{"product_id":"the-thirteen-american-arguments-isbn-9780812976359","title":"The Thirteen American Arguments","description":"\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHoward Fineman, one of our most trusted political journalists, shows that every debate, from our nation’s founding to the present day, is rooted in one of thirteen arguments that–thankfully–defy resolution. It is the very process of never-ending argument, Fineman explains, that defines us, inspires us, and keeps us free. At a time when most public disagreement seems shrill and meaningless, Fineman makes a cogent case for nurturing the real American dialogue. \u003ci\u003eThe Thirteen American Arguments \u003c\/i\u003eruns the gamut, including\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e• \u003cb\u003eWho Is a Person?\u003c\/b\u003e The Declaration of Independence says “everyone,” but it took a Civil War, the Civil Rights Act, and other movements to make that a reality. Now, what about human embryos and prisoners in Guantanamo?\u003cbr\u003e• \u003cb\u003eThe Role of Faith\u003c\/b\u003e No country is more legally secular yet more avowedly prayerful. From Thomas Jefferson to James Dobson, the issue persists: Where does God fit in government?\u003cbr\u003e• \u003cb\u003eAmerica in the World\u003c\/b\u003e In Iraq and everywhere else, we ask ourselves whether we must change the world in order to survive and honor our values–or whether the best way to do both is to deal with the world as it is.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhether it’s the nomination of judges or the limits of free speech, presidential power or public debt, the issues that galvanized the Founding Fathers should still inspire our leaders, thinkers, and fellow citizens. If we cease to argue about these things, we cease to be. “Argument is strength, not weakness,” says Fineman. “As long as we argue, there is hope, and as long as there is hope, we will argue.” | \u003cu\u003ePraise for \u003ci\u003eThe Thirteen American Arguments\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/u\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eThe Thirteen American Arguments\u003c\/i\u003e is a thought-provoking, engaging study of the great American debate, and a highly worthwhile read.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–RealClearPolitics.com\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Insightful and enjoyable . . . . In \u003ci\u003eThe Thirteen American Arguments\u003c\/i\u003e, Howard Fineman lifts readers above the fog of modern politics . . . and offers a unique vantage point from which to see that the debates that shape American politics are timeless and profound.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e--The Washingtonian\u003cu\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A spectacular feat, a profound book about America that moves with ease from history to recent events. A talented storyteller, Howard Fineman provides a human face to each of the core political arguments that have alternately separated, strengthened, and sustained us from our founding to the present day.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–Doris Kearns Goodwin, author of \u003ci\u003eTeam of Rivals\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“With a marvelous command of the past and a keen grasp of the present, Howard Fineman expertly details one of the great truths about our country: that we are a nation built on arguments, and our capacity to summon what Lincoln called ‘the better angels of our nature’ lies in undertaking those debates with civility and mutual respect. Few people understand politics as well as Fineman does, and this work is an indispensable guide not only to the battles of the moment, but to the wars that will go on long after this news cycle is long forgotten.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–Jon Meacham, author of \u003ci\u003eAmerican Lion \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e Franklin and Winston\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“In an impressively thought-provoking original approach, Fineman revisits the great defining arguments that will deepen your understanding of America.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–Newt Gingrich, author of \u003ci\u003eReal Change: From the World That Fails to the World That Works\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Howard Fineman proves that few things are as compelling as a well-argued debate. This book offers a thought-provoking way to look at America, its history, and our evolving public discourse.