SHALL COMMUNISTS RULE AMERICA?

A Powerful Patriotic Sermon by Rev. William Edward Biederwolf, Minister of the Royal Poinciana Comunity Chapel at Palm Beach, Florida, on January 26, 1936.

"In the Latter Days Perilous Times Shall Come."--2nd Timothy 3:1.

It is a matter of tremendous importance about which we are to preach this morning.

If there is any reason for thinking that the spirit of this thing in our midst known as Communism is to any considerable degree gripping the minds of the American masses, then the undisputed fact that the teachings of this system of social philosophy are not only absolutely subversive of the principles underlying every form of representative government, including that of our own, but are viciously antagonistic to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and all it stands for, gives us most certainly sufficient ground for presenting the matter from a Christian pulpit.

Of the fact that the spirit of Communism is abroad in the land, and that to an alarming extent, no one with eyes open to see can possibly deny. I am not an alarmist when I say to you that America is threatened with the poison of Bolshevik sedition and that it is high time we were awake to the seriousness of the situation; for thoughtful men are telling us that unless these forces of iniquity are checked by the power and mercy of Almighty God we can hardly expect the American public to endure.

I am not so sure but that there is more of truth than most Americans may be willing to admit in the words of William Green, President of the American Federation of Labor. Certainly Mr. Green, with his reputation for careful thought and sober judgment and all his vast experience is a man who has a right to be heard, and even more than the American people may think it might pay them to give heed to what he says. And this is what he says: "If and when the Third International, in response to the Russian Communist Dictatorship, believing that the hour has struck, sends to American Communism the command, 'Fire!' the guns of revolution will blaze upon our streets and the issue will be settled in the blood of our people."

You say, That hour will never come to America. Let us hope that it will not. But the enemy is within our gates and as a nation of God-fearing, liberty-loving people we should be asking ourselves the question, "What are we going to do about it?" For it is impossible to conceive of two groups more diametrically opposed to each other than the patriotic, home-loving, God-fearing American citizens and the God-hating, law-defying political paranoiacs who follow the Red Flag.

Now, a word about the program of this unholy system of social philosophy which is asserting itself so vigorously throughout the world today. It has certain well-defined objectives--certain regulatory and revolutionary doctrines as touching the economic, the social, and the religious life of the people. But to realize these objectives it becomes necessary, they declare, and consequently their intention, to overthrow by violence and bloodshed, if necessary, the established governments of the world and to substitute therefor in each nation a ruthless Stalin type of Dictatorship, and which together are to constitute The International Communistic Commonwealth.

If anyone is inclined to doubt the reliability of this statement, it will be well for him to read some of the statements made by the leaders of this movement themselves:

Let the Ruling Class Tremble

The last paragraph of the Marx and Engels Manifesto reads as follows:

"Communists scorn to hide their views and aims. They openly declare that their purpose can only be achieved by the forcible overthrow of the whole existing social order. Let the ruling class tremble at the prospect of a Communistic revolution."

When Trotsky left New York for Russia in March, 1917, the last thing he said in addressing a large audience was:

"I want you people to organize and keep on organizing in order that you may be able to overthrow this dirty, rotten government of the United States. I am going back to Russia to overthrow the government there and stop this war with Germany."

Mr. M. J. Olgin, the Russian-born editor of the New York "Morning Freiheit," recently wrote:

"We Comunists say there is only one way to abolish the capitalistic state, and that is to smash it by force; this means civil war."

And here are some choice remarks from Gregory Zinoviev, notorious in the Moscow dictatorship:

"We hope that the party will, step by step, conquer the proletarian forces of America and in the the not distant future raise the Red Flag over the White House."

When Lenin came into his place of power he made the following announcement:

"The dictatorship of the proletariat is nothing else than power based upon force and limited by nothing--by no law and no rule."

And here is the most recent official utterance of Dictator Stalin:

"Before the Soviet power can fulfill its function it must be established throughout the world--that is what it was born for! We will continue to fight as a Proletarian Dictatorship for the World Revolution."

