Ritual of American Solidarity

      Amanda Porterfield talks about the disconnect between the "prophetic" and the "priestly," stemmed in a "disjuncture between internalized ethical principles and external social structures." (92)  People were not identifying with the actions that their government were taking.  I wonder how much the lack of a formal declaration of war on the part of the U.S. government contributed to this disjuncture.  Did the lack of "public" participation in the ritualized action of a declaration of war affect the notion of a nation unified in war? Could it have contributed to the national acceptance of resistance?