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Authors: Lawrence Kaplan
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been in the direction of increased cultural and economic penetration of the peripheries and increased government intervention in the lives of individuals. I suggest that increased intrusion is more important than increased liberalism because it is the "proximity" of what offends that defines the extent of the offense. Conservative Protestants always knew that people in Los Angeles or New York were desperate sinners, but so long as they could live in their own shared and socially constructed subsection of America, it was not something that really hurt.
Some subsocieties and subcultures are geographical; they are regional peripheries, backwaters, or "ghettos." Others are social constructions which can, with effort, be sustained in the "centers" of modernity. However, in either form, such subcultures depend on structural conditions permitting their survival. Conservative Protes-
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tants felt themselves pushed into political action because they saw the state making increasing demands on them. They used to have racially segregated schools which began the day with public prayers. Racial integration is now public policy and the courts enforce a strict separation of church and state. Conservative Protestants react by establishing their own independent Christian schools. The state then intervenes again, depriving those which appear to be segregationist of their tax-exempt status and supporting those state legislatures that require the licensing even of independent schools. It is this sense of having their autonomy reduced which explains the considerable hostility to cosmopolitan America. This point is important in responding to Miller (1985) and others who wish to deny the novelty of the new Christian right. The sense of grievance which led to the mobilization of the NCR is qualitatively different from early conservative Protestant political movements. The rejection of liberal cosmopolitanism is common to the fundamentalism of the 1920s and the 1970s, but the replacement of world communism by secular humanism as the bogeyman represents an important change. Communism was "out there" somewhere. Although fundamentalist leaders such as McIntire and Hargis (Forster and Epstein 1964) followed Senator McCarthy in seeing signs of communist infiltration in the heart of American institutions, communism was always a somewhat remote threat. The most recent wave of fundamentalist politicization is a response to changes that need very little social construction to appear to be just beyond the glow of the campfire.
Increasing secularity and liberalism could have been ignored by fundamentalists so long as they were permitted the social space in which to create and maintain their separate social institutions. Unfortunately for them, it is in the nature of modern industrial societies to reduce that social space.
There is nothing new about such boundary disputes. Many previous contests have occurred between particular religious minorities and the state. The Mormons were forced to abandon polygamy. Jehovah's Witnesses and Christian Scientists have come into conflict with the state over their refusal to permit such medical interventions as blood transfusions. In most states some sort of accommodation has been achieved, with religious exceptions to general laws being
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permitted. But what distinguishes the Mormons, the Witnesses, and the Christian Scientists is that they were despised minorities who were pleased to be tolerated and who had no great imperial ambitions. What makes the recent church-state conflicts serious is that they involve a very large minority that has imperial ambitions. Not surprisingly, given that their beliefs and values, language and thought once dominated very large parts of America, conservative Protestants want to see themselves as a moral majority .
To summarize, the people whom Jerry Falwell represents have not grown dramatically in numbers in the last fifteen years, although their ability to utilize new
Some subsocieties and subcultures are geographical; they are regional peripheries, backwaters, or "ghettos." Others are social constructions which can, with effort, be sustained in the "centers" of modernity. However, in either form, such subcultures depend on structural conditions permitting their survival. Conservative Protes-
Page 44
tants felt themselves pushed into political action because they saw the state making increasing demands on them. They used to have racially segregated schools which began the day with public prayers. Racial integration is now public policy and the courts enforce a strict separation of church and state. Conservative Protestants react by establishing their own independent Christian schools. The state then intervenes again, depriving those which appear to be segregationist of their tax-exempt status and supporting those state legislatures that require the licensing even of independent schools. It is this sense of having their autonomy reduced which explains the considerable hostility to cosmopolitan America. This point is important in responding to Miller (1985) and others who wish to deny the novelty of the new Christian right. The sense of grievance which led to the mobilization of the NCR is qualitatively different from early conservative Protestant political movements. The rejection of liberal cosmopolitanism is common to the fundamentalism of the 1920s and the 1970s, but the replacement of world communism by secular humanism as the bogeyman represents an important change. Communism was "out there" somewhere. Although fundamentalist leaders such as McIntire and Hargis (Forster and Epstein 1964) followed Senator McCarthy in seeing signs of communist infiltration in the heart of American institutions, communism was always a somewhat remote threat. The most recent wave of fundamentalist politicization is a response to changes that need very little social construction to appear to be just beyond the glow of the campfire.
Increasing secularity and liberalism could have been ignored by fundamentalists so long as they were permitted the social space in which to create and maintain their separate social institutions. Unfortunately for them, it is in the nature of modern industrial societies to reduce that social space.
There is nothing new about such boundary disputes. Many previous contests have occurred between particular religious minorities and the state. The Mormons were forced to abandon polygamy. Jehovah's Witnesses and Christian Scientists have come into conflict with the state over their refusal to permit such medical interventions as blood transfusions. In most states some sort of accommodation has been achieved, with religious exceptions to general laws being
Page 45
permitted. But what distinguishes the Mormons, the Witnesses, and the Christian Scientists is that they were despised minorities who were pleased to be tolerated and who had no great imperial ambitions. What makes the recent church-state conflicts serious is that they involve a very large minority that has imperial ambitions. Not surprisingly, given that their beliefs and values, language and thought once dominated very large parts of America, conservative Protestants want to see themselves as a moral majority .
To summarize, the people whom Jerry Falwell represents have not grown dramatically in numbers in the last fifteen years, although their ability to utilize new
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