It happens.
It does seem that the quote comes from a single-source. There, I’ve learned something. This link suggests that it has had some life outside of the internet though
These don’t sound to me like major media, and I could not comment if these and the internet-bound accusation would deserve a full-blooded rebuttal by Bush Senior or his supporters, but I would have liked to have seen one.
Whatever, a similar bruhaha arose recently when Bush Junior said
and the same Robert Sherman turns up to take him to task for the imputation that the attacks were carried out by atheists (“our enemy… is without conscience or faith.”)
As an outsider, it seems to me that announcing oneself as an atheist in the USA is not necessarily a great career move in politics, are there any “full-on” atheist Senators for instance? If the examples of the OP are true then it seems this bigotry is indeed institutionalised.
I am a citizen of South Carolina and I am an atheist. It is my position that the Constitution of South Carolina denies me the right to vote (to be an elector.) Consider these statements from Article XVII: “No person who denies the existence of a Supreme Being shall hold any office under this Constitution.”
“No person shall be elected or appointed to any office in this State unless he possess the qualifications of an elector”
“Every qualified elector is eligible to any office to be voted for”
Therefore, anyone denying the existence of a Supreme Being cannot be an elector, since an elector is eligible to any office.
I have suggested that the atheists (and possibly the agnostics) of South Carolina be required to wear a scarlet “A” on election day so they can be kept away from the polls with cattle prods and such.
Getting back to the O.P.:
The article linked to in the original post cites Article IV, Section 2 of the constitution of South Carolina (“No person shall be eligible to the office of Governor who denies the existence of the Supreme Being”); there’s another provision in the S.C. constitution, Article VI, Section 2 (“No person who denies the existence of the Supreme Being shall hold any office under this Constitution”). These two provisions led to a lengthy struggle by Herb Silverman (a professor of mathematics at the College of Charleston) to become a notary public.
Actually, he first ran for governor, in order to challenge the Article IV provision (at that point, he hadn’t realized there was also a broader prohibition in Article VI). The courts basically told him to come back when he actually won the election and was denied office. (And as he put it, if he had won the election, his first official action would have been to demand a recount.) But then the broader prohibition in Article VI was pointed out to him, so he set out on a lengthy quest to become a South Carolina notary public. Up until that point, if I recall correctly no one had ever been denied an application to become a notary public, but his application was turned down. After a three-year legal battle, he finally won the case and became a notary public.
I tell you, is this a great country or what, where anyone, even Jewish atheist math professors who were born in log cabins (which they built with their own hands) can aspire to someday, if they struggle against all odds, become notary publics?
If only the poor Christians weren’t so persecuted, this would be a truly great country.
Seriously, the continuing persistance of these provisions in state constitutions, even if they are considered unenforceable, just shows how much bigotry against atheists there still is in this country. Note that although they’ve been struck down by the courts, the anti-atheist provisions of South Carolina’s state constitution still haven’t been formally repealed. No state would ever leave in place a constitutional bar against Jews holding office, or against a “Papist” being governor, even if it wasn’t enforced, but everone knows atheists are immoral Communist Satan-worshipping baby-eaters.
Yes, Robert Sherman is quite active here. I generally support him and think he’s got the right idea, but he can be a bit militant at a times which is counterproductive.
I’d agree with that. Although you could probably get away with it in some local elections or even as a Representative.
The bigotry isn’t really institutionalized though. No one could legally prevent you from holding office for being an atheist, those provisions in the state constitutions which call for it would be struck down as unenforceable by the Supreme Court as violations of the US Constitution.
Hmm. A skeptical mind would ask: Has Bush ever said anything similar to this in any context? That is, has he ever intimated that a person’s religious beleifs, or lack thereof, should be the basis for denying them any rights under the constitution? Bush Sr is a worldly man. The more reasonable explanation is that the quote was either exagerated or taken out of context. I’d give the guy (Bush) the benefit of the doubt until and unless he had the opportunity to face this charge and confirm or deny that it is indeed his belief. As president, he had ample opportunity to act on that statement, and I certainly saw no evidence that he ever did so.
You can go here: http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?&threadid=23090&perpage=50 to read Scylla and my fairly exhausting hashing over of the Sherman quote. But some highlights:
Well, he did say an atheist can’t be president:
“It is my firm belief that no one can be president without a belief in God, without understanding the power of prayer, without faith.” --GWB
I also found mention of it in the Associated Press, in the St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch, saturday, 21 january 1989 3B and and the Minnesota Daily, tuesday, 2 may 1989 p 14 and he mentioned it again on Larry King Live. And trying to dig up minor news stories from '89 is pretty slim pickings. Also from that link: *After Bush’s election but before his taking office, American Atheists wrote to Bush asking that he consider being sworn into office on the Constitution instead of the Bible and also asking him to retract his August 1987 statement. Bush had his White House buddy, C. Boyden Gray, counsel to the president, reply on White House stationery on February 21, 1989, stating that substantively Bush stood by his original statement.
“As you are aware, the President is a religious man who neither supports atheism nor believes that atheism should be unnecessarily encouraged or supported by the government.”*
Scylla actually asked Sherman about this, and this was part of his reply: “…the entire Chicago political press corps was there, along with national reporters. One reporter in particular, who seems to recall this exchange quite well, is Greg Lefevre of CNN. He is now the San Francisco Bureau Chief of CNN, right down the block from beautiful Port Angeles. Ask him. I’ve referred people to him about this several times over the past thirteen years.” Scylla did email Greg with no reply, but the fact that Sherman has someone he refers to seems to be a point in his favor.
