Christian Nationalism and the Rule of Law

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Christian Nationalism and the Rule of Law

Christian nationalism has become an important subject of research concerning the relationship between religion, national identity, political authority, and the rule of law. The scholarship collected on this topic examines how beliefs that the United States should possess a distinctively Christian political identity may interact with constitutional government, judicial authority, democratic institutions, religious liberty, equal citizenship, executive power, and the impartial enforcement of law.

The term rule of law generally refers to the principle that political leaders, government institutions, and private citizens are subject to publicly established legal rules rather than arbitrary exercises of power. Within the literature on Christian nationalism, a recurring question is whether political commitments grounded in a particular religious-national identity can coexist with legal principles requiring equal citizenship, institutional constraints, constitutional procedures, and neutral application of the law.

Researchers approach these questions from several directions. Legal scholars examine constitutional history and church-state doctrine, political scientists study attitudes toward courts and democratic institutions, sociologists investigate relationships between Christian nationalism and social authority, and survey researchers examine public attitudes toward government power, religious influence, political violence, and democratic norms.

Constitutionalism and the Rule of Law

A central area of scholarship considers the relationship between Christian nationalism and American constitutionalism. Legal researchers have examined historical claims that the United States was founded as a Christian nation and the ways those claims have been incorporated into modern constitutional arguments.

Historically, some nineteenth-century Christian activists criticized the Constitution because it did not explicitly recognize Christianity or God. Later political and legal movements increasingly advanced a different argument: that the existing Constitution should itself be understood as Christian in origin or character.

This shift has made constitutional interpretation an important arena in debates over Christian nationalism. Questions include whether constitutional protections should be interpreted through a specifically Christian historical framework and whether government institutions may favor Christian traditions while remaining consistent with constitutional guarantees of religious liberty and equal citizenship.

Robert K. Vischer's work on Christian nationalism and the rule of law focuses directly on the relationship between religious political commitments and professional obligations to constitutional institutions. His analysis argues that Christian political engagement need not conflict with the rule of law, but that religious identity should not become a justification for political domination or disregard for constitutional processes.

Other legal scholarship examines how claims about America's Christian identity have evolved over time. Jared Goldstein, for example, traces the development of arguments portraying the Constitution itself as Christian, while Steven Green examines the legal consequences of efforts to characterize the United States as officially or historically Christian.

Equal Application of the Law

One of the most direct rule-of-law questions concerns whether laws and legal protections are applied equally to religious insiders and outsiders.

Experimental research by Zachary D. Broeren and Paul A. Djupe examines whether Christian-nationalist attitudes influence willingness to apply legal rules equally to religious ingroups and outgroups. Their work also investigates the role of perceived Christian persecution in shaping responses toward people outside the dominant religious group.

This research highlights an important distinction between private religious belief and political preferences concerning state power. Scholarship examining the concept of Christian statism similarly distinguishes religious traditionalism from support for governmental authority being used to institutionalize particular religious values.

The rule-of-law implications extend beyond formal religious establishment. Equal application of law also concerns whether people of different religions, races, political identities, and cultural backgrounds receive equivalent treatment from government institutions.

The Supreme Court and Judicial Authority

The Supreme Court occupies a significant place in research on Christian nationalism because disputes involving religious liberty, abortion, public education, government religious expression, and church-state separation frequently reach the federal courts.

Research has examined whether Christian-nationalist attitudes affect perceptions of the Supreme Court and acceptance of religious reasoning in judicial decisions. Miles T. Armaly's research, for example, investigates whether Christian nationalism is associated with perceptions of the Court and attitudes toward explicitly religious considerations in judicial decision-making.

These debates occur alongside major changes in American religion-clause jurisprudence. Contemporary disputes involving Ten Commandments displays, school prayer, Bible instruction, and government religious symbolism have raised questions about how courts should interpret the Establishment Clause.

Earlier Establishment Clause cases often employed doctrinal tests focused on governmental purpose, religious effects, and entanglement. More recent Supreme Court decisions have emphasized historical practices and traditions when evaluating some church-state controversies.

As a result, disagreements about constitutional history have become increasingly important in litigation concerning religion and government.

Church-State Separation and Religious Liberty

Christian nationalism is closely connected to debates over the constitutional relationship between religion and government.

Some Christian-nationalist perspectives support a stronger governmental role in recognizing Christianity, promoting Christian moral principles, or affirming the country's Christian heritage. Other Christian organizations and religious-liberty advocates argue that government preference for Christianity threatens religious freedom by creating distinctions between favored and disfavored religious communities.

The uploaded research includes perspectives from organizations such as the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and Christians Against Christian Nationalism, which articulate religious arguments in favor of institutional separation between church and government.

Public-opinion research from the Pew Research Center also demonstrates that Americans distinguish among several different concepts, including viewing the United States as culturally Christian, supporting greater religious influence in public life, supporting biblical influence on laws, and supporting Christianity as an official religion.

These distinctions are important because the broad label Christian nationalism can encompass different beliefs about the appropriate relationship between religious values and governmental authority.

