Ezra Taft Benson

[Deborah]

But there seems to be a BIG CLUE, in that DOM asked him to knock it off several times, and when Elder Benson refused and and acted insubordinate to DOM, he got shipped off to England, where he did a tremendous job.

And you know this is the reason Elder Benson was sent to England because___________________-

[Lamanite]

And you know this is the reason Elder Benson was sent to England because___________________-

Because it was published in the Ensign with a scathing denunciation from the 12 and the First Presidency. Didn't you get that issue?

Big UP!

Lamanite

PS I'm just kidding. All the ref's are in Prince's bio. It was alluded to by a couple GA's, and the circumstantial evidence is pretty strong. By the way, what's the big deal if that was the reason?

[Deborah]

By the way, what's the big deal if that was the reason?

Because it implies some kind of sanctioning, which may not be the case, and which maligns his character. He may simply have been the best person to do the task at the time.

[Lamanite]

Because it implies some kind of sanctioning, which may not be the case, and which maligns his character. He may simply have been the best person to do the task at the time.

If you have a copy of Prince's bio then I'm going to irritated that I had to type all of this!

pg. 298-99

McKay gave Benson the news privately, and the accounts that both men left of the meeting show that it was upbeat, with no hint that Benson was being "punished" or "exiled." see I'm fair and balanced!

Regardless of McKay's intent, however, the move was widely seen as a rebuff to Benson's political activism...one of McKay's sons expressed such a sentiment in a letter Congressman Harding: "We shall all be relived when Elder Benson ceases to resist counsel and returns to a concentration on those affairs befitting his office. It is my feeling that therewill be an immediate and noticeable curtailment of his Birch Society activities." Two weeks later, Harding received a letter from Joseph Fielding Smith, president of the Quorum of the Twelve, that conveyed a similar message: "I think it is time that Brother Benson forgot all about politics and settled down to his duties as a member of the Council of the Twelve....It would be better for him and for the Church and all concerned, if he would settle down to his present duties and let all political matters take their course. He is going to take a mission to Europe in the near future and by the time he returns I hope he will get all of the political notions out of his system. emphasis mine

I hope I don't have to point out the relevant portions. Especially the one where the President of the Twelve speaks.

On the eve of his departure to his mission he gave an inflammatory speech that garnered severe responses from several people including President Smith again:

I have the comments regarding Brother Benson's speech in Logan, December 13, 1963. I am glad to report to you that it will be some time before we hear anything from Brother Benson [now that's funny], who is now on his way to Great Britain where I suppose he will be, at least for the next two years. When he returns I hope his blood will be purified." emphasis mine

I didn't malign his character, Joseph Fielding did...take it up with him when you see him next. LOL.

President Benson created with his son Reed and the John Birch Society, as well as his extreme Communist remarks, considerable dissension among the Brethren. pg 300-318 ish.

Big UP!

Lamanite

[ERayR]

I have no priveledged information and am just guessing but it has always been my understanding that none of the church leadership openly refuted ETB's political warnings. They were somewhat worried that his boldness and plainess and the things he was saying might cause problems with the government and the tax exempt status, him being in the highest bodys of church leadership.

[Lamanite]

I have no priveledged information and am just guessing but it has always been my understanding that none of the church leadership openly refuted ETB's political warnings. They were somewhat worried that his boldness and plainess and the things he was saying might cause problems with the government and the tax exempt status, him being in the highest bodys of church leadership.

did you read my post above? There's more where that came from.

Big UP!

Lamanite

edit: Sorry, that sounded snarky and rude. I just disagree with your assumptions, especially about the tax exempt status.

[Deborah]

did you read my post above? There's more where that came from.

I agree with ERay. Even what you quoted isn't condemning what ETB said but wanting him to put the church responsibilities first, which given his position was proper. I think also they wanted to avoid any contention since it certainly did get into the realm of politics and it was and is critical to keep those two areas separate.

One thing I have observed as well is that people tend to get excited about politics (myself included) and forget that in the end God is in control. If we are doing what we ought then all things will work toward God's ends not man's.

[stillsmallvoices]

I thought he did a wonderful job as prophet. When he stopped his politics thing he was a really great guy!

