Or, wait, was it “Federal Agents Raid LDS Cannery!“? Actually, I’m not going to perpetuate the recent viral story that’s been making the rounds online and via email. The alleged “raid” on a Tennessee LDS (Mormon) Food Cannery, in which Federal agents demanded their customer list, might not actually have happened, but maybe it did. The story hasn’t been officially verified and the original informant cited by the Oath Keepers website, where the story was originally published, has now recanted his story.

Perhaps the federal agents went back with the neutralizer pen and flashed the people at the cannery.

There are confirmed reports of door-to-door assessments of disaster preparedness in Tennessee, which has some people concerned.

Meanwhile, those of us who do have food storage (as we’ve been counseled to do for decades by latter-day prophets), especially if you are a liberty-minded constitutionalists, are now even more likely to be labeled domestic terrorists thanks to actual federal laws. Some of us have a year or more of food storage, yet having just 7-days worth of food is enough to find yourself on the list of suspects. Don’t believe me? Get the facts from Senator Rand Paul and Judge Napolitano: youtube.com/watch?v=iD1T61oTrR8

Considering the corruption of the federal government and the reality of secret combinations, I wouldn’t be surprised if the story of federal agents demanding the LDS Cannery customer list is true. Far worse has been done on behalf of the United States government, on several occassions, including the murdering of millions of innocents.

Many of the freedoms once available in America have been destroyed. If the Constitution exists at all today for sure it is hanging by a thread. Prophets have warned us for centuries, unfortunately not enough have listened, and less have acted upon those warnings.

Things like this make me even more grateful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the liberty and joy that comes as a result of learning and living the truth. When considered in the eternal perspective many of these political issues seem silly, but one thing I know for sure is that it does matter what side we stand on. I’m not talking about what political party we side with, but what political principles we support. It does matter that we stand up for freedom and truth in whatever way that we can. It might be too late for the elders of Israel to save the Constitution but it’s not too late to save your soul, and hopefully others.

Additional reading:

• Federal agents raid Mormon food storage facility, demand list of customers storing emergency food
• Did Federal Agents Really Raid a Mormon Food Storage Facility?
• EVERYTHING You Wanted to Know On the “Federal Agent’s Raid on the LDS Cannery” Story
• STORY PULLED: Oath Keepers Alert: Federal Agents Demand Customer Lists From Mormon Food Storage Facility

We’ve heard this remarkable choir tonight. They sing with such tremendous power. This choir has become a great national treasure. Its roots reach back 150 years to the pioneer beginnings of these mountain communities. We have had a wonderful time listening to them. I wish they could go on all evening…I would wish particularly. At the conclusion of my remarks, they will sing the Battle Hymn of the Republic, which has stirred audiences throughout the world.

Mine eyes have seen the coming of the glory of the Lord
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored
He has loosed the fateful lightning of his terrible swift sword
His truth is marching on
He has sounded forth the trumpet that will never call retreat
He is sifting out the hearts of men before his judgment seat
O be swift my soul to answer Him, be jubilant my feet
Our God is marching on
In the beauty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me
As He died to make men holy, let us live to make men free
While God is marching on

This great hymn of hope stirs us now as it did more than a century ago when it was first sung. I promise you, every one of you, that you will be moved in your hearts as you again hear these talented voices singing out these marvelous and eloquent words. These words speak of the theme of this meeting: that theme is recognition of, and trust in the Almighty, who has guided this nation since its inception. I salute Crystal Jolley for the excellent talk she has given.

A news magazine writer asked me the other day during an interview concerning my belief concerning the Constitution of our country. I replied that I felt it was inspired, that both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States were brought forth under the inspiration of God to establish and sustain the freedom of the people of this nation. I told him I looked upon the Founding Fathers as men who believed in God, as men who prayed to God, as men who recognized God and wished to do His will. What a singular and remarkable group they were! As I look across the world today, I search in vain for such a group has walked together across the stage of history when this nation was born.

Charles Malek, Secretary General of the United States, once said on this campus, “I respect all men and it is from this respect for none that I say there are no great leaders in the world today. In fact, greatness itself is laughed to scorn. You should not be great today; you should sink yourself into the herd. You should not be distinguished from the crowd; you should simply be one of the many.” He continued, “The commanding voice is lacking, the voice which speaks little but which when it speaks, it speaks with compelling moral authority. This kind of voice is not congenial to this age. The age flattens and levels down every distinction into drab uniformity. Respect for the high, the noble, the great, the rare, the specimen that appears once every hundred or every thousand years is gone. Respect at all is gone. If you ask people whom and what people do respect, the answer is literally nobody and nothing. This is simply an unrespecting age; it is the age of utter mediocrity. To become a leader today, even a mediocre leader, is a most uphill struggle. You are constantly in every way and from every side pulled down. One wonders who of those living today will be remembered a thousand years from now, the way we remember with profound respect Plato and Aristotle, Christ and Paul and Augustine and Aquinas.” He concluded, “If you believe in prayer my friends, and I know that you do, then pray that God send great leaders, especially great leaders of the spirit.”

Just think of a moment of George Washington, of Franklin, of Madison, of the Adams’s, of Thomas Jefferson, and their associates who signed the Declaration of Independence, or participated in the Constitutional Convention. Where in all the world today can even one or two such men be found, let alone the great aggregation that participated in the birth of America?

Can anyone deny that they were raised up unto this very purpose, that working together, they brought forth on this continent an independent nation at the risk of their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor? It is my conviction that while we’ve had a few great leaders since then, there has not been before or since, so large a group of talented, able, and dedicated men as those whom we call the Founding Fathers of this nation. For as long as they lived they acknowledged the hand of the Almighty in the affairs of this republic.

We have on our coinage and our currency a national motto. It simply says, In God We Trust. I know of no other nation with such a motto. Other nations use, By the Grace of God, but none other categorically states, In God We Trust. This is the foundation upon which this nation was established: an unequivocal trust in the power of the Almighty to guide and defend us. The hand of God was manifest when the United States of America came into being. It was evident even before then. Before disembarking from the Mayflower, our pilgrim fathers drafted and signed the compact which would become the instrument of their governance, the first such document drafted on this continent. It began with these words, “In the name of God, Amen.” It went on to say that the signers, “by these present, solemnly and mutually in the presence of God and one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic.”

When George Washington resigned his commission as General of the Army he wrote, “I consider it an indispensable duty to close this last act of my official life, but commending the interests of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty God, and those who have the superintendents of them to His holy keeping.” As Crystal has reminded us tonight, in his first inaugural address in 1789 he stated, “No people can be bound to acknowledge and ignore the invisible hand which conducts the affairs of men more than the people of the United States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency.”

We posted the colors tonight and stood and gave a pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and the Republic for which it stands. We said, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. That phrase, one nation under God, essentially comes from Abraham Lincoln. In the great Gettysburg address he stated, “This nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom.” That phrase was not in the pledge of allegiance that was spoken when I was a boy. Back in those days, all of us in grade school, if the weather permitted, would form at the front steps of the school. The flag would be posted and we would recite together the pledge of allegiance before going into the building for our daily school work. I am grateful for the addition of the words, One Nation Under God. To me, it is tremendously meaningful.

There are those in this nation today who would delete all this reference to Deity. They would take it out of the pledge of allegiance. They would take it from our coinage. They would remove it from any mention in our national life. John Wesley Heele has written, “Gettysburg was the high water mark of the rebellion. It involved the destiny of the union. Realizing this, it was Lincoln who at while battle was being fought was driven to his knees to struggle like Jacob of old, alone with God, until in Lincoln’s own words, “God told me he would give me Gettysburg and I believed Him.” When the news of the victory reached him, he gave to God the glory and set aside a day of national thanksgiving.

When Mrs. Margaret Thatcher was on this campus and I was talking with her, she said, “I cannot understand it; you have the motto, In God We Trust on your coinage and yet you cannot mention the name of Deity in the classrooms of your schools. She wondered, and I wonder about our consistency.

At this meeting tonight, the first verse of our national anthem was sung. We seldom hear the third verse, which include these words,

O thus be it ever when free-men shall stand
Between their lov’d home and the war’s desolation;
Blest with vict’ry and peace, may the heav’n-rescued land
Praise the Pow’r that hath made and preserv’d us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust!”

As boys who would grow to become citizens of this nation, we repeated the scout oath including these words; On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country. Now that is even being challenged in the courts of the land. According to the Wall Street Journal, the state of New Jersey last year passed a law banishing the mention of God from state courtroom oaths. Following this action by the legislature, a county just decided to ban Bibles for such oaths because, “You know who is mentioned inside.”