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–Arianna Huffington, author of \u003ci\u003eRight Is Wrong\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A perfect antidote to the old horse-race political journalism–a timely (and timeless) reminder of what’s really at stake in the race for the presidency.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–Jeffrey Toobin, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Howard Fineman guides the reader through the controversies that have haunted this nation since its inception. In the process he creates a fresh context for making sense of the 2008 campaign. Both scholars and students of politics can learn much from this book.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–Kathleen Hall Jamieson, co-author of \u003ci\u003eunSpun: Finding Facts in a World of Disinformation\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A stimulating book that should be read by anyone who cares about the idea and arguments that made this country great, and which are critical to our future direction.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–David Boies, author of \u003ci\u003eCourting Justice\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e“[\u003ci\u003eThe Thirteen American Arguments\u003c\/i\u003e]\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003ecouldn’t be more timely. . . . There’s nothing like a good, robust discussion at the kitchen table. Nothing better.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–Tim Russert\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A books for liberals and conservatives both.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e–The Boston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A great new book . . . Read [\u003ci\u003eThe Thirteen American Arguments\u003c\/i\u003e] if you care about America and our history.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e–Chris Matthews\u003c\/b\u003e | Howard Fineman is \u003ci\u003eNewsweek’s\u003c\/i\u003e senior Washington correspondent and columnist. His “Living Politics” column appears regularly in the magazine, on newsweek.com, and on MSNBC.com. An award-winning writer, Fineman is also an NBC news analyst and a regular on \u003ci\u003eHardball with Chris Matthews\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eCountdown with Keith Olbermann\u003c\/i\u003e. His work has appeared in \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times, The Washington Post,\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eThe New Republic\u003c\/i\u003e. Once a regular on CNN, Fineman now reports exclusively for NBC, and has appeared on most major public affairs shows, including \u003ci\u003eNightline, Face the Nation, Larry King Live, Fox News Sunday, Charlie Rose\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eWashington Week in Review\u003c\/i\u003e. Fineman lives in Washington with his wife and two children. | Chapter 3   THE ROLE OF FAITH\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGod in His infinite wisdom must have designed Tennessee as\u003cbr\u003ethe ideal place in which to argue the role of faith in public life.\u003cbr\u003eIn what sometimes is still called “the buckle of the Bible Belt,”\u003cbr\u003elocals favor “strong preachin’,” but also the evangelism of a secular gospel\u003cbr\u003ecalled Jacksonian Democracy. Nashville is home to the abstemious souls\u003cbr\u003eof the Southern Baptist Convention, but also to country singers keening\u003cbr\u003eover lives ruined by drink and dissolution. In 1925 the mountains of east\u003cbr\u003eTennessee were the site of the infamous Scopes Trial, in which a teacher\u003cbr\u003ewas sent to jail for teaching the science of biological evolution. Yet those\u003cbr\u003esame rugged mountains are home to the Oak Ridge National Laboratory,\u003cbr\u003ea leading center for advanced science, and to two nuclear power plants\u003cbr\u003ethat operate on the physics venerated there.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSo Tennessee was the appropriate launching pad for the political career\u003cbr\u003eof Senator William Frist, M.D.–and also the appropriate place for it to\u003cbr\u003ecrash to Earth. In Tennessee, the senator had to fly through the crosswinds\u003cbr\u003eof cultural conflict, between the theories and demands of Bible Belt religion\u003cbr\u003eand of ivory tower science. The bumpy ride ultimately reduced his image\u003cbr\u003efrom that of an idealistic, \u003ci\u003eGrey’s Anatomy—\u003c\/i\u003estyle “superdoc” and presidential\u003cbr\u003epossibility to a hopeless political hack. The trajectory of his public life illuminated\u003cbr\u003ethe power of an essential American Argument. We are a prayerful,\u003cbr\u003eBible-believing country, yet that same trait causes us to constantly\u003cbr\u003efret–and argue–over the extent to which our faith should influence decisions\u003cbr\u003eabout education, research, welfare, and other government activities.