Is God a Republican or Democrat? Which party do those of faith favour?
These were just some of the questions emerging at a recent event organized by Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School and PBS Religion and Ethics Newsweekly at the National Press Club.
Moderating, PBS’ Kim Lawton asked for clarity on the role faith and religion had played in the quest for the White House, what impact it had on voters and what the results may mean for the future of the role of faith in American politics.
Julian Zelizer, Professor of History and Public Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School, argued that value voters had used faith and religion to stamp moral authority on the electoral process.
“Value voters in general and people of faith in particular got disillusioned by the Republicans. The anger within the religious base in the party is because they feel strategist Karl Rove took them for a ride and also that President George Bush has not maintained fidelity to issues that concern them,” argued Zelizer.
“The fact that Republican John McCain picked a solid, religious conservative for Vice-President and that Democrat Barack Obama spiced his rhetoric with religious overtones is ample evidence that faith is not just about to go away yet,” he said.
Zelizer said Democrats had moved to appropriate religion as a force of unity, and entrenched their affinity for faith in the public square. He argued that the Reverend Jim Wallis had helped Democrats get comfortable with expressing their faith in the public square.
He said people see the world through a set of values, and that Democrats had moved fast to capitalize on that during the campaigns. “Senator Obama perceived this as an opportunity to build on faith as a tool for political mobilization and not a divine wedge,” he said.
Lawton argued that Reverend Jeremiah Wright’s association with Barack Obama and Pastor John Hagee’s endorsement of John McCain had transformed faith into a public affair, given the clergymen’s high profiles and controversial remarks.
Mickey Edwards, also a staff member at the Woodrow Wilson School, argued that the media had been preoccupied with the persona of Reverend Wright and probed less the community and institutions around him.
He predicted that contests for the allegiance of value voters will continue in the future, and that they could be fiercer.
Muslim activism in the United States, he also argued, will continue as the community’s demographics change and the Islamic interests take center stage.
He argued that 2008 might go down as the year during which Democrats closed the deal with evangelicals, though he also argued that Governor Sarah Palin’s presence on the McCain ticket had presented America with a bigger question: “Can a Pentecostal be president?”
Jesse Masai is an intern at the American Journalism Center, a training program run by Accuracy in Media and Accuracy in Academia.
