American history article john butler challenged historians of modern america to Pay Attention to religion. In particular, he noted, religion of the continuing importance in 20th century american politics deserves sustained attention and analysis. Scholars of american religious history have proliferated over the past 15 years, yet in political history, religion has often retained a jackinthebox quality colorful, surprising, anomalous, idiosyncratic, but left on the periphery to pop up occasionally rather than systematically. Today, our roundtable will address how religion matters in american political history, and we will do so in three ways. First, i will ask each of our panelists to focus on a way in which religion matters that is, in their own research, how religion plays a role in spaces that they are working on, but also how centering religion in these spaces gives us a different narrative, a different story than if it were on the periphery or ignored in an way. Second, we will talk about butlers provocation why have political historians remain somewhat reluctant bystanders about religion in American History, and why does religion still get left out of papers, courses, syntheses, or as someone joked today, there are a few of you stalwarts, which we appreciate, but not as many people come to something when religion is part of it. And we will discuss the ways in how religion is everywhere in our current moments, the religious left, the evangelical right, and the monday movement are some of the things we see regularly today. We also see how religious freedom has become the catchword of the current administration, as well as opponents to it. How can and should we explain this as political historians, and how might political and religious historians Work Together to his store size the present moment . With me is the downforce cinch in st. Louis, his awardwinning first book was preaching on racks, the photograph in the making of modern African American religion. He is currently working on a book about religion, the fbi and the natural Security State which is under contract with Princeton University press. To his right is lauren turner, and assistant professor of history at university of san antonio. She is writing a book to bring religion to all nations which will be out by cornell soonish. There is also kate rosen glad, a visiting assistant professor of the History Department and Religion Department. She is working on a mag you script cooperative battlegrounds religion and the search for economic alternatives, under contract with columbia. And i am roni stall with the university of california my first book came out last year, and i am now working on a project on religion in American Health care. With that, i will turn to our first question and ask each of our scholars to talk about the role of religion in their own work and the way in which thinking about religion has changed the way we understand these certain aspects of American History. Thank you roni for that, and what she left out of her own introduction is that her book is also an awardwinning book, the Church History prize for the best first book in american religious history. So, thanks for bringing us all together. My Current Research project examines the fbi and its relationship to religion during the directorship of longtime director J Edgar Hoover from 1924 to 1972. The focus on religion in the project illuminates under studied yet vital aspects of the bureaus internal culture and practices, and how that ethos shaped the Public Perception of the fbis political work and in particular the fbis understanding and american understanding, more broadly, of the relationship between religion and National Security. Existing studies at the fbi have strongly dismissed the role of religion in the making and shaping of the bureau. The role of religion has been more prominent in political history in postwar america, displaying how the cold war shaped americas religious landscape. Yet these studies of religionin the cold war tend to downplay the role of the nations top listed Security Force and the cold war watchdog that was the fbi. In fact, all too often in these studies, hoover is working both literally and figuratively on the margins. In my research, i focus on the research between religion and hoovers fbi. I will discuss the things today that this reveals about american politics and political history. First, J Edgar Hoover himself. Examining the role of faith in the life of J Edgar Hoover reveals hoover became a central figure in American Religion, expressing beliefs in Sacred Symbols and the public sphere. Without looking at religion in the life of J Edgar Hoover, we will miss a number of things. For example, in his childhood diaries, they show, as well as his experience as a teenage sunday school teacher, and also that he explored a call to ministry. All of this reveals how religion shaped hoovers world view long before he became the director of the fbi. His faith remained when he became the director of the fbi. He was a trustee and member of the National Presbyterian church, sharing a pew with president eisenhower and john foster dulles, and remained in contact with his pastor for the remainder of his life. All of this reveals that hoovers understanding of religion is a calvinistic understanding of religion, and only viewed how he shaped america and executed his job in protecting america. This is evident in his speeches, the books in which he began framing patriotic christianity as the sole antidote to communism, and how he organized the bureau which i will adress next. Scholars and casual observers alike might doubt this is