Romney Slips In Iowa, Going To Talk About Mormonism

(Sean sez: I know, I know, yet another national story. But, check it, I’m going to tie this to Minnesota!)

Mitt Romney has let it leak, he’s finally going to try and talk about his faith, much like JFK’s speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association (it’s a magnificent speech, read it or watch it there). Both speeches were because of one thing: getting elected, but thats just about where Romney’s and JFK’s path diverge.

JFK’s monumental speech was delivered in September, shortly before the general election where he was appealing to all Americans, while Romney has to address the issue of his faith a month before before the Iowa caucuses. And, Kennedy’s Catholicism made him part of the single largest religious group in the country Romney’s faith is the 10th largest in America (with about 1% of Americans reporting membership in the LDS, approximately the same percentage as Jewish Americans). Maybe most importantly though, while lots of Americans were hostile to Catholics, the urban catholic populations of the North were hot beds of Kennedy support, while Romney is wading into a field of Religious conservatives who view his religion very very negatively. Kennedy didn’t have to convince anyone he wasn’t a tool of the Pope to win the endorsement, whereas Romney has to answer the (unfounded and pretty rediculous) charge that he is a member of a cult.

But, I think most importantly, Romney doesn’t have a Freeman (Huzzah! I told you!).

Freeman nominated Kennedy, a Catholic, at the Democratic Party convention. The Sunday before the November vote, Minnesota churchgoers were warned that electing Kennedy would put the Pope in the White House.

“There was distributed in many many of the Protestant churches including the Lutheran church Orville went to a pamphlet which attacked Kennedy because of his religion,” said Heaney.

Within a day, Freeman went on television denouncing the attack on Kennedy, and admonishing Minnesotans who questioned the candidate’s religious views.

“And I responded we ought to be ashamed of ourselves on that now, and this is a democratic country and each man’s religion is his own business, and it’s not something in the political arena. People didn’t like to be lectured and that didn’t help me one little bit,” said Freeman.

Kennedy won Minnesota with a 20,000 vote margin. Freeman lost his re-election bid for governor by 20,000 votes.

Minnesota’s 11 electoral votes didn’t secure Kennedy’s win (he won by 80 or so electoral college votes) but Freeman’s support at the convention was integral to Kennedy’s win of the endorsement (Hubert Humphrey was a failed Presidential candidate that year, and many in the Minnesota delegation were stung by what they felt were Kennedy’s dirty tricks in the West Virginia primary), and the importance of the popular Protestant governor of Minnesota declaring his support for the Catholic candidate has been attributed as one of the reasons for his squeaker of a win.

And I don’t think the same could work for Romney, whereas Kennedy’s faith wasn’t the make or break issue for him; and thats not to diminish it’s importance, it just wasn’t, faith is a much more important issue for the people who will be deciding if Romney is going to get the nomination. And this speech can really only be seen as a last ditch effort to stop the hemorrhaging he’s seeing in the polls, where he is dropping fast to Mike Huckabee, a former pastor, and a candidate who engages the evangelical and conservative Christians that increasingly make up more and more of the Republican base as moderates scurry towards Democrats.