Without acknowledgement of deity, without recognition of the Almighty as the ruling power of the universe, the all important element of personal and national accountability shrinks and dies. Are we so arrogant as to believe that we can get along without Him? We see the manifestation of that arrogance in the great host of social problems with which we deal these days: teen pregnancy, abandoned families and broken homes, failure to recognize the property and rights of others, gangs of young people aimlessly cruising the streets of our cities, and many other problems like these have resulted in substantial part at least, from failure to recognize that there is a God to whom someday, each of us must give an accounting.

The wars in which this nation has been involved during this, the most bloody century of all time have resulted from the greed, the avarice, the arrogance, the conceit, and egotism of men in power who sought to enslave and exercise dominion over others. Their very attitude has been totally incompatible with recognition of the Almighty to whom each of us is accountable.

There can be no doubt of the sickness in our society today. We cannot build prisons fast enough to accommodate the need. Humanism has replaced worship in the lives of so many. We are forsaking the Almighty and I fear He is forsaking us. We are closing the door against the God, whose sons and daughters we are. We sang, “My country tis of thee, sweet land of liberty.” We need to sing again and again the fourth verse of that hymn:

Our Father’s God to Thee, Author of liberty, To Thee we sing
Long may our land be bright, with freedom’s holy light,
Protect us by thy might, Great God our king

Going back to George Washington’s first inaugural speech, he voiced the hope, “that the foundations of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality.” He went on to say, “…there is no truth more thoroughly established than that there exists an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness; between duty and advantage; between genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy and the solid rewards of public prosperity and felicity; since we ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which heaven itself has ordained.” The psalmist of old wrote, “The counsel of the Lord standeth forever. Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.” Paul the apostle declared, “Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.”

I believe we are paying a very high price for our increasing secularism. Jefferson said, “God who gave us life, gave us liberty.” Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are a gift of God?

Lincoln declared, “What constituted the bulwark of our own liberty and independence? It is not our frowning battlements, our bristling seacoasts; our reliance is in the love of liberty which God has planted in us. Our defense is in the spirity which prized liberty as the heritage of all men in all lands everywhere.”

We go back to the prophetic words of Alexis de Tocqueville, who came here from France as a young man in the early 1800s. After traveling widely he said, “I sought for the key to the greatness and genius of America in her harbors, in her fertile fields and boundless forests, in her rich minds and vast commerce, in her public school system and institutions of learning. I sought for it in her democratic congress and in her matchless Constitution, but not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits aflame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and her power. America is great because America is good. And if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.”

I am convinced that if we are to continue to have the freedoms which came of the inspiration of the Almighty to our Founding Fathers, we must return to the God who is their true author. We need to worship him in spirit and in truth. We need to acknowledge his all powerful hand. We need to humble ourselves before him and seek his guidance in all that concerns matters of state. Do we believe in the separation of church and state? Of course we do, but that belief does not preclude a petition to the Almighty for wisdom and guidance as we walk through these perilous times.

We celebrate the freedom of our nation. We hold this festival in remembrance of this greatest of all boons and blessings. May we look to him as the author of our liberty. Is it too much to expect that prayer, public and private, be once again established in our national and private lives? Then with a general acknowledgement of the God in whom we put our trust, we may expect a diminution in our social problems, an increase in public and private morality, and a renewed sense of freedom and liberty. I realize that after the choir sings we shall have a benediction on this sacred service to be offered by Senator Bennett, but if you will bear with me, I wish to conclude my remarks with a few words of solemn prayer. I invite all of you to lower your heads and close your eyes.

Oh God, our Eternal Father, thou who presides over the nations and their people, we come unto thee in prayer. We thank thee for this great and sovereign nation of which we are citizens. Touch the minds of those of our Congress that they shall stand tall and independent in defense of the liberty of the people. Bless the chief executive. He is our president. Let thy spirit move upon him to bring to pass those measures which will lift the burdens of government from the backs of the people and keep this nation under God, a citadel of freedom standing as an example to all the world. Bless the Supreme Court of the United States which in recent days has declared unconstitutional a measure designed to secure the religious liberty of the people of this nation. May a way be found under thy divine inspiration to bring to pass another measure which will be sustained by the court. May thy peace rest upon this nation. May we as a people look to thee and live. May the benevolent hand of the almighty protect us from the evil forces of the world. May humanism and secularism bend to an increased knowledge of these our Father and our God. May a spirit of brotherhood spread throughout the land. As we pray to thee, we do so in our manner and respect the prayers of others who speak after their manner. That thou wilt hear us all as we lift our voices in behalf of our beloved nation. Almighty Father, hear us, guide us, protect us, make us both strong and benevolent before the world. Forgive our erring ways. May we turn back to thee in our search for wisdom, for guidance, for direction, we humbly ask in Jesus’ sacred name, Amen.

“No greater immediate responsibility rests upon the members of the church, upon all citizens of this republic and of neighboring republics than to protect the freedom vouchsafed by the Constitution of the United States.” (The Instructor, August, 1953)

In the days of the Prophet Noah, men had no greater immediate responsibility than to repent and board the Ark. Now in our day, the day of the Prophet David O. McKay, he has said that we have no greater immediate responsibility than to protect the freedom vouchsafed by the Constitution of the United States.

At the last general conference of the church (October 1966), President McKay, in his opening address, said,

“Efforts are being made to deprive man of his free agency — to steal from the individual his liberty…. There has been an alarming increase in the abandoning of the ideals that constitute the foundation of the Constitution of the United States.”

Toward the close of his talk, our Prophet, quoting Paul’s letter to Timothy regarding the preaching of the word, said,

“There should be no question in the mind of any true latter day saint as to what we shall preach… the gospel plan of salvation.”

Then President McKay lists the areas our preaching should cover and admonishes us to include in our preaching what governments should or should not do in the interests of the preservation of our freedom.

Do we preach what governments should or should not do as a part of the gospel plan, as President McKay has urged or do we refuse to follow the Prophet by preaching a limited gospel plan of salvation? The fight for freedom cannot be divorced from the gospel — the plan of salvation.

We sing that we are thankful to “God for a Prophet to guide us in these latter days.” By commandment of the Lord we assemble in general conference twice a year to get that guidance from the Lord’s representative. Do we realize that in the last five years prior to October Conference, the Prophet has key noted three of these conferences with an opening discourse on freedom and given nine other addresses in the conferences that touched on freedom?

Do we see any patter here? Can we name any other gospel theme that has received as much emphases from the man who holds the keys as has the theme of freedom?

We do not need a prophet — we have one. What we need is a listening ear, a humble heart, and a soul that is pure enough to follow his inspired guidance.

Through revelations granted to the Prophet Joseph and his predecessors, we learn some profound things about our relationship to God and our ultimate des­tiny. We learn that Jesus Christ, as the Son of God, progressed “from grace to grace, until he received a fulness”¹ and that we may follow in that same path. He said, “For if you keep my commandments you shall receive of his fulness, and be glorified in me as I am in the Father; therefore, I say unto you, you shall receive grace for grace.”² In explaining the natural conclusion of this pattern, Joseph Smith said:

Here, then, is eternal life—to know the only wise and true God; and you have got to learn how to be gods your­selves, and to be kings and priests to God, . . . by going from one small degree to another, and from a small capacity to a great one; from grace to grace, from exaltation to exaltation, until you attain to the resurrection of the dead, and are able to dwell in everlasting burnings, and to sit in glory, as do those who sit enthroned in everlasting power.³

Joseph Smith also referred to God’s use of law in this process:

The first principles of man are self-existent with God. God himself, finding he was in the midst of spirits and glory, because he was more intelligent, saw proper to institute laws whereby the rest could have a privilege to advance like himself. The relationship we have with God places us in a situation to advance in knowledge. He has power to institute laws to instruct the weaker intelligences, that they may be exalted with Himself, so that they might have one glory upon another.⁴

I cite one more teaching from the Prophet that adds the remaining element to this equation—agency:

All persons are entitled to their agency, for God has so ordained it. He has constituted mankind moral agents, and given them power to choose good or evil; to seek after that which is good, by pursuing the pathway of holiness in this life, which brings peace of mind, and joy in the Holy Ghost here, and a fulness of joy and happiness at His right hand hereafter; or to pursue an evil course, going on in sin and rebellion against God, thereby bringing condemna­tion to their souls in this world, and an eternal loss in the world to come.⁵

All of this declares that we have a potential made possible by God beyond anything we can fully comprehend or appreciate at present. And we recognize, of course, that none of us will achieve the ultimate end, the status of eternal life with God our Father, in a matter of days or years or with­out substantial help. We require the help of one another and an incalculable measure of divine grace originating in Christ and administered through the Holy Ghost. Nevertheless, our own choices will always be critical to what we become. And the capacity and power to choose are, as Joseph Smith declared, dependent on laws instituted by or under the authority of God.

