From European Calvinism to American Evangelicalism: Progressivism, Conservatism, and Beyond the Republican Party
By Marcia Pally

As the U.S. presidential campaign progresses, it has been a matter of some curiosity how European Calvinism, with its étatism and stern, God-centered notions of Grace, became anti-authoritarian, man-centered evangelicalism in the U.S. And how did this approach to Protestantism come to have such impact on U.S. politics? More perplexing is that some evangelicals are now moving away from the Republican Party toward a critical look at government and a progressive politics. How, from one theology, can there be two, rather opposing evangelicalisms?

The road to this state of affairs began in Europe's "enthusiast" churches of the 17th century and in the German Moravian and pietistic movements. Beyond the basic principles of Protestantism, these churches pursued an "inner" personal relationship to God, a direct Covenant without priestly intermediary. They emphasized not only belief in Jesus but a life-transforming 'conversion' experience, the 'mission' to bring others to that conversion, individual Bible reading and thus absolute freedom of conscience.

The anti-authoritarian, individualist emphasis was strong but, in interaction with the American experience, it grew stronger. The high value placed on freedom of conscience disposed colonials to multi-faithed communities, which, once established, required freedom of conscience if settlers were to get along. Even the most monolithic Puritan colony in Massachusetts Bay by the 1660s had to get used to non-Puritans in their midst. In addition, the colonies needed immigrants willing to endure the hardships of dislocation, the frontier and later industrialization. The individual's freedom of religion was an advertisement to come. Once on the continent, immigrants continued to move, leading to sparse settlement, isolated frontier living, dispersed power, and a need for self-reliant initiative. Though colonial government regulated foreign trade, much domestically was left to the settlers, and this living-on-your-own reinforced both political/economic liberalism and evangelical liberalism, where the individual conscience is of prime importance.

In this entrepreneurial atmosphere, doctrine itself started to change. One shift was from an emphasis on God's grace to the individual's role in salvation. Accept Jesus and you are saved; the critical step is yours. This God-to-man shift became a prominent feature in Methodism, America's most popular denomination of the 19th century. A second shift was the idea that salvation is offered not to an elect but to all who accept it. Democratizing salvation, this sat well with Americans, who found hierarchy repugnant. A third was the idea that man can be not only forgiven for sin but free from sin, belief in the perfectibility of man. As free will allows man to sin or follow the Christian life, man - if he chooses the latter - may achieve something close to Christian perfection.

The potential of such great reward made Americans great strivers. It was not long before they started striving not only towards God. Faced with vast land and economic possibility, they strove for self-improvement in everything. Start over; be born again. (Weber wrote The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism after his trip to the U.S.) Americans also saw that one could improve not only the self. Confident in their can-do initiative, they saw that they could perfect others. The New Jerusalem would be not only a model but a purveyor of its way of life. Moreover, they saw the God blessed their efforts. The revolution against the British and aggressive continental expansion seemed graced by success. The new nation would be not only model and purveyor of a new way of life but one whose wars were righteous. As one of three mottos for the new country, the Founding Fathers chose Annuit Coeptis: God had favored our undertakings.

For much of the 19th century evangelicalism was the nation's most popular faith, with enduring impact on the American outlook. In mid-century, Methodist and Baptist churches alone accounted for two thirds of U.S. Protestants. Evangelicals created associations to address every aspect of public life, from promoting public education and temperance to protesting Chinese foot-binding and Indian suttee. They argued on both sides of the slavery issue. For comparison, the largest U.S. government operation of the era was the postal service yet evangelical associations had double the employees and facilities, and three times as much money. They were anti-Federalist, Jeffersonian, Jacksonian populists, against bankers and landlords, and supported women preachers and black churches.

Indeed, the Constitutional separation of church and state did not weaken but strengthened America's faiths. By keeping religion out of government, the Constitution rescued America's churches from the stains of political hypocrisy and corruption. Associated with anti-authoritarian liberty, church was home for the common man. Conversely, by keeping the state out of church, the Constitution fostered religious pluralism for America's multi-faithed immigrants. Thus those who wished to try their luck in the New World did not have to abandon something so intimate as their God.

From this history, it may not be evident how evangelicals adopted some of the most conservative frameworks in American thought. The first turn was taken at the start of the 20th century in a backlash against the "godless" Bolshevik revolution, the "immoral" Jazz Age, and the Historical Critical Approach to Bible criticism, imported from Germany, which conservatives felt threatened their literalist, common-man readings of Scripture. But the more important turn to conservativism started in the 1960s. In response to "godless communism," legal prohibitions on prayer in public schools, the black Civil Rights movement, the youth counterculture, and anti-Vietnam war protests, evangelicals and the Republicans made common cause. This "New Right" sought to take the country back from the hippies, from advocates of "special rights" for blacks and women, and from those who were "soft on communism" - in short, from all those who had abandoned America's individualist self-reliance and its mission to fight illiberal tyranny the world over. Classic Republican business-interests ("small government," low taxes, liberal markets) were understood as self-reliance and liberty, while foreign policy was understood as having a government big enough to fight illiberal tyranny overseas - from Nazism to communism.

