Talk:John Birch Society/draft

The John Birch Society is "a membership-based organization dedicated to restoring and preserving U.S. independence and the Constitution" The Society states that members come from all walks of life and are active in all 50 states via local chapters. Its mission is to achieve "Less Government, More Responsibility, and — With God's Help — a Better World." Based in Appleton, Wisconsin the Society has a professional field staff that supports volunteer members organized into local chapters. Each chapter has a volunteer chapter leader.

The Society was founded in Indianapolis, Indiana in December 1958 to counter growing threats to the Constitution of the United States, and to support individual rights and private property. It promotes an agenda of liberty and economic freedom as classically understood by the American founding fathers. The Society does not endorse any politician ever, serving instead as a watchman to ensure that politicians adhere to their oath of office. However, politicians that most emulate the core beliefs of the John Birch Society include Democratic Congressman Larry McDonald (Georgia), Republican Senator Robert A. Taft (Ohio), Republican Congressman John Ashbrook (Ohio), and Republican Congressman and recent 2008 Presidential Candidate Ron Paul (Texas).

The Society was named after John Birch, a United States military intelligence officer and Baptist missionary in World War II. John Birch was made famous as the hero who saved Colonel James H. Doolittle after his bombing raids over Japan in April 1942. Captain Birch would later be known as the “eyes and ears” of General Claire Chennault’s Flying Tigers and would become one of the most decorated intelligence officers in the Pacific Theatre during World War II. Captain Birch was killed in 1945 by armed supporters of the Communist Party of China. His parents were initially told that their son was killed by stray bullets. However, on September 5, 1950, California Senator William Knowland angrily announced on the Senate floor that the circumstances of John Birch’s death had been deliberately covered up by pro-Communists in the United States government.

Core values

The John Birch Society states that it is anti-totalitarian, particularly anti-Socialist and anti-Communist. It generally seeks to limit the powers of federal government and defends what it sees as the original intention of the U.S. Constitution, rooted in Judeo-Christian principles. It promotes the Founding Fathers ideals as timeless guardians of liberty, prosperity and freedom. The John Birch Society opposes collectivism, including wealth redistribution, economic interventionism, Socialism, Communism, and Fascism. In a 1983 edition of Crossfire, Congressman Larry McDonald, then its newly appointed chairman, characterized the group as most appropriately belonging to the old right, rather than the new right.

During the 1960s, The John Birch Society opposed aspects of the Civil Rights Movement because some proposed legislation violated private property rights. The Society also expressed concerns that the movement had a number of Communists in important positions seeking to subvert the movement to promote centralized government. The Society suspected that several aspects of the Civil Rights Movement was backed and supported by the American Communist Party. The John Birch Society opposed the 1964 Civil Rights Act in the belief that it was in violation of the 10th Amendment to the United States Constitution and overstepped the rights of individual states to make laws regarding Civil Rights.

The John Birch Society is against a unified "one world government", and has an illegal immigration reduction view on immigration reform. It has opposed the United Nations, NAFTA, CAFTA, and the FTAA, and other free-trade agreements with other nations, believing them to be destructive to American principles, the economy, freedom and national sovereignty.

The Society points to several key admissions by “Insiders” to bolster the claim that the devaluing of the US Constitution in favor of international government is not an accident. Chief among these admissions is from David Rockefeller’s 2002 autobiography “Memoirs” wherein, on page 404 Mr. Rockefeller states: “For more than a century ideological extremists at either end of the political spectrum have seized upon well-publicized incidents such as my encounter with Castro to attack the Rockefeller family for the inordinate influence they claim we wield over American political and economic institutions. Some even believe we are part of a secret cabal working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as "internationalists" and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure - one world, if you will. If that's the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it."

Origins

The John Birch Society was established in Indianapolis, Indiana on December 9, 1958 by a group of twelve "patriotic and public-spirited" men led by Robert Welch, Jr., a retired candy manufacturer from Belmont, Massachusetts who is also known as the inventor of the "Sugar Daddy" caramel on a stick candy. A noted founding member was Fred Koch, founder of Koch Industries, one of the largest private corporations in America. A transcript of Welch's two-day presentation at the founding meeting was published as The Blue Book of the John Birch Society and became a cornerstone of its beliefs, with each new JBS member receiving a copy.

