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Communism In The John Birch Society

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Anti-Communism in the United States was a widespread political and cultural phenomenon during the Cold War which reached nearly all areas of American life. It was embraced to differing degrees by both the Left and Right, spreading into churches, schools, entertainment, and even gaining influence in the Civil Rights movement. There were many different opinions over how much of a danger communism was. Was it merely an external threat from the Soviet Union, or did it also come from the communists in America, working from within their very midst? If the U.S. was under threat from internal communists, then how widespread was this enemy and how should the issue be addressed? These were the issues that divided America and among these divisions extremes …show more content…

Mulloy’s 2014 book The World of The John Birch Society. Mulloy agrees with Nash about the importance of the 1964 election to the society, believing that they reached the height of their influence in that campaign. He portrays the Society as being more politically powerful than Nash, and that by Nixon denouncing them during his 1962 gubernatorial campaign in California, he alienated many influential grass roots conservatives, which was part of the reason for his loss. Mulloy makes it seem as if Goldwater could have denounced the Society and distanced himself from “extremist” elements of the party, but partially because of their power and influence at the time, he was afraid of losing their support. Mulloy believes that the society “played an essential role in the revitalization of conservatism,” and agrees with Nash they were pushed from the political mainstream by people like Buckley, however unlike Nash, he also believes that they still held considerable influence on the political fringe and that many of their ideas still reflected those of many Americans even after 1964. Even without mainstream support, Mulloy shows that they still provided a vocal minority in the resistance to communism and the radical New Left of the era. Mulloy sees the John Birch Society as going through a slow decline after Goldwater’s defeat and that into 1967 and 1968 especially, they lost much of their appeal by continually becoming more and more conspiratorial, eventually even embracing the long paranoid tradition of the Illuminati

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