ABSTRACT
Discussing values in today's rhetorically charged environment adds complexity rather than clarity to an understanding of social welfare policy and programs. Family values, religious values, sexual values, and others are mentioned as if everyone knew what these terms stood for. The search for morally relevant values has deep roots in Western intellectual tradition. As far back as the philosopher Plato, many sought to identify moral values, or "virtues," namely, those personal characteristics that guided behavior and infused the society as well as the individual with worth. The bifurcation of values-morally relevant values from civic values-has become characteristic of America in the twentieth century and carries over to an understanding of ethics as well. The strict rules of ethical conduct, particularly among Congregationalists and Presbyterians, undoubtedly aided the development of the American nation. America might have become a theocratic state had it not been that the idea of freedom took precedence over the idea of religion.