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrist rose to prominence on the secular, science side of the argument.\u003cbr\u003eHis first calling card was medicine. His father and uncle were prominent\u003cbr\u003eNashville physicians who had made a fortune assembling one of the nation’s\u003cbr\u003efirst HMOs. He was a brilliant, meticulous student, excelling at\u003cbr\u003ePrinceton, at Harvard Medical School, and in internships at Massachusetts\u003cbr\u003eGeneral Hospital.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrist had a need to exhibit his knowledge in dramatic circumstances.\u003cbr\u003eHe became a renowned cardiothoracic surgeon famous for steely nerves\u003cbr\u003eand clinical derring-do, “cracking open chests,” as he put it, thrusting his\u003cbr\u003ehands into thoraxes to remove diseased hearts and lungs. He owned a\u003cbr\u003eplane, which he kept gassed up and ready to fly so he could ferry in replacement\u003cbr\u003eparts–living hearts–for his patients. He piloted the plane, of\u003cbr\u003ecourse. He was forever experimenting with new surgical techniques,\u003cbr\u003estudying logistics, puzzling over the social consequences of the on-the-fly\u003cbr\u003etriage necessary to match salvageable patients with salvageable hearts. A\u003cbr\u003ecommitted runner, lean as a whippet, and blessed with an ability to concentrate\u003cbr\u003ein an operating theater, Frist slept only three or four hours a night.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe used the wee hours to educate himself by writing medical tracts.\u003cbr\u003eAs he launched his campaign for the Senate in 1994, his religious faith\u003cbr\u003ewas not a visible part of his public profile. He rarely talked about his\u003cbr\u003estandard-issue Presbyterianism, the denomination of choice among the\u003cbr\u003eSouthern business establishment. Rather, he advertised the healing power\u003cbr\u003eof medicine. On the wall behind his desk, he tacked up a picture of a picnic\u003cbr\u003ehe had organized and attended earlier that year. He was surrounded\u003cbr\u003ein the photo by a cheerful-looking throng of more than one hundred.\u003cbr\u003eWho were they? “Those are my former transplant patients,” Frist said\u003cbr\u003eproudly. “I feel a deep bond with those people,” he said. “I can’t express it\u003cbr\u003ein words.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEven after he became a senator, Frist did not abandon his medical pursuits.\u003cbr\u003eHe was an unofficial doctor-in-residence in the Capitol. After the\u003cbr\u003e9\/11 terrorist attacks, he used his late-night study vigils to produce a\u003cbr\u003epicture-and-text guide and instruction manual on how to treat injuries\u003cbr\u003eand contaminations that might follow a chemical or biological assault. He\u003cbr\u003einsisted that his full title be emblazoned on press releases and in brass on\u003cbr\u003ehis office door: Senator William Frist, M.D.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhen he began fashioning his political career, Frist had little contact\u003cbr\u003ewith the Other Tennessee, the one controlled, or at least defined, by the\u003cbr\u003eSouthern Baptists. The state’s largest denomination, they had always set\u003cbr\u003ethe tone politically, but not always directly. In pioneer days they were a\u003cbr\u003eliberating political force, opposed to hierarchical authority, especially an\u003cbr\u003e“established” church, of any kind. They promoted democratic ideals by\u003cbr\u003einsisting that man had free will, and by insisting that the route to salvation\u003cbr\u003elay in the simple, straightforward act of reading and believing the\u003cbr\u003eBible. Baptists had grown mighty on America’s frontiers, where settlers\u003cbr\u003ehad needed a portable, independent faith, one that validated their sense of\u003cbr\u003efreedom but also gave them confidence that they were doing the Lord’s\u003cbr\u003ework in the New World.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAt first, Baptists and their brethren wanted nothing to do with direct\u003cbr\u003einvolvement in government, however, which they tended to fear (given\u003cbr\u003etheir history in Europe and in much of colonial America) as an instrument\u003cbr\u003eof theological oppression. That attitude changed somewhat in the\u003cbr\u003e1920s, as rural Americans came to feel themselves under assault by a new,\u003cbr\u003emetropolitan modernity. The battle was joined in Dayton, Tennessee,\u003cbr\u003ewhere a teacher named John Scopes was brought to trial for violating a\u003cbr\u003estate law against the teaching of evolution. Clarence Darrow, the most famous\u003cbr\u003ecourtroom lawyer of his day, teamed up with an equally famous\u003cbr\u003ejournalist, H. L. Mencken, to make a national laughingstock out of the\u003cbr\u003elaw’s chief defender, William Jennings Bryan, the “prairie populist.”