastern countries, writing religion into law is the stuff of barbarism and oppression, and antithetical to religious freedom.

[DavidByron]

if America ever ceased to be a religious society, freedom, and the republican ideal, would fail, because the citizenry would lack the moral virtue to keep it all going

Ah yes. The moral virtue of its citizens. That's the same thing that makes communism work so well, so I agree with your wider point here Alexandra. You can't count on any system which is based on greed and selfishness. Because you just end up making people greedy and selfish.

But is morality limited to the christian church?

The church in America has been having a hard time of it recently. It's become fat and corrupt. Your presidents for example, all born-again --- would you honestly say either one of the last two presidents were people to emulate? How about Pat Robertson? The evangelical church is mired in sin as an institution in America. It's rich and contented and ripe to be spat out of Christ's mouth.

What was it Billy Graham said? God will have to apologise to Soddam and Gomorah? If the salt loses its saltiness.... what do we do with it? A tree that bears no fruit... what happens to it?

In some senses your post above mirrors one I responded to yesterday - in charging that Republicans are more moral than liberals. Was that intentional or am I reading more into than was meant?

And this harkening back to a golden age. When exactly was the year that America was most moral? Did they have slavery at the time? Racism? I say in many respects your golden age is right now, but only if you oppose the corruption of your government.

[Michael (van der) Galien]

"As an aside-I would caution anyone against using Wikipedia. It is less than accurate on many issues including political theory and military history"

True. But because I study law and had a lot to do with State Law as we call it, I know that these observations about liberalism and its impact are, mostly, right on. Besides that in philosophy class we spend a lot of attention to people like Hume, Locke, Mill, Kant, Smith etcetera. The reason I used it, is so everybody can check what I'm saying easily and swiftly.

"The "liberalism" that many thoughtful people detest is not the liberalism of old...in fact it shares nothing in common with American left wing politics. Left wing politics is socialism or a further basterdized version. Liberal is used here in the states to identify those opposed to the very items you set out above in your comment. It does not apply around the globe-but fits well here"

Again true, but that is exactly why it is of crucial importants that people know what real liberalism is. Liberalism is not the opposite of everything America stands for. Instead it almost equals eachother (to a degree).
I am a European Liberal. By saying so, many Americans attack me almost immediately, without even knowing what liberalism stands for.

That is why I urge Alexandra to make clear what she means with 'liberals'. What kind of liberals? What do those liberals you mention stand for?
And, indeed, are they not closer to socialism than to liberalism?
And if they are closer to socialism, why don't you just call them that?

[Washington]

MichaeL:

The "liberalism" that many thoughtful people detest is not the liberalism of old...in fact it shares nothing in common with American left wing politics. Left wing politics is socialism or a further basterdized version. Liberal is used here in the states to identify those opposed to the very items you set out above in your comment. It does not apply around the globe-but fits well here.

As an aside-I would caution anyone against using Wikipedia. It is less than accurate on many issues including political theory and military history

[North by Northwest]

"Our laws and institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teachings of the Redeemer of mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise. In this sense and to this extent, our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian."

I think this statement says it all. But most critics are too close to it to recognize it; they can't see the woods for the trees. It also sounds alien to us. In a statement like this we truly recognize the dramatic shift away from the ease with which our forefathers expressed this simple fact.

We must carefully distinguish between personal opinion and cultural foundation. Say and believe what you like in relation to the former, but refrain from applying contemporary norms, values and beliefs when assessing and criticizing the latter.

Alexandra, you're nailing it with "Historical reality makes Jerry Falwell and any other bogeyman of the left look like a real ACLU member by contrast..."

[Michael (van der) Galien]

What a nice post.

" which [...] denies individual responsibility"

I do not want to call this a lie, but it is simply, at least, not true. At the core foundation of liberalism lies individual responsibility and less government influence.
"Liberalism is an ideology, broad political tradition, and current of political thought, which holds liberty as the primary political value.[1] Broadly speaking, liberalism seeks a society characterized by freedom of thought for individuals, limitations on the power of government and religion (and sometimes corporations), the rule of law, the free exchange of ideas, a market economy that supports private enterprise, and a system of government that is transparent"

" Economists such as Adam Smith, in The Wealth of Nations (1776), enunciated the liberal principles of free trade"

"Political liberalism is the belief that individuals are the basis of law and society, and that society and its institutions exist to further the ends of individuals, without showing favor to those of higher social rank"

"Economic liberalism, many of whose adherents term it classical liberalism, is an ideology which supports the individual rights of property and freedom of contract. The watchword of this form of liberalism is "free enterprise". It advocates laissez-faire capitalism, meaning the removal of legal barriers to trade and cessation of government-bestowed privilege such as subsidy and monopoly. Economic liberals want little or no government regulation of the market"

"In all of the forms of liberalism listed above there is a general belief that there should be a balance between government and private responsibilities, and that government should be limited to those tasks which cannot be carried out best by the private sector. All forms of liberalism claim to protect the fundamental dignity and autonomy of the individual under law, all claim that freedom of individual action promotes the best society"

We invented free trade. We invtented the open market:
"The Scotsman Adam Smith (1723–1790) expounded the theory that individuals could structure both moral and economic life without direction from the state, and that nations would be strongest when their citizens were free to follow their own initiative. He advocated an end to feudal and mercantile regulations, to state granted monopolies and patents, and he promulgated "laissez-faire" government. In The Theory of Moral Sentiments, 1759, he developed a theory of motivation that tried to reconcile human self-interest and an unregulated social order. In The Wealth of Nations, 1776, he argued that the market, under certain conditions, would naturally regulate itself and would produce more than the heavily restricted markets that were the norm at the time"

One of the founding fathers of Liberalism, Locke:
"Locke developed further the earlier idea of natural rights, which he saw as "life, liberty and property"."
"the idea of natural rights played a key role in providing the ideological justification for the American revolution and the French revolution"

Liberalism is at the core of the foundation of the Constitution of the US:
"Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, and John Adams would be instrumental in persuading their fellow Americans to revolt in the name of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, echoing Locke, but with one important change (opposed by Alexander Hamilton). Jefferson replaced Locke's word "property" by "the pursuit of happiness". The "American Experiment" would be in favor of democratic government and individual liberty.

