No CrossRef data available.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 April 2015
I slept with Faith, and found a corpse in my arms on awaking; I drank and danced all night with Doubt, and found her a virgin in the morning.
The belief exists among certain circles that arguments based on religious convictions are innately flawed. At a minimum those who accept this doctrine believe that religious arguments are improper and should be avoided or go unheeded; at the extreme they propose a reworking of legal and social principles to exclude religious arguments. This article will discuss two arguments frequently advanced as evidence of the unacceptability of religious arguments in the United States of America and, after a short exposition of each position, will engage in a critical examination of the theories. This is a theoretical exercise and, as such, will not involve the separate question of what actual legal limits may or may not exist on the inclusion of religious arguments.
1. Crowley, Aleister, The Book of Lies: Which is also Falsely Called Breaks 100 (Weiser Books 1981)Google Scholar.
2. See infra n. 4. The truth of the claim that some propose such theories is attested to by the examples in this footnote.
3. Although it sometimes may be the case, this way of thinking is not necessarily less hostile to religious belief or more amenable to its restricted inclusion in social debate. It may only seek to confute and not to outlaw, but often its goal is still the removal of religious arguments. It is only that the respective methodologies of the two approaches differ.
4. The attacker of religious belief is by no means a rara avis. Examples of such are the following: B.F. Skinner stated in an interview with John M Whitely that “[m]ost of the conflict in the world today … is of religious origin, and that's taking religion very broadly,” in It is Possible to Change the Ways People Treat Each Other ¶ 15 (n.d.) (available at http://www.ucf.ics.uci.edu/~zencin/peace2/interviews/Skinner.html) (accessed May 25, 2005)). A.J. Ayer wrote “[t]he point which we wish to establish is that there cannot be any transcendent truths of religion. For the sentences which the theist uses to express such ‘truths’ are not literally significant.” Ayer, A.J., Language Truth Logic & God 35–37, 114–118 (Dover Publications 1946) (available at http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/ayer_metaphysics.html)Google Scholar. Francois Voltaire wrote in the 18th century of a meditation where he saw:
“the bones of the Christians slaughtered by each other for metaphysical disputes. They are divided into several heaps of four centuries each. One heap would have mounted right to the sky; they had to be divided.” [¶]“What!” 1 cried, “brothers have treated their brothers like this, and I have the misfortune to be of this brotherhood!”
Voltaire, Francoise, Religion in, Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary 259, 260 (World Publg. Co. 1943)Google Scholar (available at Voltaire (1694-1778): On Religion, from The Philosophical Dictionary ¶ 10 (1924)Google Scholar. Marx, Karl wrote in his Communist Manifesto (1848)Google Scholar:
In the condition of the proletariat, those of old society at large are already virtually swamped. The proletarian is without property; his relation to his wife and children has no longer anything in common with the bourgeois family relations; modern industry labor, modern subjection to capital, the same in England as in France, in America as in Germany, has stripped him of every trace of national character. Law, morality, religion, are to him so many bourgeois prejudices, behind which lurk in ambush just as many bourgeois interests.
Marx, Karl & Engels, Frederick, Manifesto of the Communist Party, Ch. 1: Bourgeois and Proletarians ¶ 47 (1848) (available at http://www.anu.edu.au/polsci/marx/classics/manifesto.html) (emphasis added)Google Scholar.
In an earlier essay, Marx more blatantly stated:
Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo. Marx, Karl, Introduction to A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right 4 (1844) (available at http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1843/critique-hpr/intro.htm)Google Scholar.
Finally, but by no means exclusively, Bertrand Russell writes:
Such in outline, but even more purposeless, more void of meaning, is the world which Science presents for our belief. Amid such a world, if anywhere, our ideals henceforward must find a home. That Man is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; that all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of Man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the débris of a universe in ruins—all these things, if not quite beyond dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand. Only within the scaffolding of these truths, only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul's habitation henceforth be safely built.
Russell, Bertrand, A Free Man's Worship, in In Mysticism and Logic 44, 45 (Doubleday Anchor Books 1917, n.d.) (available at http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1917russell-worship.html) (accessed June 1, 2005)Google Scholar (emphasis added)). If there is any doubt that Russell takes a less than affectionate view of religion, see infra n. 10. For an account of more recent critics, see Hitchcock, James, The Enemies of Religious Liberty, 140 First Things 26, 26–29 (02 2001)Google Scholar.
5. In fact, some thinkers have divided the controversy into constitutional and moral considerations. Michael Perry writes: “The controversy comprises two inquiries: a debate about the constitutionally proper role of such arguments [religious] in politics and a related but distinct debate about their morally proper role.” Perry, Michael J., Religion in Politics 43 (Oxford U. Press 1997)Google Scholar. Perry later divided his discussion of the two areas into separate articles for a series of five essays he published in the early part of this century. The relevant articles are: Perry, Michael J., Why Political Reliance on Religiously Grounded Morality Does Not Violate the Establishment Clause, 42 Wm. & Mary L. Rev. 663 (2001)Google Scholar; and Perry, Michael J., Why Political Reliance on Religiously Grounded Morality Is Not Illegitimate in a Liberal Democracy, 36 Wake Forrest L. Rev. 217 (2001)Google Scholar.
6. This is the title given to the argument by ProfessorLipkin, Robert J., Reconstructing the Public Square, 24 Cardozo L. Rev. 2025, 2067 (2003)Google Scholar [hereinafter Lipkin, Reconstructing]. Arguments of similar form appear under different names. For instance, Judge Michael McConnell seems to refer to a version of the argument under the title “secular rationale.” See McConnell, Michael, Five Reasons to Reject the Claim that Religious Arguments Should Be Excluded from Democratic Deliberation, 1999 Utah L. Rev. 639, 644 (1999)Google Scholar. Professor William Marshall characterizes the argument as “rest[ing] primarily on epistemological grounds.” Marshall, William, The Other Side of Religion, 44 Hastings L. J. 843, 845 (1993)Google Scholar. Lipkin himself mentions the argument elsewhere as a “communitarian democratic argument.” See Lipkin, Robert J., Progressivism as Communitarian Democracy, 4-SPG Widener L. Symp. J. 229, 250 (1999)Google Scholar [hereinafter Lipkin, Communitarian]. The title advanced by Lipkin in his 2003 article is used here because it seems to capture the heart of the theory—that religious arguments will not be fathomable to nonbelievers-in a clear, cogent description that is more accessible to readers than other titles such as “communitarian democratic.”