These statements are only a few out of many, and on every hand the propaganda in the interests of such a world-wide conspiracy are so conspicuous that we are justified in saying it is high time that God-fearing and patriotic citizens should consider seriously the significance of this threatening cloud. Otherwise I believe the world is due for a rude awakening. You may call it "a little cloud like a man's hand" if you wish, but the menace is no longer so slight, and God only knows, and only thoughtful men can surmise, whereunto it will grow.

This program, they expect to accomplish by promoting economic wars and later by means of military power. It might be well to quote just here the words of William Z. Foster, the perennial candidate for the presidency of the United States on the Communistic ticket. He says:

"When a Communist heads a government in the United States--and that day will come just as surely as the sun rises--that government will not be a capitalistic government, but a Soviet Government, and behind this government will stand the Red Army to enforce the Dictatorship of the proletariat."

"This means," says William Green, "that if and when there is an outbreak of sufficient revolutionary character in the United States to convince the red chiefs of a chance of success, the Red Army of the Soviets will be thrown into the conflict."

Almost every nation in the world is feeling right now the effect of this insidious Red propaganda. It rules, of course, in Russia, and with a bloody hand, Germany is full of it, India is seething with it, China has been torn almost limb from limb with it, while Japan, South America, Mexico, and our own United States are all feeling the effects of its sinister and destructive influence.

There are reasons why the United States furnishes a most, if not the most, inviting field for the Red forces to carry on their work. Its cosmopolitan population, made up so largely of foreigners sympathetic with what Communism has in mind to do, and the dissatisfaction among our own toiling masses with present economic conditions--these two things present a very fertile soil for the sowing of Bolshevik seed. It is furthermore inviting, for with America flying the Red Flag, further conquest looking toward world dominion they feel will be practically assured.

How little the average individual realizes the extent to which this Red propaganda is being carried on in this land of our today!

DO YOU REALIZE that the revolutionary Communists in the United States are rapidly approaching the 3,000,000 figure?

More Communists in U. S. Than in Russia

DO YOU REALIZE that there are twice as many Communists in the United States today as there are at the present time in the Communist Party in Russia, where 160,000,000 people are subject to its tyranical will?

DO YOU REALIZE that there are six times as many members in the American Communist Party as there were in Russia at the time of the bloody Bolshevik Revolution?

DO YOU REALIZE that there are over 600 Red newspapers and magazines circulating in this country today?

DO YOU REALIZE that there are over 6,000 paid speakers daily and nightly poisoning the minds of our masses with this un-Godly and un-American doctrine?

DO YOU REALIZE that there are over 35,000 paid organizers devoting their time to this diabolical end?

DO YOU REALIZE that there are 610 National Communist Organizations, with thousands of state and local branches, constantly stirring the masses toward revolutionary action?

DO YOU REALIZE that these organizations spend over $6,000,000 every year to promote civil war in the United States with a view to establishing a Soviet America?

DO YOU REALIZE that over 100,000 copies of Stalin's book on "Lenin and Bolshevism" have been circulated among wage earners of this land?

DO YOU REALIZE that there are 49 Summer Camps where 20,000 boys and girls are taught every summer to hate everything American and to get ready for the coming proletarian revolution?

DO YOU REALIZE that this seditious propaganda has wormed and weaseled its way into practically all of our educational institutions where large numbers of the students have organized themselves into Communistic Societies?

DO YOU REALIZE that Columbia University has a Communist Club of over 700 members and that over the door of their club room is the "Sickle and Hammer"; that
(OVER)

{page image}

one of these Communistic Groups in the College of the City of New York pulled down the "Stars and Stripes," ran up the Red Flag and greased the flag pole; that on the campus of Amherst College the "Stars and Stripes" were burned to ashes, and that the Chapel Dean of the University of Chicago had to apologize for the presence of the flag in Chapel, saying that "the flag had been introduced not for patriotic motives but for the purpose of adding color to the services"?

DO YOU REALIZE that the Executive Committee of the American Communist Party has issued a complete program for armed revolution, with secret agents working in the plants of all our major industries?

