The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
There's a new and interesting study out by the Brookings Institution, a DC-based think tank, that examines the role religion played in the 2010 election. The masterminds behind the study were E.J. Dionne and William A. Galston--two senior fellows at Brookings, both liberals. They were interviewed on NPR recently to talk about their findings.
I found two items from the interview to be particularly noteworthy. The first came from Galston, responding to a question about the connection between American exceptionalism, religion, and politics:
Well, [American exceptionalism is] the idea that America is a chosen nation that has been singled out by God for a distinctive mission in the world, we put a very strong version of that proposition on the table in this survey and 6 in 10 Americans affirmed it. Indeed, 30 percent of people who probably don't believe in God at all affirmed it. So, this is a remarkably persistent part of America's cultural and political DNA that I think our political leaders ignore at their peril.
This, to me, is the most significant part of the study. It helps explain not only the pride of American voters in their heritage, but also why the liberal European-wannabes in the White House cannot fully understand America as a cultural and historical phenom.
The second noteworthy tidbit from the study is about the Republican gain among Catholic voters. In 2008, 42% of the Catholic vote went to the GOP, while this time around, 54% did (in 2006, 44% did). Here is Dionne's analysis, which I will let you chew on:
One of the fascinating things we've found is that we ask the [Catholic] respondents if they heard preaching or talk in their houses of worship about particular issues. And what was really striking among Catholics is that 65 percent of them reported hearing talk about abortion but very small numbers heard talk about either health care or the world of government.
He adds, "And in light of Catholic social teaching, this was a fascinating finding." He concludes, "I think that Catholics are still going to be up for grabs when the next election rolls around."
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May '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
I believe in American exceptionalism but I don't believe that the United States has been chosen by God. I believe it represents the best idea for man governing himself -- an inspiring idea. I'm not excluding God from the proposition, but if Brookings asked my if I believed in American Exceptionalism I would say yes but it would have nothing to do with my religion.
The study and its conclusions are all asked and answered inside a permanent and annoying Plexiglas bubble. The nonsense that somehow being Catholic and caring about social welfare means you then vote Democratic is preposterous.
Sep '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
American exceptionalism arises out of a political philosophy, grounded in Enlightenment thinkers, that sought to craft a more perfect union that avoided the pitfalls of government as seen in Greece and Rome and England.
Catholic social teaching includes the principle of subsidiarity which fits much more with American self organization into community and civic organizations as seen by Tocqueville than with monolithic hail Caesar TSA style single payer crotch fondling.
Oct '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
I would love to know which aspect of "Catholic teaching" makes the second finding so fascinating to E.J.
Scratch that - I already know the answer. What I would really love to know is how liberals like E.J. can interpret Catholic teaching as being a definitive endorsement of things like universal health care but the Church's admonition to respect life is some sort of complex grey area when it comes to abortion.
Edited on Nov 18, 2010 at 7:13amRe: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
I think you're right--there's real philosophical substance to the idea of American exceptionalism. It's interesting that these two liberals define American exceptionalism as being "chosen by God"--which, I think, deprives the idea of American exceptionalism of its historical and philosophical substance.
Oct '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
Emily Esfahani Smith, Ed. :
Well, [American exceptionalism is] the idea that America is a chosen nation that has been singled out by God for a distinctive mission in the world, we put a very strong version of that proposition on the table in this survey and 6 in 10 Americans affirmed it. Indeed, 30 percent of people who probably don't believe in God at all affirmed it. So, this is a remarkably persistent part of America's cultural and political DNA that I think our political leaders ignore at their peril.·
This is a very interesting definition of "american exceptionalism" and is much more relgious than any I have ever before heard. Wikepedia states:
American exceptionalism refers to the opinion that the United States is qualitatively different from other nations. Its exceptionalism is claimed to stem from its emergence from a revolution, becoming "the first new nation",[1] and developing "a unique American ideology, based on liberty, egalitarianism, individualism, populism and laissez-faire". This observation can be traced to Alexis de Tocqueville, the first writer to describe the United States as "exceptional".
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
Chris Bogdan: Scratch that - I already know the answer. What I would really love to know is how liberals like E.J. can interpret Catholic teaching as being a definitive endorsement of things like universal health care but the Church's admonition to respect life is some sort of complex grey area when it comes to abortion. · Nov 18 at 7:12am
Edited on Nov 18 at 07:13 a
Trace Urdan:
The study and its conclusions are all asked and answered inside a permanent and annoying Plexiglas bubble. The nonsense that somehow being Catholic and caring about social welfare means you then vote Democratic is preposterous. · Nov 18 at 6:53am
Right, it's as if Dionne can't imagine that one can be a Catholic and not be a Democrat!
