fbpx
Wikipedia

John Birch Society

October 24, 2023

The John Birch Society (JBS) is an American right-wing political advocacy group.[1] Founded in 1958, it is anti-communist,[2][3] supports social conservatism,[2][3] and is associated with ultraconservative, radical right, far-right, and libertarian ideas.[12]

John Birch Society
AbbreviationJBS
Named afterJohn Birch
FormationDecember 9, 1958; 64 years ago (1958-12-09)
FounderRobert W. Welch Jr.
Founded atIndianapolis, Indiana, US
Typenonprofit
04-2256334
Legal status501(c)(3)
Purpose
HeadquartersGrand Chute, Wisconsin, U.S.
Chief executive officer
Bill Hahn
Chairman
Clark Curry
President
Martin Ohlson
SubsidiariesThe New American
AffiliationsAmerican Opinion Foundation
FreedomProject Academy
Websitejbs.org

The society's founder, businessman Robert W. Welch Jr. (1899–1985), developed an organizational infrastructure of nationwide chapters in December 1958. The society rose quickly in membership and influence, and was controversial for its promotion of conspiracy theories.[3][13] An exposé on the JBS in 1960, highlighting Welch's allegation that President Dwight D. Eisenhower was a communist agent, led to widespread notoriety for the society.[14][15][16] In the 1960s the conservative William F. Buckley Jr. and National Review pushed for the JBS to be exiled to the fringes of the American right.[17][13] JBS membership is kept private, but it is said to have neared 100,000 in the 1960s and 1970s, declining afterward.[3][18][19]

More recently, Jeet Heer has argued in The New Republic that while the organization's influence peaked in the 1970s, "Bircherism" and its legacy of conspiracy theories have become the dominant strain in the conservative movement.[20] Politico has asserted that the JBS began making a resurgence in the mid-2010s,[19] while observers have stated that the JBS and its beliefs shaped the Republican Party, the Trump administration, and the broader conservative movement.[21][22]

Originally based in Belmont, Massachusetts, the John Birch Society is now headquartered in Grand Chute, Wisconsin,[23] with local chapters throughout the United States. It owns American Opinion Publishing, Inc., which publishes the magazine The New American,[7] and it is affiliated with an online school called FreedomProject Academy.[24]

Political positions Edit

The John Birch Society from its start opposed collectivism as a "cancer" and, by extension, communism and big government.[25][26] Allegations that "Insiders" have conspired to control the United States through communism and world government are a recurring theme of its publications.[27] The organization and its founder, Robert Welch, promoted Americanism as "the philosophical antithesis of Communism."[28] It contended that the United States is a republic, not a democracy, and argued that states' rights should supersede those of the federal government.[29] Welch infused constitutionalist and classical liberal principles, in addition to his conspiracy theories, into the JBS's ideology and rhetoric.[30] In 1983, Congressman Larry McDonald, then the society's newly appointed chairman, characterized the JBS as belonging to the Old Right rather than the New Right.[31]

The society opposes "one world government", the United Nations,[32] the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), and other free trade agreements. It argues the U.S. Constitution has been devalued in favor of political and economic globalization. It has cited the existence of the former Security and Prosperity Partnership as evidence of a push towards a North American Union.[33][34] The JBS has sought to reduce immigration.[citation needed]

The JBS opposed the civil rights movement of the 1960s and the women's Equal Rights Amendment in the 1970s.[13][35][36] It has campaigned for state nullification.[37][38] It opposes efforts to call an Article V convention to amend the U.S. Constitution,[39][40] and it has been influential at promoting opposition to it among Republican legislators.[41]

The JBS supports auditing and eventually dismantling the Federal Reserve System.[42] The JBS holds that the United States Constitution gives only Congress the ability to coin money, and does not permit it to delegate this power, or to transform the dollar into a fiat currency not backed by gold or silver.[non-primary source needed]

Its publication The New American has described what it sees as American moral decline and threats to the family, including abortion, birth control, divorce, drugs, homosexuality, crime, violence, secular humanism, teenage pregnancy, teen suicide, environmentalism, feminism and pornography.[43] The JBS has alleged that moral degeneracy is perpetrated by a conspiracy to make the United States vulnerable to internationalism.[44]

The JBS has been described as ultraconservative,[4] far-right,[7][45] extremist,[46] and fringe.[47] The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) lists the society as a "Patriot" group, a group that "advocate[s] or adhere[s] to extreme antigovernment doctrines".[48] In 1968, a notable faction of JBS members expressed opposition towards desegregation efforts and demonstrated solidarity with white nationalist groups (such as the Southern White Citizens' Council) by actively participating in related protests, particularly in support of George Wallace.[49][50][51] Both the SPLC and the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith have ascertained the existence in the past of antisemitic and racist elements such as Revilo P. Oliver and Eric D. Butler.[51][52]

By the 1990s, the JBS was perceived as "more mainstream conservative" than in the 1960s.[53] It has also been associated with the libertarian movement[10][11] and business nationalism.[54]

The society's worldview was noted in the early 2000s for influencing the American militia movement, although the JBS had not publicly called for paramilitary training.[55][56][57] Extremism expert George Michael wrote that "a virtual who's who of the American radical right had at one time or another sojourned" in the JBS.[55]

Influence on conservatism Edit

The JBS contributed to the development of modern American conservatism through its organizational tactics and its promotion of right-wing political views.[58] Despite never considering itself a religious organization, the JBS played a role in the rise of the Moral Majority and the Christian right as major political forces, ideologically and tactically influencing multiple leaders in that movement including Tim LaHaye and Phyllis Schlafly.[59] The historian D. J. Mulloy wrote in 2014 that the JBS has served as "a kind of bridge" between the Old Right (including the McCarthyites) of the 1940s–50s, the New Right of the 1970s–80s, and the Tea Party right of the 21st century.[25]

Professor Edward H. Miller wrote that Welch and the JBS were "never excommunicated" from conservatism and that "the ideas of the John Birch Society paved the way for the conservatism of the twentieth century" and "shaped events in the twenty-first century".[60]: 8–10  Miller also credits JBS with helping stop the ERA and setting the stage for the Reagan Era,[60]: 330, 347–351  while Mulloy states that the JBS "played an essential role in the revitalization of conservatism"[61] and "trained a generation of conservative activists."[24] According to Professor Matthew Dallek, modern American conservatism “bear[s] the imprint of the John Birch Society.” [62]: 2 

JBS took an early stance in opposing abortion and social liberalism,[60]: 347, 357–360  and its TRIM committees, which supported lower taxes, helped lead to the Reagan tax cuts.[60]: 361–64 [63] By the early 2020s, multiple commentators and academics argued that the John Birch Society and its beliefs had successfully taken over the Republican Party and the broader conservative movement.[21][22][64][65]

History Edit

Origins Edit

The John Birch Society was established on December 9, 1958,[66] in Indianapolis, Indiana, at the conclusion of a two-day session of a group of 12 people led by Robert W. Welch Jr. Welch was a retired candy manufacturer from Belmont, Massachusetts, who had been a state Republican Party official and had unsuccessfully run in its 1950 lieutenant governor primary.[3][67][68] In 1954, Welch wrote the first book about John Birch (an Air Force intelligence officer and Baptist missionary), titled The Life of John Birch. He organized an anti-Communist society to "promote less government, more responsibility, and a better world".[67] He named his new organization in memory of Birch, saying that Birch was an unknown but dedicated anti-Communist, and the first American casualty of the Cold War.[69] Welch alleged that a Communist conspiracy within the American government had suppressed the truth about Birch's killing.[15]

John Birch Edit

John Birch was an American Baptist who went to China as a missionary in 1940, when the Japanese invasion had created suffering and chaos. He was a U.S. military intelligence officer under Brigadier General Claire Chennault in China. Chennault commanded the "Flying Tigers" and afterwards U.S. Army Air Forces units in China. In April 1942, Birch helped Lieutenant Colonel Doolittle and his flight crew (and other crews) a few days after they bailed out of their B-25 bomber over Japanese-held territory in China. Sixteen B-25s led by Doolittle bombed Tokyo ("Doolittle raid") off the Navy aircraft carrier USS Hornet during the United States' first attack on Japan.[70] Beginning in July 1942, Birch, who spoke Chinese, became an Army intelligence officer. He operated alone or with Nationalist Chinese soldiers, and regularly risked his life in Japanese-held territory in China. His many activities included setting up Chinese agent and radio intelligence networks, and rescuing downed American pilots; he had two emergency aircraft runways built.[70] Although he suffered from malaria, he refused furloughs.[70]

In 1945, Birch was promoted to captain and began working in China both for and with the OSS, the U.S. wartime intelligence service in World War II.[70] In August, after the Japanese surrendered, Birch was ordered by the OSS to northern China to obtain the surrender of the Japanese commanders at their installations. On August 24, nine days after the war, Birch left by train with his party which included two American soldiers, five Chinese officers, and two Koreans who spoke Japanese.[70] After spending a night in a village, the party proceeded by handcar the next morning, and ran into a group of 300 armed Chinese Communists. Birch and his Chinese officer aide approached them and were told to surrender their weapons and the group's equipment. Birch refused, and after arguing about it with their commander, they were allowed to proceed. Along the way, Birch's party encountered more groups of Communists. The party arrived at a train station at Hwang Kao which was occupied by more Chinese Communists.[70] Birch requested to speak with their leader. Birch and his aide approached the group's leader and after Birch refused to give up his sidearm, both were beaten and shot. Birch's corpse was bayonetted.[70] The rest of Birch's party were taken prisoner. Birch's aide survived and the prisoners were later released.[70] Birch's remains were recovered, and a Catholic burial service was held with military honors on a hillside outside of Suzhou, in eastern China.[70] The Chinese Communists, who were active in northern China and Manchuria, were supposedly WWII allies with the United States. Birch believed that Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communists intended to take over China after the war and move into Korea.[70] There were different explanations and theories as to why Birch was killed, ranging from his party showing up at Hwang Kao instead of Ninchuan, Birch's scheduled meeting with Chinese puppet troops of the Sixth Army under General Hu Peng-chu, misunderstanding by local guerillas, and provocation from Birch himself.[71]

Founding and beliefs Edit

The founding members of the JBS included Harry Lynde Bradley, co-founder of the Allen Bradley Company and the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation,[72][73] Fred C. Koch, founder of Koch Industries[74][75][76][77] and Robert Waring Stoddard, President of Wyman-Gordon, a major industrial enterprise.[78] Another was Revilo P. Oliver, a University of Illinois professor who was later expelled from the Society and helped found the National Alliance. Koch became one of the organization's primary financial supporters. According to investigative journalist Jane Mayer, Koch's sons, David and Charles Koch, were also members of the JBS. However, both left it before the 1970s.[79]

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 prospective member receiving a copy.[80] According to Welch,

"both the U.S. and Soviet governments are controlled by the same furtive conspiratorial cabal of internationalists, greedy bankers, and corrupt politicians. If left unexposed, the traitors inside the U.S. government would betray the country's sovereignty to the United Nations for a collectivist New World Order, managed by a 'one-world socialist government'."[81][82]

Welch saw collectivism as the main threat to western culture, and American liberals as "secret Communist traitors" who provided cover for the gradual process of collectivism, with the ultimate goal of replacing the nations of western civilization with a one-world socialist government. "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."[82] Welch predicted that "you have only a few more years before the country in which you live will become four separate provinces in a world-wide Communist dominion ruled by police-state methods from the Kremlin".[2]

The JBS was organized to be, in Welch's words, "under completely authoritative control at all levels". It incorporated aspects of business hierarchies and also the Communist cells Welch opposed but whose discipline he admired. Chapters of 10 to 20 members each had a leader appointed from above, and were expected to meet twice a month. Members of chapters that grew larger than 20 members were expected to break off and form a new small chapter.[3]

The activities of the JBS include distributing literature, pamphlets, magazines, videos and other material; the society also sponsors a Speaker's Bureau, which invites "speakers who are keenly aware of the motivations that drive political policy".[83] One of the first public activities of the society 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".[84] The society also alleged that Communists and UN supporters were conducting an "assault on Christmas" to "destroy all religious beliefs and customs".[13] In 1960, Welch advised JBS members to: "Join your local P.T.A. at the beginning of the school year, get your conservative friends to do likewise, and go to work to take it over."[85] One Man's Opinion,[86] a magazine launched by Welch in 1956, was renamed American Opinion.[87] In 1965, Welch established a JBS-affiliated publication known as The Review of the News, which was intended for a larger readership and covered news.[88] In 1985, these magazines merged into The New American, a biweekly magazine published by the Society.[89]

Eisenhower issue Edit

For the first eighteen months of its existence, JBS "operated in relative obscurity".[14] Then in July 1960, the Chicago Daily News published a relatively in-depth story on the Society, including the contention of founder Robert Welch, that President Dwight D. Eisenhower was a "dedicated, conscious agent" of the communist conspiracy in the United States. "For the next few years Birchers found themselves at the center of a storm of controversy".[14]

Welch had first made the statement in 1954 when he wrote in a widely circulated statement, The Politician, "Could Eisenhower really be simply a smart politician, entirely without principles and hungry for glory, who is only the tool of the Communists? The answer is yes." He went on. "With regard to ... Eisenhower, it is difficult to avoid raising the question of deliberate treason."[90]

The controversial paragraph was removed before final publication of The Politician.[91]

The sensationalism of Welch's charges against Eisenhower prompted several conservatives and Republicans, most prominently Goldwater and the intellectuals of William F. Buckley's circle, to renounce outright or quietly shun the group. Buckley, 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 Birch Society.[92] From then on, Buckley became the leading intellectual spokesman and organizer of the anti-Bircher conservatives.[93] Buckley's biographer, John B. Judis, wrote that "Buckley was beginning to worry that with the John Birch Society growing so rapidly, the right-wing upsurge in the country would take an ugly, even Fascist turn rather than leading toward the kind of conservatism National Review had promoted."[93] Despite Buckley's opposition, the author Edward H. Miller wrote, the JBS "remained a force in the conservative movement", and arguments to the contrary are "greatly exaggerated".[60]: 211, 258 

The booklet found support from Ezra Taft Benson, then Eisenhower's Secretary of Agriculture and later the 13th President of the LDS Church. In a letter to his friend FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover, Benson asked "how can a man [Eisenhower] who seems to be so strong for Christian principles and base American concepts be so effectively used as a tool to serve the Communist conspiracy?" Benson privately fought to prevent the Bureau from condemning the JBS, which prompted Hoover to distance himself from Benson. At one point in 1971, Hoover directed his staff to lie to Benson to avoid having to meet with him about the issue.[94]

1960s Edit

In the 1960s, the JBS became known as a right-wing organization with an anti-Communist ideology.[70] It was moderately active in that decade with numerous chapters, but rarely engaged in coalition building with other conservatives. It was rejected by most conservatives because of Welch's conspiracy theories. The philosopher Ayn Rand said in a 1964 Playboy interview, "I consider the Birch Society futile, because they are not for capitalism but merely against Communism ... I gather they believe that the disastrous state of today's world is caused by a Communist conspiracy. This is childishly naïve and superficial. No country can be destroyed by a mere conspiracy, it can be destroyed only by ideas."[95][96] Some historians have said the JBS had a large role in 1960s politics, and functioned much like a third party, forcing "the GOP, the Democrats, and conservatives of all types to respond to its agenda", in Jonathan M. Schoenwald's words.[97][98]

