David Barton of Wallbuilders may be the pre-eminent historian on the role of religion in the founding and history of the United States of America. That makes him a natural for an interview with this blog. Lowell and I recently interviewed him and are happy to present the transcript of that interview here. There were some technical difficulties in the both the call conferencing and the recording that we will skip over that and get to the meat of matters.

John: … So, David, my next question would be, You worked for the RNC in ’04, is that correct?  

David Barton: That’s correct – in 2004 as well as in earlier cycles; and they have approached me to help in this cycle as well. So I guess that makes four cycles that I have worked with them.

John: Could you describe your activities.

David Barton: The activities I do for the RNC are not a lot different from what I do in any other setting. The audience is slightly different, but the message I deliver remains largely the same. What I did for the RNC was particularly talk to the constituency that included people of faith and social conservatives (there’s a lot of overlap between the two). I would essentially show the historical and Biblical reasons for people of faith to be involved politically. We also did a number of pastors’ conferences giving that same information but also distributing a four page letter from the IRS laying out exactly what churches can and cannot do as 501(c)(3) organizations. I try to clarify a lot of the confusion in this area, because there are several groups on the left that aggressively attempt to intimidate and silence pastors. However, unbeknownst to most of them, there is much that pastors legally can do and still be within the law, since those activities are related to civic engagement. They cannot endorse candidates; they cannot endorse parties; but they can endorse the concept of parishioners being active citizens.

Additionally, I try to give pastors updates on what is currently occurring within Congress. In a typical year, I may speak to as many as 10,000 pastors; in any group of 500 or so pastors, I can ask them to name the congressional issues they have heard discussed in the media over the preceding two-year session of Congress. If it’s a typical group, perhaps two dozen issues will be named; yet between ten and thirteen thousand issues are introduced in Congress every session. So, pastors may know the two dozen they’ve heard about in the media, but they don’t know about the scores of measures that relate strictly to traditional religious and moral issues – to Biblical issues. In fact, a package of eight such bills is going through Congress right now, called the American Values Agenda, yet I’ve talked to no pastor who has even heard of that package. Therefore, what I do is let folks know the issues that are out there that concern their faith; I let them know the legal parameters about what they can and can’t do from the pulpit.

That’s what I do for RNC with pastors. With general citizen rallies arranged by the RNC, I cover much of the same material but without the IRS aspect since that is not germane to the actions of individual citizens. These rallies are frequently packed out (as we recently saw in Iowa, Ohio, and other states) with grass roots conservative activists who want more historical information and also specific information about what they can do in a campaign. So, although I switch hats back and forth between political and non-profit groups, probably 90% of the message will stay the same.

John: Ok, they have you working with folks of faith, have you ever met with groups of Mormons? Mormon elders and so forth?

David Barton: On a number of occasions. In fact, I worked 41 months with U.S. Congressman Ernest Istook, who is a Mormon, and is now running for governor in Oklahoma. In September of ’94, when Republicans were still in the minority, Newt Gingrich stood outside Heritage Foundation and gave a speech promising that if Republicans became the majority in the House, the House would have a vote on a Constitutional amendment to protect school prayer and public religious expressions. When Republicans did indeed gain control of the House through the Republican Revolution of 1994, Gingrich followed through with his promise. He assigned Ernie to oversee the task – to draft a constitutional amendment that would roll back about 40 years of religion-hostile decisions by the Supreme Court. I spent 41 months working with Ernie on that project, and I don’t think I’ve seen anyone else more passionately committed to defending religious liberties than Ernie was.  Gail Ruzika with Eagle Forum of Utah is another example of a Mormon who has done a great job of moving pro-family legislation through a state legislature.

For me, on the political side, that is not a theological debate; it is a matter of values and issues. There are non-Christians (such as many conservative Jews) who share our common Judeo-Christian values with whom I would much rather work on political issues than with many Christians who do not embrace those values. If it were an issue of theology rather than values, I would have differences with a lot of folks not only without Christianity but also within it. But that is not what politics is about. Politics is about moving forward common values, not common theology. I remember that Daniel Lapin – a conservative orthodox Jewish Rabbi whom I hold in the highest regard and consider a friend – stated that when it came to theology, he and Christians had irreconcilable differences; yet, when it comes to policy, I think Rabbi Lapin is more useful and effective than hundreds of evangelicals I know. In fact, I have seen him on national television aggressively defending the contention that America is a Christian nation and that was why other religions had religious freedom, while the two Christian ministers on the same program were falling over themselves backpedaling from any such statement.

Additionally, I remember talking to high-ranking evangelical officials in the Reagan Administration. As President Reagan was trying to implement his pro-life and pro-family directives down through various cabinet level departments (HUD, HHS, etc.), these officials told me that the staffers most helpful in moving forward his pro-life and pro-family policies were Catholics and Mormons. The evangelicals tended to get weak-kneed, and squish out, not wanting any confrontation with pro-abortion workers in the bureaucratic agencies; but the best fighters for those values tended to be Mormons and Catholics. I’m a professed Protestant who takes my theological beliefs very seriously; but in the political arena, I work with any group or any other religion that shares and promotes our common Judeo-Christian values. Of course Mormons place themselves within the Christian religion, and many other Christians will vigorously dispute that placement; but such a dispute is theological rather than something germane to the creation of public policy.

