From the newspaper account it sounded as though Romney didn’t play along and engage this woman in a religious debate. I think this is wise, and should be his strategy in future encounters. Perhaps he will need to give a Kennedy “religion” speech at some point . . . but he certainly doesn’t need to engage with the wing nuts of the republican party on anti Mormon themes. The article also sounded positive in that some of the other delegates disapproved of this woman’s confrontation.

I want to believe that the reactions of the others will be the dominant reaction of the public. Nationwide, that may be the case. I’m not so sure about South Carolina. My stomach still turns over the whisper campaign that smeared McCain to elect GWB, man of God, some six years ago. South Carolina seems to be a place determined to prove ignorance is a powerful force.

Clark, please note the following quotations at the end of the story. You seem to have missed the main point of the story, which was that this was one person grilling Romney, and she was roundly criticized for it. This is more of a good news story than a bad news story.

To wit:

“Cindi Costa, a conservative Christian from Charleston and member of the Republican National Committee, waited outside the room. She earlier pleaded with Mosteller not to confront Romney.

“This makes me sick,†Costa said. “Your personal faith is not game in politics. It’s a private matter.â€

The Romney campaign said the governor is focused on seeing that S.C. Republicans get elected to office this year.

He has found Palmetto State voters “warm and open-minded.†He shares their conservative values, said Julie Teer, political director for Romney’s Commonwealth PAC.

On previous visits here, Romney has appealed to voters not to rush to judgment.

“They don’t know what I believe necessarily — yet. But they will,†he said in July.

For any evangelical who had doubts, Romney offered what amounted to a personal testimony. “From a religious standpoint, Jesus Christ is my personal savior.â€

Costa said Mosteller’s questioning “besmirches her character. It makes her look hateful. This is not what we’re about. The party does not give religious tests,â€

“This is awful,†said Spartanburg GOP chairman Rick Beltram. “I’m unhappy with Cyndi.â€

State GOP chairman Katon Dawson isn’t pleased either. “She acted in bad taste.â€

Romney has opened the door himself for such questions, unfortunately. He has repeatedly joked in recent months about how he belives marriage should be between a man and a woman and a woman. Of course, this is light hearted banter - but Romney should refrain from making polygamy jokes if he doesn’t want to be asked questions about his religion.

What would the appropriate response be for him to make to a religiously-diverse political audience regarding the Church’s prior position respecting racial priesthood restrictions? “I disagreed with the position the Church held prior to 1978″ or “I agreed with the position the Church held prior to 1978″?

Whether I like it or not, I think it’s a relevant question, just as the question of his thinking about the Church’s current maintenance of gender-based priesthood restrictions is relevant.

Okay, I read the article. They quote a Brigham Young remark making negative comments on the stereotypical appearance of African Americans. Hmmm, let’s see, contemporaneous with BY’s remarks in the second half of the 19th century, the Evangelical Christians of that day, in South Carolina and other states, were busy lynching Arfrican Americans and religious minorities like Jews and Mormons. Yup, they just strung ‘em up and killed ‘em. So who has more to be ashamed of religiously? The problem isn’t Romney and his Mormonism, it is Evangelical hypocrisy. Romney ought to give a speech highlighting the intolerance and bigotry displayed by Evangelicals — both historically and currently — as a shot across the bow. He’d probably pick up enough centrist Democrats to make it worth his while. I’m serious.

Clark, for a more complete picture on the perception of Romney, please see this article from today’s WSJ:

http://www.opinionjournal.com/diary/?id=110008991

Excellent point Dave.

Greenfrog, #5, I think Romney should avoid getting into doctrinal issues because they are not relevant to what kind of job he would do as a president, although we in the Bloggernacle find them fascinating. You don’t hear Catholics asked anymore, “so what proof do you have that Peter actually was the first bishop in Rome?” or “provide your proof that the wafer really turns into the body of Christ and the wine into His blood.”

David, #6, it’s worth pointing out that there were also many evangelicals in the north (and a few in the south) in BY’s time leading the charge for freeing the slaves. I don’t think your suggestion to highlight the “intolerance and bigotry” of evangelicals will ever happen, nor do I agree it is a good strategy.