By March 1961, the JBS had 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". According to Political Research Associates (a non-profit research group that investigates the far-right), the society "pioneered grassroots lobbying, combining educational meetings, petition drives and letter-writing campaigns.[82] Rick Perlstein described its main activity in the 1960s as "monthly meetings to watch a film by Welch, followed by writing postcards or letters to government officials linking specific policies to the Communist menace".[99]

One early campaign against the second summit between the United States and the Soviet Union (which urged President Dwight D. Eisenhower, "If you go, don't come back!"[3]) generated over 600,000 postcards and letters, according to the society. In 1961 Welch offered $2,300 in prizes to college students for the best essays on "grounds of impeachment" of Chief Justice Warren, a prime target of ultra-conservatives.[100] A June 1964 society campaign to oppose Xerox corporate sponsorship of TV programs favorable to the UN produced 51,279 letters from 12,785 individuals."[82] By the middle of the decade, it had 400 American Opinion bookstores selling its literature.[2]

In 1962, William F. Buckley Jr., editor of the National Review, an influential conservative magazine, denounced Welch and the John Birch Society as "far removed from common sense" and urged the GOP to purge itself of Welch's influence.[101]

In the late 1960s, Welch insisted that the Johnson administration's war against Communist guerillas and North Vietnamese troops in Vietnam (which was unpopular among liberals and leftists, but not among conservatives) was part of a Communist plot aimed at taking over the United States. Welch demanded that the United States get out of Vietnam, thus aligning the Society with the left.[102] The society opposed water fluoridation, which it called "mass medicine" and a Communist effort to destroy American children.[103][104][105][106]

Former Eisenhower cabinet member Ezra Taft Benson—a leading Mormon—spoke in favor of the JBS, but in January 1963 The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints issued a statement distancing itself from the Society.[107] Antisemitic, racist, anti-Mormon, anti-Masonic groups criticized the organization's acceptance of Jews, non-whites, Masons, and Mormons as members. These opponents accused Welch of harboring feminist, ecumenical, and evolutionary ideas.[108][109][non-primary source needed] Welch rejected these accusations by his detractors: "All we are interested in here is opposing the advance of the Communists, and eventually destroying the whole Communist conspiracy, so that Jews and Christians alike, and Mohammedans and Buddhists, can again have a decent world in which to live."[110][non-primary source needed]

In a 1963 report, the California Senate Factfinding Subcommittee on Un-American Activities, following an investigation into the JBS, found no evidence it was "a secret, fascist, subversive, un-American, [or] anti-Semitic organization."[111][112]

In 1964, Welch favored Barry Goldwater for the Republican presidential nomination, but the membership split, with two-thirds supporting Goldwater and one-third supporting Richard Nixon, who did not run. A number of Birch members and their allies were Goldwater supporters in 1964[101] and a hundred of them were delegates at the 1964 Republican National Convention.[113]

In April 1966, a New York Times article on New Jersey and the society voiced—in part—a concern for "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."[114] It then characterized the society as "by far the most successful and 'respectable' radical right 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."

The JBS also opposed the creation of the first sex education curriculum in the United States through a division called the Movement to Restore Decency (MOTOREDE).[115] Surviving MOTOREDE pamphlets date from 1967 to 1971. Additionally, the JBS advocated against other manifestations of social liberalism, including abortion.[60]: 347, 357–360 

John Birch Society members and activities were featured in "The Radical Americans", a series produced by National Educational Television (NET) and WGBH-TV that aired in 1966 on NET outlets.[116]

JBS membership peaked in 1965 or 1966 at an estimated 100,000.[3]

Opposition to civil rights Edit

The JBS opposed the 1960s civil rights movement and claimed the movement had Communists in important positions. In the latter half of 1965, the JBS produced a flyer titled "What's Wrong With Civil Rights?" and used the flyer as a newspaper advertisement.[117][118] In the piece, one of the answers was: "For the civil rights movement in the United States, with all of its growing agitation and riots and bitterness, and insidious steps towards the appearance of a civil war, has not been infiltrated by the Communists, as you now frequently hear. It has been deliberately and almost wholly created by the Communists patiently building up to this present stage for more than forty years."[119] The society believed that the ultimate aim of the civil rights movement was the creation of a "Soviet Negro Republic" in the southeastern United States[35] and opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, claiming it violated the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and overstepped individual states' rights to enact laws regarding civil rights. Some prominent black conservatives such as George Schuyler and Manning Johnson joined forces with the JBS during this period and echoed the Society's rhetoric about the civil-rights movement and the Civil Rights Act of 1964.[120]

As part of their opposition to civil rights, the JBS launched a "Support Your Local Police" campaign in the mid-1960s. The campaign openly advocated against the use of federal officers to enforce civil rights laws.[121]

1970s Edit

By 1976 the JBS had 90,000 members, 240 paid staffers, and a $7 million dollar annual budget, according to a paper written by libertarian conservative tycoon Charles Koch.[18]

The JBS was at the center of a free-speech law case in the 1970s, after American Opinion accused a Chicago lawyer, Elmer Gertz, who was 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 a state may allow a private figure such as Gertz to recover actual damages from a media defendant without proving malice, but that a public figure does have to prove actual malice, according to the standard laid out in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, in order to recover presumed damages or punitive damages.[122] The court ordered a retrial in which Gertz prevailed.

Key causes of the JBS in the 1970s included opposition to both the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and to the establishment of diplomatic ties with the People's Republic of China. The JBS claimed that Nixon's visit to Mainland China had "humiliated the American people and betrayed our anti-communist allies" and that it was the primary supplier of illicit heroin into the United States.[123][124] The society also was opposed to transferring control of the Panama Canal from American to Panamanian sovereignty.[125]

The John Birch Society, along with other conservative groups such as the Eagle Forum and the Christian right, successfully opposed the Equal Rights Amendment in the 1970s.[126][36] JBS played a key role in stopping the ERA's ratification – on par with Phyllis Schlafly, herself a JBS member – and it organized opposition to it across the nation.[60]: 347–351  JBS accused the ERA's supporters of subversion, asserting that the ERA was part of a Communist plot "to reduce human beings to living at the same level as animals."[36]

The JBS advocated for lower taxes, including reducing the federal income tax rate. By 1977, it had established over 200 TRIM (Tax Relief Immediately) committees across the U.S.[60]: 361–64 

In the 1970s, the JBS played a prominent role in promoting the false claim that laetrile was a cancer cure, and in advocating for the legalization of the compound as a drug.[127][128] A New York Times review in 1977 found JBS and other far-right groups were involved in pro-laetrile campaigns in at least nine states.[127] "Virtually all" of the officers of the "Committee for Freedom of Choice in Cancer Therapy," the leading pro-laetrile group, were JBS members.[128] Congressman and Birch Society leader Lawrence P. McDonald was involved in the campaign as a member of the committee.[127][129]

The JBS also opposed Earth Day, suggesting that it was a Communist plot and noting that the first celebration fell on the 100th anniversary of Vladimir Lenin's birth.[13]

The JBS was organized into local chapters during this period. Ernest Brosang, a New Jersey regional coordinator, claimed that it was virtually impossible for opponents of the society to penetrate its policy-making levels, thereby protecting it from "anti-American" takeover attempts. Its activities included the distribution of literature critical of civil rights legislation, warnings over the influence of the United Nations, and the release of petitions to impeach United States Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren. To spread their message, members held showings of documentary films and operated initiatives such as "Let Freedom Ring", a nationwide network of recorded telephone messages.[130][131]

1980s and 1990s Edit

 
A sign advocating America's withdrawal produced by the John Birch Society

After the Vietnam War, the JBS's membership and influence declined. This decline continued through the 1980s and 1990s due to Welch's death in 1985 (at age 85) and the end of the Cold War in 1991.[132][16] By the mid-1990s, membership in the JBS was estimated between 15,000 and 20,000.[133] While other anti-Communist organizations faded away following the Cold War's end, the JBS survived and experienced some growth in the 1990s.[134] News reports said President George H.W. Bush's invocation of a "new world order" during the 1991 Gulf War gave the society a new audience.[135][136] The society consolidated its national office in Appleton, Wisconsin, the birthplace of Senator Joseph McCarthy.[2]

In 1984, three members of the San Diego Padres, Eric Show, Mark Thurmond, and Dave Dravecky revealed they were members of the JBS.[137]

The society campaigned against the ratification of the Genocide Convention, arguing it would erode U.S. national sovereignty.[138][139]

The JBS continued to press for an end to United States membership in the United Nations. As evidence of its effectiveness, the society pointed to the Utah State Legislature's failed resolution calling for United States withdrawal, as well as the actions of several other states where the society's membership was active.[140]

The second head of the JBS was Congressman Larry McDonald (D) from Georgia. McDonald's first wife "estimated that, over the years, he had hosted 10,000 people in his living room for Bircher-inspired lectures and documentaries."[129] In 1982, McDonald was appointed as national chairman of the Society.[129] McDonald was killed in 1983 when airliner KAL 007 was shot down by a Soviet interceptor.[129]

William P. Hoar, a writer for the JBS who has attacked mainstream politicians from Franklin D. Roosevelt to George W. Bush, published regularly in The New American and its predecessor American Opinion. He coauthored The Clinton Clique with Larry Abraham alleging that Clinton was part of the Anglo-American conspiracy supposedly ruled through the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission. The Birch Society publications arm, Western Islands, published his Architects of Conspiracy: An Intriguing History (1984), and Huntington House Publishers published his Handouts and Pickpockets: Our Government Gone Berserk (1996).[141][better source needed]

In 1995, the JBS campaigned against plans for a Conference of States; proponents said such a conference would reduce federal powers, but the JBS feared it would lead to a second Constitutional Convention.[142][143][144][145]

2000–present Edit

In the mid-2000s, the JBS, along with the Eagle Forum, mobilized conservative opposition to a so-called North American Union and the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America. As a result of two organizations' activities, 23 state legislatures saw bills introduced condemning an NAU while the Bush and Obama administrations were deterred "from any grand initiatives."[34] In 2007, The New American published a special issue devoted to the topic; approximately 500,000 copies were distributed.[146] The JBS also advocated for U.S. withdrawal from the UN.[32]

The JBS was a co-sponsor of the 2010 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), ending its decades-long distance from the mainstream conservative movement.[147][148][24] It attended CPAC in 2023.[149]

Although JBS membership numbers are kept private, it reported a resurgence of members in the 2010s and 2020s, specifically in Texas.[19][150] A 2017 article in Politico describing the group's activities in Texas listed some of its stances as opposing the UN's Agenda 21 based on a conspiracy theory that it will "establish control over all human activity", opposing a bill that would allow people who entered the United States illegally to pay in-state college tuition, pulling the United States out of NAFTA, returning America to what the group calls its Christian foundations, and abolishing the federal departments of education and energy.[19]

Political commentator Jeet Heer argued in 2016 that "Trumpism" is essentially Bircherism.[20] Trump confidant and longtime advisor Roger Stone said that Trump's father Fred Trump was a financier of the JBS and a personal friend of founder Robert Welch.[151] Trump's former Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney was the speaker at the John Birch Society's National Council dinner shortly before joining the Trump administration.[152] Former Congressman Ron Paul (R-Texas), has had a long and close relationship with the JBS, celebrating its work in his 2008 keynote speech at its 50th anniversary event and saying that the JBS was leading the fight to restore freedom.[153][self-published source?][154] The keynote speaker at the organization's 60th anniversary celebration was Congressman Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky.), who maintained a near-perfect score on the JBS's "Freedom Index" ranking of members of Congress.[155][self-published source?] Right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who hosted Trump on his Infowars radio show and claimed to have a personal relationship with the president, called Trump a "John Birch Society president"[156] and previously said Trump was "more John Birch Society than the John Birch Society."[157][better source needed]

In July 2021, the Republican central committees of Kootenai County, Idaho, and Benewah County, Idaho, unanimously approved resolutions calling JBS "a valuable organization that is dedicated to restoring the Republic according to the vision of the Founding Fathers."[158] The Idaho Republican Party declined to endorse the resolutions,[159] though the party elected a JBS member, Dorothy Moon, as chair in July 2022.[160] The JBS had been active in Idaho.[161][162]

In 2022, the JBS campaigned against carbon-capture pipelines in Iowa, arguing they threatened property rights.[163][164]

The JBS is affiliated with FreedomProject Academy, an online school "based on Judeo-Christian values." Between 2011 and 2020, its enrollment grew from 22 to 1,000 students.[24]

The JBS publishes the Freedom Index, which rates members of Congress and state legislators “based on their adherence to constitutional principles of limited government, fiscal responsibility, national sovereignty and a traditional foreign policy of avoiding foreign entanglements.”[165]

Officers Edit

Chairmen and presidents Edit

CEOs Edit

  • G. Allen Bubolz (1988–1991)
  • G. Vance Smith (1991–2005)
  • Arthur R. Thompson (2005–2020)
  • Bill Hahn (2020–present)[168]

In popular culture Edit

  • Pete Seeger lampooned the John Birch Society with a song called "The Jack Ash Society", recorded on his 1961 Folkways Records LP album Gazette Vol. 2. The name is a pun. On the surface, it's changing the name from one type of tree, birch to another, ash. However, the name "Jack Ash" also sounds like the word "jackass" which means "a foolish person".[citation needed]
  • In 1962, Bob Dylan recorded "Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues", which poked fun at the society and its tendency to see Communist conspiracies in many situations. When he attempted to perform it on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1963, however, CBS's Standards and Practices department forbade it, fearing that lyrics equating the Society's views with those of Adolf Hitler might trigger a defamation lawsuit. Dylan was offered the opportunity to perform a different song, but he responded that if he could not sing the number of his choice he would rather not appear at all. The story generated widespread media attention in the days that followed; Sullivan denounced the network's decision in published interviews.[169]
  • Pogo cartoonist Walt Kelly lampooned the American anti-Communist movement, and the John Birch Society in particular, in a series of strips collected in 1962 in The Jack Acid Society Black Book.[170][171]
  • In 1962 The Chad Mitchell Trio recorded a satirical song "The John Birch Society" which made its way to no. 99 in the Billboard Hot 100.[citation needed]
  • When jazz trumpeter John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie launched a joke presidential campaign in 1963, fans created a "John Birks Society" to campaign for him.[172]
  • In the 1964 film Dr. Strangelove, a deranged U.S. Air Force general claims that water fluoridation would "sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids" and is part of a communist conspiracy, a parody of JBS claims.[173]
  • The 1973 song "Uneasy Rider" by Charlie Daniels contains a reference to "Brother John Birch" in the lyrics.[174]
  • In 2020, American journalist Robert Evans released a multi-part series on his podcast Behind the Bastards entitled "How The John Birch Society Invented the Modern Far Right".[175]

