James Patterson, Ph.D.

I work in the areas of race, religion, American political development, and American political thought. He has published academic articles on the use of Nehemiah in nineteenth century American political rhetoric, the Christian political  theology of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., the development of American Catholic republicanism, and articles on the political thought of Ven. Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen. My first book, Religion in the Public Square: Sheen, King, Falwell, was published by the University of Pennsylvania Press in 2019, and I am currently co-authoring book on postliberalism with Thomas Howes for the Acton Institute (to be published in 2025). I am also preparing an edited volume of Sheen's hard-to-find political writing.

• 2024. Why Postliberalism Failed with Thomas Howes. Under Contract (Acton Institute Press). To be submitted September.
• 2019. Religion in the Public Square: Sheen, King, Falwell (University of Pennsylvania Press)

Book Chapters

• 2024. “The Role of the Therapeutic during the Civil Rights Movement,” Fellow Readers: Interdisciplinary Applications and Interpretations of the Social Theory of Philip Rieff (Bloomsbury, forthcoming)
• 2020. “The Covenant Foundation of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,” Race and Covenant (Acton Institute) Peer-Reviewed

Articles

• 2024. “First-Year Experience or One-Year Experience? The Future of Civic Engagement in Higher Education,” Laws (Forthcoming, co-authored with Glenn Moots).
• 2022. “’Do We Not Owe This Debt to Africa?’: The Anti-Jim Crow Theology of Atticus Greene Haygood, Pietas Fall 1 (1),    1-31.
• 2022. “The Anti-Nationalist Patriotism of Venerable Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen,” Religions 13 (9), 1-14.
• 2022. “Catholic Republicanism in America,” Perspectives on Political Science 51 (2), 81-93.
• 2021. “Symposium on James M. Patterson’s Religion in the Public Square: Sheen, King, Falwell,” with Paul Wilford, Rachel  K. Alexander, Eryn Gammonley, Jacob C. J. Wolf, and Samuel Goldman, Political Science Reviewer 45 (1).
• 2018. “A Covenant of the Heart: Martin Luther King Jr. Civil Disobedience, and the Beloved Community,” American Political  Thought Vol. 7, no. 1 (Winter 2018): 124-151.
• 2016. “’I Am Doing a Great Work, So That I Cannot Come Down’: Civil Liberty and the Nehemiad of the Early American Republic,” Anamnesis 5 (2016), 68-98.
• 2016. “’The Cross or the Double-Cross’: Roman Catholicism, Anti-Communism, and the Political Theology of Venerable Fulton J. Sheen,” Perspectives on Political Science 45, no. 1 (Spring 2016) 47-58.

Recent Popular Publications

• 2024. “The End is Not Nigh: Reply to Daniel Miller,” April 17.
• 2024. “The Prestige Economy of Higher Education,” January 10, Law & Liberty.
• 2023. “The Realignment That Wasn’t,” November 9,  Law & Liberty.
• 2023. “The Absurdity of a Protestant Franco,” October 24, Law & Liberty.
• 2023. “The Promise and Peril of Freedom Conservatism,” August 21, Law & Liberty.
• 2023. “Is the New Right Fascist?” Summer, Religion & Liberty.
• 2023. “Two Forms of Catholic Nationalism,” May 25, Law & Liberty.
• 2023. “No to Neo-Integralism,” January 5, National Review.
• 2022. “Social Media vs. Freedom,” December 19, Law & Liberty.
• 2022. “Institutions Have Consequences,” November 14, Law & Liberty.
• 2022. “NatConfusionism,” October 17, Law & Liberty.
• 2022. “Postliberalism and a World of Pure Imagination,” February 2, Providence.
• 2021. “Charles De Koninck vs. Jacques Maritain: Philosophers and Their Choices,” December 22, Providence.
• 2021. “Doing Justice to Human Dignity,” November 18, Providence.
• 2021. “The Time to Fund New Universities Is Now,” September 27, Law &  Liberty.
• 2021. “Wokeness and the New Religious Establishment,” National Affairs, Number 48 (Summer 2021).