‘No King but Jesus,’ Ashcroft Told Bob Jones

Stressing the role of religion in the nation’s history, attorney general nominee John Ashcroft told students at a conservative Christian college in 1999 that America was founded on the belief that “we have no king but Jesus.”

“Unique among the nations, America recognized the source of our character as being godly and eternal, not [as] being civic and temporal,” Ashcroft told the audience at Bob Jones University in Greenville, S.C. “America has been different. We have no king but Jesus.”

In his brief remarks, the Missouri Republican stressed the importance of Christianity as the source of American law, culture and character.

His comments, released by Senate Democrats on Friday, are likely to raise new questions about whether or how his deeply held religious beliefs might influence his performance as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer. The Senate will open hearings Tuesday on Ashcroft’s nomination.

Ashcroft, son of a Pentecostal minister, has said before that religious beliefs infuse every aspect of his life, “including politics.”

Debate about the proper role of religion is as old as the nation itself.

While some of the nation’s founders saw religious faith as the bedrock upon which everything rested, others stressed the importance of separation between church and state. Both religion and government flourished when the two were kept separate, they said.

In his 1999 remarks, made after receiving an honorary degree from the university, Ashcroft said he believed that Christian faith was central to the nation’s founding. He said that a rallying cry of the American Revolution against the British monarchy was, “We have no king but Jesus.” This call “found its way into the fundamental documents of this great country,” he continued.

While the Declaration of Independence does not speak of Jesus, it says that the rights of all Americans are “endowed by their creator.”

Ashcroft said he believes that laws and civil authority cannot take the place of a religious order founded upon faith.

“There’s a difference between a culture that has no king but Caesar, no standard but the civil authority, and a culture that has no king but Jesus, no standard but the eternal authority,” he said. One leads to “criminality, destruction, thievery, the lowest and the least,” he said. “When you have no king but Jesus, you release the eternal, you release the highest and best, you release virtue, you release potential.”

His critics are likely to focus on his praise for the university.

For much of its history, Bob Jones University practiced racial segregation. And even after it admitted black students, it maintained until recently a ban on interracial dating. Ashcroft said last year that, when he accepted the degree, he was not aware of the university’s controversial views.

“I thank God for this institution,” Ashcroft said, adding that he was honored to appear along with Reps. Asa Hutchinson (R-Ark.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), two leaders of the House’s impeachment of President Clinton.

University President Bob Jones III, grandson of the school’s founder, said on CNN’s “Larry King Live” that Ashcroft was given the honorary degree because he was the first senator to call for Clinton’s resignation in the wake of the Monica S. Lewinsky scandal.

“That was a courageous thing in our estimation,” Jones said on CNN.

Democrats said that they will question their former colleague about his speech.

“Bob Jones University has become a symbol of divisiveness and intolerance in our society,” said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), the committee’s chairman until Republicans take control of the Senate next Saturday. “The committee will want to explore whether Sen. Ashcroft’s views have changed since he proudly accepted the university’s honorary degree.”

Elliot Mincberg, legal director for People for the American Way, a liberal group that opposes the nomination, said he was surprised that Ashcroft invoked God’s name to praise Bob Jones University.

“For someone who takes his religious belief seriously, it seems shocking he would thank God for an institution that has such a history of religious and racial bigotry,” Mincberg said. “I also think it is troubling for someone who wants to be attorney general to blur the line separating church and state.”

But a spokesman for President-elect George W. Bush noted that Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, the Democratic candidate for vice president, frequently had spoken of the importance of his religious faith.

“Faith is an important part of the fabric of our society,” said Ari Fleischer, Bush’s spokesman.

University of Utah law professor Michael McConnell, who has defended public aid to religious schools in the Supreme Court, praised Ashcroft’s comments as “beautiful.”

“He is saying freedom flourishes and the equality of human beings flourish when man is subordinate to God,” McConnell said.

“I also think it is significant that he is a Christian speaking to Christians at a Christian institution,” McConnell said. “It would be more problematic if he had said this at a meeting of government people.

