What should be the role of religion in American public life? What is its place in either the public square or our public institutions? Should it be broad and rich or narrow and austere? Like all other Americans, American Jews have tried to find proper answers to these questions for more than 200 years. They have had a special, though not unique, incentive to do so as the victims of religious persecution and discrimination in other times and places.
By and large, American Jews have inclined to more rather than less austere prescriptions, inspired, first, by the desire to take adequate precautions against persecution and, second, by the hope that America would fulfill its promise of full equality as citizens. In very large part, indeed in amazingly large part, America has accepted the Jewish interpretation of the relationship of religion and public life, especially since World War II. In addition, America has delivered on its promise. Anti-Semitism is for almost all intents and purposes not a problem for American Jews. In addition, they occupy positions of respect, influence, and power and may aspire to any office in the land. This was made completely manifest through the nomination of Senator Joseph Lieberman for the office of vice-president, but it was already evident throughout the last decade.
On the other hand, America has never accepted a completely austere or simple view of the role of religion. Taken as a whole, America's answers to this momentous question have been complicated, reflecting the very rich and very complicated role of religion under our constitutional system and in our national life. To be sure, the American constitution proscribes the establishment of a national religion, creating a separation between any particular church and the state. But it also guarantees the free exercise of religion and Americans have been very energetic in that exercise. They have frequently brought their religious faith into the public square to bear on public matters. They have even enjoyed the direct and indirect support of government. This has frequently led to questions about the meaning of the separation of church and state. Should there be a so-called wall of separation and, if so, how high and thick ought it be? Even today, after 200 years, these questions remain unsettled and complicated.
The question for American Jews today is whether the views they now offer are able to stand up to these complications and provide proper guidance for themselves and their fellow citizens. There is, unfortunately, good reason to doubt that they are. Today in the absence of meaningful religious persecution, discrimination, and indignities, not to mention material privation, we generally seek a still more austere separation of religion and public life than any heretofore realized, through which religion might be almost altogether absent from public life. We go beyond asking for the separation of church and state to seek a wall of separation between religion and society. Indeed, any connection between religious belief and some aspect of public affairs—public policy and even public rhetoric—is sufficient for us to complain. We oppose school vouchers which might be used at religious schools by poor and illiterate students; moments of silent prayer; charitable choice, which entails government funds for religious groups in the struggle against addiction, crime, and poverty. We are indignant over the involvement of groups like the Christian Coalition and the Moral Majority in politics. We complain when our politicians invoke God or their faith in public discourse. In doing so, we sometimes invoke the specter of the religious discrimination, persecution, and even strife of the past. With survivors of the Holocaust still among us this is understandable. But in contemporary America, it is also implausible and fanciful. It is clear that this is not a truly credible concern and will become clearer in the future. In fact, we speak more and more in terms of comfort, both for ourselves and others. The discomfort we decry is not material or physical, the result of active persecution, but psychological and subjective. No one, including us, should be made to feel uncomfortable by the religious beliefs of others. Put positively, we seek the new goal of the so-called tolerant and inclusive society, a society which would in effect be utterly and completely purified of religious expression.
This proposal has the advantage of being simple and clear. But it has the disadvantage of being simplistic and crude, and it fails to do justice to the history and experience of this country and the religious rights and duties of Americans, including ourselves. It is a proposal that is unnatural, presupposing that human beings normally make an absolutely strict division between their private and public lives. As a result, it is also probably impractical without the application of force, especially given the fact that Americans, uniquely among modern peoples, are and are likely to remain religious. Many Americans think that no further austerity is required and not a few think it is already too severe.
The austerity we propose is so unnatural and impracticable that we cannot or at least do not adhere to it ourselves, frequently invoking Jewish teachings, like tikkun olam—which means the repair of the world—in our own public discourse. Hence we are unlikely to persuade others of its virtue or necessity. Indeed we have opened ourselves to the charge of confusion and even hypocrisy. Worst of all, the new austerity may well undermine its apparent objective— that all Americans, including we American Jews, enjoy the twin blessings of self-respect and mutual respect. For it may be that the most solid source of respect or tolerance for our fellow Americans available in contemporary America are the teachings of its various religious groups. It may even be the case that our only serious prospect of having a meaningful understanding of the concept of "respect" now depends upon religious teachings. Of this possibility, we take almost no note.