John: That’s something we’ve had to spend some time on, on the blog. Trying to work out the nomenclature there. Now, so, you described yourself as a Protestant, and would you describe yourself as an evangelical, or a fundamentalist, or where would you put yourself?

David Barton: I’m not sure exactly what those titles mean; and I’ve had a lot fun with the media who try to label me with those titles. I do interviews with the New York Times, Newsweek, U.S. News and World Report, etc., and they try to put me in some of those categories; but I try my best to defy labels. When they use terms like “evangelical,” “fundamentalist,” or whatever, in their articles, they often associate those terms with what they often describe as fringe movements in American politics – groups like the radical religious right. I recall that on the day following the 2004 election day, some of them asked me about the Religious Right values voters “taking over” the Republican Party and trying to dictate policy to President Bush (such as the Federal Marriage Amendment, etc.). I acknowledged to them that I understand that they were trying to use me as a spokesman for the so-called “fringe right” values voters; I then pointed out a few statistics to them (noting, for example, that according to the most recent polling, 72% of the nation thought marriage should be only between a man and a woman; 76% of the nation that wants displays of the Ten Commandments posted; 68% wanted creationism taught in the public school classroom; 82% wanted daily voluntary spoken prayer at public schools; 90% wanted to keep “under God” in the Pledge; etc. After reciting these numbers, I posed a question to them, and asked “I’m from that part of the nation that supports these issues by such large margins, and if I’m also part of the fringe right, then what does it take to be mainstream? – what is mainstream if 90% and 72% and 68%, etc isn’t?” That is, how can 90%, 72%, 82% be called “fringe”? So, within religious categories, I really don’t fit concisely into any camp. In fact, I speak to hundreds of groups each year, scores of which are religious. Invariably, whenever I’m done speaking to that group, that particular group is always convinced that I am one of them. Catholics always think I’m a Catholic: Lutherans think I’m a Lutheran: Baptists think I’m a Baptist; Presbyterians think I’m a Presbyterian; etc. This is because I speak about traditional religious and moral values – values that are embraces by everyone (and by all) of those groups. That’s where I spend my time: on the values, not on the unique theology or eschatology of that particular group. The media consistently labels me Religious Right or evangelical; I don’t know if I fit those categories, because they have never adequately defined those terms to me (except that I know they regularly use it as a pejorative).

John: You know, you’ve blown through about three of my questions, which is just great. Do you mind if I ask what your particular – what church you worship in?

David Barton: It’s difficult to identify a specific church in which I regularly worship, because nearly every Sunday I am speaking in somebody else’s church. I average speaking about 400 times each year.

John: Oh my goodness….

David Barton: I have kept this schedule for 18 years now. However, my dad is the pastor of an independent country Bible church in the very small county town of Aledo, Texas. When I am home, that is my home church. I was involved in that church for years as an associate pastor, director of Christian education, youth director, etc., before I began doing what I do now. So, I’m in an independent Bible church now, but I have a very eclectic background. While growing up, we attended a Presbyterian church, an Assembly of God church, a Baptist church, a Methodist church - each for a period of years. That experience has helped familiarize me with many of the specific theological distinctions that exist between different religious groups. In fact, over the past 18 years, I have spoken in denominations that I never even knew existed. However, a country New Testament Bible church is where I’ve been for the past two decades.

John: Sure. Ok. Just out of curiosity, when I was researching for this interview, you seem to be a bit more of a lightning rod than other people in parallel positions. For example, Chuck Colson comes to mind.

David Barton: Yes.

John: Why do you think that is?

David Barton: I think its perception of me fomented by particular folks on the left. There are multiple examples to which I could point to illustrate their feelings about me. I recall receiving a call from a reporter at U.S. News and World Report who asked me to respond to what he was calling the video wars. I asked “video wars?” He answered, “Yes. The video wars between you and the ACLU.” I said I didn’t have a clue what he was talking about. We had been producing videos for years, presenting original historical documents and writings from the Framers of our governing documents, showing their position on the constitutionality of many religious and moral issues (in our library, we have over 70,000 originals, and copies of original documents that predate 1812, including thousands of works of those who signed the Declaration or the Constitution, or who framed the Bill of Rights). Those videos and books sold very well nationally, and were being taken by individuals across the nation and given to school and political officials, and placed into school and public libraries. Not surprisingly, the ACLU had not agreed with either the message or the impact of those videos, so they had produced their own video to counteract the messages in ours. Understand that our documentation shows that the Framers were not a collective group of atheists, agnostics, or deists, and that although they wanted a separation between the institutions of Church and State, they never approved of a secularization of the public arena. These messages were a real threat for secular minded and post-modern groups such as the ACLU, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, People for the American Way, etc. So apparently the ACLU had decided to go on the offensive against our materials.

