Readers will know that among my intellectual interests are politics and Mormon history. I especially love when these two subjects intersect, as they do with the League of Nations.
You’re probably asking how the long-since defunct League of Nations, the forerunner to the United Nations, is relevant in 2010. The answer: Glenn Beck.
In the past year, Beck and his disciples in the Tea Party movement have ratcheted up the rhetoric against America’s most progressive president. And they’re not talking about Barack Obama, but—oddly enough—Woodrow Wilson.
Here’s what Beck said about President Wilson back in February: “I hate that S.O.B.! He was an evil, evil dude.” Why such invective? Beck’s litany of complaints against Wilson include, among other things: the federal income tax, the re-segregation of government offices, the imprisonment of anti-war dissidents during WWI, and the League of Nations.
Now, I don’t care to revisit the Wilson administration’s policies. Suffice it to say that I agree with some of Beck’s criticisms, and I roll my eyes at others (Beck, for example, blames Wilson for the “scam” that is Mother’s Day). What I will instead focus on is Beck’s opposition to the League of Nations and the slight irony of his holding that view as a Mormon.
Like many conservatives and libertarians, Beck disagrees with international governing bodies because they take power away from the United States, and thus—it’s argued—undermine our sovereignty. Beck’s views were also likely informed by far-right LDS thinkers Ezra Taft Benson and W. Cleon Skousen who believed that the United Nations advanced the communist agenda.
In a July 9th episode of his Fox News show, Glenn Beck discussed the League of Nations with revisionist historian Burton Foslom, Jr..
BECK: Did he not say when America thwarted him on the League of Nations, he said basically what Obama said during health care, well, I haven’t explained it enough. And he went on a whistle train tour of America to try to explain it.
When America rejected it, didn’t he say—I think I read this some place—that it’s God’s will and God won’t be thwarted on this, right?
FOLSOM: He very much believed he was operating for God and that it wouldn’t be thwarted. And, thus, he was very surprised when it was, in fact, thwarted.
Here’s the irony: LDS Church President Heber J. Grant and the majority of the apostles (men who Beck revere as prophets and seers) also believed that the League of Nations was the will of God. At the October General Conference, during the height of Wilson’s campaign to rally American behind the League of Nations, church leaders likewise tried to get Mormons to support it.
I believe that the League of Nations covenant, when ratified, will become the instrument whereby the inalienable rights of men shall be extended to our Father’s children in every land, that it will be an effectual opening of the door which will admit the promulgation of the greater, the perfect, law of liberty, through which the Lord designs to make his children free. Amen. – Rulon S. Wells, October 1919 General Conference
The cause of the proposed League of Nations like that of “Mormonism,” is a positive one. Its opponents are negative. … I have been used to the inspiration of the Spirit of God, and if I am not mistaken, I have inspiration upon this subject—that it is God’s way of helping to establish peace and good will on earth, and … that a fight against the League of Nations as it has been presented to the Senate of the United States for ratification is a fight against God. – George F. Richards, October 1919 General Conference
And besides being inconvenient for Beck, these conference quotes further discredit the claim that the LDS Church has historically remained politically neutral. The church, to my knowledge, has never endorsed specific parties or candidates, but it was once fairly common to hear general authorities make overtly political statements from the pulpit.
Jon,
Great points… a couple thoughts.
The church is politically neutral, in that it does not support any politician or party. That’s the definition of political neutrality.
The church has never said it does not speak out on issues of the day. The lds.org newsroom contains stances on issues the church feels are relevant. While they don’t control the Utah legislature in the way many claim they do, the church does get involved in certain state issues: immigration, alcohol, etc.
By the way, I’m torn on the League of Nations and curious for your opinion… I would support the concept if our membership would have changed the ridiculous, borderline human rights violating, provisions that Europe imposed on Germany (causing WWII, the Holocaust, and many of the world’s problems since then).
However, I would object to our membership if it simply gave credibility to the entity without significant changes (sort of like the UN Human Rights group today).
Your thoughts?
I’ll have to get back once I’ve articulated an opinion on the League of Nations. I think I support it, but I haven’t really studied it.
If you understand politically neutral to mean non-partisan, then I agree that the church has been politically neutral. All I meant to suggest is that the church was once eager to opine on political matters, where now the church seems very reluctant to. Also, understand this post in the context of my other posts about general conference. The point of my series is to demonstrate that the old conference talks were interesting, compared to today’s sanitized talks.
“The church is politically neutral, in that it does not support any politician or party. That’s the definition of political neutrality.”
Why do you exclude participation in other political activities in your definition? Because these are the non-profit requirements?
It’s not the first time he’s contradicted himself. I can’t remember what the issue was, but he said one thing in April and not too long ago said the exact opposite. (I’m remembering him being mocked on the Daily Show for it, they showed the clips directly from Beck’s show – it wasn’t just clever editing.) Ugh, the guy just makes me sick.
Carla, it may have been his comments about how the attacks on 9/11 were as a result of our foreign policy, and then shortly after, he attacked the Iman from the Cordoba Group in New York as being anti-American for articulating the same views.
Glenn Beck’s grasp of Mormon theology and history is as tenuous as his grasp on political theory and history. This is wandering a bit off the topic of the post, but for example, his attacks on what he claims are Obama’s collectivist views of salvation are brutally ironic given Mormonism’s emphasis on Zion, community, saving families as whole trees via sealing power rather than just as individuals, and the importance of Mormons doing temple work for others to play a part in their salvation. (Ironically, we get a lot of flack from mainline Christians on the last point, saying that *we* believe too much in a collectivist salvation that improperly deemphasizes Christ.) Then of course one could turn to the Book of Mormon’s “Pride Cycle” so oft belabored in Sunday School as to become a dead horse. That is saying that the whole society rises and falls collectively based on their treatment of the least among them. Economic stratification and not helping the poor are Public Enemies #1 and 2 in the Pride Cycle.
> The church, to my knowledge, has never endorsed specific parties or candidates,
I don’t think this is true. Didn’t they used to divide congregation in half and tell each half to vote for a different party/candidate (when they were trying to gain statehood). I guess that’s not the same as “endorsing” in the sense that it was a double endorsement, but they were told exactly who to vote for. Or maybe that story is an urban legend….
Hey, Cynthia. I think you’re right about the “double endorsment.” Ha ha. I’ve heard that too. And then in early church history, Joseph Smith delivered the Mormon bloc vote to a couple of candidates, but I don’t think one’s membership was ever contingent on who or what a Mormon privately voted for.
“The church, to my knowledge, has never endorsed specific parties or candidates”
Joseph Smith 1844 presidential candidacy…?
The church is political. It contributes money to campaigns, such as the vote to repeal Prop. 8. You don’t have to support a specific candidate or party to participate politically. All issues of government are political, and the Mormons have a long history on weighing in.