Pat Buchanan Delivers 'Culture War' Speech at Republican National Convention
Event Reviewed Automatically reviewed for factual accuracy, tone, and neutrality. Review does not check claims against cited sources. Last reviewed 25 October 2026.On August 17, 1992, Pat Buchanan, who had lost the Republican presidential nomination to President George H. W. Bush, addressed the Republican National Convention at the Houston Astrodome, telling delegates that "there is a religious war going on in this country" and calling it "a cultural war" for "the soul of America."
Buchanan describes a “religious war” and “cultural war” for “the soul of America.”
Buchanan, who had worked in the Nixon and Reagan administrations, ran against Bush in the 1992 Republican primaries before losing the nomination. In the address he endorsed Bush and set the parties against each other on abortion, homosexual rights and the Los Angeles riot earlier that year, closing with a call to “take back our cities, and take back our culture, and take back our country.” The sociologist James Davison Hunter had published Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define America the year before. A 2018 journal article says the speech “has often been understood as a defining moment in the US culture wars.”
Sources
- 01.
The American Yawp Reader. Pat Buchanan on the Culture War (1992). Speech text, dated August 17, 1992, Houston, TX. Editors' introduction: Buchanan worked in the Nixon and Reagan administrations, lost the 1992 nomination to Bush, and was invited to speak at the convention. Source for the quoted "religious war", "cultural war" and "soul of America" lines, the references to abortion, the homosexual rights movement and the Los Angeles riot, and "take back our cities, and take back our culture, and take back our country."
- 02.
Voices of Democracy: The U.S. Oratory Project. Buchanan, "Culture War Speech," Textual Authentication. Source for the date (August 17, 1992) and venue (Astrodome, Houston, Texas) and for the occasion, an address to the 1992 Republican National Convention; the edited text is checked against video of the delivered speech.
- 03.
Davis, M. (2018). 'Culture Is Inseparable from Race': Culture Wars from Pat Buchanan to Milo Yiannopoulos. M/C Journal, vol. 21, no. 5. Source that the speech "has often been understood as a defining moment in the US culture wars", that it set Democrats' positions on abortion and homosexual rights against "Judeo-Christian values", and that James Davison Hunter's Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define America appeared the year before (1991).
Page history
Reviewed Oct 25, 2026Recent changes
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- Fix pass: 1 finding, all fixed Fix pass
- Reviewed: 3 findings — 2 fixed, 1 dismissed Independent review
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