“Surely you can go to a meeting of like-minded people and speak of how religion contributes to American freedom. It would be ironic on the weekend of the Martin Luther King holiday for anyone to take the position that people in public life cannot invoke religious ideals calling on America to respect civil liberties.”

Some religious leaders said they want to learn more about Ashcroft’s views.

“I hope the Senate will ask him about his understanding of the 1st Amendment and how he understands the separation of church and state,” said Scott Anderson, executive director of the California Council of Churches, which represents 1.5 million church members from 19 Protestant denominations. “If he believes in a theocracy, he certainly is out of step with mainstream Christian belief. If he is saying that the Christian church should be the civil authority, that’s a pretty serious matter.”

The Rev. Cecil L. Murray of the First African Methodist Episcopal Church in Los Angeles, said that Ashcroft’s record on human rights and social justice raises concerns for Christians. “It is inappropriate . . . no matter how many people believe in Jesus, we have no right to impose that belief on people who see God in a different way or who don’t see God at all.”

But Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations, found nothing objectionable in Ashcroft’s comments.

“It’s obviously an expression of his personal religious beliefs. We’re confident once he is in office he’ll base his decisions on the fact that America is a pluralistic and multicultural society,” he said.

Ashcroft will be introduced at Senate hearings by the new Democratic senator from his state, Jean Carnahan, a tradition in confirmation hearings. But Carnahan, whose late husband posthumously defeated Ashcroft for reelection to the Senate, has not committed to supporting him.

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Times staff writers Teresa Watanabe in Los Angeles and Janet Hook in Washington contributed to this story.

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What John Ashcroft Said

Here are Atty. Gen.-designate John Ashcroft’s remarks at Bob Jones University’s commencement on May 8, 1999:

Thank you very much, Dr. Bob [Jones III]. I want to thank each of you for investing yourselves in the mission of Christ--in redemption and forgiveness, and for preparing yourselves in the way that you have.

A slogan of the American Revolution which was so distressing to the emissaries of the king that it was found in correspondence sent back to England, was the line, “We have no king but Jesus.” Tax collectors came, asking for that which belonged to the king, and Colonists frequently said, “We have no king but Jesus.” It found its way into the fundamental documents of this great country. You could quote the Declaration with me, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, and are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights.” Unique among the nations, America recognized the source of our character as being godly and eternal, not being civic and temporal. And because we have understood that our source is eternal, America has been different. We have no king but Jesus.

My mind, thinking about that, once raced back a couple of thousand years when Pilate stepped before the people in Jerusalem and said, “Whom would ye that I release unto you? Barabbas? Or Jesus, which is called the Christ?” And when they said “Barabbas,” he said, “But what about Jesus? King of the Jews?” And the outcry was, “We have no king but Caesar.”

There’s a difference between a culture that has no king but Caesar, no standard but the civil authority, and a culture that has no king but Jesus, no standard but the eternal authority. When you have no king but Caesar, you release Barabbas--criminality, destruction, thievery, the lowest and the least. When you have no king but Jesus, you release the eternal, you release the highest and best, you release virtue, you release potential.

It is not accidental that America has been the home of the brave and the land of the free, the place where mankind has had the greatest of all opportunities, to approach the potential that God has placed within us. It has been because we knew that we were endowed not by the king but by the creator, with certain unalienable rights. If America is to be great in the future, it will be if we understand that our source is not civic and temporal, but our source is godly and eternal. Endowed by the creator with rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I thank God for this institution and for you, who recognize and commit yourselves to the proposition that we were so created, and that to live with respect to the creator promises us the greatest potential as a nation and as individuals. And for such we must reacquaint ourselves daily with his call upon our lives.

Thank you. God bless you, and thank you for honoring me by allowing me to stand with [Rep.] Asa [Hutchinson of Arkansas] and [Rep.] Lindsey [Graham of South Carolina] and a great governor [David Beasley].

Source: Associated Press