Our behavior frequently implies that as Jews and Americans we have no other choice but to seek greater austerity. American principle requires it as well as American tradition. But this is far from obvious. Historically speaking, it is clear that this would entail new conditions of American life. Never in the past was religion really absent from American public and political life and it was frequently prominent, beginning with the American Revolution itself and continuing through various later political movements—abolition, temperance, civil rights, etc. Hence, its justification requires the possibility and desirability of "progress," of rather sudden and dramatic progress, since it was but just yesterday that ministers, priests, and rabbis marched in America's streets for civil rights and against the war in Vietnam. That progress presupposes that we have also achieved an advance in our understanding of American principles since in the past those principles, including separation of church and state, never led to the austerity now proposed. But is this merely an advance in our understanding of old principles or the adoption of altogether new ones which lack the sanction of American tradition as well as American experience whose success, especially manifest now, tends to argue that no innovations are necessary? Since the answer is not obvious, it places upon us a very great burden of argument and proof for the merits of the society we seek. What is this glorious progress, why is it desirable, and how possible is it?
As indicated, the grounds of this austerity are the principles of toleration and inclusion. Today, many Jews and many other Americans uphold tolerance and inclusion as our highest virtues and aspirations; our greatest vices are to be judgmental and exclusive. As indicated below, these aspirations are not simply new, but they are newly defined and differently evaluated. Tolerance is today understood to require unqualified respect for any and all individuals and groups, no matter who they are, what they believe, and how they live their lives. It is only subject to the condition that such individuals and groups be themselves tolerant and accord similar respect to others. It is important that all groups and individuals be aware of such respect as a condition of their enjoying self-esteem, which is subjectively and objectively the highest human good. Hence, it is not sufficient that Americans avoid criticizing or blaming other Americans. They must be actively embraced so as to feel "included." Their subjective lack of such feeling is sufficient to call our tolerance into question. This is said to be implicit in the fundamental requirements of democracy and the equality of all its citizens. Thus, in pursuing tolerance and inclusion we often claim to be doing no more than fulfilling the full democratic promise of the American foundings of 1776 and 1787.
Moreover, it has been argued by eminent authorities that the present state of American society indicates that the promised land of tolerance and inclusion, thus understood, is nearly within our reach. According to sociologist Alan Wolfe, we are "one nation, after all." The vast majority of Americans eschew "judgmentalism" and are emphatically tolerant, though not yet completely inclusive; for example, they are tolerant of homosexuality, but they do not embrace it with respect. Racism, sexism, and other forms of discrimination have declined to near vanishing points. If there is anything which still disturbs the unity and inclusion of all Americans it is religion, including the moralism associated with some religious groups. This is almost inevitable since the particular teachings of many religious groups typically conflict with one another. As they are made on behalf of divine authority, the highest possible authority, it is likely, if not simply inevitable, that they imply some disrespect for the beliefs and therewith the person of other Americans. Happily, according to Wolfe, the religious beliefs of Americans are increasingly easygoing and are defined less by ancient teachings than by modern views and life. Though some Americans may still take their religious differences seriously, they are increasingly confined to the margins of American society. Their impact on American life may be rendered still more marginal and less upsetting to the tolerant and inclusive society if they have few, if any, outlets in public life. This is in part the logic of pursuing greater and greater public austerity in matters of religion. Through it we will get closer and closer to the fulfillment of the fundamental principles of America, the tolerant and inclusive society. American Jews, including Mr. Wolfe, may help lead the way.
There are a number of difficulties with this view of contemporary America and its requirements. Some of them emerged in the 2000 elections, in which religious rhetoric played a particularly prominent role as did groups which were alleged to lie at the margins of American society. Moreover, an American Jew, Senator Lieberman, who is now also America's most prominent and distinguished Jew, was a leading exponent of such religious rhetoric. This does not look like an America which is ready to banish religion from public life.
But this is not decisive. If American principle truly requires the tolerant and inclusive society as currently conceived, it would be necessary to pursue it in fair weather or foul. It would be our duty. But as already indicated, it is far from clear that we are simply expounding American democratic principles. To be certain that we are right, it is also our duty to study with great seriousness, worthy of the Jewish tradition of study, the facts of the matter. Do authoritative American accounts of the relationship of religion and public life describe a vision of society similar to our own, if not completely, at least in embryo? If not, what deficiency do they have and how compelling is our remedy?
For the purposes of the American Jewish community, if not Americans as a whole, it would be helpful if such an authoritative statement took cognizance of the American Jewish community and their particular concerns.