7. Not all thinkers use the term “pluralistic” to describe the condition of American society that requires arguments in the public realm be accessible to all members. Professor Lipkin draws on the term “communitarian democratic” to describe the social condition. Lipkin, Communitarian, supra n. 6, at 233. Professor Shiffrin focuses on assumptions about “the role of speech in a democratic society” as the basis for the argument. Shiffrin, Steve, Religion and Democracy, 74 Notre Dame L. Rev. 1631, 1638 (1999)Google Scholar. Philosophy professor Robert Audi employs a “perspective on liberal democracy” to suggests “why … the use of secular reason must in general be the main basis of sociopolitical decision.” Audi, Robert, The Place of Religious Argument in a Free and Democratic Society, 30 San Diego L. Rev. 677, 690 (1993)Google Scholar. The purpose behind these illustrations is to show that there is great variation in terminology as this argument is concerned. Use of the term “pluralistic democracy” is in accord with a twofold purpose. One, the term pluralistic implies that not all within the society share the same religious beliefs, which is a necessary condition of the argument. (Obviously, if everyone in a society were of the same religious beliefs, then one could not propose that arguments drawn from those beliefs were inaccessible.) Two, the existence of a democracy adds a unique, though not essential, element to the theory. It makes the opinion of all voting members of the pluralistic society particularly important and adds weight to the claim that public arguments should be accessible to them. This weight would not be so great in a non-democratic system-although theoretically one might still argue that the gaudium populi still requires accessibility in terms of policy justification. It is hoped that use of “pluralistic democracy” will present terms generally acceptable.
8. I might seem prolix in choosing this title, especially since a shorter one could have avoided the necessity of using an acronym. However, the use of both “Dangerous” and “Divisive” is in recognition of two forms the argument sometimes takes. E.g. “This argument comes in two forms: first, religious arguments in the public forum are divisive and lead to instability; second (less commonly given in the literature, but widely uttered in the academy), religion is a reactionary force.” Shiffrin, supra n. 7, at 1644. The two will not be prescinded for the purposes of this article, but it is reasonable to employ a title that recognizes both.
9. This particular criticism has not been limited to “religious beliefs” but has been advanced against all philosophical absolutism i.e., the belief that knowledge is not relative to the knower. For instance, Hans Kelsen wrote:
Tolerance, minority rights, freedom of speech, and freedom of thought, so characteristic of democracy, have no place within a political system based on the belief in absolute values. This belief irresistibly leads—and has always led—to a situation in which the one who assumes to possess the secret of the absolute good claims to have the right to impose his opinion as well as his will upon the others who are in error.
Kelsen, Hans, Absolutism and Relativism in Philosophy and Politics, 42 Am. Political Sci. Rev. 906, 913 (1948) (emphasis added)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Presumably, this criticism would apply equally to atheistic systems that hold to a philosophical absolutism and reject relativism. Take, for instance, the Objectivism of Ayn Rand, which lacks a belief in a supreme being but does hold to a reality independent of and impartially knowable by the human mind. “My philosophy, Objectivism, holds that: 1. Reality exists as an objective absolute—facts are facts, independent of man's feelings, wishes, hopes or fears.” Rand, Ayn, Introducing Objectivism (1962) (available at http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=objectivism_intro) use search terms Introducing Objectivism) (accessed June 4, 2005))Google Scholar. Such a stance seems to qualify as philosophical absolutism by Kelsen's standard. For a critical response to the claim that philosophical absolutism necessarily leads to political absolutism and an argument that, in fact, the opposite is true see Paul, John II, Fides et Ratio ¶ 46 (1998) (available at http://www.cin.org/jp2/fides.html)Google Scholar:
Opposed to this kind of thinking were various forms of atheistic humanism, expressed in philosophical terms, which regarded faith as alienating and damaging to the development of a full rationality. They did not hesitate to present themselves as new religions serving as a basis for projects which, on the political and social plane, gave rise to totalitarian systems which have been disastrous for humanity. John Finnis also offers a philosophical defense of absolutism as not leading inevitably to political absolutism and goes so far as to say that “[t]he first theorist of government to articulate as a specific concept the desideratum that governmental authority/power be legally 'limited' seems to have been Thomas Aquinas.” Finnis, John, Is Natural Law Theory Compatible with Limited Government?, in Natural Law, Liberalism, and Morality 1 (George, Robert P. ed., Clarendon Press 1996)Google Scholar. This statement and the discussion it leads into are particularly apropos because in his critique, Kelsen chose Aquinas as a paradigm thinker of philosophical absolutism. “Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologiae and Dante Alighieri's De Monarchia are the classical examples for this coincidence of philosophical and political absolutism.” Kelsen, supra n. 9, at 912.
10. Schwartz, Peter, Reason vs. Faith ¶ 3 (12 7, 1998) (available at http://www.aynrand.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5334&news_iv_ctrl=1087)Google Scholar. This supposedly atavistic characteristic of religious thinking i.e., that it is divisive, certain, and dangerous, is the basis for the supposition that religion is dangerous. As noted atheist Bertrand Russell wrote in 1930:
My own view of religion is that of Lucretius. I regard it as a disease born of fear and as a source of untold misery to the human race. I cannot, however, deny that it has made some contributions to civilization. It helped in early days to fix the calendar, and it caused Egyptian priests to chronicle eclipses with such care that in time they became able to predict them. These two services I am prepared to acknowledge, but I do not know of any others.
Russell, Bertrand, Has Religion Made Useful Contributions to Civilization? ¶ 1 (1936)(available at http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/russell2.htm)Google Scholar. Russell's broad proclamation—defamation—of religion is immediately qualified, but far from dulling the edge of his words, this modest acknowledgement of some mean role for religion seems more a product of humor than any conciliatory feeling.
11. Voltaire, , A Treatise on Tolerance ¶ 3 (1763) (available at http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/ENLIGHT/TOTOL.HTM)Google Scholar.
12. Russell, Bertrand, Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays 16 (repr. Barnes & Noble Books 1981)Google Scholar.
13. Lipkin, Reconstructing, supra n. 6, at 2067.
14. Id. at 2073.
15. As evident by the choice of words, I neither assert nor contend that this “general form” will represent the particularities of every manifestation of the Inaccessibility Argument. I have no doubt some proponents of the Inaccessibility Argument would find it inadequate or would object by referencing some peculiarity of their own arrangement. However, given the fact that I am not critiquing any particular thinker's formation of the theory, this treatment is adequate and appropriate.