The reporter told me that the ACLU had just finished spending a million dollars to discredit me and our videos. When I told him that I had not seen – or even heard of – the ACLU’s video, he told me that he had seen both theirs and ours, and he asked me if he could give me his opinion. I said, go for it. He said that in our videos I kept holding up original documents and saying here’s the bill passed by Congress in 1789 (or whatever): he then noted that in the ACLU video, all they did was appeal to popular prejudice and gave no original documentation. They had a Baptist minister who kept saying, “Now we all know the Founding Fathers wanted separation of church and state, and that we shouldn’t be involved . . .etc.” He told me that in his opinion, we used documentation, but they used only rhetoric. In short, by bringing out what the Founding Fathers actually said, it had become very much like George Washington versus the ACLU; or Thomas Jefferson versus Americans United; rather than just opinions between professors and lawyers. That certainly was not a position into which they wanted to be placed.

That’s one reason I’m a threat for their movement: the very message we convey from the original documents undermines their singular reason for existence. Similarly, last February as Time Magazine was preparing their list of the top 25 most influential evangelicals in America, they included me in the list. Time admitted to us that they had never heard of me and didn’t know anything about me. (I’m not out there visible in the media in the way that so many of the other folks are; I don’t seek the media, and I often try to stay out of it.) Time told us that the reason they chose me was the groups on the Left kept saying that I was one of the most influential – at least, the left considered me a problem and kept running up against others who were repeating what they had learned from the original documents in our books and videos. In fact, there is a leftist group called the Freedom Network that conducted seminars on how to counter the Religious Right; they held entire workshops just on how to counter me. Such groups have been diligent and consistent in launching negative articles and media assassinations against me over a period of years, claiming that I make up my historical quotes, etc. But again, the fact that I use actual, genuine, original documents is what so impressed the reporter from the U.S. News and World Report. Therefore, I am enough of a threat that they actually spend money against me, produce products to combat our products, hold training seminars on how to neutralize our message and materials, and then concoct stories and rumors attempting to impugn our credibility. That’s typical; it doesn’t bother me, it’s just a result of what I do.

John: Sure. Could you maybe talk a little about, just for the benefit of our readers, and maybe explain why I even ask this question about the difference between separation and establishment.

David Barton: Today, we say “separation of church and state”; however, based on the original intent of that phrase, it would be more accurate were we to say “separation of state and church.” Their reason for such a separation was enumerated by Thomas Jefferson, not only in his famous letter of January 1, 1802, but also in his second inaugural address, in the Kentucky-Virginia resolutions, in his letter to Justice Samuel Miller, and several other writings. Jefferson attached his separation metaphor to what we call the “Free Exercise” clause. (The First Amendment’s religion clauses state: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Today, the first part is called “The Establishment Clause,” prohibiting Congress from establishing a national religion; the second part is called “The Free Exercise Clause” and is to keep the federal government from interfering with religious expressions.) That is, Jefferson assured the Danbury Baptists that because of the separation of church and state, they needed not fear that the government would interfere with, hinder, or impede religious expressions or activities. Therefore, the purpose of separation was to keep the state from meddling with religious expressions. (Recall that when the various groups came to colonial America, whether the groups were Puritans, Huguenots, Moravians, or whoever else, they were largely fleeing a situation where the state was running the church and was punishing other individuals for their religious expressions. Therefore, when given the opportunity, Americans enacted a prohibition against the federal government establishing a national church or hindering religious expressions. That was their concept of separation.

It stayed that way until 1947 when in Everson v. Board of Education, Justice Hugo Black, writing for the majority, decided that the separation metaphor should actually be tied to the Establishment Clause rather than the Free Exercise Clause. That change therefore required the government to stop, rather than to protect, public religious activities; that is, if they were to allow the Free Exercise of religion in public arenas, then it would appear that the government was establishing a religion. Yet, the original definition of an establishment of religion was given by literally dozens of early Framers and legal writers; and according to their definition, an establishment of religion meant the establishment of a national ecclesiastical hierarchy – what James Madison had termed the establishment of a national church, or a national religion. They explained that they wanted to avoid what they personally had experienced in Great Britain, where the government could, by law, require them all to be Catholics, or Anglicans, or whatever. For this reason, the First Amendment said that “Congress shall make no law” now means that “a student shall say no prayer”; somehow, “Congress” now means “a student,” and “making a law” now means “saying a graduation prayer” (or whatever). Very simply, separation was put in place to make sure that we would have free exercise of religion – that the government could not establish a national church. Now, however, the Court regularly holds that for someone to practice their free exercise of religion is an unconstitutional establishment of religion, thereby causing the First Amendment to violate itself!

Lowell: I want to . . . .

John: No, go, Lowell.