Such laws link particular actions to fixed outcomes. If a given choice did not always and invari­ably yield the same result, we could not in the end control outcomes, and the power to choose would be meaningless. And even with law, if we are not free to act, either to follow or reject it, we likewise could not use law to progress from grace to grace. I believe that Satan’s proposals in the premortal world attacked both of these principles. He wanted to be vested with a power of compul­sion over the souls of men and with the honor or power of God:

And I, the Lord God, spake unto Moses, saying: That Satan, whom thou hast commanded in the name of mine Only Begotten, is the same which was from the beginning, and he came before me, saying—Behold, here am I, send me, I will be thy son, and I will redeem all mankind, that one soul shall not be lost, and surely I will do it; wherefore give me thine honor.⁶

Had Satan been granted power to dictate our choices, we would have become nothing more than his puppets, eternally dependent upon him. It is my personal opinion that in demanding “Give me thine honor,” Satan was also coveting God’s power to establish the law, and that it was his intention to use that power arbitrarily—to apply, revoke, and change laws in an arbitrary fashion that would destroy our power to act indepen­dently and to choose our destiny. For whatever reason, Satan was excep­tionally persuasive in lobbying for his approach. Happily, his plan was rejected, although echoes continue to reverberate in the world around us.

The deities of ancient Greek and Roman mythology were often arbitrary beings. While they were supposed to possess remarkable powers, they were ruled by their passions. As they fought and jockeyed for position among themselves, or simply vented feelings of lust, anger, or frustration, mere mortals were sometimes caught in the cross fire. We can be grateful, to say the least, that the true and living God is nothing like the imaginary Zeus or Jupiter.

The scripture states, “There are many kingdoms. . . . And unto every kingdom is given a law; and unto every law there are certain bounds also and conditions.”⁷ Apparently, laws with their con­ditions and bounds may vary in different kingdoms or spheres—as, for example, the laws of the several kingdoms that prevail in our postmortal life. The Lord says that His celestial kingdom is populated by those who are “sanctified through the law which I have given unto you, even the law of Christ,”⁸ and that those who cannot abide this celestial law must inherit a lesser kingdom whose law they are able and willing to follow.⁹ While differing laws may apply in different parts of God’s creation, the laws that do apply do not themselves vary. Such beings and creations as are subject to them can rely on them to achieve their divine potential. We are told that those who are governed by law are preserved, perfected, and sanctified by the same.¹⁰

Under the umbrella of divine law and order applicable to the “kingdom” that is our present mor­tal world, God delegates to us, His children, the opportunity and responsibility to establish laws and legal systems to govern human relations and conduct. Let me quote from section 134 of the Doctrine and Covenants:

We believe that governments were instituted of God for the benefit of man; and that he holds men accountable for their acts in relation to them, both in making laws and administering them, for the good and safety of society.

We believe that no government can exist in peace, except such laws are framed and held inviolate as will secure to each individual the free exercise of conscience, the right and control of property, and the protection of life.¹¹

These standards—(1) that laws are to be made and administered for “the good and safety of soci­ety” and (2) that they must secure to each individual the rights of life, property, and conscience—bespeak a legal environment in which man may progress toward his divine destiny, to become what God has ordained he may become. They establish the stability, order, and means whereby each individual may exercise moral agency. They produce a setting wherein each person, if he or she so desires, can “come unto Christ, and be perfected in him”¹² and all that that entails.

In the infant days of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Lord expressed in a revelation to Joseph Smith the wisdom and benefit of organizing the Church and its work “according to the laws of man; That your enemies may not have power over you; that you may be preserved in all things; that you may be enabled to keep my laws.”¹³ I read this to mean that, as a general principle, submission to the laws of man will offer very real protections, providing in effect a safe haven within which we can act to obey and serve God.

In his book The Clash of Orthodoxies, Robert P. George has an interesting chapter titled “What Is Law?” He examines the debates among legal thinkers and philosophers in the English-speaking world over the last century, beginning with Oliver Wendell Holmes, about the origins and nature of law. He cites, for example, the group whose legal realist movement flourished to some extent in the 1930s and 1940s. These scholars debunked the idea of legal objectivity; to be realistic, they main­tained, we “should abandon the idea that law pre-exists and is available to guide legal decisions.”¹⁴ They argued that judges’ reasoning and citation of laws as the basis of their decisions are in reality “mere legal rationalization of decisions reached on other grounds.”¹⁵

George reviews other theories such as “legal positivism,” which in some versions holds to “the idea that law ought not to embody or enforce moral judgments.”¹⁶ Other proponents, however, acknowledge that the content of legal rules reflects “nothing so much as the moral judgments pre­vailing in any society regarding the subject matters regulated by law.”¹⁷ For George himself, “legal rules and principles function as practical reasons for citizens, as well as judges and other officials, because the citizens appreciate their moral value.”¹⁸ He subscribes to the proposition lex iniusta non est lex (an unjust law is not law), by which he means, if I understand him correctly, that it is essential for the laws and legal systems created by man to have a basis in natural law or morality.¹⁹

In his 1993 encyclical letter titled “Veritatis Splendor,” Pope John Paul II expressed the relevant Catholic doctrine in these words:

Only by obedience to universal moral norms does man find full confirmation of his personal uniqueness and the possibility of authentic moral growth. . . . These norms in fact represent the unshakable foundation and solid guar­antee of a just and peaceful human coexistence, and hence of genuine democracy, which can come into being and develop only on the basis of the equality of all its members, who possess common rights and duties. When it is a matter of the moral norms prohibiting intrinsic evil, there are no privileges or exceptions for anyone. It makes no difference whether one is the master of the world or the “poorest of the poor” on the face of the earth. Before the demands of morality we are all absolutely equal.²⁰

Latter-day Saints would necessarily be included among those who believe in preexisting and uni­versal natural law—or, as we might express it, law rooted in the preexisting justice and order of God. I firmly agree that insofar as humanly possible, man’s laws and legal systems should be tied to God’s laws and should reflect the same ultimate purpose: to foster our becoming all that we can become here and hereafter. People instinctively appreciate the value of law that has valid moral underpin­nings because it is in their nature as spiritual beings and children of God—the ultimate moral Being. The light of Christ that we sometimes call conscience lights every person who comes into this world.²¹

Some of you may be thinking, “This is all very grand, but where, for example, does tax law fit in?” I would answer that it probably does not, since tax codes are the work of the devil, right? But in all seriousness, even the very mundane can have a role if it is supportive of—or at least not inconsistent with—overarching divine principles and purpose. The Uniform Commercial Code, for example, would seem to have little if any contribution to make in helping us achieve our divine potential, but even something so unethereal can have value as part of a larger legal structure that supports fundamental fairness, mini­mizes strife, rewards honest labor, preserves stable families, and, ultimately, enshrines moral agency.

Returning again to the Doctrine and Covenants:

We believe that all governments necessarily require civil officers and magistrates to enforce the laws of the same; and that such as will administer the law in equity and justice should be sought for and upheld by the voice of the people if a republic, or the will of the sovereign.²²

Here, more specifically, we come to many of you in the profession of law. You live in societies where the system of “civil officers and magistrates” includes judges and lawyers who occupy a vital role in administering the law “in equity and justice.” You whose first loyalty is to God can press in a variety of ways for laws and systems that track the divine model or that at least do not undermine it. Let me be clear that I am not speaking of any endeavor to impose upon society by some sort of fiat what we see as the appropriate application of divinely revealed principles. We cannot, and we make no attempt to do so. I am speaking of advocacy and persuasion. At the same time, it will not do to pretend that an individual or group may not participate in the debates and processes that shape our laws simply because their arguments are based on moral norms or because their moral vision is not shared by all citizens. Essentially all legislation is based on moral judgments—religious, secular, or otherwise, and all parties to the ongoing contest seek to have their ethical and moral concerns heard. In the end we are governed by those that prevail in the public mind. It is not an imposition of religion for religionists to take part in the discussion, and there is no justice in one side with deeply held values seeking to silence another because it espouses different deeply held values.

