Progressive evangelicalism peaked in the mid-1970s with Carter’s election

Evidence

The decade of the 1970s did not begin or end well for progressive evangelicalism, the tradition exemplified by Charles Grandison Finney and other nineteenth-century evangelicals. In between the beginning and end of the decade, however, the movement may have reached its zenith with a remarkable affirmation of evangelical social concern and the election of a progressive evangelical as president of the United States. — Randall Balmer, Bad Faith, 72

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Institutions built for withdrawal later enabled evangelical political reentry; Evangelicals conspired against Carter’s reelection secretly; Unorganized evangelicals voted for Carter before the Religious Right existed — Randall Balmer, Bad Faith: Race and the Rise of the…, 83 (+3 more)

Related

• Institutions built for withdrawal later enabled evangelical political reentry (similarity 0.88)
• Evangelicals conspired against Carter’s reelection secretly (similarity 0.86)
• Unorganized evangelicals voted for Carter before the Religious Right existed (similarity 0.85)
• Evangelicals punished Carter for abortion while Reagan had signed the most liberal abortion bill (similarity 0.84)
• Evangelical conspiracy against Carter began well before his reelection campaign. (similarity 0.84)
• White evangelicals in 1980 chose image over co-religionist Carter and backed Reagan (similarity 0.84)
• Evangelicals’ turn against Carter was rooted in racial segregation defense, not abortion (similarity 0.82)
• American evangelicalism was politically reformist long before it aligned with the right (similarity 0.82)
• Mid-century evangelicals boycotted voting as politics belonged to Satan (similarity 0.81)
• IRS regulations topped evangelicals’ 1979 grievances against Carter while abortion went unmentioned (similarity 0.80)
• The Religious Right includes more than fundamentalists (similarity 0.80)
• Few evangelical voices spoke against abortion through most of the 1970s (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Unorganized evangelicals voted for Carter before the Religious Right existed #corroborates (0.78) — Randall Balmer, Bad Faith, 83
• White evangelicals in 1980 chose image over co-religionist Carter and backed Reagan #corroborates (0.75) — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 244
• A viable evangelical Left existed in 1973 but lost to conservatives #qualifies (0.72) — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 120
• Evangelicals punished Carter for abortion while Reagan had signed the most liberal abortion bill #corroborates (0.72) — Randall Balmer, Bad Faith, 131