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God's Own Party: The Making of the Christian Right
When the Christian Right burst onto the scene in the late 1970s, many political observers were shocked. But, as God's Own Party demonstrates, they shouldn't have been. The Christian Right goes back much farther than most journalists, political scientists, and historians realize. Relying on extensive archival and primary source research, Daniel K. Williams presents the first comprehensive history of the Christian Right, uncovering how evangelicals came to see the Republican Party as the vehicle through which they could reclaim America as a Christian nation. A fascinating and much-needed account of a key force in American politics, God's Own Party is the only full-scale analysis of the electoral shifts, cultural changes, and political activists at the movement's core--showing how the Christian Right redefined politics as we know it.
400 pages, Hardcover
First published September 3, 2010
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922 people want to read
About the author
Daniel K. Williams
10 books20 followersDr. Daniel K. Williams is a historian who specializes in American religion and politics. Currently, he is an associate professor of history at the Ashland University.
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November 9, 2022
Jesus!
The man, from what we know of him, was forgiving, called for all to listen to what he had to say without condemning them and was upset only with the piling up of wealth by the few at the expense of the many. Above all his message was that reward is in the afterlife, not this one and that to amass wealth is in itself a deprivation for others. Sharing is caring! The man was a socialist.
This would make one believe that anyone calling himself or herself a Christian in modern America would be in the streets over income inequality and the rule of the 1%. Yet nothing could be further from the minds of those who most vehemently call themselves followers of Jesus. Becoming rich is praised by American fundamentalists and evangelicals. Their leaders publish books about material success and credit Jesus with it. Socialism? It along with Communism are absolute evil to be destroyed while private profit is sacred to the point that if you make a bundle, think of Jesus smiling in the background. As for social tolerance, let the person who departs from a specific conservative lifestyle beware, no afterlife for you.
The Christianity for which America is known should always be in quotes, "Christianity", because it is in name only; at a complete remove from the man upon whose words it is supposed to be based. God's Own Party is an engrossing documentation of the attempt by "Christians" in America to force their way of life upon the nation as a whole.
All of the big names we've heard over the years are here from the preachers - Billy Graham, Billy James Hargis, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell - to the ultra conservatives such as Phyllis Schlafly, Anita Bryant and Pat Boone, Boone known for his comment that he would rather his daughters were blown to heaven in a nuclear war than that they live under communism. As you would expect in a book about how the GOP was taken over by the religious right, also found are the presidents that appeared to offer the road to power for religion. Ironically, the most truly Christian president of all, Democrat Jimmy Carter, was an epic disappointment because he turned out to be, regarding social issues in America, a true follower of Christ's teachings.
Daniel Williams carefully follows the history without judging the participants. He reaches conclusions only when history has given the evidence. This book is a must-read for anyone interested in the way American politics works. Regarding Pat Robertson's failure to be elected president then turning to lobbying, Williams notes that having failed to come in through the front door, Robertson decided to enter through the back.
Not only is it an account of a powerful lobby but also one that shows influence can only go so far in a democracy. When a lobby faces popular dislike of the agenda being pushed then it will run up against a wall that cannot be breached. This is why attempts to force school prayer on America, or outlaw gay marriage have not succeeded at the national level. The best that can be hoped is for success in certain states, or to finesse a victory through the action of the Supreme Court. Even a Supreme Court ruling can be superceded with a new law.
Williams provides a great review of all the ways in which a minority of Americans became invigorated with their sense of political power and attempted in a variety of ways to push the country along their very specific path with abortion being the rally point. As is always the case, no movement can be absolutely united. The charismatics (fans of speaking in tongues), the fundamentalists (believers in biblical inerrancy) and the evangelicals (success is yours with Jesus!) try to get their guy in the White House but are always disappointed when the chief executive finds that religious euphoria has to bow to political reality.
This work goes on my reference shelf as it effectively lays out the interplay of religion and politics in America since the 1920's. My only regret is that it has to end at the date of publication, 2010, and cannot cover the rise to power of a man of absolutely no religious belief on the strength of the religious vote, the crowning contradiction of the movement, testimony to the desperation born of frustration with religion repeatedly denied political rule, a good thing for which we can thank the Constitution.
The man, from what we know of him, was forgiving, called for all to listen to what he had to say without condemning them and was upset only with the piling up of wealth by the few at the expense of the many. Above all his message was that reward is in the afterlife, not this one and that to amass wealth is in itself a deprivation for others. Sharing is caring! The man was a socialist.
This would make one believe that anyone calling himself or herself a Christian in modern America would be in the streets over income inequality and the rule of the 1%. Yet nothing could be further from the minds of those who most vehemently call themselves followers of Jesus. Becoming rich is praised by American fundamentalists and evangelicals. Their leaders publish books about material success and credit Jesus with it. Socialism? It along with Communism are absolute evil to be destroyed while private profit is sacred to the point that if you make a bundle, think of Jesus smiling in the background. As for social tolerance, let the person who departs from a specific conservative lifestyle beware, no afterlife for you.
The Christianity for which America is known should always be in quotes, "Christianity", because it is in name only; at a complete remove from the man upon whose words it is supposed to be based. God's Own Party is an engrossing documentation of the attempt by "Christians" in America to force their way of life upon the nation as a whole.
All of the big names we've heard over the years are here from the preachers - Billy Graham, Billy James Hargis, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell - to the ultra conservatives such as Phyllis Schlafly, Anita Bryant and Pat Boone, Boone known for his comment that he would rather his daughters were blown to heaven in a nuclear war than that they live under communism. As you would expect in a book about how the GOP was taken over by the religious right, also found are the presidents that appeared to offer the road to power for religion. Ironically, the most truly Christian president of all, Democrat Jimmy Carter, was an epic disappointment because he turned out to be, regarding social issues in America, a true follower of Christ's teachings.
Daniel Williams carefully follows the history without judging the participants. He reaches conclusions only when history has given the evidence. This book is a must-read for anyone interested in the way American politics works. Regarding Pat Robertson's failure to be elected president then turning to lobbying, Williams notes that having failed to come in through the front door, Robertson decided to enter through the back.