Remarkably enough, this is actually ready to hand through the primary and indeed chronologically first "official" view of the status of the Jews in the new United States. It was offered by the new and first president of the United States, George Washington, in a famous letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, Rhode Island, which had congratulated him on his election with "expressions of affection and esteem." It deserves to be cited at length for its comprehensive and nuanced discussion, albeit in a short space, of the relevant issues. In fact, it offers a vision of a "tolerant and inclusive society," thus, in a way, confirming our claim. On the other hand, its vision is vastly different than that of contemporary Jews. It has the immediate advantage of conforming to America's historical experience; indeed, it is in no small part responsible for forming that history, at least its better angels. Above all, it offers a different account of the "tolerant and inclusive" American society which is more thoughtful, practical, and, above all, more admirable than our own.
In his letter, Washington asserted that the citizens of the new country had "a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a policy worthy of imitation." The essence of that policy was that "all possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship." Moreover, the grounds of the policy were emphatically new. "It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support."
Washington closed his letter with a passage which expressed both a hope and a prayer, whose language was plainly drawn from the Hebrew Bible. "May the Children of the Stock of Abraham, who dwell in this land, continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other Inhabitants; while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree, and there shall be none to make him afraid. May the father of all mercies scatter light and not darkness in our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in his own due time and way everlastingly happy."
The first part of Washington's message is emphatic in asserting that it is precisely not toleration or tolerance, as we would say today, which defines the legal status of Jews in the United States but right. Nor should toleration play that role. For tolerance is a species of indulgence by a superior to an inferior and depends upon the good will of the former for the latter. Indeed, it necessarily implies a critical or, as we would say, judgmental stance to others. Our current discourse is actually confused on this point. More important, from Washington's point of view our present stance toward tolerance would amount to a regress to an older and inadequate view of the situation of minorities rather than a progress as we would have it.
Washington asserts that the rights which are the foundation of the American polity are natural and inherent and thus shared equally by all. Thus it may always have been so, at least in principle. However, the innovation of the United States and its new constitution has been to give these natural rights the force of law, which makes it possible to use the machinery of law to oppose any actual or prospective state bigotry or persecution. Washington is confident that these innovative, indeed unprecedented, features of the American constitutional system make for a revolution in the legal status and political condition of Jews. All of American history since is a testament to the correctness of that conviction. For, in fact, the federal government of the United States has never in more than 200 years given "bigotry" its "sanction" nor "persecution" its "assistance" and on the amazingly few occasions when a threat arose it was swiftly eliminated. More positively, American Jews have always enjoyed "liberty of conscience."
Washington's repudiation of tolerance as the standard for political and legal rights, indeed his insistence that it is a defective and undesirable standard for such rights, precisely for Jews, who would thereby depend upon the indulgence of others, necessarily the majority of their fellow citizens, does not mean that he is entirely unappreciative of the virtues of tolerance or, as he puts it, "good will." The conditions of life are not entirely determined by law and, under the federal constitution, not entirely by federal law. Hence, he expresses the hope and the prayer that American Jews would "merit and enjoy the good will" of their fellow citizens. But this precise hope and prayer is not something that can be guaranteed by the constitution and its workings. They may even merit the good will of their fellow citizens and not enjoy it. This is clearly not true of Washington himself and his letter to the Newport Jews is clearly designed to set the proper tone and example for other non-Jewish Americans, and in substantial, though not complete, measure it has. But Washington had much too much experience of the weakness of human beings to place his confidence in their good will and indulgence of others, and, hence, he separates the issue of constitutional right to liberty of conscience from that of good will or toleration.
Today it is likely that American Jews would disagree with Washington's assessment. For unlike Washington who thought of good will or tolerance as something to be earned or gently encouraged by force of argument, Jews today now think of it as something to be prescribed. We would hold that Washington was insufficiently ambitious or at least that we are now in a position to make progress beyond what was possible in his time.