Consider the example of William Wilberforce and others of his time who sought to conform the laws of Great Britain to a higher moral standard of equity and justice. Wilberforce is rightly remembered and revered for his central role in the abolition of the slave trade that was then domi­nated by British ships. For some 18 years, beginning in 1789, he labored as a member of Parliament to end this evil commerce and lay the groundwork for the abolition of slavery altogether:

Wilberforce’s involvement in the abolition movement was motivated by a desire to put his Christian principles into action and to serve God in public life. . . . [He] sensed a call from God, writing in a journal entry in 1787 that “God Almighty has set before me two great objects, the suppression of the Slave Trade and the Reformation of Manners [moral values].”²³

Initially, Wilberforce’s bills in the House of Commons were easily defeated. Then, just as momentum began to build, the French Revolution and slave revolts in the West Indies caused a shift back to caution and delay. During the protracted campaign, “Wilberforce’s commitment never wavered, despite frustration and hostility. He was supported in his work by fellow members of the so-called Clapham Sect. . . . Holding evangelical Christian con­victions, and consequently dubbed ‘the Saints,’ the group lived in large adjoining houses in Clapham.”²⁴ Finally, in 1807, Wilberforce’s Abolition Bill passed the House of Lords and was pre­sented to the House of Commons. “As tributes were made to Wilberforce, whose face streamed with tears, the bill was carried by 283 votes to 16.”²⁵

It is significant to recognize that while Wilberforce, as a member of Parliament, took the lead­ing role in official circles, the active and devoted efforts of many others with no political portfo­lio were essential to success in the campaign to end the slave trade. The collaboration of Thomas Clarkson, a fellow graduate of Wilberforce at St. John’s Cambridge, was especially important. Also critical was the part played by members of the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade, a group made up primarily of like-minded British Quakers and Anglicans that included Clarkson and that Wilberforce joined in 1791.

The society was highly successful in raising public awareness and support, and local chapters sprang up throughout Great Britain. Clarkson travelled the country researching and collecting firsthand testimony and sta­tistics, while the committee promoted the campaign, pioneering techniques such as lobbying, writing pamphlets, holding public meetings, gaining press attention, organizing boycotts and even using a campaign logo: an image of a kneeling slave above the motto “Am I Not a Man and a Brother?” designed by the renowned pottery-maker Josiah Wedgwood. The committee also sought to influence slave-trading nations such as France, Spain, Portugal, Denmark, Holland and the United States, corresponding with anti-slavery activists in other countries and organ­ising the translation of English-language books and pamphlets. These included books by former slaves Ottobah Cugoano and Olaudah Equiano, who had published influential works on slavery and the slave trade in 1787 and 1789, respectively. They and other free blacks, collectively known as “Sons of Africa,” spoke at debating societies and wrote spirited letters to newspapers, periodicals and prominent figures, as well as public letters of support to campaign allies. . . . The campaign proved to be the world’s first grassroots human rights campaign, in which men and women from different social classes and backgrounds volunteered to end the injustices suffered by others.²⁶

William Wilberforce and his allies provide an encouraging example of success after much labor and against daunting opposition. Not every effort, however, will succeed—at least not ini­tially. Consider a more recent example in the arena of things that bear on marriage and families and the rearing of children. The “no-fault” divorce laws that have been adopted in the United States and elsewhere were warned against decades ago by President David O. McKay and others. The disastrous consequences visited on the institution of mar­riage since then are clearly evident, with children being the primary victims—some of whom, given their suffering, are now reluctant to marry and rear families themselves. But whatever the setbacks in our striving to sustain family or other moral imperatives among our fellowman, surely we must, as Paul declared, fight the good fight.²⁷ Mohammed is reported to have said, “Who[so]ever sees a wrong and is able to put it right with his hand, let him do so; if he can’t, then with his tongue; if he can’t, then in his heart, and that is the bare minimum of faith.”²⁸

Of all the moral imperatives we seek to embrace and defend in our legal systems, in my opin­ion it is individual agency and accountability that must always be preeminent, because agency is so basic to realizing our God-given potential. On the one hand, we should uphold those legal and political concepts that protect legitimate individual action, and, on the other, we should oppose those theories and schemes that exert unjust dominion or diminish predictability and consistency in the operation of law. True, there is some degree of compulsion in any law, but generally it is the kind designed to preserve space and opportunity for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Other pro­posals, however, look to compel our acceptance or tolerance of actions that offend the moral con­science. A potential example would be the case of a doctor being forced to participate in an abortion against his or her conscientious objection on pain of forfeiting the right to practice medicine.

All man-made legal systems are imperfect and include elements of injustice. Still, you can strive to make the legal system within which you live and work come as close as possible to the perfectly just “legal system” of God. You can take as your guide not only the wisdom of similarly minded men and women from the past but also the teachings of the scriptures, prophets, and the Holy Spirit. In this, as in other matters, you are invited to study out in your own mind concepts regarding the stan­dards, direction, and even the specifics of what the law should be, how the legal system should be structured, and how it should operate and then to ask God if it be right.²⁹ Surely you are entitled in your role and sphere to revelation on things that bear so directly on not only the present estate of man but also his ultimate future.

God finds His glory, as Joseph Smith said, in providing laws by which other beings can come to enjoy the same perfections and glory He possesses.³⁰ Our view and motivations should be the same. Rather than seeing law as an instrument of domination, it is our mission to use it as an enabling power to help men and women achieve greater independence and ultimate potential. We do so by acting to have our earthly governmental and legal systems mirror as closely as possible the divine order.

After all I have said in praise of law and all the effort I have enjoined you to make in sustaining and defending a moral order, we must in the end acknowledge that we cannot achieve ultimate jus­tice apart from Jesus Christ. To establish and preserve the law is a great good, but the greatest good we can do in helping others become what they can become will be to lead them to the Savior. Only His Atonement has the power to overcome all weakness and imperfection and to make right all injustice. Only He can convert offense and injury into blessings; only He can bring life again to a life unjustly cut short; only He can return a perfect body for one diseased or malformed; only He can reinstate beloved associations lost and make them permanent; only He can make right the suffering entailed upon the innocent by ignorance and oppression; only He can erase the impact of sin on one who is wronged; only He can remove the stain and effect of sin in the sinner; only He can eliminate sor­row and wipe away all tears;³¹ only He can provide immortality; only His grace can compensate for our inadequacy and justify us before that law that enables us to become joint heirs of eternal life with Him. Of the glorious reality of the living Christ, I bear my witness.

notes

1. D&C 93:13.
2. D&C 93:20.
3. History of the Church, 6:306.
4. History of the Church, 6:312.
5. History of the Church, 4:45.
6. Moses 4:1.
7. D&C 88:37–38.
8. D&C 88:21.
9. See D&C 88:21–24.
10. See D&C 88:34.
11. D&C 134:1–2.
12. Moroni 10:32.
13. D&C 44:4–5.
14. Robert P. George, The Clash of Orthodoxies (Wilmington, Delaware: isi Books, 2001), 219.
15. Clash, 219.
16. Clash, 222.
17. Clash, 223.
18. Clash, 226.
19. See Clash, 227–28.
20. Pope John Paul II, “Veritatis Splendor,” 6 August 1993, 91; emphasis in original.
21. See D&C 84:45–46; 88:7–14; 92:2.
22. D&C 134:3.
23. Wikipedia, William Wilberforce, 31 January 2011, 8:23 p.m.
24. Wikipedia.
25. Wikipedia.
26. Wikipedia.
27. See 2 Timothy 4:7.
28. Qanta A. Ahmed, “Fulfilling Our Duty as Muslim-Americans,” Wall Street Journal, 7 January 2011, A11.
29. See D&C 9:8.
30. See Moses 1:39.
31. See Isaiah 25:8.

Yet I do know that the Communists and their co-conspirators, our American revolutionists, have planned out what postwar America is to be, and I also know that unless the rest of us are awake they will have their way.  For, as their sort have worked in other countries, they stop at nothing–intimidation, lawlessness, plunder, arson and murder, which they have rechristened with the sweeter name, “liquidation.”  In other countries they have used all of these things wholesale wherever they have operated.  They will do the same here, if their opportunity shall come.

…Any clean-visioned person can see that if the government is to take care of all the people, it must own all that the people own in order to do it.  There must be no private property: no one must own anything.  As one Utah Communist expressed it, when urged to put in a winter’s supply of food– “Why should I?  Jim Jones, my neighbor, has plenty, and if I run out I will just go and help myself to his.  I don’t intend to suffer as long as anyone else has anything.”  This feeling will last the war out and be with us in the postwar era.

…Every farmer, every industrialist, every merchant, every person in any walk of life who takes a gratuity from the government for not producing, or for not working, or for anything unearned, is just as culpable, in morals and in sound government finance and in our economic national life, is just as much a “doler” as is the man who takes his dole of $30 or $50 or $60 per month to pay his heat, light, rent and grocery bills.

