3 Styles of Engagement with Politics

How has the influence of the religious conservatives been exercised, and to what effect?

Within the modern evangelical movement there have been at least three different styles of engagement. In shorthand, they may be described as the priest, the prophet, and the kingmaker.

Priest

Billy Graham has acted as the priest and confessor of American democracy—a fixture at public ceremonies like presidential inaugurals and services of national mourning. For decades he has maintained a clear Christian witness.

Prophet

In contrast, James Dobson, the founder of Focus on the Family, has assumed the role of prophet. On issues relating to the upbringing of children, Dobson’s tone tends to be quiet and measured; in politics, however, he has a long-standing habit of issuing thundering demands and denunciations, only to threaten to pick up his political marbles and go home. “If neither of the two major political parties nominates an individual who pledges himself or herself to the sanctity of human life,” Dobson has said, “we will join others in voting for a minor-party candidate.”14 Or again, “Does the Republican Party want our votes, no strings attached—to court us every two years, and then say, ‘Don’t call me; I’ll call you’—and not care about the moral law of the universe? . . . Is this the way it’s going to be? If it is, I’m gone, and if I go, I will do everything I can to take as many people with me as possible.”15

Kingmaker

Then there is Pat Robertson, the founder of the Christian Broadcasting Network and the Christian Coalition. The son of a conservative Democratic senator, Robertson has sought to be a Republican kingmaker, even running for president himself in 1988 and later setting out to be a grassroots political force. Of the Christian Coalition, he has said, “We are training people to be effective—to be elected to school boards, to city councils, to state legislatures and to key positions in political parties. . . . If we work and give and organize and train, the Christian Coalition will be the most powerful political organization in America.”16 Robertson’s main emphasis has often fallen on strategy, i.e., “electability,” rather than on ideological purity. Thus, during the 2008 presidential primaries he endorsed former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani, a candidate who supported both abortion and gay rights.

Drawbacks and Strengths

Each of these styles exhibits drawbacks as well as strengths. Graham’s effectiveness has occasionally been compromised by uncritical associations with the powerful. Dobson’s approach—afflicting and intimidating the powerful—is of demonstrably questionable utility. Robertson’s role as Republican kingmaker has been undercut by his habit of making embarrassing and offensive statements of one kind or another. Of the three, however, Robertson undeniably contributed a grassroots political sophistication to the religious right—along with the recognition that compromise is sometimes necessary to build winning political coalitions.

As for those coalitions, they have generally been with the GOP. This should come as no surprise. Of the two major parties, at least since the 1970s, the GOP at the national level has been the more culturally conservative. Even secular Republicans tend to stand for social order and cohesion against the expressive individualism of modern liberalism. This broad trend has been accelerated by the public disdain shown by many Democrats toward the religious right and by the Democratic Party’s unqualified embrace of abortion on demand. In 1976, about 50 percent of white evangelicals voted for the GOP presidential candidate. By 1984, the figure was 76 percent—a swift and massive shift.