By Patrick O'Hannigan
Townsend asserts that she gave America by Heart a careful reading, from which she came away sure that Palin supports an unconstitutional religious test for public office. Inconveniently, we have to take Townsend's word for that, because Palin actually says no such thing: the closest she gets is to express disappointment at John F. Kennedy's failure to reconcile his "private faith and public role," and his unwillingness to tell fellow countrymen "how his faith had enriched him." Palin did not use Hilaire Belloc as a counter-example, but he would have been a better choice than Mitt Romney, whom she did mention. In 1906, when Belloc ran for a seat in the British Parliament as a representative of the Liberal party, his stem-winding stump speech included a ringing affirmation of faith: "Gentlemen, I am a Roman Catholic. As far as possible, I go to Mass every day. This [taking a rosary out of his pocket] is a rosary. As far as possible, I kneel down and tell these beads every day. If you reject me on account of my religion, I shall thank God that he has spared me the indignity of being made your representative."
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