\u003cbr\u003eAnd yet it was Bryan’s side–the Bible-believing one–that won the\u003cbr\u003ecase at trial and on appeal. In New York City, textbook authors were\u003cbr\u003eforced to delete evolution from their newest manuscripts. The Tennessee\u003cbr\u003elaw remained on the books, banning instruction in “any theory that denies\u003cbr\u003ethe story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible” or that\u003cbr\u003esuggests “man has descended from a lower order of animals.” Similar\u003cbr\u003elaws existed in fourteen other states until the U.S. Supreme Court, in\u003cbr\u003e1968, firmly and finally ruled that they were an unconstitutional imposition\u003cbr\u003eof sectarian dogma in secular classrooms.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe national ridicule engendered by the Scopes Trial drove two generations\u003cbr\u003eof Baptists out of the political arena. Despite their legal early\u003cbr\u003e“victory,” the Southern Baptist leaders increasingly downplayed fundamentalist\u003cbr\u003eteachings, even if their congregants did not.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut by the time Frist was thinking of running for office, a new generation\u003cbr\u003eof hard-liners–more media-savvy and sophisticated, but no less dedicated\u003cbr\u003eto Scripture–had reasserted control of the denomination. Luckily\u003cbr\u003efor Frist (at least it seemed lucky at the time) the Baptists’ leading political\u003cbr\u003efigure in the early 1990s was Dr. Richard Land, who had close ties to Karl\u003cbr\u003eRove, an ally of the late Lee Atwater’s and the emerging kingmaker of the\u003cbr\u003eSouthern-based Republican Party. Land headed the Southern Baptists’ political\u003cbr\u003eand grassroots organizing arm. He was theologically devout, but\u003cbr\u003ehad a doctorate from Oxford and enjoyed jousting with the Other Side.\u003cbr\u003eAnd maybe the Lord had a hand in bringing him to the campaign: Like\u003cbr\u003eFrist, Land was a Princeton man. He could educate Frist in the political\u003cbr\u003eways of the Word.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was a slow, careful process. In Frist’s first campaign, in 1994, Land\u003cbr\u003edid not press his fellow Princetonian on faith issues. It wasn’t part of the\u003cbr\u003eGOP’s national game plan. Instead, the Republicans ran coast-to-coast on\u003cbr\u003eNewt Gingrich’s determinedly secular “Contract with America,” which\u003cbr\u003estudiously avoided social and theological issues and instead focused on\u003cbr\u003eanti-Washington themes: tax cuts, spending reform, and the iniquity of\u003cbr\u003ethe new Clinton administration and the Democrats who had ruled the\u003cbr\u003eHouse of Representatives for forty years. Frist was anti-abortion–just\u003cbr\u003eabout everybody in the new GOP was–but otherwise had felt little need\u003cbr\u003eto talk much about “the social issues.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrist’s focus changed once he arrived in Washington, especially after\u003cbr\u003eGeorge Bush became president, the GOP took control of the Senate, and\u003cbr\u003eFrist, with a behind-the-scenes boost from the White House, became majority\u003cbr\u003eleader. Suddenly he was the man in the middle of an American Argument.\u003cbr\u003eStem-cell research was the specific issue. Baptists and other\u003cbr\u003efundamentalists joined with the Vatican hierarchy to oppose the use of\u003cbr\u003ehuman embryos in such research, even though many frozen embryos\u003cbr\u003ewere being discarded by fertility clinics and most scientists thought research\u003cbr\u003eusing cells from that source held great clinical promise in the\u003cbr\u003esearch for cures to disease.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrist proceeded to ambush himself on the issue. In 2001, he supported\u003cbr\u003ethe president’s decision to limit federally funded research to cultures from\u003cbr\u003eexisting embryo “lines.” But under pressure from his erstwhile colleagues\u003cbr\u003ein the medical community–not to mention former first lady Nancy Reagan,\u003cbr\u003ewho saw stem-cell research as the route to a cure for Alzheimer’s\u003cbr\u003edisease–Frist reversed course. Now, he said, he considered the existing\u003cbr\u003e“lines” inadequate, and would support the use of embryos that would otherwise\u003cbr\u003ebe discarded by clinics and perhaps other sources as well. Since he\u003cbr\u003ewas a doctor and potential presidential candidate, Frist’s 2005 switch was\u003cbr\u003emajor national news. “It’s an earthquake,” said his Republican colleague\u003cbr\u003eArlen Specter of Pennsylvania at the time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrist garnered praise from the same medical and scientific community\u003cbr\u003ethat had denounced him earlier. But the GOP’s religious fundamentalists\u003cbr\u003eattacked him for supporting what they labeled “destructive embryo research.”