Welch saw "collectivism" as a threat to Western Civilization. "There are many stages of welfarism, socialism, and collectivism in general," he wrote, "but Communism is the ultimate state of them all, and they all lead inevitably in that direction."

The John Birch Society's objective has been to fight Communism in all of its forms. They have organized grassroots chapters in every state and are the only Americanist organization to have full-time paid field staff assisting those chapters. Their activities include distribution of literature, pamphlets, magazines, videos and other educational material while sponsoring a Speaker's Bureau and encouraging members to conduct letter-writing campaigns especially to elected officials.

One of the first public activities of the JBS was a "Get US Out!" (of membership in the UN) campaign, which claimed in 1959 that the "Real nature of [the] UN is to build a One World Government."

One Man's Opinion, a magazine launched by Welch in 1956, was renamed American Opinion and became the Birch Society's official publication. It has since been replaced by the bi-weekly magazine, The New American.

1960s

By March 1961, the Society had an estimated 60,000 to 100,000 members and, according to Welch, "a staff of 28 people in the Home Office; about 30 Coordinators (or Major Coordinators) in the field, who are fully paid as to salary and expenses; and about 100 Coordinators (or Section Leaders as they are called in some areas), who work on a volunteer basis as to all or part of their salary, or expenses, or both." One early campaign against the second summit between the United States and the Soviet Union generated over 600,000 postcards and letters, according to the Society. A June 1964 Birch campaign to oppose Xerox corporate sponsorship of TV programs favorable to the UN produced 51,279 letters from 12,785 individuals." The Birchers' ad-hoc special issues committees have been effective in creating awareness about issues which they believe to be affecting the American way of life.

John Birch Society influence on U.S. politics was noticable in the years around the failed 1964 presidential campaign of Republican candidate Barry Goldwater, who lost to incumbent President Lyndon Baines Johnson. Welch had supported Goldwater over Richard Nixon for the Republican nomination, but the membership split, with two-thirds supporting Goldwater and one-third supporting Nixon. A number of Birch members and their allies were Goldwater supporters in 1964 and some were delegates at the 1964 Republican National Convention. The Goldwater campaign in turn brought together the nucleus of what later became known as the New Right.

John Birch Society members and other opponents of Communism also authored several widely-distributed books that promoted concerns over globalist policies expressed by many US State Department officials and mobilized support for the Goldwater campaign:

• A Choice, Not an Echo by Phyllis Schlafly, which suggested that the Republican Party was secretly controlled by elitist intellectuals dominated by members of the Bilderberger banking conference, and whose policies were designed to usher in global Communist conquest. "A Choice, Not an Echo" became one of Goldwater's campaign slogans.
• The Gravediggers, co-authored by Schlafly and retired Rear Admiral Chester Ward of the Foreign Policy Research Institute, claimed that U.S. military strategy and tactics were actually designed to pave the way for global Communist conquest.
• None Dare Call It Treason, by John A. Stormer, sold over seven million copies, making it one of the largest-selling paperback books of the day. It decried "the concurrent decay in America's schools, churches, and press which has conditioned the American people to accept 20 years of retreat in the face of the Communist enemy." Mr. Stormer also added, in his 1998 preface to the paperback edition: "Communism, which some believe (or hope) died in the Soviet Union, is alive and on the march in Asia, the Middle East, Central and Southern Africa and through guerrilla groups in Central and South America."
• A Texan Looks at Lyndon by J. Evetts Haley, a book containing a number of allegations of political corruption throughout the career of Lyndon Johnson.

In April 1966, a New York Times article opined about "the increasing tempo of radical right attacks on local government, libraries, school boards, parent-teacher associations, mental health programs, the Republican Party and, most recently, the ecumenical movement." It went on to characterize the Society as, "by far the most successful and 'respectable' conservative organization in the country. It operates alone or in support of other extremist organizations whose major preoccupation, like that of the Birchers, is the internal Communist conspiracy in the United States." By then, a committee called the Movement to Restore Decency (MOTOREDE) was established to promote opinions about child-rearing; in particular, MOTOREDE pushed for a ban on sex education.

Robert Welch and The Politician

Republican mainstream unhappiness with the Birch Society intensified after Welch circulated a letter calling President Dwight D. Eisenhower a possible “conscious, dedicated agent of the Communist Conspiracy.” Welch went further in a book titled The Politician, written in 1956 and published by the JBS in 1963. He said also that President Franklin D. Roosevelt knew about the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in advance, but said nothing because he wanted to get his country in the war.

