{"id":45,"date":"2010-07-29T13:05:34","date_gmt":"2010-07-29T13:05:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/religionandpubliclife\/2010\/07\/tennessees-lt-gov-and-its-muslims.html"},"modified":"2010-07-29T13:05:34","modified_gmt":"2010-07-29T13:05:34","slug":"tennessees-lt-gov-and-its-muslims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/2010\/07\/tennessees-lt-gov-and-its-muslims.html","title":{"rendered":"Tennessee’s Lt. Gov. and its Muslims"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ramsey.jpg\"Tennessee Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey, who happens to be
\nrunning for governor of the Volunteer State, has caught a bunch of flak
\nfor his recent comments on
\nthe stump<\/a> suggesting that Muslims might not merit First Amendment
\nprotection. Asked to comment on the proposed construction of an Islamic
\ncommunity center in Murfreesboro, he said, “You could even argue whether
\nbeing a Muslim is actually a religion or
\nis it a nationality, way of life or cult, whatever you want to call it.
\nNow certainly we do protect our religions, but at the same time this is
\nsomething we are going to have to face.<\/span><\/a>”<\/p>\n

This has tempted me to wonder out loud if Ramsey’s
\nunderstanding of the First Amendment is that laws can be made
\nprohibiting the free exercise of cults, to point out that one man’s cult
\nis another’s religion, etc. But averse as I am to shooting fish in a
\nbarrel, and always actuated by a desire for deeper understanding, I
\nfigured I’d try to determine where Ramsey’s coming from.<\/p>\n

\"enuf.jpg\"Where he comes from<\/a> is
\nBlountville, which is about as deep as you can get into Upper East
\nTennessee. That’s the hilly part of the state that has given the world
\nNASCAR, thanks to the pressing need moonshiners had to outrace the
\nrevenooers. The local soft drink, brewed by Tri-City Beverage in Johnson
\nCity, is Dr. Enuf<\/a>,
\noriginally sold as a tonic for hangovers, which is definitely what
\nyou get if you make a habit of drinking what they’re running down from the
\nhollers. The drink’s marketing slogan is “Enuf is Enough,” which, I can
\nattest, is also true.<\/p>\n

\"liston.jpg\"When it comes to cults, the most famous local variety<\/a>
\nfeatures churches with names like the Church of God with Signs Following
\nand the Church of Jesus with Signs Following and the Holiness Church of
\nGod in Jesus Name–all offshoots of the Church of God (Cleveland, TN)
\nthat, based on Mark
\n16: 17-18<\/a>, favor the handling of snakes and the drinking of poison
\nas signs of election. They also follow a distinctive way of life that
\neschews alcohol, carbonated beverages, coffee, and tea; smoking;
\ndancing; the use of cosmetics and jewelry; and recourse to medical
\ndoctors. Male co-religionists greet each other with a vigorous hug and
\nthe “holy kiss,” a mouth-to-mouth osculation.<\/p>\n


\n
Now, as a Methodist Sunday School teacher, Ramsey can be expected to
\ntake a dim view of this lineal descendant of Methodism whose most
\ndistinctive practices Tennessee sought to prohibit through legislation
\npassed after World War II banning the displaying of snakes in such a way
\nas to endanger others. Indeed, in 1975, when Ramsey was pursuing his
\nundergraduate studies at East Tennessee State University, the Tennessee
\nSupreme Court handed down a unanimous decision prohibiting the handling
\nof snakes and the consumption of poison in a case, State
\nex rel. Swann<\/i> v. Pack<\/i><\/a>, involving a church in Newport, 60
\nmiles southwest of the ETSU campus. The case was brought because the
\nlocal prosecutor feared that Cocke county was in imminent danger and
\nlikely to “become the snake handling capital of the world.”<\/p>\n

To be
\nsure, the number of snake-handling Christians number in the hundreds
\nand the number of Muslims in the hundreds of millions, but I reckon
\nthere are comparable numbers of both groups in Tennessee. So Ramsey
\nmight be forgiven–well, not exactly forgiven, but, let’s say, understood<\/i>
\nfor thinking of Muslims as comparable to the snake-handling folk
\nin his own religious neck of the woods. Yesterday, he did seek to
\nnuance his position, telling the Nashville Tennessean<\/i> that he
\nhas “no problem–and I don’t think anyone in this country has a
\nproblem–with peace-loving, freedom-loving Muslims that move to this
\ncountry
\nand assimilate into our society.”<\/p>\n

“But, he continued, “it’s
\nundeniable that there’s a
\nportion of Islam that’s been co-opted by a radical faction that
\npromotes violence not only against Americans but around the world. That’s what I’m talking about.” What Ramsey thinks that has to do
\nwith the Murfreesboro situation is not clear, but under the circumstances,
\nI’d recommend that he go back and read State
\nex rel. Swann<\/i> v. Pack<\/i><\/a>, wherein the justices of the state he hopes to govern take
\nexceptional pains to make clear that in disallowing life-threatening
\nreligious practices they in no way wish to undermine the protections
\noffered to religious conscience by both the federal and state
\nconstitutions. Here’s a taste:<\/p>\n

Under our
\nconstitutions, a citizen may be a devout Christian, a dedicated Jew or a
\nconsummate infidel–or he may be a member of the Holiness Church of God
\nin Jesus Name. The government must view all citizens and all religious
\nbeliefs with absolute and uncompromising neutrality. The day this
\nCountry ceases to countenance irreligion or unusual or bizarre
\nreligions, it will cease to be free for all religions. We must prefer
\nnone and disparage none.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is something the Lt. Governor is going to have to face. Or in other words, enuf is enough.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tennessee Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey, who happens to be running for governor of the Volunteer State, has caught a bunch of flak for his recent comments on the stump suggesting that Muslims might not merit First Amendment protection. Asked to comment on the proposed construction of an Islamic community center in Murfreesboro, he said, “You…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":222,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nTennessee's Lt. 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After teaching at Harvard in the Department of History and Literature for three years, he became editor of the Boston Review. In 1987 he joined the staff of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, where he worked variously as a reporter, editorial writer and columnist. In 1996 he became the founding director of the Leonard E. Greenberg Center for the Study of Religion in Public Life at Trinity College and in 1998 founding editor of Religion in the News, a magazine published by the Center that examines how the news media handle religious subject matter. In 2005, he was named director of the Trinity College Program on Public Values, comprising both the Greenberg Center and a new Institute for the Study of Secularism in Society and Culture directed by Barry Kosmin. In 2007, he became Professor of Religion in Public Life at the College. Professor Silk is the author of Spiritual Politics: Religion and America Since World War II and Unsecular Media: Making News of Religion in America. He is co-editor of Religion by Region, an eight-volume series on religion and public life in the United States, and co-author of The American Establishment, Making Capitalism Work, and One Nation Divisible: How Regional Religious Differences Shape American Politics. In 2007 he inaugurated Spiritual Politics, a blog on religion and American political culture.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/author\/msilk"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/222"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/religionandpubliclife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}