See also Edit

References Edit

  1. ^ Webster's guide to American history: a chronological, geographical, and biographical survey and compendium. Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam Co. 1971. p. 576. ISBN 978-0877790815.
  2. ^ a b c d e Stewart 2002, pp. 423–447.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Mulloy 2014, p. [page needed].
  4. ^ a b Lunsford, J. Lynn (February 4, 2009). "Business Bookshelf: Piles of Green From Black Gold". The Wall Street Journal. p. A.11.
    Haddock, Sharon (March 21, 2009). "Beck's backing bumps Skousen book to top". Deseret News. Salt Lake City, Utah.
    Byrd, Shelia (May 25, 2008). "Churches tackle tough topic of race". Sunday Gazette-Mail. Charleston, W.V. p. C.5.
  5. ^ Blumenthal, Max (2010). Republican Gomorrah: inside the movement that shattered the party. New York: Nation Books. p. 332. ISBN 978-1568584171. Skousen's vocal support for the Far-right John Birch Society's claim that Communists controlled President Dwight Eisenhower cost him the support of the corporate backers who had paid for his Red-bashing lecture tours.
  6. ^ Eatwell, Roger (2004), "Introduction: The new extreme right challenge", Western Democracies and The New Extreme Right challenge, Routledge, p. 7, ISBN 978-1134201570
    Potok, Mark (2004), "The American radical right: The 1990s and beyond", Western Democracies and The New Extreme Right challenge, Routledge, p. 43, ISBN 978-1134201570
  7. ^ a b c Levine, Deborah; Brenman, Marc (November 15, 2019). "The Local–Global Context". When Hate Groups March Down Main Street: Engaging a Community Response. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-1-5381-3266-1 – via Google Books. ...there are fierce objections on the extreme right to initiatives related to international collaboration. This attitude is typified by The New American (TNA), a print magazine published by American Opinion Publishing, Inc., a subsidiary of the John Birch Society (JBS), a far-right organization.
  8. ^ Bernstein, Richard (May 21, 2007). "The JFK assassination and a '60s leftist prism Letter from America". International Herald Tribune. Paris. p. 2.
    Jordan, Ida Kay (August 26, 2001). "Voters Admired N.C. Senator's Independent Streak, Southern Charm". The Virginian-Pilot. Norfolk, Va. p. J.1.
    Brinkley, Douglas (February 10, 1997). "The Right Choice for the C.I.A.". The New York Times. p. A.15.
  9. ^ Webb, Clive. Rabble rousers: the American far right in the civil rights era. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2010 ISBN 0820327646 p. 10
  10. ^ a b Tanenhaus, Sam; Rutenberg, Jim (January 25, 2014). "Rand Paul's Mixed Inheritance". The New York Times. Retrieved August 5, 2021.
  11. ^ a b Kaminer, Wendy (March 18, 2010). "Will the Right Find Libertarianism?". The Atlantic. Retrieved August 5, 2021.
  12. ^ [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11]
  13. ^ a b c d e Chapman, Roger (2010). Culture Wars: An Encyclopedia of Issues, Viewpoints, and Voices. M.E. Sharpe. pp. 58, 91, 148. ISBN 978-0765617613.
  14. ^ a b c Mulloy 2014a, p. 15.
  15. ^ a b Mallon, Thomas (January 4, 2016). "A View from the Fringe: The John Birch Society and the rise of the radical right". The New Yorker. Retrieved April 7, 2022.
  16. ^ a b Stewart 2002, p. 425.
  17. ^ Regnery, Alfred S. (2008). Upstream: The Ascendance of American Conservatism. Simon and Schuster. p. 79. ISBN 978-1416522881.
  18. ^ a b Jane Mayer. Dark Money. p. 55.
  19. ^ a b c d Savage, John (July 16, 2017). "The John Birch Society Is Back". Politico. Retrieved January 4, 2019.
  20. ^ a b Heer, Jeet (June 14, 2016). "Donald Trump's United States of Conspiracy". The New Republic. Retrieved February 11, 2018.
  21. ^ a b Miller, Edward H. (January 9, 2022). "Op-Ed: Today's right-wing conspiracy theory mentality can be traced back to the John Birch Society". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved April 19, 2022.
  22. ^ a b Lehmann, Chris (November 23, 2021). "We All Live in the John Birch Society's World Now". The New Republic. Retrieved April 19, 2022.
  23. ^ Dan Barry (June 25, 2009). "Holding Firm Against Plots by Evildoers". The New York Times. Retrieved April 4, 2010.
  24. ^ a b c d Leonard, Collin (February 22, 2023). "Is this the death of the John Birch Society - or its renaissance?". Deseret News. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  25. ^ a b Mulloy 2014, p. 11.
  26. ^ Stewart 2002, pp. 428–429, 436, 441–442.
  27. ^ Stewart 2002.
  28. ^ Celestini, Carmen (2018). God, Country, and Christian Conservatives: The National Association of Manufacturers, the John Birch Society, and the Rise of the Christian Right (PDF) (PhD). University of Waterloo. pp. 10, 114–116, 124–126.
  29. ^ Stewart 2002, pp. 428–429.
  30. ^ Verhoeven 2015, pp. 3, 56–57, 103.
  31. ^ Larry McDonald on the New World Order (Television). Crossfire. May 1983. Event occurs at 2:22.
  32. ^ a b Spangler, Jerry D.; Bernick, Bob Jr. (June 16, 2003). "John Birch Society forges on in Utah". Deseret News. Retrieved July 26, 2022.
  33. ^ Farmer, Brian (September 17, 2007). . The John Birch Society. Archived from the original on October 20, 2007. Retrieved September 20, 2011.
  34. ^ a b Pastor, Robert (2011). The North American Idea: A Vision of a Continental Future. New York: Oxford University Press, USA. pp. 11, 76. ISBN 978-0-19-978241-3. OCLC 741646639.
  35. ^ a b Hill, Gladwin (August 16, 1963). "Birch Head Sees Red Rights Plot". The New York Times. Retrieved November 5, 2020.
  36. ^ a b c Rhode, Deborah L. (2009). Justice and Gender. Harvard University Press. pp. 63, 70–71. ISBN 9780674042674. [T]he John Birch Society perceived the amendment as an integral part of "Communist plans...at work in a now vast effort to reduce human beings to the same level as animals."
  37. ^ Stone, Junius (October 28, 2021). "Local Patriots talk about constitutional convention, nullification". Texarkana Gazette. Retrieved October 29, 2021.
  38. ^ Steinback, Robert (April 26, 2011). "Nullification Advocates Take Show On The Road". Southern Poverty Law Center. Retrieved April 7, 2022.
  39. ^ H. Neale, Thomas (November 15, 2017). "The Article V Convention to Propose Constitutional Amendments:Current Developments" (PDF). fas.org. Congressional Research Service. Retrieved April 28, 2021.
  40. ^ Wilson, Sam (February 11, 2021). "Fiery Constitutional Debate Splits Senate Republicans". Independent Record. Retrieved April 30, 2021.
  41. ^ Russ, Feingold; Prindiville, Peter (2022). The Constitution in Jeopardy. New York: Hachette Book Group. pp. 142, 164–65. ISBN 978-1541701526.
  42. ^ . Jbs.org. Archived from the original on July 21, 2012. Retrieved July 7, 2012.
  43. ^ Stewart 2002, p. 440.
  44. ^ Stewart 2002, p. 441.
  45. ^ Burch, Kurt; Robert Allen Denemark (1997). Constituting international political economy. Lynne Rienner Publishers. p. 125. ISBN 978-1-55587-660-9.
    Oshinsky, David (January 27, 2008). "In the Heart of the Heart of Conspiracy". The New York Times Book Review. p. 23.
    Danielson, Chris (February 2009). "Lily White and Hard Right: The Mississippi Republican Party and Black Voting, 1965–1980". The Journal of Southern History. 75 (1): 83.
    Lee, Martha F (Fall 2005). "Nesta Webster: The Voice of Conspiracy". Journal of Women's History. 17 (3): 81. doi:10.1353/jowh.2005.0033. S2CID 143991823.
    Blumenthal, Max (2010). Republican Gomorrah: inside the movement that shattered the party. New York: Nation Books. p. 332. ISBN 978-1568584171. Skousen's vocal support for the Far-right John Birch Society's claim that Communists controlled President Dwight Eisenhower cost him the support of the corporate backers who had paid for his Red-bashing lecture tours.Walsh, DA. (2020). "The Right-Wing Popular Front: The Far Right and American Conservatism in the 1950s". Journal of American History. 107 (2): 411-432. doi:10.1093/jahist/jaaa182. "But this emphasis on the 1960s and the setting of the boundaries between the 'responsible' conservatism of Buckley and Goldwater and the far-right 'fringe' of the Birchers has occluded the deep relationship between conservatives and the far right in the 1950s."
  46. ^ Liebman, Marvin (March 17, 1996). "Perspective on Politics; The Big Tent Isn't Big Enough; By allowing extremists to flourish openly, the GOP forces out those who represent the party's moderate values". Los Angeles Times. p. 5.
    Tobin, Jonathan S. (March 9, 2008). "The writer who chased the anti-Semites out". The Jerusalem Post. p. 14.
    Gerson, Michael (March 10, 2009). "Looking for conservatism". Times Daily. Florence, Ala.
  47. ^ Ward, Ian (March 19, 2023). "The fringe group that broke the GOP's brain — and helped it win elections". Vox. Retrieved September 28, 2023.
  48. ^ "'Patriot' Groups". Southern Poverty Law Center. February 26, 2009. Retrieved February 1, 2018. Generally, Patriot groups define themselves as opposed to the 'New World Order' or advocate or adhere to extreme antigovernment doctrines. ... Listing here does not imply that the groups advocate or engage in violence or other criminal activities, or are racist.
  49. ^ Nelson, Michael (2017). Resilient America – Electing Nixon in 1968, Channeling Dissent, and Dividing Government. University Press of Kansas. p. 209. ISBN 978-0700624423.
  50. ^ Roberts, Zach D. (May 5, 2023). "The Origins and Afterlife of the Infamous John Birch Society". Progressive.org. Retrieved July 8, 2023.
  51. ^ a b Terry, Don (March 3, 2013). "The John Birch Society, the conspiracist group exiled by the right a half century ago, is on the march and gaining influence". Intelligence Report (2013 Spring Issue).
  52. ^ "John Birch Society Charged with 'contributing to Anti-semitism'". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. March 20, 2015. Retrieved September 26, 2023.
  53. ^ Stewart 2002, pp. 443–444.
  54. ^ Verhoeven 2015, pp. 2, 4, 38.
  55. ^ a b Michael, George (September 2, 2003). Confronting Right Wing Extremism and Terrorism in the USA. Routledge. pp. 41–42. doi:10.4324/9780203563212. ISBN 978-1-134-37762-6.
  56. ^ Freilich, Joshua D.; Pienik, Jeremy A.; Howard, Gregory J. (May 1, 2001). "Toward Comparative Studies of the U.S. Militia Movement". International Journal of Comparative Sociology. 42 (1): 163–210. doi:10.1163/156851801300171751.
  57. ^ Crothers, Lane (June 2002). "The Cultural Foundations of the Modern Militia Movement". New Political Science. 24 (2): 222, 230. doi:10.1080/07393140220145225. ISSN 0739-3148. S2CID 143461538.
  58. ^ Verhoeven 2015, pp. 260–263, 266–271.
  59. ^ Celestini, Carmen (2018). God, Country, and Christian Conservatives: The National Association of Manufacturers, the John Birch Society, and the Rise of the Christian Right (PDF) (PhD). University of Waterloo. pp. iv, 322–325, 328–334.
  60. ^ a b c d e f g h Miller, Edward H. (2021). A Conspiratorial Life: Robert Welch, the John Birch Society, and the Revolution of American Conservatism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0226449050. OCLC 1304351277.
  61. ^ Mulloy 2014, pp. 188–189.
  62. ^ Dallek, Matthew (2023). Birchers: How the John Birch Society Radicalized the American Right. New York: Hachette Book Group. ISBN 978-1541673564.
  63. ^ Brooks, Anthony; Chang, Jonathan (July 13, 2022). "The history of far-right populism, from the John Birch Society to Trumpism". WBUR-FM. Retrieved July 26, 2022.
  64. ^ "Did the John Birch Society Win in the End?". The Bulwark. April 13, 2022. Retrieved April 19, 2022.
  65. ^ Dallek, Matthew (2023). Birchers: How the John Birch Society Radicalized the American Right. New York: Basic Books. ISBN 978-1541673564. OCLC 1334884890.
  66. ^ "John Birch Society", by Thomas C. Ellington, in Culture Wars: An Encyclopedia of Issues, Viewpoints, and Voices, ed. by Roger Chapman (M. E. Sharpe, 2010) p. 286
  67. ^ a b James and Marti Hefley, The Secret File on John Birch, Tyndale House Publishers, 1980, ISBN 0-8423-5862-5
  68. ^ History
  69. ^ Schoenwald, Jonathan M. (2002). "3 – A New Kind of Conservatism: The John Birch Society". A Time for Choosing: The Rise of Modern American Conservatism. Oxford University Press (US). ISBN 0-19-515726-5.
  70. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k McGowan, Sam (September 6, 2016). "For God and Country: The Story of John Birch". Warfare History Net. Retrieved March 10, 2021.
  71. ^ Spector, Ronald H. (2007). In the ruins of empire: the Japanese surrender and the battle for postwar Asia (1st ed.). New York: Random House. ISBN 9780375509155.
  72. ^ Horwitz, Jeff; Bauer, Scott (June 12, 2015). "Before Walker run, a conservative foundation set the stage". Yahoo.com. Retrieved October 21, 2015.
  73. ^ Daniel, Bice; Bill, Glauber; Poston, Ben (November 28, 2011). "Conservative empire built from Wisconsin foundation". The Seattle Times. Retrieved November 12, 2019.
  74. ^ Davis, Jonathan T. (1997). Forbes Richest People: The Forbes Annual Profile of the World's Wealthiest Men and Women. Wiley. p. 138. ISBN 978-0-471-17751-7. Founding member (1958) John Birch Society—reportedly after seeing Russian friends liquidated
  75. ^ Hoover's 500: Profiles of America's Largest Business Enterprises. Hoover's Business Press. 1996. p. 286. ISBN 978-1-57311-009-9. In 1929 Koch took his process to the Soviet Union, but he grew disenchanted with Stalinism and returned home to become a founding member of the anticommunist John Birch Society.
  76. ^ Wayne, Leslie (December 7, 1986). "Brothers at Odds". The New York Times. Sec. 6; Part 2, p 100 col. 1. ISSN 0362-4331. He returned a fervent anti-Communist who would later become a founding member of the John Birch Society.
  77. ^ Diamond, Sara (1995). Roads to Dominion: Right-Wing Movements and Political Power in the United States. New York: Guilford Press. p. 324 n. 86. ISBN 0-89862-862-8.
