Building the Choir to Preach to

“I even have a choir,” said former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee while marveling at the turnout at a 7:30 AM event at the Best Western Hotel in Marshalltown, Iowa. The crowd of mostly seniors and middle-aged white folks sat on all sides of a small stage.

“Looks familiar,” Huckabee said of the layout. “For a long time I was a pastor, I’d get up, the congregation would be here [in front of me], the choir would be here [behind me].” He enjoys playfully riffing on an off-hand joke in his speeches. He turned to his ersatz choir: “You ready?” Turning back to the chuckling crowd, he added, “The only thing we need now are ushers and we’ll be ready to receive the offering!”

These opening comments from the new front runner for the GOP presidential nomination may feed the caricature that Huckabee is a Christian fundamentalist who’s grown too big for his pulpit. Indeed, his Christmas ad now airing in Iowa—in which he describes “what really matters” during the holiday “is the celebration of the birth of Christ” along with being with friends and family—has been reported as evidence of his bible-thumping ways. And his surge among Iowa Republican caucus goers, 40% of whom self-identify as evangelical Christians, may give the impression that the GOP base is still looking for the second coming of Pat Robertson, the preacher embraced by Iowans in 1988 for his political crusade for Christian values.

But this perception doesn’t account for his appeal to every room of Iowa voters. Yes, many of them are Christian, and relate to his faith and his commitment to traditional “social values” issues, especially banning abortion. But when asked what they find him appealing, many don’t sound that different from other American voters: They want someone who understands them and where they come from. Huckabee’s faith and stances on certain issues are an important ways of establishing the candidate “is one of us,” but it is what they say about his character that matters.

“He comes from a family like ours,” said 21-year old Sarah Stone, who came to the Marshalltown event with her four-month-old son. Stone’s mother, Becky Sayre, chimed in, “He’s just a regular guy that has strong integrity, family values, and of course [we] shar[e] the same faith…”

Her sentiments were echoed by Jeff Mossman, who was taking Huckabee signs over to his church (New Hope Christian) after the speech. “What I like about his faith is that he has the same values as I do. He’s not a highfalutin politician who takes the temperature of the room. What he believes today is the same thing he believed 10 years ago.”

For Lynne Quernemoer from McKinney, Texas (who happened to catch Huckabee while accompanying her husband on an Iowa business trip), Huckabee’s willingness to stand up for his faith showed he possessed old-fashioned American principledness. “Our forefathers… came here because they’d been under oppression and they wanted freedom. Our country is established ‘One nation under God.’… [T]hey stood on that ground with their lives. We need to get back to being firm in our conviction…. I don’t think he’s going to be a person who just follows the polls.” But when asked if she thought his faith made Huckabee more sincere, she flatly rejected the suggestion. “I share his faith—I am a churchgoer—but I can honestly say no.” She respected the integrity with which he represented his positions.

While Huckabee talks about “protecting life” and the “sanctity of marriage” in his speeches and on TV, the impression that he’s in Iowa on a Christian values crusade is missing this important piece of his appeal. While his stump speech always contains a kernel of family values rhetoric–and he amped it up substantially before friendly crowds in Manchester and before the Iowa Christian Alliance in Cedar Falls–it is cast in a way that allows it to reach beyond the evangelical base. He roots his pro-life stance in the Declaration of Independence’s assertion that “all men are created equal” and that “life” is one of the inalienable rights with which they are “endowed by their Creator.” Much of his rhetoric could come out of the mouth of John Edwards, describing his hardscrabble upbringing and the concerns of working people who have big dreams for their children. At every Huckabee event I’ve attended so far on this visit to Iowa, Huckabee supporters—including self-identified Christians—have cited the economy as more important than social values issues. And Huckabee’s ability to empathize with their struggle is one of his main selling points.

Huckabee also talks about electioneering in a way that his audience recognizes. He talks about the disappointment of Iowans who go to their mailbox expecting Christmas cards and prolix letters from family members and instead find nasty negative campaign mailers. He describes the small-businessperson wrestling government regulation as someone who dreamt up a plan on the back of a napkin while struggling to win over his skeptical wife. By comparing his Marshalltown event to a church service warmed up the crowd, likening the somewhat unusual setting to something more familiar.

Does that mean he’s crossing the line between the seperation of church and state? I’ll leave that to others to debate. But the challenge his candidacy poses to this divide is subtler than whether he mentions Jesus in an inappropriate context or he advances faith-base policies more vigorously than George W. Bush. It also raises the question of whether his rhetoric inappropriately excludes listeners that find the imagery and language of the evangelical church unfamiliar or uncomfortable. Attendees at his rallies—and perhaps the largely Christian folks who make up Iowa republican caucus-goers—don’t seem to have a problem with it.

Certainly, those who dismiss Huckabee as unelectable in the general election are greatly miscalculating. If he translates well to television, his ability to convince voters that he’s “one of them” has the potential to overcome the wariness of another Christian conservative after George W. Bush has discredited the label. His perceived genuiness will be an especially strong asset if his opponent is Senator Hillary Clinton, often seen as calculating and contrived. Perhaps most importantly, Huckabee’s arguably the only GOP candidate who can turn out the otherwise demoralized Christian base, who could put a Democrat in the White House if they stay home in key states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida.

That was the brilliance of the Christmas ad. It stoked the fire under evangelicals angry about the secularization of the season that they’ve labeled “the War on Christmas,” while only a small sliver of Americans will see much difference between a Christmas greeting that mentions Jesus and one that doesn’t. To many who saw it on TV, he was just talking about Christmas the same way they would—only a Grinch would say otherwise.