Just cause your ignorant of certain things doesn't mean ETB was speaking incorrectly on his views of politics and secret combinations.

[stillsmallvoices]

I will repeat what I said in another thread:

For those who weren't old enough or even born at the time of ETB's talk, you do need to realize Communism was a real threat whose goal was to bring down America, much the same as Bin Laden's goal. We didn't have all those bomb shelters and bomb drills in schools in the 50's for the fun of it. I do not find this talk radical for the time it was given. Elder Bensen didn't become prophet until 18 years later and by that time the failure of Communism was becoming obvious and I suspect Pres. Bensen saw its imminent fall which came in a few more years, so certainly he wouldn't have had a need to speak so emphatically on it.

So sad people thing it "was" a real threat

[ERayR]

Just cause your ignorant of certain things doesn't mean ETB was speaking incorrectly on his views of politics and secret combinations.

I think if those that are maligning his political views would care to look they will find he was quite accurate in his assesment.

QUOTE(annewandering @ Dec 29 2008, 11:53 PM) I thought he did a wonderful job as prophet. When he stopped his politics thing he was a really great guy!

Thats exactly what Isreal said to Jeremiah when he told them not to align with Egypt.

So sad people thing it "was" a real threat

I agree it still is only now it is ingrained in the thinking of our own.

[Deborah]

So sad people thing it "was" a real threat

Yes, but don't say that too loudly. Look what happened when it was truly an overt threat. Now it is much more subtle. If you read the goals of Communism from the Congressional Report you will see that they have pretty much accomplished these things.

[koakaipo]

I think there's different things being addressed however and that may be where people are talking past one another.

I think we have the luxury of 20/20 hindsight, so there's no use for judging people in ways that aren't fair.

But we can judge ideas, and I think the reality is that while some of PResident Benson's political rhetoric stands the test of time quite eloquently, his ideas on how the civil rights movement was really just a cover for more insidious things don't age well. So much of that type of rhetoric rests on the notion that somehow the goals of the civil rights movement were not valid or needed, as well as touch on race and the notion that blacks as a whole could be easily duped by foreign and traitrous forces to become their pawns who would take over the US if needs be by force. That they could easily be riled into violent uprising, as if they had no stakes in the American dream.

The civil rights movement was not a radical movement. It's success rested on appealing to whitestream America to instigate change. The leaders who mattered most took a play out of Ghandi's playbook(and the SErmon on the mount's for that matter), and used nonviolent protest - and took full advantage of the power of TV and the media to document it all in ways that did move America as a whole.

When you see the reality of the movement with 20/20 hindsight, it answers the question that was asked again and again in the 60's regarding where black American loyalties laid and what their motivations for instigating change came from. They wanted a piece of the American pie, they didn't want to destroy it.

Communism and the subject of Communism infiltrating the Civil Rights Movement to the point of playing puppet master are two very different subjects, and I was answering mainly to the latter subject.

[ERayR]

I think there's different things being addressed however and that may be where people are talking past one another.

I think we have the luxury of 20/20 hindsight, so there's no use for judging people in ways that aren't fair.

Communism and the subject of Communism infiltrating the Civil Rights Movement to the point of playing puppet master are two very different subjects, and I was answering mainly to the latter subject.

I am not sure that ETB believed or said that communism had infiltrated to the point of playing puppet master. I certainly know that wasn't true. However, it cannot be denied that communism had made some deep intrusions into some areas of the movement.

It is true that something was needed to start a well needed change. I don't know to what extent communism had infiltrated the civil rights movement but I do know that there was some infiltration. ETB saw it and warned against it. I do remember that it was an intense time with some reacting more intensly than others.

[koakaipo]

President Benson stated such thoughts both in 1965 and 1967 in televised meetings on TEmple Square. One particular quote that got a lot of mainstream press attention was the following:

"the so-called civil rights movement as it exists today is a Communist program for revolution in America."

So-called calling attention to the idea that it is simply a front, and by revolution, he was inferring violent revolution. He contributed talks to certain anthologies that elaborated on the worries of bloody revolution in the south.

