Review of The Gospel of J. Edgar Hoover

Published in The Journal of Church & State

Engaging new book

In this engaging new book, Lerone Martin (Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Stanford University) persuasively argues that J. Edgar Hoover was one of the central figures of mid-twentieth century US religious history. Martin shows how Hoover combined mainline Protestant respectability, traditionally conservative ideas about gender and race as well as—thanks to his leadership of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)—an unparalleled authority to identify national security threats to the United States. Hoover’s leadership of the most powerful US internal security apparatus allowed him to exert tremendous pressure to shape American religion in the way he saw fit. Leveraging widespread American concerns about the looming specter of atheistic communism, Hoover transformed himself into a widely respected and deeply trusted figure in white Christian circles. Across eight deeply researched chapters, Martin presents the FBI as the link between white evangelicals and state power. In one of many clever turns of phrase, Martin says that if Billy Graham was America’s pastor, “then J. Edgar Hoover was America’s bishop, adjudicating the faith and shepherding white evangelicals toward white Christian nationalism”

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