16. For a discussion of the term “pluralistic democracy,” see supra n. 7.
17. Webster's College Dictionary 1019 (Random House 2000)Google Scholar. Other dictionaries also list pluralism as, “A condition in which numerous distinct ethnic, religious, or cultural groups are present and tolerated within a society.” American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language 1351 (Houghton Mifflin Co. 2000)Google Scholar. Some older dictionaries, meanwhile, do not list the condition of societal diversity and, for the purposes of the Inaccessibility Argument, the only suitable definition is, “[t]he doctrine that there is more than one kind of ultimate reality.” Webster's New Colligate Dictionary 650 (Bethel, John P. ed., G & C Merriam 1949) (1916) (originally published 1916)Google Scholar.
18. Webster's College Dictionary, supra n. 17, at 220.
19. Examples of such groups are Atheist, Christian, Muslim, Jehovah's Witness, Agnostic, Hindu, Buddhist, Feminist, Wicca, Zoroastrian, Secular Humanist, Deist, Existentialist (which I use only hesitantly, because it is a word applied with so many variations that one begins to suspect it is more inclusive than exclusive). Some would argue that there are sundry identities assorted with the different races or ethnic groups that compose American society.
To begin with, then, basic group identity consists of the ready-made set of endowments and identifications which every individual shares with others from the moment of birth by the chance of the family into which he is born at that given time in that given place.
Ethnicity: Theory and Experience 31 (Glazer, Nathan & Moynihan, Daniel P. eds., Harv. U. Press 1975)Google Scholar. For other works that discuss the pluralistic aspect of American society, see Social Stratification (Grusky, David B. ed., Westview Press 2001)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Calhoun, Craig, Critical Social Theory (Blackwell Publishers 1995)Google Scholar; Best, Steven & Kellner, Douglas, The Postmodern Adventure: Science, Technology, and Cultural Studies at the Third Millennium (Guilford Press 2001)Google Scholar.
20. See generally Holcombe, Randall G., From Liberty to Democracy: The Transformation of American Government (U. Mich. Press 2002)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Sandel, Michael J., Democracy's Discontent: America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Belknap Press 1996)Google Scholar; The State of Democracy in America (Crotty, William ed., Geo. U. Press 2001)Google Scholar.
21. Consider the statement that everything would be better if everyone just got along. Surely, everything would be better, but that doesn't mean it would be practical to pass a law saying that everyone must get along with everyone else. Likewise, it may turn out in the long run that while it is fine to imagine a better world where everyone's public arguments are accessible to everyone else, the reality simply is that human beings engage in a host of government activities that cannot be made accessible to all members of society because they necessarily involve value judgments.
22. Professor Lipkin responds to a similar criticism made by Judge McConnell in his brief for the Boy Scouts of Am. v. Dale (“A society in which each and every organization must be equally diverse is a society that has destroyed diversity.”) Reply for Br. of Pet. at 19-20, Boy Scouts of Am. v. Dale, 530 U.S. 640 (2000) (available at http://www.lambdalegal.org/cgi-bin/iowa/cases/brief.html?record=592)Google Scholar; and in a law review article (“If every group is internally diverse and pluralistic, reflecting the population as a whole, every group will be the same.”) McConnell, Michael W., The New Establishmentarianism, 75 Chi.-Kent L. Rev. 453, 466 (2000)Google Scholar. Lipkin writes:
McConnell's idea of pluralism appears to be absolutist and unfettered. But if so, it proves too much; it implies that discrimination on the basis of race and gender should be permissible on the grounds of diversity. More important, no one claims that “each and every organization must be equally diverse” …. Instead, the argument is that each and every organization should adhere to certain minimal diversity conditions, one of which is sexual orientation.
Lipkin, Reconstructing, supra n. 6, at 2059. This discussion is worth mentioning here because it comes close to addressing the point made in the text above: that the enforcement of a single, uniform standard of society can destroy the pluralism whose existence it claims to uphold. However, although it may draw near to the argument above, it does not quite reach it because the “minimal” standard of the Inaccessibility Argument is the exclusion of all religious arguments from the public sphere. This is not some sort of “minimal” compromise, but an eradication.
23. McConnell supra n. 6, at 655-656 (emphasis added).
24. Shiffrin discusses the argument in a section dubbed “Unfair?”; however, it seems rather clear from the premise that he attributes to the theory (“because pluralism is a central fact of our democratic society, it is vital that forms of public reason be acceptable to reasonable people …”) that he believes the argument turns on accessibility or the lack thereof. Shiffrin supra n. 7, at 1634. He confirms this fact several pages later by referring to the argument as the “accessibility argument.” Id. at 1638.
25. Id. at 1635.
26. Professor Shiffrin had earlier defined John as “the religious person.” Id. at 1635.
27. Id. at 1636.
28. Lipkin, Reconstructing, supra n. 6, at 2055.
29. School officials qua officeholders have been considered government actors. For example, see Aguilar v. Felton, 473 U.S. 402 (1985)Google Scholar; Sch. Dist. of City of Grand Rapids v. Ball 473 U.S. 373 (1985)Google Scholar; Witters v. Wash. Dept. of Services for the Blind, 474 U.S. 481 (1986)Google Scholar; which all hold that school officials are government actors whose action may be governed by the principles of the First Amendment's Establishment and Free Exercise Clauses. See also NJ v. T.L.O., 469 U.S. 325 (1985)Google Scholar, which holds that searches by school officials are governed by the Fourth Amendment.
30. Note the furor that accompanied the recent Supreme Court decision in diversity: Grutier v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306 (2003)Google Scholar.
31. There are numerous classes which some would and do find outrageous but are quickly defended on the basis of academic freedom. E.g. “The Social Construction of Whiteness and Women” (U. Mass. at Amherst); “Topics in Film” with an emphasis on pornography (U. Cal. Berkeley); “How to be Gay” (U. Mich.); see also The Dirty Dozen: America 's Most Ridiculous Courses (available at http://www.academia.org/campus_reports/2000/september_2000_2.html (accessed June 17, 2005)); “The Bible and Horror” (Geo. U.); “Death, Suicide and Trauma” (U. Cal. L.A.); “Sex and Death” (Carnegie Mellon U.). See also Billups, Andrea, Higher Ed's Dirty Dozen (2000) (available at http://www.boundless.org/2000/features/a0000332.html)Google Scholar.