Not only is it an account of a powerful lobby but also one that shows influence can only go so far in a democracy. When a lobby faces popular dislike of the agenda being pushed then it will run up against a wall that cannot be breached. This is why attempts to force school prayer on America, or outlaw gay marriage have not succeeded at the national level. The best that can be hoped is for success in certain states, or to finesse a victory through the action of the Supreme Court. Even a Supreme Court ruling can be superceded with a new law.
Williams provides a great review of all the ways in which a minority of Americans became invigorated with their sense of political power and attempted in a variety of ways to push the country along their very specific path with abortion being the rally point. As is always the case, no movement can be absolutely united. The charismatics (fans of speaking in tongues), the fundamentalists (believers in biblical inerrancy) and the evangelicals (success is yours with Jesus!) try to get their guy in the White House but are always disappointed when the chief executive finds that religious euphoria has to bow to political reality.
This work goes on my reference shelf as it effectively lays out the interplay of religion and politics in America since the 1920's. My only regret is that it has to end at the date of publication, 2010, and cannot cover the rise to power of a man of absolutely no religious belief on the strength of the religious vote, the crowning contradiction of the movement, testimony to the desperation born of frustration with religion repeatedly denied political rule, a good thing for which we can thank the Constitution.
June 20, 2017
The Republican Party. The Religious Right. They're pretty much considered inseparable in today's American political climate. But it wasn't always so.
How exactly did the Religious Right become such a formidable force in US politics, remaking a major party in their image along the way? The traditional answer among evangelicals is that the movement spontaneously emerged in reaction to the Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion. More cynical historians trace the movement back to the racists and reactionaries who protested school desegregation.
Author Daniel K. Williams has a different answer - there has pretty much always been a movement toward political activism among religious conservatives in the US - but only starting in the 70's did they begin to be unified as a single voice. And even then - the story is complicated.
Williams's book surveys conservative political activism from the early 1920's to 2009. In those early days, religious fundamentalists saw the nation sliding into moral decay as people flocked to the cities. Women cut their hair short, Hollywood films were full of filth, people were smoking and drinking and *gasp* dancing!. Fundamentalists at the time made an effort to stem the tide, throwing their weight first behind Prohibition and then later, unsuccessfully, trying to stop the end of Prohibition. However, they weren't very organized and at the end of the day they simply didn't have the ear of the politicians in power.
That would change. Starting in the 50's a new breed of conservative Christians calling themselves evangelicals (as opposed to the fundamentalists) emerged. Their leader was evangelist Billy Graham, and he had the ear of President Eisenhower. The evangelicals of the time were pretty conservative, but they were moderates on the subject of civil rights. Most of them weren't exactly marching with MLK, but they at least tacitly approved of desegregation. Fundamentalists, meanwhile, opposed desegregation, civil rights, and inter-racial marriage. The two groups did not see eye-to-eye.
Other big issues to both fundamentalists and evangelicals was opposition to communism, not to mention those damn papists in the Catholic church. But there was too much division between the two groups to cooperate, and at the time most American Christians actually belonged to 'mainline' Protestant congregations, which were more moderate than either. However that would rapidly change in the 60's.
Many of the names that pop up in the early part of this history are still familiar - Billy Graham, of course, but also Jerry Falwell, the Bob Joneses (jr & sr), Tim LeHaye, Bill Bright, and others.
By the 70's fundamentalists and evangelicals were able to cooperate together to a greater degree, mostly because both groups accepted that civil rights was basically a done deal that they could move past. Meanwhile, these groups were growing as the mainline denominations shrank. The rise of televangelists and mega-churches meant for the first time they had legitimate demographic power.
However, things still hadn't shaken out to the current status quo. At the time there was no consensus on whether the Democrat or Republican party was the natural home of the Religious Right. Nor were things like abortion, gay rights, or school prayer the wedge issues they are today. Southern Protestants like the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) had a tradition of staying out of politics, for starters. Abortion was seen as a Catholic issue (the Catholic Church was 'Pro-Life' centuries ago). School prayer wasn't a big deal to many Protestants because they didn't want the government dictating prayer anyway. Homosexuality wasn't even on the radar of most church leaders.
In the 1970's, believe it or not, the SBC came out in favor of a liberal 'therapeutic abortion' policy - abortion in the case of rape or when the pregnancy was a danger to the mother's health. Ronald Reagan, of all people, would sign a bill legalizing exactly that into law in California about this time. Republicans, at the time, were the party of business and civil rights, and couldn't have cared less about these 'religious' issues. Black was white, up was down, cats and dogs were living together!
It took a long time of a small groups of people being very upset for these issues to start gaining traction. In 1979 conservatives in the SBC basically engineered a coup, throwing out the moderate leadership. Televangelists like Jerry Falwell decided to start political action groups. The religious right fell out of love with Jimmy Carter and instead turned to Ronald Reagan, who embraced them like no politician before. By the 80's, conservative Christians were consistently voting Republican, and the party began to open its arms to them.
Today's evangelicals often seem monolithic in nature. Good Christians vote Republican, think about specific issues in certain ways, and just generally move in lockstep. What I found insightful about this book is that it shows that it wasn't always this way by any stretch. There was a time when Christianity was not a cultural and political movement. Faith was seen as a private thing, rather than as a campaign platform. How refreshing!
Another important lesson from this book is that, as powerful as the Religious Right has become in the last 30-40 years, it has actually claimed very few policy victories. Roe v Wade is still the law of the land and shows no sign of being overturned. State-mandated prayer still has no place in school. Feminism continues marching along. Gay people can now get married.
What does this mean? That the Religious Right doesn't actually represent America. Most Americans still see their country as a place of diverse ideas and beliefs - and they're okay with that. The number of Americans who want to see the government pushing specific religious agendas appears to have a hard cap. There is not, actually, any such thing as a 'Moral Majority'.
Those who call themselves evangelicals or identify with the right would do well to remember that.
Overall I found this book to be very interesting and informative, if this is a subject you want to know more about. The author does a great job of tracing the politics of the times, the people involved, and the issues that motivated them. He does not spend time editorializing on the issues themselves. Enjoyable and eye-opening. Definitely recommended.
One last thing - this book wraps up at the beginning of Barack Obama's first term. I dearly hope that a subsequent edition will add chapters on the Obama years - and especially on how religious conservatives wound up backing the appallingly amoral Donald Trump in his presidential campaign. The next chapter on the religious right in America is still being written.
