Jehovah's Witnesses as Un-Americans? Scriptural Injunctions, Civil Liberties, and Patriotism

Abstract

In the United States, the steadfast refusal of the Jehovah's Witnesses to perform some of the most basic rituals of citizenship has led champions of Americanism to cast them as unpatriotic and even seditious. The Watch Tower Society, the corporate body of the Witnesses, has responded to these accusations by presenting Witnesses as upstanding citizens, only ever departing from the letter of the law when there is a conflict between secular legal directive and scriptural injunction. This essay argues that the gulf between the popular perception of the Witnesses as poor citizens, particularly during the middle decades of the twentieth century, and the society's own representation of its members as assets to their communities highlights the contested and mutable nature of the label un-American. Furthermore, it argues that there is a paradox in the place of the Jehovah's Witnesses in modern American history: though operating beyond the pale of understood norms of citizenship, they have been fundamental to shaping the First Amendment freedoms enjoyed by all citizens. It seeks to contribute to two largely unwritten histories, namely the place of the Witnesses in American religious history, and the ever-changing yet resolutely politicized concept of the un-American.