Public Schools and Government-Sponsored Religion

Public education has become a major arena for legal disputes involving religion and government.

Recent controversies have included state laws or directives involving Ten Commandments displays, Bible instruction, school prayer, religious chaplains, and other forms of religious expression in public schools.

Supporters of such measures may describe them as acknowledgments of historical traditions, educational resources, or protections for religious expression. Opponents often argue that mandatory religious exercises or displays constitute governmental endorsement of religion and may place students from minority religions or nonreligious families in unequal positions.

The resulting litigation raises questions under the Establishment Clause, Free Exercise Clause, freedom of speech protections, and state constitutional provisions.

The broader rule-of-law issue concerns the limits of governmental authority when public institutions promote or incorporate religious teachings.

Democratic Norms and Executive Power

Another major body of research examines Christian nationalism in relation to democratic institutions and executive authority.

Studies have investigated whether Christian-nationalist beliefs correlate with support for political leaders who violate established democratic norms, particularly during emergencies. Research by Samuel L. Perry and Joshua B. Grubbs specifically examines attitudes toward leaders who bypass ordinary democratic constraints during national crises.

Survey research from the Public Religion Research Institute has also explored relationships among Christian nationalism, authoritarian attitudes, strong-leader preferences, political violence, and democratic commitments.

These studies address a fundamental rule-of-law question: whether political goals should remain constrained by established laws and institutions even when supporters believe that extraordinary political or moral circumstances justify stronger executive action.

This issue extends beyond Christian nationalism. Democracies generally depend upon institutional constraints, separation of powers, legal accountability, and acceptance that political authority remains limited even when one political faction controls the government.

Checks and Balances and Administrative Power

Debates over executive power increasingly overlap with arguments concerning the structure of the federal government.

Research and commentary in the collection examine proposals associated with expanding presidential control over executive agencies, restructuring the civil service, changing administrative authority, and increasing executive influence over federal policy.

Some critics connect these developments with Christian-nationalist political movements, particularly where proposals concerning executive authority overlap with efforts to promote particular religious or social policies. Supporters of stronger executive authority may instead frame these proposals in terms of presidential accountability, administrative reform, or constitutional theories concerning executive control of government agencies.

The rule-of-law question is therefore not simply whether executive power expands, but how such power interacts with statutory authority, congressional oversight, judicial review, professional civil service protections, and constitutional separation of powers.

Political Violence and January 6

The relationship between Christian nationalism and political violence has received significant scholarly attention.

Research following the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol examined the presence of Christian symbols, religious rhetoric, conspiracy beliefs, perceived victimhood, racial identity, and Christian-nationalist ideas among participants and supporters.

Political scientists Miles T. Armaly, David T. Buckley, and Adam M. Enders studied associations among Christian nationalism, perceived victimhood, racial identity, conspiracy beliefs, and support for the Capitol attack.

Additional reports documented Christian imagery, prayer, rhetoric concerning divine authority, and religious organizations connected with events surrounding January 6.

The presence of religious symbolism at a political event does not itself establish that all participants share the same ideology. Researchers therefore distinguish among religious identity, Christian nationalism, partisan affiliation, conspiracy beliefs, authoritarian attitudes, and support for political violence.

From a rule-of-law perspective, the central issue is whether political or religious convictions are considered legitimate grounds for rejecting lawful electoral processes or using force against governmental institutions.

Elections and Political Legitimacy

Christian nationalism has also been studied in connection with voting behavior, election legitimacy, and perceptions of democratic institutions.

Research examines how Christian-nationalist identity interacts with political affiliation, candidate support, perceptions of electoral outcomes, and acceptance of political institutions.

The rule of law depends partly on acceptance of established procedures for resolving political competition. Elections, courts, legislatures, and constitutional transfer-of-power mechanisms provide procedures through which competing groups can pursue political goals without resorting to force.

Research concerning Christian nationalism therefore frequently overlaps with broader scholarship on democratic legitimacy, political polarization, election denial, and public trust in institutions.

Authority, Punishment, and Social Control

Researchers have also examined the relationship between Christian nationalism and attitudes toward policing, punishment, social hierarchy, and governmental coercion.

Joshua Davis's research on Enforcing Christian Nationalism examines associations between Christian-nationalist identity and support for punitive approaches to crime and social deviance.

Other studies examine relationships among Christian nationalism, racial boundaries, citizenship, policing, family authority, and ideas about social order.

These findings contribute to debates about whether Christian nationalism primarily represents cultural identity, private religious traditionalism, support for governmental enforcement of religious values, or some combination of these orientations.

The distinction matters because support for voluntary religious norms has different legal implications from support for using state authority to enforce those norms.

Conspiracy Beliefs and Institutional Trust

Institutional trust is another recurring theme in the scholarship.

Research has examined associations among Christian nationalism, biblical literalism, conspiracy beliefs, distrust of expertise, and perceptions of political institutions.

Studies concerning conspiracy beliefs are particularly relevant to the rule of law because legal institutions depend on public acceptance of procedural legitimacy. Courts, elections, administrative agencies, scientific institutions, and law-enforcement organizations cannot function solely through coercion; they also depend upon public confidence that established procedures are legitimate.

