Powerful Beast Helpless Prey

What some are calling a “New Order” follows the oldest order known. It is not unlike the practice o the powerful beast devouring its helpless prey. It is an order whose motives are prompted by envy, hatred and malice. It is an order that takes from man his freedom and makes it impossible for the individual, however righteous, trustworthy, talented, ambitious or competent, to work effectively, to rise and to make his contribution to the good of mankind by rendering the highest human service of which he is capable. This so-called new order is distinctly, yes, violently against the progress and welfare of the masses of the people. It would destroy the very foundations of free government. This plan displaces the rule of moral principle with that of selfishness, force and greed.

Source: Elder Richard R. Lyman
General Conference, October 1941

Topics: Freedom, Loss of

Natural Ability Richly Rewarded

Our country has had an unparalleled development and growth because here in this land of freedom men and women who exhibit exceptional ability and capacity for achievement are given an opportunity to rise quickly to positions and opportunities of ever-increasing importance. President Nicholas Murray Butler says that of the chief administrative officers of twelve of the greatest railway companies in our country, five began their services as clerks, two as office boys, one as fireman, one as locomotive engineer, one as a track laborer, one as a stenographer, one as a telegraph operator, and one as a rodman in a surveying party. This indicates how in a free country opportunities and positions of the highest order are open to those who possess exceptional native ability.

Source: Elder Richard R. Lyman
General Conference, October 1941

Topics: America

It is true the world is passing through a period of transition, of sorrow, and to many of despair. Nations are being subjected to tyranny. The four devastating Horsemen—War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death—are galloping seemingly unchecked. The daily press announced recently—“The greatest battle of annihilation in all history.” Freedom of the individual to speak, to act, and to work is being shackled. Systems of government heretofore advocated as the best and safest for mankind are being questioned. Religious truths, once held sacred, are now doubted, ridiculed, or rejected. In some parts of the world, even hell itself seems to have broken loose, spreading hatred, terror and death in its wake. Now as never before we should put our trust in God, “stand fast in the faith, quit ourselves like men, be strong.”

Source: President David O. McKay
General Conference, October 1941

Topics: Freedom, Loss of

The people have been forgotten by the administrators of their Government. There is no question about it. Many Governmental policies now in operation are being imposed upon the people without their consent or knowledge. In contemplation of these conditions, it can readily be seen that a great apostasy from “the law and the testimony” of the American democracy, the Constitution, is taking shape and form.

Furthermore, the people are being lulled to sleep by an opiate called “borrowed prosperity.” As Jefferson indicated, the people are so inclined toward the gaining of wealth they are forsaking the fundamental law of this great republic.

A new danger—American being arrayed against American in a new line of class demarkation which will divide this great nation, and, as has been said, “a house divided against itself cannot stand.”

One of these groups in the face of a national emergency is literally lying down on the job, while our boys are in the military camps without proper weapons in their hands to learn the science of war. In the days of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln such a situation would have been handled as rebellion, and it should be handled as such today if America and American institutions are to continue.

Source: Elder Joseph L. Wirthlin
General Conference, October 1941

Topics: Government, Downfall

One of the great fundamentals advocated by the founders of this American nation was that of frugal administration of government affairs. Never before in the history of the world has there been such an extravagant expenditure of the people’s money.

Someone made reference to four or five freedoms. We have had more than four or five freedoms, for I think of at least the sixth one—the right under the Constitution of the United States for every man to work how, when, or where he will—and that right has disappeared. It is gone and now lies in the hands of a group who rule the laboring class of the United States.

I point out these few facts to you in substantiation of the point that as a people and a government we are on the high road of apostasy from that inspired Bill of Rights bequeathed to us by the founders of this great republic.

Source: Elder Joseph L. Wirthlin
General Conference, October 1941

Topics: Bill of Rights; Free Agency; Rights

I think the business men are largely to blame for these chaotic conditions. The Lord says: “Search out good and wise men”—not of any party; not of any church, but search out these good men and put them in charge of our civil affairs. But if you ask a business man to run for office, he becomes a Pharisee, a political Pharisee. He says: “I don’t like to enter into the slime of politics.” But who has made it a slime? The men who were unworthy to hold office. Business men say: “We can’t be elected.” Well, when, in the name of heaven, will you be any stronger? Why not enter the conflict? There ought to be common ground where good and wise men may stand, and their influence will be felt at headquarters in Washington.

Source: Elder Charles A. Callis
General Conference, October 1941

Topics: Politics; Voting

And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure if we have removed their only firm basis: a conviction in the minds of men that these liberties are the gift of God?

Source: Thomas Jefferson
Notes on the State of Virginia

Topics: Rights

Thus by action of the people two history-making documents publicized to all the world the fact that in America was founded a nation, the purpose of which was to secure to every citizen the inalienable right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Hence our government exists for the individual rather than the individual for the government. To this concept of the purpose of government, totalitarianism is diametrically opposed, for it asserts that the individual exists for the State. Personal liberty is, therefore, non-existent in a totalitarian State.

But between principle and practice there is frequently a wide gulf. It was because of their religion that the Mormons suffered violent persecution, and were finally driven from the boundaries of civilization—from the settled areas of a land that guaranteed religious liberty. And this was in America, the only country in all the world in which, at the time, religious liberty was guaranteed by the fundamental law of the land. But the Mormons might have said as did Jesus of Nazareth “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.” The coming of the Mormons to the arid wilderness of the Rocky Mountains proved to be not only a great blessing for them but for the nation also.

Source: Elder Joseph F. Merrill
General Conference, October 1941

Topics: America, Heritage

With God denied there is none to whom man owes reverence. With reverence gone man is adrift. Each one’s notions have equal status with every other one’s notions, and no one knows what he ought to believe; respect for authority dies out because there is nothing authoritative left; veneration for parental authority breaks down and reverence for law ceases to command allegiance.

All these consequences are clearly revealed in the course of events, even in our own land. We of this generation received this great government of ours from the generations which had gone before sound in its principles, Its Constitution was everywhere held in reverence: Its laws were obeyed. No one doubted its superiority over every other form of government on earth. Every one had unshaken faith in its perpetuity. We pass it on with that faith terribly shaken. Its people are torn by dissension. They do not trust each other. They are not sure that after all our system of government is better than any other. They have grown cynical and doubt if good is to be found anywhere.

Source: Elder Albert E. Bowen
General Conference, October 1941

Topics: Freedom, Loss of

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