  78. ^ "Robert Stoddard Dies at 78; A Founder of Birch Society". The New York Times. December 16, 1984. Retrieved May 7, 2012.
  79. ^ Towler, Christopher (December 6, 2018). "The John Birch Society is still influencing American politics, 60 years after its founding". The Conversation. Retrieved May 4, 2021.
  80. ^ Mulloy 2014, p. 3.
  81. ^ Welch, Robert E. (1961). The Blue Book of the John Birch Society. American Opinion Books. ISBN 0-88279-215-6.
  82. ^ a b c d "John Birch Society". Political Research Associates. Retrieved July 18, 2008.
  83. ^ John Birch Society Speakers Bureau
  84. ^ Matthew Lyons; Chip Berlet (2000). Right-Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort. New York: The Guilford Press. p. 179. ISBN 1-57230-562-2.
  85. ^ French, William Marshall (1967). American Secondary Education. Odyssey Press. p. 477. ISBN 0-7719-9198-3. Retrieved July 20, 2008.
  86. ^ OCLC 1713996.[full citation needed]
  87. ^ ISSN 0003-0236 OCLC 1480501.[full citation needed]
  88. ^ OCLC 12803345.[full citation needed]
  89. ^ Barbagallo, Paul (June 1, 2006). "The New American Goes Mobile". Adweek. Retrieved September 29, 2023.
  90. ^ Quoted at "Glenn Beck talks with JBS President John F. McManus" Aug. 15, 2006, The John Birch Society January 12, 2010, at the Wayback Machine.
  91. ^ Welch, Robert (1975). The Politician. Boston: Western Islands. cxxxviii–cxxxix. ISBN 99908-64-98-5. 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.
  92. ^ John B. Judis, William F. Buckley, Jr.: Patron Saint of the Conservatives (2001) pp. 193–200
  93. ^ a b Confounding Fathers: The Tea Party's Cold War Roots by historian Sean Wilentz, The New Yorker, October 18, 2010
  94. ^ Davidson, Lee (November 16, 2010). "FBI files shed light on Ezra Taft Benson, Ike and the Birch Society". The Salt Lake Tribune. Retrieved February 11, 2018.
  95. ^ "Who was Ayn Rand? – a biography, Playboy interview, 1964". Retrieved July 18, 2008.
  96. ^ Hauptman, Don (March 1, 2004). . The Atlas Society. Archived from the original on June 20, 2010.
  97. ^ Schoenwald, Jonathan M. (2001). Time for Choosing: The Rise of Modern American Conservatism. Oxford University Press. p. 9.
  98. ^ Mulloy 2014, pp. 12–13.
  99. ^ Rick Perlstein (2001). Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus. Hill and Wang. p. 117. ISBN 0786744154.
  100. ^ Oscar Theodore Barck Jr.; Nelson Manfred Blake (1969). Since 1900 A History of the United States in Our Times. New York: Macmillan Company. p. 754.
  101. ^ a b William F. Buckley Jr. (March 1, 2008). "Goldwater, the John Birch Society, and Me". Commentary. Retrieved March 9, 2008.
  102. ^ Stephen Earl, Bennett (1971). "Modes of Resolution of a 'Belief Dilemma' in the Ideology of the John Birch Society". Journal of Politics. 33 (3): 735–772. doi:10.2307/2128280. JSTOR 2128280. S2CID 154740758.
  103. ^ Dion Lefler (October 27, 2012). "Fluoride fight has long roots, passionate advocates". The Wichita Eagle. Retrieved December 8, 2016. The John Birch Society was an active participant in Wichita's 1964 referendum that repealed fluoridation after the City Commission had voted to implement it.
  104. ^ William Heisel (November 11, 2016). "Does fluoride have lessons for the vaccine debate?". Center for Health Journalism Newsletter. Retrieved December 8, 2016. From the 1940s through the 1960s, groups like the John Birch Society were vocal opponents of water fluoridation.
  105. ^ Coates, Paul (April 28, 1966). "It's a Day of Decision". Los Angeles Times. p. 3.
  106. ^ Stewart 2002, p. 430.
  107. ^ Prince, Gregory A. (2004). "The Red Peril, the Candy Maker, and the Apostle: David O. Mckay's Confrontation with Communism". Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. 37 (2): 37–94. doi:10.2307/45227582. JSTOR 45227582. S2CID 254391712.
  108. ^ "A Spectre Haunting Mormonism". Retrieved July 18, 2008.
  109. ^ Bove, Nicholas J. Jr. . Archived from the original on May 13, 2008. Retrieved July 18, 2008.
  110. ^ Robert Welch (1963). The Neutralizers. John Birch Society. p. 20.
  111. ^ Twelfth Report of the Senate Factfinding Subcommittee on Un-American Activities. Sacramento, California: Senate of the State of California. 1963. pp. 61–62.
  112. ^ Mulloy 2014, p. 63.
  113. ^ Mulloy 2014, p. 98.
  114. ^ Sullivan, Ronald (April 20, 1966). "Foes of Rising Birch Society Organize in Jersey". The New York Times. p. 1. Retrieved May 2, 2018.
  115. ^ Irvine, Janice M. (2004). Talk about Sex: the battles over sex education in the United States. Berkeley, California: University of California Press. p. 52. ISBN 9780520243293.
  116. ^ "The Radical Americans". American Archive of Public Broadcasting. Retrieved March 14, 2022.
  117. ^ Epstein, Benjamin R.; Forster, Arnold (1966). Report on the John Birch Society, 1966. Random House. p. 9.
  118. ^ What's Wrong with Civil Rights?. Belmont, MA: American Opinion. 1965. OCLC 56596124.
  119. ^ "The John Birch Society Asks: What's Wrong With Civil Rights?". The Post-Times. West Palm Beach, FL. October 31, 1965. p. A10 cols. 1–6. Retrieved January 30, 2011.[permanent dead link]
  120. ^ Russler, Brett (July 2, 2020). ""We aren't after a House Negro to prove our love for Black People": the complicated relationship between George S. Schuyler and the John Birch society". The Sixties. Informa UK Limited. 13 (2): 121–145. doi:10.1080/17541328.2020.1837494. ISSN 1754-1328. S2CID 226314820.
  121. ^ Berlet, Chip; Lyons, Matthew N. (March 8, 2018). Right-Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort. Guilford Publications. p. 181. ISBN 978-1-4625-3760-0.
  122. ^ Haiman, Franklyn Saul; Tedford, Thomas L.; Herbeck, Dale (2005). . Freedom Of Speech In The United States. Strata Publishing. ISBN 1-891136-10-0. Archived from the original on May 17, 2008. Retrieved May 12, 2008.
  123. ^ Hamilton, Neil A. (2009). The 1970s. Infobase Publishing. p. 87. ISBN 978-1-4381-0878-0.
  124. ^ Clarity, James F. (September 26, 1971). "Wallace, Here to 'Test the Atmosphere,' Attacks President and Mayor". The New York Times. Retrieved October 1, 2023.
  125. ^ Hudson, Richard (May 16, 1976). "Storm Over the Canal". The New York Times. Retrieved October 1, 2023.
  126. ^ Ruth Murray Brown, For a Christian America: A History of the Religious Right (Prometheus Books, 2002), pp. 49-51.
  127. ^ a b c Richard D. Lyons, Rightists Are Linked to Laetrile's Lobby, The New York Times (July 5, 1977).
  128. ^ a b Gerald E. Markle, James C. Petersen & Morton O.Wagenfeld, "Notes from the Cancer Underground: Participation in the Laetrile Movement," Social Science & Medicine (January 1978), Vol. 12: pp. 31-37.
  129. ^ a b c d Dorfman, Zach (December 2, 2018). "The Congressman Who Created His Own Deep State. Really". Politico. Retrieved January 4, 2019.
  130. ^ Glass, Andrew (December 9, 2017). "John Birch Society founded Dec 9, 1958". Politico. Retrieved November 12, 2019.
  131. ^ "US right-wing group disseminates lies against Weizmann Institute". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. January 9, 1967. Retrieved November 12, 2019.
  132. ^ Thomas Lansford, "John Birch Society" in Encyclopedia of American Religion and Politics (eds: Paul A. Djupe & Laura R. Olson; Facts on File, 2003), pp. 233-34.
  133. ^ Mulloy 2014, "Introduction": "by the mid-1990s the figure was down to fifteen thousand or twenty thousand (estimates are all that are available because the Society declined to release its official membership rolls)."
  134. ^ Stewart 2002, pp. 425–426, 441–444.
  135. ^ Lackmeyer, Steve (January 20, 1992). "Birch Society Sees Plot In "New World Order"". The Oklahoman. Retrieved May 11, 2022.
  136. ^ Stewart 2002, pp. 424–447.
  137. ^ Curtis, Bryan (October 31, 2017). "Remembering Baseball's Right-Wing Rotation". The Ringer. Retrieved July 26, 2022.
  138. ^ Oberdorfer, Don; Cannon, Lou (September 6, 1984). "Administration Calls for Ratification of Treaty Against Genocide". The Washington Post. Retrieved November 22, 2020.
  139. ^ Relations, United States Congress Senate Committee on Foreign (1985). Crime of Genocide: Hearing Before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, Ninety-ninth Congress, First Session, on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, March 5, 1985. U.S. Government Printing Office.
  140. ^ Spangler, Jerry; Bernick, Bob (June 16, 2003). "John Birch Society forges on in Utah". Deseret News.
  141. ^ see short biography from Claremont Review of Books
  142. ^ "Birch Informant Decries 'Influence' of Big Business". Deseret News. May 30, 1995. Retrieved August 23, 2022.
  143. ^ "States Conference Encounters Resistance". The Washington Post. March 27, 1995. Retrieved August 23, 2022.
  144. ^ "States' Rights Meeting Coming Under Attack Right-Wingers Undermining Plans, Idaho Lawmaker Says". The Spokesman-Review. April 25, 1995. Retrieved August 23, 2022.
  145. ^ Sullivan, Laurie (April 25, 1995). "States' Rights Backers Are Not Backing Down". The Salt Lake Tribune. Salt Lake City. p. D-2.
  146. ^ Berlet, Chip (March 10, 2008). "The North American Union Right-Wing Populist Conspiracism Rebounds". Political Research Associates. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
  147. ^ Just, Sara (February 19, 2010). . ABC News. Archived from the original on February 21, 2010. Retrieved February 6, 2016.
  148. ^ Sam Tanenhaus (October 19, 2010). The Death of Conservatism: A Movement and Its Consequences. Random House Digital, Inc. p. 121. ISBN 978-0-8129-8103-2.
  149. ^ Niquette, Mark (March 2, 2023). "Donald Trump Is a Star Among Ultra-Conservatives, But He Faces a New Test". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved March 7, 2023. Nearby, conference-goers could pick up Ginger Betty Bakery's $8 gingerbread Trump-shaped cookies while browsing booths set up by groups including the John Birch Society and Moms For America.
  150. ^ Monacelli, Steven (July 21, 2022). "The John Birch Society Sees a Renaissance in North Texas". The Texas Observer. Retrieved August 23, 2022.
  151. ^ Newman, Alex (January 1, 2018). "Deep State "Plan C" Is to Kill Trump, Advisor Roger Stone Warns". The New American. Retrieved January 5, 2019.
  152. ^ Levy, Pema (December 19, 2016). "Trump's Budget Director Pick Spoke at a John Birch Society Event". The New Republic. Retrieved January 5, 2019.
  153. ^ Farmer, Brian (October 8, 2008). "Ron Paul Addresses John Birch Society". The New American. Retrieved January 5, 2019.
  154. ^ Kirchick, James (February 27, 2009). "Yes, Ron Paul Is A Bircher". The New Republic. ISSN 0028-6583. Retrieved April 2, 2022.
  155. ^ Newman, Alex (October 8, 2018). "At John Birch Society's 60th Anniversary, Lawmakers Speak Out". The New American. Retrieved January 5, 2019.
  156. ^ Archived at Ghostarchive and the : Jones, Alex (host) (December 3, 2018). Infowars (radio/tv broadcast). Austin, Texas: Infowars. Retrieved January 5, 2018.
  157. ^ Archived at Ghostarchive and the : Jones, Alex (host) (January 10, 2017). Infowars (radio/tv broadcast). Austin, Texas: Infowars. Retrieved January 5, 2018.
  158. ^ Hardy, Madison (July 29, 2021). "Embracing Birch". Coeur d'Alene Press. Retrieved September 23, 2021.
  159. ^ Hardy, Madison (September 3, 2021). "Idaho GOP bursts Bircher bubble". Coeur d'Alene Press. Retrieved September 23, 2021.
  160. ^ Moseley-Morris, Kelcie (July 16, 2022). "Rep. Dorothy Moon becomes new chairwoman of Idaho Republican Party". Idaho Capital Sun. Retrieved January 7, 2023.
  161. ^ Baker, Mike (May 17, 2022). "A Fracture in Idaho's G.O.P. as the Far Right Seeks Control". The New York Times. Retrieved November 3, 2022.
  162. ^ Smith, David (May 11, 2022). "'Republican and more Republican': Idaho shifts ever rightward". The Guardian. Retrieved November 3, 2022. ...elections for other offices of state are more competitive between the hard right and harder right. ... Dorothy Moon, a member of the far-right John Birch Society, is a contender for secretary of state.
  163. ^ Kurt, Dylan (June 13, 2022). "'This is winnable'". manchesterpress.com. Retrieved November 3, 2022.
  164. ^ Helton, Elijah (July 16, 2022). "Unlikely allies leading anti-pipeline fight". The N'West Iowa REVIEW. Retrieved November 3, 2022.
  165. ^ Wolfson, Leo (August 17, 2023). "John Birch Society Says Wyoming Part Of Conservative Resurgence". Your Wyoming News Source. Retrieved August 31, 2023.
  166. ^ . John Birch Society. Archived from the original on October 11, 2016. Retrieved September 21, 2016.
  167. ^ "2019 FOREIGN NOT FOR PROFIT CORPORATION ANNUAL REPORT Entity Name:THE JOHN BIRCH SOCIETY INCORPORATED". sunbiz.org. Florida Department of State. February 22, 2019. Retrieved August 9, 2020. Title PRESIDENT Name OHLSON, MARTIN P
  168. ^ "The John Birch Society Leadership Team". John Birch Society. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  169. ^ "Bob Dylan walks out on The Ed Sullivan Show". History.com archive. Retrieved May 12, 2015.
  170. ^ Cart, Michael (March 15, 2012). "Carte Blanche: My Choice for President". Booklist. p. 51.
  171. ^ Dussere, E. (March 2003). "Subversion in the Swamp: Pogo and the Folk in the McCarthy Era". Journal of American Culture. 26 (1): 134–141. doi:10.1111/1542-734X.00081.
  172. ^ Clarence Lusane (January 23, 2013). The Black History of the White House. City Lights Books. pp. 332–. ISBN 978-0-87286-611-9.
  173. ^ Bailey, Ronald (December 5, 2001). ""Impurifying our precious bodily fluids"". Reason. Retrieved November 14, 2022.
  174. ^ "Uneasy Rider". Genius. Retrieved October 7, 2021.
  175. ^ Evans, Robert (December 15, 2020). "Part One: How The John Birch Society Invented The Modern Far Right". Stitcher. Retrieved October 7, 2021.

