Freedom for and freedom from: Baptists, religious liberty, and World War II

Baptist History and Heritage, Summer-Fall, 2001 by J. Bradley Creed

On January 6, 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt addressed both houses of the United States Congress in his state of the union speech.

Under normal circumstances, this would merely have been an annual ritual of American politics, but this year the speech was more than a perfunctory duty. An air of gravity and solemnity pervaded the president's remarks as a stunned nation listened by radio. Less than four weeks earlier, Roosevelt and Congress had declared war on the Axis powers following the surprise, early-morning attack on Pearl Harbor by Japanese Imperial forces. As America measured carefully every word spoken by its commander-in-chief, he outlined four freedoms that were emblematic of the American spirit and for which the country was now fighting against totalitarian aggression. Along with their Allied companions, America was battling to preserve the freedom of speech, the freedom of religion, the freedom from want, and the freedom from fear.

This state of the union address captured the national imagination and has been canonized as a classic in the annals of American rhetoric and political discourse. "The Four Freedoms" speech focused the collective energies of citizens on the ordeal at hand and clarified the ideological reasons why war was necessary. Like a national mantra, the "Four Freedoms" entered common parlance functioning as a point of reference and reflection in public conversation. Norman Rockwell, the well-known illustrator for the Saturday Evening Post, even created four paintings representing the freedoms for which his country and the entire world were fighting.

Baptists in the United States latched on to Roosevelt's proclamation. For the duration of the war, Baptist commentators frequently referenced "The Four Freedoms" speech. Pastor and educator Edwin McNeill Poteat Jr. even published a book, Four Freedoms and God, that was a theological reflection and expansion on the president's address. (1) Baptists viewed the world war as a great effort to preserve basic democratic freedoms against the menace of totalitarian regimes. Prior to the declaration of war, both Northern and Southern Baptists condemned foreign aggression and endorsed the possibility of a defensive war only, but once the aggression directly threatened United States' interests, they advocated a war of intervention. (2) Like their brethren in other denominations, they saw the war as an engagement between two ways of life and a battle to preserve democracy and protect Christianity, the source and defender of liberty.

The war, however, held another, more urgent concern for Baptists. They feared that the global military crisis would precipitate other crises on a range of fronts, particularly in the preservation and spread of religious liberty. (3)

Religious Liberty: the Foundation of Democratic Freedom

The thesis of this article is that Baptists viewed World War II as a fight of freedom for democracy and from tyranny and that religious liberty was the source, stability, and foundation of democratic freedom. During the course of the conflict, Baptists addressed specific religious liberty issues precipitated by the emergency of war. They also reaffirmed their historic commitment to religious liberty as the bedrock of democratic freedom and the only sound basis for establishing a just and durable peace at the war's conclusion.

Baptists did not view World War II as a holy crusade fighting for the side of God, but they portrayed the struggle in strong religious overtones as a contest between two diametrically opposed ideologies. The Axis powers' politics of force subordinated individual freedoms to the supremacy of the state. Harry Emerson Fosdick warned that the supreme evil of war was its trust in a collective will that endangers the voluntary life that gives humans their dignity and distinctiveness. (4)

Others were not as restrained with their remarks. Preaching from the pulpit of the Marquette Road Baptist Church in Chicago, Illinois, George Manning Lewis declared, "This is a religious war! Believe it or not!" (5) He saw Christianity engaged in a death struggle with an evil state religion founded upon the diabolical trinity of "German blood, German soil, and German genius." (6)

L. R. Scarborough, president of the Southern Baptist Convention in 1939, told messengers gathered in Oklahoma City that the battle for liberty of conscience was never more imperiled than in this day of totalitarian dictators. J. Howard Williams warned the Baptist General Convention of Texas that religious liberty faced its greatest threat in 150 years because of the rise of the totalitarian powers. (7)

Other prominent Baptist leaders echoed these sentiments: "Totalitarian statism asserts its ultimate authority over every individual.... The present war, led by a swaggering maniac in Central Europe is a determined attempt to sweep Christianity from the face of the earth;" (8) "Hitler and his henchmen have outlined an elaborate scheme for a state-controlled church." (9) Edward Hughes Pruden, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Washington, D. C., condemned the enemy for treating the individual as a cog in a wheel and observed that "as Baptists our doctrinal position is in line with the highest ideals for which the United Nations are struggling." (10)