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One
Nation Under . . . By Kathryn
Jean Lopez, NRO executive editor |
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Michael Novak: The American Republic took flight on two wings: faith and common sense. The faith that God so made the world that liberty might prevail, and the lowly, empirical type of reasoning so beloved in English common law, and in certain Whig philosophers of liberty such as Algernon Sidney and John Locke. Many of the preachers of the Founding Era observed that on matters of liberty arguments from reason and arguments from Jewish and Christian tradition led to the same conclusion. Either set of reasons might have been sufficient. The consonance of both made an especially powerful case. By "reason" I mean the habit of mind addressed by Federalists, the ability to look beyond one's own interests to see the long range good of one's descendants, the capacity to reflect on the future good of the whole union, not only one's own state, and the wisdom to take into account the dangers of turning down a good constitution in the name of wishing for a perfect one. By "faith" I mean seeing reality through the eyes of the Creator, as it is revealed in the tradition of reflection on the Bible. In the period 1774-1799 all the leading Americans were skillful in drawing upon both common sense and humble faith. Lopez: Why is there such hostility to faith in American public life today? Novak: For some years, polling data have shown that about 90 percent of the people believe in God, and about eight percent are atheists. Just as in predominantly Catholic countries there has traditionally appeared a strong tendency toward anti-clericalism, so in the lively religious atmosphere of the United States, one wing of the secular humanist contingent is vociferously anti-church, and sometimes anti-religious. Many of the most vigorously anti-religious personalities loom rather large in the public eye by dint of their talents in the arts, journalism, and other forensic professions. They form a sort of clerical class in opposition to the clergy. Sometimes they seem fairly resentful that those they regard as their inferiors have more influence on the public mind than they do. The older religious writers used to put this down to the "pride" of many in the intellectual class. On the whole, though, it's not a bad thing to have a rivalry among elites — checks and balances in the culture, as well as in government. Sometimes religious figures are too anti-intellectual or to unsophisticated, and this tempts their foes to ridicule them. Such ridicule is an annoying form of intolerance. Surprisingly, though, a great many intellectual and accomplished artists and thinkers are religious, but these are seldom asked to express their views on religious subjects. There is a kind of conspiracy of silence about the human soul and its immensity. Our journalists, our moviemakers, our dramatists seem unusually timid in exploring these most important regions of the human adventure. Lopez: In On Two Wings, you write, "Virtually all schools of politics and religion today diminish the power of religion in American thought...." Why is this so widespread? And why do religious people allow it? Novak: Sometimes it seems as if most of those who have been writing history or American political philosophy during the past three or four generations — most of the 20th century, really — have been far less religious than most of the public. If that is not literally true, at least the scholarly conventions in those two fields seem to oblige their practitioners to write as if it were. For nearly all do give every appearance that religion is not very important to them. Accordingly, they ignore vast mountains of evidence that do not appeal to them, evidence of profound religious argument, conviction, and public action in the Founding. They seem to project upon the Founders their own personal indifference toward religion. That is a bad mistake. The evidence simply doesn't permit it. Lopez: What do you mean by the evidence? Novak: I try to concentrate on the top 100 Founders — the 80-some who signed either the Declaration or the Constitution (or in a few cases, both), and the remaining 15 or so who were very important to the arguments or actions of that time, even though they did not actually sign either of the two Founding documents. Secondly, I give prominence of place to the official documents and institutional actions of the Founding period — such things as motions carried by the Continental Congress, congressional decrees, presidential decrees, and other official actions. But of course I attend, too, to the public arguments presented on public questions. Finally, especially in the appendix, I suggest that further inquiries into the private beliefs and practices of the lesser known among the top one hundred might provide a wealth of illuminating evidence about their understanding of "reason" and "faith." Like everyone else, I had encountered many arguments about the predominant reliance of the Founders upon the Enlightenment, upon John Locke, and upon a form of sophisticated "double think," according to which certain leading Founders, being prudent men, pretended to be far more religious than they actually were, and couched their non-religious or even anti-religious reasonings under a patina of religious language. A kind of esoteric code, interpreted one way by the few philosophers reading it so, but in order to assuage the anxieties of less sophisticated citizens, simultaneously setting forth a more traditional interpretation. Such a methodology, of course, suggests that "we the people" constituted a government on false premises; that the republic is based upon doubletalk. The actual evidence rules that out. Often in the book, I found myself telling little stories about religious actions that surprised me, having for so long heard only the secular side of the story. Did you know, for example, that the largest worship