very of his faith, but americans at his time did not doubt that faith. Every major Christian Faith community from the Catholic Church to the african methodist episcopal church, to even protestant and mainline churches alike crown hoover with awards stained glass, and deemed as a champion of american politics. He can be seen as arguably the high priest of american civil religion. This title has normally been reserved such as hoovers coreligionist, dwight eisenhower. In fact, for almost half a century, hoover led the bureau and for countless americans, he was the person to look to for all things for god, flag, and country. Second, a keen eye on the importance of religion i revealed the bureau it under hoovers offices, the fbi instituted private Worship Services, spiritual retreats, and communion and Prayer Breakfast exclusively for fbi agents, and even when the fbi admitted africanamerican agents to these Worship Services and private religious affairs, they were exclusively for white agents only. The culture borrowed from protestant and catholic forms, including the militant aspect of jesuit spirituality. This was seen as more than federal bureaucrats, but as pious soldiers drafted to embark on a crusade against all things subversive and ungodly. Indeed in the context of the cold war, americans began to see their god fearing fbi agents as a clearinghouse of true faith and allegiance. They are filled with letters you mr. Hoover that, which church should i attend . Is billy graham a real question . Mr. Hoover, is Martin Luther king a communist . Should i attend a church led by a woman . Is that subversive . These letters fill fbi files. Americans may have look to their pastors, priests and bishops to be able to address theological disputes but many of them interested the fbi for wavier matters of politics. The history of the fbi can be seen and rewith an as digital cater of true faith and political allegiance in 20 a century u. S. Politics. Something contemporary observers of the fbi know all too well. Finally, focusing on religion illuminates all to influence important aspects of 20th century politics hoover and his fbi were working professional and working relationships with leading clergy, President Trump s pastor norm index. Appeal, billy graham, and the chaplain of the united clans of america, reverend george dorset, as well as the first clergy member to have his own television show, elder lightfoot solomon. The fbi worked with these men and all because hoover did not recognize female clergy. They all worked together to bring about a certain ideal of what the proper relationship was between religion and politics in the nation. Indeed, they preached and published it as a gospel. They privately worked with the bureau to employ Christian Faith and racialized rhetoric to construct a shared ideal of religion and National Security specifically and policy ideas more broadly. The fbi and its Christian Network worked in concert to promote antichristian rhetoric and communist for. Those that supported such causes were discredited as domestic and subversive at best, and destructive at worst. Hoover used this christian syndicate to make sure those folks were kept outside of the realm of what was considered american. With all of this in mind, whoevers faith and religious formation of the bureau and his fruitful partnerships with leading clergy, we can use this perhaps to rewrite American History in the post war era. Hoover and his fbi are important actors and factors that contributed to the rise of the modern religious right. In the end is just not replace narratives and studies at the fbi in american politics, but highlighting religion, it adds more texture to the story, brings more historical actors to the already crowded stage. It gives a clear picture to its role the fbi in american politics. This naming in framing might just help us to better understand todays fbi and its relationship with religion and National Security. Specifically american politics more broadly. Thank you. So i am a historian of u. S. Foreignpolicy with a focus on politics and religion, and my forthcoming book looks specifically at how conservative evangelical christian groups sought to influence u. S. Foreignpolicy on a range of issues, around religious freedom and human rights to International Trade and foreign aid. Starting in the 1970s and moving through the 1990s. In the process of conducting this research, one of the things i have found is that religion is a particularly fruitful avenue for analyzing not just politics, but also policymaking. I find in particular it helps shed light on the formation of ideology and national values, and helps policymakers and domestic Interest Groups promote those values. Religious beliefs had enduring elements of American Culture and ideology, shaped and continue to shape the worldview of leaders as well as the public. They helped to steer our National Discourse and in some cases that the parameters of what is acceptable and policymaking in terms of Foreign Policymaking. One of the key arguments i make in my book is that longstanding anxieties about religious repression and persecution and totalitarian regimes, and the threat that persecution posed to the Global Missionary agenda of evangelical groups led to a powerful policy lobby in the United States starting in the late 1970s. Owing in part to their particular theological beliefs, i found that evangelical privileged religious freedom, by which they meant their freedom to evangelize and the freedom of others to hear their even libation as the most fundamental human right. Concerns about religious persecution and other abuses