Even as the Puritanical concept of 'the elect,' having been 'chosen' as saved, applies in the case of
individuals, there has been a sense from the arrival on this continent, that initially this people, and later,
this nation, might be a 'chosen' people collectively. There has been, as well, a long time practice of
drawing parallels between ancient Israel and America, coming out of that Puritan tradition. Jonathan
Edwards, key figure in the Great Awakening, sermonized:

	"With its treasures, America is a type and a forerunner of what is approaching
	in spiritual things when the world shall be supplied with spiritual treasures from
	America. God and His Providence has given the American people to prove what
	man can be."

The notion that if something can happen on earth, it is bound to be between these shores where it will take
place grows of that. Indeed, the whole of Manifest Destiny can be argued from this. NEHIAMIAS
AMERICANUS was Cotton Mather's biography of John Winthrop and 'American Moses' has been applied
to such figures as Washington, Daniel Boone, and Harriet Tubman. Earlier Puritans seem to have had the
sense of Elizabeth, as those of a later generation would of George III, as 'Pharoah.' This was the 'Promised
Land' we had been delivered into, and the Atlantic became the Red Sea in much early literature.
Unfortunately, this allegory was summarily extended to view native Americans as the wicked
Chanaanites. This same theme is reflected in Mormonism, if in variation. The corrupt east, i.e. Egypt or
England, was being fled for Zion in the west.

     One of the ways that all of this might be encapsulated is Robert Bellah's civil religion. Oden's
assessment is that it is a conceptualization which very much typifies the Puritan origins of this American
self. Two of Bellah's thrusts involve the sentiment  that a number of visiting observers and commentators
on America have expressed that, whatever else this country may be, it is permeated by religion. the best
example of this may Tocqueville, but Dickens reflected on the point, as well. D.K. Chesterson, the English
literary critic, has said that "America is a nation with the soul of a church."
 
     For Bellah, this civil religion, which comes from Puritanism is:

	" ... the religious dimension of American political life in our republic since its
	foundation, and its central tenet is that the nation isn't an ultimate end in itself,
	but stands under transcendent judgment and has value only if it recognizes
	a higher law."

It was for him, also, a de-denominationalized 'unitarian caste' that gives a trans-denominational character
to American life, and is largely unimpacted by First Amendment sanctions, but the entity itself may work
to prevent any particular denomination's dominance.

     He also plows through the texts of Presidential Inaugural Addresses, as previously mentioned, as a
source of the illustration of the role of this religion in American life. There are considerable strands of
commonalities which run through them, and Bellah culls out of these three chief themes in his
constitution of religion:

	1) America's providential history -- God has a plan for humanity and it is one with a very 
		important role in it for America;
	2) the notion of covenant -- this country or people made a special but historically conventional
		agreement or pact with God;
	3) ultimate sovereignty questions -- as it is the voice and will of God which sets America's 
		course, the people ultimately are not fully sovereign.

All three of these themes obviously have Puritanical overtones. Oden suggests that the one Inaugural
Address which most clearly expresses the theme is Kennedy's: 

	"Here on earth, God's work must truly be our own."

     For Oden, this indicates just how deeply the Puritan strain has permeated our culture, demonstrated by
the fact that the statement was made by the first Catholic President. But such a viewpoint would preclude
alternative explanations. It may not be providential at all. The quotation could be better interpreted to
mean we have the choice of doing God's work. And, it is difficult to accept the necessary premise, if only
by omission, that only Protestant-inspired thought would be contemplating the potential for creating an
improved society or world. The point that it puts emphasis on a special American role in the process is
probably better explained by its being uttered by an American leader seeking to rally people to his  banner.
The notion of forging a better society is at least as old as Plato, and probably much older. It certainly is as
compatible with Renaissance thought or some strains of Catholic thinking as it with that of the Puritans.

     A quotation from Washington's second address is similarly attributed:

	"No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand which
	conducts the affairs of man more than those in the United States. Every step by 
	which they have advanced to the character of the independent nation seems to
	have been distinguished by some token of Providential agency."

Again, while one might read this in the manner of Puritanical or Protestant concepts, it need not be
limited to such interpretation. That what is transpiring in the country may not be by accident, and we may
have been blessed by the providence of God to independence, the hand at work may be our own as much
as it is God's. An alternative reading might hold the appendage described as that of man acting as God on
earth, or the 'invisible hand' may be a reference to that in Adam Smith.

