June 13, 2005
An American Theocracy: What Every Citizen Should Be Concerned About by
Public Theologian
http://blog01.kintera.com/christianalliance/archives/2005/06/americans_of_ev.html
[excerpt]
Americans of every party and religious persuasion have reason to be
concerned about the direction our nation is heading. For the last quarter
century, a group of influential religious conservatives have slowly worked
their way into the power elite in our country. It is neither their
religious beliefs nor their conservatism that should concern us, though,
for there are many people who share similar religious beliefs and
conservative principles yet who are still committed to living in a
democracy.
However the particular people to which I am referring have no such
commitment but are rather intent upon turning the United States into a
theocracy. In the run-up to the 1980 Presidential election many of these
people joined forces to bring about the election of Ronald Reagan. At that
time their existence, at least on the surface came to the awareness of the
American electorate. Many citizens were concerned, not about religious
people being in politics, for that has been the case in American political
life since the colonial period, but instead about the content of the
political rhetoric that insisted that America be brought to live and govern
itself under the principles of biblical law. The immediate sense of alarm
faded, however, when the takeover of the government by theocratic
proponents never occurred under the successive administrations of Reagan
and Bush, who without the theocratic support would have wound up as trivia
questions instead of our nation’s presidents, even as the faces of such
figures as Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and James Dobson became familiar to
most Americans. The theocrats on the right were never able to fully advance
their agenda inasmuch as they were blocked by a Democratic majority in the
Congress as well as by traditional Republicans, the so-called fiscal
conservatives who were committed to democracy, as opposed to the social
conservatives who had begun to colonize the GOP.
All of that began to change with mid-term election in 1994 when Newt
Gingrich led the Republicans to power in the Congress. Many of these newly
elected representatives were social conservatives intent on completely
reshaping the government according to the agenda of the theocrats who had
helped them to power. This same electoral trend has occurred in every
national election since that time, culminating in the re-election of
President Bush and an increase in presence of social conservatives in both
houses of Congress in 2004. And now the socal conservatives are off the
leash, no longer capable of being reined in my the moderates who long held
sway. These newer members of the GOP, many of whom were Southern democrats
just a few years ago who could trace their roots in that party back to the
civil War, have now taken to calling their more moderate party-members like
Rudolph Giuliani and Arnold Schwarzenegger, RINO’s, that is “Republicans in
name only,” for they consider themselves the “true: conservatives, like the
Byzantine Greeks who had never set foot in Italy but who considered
themselves the “true” Romans.
But don’t take my word for this, because I am a liberal who can’t be
trusted, right? Well how about Republican Congressman Christopher Shays of
Connecticut who recently had this to say in the New York Times about the
direction of his own party: "This Republican Party of Lincoln has become a
party of theocracy." Or is Shays too much of a moderate for you? Do you
need the word of a religious person, say a man of the cloth, to persuade
you of the seriousness of the situation? How about the op-ed from the Rev.
John Danforth, an Episcopal priest, former US senator from Missouri and
President Bush’s most recent UN ambassador:
[end of excerpt]
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Posting and reading from alt.politics.usa.constitution OR alt.education
You are invited to check out the following:
The Rise of the Theocratic States of America
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocracy.htm
American Theocrats - Past and Present
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocrats.htm
The Constitutional Principle: Separation of Church and State
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html
[and to join the discussion group for the above site and/or Separation of
Church and State in general, listed below]
HRSepCnS · Hampton Roads SepChurch&State
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HRSepCnS/
[Its not just Hampton Roads folks who are members]
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.. . . You can't understand a phrase such as "Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion" by syllogistic reasoning. Words
take their meaning from social as well as textual contexts, which is why "a
page of history is worth a volume of logic." New York Trust Co. v. Eisner,
256 U.S. 345, 349, 41 S.Ct. 506, 507, 65 L.Ed. 963 (1921) (Holmes, J.).
Sherman v. Community Consol. Dist. 21, 980 F.2d 437, 445 (7th Cir. 1992)
.. . .
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THE CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLE:
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html
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