It's only natural that a country founded by pilgrims would never LET ITS politics wander far from its faith. As voters weigh the faith-based presidency of George W. Bush, they should note that his is hardly the first of its kind. George Washington ad-libbed the line "So help me God" at the end of his swearing-in, and Thomas Jefferson extolled Jesus as the most important philosopher in his life two centuries before Bush ever did. Abraham Lincoln, the President whom Bush says he admires most, called the Civil War God's punishment for the sin of slavery, and the presidency an office that drove him to his knees "by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go." William McKinley decided to invade the Philippines to "uplift and civilize and Christianize" its people. And Woodrow Wilson, a son and grandson of ministers, believed that God had ordained him to be President, inspiring Freud to wonder whether he had a Messiah complex.
And yet, and yet ... The story of presidential faith throughout history is one of argument and mystery, as it was meant to be. A sense of independence was hard-wired into the nation so that all could worship as they pleased. Washington was a Freemason and a deist; no one knew what he truly believed. Jefferson read the Bible every day--even wrote his own version--but that was because he wanted to cut out all the miraculous parts, including the Resurrection. Lincoln worshipped faithfully but never joined a church, and was labeled an infidel by at least one congressional opponent. And it was Bill Clinton, viewed by his foes as the devil's disciple, of whom Billy Graham said in 1996, "He believes the Bible. He believes in Christ. He believes that he has been born again. He's got all the gifts an evangelist should have."
So what of the men who run for the presidency now, at a time when matters of faith have seldom played a more central role or divided voters more deeply? Church and state may be separate, but faith and politics are not. According to a TIME poll, those who consider themselves "very religious" support Bush over John Kerry, 59% to 35%, while those who are "not religious" favor Kerry, 69% to
22%. Asked if a President should be guided by his faith when making policy, 63% of Democrats say no while 70% of Republicans say yes. The gap would probably be even wider if it were not for those black voters who tend to be socially conservative, attend church regularly but nonetheless vote for Democrats.
The battle is not so much between faiths as within them. The more traditionally religious that people say they are, the more often they pray and attend worship services, the more likely they are to vote for Bush, says Professor John Green of the University of Akron in Ohio. "Where we used to have antagonism between religious traditions, Catholics versus Protestants versus Jews," he says, "now what we have is liberal Protestants linking up with liberal Catholics and liberal Jews against an alliance of conservative Protestants, conservative Catholics and conservative Jews."