In my opinion, the weight of the evidence seems to lean towards believing it. Sherman is an accredited reporter, and if a reporter said person X said Y and it did not seem terribly uncharacteristic, it was picked up by multiple news outlets, another source reports written confirmation on White House stationery, the reporter has not been found lying before, and the alleged source never rebutted the quote, well, I’m inclined to believe unless more evidence against it comes to light. It is certainly more evidence in favor of truth than I require from nearly every other quote I take as fact; I’ve read a dozen stories today where I accepted as truth without such checking.
If you read the quote in context, it is clear that what he means is that he doesn’t see how a non-believer could carry out the duties of a president. Hell, he may even believe that Amercans shouldn’t elect an atheist to the presidency. He’d have the vast majority of Americans in agreement with him. But to read it as saying “Atheists should be forbidden to hold the office of the president” is, to my mind, incorrect.
Yes, it’s so much better to say something like “atheists/blacks/Jews/redheads/conservatives lack the qualities to be president” rather than “atheists/blacks/Jews/redheads/conservatives would be perfectly capable, but I won’t let them”. 
Remember, bigotry doesn’t come from just a arbitrary desire to deny a certain group something; it comes from a belief that that group is inferior. Imagine the foofooraw if he has said in a speech that he believed someone couldn’t be president without being white, or without believing in Jesus.
Gaudere:
C’mon. How often does one here “I could never have survivied X without my belief in God”. Now, do I, as an atheist, think the person has insulted me? Has he implied that I would be incapable of “surviving X”? No. It just means that the person in question relies on their faith in God and can’t imagine getting by without it.
Another example. I might say: “It is my firm belief that no one can post in GD without being well read wrt current events”. Does that mean I’m saying people who are not duly well read should be forbidden from posting? Of course it doesn’t.
But at least what you’re saying about well-read people, John Mace, makes some sort of logical sense. However, you’re also rightfully pointing out another issue: we’re descriminant about who we can’t discriminate against. This is all about political correctness, and frankly it just doens’t seem to be politically incorrect to attack atheists. This is not at all surprising in America, considering how religious it is (as compared to countries in Europe, say). (
The fact is that until an atheist gets lynched, no one’s going to care. At all. They really won’t. :-/
No one cared about women’s rights either because no one was lynching them. The only thing women had going for them is that they’re half the population, a benefit atheists will never have.
Sucks for us, i suppose, but life’s not fair. All we can hope for is that the law will remain on our side. Or we can always just move to europe.
As for me I go out of my way to discriminate against atheists. I discriminate against racists. I discriminate against hate mongers and child molesters, and I go out of my way to discriminate against self-centered atheists.
It is my God given right.
milum, was that a joke or would you like to elaborate on your views?
That wouldn’t be analogous at all – a fairer analogy would be asking, how often does one hear “You couldn’t survive that experience without a belief in God”? No?
MEBuckner, you speak like this has been some kind of hijack, apologies from me if that is not so, I certainly didn’t mean it to be.
When you say, “I couldn’t have climbed Mount Everest without Jesus” you’re talking about yourself. But when you say, “Nobody could climb Mount Everest without Jesus” you’re saying no Jew or atheist or Muslim could climb Mount Everest. GWB didn’t say “I couldn’t have made it as pres without God”, he says “no one” can be president without belief in God and faith.
And do you only discriminate against “self-centered atheists” or more altruistic ones as well?
Stories about weird little laws in the US pop up everywhere. Women not being allowed to eat bananas in public, it being ok to beat your spouse if you do it at the courthouse steps, moose disallowed from making love within city limits and whatnot. Is there some effort being made to “clean up” these quirky things or is it judged too unimportant?
Aw, schucks!
Anyway, Alex_Dubinsky, have no fear, the rational has always won the long-game against the irrational, there’s no reason to suppose this is a trend that won’t continue.
I realize it’s a fine distinction, but I didn’t say “only bigots” don’t believe the story. I said “Only because bigots refused to believe Sherman because he was an atheist.” Stated that way it allows for others to disbelieve the story for other reasons than bigotry.
I know. I know. It’s splitting hairs. If you require corroboration before you believe a story, so be it. But if you would re-read your own sentence, you did say “we” instead of “they.” You didn’t mean to include yourself, did you?
That’s already happened in a sense. Madalyn O’Hair was murdered because of her atheism. She wasn’t dragged to a magnolia tree by a mob, but she was killed for her atheism. That’s close enough to a “lynching” in my book. And as far as I know, her murder hasn’t been solved. My guess is, her case is not a high priority because she was an atheist. That, too is a kind of institutionalized discrimination.
Not quite. He didn’t say “No one can be president…” he said “It is my firm belief that no one can be president…”. I would agree that the first version would be cause for alarm. Sounds too much like stating a fact. The second version, to me, is equivalent to saying “I’ve been a president. I know what it takes. My faith was essential for getting me through it. I don’t think someone without faith could hack it.”
While we’re parsing this sentence, I would also be alarmed if Bush had said “It is my firm belief that no one should be president…” I see a world of difference in the sentences based on that one word: can vs should.