Actually, I do agree that Smith’s Catholicism was an issue, and that that is indicative of something much deeper in American history, and it’s not bigotry. It answers one poster’s comment that “the Catholic Church is the only church that matters.”
We have scale, we have immigrants and strangeness, we have the notion that the Pope could at least have the appearance of being a player in international politics. All that would make me sit up and take notice.