The Fish Speaks on Religion and Politics

I've never liked Stanley Fish. I think my first exposure to him was something he had written that I really, really disagreed with (I think it was about higher education). Since then, I've had little reason to change my mind, at least until this morning. I ran across a long column of his in the New York Times (unfortunately, it is behind the TimesSelect firewall, so no link). In it, Fish talks about the ongoing conflict between liberalism and religion. I want to excerpt a few paragraphs because I think he's got something to say:

If the goal is to facilitate the free flow of ideas in a marketplace of ideas, the one thing that cannot be tolerated is the idea of shutting down the marketplace. Liberalism, if it is to be true to itself, must refuse to entertain seriously an argument or a project the goal and effect of which would be to curtail individual exploration, self-realization (except in one direction), free expression and innovation. Closed-mindedness with respect to religions that do not honor the line between the secular and the sacred is not a defect of liberalism; it is its very definition.

The fact that liberalism's quashing of ideas extends beyond mere self-preservation aside (unless we're going to separate the ideas quashed by capitalism or Protestantism), I think Fish has something of a point, or at least one well-made in the void. I'm not sure how true this is in reality anymore.

But say it's true. Realizing that liberalism is a political-philosophical concept embodied by humans, and realizing that K-12 students have generally been taught these precepts (in the past at least, and albeit in a totally normalized way), I think it's time to admit that there's a portion of the country that now disagrees with this basic premise. Instead of a secular framework that allows for private religious practices, many folks - let's call them Christian Fundamentalists, just for fun - have started insisting that 1) The United States was founded as a strictly Christian nation, and should therefore have Christian morality embedded in the laws, policies and practices of the nation-state; and 2) Anyone who doesn't agree with #1 is the enemy.

Unsurprisingly, this has created some conflicts. On the one hand there are Christian Fundamentalists, who are deeply enmeshed within the Republican Party, and on another (broadly speaking), lefty political bloggers. The lefty political bloggers agree with more or less intensity with Fish's proposition about the place of religion in a liberal state.

It's pretty obvious who's right in the historical debate - while the so-called "Founding Fathers" were Christian Deists, they were pretty explicit in not wanting a religious state. (Why did people come to American, especially from England? Religious persecution. Come on people.) Essentially, the Christian Right is attempting some serious historical revisionism on this count.

But what about the ideological debate? Should America follow the path of liberalism or should it fundamentally alter its ideology? (I say ideology because America has always been dominated by Christians in practice. Obviously.)

I think it should be pretty clear by now that given this choice, I'd go for the ideology of liberalism. However, given a little more, um, freedom of choice, I'd go for this or something like it.

Anyway, there was one other related thing I wanted to address from the Fish column, and then I'll end this boring rant of a post:

There are two answers presidential candidates cannot give to the now obligatory (and deeply offensive) question about their religious faith. A candidate cannot say, “I don’t have any,” and a candidate cannot say, “My faith dictates every decision I make and every action I take.” Rather, a candidate must say something like, “My faith generally informs my moral values, but my judgments and actions as president will follow from the constitutional obligations of the office, not from my religion.” In other words, I too believe in the public-private distinction and I will uphold it. I won’t insist that you adopt my values and I will respect yours. (In short, I’m a liberal.)

A candidate who didn’t say something like that but instead announced a determination to reshape public institutions in accordance with the dictates of his or her faith would be seen as too closely resembling the Islamic fundamentalists who, we are told again and again, are our sworn enemies.

Fish's comment is dead on if we're talking about Democrats. Watch Clinton or Obama or Edwards some time; they say something that is remarkably similar to what Fish suggests is the only possible course of action.

However, that's where the similarity ends and where I think Fish's head is in the sand. There's a huge fight going on within the Republican Party right now over this very issue. The Christian Right, especially its most militant and active members, wants a candidate who will "reshape public institutions in accordance with the dictates of his or her faith." That's exactly what is wanted, actually. All the stuff about restricting or outlawing things like abortion and birth control, outlawing gay marriage before it's ever legal, etc. - those are all social practices that a vocal minority want to force everyone to follow. Yes, such a move would certainly undermine Fish's carefully constructed liberalism. No, I don't think said Christian Fundamentalists would care. And no, I don't think Fish - or very many other Establishment folks, be they politicians or academics or pundits - really understand the depth of this particular conflict. And yes, there could be - and have been - serious and seriously negative consequences already.