But is such a resolution really possible? Is such progress really desirable? A resolution might be possible but it would not be easy within the American constitutional framework which permits and encourages religious expression. Due to the fact that religious teachings are likely to be at some important level exclusive, the only way to achieve complete inclusion would be to alter all such teachings in such a way as to lead to a unitary and inclusive teaching. Historically speaking, this has been politically possible in one of two ways: the establishment of one national religion and church or the suppression of all religious teachings in the name of a completely unreligious or antireligious teaching. The former was, of course, the situation in many countries prior to the founding of America. It was also sought in a different way after America's founding by fascist movements. The second method was that characteristic of communist regimes which imposed state atheism. Neither of these approaches had a happy outcome from the point of view of tolerance for Jews, not to mention other matters. It was precisely to avoid the consequences of these kinds of "inclusion," both after and before the fact, that the United States was founded as it was, without an established church but with full liberty of conscience. But according to some, today there is a third possibility—the transformation of religious belief such that there will be no differences which have meaningful societal impact.
Washington effectively doubts that this is possible when he speaks of "our several vocations," meaning by that the separate religious groups into which Americans were then and would continue to be divided. But even more important and in contrast to current views, he suggests that this is not even desirable, as those separate vocations may be the source of our being "useful here." They may be the source of a great utility to the nation, a common utility. They may be the foundation, among other things, of tolerance and inclusion. In fact, American tolerance and inclusion may actually depend upon religion, properly understood and applied, rather than require its absence.
The prospect of tolerance and inclusion depends in the first instance on what Washington calls the comportment of religious Americans, Jewish or otherwise, as good citizens. This will certainly merit good will and may be hoped to earn it. All good citizens should and hopefully will be considered equal members of the American public.
Good conduct as citizens and the good will it generates may have a strong, if complicated, relationship to religion, at least the religions with which Washington was directly familiar. As Washington implied in his letter to the Newport Jews, good citizenship involves less he assertion of rights than the assumption of duties, large and small, toward one's fellow citizens. But a sense of duty rather than an assertion of rights may depend very heavily on the fact and efficacy of religious teaching. The duty of tolerance and inclusion may be especially dependent upon such teachings.
Washington developed this point on a different occasion his famous Farewell Address. There he asserted that "of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports; . . . these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens." He added, "let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion."
Today many do indulge that supposition. They believe that morality, including and especially the moral duty of tolerance and inclusion can be maintained without religion. Indeed, they argue that the duties of tolerance and inclusion, our highest and almost only duties, can best be maintained through the dilution, if not the withering away, of religion. The question is whether in the long run they are right or whether Washington's understanding is deeper and more accurate.
A certain form of that question arose in the 2000 election occasioned by some remarks of vice-presidential nominee Joseph Lieberman. As in times past, Lieberman, invoking, without citation, Washington's statement, asserted that the future moral condition of the country depended upon religion and its revival as a force in American public life. He implied that our capacity for duty must be sought in religion.
For this Lieberman was criticized by some, though not many, of his fellow Jews. It was charged that he was claiming that only religious Americans could be moral and that this claim was intolerant and therefore itself immoral. Lieberman quickly denied both. But he might have added that neither was this Washington's position and that the question is more complicated than his critics appreciate. For in his Farewell Address, Washington went on to say "that whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that National morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."
As is evident, Washington did not believe that morality and duty was impossible without religion. It could result from a refined or enlightened education in the case of some individuals. What he denied was that this was sufficient for society as a whole. For the majority of Americans, religion would remain important.
Today's invocation of tolerance and inclusion presupposes that such is no longer the case. In effect, it presupposes that today such a refined education is universally available and efficacious or might be with just a bit of effort. It believes that the morality of tolerance and in particular the duty of inclusion can be inculcated with such an education. Both this morality and this education are meant as improved substitutes for the morality and education of religion. For even if religion is a teacher of duty it must inevitably bear the liability of exclusivity. Tolerance and inclusion are the essence of citizenship and may teach it to us. It is only this which could make possible and justify the new and present vision of the tolerant and inclusive society.
How persuasive is this? There is certainly something to it. Tolerance and inclusion are on everybody's lips; it has become conventional wisdom and enlightenment. But it is not the only theme of conventional wisdom. Our general discourse is as dominated, if not more so, by the multiplication of rights and ever greater demands on their behalf. What is lacking is much talk of duty. Duty, except in the form of tolerance, is lacking as a subject of our education. Moreover, the duty of tolerance depends in no way on whether or not others perform their duties, great or small. It does not even attempt to encourage such duties. It offers esteem under any and all circumstances. It does not require that we merit that esteem or earn good will as citizens, as Washington proposed. It is a much diminished and therefore weaker form of respect and duty. It might suffice to provide for some general level of tolerance, but it is unlikely to lead to any serious and meaningful embrace of our fellow citizens. Nor can one be certain that it will triumph when and if it comes into conflict with the passions nurtured by our concern with our rights as individuals.
