AMERICA'S LAST ACCEPTABLE PREJUDICE

November 3, 2008

On this the eve before voting begins for the election in which I believe America will choose Barack Obama to be the first African-American President of the United States; I am both thrilled and troubled by the steps which have gotten us to this great state of progress. While some might question Senator Obama’s policies or inexperience, neither is my concern. Senator Obama, by his very nature, exudes all the qualities that a president should possess-leadership, intelligence, and charisma, to name a few. Still, I am bothered that in this day of celebration to what may signal the fulfillment of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the ultimate lack of necessity for programs such as Affirmative Action, there remain few “acceptable” prejudices.

On September 12, 1960, presidential candidate John F. Kennedy delivered a speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association of Protestant ecclesiastical leaders addressing the subject of religion in his hope to become the first President of the United States of America who also happened to be Catholic. Many Protestants at the time were worried about his ability to lead the nation independent of his religious convictions and affiliations.

In his speech he affirmed,

“No Catholic has ever been elected president; the real issues in this campaign have been obscured — perhaps deliberately, in some quarters less responsible than this. So it is apparently necessary for me to state once again not what kind of church I believe in — for that should be important only to me — but what kind of America I believe in.

“I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish; where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source; where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials; and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.

“For while this year it may be a Catholic against whom the finger of suspicion is pointed, in other years it has been, and may someday be again, a Jew— or a Quaker or a Unitarian or a Baptist. It was Virginia's harassment of Baptist preachers, for example, that helped lead to Jefferson's statute of religious freedom. Today I may be the victim, but tomorrow it may be you — until the whole fabric of our harmonious society is ripped at a time of great national peril.

“Finally, I believe in an America where religious intolerance will someday end; where all men and all churches are treated as equal; where every man has the same right to attend or not attend the church of his choice; where there is no Catholic vote, no anti-Catholic vote, no bloc voting of any kind; and where Catholics, Protestants and Jews, at both the lay and pastoral level, will refrain from those attitudes of distain and division which have so often marred their works in the past, and promote instead the American ideal of brotherhood.

“That is the kind of America in which I believe.Yet nearly a half century after this speech, it seems that the religious concerns of yesteryear have yet to be quelled even as the younger Civil Rights Act of 1964 and its affiliated programs may have reached obsolescence as an African-American is elected President, or at the very least has garnered the Democratic nomination.

Before I illustrate further, I acknowledge being Caucasian, Republican and Mormon, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the preferred name of the Mormon faith.

As a Caucasian (white-as I prefer not to use “politically correct” vernacular when referring to myself) being raised in the Northwestern United States, I have enjoyed a life with few, if any, racial disadvantages or advantages. Just a year after graduating from high school, I spent two years working as a racial minority in the Dominican Republic, a third-world Afro-Dominican nation sharing its borders with Haiti. I am the uncle to an African-American niece, whom I love dearly.

As a Republican now residing in what may be considered the reddest of red states, I have witnessed little opposition locally to my personal political convictions. While the apparent national landscape seems to shift toward a democratic backdrop chiefly whipped up by a liberal leaning media, I have also witnessed a return to conservative values from the silent majority of Americans with whom I share political conviction. Nevertheless, citizens of all persuasions seem to share a collective hope for national economic recovery and social advancement.

As a Mormon, I studied at two of the finest universities in the land, both originating out of Christian values--Brigham Young University located in Provo, Utah and graduate studies at Harvard University , whose seal reads Ve-Ri-Tas or Latin for “truth”. It is a University named after Reverend John Harvard who in 1638 donated funds and books to the two year old institution for the purpose of training young ministers in the gospel.

Just as Harvard University has stirred away from its religious roots, I have witnessed a mass emigration toward the dark ages of religious intolerance in America only as it pertains to my faith. This small-mindedness aimed at Mormons is not seen among ecclesiastical entities as a whole, but has focused its aim toward one particular congregation known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This, I contend, is one of society’s last acceptable prejudices.

Academy Award winning actor, Ben Affleck, a democratic activist proudly representing itself as the “party of tolerance”, called on national television “the Mormonism thing really suspect”. On 2007’s season finale of “Real Time with Bill Maher”, Affleck made the predication that despite a “suspect” religion, his Massachusetts neighbor then advancing in the polls, Mitt Romney, would be the nominee.

Could you imagine in this millennium publicly calling a Jewish candidate “suspect” based only on his or her religion? Or how about that Baptist “thing being really suspect”? Those statements aimed exclusively at one religion, as well as their purveyors, do not belong in a citizenry of tolerance and democracy.