The book spawned much debate in the 1960s over whether the author really intended to call Eisenhower a Communist. G. Edward Griffin, one of his friends, thinks that he meant collectivist. Welch was especially concerned over Eisenhower's decision to use the CIA to depose the government in Iran in 1953 (without Congressional approval). Welch believed that such action was a clear violation of the US Constitution.

In the published edition that excises the allegations mentioned above, there is a footnote on page 278 (footnote 2) and its text appears on pages cxxxviii–cxxxix at the back of the book. That text is as follows:

• "At this point in the original manuscript, there was one paragraph in which I expressed my own personal belief as to the most likely explanation of the events and actions with this document had tried to bring into focus. In a confidential letter, neither published nor offered for sale and restricted to friends who were expected to respect the confidence but offer me in exchange their own points of view, this seemed entirely permissible and proper. It does not seem so for an edition of the letter that is now to be published and given, probably, fairly wide distribution. So that paragraph, and two explanatory paragraphs, connected with it, have been omitted here. And the reader is left entirely free to draw his own conclusions."

• On page 278 of The Politician, Welch summarized, from his perspective, the only two possible interpretations of President Eisenhower's motives: "The role he has played, as described in all the pages above, would fit just as well into one theory as the other; that he is a mere stooge or that he is a Communist assigned the specific job of being a political front man."

• On page 279, Welch discusses the 3 stages by which Communists came to control the U.S. Presidency. In stages 1 and 2, FDR and Truman were "used" by Communists. In Truman's case, according to Welch, he was used "with his knowledge and acquiescence as the price he consciously paid for their making him President."

• Then, with respect to Eisenhower, from page 279 of the 1963 published edition of The Politician: "In the third stage the Communists have installed in the Presidency a man who, for whatever reasons, appears intentionally to be carrying forward Communist aims... With regard to this third man, Eisenhower, it is difficult to avoid raising the question of deliberate treason."

The original formulation of this comment from the 1958 unpublished version of The Politician is as follows:

• "In the third stage, in my own firm opinion, the Communists have one of their own actually in the Presidency. For this third man, Eisenhower, there is only one possible word to describe his purposes and his actions. That word is treason."

There are many other passages in both the 1963 published edition and the 1958 unpublished version of The Politician wherein Welch makes clear that he considered Eisenhower to be a Communist and a traitor. Below are a few examples from the unpublished version (aka "private letter") which was mailed by Welch to friends and acquaintances in the summer of 1958.

• "In my opinion the chances are very strong that Milton Eisenhower is actually Dwight Eisenhower's superior and boss within the Communist Party."

• "We think that an objective survey of Eisenhower's associates and appointments shows clever Communist brains, aided by willing Communist hands, always at work to give the Communists more power, and to weaken the anti-Communist resistance."

• In discussing Eisenhower's appointment of Philip C. Jessup, Robert Welch refers to Eisenhower as "he and his fellow Communists."

• In discussing Eisenhower's appointment of James B. Conant, Robert Welch refers to "the appointment of Conant...made by a Communist President..."

• "For Eisenhower and his Communist bosses and their pro-Communist appointees are gradually taking over our whole government right under the noses of the American people."

• Welch refers to Eisenhower's actions in Europe which "show his sympathies with the Communist cause and friendship for the Kremlin tyrants..."

• "For the sake of honesty, however, I want to confess here my own conviction that Eisenhower's motivation is more ideological than opportunistic. Or, to put it bluntly, I personally think that he has been sympathetic to ultimate Communist aims, realistically willing to use Communist means to help them achieve their goals, knowingly accepting and abiding by Communist orders, and consciously serving the Communist conspiracy for all of his adult life."

• "But my firm belief that Dwight Eisenhower is a dedicated, conscious agent of the Communist conspiracy is based on an accumulation of detailed evidence so extensive and so palpable that it seems to me to put this conviction beyond any reasonable doubt."

• "To paraphrase Elizabeth Churchill Brown, 'the only enemies the American people have to fear are the enemies in their midst.' The most conspicuous and injurious of these enemies today, I believe, is named Dwight David Eisenhower. He is either a willing agent or an integral and important part of a conspiracy of gangsters determined to rule the world at any cost."

