Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, would have us believe he is, foremost, a devout Christian. He’s just so prim and pious … even while defending Trump’s deviant cabinet nominees, policies and behaviors. What follows is offered as hypothesis, rather than as authoritative sociological scholarship:
Observing the feverish zealotry of the MAGA “evangelicals” and “Christian Nationalists” triggers inquiry into whether there is causal linkage between hate and religion. As a preliminary offering, the word-sequencing of “Bigotry” before “Bible” in the title above is intentionally descriptive: the “hate” of the bigots is the “horse” that is pulling the “cart” of religion, not vice versa.
Religious doctrinal sources, like our country’s Constitution, contain agreed upon text that surely foreclose certain interpretations (e.g., one can’t be a Christian without belief in the divinity of Christ; likewise, one cannot think the 8th Amendment ban on “cruel and unusual punishment” permits the drawing and quartering of a shoplifter). But the exercise of reasoned discretion (choice) remains.
The abhorrent 7-1 pro-segregation decision in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) and the directly contrary 9-0 integration decision in Brown V. Board (1954) were arguably both permitted by the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. Both were energetically rationalized; neither decision was per curium. Did the Brown v. Board justices, 58 years after Plessy, possess superior legal skills? Unlikely; what they possessed was a superior moral sensibility, an enlightened commitment to the 1776 proposition of the equality of all.
The late Justice Scalia, a self-identified “originalist,” asserted he would have dissented in Plessy. This is questionable. The majority opinion writer in Plessy, Justice Henry Brown (ironically), could conceivably have originated the label of “originalist” earlier than Scalia. In effect, that is what he was claiming in 1896, as was the lone dissenter, Justice John Harlan Sr.
So “originalism” is no more defensible as a self-executing mandate to constitutional interpretation than would be a singular reading of a Biblical passage. Choice remains. At best, the framers of the Constitution and the authors of religious writings agreed upon text, but were not like-minded when it came to word-meaning or how the text would direct a particular interpretative outcome.
When has such consensus ever existed in any narrative context? To think otherwise is fantastical, more likely a grossly insincere claim, if not a lie (e.g., during his confirmation hearing, John Roberts outrageously asserted that justices are akin to baseball umpires calling balls and strikes, so “strike three, you’re outta here, Roe v. Wade”?).
Those joining the KKK did so driven by hate (hating Catholics and Jews with comparable fervor). KKK membership did not arise from their professed Protestantism, which they proceeded to soil by rationalizing their bigotry. The proof, surely, is that more Protestants, even then (or at least now), found the KKK’s mission, or the terroristic methods at a minimum, to be barbarous.
Gregg Mumm
Oak Park