Politics & Power Quote by James Dobson

Dobson frames voting not as a civic choice but as a divine assignment, collapsing the distance between private belief and public power. The first sentence performs the key move: it deputizes the listener as "His representatives", a phrase that borrows the moral authority of religion and the procedural authority of politics at once. Representation is usually a constitutional concept; here it becomes a spiritual identity. That shift matters because it turns disagreement into disobedience. If God "called" you, opting out is not neutrality, its failure.

The subtext is organizational: this is less about individual conscience than about mobilization. "Select candidates who represent your views" sounds like pluralism, even modesty, but it quietly assumes your views are the ones aligned with God's call. The next clause, "work for their election", is the tell. Dobson isn't merely endorsing voting; he's recruiting volunteers, donors, precinct walkers, church networks. It's a template for turning congregations into political infrastructure while keeping the language sanctified rather than partisan.

Context sharpens the intent. As a psychologist turned culture-war entrepreneur, Dobson built a brand around family anxiety: threats to children, marriage, and moral order. This kind of rhetoric thrives in moments when religious conservatives feel besieged by changing norms. By casting politics as representation of God "in our nation and in our world", he scales local ballot-box choices into cosmic stakes, a powerful antidote to apathy and a potent solvent for compromise. The moral urgency is the product: it binds identity to a voting pattern and makes coalition politics feel like faithfulness.