Article VI Blog

Here's an op-ed piece that covers a lot of old ground, but does it well. A sampling:

It's hard to believe that anyone seriously thinks Romney would be a puppet of the prophet in Salt Lake City any more than Kennedy was a mouthpiece for the pope in Rome.

Nothing in his political career supports that fear. And the 15 Mormon members of Congress hardly march in lockstep with the church. If Mormon leaders are telling Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch and Democratic Sen. Harry Reid how to vote, they must be sending mixed signals.

People have plenty to debate in Romney's positions on public policy without getting distracted by the nonissue of where he goes to church. Unfortunately, prejudice against Mormons leaves Romney little choice. Echoing JFK, Romney must now persuade voters that his values are shaped by faith, but his policies aren't dictated by church.

Some Baptists in South Carolina don't find The Question troubling at all, it seems. John comments: This piece is great for a couple of reasons. The first is the "homey" voice of the piece. That gives me hope because it seems much more what the voters are thinking as opposed to the leadership and activists. As we know, South Carolina is expected to be Romney's weak spot in the early primaries, and many are trying to attribute that to The Question. Being from the South myself, I wonder if it has more to do with Massachusuetts than Mormonism. I wonder if there is a polling tool to make that distinction?

Interfaith respect in Salt Lake City: Mormons and Evangelicals in conversation. John adds: What is most amazing to me about the prejudice between the faiths is how much history, politics, and religion really do conflate, at least in people's minds. Why is there the kind of hostility that was illustrated in the Florida incident over faithfully held ideas? Well, ignorance is certainly one answer, but there is I think more at play. See my comments on the next item.

Rich Lowry thinks Romney's religion could be a problem if he "seems slippery about it." But Rich then proceeds to quote two e-mails he received that don't seem to reflect any slipperiness. Go figure. More from John: As we learned yesterday discussing the Reed Smoot hearings there was a period in history when Mormons did in fact behave a bit "slippery." Sadly, the existence of groups claiming the "Mormon" name and sharing some heritage continues to create an appearance of "slipperiness." I doubt very seriously any person not as deeply involved in being a Presbyterian as I am could readily tell you the difference between the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) and the Prebyterian Church in the United States of America (PC[USA]) - and yet they are pretty different institutions. So I think is is with the CJCLDS (reasonable, virtuous, majority of Mormons) and the FLDS (murderous, polygamous, tax evading, welfare cheating "Mormons") This difficult for the non-student of religion to hold distinction can create the illusion of "slipperiness" where none exists.

I do think this "slipperiness" idea is why the "flip-flopper" attack is having some traction that it has not had with other figures like say, Ronald Reagan, whose ideas on abortion did evolve through his political career. What it says, sadly, is that Romney will to some extent have to be a "super-candidate." His character, his demeanor, will simply have to outshine the possible prejudices. Like the first blacks to break the color line, it will not be good enough to be good, Romney will have to be the best. He looks to this observer to be up to the task, but it's a long, micro-examined path to hold the to that kind of super-human discipline.

Back to Lowell: I've been mulling over John's "slipperiness" comment, and it occurs to me how valuable it is to have both an Evangelical and Mormon perspective here. By the time the Smoot controversy came along, Mormons had been brutalized for decades over what to them were matters of religious conscience. Their women had been raped, their men and children murdered and chased out of sovereign states– with the blessing of the state governments. The U.S. government actually put the LDS Church into receivership. At one time over 1,000 Mormon men were in federal prison because of polygamy. The Mormons then justifiably saw the USA as the enemy, I think, and distrusted the government deeply. Viewed in that light. the coyness and "slipperiness" John refers to may have really been the Mormons' effort to be "wise as serpents, yet harmless as doves." All this supports the interpretation that after Smoot, the Church re-joined American society after a very long and weird estrangement. Mormons had no reason to trust the government during that time, and the government (and the rest of America) were justified in not trusting Mormons. A dark period that is, fortunately, long since behind us all.

A joke, irrelevant to Article VI, but funny nonetheless.

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