     The expression of covenant bears overtones, to be sure, of Abraham's agreement with God whether it
came from the mouth of Lincoln, who especially entoned the idea, or of more recent vintage as with the
short-lived 'New Covenant.' But Clinton also, and almost interchangeably, tossed that term around with
his 'New Social Compact,' and that clearly has different connotations. Bellah was looking at the contract
with God as assertion as to what a 'correctly defined humanity' would mean for mankind. There is also in
this theme the idea that we should suffer where we do not live up to our end of the agreement. Lincoln, for
example, expressed the Civil War in very covenantal terms. Fairly well convinced that the Union had the
right, but never absolutely certain, time would tell who was in the right and whether we were living up to
the contract in that testing. As in the theme of Providential history, it is by no means possible to limit the
idea to a Protestant context, and, furthermore, if that requires a rejection of free will, it is even less so.
Additionally, for a contract to be binding, it must have been entered into freely, without duress or
coercion. Without that, and this would be extremely tenuous in the context Bellah was placing it, the
contract would not be valid.

     The third theme is probably even more tentative. Bellah suggests a sense in which people are deprived
of any ultimate sovereignty. This has a strong anti-democratic character inherent in it. The voice that sets
the direction of the country finally is that of God. Such would at the least render any agreement null and
void. A more appropriate reading of the several themes would place them in thought systems outside the
Reformation, such as the Renaissance. There are difficulties with the vision of God that the doctrine of
predestination rests upon. In the Old Testament there is very little that indicates any concept whatsoever
that God is omniscient. He quite obviously knows much, but not everything, and certainly not the minutia
of human behavior. That is a strong argument for the idea of free will. he did not know that 'Adam' would
violate his orders or that Cain would slay his brother. Nor is there indication that he knew beforehand
what the Hebrews would do or what would happen to them at every turn, even as a result of his own acts
of retribution. Not only does God 'regret' his previous acts, including creation itself, but continually seems
to change his mind. Further, as biblical accounts of history progress, God becomes more and more distant
from active involvement in this world. After his final comment to Job, his voice falls silent, although of
course his law and word continue, and he makes his word known through others. This in some fashion
demonstrated a development, a maturing, an evolution of God. Though some might insist that the
perception of change is in the eye of the beholder, man, it is difficult to square all this with Calvin's God.
It may be taken, on that view of objection even, that what scripture teaches is the process of perfectibility
for man, but shown through the Lord. Actually, however, there is no implication in all of this of any
diminishment of God. Rather, it represents an elevation of man. It seems blatantly contradictory for God
to have led the Israelites from captivity in Egypt, but to have left them to fend for themselves against the
Persians, or the Romans, or the Nazis. But increasingly as biblical history develops, such matters are left
more and more for man to resolve. That is an empowering, and humbling, idea. Much the same
contention can be raised on the New Testament, as well.  The image of Jesus at Gethsemane, for example,
is scarcely a model of self-confidence. Indeed, there, God-as-man decides finally after much anguish to
fulfill his destiny, but of his own human volition. Invariably, objections will come of faithlessness, or of
our feeble incapability of understanding. We should not question or tempt the Lord. But that is hardly
what is being suggested. No  pretense is made of challenging the Almighty, or of doubting his existence.
Quite to the contrary, it all represents a powerful lesson. There is, at any rate, strong evidence against
atheism -- the continued existence of the Jews, for example. This commentary neither questions the divine
revelation of scripture. Such would seem sheer folly in any event. In fact, what is being suggested is a
powerful case for the inspirational character of scripture, both as divine in its origin, and for man, as well.
What this does do, however, is cast doubt on the doctrine of predestination, and put man, empowered by
volition, in a much greater light. This also does just the opposite of removing God from the American
situation, placing him, through his agent, man, within it, rather than placing him in a position outside it
and dictating its course.

     A number of other characteristics of the American spirit or psyche are argued by Oden as squarely
grounded in the Puritan ethic. There is an emphasis in the nation which stresses the individual  and
experience while it gives short shrift to theory and collectivity and science. But, as great an emphasis as is
placed on the individual, that does not have to be only out of Protestantism. Indeed, at its inception,
Protestantism was scarcely ever an individual choice. The appellation 'We the People'  can hardly be taken
as an utterly individualistic explication, either. The same can be said of the entire communitarian strain
which runs through our 'heritage' and our historical experience. Nor does concentration on experience 
have to preclude theory or science. If there has been a stream of anti-science, or, as Hofstader argued in
ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM IN AMERICAN LIFE, given that sort of tendency in our tradition, it is
difficult to find the basis for the rising tide of educational advancement or commitment which has marked
American history, or to explain  the record of invention, innovation, and technology which the country
has experienced. That will not deny some considerable such sentiment, or his additional grounding of the
pioneers to fundamentalism and career choice anxiety to the principle of calling in Protestantism. 