DO YOU REALIZE that suggestions have been issued for a nation-wide strike, setting up barricades in the streets of all our principal cities; seizing the President and his Cabinet and the Federal government buildings and setting up a Soviet United States?

And thus we might go on. It was the distinguished Upton Sinclair who recently said: "The United States, unless it will abandon its present form of government, must ultimately be attacked and destroyed by the Red forces of the warld," and it was the present President of this Government himself who said: "If my administration fails, I won't be the Worst President; I'll be the Last!" I think they are both wrong. America is not going to go Red; but certainly enough has been said to show that the warnings which come from faithful watchmen on the walls of national prosperity are something more than the "Red Scare" with which so many people are seemingly willing to dismiss the whole matter.

Some one has said: "You can dodge your responsibility, but you can't dodge the consequence of dodging your responsibility."

What, now, in brief are the particular things which the Soviet Regime, as proposed by Communism, means to accomplish?

1. THE ABOLITION of all representative governments and the substitution therefor of a World-wide Communist Commonwealth with a World-Dictator in the seat of power. This we have already seen.

As a means to this end class hatred is to be stirred up. The masses are to be arrayed against the classes. We remember Lenin once wrote: "Whatever serves to advance class warfare is moral." Incitement to hunger--marches, street demonstrations and riots among the unemployed; acts of violence among the wage earners, sabotage, strikes and lockouts are to be the order of the day. Most of our industry-paralyzing strikes are the result of Communistic agitation, and in many of them, it is now well known, the hand in Moscow played no little part.

2. THE ABOLITION of Private Property and of Inheritance. Under Communism you cannot even own your own home. The State owns everything. All banks, factories, farms and private property of any kind are confiscated. To accumulate money is a crime punishable by imprisonment.

Abolition of Free Speech

3. THE ABOLITION of Free Speech. A single spoken or written word in criticism of the Communistic Party in Russia means instant death.

4. THE ABOLITION of Marriage, Morals and the Home. When sex-purity goes the home goes with it and with the passing of the home we will find ourselves swallowed up in a nightmare of misery, bestial animalism and moral insanity not unlike that "which at the present time is crushing out of existence every impulse of self-respect and decency among Russia's millions."

The cheapest thing to be found in Russia today is marriage and divorce. A couple simply go to the marriage bureau and sign their names, and when either one is tired of the other that one has simply to go back and sign off. Abortion is legalized and the abortion stations are kept busy from the opening hour until they close.

There is no such thing as respect for womanhood. The sexes are free to indulge themselves without any breach of social propriety. There has accordingly been ushered in the most gigantic orgy of licensed sensuality that any country professing civilization has ever known. Of course in the presence of such conditions all the old and sacred standards of marriage, morality and the home must go down. But this is part of the Communist program, for the home as we know it in America these godless apostles of debauchery consider to be detrimental to the proper functioning of the State.

This will give you some idea of the social curse Communism will bring with it if it ever becomes the dominant force in the life of the American people.

5. THE ABOLITION of all forms of Religion. Religion, the Communist claims, is nothing more than a blighting superstition. It is, as Lenin said, "opium to the people." In Russia every member of the Communist Party is an avowed atheist. They have blotted God out of their skies and torn Christ out of the hearts of their children.

Churches have been turned into anti-religious museums filled with blasphemous cartoons of God and Jesus Christ and everything sacred to the Christion Faith. I have seen copies of many of these pictures. So utterly vile and blasphemous are they that I can hardly force myself to describe them. I make slight mention only of two.

One is a caricature of the Lord's Supper, turned into a drunken carousal. On the side is an inscription reading:

"The so-called Last Supper clearly proves that religion excuses drunkenness. To fight against religion is to fight against drunkenness."

Jesus is shown holding a whiskey bottle in His right hand and a glass in His left, and is making an after-dinner speech:

"Drink all of you, for this is my own distilled whiskey which is being drunk for you, and for us, and for many. Hurrah!"