Worse still, the more "refined" forms of enlightened opinion are now postmodern, which is to say, among other things, that by their own admission they can no longer make any sense of morality or duty at all, in the proper sense of these words. All forms of morality are as such relative or merely values, which is to say preferences. The source of such preferences is the desire for power. Every formulation of a moral duty is nothing more than the attempt of some individual or group to impose itself on others. It is at bottom nothing but a form of oppression. There is in fact no reason to tolerate and include others or to champion these virtues except as a tactic. In terms of the "refined" and "enlightened" contemporary understanding of morality, tolerance and inclusion could be at best only the outcome of a shared desire for peace, including peace of mind. If we avoid blaming others, maybe they will avoid blaming us. We can avoid all feelings of shame and guilt. It is a desire for comfort, as much psychic as well as material, rather than any real sense of duties to others which is the content of the contemporary understanding of tolerance and inclusion.
To be sure, many Americans do feel a real duty to others. But due to our rights talk and postmodern enlightenment, that must be taken to be something of a "miracle." Like many "miracles," this probably has more to do with religion, even the most simple piety, than it does with "refined" opinion. It is most likely to be a function of religious teachings which espouse generosity of spirit to our fellow man on the grounds that we are all created equally in the image of God, the same grounds to which Washington appealed in his letter. For Americans who believe this, and there are many, there is an absolute duty of tolerance and inclusion of a certain kind. The survival of this sense of duty is at the same time a testament to the good sense in Washington's vision of what the tolerant and inclusive American society would look like and require.
As already noted, at the end of his letter to the Newport Jews, Washington spoke of the "separate vocations" of Americans, meaning by that the separate religious communities and ways of life of Americans. He obviously expected that to continue but hoped that it would constitute the grounds of common good will. He knew, of course, that religion, like all other aspects of human life, had its darker as well as its brighter side. His whole Farewell Address, like that of another and biblical one—that of Moses to the People of Israel on the eve of his death1—is suffused with a certain pessimism. But precisely in that context, such optimism as he expressed was grounded in the future piety of Americans.
Despite many ups and downs which Washington anticipated, contemporary American society seems to have vindicated his optimism rather than his pessimism, at least with regard to the role religion might play. Today America embraces many religious groups, each pursuing its own vocation, sometimes in private, sometimes in public. Despite the intertwining of religion and public life, the conflict between religious groups is minimal. In addition, given the changes in "enlightened" and "refined" opinion between Washington's time and our own, our age may be in more need of religion than his. For as indicated before, today, religion is the only voice which speaks unequivocally on behalf of duty in general and in particular of the duty to respect others. If we want vigorous tolerance and inclusion as we claim that we do, rather than tepid civility mixed with indifference, religion may be our primary resource.
Many Americans today seem inclined to that view, concerned with what is perceived as a national moral decline, including a decline in significant respect for others. Americans may frequently invoke the language of tolerance and respect; after all, everyone now knows that this is expected. But their actions frequently belie these pious expressions. The general public's sense that this is the true state of affairs has been recorded in many polls which also record an associated appreciation of the potentially beneficial influence of religion. We American Jews to some degree share in this sense without directly expressing it or in fact frequently denying it. Nonetheless, it is shown by the fact that we are frequently impelled by its logic. When Joe Lieberman spoke, as he often did, of the Jewish roots of his public service, he engaged in a practice which has become ubiquitous among American Jews. It has become commonplace for Jews to appeal to an ancient Jewish concept, tikkun olam, to explain and defend their public doings, their justice and our duty. In light of our concerns about religion and public life, this is, to put it mildly, surprising. It is fair to say that we would not do it if we thought other moral resources would be adequate.
All this is to say that the character of our own behavior in the public square as well as the general weakness in American society of a deep understanding of duty and respect argue for a more benign view of the role of religion than is current in the American Jewish community. It argues for a thorough reconsideration along the lines laid out by Washington, to be sure updated in the light of 200 years of American history and experience. It would be best if the American Jewish community undertook this reconsideration at its own initiative; it would be best if it thoughtfully faced its current pieties and seriously examined them. It would be best because the objective of the tolerant and inclusive society requires it. It would also be best because sooner or later, and probably sooner, it may be forced to do so by other Americans. For the present position of the American Jewish community is fraught with inconsistencies, both rhetorical and concrete. It is subject to the charge of confusion and worse—hypocrisy and even intolerance.
