JFK 9-11-1960
Fact is JFK almost lost because he was Catholic. People feared that it would end up giving the Pope/Catholic Church too much control over the country.
"But because I am a Catholic, and no Catholic has ever been elected President, the real issues in this campaign have been obscured--perhaps deliberately, in some quarters less responsible than this. So it is apparently necessary for me to state once again--not what kind of church I believe in, for that should be important only to me--but what kind of America I believe in.
I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute--where no Catholic prelate would tell the President (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote--where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference--and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the President who might appoint him or the people who might elect him. "
Fact is JFK almost lost because he was Catholic. People feared that it would end up giving the Pope/Catholic Church too much control over the country.