How exactly did the Religious Right become such a formidable force in US politics, remaking a major party in their image along the way? The traditional answer among evangelicals is that the movement spontaneously emerged in reaction to the Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion. More cynical historians trace the movement back to the racists and reactionaries who protested school desegregation.
Author Daniel K. Williams has a different answer - there has pretty much always been a movement toward political activism among religious conservatives in the US - but only starting in the 70's did they begin to be unified as a single voice. And even then - the story is complicated.
Williams's book surveys conservative political activism from the early 1920's to 2009. In those early days, religious fundamentalists saw the nation sliding into moral decay as people flocked to the cities. Women cut their hair short, Hollywood films were full of filth, people were smoking and drinking and *gasp* dancing!. Fundamentalists at the time made an effort to stem the tide, throwing their weight first behind Prohibition and then later, unsuccessfully, trying to stop the end of Prohibition. However, they weren't very organized and at the end of the day they simply didn't have the ear of the politicians in power.
That would change. Starting in the 50's a new breed of conservative Christians calling themselves evangelicals (as opposed to the fundamentalists) emerged. Their leader was evangelist Billy Graham, and he had the ear of President Eisenhower. The evangelicals of the time were pretty conservative, but they were moderates on the subject of civil rights. Most of them weren't exactly marching with MLK, but they at least tacitly approved of desegregation. Fundamentalists, meanwhile, opposed desegregation, civil rights, and inter-racial marriage. The two groups did not see eye-to-eye.
Other big issues to both fundamentalists and evangelicals was opposition to communism, not to mention those damn papists in the Catholic church. But there was too much division between the two groups to cooperate, and at the time most American Christians actually belonged to 'mainline' Protestant congregations, which were more moderate than either. However that would rapidly change in the 60's.
Many of the names that pop up in the early part of this history are still familiar - Billy Graham, of course, but also Jerry Falwell, the Bob Joneses (jr & sr), Tim LeHaye, Bill Bright, and others.
By the 70's fundamentalists and evangelicals were able to cooperate together to a greater degree, mostly because both groups accepted that civil rights was basically a done deal that they could move past. Meanwhile, these groups were growing as the mainline denominations shrank. The rise of televangelists and mega-churches meant for the first time they had legitimate demographic power.
However, things still hadn't shaken out to the current status quo. At the time there was no consensus on whether the Democrat or Republican party was the natural home of the Religious Right. Nor were things like abortion, gay rights, or school prayer the wedge issues they are today. Southern Protestants like the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) had a tradition of staying out of politics, for starters. Abortion was seen as a Catholic issue (the Catholic Church was 'Pro-Life' centuries ago). School prayer wasn't a big deal to many Protestants because they didn't want the government dictating prayer anyway. Homosexuality wasn't even on the radar of most church leaders.
In the 1970's, believe it or not, the SBC came out in favor of a liberal 'therapeutic abortion' policy - abortion in the case of rape or when the pregnancy was a danger to the mother's health. Ronald Reagan, of all people, would sign a bill legalizing exactly that into law in California about this time. Republicans, at the time, were the party of business and civil rights, and couldn't have cared less about these 'religious' issues. Black was white, up was down, cats and dogs were living together!
It took a long time of a small groups of people being very upset for these issues to start gaining traction. In 1979 conservatives in the SBC basically engineered a coup, throwing out the moderate leadership. Televangelists like Jerry Falwell decided to start political action groups. The religious right fell out of love with Jimmy Carter and instead turned to Ronald Reagan, who embraced them like no politician before. By the 80's, conservative Christians were consistently voting Republican, and the party began to open its arms to them.
Today's evangelicals often seem monolithic in nature. Good Christians vote Republican, think about specific issues in certain ways, and just generally move in lockstep. What I found insightful about this book is that it shows that it wasn't always this way by any stretch. There was a time when Christianity was not a cultural and political movement. Faith was seen as a private thing, rather than as a campaign platform. How refreshing!
Another important lesson from this book is that, as powerful as the Religious Right has become in the last 30-40 years, it has actually claimed very few policy victories. Roe v Wade is still the law of the land and shows no sign of being overturned. State-mandated prayer still has no place in school. Feminism continues marching along. Gay people can now get married.
What does this mean? That the Religious Right doesn't actually represent America. Most Americans still see their country as a place of diverse ideas and beliefs - and they're okay with that. The number of Americans who want to see the government pushing specific religious agendas appears to have a hard cap. There is not, actually, any such thing as a 'Moral Majority'.
Those who call themselves evangelicals or identify with the right would do well to remember that.
Overall I found this book to be very interesting and informative, if this is a subject you want to know more about. The author does a great job of tracing the politics of the times, the people involved, and the issues that motivated them. He does not spend time editorializing on the issues themselves. Enjoyable and eye-opening. Definitely recommended.
One last thing - this book wraps up at the beginning of Barack Obama's first term. I dearly hope that a subsequent edition will add chapters on the Obama years - and especially on how religious conservatives wound up backing the appallingly amoral Donald Trump in his presidential campaign. The next chapter on the religious right in America is still being written.
October 8, 2011
Excellent read. I was greatly encouraged by this book == the book is about the making of the Christian Right. While we are all very aware of how many times Christian activists have been double-crossed by the Republos, this book makes it very clear how deep in the soup we would all be if there had been no pressure from evangelical Christians.
February 2, 2023
I learned so much about the Religious Right. This book is exhaustively researched and detailed. I'm curious how Williams would explain the Trump Years and the neo-fascism that now pervades their side, as this book stops at the beginning of the Obama administration.
February 7, 2017
"My kingdom is not of this world" Jesus told us but mankind has had little interest in heeding His words. God's Own Party is a good examination of that, showing a Christian Right that starts in opposition to the Civil Rights Movement and the dangers presented by the Catholic church and continues to work today to establish a theocracy which many would be hard pressed to recognize as being based on the teachings of Jesus Christ. There are so many good points in this book but I'll cover just a few of my favorites.