Lowell: I don’t want to interrupt you. I wanted to interject a question along those lines. I have read the letter from Jefferson to the Danbury Baptists many times and, to be honest, I didn’t – I’m a lawyer, went to law school, and the subject got a passing mention in my First Amendment class, when I was a third year law student. My professor at the time was a religious person. So, I haven’t heard anybody talk about it much at all, until the last few years. And you are one of the people addressing it. I’m just kind of struck by how that letter, when you read it in context, is so clearly about government interfering with religious belief.  So how did we get to the point where that terminology, separation, the wall of separation of church and state, has become so iconic –

John: –yeah.

Lowell: –in Constitutional analysis. How did we get there? And why is it that nobody knows about that letter?

David Barton: One of the ironies about Jefferson’s separation letter is that in the first one hundred and fifty years after it was written, it was invoked by the courts in less than a dozen cases; yet, since the Court reversed its purpose in 1947, it has been invoked by the courts in over three thousand cases. Jefferson’s metaphor has now become the replacement wording of the First Amendment, overriding even the actual constitutional language. As you mention, the context of the letter is very significant. The letter was actually first used by the Supreme Court in the Mormon cases, starting in 1878, with Reynolds v. U.S. to re-emphasize that under separation of church and state, the government was not to interfere with free exercise of religion. However, Jefferson in his separation letter had set forth two reasons that the government could interfere with free exercise of religion: if the religious practice undermined the safety of a secure society, or if it directly injured another person. The issue in the 1878 case had been Mormon polygamy, and the Mormon’s had invoked Jefferson’s letter to prove that their religious practice should not be interfered with and therefore to sustain their practice. The Court acknowledged the accuracy of the Mormon’s interpretation of Jefferson’s letter and then acknowledged that there were two reasons that government could interfere with a religious expression. The Court asserted that by weakening the traditional marriage bond of one man and one woman, the Mormon practice was actually directly undermining the security of society since civil society was based upon strong families. Jefferson’s letter was therefore affirmed to be written as a protection for public religious expressions, but the Mormons had come under one of the very narrow exceptions in that letter.

Significantly (as another indication of Jefferson’s intent in that letter), he wrote his separation metaphor in his letter on Friday, January 1, 1802; two days later, on Sunday, January 3, 1802, Jefferson attended church in the U. S. Capitol to hear his friend, the Rev. John Leland, preach a sermon in the Hall of the House of Representatives.  The practice of having church at the Capitol was a practice that had been approved (see the Records of Congress for December 4, 1800) when Jefferson was the President of the Senate – the Vice President of the United States. Jefferson not only attended church services in the Capitol as Vice President, but he attended for eight years as President. In fact, he ordered the Marine Corps band to play the worship services at the Capitol for Sunday Divine services.  Therefore, two days after he wrote the separation letter, he was going to church in the federal Capitol; that fact was no contradiction since the separation letter was to protect the free exercise of religion (such as church in the Capitol) rather than stop it. Furthermore, on the recommendation of Levi Lincoln, Attorney General of the United States (Jefferson’s close friend), Jefferson had scratched out several lines he had written in his original letter, substituting Lincoln’s recommendation – including the separation metaphor. In 2002, on the 200^th anniversary of the writing of Jefferson’s letter, Jim Hutson (head of the manuscript division at the Library of Congress) had the FBI do forensic testing on Jefferson’s letter to recover the content of the lines that Jefferson had blotted out with his pen. Recovering Jefferson’s original language even further reaffirms the purpose presented above – that he was not advocating secularization of the public square but rather that the government would not halt religious practices. (Jefferson’s original handwritten letter, and the portion recovered by the FBI, is posted on the Library of Congress website.)

John: Yeah, I think Lowell and I would love to talk to you about that for hours, but that’s not the – unfortunately, that’s not what the blog is about. David, you mentioned the Mormons calling up the Danbury letter, as a part of some of their constitutional cases. In general, do you – what do you see as the role of the Mormons in American history in terms of, you know, religious issues, and do you think it has been primarily a positive? or a negative? or, you know, do you have any general comments on that?

David Barton: I really don’t know, and haven’t studied much, about Mormon history in America, but I do know that in the modern era, the participation of Mormons in the political arena has definitely been positive. Historically speaking, there are mixed reports about Mormons and Mormon activities in the early eras (the mid-1800s) – many reports that would constitute “black eyes” and blemishes, particularly with their internal enforcement policies in Utah and the federal territories; yet, there are some mixed reports on the Puritans and other religious groups as well. In the modern era, however, for Mormons there’re more positives than there are negatives in many areas – especially politically; and fighting for traditional pro-life and pro-family values in the public arena is right at the top of that list. I do find it interesting (speaking as a non-Mormon) that a significant element of Mormon religious doctrine involves preserving the Constitution of the United States in its original intent. I recall that when I was speaking on constitutional issues in Utah, in order for Mormons in the audience to have comfort in attending the meeting, Mormon leaders had to examine my writings and affirm that I was speaking the truth about the Constitution. I have also been told by Mormons that when a constitutional amendment is proposed, approval from Mormon leadership is necessary before Mormons will support that amendment since there is a belief that the Constitution was divinely inspired and any proposed alterations therefore have to be vigorously investigated. This belief makes Mormons great advocates for defending the Constitution and opposing judicial activism. So even though many may disagree theologically with Mormon doctrines, the current societal outcome from some of those doctrines has been positive for society – at least for anyone who has a conservative political or traditional religious and moral values viewpoint.