Rhetorically speaking, our problem is embodied in the practice, mentioned before, of appealing in support of our public activities to Jewish teachings; at the moment the most popular is tikkun olam. The most publicly active members of our community never tire of invoking this phrase. In fact, for many American Jews this has come to be the very definition of Judaism. Insofar as this is the case, there could not be a closer intermingling of religion and public life. Of course, we could decide to desist from this practice, but this is very unlikely. We continue to want an identification with the Jewish community and its traditions and this is often our only means.
But unless we desist, there will be no reason to expect others to desist from their own forms of religious rhetoric. There will be no right either. If we continue to insist that others be silent, we will eventually be charged with being hypocrites, and we will be guilty.
American Jews have by and large seen no difficulty in this inconsistency, but other Americans have and in the future more will, as a result of Senator Lieberman's prominence. Moreover, many other Americans have and will welcome the fact that American Jews draw upon religious terminology to describe and defend their public activities. They have already welcomed Senator Lieberman's remarks both because they see something admirable in so doing and because they believe that it justifies their own inclination to bring religious beliefs and feelings to bear upon public life.
The difficulty of our present position is increased by the fact that it is our present practice rather than our current theory which is most consonant with American history, a history which is increasingly well known due in part to the energetic work of recent defenders of a religious role in public life. These authors, who include Senator Lieberman, have been vigorous in reminding the American public not only of the fact of public religious expression but also of the beneficial role it has played in American political history. They commonly cite the important and frequently decisive role religious groups played in important political movements of the past which aimed to remedy injustices and vices within American life. These include the abolitionist movement, the temperance movement, the woman's suffrage movement in the nineteenth century as well as movements which were important within living memory—the civil rights movement and the antiwar movement.
In fall 2000, Stephen Carter, a distinguished African-American author and professor at Yale Law School, published a book, God's Name in Vain: How Religion Should and Should Not Be Involved in Politics, which once again rehearsed this history and defended the importance of its bearing on contemporary American politics. Carter, like others, has insisted that the role religious groups played in important political and social movements was not merely civic but depended upon and expressed itself through religious faith and sentiment. Though other not strictly religious grounds were available in each case, religious participation in these movements was expressly founded in religious faith and formulated in religious terms. Carter and others argue that the vitality of religious involvement and frequently the success of these efforts depended upon the sense of religious obligation.
These defenders of religion in public life might suggest that the efficacy of Jewish political action has some of the same religious quality. Why else invoke tikkun olam and other Jewish teachings on morality and politics? In any event, it is far too easy to point out that in the recent past American Jews did not complain of the undue influence of religion in public life when their clergy, volunteer leadership, and institutions were involved in political movements such as the civil rights and antiwar movements, precisely while flying a "Jewish" flag. It is also far too easy to suggest that present criticism of the political involvement of religious groups has less to do with the fact that they are religious than that the views they support are ones to which American Jews are opposed. Stung by such criticism, other relatively liberal religious groups have recently admitted as much. They responded by reinvigorating their own political activism with the founding of the Interfaith Alliance.
More broadly, the 2000 election campaign testified to the fact that it is still the case today that the most prominent American political figures feel free to invoke religion and that this is unobjectionable to the majority of American citizens. For it was not only Senator Lieberman who invoked religion. So, too, did Vice-President Gore and Governor Bush, and they did so well before Senator Lieberman was part of the race. Moreover and remarkably enough, despite many policy differences between Gore and Bush, they actually agreed on one thing: the propriety of legislation to assist so-called faith-based organizations as an instrument to deal with social problems.
This agreement presents an additional, more concrete, and immediate challenge to the merits of the views espoused by the American Jewish community. Such legislation is, in fact, already in place through the so-called charitable choice provision of the Welfare Reform Act. Its basic objective has recently been augmented by President Bush, who has already established a new Federal Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. The purpose of this office is to make it easier for religious groups to participate in federal programs which address our gravest social problems.