"Jimmy Carter did not expect a conflict with evangelicals when he entered the White House. At the beginning of his administration, he gave every indication that he would be one of the most religiously devout presidents that the nation had had in decades. . . .His view of religion centered on personal piety, not public morality. He continued to cling to a centuries old Baptist tradition of church -state separation. "
In spite of being a regular church attender, Sunday school teacher, and writer of devotionals, Jimmy Carter did not meet the rights standard which divorced, non-church attending, astrology believing, sure as heck not able to teach Sunday school Reagan did. In short, Carter was a Christian, these men were looking for a politician who would give their brand of "faith" power - and tax cuts. I loved how the book highlighted hypocrisy - from Anita Bryant who feared the affect gays would have on family life and wound up neglecting her own to moralistic ministers who inevitably yielded to the very sins they hated in others.
The book also explained some things to me. Growing up I attended both Catholic and public schools and in both was taught that separation of church and state came about because of incidents like what happened under Henry the 8th and Queen Mary, both of whom tortured their people for being the wrong kind of Christian at the wrong time. Seeing everything that had happened in Europe as a result of a state religion, our founders were determined to offer freedom of religion here. Yet recently I've heard crazy theories that indicate the opposite and I wondered where they had come from. Seems like they came from Reagan who said, "The first amendment was written not to protect the people and their laws from religious values, but to protect those values from government tyranny." The first amendment is to protect us from having religious values inform our laws. It protects us from government tyranny only in the sense that it keeps government from being involved in church - and church from being involved in state. I'm flabbergasted that people are so quick to shove this vital protection aside in order to form a culture of which they approve (but can not themselves live up to.)
I also wondered about the term moral majority because growing up in a conservative area I never saw the majority having Christian values. The book cleared this up for me when I learned about the inflation of numbers utilized by Falwell et al - they didn't have a majority but they talked like they did. Jesus would be so proud.
In conclusion, this book showed me the very great gulf that exists between the Christian Right and genuine followers of Jesus Christ. For all those wondering about a guide the underhanded politics that put our current president in power and why people who call themselves Christian resemble in no way the founder of their faith, look no further. This book is a pedantic but thorough look at how the so called "right" became so very wrong.
"Jimmy Carter did not expect a conflict with evangelicals when he entered the White House. At the beginning of his administration, he gave every indication that he would be one of the most religiously devout presidents that the nation had had in decades. . . .His view of religion centered on personal piety, not public morality. He continued to cling to a centuries old Baptist tradition of church -state separation. "
In spite of being a regular church attender, Sunday school teacher, and writer of devotionals, Jimmy Carter did not meet the rights standard which divorced, non-church attending, astrology believing, sure as heck not able to teach Sunday school Reagan did. In short, Carter was a Christian, these men were looking for a politician who would give their brand of "faith" power - and tax cuts. I loved how the book highlighted hypocrisy - from Anita Bryant who feared the affect gays would have on family life and wound up neglecting her own to moralistic ministers who inevitably yielded to the very sins they hated in others.
The book also explained some things to me. Growing up I attended both Catholic and public schools and in both was taught that separation of church and state came about because of incidents like what happened under Henry the 8th and Queen Mary, both of whom tortured their people for being the wrong kind of Christian at the wrong time. Seeing everything that had happened in Europe as a result of a state religion, our founders were determined to offer freedom of religion here. Yet recently I've heard crazy theories that indicate the opposite and I wondered where they had come from. Seems like they came from Reagan who said, "The first amendment was written not to protect the people and their laws from religious values, but to protect those values from government tyranny." The first amendment is to protect us from having religious values inform our laws. It protects us from government tyranny only in the sense that it keeps government from being involved in church - and church from being involved in state. I'm flabbergasted that people are so quick to shove this vital protection aside in order to form a culture of which they approve (but can not themselves live up to.)
I also wondered about the term moral majority because growing up in a conservative area I never saw the majority having Christian values. The book cleared this up for me when I learned about the inflation of numbers utilized by Falwell et al - they didn't have a majority but they talked like they did. Jesus would be so proud.
In conclusion, this book showed me the very great gulf that exists between the Christian Right and genuine followers of Jesus Christ. For all those wondering about a guide the underhanded politics that put our current president in power and why people who call themselves Christian resemble in no way the founder of their faith, look no further. This book is a pedantic but thorough look at how the so called "right" became so very wrong.
September 14, 2016
An enthralling account of the Christian Right's rise and marriage to the GOP. Daniel K. Williams begins in the 1920s and ends in the early years of President Barack Obama's first term (the majority of the book spans the Nixon-George W. years). Williams reminds us that conservative Christianity's ties to the Republicans are remarkably new, that for a long time the South was dominated by the Democrats. As the twentieth century advanced, conservative Christians shifted from alarm and fear towards communism to alarm and fear towards secular liberalism.
It is fascinating seeing fundamentalists and evangelicals initially avoid politics before the Christian Right became a dominant force; more focus would have been given to individual, rather than social, transformation. Additionally, until the radical cultural revolutions of the 1960s, religious conservatives probably did not feel as if their moral order was threatened. Once abortion, gay rights, feminism and other contested social issues began fissuring the nation, conservative Christians turned to politics to preserve the moral order from liberal usurpation.
It is also amazing seeing the transformation of inter-Christian relations and how astonishingly recent conservative Protestant and Roman Catholic ties have been (although fundamentalists such as the Bob Jones clan stubbornly scorned this softening stance). Abortion and opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment, spearheaded by Catholic Phyllis Schlafly (the latter bringing together conservative Protestant, Catholic and Mormon women), helped establish a political ecumenism among religious voters. Though many Protestants were nervous about John F. Kennedy's Catholicism, now the Christian Right flocks to conservative Catholic politicians such as Rick Santorum and Paul Ryan. As well, within Protestantism fundamentalists have often been leery of charismatics.
Williams carefully differentiates and discusses the political activity of both evangelicals (in the vein of figures like Billy Graham, Charles Colson and Rick Warren) and fundamentalists (in the vein of Jerry Falwell and Randall Terry). Williams also pays particular attention to Baptists, especially Falwell and the Southern Baptist Convention. Williams notes that it was only in 1979 that the SBC was subject to a conservative takeover; before that it had been a more mainline denomination. I was surprised to learn that the Moral Majority, even at its height, wasn't very large and that Pat Robertson's (who figures prominently in the book) later Christian Coalition was much larger and influential, especially with Ralph Reed at the helm.