"Conservative" writer William F. Buckley, Jr., a member of the Council of Foreign Relations and an early friend and admirer of Welch, regarded his accusations against Eisenhower as "paranoid and idiotic libels" and attempted unsuccessfully to purge Welch from the JBS. Welch responded by attempting to take over Young Americans for Freedom, a conservative youth organization founded with assistance from Buckley.

1970s

The Society wound up at the center of an important free-speech law case in the 1970s, after American Opinion accused a Chicago lawyer representing the family of a young man killed by a police officer of being part of a Communist conspiracy to merge all police agencies in the country into one large force. The resulting libel suit, Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., reached the United States Supreme Court, which held that "Under the First Amendment there is no such thing as a false idea" (while nevertheless finding for the plaintiff, who prevailed upon retrial).

Key Birch Society causes of the 1970s included opposition to OSHA and to the establishment of diplomatic ties with the People's Republic of China. The organization claimed in 1973 that the regime of Mao Zedong had murdered 64 million Chinese as of that year and that it was the primary supplier of illicit heroin into the United States. This led to bumper stickers showing a pair of scissors cutting a hypodermic needle in half accompanied by the slogan "Cut The Red China Connection." According to the Voice of America, the society also was opposed to transferring control of the Panama Canal from American to Panamanian sovereignty.

The John Birch Society was organized into local chapters. Ernest Brosang, a New Jersey regional coordinator, contended that it was virtually impossible for opponents of the society to penetrate its policy-making levels, thereby protecting it from anti-Americanist takeover attempts. Its activities included distribution of literature critical of civil rights legislation, warning of the influence of the United Nations, and distributing petitions to impeach U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren. To spread their message, members held showings of documentary films and operated initiatives such as "Let Freedom Ring", a nation-wide network of recorded telephone messages. Some members also helped organize the "Minutemen", a paramilitary group training to lead guerrilla warfare in case of a Communist takeover which later left the Society, saying it did little but talk.

After Welch

The UN's role in the Gulf War and President George H. W. Bush's call for a 'New World Order' appeared to many JBS members to validate their claims about a "One World Government" globalist concerns.

In the late 1990s, the John Birch Society started a campaign to impeach President Bill Clinton for alleged connections with Chinese interests and on charges of treason and bribery. Within months of the Society's call for impeachment, news of the Monica Lewinsky affair broke, and the Society's charges were overshadowed by media coverage of Lewinsky and Clinton. The President was eventually indicted on impeachment charges, but the charges were different from those the Society had hoped to bring. Nevertheless, the impeachment campaign's relative success bolstered the Society and its public knowledge, membership, publication circulation, and finances.

In recent years, The John Birch Society has been just as critical of President George W. Bush as it had been of Democratic presidents, accusing the Bush administration of advocating and carrying out acts of torture against suspected terrorist leaders during the War on Terror. In a 2005 online poll, the organization's membership voted for President Bush's impeachment, citing issues such as the USA PATRIOT Act, the proposed sellout of U.S. Seaports to Dubai Ports World, and recent allegations against the Bush administration concerning domestic telephone surveillance of suspected terrorists operating within the United States. These were cited as evidence of Bush's lack of regard for the Constitution.

The JBS continues to press for an end to U.S. membership in the United Nations. As evidence of the effectiveness of JBS efforts, the Society points to the Utah State Legislature's resolution calling for U.S. withdrawal, as well as the actions of several other states where the Society's membership has been active. The Birch Society repeatedly opposed overseas war-making, although it is strongly supportive of the American military. It has issued calls to "Bring Our Troops Home" in every conflict since its founding, including Vietnam (it wanted a quick win and exit after the conflict had already started rather than a simple losing pullout). The Society also has a national speakers' committee called American Opinion Speakers Bureau (AOSB) and an anti-tax committee called TRIM (Tax Reform IMmediately).

In April 2008, Dr. Ron Paul, 2008 Presidential Candidate and ten term congressman from Texas endorsed the society by stating: “The John Birch Society is a great patriotic organization featuring an educational program solidly based on constitutional principles. I congratulate the Society in this, its 50th year. I wish them continued success and endorse their untiring efforts to foster ‘less government, more responsibility … and with God’s help … a better world.’”