These statements ended up being softened when they were officially published in the Improvement Era that year, when you compare the televised statements and newspaper quotes with the church publication.

As for communist influence in the civil rights movement. I think there was influence, particularly in certain factions within the movement. But the proof is in the pudding in the end when you look back at the movement historically. How much influence did communist sympathies have in the end when we see how the movement went down and what it achieved overall? That it appealed to Mainstream America, in effect illustrating the need to want to assimilate into the American dream, not revolt against it?

And we also have to look at what the forecasts were for those arguing that themovement was a communist plot. The forecasts imagined violent uprisings of blacks all over, similar forecasts that were raised a hundred years earlier with the idea of slave uprisings completely demolishing the White South.

The deepest irony among those forecasts is the civil rights movement ultimately took a nonviolent path to instigate change. All the concerns that black rage was going to be manipulated and directed by communist forces were so off the mark in the end.

[ERayR]

President Benson stated such thoughts both in 1965 and 1967 in televised meetings on TEmple Square. One particular quote that got a lot of mainstream press attention was the following:

"the so-called civil rights movement as it exists today is a Communist program for revolution in America."

So-called calling attention to the idea that it is simply a front, and by revolution, he was inferring violent revolution. He contributed talks to certain anthologies that elaborated on the worries of bloody revolution in the south.

These statements ended up being softened when they were officially published in the Improvement Era that year, when you compare the televised statements and newspaper quotes with the church publication.

As for communist influence in the civil rights movement. I think there was influence, particularly in certain factions within the movement. But the proof is in the pudding in the end when you look back at the movement historically. How much influence did communist sympathies have in the end when we see how the movement went down and what it achieved overall? That it appealed to Mainstream America, in effect illustrating the need to want to assimilate into the American dream, not revolt against it?

And we also have to look at what the forecasts were for those arguing that themovement was a communist plot. The forecasts imagined violent uprisings of blacks all over, similar forecasts that were raised a hundred years earlier with the idea of slave uprisings completely demolishing the White South.

The deepest irony among those forecasts is the civil rights movement ultimately took a nonviolent path to instigate change. All the concerns that black rage was going to be manipulated and directed by communist forces were so off the mark in the end.

I never got the televised version-couldn't afford a TV at the time. And yes the civil rights movement was much needed. In some of my more reflective moments I sometimes wonder how the course of the civil rights movement might have been different if it wasn't for the J. Edgar Hoovers the ETB's and other voices of warning. I like to think that God somehow guided us to the best outcome possible. I think that we still have a ways to go from both sides of the problem but it is certainly much better than before.

I for one am glad we have been granted the improvement that we have.

[cjcampbell]

President Benson stated such thoughts both in 1965 and 1967 in televised meetings on TEmple Square. One particular quote that got a lot of mainstream press attention was the following:

"the so-called civil rights movement as it exists today is a Communist program for revolution in America."

Certainly Stalin thought it was when he began promoting it in the 1930s. That many of the movement's leaders eventually became disaffected with communism and some even became virulent anti-communists is well documented now. The picture was not so clear in Elder Benson's day.

[koakaipo]

Certainly Stalin thought it was when he began promoting it in the 1930s. That many of the movement's leaders eventually became disaffected with communism and some even became virulent anti-communists is well documented now. The picture was not so clear in Elder Benson's day.

I qualified both posts by pointing out that this was not a judgement on Elder Benson, but on how well his ideas aged in 20/20 hindsight. That some of his ideas aged very well; while others, particularly how he viewed the civil rights movement, did not.

The only reason I'm bringing this up isn't to disrespect him. But it is to point out that it's hard to indulge some of these sentiments in hindsight. Their inferences that don't age well.

Some of those inferences rest on the notion that blacks couldn't mentally handle leading an movement on their own, that they would be easily manipulated by others. It dismisses the fact they were second class citizens in some respects, by acting as if the movement was simply a cover, and blacks were just pawns in the whole thing. That they didn't identify at all with their American-ness, that somehow they didn't internalize that identity at all. That black rage(emotion plus brutish force) would prevail.

So many of those sentiments were direct products of segregation, where little to no contact with blacks other in subservient ways fosters these types of stereotypes and fears.