Dave and John F,

Before we go down the well-trod road of bashing evangelicals, would you two please read about Harriet Beecher Stowe?

http://americancivilwar.com/women/hbs.html

Please remember that the northeast in the 1840s, 1850s and 1860s was very different than it is today. Harvard and Yale were primarily universities for training ministers who were sent around the world to preach the gospel. Yes, there were evangelicals in the south (Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson were two of them) but there were at least as many in the north as well.

Dave, I fully agree there is tons of hypocrisy from Evangelicals in all this.

Geoff, I agree that the rest of the GOP leadership tried to cover for Romney. That to me though isn’t the big issue. It is that sizable constituent of people who think we’re of the devil and what they will do despite pressure from more level headed GOP leadership.

Geoff, regarding Evangelical hypocrisy. There’s no doubt there were Evangelicals who were anti-slavery. However one should also note that even the most enlightened preacher from Harvard or Yale didn’t exactly treat those of African descent as full equals due full respect. Read some of their literature and they are amazingly patronizing and buy into most of the same beliefs Young and the other early LDS leadership whose racism we find objectionable. Also, by the same measure, Mormons can point to early Mormons who were against slavery including Joseph’s own Presidential Platform.

The point is just that to point to individual Mormons who were products of their time (for better or worse) and yet not do the same for ones own movement is pure hypocrisy.

Geoff, if good works by individual Mormons don’t insulate the Church from institutional criticism — and if Evangelicals can go after Romney for every little imperfection they perceive in the record of LDS history and doctrine — then turnabout is fair play and Evangelicals should own up to their ugly past. And it is ugly. Being nice to these people will only confirm the false picture they have painted of themselves, and it is their inflated sense of divine entitlement which drives their willingness to stand in judgment on any denomination they don’t like. Start pointing out their hypocrisy and they’ll get a little more humble and less judgmental.

Romney needs to attack if he wants to look like an alpha male. If he just rolls over on this, he’ll lose support. In a world increasingly defined by religiously motivated terrorism, you’ve got to make a stand for your own religious beliefs and call out hypocrites rather than kow-tow to them. At least that’s how I see it. If Romney gets tough with Evangelical hypocrisy, there are tens of millions of Democratic Catholics and Jews who will suddenly discover how much they like him.

Geoff B,

If it isn’t too much of a derail, I’ll offer how I think those questions are, really, relevant to a voter’s decision about whether or not to support a candidate. If you’d prefer not to let this thread drift in that direction, please disregard…

When Justice Rehnquiest was nominated as Chief Justice, the press investigated and discovered that he owned a home in a community that had on its books some historical homeowner covenants that prohibited sale of the properties in the community to African Americans. By the time that the issue was raised, it was perfectly clear that under US law, such covenants were unenforceable. Nonetheless, I think the questions that Justice Rehnquist was asked to address about his views of the covenants were relevant to whether he should have been appointed Chief Justice. Did he know about the covenants at the time he acquired the property? Were the covenants ever enforced to exclude African Americans from the community? Did his involvement with a community that explicitly discriminated against certain persons on the basis of their race affect how he might administer his legal duties as Chief Justice?

He answered, IIRC, that he didn’t know of the covenants until the press pointed them out to him, and in any event, he considered them null and void.

Mitt Romney was also associated with a community that explicitly discriminated against certain persons on the basis of their race. And he was associated with that community at a time that the discrimination was active, rather than just an aging entry on forgotten books.

I don’t think it’s a stretch for non-LDS voters to want to understand whether he had a personal opinion respecting the propriety of those restrictions, and, if he agreed with them, why he did so, and how his judgment as President of the United States of American is going to be affected by institutional practices in general, and the LDS Church’s instructions in particular.

greenfrog: I think your analogy between state action, i.e., enforcement of invalid CCR’s and religious belief, protected under the First Amendment is misplaced.

I can agree that if evangelicals are going to criticize Mormons for, as an example, the priesthood ban, they should be willing to look at their own behavior in, as an example, not discouraging racism and segregation in the South. But it is worth pointing out that there were many evangelicals leading the desegregation fight, and these people don’t have much to apologize for in that regard.

I think evangelicals who call us a “cult” and satanic have a lot of soul-searching to do on how they are truly following Christ’s teaching. But I will say once again that most evangelical leaders, rather than the rank and file, who have spoken out on the issue are not doing this and are instead reaching out to Mormons as political allies rather than criticizing us. I think based on our history some of us are way too hasty to get defensive when we don’t need to. And that’s understandable. But this article is a great example of a conservative leader being reined in and controlled when criticizing us rather than an example of evangelicals piling on. I am mostly encouraged with the political scene right now regarding Mormons.