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
Good Berean
This is a very interesting definition of "american exceptionalism" and is much more relgious than any I have ever before heard. Wikepedia states:
American exceptionalism refers to the opinion that the United States is qualitatively different from other nations. Its exceptionalism is claimed to stem from its emergence from a revolution, becoming "the first new nation",[1] and developing "a unique American ideology, based on liberty, egalitarianism, individualism, populism and laissez-faire". This observation can be traced to Alexis de Tocqueville, the first writer to describe the United States as "exceptional". · Nov 18 at 7:17am
Right--I agree. What's revealing is that the two liberals grouped religion and American exceptionalism together in such an explicit way. I can see how their antipathy of one can cause antipathy of the other.
Oct '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
Pseudodionysius: American exceptionalism arises out of a political philosophy, grounded in Enlightenment thinkers, that sought to craft a more perfect union that avoided the pitfalls of government as seen in Greece and Rome and England.
Catholic social teaching includes the principle of subsidiarity which fits much more with American self organization into community and civic organizations as seen by Tocqueville than with monolithic hail Caesar TSA style single payer crotch fondling. · Nov 18 at 7:08am
Spoken like a true Thom cat.
I agree on point two but disagree on point one, pseudokitty: the exceptionalsim of America is due to a confluence of beliefs, both "sacred" and "secular". The fundamental worldview of Americans at the founding was reformed Christianity. Catholics were a small minority in total but combined with the members of the Church of England in the former "royal charter" colonies, the "romanized" Christian worldview was very strong. Enligtenment ideas were present in a syncretized form within this praticular group (e.g Jefferson), but this was nothing new since the Catholics (including your namesake, Thomas Aquinas, had previously worked to incorporate pagan Greco-Roman ideas such as "reason" into faith.
May '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
Most of us aspire to the ideal that we should work together to solve our problems. That was Mr. Obama's great appeal in 2008 - based on his keynote at the DNC Convention in '04 - that there is no Red or Blue America, only the United States of America.
But even as votes are being cast, exit pollsters are dividing and categorizing the voters. The media says it's done so that they may understand and make sense of the vote. Horse pucky.
The exit polling and the studies like the one Emily cites are only used to strategize, to pander and to divide us.
This is why Washington is doomed and so are we.
Jun '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
In the Catholic Church, talking about abortion is like talking about the house being on fire. That's the emergency. It's fatal for the child and soul-destroying for those that participate. By comparison, America's other high-profile welfare issues are like a leaking toilet. Bad too, but first things first.
Sep '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
Good Berean
Spoken like a true Thom cat.
I agree on point two but disagree on point one, pseudokitty: the exceptionalsim of America is due to a confluence of beliefs, both "sacred" and "secular". The fundamental worldview of Americans at the founding was reformed Christianity. Catholics were a small minority in total but combined with the members of the Church of England in the former "royal charter" colonies, the "romanized" Christian worldview was very strong. Enligtenment ideas were present in a syncretized form within this praticular group (e.g Jefferson), but this was nothing new since the Catholics (including your namesake, Thomas Aquinas, had previously worked to incorporate pagan Greco-Roman ideas such as "reason" into faith. · Nov 18 at 7:37am
Well, yes, I did oversimplify a bit, though I think you understate the philosophical difference between the Catholic and Protestant synthesis of other thinkers. But, suffice it to say that, yes, American exceptionalism is a synthesis (or syncretic) blend of secular and theological ideas -- as thinkers such as Eric Voegelin, Leo Strauss (need I say Thomas Pangle?) have wrestled with over the years.
Jun '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
It seems not to have occurred to the authors that many Catholics, and people of faith in general, care about the welfare of individuals on their own turf or through their own agency (the church, for one), not through the conscription of their dollars by a government that relieves them from the opportunity and personal virtue that attaches to charitable care and giving. Or, to put it in religious terms, they cherish the injunction to “lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust does corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal.” Corruption and thieves indeed. To see their “charity” lost in the Kafkaesque bureaucracy of the social welfare state rather than invested in the heavenly virtue that invokes the tradition of lending a hand is, to many of us, the opposite of virtue. Not surprised this would come as a surprise to the study’s clueless authors, Mr.’s Tweedle-Dee and Dumb.
Edited on Nov 18, 2010 at 8:17amSep '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
Abortion is viewed as a fundamental issue for building a just society. Since the victim is innocent (the child did nothing to will itself into existence), no just society can be built on a foundation of that type of injustice.