To have thoughts to this end may be natural, but to verbalize them and so openly make them in a national forum within this country only demonstrates the public distain directed towards my faith. Other religious entities or races endured through comments of this type and while I certainly do not call Ben Affleck or any other broker of prejudice a “bigot”, I wonder when the day will come in which we can demonstrate acceptance to all faiths as President Kennedy called for decades ago.

I am not so naïve so as to think that Mormonism is the last of all prejudices. I do, however, believe it is one of the few, if not the only acceptable prejudices in America relating to race, creed, color or religion. In recent years, Muslims living in this country have been threatened, put down and continue to be feared. Fear is generally a byproduct of misunderstanding or ignorance. However, would it serve as acceptable to deride any religious sect based solely on ignorance? Americans may question it privately, but no educated or tolerant American would ever dare categorize on a national forum an entire religious body as “suspect”, whether Muslim or Jew, Catholic or Lutheran.

In America we made one’s faith the underlying issue in this 2008 presidential primary race. Smeared by opponents both Democrat and Republican, by national news figures and self-proclaimed Civil Rights activists, in addition to Hollywood actors advocating open-mindedness, the national candidate who shares my faith and whom I predict to be the Republican nominee for President 2012 (just as the runner-up has done for the last thirty years, sans George W. Bush) lost this race before it began solely based on his religion.

Mitt Romney, in his December 5, 2007 address to clarify his position on religion vis-à-vis the presidency declared,

"Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom. Freedom opens the windows of the soul so that man can discover his most profound beliefs and commune with God. Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone.

"Given our grand tradition of religious tolerance and liberty, some wonder whether there are any questions regarding an aspiring candidate's religion that are appropriate. I believe there are. And I will answer them today.

"Almost 50 years ago another candidate from Massachusetts explained that he was an American running for President, not a Catholic running for President. Like him, I am an American running for President. I do not define my candidacy by my religion. A person should not be elected because of his faith nor should he be rejected because of his faith.

"Let me assure you that no authorities of my church, or of any other church for that matter, will ever exert influence on presidential decisions. Their authority is theirs, within the province of church affairs, and it ends where the affairs of the nation begin.

Two days after Romney’s speech on religion, Lawrence O’Donnell spoke out seeking to discredit Romney and claiming expertise on the Mormon faith. O’Donnell, a part-time actor and producer, turned MSNBC political analyst, currently cast as part of HBO’s series “Big Love”, depicting a modern-day polygamist not affiliated with the Mormon church, on December 7th’s McLaughlin Group, falsely accused Joseph Smith (a man whom I revere as a prophet of God just as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob), to be a rapist and a criminal. Not only was O’Donnell not fired like his MSNBC counterpart Don Imus, for using the words “nappy-headed” describing young African-Americans, he was encouraged to speak again given additional forums on radio shows and interviews with regional newspapers through mid-December.

Had he called Mohammad a rapist due to his religious practices, not only would he have lost his job, but he would have likely been threatened with his life. Had he called Moses criminal, the outrage could have paralyzed an entire network.

Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, a former Republican presidential hopeful running against Romney and an ordained Southern Baptist minister, posed the question in a December interview, "Don't Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?"

Later Huckabee apologized for accusatory comments, but the damage was done.

While denying Huckabee’s claim, Romney responded on the “Today” show by saying, "I think attacking someone's religion is really going too far. It's just not the American way, and I think people will reject that."

Civil rights activist Al Sharpton, who led the charge to have Don Imus fired for making the aforementioned racially insensitive remarks, found limited scrutiny, but nothing more after telling his audience that Mormons don’t really believe in God.

During a debate on religion and politics at the New York Public Library with atheist author Christopher Hitchens, Sharpton stated, "As for the one Mormon running for office, those that really believe in God will defeat him anyway, so don't worry about that. That's a temporary situation."

Sharpton also stated, “What I do functionally is what Dr. King, Reverend Jackson and the [civil rights] movement are all about.” As a God-fearing Caucasian, Republican and Mormon, I don’t agree that his or the other comments about Mormonism to be in line with the civil rights movement or the communal progress made since its inception.

As it turns out, enough false and publicly prejudiced comments can make a difference in the polls and the way a nation sees a candidate or his religion.

Once the party front-runner to win the Republican nomination, and certainly the candidate I believe to be the most skilled to lead us out of this current economic crisis, unprincipled use of the first amendment right of free speech claimed him as a presidential casualty not based on his polices, political or business prowess, but because of his religion.

It is this discrimination, not racial, not socio-economic, but against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints which I believe to be one of America’s Last Acceptable Prejudices.

With hope for a more equitable future,

James Clarke