Romney: Religion won’t run decisions

The candidate’s Mormon beliefs worry Iowa voters.

DALLAS MORNING NEWS

COLLEGE STATION, Texas — Moving to win over Christian conservatives wary of his Mormon faith, Republican Mitt Romney said Thursday his religion shouldn’t preclude him from being president and wouldn’t dictate his decisions if elected.

“I will serve no one religion, no one group, no one cause and no one interest,” Romney said in a speech that comes as Mike Huckabee has gone ahead in polls in Iowa with strong support from evangelicals.

Christian conservatives who heard Thursday’s speech at the George Bush Presidential Library generally gave Romney good marks. But the test of whether the former Massachusetts governor can win over religious conservatives won’t come until the Iowa presidential caucuses next month.

About 39 percent of likely GOP Iowa caucus-goers describe themselves as evangelicals, and many of them say they would be reluctant to vote for a Mormon.

Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention, who has not endorsed a candidate in the race, said the speech “won’t hurt” in efforts to attract faith-based voters.

“He certainly helped himself with some evangelicals. But let’s remember, Kennedy didn’t convert all Protestants” with his 1960 speech on religion and politics, said Land, who was among guests invited by the Romney camp.

Lou Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition and a Romney supporter, called the speech “a defining moment” for the campaign.

“I now have enough ammunition to silence the criticism of an unbelievable number of these friends of mine,” he said.

But Florida televangelist Bill Keller, reflecting an anti-Mormon streak among some religious conservatives, said the speech isn’t enough to convince those who believe Mormonism is a cult.

In his 20-minute address, in which he was introduced by former President George Bush and framed by a phalanx of American flags, Romney reassured evangelicals that he would not be taking orders from his church but declared that their shared religious values would have a place in his administration.

“ I will take care to separate the affairs of government from any religion, but I will not separate us from the God who gave us liberty,” he said. “There are some,” he said, who “would prefer it if I would simply distance myself from my religion, say that it is more a tradition than my personal conviction, or disavow one or another of its precepts. That I will not do.”

The Rev. Barry Lynn of Americans United for Separation of Church and State objected to Romney’s description of the role of religious faith in government. “I was particularly outraged that Romney thinks that the Constitution is somehow based on faith and that judges should rule accordingly,” he said.