Eduardo is unimpressed by the evidence, to which I linked here, suggesting that religious conservatives are more generous than secular liberals. The evidence is provided in a forthcoming book by Arthur Brooks, "Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth about Compassionate Conservativism," referenced in the linked-to post. Brooks finds that "conservatives who practice religion, live in traditional nuclear families and reject the notion that the government should engage in income redistribution are the most generous Americans, by any measure." Eduardo writes, though:
I'm not sure what the comparison between religious conservatives and secular liberals proves, but it certainly doesn't prove, to quote Instapundit (quoting Beliefnet), that conservatives are more generous "by any measure." At most, it shows that religious conservatives are more generous donors to private charities. But, if I define "generous" to encompass, say, support against one's financial interest for social programs funded through redistributive taxation, then wealthy liberals (secular or religious), who generally support such taxes and such programs, do well and conservatives (religious or not) don't look so hot.
I have not read the Brooks book, but again, his claim is that the evidence does, in fact, make it claer that "conservatives who practice religion, live in traditional nuclear families and reject the notion that the government should engage in income redistribution are the most generous Americans, by any measure."
As for Eduardo's proposed expansion of the definition of "generosity" (to include, in my words, "supporting the government taking money from others and directing it toward uses of which I approve"), I'm not sure the proposed expansion does much to blunt the force of (what I gather is) Brooks's case. After all, whether they support redistributive policies or not, religious conservatives pay their taxes, just like "wealthy liberals"; they just give away more on top of that. Their opposition to the policies that reduce the size of the pot from which they can donate to charity hardly diminishes -- indeed, I would think it exhances -- their "generosity."
Eduardo also writes:
I would be interested to know whether the "private charities" canvassed for the study include the religious conservatives own churches. [RG: My understanding is that it does.] I'd also like to see the magnitude of the differences, especially on some of the non-monetary measures noted in the beleifnet article, such as blood donation. [Apparently, Brooks finds that the differences hold up for volunteering time; I do not know about blood donation.] Finally, I'd want to see the numbers for secular conservatives and religious liberals, since the presence of religious involvement is a potentially conflating variable in this analysis that cuts across political orientation. [I would, too.]
Eduardo writes:
Given egalitarian liberal views about the role of the state in solving certain widespread social problems, one would expect them (egalitarian liberals) to support state over private solutions and to view at least some sorts of private charitable contributions as wasted money.
Maybe. But, Brooks's point (I gather) is that religious conservatives, who believe that redistributive taxation to fund government efforts to "solv[e] widespread social problems" is often also "wasted money" (that the conservatives are nonetheless legally required to provide), also give money to private charity. And, I would be surprised to learn that "wealthy liberals" think that *all* private charities are a waste of money. Surely, there are *some* that they think do good work? And yet, they do not give as much, or so Brooks claims.
Finally, Eduardo is too quick, in my view, when he says that "religious conservatives" are those "who will give money to private charities but oppose state intervention in the service of social justice." I am confident that the "religious conservatives" studied by Brooks support all kinds of "state intervention in the service of social justice," even if they do not support the same package of policies, or the same level of spending, as Eduardo does.
UPDATE: Here's more on the Brooks book, and the evidence, and the issue generally, from Jim Lindgren (Northwestern). He writes, among other things:
[S]ome commenters speculate that the pattern of greater donations to charity by anti-redistributionists is trivial in size or simply a function of religion. But anti-redistributionists give more to secular (non-religious) charities as well. Brooks reports (p. 56) that strong anti-redistributionists gave 12 times more money to charity than strong redistributionists, and 9 times more to secular (non-religious) causes.
It's not quite "Catholic," but there's some "legal theory", so . . .
Here is a debate, on the web site -- "PENNumbra" -- of the Penn Law Review, between Prof. Kermit Roosevelt (Penn) and me about his new book, "The Myth of Judicial Activism." Here is the teaser:
“Judicial activism,” writes Professor Kermit Roosevelt, of Penn, has been employed as an “excessive and unhelpful” charge—one “essentially empty of content.” As a substitute, Roosevelt reviews here the framework for analysis of Supreme Court opinions that receives fuller treatment in his recent book, The Myth of Judicial Activism. Professor Richard W. Garnett, of Notre Dame, is willing to go along with “much, though not all, of Roosevelt’s position. Ultimately, Garnett suggests “that ‘judicial activism’ might be salvaged, and used as a way of identfying and criticizing decisions . . . that fail to demonstrate th[e] virtue” of constitutional “humility.”
