What the beltway could learn from the Bible belt; campaigns aren't horse races, they're moral arguments.

• Author: Cornfield, Michael
• Position: Critical review of Garry Wills's 'Under God: Religion and American Politics'

WHAT THE BELTWAY COULD LEARN FROM THE BIBLE BELT

You might think you've heard too much, not too little, about religion in politics. But, quick, to what denomination does Jesse Helms belong? What's the percentage of evangelicals in the North Carilona electorate? Don't know? You are forgiven, since the news mdeia act as though the Bible and its various believers and interpreters matter only to inhabitants of an insignificant Beltway symbolically cinched around Dayton, Tennessee, where the Scopers trial occurred in 1925.

You are not forgiven, however, if you don't care. In Under God, (*1) Garry Wills contends that we pay a heavy price for the secular Beltway's perspective on American elections. Unless we look at religion, especially evangelical Protestantism, Wills contends, "we cannot understand our corporate past; we cannot even talk meaningfully to each other about things that will affect us all (and not only the 'religious nuts' among us)." To Wills's mind, by ignoring religion the press not only misread the key events of campaign 1988, but also abetted the moral enervation of America's democratic dialogue.

The Beltway perspective--as evidenced by the recent campaign opuses of Sidney Blumenthal, Paul Taylor, Jack Germond and Jules Witcover, and Roger Simon--tends to turn campaign coverage into stories about journalism. Everything becomes grist for Fred Friendly roundtables. The pattern holds for Jesse Jackson (Do We The Media have a double standard?), Michael Dukakis (Did Maureen Dowd's Sasso story and Bernard Shaw's debate question range beyond Our Professional Objectivity?), and George Bush (Should We The Media check these television ads for accuracy?). Media ethics is an interesting and important topic. But it's a selfish stand-in for understanding campaigns, and it inclines thoughtful people to identify with the journalists' perspective, and, thus, toward the wrong kinds fo reforms.

By contrast, Wills cuts to the essential quality of presidential campaigns. He regards them as an interplay of moral arguments. The contents of the arguments matter more than who wins and who loses the final vote count (not to mention the synthetic vote counts along the way). A presidential campaign, he argues, is more significant as a communal ritual than as a preface to government. Wills's approach is a tonic to political scientists, who have wailed for years at reporters and other campaign junkies that most voters pay little attention to the elction...