Children Under Communism

But the communistic revolutionists of other lands have changed all this; under their concepts children are the property of the State; men and women are merely the brood animals to beget and birth them; great State nurseries care for them; State schools, completely dominated, train them in the doctrines and habits and beliefs they wish them to have; great public dormitories lodge them; food and clothing come from the State; the State determines what and how they worship, if at all; the State tells them when, how, and at what they shall work; the State determines how far they shall go in any and every line of human thought and human action.

Man’s achievement is no longer measured by his capabilities, but by what the little group of despotic overlords decide.  Free speech, free thought, free conscience, free agency, are driven out of mortal ken–And who is the State?  Not all the humans living within its territorial limits, but a few despots that by pillage, plunder, and murder, “liquidation,” shall place themselves at the head.  I am not speaking in hyperbole; I am only in a few words setting out the essentials of what the world in my short life time has witnessed in other lands.

Our Progress Towards Communism

Let us look at our condition:  Already we have begun to move down that trail which we follow like dumb sheep; public nurseries have been set up to tend the children while the mothers work–this is the first time in our America that women have been called out by the State or by our economic system into the field and workshops to do the manual labor of men, as do the peasant women of Europe:  public kitchens have been established in the schools where the children may be fed by the State instead of going home…..proposed laws have been passed which would prevent youths from helping earn the family livelihood and governmental recreation has been provided to take the place of work; CCC camps have been created to take youths thus State fed, clothed, and housed, from their home localities, mingling all kinds and classes together and gathering them into large camps that we in this area have seen become, in some cases, breeding places for idleness, gambling, blasphemy, and all the cardinal transgressions; public gratuities have been scattered abroad for doing something and for doing nothing:  they have persuaded many of us good old people, who as a group make up perhaps as much as a third of our total population, that we should be fed, housed, and clothed by the State no matter how able our children are to provide for us, nor, in practice, how able we are to care for ourselves.

Social Security

Another angle of this concept of State support, is that of so-called social security, which, under existing governmental policies, will loom increasingly larger in the postwar period.  Here, as elsewhere, plans are building on the basis of the economic returns of free enterprise, whereas those same plans contemplate the abolition of free enterprise with a consequent destruction of the returns that come from it.  We are going to try to eat our cake and yet still have it.  No one has yet successfully done this.

Small Business

We shall enter the postwar era with small business in a precarious position, if not indeed essentially ruined.  What private enterprise is left may be largely in the hands of the few.  This would be the pattern that would fit best the system set up by the revolutionists in other lands.  It is far easier to bring compelling pressure on a few, easily reached in a few communities, than on the many, widely scattered over the whole land…..

Inflation

As a companion problem to the debt, will be the problem of inflation.  So far as I can gather, no one, inside or outside of governmental circles, can tell us whether or not that will come, that is, come beyond our present inflation.  Patriotic men of all shades of political belief, earnestly desire that it may not get beyond control.  The alien revolutionists would probably view radical inflation with favor, as bringing the economic chaos out of which they expect to rise as dictators.

Postwar Regimentation

Almost four years ago (eight months before Pearl Harbor) I made this public statement:  “No thinking person doubts that our people, our nation, and the world are now passing through one of the great crises of the world’s history.  We are in the midst of a world-wide revolution, which is wholly alien to our free institutions and is foreign in birth, concept, and directing head.  No man, of his own power, sees the end.  But the end the revolutionists seek is fairly clear:  it is the overturning of the whole existing order, political financial, economic, social, religious, the complete destruction of our Constitution and the government established under it, and then the setting up of some sort of despotism that shall destroy, in all these fields, the free agency which the Lord gave to man.  The revolutionists plan that this is to be largely done during the war, under the plea of war neccessity:  it is to be continued after the war under the excuse–if we are not then too cowed to require an excuse–that this new political order is neccessary that we may rehabilitate the world.  They count that then, after a little time, the revolution will be secure.  There seems no doubt that this is their conscious, deliberate, planned end.  We have gone a long way already down this road.”

Factors Used in Regimentation

There are certain patriotic, economic, and social factors which have been instrumental in bringing us to where we are, and that are the common instruments of the revolutionists of other lands.  Most of these will persist after the war.

Patriotic Factor

First, there is the patriotic factor:  We must do this to win the war!  And we, not wishing to hinder the war effort, nor to be charged therewith, but desiring to aid it in every way possible, have held our tongues and bent our backs to every burden lest we should be called unpatriotic and might really hamper the war effort.  It was known we would do so, and that knowledge was traded on.  After the war we shall have added to the patriotic urge, the urge of serving humanity, to put us behind foreign relief, continuation of lend-lease, international monetary programs, policing the world, and other like schemes and plans.

Mass Inertia

Another instrumentality that has been consciously used in other lands is the well-known inertia of a great human mass, which leads it to endure rather than to act.  The conventional procedure has been known and applied of working slowly and cautiously, so as not unduly to arouse the mass, while it was brought under regulation after regulation to its undoing.  We have laready seen this at work.

Love for Ease and Idleness

Again: the inherent love of man for ease and idleness, plus his greed and cupidity have been played upon, by giving us something for nothing, letting us live without work.  Many of us have come to believe the world owes us a living, whether we work or loaf.

Mental Laziness

Man’s natural mental laziness has been taken advantage of by showing us we did not need to think or plan or worry about our shelter, fuel, food, and clothing; the state would take care of us and we could forget the anxieties attending upon earning a livelihood.  We have blithely walked along that easy road.

Spendthrift Urge

This last argument has been enforced by telling us we could and should spend all we had, make no savings, because the state would care for us.  Thus thrift and frugality were killed.  The father no longer need provide for the wife, son, and daughter, the state would care for that, and wife, son and daughter should thereafter look to the state, not to father, for their sustenance.

Fear of Old Age Penury

Our fears that our old age would find us penniless and in want have been played upon, and we have been persuaded that the state would care for us in our old age, we forgetting that this would make of the nation one great poorhouse.  We are not through with that technique.

Fear of Food Shortage

At the moment our fears have been raised that we are faced with a shortage of all foodstuffs, so there is fastened upon us additional regimentation in food.  Persons reputedly well informed tell us that there is no real shortage of food and that all this is done, first, to make us more amenable to direction and, next, to make us more war-conscious, as if the sorrow and mourning that has invaded hundreds of thousands of households in the land have not told us in grim words that our sons were dying in a bloody war.  This is not our first war.  We fought one war when the enemy pickets patrolling the south bank of the Potomac could be seen by Lincoln from the south porch of the White House.  We were then strained to the utmost, but we had not a hundreth part of the regulation and regimentation we have with a war 3000 miles away in one direction and twice that distance in another.  Relatively we were as hard pressed then as now.

Fright of Industrial Leaders

Our industrial leaders, charged with the responsibility of looking after the interests of stockholders have been frightened with the thoughts that if they did not accept and carry out the regimentations and regulations imposed upon business, that the state would seize and operate the plants with a threat of not returning them.

Pretended Helping of Underprivileged

The whole regimentation program and action has been veneered either with a plea of patriotism, too frequently not involved at all and to which I have already referred: or with a pious pretense of caring for the “underprivileged.”

So we have been given and have accepted food, fuel, clothing, and shelter in exchange for our liberties and our free agency, until now, frequently pauperized, we look for sustenance, not to the results of our own labors, not to the filial obligation of our children, not to the Christian care of our church, but to the state, which thus takes the place in our lives of self-effort, children, and church.

This is state socialism; it is not democracy; it is not the concept of a republic.

Joseph Sold Into Egypt

The fundamentals of this technique are as old, certainly, as Joseph, who was sold into Egypt.  For he, acting for Pharaoh, first purchased from the people with the taxes extorted from the people, all the grain produced by the people; then when the famine came Joseph sold this grain back to the people, in the first year for all the cash they had, which he turned over to Pharaoh; in the second year for all the flocks and herds they owned, which all went to Pharaoh; next, for all their lands, which he turned over to Pharaoh; and finally, he gave them grain in exchange for their bodies and they became “servants unto Pharaoh.”  The enslavement of the people was complete, Joseph saying to them, “Behold, I have bought you this day and your land for Pharaoh,” (Genesis 47) and thereafter Joseph moved the people as he willed, and they rented back their lands on the terms he prescribed.  There is more than one lesson in Egypt’s seven years of plenty and seven years of famine.

God grant that to all of us shall come the will and the strength to preserve America for our children and our children’s children, even as our fathers preserved it for us.

Click here to read the full text of the address by Pres. J. Reuben Clark, Jr.

I am greatly honored in being asked to say something this evening to this 67th Annual Congress of this great patriotic organization-the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution. There is need for such an organization these days to help keep alive the fires on the sacred altar of human liberty.

First, allow me to congratulate you Sons of the American Revolution upon your distinguished forefathers. Men they were of surpassing patriotism, outstanding abilities, profound wisdom, greatest courage, physical and moral, and of loyalty and devotion of the very highest quality.