In popular culture

The JBS has sometimes been made a target of political satire. For example:

• In 1964, notable jazz trumpet player Dizzy Gillespie made a semi-satirical run for President, and formed chapters of the "John Birks Society" (his real name was John Birks Gillespie) in 25 states. Gillespie's politics, such as they were, were incompatible with the views of the John Birch Society: among his campaign pledges were to provide free universal health care and appoint Malcolm X as Attorney General.
• In his novel, The Crying of Lot 49, Thomas Pynchon satirized the famously conservative society with his "Peter Pinguid Society", an organization that opposed Capitalism, in part because it led inevitably to Communism.
• The Bob Dylan song, "Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues", from The Bootleg Series Volumes 1-3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961-1991, is a fictitious satire about a man joining the society.
• The Chad Mitchell Trio's 'break-out' song hit was their comic parody, "The John Birch Society," which contained the lyrics, "If Mommy is a commie then you've got to turn her in."
• The Charlie Daniels song "Uneasy Rider" satirizes rural white southern conservatism with the line, "I'm a faithful follower of Brother John Birch, and I belong to the Antioch Baptist Church."
• The Beat Farmers' song, "Gun Sale at the Church", contains the line, "My two main men are Jesus and ol' John Birch. So, I'm going on down to the gun sale at the church."
• Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea's novel, Illuminatus!, contains several references to the John Birch Society in a subplot.
• Robert Anton Wilson's subsequent novel/sequel, Schrödinger's Cat trilogy, incorporates the Warren Belch Society.
• David Byrne's 1986 movie, True Stories, had John Ingle playing the part of "the preacher". At the beginning of his sermon, he notes that he is not a member of the John Birch Society.
• Steve Jackson Games included a mythical "Fred Birch Society" as one of hundreds of groups in the collectible card game, Illuminati: New World Order. The F.B.S. is also mentioned in their GURPS Supers — International Super Teams universe.
• Walt Kelly's comic strip, Pogo, featured references to a rather muddled political group called the "Jack Acid Society" (more than likely a play on the insult, "jackass").
• The 1971 film Cold Turkey, written and directed by Norman Lear and starring Dick Van Dyke, featured a reactionary "Christopher Mott Society", opposed to plans to have an entire small town quit smoking, until offered "policing function" at a parade.
• Among the many pins seen pricking an Alfred E. Neuman voodoo doll on the cover of the Mad magazine collection, The Voodoo Mad, is one labeled "The John Birch Society." Another collection includes a visit to a Birch chapter made up of law enforcement officials, whose talk topic is "Better Policemen for a Better Police State".
• Billy Pilgrim, the protagonist of Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five, drives a Cadillac with John Birch Society bumper stickers given to him by his father-in-law.
• In Girl, Interrupted, Susanna Kaysen describes the John Birch Society building as a sort of counterpart to the mental asylum she lived in for two years, saying, "The John Birch Society lay as far to the east of Belmont as the hospital lay to the west. We saw the two institutes as variations on each other. Doubtless, the Birchers did not see it this way, but between us, we had Belmont surrounded."
• On the track, Laredo, from Sibling Revelry - The Best Of The Smothers Brothers, Tommy Smothers, introducing "the entire ensemble", begins "on my far right is John Birch..."
• In his short novel, "Travels With Charley", John Steinbeck describes the people of Montana thusly: "Its people did not seem afraid of shadows in a John Birch Society sense. The calm of the mountains and the rolling grasslands had got into the inhabitants."
• In the Gilmore Girls, Lorelai describes Luke's un-altruistic charging of elderly woman to carry their groceries as "John-Birch-Societyee of you," as opposed to "boy-scoutee," when she thought that he did it for free.
• in the Chain of fools, Andy Brower discovers a John Birch Society membership card in the wallet of Avnet, refuting Kresk's claim that Avnet was a Communist.

Leaders and notable members

Presidents

• Robert W. Welch Jr. (1958–1983)
• Larry McDonald (1983)
• Charles R. Armour
• John F. McManus (1991–2004, 2005–present)
• G. Vance Smith (2004–2005)

The second John Birch Society chairman, U.S. Representative Dr. Larry McDonald, was killed in the 1983 KAL-007 shootdown incident. Many Society members suggested that McDonald had been the principal target of the Soviets in the attack upon the airplane.

