When Democrats lost control of Congress in 1994, the Christian Right claimed a major role in their defeat and House Speaker Newt Gingrich credited the "organized Christian vote" with the Republican victory. Ministers from many political persuasions have long been active in American politics, but in the 1980s and 1990s it has seemed impossible to find any political controversy that did not involve the clergy-often on both sides of the issue.

The Bully Pulpit is the first major study of clergy politics in more than twenty years. Drawing on two decades of survey research involving...