\u003cbr\u003e“To push for the expansion of this suspect and unethical science,”\u003cbr\u003esaid Dr. James Dobson, “will be rightly seen by America’s values voters as\u003cbr\u003ethe worst kind of betrayal of choosing politics over principle.” Dr. Land\u003cbr\u003ehad a simpler political reaction, but equally to the point. “I’m heartbroken,”\u003cbr\u003ehe declared.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd so it came to pass that Frist was politically doomed, even though\u003cbr\u003ehe tried his best to reconnect with the “heartbroken” Land. The senator\u003cbr\u003esought to placate his religious “base” by championing the anti-euthanasia\u003cbr\u003ecause of Terri Schiavo. Although he had not personally seen the bedridden\u003cbr\u003eand severely brain-damaged woman, he offered a long-range “diagnosis”\u003cbr\u003eof her condition, concluding that she was aware of her surroundings and\u003cbr\u003ethus should be spared. He did so after watching a video of her moving her\u003cbr\u003eeyes in what some had concluded was a purposeful, sentient fashion.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen, as though burrowing into Tennessee’s antimodern past, Frist\u003cbr\u003eshowed up at a Rotary club in Nashville to talk about evolution. After the\u003cbr\u003eSupreme Court in 1968 invalidated statutes that had banned the teaching\u003cbr\u003eof evolution, Biblical literalists had developed a new strategy. Rather than\u003cbr\u003eopposing evolution per se, they supported the teaching of a theory they\u003cbr\u003ecalled “intelligent design.” The idea was that human beings and other\u003cbr\u003eforms of life were so complex and elegantly arranged that only an intelligent\u003cbr\u003e“Creator”–that would be God–could have made them. Scientists\u003cbr\u003egenerally dismiss the theory as nothing more than a faith-based tautology,\u003cbr\u003ean assertion beyond the reach of experimental, factual verification, and\u003cbr\u003etherefore not “science” at all.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut Frist was not one of those scientists. “I think a pluralistic society\u003cbr\u003eshould have access to a broad range of fact, of science, including faith,” he\u003cbr\u003esaid. Exposing schoolchildren to intelligent design “doesn’t force a particular\u003cbr\u003etheory on anyone,” he said. A few months later, a federal judge in\u003cbr\u003ePennsylvania disagreed. He struck down a local school-board policy that\u003cbr\u003erequired that students be made “aware of the gaps\/problems in Darwin’s\u003cbr\u003etheory, and of other theories of evolution, including, but not limited to,\u003cbr\u003eintelligent design.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBy then Frist had bowed out of that debate–and most others in the\u003cbr\u003efaith wars. He had said from the beginning of his political adventure that\u003cbr\u003ehe would serve only two terms in the Senate, and as his second term drew\u003cbr\u003eto a close in the fall of 2006, the only remaining question was whether he\u003cbr\u003ewould run for the GOP presidential nomination. He was not a deft politician–\u003cbr\u003eyou could see the gears grinding with every move he made–but\u003cbr\u003eeven a Lyndon Johnson would have had trouble surviving in the riptides\u003cbr\u003eof the faith-versus-science debate.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn his final few months, Frist almost literally wasted away, shrinking\u003cbr\u003efrom lean to gaunt, his normally chipper surgeon’s demeanor falling off\u003cbr\u003einto what resembled absentmindedness. On the Senate floor, he seemed\u003cbr\u003ealmost lost. He had been chewed to pieces by the Eastern establishment\u003cbr\u003ethat had credentialed him initially; he was almost too easy a target for \u003ci\u003eThe\u003cbr\u003eNew York Times. \u003c\/i\u003eAt the same time, the Richard Lands of the world had\u003cbr\u003egiven up on him, looking elsewhere for Republican presidential candidates\u003cbr\u003eto champion. Rove had once been a backer–had led the effort to\u003cbr\u003eget him the majority leader’s job–but Bush aides now privately derided\u003cbr\u003eFrist as a ham-fisted