     Bellah has, however, extended the apparent thesis of at least his early work on civil religion and its
Puritanical spirit, particularly in the languages theory as set forth in his more recent HABITS OF THE
HEART. It is also quite possible that a good deal of the problem with the Puritan thesis stems from
oversimplification in the interpretation of religious dogmas such as free will or predestination. A basic
tenet of both involve the different planes or manifolds which God and man are taken to operate on. Under
such reading, the acceptance of the concept of an omniscient and omnipotent God does not preclude free
will, nor does the doctrine of predestination have to mean that human beings have no choices to make.
This examination returns to the languages of Bellah at other points, but a reiteration of the suggestion that
compatibility with certain aspects of Protestantism need not preclude other explanations reinforces that
point. This idea of America as a special place, unique in the world, has a substantial literature of its own
in American exceptionalism. If Puritanism, then, cannot be seen as the source of this exceptional trait, it
would certainly have to be another of the dozens of competing possible reasons in accounting for it. The
apparent fundamental antinomy referred to earlier may have been resolved in perhaps the key work on the
topic, Max Weber's PROTESTANT ETHIC AND THE SPIRIT OF CAPITALISM anyway, as a
fundamental characteristic of that ethic in the first place. Reconciliation of the unabashed selfish pursuit
of material gain in Adam Smith and the Protestant Ethic is not broached without difficulty. Even
accepting such pursuit as a significantly higher level, the materialist, worldly aspect may be hard to justify
on religious grounds. Perhaps at the level of fulfillment of one's vocation or calling, the reconciliation can
be accomplished. Weber carries his argument in that direction. However, in the formulization of the
approach in political theory of the increase of social surplus to raise both the standard of living through
wealth creation and the level of potential for human development described earlier in reference to
community purpose on Locke, the antinomy is resolved. Weber does not go to that point, except possibly
by inference, but rather runs far afield on the matter. The single most objectionable characteristic of
Weber is probably what comes down to a sense of aversion to profit which seems to permeate at least his
work on Puritanism and capitalism. It may be that normal profit works for him, although that is not even
always clear, but certainly not economic profit. Not the only problem in his analysis, it represents a bias
which taints the entire exercise. In economic terms,  it is a fatal flaw, and it blinds the entire discourse to
the absolute moral imperative of capitalism. It will be argued here that this represents a categorical
imperative, in Kantian terms, which seems to allude Weber completely. It is not that he fails to distinguish
between finance capital and product or industrial capital, for he expressly does that (20). Weber is also
quite definitive as to economic impact on the formative influence on conduct and the religious factor
involved  therein -- that is, after all, the crux of his argument (21). Of special relevance here is his
introductory commentary on this matter in addressing:

	" ...the influence of certain religious ideas on the development of an economic spirit,
	or the ethos of an economic system,"(22)

but he complicates this with his primary premise:

	"In this case we are dealing with the connection of the spirit of modern economic life
	with the rational ethics of ascetic Protestantism."(23)

     There are a goodly number of premises in Weber which, although perhaps valid enough for his time
and place, are on much more shaky ground in the United States, especially in the late 20th century, and
some of these are basic enough to his overall argument as to make it considerably more tenuous. A theme
which is argued throughout Chapter 1 involves the relationship between religious affiliation and social
stratification. It may still be the case that Catholics are less likely, and less economically able, to enter the
market place as entrepreneurs or to obtain the expansive education necessary for success there(24), but it
is much less a problem now than it apparently was then and there. As Weber fixes the root of this problem
at least in part in the nature of the Church and its teachings, it is possible that the nature of the Church
has been altered. On the other hand, the comparative position of disadvantage of Catholics in Weber's
observation base may have served as a basis for such a phenomenon. This may have been in large measure
a problem of mistaken causation, at least in part. Not surprisingly, Weber comments on the trained official
(bureaucrat) as the "pillar of both the modern state and the economic life of the West."(25) And, given any
position of comparative disadvantage for Catholics, the problem he presents would have thereby only been
complicated, as would be the apparent conclusion he draws from it, and would have reverberated through
the rationalized structuring of such a society, a rationalization of the state and society absolutely essential
for the flowering of capital.

