SENATOR OBAMA CHANGING THE DRUM BEAT OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY ON ABORTION AND RELATED SOCIAL ISSUES

By Amos Ajo, Ph.D.

For the past three decades, some of the most divisive political issues in the United States have been socially constructed around morality based on religion. For example, the debate on abortion between the democrats and the republicans has been simplified and redefined as either pro-choice or pro-life. For the past several years the line of political demarcation between the democrats and the republicans has been drawn. The imprint of this line says you are either for abortion or against abortion. For almost all democrats, their debate on abortion has been very limited. Senator Hillary Clinton, Senator John Edwards and Senator John Kerry – all have very limited to say. Their most compelling argument has been the traditional position of democrats which says “I am pro-choice and believe in the woman’s right to choose”.

However, for the first time, Obama has been the only one who has been able to successfully advance the intellectual debate on the issue of abortion beyond the traditional response of pro-choice and pro-life position which has no meaning to any learned person. Obama’s profound analysis on these divisive issues has completely caught most republicans off guard with the potential to compel the Republican Party to come up with a better argument than simply ‘pro-life’.

In his keynote address on “Call to Renewal” on June 28, 2006, Senator Obama made a compelling intellectual analysis on several issues that most democrats have often avoided. According to Senator Obama, the discomfort of his follow democrats with any hint of religion has often prevented them from effectively addressing issues in moral terms. He said: “Some of the problem here is rhetorical - if we scrub language of all religious content, we forfeit the imagery and terminology through which millions of Americans understand both their personal morality and social justice. Imagine Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address without reference to "the judgments of the Lord." Or King's I Have a Dream speech without references to "all of God's children." Their summoning of a higher truth helped inspire what had seemed impossible, and move the nation to embrace a common destiny”.

Obama went on to argue that religious people have no monopoly on morality. According to Obama, secularists are wrong when they ask believers to leave their religion at the door before entering into the public square. Obama pointed out that Frederick Douglas, Abraham Lincoln, Williams Jennings Bryant, Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King - indeed, the majority of great reformers in American history - were not only motivated by faith, but repeatedly used religious language to argue for their cause. So to say that men and women should not inject their "personal morality" into public policy debates is a practical absurdity. Our law is by definition a codification of morality, much of it grounded in the Judeo-Christian tradition.

Challenging the conservatives, Obama pointed out the critical role that the separation of church and state has played in preserving not only our democracy, but the robustness of our religious practice. He said, “Folks tend to forget that during our founding, it wasn't the atheists or the civil libertarians who were the most effective champions of the First Amendment. It was the persecuted minorities, it was Baptists like John Leland who didn't want the established churches to impose their views on folks who were getting happy out in the fields and teaching the scripture to slaves. It was the forbearers of the evangelicals who were the most adamant about not mingling government with religious, because they did not want state-sponsored religion hindering their ability to practice their faith as they understood it.”

In what appears to be most touching and compelling argument, Obama pointed out that “given the increasing diversity of America's population, the dangers of sectarianism have never been greater. According to Obama, the American society has dramatically changed. He said, “We are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers. And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson's, or Al Sharpton's? Which passages of Scripture should guide our public policy? Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is ok and that eating shellfish is abomination? How about Deuteronomy, which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith? Or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount - a passage that is so radical that it's doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application? So before we get carried away, let's read our bibles. Folks haven't been reading their bibles.”

I am in agreement with Senator Obama. I think the practice of holding on one or two emotional issues for political gain is fraud and very dishonest. I think Obama has finally provided us with a new framework to rethink on these issues as they involve public policy. Again in his words, “We are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers. And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson's, or Al Sharpton's? Which passages of Scripture should guide our public policy? Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is ok and that eating shellfish is abomination? How about Deuteronomy, which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith? Or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount - a passage that is so radical that it's doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application? So before we get carried away, let's read our bibles. Folks haven't been reading their bibles.”

For more on Obama’s keynote address on “Call to Renewal” on June 28, 2006, go to http://obama.senate.gov