I honestly thought it was a parody written by liberals/skeptics like ChristWire and Landover Baptist the first few times I read it. Then I found out Andy Schlafly was behind it...
BTW, would anyone else here consider the maternal Schlafly the founder of the Religious Right? She set up the STOP-ERA Coalition "Stop Taking Our Privileges (Equal Rights Amendment)" in 1972- I am yet to work out quite how maintaining legal patriarchy is a "privilege" for women- with the "pink slips" warning right-wing Christian women that same-sex marriage, women in combat, abortion on demand, state-funded birth control and other supposed unmitigated evils would result from the ERA being passed.
I am used to hearing the story that the RRW began with the meeting of Weyrich [FCF], Falwell, Terry Dolan, Viguerie [early Heritage Foundation] and Phillips [Conservative Caucus] in 1978 responding to the Carter admin's plan to strip de facto segregated Fundie/Southern Baptist schools and colleges, particularly Bob Jones, of tax-exempt status. Christian Voice was formed that year, Religious Roundtable and Moral Majority the year after.
The irony is Bob Jones himself was opposed to the whole enterprise, as an old-school Militant Fundamentalist he believed that this world was always going to be wicked until Jesus came back and Christians were to win individual souls without trying to change the culture around them- he saw it as part of the "heretical Social Gospel". The association of Protestants, Catholics and Jews in the religious right also upset him due to his belief in separating from anyone who was not a true Christian by fundamentalist standards (including Catholics and "modernists"/evolution-believers) and separating secondarily from any true Christian who did not themselves practise this separation as they were compromised; hence David Cloud, Jack Hyles, Pensacola Christian College and BJU among other Fundie leaders condemned Falwell.
However, Onalee McGraw and Bob Simonds- though their RRW groups were founded later- got involved along with right-wing Christian national politicians in the 1974 Kanawha textbook controversy, and Catholics began anti-abortion groups in 1973 within months of the Roe and Doe SCOTUS decisions. This gives the lie to the view that the RRW was specifically "founded over racism", though I have no doubt many of the members were racist, being privileged white Southern men with a bent towards preserving tradition and opposing change- the tradition of their day was white supremacy, so it would be a natural fit.
The more I have looked into it, the more I think that Phyllis Schafly's first campaign in 1972- linking abortion, homosexuality, Christianity and gender roles in an anti-feminist context even before Roe or the large mainstream gay-rights organisations forming; getting Catholics and Protestants together; mobilising working-class people to vote for economic rightwingers based on a social agenda of preserving pre-modern values and rejecting separation of church and state; setting up highly active local chapters to push the rightwing agenda in conservative parts of the country and build morale and momentum even when Dems had control of national politics- had all the hallmarks of Religious Right activism in the 41 years since in a way that no-one else did before her, and so she should be considered the "Godmother of the movement", rather than crediting Jerry Falwell, Francis & Edith Schaeffer, Pat Robertson or Howard Phillips.
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