Encyclopedia of Religion
and Society

William H. Swatos, Jr. Editor

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MULVANEY, BERNARD G.

(1910-1995) With an M.A. in sociology from Catholic University of America, a licentiate degree in Political Science from Louvain University, and a Ph.D. in sociology from University of Illinois (1941), Mulvaney taught at the Catholic University of America from 1941 until 1957. Member of the Clerics of St. Viator (Viatorian) religious order.

Mulvaney's areas of interest and his journal publications were in demography and theory. He was one of the members of the American Catholic Sociology Society who insisted on the use of empirical method in sociology at a time when empiricism was often equated in Catholic circles with determinism.

Elected President of the American Catholic Sociological Society for 1957, Mulvaney was prevented from fulfilling his duties by being elected in the summer of that year to the second highest office in his religious order; this required his immediate residence in Rome. At that point, ACSS Executive Secretary Ralph Gallagher, ignoring the candidate slated for nomination by the election committee, placed in nomination Allen Spitzer, a St. Louis University anthropologist. The ensuing controversy failed to derail Spitzer's election as president for 1957.

Loretta M. Morris

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