American historians and political commentators have also used the term to refer to politico-religious tendencies in American society.
Chris Hedges and David Neiwert observe the beginnings of American Christofascism during the Great Depression, when Americans espoused forms of fascism that were "explicitly 'Christian' in nature."[15]:88 Hedges writes that "fundamentalist preachers such as Gerald B. Winrod and Gerald L.K. Smith fused national and Christian symbols to advocate the country's first crude form of Christo-fascism."[16]:140 Smith's Christian Nationalist Crusade said that "Christian character is the basis of all real Americanism."[16]:140 Another prominent advocate of Christofascism was William Dudley Pelley.[15]:88
By the late 1950s, followers of these philosophies became the John Birch Society, whose policy positions and rhetoric have greatly impacted modern dominionists.[16]:140 Likewise, the Posse Comitatus movement began with former associates of Pelley and Smith.[15]:90 The 1980s saw the Council for National Policy[16]:140 and the Moral Majority[17][18] carry on the tradition, while the patriot movement and militia movement represented efforts to mainstream the philosophy in the 1990s.[15]:90
The term is also used to describe modern tendencies. Episcopal priest Carter Heyward, professor of theology at Episcopal Divinity School, uses the term to describe political and social policies that exclude nontraditional families in the name of Christianity, a practice she described as "arrogant and blasphemous."[19] Jonathan Turley referred to conservatives who wished to make Representative Keith Ellison, a Muslim, swear in on a Bible as "Judeo-Christofascists," in response to the use of "Islamofascists."[20] Incidents of anti-abortion violence, including the bombings committed by Eric Robert Rudolph and the murder of George Tiller, have also been called Christofascism.[15]:90-91[21] The term caused controversy in 2007, when Melissa McEwan, a campaign blogger for then-presidential candidate John Edwards, referred to religious conservatives as "Christofascists" on her personal blog.[22][23]