You are legatees of this most illustrious heritage. I appeal to you to honor and protect that heritage, if necessary to the final sacrifice your fathers offered, even life itself. This you owe to them, to us, and to the generations of free men yet unborn.

I come to you with the dictum of Curran, that “the price of liberty is eternal vigilance.” Your fathers gave us liberty. Our vigilance must preserve it.

The service of your fathers brought us independence. But their service in the field was not their total service. They also served in the establishment of this nation and its Government. You may know an about it already. But it is of this service in the establishment of our Government that I wish to remind you tonight.

The theme of our discussion tonight is this simple and basic principle that underlies our Federal Government:

Neither that Government nor any of its departments or agencies, can, without usurpation, exercise any power whatsoever that we the sovereign people have not delegated to them in the Constitution, and its amendments, plus the BiII of Rights. Tonight we shall try to reach some foundation principles. We shall start at the roots.

There is a certain historical world relationship involved in these foundation principles. Our Government is the legitimate offspring of centuries of world achievement and development, with its deep and ofttimes tragic lessons. Our constitutional system preserved the best of all that had gone before and had cast aside, as Franklin said, seeds of earlier Republics that led to their dissolution, the most important and fertile of which seeds was that which recognized the sovereignty as placed elsewhere than in the people themselves.

The fructifying genius of our Constitution and the Government set up under it was the full and complete sovereignty of the people, with all of the incidents and attributes attaching thereto. This principle controlled the Constitutional Convention in its work, and was never lost sight of. It was expressly stated in the Constitution itself, the Preamble providing : “We the People of the United States … [for the implementing of the purposes named] do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

This talk tonight is aimed at showing in outline some of the means taken by the Framers so to draw the Constitution as to accomplish this great and divinely inspired end-the retention of sovereignty in the people, sovereignty beyond the reach of any governmental agency and to be surrendered voluntarily or modified only by the sovereign people themselves, as provided for by them in the Constitution itself.

Basic Sovereignty and Systems

Behind the establishment, operation, and maintenance of every real human government is a sovereign, the possessor of an legislative, executive, and judicial powers and authorities, and an matters incident thereto. That sovereign may be an individual, a group, or, as with us, the people themselves.

My first point is where the sovereignty rests in the United States.

In the world which we call the civilized world, there are now and were in 1776, two great fundamental legal systems-the Civil Law system, of which Continental Europe, with certain of their colonial possessions, and Japan, are representatives; and the Common Law system in force in Britain, with certain of her colonial possessions )former and present( and in America, as we have developed its system. The Latin American countries are, in certain ways, a combination of both ….

We summarize in a sentence the basic principle of the Roman or Civil Law:

The sovereign power rested in the head of the state, who granted to the people, his subjects, the rights he decided they should have, reserving an other rights in himself, as likewise the right to extend, alter, add to, or withdraw the rights already granted.

In our discussion tonight, we come now to the Common Law system of government, particularly as developed in the United States after we had gained our independence. It is completely polar to the Roman or Civil Law system as to legal origin and the sovereignty behind it ….

In the last several years, foreign-born, Roman Law trained immigrants, knowing only the lex regia system, have acquired, in our national administration, places of considerable influence and power. In recent years the yen for a world-state in which we shall play a dominant part, has seemingly innoculated even some of our highest officials.

Recent Multipartite Treaties

In furtherance of the general plan in contemplation of a world-state, we have made treaties of alliance containing obligations that infringed upon our sovereignty. We have made multipartite treaties – the League of Nations (which, when it was understood, the people rejected), the United Nations Charter, to which the Senate gave its advice and consent just one month and two days after its signature, the people having no time to examine its merits before it became operative. All of these surrendered some of our sovereignty. Not infrequently they involve commitments for the Chief Executive which he cannot fulfil, as also for the nation which the Chief Executive cannot guarantee shall be carried out.

These circumstances have brought into high places an expressed feeling that our treaty powers are uncontrolled, even unlimited; that we may by treaty do what our Chief Executive may wish, with the Senate’s prescribed approval.

Some Modern Views

It has been affirmed that:

” … the investment of the Federal government with the powers of external sovereignty did not depend upon the affirmative grants of the Constitution. The powers to declare and wage war, to conclude peace, to make treaties, to maintain diplomatic relations with other sovereignties, if they had never been mentioned in the Constitution, would have vested in the Federal government as necessary concomitants of nationality.” (United States v. Curtiss-Wright Export Corp., 299 U.S. 304, 318.)

This is surely a dangerous doctrine.

If this learned jurist was speaking of the situation as relating to us, the sovereign people, he might justify in proper language the principle he announces. But if he is talking of governmental instrumentalities that we the sovereign people set up with certain delegated powers, then if he will examine the records of the Constitutional Convention, he might be forced to conclude that the Framers, who fought long and hard over questions involved in this statement, would think he was talking without thought or reason. It is one thing to assert that a certain thing is an attribute of sovereignty, and a wholly different thing to assert it as an attribute of government in a government of delegated power. Without such a delegation, the power cannot be exercised by an undelegated. agency.

But the matter seems to have gone far beyond this general statement. One now holding high government office is quoted as declaring:

” … congressional laws are invalid if they do not conform to the Constitution, whereas treaty laws can override the Constitution. Treaties, for example, can take powers away from the Congress and give them to the President; they can take powers from the States and give them to the Federal Government or to some international body and they can cut across the rights given the people by the Constitutional Bill of Rights.” (Frank E. Holman, Story of the “Bricker” Amendment [New York, Committee for Constitutional Government, Inc., 1954], pp. 14-15.)

The Bill of Rights did not give anything to the people; the people reserved these rights to themselves. This treaty-law doctrine is power-thirst gone mad.

Of course, if this were the law, or if it were to become the law, which pray God may never be, then the sovereignty would be shifted from us, the people, and would be lodged in the Chief Executive and a two-thirds majority of a quorum present in the Senate. We would cease to be a Republic and become a lex regia, virtual despotism, for there would be in the Chief Executive and the Senate unlimited sovereign power.

Views of Framers

Furthermore, this heresy runs counter to views of the ablest of the Framers themselves.

It has been said we cannot have a world-state without a surrender of some of our sovereignty. This is probably true. But if and when we come to the surrender of that sovereignty, it must be done by an amendment to our Constitution authorizing it, the amendment to be made in form and manner that we the sovereign people have prescribed in the Constitution itself. Let us not surrender our sovereignty by illegal usurpations ·by our treaty-making agents. I am speaking of voluntary surrenders of sovereignty.

We the sovereign people of these United States, challenge our treaty-making agency to submit to us the people the question whether and to what extent we shall surrender our sovereignty.

It cannot be too often repeated that any suggestion of any doctrine such as this at the time of the Convention, would not only have broken up the Constitutional Convention itself (it would have been treated with the scorn some of us think it deserves) but would, having in mind the then temper of the people, also have made the formation of the United States of America under the Constitution an impossibility.

Madison commented on the extent of the treatymaking power:

“I do not conceive that power is given to the President and Senate to dismember the empire, or to alienate any great, essential right. I do not think the whole legislative authority have this power. The exercise of the power must be consistent with the object of the delegation.” (Debates on the Federal Constitution, Jonathan Elliot, ed., 2nd ed. [Philadelphia, J. B. Lippincott Company, 1907] , Vol. III, p. 514.)

Note first, Madison regards this power as a delegated power, not a power inherent in government itself, as distinguished from sovereignty. Sovereignty can do whatever it determines to do, but its agencies can only do wha:t the sovereign principal desires and directs. Any transference to any international body outside of the United States would be a “dismembering of the empire.”

Next-Madison considers our treaty-making power must be exercised “consistent with the object of the delegation,” which was the conduct of the normal international business and relationships. No one had in mind to “dismember the empire,” by surrendering sovereignty for the building of a world-state. And when all is said and done, this seems surely the end aimed at when they give their new theory of the status of “treaty-law.”

A little later in the debate, Madison said:

“Here the supremacy of a treaty is contrasted with the supremacy of the laws of the states. It cannot be otherwise supreme,” – that is, it cannot in any other manner or situation be supreme. (Op. cit.)

Again, he says:

“I conceive that, as far as the bills of rights in the states do not express any thing foreign to the nature of such things, and express fundamental principles essential to liberty, and those privileges which are declared necessary to all free people, these rights are not encroached on by this government.” (Idem, p. 516.) Mr. George Nicholas (a Framer) said in the course of the debates of the Virginia ratifying convention:

“They can, by this [the treaty-making power], make no treaty which shall be repugnant to the spirit of the Constitution, or inconsistent with the delegated powers.” (Idem, p. 507.)