The Republicans continually wooed the Christian Right but as Williams makes clear, for the most part the Christian Right was duped. Occasionally legislation passed that appeased them but the Christian Right has been unable to prevent or turn back abortion and same-sex marriage. Though many conservative Christians have been elected to office, they have proven ineffectual and even Ronald Reagan, the darling of the Republican party, let down religious conservatives by appointing more moderate/liberal nominees to the Supreme Court.
While the book is excellent and detailed,it is strange reading "God's Own Party" in summer 2016, with Donald Trump, the least religious Republican (presumptive) presidential nominee in decades poised to lead the GOP into the election in the fall. Williams ends the book speculating as to whether the Christian Right will survive while also concluding with a brief analysis of shifting social engagement by younger evangelicals to have rejected the antiquated and defensive culture war mentality of Falwell, Robertson, et al. Though Trump has (shockingly!) received the endorsements of Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell Jr., many religious conservatives are also aghast at his demeanour and statements and many have suggested voting for a third party or abstaining from voting at all. It will be interesting to investigate the Christian Right's activity during this election cycle. Readers would do well to read this alongside David R. Schwartz's "Moral Minority: The Evangelical Left in an Age of Conservatism."
It is fascinating seeing fundamentalists and evangelicals initially avoid politics before the Christian Right became a dominant force; more focus would have been given to individual, rather than social, transformation. Additionally, until the radical cultural revolutions of the 1960s, religious conservatives probably did not feel as if their moral order was threatened. Once abortion, gay rights, feminism and other contested social issues began fissuring the nation, conservative Christians turned to politics to preserve the moral order from liberal usurpation.
It is also amazing seeing the transformation of inter-Christian relations and how astonishingly recent conservative Protestant and Roman Catholic ties have been (although fundamentalists such as the Bob Jones clan stubbornly scorned this softening stance). Abortion and opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment, spearheaded by Catholic Phyllis Schlafly (the latter bringing together conservative Protestant, Catholic and Mormon women), helped establish a political ecumenism among religious voters. Though many Protestants were nervous about John F. Kennedy's Catholicism, now the Christian Right flocks to conservative Catholic politicians such as Rick Santorum and Paul Ryan. As well, within Protestantism fundamentalists have often been leery of charismatics.
Williams carefully differentiates and discusses the political activity of both evangelicals (in the vein of figures like Billy Graham, Charles Colson and Rick Warren) and fundamentalists (in the vein of Jerry Falwell and Randall Terry). Williams also pays particular attention to Baptists, especially Falwell and the Southern Baptist Convention. Williams notes that it was only in 1979 that the SBC was subject to a conservative takeover; before that it had been a more mainline denomination. I was surprised to learn that the Moral Majority, even at its height, wasn't very large and that Pat Robertson's (who figures prominently in the book) later Christian Coalition was much larger and influential, especially with Ralph Reed at the helm.
The Republicans continually wooed the Christian Right but as Williams makes clear, for the most part the Christian Right was duped. Occasionally legislation passed that appeased them but the Christian Right has been unable to prevent or turn back abortion and same-sex marriage. Though many conservative Christians have been elected to office, they have proven ineffectual and even Ronald Reagan, the darling of the Republican party, let down religious conservatives by appointing more moderate/liberal nominees to the Supreme Court.
While the book is excellent and detailed,it is strange reading "God's Own Party" in summer 2016, with Donald Trump, the least religious Republican (presumptive) presidential nominee in decades poised to lead the GOP into the election in the fall. Williams ends the book speculating as to whether the Christian Right will survive while also concluding with a brief analysis of shifting social engagement by younger evangelicals to have rejected the antiquated and defensive culture war mentality of Falwell, Robertson, et al. Though Trump has (shockingly!) received the endorsements of Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell Jr., many religious conservatives are also aghast at his demeanour and statements and many have suggested voting for a third party or abstaining from voting at all. It will be interesting to investigate the Christian Right's activity during this election cycle. Readers would do well to read this alongside David R. Schwartz's "Moral Minority: The Evangelical Left in an Age of Conservatism."
February 17, 2017
Really ought to be required reading for every Christian in America. Written from a careful, objective perspective, Williams looks starts with the decidedly progressive 19th c. evangelical movement's transformation into the conservative movement familiar to people today, under the influence of anti-communism, anti-feminism, and anxiety about pluralism and secularism in the public square.
Also uplifting. If the unholy alliance (my words, not Williams) between Christianity and the GOP rose up in such a short period of time, Lord knows it can be dismantled just as quickly. Let's find some politicians and faith leaders to do it.
Also uplifting. If the unholy alliance (my words, not Williams) between Christianity and the GOP rose up in such a short period of time, Lord knows it can be dismantled just as quickly. Let's find some politicians and faith leaders to do it.
April 6, 2016
As I always say, one book is never enough, but Williams's book helped me understand the Christian Right and its various roots. It helped me understand why so many conservative Christians feel persecuted and how they strategize to build that feeling of persecution into political motivation. It helped me to better understand Super PACs and how people with narrow interests but lots of money can influence national politics and national culture. I did not grow up in an overtly religious household but I understand the conservative Protestant culture I grew up in (and despised) better. The deep-seated resentment I have toward where I grew up, why I cannot speak with some family members except to be cordially respectful, it's all in a book about things I don't think I care about but nevertheless affect me.
April 15, 2011
Great book. As I have said, I love books that explain how we've gotten where we are. This is a history of the stumbling, staggered rise of the Christian right to dominate the GOP. Its the story of those who have put on the full armor of the Good Ol Party.
After reading the Sutton book on Aimee McPherson, this was a great follow up. It begins in the culture wars of the 1920's and goes on to Nixon's duping of Graham, the Moral majority and the worldly waltz of Pat Robertson. It is a shallow and narrow orthodoxy that Christians are willing to accept in the disingenuous talk of politicians.
After reading the Sutton book on Aimee McPherson, this was a great follow up. It begins in the culture wars of the 1920's and goes on to Nixon's duping of Graham, the Moral majority and the worldly waltz of Pat Robertson. It is a shallow and narrow orthodoxy that Christians are willing to accept in the disingenuous talk of politicians.
May 21, 2024
This is one of my favorite single-volume historical explorations of the roots of the Christian Right in American politics (though a caveat: it's equal parts disorienting AND illuminating to read this in the Trump-era).