General and cited references Edit

  • Mulloy, D. J. (2014). The World of the John Birch Society: Conspiracy, Conservatism, and the Cold War. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press. ISBN 978-0826519818.
    • Mulloy, D. J. (2014a). "1. exposure". The World of the John Birch Society: Conspiracy, Conservatism, and the Cold War. Vanderbilt University Press. pp. 15–41. doi:10.2307/j.ctv1675660. ISBN 9780826519818. JSTOR j.ctv1675660.
  • Stewart, Charles J. (2002). "The Master Conspiracy of the John Birch Society: From Communism to the New World Order". Western Journal of Communication. 66 (4): 423–447. doi:10.1080/10570310209374748. S2CID 145081268.
  • Verhoeven, Bart (July 2015). The Rearguard of Freedom: The John Birch Society and the Development of Modern Conservatism in the United States, 1958–1968 (PDF) (PhD). University of Nottingham. Retrieved September 26, 2023.

Further reading Edit

Scholarly studies Edit

  • Lautz, Terry E (2016). John Birch: A Life. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0190262891.
  • McGirr, Lisa. Suburban Warriors: The Origins of the New American Right (2001), focus on Los Angeles suburbs in 1960s
  • Schoenwald, Jonathan M. (2002). A Time for Choosing: The Rise of Modern American Conservatism pp. 62–99 excerpt and text search, a national history of the party
  • Stone, Barbara S. "The John Birch Society: a Profile", Journal of Politics 1974 36(1): 184–197, JSTOR 2129115.
  • Wander, Philip. "The John Birch and Martin Luther King, Symbols in the Radical Right", Western Speech (Western Journal of Communication), 1971 35(1): 4–14.
  • Wilcox, Clyde. "Sources of Support for the Old Right: A Comparison of the John Birch Society and the Christian Anti-Communism Crusade". Social Science History 1988 12(4): 429–450, JSTOR 1171382.
  • Wright, Stuart A. Patriots, politics, and the Oklahoma City Bombing. Cambridge University Press. 2007. ISBN 978-0-521-87264-5.

Primary sources Edit

  • Gary Allen. None Dare Call It Conspiracy. G S G & Associates, Inc., 1971.
  • Griffin, G. Edward (1972). This is the John Birch Society; an invitation to membership. Thousand Oaks, Calif: American Media. ISBN 0-912986-04-2. OCLC 2192524.
  • McManus, John F. (2018). The John Birch Society: Its History Recounted by Someone Who Was There. Wakefield, Massachusetts: Overview Productions. ISBN 978-0692132968.
  • Robert W. Welch Jr. The New Americanism and Other Speeches. Boston: Western Islands, 1966.
  • Welch, Robert (1961). The blue book of the John Birch Society. Boston: Western Islands. ISBN 0-88279-105-2. OCLC 16903114.
  • Welch, Robert (1964). The Politician. Belmont, Massachusetts: Belmont Publishing. ISBN 99908-64-98-5. OCLC 376165.
  • Welch, Robert (1964). The White Book of the John Birch Society for 1964. Belmont, Massachusetts: John Birch Society. OCLC 21571870.
  • Welch, Robert (1966). The New Americanism and Other Speeches. Boston: Western Islands. ISBN 0-88279-211-3.

Criticizing the John Birch Society Edit

  • Buckley, William F. Jr. (March 2008). "Goldwater, the John Birch Society, and Me". Commentary.
  • Conner, Claire (2013). Wrapped in the Flag: A Personal History of America's Radical Right. Boston: Beacon Press. ISBN 978-0807077504. OCLC 930959176.
  • 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 Wing: Readings in Political Behavior. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. OCLC 470572700.
  • Hardisty, Jean V. (1999). Mobilizing Resentment: Conservative Resurgence from the John Birch Society to the Promise Keepers. Boston: Beacon Press.

External links Edit

 
Wikimedia Commons has media related to John Birch Society.
  • Official website  
  • The New American, JBS biweekly publication which publishes the Freedom Index August 27, 2017, at the Wayback Machine congressional scorecard twice a year
  • John Birch Society at Political Research Associates
  • "What Is the John Birch Society?", short excerpt of a film, released c. 1965, of Robert W. Welch Jr., explaining why he founded the John Birch Society and its aims.
  • Rating group positions by year at Project Vote Smart