John: What do you see as the five most important issues for the current election cycle? And take a shot at ’08 too.

David Barton: For the current election cycle, the most important issue would be the judiciary; Issue No. 2 would be the judiciary. Issue No. 3 would be the judiciary; etc. We are within one vote of having five solid strict constructionist justices on the U.S. Supreme Court. Close friends in Washington have been told face to face by one of the Justices about a forthcoming retirement from the Court. In my view, the federal judiciary – and specifically a fifth strict constructionist on the Court – is what every Senate race is about in this cycle. A fifth Justice will offer the opportunity to roll back 40 years of judicial activism. A fifth Justice will not end abortion, but can return the decisions to the states; he would not reinstate school prayer, but could let the states make the decision; and the same on so many other issues that have become central in the culture war. Those are all issues that we have seen 5 – 4 losses in recent years, but which could go the other way with a new Justice. Therefore, the Senate race in Washington state, in Missouri, in Minnesota, in Michigan, and in every other state is about the opportunity to place another Alito or Roberts on the Court rather than another Souder or Ginsberg or Brier.

John: Now, is that proposed resignation going to happen before the next court term?

David Barton: Well –

John: Is there commitment there?

David Barton: The specific Justice who has spoken to our friends has said that he was appointed by a Republican and he is going to allow a Republican to appoint his replacement. So that has to happen in the next two years in my thinking. Many of the guys I know in DC are waiting on pins and needles right now, hoping that an announcement might occur shortly. If it were to occur before the election, it would significantly change the political complexion of most Senate races. If it happens after the 2006 election, it will certainly change the complexion of the Presidential election in 2008. Even if this inside information is wrong, you do have the issue of advanced age for one current Justice and deteriorating health for another, so there are two or three that are potential retirees. Therefore, I believe that the most important issue in any Senate or Presidential race is what the candidate will do concerning judicial nominees.

John: How do you handle primaries? You’ve worked for the RNC. Do you back a specific candidate in a primary?

David Barton: I will back a candidate in a primary if there is one candidate that stands well above the others on moral, family, and religious values. However, if there are two candidates in the race that have the same values, I tend to stay out of that race; I think the people in a state or region need to make their own decision between the two and don’t need any input from me. But again, if there is a difference between the value systems of the two, I am definitely willing to lend any influence I might have to help advance those values in policy. There is another occasion in which I might endorse a candidate in a primary. Because of the time I spend in DC, and because I have been closely involved in much important legislation over the years, I have seen a number of Members of Congress close up – I have seen them under fire and on the front of the battle lines in the culture war. Therefore, if one of those warriors runs for Senate, I will often back that individual, even if someone of similar values is in the race. I believe that the fact that someone has experience – that someone has been in the trenches and then taken the leadership in a fight for traditional values (especially when they didn’t have to), is an important factor when compared to someone who might hold the same values but has not been proved in the trenches. These are two factors that I will use in making endorsements in primaries. And I am involved in Senate races right now in which I am endorsing candidates and helping in those races.

John: Any thought on the current buzz people for ’08?

David Barton: I think this is the earliest I have ever seen the cycle get going on presidential stuff.

John: Tell us about it!

David Barton: It’s crazy. I guess the media needs something else to talk about; however, many states are also responsible for promoting this early hype. Several states have passed legislation moving their primaries earlier in the process because this allows them not only to have greater political impact, but it also produces a direct positive economic impact on the state. For example, one of the greatest economic boons for Iowa and New Hampshire is from all of the national media, observers, candidates, and pundits who come in to cover the presidential primaries. Consequently, other states (e.g. Louisiana, South Carolina, etc.) want the national coverage for their state as well as desire the economic boon that comes from having thousands of media and outsiders coming in, getting hotels, eating at their restaurants, etc. But when you move your primary dates earlier, it means that the polling has to be done earlier, and therefore, there is more political news earlier in the process. Yet, I think that someone can enter the race after the November 2006 election and still be a viable presidential candidate. For example, if George Allen wins his Senate race by double digits in Virginia, he could enter and be a very viable, very strong candidate for 2008, even though we don’t hear much about him right now. I think there are a lot of things still to happen before we see a firm field. Many names are being tossed around; and some have created exploratory committees. For some candidates, most everything is already known about them (that is, they have voting records, have been Governors or Senators, have run before, etc.). For others, there is still some discovery to come. For example, while Giuliani is well known for his handling of the NYC crisis, many voters still know little about his social positions on issues such as abortion, homosexual marriage, etc. But with McCain, there is very little still to be discovered; folks tend to love him or hate him (and for many Republicans, it tends to be the latter rather that the former because of his unpopular positions on immigration, federal marriage protection, campaign finance reform, his support of filibusters, joining the Gang of 14, killing the bill to get the IRS out of church pulpits, etc.). That being said, I really don’t think that things – or potential candidates – will change much over the next two and a half years.

