Right Stuff, The

Sojourners Magazine, Jul 2004 by Batstone, David, Wexler, Mark

Many people think the Religious Right has faded into obscurity and political powerlessness. In fact, it just might be stronger than ever.

In the mid-1990s, following Bill Clinton's second electoral ride to the White House, the vibrancy of Religious Right organizations appeared to be on the wane. Outside the sanctuary of the fundamentalist church, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson had become public caricatures of intolerance and zealotry. Pundits in the media and the liberal church deemed the movement torn, shattered, and perhaps dead.

How then, less than a decade later, has the Religious Right become a powerful sector of the Republican Party, holding veto power over most any GOP maneuver?

"The Religious Right has been institutionalized within the Republican Party," confirms Kenneth WaId, a professor of political science at the University of Florida at Gainesville. "Just look at the leaders of the GOP."

Note the top seven ranking Republicans in the U.S. Senate: Bill Frist, Tennessee; Mitch McConnell, Kentucky; Rick Santorum, Pennsylvania; Bob Bennet, Utah; Kay Bailey Hutchinson, Texas; Jon KyIe, Arizona; and George Alien, Virginia. Other than party affiliation, what do these senators all have in common? Each has earned a f OO percent rating on the Christian Coalition's scorecard, voting in accordance with that organization's positions on key legislation.

A similar pattern exists among the Republican leadership in the U.S. House of Representatives. Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas, who in part controls whether an issue will be even debated on the House floor, also receives a 100 percent on the Christian Coalition scorecard.

Yes, the Religious Right is alive and well. Over the past quarter century, it has grown from an adolescent, grassroots movement to a mature political player closely integrated into the Beltway mainstream. The results of a recent poll by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press illustrated the historical shift in political classification of white evangelical Protestants. In 1987 and 1988, 34 percent identified as Republican while 31 percent identified as Democrats. Currently, 43 percent view themselves as Republicans against 22 percent as Democrats.

POLITICAL ROOTS

After the landslide defeat of Barry Goldwater in the 1964 presidential election, a small group of conservative elites, known as the New Right, concluded that the Republican Party had to expand beyond its staunchly anti-communist and fiscally conservative base. Headed by Paul Weyrich (chair and CEO of the Free Congress Foundation), Richard Viguerie (direct mailing pioneer), Ed McAteer (founder of the Religious Roundtable), and Howard Phillips (founder and president of the Conservative Caucus, a lobby group), the New Right sought to wake a sleeping bear, religious conservatives.

By placing traditional family values at the core of its credo, the New Right was able to coax religious conservatives into political life. In 1979, the group engaged Jerry Falwell to establish and lead the Moral Majority. In short order, the Moral Majority claimed to have signed up 3 million first-time voters for the 1980 presidential elections (a disputed number, but still startling).

Voter registration drives notwithstanding, over the next two decades the Religious Right carefully nurtured grassroots organizations with a decidedly outsider political mentality. The efforts of groups such as Christian Voice, the Family Research Council, Concerned Women for America, the Freedom Council, American Coalition for Traditional Values, and the Christian Coalition were linked masterfully to make a strong impact on local political issues. During this period of rapid growth, the movement concentrated on political battles involving its key moral concerns: abortion, gay rights, school prayer, teaching creationism in public schools, and support for a regressive tax structure (it sees little or no gray area between socialism and tax policy that supposedly "overtaxes" the rieh and "redistributes" wealth to the poor). In the process, the movement gleaned valuable insight about how to work the political structure from Washington insiders like Senators Orrin Hatch and Jesse Helms.

The mainstream media, along with most of those in moderate and left-leaning political circles, treated the rise of religious conservatives with derision, often depicting them as "radical extremists" out of touch with modern American life. But an organic relationship was developing between the legions of Religious Right constituents and the political establishment, argues Sara Diamond in her book, Roads to Dominion. According to Diamond, by dismissing the Religious Right, media and political opponents enabled it to make strong inroads in established political channels without close scrutiny of its intentions and capacity.

OUTSIDER TO INSIDER

Early on, Republican centrists also detested the notion of power-sharing with the "extreme Right." The image of Falwell vilifying his political adversaries in colorful biblical language might play to a core audience, but it scared Republican operatives who did not want to alienate moderate voters.