When new presidents raise their right hands to take the oath of office, they often will lay their left hands on a Bible open to a specific verse. The scriptures that two former presidents chose for their inaugurations started Mason Hull \u201923 thinking about how religious beliefs influenced their policy decisions.<\/p>\n
In 1977, Jimmy Carter chose Micah 6:8: \u201cHe hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?\u201d<\/p>\n
In 1981 and 1985, Ronald Reagan looked to 2 Chronicles 7:14: \u201cIf my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou see a stark contrast in their two inauguration verses,\u201d Hull said. \u201cCarter\u2019s was more personal in how it guided him, and Reagan\u2019s was more a call for all the people of the nation to take on this religious view of America.\u201d<\/p>\n
In that contrast, the religion major found the inspiration for her senior thesis. She will present that thesis, \u201cPresidents, Public Policy, and the Good Book: How President Jimmy Carter and President Ronald Reagan Set the Tone for Modern Day Usage of the Bible in Presidential Speeches,\u201d on April 14 during Furman Engaged<\/a>, a day full of events highlighting Furman\u2019s diverse variety of immersive, high-impact engaged learning experiences.<\/p>\n For her thesis, Hull, a double major in religion and business administration, studied the 2014 monograph \u201cPresidential Faith and Foreign Policy: Jimmy Carter the Disciple and Ronald Reagan the Alchemist\u201d by William Steding.<\/p>\n Steding argued that Carter\u2019s background as a self-declared born-again Christian inspired his desire to redeem the United States for past sins and become an evangelical instrument of social justice, leading to policy decisions like the Panama Canal treaties and the pursuit of peace in the Middle East. In contrast, Reagan grew up in the Disciples of Christ Church, which emphasized strong ethics, character development and individualism, influencing his desire to reestablish American pride through strength, not humility.<\/p>\n \u201cThey had a similar background of morality feeding into what they were doing,\u201d said Hull, \u201cbut their approaches were so different.\u201d<\/p>\n She also discovered that, prior to this period, many politicians preferred to keep church and state well separated. Carter and Reagan, along with the evangelical movement of the 1970s and 1980s, encouraged later chief executives to embrace religion more publicly, she said.<\/p>\n Many of those presidents\u2019 references to scripture may have been delivered out of context or tongue-in-cheek, Hull said. Notably, Bill Clinton used the phrase \u201cNew Covenant\u201d \u2013 which, in the New Testament, describes the mediation of Jesus Christ between God and humans \u2013 to describe his political campaign.<\/p>\n \u201cI went back and read Hebrews, and I don\u2019t think that\u2019s what the New Covenant is supposed to be,\u201d said Hull, who worked with Bryan Bibb, the Dorothy and B.H. Peace Jr. Chair and associate professor of religion, on her thesis.<\/p>\n President Biden \u201chas taken more of a Carter approach,\u201d she said, \u201cgrowing up with a Catholic faith, yet not overtly using religious references in his speeches.\u201d<\/p>\n After graduation in the spring, Hull, who is also pursuing a minor in data analytics, will start work at a Big Four accounting firm. But at some point, she may return to studying religion.<\/p>\n \u201cI wouldn\u2019t really be surprised if I went back to school and became a religion professor,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n She is glad that her school has given her the opportunity to find her own unique path.<\/p>\n \u201cI still don\u2019t know exactly what I want to do,\u201d she said, \u201cso having multiple majors and a minor has helped to keep my options open.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n We\u2019re excited to connect the 15th Annual Furman Engaged with our campaign launch<\/a> to amplify and showcase all that our students work toward during the year, and how deserving they are of our support. Join us for this signature event and others April 13-15 as we feature the best that Furman has to offer. Learn more at www.furman.edu\/campaign<\/a>.<\/p>\n Mason Hull \u201923 explored how Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan used scripture in their speeches to sway public opinion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":265,"featured_media":24090,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,23,30],"tags":[1945],"class_list":["post-24089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-and-accounting","category-religion","category-top-stories","tag-furman-engaged"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/265"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24089\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24090"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Beliefs shaped policies<\/h3>\n
Options open<\/h3>\n
Furman Engaged and Clearly Furman: The Campaign for Our Third Century<\/h3>\n
Furman Engaged: April 14<\/a><\/h4>\n
Furman Campaign Launch Weekend: April 13-15<\/a><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"