amateur who had never learned to play the game, no\u003cbr\u003ematter how adroit he had been in an operating theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn November of 2006, after the Democrats won back control of the\u003cbr\u003eSenate, Frist limited himself to the occasional Washington social event as\u003cbr\u003ehe and his wife prepared to return to Nashville. He said he was building\u003cbr\u003ea new home there. In a sad, unself-conscious parody, the new edifice resembled\u003cbr\u003ea downsized White House, with pillars, portico, and all. He\u003cbr\u003ecould take shelter there from the argument that had overwhelmed him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe land we live on was claimed in God’s name, but the world’s first\u003cbr\u003eofficially secular government sits on it. We invoked God in making\u003cbr\u003eour Declaration of Independence, but not in our governing authority, the\u003cbr\u003eConstitution. Only one clergyman signed the former; none the latter. Yet\u003cbr\u003ewe are among the world’s most devout people; most of us see the Bible as\u003cbr\u003eliteral truth, the Word of God. We base our nationhood on the unalienable\u003cbr\u003erights the Creator bestowed upon all of mankind. So what role\u003cbr\u003eshould He play in our public life?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFaith and its traditions and institutions can strengthen society’s social\u003cbr\u003efabric, and amplify its commitment to family and justice. But if the Word\u003cbr\u003erules all, the faithful are duty bound to spread–yea, even enforce–it.\u003cbr\u003eThe result: sectarian crusades in secular realms. Some are noble (abolition\u003cbr\u003eor the bioethics movement), but some foment intolerance (the anti-\u003cbr\u003eCatholic Know-Nothings, the ravings of Louis Farrakhan), or warp scientific\u003cbr\u003einquiry, public education, and foreign policy. We are one country,\u003cbr\u003eyet forever torn between two methods of understanding, Revelation and\u003cbr\u003eReason, and two sacred texts, the Bible and the Constitution. Of all the arguments\u003cbr\u003ethat define us none is more vexing–alternately troubling and\u003cbr\u003einspiring–than the one we had for four centuries over the role of faith.\u003cbr\u003eAmerica, the late Jerry Falwell proclaimed, was a “faith nation.” His\u003cbr\u003epolitical foes disputed the specific term, but they cannot gainsay the basic\u003cbr\u003epoint. The polling figures are as familiar as they are immutable: 90 percent\u003cbr\u003eof us say we believe in God; 85 percent believe in the personal power\u003cbr\u003eof prayer; 70 percent are affiliated with an organized religion; 42 percent\u003cbr\u003esay they attend religious services regularly; and 38 percent refer to themselves\u003cbr\u003eas “committed Christians.” Senator Barack Obama summarized\u003cbr\u003ethese numbers in his tart fashion. “Substantially more people in America,”\u003cbr\u003ehe said, “believe in angels than they do in evolution.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLooking back, it is clear that it is our destiny to argue about faith in\u003cbr\u003epublic life. History makes us do it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOne reason is the centrality of the Bible–not just what it contains, but\u003cbr\u003ethe fact of its new, wide availability at the time of our founding. Our earliest\u003cbr\u003eseventeenth-century settlers arrived with Reformation ideas. They\u003cbr\u003ecame bearing new ways of thinking and guiding their lives created by\u003cbr\u003epost-Gutenberg technology (the movable-type printing press) and individualistic,\u003cbr\u003epost—Martin Luther theology. To these early Protestants, and\u003cbr\u003efor those who came here over the next two centuries, the Bible–not\u003cbr\u003epopes, prelates, or princes–was the arbiter of morality and the road map\u003cbr\u003eto heaven. What’s more, it was within the power and the ken of any mortal\u003cbr\u003eto read it and interpret it for himself. He could and did go forth into\u003cbr\u003ethe New World to seek its riches and master its dangers with a rifle, an ax,\u003cbr\u003eand a Bible. “Those who believe that knowledge of God comes direct to\u003cbr\u003ethem through the study of the Holy Writ,” observes historian Paul Johnson,\u003cbr\u003e“read the Bible for themselves, assiduously, daily. The authority lay\u003cbr\u003ein the Bible, not the minister.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe result was a uniquely American invention: a lively, supply-side\u003cbr\u003emarketplace of religion. “The direct apprehension of the word of God,”\u003cbr\u003ewrites Johnson, was a formula for dissent–“for a Babel of conflicting\u003cbr\u003evoices.” Diverse faith was, and is, like the energy from splitting the atom.