I'm not sure what the comparison between religious conservatives and secular liberals proves, but it certainly doesn't prove, to quote Instapundit (quoting Beliefnet), that conservatives are more generous "by any measure." At most, it shows that religious conservatives are more generous donors to private charities. But, if I define "generous" to encompass, say, support against one's financial interest for social programs funded through redistributive taxation, then wealthy liberals (secular or religious), who generally support such taxes and such programs, do well and conservatives (religious or not) don't look so hot.
I have not yet read the book (though I certainly will), but before
drawing any conclusions, I would be interested to know whether the
"private charities"
canvassed for the study include the religious conservatives own churches.
I'd also like to see the magnitude of the differences, especially on
some of the non-monetary measures noted in the beleifnet article, such
as blood donation. Finally, I'd want to see the numbers for secular
conservatives and religious liberals, since the presence of religious
involvement is a potentially conflating variable in this analysis that
cuts across political orientation.
To be honest,
though, I'd be fairly unsurprised to see that conservatives as a whole donate more to
private charities than liberals. Given egalitarian
liberal views about the role of the state in solving certain widespread
social problems, one would expect them (egalitarian liberals) to support state over private
solutions and to view at least some sorts of private charitable
contributions as wasted money.
Carl Sagan used to refer to this as the "brick in the toilet" question. He talked one category of people, who think that environmental problems should be solved by voluntary changes of individual behavior. Others, he said, think that many such problems require a level of coordination that can only be accomplished through the state. He used the question of water conservation as a hypothetical. People in the former group might put a brick in their toilet to save water with each flush but oppose centralized regulation aimed at ensuring broad based water conservation. (These are your religious conservatives, if you will, who will give money to private charities but oppose state intervention in the service of social justice.) On the other hand, people in the latter group, who favor state intervention to compel water conservation but are skeptical of the effectiveness of voluntary action in this regard, would support (or vote for) state regulation of water consumption but, in its absence, would not bother to put the brick in their toilet because they view the action as pointless without the broader coordination offered by state action. (These are your secular liberals who favor redistributive policies, even to their own financial disadvantage, but who, according to Instapundit and Greg, are stingy with their donations to charity.) Whether this story supports saying that people who put bricks in their toilets are the "true" environmentalists (or religious conservatives are the truly generous) and the people who do not but who vote for environmental interests are hypocrites strikes me as unanswerable apart from one's views about the substantive merits of the beliefs underlying their decisions.
The relevance of Bono's behavior for all of this strikes me as too far-fetched to be worthy of comment and bordering on (or, on second thought, crossing well over into) the realm of intellectual dishonesty. (Not surprising for Instapundit.) Suffice it to say that if we want to get into comparing the anecdotal evidence of hypocrisy among prominent individuals within the ranks of our respective political movements, religious conservatives are living in a glass house. In the same way that meth-purchasing, male-prostitute-hiring evangelical ministers don't say anything about the bona fides of conservative Christians, or the merits of their beliefs, Bono's tax evasion adds nothing useful to this conversation.
Yesterday, there was a rally at the State House in Boston involving the failure of the General Court (the Massachusetts legislature) to vote on the question of a Constitutional Convention that could have a substantive effect on the Supreme Judicial Court's decision in the Goodrich case. The news report of the Boston Globe is HERE . I find Professor Friedman's argument, referred to in the article, that the Governor is wrong quite interesting. But then, the Professor did file an amicus brief in the Goodrich case that appears to agree with the court's majority ruling in favor of homosexual marriage. At this stage, it also appears that the legal and political issues addressed in the Globe article could generate future discussion and interest among MOJ contributors and readers. RJA sj
. . . are the Evangelicals, John Wilson explains.
Ever since Jerry Falwell and his Moral Majority began making headlines in the 1980s, it has served the purposes of certain conservative activists and their ideological foes to exaggerate the influence they wield among evangelical Christians. In fact, it is both a strength and a weakness of evangelicalism that the “movement” lacks a center. Yes, a significant majority of evangelicals voted for George W. Bush. Big deal. At the moment, it appears unlikely that a Republican of any stripe will win the White House in 2008, though the Democrats may yet find a way to squander their advantage. So much for theocracy.
From Instapundit:
ARE CONSERVATIVES more charitable? "The book's basic findings are that conservatives who practice religion, live in traditional nuclear families and reject the notion that the government should engage in income redistribution are the most generous Americans, by any measure. Conversely, secular liberals who believe fervently in government entitlement programs give far less to charity. They want everyone's tax dollars to support charitable causes and are reluctant to write checks to those causes, even when governments don't provide them with enough money."
Apparently they're not big on paying the taxes to support those entitlement programs, either: "Bono demands more of the taxes he won't pay."
