Robert P. George - Political Activity

Political Activity

George twice served as Governor of the West Virginia Democratic Youth Conference, and attended the 1976 Democratic National Convention as an alternate delegate. George moved to the right in the 1980s, largely due to his views on abortion, and left the Democratic Party as a result of what he saw as its increasingly strong commitment to legal abortion and its public funding, and his growing skepticism about the effectiveness of Great Society social welfare projects in Appalachia and other low income rural and urban areas. George is founder of the American Principles Project, which aims to create a grass-roots movement around his ideas. The American Principles Project states that it is dedicated to "preserving and propagating the fundamental principles on which our country was founded." He is a past chairman of the National Organization for Marriage, an advocacy group opposed to same-sex marriage, and co-founder of the Renewal Forum, an organization fighting the sexual trafficking and commercial exploitation of women and children.

George drafted the Manhattan Declaration, a manifesto signed by Orthodox, Catholic and Evangelical leaders that "promised resistance to the point of civil disobedience against any legislation that might implicate their churches or charities in abortion, embryo-destructive research or same-sex marriage."

Andrew Sullivan writes that George, along with other public intellectuals, played a key role in creating the "theoconservative" movement and integrating it into mainstream Republicanism. Sullivan sees George as a central figure to understanding "the revolution in American conservatism".