This clearly negatives any such treaty power as that voiced by the man who said that treaty-law could override the Constitution.

Hamilton is quoted as saying (and he cannot be charged with any feeling or intent to lessen the authority of the central government) :

“A treaty cannot be made which alters the constitutions of the country, or which infringes any express exceptions to the power of the Constitution of the United States. But it is difficult to assign any other bounds to the power.” (The Works of Alexander Hamilton, Henry Cabot Lodge, ed. [N ew York and London, G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1904], Vol. V, pp, 158-159.)

This also negates the treaty-making power from making changes in our Constitution via the treaty route.

Comments in “The Federalist“

One other discussion of the time may be noted, that occurring in The Federalist, a series of essays on the Constitution authored by Hamilton, Madison, and Jay, and declared to be “undoubtedly the most profound and suggestive treatise on government that has ever been written …. But for all posterity the ‘Federalist’ must remain the most authoritative commentary upon the Constitution that can be found; for it is the joint work of the principal author of that Constitution and of its most brilliant advocate.” (Fiske, pp. 341-342.) The reference was obviously to Madison and Hamilton.

A careful, though not meticulous examination of The Federalist seems to show not only that it contains no statement, but not even the shadow of an allusion in support of this modern “interpretation” that would make treaty-law superior even to the point of changing the form of government. The discussion by these statesmen, coupled with the records of the Convention, can leave no doubt to any reasonable mind that any interpretation even of a suggestive character to the point of the supremacy of treaty-law over the Constitution would have defeated the adoption of the Constitution and the formation of our Government. The men of that time repeatedly spoke of anarchy as the alternative to the adoption of the Constitution.

The Federalist was primarily concerned in restricting the field of the treaty-making power itself and justifying the power in the Chief Executive and Senate.

The discussions in The Federalist indicate rather clearly subjects to which the power was to be applied, to wit: The prevention of “hostilities from abroad,” that is, foreign wars, and through national treaties, the avoidance of just causes of war (No. III, Jay); fisheries, navigation and carrying trade, territorial border problems, trade generally, boundary waters and access to our territories (the Mississippi and St. Lawrence Rivers) (No. IV, Jay); treaties relating to war, peace, and commerce (No. LXIV, Jay).

Hamilton (No. LXXV) lists the objections then made to the treaty-making power. He says:

” … I scruple not to declare my firm persuasion, that it is one of the best digested and most unexceptionable parts of the plan. One ground of objection is the trite topic of the intermixture of powers; some contending that the President ought alone to possess the power of making treaties; others, that it ought to have been exclusively deposited in the Senate. Another source of objection is derived from the small number of persons by whom ~a treaty may be made.” (“The Federalist,” The Works· of Alexander Hamilton, Henry Cabot Lodge, ed. [New York and London, G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1904], Vol. XII, p. 232.)

Commenting upon the authority of the Legislature to make laws and of the Chief Executive to enforce them, Hamilton, as applying the principle of treaties, observes:

“The power of making treaties is, plainly, neither the one nor the other. It relates neither to the execution of the subsisting laws, nor to the enaction of new ones; and still less to an exertion of the common strength. Its objects are contracts with foreign nations, which have the force of law, but derive it from the obligations of good faith. They are not rules prescribed by the sovereign to the subject, but agreements between sovereign and sovereign.” (Idem, p. 233.)

The whole of the discussions in the Constitutional Convention itself, in the State Conventions considering the adoption of the Constitution, and in The Federalist, all join in what seems a unanimous voice that the treatymaking power was to extend to the normal incidents of the intercourse and relationship of sovereign nations, and no further. It was never contemplated by the Framers that this power should be subverted in an effort to destroy our independence as a nation and make us a subservient part of a world-state.

Washington’s Principles

How earnestly Washington, a fond and wise “Father of his Country,” in his poignant Farewell Address, with prophetic admonition and warning, urged us against foreign entanglements and alliances:

“Why,” he said, “by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice?” (Wiley-Rines, Vol. IV, p. 305.)

How much more serious an interweaving of our destinies with the whole family of nations!

It has already been said that to an outsider this new theory of treaty-law is a device to secure our participation in a world-state. The visionary beauties of this state, its advantages, its blessings to humanity, are dressed for us as if this were some modern concept now for the first time blossoming in the earth-a sort of flower of paradise.

Summary of World-State Movements

We are not usually told that a rather mature concept of such an international organization had a blossoming in 1497 B.C., in the Amphictyonic Council of Greek States, with one race, one religion, one culture, one language, one tradition. When we consider a world-state, not infrequently there is forgotten the multiplicity of race, language, tradition, religion, culture, and all the rest, in a world-state. At its peak, there were in the Amphictyonic Council, thirty-one members. The machinery of the Council was essentially the machinery of our proposed international organizations of today. The intrigues of Philip of Macedon are said to have brought this down in ruins. (William Ladd, An Essay on a Congress of Nations [New York, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1916], p.39.)

There was also the Lycian Confederacy, said to have been very ancient, possibly 1400 B.C., and the Achaean League, 281 B.C.

More recently, in the twelfth century, the organization known as the Hanse Towns came into existence and became very powerful. The Helvetic Union (Switzerland) was organized in early days.

All these organizations were made up of small units, rather than nations, and the organizations were more or less a uniting of these smaller parts into nations. (Sylvester John Hembleben, Plans for World Peace Through Six Centuries [Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1943], Ch. 1.)

Probably as the result of studies by one Dubois (A.D. 1255) and later by Emeric Cruce (1623), the Grand Design of Henry IV of France and Elizabeth I of England was projected (about 1638). It was avowedly based on the plan of the Amphictyonic Council. It was aimed against the Hapsburgs. It was certainly in some aspects primarily a military alliance. Among its agencies was an international police force. The Grand Design was to make France “happy forever,” and to accomplish this, all Europe was to come into the plan. The machinery was substantially the machinery of our modern setups. The plan proved abortive, because of the death, first, of Elizabeth, and then of Henry.

From the collapse of the Grand Design until 1815, there was a steady but seemingly unorganized propaganda looking towards the setting up of Europe “as one great family” at peace, not war. Articles, books, pamphlets, were written and distributed by various persons of note. In 1815, at the instance of Alexander of Russia, the Emperor of Austria and the King of Prussia joining in the project, the Holy Alliance was formed, aimed primarily against France. For a variety of reasons this plan failed.

Publicists have affirmed that all the foregoing plans involved in their general purport, from the earliest till the Holy Alliance, the same general principles, with the same objectives. It should be remembered that the Grand Design was aimed at the Hapsburgs, the Holy Alliance at France. (Walter Alison Phillips, The Confederation of Europe [London, Longmans, Green, and Co., 1914], pp. 1-69. )

Between 1815 and the end of World War I, there were continued urging and development of the general theme of a united world in peace.

Then came the League of Nations, aimed primarily against Germany. The League contained the same essential machinery as the Grand Design, with some new names and designations. As the other plans had failed over the centuries, so this proved abortive.

Then, at the end of World War II, came the United Nations. Still the same essential machinery. The work of this organization is in our minds.

Some wag has said that the trouble with this generation is that it has not read the minutes of the last session .

We must have peace in the human heart before we shall have peace in the nations; and the level of righteousness of the mass always falls below the level of righteousness of the component individuals ..

In closing I must add a personal word. My faith teaches me that the Constitution is an inspired document drawn by the hands of men whom God raised up for that very purpose; that God has given His approval of the Government set up under the Constitution “for the rights and protection of all flesh, according to just and holy principles”; that the constitutional “principle of freedom in maintaining rights and privileges, belongs to all mankind, and is justifiable before” the Lord. (D & C 101 :77; 98 :5.)

The Constitution is a part of my religion.

So far as my knowledge goes, this is the only government now on the earth to which God has given such an approval. It is His plan for the government of free men.

There will be no permanent peace until He comes to reign whose right it is to reign-a reign of righteousness.

God hasten that day and prepare us therefor, that we shall not be as the five foolish, but as the five wise virgins.

May God hear our prayer.

It is inspiring to learn how Parley Pratt came to know of the book about which he wrote the words of this hymn. In August of 1830, as a lay preacher, he was traveling from Ohio to eastern New York. At Newark, along the Erie Canal, he left the boat and walked 10 miles (16 km) into the country where he met a Baptist deacon by the name of Hamlin, who told him “of a book, a strange book, a VERY STRANGE BOOK! . . . This book, he said, purported to have been originally written on plates either of gold or brass, by a branch of the tribes of Israel; and to have been discovered and translated by a young man near Palmyra, in the State of New York, by the aid of visions, or the ministry of angels. I inquired of him how or where the book was to be obtained. He promised me the perusal of it, at his house the next day. . . . Next morning I called at his house, where, for the first time, my eyes beheld the ‘BOOK OF MORMON’—that book of books . . . which was the principal means, in the hands of God, of directing the entire course of my future life.

