John+Birch+Societies+-+p2

Evelyn The John Birch Societies are groups of people who are very radical in their beliefs and opinions. They believe the government should be involved in as little as possible. They believe all schools should be private and that the United States should not be involved in any trade groups or treaties. They believe that there shouldn’t be any gun control. They are still around today.

Founded in Indianapolis, Indiana on December 9, 1958 by Robert Welch Jr., the people in this group believed that there was an underlying group of communists in the government that were planning to turn the US government communist

In order to show how serious they were about being anti-communist, I have a quote from the blue book. “…We need to do everything we can which will directly affect the actions and decisions of the government.” Including accusing innocent people, black listing them, and harassing them. They accused Eisenhower, Truman, and Dulles of being communist.

You might be wondering who John Birch was. He was an American Military Intelligence Officer and a Baptist missionary. In the 1930s and 40s he was sent to China and in 1945 he was killed by Chinese communist. The John Birch society called him “the first American victim of the Cold War".

I know someone who was accused by the John Birch societies of being communist. She was fired from her job and forced to divorce her husband. And she was not the least bit communist. There were others too. They would be harassed and blacklisted for no reason.

This event was very important to history in many ways. First, we need to learn about it to keep it from happening again. One of the main reasons it happened was fear. We need to learn to manage our fears and not let them have control of us. Also it shows that a couple people can convince many others. All in all, I think we learned enough to keep this from happening again.

A member's card Robert Welch

"John M Birch." Hutchinson's Biography Database. EBSCOhost. 5 Feb 2007 <[|http://web.ebscohost.com/src/detail?vid=3&hid=117&sid=2c4d26ab-48a4-4067-b6bb-fcb6d8067f41%40SRCSM1>.]

Bentley, Chris. "John Birch Society." 5 Oct. 2006. 7 Feb. 2007 <[|http://www.jbs.com>.]

Welch, Robert H. The Blue Book of the John Birch Society. Appleton, Wis: Western Islands, 1992.

Ritter, Janet T. Personal interview. 6 Feb. 2007.