Nov '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
Reading de Tocqueville, one does not come away with an impression that America is objectively chosen by God. Rather he observes that Americans subjectively choose God and industry. To quote: "His passions, his wants, his education, and everything about him seem to unite in drawing the native of the United States earthward; his religion alone bids him turn, from time to time, a transient and distracted glance to heaven."
Well that might have been true in 1831 we certainly see far less of it today.
Oct '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
What you are describing are the effects of the "social gospel", the outworking of which is the usurpation by the state (or, more accurately from the biblical perspective) the abdication of the church from it's responsibility to care for the poor. Instead of the tithe we have the tax. And, since the tax is coerced by force, the tithe is voluntarily withheld. The only way this will change is for the church to resume the tithe and restore the voluntary associations that once thrived in an America with a small government. See Democacy in America.
Nov '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
By 1945, America had established itself as the richest and most powerful nation of all time, whose citizens enjoyed unprecedented freedom and prosperity. So the empirical evidence for American Exceptionalism is irrefutable.
However, the fundamental nature of the American Character is more elusive and not well understood – even by Americans. This unique character was born out of several factors:
(1) Prostestant Christianity – Americans were imbued with a deep sense of Morality.
(2) Enlightenment Philosophy – In fact, the Constitutional Convention was the crowning glory of the Enlightenment.
(3) Violence, with Moderation – Americans are a rough bunch, born, as I like to say, with a Bible in one hand and a gun in the other. We love to fight – even for the rights of other people (which, in human affairs, is very unusual). But Americans also have a profound sense of the limits of violence. For example, when the American Revolution ended, there was no wholesale massacre of the Loyalists.
But there has been a critical change in the way Americans think. In Colonial Days, people believed in Societal Rights and Individual Responsibilities. Today, we harp on Societal Responsibilities and Individual Rights, which is the basis of Socialism and our current problems.
May '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
I'm late to the thread, but I am very much with the consensus of the group that Dionne and Galston have mis-defined the term. I suspect that they do so to discredit it and marginalize it, at least in the eyes of liberal secular readers.
I may be reading too much into their comments, along with their simplistic assessment of American Catholics, but I do sense an attitude in them that these are ideas that "no thinking person would hold".
Anyone with a deep love for America and a strongly held faith is going to make an emotional link between the two, but it is more accurate to say that "America chooses God" than "God chooses America".
Jun '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
I too am late chipping in. I have a foot in both camps. My religious background informs my belief that there is something special about America that relates to its relationship with God.
But I agree that a major component of American exceptionalism can be traced back to Enlightenment thought, the geo-political/religious nature of our beginnings (in which the different religous sects were important, but none were dominant), the founding ideas (probably best articulated by Madison and Hamilton), the vast frontier, the American penchant for volunteerism (Tocqueville's "small brigades"), and our economic success (which tends to breed more success).
I agree generally with G. A.'s view that it's more "America chooses God" than the reverse, with the caveat that God has placed America in unique circumstances that allow it to be exceptional.
May '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
One minor nit, Trace- if you look at the opening of the Declaration and the lives of its signers, etc., you certainly get a sense that many, probably most, indeed did see America as having some special divine touch. They certainly seemed to credit Him contemporaneously.
Those of a more secular bent today are welcome to adopt the Enlightenment as inspiration, but looking at John and Samuel Adams, to name two Founders who were not Puritan preachers (watch the church meeting scene in the miniseries), you get a sense that their Enlightenment sensibilities were coatings on a theistic core.
Jul '10
Re: The Role Religion Played in the 2010 Midterms
EJHill: Most of us aspire to the ideal that we should work together to solve our problems. That was Mr. Obama's great appeal in 2008 - based on his keynote at the DNC Convention in '04 - that there is no Red or Blue America, only the United States of America.
But even as votes are being cast, exit pollsters are dividing and categorizing the voters. The media says it's done so that they may understand and make sense of the vote. Horse pucky.
The exit polling and the studies like the one Emily cites are only used to strategize, to pander and to divide us.
This is why Washington is doomed and so are we. · Nov 18 at 8:01am
Despair is a sin, EJ. The political process has become so meta that the message and narrative memes have spilled over into the new reader's presentation as if they represented substance rather than rhetorical tools. Properly conducted, those exit polls would show that most Americans care not a twig for the political scientists selling demographic determinism to the politicians and news readers, and delight in blowing up that whole house of cards.
Have some tea.