This has little to do with Elder Benson overall for me, but more about what the implications of some sentiments with the luxury of 20/20 hindsight, and how some of those implications do not sit well in the present day.

Eray: I totally agree we have a ways to go and that God has guided us this far along. True true.

[ERayR]

Certainly Stalin thought it was when he began promoting it in the 1930s. That many of the movement's leaders eventually became disaffected with communism and some even became virulent anti-communists is well documented now. The picture was not so clear in Elder Benson's day.

I think it is very difficult for those that did not live through those times to have an understanding of what was going on. I also meditate at times on the idea that if what actually took place can be so easily dismissed and misunderstood in so short of a time how can we ever hope to get any kind of an understanding of earlier history - say early church history. I shake my head in amazement that anti's can so easily transfer modern sesibilities to early church history.

[selek]

I think it is very difficult for those that did not live through those times to have an understanding of what was going on. I also meditate at times on the idea that if what actually took place can be so easily dismissed and misunderstood in so short of a time how can we ever hope to get any kind of an understanding of earlier history - say early church history. I shake my head in amazement that anti's can so easily transfer modern sesibilities to early church history.

So has it always been-

Children who have never known darkness stand in the light of the "new dawn" and casually dismiss the fears of their fathers as mere superstition and the foolishness of old men.

"History is dead", they cry with callous bombast. "We are a generation of enlightenment and wisdom, and have no need of the foolish ramblings of old men."

"Night is past! What have we to fear?" Confidence and self-assureance are their watchwords- and so they do not see the clouds gathering, nor do they hear the wolves prowling about the edges of their vision.

Then the darkness gathers.

Then the wolves come- and the callow and the proud learn that light passes all too easily, that darkness returns- and that not all fears can be so easily dismissed as the "foolishness of old men".

Contrary to how they are vilified; contrary to how the fools, the fellow-travellers, and the propogandists have spun the history- Benson, Hoover, and McCarthy were right far more than they were wrong- the KGB archives have confirmed it, and so the evidence is swept to the dark recesses of history where they cannot trouble minds of those who prefer the comforting mythology.

That their ideas do not rest well upon the ears of the comfortable, the somnolent, and the apathetic is a mark of their truth- not their falsity.

[ERayR]

So has it always been-

Children who have never known darkness stand in the light of the "new dawn" and casually dismiss the fears of their fathers as mere superstition and the foolishness of old men.

"History is dead", they cry with callous bombast. "We are a generation of enlightenment and wisdom, and have no need of the foolish ramblings of old men."

"Night is past! What have we to fear?" Confidence and self-assureance are their watchwords- and so they do not see the clouds gathering, nor do they hear the wolves prowling about the edges of their vision.

Then the darkness gathers.

Then the wolves come- and the callow and the proud learn that light passes all too easily, that darkness returns- and that not all fears can be so easily dismissed as the "foolishness of old men".

EXACTLY!!!

[Droopy]

cjcampbell:

The sad part about that time was that the USSR was equally(if not more so) as paranoid as we were. Two nuclear giants armed to the teeth staring across the gulf dark of ignorance just waiting for the other guy to blink. It took another 30 years to realize it but the "Cold War" ended with the Cuban Missile Crises. Both sides finally "got it" that a nuclear war was not winnable.

There was no ignorance about it. The Cold War was the project of Stalin and the Soviet Nomenklatura and was in process of execution before WWII ended. The Soviets moved effortlessly into their stance of conflict, belligerence, and imperialism as the war wound down and it became clear the Soviet Union could profit from the the vastly altered conditions brought about by it. We were not ignorant about the Soviets or their intentions, as they had made these clear in countless speeches, publicatgions, and throught their behavior in the decades prior.

Interestingly, the Soviets believed that a nuclear war was winnable, and created their nuclear arsenal, strategy, and civil defense system with this in mind. It was only the U.S. anti-nuclear movement, and especially groups like SANE/FREEZE that were partially funded and controlled by Moscow, that spread the unwinnability idea.

They didn't believe a word of it.

