1 Shall Not Be Infringed: How the NRA Used Religious Language to Transform the 2 Meaning of the Second Amendment 3 4 Jessica Dawson 5 United States Military Academy at West Point 6 7 Abstract 8 Understanding the deep meaning of the Second Amendment is critical to 9 understanding the deeper meaning of guns in American culture. The 10 centrality of the Second Amendment in American culture can be better 11 understood through the intersection of American nationalism with 12 Protestant Christianity. Understanding the transformation of the Second 13 Amendment from an important Constitutional amendment to an article of 14 faith in religious nationalism provides new insight about the meaning of 15 guns for American identity. This paper argues that the NRA has capitalized 16 on the religious nationalism that arose in the late 1970s alongside the Moral 17 Majority and has increasingly used religious language to shape the discourse 18 surrounding the Second Amendment. The use of religious rhetoric, such as 19 references to evil, illustrates the merging of American civic religion with the 20 New Christian Right’s rhetoric. Using issues of the American Rifleman to 21 investigate the changing discourse since the mid-1970s, this paper 22 demonstrates how the NRA increased its use of religious language to frame 23 the political debate about gun rights through a religious nationalist lens. 24 25 Keywords: religious nationalism, Second Amendment, gun rights, gun 26 culture, sociology of evil 27 28 Introduction: Second Amendment and Religious Nationalism 29 30 Perhaps no other subject in America engenders the level of controversy and 31 intensity of emotions as the Second Amendment. Gun rights advocates and gun control 32 advocates occupy opposing positions on the political spectrum regarding the role of guns in 33 America. The Second Amendment has been a motivating force in American politics since at 34 least the 1960s, when violence shook the nation and a series of public assassinations lead 35 to a “moment of profound popular revulsion against guns” (Hofstadter, 1970, p. 9). Guns 36 and the Second Amendment have been widely studied in political, legal, historical, 37 criminological, and gender contexts, and recent studies have begun to consider gun in the 38 context of American religion (Mencken and Froese, 2017; O’Neill, 2007; Yamane, 2017a). 39 With the rise of studies of religious nationalism, the investigation of gun culture at the 40 intersection of religion and nationalism is a relatively recent development (Whitehead et 41 al., 2018). In this paper, I explore the NRA’s use of religious language to increasingly frame 42 the political debate about gun rights through a religious nationalist lens. 43 This paper contributes to the rich literature that has investigated the changing 44 meaning of the Second Amendment over time. The Second Amendment has been broadly 45 studied in political (Carlson, 2015; Horwitz and Anderson, 2009; Obert, 2018; Winkler, 46 2013), legal (Waldman, 2015; Winkler, 2013), gender (Dunseith, n.d.; Melzer, 2012; O’Neill, 1 47 2007), and historical (Burbick, 2006; Dunbar-Ortiz, 2018) contexts. Dunbar-Ortiz’s (2018) 48 Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment expanded on this rich literature and 49 demonstrated how larger social and political forces created the myths surrounding the 50 Second Amendment and the role of guns in American history. A major contribution of that 51 work was to situate these myths in the larger patterns of the violent control of native and 52 slave populations (Dunbar-Ortiz, 2018; Obert, 2018). This historical context is critical for 53 any discussion of religious nationalism today, given the dominance of white Christian 54 nationalism in the current political sphere (Gorski, 2017a). Sociological studies of gun 55 culture and the Second Amendment are experiencing a resurgence (Burbick 2006; Yamane 56 2017b; Stroud 2016; Hovey et al. 2017). Recent studies have begun considering the role of 57 guns in American religious contexts (Mencken and Froese, 2017; Yamane, 2017a). Other 58 studies have analyzed gun-related texts for religious symbolism. Lamy (1992) analyzed 59 Soldier of Fortune magazine to demonstrate the presence of apocalyptic millennialism 60 (Yamane et al., 2018), laying the foundation for investigating the links between gun culture 61 and religious beliefs. Gibson’s Warrior Dreams (1994) also used Soldier of Fortune and 62 other gun magazines to explain the rise of paramilitary culture in the post-Vietnam years. I 63 expand on these studies to demonstrate how the NRA has increasingly used religious 64 language to shape its argument in favor of the Second Amendment—that is, that the right 65 to bear arms is part of God’s covenant with America (Gorski, 2017b). 