October 24, 2023
john, birch, society, american, right, wing, political, advocacy, group, founded, 1958, anti, communist, supports, social, conservatism, associated, with, ultraconservative, radical, right, right, libertarian, ideas, abbreviationjbsnamed, afterjohn, birchforma. The John Birch Society JBS is an American right wing political advocacy group 1 Founded in 1958 it is anti communist 2 3 supports social conservatism 2 3 and is associated with ultraconservative radical right far right and libertarian ideas 12 John Birch SocietyAbbreviationJBSNamed afterJohn BirchFormationDecember 9 1958 64 years ago 1958 12 09 FounderRobert W Welch Jr Founded atIndianapolis Indiana USTypenonprofitTax ID no 04 2256334Legal status501 c 3 Purposepolitical advocacy group anti communism paleoconservatism right wing politicsHeadquartersGrand Chute Wisconsin U S Chief executive officerBill HahnChairmanClark CurryPresidentMartin OhlsonSubsidiariesThe New AmericanAffiliationsAmerican Opinion Foundation FreedomProject AcademyWebsitejbs wbr orgThe society s founder businessman Robert W Welch Jr 1899 1985 developed an organizational infrastructure of nationwide chapters in December 1958 The society rose quickly in membership and influence and was controversial for its promotion of conspiracy theories 3 13 An expose on the JBS in 1960 highlighting Welch s allegation that President Dwight D Eisenhower was a communist agent led to widespread notoriety for the society 14 15 16 In the 1960s the conservative William F Buckley Jr and National Review pushed for the JBS to be exiled to the fringes of the American right 17 13 JBS membership is kept private but it is said to have neared 100 000 in the 1960s and 1970s declining afterward 3 18 19 More recently Jeet Heer has argued in The New Republic that while the organization s influence peaked in the 1970s Bircherism and its legacy of conspiracy theories have become the dominant strain in the conservative movement 20 Politico has asserted that the JBS began making a resurgence in the mid 2010s 19 while observers have stated that the JBS and its beliefs shaped the Republican Party the Trump administration and the broader conservative movement 21 22 Originally based in Belmont Massachusetts the John Birch Society is now headquartered in Grand Chute Wisconsin 23 with local chapters throughout the United States It owns American Opinion Publishing Inc which publishes the magazine The New American 7 and it is affiliated with an online school called FreedomProject Academy 24 Contents 1 Political positions 1 1 Influence on conservatism 2 History 2 1 Origins 2 1 1 John Birch 2 1 2 Founding and beliefs 2 2 Eisenhower issue 2 3 1960s 2 3 1 Opposition to civil rights 2 4 1970s 2 5 1980s and 1990s 2 6 2000 present 3 Officers 3 1 Chairmen and presidents 3 2 CEOs 4 In popular culture 5 See also 6 References 7 General and cited references 8 Further reading 8 1 Scholarly studies 8 2 Primary sources 8 2 1 Criticizing the John Birch Society 9 External linksPolitical positions EditThe John Birch Society from its start opposed collectivism as a cancer and by extension communism and big government 25 26 Allegations that Insiders have conspired to control the United States through communism and world government are a recurring theme of its publications 27 The organization and its founder Robert Welch promoted Americanism as the philosophical antithesis of Communism 28 It contended that the United States is a republic not a democracy and argued that states rights should supersede those of the federal government 29 Welch infused constitutionalist and classical liberal principles in addition to his conspiracy theories into the JBS s ideology and rhetoric 30 In 1983 Congressman Larry McDonald then the society s newly appointed chairman characterized the JBS as belonging to the Old Right rather than the New Right 31 The society opposes one world government the United Nations 32 the North American Free Trade Agreement NAFTA the Central America Free Trade Agreement CAFTA the Free Trade Area of the Americas FTAA and other free trade agreements It argues the U S Constitution has been devalued in favor of political and economic globalization It has cited the existence of the former Security and Prosperity Partnership as evidence of a push towards a North American Union 33 34 The JBS has sought to reduce immigration citation needed The JBS opposed the civil rights movement of the 1960s and the women s Equal Rights Amendment in the 1970s 13 35 36 It has campaigned for state nullification 37 38 It opposes efforts to call an Article V convention to amend the U S Constitution 39 40 and it has been influential at promoting opposition to it among Republican legislators 41 The JBS supports auditing and eventually dismantling the Federal Reserve System 42 The JBS holds that the United States Constitution gives only Congress the ability to coin money and does not permit it to delegate this power or to transform the dollar into a fiat currency not backed by gold or silver non primary source needed Its publication The New American has described what it sees as American moral decline and threats to the family including abortion birth control divorce drugs homosexuality crime violence secular humanism teenage pregnancy teen suicide environmentalism feminism and pornography 43 The JBS has alleged that moral degeneracy is perpetrated by a conspiracy to make the United States vulnerable to internationalism 44 The JBS has been described as ultraconservative 4 far right 7 45 extremist 46 and fringe 47 The Southern Poverty Law Center SPLC lists the society as a Patriot group a group that advocate s or adhere s to extreme antigovernment doctrines 48 In 1968 a notable faction of JBS members expressed opposition towards desegregation efforts and demonstrated solidarity with white nationalist groups such as the Southern White Citizens Council by actively participating in related protests particularly in support of George Wallace 49 50 51 Both the SPLC and the Anti Defamation League of B nai B rith have ascertained the existence in the past of antisemitic and racist elements such as Revilo P Oliver and Eric D Butler 51 52 By the 1990s the JBS was perceived as more mainstream conservative than in the 1960s 53 It has also been associated with the libertarian movement 10 11 and business nationalism 54 The society s worldview was noted in the early 2000s for influencing the American militia movement although the JBS had not publicly called for paramilitary training 55 56 57 Extremism expert George Michael wrote that a virtual who s who of the American radical right had at one time or another sojourned in the JBS 55 Influence on conservatism Edit The JBS contributed to the development of modern American conservatism through its organizational tactics and its promotion of right wing political views 58 Despite never considering itself a religious organization the JBS played a role in the rise of the Moral Majority and the Christian right as major political forces ideologically and tactically influencing multiple leaders in that movement including Tim LaHaye and Phyllis Schlafly 59 The historian D J Mulloy wrote in 2014 that the JBS has served as a kind of bridge between the Old Right including the McCarthyites of the 1940s 50s the New Right of the 1970s 80s and the Tea Party right of the 21st century 25 Professor Edward H Miller wrote that Welch and the JBS were never excommunicated from conservatism and that the ideas of the John Birch Society paved the way for the conservatism of the twentieth century and shaped events in the twenty first century 60 8 10 Miller also credits JBS with helping stop the ERA and setting the stage for the Reagan Era 60 330 347 351 while Mulloy states that the JBS played an essential role in the revitalization of conservatism 61 and trained a generation of conservative activists 24 According to Professor Matthew Dallek modern American conservatism bear s the imprint of the John Birch Society 62 2 JBS took an early stance in opposing abortion and social liberalism 60 347 357 360 and its TRIM committees which supported lower taxes helped lead to the Reagan tax cuts 60 361 64 63 By the early 2020s multiple commentators and academics argued that the John Birch Society and its beliefs had successfully taken over the Republican Party and the broader conservative movement 21 22 64 65 History EditOrigins Edit The John Birch Society was established on December 9 1958 66 in Indianapolis Indiana at the conclusion of a two day session of a group of 12 people led by Robert W Welch Jr Welch was a retired candy manufacturer from Belmont Massachusetts who had been a state Republican Party official and had unsuccessfully run in its 1950 lieutenant governor primary 3 67 68 In 1954 Welch wrote the first book about John Birch an Air Force intelligence officer and Baptist missionary titled The Life of John Birch He organized an anti Communist society to promote less government more responsibility and a better world 67 He named his new organization in memory of Birch saying that Birch was an unknown but dedicated anti Communist and the first American casualty of the Cold War 69 Welch alleged that a Communist conspiracy within the American government had suppressed the truth about Birch s killing 15 John Birch Edit John Birch was an American Baptist who went to China as a missionary in 1940 when the Japanese invasion had created suffering and chaos He was a U S military intelligence officer under Brigadier General Claire Chennault in China Chennault commanded the Flying Tigers and afterwards U S Army Air Forces units in China In April 1942 Birch helped Lieutenant Colonel Doolittle and his flight crew and other crews a few days after they bailed out of their B 25 bomber over Japanese held territory in China Sixteen B 25s led by Doolittle bombed Tokyo Doolittle raid off the Navy aircraft carrier USS Hornet during the United States first attack on Japan 70 Beginning in July 1942 Birch who spoke Chinese became an Army intelligence officer He operated alone or with Nationalist Chinese soldiers and regularly risked his life in Japanese held territory in China His many activities included setting up Chinese agent and radio intelligence networks and rescuing downed American pilots he had two emergency aircraft runways built 70 Although he suffered from malaria he refused furloughs 70 In 1945 Birch was promoted to captain and began working in China both for and with the OSS the U S wartime intelligence service in World War II 70 In August after the Japanese surrendered Birch was ordered by the OSS to northern China to obtain the surrender of the Japanese commanders at their installations On August 24 nine days after the war Birch left by train with his party which included two American soldiers five Chinese officers and two Koreans who spoke Japanese 70 After spending a night in a village the party proceeded by handcar the next morning and ran into a group of 300 armed Chinese Communists Birch and his Chinese officer aide approached them and were told to surrender their weapons and the group s equipment Birch refused and after arguing about it with their commander they were allowed to proceed Along the way Birch s party encountered more groups of Communists The party arrived at a train station at Hwang Kao which was occupied by more Chinese Communists 70 Birch requested to speak with their leader Birch and his aide approached the group s leader and after Birch refused to give up his sidearm both were beaten and shot Birch s corpse was bayonetted 70 The rest of Birch s party were taken prisoner Birch s aide survived and the prisoners were later released 70 Birch s remains were recovered and a Catholic burial service was held with military honors on a hillside outside of Suzhou in eastern China 70 The Chinese Communists who were active in northern China and Manchuria were supposedly WWII allies with the United States Birch believed that Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communists intended to take over China after the war and move into Korea 70 There were different explanations and theories as to why Birch was killed ranging from his party showing up at Hwang Kao instead of Ninchuan Birch s scheduled meeting with Chinese puppet troops of the Sixth Army under General Hu Peng chu misunderstanding by local guerillas and provocation from Birch himself 71 Founding and beliefs Edit The founding members of the JBS included Harry Lynde Bradley co founder of the Allen Bradley Company and the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation 72 73 Fred C Koch founder of Koch Industries 74 75 76 77 and Robert Waring Stoddard President of Wyman Gordon a major industrial enterprise 78 Another was Revilo P Oliver a University of Illinois professor who was later expelled from the Society and helped found the National Alliance Koch became one of the organization s primary financial supporters According to investigative journalist Jane Mayer Koch s sons David and Charles Koch were also members of the JBS However both left it before the 1970s 79 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 prospective member receiving a copy 80 According to Welch both the U S and Soviet governments are controlled by the same furtive conspiratorial cabal of internationalists greedy bankers and corrupt politicians If left unexposed the traitors inside the U S government would betray the country s sovereignty to the United Nations for a collectivist New World Order managed by a one world socialist government 81 82 Welch saw collectivism as the main threat to western culture and American liberals as secret Communist traitors who provided cover for the gradual process of collectivism with the ultimate goal of replacing the nations of western civilization with a one world socialist government 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 82 Welch predicted that you have only a few more years before the country in which you live will become four separate provinces in a world wide Communist dominion ruled by police state methods from the Kremlin 2 The JBS was organized to be in Welch s words under completely authoritative control at all levels It incorporated aspects of business hierarchies and also the Communist cells Welch opposed but whose discipline he admired Chapters of 10 to 20 members each had a leader appointed from above and were expected to meet twice a month Members of chapters that grew larger than 20 members were expected to break off and form a new small chapter 3 The activities of the JBS include distributing literature pamphlets magazines videos and other material the society also sponsors a Speaker s Bureau which invites speakers who are keenly aware of the motivations that drive political policy 83 One of the first public activities of the society 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 84 The society also alleged that Communists and UN supporters were conducting an assault on Christmas to destroy all religious beliefs and customs 13 In 1960 Welch advised JBS members to Join your local P T A at the beginning of the school year get your conservative friends to do likewise and go to work to take it over 85 One Man s Opinion 86 a magazine launched by Welch in 1956 was renamed American Opinion 87 In 1965 Welch established a JBS affiliated publication known as The Review of the News which was intended for a larger readership and covered news 88 In 1985 these magazines merged into The New American a biweekly magazine published by the Society 89 Eisenhower issue Edit For the first eighteen months of its existence JBS operated in relative obscurity 14 Then in July 1960 the Chicago Daily News published a relatively in depth story on the Society including the contention of founder Robert Welch that President Dwight D Eisenhower was a dedicated conscious agent of the communist conspiracy in the United States For the next few years Birchers found themselves at the center of a storm of controversy 14 Welch had first made the statement in 1954 when he wrote in a widely circulated statement The Politician Could Eisenhower really be simply a smart politician entirely without principles and hungry for glory who is only the tool of the Communists The answer is yes He went on With regard to Eisenhower it is difficult to avoid raising the question of deliberate treason 90 The controversial paragraph was removed before final publication of The Politician 91 The sensationalism of Welch s charges against Eisenhower prompted several conservatives and Republicans most prominently Goldwater and the intellectuals of William F Buckley s circle to renounce outright or quietly shun the group Buckley 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 Birch Society 92 From then on Buckley became the leading intellectual spokesman and organizer of the anti Bircher conservatives 93 Buckley s biographer John B Judis wrote that Buckley was beginning to worry that with the John Birch Society growing so rapidly the right wing upsurge in the country would take an ugly even Fascist turn rather than leading toward the kind of conservatism National Review had promoted 93 Despite Buckley s opposition the author Edward H Miller wrote the JBS remained a force in the conservative movement and arguments to the contrary are greatly exaggerated 60 211 258 The booklet found support from Ezra Taft Benson then Eisenhower s Secretary of Agriculture and later the 13th President of the LDS Church In a letter to his friend FBI chief J Edgar Hoover Benson asked how can a man Eisenhower who seems to be so strong for Christian principles and base American concepts be so effectively used as a tool to serve the Communist conspiracy Benson privately fought to prevent the Bureau from condemning the JBS which prompted Hoover to distance himself from Benson At one point in 1971 Hoover directed his staff to lie to Benson to avoid having to meet with him about the issue 94 1960s Edit In the 1960s the JBS became known as a right wing organization with an anti Communist ideology 70 It was moderately active in that decade with numerous chapters but rarely engaged in coalition building with other conservatives It was rejected by most conservatives because of Welch s conspiracy theories The philosopher Ayn Rand said in a 1964 Playboy interview I consider the Birch Society futile because they are not for capitalism but merely against Communism I gather they believe that the disastrous state of today s world is caused by a Communist conspiracy This is childishly naive and superficial No country can be destroyed by a mere conspiracy it can be destroyed only by ideas 95 96 Some historians have said the JBS had a large role in 1960s politics and functioned much like a third party forcing the GOP the Democrats and conservatives of all types to respond to its agenda in Jonathan M Schoenwald s words 97 98 By March 1961 the JBS had 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 According to Political Research Associates a non profit research group that investigates the far right the society pioneered grassroots lobbying combining educational meetings petition drives and letter writing campaigns 82 Rick Perlstein described its main activity in the 1960s as monthly meetings to watch a film by Welch followed by writing postcards or letters to government officials linking specific policies to the Communist menace 99 One early campaign against the second summit between the United States and the Soviet Union which urged President Dwight D Eisenhower If you go don t come back 3 generated over 600 000 postcards and letters according to the society In 1961 Welch offered 2 300 in prizes to college students for the best essays on grounds of impeachment of Chief Justice Warren a prime target of ultra conservatives 100 A June 1964 society campaign to oppose Xerox corporate sponsorship of TV programs favorable to the UN produced 51 279 letters from 12 785 individuals 82 By the middle of the decade it had 400 American Opinion bookstores selling its literature 2 In 1962 William F Buckley Jr editor of the National Review an influential conservative magazine denounced Welch and the John Birch Society as far removed from common sense and urged the GOP to purge itself of Welch s influence 101 In the late 1960s Welch insisted that the Johnson administration s war against Communist guerillas and North Vietnamese troops in Vietnam which was unpopular among liberals and leftists but not among conservatives was part of a Communist plot aimed at taking over the United States Welch demanded that the United States get out of Vietnam thus aligning the Society with the left 102 The society opposed water fluoridation which it called mass medicine and a Communist effort to destroy American children 103 104 105 106 Former Eisenhower cabinet member Ezra Taft Benson a leading Mormon spoke in favor of the JBS but in January 1963 The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints issued a statement distancing itself from the Society 107 Antisemitic racist anti Mormon anti Masonic groups criticized the organization s acceptance of Jews non whites Masons and Mormons as members These opponents accused Welch of harboring feminist ecumenical and evolutionary ideas 108 109 non primary source needed Welch rejected these accusations by his detractors All we are interested in here is opposing the advance of the Communists and eventually destroying the whole Communist conspiracy so that Jews and Christians alike and Mohammedans and Buddhists can again have a decent world in which to live 110 non primary source needed In a 1963 report the California Senate Factfinding Subcommittee on Un American Activities following an investigation into the JBS found no evidence it was a secret fascist subversive