John: You don’t think fundraising makes a difference?

David Barton: I think fundraising can make a difference, and a lot of that difference is in perception. That is, if someone wins an early primary, watch what happens to their fundraising: it will soar. They may have been last in the national polling, but if they win one of the major media covered primaries (e.g., New Hampshire, Iowa, Louisiana, etc.) their fundraising increases dramatically. Many donors want to feel that they are giving to a winner; they don’t want to waste their money on a sinking ship; so perceptions have an early effect on fundraising, but actual performance has an effect on later fundraising. For example, Brownback has yet to raise much money, but if he were to do well in New Hampshire, his ability to raise money would escalate dramatically. Similarly, Huckabee has not raised much money, but that would change in the same way. Candidates who are not high in the polls will often take a large percentage of their resources and place them into a single early primary state because of the potential fundraising and polling effect of winning or placing well in a nationally covered primary. Frist, on the other hand, raises money well, but he is still focused on just a few early states – for a different reason from Huckabee or Brownback. Frist has the money but he is not running high in the early straw polls, therefore he needs to show an early victory. In reality, there can be a lot of dichotomy in primaries between the money raised and spent and the actual voter results. Although it is not always the case, it is certainly not uncommon that the best money-raisers are not the top vote-getters.

John: The one name you haven’t mentioned is Romney, who is obviously the candidate we are most interested in. Just so you know where we’re coming from, I remain entirely uncommitted in terms of supporting a candidate. Lowell, you can describe your own position.

Lowell: I’m leaning heavily toward supporting Romney, but still holding back.

David Barton: I think that Romney has some political liabilities that make it difficult for him. The fact that he’s the Governor of Massachusetts may make it really hard to win a race in Louisiana, Florida, etc., because when a Republican hears “Massachusetts,” he pictures Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, and Barney Frank, rather than a conservative pro-family individual. Massachusetts often seems to be the state that Republicans love to hate and I think that Romney’s greatest political liability is simply the state from which he hails. I think that if he were from New York or Delaware, or somewhere else, he would have a much better chance. We’ll see. Romney is definitely out there, but I think he has an uphill battle simply because of the negative perception that so many grass roots Republican voters associate politically with Massachusetts.

John: You’ve sort of come up with my next question – somebody who gets around in the circles you get around in and talks to the people you talk to, are you hearing positives or negatives, particularly in terms of his Mormon faith, out there?

David Barton: I have heard little-to-nothing about the Mormon faith aspect of Romney. It’s the same with Ernie in Oklahoma. I hear slight buzz that it might be an issue, but I have seen or heard nothing substantive that tells me that it actually is. I hear buzz that Oklahoma is not going to support a Mormon for Governor, but Ernie just won his primary hands down, going away. I hear people worrying around the fringes that it might be an issue, but I’ve not found those hypothetical worries to be substantiated by reality.

John: Now, some guys, like we, Lowell and I got started with this because of Robert Novak’s piece in the Washington Post, April 27th in which Novak said he was hearing from “leading evangelicals” that evangelicals would never vote for Romney.

David Barton: I’ve never heard that, and I run with the evangelicals and speak to their groups on a regular basis; I’ve never had any of them tell me that. If they do say it, it must be privately, but I still don’t think it’s an issue. I think the issue right now is that Romney is more of a tier 2 candidate than a tier 1 candidate. I think there are three or four tier 1 candidates, and they have a better place from which to begin working. And although Giuliani is one of them, I don’t think he will get far in the primaries - despite the fact that he’s a tier 1 candidate and has lots of national publicity. Romney hasn’t had that national exposure. He was in a Senate race with Ted Kennedy some years back and was doing very well until he made a couple of major stumbles, but that’s been the extent of his national exposure.

John: He’s getting a lot now with the big dig problems.

David Barton:Yet even with some of that national exposure, it’s not permeating the press coverage in places like Wichita, Kansas or Phoenix, Arizona or Reno, Nevada or Tulsa, Oklahoma or Waco, Texas, etc. He’s getting some coverage on the outlets on the coasts, but not in the heartland. Until a candidate gets coverage in the heartland as well as on the coasts, I think he remains a tier 2 candidate. I think Huckabee’s got that problem; I think that there’re eight or ten Republicans who have that problem. I think Gingrich has that problem as well - he’s not being covered seriously in the heartland. He’s being covered seriously in the LA Times, the New York Times, the Washington Post, etc., but not in the heartland. That’s where I see Romney at this point: he’s getting very little ink anywhere except along the coastal outlets, and that’s not where most of the Republican primary voters are located.