service in the United States took place every Sunday during the Jefferson administration in the U. S. Capitol building, and that by President Jefferson's instructions, the music was provided at federal expense? Did you know that it was the Baptists of Southern Virginia (Jerry Falwell's ancestors) who insisted that before they would support James Madison, who desperately needed their votes, he must support a Bill of Rights guaranteeing freedom of religion? At first, Madison argued against them that no Bill of Rights was necessary. When they insisted, Madison changed his mind, agreed to support the Bill of Rights, and by a great feat of political statesmanship singlehandedly carried the Bill of Rights through the Congress. (My friend Robert Goldwin at AEI has written the best book on this feat, From Parchment to Power.) Many other questions such as taxes, the post office, fisheries, and an immense flood of other practicalities awaited the attention of the first Congress; to most representatives, the theoretical arguments concerning a Bill of Rights seemed airy materials, compared to the practical necessities they faced. But not to the Baptists. They had been whipped and put in jail for failing to ask permission to preach the Gospel. They didn't trust the Anglicans. They wanted their right to free exercise written down. Again, did you know about the decree of the Congress in 1776, requesting the States to set aside a day of fasting and humiliation to plead with God to forgive the manifold sins of Americans of all ranks and stations, so that God might bless the cause of liberty and independence? Lopez: Can there be an accurate understanding of rights without a religious source? Novak: Yes, there is a quite powerful argument that can be derived from the work of Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, and this argument can be made in a non-religious way (although some authors present it also in a religious way). One version of it goes this way: Men are vicious to one another, and so, being moved primarily by fear of being injured, they make a contract to set aside all private violence against one another, and to adjudicate their differences only according to due process and solely in official settings. Another version of the argument stresses the principle that by nature no man has authority over another. From this position of fundamental equality, humans form a contract so as to proceed solely by due process, to which all have given their consent. With all such arguments, there are philosophical difficulties; but some philosophers do find them satisfying. There is much evidence, however, that virtually the entire top 100 American Founders had a far different way of reasoning to human rights, a way that was rooted in their Jewish and Christian faith. They saw themselves acting within a cosmic narrative, according to which the Creator, having formed the entire cosmos from nothing, and although regarding it in some ways as but a grain of sand, nonetheless created within that universe at least one creature to whom He would offer His friendship. This creature, male and female, would not be coerced into God's friendship; He did not wish the friendship of slaves, but of free women and free men. The purpose was friendship, but the condition thereof was this, that when He made human beings, He would make them free. In being made able to reflect, to deliberate, and to choose with total responsibility for their own choices, human beings were made in the image of God. They were made unlike any other creature, and in this fact lay their special dignity. Moreover, no other human being and no other creature had any right to interfere with the choice that each of them would make, in his or her own conscience, alone in the presence of their Creator. They must say yes or no to His offer of friendship, on their own. Neither mother or father, brother or sister, could make this choice for them. It was inalienable. It was their right — and theirs alone — to make this choice. In that fundamental right of conscience lay the source of their special dignity among all creatures, and of all their rights. This account, I believe, fairly represents the thinking of John Adams, John Dickinson, James Wilson, Benjamin Rush, and virtually all the other Founders, including Jefferson and Madison, about the source and logic of human rights. At root, it is a religious understanding. Lopez: How was Thomas Aquinas the first Whig? Novak: I believe it was Lord Acton who first called him so, and for the sound historical reason that he was the first to concentrate attention upon the human person as, of all God's creation, the most noble and most beautiful creature in the universe. For Aquinas, the liberty of the human person, and the story of the love offered by the Creator to the creature, lies at the center of all theological reflection: and, mutatis mutandis, of all philosophical reflection. Thomas Aquinas, like Dante, saw human liberty as the crimson thread running down the center of human history. Every story in the Bible is focused on that crimson thread. Frederich Hayek followed Lord Acton in giving Aquinas due credit for stressing the liberty of the human individual. Of course, Hayek argued, as anyone must argue, it took many centuries before this fundamental liberty could find safe and adequate institutional expression in political life, then in economic life, and finally in religious life. Much trial and error was required. It was one thing to state the philosophical vision clearly; it was quite another to work out its institutional implications over time. Aquinas did not achieve the second, only the first. Lopez: How can Christians and Jews feel confident saying their religions are true, in a "multicultural," "multi-faith" nation? Novak: For one thing, if a religion isn't true, there really isn't much point in holding to it, is there? If it isn't true, it can't be very satisfying. Second, if a religion (or even a secular philosophy) is to be taken as