The other is a grotesque picture of the Lord Jesus Christ with the words, "Take, eat; this is my body broken for you," printed below. It presents a revolting scene where a lot of human beings are tearing the body of Jesus to pieces and feasting upon it. One woman has broken away His arm and is knawing on it. Another is drinking a bowl of blood she has caught from His opened side. Great chunks of His flesh are torn away and even His internal organs are torn out, and upon these the people round about are feeding.

But I can go no further. I have forced myself to say as much. It is all too horrible. Communists! There are two wonders about it all. One is that any people professing to be civilized, could sink so low. The other is the long-suffering of God.

And yet it was to this home-destroying, God-defying, and Christ-hating murderers of civilization, bent on the overthrow of all governments, beginning with our own, that the powers at Washington recently held out the hand of national fellowship. And they owed us $192,000,000.00 of war debt, which they refused to pay, when we did it. There is a drop of comfort, however, in the fact that it was done over the loud protest of millions of loyal, liberty-loving, God-fearing American people.

Time to "Attend to It"

I've had a few interesting experiences with the Communists. They don't like me because of the things I stand for. Well, that makes us even, for I don't like them because of the things they stand for. If Russia likes the sort of civilization she is suffering at the hands of Communism, that's her business, but when the Communists of America try to introduce it here, it's our business, and may God give grace to the American people to attend to it.

Christianity and Communism have nothing in common. Between the two there can be nothing but eternal conflict. Says Stanley Jones, in his recent volume on "Christ, the Alternative to Communism":

"We have been waiting for this hour for fifty years. It is on us! Everything is breaking up--everything will have to be made new. After what image? That is for us to say. But the eventual fight, whatever the preliminary skirmishes may be, will be between Communism and the Gospel."

It is because I believe that, that I bring to you this message this morning. If Communism wins the "Stars and Stripes" go down and the "Red Flag" goes up, the home life of America will go into the discard and the Gospel of Christ will become the laughing stock of the powers that rule.

But, as we said before, America is NOT going Red. We may have bloodshed, as many are predicting, but Communism, if it must be so, will have a chance to test the real stuff that has made the soul of America what it is. For, as another has said:

"There is something in the soul of Christian American which the Russians did not have. This something will assert itself if the crisis hour strikes."

We must not close until we have said that we believe that this whole unholy procedure is but another of the several signs that point to the "end time" of this age in which we are now living, and is nothing more or less than the moving of the whole anti-Christ program toward the terrible, and yet glorious, climax so clearly predicted in the Word of God. Terrible for the Communist and all who contend against Almighty God, but glorious for the child of God, for Christ shall have then returned in overwhelming, permanent victory, and the kingdoms of this world will have become His whose right alone it is to rule.

Some years ago in a terrific storm on the coast of Canada a ship was wrecked and many perished. The mate with several strong men and one timid girl leaped into the lifeboat, but the waves ran high and overturned the boat. One by one the men went down but the mate had taken the precaution to lash the girl to the prow of the boat and after a time she drifted to shore, was found by an Indian and lived for many years after the harrowing experience. She wasn't saved by any wisdom of her own or by anything that she had done. She was saved because she was tied to that which could not sink, and while strong men were going down with cries of despair, this helpless girl was saved because she was lashed to the lifeboat.

Oh, my people, a mighty storm is gathering over the world, a storm such as has never yet beaten down upon our sinful race. Multitudes are pinning their hopes, some to one panacea and some to another. But in that hour there is only one hope that will do you any good. Are you lashed to the Word of God which "liveth and abideth for ever?" Do you know Christ, Whom to know aright is life eternal?

"Show us Thy mercy, O Lord, and grant us Thy salvation."--Psalm 85:7.

(COPIES 1c EACH at Edmondson Economic Service, 80 Washington St., N. Y. City, Tel. WH 4-5232. DELIVERED POSTPAID by Sealed Mail [the ONLY safe way], 3 copies for 6c; 6 for 12c; 10 for 20c; 15 for 30c. Above 15 copies to 100, 1c each plus 15c prepaid express. 500 for $5.50 express prepaid. Payable in "small" stamps, coins, dollar bills, checks or money orders.)

Also See:

HOME

2008 GunShowOnTheNet.com