Huckabee's radical religious friends

A list of religious extremists linked to the GOP candidate.

By Alex Koppelman and Vincent Rossmeier

Read more: Republican Party, Christian Right, Politics, evangelicals, News, Mike Huckabee, 2008 election, Alex Koppelman

AP Photo/Steve Mitchell

Mike Huckabee speaks March 17, 2006, at a Fort Lauderdale, Fla., church.

Jan. 18, 2008 | Mike Huckabee, the former Baptist preacher turned Arkansas governor and now Republican presidential candidate, has deep connections to some conservative Christians with radical political ideas. As Salon's Mike Madden details here, while Huckabee talks up his experience visiting Israel in response to questions about foreign policy, he is also campaigning with the support of prominent figures who see Israel as the site of a coming Armageddon. Huckabee's connections within the evangelical movement also extend to leaders whose focus is on the United States; a number of those leaders are working to transform the United States into a Christian nation governed by what they see as biblical principles. On Monday, as Salon columnist Joe Conason notes, Huckabee seemed to hint that he shares at least some of that vision. "It's a lot easier to change the Constitution," said Huckabee, "than it would be to change the word of the living God, and that's what we need to do, is to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards."

Ideas like the ones some of Huckabee's supporters hold stem from two radical doctrines, reconstructionism and dominionism. As Conason writes, these ideas come down to "the notion that America, indeed every nation on earth, is meant to be governed by biblical law." Additionally, they stem from a belief that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, then betrayed by secular humanist liberals who created a myth of separation of church and state in the 20th century, leading the country to immorality and godlessness, and that the United States must be taken back by Christians. Some of the proponents of this idea are unashamed about using the word "theocracy" to describe their goal. The most radical among them -- including two of the movement's leading lights and progenitors, R.J. Rushdoony and his son-in-law Gary North -- advocate a return to the practice of stoning as a method of execution, and expanding this death sentence to the crimes of homosexuality, blasphemy and cursing one's parents.

One of the early organizations to promote reconstructionist ideas was the Coalition on Revival. Rushdoony and North were members of its steering committee. In 1986, two years after its founding, the group produced "A Manifesto for the Christian Church," which says, among other things, "[The] Bible is the only absolute, objective, final test for all truth claims ... The Bible is not only God's statements to us regarding religion, salvation, eternity, and righteousness, but also the final measurement and depository of certain fundamental facts of reality and basic principles that God wants all mankind to know in the spheres of law, government, economics, business, education, arts and communication, medicine, psychology, and science." The group also released 17 tracts laying out its prescription for what the "Christian Worldview" should be on topics from government to law, medicine, family and economics. The introduction to these states, "We believe America can be turned around and once again function as a Christian nation as it did in its earlier years. We believe that wherever the pastors of any city in the world join together in unity to make Christ Lord of every sphere of life, and, with Spirit-led strategy, mobilize their people into a unified spiritual army; that city can and will become 'a city set upon a hill.'"

The list that follows is an examination of some of Huckabee's connections within the Christian right, including his most prominent connections to members and supporters of the Coalition on Revival and other proponents of reconstructionist and dominionist theology.

D. James Kennedy: Like Huckabee, Kennedy -- who died in 2007 -- denied that he was a reconstructionist or dominionist. But Kennedy, known in certain circles as the most influential evangelical leader no one outside the evangelical world has ever heard of, long associated himself with prominent members of both disciplines and was an important conduit for their mainstreaming. He was a member of the Coalition on Revival's steering committee and a signatory to the manifesto. Even if he had been just your run-of-the-mill televangelist, Kennedy's reach and influence during his life couldn't have been dismissed: His ministry, Florida's Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, claimed 10,000 members, and his radio and television shows reached millions in the United States and worldwide.

It was from Coral Ridge that Kennedy hosted an annual "Reclaiming America for Christ" conference. In 2005, a packet of information handed out at the conference included a message from Kennedy. "Our job is to reclaim America for Christ, whatever the cost," he wrote. "We are to bring His truth and His will to bear on every sphere of our world and our society. We are to exercise godly dominion and influence over our neighborhoods, our schools, our government ... our entertainment media, our news media, our scientific endeavors -- in short, over every aspect and institution of human society." Kennedy also embraced the standard reconstructionist idea that the United States was founded as a Christian nation and should return to its roots. David Barton, one of the leading revisionist historians in this vein, was a speaker at some of the conferences. Along with Barton, Rushdoony and North were frequent guests on Kennedy's broadcasts. In 2006, Huckabee spoke at an awards dinner during "Reclaiming America for Christ." But Huckabee's primary connection to Kennedy is through his strong ties to Kennedy's followers and former employees.

George Grant: The former executive director of Kennedy's Coral Ridge Ministries, Grant co-wrote one of Huckabee's books, "Kids Who Kill: Confronting Our Culture of Violence," which was released in 1998. About 10 years before, Grant, a prolific author and, according to Reason Magazine, a "militant" reconstructionist, had written a book called "The Changing of the Guard: The Vital Role Christians Play in America's Cultural Drama." In one now infamous passage from that book, he wrote:

Christians have an obligation, a mandate, a commission, a holy responsibility to reclaim the land for Jesus Christ -- to have dominion in civil structures, just as in every other aspect of life and godliness.
But it is dominion we are after. Not just a voice.
It is dominion we are after. Not just influence.
It is dominion we are after. Not just equal time.
It is dominion we are after.
World conquest. That's what Christ has commissioned us to accomplish. We must win the world with the power of the Gospel. And we must never settle for anything less...
Thus, Christian politics has as its primary intent the conquest of the land -- of men, families, institutions, bureaucracies, courts, and governments for the Kingdom of Christ.

Next page: "Why should God bless America? She's forgotten He exists"