This will occasion further scrutiny of the views of American Jews concerning religion and public life, in this case as regards legal rather than rhetorical matters. In fact, of course, we have already invited such scrutiny. Many American Jewish leaders have already announced their opposition, invoking as always the threat to separation of church and state and the specter of theological crusades, religious discrimination, etc. Whether or not we realize it, it will be all too easy and correct to characterize this reaction as hysterical and even mean-spirited. After all, the purpose of such programs is manifestly not theological but social. They are directed at our most grievous and resistant social ills—drug and alcohol addiction, juvenile crime, family decay. In light of our well-publicized concern for a solution to these problems—our dedication to tikkun olam—it places upon us the burden of suggesting other means to the same ends. But this will not be easy to do and may be impossible. For the current proposals to engage religious groups in the fight against social ills are precisely not the result of a theological crusade but an expression of despair at the failure of thirty-five years of Great Society programs, which arguably made matters worse.
The American Jewish community, in its indignant reaction to these new initiatives, gives little sign of a generous appreciation of these basic motives. To the extent that it does, its position seems to be that despite these motives and even the help these programs might provide, the cost in terms of the violation of strict separation of church and state is too high. The importance of that principle trumps all other considerations.
This presents additional difficulties. It presupposes that the separation of church and state means that the government may not and has not provided support of various kinds to religious groups. It further presupposes that the Jewish community has in no way been the beneficiary of such support and has vigorously objected to and declined it. But neither of these propositions is true.
All religious groups in the United States are entitled to tax-exempt status, which applies both to their property and the contributions their members make to the support of their activities. As some have argued, this amounts to a state subsidy of religion and in fact a very large one, without which religious institutions would be unable to survive. (Moreover, it entails that the government engage in the definition of religion for the purpose of defining eligibility for this exemption.) The Jewish community has never opposed this status and is unlikely ever to do so since it would bankrupt its institutions.
More directly, the government has and continues to provide funds for religious groups in their capacity as providers of social services. The Jewish community has not opposed such funding. In fact, many Jewish social service agencies receive government funds, federal as well as state and local. Though this support goes for ostensibly neutral purposes, it also may be regarded as tantamount to a subsidy of religion. For example, in many Jewish communities, Jewish religious schools depend upon a subsidy from local Federations for their existence. Indeed, because of concern for assimilation, the American Jewish community has recently been energetic in encouraging the founding of such schools and they are growing in number. These schools and the subsidies they require would be difficult and probably impossible to maintain if Jewish communities could not count upon at least partial support of their social service agencies from local, state, and federal dollars. One might argue, then, that this support effectively supports religious instruction, which American Jews have claimed they regard as absolutely impermissible. It is on that basis that they have opposed school vouchers, even where their support of religious schools would be indirect.
To put the matter most simply, in the legal as in the rhetorical sphere, the American Jewish position on religion and public life is inconsistent and confused. A charitable explanation would be that we American Jews are or have grown obtuse and thoughtless, a testament to the actual ease of life we enjoy in America. But the most charitable explanation is that our confusion is consistent with the confusions and even the apparent contradictions of American experience, to the paradoxical character of America. For America is a paradox, combining as it does modern freedom and ancient faith. Whatever difficulties this entails, the fruitfulness of this combination has been extraordinary, both for us and our fellow Americans. Its dividends have been extraordinary freedom, security, and material prosperity, as well as tolerance and respect for our ancient ways. It has provided inclusion for us and all Americans.
However, to merit this charitable explanation we are obliged to appreciate this paradox, as George Washington asked us to do more than 200 years ago. Instead, we seem bound and determined to resolve it by our ever greater demands for religious austerity in public life. We claim to offer the prospect of greater tolerance, but the tolerance we offer is a pallid extension of a more or less thoroughly materialist view of human life, bound to champion comfort at all cost. Worse still, we denounce our pious fellow Americans in a most intolerant tone. We express little to no appreciation of their devoted service to other Americans and complain about their sense of moral duty. Allegedly preoccupied with the decline of our own families and the concomitant decline of our community, in both numbers and seriousness, we remarkably find time to complain about the efforts of others to preserve and protect their families and communities from moral decay through religious activity. Instead of entertaining the modest thought that we might have something to learn from our fellow Americans and American experience, we are arrogantly certain that it is our right to lecture them, with insults and complaints.
If we fail to embrace the American paradox in a thoughtful and generous spirit, we may still escape a most uncharitable explanation of our behavior. We may owe that to the indifference of secular Americans or the appreciative, if sometimes critical, embrace of pious ones. Of the two, only the latter offers much prospect of genuine respect for us as Jews, of a truly dignified tolerance and inclusion worthy of the names.
