The Christian right, otherwise referred to as the religious right, are Christian political factions characterized by their strong support of socially conservative and traditionalist policies. Christian conservatives seek to influence politics and public policy with their interpretation of the teachings of Christianity.
The Moral Majority was an American political organization and movement associated with the Christian right and the Republican Party in the United States. It was founded in 1979 by Baptist minister Jerry Falwell Sr. and associates, and dissolved in the late 1980s. It played a key role in the mobilization of conservative Christians as a political force and particularly in Republican presidential victories throughout the 1980s.
New Right is a term for various right-wing political groups or policies in different countries during different periods. One prominent usage was to describe the emergence of certain Eastern European parties after the collapse of the Soviet Union. In the United States, the Second New Right campaigned against abortion, LGBT civil rights, the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), the Panama Canal Treaty, affirmative action, and most forms of taxation.
Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) is a conservative youth activism organization that was founded in 1960 as a coalition between traditional conservatives and libertarians on American college campuses. It is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization and the chapter affiliate of Young America's Foundation. The purposes of YAF are to advocate public policies consistent with the Sharon Statement, which was adopted by young conservatives at a meeting at the home of William F. Buckley in Sharon, Connecticut, on September 11, 1960.
Howard Jay Phillips was an American politician and activist. A political conservative, Phillips was a United States presidential candidate who served as the chairman of The Conservative Caucus, a conservative public policy advocacy group which he founded in 1974. Phillips was a founding member of the U.S. Taxpayers Party, which later became known as the Constitution Party.
Ralph Eugene Reed Jr. is an American political consultant and lobbyist, best known as the first executive director of the Christian Coalition during the early 1990s. He sought the Republican nomination for the office of Lieutenant Governor of Georgia but lost the primary election on July 18, 2006, to state Senator Casey Cagle. Reed started the Faith and Freedom Coalition in June 2009. Reed and his wife JoAnne Young were married in 1987 and have four children. He is a member of the Council for National Policy.
The Council for National Policy (CNP) is an umbrella organization and networking group that advocates for conservative and Republican Party initiatives in the United States. It was launched in 1981 during the Reagan administration by Tim LaHaye and the Christian right, to "bring more focus and force to conservative advocacy". The membership list for September 2020 was later leaked, showing that members included prominent Republicans and conservatives, wealthy entrepreneurs, and media proprietors, together with anti-abortion and anti-Islamic extremists. Members are instructed not to reveal their membership or even name the group.
Paul Michael Weyrich was an American conservative political activist and commentator associated with the New Right. He co-founded The Heritage Foundation, the Free Congress Foundation, and the American Legislative Exchange Council, and coined the term "moral majority," co-founding an organization of the same name in 1979 with Jerry Falwell. He was also a Melkite Catholic deacon.
The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property, also known as The American TFP, and legally incorporated as The Foundation for a Christian Civilization, Inc. is a Traditionalist Catholic American advocacy group. It is an autonomous organization which forms part of the larger social conservative, anticommunist and monarchist international Tradition, Family, Property (TFP) movement founded by Brazilian intellectual, politician, and activist Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira.
Richard Art Viguerie is an American conservative figure, pioneer of political direct mail and writer on politics. He is the current chairman of ConservativeHQ.com.
Robert G. Grant is an American political activist, and the former leader of several Christian right groups in the United States. He is considered by many the "father" of the Christian Right in the US. He served as the chairman of Christian Voice, "the nation’s oldest conservative Christian lobby", and the American Freedom Coalition.
The Arlington Group was a coalition uniting the leaders of prominent Christian conservative organizations in the United States. Founded in 2002 principally through the efforts of American Family Association President Donald Wildmon and Free Congress Foundation Chairman Paul Weyrich, the group sought to establish consensus goals and strategy among its members and translate its combined constituency into an overwhelming force within the Republican Party, particularly at its highest levels. Its membership and purpose overlapped to a high degree with the Council for National Policy; but the group is much more narrowly focused, choosing to emphasize such issues as same-sex marriage, abortion, and confirmation of like-minded federal judges.
National Empowerment Television (NET), later known as America's Voice and eventually The Renaissance Network, was a cable TV network designed to rapidly mobilize politically conservative individuals for grassroots lobbying on behalf of the movement's policy aims. It was created by Paul Weyrich, a veteran strategist for the paleoconservative movement. At its peak, NET claimed to reach more than 11 million homes on selected cable systems or, in some markets, low-powered television stations. It accompanied the contemporaneous explosion of the popularity of talk radio, practically all of which was dedicated to propagating conservative political positions, on numerous issues in the United States during the 1990s.
John Terrence "Terry" Dolan was an American New Right political activist who was a co-founder and chairman of the National Conservative Political Action Committee (NCPAC). Dolan was also, during the mid to late 1970s, in the leadership of Christian Voice, "the nation's oldest conservative Christian lobby".
The National Conservative Political Action Committee, based in Alexandria, Virginia, was a New Right political action committee in the United States that was a major contributor to the ascendancy of conservative Republicans in the early 1980s, including the election of Ronald Reagan as President, and that innovated the use of independent expenditures to circumvent campaign finance restrictions.
The Reagan era or the Age of Reagan is a periodization of recent American history used by historians and political observers to emphasize that the conservative "Reagan Revolution" led by President Ronald Reagan in domestic and foreign policy had a lasting impact. It overlaps with what political scientists call the Sixth Party System. Definitions of the Reagan era universally include the 1980s, while more extensive definitions may also include the late 1970s, the 1990s, and even the 2000s. In his 2008 book, The Age of Reagan: A History, 1974–2008, historian and journalist Sean Wilentz argues that Reagan dominated this stretch of American history in the same way that Franklin D. Roosevelt and his New Deal legacy dominated the four decades that preceded it.
Social conservatism in the United States is a political ideology focused on the preservation of traditional values and beliefs. It focuses on a concern with moral and social values which proponents of the ideology see as degraded in modern society by liberalism. In the United States, one of the largest forces of social conservatism is the Christian right.
This timeline of modern American conservatism lists important events, developments and occurrences that have affected conservatism in the United States. With the decline of the conservative wing of the Democratic Party after 1960, the movement is most closely associated with the Republican Party (GOP). Economic conservatives favor less government regulation, lower taxes and weaker labor unions while social conservatives focus on moral issues and neoconservatives focus on democracy worldwide. Conservatives generally distrust the United Nations and Europe and apart from the libertarian wing favor a strong military and give enthusiastic support to Israel.
The Free Congress Research and Education Foundation, also known as the Free Congress Foundation or FCF, was an American conservative think tank founded by Paul Weyrich and based near Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C.