[Lamanite]

To Deborah and anyone else,

Quoting Joseph Fielding Smith:

I have the comments regarding Brother Benson's speech in Logan, December 13, 1963. I am glad to report to you that it will be some time before we hear anything from Brother Benson, who is now on his way to Great Britain where I suppose he will be, at least for the next two years. When he returns I hope his blood will be purified." emphasis mine

Does this sound like someone who thinks Elder Benson is doing a fine job with his political speeches? I certainly don't. Perhaps you could spin it for me?

As I've stated before, I keep,read and agree with 99% of "An Enemy Hath Done This". Some of his ideas have born the test of time. Some have not.

But I believe, he went too far in some cases. I think that DOM and the Twelve sent him to Europe to silence his political rhetoric. I think his connection to the John Birch Society was a conflict of interest. He even TRICKED DOM into being on the cover. (I'm not typing the whole story, look it up in Prince).

I love him as an Apostle. I love him as a Prophet. Did he make mistakes? Yes. And I'm happy about it because it allows me some hope as I struggle along the path of discipleship.

Big UP!

Lamanite

[Droopy]

And for good reason. If it hadn't been for the ETB's and others in and out of the church and finally Ronald Reagan communisim could have done much more damage to our way of life. All these years after the fact, with The USA sitting as the lone superpower it is easy loose perspective on those times. There was real danger.

This is exactly correct, and at the present time, with the wealth of recent scholarship that has come to light since the fall of the Soviet Union from the Soviet archives, the Venona decrypts, and other extensive sources (such as a virtually complete archive of the Stasi, the East German secret police, and the Mitrokhin materials) there is quite literally no excuse to continue relying on the tall tales told to many of us as we grew up by Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, Bill Moyers, Judy Woodruff, 60 Minutes, The Grey Lady, and other dubious sources of political and social history.

That ETB was wrong or exaggerated some of his statements is moot. He was human, and we are prone to do that. Dr. King was not a communist. However, his movement was infiltrated and colonized to some degree by radicals more than sympathetic to this ideology, which drew the attention of commentators, intellectuals, and law enforcement. King was a man of the Left, to be sure (and his intemperate and extreme statements about the Vietnam war probably did little to dispel the notion that he was perhaps farther to the Left than he appeared), but of course, he was no communist.

We must keep in mind that, at the time, communism was an ideology, but being a communist, either within or without the party (but especially within) meant supporting a foreign government who's stated prime directive was the destruction of this country and political institutions. The CPUSA and other sympathetic front groups were controlled by, or morally and ideologically beholden to this hostile foreign government, not the United Stares.

Keep also in mind that our alliance with the Soviets during WWII was brought to us via Hitler, not any affinity of the Soviets for us or our manner of life. The Soviet Union was a part of the original Axis seeking the conquest and carving up of Europe before Hitler's intemperate and foolhardy invasion of the Russia altered the hard realities of the matter and the War in Europe became a two front war, eastern and western.

Keep in mind too that German National Socialism and Marxian Socialism were sibling ideologies that drew inspiration and ideological material from each other (just as Fascism did from socialism), and not ideological opposites. Alliance then, came naturally to both with both. However, they are also both totalitarian systems headed by power mad despots, which makes any alliance tenuous, as there is simply not room in the same room for both. Hitler was going to let Stalin have eastern Europe (pretty much what Roosevelt, Hiss at his side, gave him at Yalta) as his part of the booty, but Hiter wanted it all. Hence, we got Stalin as a de facto ally and the Popular Front switched its well greased gears yet again on the home front.

ETB can be criticized on points here and there to be sure, but not on his core convictions. Marxian utopian socialism is very likely the most murderous, catastrophic, and malignant political system and ideology in the history of humankind.

Bensen's perceptions of it were correct, even if he mistook some details of the current political culture.

[Droopy]

Which will make the looming wake up call that much more frightening.

Our children and grandchildren have never known true fear, have never faced nuclear annihilation, have never faced a conquering army or truly acknowledged even the possibility of the end of our way of life- and our political crop shows it.

Having failed to learn from history, they are doomed to repeat it.

Does no one else see the invasion and subjugation of Georgia as ominous?

Have the Sudetenland in 1938 and Poland in 1939 been so utterly forgotten?