un American or anti Semitic organization 111 112 In 1964 Welch favored Barry Goldwater for the Republican presidential nomination but the membership split with two thirds supporting Goldwater and one third supporting Richard Nixon who did not run A number of Birch members and their allies were Goldwater supporters in 1964 101 and a hundred of them were delegates at the 1964 Republican National Convention 113 In April 1966 a New York Times article on New Jersey and the society voiced in part a concern for 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 114 It then characterized the society as by far the most successful and respectable radical right 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 The JBS also opposed the creation of the first sex education curriculum in the United States through a division called the Movement to Restore Decency MOTOREDE 115 Surviving MOTOREDE pamphlets date from 1967 to 1971 Additionally the JBS advocated against other manifestations of social liberalism including abortion 60 347 357 360 John Birch Society members and activities were featured in The Radical Americans a series produced by National Educational Television NET and WGBH TV that aired in 1966 on NET outlets 116 JBS membership peaked in 1965 or 1966 at an estimated 100 000 3 Opposition to civil rights Edit The JBS opposed the 1960s civil rights movement and claimed the movement had Communists in important positions In the latter half of 1965 the JBS produced a flyer titled What s Wrong With Civil Rights and used the flyer as a newspaper advertisement 117 118 In the piece one of the answers was For the civil rights movement in the United States with all of its growing agitation and riots and bitterness and insidious steps towards the appearance of a civil war has not been infiltrated by the Communists as you now frequently hear It has been deliberately and almost wholly created by the Communists patiently building up to this present stage for more than forty years 119 The society believed that the ultimate aim of the civil rights movement was the creation of a Soviet Negro Republic in the southeastern United States 35 and opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 claiming it violated the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and overstepped individual states rights to enact laws regarding civil rights Some prominent black conservatives such as George Schuyler and Manning Johnson joined forces with the JBS during this period and echoed the Society s rhetoric about the civil rights movement and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 120 As part of their opposition to civil rights the JBS launched a Support Your Local Police campaign in the mid 1960s The campaign openly advocated against the use of federal officers to enforce civil rights laws 121 1970s Edit By 1976 the JBS had 90 000 members 240 paid staffers and a 7 million dollar annual budget according to a paper written by libertarian conservative tycoon Charles Koch 18 The JBS was at the center of a free speech law case in the 1970s after American Opinion accused a Chicago lawyer Elmer Gertz who was 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 a state may allow a private figure such as Gertz to recover actual damages from a media defendant without proving malice but that a public figure does have to prove actual malice according to the standard laid out in New York Times Co v Sullivan in order to recover presumed damages or punitive damages 122 The court ordered a retrial in which Gertz prevailed Key causes of the JBS in the 1970s included opposition to both the Occupational Safety and Health Administration OSHA and to the establishment of diplomatic ties with the People s Republic of China The JBS claimed that Nixon s visit to Mainland China had humiliated the American people and betrayed our anti communist allies and that it was the primary supplier of illicit heroin into the United States 123 124 The society also was opposed to transferring control of the Panama Canal from American to Panamanian sovereignty 125 The John Birch Society along with other conservative groups such as the Eagle Forum and the Christian right successfully opposed the Equal Rights Amendment in the 1970s 126 36 JBS played a key role in stopping the ERA s ratification on par with Phyllis Schlafly herself a JBS member and it organized opposition to it across the nation 60 347 351 JBS accused the ERA s supporters of subversion asserting that the ERA was part of a Communist plot to reduce human beings to living at the same level as animals 36 The JBS advocated for lower taxes including reducing the federal income tax rate By 1977 it had established over 200 TRIM Tax Relief Immediately committees across the U S 60 361 64 In the 1970s the JBS played a prominent role in promoting the false claim that laetrile was a cancer cure and in advocating for the legalization of the compound as a drug 127 128 A New York Times review in 1977 found JBS and other far right groups were involved in pro laetrile campaigns in at least nine states 127 Virtually all of the officers of the Committee for Freedom of Choice in Cancer Therapy the leading pro laetrile group were JBS members 128 Congressman and Birch Society leader Lawrence P McDonald was involved in the campaign as a member of the committee 127 129 The JBS also opposed Earth Day suggesting that it was a Communist plot and noting that the first celebration fell on the 100th anniversary of Vladimir Lenin s birth 13 The JBS was organized into local chapters during this period Ernest Brosang a New Jersey regional coordinator claimed that it was virtually impossible for opponents of the society to penetrate its policy making levels thereby protecting it from anti American takeover attempts Its activities included the distribution of literature critical of civil rights legislation warnings over the influence of the United Nations and the release of petitions to impeach United States Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren To spread their message members held showings of documentary films and operated initiatives such as Let Freedom Ring a nationwide network of recorded telephone messages 130 131 1980s and 1990s Edit nbsp A sign advocating America s withdrawal produced by the John Birch SocietyAfter the Vietnam War the JBS s membership and influence declined This decline continued through the 1980s and 1990s due to Welch s death in 1985 at age 85 and the end of the Cold War in 1991 132 16 By the mid 1990s membership in the JBS was estimated between 15 000 and 20 000 133 While other anti Communist organizations faded away following the Cold War s end the JBS survived and experienced some growth in the 1990s 134 News reports said President George H W Bush s invocation of a new world order during the 1991 Gulf War gave the society a new audience 135 136 The society consolidated its national office in Appleton Wisconsin the birthplace of Senator Joseph McCarthy 2 In 1984 three members of the San Diego Padres Eric Show Mark Thurmond and Dave Dravecky revealed they were members of the JBS 137 The society campaigned against the ratification of the Genocide Convention arguing it would erode U S national sovereignty 138 139 The JBS continued to press for an end to United States membership in the United Nations As evidence of its effectiveness the society pointed to the Utah State Legislature s failed resolution calling for United States withdrawal as well as the actions of several other states where the society s membership was active 140 The second head of the JBS was Congressman Larry McDonald D from Georgia McDonald s first wife estimated that over the years he had hosted 10 000 people in his living room for Bircher inspired lectures and documentaries 129 In 1982 McDonald was appointed as national chairman of the Society 129 McDonald was killed in 1983 when airliner KAL 007 was shot down by a Soviet interceptor 129 William P Hoar a writer for the JBS who has attacked mainstream politicians from Franklin D Roosevelt to George W Bush published regularly in The New American and its predecessor American Opinion He coauthored The Clinton Clique with Larry Abraham alleging that Clinton was part of the Anglo American conspiracy supposedly ruled through the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission The Birch Society publications arm Western Islands published his Architects of Conspiracy An Intriguing History 1984 and Huntington House Publishers published his Handouts and Pickpockets Our Government Gone Berserk 1996 141 better source needed In 1995 the JBS campaigned against plans for a Conference of States proponents said such a conference would reduce federal powers but the JBS feared it would lead to a second Constitutional Convention 142 143 144 145 2000 present Edit In the mid 2000s the JBS along with the Eagle Forum mobilized conservative opposition to a so called North American Union and the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America As a result of two organizations activities 23 state legislatures saw bills introduced condemning an NAU while the Bush and Obama administrations were deterred from any grand initiatives 34 In 2007 The New American published a special issue devoted to the topic approximately 500 000 copies were distributed 146 The JBS also advocated for U S withdrawal from the UN 32 The JBS was a co sponsor of the 2010 Conservative Political Action Conference CPAC ending its decades long distance from the mainstream conservative movement 147 148 24 It attended CPAC in 2023 149 Although JBS membership numbers are kept private it reported a resurgence of members in the 2010s and 2020s specifically in Texas 19 150 A 2017 article in Politico describing the group s activities in Texas listed some of its stances as opposing the UN s Agenda 21 based on a conspiracy theory that it will establish control over all human activity opposing a bill that would allow people who entered the United States illegally to pay in state college tuition pulling the United States out of NAFTA returning America to what the group calls its Christian foundations and abolishing the federal departments of education and energy 19 Political commentator Jeet Heer argued in 2016 that Trumpism is essentially Bircherism 20 Trump confidant and longtime advisor Roger Stone said that Trump s father Fred Trump was a financier of the JBS and a personal friend of founder Robert Welch 151 Trump s former Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney was the speaker at the John Birch Society s National Council dinner shortly before joining the Trump administration 152 Former Congressman Ron Paul R Texas has had a long and close relationship with the JBS celebrating its work in his 2008 keynote speech at its 50th anniversary event and saying that the JBS was leading the fight to restore freedom 153 self published source 154 The keynote speaker at the organization s 60th anniversary celebration was Congressman Thomas Massie R Kentucky who maintained a near perfect score on the JBS s Freedom Index ranking of members of Congress 155 self published source Right wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones who hosted Trump on his Infowars radio show and claimed to have a personal relationship with the president called Trump a John Birch Society president 156 and previously said Trump was more John Birch Society than the John Birch Society 157 better source needed In July 2021 the Republican central committees of Kootenai County Idaho and Benewah County Idaho unanimously approved resolutions calling JBS a valuable organization that is dedicated to restoring the Republic according to the vision of the Founding Fathers 158 The Idaho Republican Party declined to endorse the resolutions 159 though the party elected a JBS member Dorothy Moon as chair in July 2022 160 The JBS had been active in Idaho 161 162 In 2022 the JBS campaigned against carbon capture pipelines in Iowa arguing they threatened property rights 163 164 The JBS is affiliated with FreedomProject Academy an online school based on Judeo Christian values Between 2011 and 2020 its enrollment grew from 22 to 1 000 students 24 The JBS publishes the Freedom Index which rates members of Congress and state legislators based on their adherence to constitutional principles of limited government fiscal responsibility national sovereignty and a traditional foreign policy of avoiding foreign entanglements 165 Officers EditThis section needs additional citations for verification Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources in this section Unsourced material may be challenged and removed Find sources John Birch Society news newspapers books scholar JSTOR December 2019 Learn how and when to remove this template message Chairmen and presidents Edit Robert W Welch Jr 1958 1983 Larry McDonald 1983 a U S Representative who was killed in the KAL 007 shootdown incident Robert W Welch Jr 1983 1985 Charles R Armour 1985 1991 John F McManus 1991 2004 G Vance Smith 2004 2005 John F McManus 2005 2016 Ray Clark 2016 2019 166 Martin Ohlson 2019 present 167 CEOs Edit G Allen Bubolz 1988 1991 G Vance Smith 1991 2005 Arthur R Thompson 2005 2020 Bill Hahn 2020 present 168 In popular culture EditPete Seeger lampooned the John Birch Society with a song called The Jack Ash Society recorded on his 1961 Folkways Records LP album Gazette Vol 2 The name is a pun On the surface it s changing the name from one type of tree birch to another ash However the name Jack Ash also sounds like the word jackass which means a foolish person citation needed In 1962 Bob Dylan recorded Talkin John Birch Paranoid Blues which poked fun at the society and its tendency to see Communist conspiracies in many situations When he attempted to perform it on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1963 however CBS s Standards and Practices department forbade it fearing that lyrics equating the Society s views with those of Adolf Hitler might trigger a defamation lawsuit Dylan was offered the opportunity to perform a different song but he responded that if he could not sing the number of his choice he would rather not appear at all The story generated widespread media attention in the days that followed Sullivan denounced the network s decision in published interviews 169 Pogo cartoonist Walt Kelly lampooned the American anti Communist movement and the John Birch Society in particular in a series of strips collected in 1962 in The Jack Acid Society Black Book 170 171 In 1962 The Chad Mitchell Trio recorded a satirical song The John Birch Society which made its way to no 99 in the Billboard Hot 100 citation needed When jazz trumpeter John Birks Dizzy Gillespie launched a joke presidential campaign in 1963 fans created a John Birks Society to campaign for him 172 In the 1964 film Dr Strangelove a deranged U S Air Force general claims that water fluoridation would sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids and is part of a communist conspiracy a parody of JBS claims 173 The 1973 song Uneasy Rider by Charlie Daniels contains a reference to Brother John Birch in the lyrics 174 In 2020 American journalist Robert Evans released a multi part series on his podcast Behind the Bastards entitled How The John Birch Society Invented the Modern Far Right 175 See also Edit nbsp Conservatism portal nbsp Libertarianism portalGranville Knight Rousas Rushdoony W Cleon Skousen American conservatism Paleoconservatism Christian rightReferences Edit Webster s guide to American history a chronological geographical and biographical survey and compendium Springfield Mass G amp C Merriam Co 1971 p 576 ISBN 978 0877790815 a b c d e Stewart 2002 pp 423 447 a b c d e f g h Mulloy 2014 p page needed a b Lunsford J Lynn February 4 2009 Business Bookshelf Piles of Green From Black Gold The Wall Street Journal p A 11 Haddock Sharon March 21 2009 Beck s backing bumps Skousen book to top Deseret News Salt Lake City Utah Byrd Shelia May 25 2008 Churches tackle tough topic of race Sunday Gazette Mail Charleston W V p C 5 Blumenthal Max 2010 Republican Gomorrah inside the movement that shattered the party New York Nation Books p 332 ISBN 978 1568584171 Skousen s vocal support for the Far right John Birch Society s claim that Communists controlled President Dwight Eisenhower cost him the support of the corporate backers who had paid for his Red bashing lecture tours Eatwell Roger 2004 Introduction The new extreme right challenge Western Democracies and The New Extreme Right challenge Routledge p 7 ISBN 978 1134201570 Potok Mark 2004 The American radical right The 1990s and beyond Western Democracies and The New Extreme Right challenge Routledge p 43 ISBN 978 1134201570 a b c Levine Deborah Brenman Marc November 15 2019 The Local Global Context When Hate Groups March Down Main Street Engaging a Community Response Rowman amp Littlefield ISBN 978 1 5381 3266 1 via Google Books there are fierce objections on the extreme right to initiatives related to international collaboration This attitude is typified by The New American TNA a print magazine published by American Opinion Publishing Inc a subsidiary of the John Birch Society JBS a far right organization Bernstein Richard May 21 2007 The JFK assassination and a 60s leftist prism Letter from America International Herald Tribune Paris p 2 Jordan Ida Kay August 26 2001 Voters Admired N C Senator s Independent Streak Southern Charm The Virginian Pilot Norfolk Va p J 1 Brinkley Douglas February 10 1997 The Right Choice for the C I A The New York Times p A 15 Webb Clive Rabble rousers the American far right in the civil rights era Athens GA University of Georgia Press 2010 ISBN 0820327646 p 10 a b Tanenhaus Sam Rutenberg Jim January 25 2014 Rand Paul s Mixed Inheritance The New York Times Retrieved August 5 2021 a b Kaminer Wendy March 18 2010 Will the Right Find Libertarianism The Atlantic Retrieved August 5 2021 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 a b c d e Chapman Roger 2010 Culture Wars An Encyclopedia of Issues Viewpoints and Voices M E Sharpe pp 58 91 148 ISBN 978 0765617613 a b c Mulloy 2014a p 15 a b Mallon Thomas January 4 2016 A View from the Fringe The John Birch Society and the rise of the radical right The New Yorker Retrieved April 7 2022 a b Stewart 2002 p 425 Regnery Alfred S 2008 Upstream The Ascendance of American Conservatism Simon and Schuster p 79 ISBN 978 1416522881 a b Jane Mayer Dark Money p 55 a b c d Savage John July 16 2017 The John Birch Society Is Back Politico Retrieved January 4 2019 a b Heer Jeet June 14 2016 Donald Trump s United States of Conspiracy The New Republic Retrieved February 11 2018 a b Miller Edward H January 9 2022 Op Ed Today s right wing conspiracy theory mentality can be traced back to the John Birch Society Los Angeles Times Retrieved April 19 2022 a b Lehmann Chris November 23 2021 We All Live in the John Birch Society s World Now The New Republic Retrieved April 19 2022 Dan Barry June 25 2009 Holding Firm Against Plots by Evildoers The New York Times Retrieved April 4 2010 a b c d Leonard Collin February 22 2023 Is this the death of the John Birch Society or its renaissance Deseret News Retrieved March 7 2023 a b Mulloy 2014 p 11 Stewart 2002 pp 428 429 436 441 442 Stewart 2002 Celestini Carmen 2018 God Country and Christian Conservatives The National Association of Manufacturers the John Birch Society and the Rise of the Christian Right PDF PhD University of Waterloo pp 10 114 116 124 126 Stewart 2002 pp 428 429 Verhoeven 2015 pp 3 56 57 103 Larry McDonald on the New World Order Television Crossfire May 1983 Event occurs at 2 22 a b Spangler Jerry D Bernick Bob Jr June 16 2003 John Birch Society forges on in Utah Deseret News Retrieved July 26 2022 Farmer Brian September 17 2007 The North American Union Conspiracy Theory or Conspiracy Fact The John Birch Society Archived from the original on October 20 2007 Retrieved September 20 2011 a b Pastor Robert 2011 The North American Idea A Vision of a Continental Future New York Oxford University Press USA pp 11 76 ISBN 978 0 19 978241 3 OCLC 741646639 a b Hill Gladwin August 16 1963 Birch Head Sees Red Rights Plot The New York Times Retrieved November 5 2020 a b c Rhode Deborah L 2009 Justice and Gender Harvard University Press pp 63 70 71 ISBN 9780674042674 T he John Birch Society perceived the amendment as an integral part of Communist plans at work in a now vast effort to reduce human beings to the same level as animals Stone Junius October 28 2021 Local Patriots talk about constitutional convention nullification Texarkana Gazette Retrieved October 29 2021 Steinback Robert April 26 2011 Nullification Advocates Take Show On The Road Southern Poverty Law Center Retrieved April 7 2022 H Neale Thomas November 15 2017 The Article V Convention to Propose Constitutional Amendments Current Developments PDF fas org Congressional Research Service Retrieved April 28 2021 Wilson Sam February 11 2021 Fiery Constitutional Debate Splits Senate Republicans Independent Record Retrieved April 30 2021 Russ Feingold Prindiville Peter 2022 The Constitution in Jeopardy New York Hachette Book Group pp 142 164 65 ISBN 978 1541701526 Federal Reserve Jbs org Archived from the original on July 21 2012 Retrieved July 7 2012 Stewart 2002 p 440 Stewart 2002 p 441 Burch Kurt Robert Allen Denemark 1997 Constituting international political economy Lynne Rienner Publishers p 125 ISBN 978 1 55587 660 9 Oshinsky David January 27 2008 In the Heart of the Heart of Conspiracy The New York Times Book Review p 23 Danielson Chris February 2009 Lily White and Hard Right The Mississippi Republican Party and Black Voting 1965 1980 The Journal of Southern History 75 1 83 Lee Martha F Fall 2005 Nesta Webster The Voice of