After just two weeks in the White House George Bush's 'compassionate conservatism' has already taken on a deeply religious tone, but has been well received throughout the US, finds Martin Kettle Special report: George W Bush's America Friday February 2, 2001 Never underestimate the importance of organised religion in the United States. This is a nation of believers, in which 86% consider themselves practising Christians, seven out of 10 people say that the events described in the Bible are literally true and 63% of the population says that religion can answer "most or all of today's problems". In this respect, the US is very different from Europe and Britain in particular. So, when George Bush began saying during the election campaign that he foresaw an important role for "faith-based organisations" in such policy areas as education, prisons, welfare and social programmes, few Americans dissented. Al Gore, indeed, agreed with him. The election campaign was full of such talk from both sides. Nevertheless, it is unlikely that many Americans are yet aware of the full significance of the role Mr Bush intends these religious organisations to play in the social policies of the future. Indeed it would not be an exaggeration to say that Mr Bush foresees a policy revolution with religion at its centre. To understand what Mr Bush is attempting, it's also important to understand what he means - and certainly what some of those around him mean - by the phrase "compassionate conservatism". Mr Bush's catch phrase was always a neat campaign slogan. But it was - and is - also an agenda. It's not about finding a middle course between government and the market. It's not about capitalism with a human face. It's about using government to enable religion, and more specifically to enable evangelical Christianity, to transform American society from anarchy into order. Before this week, Mr Bush's most important utterance on the subject came in a speech in Indianapolis in July 1999. What leaps out from that speech is its evangelical tone. At its heart is Mr Bush's commitment to "the transforming power of faith". Elsewhere in the speech he extolled "the power of religion to protect families and change lives". The Indianapolis speech revealed the intellectual debt Mr Bush owes to one man in particular. Marvin Olasky has been a Mr Bush adviser since 1993. His book Compassionate Conservatism, in which Mr Bush wrote an enthusiastic preface, was published last year. It spells out its aims vividly and with great passion. Compassionate conservatism, Mr Olasky says, is "a full-fledged programme with a carefully considered philosophy". Its guiding star is that "Christ changes lives" and it calls for an American president who "will have to speak regularly about the importance of faith in God to poverty fighting and other social concerns". This week, as one of his first presidential acts, Mr Bush began to act out the part that Olasky has scripted for him. After meeting some three dozen religious leaders and activists at the White House, Mr Bush announced the setting up of a White House office of faith-based and community initiatives and ordered five key government departments to set up similar internal agencies to focus their own work with religious groups. It is now more than 18 months since the Indianapolis speech, and Mr Bush's approach to the faith-based agenda has become more subtle and conciliatory in important ways. Mr Bush has gone out of his way to say that "government will never be replaced by charities and community groups" and to stress that federal dollars will not go to "fund the religious activities of any group". These apparent compromises won a generally respectful reception for Mr Bush's initiative this week. But the package raises a succession of explosive issues nevertheless, even if few politicians of either party seem to want to draw attention to them. In the first place, Mr Bush's move skates deliberately close to the constitutionally guaranteed separation of church and state, which the supreme court has repeatedly upheld. For example, one of Mr Bush's chief lieutenants in this area of policy the former mayor of Indianapolis, Steve Goldsmith, has argued that government should support homeless shelters in which participation in daily prayer is a condition of entry. Secondly, Mr Bush has yet to ensure that the "faith-based" programmes are run in compliance with, or at least compatibly with, the rules which apply to government programmes. Existing organisations must be audited and, unlike many religious organisations, are covered by anti-discrimination law. No such standards have yet been drawn up for the organisations Mr Bush hopes to encourage. Yet perhaps the main problem Mr Bush faces is that the programme has been set up to achieve something - religious conversion - which he is increasingly forced to deny for political reasons. Olasky, however, is explicit. In his book he says that proselytising is desirable. He supports "change by conversion". It is in many respects the rationale of his philosophy. "Marvin is an evangelical Christian and Mr Bush is an evangelical Christian," commented one activist last year. This week, Mr Bush placed that activist, John DiIulio, in charge of his new White House initiative. Mr Bush has put religious faith at the centre of American government and of the contemporary American experience. Like it or hate it, this somehow seems like a pretty historic achievement for a man who is in only his second week at the White House. Guardian _______________________________________________ Crashlist website: http://website.lineone.net/~resource_base