Research suggests that perceptions of institutions may vary depending on whether people believe those institutions represent or threaten their religious and political identities.

This creates an important distinction between criticism of specific institutions—which is normal in democratic societies—and rejection of institutional legitimacy itself.

Emergency Powers and Government Restrictions

The COVID-19 pandemic provided researchers with an opportunity to examine Christian nationalism in the context of emergency government authority.

Studies investigated relationships between Christian nationalism and attitudes toward public-health restrictions, government mandates, scientific expertise, personal liberty, and economic concerns.

Research by Samuel L. Perry, Andrew L. Whitehead, and Joshua B. Grubbs examined Christian nationalism in relation to opposition to government COVID-19 restrictions and pandemic-related behavior.

These controversies illustrate a broader tension within the rule of law: governments sometimes receive extraordinary powers during emergencies, but constitutional systems also attempt to prevent temporary emergency authority from becoming permanently unconstrained.

Research on Christian nationalism adds another dimension by examining whether religious-national identity affects judgments about when government authority is legitimate and when resistance to government authority is justified.

Religious Pluralism and Equal Citizenship

Underlying many debates about Christian nationalism is the question of national belonging.

If Christianity is treated as a defining feature of American identity, scholars ask what that means for Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists, agnostics, members of other religious traditions, and Christians who reject Christian nationalism.

Research on religious pluralism examines whether national identity can incorporate strong religious traditions while preserving equal citizenship for people with different beliefs.

Some scholarship distinguishes Christian nationalism from broader American civil religion. Civil religion may incorporate religious language, symbols, or references to God into national traditions without necessarily requiring government preference for a particular denomination or religious identity.

Christian nationalism generally becomes more legally consequential when religious identity is connected to governmental authority, citizenship, lawmaking, or unequal political status.

Debates Within Christianity

Christian nationalism should not be treated as synonymous with Christianity.

The research collection includes substantial criticism of Christian nationalism from Christian scholars, clergy, legal scholars, and religious-liberty organizations.

Some Christian critics argue that combining Christianity with nationalism distorts Christian theology by subordinating religious commitments to political power. Others focus primarily on constitutional concerns, arguing that government preference for Christianity undermines religious freedom for Christians as well as non-Christians.

Other Christians defend a larger public role for Christian values and dispute definitions or measurements used in Christian-nationalism scholarship.

These disagreements demonstrate that Christian nationalism is contested both politically and theologically.

Measurement and Scholarly Debate

Researchers also disagree about how Christian nationalism should be defined and measured.

Many studies rely on survey questions concerning whether the federal government should declare the United States a Christian nation, whether Christian values should influence government, whether the country's success is part of God's plan, or whether public institutions should permit explicitly Christian expression.

Critics of existing measurement methods argue that survey scales may combine distinct ideas, including religious traditionalism, patriotism, cultural Christianity, political conservatism, and support for governmental religious authority.

Nicholas T. Davis and other researchers have raised methodological questions about widely used Christian-nationalism scales. More recent scholarship has attempted to distinguish different varieties of Christian nationalism and separate private religious traditionalism from explicitly statist political orientations.

These debates caution against assuming that everyone identified by a survey measure of Christian nationalism holds identical political or theological views.

Comparative Perspectives

Although much of the literature concerns the United States, Christian nationalism is not exclusively an American phenomenon.

Comparative research examines Christian nationalism and religious nationalism in other political systems. Studies involving African countries, for example, analyze relationships among religious-national identity, democratic support, authoritarian alternatives, secular government, and political tolerance.

International comparisons can help researchers determine which relationships are specific to American political history and which may reflect broader dynamics associated with religious nationalism.

They also demonstrate that the relationship between religion and democracy is not uniform. Religious movements can support democratic participation, challenge authoritarian governments, advocate civil rights, or support concentrated political authority depending on historical and institutional circumstances.

Conclusion

Research on Christian nationalism and the rule of law centers on a fundamental question: how should religious conviction, national identity, and political power interact within a constitutional democracy?

The scholarship does not treat every form of Christian political participation as Christian nationalism, nor does it present Christianity itself as incompatible with democratic government. Instead, much of the literature focuses on circumstances in which religious-national identity becomes connected to governmental privilege, unequal citizenship, expanded executive authority, rejection of institutional constraints, or selective application of legal protections.

Major areas of research include constitutional interpretation, Supreme Court legitimacy, church-state separation, public education, religious liberty, executive authority, elections, political violence, punishment, institutional trust, emergency powers, and equal treatment under law.

At the same time, scholars continue to debate definitions, measurement techniques, historical interpretations, and the extent to which different forms of Christian nationalism should be treated as a single political phenomenon.

The rule of law ultimately provides a useful framework for examining these disagreements because it shifts attention from religious belief itself to the exercise of political authority. The central questions concern whether laws are publicly established and consistently applied, whether government officials remain subject to constitutional constraints, whether citizens receive equal legal protection regardless of religious identity, and whether political disagreements are resolved through lawful institutions rather than arbitrary power or violence.

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