What Robert Jeffress wants us to forget

In 2011, Robert Jeffress preached that the word "religion" in the First Amendment only applied to Christians. He has taken down both his sermon video on the subject and his blog from his Twilight Last Gleaming series.  However he did not delete his book or it's forward by Mike Huckabee.

 Given his recent Nazi comments, it is interesting that he specifically writes about Judaism by name as a faith that is not a constitutionally a  "religion" according to his interpretation.  Below are the comments that he made on Hannity.

I want to remind people that the Nazis weren't able to take the Jews to the crematoriums immediately. The German people wouldn't have allowed for it. Instead, the Nazis had to change public opinion. They marginalized the Jewish people, disparaged them, and made them objects of contempt.

Basically his argument in his book rests on the idea that contextually the word "religion" would have meant only Christianity to the Founding Fathers.

Jeffress argues that Freedom of Religion only applies to Christians, because the Founding Fathers only meant Christianity by the word "religion".  I dealt somewhat with this argument in a blog I wrote in 2011, Need help convincing your friends that Islam is a religion?  I gave examples of the Founding Fathers who used "religion" to refer to the non-Christian faith of Islam.  Perhaps the most concise take down of this position was done by the American Family Association (also in 2011) to counter their spokesman, Bryan Fischer, making the same argument that Jeffress makes.  Even though the AFA has increased their opposition to their own employee both in writing and by removing him as spokesman, they have strangely deleted their epic take down.  It has however been preserved by Rightwingwatch.

Pertinent to the topic of  "marginalized the Jewish people", Jeffress specifically mentions Judaism and Islam as his two examples of non-Christian religions OK to be excluded by the state, because they are not legally "equally valid as Christianity". 

There is no mandate in the Constitution that requires the government to prohibit expressions of the Christian faith in the public square.  In fact, as I have demonstrated in several examples, the First Amendment does not even require that the government treat all faiths equally.  Although the Constitution demands that the government allow expressions of all faiths, the government can (and for more than 150 years did) show a preference for the Christian faith.  A high school principal does not have to have both a Christian and a Muslim student offer a prayer at graduation.  A city mayor is not obligated to balance a nativity scene in the town square with a Jewish menorah.  True tolerance allows for preferences by individuals.

Jeffress believes that schools should be engaged in daily leading prayer for their students.  Given this background, he specifically argues that a Muslim student does not have to be allowed to lead prayer at a graduation.  He is using Muslim and Jewish interchangeably here so my hypothetical scenario that I wrote in 2011 is not too far off what he has already said. 

Pastor Jeffress believes that the First Amendment says that a teacher can select a 6 year old Christian boy to lead his public school first grade class in prayer. However, when the boy's practicing Jewish best friend volunteers to lead the following day, the teacher can say, "I am sorry Ben you can't, because you are a Jew."

He specifically even says that a mayor would be within his rights to ban a Jewish menorah from the town square.

There is no secret that Jeffress preaches that Christians should usually vote for Christians.  In 2011, he endorse Rick Perry over Mitt Romney because Perry was "born again". Electing a Mormon was to invite the judgment of God on America.  Apparently God changed his mind when Romney won the primary. Jeffress doubled back arguing that Romney was preferable to Obama who had his "Fist in the Face of God"

Sadly this evangelical idea about not voting for Jews became tragic when a Missouri Republican Party chairman started a whisper campaign to suggest that one of the primary candidates for Governor was actually Jewish instead of Christian.

You know where Judaism not having full religious rights and not voting for Jews, does not play well? Israel.  Fischer was ultimately fired from his job as spokesman for this and other views.  (The AFA sent the Southern Poverty Law Center a list.)  Still Jeffress has never repudiated his same views. He just stopped talking about them.  How can he go around from show to show and never get asked about this portion of his book?

As mentioned, Huckabee wrote the forward.

Huckabee is running for President again.  How can he avoid questions about Jeffress' view on how Judaism should be treated under the law?