THE CHRISTIAN FRIGHT PEDDLERS

by Brooks R. Walker ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

This author knows whereof he speaks; he is one of two California ministers whose homes were bombed in 1962 while they were addressing a public forum on the topic ""The Extreme Right-- Threat to Democracy?"" But Rev. Walker's intent is not merely to expose the threats of ultraconservatism and its consequent confusion of ""possibility with certainty,"" rather he wants to understand those threats and to meet them with a ""coherent view of reality."" Thus his scrutinies of the personalities and activities of such men as Billy James Hargis, Carl McIntire, John Rousselot, and of course Robert Welch, are never malicious or precipitate. He has read the literature of the John Birch Society, the Christian Crusade, and the other organizations closely and deeply, and attempts--with notable success-to explain them. He has no argument with their purpose. As he points out, nobody, not even Karl Marx, would want to quibble with Welch's stated program: ""to promote less government, more responsibility, and a better world."" It is their means he fears, and the danger that we, like them, ""in attempting to counter the arbitrary and the coercive,"" may ourselves ""become arbitrary and coercive."" This book, for all its calm reasoning, is a potent weapon against such dangers.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1964

Categories: NONFICTION