Politics and Morality

Jimmy Carter has repeatedly numbered Reinhold Niebuhr among the thinkers who have most influenced his intellectual development. About this, however, as about much else, he has not become specific.

And perhaps it is the man rather than the writer and thinker that Carter has in mind. Niebuhr was a Protestant minister and theologian of the neoLutheran tendency that arose in Europe early in this century. He also became something of a political activist. The positions Niebuhr took on domestic affairs were usually liberal, although ideologically he had little in common with standard American liberalism. He sometimes called his political outlook “Christian realism,” and once defined politics as “the sad art of establishing justice in a sinful world.”

JB

About the Author

James Burnham

Featured Tags

Manage following

Jimmy Carter

Presidential Election

Jimmy Carter has repeatedly numbered Reinhold Niebuhr among the thinkers who have most influenced his intellectual development. About this, however, as about much else, he has not become specific.

And perhaps it is the man rather than the writer and thinker that Carter has in mind. Niebuhr was a Protestant minister and theologian of the neoLutheran tendency that arose in Europe early in this century. He also became something of a political activist. The positions Niebuhr took on domestic affairs were usually liberal, although ideologically he had little in common with standard American liberalism. He sometimes called his political outlook “Christian realism,” and once defined politics as “the sad art of establishing justice in a sinful world.”