It was an optimistic message - be disciplined, strive, and you will soar - preached to a nation in crisis. In addition to the '60s cultural upheavals and foreign policy failures in Vietnam and Iran, the U.S. in the 1970s was humiliated as OPEC stopped production, inflation hit double digits, U.S. good were undercut by low-cost imports, and jobs moved overseas to low-wage countries. In this setting, the New Right message of "can-do" self-reliance found wide audience - especially among evangelicals, whose individualist, missionary liberalism had contributed much to America's can-do-ism in the first place. The coalition with Republicans was not a Faustian bargain but an earnest support of Republican economics from the evangelicals' own belief in individualist liberty. In 2004, the legislative priority of the Christian Coalition (formerly the largest evangelical umbrella organization) was to make Bush's tax cuts permanent.

Many evangelicals today remain allied with the Republicans for their self-reliant economics and missionary foreign policy. In November, 2007, Pat Robertson, a 30-year evangelical leader, endorsed Rudolph Giuliani for president - though Giuliani is a Catholic, twice-divorced philanderer who supports reproductive choice and gay marriage. Giuliani's business positions are classic Republican and he is hawkish on foreign policy, and these fit well with Robertson's views. Evangelicals who see liberal markets at home and abroad as a key extension of individualist liberty will remain a Republican bloc in the 2008 presidential election, as will other Americans with this priority - Giuliani's private life notwithstanding.

 The limit of their tolerance, it seems to date, is the Mormon Mitt Romney. Though he holds many classic Republican positions, he faces an uphill battle. Mormonism, born in America's marketplace of confessions, has nonetheless been seen as violating core American values and as relying on mysteries and rituals even more alien to literalist American Protestantism than Catholic ones. 62% of Americans and 67% of evangelicals believe Mormonism is very different from their religion; 31% of Americans and 53% of evangelicals do not believe Mormons are Christians at all. Overall, only half the public has a positive opinion of Mormons. In 1928, Al Smith was defeated because of his Catholicism; in 1960, John Kennedy was not. Romney is not at this point the Mormon JFK.

More interesting perhaps are evangelicals who are questioning classic Republican policies. Between 2001 and 2005, the percentage of young, white evangelicals (age 18-29) who considered themselves Republicans was 55%; in 2007, it was 37%. The shift began with environmental protection. In 2007, the National Association of Evangelicals published "An Evangelical Call to Action on Climate Change," explaining, "any damage that we do to God's world is an offense against God Himself." And it continued with foreign policy: with evangelical prodding, Bush in 2004 increased overseas development assistance to $19 billion, up from less than $7 billion in 1997, under Clinton.

 Some have taken their political change further, returning to "First Heritage" evangelicalism (the historical mandate for social justice) in contrast to the "Second Heritage" focus on abortion, gay marriage and so on. Tri Robinson, pastor of the Vineyard Boise evangelical mega-church in Idaho, explained that his congregants are "looking for someone who supports life in an out of the womb." First Heritage churches preach an anti-militarist, anti-imperialist, anti-consumerist theology which seeks to bring believers back to devotion to the needy, and to take churches out of political parties. Richard Cizik, vice president of the National Association of Evangelicals announced "Never in my Bible did it say I have to be an economic or a political conservative, although I happen to be both."

This sort of talk is having effects on the presidential election. In the 2006 Congressional election, 41% of evangelicals voted Democrat. In an October, 2007 CBS poll, 24% of evangelicals said that Democrats were talking about their top issue, while only 10% said Republicans were. Given that 78% of white evangelicals voted for Bush in 2004, this suggests a substantial shift in priorities for some evangelicals. A Democratic presidential vote is unlikely, however, since only 29% said they could vote for a presidential candidate who supports abortion and same-sex marriage. More likely is a third-party vote, or not voting at all.

But since Mike Huckabee's emergence as a viable candidate, he is at present the likeliest "First Heritage" choice. And both Republicans and Democrats are noting that Huckabee has garnered evangelical support not with classic Republican policies but with a mix of social conservativism, economic populism aimed at aiding lower-income Americans, and some policies helpful to immigrants of all races. If First Heritage evangelicals insist on these priorities as the price for their vote, they may spur a shift in the Republican platform or, more likely, a party split, as classic business Republicans are unlikely to go along.

In their critical stance toward government, First Heritage churches are building on individualist evangelical tradition. Yet so too are evangelicals who remain classic Republicans. The New Right evangelicals are loyal to a political party which they believe puts anti-authoritarian, individualist traditions into political practice. The First Heritage churches find that their traditions make them something of a loyal opposition.

From core evangelical belief have come rather different churches. This is unsurprising. As a human institution, religious principles are subject to interpretation and change, for good and ill. The evangelical core was formed in the synergy among continental Calvinism, British liberalism, and the accident of American size and diversity. Under these conditions, evangelicalism - if I may abuse Luther's words - "steht dort und kann nicht anders." "I stand here and can do not otherwise."

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Marcia Pally is a Professor at New York University and and a recent participant in the AICGS conference on Government and Faith-based Initiatives.

For a German version of this article which originally appeared in the December 31, 2007, Süddeutsche Zeitung, please click here (PDF).