Religious language plays a pivotal role in shaping political behavior and attitudes. This study investigates how representatives utilize religious rhetoric when addressing the House floor and their constituents, and how this language is influenced by congressional leadership. The inauguration of openly religious Mike Johnson as House Speaker in 2023 provides a unique case to explore these dynamics. Using difference-in-differences and triple difference models, we analyze House speeches and newsletters from before and after Johnson became House Speaker to assess changes in religious speech between Republican and Democratic representatives. Our findings reveal a significant increase in newsletters using religious language sent out by Republicans after Johnson became Speaker, while religious speech on the House floor remains unchanged. Overall, our findings contribute to the literature on the relationship between religion, partisanship, and Congressional leadership, highlighting the potential influence of the Speaker of the House on religious communication to constituents.

How do military chaplains perceive the legitimacy of US drone strikes? Though chaplains are entrusted to shape the moral use of force, scholars have not studied what accounts for their perceptions of legitimate drone warfare, and whether these relate to legal-rational or moral considerations. To understand these dynamics, we field a survey experiment among a rare sample of US Army chaplains. We find that while chaplains’ perceptions of legally and morally legitimate strikes largely covary, they can also deviate. Chaplains discount the legality of strikes in undeclared theaters of operations, even when they are tightly constrained to minimize civilian casualties. Though chaplains may perceive strikes as legitimate, they can also support them less. Finally, other factors shape chaplains’ perceptions, with combat experiences exercising the greatest effect on perceptions of legal versus moral legitimacy. This first evidence for chaplains’ attitudes toward drone warfare has implications for policy, research, and military readiness.

About a decade after the Arab Uprisings, the Tunisian Ennahda party experienced the exodus of several high-profile leaders. Motivated by the party’s growing factionalism and shrinking support, this article investigates the organizational factors that account for the low system-ness of an Islamist-born party following major organizational changes. It does so by drawing on interview data and organizational developments that unfolded inside Ennahda (2016–2021). In a framework that intersects the field of party politics and organization studies, this article argues that the major factors that account for Ennahda’s low system-ness include (i) an inefficient and inadequate theorization of the need for the party’s specialization in political activities, (ii) a problematic identification with the subsequently refashioned organizational identity, and (iii) an uneasy coexistence of distinct group identities involved in separate processes of organizational identity recrafting. This article concludes by challenging the way scholars traditionally conceive coherence, cohesion, and “change” in religious parties.