against the faithful led evangelical groups in the United States to advocate for a christian foreignpolicy, one that upheld core religious values and protected american missionaries as those that they evangelized. I look at a number of case studies to demonstrate this. One set is going to of course be very familiar, the cold war, the soviet union, there is a lot of concern about persecution against religious believers in the soviet union, cases like the siberian seven who were very famous in the 1970s and 1980s, but there are number of cases as well that i look at. There is a considerable amount of activism by evangelicals, often that aligned with reagan era policies, but evangelicals also at times went against reagan era policies. With romania, for example, where the Reagan Administration sought to have a differentiation policy and extend trade, evangelicals were uncomfortable with that given the ongoing religious persecution there. There is interestintg activism that happens. These views, which were for promoting religious freedom in the soviet union and other totalitarian states, at times as friendly to their objectives. This is where things get interesting. This perception enabled evangelicals to interpret state violence and authoritarian countries as acceptable and sometimes even desirable efforts to combat this spread of communism and therefore prevent religious persecution. This is where we see support for genocidal dictators in places like guatamala being framed in human rights and religious freedom. Support for constructive engagement, the reagan policy of constructive engagement in south africa as an effort preventing the spread of communism and religious persecution, to protect Christian South africa. There is different ways in which this line which of human rights comes into play. Evangelical lobbyists were adapting and adopting human rights language into their Advocacy Campaign and congressional testimony about central america, africa, the middle east, and elsewhere. In using this language, i found it was shaping how certain policymakers, particularly politically conservative policymakers, were interpreting violence and oppression abroad. Ultimately these evangelical activists and Interest Groups were able to exert an influence on official decisionmaking on a range of vital foreignpolicy issues. Everything from military aid to guatamala is a trade relations with the soviet bloc and diplomatic relations with south africa. In terms of politics at home, this includes really significant lobbying efforts to strike down the comprehensive antiapartheid act in 1986. They are not successful in doing it, but they play a significant role in the efforts to oppose it. All this to say that evangelical foreignpolicy advocates, their Global Network really mattered. It had a substantive effect on u. S. Policymaking, and bringing religion into our study of politics and foreignpolicy really matters. It reminds us of the way the policymakers and politicians understand the world around them. It reminds us that religion is often a part of how they shape their world view. It is integral. Deeply held religious belief motivate grassroots political activism not just on issues like abortion, but foreignpolicy as well. I found bringing religion into the study of human rights activism and into politics, foreignpolicy is critical. These groups may be offering a different vision of human rights than the one we may typically think of as being offered by liberal human rights activist, but they like liberal human rights activists, they are often couching their activism in explicitly religious terms. There is a sense they are embracing that morality and freedom of religion should be fundamental parts of u. S. Foreign policymaking. There should be explicit goals. For us, one of the things that this pushes us to keep in mind, is that when we think about the history of foreignpolicy, it is not just a realist calculation of power, often religion is a foundational aspect of shaping what policymakers think of as a National Interest and think of exporting morality or Core National values and seeing the ways in which religion is tied up and incomplicated into those particular values. Bringing the history of religion into the excuse me, conservative religion into the study of human rights helps us think about the ways that human rights history and political history around activism. A lot of these terms are fluid and contested. Human rights as a term was fluid and contested in the 1970s, and shows us the ways activists can use language of human rights and shape the parameters of debate and shape the parameters of politics. In the 1980s, the views, the ways of thinking about human rights that conservative activists put forth and up shaping the politics of the Reagan Administration and shaping the way human rights policies look in the 1980s, it was quite significant. So, religious differences, religious conflicts all have an impact in politics. Basically, we should be keeping this in mind is essentially what my work shows. I am a historian, a modern u. S. Political and labor historian, but the popular language today, i am a historian of capitalism. In particular, i write about cooperative corporations, cooperatives which are usually dismissed as some variant of communalism, but instead i write about them as cooperatives. Not only as cooperatives, not only that, but cooperatives are democratically organized. One member, one vote, and they are oriented around Service Rather than profit. The historiography on corporations tends to suggest when we talk about corporations, most people point to a private business c