32. See infra nn. 33, 34, & 35.
33. See the explanation of the policy, that upon valid application gives federal funds for restoration or beautification projects, at Fact Sheet: Transportation Enhancements (Sept. 14, 1998) (available at http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/tea21/factsheets/te.htm).
34. One hundred seventeen million dollars requested for 2004 (available at http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy04/browse.html) (accessed June 17, 1005) (under “Other Agencies”)).
35. A comprehensive list of such agencies is difficult to find, especially because “art” funding may take place in the context of other funding. Examples include the following: The Indian Arts and Crafts Board, run by the Department of the Interior, see website at U.S. Dept. of Interior, Indian Arts and Crafts Board (available at http://www.iacb.doi.gov) (accessed June 17, 2005)); The National Gallery of Art Extension Services run by the National Gallery of Art (available at http://12.46.245.173/cfda/cfda.html) (accessed June 17, 2005) (use “Search for Assistance Programs”)); and The Creative Art Grants run ultimately by The Department of State (available at http://exchanges.state.gov/education/grantsdiv/cfda.htm) (accessed June 17, 2005)).
36. Weathers, Seth, One Man's Dung is Another Man's Art (03 1, 2002) (available at http://www.rightturns.com/columnists/guest/sw/swcurrent.htm)Google Scholar. I do not mean to suggest that there are no standards in art, merely that the value placed on an individual piece of art or the type or school of art can be hotly debated. See infra n. 37.
37. This is not to deny that there are rationally expressible distinctions to be made in artwork. And, in fact, there are those who believe that art at its best is not an ungoverned exercise of the creative faculties, that there are measures and limits the artist is bound by, and who speak of the modern “rules” of artwork as “a gross absurdity.” Maritain, Jaques, Art and Scholasticism, The Rules of Art Ch. 7, ¶ 7 (Evans, Joseph W. trans. 1935) (available at http://www.nd.edu/Departments/Maritain/etext/art6.htm)Google Scholar. However, such theorists would normally allow that, between individual choices as to whether or not one work of art is better or worse than another, there is great latitude.
38. Natl. Endowments for the Arts v. Finley, 524 U.S. 569, 605 (1998) (Souter, J., dissenting)Google Scholar.
39. Finnis, John, On the Practical Meaning of Secularism, 73 Notre Dame L. Rev. 491, 505 (1998)Google Scholar.
40. Perry, Michael J., Why Political Reliance on Religiously Grounded Morality is Not Illegitimate in a Liberal Democracy, 36 Wake Forest L. Rev. 217, 248 (2001)Google Scholar.
41. Professor Emeritus at Harvard University. See Gewertz, Ken, John Rawls, Influential Political Philosopher, Dead at 81 (12 5, 2002) (available at http://www.hno.harvard.edu/gazette/2002/12.05/03-rawls.html)Google Scholar. Rawls is a giant of 20th century jurisprudence, a remarkable thinker who has engendered much debate and captured the minds of many followers with his writings. Consequently, I critique his theory only out of necessity, with full knowledge that both the confines of this article and my own knowledge of his thought are inadequate to do true justice or fairness. A list of Rawls' works to the late eighties can be found in the preface to Thomas W. Pogge's book, Realizing Rawls xi–xii (Cornell U. Press 1989)Google Scholar.
42. As one book reviewer wrote: “Rawls' Theory of Justice is widely and justly regarded as this century's most important work of political philosophy. Originally published in 1971, it quickly became the subject of extensive commentary and criticism ….” J.D. Moon, Book Review, in Choice (available at http://www.hup.harvard.edu/reviews/RAWTHR_R.html) (accessed June 17, 2005)).
43. Rawls, John, A Theory of Justice (Harv. U. Press 1971)Google Scholar.
44. Rawls writes in the preface:
Perhaps I can best explain my aim in this book as follows. During much of modern moral philosophy the predominant systematic theory has been some form of utilitarianism. One reason for this is that it has been espoused by a long line of brilliant writers who have built up a body of thought truly impressive in its scope and refinement …. But they failed, I believe, to construct a workable and systematic moral conception to oppose it. The outcome is that we often seem forced to choose between utilitarianism and intuitionism …. What I have attempted to do is to generalize and carry to a higher order of abstraction the traditional theory of the social contract as represented by Locke, Rousseau, and Kant.
Id. at vii-viii.
45. See the works of John Locke 1632-1704 (Two Treatises of Government); Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) (Leviathan, De Cive); Jean Jacque Rousseau (1712-1778) (Emile, The Social Contract); Immanuel Kant ( 1724-1804) (Critique of Practical Reason, Practical Philosophy).
46. “1 wanted to show that this doctrine [social contract] was not open to the more obvious objections often thought fatal to it. I hoped to work out more clearly the chief structural features of this conception-which I call ‘justice as fairness.’” Rawls, John, Political Liberalism xv (Colum. U. Press 1993)Google Scholar.
47. Rawls does not intend to imply that justice is fairness. As he says, the phrase “justice as fairness” does not imply that the concepts are the same anymore than the phrase “poetry as metaphor.” Rawls, supra n. 43, at 13.
48. id. at 12.
49. “This original position is not, of course, thought of as an actual historical state of affairs, much less as a primitive condition of culture. It is understood as a purely hypothetical situation characterized so as to lead to a certain conception of justice.” Id. Ronald Dworkin makes this point well when he writes: “Rawls does not suppose that any group ever entered into a social contract of the sort he describes.” Dworkin, Ronald, The Original Position, in Reading Rawls 16, 17 (Daniels, Norman ed., Basic Books 1975)Google Scholar.
50. Professor Rawls described the necessity for the veil of ignorance in the following manner:
Somehow we must nullify the effects of specific contingencies which put men at odds and tempt them to exploit social and natural circumstances to their own advantage. Now in order to do this I assume that the parties are situated behind a veil of ignorance. They do not know how the various alternatives will affect their own particular case and they are obliged to evaluate principles solely on the basis of general considerations. It is assumed, then, that the parties do not know certain kinds of particular facts. First of all, no one knows his place in society, his class position or social status; nor does he know his fortune in the distribution of natural assets and abilities, his intelligence and strength, and the like.
