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Analysis Social conservatives kept to the kiddie table
By JOE FEUERHERD
President Bushs Jan. 29 State of the Union speech served as
a rousing and emotional rallying cry for many, but provided little in the way
of inspiration -- not to mention programs or funding -- to the faith-based wing
of his party, more concerned about abortion, school prayer, limiting gay
rights, and education vouchers than tax cuts or the military budget.
We choose freedom and the dignity of every life, the
president intoned at the close of his 55-minute address, even there contrasting
American beliefs with the values of those who send other peoples
children on missions of suicide and murder. On cue, as Bush spoke the
words dignity of every life, the television cameras panned to the
U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops president, Bishop Wilton D. Gregory,
providing a visual aid for those who missed the antiabortion code words.
It wasnt supposed to be this way.
Back in February 2000, and the make-or-break South Carolina
primary, it was about explicit promises -- to support restrictions on abortion,
to promote school prayer and vouchers and, foremost, to not be John McCain,
whose jibes at Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell represented an intolerable
breach of Republican etiquette. According to this version of history, Bush owes
his presidency to the partys religious conservatives, who rescued him
from political oblivion in South Carolina after a near-disastrous defeat in New
Hampshire. And now its payback time.
Or is it?
Catholics and fundamentalists
The Bush White House has, no doubt, tended to religious
conservatives, which they define as church-going Catholics (who gave him nearly
60 percent of their vote against Al Gore) and fundamentalist and evangelical
Protestants. The president talks the talk -- speeches sprinkled with references
to the culture of life, the push for a Faith-Based
Initiative, and a domestic program developed under the rhetorical rubric
of compassionate conservatism all point to an administration that
wants to keep a core constituency satisfied. And the administration gained some
additional points in its proposed fiscal year 2003 budget by including a
tuition tax credit for parents of private and parochial school students (not
likely to pass) and through its announcement that unborn children are eligible
for the Childrens Health Insurance Program.
Beyond that, there have been plums, invitations, meetings and
appointments:
In March 2001, across from The Catholic University of America, the
president, surrounded by a flock of U.S. cardinals, spoke at the opening of the
John Paul II Cultural Center. Four months later he presented a Congressional
Gold Medal to the family of the late Cardinal John OConnor.
His political and policy operatives seek weekly advice, and give
it, to their allies on the Catholic and Christian right. Washington Archbishop
Theodore McCarrick dined at the White House residence, while Los Angeles
Archbishop Roger Mahony delivered the blessing at the administrations
only state dinner, honoring Mexican president Vicente Fox.
Appointments, both significant (longtime Catholic right activist
Robert Reilly to head the Voice of America) and ceremonial (Rockville Centre,
N.Y., Bishop William Murphy to the United States Commission on International
Religious Freedom) are delivered with sensitivity.
The American Conservative Unions state-based leaders are
treated to a personal presidential briefing, while the Unification
church-underwritten Faith-Based Summit hears from Attorney General
John Ashcroft and other administration luminaries. The Weyrich Strategy
Lunch -- named for Coalition for America chairman and religious right
founding father Paul Weyrich -- receives regular briefings by leading
administration officials.
Make no mistake about it, says Michael Schwartz, vice president
for government relations of Concerned Women for America, the social
conservatives have a seat at the table in this administration.
But while its clear that the economic conservatives (pro-tax
cut and anti-regulation) and the national security conservatives (pleased with
the war on terrorism) are sitting with the grown-ups in the West Wing,
its also apparent that the social conservatives have been relegated to
the kiddie table. They are, it seems, easily satisfied with soothing words and
scrumptious morsels, but not quite ready for polite company.
The president, for example, did not make an appearance before last
months Right to Life March in Washington, a gritty grassroots affair that
brought thousands of his most loyal supporters to the White House gates.
Instead, his comments were phoned in and blared over loudspeakers to the
thousands gathered to commemorate the 29th anniversary of Roe v.
Wade.
A teeny, tiny bit
insulting
Im sure that pro-lifers appreciate the gesture,
wrote National Reviews Jay Nordlinger. But isnt it
just a teeny, tiny, eeny, beeny bit insulting? The previous year was
worse. As thousands began to gather for the 28th anniversary march, First Lady
Laura Bush was telling NBCs Katie Couric that she supported Roe
v. Wade. The president was not seen, nor his voice heard. Instead,
he sent a written statement.
The problem, of course, is that the social conservatives are
viewed as intolerant -- and that is among the worst things to be in American
politics. Says Schwartz, an in-the-trenches veteran of the capitols
culture wars, The administration knows they cant kick their base
away, but they want to send a message to different voters [everyone but the
religious right] that We dont really belong to them.
That distance made it difficult for religious conservatives to get
much done in the first year of Bushs term.
On the education bill, for example, faith-based conservatives were
routed. They sent a signal very early on that vouchers would not make or
break the education bill, says former Clinton administration deputy
assistant for domestic policy William Galston.
On embryonic stem cell research, meanwhile, a Solomonesque Bush
rejected the advice of those, such as Pope John Paul II and the U.S. Catholic
bishops, who called for a total ban, and instead allowed federal funding for
research on existing stem cell lines. And while the administration supports
below-the-radar measures to restrict abortion, such as banning U.S. funding for
groups that support abortion in foreign countries, the once-ballyhooed ban on
partial-birth abortion (twice vetoed by President Clinton) has not come to a
vote since Bush assumed office. Supporters of such a ban say a June 2000
Supreme Court overturning of a Nebraska law restricting late-term abortions,
has stymied the effort.
What happened to the power of the Christian right? For starters,
says presidential counselor and political strategist Karl Rove, they are losing
their most important lever: the ability to bring Republican voters to the
polls. It is a self-induced electoral rapture that threatens Republican hopes
for the future.
Bad news for Bush
If you look at the model of the electorate, Rove told
pundits and policy wonks assembled at a December 2001 American Enterprise
Institute gathering, and you look at the model of who voted [in the 2000
presidential election], the big discrepancy is among self-identified, white,
evangelical Protestants, Pentecostals and fundamentalists.
There should
have been 19 million of them, and instead there were 15 million of them.
The fact that 4 million stayed home has Rove worried: I think we may be
seeing
some return to the sidelines of some of the previously
politically involved religious conservatives.
Thats bad news for George W. Bush and the party he leads,
particularly as they fight to keep control of the House and regain a majority
in the Senate. Between 70 and 80 percent of the 15 million voters in the 2000
presidential contest who fit the Rove demographic -- white, evangelical
Protestants, Pentecostals and fundamentalists -- voted for Bush over
Gore.
Meanwhile, the Washington-based religious conservative
infrastructure -- exemplified by the Christian Coalition -- is not what it once
was. The December departure of Pat Robertson from the group revealed a downward
spiral, in both fundraising and influence that will not be easily restored.
The presidents war-driven popularity -- he is viewed
favorably by 80 percent of the electorate and by even higher percentages among
religious conservatives -- makes it that much more difficult to mobilize the
socially conservative base on any given issue. With a war going on and
everyone wondering when the next terrorist attack is going to come, says
Ethics and Public Policy Center Vice President Michael Cromartie,
its really hard for those groups to activate their grassroots
supporters.
Social conservatives and their representatives in Washington,
moreover, are inclined to welcome any Republican, particularly
after eight years of Bill Clinton, says Schwartz. They see only black and
white and not shades of gray. And George W. Bush, war president and
born-again Christian, is one of the good guys, and hence, gets the benefit of
many doubts.
Joe Feuerherd is a journalist living in Maryland.
National Catholic Reporter, February 15,
2002
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