I think greenfrog raises a valid point, and whether the racial discrimination is part of a religious belief protected by the 1st Amendment is irrelevant.

Besides, I would hope ane expect that Romney has a satisfactory answer (that I think was the attitude of many in the church in those pre-1978 days):

1. I did not understand the reasons for the limitation on priesthood. But I did understand the limitation to be temporary, and that salvation as the LDS teach it is available to all, of whatever race or ethnicity.

2. I hoped and prayed that the limitation on priesthood would come to an end.

3. I rejoiced on that day in June 1978, with the overwhelming majority of my brothers and sisters in the church.

4. All my life I have believed racial discrimination in housing, in employment, in education, in voting, in access to public accomodations or other facilities to be wrong.

If Romney’s experience was at all like mine, he used to think through these issues and just has to dredge up his answers from 30 years ago.

It think it’s great that the majority of the leadership supported Romney against the questions. Unfortunately when the campaign really gets going, the news will cover the controvery. The CNN headline for the story won’t be “The majority of the Republican Leadership supports Romney”, but will be “Certain Members of the Republican Leadership want to know why Romney thought blacks weren’t as good as whites until 1978″. Media wants ratings, and controversy will give it to them. Romney needs to count on more confrontations like this in the future, and be prepared for the resulting headlines to have an impact on what the public thinks about him.

I also think any Rove-like Republican candidate would be smart to push poll anything mentioning polygamy, magic underwear, golden bibles or blacks and the priesthood.

I don’t know Dave.

It’s hard to say where the most predjudice against Romney is going to hail from.

Counter-cultist Evangelicals?

Or anti-religion-John Krakauer (Banner of Heaven)-liberal-types?

Romney needs to walk a fine line between the two, because either camp could make trouble for him in the press.

But those two camps don’t represent most of America. I think the most votes are to be had among Americans who are religious as a general matter, but don’t give much thought to doctrinal schisms and are outright hostile toward anything that smacks of aetheism.

I think Romney has more to lose by attacking a Christian faith in the US than he has to gain among the hostile secularist/aetheist crowd. The “shot across the bow” would turn-off more people than it would gain in my opinion.

Look, there’s no love lost between me and most of those Evangelicals who actually behave as if Mormonism really exists. But even I don’t think that it’s wise to go out of the way to antagonize them, even if it might garner some short-term personal satisfaction for me and you.

Greenfrog,
Here is the real problem with playing the race card in regard to 30 year old racial policies tied into religion. How fair is it to ask a Lutheran how many Reverends of African descent do they have Nationwide? How fair is it to dredge up a curse of cain quote on Africans and Slavery from John Wesley or Calvin to go on the offensive against a Wesleyan or Calvinist?

To this day, nowhere in America is more segregated than the chapel. The real question is if any of these questions really give a good indication of the candidates personal beliefs regarding race. They do not give any real indication of what the candidate’s policies will be based on. To assume they do is to be a simpleton, not that I think that is what any of these people are doing.

Would you consider it fair game for a southerner to be denied a UN ambassadorship because their home state had Jim Crow laws on the books up through the 1960’s? What about if your Father dressed in minstrel face for a play in the depression era, are you then unworthy to ever hold public office?

It is unfortunately far to easy to smear the racist by association label on most anyone these days. It is such a convenient and effective character assassin, especially for those candidates without lurid scandal or dishonest business backgrounds. What else a poor opposition troll left to arm themselves with? The poor dumb electorate must have their Black and White (no pun intended), oversimplified, character issue or else they won’t stay at home disgusted and may actually make an intelligent decision based on policy and ideas.

We blogged extensively about this today at Article 6 Blog.

Lots of links developing here. The significance of the story is that the woman who conducted the “grilling” is a McCain operative, meaning there is more of this to come. Drop on by and see what you think.

Lowell

[Mod edit: made the link a hyperlink]

It turns out this woman is a McCain operative. Curiouser and curiouser.

http://www.evangelicalsformitt.org/front_page/the_mccain_camp_swings_and_mis.php

Here is the real problem with playing the race card…

Asking whether he supported a prominent and prejudicial policy in an organization that he was, himself, a member of — at the time the policy was in place, official, and enforced — is “playing the race card?