Lowell: Follow up question, John, if I might interject, that I think ties in with that one. I’ve kind of been thinking for some time, and I’d like to know your reaction to this, if perhaps there has been some sort of fighting inside the tent, so to speak, about denominational issues and regarding, for example, Romney’s particular religious faith and its beliefs. When you look down the road at 2008, whoever gets nominated, whether it’s a Brownback or Allen, or someone like that, if it’s a person of deep religious faith, like Romney, who believes the U.S. Constitution is divinely inspired and has strong, strong views on issues like same sex marriage and is pro-life, and so forth, I wonder if you’d mention the institutional bias by the news media and the organized left, the ACLU and others?  I think that the opposition to such a candidate will be quite furious and there will be a great effort to try to marginalize that person, as you mentioned at the outset of this interview. Do you share my concern?

David Barton: John, I heard most of what Lowell said, but there was some dropout; could you repeat what Lowell asked me?

Lowell: Should I try again?

David Barton: Yeah, I can hear you great now.

Lowell:  My question had to do with what I think might be a bit of a focus on something of a sideshow right now, which is denominational issues. Beliefs between different religions. The differences between different religious about doctrinal matters, when, in fact, if you look down the road, if the nominee of the Republican party is someone like Sam Brownback or George Allen or Romney, all of whom have strong views on fundamental values issues, such as abortion, same sex marriage, judicial legislation, and so forth, I wonder if the opposition from the left, the institutional left, the ACLU, most of the main stream news media, won’t be quite furious against that person and won’t there be an effort to marginalize that nominee? In other words, don’t Republican’s have a lot more to fear from people outside their own tent, the left,, than they do from internal squabbles over, perhaps, religious doctrine?

David Barton: Well, yes and no. That is, there is a theoretical answer and there is a practical answer. On the theoretical side, it’s friendly fire that you worry about more than anything else. Remember, Moses only had to fight the Egyptians once, but he fought his own people for 40 years; Republicans can too often be that way. However, on the issue of religion, if the Democrats or the left choose to go after any candidate because of religious beliefs, they have just shot themselves in the foot (again) - they have just validated Ann Coulter’s assertion they are Godless – they have just repeated the mistake they have made in the previous cycles. On the other hand, Democrat leaders this cycle are making noise about how they are reaching out to appeal to religious folks to get them to vote Democrat, and then they attack someone because of their faith? That might look like it was an Article VI problem - they claim they want no religious test but then they impose one??? I think they would seriously damage themselves if they did that. The only way they might do that is through whisper campaigns rather than coming straight out and making it an issue. I don’t think they’re stupid enough and make that an issue straight on; and I don’t think they’re stupid enough, after the last two elections, to have any publicly known Democratic spokesman speak that way. Instead, what they can do is get 527s to start shooting some emails around and start some buzz going; however, even that has not been very effective of late.

On the Republican side, I think that up to about six years ago, doctrinal issues were big in the Republican primaries, but in the last three cycles I’ve not seen that to be an issue. The greater issue has become where someone stands on the values; and if he stands on the right values, Republicans can overlook much else. Perhaps Clinton had a lot to do with this change in the sense that he had every appearance of being an evangelical Baptist; in fact, I’ve personally seen him preach on Bible verses much better than a lot of Baptist preachers I’ve heard; yet his policy positions were dead wrong on so many issues that the rest of the Baptists held dear (e.g., homosexuals in the military, abortion, homosexuality, etc.). I think that Clinton cured a lot of voters from having theological disputes because he was right in his theology but wrong in his policies and behaviors. So, since the time of Clinton, I have not seen religious theology be an issue in many Republican primaries; in the few instances where it has been raised, it has not been a substantive issue; and I see it even less today than I did six years ago.

John: David, do you pay much attention to the blogosphere?

David Barton: I do, and I don’t. It depends on the blogs. I monitor some. What I try to watch is how much of an issue on the blogs actually gets into the thinking of folks in the mainstream. Sometimes it happens, but at other times, the issue never gets beyond a particular blogisphere. So, I try to watch for what pops up and moves into more substantive areas - that’s when I really pay attention to a blog.

John: The reason I ask the question is, you know, you don’t think that the left is stupid enough to do the kinds of things that Lowell was proposing, and boy, if you read the leading leftie bloggers, they are precisely that stupid.

David Barton: I agree. The bloggers will do it. But I don’t think you will ever get a national Democratic spokesperson repeating it or speaking about it on an eight second sound byte on national media. You’ll not hear that from a nationally known Democrat spokesperson interviewed on CNN, Fox, ABC, etc. You might see it on some blogs and in some email circuits, but that’s as far as it will go. Certainly, neither Howard Dean, nor Dick Durbin, nor Frank Lautenberg will do it, even though they have previously been leaders in such attacks.

John: Well, Dean’s come close on – and I would think Pelosi and Boxer would step into that in a second.

David Barton: I don’t think they can. In fact, Pelosi has challengers breathing down her neck right now. And at the DNC, you have Bayh from Indiana trying to take Democrats in a more pro-life, traditional family direction.

John: I know him.