CEOs

• G. Allen Bubolz (1988–1991)
• G. Vance Smith (1991-2005)
• Arthur R. Thompson (2005-present)

Notable members in history

• Tom Anderson (syndicated journalist)
• Benson, Ezra Taft (Former president of the LDS Church and US Secretary of Agriculture)
• Brennan, Walter ("Grandpa" on the "Real McCoys")
• Taylor Caldwell
• Delmar Dennis, deceased (infiltrator of Ku Klux Klan for FBI)
• Medford Evans (author of The Secret War for the A-Bomb)
• Ezola Foster
• Andrew Gatsis
• William J. Grede
• Griffin, G. Edward (author)
• Hiestand, Edgar W., Congressman, deceased
• Hunt, Nelson Bunker (businessman)
• James, Rollye (syndicated radio talk show host)
• LaHaye, Tim (evangelical Christian co-author of the popular Left Behind novel series)
• McDonald, Larry, Congressman, deceased (shot down by Soviets)
• Floyd Paxton, deceased 1975 (Inventor of the bread clip called the Kwik Lok)
• Rarick, John, Former Congressman
• Reagan, Ronald (member of the Beverly Hills branch)
• Roosevelt, Archibald
• Root, E. Merrill, Professor (poet and essayist)
• Rousselot, John, Congressman, deceased
• Andy Schmitt (1980's Christian pop artist)
• Schmitz, John G., Congressman, deceased
• Robert Lee Scott (author of "God is my Co-pilot")
• Show, Eric (pitcher for the San Diego Padres)
• Edwin Shull
• Robert Waring Stoddard (former president of Wyman-Gordon and chairman of the Worcester Telegram & Gazette)
• Thomson, Meldrim, Jr., Former Governor (of New Hampshire)
• Walker, Edwin Anderson, Major General, deceased (targeted by Oswald before Kennedy)
• Walker, John Anthony (spy to the Soviet Union from 1968 to 1985)
• Wayne, John (actor)
• Welch, Robert (president of Welch's Candy company)

Factual errors

There are numerous factual errors in this article as presently written.

• First, none of the following people were "JBS members" (as claimed in the article): Ezra Taft Benson, John Rarick, Ronald Reagan and John Wayne.
• Second, Welch was not (as claimed here) "President of Welch's Candy Company". Robert Welch's brother was the CEO of the James O. Welch Company. Robert terminated his relationship with the company after a discussion he had with his brother (James) about Robert's political activities which he (James) did not want associated with the James O. Welch Company.
• Third, an accurate understanding of the core beliefs of the Birch Society cannot be obtained solely from their published materials --- just as an accurate understanding about the CPUSA requires access to minutes of their closed secret meetings.

The comments I quote below were made by Robert Welch to the first meeting of his National Council in Chicago on January 9, 1960. Only after reading these comments can you understand the full scope of JBS premises and conclusions about modern U.S. history:

“From a careful and realistic study of the mountainous pile of evidence that is there for all to see, certain terrifying conclusions are objectively inescapable.

Among them are: (1) The Communists are winning their large victories, as they always have, through the cumulative effect of small gains; (2) They make these gains chiefly through the conniving assistance of many of the very diplomats and officials who are supposed to be opposing them; (3) Communist influences are now in almost complete working control of our government; (4) And hence, the United States Government is today, as it has been for many years, the most important and powerful single force promoting the world-wide Communist advance.”

[A Confidential Report To Members Of The Council of The John Birch Society – minutes of 1/9/60 meeting held at Union League Club in Chicago IL, page 1-2; minutes signed by Robert Welch.]

Furthermore, Welch continued:

"Today, gentlemen, I can assure you, without the slightest doubt in my own mind, that the takeover at the top is, for all practical purposes, virtually complete. Whether you like it or not, or whether you believe it or not, our Federal Government is already, literally in the hands of the Communists." [Ibid, page 2]

"In our two states with the largest population, New York and California...already the two present Governors are almost certainly actual Communists...Our Congress now contains a number of men like Adam Clayton Powell of New York and Charles Porter of Oregon, who are certainly actual Communists, and plenty more who are sympathetic to Communist purposes for either ideological or opportunistic reasons." [Ibid, page 7] [Note: the reference to Governors refers to Edmund G. Brown of California and Nelson Rockefeller of New York.]