66 The NRA’s role in transforming the Second Amendment to one of central political 67 importance has been well documented (Dunbar-Ortiz, 2018; Halbrook, 2008; Melzer, 2012; 68 Waldman, 2015). Melzer’s Gun Crusaders provided an in-depth study of NRA members and 69 how the NRA as a social movement organization mobilized members with differing levels 70 of commitment during elections to protect gun rights through the political process (2012). 71 Melzer’s work revealed critical early links between the NRA’s shaping argument around the 72 Second Amendment and the use of religious nationalism. Members of the NRA leadership 73 have argued that “you would get a far better understanding if you approached [the NRA] as 74 if you were approaching one of the great religions of the world” (Melzer, 2012, p. 15). 75 Whereas much research on gun culture views the Second Amendment in a political and 76 legal context, I argue that the NRA has capitalized on the religious nationalism that arose in 77 the late 1970s with the rise of the Moral Majority and the New Christian Right (Wuthnow, 78 1990) and has increasingly used religious language to shape the discourse surrounding the 79 Second Amendment. 80 Before turning to the links between religious nationalism and the Second 81 Amendment, I summarize the political, legal, and cultural context in order to discuss how 82 the meaning around the Second Amendment has already been studied. 83 84 The Evolution of the Second Amendment 85 86 The transformation of the NRA from a shooting club to a gun rights advocacy 87 organization in the 1970s is well documented (Halbrook, 2013; Hovey et al., 2017; 88 Waldman, 2015; Winkler, 2013) and, because of space constraints, will be noted only 89 briefly here. Rising out of both the violence and high-profile assassinations of the 1960s, 90 Second Amendment hardliners diverged sharply from more moderate gun rights 91 advocates, arguing for principled opposition to any gun control measure (Knox, 2009). 92 Harlan Carter served as the first director of the NRA’s lobbying arm, the Institute for 2 93 Legislative Affairs (ILA), begun in 1975. He later served as the president of the NRA, 94 shaping the NRA’s political and legal efforts toward “Second Amendment absolutism” 95 (Hodges, 2015, p. 91)—that is, the unrestricted right of individuals to keep and bear arms. 96 Neal Knox was a subsequent director of the ILA and president of the NRA before being 97 replaced by Charlton Heston in 1997 (Knox, 2009); Knox remained a dedicated proponent 98 of gun rights until his death in 2005. Both Carter and Knox helped orchestrate the 1977 99 takeover of the board of directors in an event that would be known the Revolt in Cincinnati, 100 when members of the new guard pushed out old guard board members who were more 101 willing to compromise on gun rights. By focusing their efforts on electing congressmen who 102 supported gun rights as an individual right, the NRA sought to have this “God-given 103 individual right” protected by the legal system that they—and many Americans—view as 104 handed down by God through the Constitution (Bonikowski and DiMaggio, 2016; Dunbar- 105 Ortiz, 2018; Gorski, 2017b). 106 107 Individual Rights 108 109 The key point of disagreement over the legal and historical framing of the Second 110 Amendment argues about whether it is rooted in “civic republicanism and militia service 111 [or whether]…it protected a bit more, including the right to own and acquire firearms for 112 non-militia-related purposes, such as self-defense”(Charles 2018, p. 302). The legal 113 strategy advocated by hardliners, such as Carter and Knox. centered on the goal of 114 enshrining the Second Amendment as an individual right (Halbrook, 2008; Knox, 2009; 115 Waldman, 2015). This argument was premised on the second half of the Second 116 Amendment and sidestepped the initial text of the amendment referring to the “well- 117 regulated militia” (Waldman 2015). From 1980 to 1999, a “small collective of lawyers were 118 able to usher in a flood of individualistic studies so that they outnumbered the total 119 number of militia-centric studies by almost two to one” (Charles 2018, p. 301). This 120 individualized interpretation of the Second Amendment became known as the Standard 121 Model (Winkler, 2013). 122 Even if the Second Amendment did not enshrine an individual right in the 123 Constitution, “the individual right to bear arms has never depended on [the Second 124 Amendment]. At least forty-three of the fifty state constitutions contain language that 125 clearly and unambiguously protects the right of individuals to own guns” (Winkler 2013, p. 126 33). These are not modern legal provisions. In keeping with the individual right to keep and 127 bear arms already protected in the vast majority of states, the affirmation of this right at 128 the federal level was affirmed in the now-famous Heller case (554 U.S.