Both Citizen and Saint
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Both Citizen and Saint: Religious Integrity and Liberal Democracy by Benjamin Richard Hertzberg Department of Political Science Duke University Date:_______________________ Approved: ___________________________ Thomas A. Spragens, Supervisor ___________________________ Ruth W. Grant ___________________________ J. Peter Euben ___________________________ Jack Knight Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Political Science in the Graduate School of Duke University 2011 i v ABSTRACT Both Citizen and Saint: Religious Integrity and Liberal Democracy by Benjamin Richard Hertzberg Department of Political Science Duke University Date:_______________________ Approved: ___________________________ Thomas A. Spragens, Supervisor ___________________________ Ruth W. Grant ___________________________ J. Peter Euben ___________________________ Jack Knight An abstract of a dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Political Science in the Graduate School of Duke University 2011 Copyright by Benjamin Richard Hertzberg 2011 ABSTRACT In this dissertation, I develop a political liberal ethics of citizenship that reconciles conflicting religious and civic obligations concerning political participation and deliberation—a liberal-democratic ethics of citizenship that is compatible with religious integrity. I begin by canvassing the current state of the debate between political liberals and their religious critics, engaging Rawls‟s Political Liberalism and the various religious objections Nicholas Wolterstorff, Christopher Eberle, Robert George, John Finnis, Paul Weithman, Jeffrey Stout, and Gerald Gaus and Kevin Vallier develop (Chapter One). I then critically evaluate political liberalism‟s requirements of citizens in light of the religious objections and the religious objections in light of political liberal norms of reciprocity, concluding that some religious citizens have legitimate complaints against citizenship requirements that forbid citizens from offering religious arguments alone in public political discussions (Chapter Two). Next, I propose an alternative set of guidelines for public political discussions in constitutional democracies, the phased account of democratic decision-making, that, I argue, addresses the religious citizens‟ legitimate complaints without undermining a constitutional democracy‟s legitimacy or commitment to public justification (Chapter Three). Then, I argue that a religious practice of political engagement I call prophetic witnessing is compatible with the phased account, can serve as a canonical model to guide religious citizens‟ political participation, and can help religious citizens navigate the substantive conflicts between their religious and civic obligations that remain possible even in a society that follows the phased iv account (Chapter Four). Finally, I conclude by imagining three different democracies, each adhering to a different set of guidelines for public political discussions, in order to argue for the benefit of adopting norms that balance citizens‟ obligations to govern themselves legitimately with citizens‟ ability to integrate their deepest moral and religious commitments and their public, political argument and advocacy. v To Ruth and Marty, examples of political passion and principle vi CONTENTS Abstract .............................................................................................................................. iv Contents ............................................................................................................................ vii List of Tables ...................................................................................................................... x Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................ xi Chapter One. Religious Liberty, Religious Integrity, and Democratic Citizenship: Rawls‟s Political Liberalism and its Religious Critics ....................................................... 1 I: Political Liberalism ................................................................................................. 16 II: The Religious Response: Against the Duty of Civility .......................................... 32 II.1: The Integrity Objection ..................................................................................... 34 II.2: The Natural Law Objection ............................................................................... 47 II.3: The Unreasonable Exclusion Objection ............................................................ 55 III: Next Steps ............................................................................................................. 60 IV: Methodological Note ............................................................................................ 65 Chapter 2. Assessing the Reasonableness of Religion: Religious Integrity and Religion in Public Political Discussions .............................................................................................. 68 I: The First Definition of Reasonableness .................................................................. 76 II: The Second Definition of Reasonableness ............................................................. 83 III: The Third Definition of Reasonableness .............................................................. 89 IV: The Fourth Definition of Reasonableness ............................................................ 97 IV.1: Comprehensive Compatibility and Incompatibility ...................................... 102 IV.2: Religious Compatibility and Incompatibility ................................................ 105 IV.3: Examples of Religious Compatibility and Incompatibility ........................... 111 vii IV.4: The Fourth Definition of Reasonableness and the First Definition Compared ................................................................................................................................. 123 V: The Fifth Definition of Reasonableness .............................................................. 129 VI: The Reasonableness of the Religious Objections Assessed ............................... 132 VI.1: The Natural Law Objections .......................................................................... 133 VI.2: The Integrity Objection ................................................................................. 142 VI.3: Implications ................................................................................................... 145 Chapter 3. The Phased Account of Democratic Decision-making ................................. 147 I: The Aim of Articulating Norms to Guide Democratic Decision-making ............. 151 II: The Phased Account of Democratic Decision-making ........................................ 158 II.1: Unhelpful Attempts to Specify the Context of the Public Justification Requirement ............................................................................................................ 159 II.2: The Phases of Democratic Decision-making .................................................. 169 II.3: John Rawls‟s Proviso and the Phases of Democratic Decision-making ......... 174 II.4: Substantive Norms for the Phases of Democratic Decision-making .............. 181 III: Against Other Extant Alternative Guidelines for Public Political Discussion ... 201 III.1: Alternative Ethics of Citizenship ................................................................... 202 III.2: Convergence .................................................................................................. 212 IV: The Phased Account of Democratic Decision-making and Revealed Liberals .. 223 V: Conclusion ........................................................................................................... 228 Chapter 4. Prophetic Witnessing in the Liberal Public Sphere ....................................... 230 I: Holy Crimes in a Well-Ordered Society ............................................................... 234 II: Religious Practices of Political Engagement ....................................................... 241 III: Prophetic Witnessing .......................................................................................... 245 viii IV: Prophetic Witnessing and the Obligations of Liberal-Democratic Citizenship . 270 V: Prophetic Witnessing and Holy Crimes ............................................................... 288 Conclusion: A Tale of Three Democracies ..................................................................... 299 I: The Argument Thus Far ........................................................................................ 299 II: Democracy A ....................................................................................................... 301 III: Democracy C ...................................................................................................... 304 IV: Democracy B ...................................................................................................... 307 V: The Three Democracies Compared ..................................................................... 310 VI: Conclusion .......................................................................................................... 311 Bibliography ..................................................................................................................