ABSTRACT

This chapter examines how each of the important figures advances John F. Kennedy's own ideas by purposefully blending and blurring religious, historical, and national characterizations of destiny. Thereby intentionally wielding these rhetorical manipulations both as demonstrations of their own power and as provocations for readers and listeners to reaffirm, advance, and capitalize on the destiny promised to them. A review of the places from which the multiple constructions of destiny emerged is necessary to understand how these differing approaches further complicated the decision-making of blacks and whites in the 1960s. Christians can do right by God by doing right by their people on earth-an idea that formed the perfect platform for infusing social constructions of freedom, justice, and equality into religion as "natural rights" sanctioned by God. References to the Confederacy, to the "Great Anglo-Saxon Southland", to freedom, to slavery, and to segregation-all in one powerful paragraph-firmly establish Wallace's position and loyalty to white Alabamians, not all Alabamians.