If it's true, as F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, that the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function, the Christian right assembled a veritable brain trust on the altar of a Kentucky “megachurch” last night.
In the Family Research Council's much-anticipated “Justice Sunday” event, which was simulcast to evangelical and conservative churches around the country, a parade of evangelical preachers and activists stood before a crowd of 2,000 to alternately blast the federal judiciary for being too independent of Congress and to complain that Senate Democrats are “destroying” the independence of the judiciary.
They promised that they were not questioning the religious beliefs of those who disagree with them -- then introduced speakers who openly cast doubt on the faith of specific Democratic lawmakers.
And perhaps most absurdly -- with satellites beaming their images across the country, Christian radio stations broadcasting their words to millions of households, and a live Internet feed making the program available literally worldwide -- they tried to play the role of an oppressed minority whose freedom of speech is being denied.
The ostensible high point of the evening -- and the segment from which most major news outlets have been trying to wring some news -- was a videotaped message from Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist. The Tennessee Republican's anodyne remarks actually added little to what was already known about the likelihood of a showdown over Democrats' threatened filibuster of judicial nominees, and the rest of the speakers avoided the more incendiary rhetoric they let fly earlier this month. But the real news is that the leader of the Senate was happy to lend his support to an effort clearly designed to give the religious right even more influence over public affairs than it already enjoys.
The event, which was billed as the kickoff of a grass-roots effort to stop Senate Democrats from filibustering seven of President Bush's most conservative judicial nominees, took place at Highview Baptist Church in Louisville. Against a backdrop of banners displaying the faces of several of Bush's stalled nominees, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins played the persecution card early, complaining that the First Amendment rights of Christians have “taken a pounding from activist judges” in recent years.
“The courts have become an enclave for a liberal ideology that seeks to muzzle the voice of Americans,” Perkins complained. “We believe we have a voice in this process. Just because we believe the Bible [is a] guidepost for life does not disqualify us from participating in our government.”
Al Mohler, head of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, whipped himself into a froth over the subject of Judge Charles Pickering, a Bush nominee who was denied confirmation in the president's first term, insinuating that a single remark about Christian responsibility had been responsible for the Democrats' opposition to Pickering.
“He was speaking as a Christian to fellow Christians about our Christian responsibilities,” Mohler said, his voice rising. “But in the views of some radical secularists, that invalidates him from serving on the federal bench, and we as Americans had better hear that as a wake-up call. Because if it's Judge Pickering now, it could be you and it could be me tomorrow.”
Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, raged at imaginary opponents, practically shouting “We won't be told to shut up and give it over to the secular left. Who are they to say that I don't have a right to freedom of speech?”
Perkins, who combines the scrubbed smoothness of Ralph Reed with a Marine pedigree, tried to spread a patina of reasonableness on the event.
“We are not here tonight to impose our views on the nation,” said Perkins. “We are not saying that people who disagree with us are not people of faith. We have never said that; we'll never say that.”
But of course, that's exactly what Perkins and company were saying, and his colleagues on the stage had no compunction about making their emcee a liar.
Donohue, of the Catholic League, was quite happy to disparage the Catholic faith of Democratic Senators Ted Kennedy and Richard Durbin. And James Dobson of Focus on the Family certainly seemed to imply that opposition to the Christian right's agenda is equivalent to being anti-religion, accusing the U.S. Supreme Court of conducting a 43-year “campaign to limit religious freedom.”
For a group usually remarkable for its adherence to mutual talking points, the speakers seemed a tad confused about what their real attitude toward the judiciary ought to be.
“The Constitution gives the Congress the right to control the courts,” Dobson said, quickly adding, “Not that it is not independent.”
Amid calls for Congress to use its power under Article III of the Constitution to subjugate the federal courts, Watergate figure Chuck Colson, now head of the evangelical Prison Fellowship Ministries, appeared by videotape to remind the audience that it was the Founding Fathers' “Christian sensibilities” that led to the separation of powers in a three-branch federal government.
“Now what the Senate minority is trying to do is, by a filibuster, to seize what they lost at the ballot box and to prevent the appointment of judges -- holding the judiciary hostage,” Colson said. “It is destroying the independence of the judiciary and it is destroying the balance of powers, which was a vital Christian contribution to the founding of our nation.”
It was quite clear, though, that the only members of the judiciary whose “independence” Justice Sunday participants actually value are those who share their own evangelical Christian conception of morality. And that they believe they are doing God's will by pushing them on the rest of the country.
“I believe that tonight is the start of something really important,” said Mohler. “I think this is about the people of God -- evangelical Christians -- beginning to understand what our responsibility really is.”
Rob Garver is a freelance journalist living in Springfield, Virginia.