\u003cbr\u003e“Nowhere else in Christendom was religion so fragmented,” writes colonial\u003cbr\u003ehistorian Gordon S. Wood. “Yet nowhere was it so vital.” It was all\u003cbr\u003ethe more vital because, in a New Eden of America, there was more ur-\u003cbr\u003egency in finding the right biblical path away from sin. The place was\u003cbr\u003epure; the temptations of freedom were great.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs with other parts of our heritage, this marketplace was so fervent\u003cbr\u003ebecause it was based on freedom of the individual. As with other marketplaces,\u003cbr\u003eit was buffeted by crowd psychology, the dynamics of salesmanship,\u003cbr\u003eand the laws of supply and demand. Without the clerical structure of\u003cbr\u003ean official church, preachers rose to power on the strength of eloquence\u003cbr\u003eand marketing skill, convincing the layman of the wisdom of their interpretation.\u003cbr\u003ePopular preachers were early fruits of our democratic thinking–“\u003cbr\u003ein a sense, the first elected officials,” says Johnson, “of the New\u003cbr\u003eAmerican society.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePhiladelphia, birthplace of our Republic, was known through most of\u003cbr\u003ethe eighteenth century as the ultimate faith-based bazaar–site of the legendary,\u003cbr\u003ebuilding-packing sermons of George Whitefield, American’s first\u003cbr\u003erevival evangelist. The Founders who convened there in 1787 to draft a\u003cbr\u003eConstitution knew the history of the city. They were not hostile to religion;\u003cbr\u003eindeed, they were not all firmly against some version of an official\u003cbr\u003echurch, if it could be democratically selected.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJust two years earlier, a committee of the Continental Congress had\u003cbr\u003ecome within a single vote of moving in that direction. Drafting rules for\u003cbr\u003eselling land in the Northwest Territory, the committee voted to allot for\u003cbr\u003e“the maintenance of public Schools” one section within each square of\u003cbr\u003esurveyed squares. Then they voted to devote “the section immediately adjoining\u003cbr\u003ethe same to the northward for the support of religion. Profits arising\u003cbr\u003etherefrom in both instances to be applied forever according to the will\u003cbr\u003eof the majority of male residents of full age within the same.” In other\u003cbr\u003ewords, the public would pay to “support religion,” presumably by constructing\u003cbr\u003ethe church the locals wanted.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo James Madison’s great relief, the “support of religion” clause was\u003cbr\u003evoted down in the end. “How a regulation so unjust in itself, foreign to\u003cbr\u003ethe authority of Congress . . . smelling so strongly of an antiquated Bigotry,\u003cbr\u003ecould have received the countenance of a committee is a matter of astonishment,”\u003cbr\u003ehe wrote to James Monroe. Presbyterian clergy, Madison\u003cbr\u003ereported, “were in general friends of the scheme,” but they had tempered\u003cbr\u003etheir “tone, either compelled by the laity of that sect, or alarmed at the\u003cbr\u003eprobability of further interferences of the Legislature, if they once begin\u003cbr\u003eto dictate in matters of religion.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn writing a Constitution, Madison and the other Founders took another\u003cbr\u003estep back from the approach the Continental Congress had considered.\u003cbr\u003eThe idea of a state-supported church–even one democratically\u003cbr\u003echosen by local elders–would not even be considered. When it came\u003cbr\u003etime to draft a Bill of Rights four years later, they hammered home the\u003cbr\u003epoint. “Congress shall make no law,” the First Amendment says, “respecting\u003cbr\u003ethe establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise\u003cbr\u003ethereof.” The framers were not banishing faith from the public square–\u003cbr\u003ebut they were banishing the possibility of state monopoly in the market of\u003cbr\u003ecreeds. They made the point in 1796 in another, but significant, context.\u003cbr\u003eIn the Treaty of Tripoli, they tried to soothe the Muslim ruler there by asserting\u003cbr\u003ethat “the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian\u003cbr\u003ereligion.” That wasn’t quite right, of course. We \u003ci\u003ewere \u003c\/i\u003eset in motion by\u003cbr\u003eChristians in the name of Christian kings. But after 1776, the kings did\u003cbr\u003enot govern us, and neither did their faith. No one faith could. You could\u003cbr\u003ebelieve in any you chose–or in none at all.