What sets this book apart, for me, is William's exploration of some of the deeper roots of the movement, rather than starting in the 70s, or even the 60s. He begins in the early 1900s, though the book really gains traction in the 40s, with the establishment of the NAE, the prominence of Graham, and especially the civil religion of Eisenhower. Of the many, many insightful sections, a few that stand out are the theme of anti-communism, the prominence of anti-Catholicism, the shifts in political posturing around Kennedy, his discussion of the disappointment with Jimmy Carter in the White House, the several sections devoted to the Supreme Court and cultural issues like "prayer in school," and his clear delineation between "fundamentalists" and "evangelicals" over the decades (even though the use of those labels is always contested and frequently slippery). In general, the reader of this book gains a ton of insight into key historical developments, consistent cultural currents, and the very-strong antecedents that propelled the action of the 80s and 90s into such prominence. An excellent, excellent historical study for anyone interested in American religious and political history.
What sets this book apart, for me, is William's exploration of some of the deeper roots of the movement, rather than starting in the 70s, or even the 60s. He begins in the early 1900s, though the book really gains traction in the 40s, with the establishment of the NAE, the prominence of Graham, and especially the civil religion of Eisenhower. Of the many, many insightful sections, a few that stand out are the theme of anti-communism, the prominence of anti-Catholicism, the shifts in political posturing around Kennedy, his discussion of the disappointment with Jimmy Carter in the White House, the several sections devoted to the Supreme Court and cultural issues like "prayer in school," and his clear delineation between "fundamentalists" and "evangelicals" over the decades (even though the use of those labels is always contested and frequently slippery). In general, the reader of this book gains a ton of insight into key historical developments, consistent cultural currents, and the very-strong antecedents that propelled the action of the 80s and 90s into such prominence. An excellent, excellent historical study for anyone interested in American religious and political history.
January 25, 2025
Read this for my independent study. A very well done history of “The Christian Right.” It’s pretty standard, following a chronological history of the movement from the 1920s until the book’s publication in 2010. I appreciated its focus on major figures of the movement to ground the historical narrative. Williams’ categories of “fundamentalist” and “evangelical” might be a little flimsy at points, but I can understand the need for looser categorization, especially by the book’s discussion of the Reagan era forward. Also, I have to applaud Williams for not closing off possibilities of what is to come for the Religious Right in the 2010s in comparison to other books I’ve read from the Obama era which presumptuously declare the culture wars as over! Williams ends with, “At the beginning of the Obama administration, the Christian Right is still many millions strong, and well positioned to continue exerting its influence in national life. Conservative Christian leaders still have faith that, with the help of God and the Republican Party, they can restore a Christian moral order to the nation.” (276)
September 16, 2019
This was a fascinating exploration of a clearly relevant contemporary topic, told in lucid, bipartisan prose. The worry with histories like this is that they are extremely biased, or argumentative; but Williams here presents a rather straightforward account that engages a LOT of material straight from the participants themselves, painting a comprehensive portrait of the development of the Christian Right in all its guises, for good or for ill. Williams's writing is straightforward but persuasive, gradually and effectively building the picture in the minds of the readers, carefully exploring motivations, fallout, in-fighting, and other elements that show how Christian leaders have been remarkably human in both inspiring and despicable ways. The title and headline of the book is provocative, rightly so given the actual story unfolding in its pages. For those interested in religion, politics, and the contemporary situation we find ourselves in, this is a book from which people on both sides of the issues can learn, and which provides a great deal of material for discussion.
May 21, 2025
A comprehensive summary of right-wing evangelical political action from Eisenhower to Obama. Very good, but probably in need of an expansion or new edition.
I was impressed how fair Williams was throughout. The usual posse – Falwell, Robertson, Graham, etc. – were portrayed as actual people, neither canonized nor demonized. Williams mostly refrains from offering any explicit analysis and contents himself with merely painting the picture. I would have appreciated some more Noll or Marsden style depth, but that's simply not the style Williams is going for.
Another positive (but also a potential negative): Williams' 2010 book doesn't suffer from the retrospective bias that post-Trump histories of the Religious Right frequently contain. The election(s) of Trump will rightly be the climactic jewel in future Religious Right historiography, but I think the pre-Trump perspective of Williams here is eminently clarifying.
Also, to whom it may concern: Ed Harrell had a hand in critiquing and reviewing an early draft of this manuscript.
I was impressed how fair Williams was throughout. The usual posse – Falwell, Robertson, Graham, etc. – were portrayed as actual people, neither canonized nor demonized. Williams mostly refrains from offering any explicit analysis and contents himself with merely painting the picture. I would have appreciated some more Noll or Marsden style depth, but that's simply not the style Williams is going for.
Another positive (but also a potential negative): Williams' 2010 book doesn't suffer from the retrospective bias that post-Trump histories of the Religious Right frequently contain. The election(s) of Trump will rightly be the climactic jewel in future Religious Right historiography, but I think the pre-Trump perspective of Williams here is eminently clarifying.
Also, to whom it may concern: Ed Harrell had a hand in critiquing and reviewing an early draft of this manuscript.
January 10, 2022
williams does a thorough job with the history here, so this book is great if you’re looking for a resource to cover the grounds of the christian right. and yet, it feels as if williams meanders through the history rather than telling a cultural narrative of the evolution of christian conservatism in the second half of the twentieth century. i happen to think this is a historiographical error due to his focus primarily on elections as the inciting incidents for change as opposed to many other cultural and political moments. similarly, williams, in my opinion, overemphasizes the role of institutional leaders as agents of change with basically no consideration of the foot soldiers in these movements.
Read
March 23, 2022DNF'd at 167 pages.
Williams did his research, no question about it. His notes and citations run for over 60 pages. I have zero scrutiny when it comes to his empiricism.
Yet a good history book does more than relay facts and reveal the odd connection between events. It speaks to a greater story, drawing some conclusion or building up to a bigger picture. Indicating how everything comes together. Perhaps I just didn't stick around long enough, but at over halfway through I had already pulled my biggest lessons on the dangers of politics intermixing with religion. It felt there was little more to learn from repetition.
Williams did his research, no question about it. His notes and citations run for over 60 pages. I have zero scrutiny when it comes to his empiricism.
