An Outrage Beyond All Others: The Use Of Religion to Assault Democracy

There is a fairly well-know idiom, “give someone an inch and they’ll take a mile” that describes a person or group who has been given a small amount of power or freedom to do something, and then attempts to seize a lot more, or unlimited, power. That sense of entitlement is often the result of giving preferential treatment to a person or group over and above that of everyone else, and it is likely why the Founding Fathers did not single out any group as having supremacy or special rights over any other. It is true the Founders gave preferential treatment to white male landowners, but the Ninth Amendment provided a means for future lawmakers to give equal footing to the entire population. Where the Founders did not give preferential treatment or privileges was for religious adherents, and they included the Establishment Clause to ensure that future generations would never face the threat of religious imposition due to preferential treatment from the government.

Within 24 hours of the Hobby Lobby ruling, there were two statements from Christian fundamentalists that demonstrate exactly what happens when a group has been given a small amount of power or freedom and then attempts to gain much more. The first statement, “My religion trumps your right to (fill in the blank) is precisely why the Founders included the 1st Amendment’s Establishment Clause the High Court’s conservatives’ Hobby Lobby ruling demolished according to constitutional scholars and lawyers. The second statement was in a letter to the President within 24 hours of the ruling warning him he better start “giving deference to the Christian prerogative” that is also a direct result of the conservative Court neutering the Establishment Clause. However, the idea of government “deference to the Christian prerogative” began long before Hobby Lobby, and it is the result of giving the religious right an inch that inspired them to take a mile.

There is not one specific instance of deference to the Christian prerogative that is bringing Americans closer to a theocracy, but rather, a combination of government actions that not only violated the Establishment Clause, they gave the religious right freedoms and power over and above that of every other American. Now, the American people are beginning to realize the danger, and folly, of “government deference to the Christian prerogative” that began in earnest when the B-movie actor Ronald Reagan gave the moral majority a voice in the direction of government. Because Reagan set the precedent, every President since then keeps religious advisors close to the White House.