c. 2007 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON (RNS) _ As the majority whip in Congress, Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C., is charged with keeping fellow House Democrats in line come voting time.

But Clyburn exercises another role on Capitol Hill as well. The son of a Pentecostal preacher, the South Carolina lawmaker also heads the Democrats’ Faith Working Group, a forum for religious outreach and conversation.

As the first federal minimum wage increase in 10 years goes into effect this week (July 24), Clyburn spoke with Religion News Service about the morality behind the increase, hate crimes legislation circulating through Congress and whether Democrats are “getting religion.” This interview has been edited for length.

Q: Is raising the minimum wage a moral victory for Congress?

A: I think so. I think all of us ought to be in the business of supporting those people who are hourly employees. No matter how we measure it, there’s something immoral about going 10 years without increasing the minimum wage, which is about half of what a livable wage is in this country. I find it a little bit immoral of us to be able to find justifications for salaried people to be given annual cost-of-living increases and hourly people aren’t.

Q: Do you agree with those religious leaders who say Congress took a step in the right direction raising the minimum wage but it’s still not a living wage?

A: Absolutely, I would agree with that.

Q: What about the small business owner or restaurateur who says he doesn’t have enough money to increase his hourly employees’ wages? How would you try to convince him that raising the minimum wage is the right thing to do,morally?

A: I always say to that: “Why don’t you treat these people the same way you treat your salaried employees?” … Nine times out of 10 you pass that (increase in expenses) on to the public.

Q: What other issues are before Congress now that you believe have a prominent moral dimension?

A: One of my favorite books of the Bible is the Book of James. I believe that if James were writing his epistles today he would say to us that if you have children who cannot get good health care, (or adequate) education, if you have children that are hungry, you have to feed them. I think dealing with the least of these are issues of faith, be it minimum wage, food stamps, women, infant and children programs, school lunch programs.

Q: A number of conservative religious groups say that hate crimes legislation regarding sexual orientation that’s been circulating on the Hill would muzzle them from preaching against homosexuality. Are they right to be concerned?

A: I don’t understand what’s going on with that. They know better than that. This bill is about criminal activity. It’s not going to muzzle pastors in their pulpit on Sunday morning. Now if a pastor gets down from his pulpit and smacks someone in the head with their Bible that happens to be gay, then this bill is for them. (But) this is not about worship and expression and I think they do a disservice to themselves and their faith to misrepresent this bill that way.

Q: In the last few years, you’ve talked a lot about how your party has been pigeonholed as being hostile to faith. Do you see that turning around?

A: Yes, I do. That’s been part of my mission. I set out to try to do it in such a way that would get my members more comfortable with the issues of faith,not so much trying to convert anybody but to get people to understand that you are where you are because of your faith.

Some of these things you have to internalize. One person (in Congress) will never be comfortable talking about issues as part of his faith because he ain’t there. But he’s one of the most sensitive people in our caucus on issues of morality.

Q: The Democratic candidates for president have been talking about their faith a lot on the campaign trail. Is that a good thing?

A: Yes, because people want to hear that. I think a lot of people took our silence on these things as an indication that we had a problem with that.

Q: Religious leaders on the left say their communities were galvanized by the state campaigns to raise the minimum wage. Are there similar issues out there that could have a similar effect?

A: Health care, immigration, affordable housing _ all of these are issues that because of our faith are really important.

Q: Going back to Democrats “getting religion,” is it just a matter of recasting the Democratic platform in moral or religious language or is it something deeper?

A: Well, I don’t know about religious language but I do think we have to think about (issues) in a moral way. Something as simple as (the federal education bill) No Child Left Behind says in no uncertain terms that education is a moral issue.

But it’s much more than (talking about faith). People will know you’re phony from a mile away. It’s a whole lot about how you respond to people, how you vote. I think one of the most hypocritical things is people running around talking about family values and demonstrating every day that they don’t much value families.

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A file photo of Rep. James Clyburn is available via https://religionnews.com.