Conspiracy Journal of Women s History 17 3 81 doi 10 1353 jowh 2005 0033 S2CID 143991823 Blumenthal Max 2010 Republican Gomorrah inside the movement that shattered the party New York Nation Books p 332 ISBN 978 1568584171 Skousen s vocal support for the Far right John Birch Society s claim that Communists controlled President Dwight Eisenhower cost him the support of the corporate backers who had paid for his Red bashing lecture tours Walsh DA 2020 The Right Wing Popular Front The Far Right and American Conservatism in the 1950s Journal of American History 107 2 411 432 doi 10 1093 jahist jaaa182 But this emphasis on the 1960s and the setting of the boundaries between the responsible conservatism of Buckley and Goldwater and the far right fringe of the Birchers has occluded the deep relationship between conservatives and the far right in the 1950s Liebman Marvin March 17 1996 Perspective on Politics The Big Tent Isn t Big Enough By allowing extremists to flourish openly the GOP forces out those who represent the party s moderate values Los Angeles Times p 5 Tobin Jonathan S March 9 2008 The writer who chased the anti Semites out The Jerusalem Post p 14 Gerson Michael March 10 2009 Looking for conservatism Times Daily Florence Ala Ward Ian March 19 2023 The fringe group that broke the GOP s brain and helped it win elections Vox Retrieved September 28 2023 Patriot Groups Southern Poverty Law Center February 26 2009 Retrieved February 1 2018 Generally Patriot groups define themselves as opposed to the New World Order or advocate or adhere to extreme antigovernment doctrines Listing here does not imply that the groups advocate or engage in violence or other criminal activities or are racist Nelson Michael 2017 Resilient America Electing Nixon in 1968 Channeling Dissent and Dividing Government University Press of Kansas p 209 ISBN 978 0700624423 Roberts Zach D May 5 2023 The Origins and Afterlife of the Infamous John Birch Society Progressive org Retrieved July 8 2023 a b Terry Don March 3 2013 The John Birch Society the conspiracist group exiled by the right a half century ago is on the march and gaining influence Intelligence Report 2013 Spring Issue John Birch Society Charged with contributing to Anti semitism Jewish Telegraphic Agency March 20 2015 Retrieved September 26 2023 Stewart 2002 pp 443 444 Verhoeven 2015 pp 2 4 38 a b Michael George September 2 2003 Confronting Right Wing Extremism and Terrorism in the USA Routledge pp 41 42 doi 10 4324 9780203563212 ISBN 978 1 134 37762 6 Freilich Joshua D Pienik Jeremy A Howard Gregory J May 1 2001 Toward Comparative Studies of the U S Militia Movement International Journal of Comparative Sociology 42 1 163 210 doi 10 1163 156851801300171751 Crothers Lane June 2002 The Cultural Foundations of the Modern Militia Movement New Political Science 24 2 222 230 doi 10 1080 07393140220145225 ISSN 0739 3148 S2CID 143461538 Verhoeven 2015 pp 260 263 266 271 Celestini Carmen 2018 God Country and Christian Conservatives The National Association of Manufacturers the John Birch Society and the Rise of the Christian Right PDF PhD University of Waterloo pp iv 322 325 328 334 a b c d e f g h Miller Edward H 2021 A Conspiratorial Life Robert Welch the John Birch Society and the Revolution of American Conservatism Chicago University of Chicago Press ISBN 978 0226449050 OCLC 1304351277 Mulloy 2014 pp 188 189 Dallek Matthew 2023 Birchers How the John Birch Society Radicalized the American Right New York Hachette Book Group ISBN 978 1541673564 Brooks Anthony Chang Jonathan July 13 2022 The history of far right populism from the John Birch Society to Trumpism WBUR FM Retrieved July 26 2022 Did the John Birch Society Win in the End The Bulwark April 13 2022 Retrieved April 19 2022 Dallek Matthew 2023 Birchers How the John Birch Society Radicalized the American Right New York Basic Books ISBN 978 1541673564 OCLC 1334884890 John Birch Society by Thomas C Ellington in Culture Wars An Encyclopedia of Issues Viewpoints and Voices ed by Roger Chapman M E Sharpe 2010 p 286 a b James and Marti Hefley The Secret File on John Birch Tyndale House Publishers 1980 ISBN 0 8423 5862 5 History Schoenwald Jonathan M 2002 3 A New Kind of Conservatism The John Birch Society A Time for Choosing The Rise of Modern American Conservatism Oxford University Press US ISBN 0 19 515726 5 a b c d e f g h i j k McGowan Sam September 6 2016 For God and Country The Story of John Birch Warfare History Net Retrieved March 10 2021 Spector Ronald H 2007 In the ruins of empire the Japanese surrender and the battle for postwar Asia 1st ed New York Random House ISBN 9780375509155 Horwitz Jeff Bauer Scott June 12 2015 Before Walker run a conservative foundation set the stage Yahoo com Retrieved October 21 2015 Daniel Bice Bill Glauber Poston Ben November 28 2011 Conservative empire built from Wisconsin foundation The Seattle Times Retrieved November 12 2019 Davis Jonathan T 1997 Forbes Richest People The Forbes Annual Profile of the World s Wealthiest Men and Women Wiley p 138 ISBN 978 0 471 17751 7 Founding member 1958 John Birch Society reportedly after seeing Russian friends liquidated Hoover s 500 Profiles of America s Largest Business Enterprises Hoover s Business Press 1996 p 286 ISBN 978 1 57311 009 9 In 1929 Koch took his process to the Soviet Union but he grew disenchanted with Stalinism and returned home to become a founding member of the anticommunist John Birch Society Wayne Leslie December 7 1986 Brothers at Odds The New York Times Sec 6 Part 2 p 100 col 1 ISSN 0362 4331 He returned a fervent anti Communist who would later become a founding member of the John Birch Society Diamond Sara 1995 Roads to Dominion Right Wing Movements and Political Power in the United States New York Guilford Press p 324 n 86 ISBN 0 89862 862 8 Robert Stoddard Dies at 78 A Founder of Birch Society The New York Times December 16 1984 Retrieved May 7 2012 Towler Christopher December 6 2018 The John Birch Society is still influencing American politics 60 years after its founding The Conversation Retrieved May 4 2021 Mulloy 2014 p 3 Welch Robert E 1961 The Blue Book of the John Birch Society American Opinion Books ISBN 0 88279 215 6 a b c d John Birch Society Political Research Associates Retrieved July 18 2008 John Birch Society Speakers Bureau Matthew Lyons Chip Berlet 2000 Right Wing Populism in America Too Close for Comfort New York The Guilford Press p 179 ISBN 1 57230 562 2 French William Marshall 1967 American Secondary Education Odyssey Press p 477 ISBN 0 7719 9198 3 Retrieved July 20 2008 OCLC 1713996 full citation needed ISSN 0003 0236 OCLC 1480501 full citation needed OCLC 12803345 full citation needed Barbagallo Paul June 1 2006 The New American Goes Mobile Adweek Retrieved September 29 2023 Quoted at Glenn Beck talks with JBS President John F McManus Aug 15 2006 The John Birch Society Archived January 12 2010 at the Wayback Machine Welch Robert 1975 The Politician Boston Western Islands cxxxviii cxxxix ISBN 99908 64 98 5 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 John B Judis William F Buckley Jr Patron Saint of the Conservatives 2001 pp 193 200 a b Confounding Fathers The Tea Party s Cold War Roots by historian Sean Wilentz The New Yorker October 18 2010 Davidson Lee November 16 2010 FBI files shed light on Ezra Taft Benson Ike and the Birch Society The Salt Lake Tribune Retrieved February 11 2018 Who was Ayn Rand a biography Playboy interview 1964 Retrieved July 18 2008 Hauptman Don March 1 2004 The Lost Parts of Ayn Rand s Playboy Interview The Atlas Society Archived from the original on June 20 2010 Schoenwald Jonathan M 2001 Time for Choosing The Rise of Modern American Conservatism Oxford University Press p 9 Mulloy 2014 pp 12 13 Rick Perlstein 2001 Before the Storm Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus Hill and Wang p 117 ISBN 0786744154 Oscar Theodore Barck Jr Nelson Manfred Blake 1969 Since 1900 A History of the United States in Our Times New York Macmillan Company p 754 a b William F Buckley Jr March 1 2008 Goldwater the John Birch Society and Me Commentary Retrieved March 9 2008 Stephen Earl Bennett 1971 Modes of Resolution of a Belief Dilemma in the Ideology of the John Birch Society Journal of Politics 33 3 735 772 doi 10 2307 2128280 JSTOR 2128280 S2CID 154740758 Dion Lefler October 27 2012 Fluoride fight has long roots passionate advocates The Wichita Eagle Retrieved December 8 2016 The John Birch Society was an active participant in Wichita s 1964 referendum that repealed fluoridation after the City Commission had voted to implement it William Heisel November 11 2016 Does fluoride have lessons for the vaccine debate Center for Health Journalism Newsletter Retrieved December 8 2016 From the 1940s through the 1960s groups like the John Birch Society were vocal opponents of water fluoridation Coates Paul April 28 1966 It s a Day of Decision Los Angeles Times p 3 Stewart 2002 p 430 Prince Gregory A 2004 The Red Peril the Candy Maker and the Apostle David O Mckay s Confrontation with Communism Dialogue A Journal of Mormon Thought 37 2 37 94 doi 10 2307 45227582 JSTOR 45227582 S2CID 254391712 A Spectre Haunting Mormonism Retrieved July 18 2008 Bove Nicholas J Jr The Belmont Brotherhood Archived from the original on May 13 2008 Retrieved July 18 2008 Robert Welch 1963 The Neutralizers John Birch Society p 20 Twelfth Report of the Senate Factfinding Subcommittee on Un American Activities Sacramento California Senate of the State of California 1963 pp 61 62 Mulloy 2014 p 63 Mulloy 2014 p 98 Sullivan Ronald April 20 1966 Foes of Rising Birch Society Organize in Jersey The New York Times p 1 Retrieved May 2 2018 Irvine Janice M 2004 Talk about Sex the battles over sex education in the United States Berkeley California University of California Press p 52 ISBN 9780520243293 The Radical Americans American Archive of Public Broadcasting Retrieved March 14 2022 Epstein Benjamin R Forster Arnold 1966 Report on the John Birch Society 1966 Random House p 9 What s Wrong with Civil Rights Belmont MA American Opinion 1965 OCLC 56596124 The John Birch Society Asks What s Wrong With Civil Rights The Post Times West Palm Beach FL October 31 1965 p A10 cols 1 6 Retrieved January 30 2011 permanent dead link Russler Brett July 2 2020 We aren t after a House Negro to prove our love for Black People the complicated relationship between George S Schuyler and the John Birch society The Sixties Informa UK Limited 13 2 121 145 doi 10 1080 17541328 2020 1837494 ISSN 1754 1328 S2CID 226314820 Berlet Chip Lyons Matthew N March 8 2018 Right Wing Populism in America Too Close for Comfort Guilford Publications p 181 ISBN 978 1 4625 3760 0 Haiman Franklyn Saul Tedford Thomas L Herbeck Dale 2005 Gertz v Robert Welch Inc Freedom Of Speech In The United States Strata Publishing ISBN 1 891136 10 0 Archived from the original on May 17 2008 Retrieved May 12 2008 Hamilton Neil A 2009 The 1970s Infobase Publishing p 87 ISBN 978 1 4381 0878 0 Clarity James F September 26 1971 Wallace Here to Test the Atmosphere Attacks President and Mayor The New York Times Retrieved October 1 2023 Hudson Richard May 16 1976 Storm Over the Canal The New York Times Retrieved October 1 2023 Ruth Murray Brown For a Christian America A History of the Religious Right Prometheus Books 2002 pp 49 51 a b c Richard D Lyons Rightists Are Linked to Laetrile s Lobby The New York Times July 5 1977 a b Gerald E Markle James C Petersen amp Morton O Wagenfeld Notes from the Cancer Underground Participation in the Laetrile Movement Social Science amp Medicine January 1978 Vol 12 pp 31 37 a b c d Dorfman Zach December 2 2018 The Congressman Who Created His Own Deep State Really Politico Retrieved January 4 2019 Glass Andrew December 9 2017 John Birch Society founded Dec 9 1958 Politico Retrieved November 12 2019 US right wing group disseminates lies against Weizmann Institute Jewish Telegraphic Agency January 9 1967 Retrieved November 12 2019 Thomas Lansford John Birch Society in Encyclopedia of American Religion and Politics eds Paul A Djupe amp Laura R Olson Facts on File 2003 pp 233 34 Mulloy 2014 Introduction by the mid 1990s the figure was down to fifteen thousand or twenty thousand estimates are all that are available because the Society declined to release its official membership rolls Stewart 2002 pp 425 426 441 444 Lackmeyer Steve January 20 1992 Birch Society Sees Plot In New World Order The Oklahoman Retrieved May 11 2022 Stewart 2002 pp 424 447 Curtis Bryan October 31 2017 Remembering Baseball s Right Wing Rotation The Ringer Retrieved July 26 2022 Oberdorfer Don Cannon Lou September 6 1984 Administration Calls for Ratification of Treaty Against Genocide The Washington Post Retrieved November 22 2020 Relations United States Congress Senate Committee on Foreign 1985 Crime of Genocide Hearing Before the Committee on Foreign Relations United States Senate Ninety ninth Congress First Session on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide March 5 1985 U S Government Printing Office Spangler Jerry Bernick Bob June 16 2003 John Birch Society forges on in Utah Deseret News see short biography from Claremont Review of Books Birch Informant Decries Influence of Big Business Deseret News May 30 1995 Retrieved August 23 2022 States Conference Encounters Resistance The Washington Post March 27 1995 Retrieved August 23 2022 States Rights Meeting Coming Under Attack Right Wingers Undermining Plans Idaho Lawmaker Says The Spokesman Review April 25 1995 Retrieved August 23 2022 Sullivan Laurie April 25 1995 States Rights Backers Are Not Backing Down The Salt Lake Tribune Salt Lake City p D 2 Berlet Chip March 10 2008 The North American Union Right Wing Populist Conspiracism Rebounds Political Research Associates Retrieved April 22 2022 Just Sara February 19 2010 Far Right John Birch Society 2010 ABC News Archived from the original on February 21 2010 Retrieved February 6 2016 Sam Tanenhaus October 19 2010 The Death of Conservatism A Movement and Its Consequences Random House Digital Inc p 121 ISBN 978 0 8129 8103 2 Niquette Mark March 2 2023 Donald Trump Is a Star Among Ultra Conservatives But He Faces a New Test Bloomberg com Retrieved March 7 2023 Nearby conference goers could pick up Ginger Betty Bakery s 8 gingerbread Trump shaped cookies while browsing booths set up by groups including the John Birch Society and Moms For America Monacelli Steven July 21 2022 The John Birch Society Sees a Renaissance in North Texas The Texas Observer Retrieved August 23 2022 Newman Alex January 1 2018 Deep State Plan C Is to Kill Trump Advisor Roger Stone Warns The New American Retrieved January 5 2019 Levy Pema December 19 2016 Trump s Budget Director Pick Spoke at a John Birch Society Event The New Republic Retrieved January 5 2019 Farmer Brian October 8 2008 Ron Paul Addresses John Birch Society The New American Retrieved January 5 2019 Kirchick James February 27 2009 Yes Ron Paul Is A Bircher The New Republic ISSN 0028 6583 Retrieved April 2 2022 Newman Alex October 8 2018 At John Birch Society s 60th Anniversary Lawmakers Speak Out The New American Retrieved January 5 2019 Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine Jones Alex host December 3 2018 Infowars radio tv broadcast Austin Texas Infowars Retrieved January 5 2018 Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine Jones Alex host January 10 2017 Infowars radio tv broadcast Austin Texas Infowars Retrieved January 5 2018 Hardy Madison July 29 2021 Embracing Birch Coeur d Alene Press Retrieved September 23 2021 Hardy Madison September 3 2021 Idaho GOP bursts Bircher bubble Coeur d Alene Press Retrieved September 23 2021 Moseley Morris Kelcie July 16 2022 Rep Dorothy Moon becomes new chairwoman of Idaho Republican Party Idaho Capital Sun Retrieved January 7 2023 Baker Mike May 17 2022 A Fracture in Idaho s G O P as the Far Right Seeks Control The New York Times Retrieved November 3 2022 Smith David May 11 2022 Republican and more Republican Idaho shifts ever rightward The Guardian Retrieved November 3 2022 elections for other offices of state are more competitive between the hard right and harder right Dorothy Moon a member of the far right John Birch Society is a contender for secretary of state Kurt Dylan June 13 2022 This is winnable manchesterpress com Retrieved November 3 2022 Helton Elijah July 16 2022 Unlikely allies leading anti pipeline fight The N West Iowa REVIEW Retrieved November 3 2022 Wolfson Leo August 17 2023 John Birch Society Says Wyoming Part Of Conservative Resurgence Your Wyoming News Source Retrieved August 31 2023 The John Birch Society Leadership John Birch Society Archived from the original on October 11 2016 Retrieved September 21 2016 2019 FOREIGN NOT FOR PROFIT CORPORATION ANNUAL REPORT Entity Name THE JOHN BIRCH SOCIETY INCORPORATED sunbiz org Florida Department of State February 22 2019 Retrieved August 9 2020 Title PRESIDENT Name OHLSON MARTIN P The John Birch Society Leadership Team John Birch Society Retrieved August 29 2020 Bob Dylan walks out on The Ed Sullivan Show History com archive Retrieved May 12 2015 Cart Michael March 15 2012 Carte Blanche My Choice for President Booklist p 51 Dussere E March 2003 Subversion in the Swamp Pogo and the Folk in the McCarthy Era Journal of American Culture 26 1 134 141 doi 10 1111 1542 734X 00081 Clarence Lusane January 23 2013 The Black History of the White House City Lights Books pp 332 ISBN 978 0 87286 611 9 Bailey Ronald December 5 2001 Impurifying our precious bodily fluids Reason Retrieved November 14 2022 Uneasy Rider Genius Retrieved October 7 2021 Evans Robert December 15 2020 Part One How The John Birch Society Invented The Modern Far Right Stitcher Retrieved October 7 2021 General and cited references EditMulloy D J 2014 The World of the John Birch Society Conspiracy Conservatism and the Cold War Nashville Vanderbilt University Press ISBN 978 0826519818 Mulloy D J 2014a 1 exposure The World of the John Birch Society Conspiracy Conservatism and the Cold War Vanderbilt University Press pp 15 41 doi 10 2307 j ctv1675660 ISBN 9780826519818 JSTOR j ctv1675660 Stewart Charles J 2002 The Master Conspiracy of the John Birch Society From Communism to the New World Order Western Journal of Communication 66 4 423 447 doi 10 1080 10570310209374748 S2CID 145081268 Verhoeven Bart July 2015 The Rearguard of Freedom The John Birch Society and the Development of Modern Conservatism in the United States 1958 1968 PDF PhD University of Nottingham Retrieved September 26 2023 Further reading EditScholarly studies Edit Lautz Terry E 2016 John Birch A Life New York Oxford University Press ISBN 978 0190262891 McGirr Lisa Suburban Warriors The Origins of the New American Right 2001 focus on Los Angeles suburbs in 1960s Schoenwald Jonathan M 2002 A Time for Choosing The Rise of Modern American Conservatism pp 62 99 excerpt and text search a national history of the party Stone Barbara S The John Birch Society a Profile Journal of Politics 1974 36 1 184 197 JSTOR 2129115 Wander Philip The John Birch and Martin Luther King Symbols in the Radical Right Western Speech Western Journal of Communication 1971 35 1 4 14 Wilcox Clyde Sources of Support for the Old Right A Comparison of the John Birch Society and the Christian Anti Communism Crusade Social Science History 1988 12 4 429 450 JSTOR 1171382 Wright Stuart A Patriots politics and the Oklahoma City Bombing Cambridge University Press 2007 ISBN 978 0 521 87264 5 Primary sources Edit Gary Allen None Dare Call It Conspiracy G S G amp Associates Inc 1971 Griffin G Edward 1972 This is the John Birch Society an invitation to membership Thousand Oaks Calif American Media ISBN 0 912986 04 2 OCLC 2192524 McManus John F 2018 The John Birch Society Its History Recounted by Someone Who Was There Wakefield Massachusetts Overview Productions ISBN 978 0692132968 Robert W Welch Jr The New Americanism and Other Speeches Boston Western Islands 1966 Welch Robert 1961 The blue book of the John Birch Society Boston Western Islands ISBN 0 88279 105 2 OCLC 16903114 Welch Robert 1964 The Politician Belmont Massachusetts Belmont Publishing ISBN 99908 64 98 5 OCLC 376165 Welch Robert 1964 The White Book of the John Birch Society for 1964 Belmont Massachusetts John Birch Society OCLC 21571870 Welch Robert 1966 The New Americanism and Other Speeches Boston Western Islands ISBN 0 88279 211 3 Criticizing the John Birch Society Edit Buckley William F Jr March 2008 Goldwater the John Birch Society and Me Commentary Conner Claire 2013 Wrapped in the Flag A Personal History of America s Radical Right Boston Beacon Press ISBN 978 0807077504 OCLC 930959176 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 Wing Readings in Political Behavior New York Holt Rinehart and Winston OCLC 470572700 Hardisty Jean V 1999 Mobilizing Resentment Conservative Resurgence from the John Birch Society to the Promise Keepers Boston Beacon Press External links Edit nbsp Wikimedia Commons has media related to John Birch Society Official website nbsp The New American JBS biweekly publication which publishes the Freedom Index Archived August 27 2017 at the Wayback Machine congressional scorecard twice a year John Birch Society at Political Research Associates What Is the John Birch Society short excerpt of a film released c 1965 of Robert W Welch Jr explaining why he founded the John Birch Society and its aims Rating group positions by year at Project Vote SmartPortals nbsp Conservatism nbsp Libertarianism nbsp United States Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title John Birch Society amp oldid 1178038524, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

article

, read, download, free, free download, mp3, video, mp4, 3gp, jpg, jpeg, gif, png, picture, music, song, movie, book, game, games.