Let the Negative Campaigning Begin! Constitutional Roll-backs?

There are two rather interesting issues that have emerged lately in the political debate, issues that to my mind strike at the very core of the American ethos.  Both seem to me to be rather blatant challenges to American freedoms and opportunities -- and no that issue here isn't the right to bear arms.  The issues though are related.  One has to do with immigration and the other with religious freedom.

It saddens me to watch as two Republican Senators, both of whom have stood at the head of the line in support of comprehensive immigration reform, back pedal and embrace the repeal of the 14th Amendment, which interestingly enough was engineered in the 1860s by leaders of the Republican party.  The 14th Amendment has several parts to it, but the section relating to the current conversation reads:

Section. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Sen. Lindsey Graham has suggested that this provision be rolled back, because it provides opportunity for "anchor babies," a rather ugly term that suggests that women come to the US to "drop babies," another popular term -- so that they can have residency in the US.  It has been rare in American history to roll back constitutional protections.  The only amendment that has been passed and then repealed was Prohibition.  Supporting Graham is John McCain -- also in trouble politically in his home state -- which has led him to take up causes he once opposed.   Do we really want to undermine constitutional protections that make it possible for the children of immigrants to become citizens?  Oh, it might be politically popular, but do we really want to go there?   And let me remind readers that this Amendment was Republican sponsored and largely opposed by the Democrats of the day.  

The other issue is the proposed mosque in Manhattan (and other mosques around the country).  The First Amendment reads:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The Constitution reads pretty clearly here -- Americans have a freedom to exercise their faiths.  This includes popular and unpopular ones.  Unless they are clearly breaking laws or impinging on zoning restrictions, people have the freedom to gather wherever they like.  Thus, the sponsors of the Manhattan mosque and community center have the right to build two blocks from "Ground Zero."   It may not be politically popular -- and apparently the Republican Party is ready to make this a "campaign issue" for the fall -- but its a Constitutional protection.  I continually hear Tea Party folks and others talking about the Constitution -- usually their right to bear arms -- but when the Constitution doesn't go their way, well then -- "the Constitution be damned!"   My hope is that the American people have a broader and more open vision of the world than to decide who should govern them on the basis of the President's remarks about the mosque in New York. 

So, here's my question -- not so much as a Christian (my faith calls for justice for all people and therefore my view is colored by that theology, but I think this time the question emerges from my being a citizen of this nation) as an America citizen:  Do we really want to undermine constitutional protections of religion and citizenship?

The Mojave Cross -- Religious or Not? -- Sightings

Is the cross a religious symbol or is it a secular one?  That is the question that was raised by the Supreme Court in upholding the rights of those who placed a giant cross out in the Mojave Desert to honor war dead.  The Court essentially determined that the cross isn't simply a religious symbol and thus it can stay.  Martin Marty raises questions today about the meaning of the cross -- is there a principled Christian case that would support those protesting the cross?    I welcome your thoughts in response to Marty's helpful diagnosis!

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Sightings 5/3/10

The Mojave Cross – Religious or Not?

-- Martin E. Marty

Days ago, the Supreme Court’s currently-standard 5-4 majority ruled that “the Mojave Cross,” a contested war memorial in the desert of California, may stand. The case itself is too complicated – it involved lower court rulings on a land transfer, and more – to be treated in the short scope of a Sightings column. But two justices framed what is at issue. Justice Anthony Kennedy won the favor of many religious citizens by broadening the meaning of the cross and in effect secularizing it. It is wrong, he said, to see the cross solely as a religious symbol; this “one Latin cross in the desert evokes far more than religion.” Justice John Paul Stevens, in dissent, won the disfavor of many citizens by trying to re-religiocify the symbol. The government is endorsing a “starkly sectarian message,” he said, a judgment which Jews, Muslims, other-religious, or non-religious citizens would affirm. Justice Samuel Alito in effect spoke for both sides: “[I]t is likely that the cross was seen by more rattlesnakes than humans,” and snakes are presumably secular. Then he admitted that Easter services have often been held at the site, and such services are presumably and specifically religious.

I happened to be lecturing last week at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama, under sponsorship of the University, the endowment of historian Walter Shurden and spouse Kay, and, most of all, the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty. Score three for Baptists, in my book. The BJC deployed a half-dozen staffers, and I eavesdropped as they discussed responses to the Court ruling, which, again because of the complications of the case, were measured. The responses and the context brought to my mind a case that too seldom gets made: that many who are nervous about “sectarian” messages and symbols in public settings are so for principled religious reasons. That is, despite some media portrayals and populist reactions, those who oppose public privileging of Christian symbols are not all atheists, secularists, humanists, and liberal non-believers. Some are dedicatedly Christian. What supports their case?

First, the argument of the Jewish War Veterans and others, that the cross is “a powerful Christian symbol,” would restore it to the place where it evokes awe, wonder, the need for decision, and attention from more than rattlesnakes. Second, while the majority of justices are rightly sympathetic about the placement of the cross on graves of thousands who gave their life for their country, the current debates also recall the New Testament understandings, projected into the future, that while believers are saved by the cross, it is “a stumbling-block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles” (I Cor. 1:23, Gal 5:11).

My text for the BJC lecture on “not privileging” a particular religion or religion itself was from a James Madison favorite, Montesquieu, who observed that the way “to attack a religion is by favor, not by what drives away, but by what makes men lukewarm.” The fact that Montesquieu said it does not necessarily make it true. But the evidence – for example, of lukewarm Christendom in Europe as it lingers in favor of and after fourteen centuries of legal establishment and privilege – needs to be reckoned with.

When Baptists were Baptist, they knew this, which is why they found the United States Constitution so protective and congenial. Many of their heirs continue to regard the Cross (and particular symbols of Jews, Muslims, Baha’i, Wiccans, and all the rest) as symbols of more than “religion in general.” Some court cases treat the monuments as “cross-shaped” secular symbols. It is also more and other than that.

References:

Read the court’s decision at http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/09pdf/08-472.pdf.

For further coverage of the case, see http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704423504575212001980127366.html.

Martin E. Marty's biography, current projects, publications, and contact information can be found at www.illuminos.com.

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In this month’s Religion and Culture Web Forum, Web Forum editor emeritus Spencer Dew explores the relationship between Jack Kerouac’s religious thought and its expressive practice in the act of writing: “Indeed, his entire oeuvre can be read as an expression of his personal religious stance, a kind of ‘fusion’ of Catholic theology with notions taken from Buddhist philosophy and practice.” Through a close reading of Kerouac’s novella Tristessa, Dew suggests that such a fusion—despite exemplifying Kerouac at his writerly best—leads to a solipsism that is ethically troubling, and likely reflective of Kerouac’s personal and professional shortcomings—especially later in his life. “Devotion to Solipsism: Religious Thought and Practice in Jack Kerouac’s Tristessa,” with invited responses from Benedict Giamo (University of Notre Dame), Nancy Grace (College of Wooster), Sarah Haynes (University of Western Illinois), Kurt Hemmer (Harper College), Amy Hungerford (Yale University), Omar Swartz (University of Colorado, Denver), Matt Theado (Gardner-Webb University), and Eric Ziolkowski (Lafayette College).

http://divinity.uchicago.edu/martycenter/publications/webforum/index.shtml  

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Sightings comes from the Martin Marty Center at the University of Chicago Divinity School.