"In the Senate, there are men like Stephen Young of Ohio, and Wayne Morse of Oregon, McNamara of Michigan, and Clifford Case of New Jersey and Hubert Humphrey of Minnesota and Estes Kefauver of Tennessee and John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts, whom it is utter folly to think of as just liberals. Every one of those men is either an actual Communist or so completely a Communist sympathizer or agent that it makes no practical difference..." [Ibid, page 8]

“Our Supreme Court, dominated by Earl Warren and Felix Frankfurter and Hugo Black, is so visibly pro-Communist that no argument is even needed…And our federal courts below that level…are in many cases just as bad.” [Ibid, page 8]

"Our State Department is loaded with Communists from top to bottom, to the extent that our roll call of Ambassadors almost sounds like a list somebody has put together to start a Communist front." ... [Ibid, page 8]

"It is estimated from many reliable sources that from 70% to 90% of the responsible personnel in the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare are Communists. Our Central Intelligence Agency under Allen Dulles is nothing more or less than an agency to promote Communism throughout the world...Almost all the other Departments are loaded with Communists and Communist sympathizers. And this generalization most specifically does include our whole Defense Department." [Ibid, page 8] —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ernie1241 (talk • contribs) 22:44, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

See also

• Anti-Communism
• Paleoconservatism
• Christian Patriot movement
• Withdrawal from the United Nations

References

Footnotes

Supporting the John Birch Society

• Welch, Robert. (1961). The Blue Book of the John Birch Society. 21st printing. Boston: John Birch Society.
• Welch, Robert. (1964). The Politician. Revised, 5th printing, hardcover. Belmont MA: Belmont Publishing.
• John Birch Society. (1964). The White Book of the John Birch Society for 1964. Belmont, MA: John Birch Society.
• Welch, Robert. (1966). The New Americanism and Other Speeches. Boston: Western Islands.
• Allen, Gary, with Larry Abraham. (1972 [1971]). None Dare Call It Conspiracy. Rossmoor, CA; Seal Beach, CA: Concord Press. Self-published in 1971.
• Griffin, G. Edward. (1975). The Life and Words of Robert Welch: Founder of the John Birch Society. Thousand Oaks, CA: American Media.
• McManus, John F. (1983). The Insiders. Belmont, MA: John Birch Society.
• McManus, John F. (1992). “Taking on the Giant: How Dare Pat Buchanan Defy the Establishment!” The New American, April 20, p. 5.

Criticizing the John Birch Society

• "Birch Society Investigated," Idaho Statesman, October 9, 1964.
• Berlet, Chip. (1989). “Trashing the Birchers: Secrets of the Paranoid Right.” Boston Phoenix, July 20, pp. 10, 23.
• Broyles, J. Allen. (1964). The John Birch Society: Anatomy of a Protest. Boston: Beacon Press.
• De Koster, Lester. (1967). The Citizen and the John Birch Society. A Reformed Journal monograph. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans.
• Epstein, Benjamin R., and Arnold Forster. (1966). The Radical Right: Report on the John Birch Society and Its Allies. New York: Vintage Books.
• Grove, Gene. (1961). Inside the John Birch Society. Greenwich, CT: Fawcett.
• Grupp, Fred W., Jr. (1969). “The Political Perspectives of Birch Society Members.” In Robert A. Schoenberger (Ed.), The American Right
• Hardisty, Jean V. (1999). Mobilizing Resentment: Conservative Resurgence from the John Birch Society to the Promise Keepers. Boston: Beacon.
• Janson, Donald & Eismann, Bernard. (1963). "The John Birch Society" pages 25–54 from The Far Right, New York: McGraw-Hill.
• Johnson, George. (1983). Architects of Fear: Conspiracy Theories and Paranoia in American Politics. Los Angeles: Tarcher/Houghton Mifflin.
• Kraft, Charles Jeffrey. (1992). A Preliminary Socio-Economic and State Demographic Profile of the John Birch Society. Cambridge, MA: Political Research Associates.
• Moore, William V. (1981). The John Birch Society: A Southern Profile. Paper, annual meeting, Southern Political Science Association, Memphis, TN.
• Ronald Sullivan, “Foes of Rising Birch Society Organize in Jersey,” New York Times, April 20, 1966, pp. 1, 34.
• FBI files and documents pertaining to Birch Society: ^ http://ernie1241.googlepages.com/jbs-1

Regarding heroin trade in Southeast Asia

• McCoy, Alfred W. (2003). "The politics of heroin : CIA complicity in the global drug trade : Afghanistan, Southeast Asia, Central America, Colombia", Chicago : Lawrence Hill Books.

External links

• John Birch Society website
• The New American, JBS biweekly publication
• "John Birch Society," Political Research Associates
• Report of the California Senate Factfinding Subcommittee on Un-American Activities on the John Birch Society

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