Rawls, supra n. 43, at 136-137.
51. Id. at 12.
52. Id.
53. Rawls gives five “basic goods” that are to inform the veil of ignorance and allow those behind it to seek the good of those they represent as:
a. The basic liberties (freedom of thought and liberty of conscience, and so on) …. b. Freedom of movement and free choice of occupation against a background of diverse opportunities …. c. Powers and prerogatives of offices and positions of responsibility …. d. Income and wealth, understood broadly as all-purpose means (having an exchange value) …. [and] e. The social bases of self-respect ….
Rawls, supra n. 46, at 308.
54. Rawls, John, Political Liberalism (Colum. U. Press 1993)Google Scholar.
55. Rawls, supra n. 46, at xvi-xvii.
56. Id. at xvi.
57. Id.
58. “[A] consensus in which it is affirmed by the opposing religious, philosophical, and moral doctrines likely to thrive over generations in a more or less just constitutional democracy, where the criterion of justice is that political conception itself.” Rawls, John, The Idea of an Overlapping Consensus, in Collected Papers 421, 421 (Freeman, Samuel ed., Harv. U. Press 1999)Google Scholar. Rawls addresses several potential objections to the “overlapping consensus” in Political Liberalism. Rawls, supra n. 46, at 145-164.
59. Id. at xviii.
60. Rawls, John, The Law of Peoples 32 (Harv. U. Press 1999)Google Scholar.
61. Rawls, John, The Idea of Public Reason Revisited, 64 U. Chi. L. Rev. 766, 766 (1997)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
62. Rawls, John, Justice As Fairness: A Restatement 92 (Harv. U. Press 2001)Google Scholar.
63. Rawls, supra n. 61, at 773-774.
64. “The first point is that the limits imposed by public reason do not apply to all political questions but only to those involving what we may call ‘constitutional essentials’ and questions of basic justice.” Rawls, supra n. 46, at 214.
65. Id. at 223. In a recent law review article, Professor Rawls gives the content of public reason as:
First, a list of certain basic rights, liberties, and opportunities (such as those familiar from constitutional regimes); Second, an assignment of special priority to those rights, liberties, and opportunities, especially with respect to the claims of the general good and perfectionist values; and Third, measures ensuring for all citizens adequate all-purpose means to make effective use of their freedoms.
Rawls, supra n. 61, at 774.
66. Professor Rawls does hold that public reason standards only apply to
the public political forum … [1] the discourse of judges in their decisions, and especially judges of a supreme court; [2] the discourse of government officials, especially chief executives and legislators; and finally, [3] the discourse of candidates for public office and their campaign managers, especially in their public oratory, party platforms, and political statements.
Rawls, supra n. 61, at 767. This distinction later is later dispensed with for the voting of private citizens, of whom it is later written “citizens are to think of themselves as if they were legislators.” Rawls, supra n. 61, at 769. Thus, the public forum application of public reason includes citizens as well. This only seems right since in a representative government, where the people are the theoretical source of a legislator's power, it seems odd to hold the legislator to a philosophical and moral standard that those they represent need not meet. If this standard is fundamental to democracy, then all should strive for it in a democratic system.
67. Rawls, supra n. 46, at 217.
68. Perry, supra n. 5, at 58-59 (emphasis added).
69. Rawls, supra n. 61, at 771.
70. Id.
71. Rawls seems to recognize that he relies on this premise and simply states that those who do not accept it argue outside the bounds political liberalism is willing to entertain:
The idea of public reason specifies at the deepest level the basic moral and political values that are to determine a constitutional democratic government's relation to its citizens and their relation to one another. In short, it concerns how the political relation is to be understood. Those who reject constitutional democracy with its criterion of reciprocity will of course reject the very idea of public reason. For them the political relation may be that of friend or foe, to those of a particular religious or secular community or those who are not; or it may be a relentless struggle to win the world for the whole truth. Political liberalism does not engage those who think this way. The zeal to embody the whole truth in politics is incompatible with an idea of public reason that belongs with democratic citizenship.
Id. at 766-767. There are at least two concepts that seem to be operating in this paragraph: an assumption and presumption. On the one hand—the assumption—Rawls identifies basic premises that must be accepted to continue the discussion he is holding: that one must accept “constitutional democracy with its criterion of reciprocity, and “an idea of public reason that belongs with democratic citizenship.” There is no proof given that these are necessary connections (say that constitutional democracy always carries the criterion of reciprocity) to be accepted in themselves; the only necessity for believing them is for carrying forward with Rawls' argument. In and of itself, this does not seem to be a problem. Philosophers have often restrained the scope of their discussion. Yet, while commonplace and tolerable, such identification of assumed premises and exposed hypotheses does not of itself dispose of them—as if merely making note of a defect can cure it. Hence there is presumption, since, while it is fitting of Rawls to make note of the fact that he assumes certain things for his argument, this does not of itself justify his presumption in concluding that those who disagree are somehow acting in a manner incompatible with or rejecting constitutional democracy. That these things are true and necessary connections anywhere and everywhere such ideas are raised remains to be shown.
72. Rawls, supra n. 46, at 137 n. 5.
73. Rawls writes:
Injustice as fairness, and I think in many other liberal views, the guidelines of inquiry of public reason, as well as its principles of legitimacy, have the same basis as the substantive principles of justice. This means in justice as fairness that the parties in the original position, in adopting principles of justice for the basic structure, must also adopt guidelines and criteria of public reason for applying those norms. The argument for those guidelines, and for the principle of legitimacy, is much the same as, and as strong as, the argument for the principles of justice themselves. In securing the interests of the persons they represent, the parties insist that the application of substantive principles be guided by judgment and inference, reasons and evidence that the persons they represent can reasonably be expected to endorse. Should the parties fail to insist on this, they would not act responsibly as trustees. Thus we have the principle of legitimacy.
Rawls, supra n. 46, at 225 (emphasis added).
74. Id.
75. Rawls mentions this as a moral, not a legal duty. Id. at 213. He is not a totalitarian. See infra n. 91 for further comments on this issue.