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe fact is that the focus of the Founders–what they thought the\u003cbr\u003ecountry indeed was “founded on”–was not Christianity per se, or the\u003cbr\u003eBible, or at least the Bible alone. The focus of their intellectual, political,\u003cbr\u003eand moral ambition was the world, history as it was lived, and the Enlightenment\u003cbr\u003espirit of inquiry and science. Many were Deists, skeptical of\u003cbr\u003eChristian dogma about the divinity of Jesus. They studied Athens and\u003cbr\u003eRome–not Jerusalem–for most of their clues to the nature of government.\u003cbr\u003eTheir holy trinity was Hume, Locke, and Montesquieu. The decision\u003cbr\u003eof the committee of the Continental Congress is a footnote in history,\u003cbr\u003ebut a crucial one, reflecting and foreshadowing an argument for the ages:\u003cbr\u003eThey concluded that the only kind of education that government should\u003cbr\u003epay for is the kind that takes place in a secular classroom.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut, as was the case in 1785, it was always a close question. In 1801,\u003cbr\u003eBaptists, a minority in Connecticut, wrote to President Jefferson to complain\u003cbr\u003ethat their state viewed religious liberty not as an immutable right\u003cbr\u003ebut as a privilege granted by the legislature–as “favors granted.” In his\u003cbr\u003efamous and carefully considered reply, Jefferson said nothing about Connecticut,\u003cbr\u003ebut noted that it was an “act of the whole American people” (the\u003cbr\u003eBill of Rights) “which declared that \u003ci\u003etheir \u003c\/i\u003elegislature should make no law\u003cbr\u003erespecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise\u003cbr\u003ethereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state.”\u003cbr\u003ePerhaps no single “thus” has generated so much controversy. To be\u003cbr\u003esure, Jefferson’s “wall” means there can be no state-sponsored church. But\u003cbr\u003emust it mean no role for faith in public life?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eProbably not. Even in his letter, Jefferson seemed to make the point.\u003cbr\u003eHe closed his “wall of separation letter” to the Danbury Baptists this\u003cbr\u003eway: “I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection and blessing of\u003cbr\u003ethe common Father and creator of man.” However guarded his words,\u003cbr\u003ehe was reciprocating \u003ci\u003esomething. \u003c\/i\u003eFaith and public life are not a unity, but\u003cbr\u003eJefferson understood that here they are virtually inseparable in many\u003cbr\u003eways.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe idea of “revival” is one example of how faith and politics in\u003cbr\u003eAmerica are intertwined. Indeed, it is, arguably, our most important political\u003cbr\u003emetaphor. We are a nation that operates by continual revival. Without\u003cbr\u003ean established church, with each of us free to read the Word for\u003cbr\u003ehimself, we compete with each other to win souls, and revivals are our\u003cbr\u003eunique method for doing so. The religious Great Awakenings were mirrored\u003cbr\u003ein our politics, and vice versa. In a nation that prays for the advent\u003cbr\u003eof Good News, every deal is New, every political campaign is a crusade,\u003cbr\u003eand every crusade is a campaign. The mechanics of a Billy Graham event\u003cbr\u003e(he no longer calls them “crusades”) and those of a candidate rally are indistinguishable.\u003cbr\u003eMuch of the language is the same, sign-up tables are the\u003cbr\u003esame, prayer counselors and precinct workers are the same. Only the objective\u003cbr\u003eis different: souls versus votes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat we think of as civic life would not exist without the religious impulse\u003cbr\u003eto lead, to educate, and to convince. That impulse fostered the\u003cbr\u003efounding of our great universities and colleges, from Harvard to Notre\u003cbr\u003eDame to Brigham Young to Brandeis. It encouraged us to be the most\u003cbr\u003echaritable of people, with faith-based institutions leading the way from\u003cbr\u003ethe time of the Puritans through Dorothy Day and","brand":"Random House Trade Paperbacks","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48338553667813,"sku":"NP9780812976359","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780812976359.jpg?v=1769572663","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/the-thirteen-american-arguments-isbn-9780812976359","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}