Yet a good history book does more than relay facts and reveal the odd connection between events. It speaks to a greater story, drawing some conclusion or building up to a bigger picture. Indicating how everything comes together. Perhaps I just didn't stick around long enough, but at over halfway through I had already pulled my biggest lessons on the dangers of politics intermixing with religion. It felt there was little more to learn from repetition.
December 16, 2021
This was a very good book about the recent political machinations of the religious right. As with most of these sorts of books, you can quibble over whether he appropriately emphasizes some facet or other – race or gender, class or education, abortion or the ERA. But all of these issues at least get a mention, and Williams does a good job focusing on certain aspects other historians of this era have missed, such as the strident anti-Catholicism in the early days of the religious right, or the turn away from democracy and toward judicial power in its latter days.
October 31, 2016
Interesting, but I feel like the argument is missing something . . . can't quite put my finger on what it is. I have to read four other books on the exact same topic for my final historiography paper, though; so once I get a chance to compare them all, hopefully I'll be able to figure it out :-)
November 14, 2023
Probably the best single book on the formation of the Christian Right in America. Williams' work is well-researched, well-written, and well worth your time, especially if you want to understand why the Republican Party currently is what it is.
As someone who claims to know a fair bit about the Christian Right, I have no real nits to pick.
As someone who claims to know a fair bit about the Christian Right, I have no real nits to pick.
June 21, 2023
Really good pre-trump era reference guide but of course, trumps presidency changes everything.
May 4, 2024
A good read detailing the history of the "religious right" in the USA.
Williams outlines how different evangelicals and fundamentalists were in the 20th century, and how they frequently clashed. Evangelicals (eg. Billy Graham) supported civil rights, but fundamentalists (eg. Jerry Falwell, Bob Jones Jr, & John Rice) did not. Fundamentalists were unhappy with the apex court for its decisions such as Engel (concerning prayer in schools) and Schempp (concerning devotional Bible reading in schools), while evangelicals were not. Fundamentalists got into bed early with politicians like Goldwater (for purposes linked to the two factors listed above), while evangelicals stayed out of politics until later. The two often clashed, and fundamentalists have even denounced Billy Graham over segregation. It is not written in the stars that evangelicals are synonymous with fundamentalism, as is the case today, and it was fascinating to see how these two threads were slowly weaved together into one "evangelical" movement (/religious right).
It is also interesting to see how the stance of evangelicals changed on issues which seem core to the movement today. For example, concerning abortion pre-Roe (and even immediately after Roe), it was mainly Roman Catholic activists that were against laws permitting abortions, while evangelicals remained mostly silent. Williams submits that it was due to evangelicals not having a "tradition of antiabortion church teaching dating back to the first centuries of Christianity" to draw from, but I have my doubts with that explanation since it seems to neglect Protestant and evangelical traditions that have a high view of tradition. Nevertheless, the phenomena that most evangelicals were not as dogmatic about abortion (compared to decades later in the present day) remains.
The rest of the book was fairly standard stuff –evangelicals mobilised around issues relating to abortion and same-sex marriage, became a key constituency for the Republican party, and shifted the focus of their advocacy to the judiciary. Indeed, the promise of conservative justices was one of the big promises that caused many to vote for Trump in 2020 (despite other factors which would ordinarily be undesirable to evangelicals).
Williams ended his book on a hopeful note of Rick Warren's rising influence and the brand of evangelicalism he championed – caring about social issues such as poverty and AIDS, and also less confrontational and polarising than his predecessors such as Falwell, Robertson, Reed, and Dobson. Might the election of Trump in 2020 signal that American evangelicalism has failed to develop along this hopeful trend? I don't think so, especially given the fact that, post-Trump, many evangelicals have begun to re-examine the role of the evangelical movement in politics and how the way evangelicals behave in the political sphere is affecting their ministries. It is also a good sign that evangelicals such as Russell Moore are forcing evangelicals to think hard about their getting into bed with Republican politics. Given the above and the Dobbs decision overturning Roe, I anticipate the evangelical movement in the next decade looking very different from that in the past decade.
How evangelicals will change their political behaviour is up for speculation, but one thing is almost certain, based on the history outlined by Williams – Evangelicals are still very much relevant in the American political scene, as can be seen by multiple premature declarations of declining evangelical influence. It will thus be unwise to write off the evangelical moment on account of the scandals plaguing it today, instead of looking for how it will adapt to a new political landscape. Evangelicals may be God's own people, but the Republican party is not necessarily God's own party.
Williams outlines how different evangelicals and fundamentalists were in the 20th century, and how they frequently clashed. Evangelicals (eg. Billy Graham) supported civil rights, but fundamentalists (eg. Jerry Falwell, Bob Jones Jr, & John Rice) did not. Fundamentalists were unhappy with the apex court for its decisions such as Engel (concerning prayer in schools) and Schempp (concerning devotional Bible reading in schools), while evangelicals were not. Fundamentalists got into bed early with politicians like Goldwater (for purposes linked to the two factors listed above), while evangelicals stayed out of politics until later. The two often clashed, and fundamentalists have even denounced Billy Graham over segregation. It is not written in the stars that evangelicals are synonymous with fundamentalism, as is the case today, and it was fascinating to see how these two threads were slowly weaved together into one "evangelical" movement (/religious right).
It is also interesting to see how the stance of evangelicals changed on issues which seem core to the movement today. For example, concerning abortion pre-Roe (and even immediately after Roe), it was mainly Roman Catholic activists that were against laws permitting abortions, while evangelicals remained mostly silent. Williams submits that it was due to evangelicals not having a "tradition of antiabortion church teaching dating back to the first centuries of Christianity" to draw from, but I have my doubts with that explanation since it seems to neglect Protestant and evangelical traditions that have a high view of tradition. Nevertheless, the phenomena that most evangelicals were not as dogmatic about abortion (compared to decades later in the present day) remains.
The rest of the book was fairly standard stuff –evangelicals mobilised around issues relating to abortion and same-sex marriage, became a key constituency for the Republican party, and shifted the focus of their advocacy to the judiciary. Indeed, the promise of conservative justices was one of the big promises that caused many to vote for Trump in 2020 (despite other factors which would ordinarily be undesirable to evangelicals).