76. Rawls, supra n. 46, at 134.
77. This was the flaw with Rawls' original A Theory of Justice.
78. Note Rawls' discussion of the “fact of oppression”:
A second and related general fact is that a continuing shared understanding on one comprehensive religious, philosophical, or moral doctrine can be maintained only by the oppressive use of state power. If we think of political society as a community united in affirming one and the same comprehensive doctrine, then the oppressive use of state power is necessary for political community. In the society of the Middle Ages, more or less united in affirming the Catholic faith, the Inquisition was not an accident; its suppression of heresy was needed to preserve that shared religious belief. The same holds, I believe, for any reasonable comprehensive philosophical and moral doctrine, whether religious or nonreligious. A society united on a reasonable form of utilitarianism, or on the reasonable liberalisms of Kant or Mill, would likewise require the sanctions of state power to remain so. Call this the “fact of oppression.”
Rawls, supra n. 46, at 37.
79. Rawls, supra n. 62, at 37.
80. See supra n. 71.
81. For this discussion, see Rawls, supra n. 46, at 249-251.
82. For this discussion, see Rawls, supra n. 61, at 798-800.
83. Rawls writes:
The abolitionists and King would not have been unreasonable in these conjectured beliefs if the political forces they led were among the necessary historical conditions to establish political justice, as does indeed seem plausible in their situation. On this account the abolitionists and the leaders of the civil rights movement did not go against the ideal of public reason; or rather, they did not provided they thought, or on reflection would have thought (as they certainly could have thought), that the comprehensive reasons they appealed to were required to give sufficient strength to the political conception to be subsequently realized.
Rawls, supra n. 46, at 250-251.
84. Id.
85. “Roman Catholics may reject a decision to grant a right to an abortion. They may present an argument in public reason for denying it and fail to win a majority.” Rawls, supra n. 61, at 798. And later, after saying they may not use force, he writes: “[c]ertainly Catholics may, in line with public reason, continue to argue against the right to abortion.” Id. at 799 (emphasis added).
86. For the quoted text, which is in Rawls' discussion of abolitionists in Political Liberalism, see Rawls, supra n. 83.
87. Rawls, supra n. 61, at 798-799.
88. Rawls expressly states that he does not “discuss the question of abortion in itself since [his] concern is not with that question ….” Rawls, supra n. 61, at 799. I reject this analysis on his part. If he is to make fundamental distinctions about the way that one moral argument is to be characterized from another, with the attending wholesale exclusion of a class of individuals from the original position analysis, then he should be prepared to offer a defensible view of why this is allowable. Otherwise he leaves the impression of personal bias.
89. Perhaps in the final analysis, after the arguments are weighed, the conclusion will be to exclude the unborn. However, making this decision from the outset, without any arguments, is very troubling.
90. Sandel, Michael J., Book Review: Political Liberalism, 107 Harv. L. Rev. 1765, 1783 (1994)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
91. Rawls, who is not advocating a totalitarian system, is quick to point out that the duty of the private citizen in voting “is an intrinsicaUy moral duty … [but] not a legal duty, for in that case it would be incompatible with freedom of speech.” Rawls, supra n. 61, at 769. He also holds in Political Liberalism:
That public reason should be so understood and honored by citizens is not, of course, a matter of law. As an ideal conception of citizenship for a constitutional democratic regime, it presents how things might be, taking people as just and well-ordered society would encourage them to be. It describes what is possible and can be, yet may never be, though no less fundamental for that.
Rawls, supra n. 46, at 213.
92. Devlin v. Scardelletti, 536 U.S. 1, 21–22 (2002)Google Scholar.
93. I could imagine many would accept the theory of public reason if it excluded the arguments that were contrary to their own, but not for their own arguments.
94. See supra nn. 75, 91 for the point that Rawls' duty is moral, not legal.
95. “Nonbelievers” in this context does not simply mean atheist, but rather, those who do not believe in the religious convictions supplying the argument, even if they might technically be described as a “believer” by virtue of holding other religious convictions.
96. I do not mean to imply that all conversion was uncoerced—surely there were many coerced conversions - but only to hold that there was significant uncoerced conversion.
97. Berry, Thomas, Buddhism 15–17 (Hawthorn Books 1967)Google Scholar.
98. Id.
99 The expansion of Buddhism throughout most of Asia was peaceful and occurred in several ways. Shakyamuni Buddha set the precedent. Being primarily a teacher, he traveled to nearby kingdoms to share his insights with those who were receptive and interested. Likewise, he instructed his monks to go forth in the world and expound his teachings. He did not ask others to denounce and give up their own religion and convert to a new one, for he was not seeking to establish his own religion. He was merely trying to help others overcome the unhappiness and suffering that they were creating for themselves because of their lack of understanding. Later generations of followers were inspired by Buddha's example and shared with others his methods that they found useful in their lives. This is how what is now called “Buddhism” spread far and wide.
Berzin, Alexander, The Spread of Buddhism in Asia ¶ 5 (06 1996) (available at http://www.berzinarchives.com/history_buddhism/spread_buddhism_asia.html)Google Scholar.
100. “The spread of Christianity was greatly facilitated by the Pax Romana. Within three decades of Christ's crucifixion, Christian communities were established in most of the great cities of the eastern Mediterranean.” Davies, Norman, Europe: A History 195 (Oxford U. Press 1996). 101Google Scholar.
101. Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular.
Publius Cornelius Tacitus, The Annals, ¶ 15.44 (Modern Library 1942) (available at http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/txt/ah/tacitus/TacitusAnnalsl5.html)Google Scholar. The very inception of the Christian religion was in persecution, with its founder—Jesus Christ—being killed for His views. Even after this there were the well-documented persecutions of Nero, Domitian, Valerian, and Decius—these are only a few of the more well known examples. In fact, the persecution of Christians continued in various eruptions until Constantine, the first Roman Emperor to adopt Christianity, instituted a policy of official toleration with the Edict of Milan. Davies supra n. 100, at 209. 102.
102. That Christianity should have become the official religion of the Roman Empire could hardly have been foreseen …. Jesus was long regarded as an obscure, local phenomenon. His followers, whose beliefs were confused by outsiders with Judaism, were unlikely candidates to found a religion of universal appeal. The faith of slaves and simple fishermen offered no advantage for class or sectional interest. Their gospel, which made such a clear distinction between the spiritual “Kingdom of God” and the rule of Caesar, seemed to have resigned in advance from all secular ambitions. Davies, supra n. 100, at 193.
