Any time the Tennessee General Assembly tackles any issue related to animal life, animal death or animal passions, unknown terrors always rear their ugly heads.

More than once during its history, the Assembly has been asked to consider legislation dealing with “exotic animals”—lions, tigers, cougars, bears and so on. Most often, such beasts have appeared on the legislative agenda after one of them has escaped from its cage and, driven by its natural animal urges, has gobbled up a toddler or two.

In the wake of such unusual—albeit not unnatural—occurrences, Tennessee lawmakers would be asked to prescribe the conditions under which wild animals could be permitted to exist alongside better socialized beasts. The people most affected by the new regulations would be the animal owners themselves—at most about 500 of them. Nevertheless, another 4.4 million Tennessee residents would suddenly be faced with the unsavory prospect of being ripped apart and eaten alive. Even if such disasters were uncommon, Tennesseans seemed to figure, one could never be too careful.

Inevitably, when the beastly legislation was debated, exotic animal owners would converge on the Legislature, waving signs, yelling slogans and protesting the intrusion of the government into their private animal kingdoms. Almost inevitably, when faced with such a massive onslaught of persons who own their own tigers, state lawmakers would react with typical bravery. They would roll over, kill the bills and free the animal owners to do exactly as they pleased.

It was not that the exotic animal owners represented some huge segment of the state’s population. Instead, trapped face-to-face with constituents storming the legislative chambers, our representatives and senators simply couldn’t say no.

That’s pretty much what’s going on right now on Capitol Hill. Now, however, it’s not the lions but the Christians who are attacking the hill. Admittedly, there are more conservative Christians in Tennessee than there are mountain lions, but, in the Legislature, they all have clout for the same reason. When they roar, people listen. As a result, they can summon up more terror than they deserve.

When it comes to actual numbers, it is hard to determine just how many of Tennessee’s innumerable Christians would consider themselves politically conservative. Still, it’s a safe bet that most Christians do not think of themselves as heathen-haters who want to hang the Ten Commandments on every interstate mile marker. Nor do most of them have any desire to bash gays and lesbians or to return to the teaching of medieval science in our public-school classrooms. It is a safe bet that, when most Christians hear about developments such as the ones that have recently attracted so much media attention to our state Legislature, they feel more than a little uneasy. They wonder whether or not the teaching of evolution has anything to do with their faith at all.

To be sure, conservative Christians are not without clout. Last year, during the waning days of Nashville mayor Phil Bredesen’s failed bid for the governor’s office, their direct-mail materials warned voters against the Democratic infidel. If elected, the mailings warned, Bredesen would encourage public school teachers to promote same-sex unions. Of course, Bredesen had no such intention, but the demagoguery was effective. It may have helped Sundquist’s campaign, but it was still wrong. It was still lies. And it was still un-Christian.

Beastly behavior

This year, the Assembly is debating four pieces of legislation that have brought Tennessee under media scrutiny such as it has not known since the notorious Scopes Trial of 1925. All four pieces of legislation are fueled by supposedly “Christian” fervor.

They include:

♦ The Same-Sex Marriage Bill

State Sen. Jim Holcomb, the Kingsport Republican who is the sponsor of the bill, makes a living as a psychologist and claims that he has successfully helped various gay men and lesbians overcome their “deviancy” by reorienting them toward heterosexuality.

Holcomb’s bill would state that, as a matter of policy, the only marriages that can exist in Tennessee are those that involve one man and one woman. In Tennessee at present, men cannot marry men, and women cannot marry women. But, because of an impending court ruling in Hawaii, such arrangements might soon be possible in a number of other states. At present, Tennessee honors marriages that are valid in other states. Holcomb does not want to see gays and lesbians from Tennessee jetting off to Honolulu, getting married and then flying back home.

♦ The Monkey Bill

This bill’s sponsor, state Sen. Tommy Burks, a Democrat from Monterey, is a pig farmer. As such, he has probably seen what can happen when a small pig mates with a big pig and a medium pig results. Such experience notwithstanding, Burks is troubled about evolution being taught as fact in Tennessee classrooms.

Burks’ measure would prohibit any teacher in Tennessee from teaching evolution as fact. Burks and his supporters would argue that the biblical book of Genesis provides a perfectly acceptable explanation of how humankind came into being. They do not want this version to be given any less credence than the theories of Darwin.