Williams ended his book on a hopeful note of Rick Warren's rising influence and the brand of evangelicalism he championed – caring about social issues such as poverty and AIDS, and also less confrontational and polarising than his predecessors such as Falwell, Robertson, Reed, and Dobson. Might the election of Trump in 2020 signal that American evangelicalism has failed to develop along this hopeful trend? I don't think so, especially given the fact that, post-Trump, many evangelicals have begun to re-examine the role of the evangelical movement in politics and how the way evangelicals behave in the political sphere is affecting their ministries. It is also a good sign that evangelicals such as Russell Moore are forcing evangelicals to think hard about their getting into bed with Republican politics. Given the above and the Dobbs decision overturning Roe, I anticipate the evangelical movement in the next decade looking very different from that in the past decade.
How evangelicals will change their political behaviour is up for speculation, but one thing is almost certain, based on the history outlined by Williams – Evangelicals are still very much relevant in the American political scene, as can be seen by multiple premature declarations of declining evangelical influence. It will thus be unwise to write off the evangelical moment on account of the scandals plaguing it today, instead of looking for how it will adapt to a new political landscape. Evangelicals may be God's own people, but the Republican party is not necessarily God's own party.
March 22, 2012
Wow! A history of hope, a history of despair. A history of victory, a history of defeat. A story of people with character rising up in great courage and conviction, and a story of people with few principles giving up and giving in. And as these histories and stories occur on both the political and religious sides, Daniel K. Williams writes a remarkable, well-documented narrative of the birth and rise of Christian involvement in politics in the 20th and 21st centuries in America.
Showing a mastery of historical facts in the political realm and even being able to distinguish between a fundamentalist and an evangelical in the Christian realm, Williams is clearly qualified to write about this subject with authority. And along with that authority he brings an amazing writing ability to continually engage the reader.
Regardless of your views of the Democratic or Republican party (or even if you have a distaste for a two-party system), this book will certainly educate you on American history with regards to Christian fundamentalism, Evangelicalism, and the political strategies employed by both Democrats and Republicans as they begin to recognize the importance of the Christian vote in today's America.
Some things in this book you may already know. Some things are sure to surprise you! Either way, Williams well articulates to all whether for good or for ill how the Grand Old Party became "God's Own Party" as the majority of born-again Christians have at some point (whether out of conscious choice or out of necessity) adopted the Republican party as their own, and how the Republican party (whether out of conscious choice or out of necessity) has adopted the "Christian Right" as their own(!).
Whatever the case, this is a compelling read for understanding the issue, and it deserves to be read by all those interested in this fascinating subject.
Showing a mastery of historical facts in the political realm and even being able to distinguish between a fundamentalist and an evangelical in the Christian realm, Williams is clearly qualified to write about this subject with authority. And along with that authority he brings an amazing writing ability to continually engage the reader.
Regardless of your views of the Democratic or Republican party (or even if you have a distaste for a two-party system), this book will certainly educate you on American history with regards to Christian fundamentalism, Evangelicalism, and the political strategies employed by both Democrats and Republicans as they begin to recognize the importance of the Christian vote in today's America.
Some things in this book you may already know. Some things are sure to surprise you! Either way, Williams well articulates to all whether for good or for ill how the Grand Old Party became "God's Own Party" as the majority of born-again Christians have at some point (whether out of conscious choice or out of necessity) adopted the Republican party as their own, and how the Republican party (whether out of conscious choice or out of necessity) has adopted the "Christian Right" as their own(!).
Whatever the case, this is a compelling read for understanding the issue, and it deserves to be read by all those interested in this fascinating subject.
March 6, 2013
The author explains the origins of the Christian Right movement, in particular that movement's capture of the Republican Party. The author traces the origin of the movement in the 1920's in its reaction against the teaching of evolution and later communism, though this is somewhat unconvincing. Except for the chapters on Billy Graham and his influence in the Eisenhower and Nixon administrations, the book doesn't really get going until the 1970s and the Christian Right's reactions against what it would later call "secular humanism", e.g., abortion, gay rights, and restrictions on school prayer. Although my biased opinion is that this is a reactionary theocratic movement, proceeding from some idealized vision of a Christian nation that never really existed, it is fascinating to read about the tactics and political successes of this well mobilized, ideologically-driven minority. One small criticism, the author does differentiate between Evangelicals and Fundamentalists, but the theological differences (if any) aren't really very well explained and I walked away with the understanding that the differences are probably based more on style than anything else.
June 21, 2023
This book was an enormous eye opener for me. Its subject is the relationship between the political Right in this country (largely the Republican Party} and Christianity. He covers the history of this relationship all the way back to the beginning of the 1900s, and the southern Baptist Convention and even a little bit of the end of the 1800s. In summary, this book has made me aware of the historical underpinnings of just about EVERYTHING that is happening in the United States right now with both politics and Christianity, especially the ultra conservative and right-wing members of the Republican party. It is a fascinating read and I recommend it to anyone who is trying to make sense of current events in 2022. And I am concerned because Donald Trump and his supporters are using many of the same morally questionable tactics which have been tried and tested and proven to work over that long history which this book covers.
February 2, 2012
A straight forward account of the Christian Right with no bias one way or the other. I learned it's not a recent phenomenon. Conservative Christians have been trying to restore the US to what they believe is a Christian nation for over a century. Overall, they have failed in their endeavors but they have never given up even now. Their most recent strategy was to gain control of the Republican Party. But their heroes--Nixon, Reagan, Bush--never quite fulfill their hopes. Now in 2012 they have a choice between a Mormon and an an adulterer, not exactly a high moment in their effort. Where else in the world are evangelicals so politically focused?
May 30, 2018
This is an important read, especially for people of faith. As I read this, I was reminded of all the lies I have believed over the years because I believed the sources of those lies to be honest and trustworthy. Today there is such an abundance of lies especially in the church that threaten to rob the church of its authority.
October 23, 2022
A history of the relationship between the Republican party and the majority of "Evangelicals". This book sometimes felt personal, because I grew up knowing the names mentioned in the book, but, not really hearing of or thinking of their role in political circles.
February 20, 2011
A good academic history of the movements. Entertaining read if you have an interested in this area.
October 27, 2011
The successes and foibles of the Christian Right. Williams does a good job being impartial and objective.
July 12, 2014
Excellent work. Best book on rise of Evangelical political movement in GOP
August 29, 2012
Pretty decent.
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