     There was a strain of anti-Catholicism or anti-Papism active in much of the early national period of
U.S. history, but it may be greatly misunderstood. It might be more suitably traced to the political conflicts 
out of the Reformation (or into it). Forces arrayed against Rome were configured toward exertion of
political and economic power, which meant in many places opposing the Vatican and its allies.
Theological disputes were perhaps at issue, but contrary to many analyses, these essentially overscore the
more basic controversies. Such things do take on a life of their own, however, but may be largely
superfluous to the root causes. They developed 'ethnic' or similarly divisive character as well, which may
have had more to do with their perseverance and permeation of less 'sophisticated' layers of the
population. Nor were papal forces so monolithic as such interpretation would seem to infer. The Church
clearly had 'backward' tendencies, but it also had Erasmusian strains. The problem of the perceived 'threat' 
from the Papists may have been reinforced by actions of groups like the Jesuits (although the 'threat' they
posed was also one recognized within the Latin Church). It was not, in essence, the overly simplistic
argument posed by Weber. 

     To be fair, Weber has made acknowledgment concerning the relationship that actually prevails
between capitalism and the pursuit of profit:




	"The impulse to acquisition and pursuit of gain, of money, of the greatest possible
	amount of money, has in itself nothing to do with capitalism. This impulse exists and 
	has existed ... common to all sorts and conditions of men ... It should be taught in the
	kindergarten of cultural history that this naive idea of capitalism must be given up once
	and for all. Unlimited greed for gain is not in the least identified with capitalism, and is 
	still less its spirit. Capitalism may even be identified with the restraint, or at least a 
	national tempering, of this irrational impulse. But capitalism is identified with the
	pursuit of profit, and forever renewed profit, by means of continual, rational, 
	capitalistic enterprise ... "(26)

     We witness this conflict in boardrooms today of course, where short-sightedness may prefer immediate
profit to long term investment for long term profit. This may be but infantile immediate sense gratification
of the monad operative. But no where is Weber more lucid in the depiction of the spirit of capitalism than
in his extended quotation and discussion of Benjamin Franklin(27). There is an interesting reference in
the context of that discussion which serves this examination to "Ferdinand Kurnberger [who] satirizes
[this] in his clever and malicious PICTURE OF AMERICAN CULTURE as the supposed confession of
faith of the Yankee."(28)
 
     Benjamin Franklin's dedication to this pursuit "takes on the character of an ethically colored maxim
for the conduct of life."(29)

	"Benjamin Franklin's own character, as it appears in the really unusual candidness            
	of his autobiography, belies that suspicion. The circumstance that he ascribes his 
	recognition of the utility of virtue to a divine revelation which was intended to lead
	him in the path of righteousness, shows that something more than mere garnishing 
	for purely egocentric motives is involved."(30)

Weber identifies the impulse in Franklin as an outgrowth of the training "which his strict Calvinistic
father drummed into him again and again in his youth ..."(31)

     If this is evidence that the spirit of capitalism existed in the United States before the capitalist order, it
certainly reflects the whole notion of the 'inner light' of the Quakerism which so impacted Franklin, and it
reaches to the doctrine of the pursuit of a 'calling,' such that the pursuit that marks capitalism is the quest
for a calling and not just profit. It is that vision, of which Franklin is an exemplar, which marks the spirit
of capitalism, and forms the substance of the Protestant ethic, even where those possessed of the ethic
have reached a point viewing religion as superfluous or ever interfering with their quest.(32)

     This concept of calling must be qualified, however, to devotion to labor. What Weber identifies as the
Protestant Ethic involves "the moral emphasis on and the religious sanction of, organized worldly labour
in a calling ... "(33) His extended assessment of the sundry Protestant variations produce what amount to
mere variations on this theme. (Although he clearly divorces Luther from either his capitalist spirit or
Franklin ) (34). But the substance of the problem with Weber is not so much his identification of the ethos
in its religious connection, but his dedication of it, though there are problematic nuances.
     In the restraints that are embodied in the spirit of capitalism:

	"When the limitation of consumption is combined with this release of acquisitive 
	activity, the inevitable practical result is obvious: accumulation of capital through
	ascetic compulsion to save. The restraints which were imposed upon the consumption
	of wealth naturally served to increase it by making possible the productive investment 
	of capital,"(35)
there is a dramatically limiting character to capital accumulation, and one which, even given the
multiplication effect of aggregation, will not result in adequate capitalization for the level of investment
requisite for adequately expanded reproduction. (It is also curious that this country so tied to this ethic
which includes savings has for so long been so little disposed toward it)

Continue