The
Political Wisdom of J. Reuben Clark
Warnings from J. Reuben Clark, Jr.
- “Is there any one so
naive as to think that things will right themselves without a fight? There
has been no more fight in us than there is a bunch of sheep, and we have
been much like sheep. Freedom was never brought to people on a silver
platter, nor maintained with whisk brooms and lavender sprays. And do not
think that the usurpations, intimidations, and impositions are being done
to us through inadvertence or mistake; The whole course is deliberately
planned and carried out; its purpose is to destroy the Constitution and
our constitutional government; then to bring chaos, out of which the new
Statism with its slavery is to arise…” [Church News PPNS pg. 327]
·
“The ravening wolves are amongst us, from
our own membership, and they, more than any others, are clothed in sheeps
clothing because they wear the habiliments of the priesthood
we should be
careful of them.” [Church News 6/15 1940]
- “This gigantic worldwide
struggle more and more takes on the form of war to the death. We shall do
well and wisely so to face and so to enter it. And we must all take part.
Indeed, we all are taking part in that struggle, whether we will or not.
Upon its final issue, liberty lives or dies.
·
“This earth-wide conflict has taken the
form of seizing without compensation from the man who has, and giving to the
man who has not; of taking from the worker the fruits of his work, and giving
to the idler who does not work. It has from its very nature become an economic,
uncompensated leveling downward, not upwards of the whole mass. That this
result may in one country be reached by confiscatory taxation, and in another
by direct seizure, is a mere matter of method. The result is the same. In some
countries outright seizure and confiscation are already openly and shamelessly
practiced. All is done in the name of the state, as if it were deity as if
the state, not God gives all. Even into the field of family relationship,
which, next to mans relationship to God, is the most precious and dearest of all
relationships, this modern State is thrusting its polluting hand. In some lands
this new State is robbing the parents of custody of their children, it is
forbidding the parents to teach and admonish the children in the ways of
righteous living; it is teaching the children that officers of State, not God,
shall be looked to for a guide as to standards of life! Into the field of
religion, the holy of holies of the soul of man, this modern world State also
enters, to dethrone God and exalt the State into Gods place. This is the
archest reason of them all! For man robbed of God becomes a brute. This sin
must be felt, not told, for words cannot measure the height and breadth of this
iniquity; nor can human mind encompass the punishment of those who shall commit
this sin.” [1938 Vital Speeches]
- “The statement of the
Lord, I have established the Constitution puts it in the position in
which it would be if it were written in this D&C itself. This makes
the constitution the WORD OF THE LORD to us.” [CR Apr 1935]
·
“God provided that in this land of liberty,
our political allegiance shall run not to individuals, that is, to government
officials, no matter how great or how small they shall be. Under His plan the
only allegiance we owe as citizens of the
Constitution which God himself set up.
This principle of allegiance to the
Constitution is basic to our freedom.
·
“I wish to say with all the earnestness I
possess that when you see any curtailment of these liberties I have named, when
you see government invading any of these realms of freedom which we have under
our Constitution, you will know that they are putting shackles on your liberty,
and that tyranny is creeping upon you, no matter who curtails these liberties
or who invades these realms, and no matter what the reason and excuse therefore
may be.
- “I say to you that the
price of liberty is and always has been blood, human blood, and if our
liberties are lost, we shall never regain them except at the price of
blood. They must not be lost. [The Improvement Era, 43, [July 1940] 444.] - Once in debt, interest is
your companion every minute of the day and night; you cannot shun it or
slip away from it; you cannot dismiss it; it yields neither to entreaties,
demands, or orders; and whenever you get in its way or cross its course or
fail to meet its demands, it crushes you.” [1938]
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