We have a misty-eyed dreamer and a rabid pack of weak-kneed appeasers in office while forces of darkness are rearming.

Anyone want to take bets on who will be this generation's Chamberlain?

Or who will be this generation's Poland? Could it be Taiwan? Georgia? Israel? There is no dearth of candidates.

Our leaders have practiced appeasement with the North Koreans, the Iranians, the Syrians, and their terrorist puppets for the last five decades. Does anyone believe they will not kowtow to buy peace with a rearmed and resurgent Russian Empire? Or China?

For those nitwits who insist that China would never attack us for fear of harming their economy, let me point out that Japan's largest trading partner in the late 30's and early 40's- by a huge margin- was the United States.

They can- and they will- strike at us if it means becoming the world's newest super power.

Our military is being run-down, both by extended use and political neglect. It will be run-down further in the coming administration as priorities are shuffled to deal with the domestic crisis.

And while we vaccilate and obsolesce, our enemies are rearming.

These are perilous times, indeed.

The real sad thing about this is that both the major parties have allowed this state of affairs to develop. One party, true, has actually invested itself and its political fortunes in our defeat in Iraq and in retreat from our national security commitments and responsibilities, but the other party has sold its principles for the domestic vote buying schemes normally associated with its opposition.

Both parties are roiling in the intellectual and moral decadence of the welfare and entitlement society they have helped, even if lopsidedly, to create.

[Droopy]

Second, what I have termed "Evangelical Communism" was (and remains) a potent force in world politics. Russia was the champion of this movement and had shown itself to be very adept at "liberating" people into communism. This has not changed, as we see in Venuzuela and other South American countries today. A partial list of countries that came under communist sway from WWII on includes China, Cuba, North Korea, East Germany, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Albania, Greece (nearly and the fight continues there now), Saskatchewan (province in Canada), and California and Massachusetts . It was not an idle concern, it was real. Totalitarian regimes destroyed huge parts of the earth's people and environment (communists have the worst record on the environment in the world).

Love it. Love it. I really need to add the People's Democratic Republic of Maryland (where I lived for some five years), and the People's Democratic Republic of North Carolina, just across the border from me, which is fast becoming a part of the northeast corridor in Dixie.

Interestingly, after the fall of the Soviet Union, Evangelical Communism survived primarily in the humanities and social science professorate here and in some other western countries, while it was publically discredited in Eastern Europe. Unfortunately, as many other intellectuals have pointed out, unlike what happened with Nazism after the war, there has never been a denazification of communism; a decommunization in which the ideology itself is deligitimized and relegated to moral and intellectual oblivion, as was Nazism. Also unlike the Nazis, communism, and communists have never been held to account publically and as a matter of the general and broad based historical recored for their crimes. Nor have western shills and apologists for communism ever been held, except among certain elements of the western intellectual tradition, to account for their support and cheer leading of the criminals and their ideas.

Revolutionary socialism, and Marxism, the philosophical seat of the various ideologies, remains intellectually and morally intact among much of the western intelligentsia, while Nazism has somehow earned a special and unique place in hell. Communism and other variations of utopian socialism will never go away until and unless a critical mass of the western population can disabuse itself of its pathological romance with the core philosophical premises of the ideology.

Third, while there is a Doctor Strangelovian aspect to nuclear war, it is winnable. It all depends on how willing one is to pay the price of that victory (or defeat). That's why the bomb shelters, and the ABM systems Russia (but not USmerica) installed. Even today, both India and Pakistan are willing to fight with nuclear weapons. They deem them as nothing more than large bombs. They are not stupid, but see things differently from your PoV.

True. The idea of unwinnability was a peace offensive nostrum, useful to the Soviets and their ideological hangers on but hardly to the west.

Socialism, of any human contrived variety, is a part of the Great and Abominable Church. I have long been convinced that this endless conflict we see here in mortality revolving around the issues of quality and equality, the individual and the collective, achievement and excellence vs. leveling and sameness, entitlement and personal responsibility, and free agency over against coercion and enforced virtue, were many of the same issues that animated the war in Heaven and led to the revolt by one third of God's children against the plan of Jesus Christ.

The issues change little, even if the details vary in time and place.