103. This tradition includes such writers as St. Paul 10-67 (various letters); Anicius Boethius 480-525 (Consolatio Philosophiae); St. Augustine of Hippo 354-430 (De Civitate Dei); St. Thomas Aquinas 1225-1274 (Summa Contra Gentiles, Summa Theologiae); John Duns Scotus 1265-1308 (Theoremata, De Primo Principio, Quaestiones Quodlibetales); and in the last century by such thinkers as John Finnis (Fundamentals of Ethics, Natural Law and Natural Rights); Etienne Gilson (The Christian Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas, God and Philosophy); Jacque Maritain (An Introduction to Philosophy, Man and the State, The Twilight of Civilization); as well as a host of encyclicals and declarations issued throughout history by the Magisterium of the Catholic Church.
104. In particular, the works of Hugo Grotius 1583-1645 (De Jure Belli ac Pacts); and Samuel Pufendorf 1632-1694 (De Jure Naturae et Gentium, De Officio Hominis et Civis) come to mind.
105. Specifically, Abn Ali Al Hosain Ibn Abdallah Ibn Sina 980-1037 (known as “Avicenna” in the West); (Al Schefa or Al Chifa, Al Nadja) and Abul-Waleed Muhammad Ibn Rushd 11281198 (known as “Averroes” in the West) (Talkis Kitab al-Jadal, Fasl al-Maqal, Rislat an-Nafs).
106. The most well-known example is probably Moses Maimonides 1138-1204 (Mishneh Torah, Dalalat al-ha 'irin); but others include Martin Buber (I and Thou), Isaac Luna, Baal Shem Tov, Theodor Herzl, and Mordecai Kaplan.
107. Much of this will be line drawing in the context of an Inaccessibility Argument. All that is meant by this is that what will make the difference will be the fiercely debated topic of whether the argument is accessible by virtue of its nonreligious aspects, or still of too great of a religious content to avoid alienating nonbelievers. Of course, in the former case even the most stringent proponents of the Inaccessibility Argument will have to admit that the religious argument should be allowed; equally, the most latitudinarian inclined will likely deny the accessibility of recourse to non-dispositive reasoning to support a prior judgment of faith.
108. In this sense they fall into a subcategory of the facts supporting the arguments in the paragraph immediately preceding this one. See supra 128-129.
109. I assume that no one would rationally argue for a theory that eliminates all discourse.
110. McConnell supra n. 6, at 652.
111. The term identity politics, which is sometimes described as social identity theory (to distinguish it from identity theory), has been defined as the following:
In social psychology, the acknowledgement that different groups want their identities to be respected on their own terms, or the belief that some issues regarding disadvantaged minorities are the exclusive jurisdiction of those members; for instance, that only an African American person can deal with color-based racism. Also known as the politics of recognition.
Corsini, Raymond J., The Dictionary of Psychology 468 (Taylor & Francis 1999)Google Scholar.
112. Jones, Jackie, Stereotypes Don't Change Themselves ¶ 6 (01 1, 2003) (available at http://www.ciij.org/newswatch?id=118)Google Scholar.
113. See Program of the Communist Program Party (May 1, 1996) (available at http://kpp.aksios.de/dokument/programm-en.htm#inhalt).
The goal of communism is the complete and lasting negation of the exploitation of the human being by the human being. This is the basic effect-principle of communism. It describes the starting point of all considerations, all moral concepts and all methods, that characterise communism. This principle doesn't separate the Communists from all other people, it connects them with a great part of mankind. Because the starting point of communism is the wish of all humanists, all people, that simply only want to live in peace and freedom, and mean no harm to others.
Id. at ch. 1 a.
114. Melvin I. Urofsky writes on the State Department's webpage that “[w]e have identified 11 [root principles] that we believe are key to understanding how democracy has evolved and how it operates in the United States.” Urofsky, Melvin I., Introduction: The Root Principles of Democracy ¶ 4 (11 2001) (available at http://usinfo.state.gov/products/pubs/democracy/homepage.htm)Google Scholar. A few examples are the values of “Constitutionalism,” “Federalism,” and an “Independent Judiciary.” Id.
115. See the discussion of John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham's notion of utilitarianism at Utilitarianism (updated Feb. 21, 2002) (available at http://www.philosophypages.com/hy/5q.htm). Also, see generally the following works: Mill, John Stuart, On Liberty (1869) and Utilitarianism (1861)Google Scholar; Bentham, Jeremy, An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislations (1789)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
116. See also the seminal work by Carson, Rachel, Silent Spring (Houghton Mifflin 1962)Google Scholar.
117. At one far extreme, consider the famous statement of Bertrand Russell concerning his student Ludwig Wittgenstein: “He thinks nothing empirical is knowable—I asked him to admit that there was not a rhinoceros in the room, but he wouldn't.” (available at http://www.handprint.com/SC/WIT/witt04.html) (accessed June 29, 2005)). Clearly, if this can be denied, then no basic principle of any science is entirely safe. Nor should less than total consensus of agreement be mistaken for speculative certainty as to the accessibility of a particular belief.
118. Greenawalt, Kent, Religious Convictions and Political Choice 70 (Oxford U. Press 1988) (emphasis in the original)Google Scholar.
119. Greenawalt addresses homosexuality in the next chapter of the same work. Id. at 87-97.
120. This phrase is problematic in the context of Greenawalt's argument. It immediately assumes the definition of the reader's sense of “unjustified” without relation to particular acts, and it seems only to equal a near-tautological expression. It is removed but one slight logical degree from describing “immoral sexual behavior” as universally held to be immoral, and Greenawalt does not discuss particular acts that may or may not (depending on one's viewpoint) fall under the term “immoral sexual behavior”—incest, homosexuality, adultery, extramarital sex, etc. Far better if Greenawalt described one act of Wiling, say shooting a stranger for a certain sum of money or executing a criminal or killing for revenge, over adultery.
121. Greenawalt later gives the following breakdown, attributed to Ninian Smart, by which to judge the accessibility of religious reasons:
(2) Were the leaders of the faith flagrantly unethical?
(3) Do the elements of its faith involve self-contradistinction or an intolerable tension?
(4) Does acceptance of the faith produce the fruits that the faith values?
(5) Does the faith produce a deep and meaningful account of the problems of life that are hardest to explain?
(6) Do the founder and prophets have force and style?
(7) Is there a solidity and aesthetic coherence to the narratives of the Faith? Id. at 71.