To help legislators understand the scientific principles involved, one of the bill’s opponents put matters on the only level many of our lawmakers can understand. He reminded his colleagues of the process by which mules are bred. Since mules are a cross between a donkey and a horse, doesn’t that show that genetic evolution is a proven fact?

♦ The Ten Commandments Resolution

State Sen. Ben Atchley, who has always been thought of as a decent Republican, is now facing stiff opposition from a right-winger back in his home district in Knoxville. In retaliation, he has introduced the Ten Commandments Resolution. As a result, Tennessee has made it onto the Today show and into the pages of Newsweek.

The Ten Commandments Resolution recognizes that the Ten Commandments are the bedrock foundation of our Judeo-Christian culture. The resolution recommends that all Tennesseans, regardless of their faiths, should observe the Ten Commandments and post them in their homes, businesses, schools and churches.

State Sen. Douglas Henry, who has a Hindu temple in his district, tried to amend the bill so the temple wouldn’t have to post the Ten Commandments on its walls. Henry’s amendment was defeated.

♦ The Leaving School Bill

This little number is being proposed by state Sen. David Fowler of Chattanooga. It would allow kids to leave school for an hour a day to receive religious instruction.

Supporters of the measure include home-schoolers, many of whom are fundamentalist Christians who believe the public school system to be a godless wilderness. It is not known whether the religious instruction period would be limited to lunchtime or if it could take the place of a math class. It is not known whether the school day might be extended for an hour to accommodate the lost class time.

Horny dilemma

Politically, all four bills put our state representatives and senators in a bind. If they vote against the bills, they will be tagged as anti-Christian. If they vote for them, the legislators, whatever their personal convictions, will have an easy ride.

If they vote for the bills, the legislators will not have have to worry about facing the noisy protests of the Christians who purport to be concerned about a decent society. Meanwhile, the Christians who are growling the loudest are the ones who look the least like Christians at all. They have more in common, in fact, with the Pharisees. The Pharisees were always right, and they were always loud, and in the end, it finally took Jesus himself to shut them up.

Absent a Second Coming, some of the state’s more powerful minds should be standing up more strongly against these measures. Such a stance might have its negatives—after all, it is possible simply to ignore the bills in the hopes that they’ll go away. But the fact is that, increasingly, such bills, and their supporters, aren’t going away. And with national news crews steadily descending on our Legislature, we have begun to bear little resemblance to the progressive, New South state that our political leadership presents us to be.

Meanwhile, these bills remind us that conservatism is in a strange position these days. Conservatism supposedly holds that government should get off our backs, that we should be able to think and act, and buy and spend, as we please. Christian-coalition conservatism, however, posits the notion that government action can produce behavior modification.

Classic conservatism also demands a very literal interpretation of the Constitution. Meanwhile, the new brand of conservatism reacts to today’s moral dilemmas by calling for a return to “values.” Many of those values are nothing more than religious principles. However, the Constitution clearly states, in the first words of the Bill of Rights, that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

When the first settlers from the Old World landed in the New World, they did not want government to play any role in determining how they worshiped their God. The Old World, however, was a far simpler place than the world we know. You couldn’t get the Playboy Channel on cable in Jamestown. There weren’t any profanity-riddled rap songs on the radio. Only a few kids were born out of wedlock (remember Hester Prynne?), and crack wasn’t sold on street corners.

The sharp turn to the religious right in this year’s legislative calendar hasn’t just come out of nowhere. To the people who want such legislation passed, the world seems to be a place drowning in moral crises, a place filled with turmoil and unacceptable behavior, a place very likely controlled by the Devil himself. The Christian Coalition is not the only group saying as much—even some of the Republican Party’s more intellectual subsets, including people like Bill Bennett and Bill Kristol, are suggesting the same things too.

All such hectoring, however, is mere shadowboxing. It stirs up an argument in a place where no good can be created. At the state Legislature, Don Sundquist has introduced a massive welfare bill that will, it is hoped, move thousands of Tennesseans off the welfare rolls and into productive jobs. If Christians wanted to jump on the political playing field, the welfare plan would be a great place to start.

It is, after all, the poor who will be with us always. It is the meek who shall inherit the earth. It is the sick who need to be healed. It is injustice that must be set right.