true, it must itself have a theory of truth that holds up under questioning; and it must have an account of the world that explains such things as these: how both the one and the many are related to one another; how there can be truth in many different human communities and traditions, and yet how one can separate truth from falsehood in each of them, and even come to believe that one tradition, in fact, reaches farther, covers more ground, and is deeper than any of the other traditions. My good friend Irving Kristol and I have sometimes made this point at the same conference, even while he is offering reasons why he believes that the Jewish tradition is more inclusive, truer, more realistic, whereas I am arguing that the Catholic tradition is. We do not have to force each other's conscience or judgment on this point, but we can each set forth our reasons. These reasons are complicated, often delicate, and they would require a great many more hours of discussion than any of us usually have at our disposal. For practical reasons, then, we agree to share mutual respect for one another, and to remain in good conversation over our lifetime, learning a great deal from each other. In some ways, it is better for both of us — for all of us — if we do not agree. By that much, we are not allowed to lapse into a kind of complacence and bland conformity. Our differences force us up on our toes. It is sometimes in sharpening the differences between us that we come to greater respect for one another, much more so than if we agreed to be satisfied with some lowest common denominator, which perhaps did less than full justice to either of us. The ways of the human soul and the human mind are many, complicated, and mysterious. But we need not give up the ideal of discriminating truth from falsehood, and better from worse, in our effort to present evidence for what we believe. Lopez: Do you think that the role of religion in American life is more acceptable and prominent since Sept. 11? Novak: In public life, religion has certainly become more acceptable after September 11. For the time being, we have gone back toward behaving much more as the first generation of Americans did in 1774. The first sign was when the Congress burst into "God Bless America" (somewhat off-key) in their meeting of September 12. Then signs went up all over America — on banks, real-estate agencies, shops, motels: PRAY FOR AMERICA. GOD BLESS AMERICA. Polls show that some 90 percent of the public said a prayer for the victims and their families. About half of the public attended a common service in a church or a synagogue. Yes, God came back into public speech and public action in a straightforward, unapologetic way after September 11. Serious times demand serious responses. On the other hand, the fact that the Taliban used a form of heavily politicized religion to make a political attack on the United States made it more difficult for those who have been criticizing America's popular culture. At the same time, many leaders of popular culture themselves showed a new seriousness, and seemed to be pulling back from their worst excesses. (An especially unfortunate incident was Jerry Falwell's projection of all guilt for America's "sin" upon others — not the sins of us believers, his sins and mine, but the sins of abortionists, feminists, and "others." This was to turn political adversaries into scapegoats. It was very bad theology, and embarrassing politics. It's a good practice not to worry so much about other people's sins as about our own.) Lopez: If you were to put together a curriculum for reeducation of Americans on their nation's history and laws and religion, what are some of the readings (beside On Two Wings) you'd require? Novak: For older students, the greatest handbook on how to fashion a revolutionary government ever written: The Federalist. For younger readers, stories about the great personalities of the Founding era — the leading one hundred or so. Stories, stories, stories. Although neither is adequate on religious matters, both Founding Brothers by Joseph Ellis and John Adams by David McCullough tell wonderful stories. Lopez: Are you optimistic about the chances of success in re-educating, in undoing what has gone wrong? Novak: As one of Slavic background, pessimism gives me a sense of vitality. As an American, on the other hand, I have observed how often Great Awakenings actually occur in American life; it is never wise to bet against America. In this country, great changes (for ill as for good) occur swiftly. When I was a young man, abortion was regarded as shameful, a great evil, a crime. After not more than a decade of public agitation on the part of a relatively small group, by about 1968, elite opinion shifted rapidly. After a massive public-relations campaign from most of the "better" classes, about half the American public (men especially) came to support abortion "rights." What had shortly before been a great WRONG became a moral good (or at least a permissible deed) and a human "RIGHT." Abortion is not, of course, a right; no one can have a right to destroy another. But as Woody Allen says, "What the heart wants, the heart wants." I saw evil become "good" in fewer than 20 years. A short time for so massively important a switch. The point is, in America great changes can occur quickly, even in matters of the greatest moment. They can change quickly for the good, too. The tides that run in the human soul are very deep and sometimes very strong, but only God knows the hours of their ebbing and their rising. "God bless America" — grace — may have far more to do with it than we know. You should fight as if victory is certain. If the issue does not go well, if all efforts fail — then proceed "with a firm reliance on divine Providence," as our Declaration commends. Both approaches strengthen one's courage to continue. |
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ichael Novak,
an NRO contributing editor and the George F. Jewett scholar at the