James Madison was prominent among the next generation of political theorists in America, arguing that in a republic self-government depended on setting "interest against interest", thus providing protection for the rights of minorities, particularly economic minorites. The American constitution instituted a system of checks and balances: federal government balanced against states' rights; executive, legislative, and judicial branches; and a bicameral legislature. The goal was to insure liberty by preventing the concentration of power in the hands of any one man"

"The American War of Independence established the first nation to craft a constitution based on the concept of liberal government, especially the idea that governments rule by the consent of the governed"

Again: At the core of Liberalism lies individual responsibility. From The Dutch version of Wikipedia:
"According to Adam Smith society is best served when everyone persues their own individual interests".

Conclusion:
- liberalism is the foundation of the American Constitution
- liberalism favors small government
- liberalism believes very strongly in the responsibility of the individual

John Locke, Adam Smith, John Stuart Mill, David Hume, all were liberals in the trueest essence of the word. They all influenced Jefferson, Madison, Washington, in other words; the founding fathers.

Religion
Liberalism made if possible that Catholics and Protestants lived in the same nation. Before liberalism Catholics and Protestants prosecuted and killed eachother.
Liberalism is far from anti-religion. Instead it is very pro-religion. The only thing liberalism is against is the establishment of any religion in government (sounds familiar??).
Liberalism advocates that everybody should be able to be religious, to live in accordance with their religion.
The State however should not press the beliefs of the majority on the minority: because that would destroy that goal.

Since you seemed to be talking about liberalism in general I responded about it in general.
There are important differences you did not point out. There are many kinds of liberalism. So before judging liberalism (in general, I have just proven liberal in general is not anything like you described it) you should make clear what kind of liberalism you're talking about.
Are you talking about classical liberalism?
Are you talking about neoliberalism?
Are you talking about conservative liberalism?
Are you talking about progressive liberalism?
Are you talking about political liberalism?
Are you talking about social liberlism?
Are you talking about economical liberalism?
Should I continue?

What kind of liberalism are you talking about? Because, like I said, liberalism in general is at the very core of the US Constitution.

Besides that, here's something I wrote myself related to this:
Being Christian And Politically Engaged
I am a Christian and I am politically engaged as I think it is called. I have a passion for politics.

There are quite some Christians who share those two passions. In the Netherlands we have the 'Christian parties' CDA, Christenunie and SGP. All of them are represented in Parliament. CDA is by far the largest of them (actually it even is the largest party in Parliament right now), but it is also the most 'soft' one of all of them. They do not (really) want to legislate all kinds of things concidered Christian. The other two are quite small (especially SGP with only 2 out of 150 seats).

In the US Christians are active in politics as well: Which is logical because the majority of the Americans is Christian. Christians are represented in both major political parties. There is, however, one 'group' I want to talk about today. They are called 'Christian Right".

The essence of Christian Right is that they want to legislate everything they regard as Christian (funny enough mostly based on the Old Testament instead of on the New Testament). They want to forbid gay-marriage, abortion, euthenesia, etcetera, etcetera. They say their 'values' are Christian. But I've got something to say about that.

My Lord Christ is a Christ of compassion. He is love. My Christ is not condemning people all the time. My Christ is not making life impossible for certain people. My Christ leaves it up to the people themselves to decide whether or not they accept His gift of Salvation and the bycoming way of life.
As a Christian there are certain things you will not do or do not approve of: Personally (through my faith) I am against abortion. I am also 'against' euthenesia. Why? Because it is the taking away of lives, or at least (with abortion) the ending of something that could evolve into a 'full' human being.

But if I want to bring my Christian beliefs into politics there are certain things holding me back. Where did Jesus say that we should legislate his teachings? Where?
Instead (Saint) Paul even wrote that Jesus' teachings are written in our hearts, so we do not need to write them on a stone anymore (as the Jews in the Old Testament did). The stone meaning the written law for all Israelites. Paul makes clear we should nót write them down anymore.

Furthermore Jesus himself said "my Kingdom is not of this world".

Here I just used two examples why we (as Christians) should not push our beliefs / values on others. However, I could use many more.

Like I said: I am a Christian; one with a very strong faith. As a Christian I live on the New Testament. Of course I also read and study the Old Testament, but there is a reason it is called New and Old. The New replaced the old. Meaning: if I read and study the Old Testament I always interprete it in line with the New Testament. That is because the Law (Old Testament) was fulfilled in Christ (New Testament).

For those who want to know more about the roots of liberalism and what role it played in forming the US Constitution go to:
Wikipedia Liberalism

Or read for instance something from John Stuart Mill (on Liberty), John Locke (a letter concerning toleration), David Hume and many others.