From the WSJ Opinion Archives
THE WESTERN FRONT
What Would Jesus Drive?
What kind of silly question is that?
It seems environmentalists have found God. Last week top auto executives in Detroit agreed to meet with leaders of a group called the National Religious Partnership for the Environment, which has launched an anti-SUV campaign dubbed "What Would Jesus Drive?"
The goal is to make Americans feel guilty for driving big, gas guzzling vehicles. This isn't the first time green parsons have weighed in on environmental issues. The Evangelical Environmental Network was formed in 1994 to do just that. Two years later it waged a $1 million campaign to save the Endangered Species Act, mailing out "Let Earth Be Glad" kits to 33,000 churches and paying for radio and TV ads.
The argument this time is simple. Jesus taught us to love and honor our neighbors. Since SUVs pollute more than other cars and pollution is bad for all of us, it is sinful to drive one unless you absolutely need to.
When the "What Would Jesus Drive?" campaign was rolled out, a few commentators derided it, rightly remarking that Jesus would likely drive an SUV or van, if not a bus. After all, he'd need space to seat his 12 apostles, not to mention pamphlets and other religious literature to hand out.
It's no coincidence that the environment in the United States--home to millions of SUVs--is getting better all the time, while in Bangkok, where motorbikes are the norm, the air is so polluted that many people wear masks while outside. And although the world's poor would rather endure dirty factories than starve, those of us in wealthy nations needn't make that choice.
We don't owe our vast wealth to sport utility vehicles, of course. But these behemoths do make us better off. They're large, heavy vehicles and therefore safer in an accident. They also provide the cargo space and towing capacity many families need to cart children to soccer games or take the family out on the boat. SUVs are also useful for millions of middle-class Americans who improve their homes by making regular trips to Home Depot.
The dirty secret about SUVs is that they are good for the economy and therefore the environment. They're big and expensive, so making and selling them supports millions of people in a vast array of industries. They are also often the cash cow of an automaker's fleet, making many of the other less economically viable but environmentally friendly models possible. Likewise, West Germans drove much bigger cars than East Germans did, but when the Berlin Wall came down, it was in the east that the reunified Germany faced a crisis of pollution that killed fish, poisoned ground water and contributed to higher rates of disease.
BMW adjusted to the demands of the market. Soon its factories were churning out sellable cars, some with faster engines. Others were powered by motorcycle engines, but still found their market niche. One such model was the Isetta. It was designed by a refrigerator maker, and it looked it. It was so small that there was no need to parallel park it; with its nose to the curb, its tail end didn't stick out into traffic. But more than 160,000 of them sold, bringing in enough money for BMW to stave off several buyout attempts and stay in business.
By the mid-1960s BMW was gaining dominance in the luxury car market and had several full-grown cars to round out its fleet. More importantly, the company was profitable, leading car designers in new directions and--as a symbol of its new strength--building a new headquarters in the shape of a four-cylinder engine.
Today car makers are again offering models with limited appeal, while depending on the models that the middle class is willing to buy by the millions. But this time the middle class is demanding bigger, more expensive cars, while the mandate for small cars comes from Washington. Prosperity for many car makers, and a large sector of the economy, now depends on selling SUVs. That prosperity feeds into the economy that supports the environmental projects the greens love.
The greens and their religious supporters will have none of this, of course. They don't see virtue in prosperity. Instead, they take it as a matter of faith that no one should have the kind of power a V-8 offers, that Americans just shouldn't be able to turn onto the highway, accelerate to a good cruising speed and enjoy it. It's all somehow immoral.
Mr. Miniter is assistant editor of OpinionJournal.com. His column appears Mondays.