To my mind this does little to resolve the issue of the morality that Greenawalt preadopts. Where is the definition of these rather imprecise and very debated principles, such as style, to come from? If we are to apply the common understanding then don't we simply assume in argument a developed set of principles by which to judge what principles we will adhere to?
122. There is a point at which holding wrong specific acts of killing comes to be based on a value judgment, as evidenced by the various ways in which it has been expanded or limited over the centuries in different cultures. Homosexual congress, likewise, has been held at various levels of restriction or acceptance throughout history. See also Gay and Lesbian Rights in the United States: A Documentary History (Williams, Walter L. & Retter, Yolanda eds., Greenwood Press 2003)Google Scholar; Cocks, H.G., Nameless Offences: Homosexual Desire in the Nineteenth Century (I.B. Tauris 2003)Google Scholar. The distinction between them on the grounds that their difference is obvious seems confusing and contradictory in terms of the Inaccessibility Argument—especially since mere conviction of the individual is specifically being rejected as enough in the context of religion.
123. This problem arises in several other areas, as well. Take relativism as a case in point. Often, it is not besotted with its tenets per se, as conclusions to be sought in themselves, but as a means to achieving another end, namely, that of granting near complete moral and intellectual license. For example, many of its thinkers are not concerned with the proposition, and only the proposition, that there is no absolute answer so much as they are concerned with removing obstacles, perceived or real, to their answer—a far more appealing and self-serving prospect. Perhaps a short digression will illustrate this point. Imagine that one were to enter a room where a group of school children are engaged in a mathematics exam and tell them that there are no answers to the problems they are working on. Provided they believed you, it isn't hard to suppose that most of the students would promptly stop working in a fit of disgust. Now, imagine if the same conclusion were couched in slightly different terms, and with one minor addendum. Let the students be told that there is no answer to the math problems before them, but that as a result of this fact they are now free to put any answer they might wish. No doubt the room would soon be filled with the sounds of gleeful scribbling. Of course, the problem with this example is that the answers proposed by the children are still of no more actual utility than in the first case; writing them down remains, to use a classic cliché, an exercise in futility. In the case of those relativistic thinkers who argue at length for the first basic propositions of relativism before advocating, even if not in the same work, conclusions from whatever ideology suits them, this oft-indulged exercise in futility establishes an inconsistency.
124. See Michael J. Perry's quote, supra at -119-120 where he makes this point. Supra p. 119-120.
125. Nietzsche, Frederick, The Gay Science, Book Three ¶ 153 (Cambridge U. Press 2001)Google Scholar.
126. It might focus on the inaccessibility of religious arguments as a cause of division in society but does not look at them per se. See Garver, Eugene, Why Should Anybody Listen? The Rhetoric of Religious Argument in Democracy, 36 Wake Forest L. Rev. 353 (2001)Google Scholar. (“Religious argument frequently causes mistrust not because it is religious, and not because it resorts to comprehensive or inaccessible premises, but because it claims to be certain.”) Id. at 392. 121 As Justice Brennan wrote:
[J]ust as religion throughout history has provided spiritual comfort, guidance, and inspiration to many, it can also serve powerfully to divide societies and to exclude those whose beliefs are not in accord with particular religions or sects that have from time to time achieved dominance.
Sch. Dist. of City of Grand Rapids v. Ball, 473 U.S. 373, 382 (1985)Google Scholar.
128. Kagin, Edwin F, Kagin's Column: On Religion As a Public Health Threat (10 1994) (available at http://www.edwinkagin.com/columns/health-threat.htm)Google Scholar. Consider the even stronger language used by Voltaire: “Christianity is the most ridiculous, the most absurd and bloody religion that has ever infected the world.” (Letter to Frederick the Great in 1726). See also Tallentyre, S.G., Voltaire in His Letters, Being a Selection from His Correspondence (G.P. Putnam 1919)Google Scholar.
129. Fanaticism is here used as meaning “excessive, irrational zeal.” See American Heritage Dictionary, supra n. 17, at 639.
130. “Religion has been able to recommend so many evil things!” Titus Lucretius Carus, On the Nature of Things, in The Oxford Book of Latin Verse 95 (Heathcoat, William Garrod ed., Clarendon Press 1912, on-line ed., Bartleby.com 2002) (available at http://www.bartleby.com/245/66.html) (author translation)Google Scholar.
131. Marshall, supra n. 6, at 862. Professor Marshall also writes that “religion must also attack the validity of other beliefs. If those seeking religion need to feel certainty, then the presence of conflicting beliefs can only interfere with that desire.” Id. at 852. Of course, the truth or falsity of this statement depends on the meaning of the word “attack.” If it simply means to disagree with or contest the claims of others, then of course, not only certainty, but any level of conviction results in such. If, however, what is meant by “attack” is an attempt to destroy or meet with violence, then it should be noted that mere certainty does not yield such a result.
132. Promulgated on December 7, 1965. Pope Paul VI, Dignitatus Humanae (available at http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-i_decl_l9651207_dignitatis-humanae_en.html) (accessed June 29, 2005)).
133. Kinsley, Michael, The Religious Superiority Complex, 162 Time 106 (11 3, 2003)Google Scholar.
134. Marshall, supra n. 6, at 852.
135. Id. at 855
136. Id. at 854.
137. If nothing else the fact that these political conceptions have so often conflicted with or sought to suppress religion should show that the two “reach for the same goals and often serve similar purposes.”
138. Professor Marshall does not ignore the contributions of religion by not mentioning them in his article. (“This is not to deny that religion has been an important political force from time to time in American history.” Id. at 860.) He devotes a line to them. He ignores them because he does not take them into account. What's more, his description of religion's involvement as occurring from “time to time” fails to account for the conclusions urged by his own theory. If he is right about the “symbiotic relationship” of human beings with religion by which they “understand [their] role in the cosmos,” then, necessarily, religion has had a massive impact on American history. Id. at 854. It has played a crucial role in every election because it has informed the decision of every voter; it has played a crucial role in the decisions of statesmen and presidents who made decisions of policy; it has changed the course of American history at every twist or turn when an individual was called upon to make difficult decisions in light of his understanding of his and others' role in the universe.
139. McConnell, supra n. 6, at 649.
140. Id. at 649-651.
141. Walzer, Michael, Drawing the Line: Religion and Politics, 1999 Utah L. Rev. 619, 628 (1999)Google Scholar.
142. Perry, supra n. 5, at 232.
143. Id.
144. A host of others merit mention that this space will not allow.