David Barton: If Democrat leaders were to engage in overt religious baiting, many other Democrat leaders would be screaming to high heaven - if not because of pro-religious convictions, certainly because of the bad politics involved in attacking religion. Democrats are having some real internal struggles right now, and Pelosi’s position is not that strong or safe within her own party. If she were to do something that were to give, for example, voters more ammunition to say, “Look at these religious bigots in the Democrat Party; we’ve got to go defend faith again and elect Republicans,” I think she would not be leader the next session, and I think she knows that. Pelosi has made her mistakes, but I don’t think she’ll make this mistake.

John: Ok. David you’ve been a – I’m done. Lowell, do you have anything else?

Lowell: I’ve got one last question, just to get your reaction. I understand that recently, I don’t have too many details about this, and maybe you’ve heard about it, the IRS sent letters to about 15,000 tax exempt organizations, which include charities and churches, and others, telling them to pay close attention to the prohibition against advocacy. I just wondered if you had a comment about that or know about it.

David Barton: There has been a real battle back and forth with the IRS on this issue. For example, January a year ago the IRS came out with a new “interpretation” of their old regulations regarding churches and 501(c)3s. That new interpretation sent many Members of Congress through the roof, and congressional leadership contacted them and requested a clarification. The resulting interpretation basically repudiated the previous one. There is often political pressures and political stuff going on within the IRS that contradicts their own stated and written policies. Recall that the IRS recently reported that they had investigated 1100 complaints against churches, and a spokesman claimed that nearly ten percent were in “violation.” Yet, on closer inspection, they had found only one church that had committed violations that resulted in the revoking of their tax-exempt status. It turns out that of the so-called ten percent in “violation,” they weren’t really violations of the law; rather, they were violations of what the IRS spokesman thought was proper; they had not crossed the statutory line, but he felt they had gotten too close, therefore they were in “violation.” Their language is meant to be intimidating – to issue a warning to churches. In actuality, there is really a kind of power struggler going on between the IRS and members of Congress: the IRS is using rhetoric that is chilling in its effect, but the actual statutory language is not chilling in its effect, and Congress wants the statutes followed rather than the rhetoric. Some folks within the IRS have embraced the Americans United for Separation of Church and State line rather than the statutory line. Barry Lynn of AU uses the IRS platform for a press release – a reason to announce that he has requested another investigation, or filed another complaint against a church or pro-family organization. Nearly 100 percent of the time, nothing comes from his complaint or request, but it does allow him to broadcast his press release so that he can attempt to intimidate and frighten others. Specifically, I had not heard about the letter to the 15,000, but it would be interesting to see the tone in that letter.

Nevertheless, I still have on our website the IRS’s four page, actual, legal, statutory position, on what churches can and cannot do, and this is the guiding, controlling influence in this issue. The difficulty, however, is that political forces attempt to use the IRS as an inquisition service against religious organizations. In reality, it can cost you tens of thousands of dollars to supply what the IRS demands in an audit, and it can cost even more to defend yourself in an investigation. In such cases, money is diverted away from activities on which they would otherwise be used, thus weakening and hindering the church or ministry. Furthermore, interpretation of the IRS regulations is very subjective; that is rarely can you get two IRS agents to agree on the same interpretation. The statutes are fairly clear, but the regulations interpreting them are muddled and confused, written and rewritten on a regular basis by administrative bureaucrats; and the administrative interpretations are used as if they are the actual force of statutory law. (Significantly, the IRS code is over seven times longer that the Bible. God has ruled the entire world with His Book for seven thousand years, and the IRS needs a code book seven times that long just to handle one segment of the American tax system!) Congress has stepped in on several occasions when they sense any type of IRS intimidation occurring. Therefore, I would expect that if the 15,000 letters that have been sent out had any type of chilling effect, you will see Congress step in (again) and demand a clarification letter be sent out. In a previous situation, an IRS chill letter was sent to major pro-family leaders (Jim Dobson, D. James Kennedy, et. al), suggesting that it was a violation of the IRS code even to speak about an issue that “might” have political ramifications. Of course, that could mean any issue, but it specifically meant keep your mouth shut about abortion, marriage, stem cell, etc. Yet from the statutory side, it is completely legal to talk about such issues; and non-profit groups can even legally spend money to lobby Congress on those issues – just so long as they do not explicitly endorse a specific candidate or party as part of that activity. In this instance, leaders of Congress stepped in and got the IRS to issue a “clarification” declaring that such activities were indeed legal. So, Lowell, what you told me about this is the first I’ve heard, but it will be interesting to see how it works out politically.

John: We’ve got – I’ll send you the link to that article.

David Barton: I would love to see it because I had not heard about that.

John: We – when did we put that up, Friday, Lowell?

Lowell: Yeah, it just came out.

David Barton: If it is anything more than the repetition of the statutory four-pager, I think that we will see some intervention from Congress. That’s just my guess, but I’ll have to see it to know for sure.

John: Ok, well, David, you’ve been a marvelously easy interview, and I really appreciate it….

At this point the conversation develved into technical editorial details, and small talk, so we will leave it there.

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