“I opened it with eagerness, and read its title page. I then read the testimony of several witnesses in relation to the manner of its being found and translated. After this I commenced its contents by course. I read all day; eating was a burden, I had no desire for food; sleep was a burden when the night came, for I preferred reading to sleep.

“As I read, the spirit of the Lord was upon me, and I knew and comprehended that the book was true, as plainly and manifestly as a man comprehends and knows that he exists.” 2

Parley Pratt was then 23 years of age. The reading of the Book of Mormon affected him so profoundly that he was soon baptized into the Church and became one of its most effective and powerful advocates. In the course of his ministry he traveled from coast to coast across what is now the United States, into Canada, and to England; he worked in the isles of the Pacific and was the first Latter-day Saint missionary to set foot on the soil of South America. In 1857, while serving a mission in Arkansas, he was shot in the back and killed by an assailant. He was buried in a rural area near the community of Alma, and today in that quiet place a large block of polished granite marks the site of his grave. Incised in its surface are the words of another of his great and prophetic hymns, setting forth his vision of the work in which he was engaged:

The morning breaks, the shadows flee;
Lo, Zion’s standard is unfurled! . . .
The dawning of a brighter day
Majestic rises on the world.

The clouds of error disappear
Before the rays of truth divine; . . .
The glory bursting from afar
Wide o’er the nations soon will shine. 3

Parley Pratt’s experience with the Book of Mormon was not unique. As the volumes of the first edition were circulated and read, strong men and women by the hundreds were so deeply touched that they gave up everything they owned, and in the years that followed not a few even gave their lives for the witness they carried in their hearts of the truth of this remarkable volume.

Today, a century and three-quarters after its first publication, the Book of Mormon is more widely read than at any time in its history. Whereas there were 5,000 copies in that first edition, about 5,000,000 are currently distributed each year, and the book or selections from the book are available in 106 languages.

Its appeal is as timeless as truth, as universal as mankind. It is the only book that contains within its covers a promise that by divine power the reader may know with certainty of its truth.

Its origin is miraculous; when the story of that origin is first told to one unfamiliar with it, it is almost unbelievable. But the book is here to be felt and handled and read. No one can dispute its presence. All efforts to account for its origin, other than the account given by Joseph Smith, have been shown to lack substance. It is a record of ancient America. It is a scripture of the New World, as certainly as the Bible is the scripture of the Old. Each of these volumes of scripture speaks of the other. Each carries with it the spirit of inspiration, the power to convince and to convert. Together they become two witnesses, hand in hand, that Jesus is the Christ, the resurrected and living Son of the living God.

The Book of Mormon narrative is a chronicle of nations long since gone. But in its descriptions of the problems of today’s society, it is as current as the morning newspaper and much more definitive, inspired, and inspiring concerning the solutions of those problems.

I know of no other writing which sets forth with such clarity the tragic consequences to societies that follow courses contrary to the commandments of God. Its pages trace the stories of two distinct civilizations that flourished on the Western Hemisphere. Each began as a small nation, its people walking in the fear of the Lord. But with prosperity came growing evils. The people succumbed to the wiles of ambitious and scheming leaders who oppressed them with burdensome taxes, who lulled them with hollow promises, who countenanced and even encouraged loose and lascivious living. These evil schemers led the people into terrible wars that resulted in the death of millions and the final and total extinction of two great civilizations in two different eras.

No other written testament so clearly illustrates the fact that when men and nations walk in the fear of God and in obedience to His commandments, they prosper and grow, but when they disregard Him and His word, there comes a decay that, unless arrested by righteousness, leads to impotence and death. The Book of Mormon is an affirmation of the Old Testament proverb: “Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people” (Proverbs 14:34).

The God of heaven spoke to these people of the Americas through prophets, telling them where true security could be found: “Behold, this is a choice land, and whatsoever nation shall possess it shall be free from bondage, and from captivity, and from all other nations under heaven, if they will but serve the God of the land, who is Jesus Christ” (Ether 2:12).

While the Book of Mormon speaks with power to the issues that affect our modern society, the great and stirring burden of its message is a testimony, vibrant and true, that Jesus is the Christ, the promised Messiah, He who walked the dusty roads of Palestine healing the sick and teaching the doctrines of salvation; who died upon the cross of Calvary; who on the third day came forth from the tomb, appearing to many. Prior to His final Ascension, He visited the people of this Western Hemisphere, concerning whom He earlier had said, “And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd” (John 10:16).

For centuries the Bible stood alone as a written testimony of the divinity of Jesus of Nazareth. Now, at its side, stands a second and powerful witness which has come forth “to the convincing of the Jew and Gentile that Jesus is the Christ, the Eternal God, manifesting himself unto all nations” (Book of Mormon title page).

As I indicated earlier, at this season exactly 176 years ago the first edition of the Book of Mormon, which had been translated “by the gift and power of God” (Book of Mormon title page) was being set in type and run on a small press in Palmyra, New York. Its publication preceded and was a forerunner to the organization of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which took place on April 6, 1830.

We studied the Book of Mormon in Sunday School this past year. Nonetheless I offer a challenge to members of the Church throughout the world and to our friends everywhere to read or reread the Book of Mormon. If you will read a bit more than one and one-half chapters a day, you will be able to finish the book before the end of this year. Very near the end of its 239 chapters, you will find a challenge issued by the prophet Moroni as he completed his record nearly 16 centuries ago. Said he:

“And I exhort you to remember these things; for the time speedily cometh that ye shall know that I lie not, for ye shall see me at the bar of God; and the Lord God will say unto you: Did I not declare my words unto you, which were written by this man, like as one crying from the dead, yea, even as one speaking out of the dust? . . .

“And God shall show unto you, that that which I have written is true” (Moroni 10:27, 29).

Without reservation I promise you that if each of you will observe this simple program, regardless of how many times you previously may have read the Book of Mormon, there will come into your lives and into your homes an added measure of the Spirit of the Lord, a strengthened resolution to walk in obedience to His commandments, and a stronger testimony of the living reality of the Son of God.

Notes

1. See Hymns, no. 13.
2. Autobiography of Parley P. Pratt, ed. Parley P. Pratt Jr. (1938), 36–37.
3. “The Morning Breaks,” Hymns, no. 1.

This is video of a monument at Temple Square in Salt Lake City, Utah. The Slabs have various statements of LDS scripture, doctrine and teachings on The Law, Governments, Liberty and The Way (Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ)

Text of the inscriptions on the slabs…

The Law:

Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image… Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor server them…
Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain…
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land in which the Lord thy God giveth thee.
Thou shalt not kill.
Thou shalt not commit adultery.
Thou shalt not steal.
Thou shalt not bear false witness…
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house …thy neighbour’s wife… nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s.
Exodus 20: 3–17

Governments:

We believe that governments were instituted of God for the benefit of man; and that he holds men accountable for their acts in relation to them, both in making laws and administering them, for the good and safety of society.
We believe that no government can exist in peace except such laws are framed and held inviolate as will secure to each individual the free exercise of conscience, the right and control of property, and the protection of life.
Doctrine & Covenants 134

Let no man break the laws of the land, for he that keepeth the laws of God hath no need to break the laws of the land.
Doctrine & Covenants 58

We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law.
12th Article of Faith of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Liberty:

The Constitution of the United States is a glorious standard… founded in the wisdom of God… established… by the hands of wise men… raised up unto this very purpose.
It is to all those who are privileged with the sweets of liberty like the cooling shades and refreshing waters of a great rock in a thirsty and weary land.
Joseph Smith

The laws and constitution of the people… should be maintained for the rights and protection of all flesh according to just and holy principles; That every man may act… according to the moral agency… given unto him, that every man may be accountable for his own sins in the day of judgment.
Doctrine & Covenants 101

Where the Spirit of the Lord is, the is liberty.
2 Corinthians 3:17

The Way:

I am the way the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
John 14:6

Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all they heart, and with all the soul, and with all thy mind.
This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
Matthew 22: 37–39

Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.
Matthew 7:12

Give diligent heed to the words of eternal life. For you shall live by every word that proceedeth forth from the mouth of God.
Doctrine & Covenants 84

“Besides the preaching of the Gospel, we have another mission, namely, the perpetuation of the free agency of man and maintenance of liberty, freedom and the rights of man.” (John Taylor, Journal of Discourses 23:63)

Source: Ezra Taft Benson. Our Immediate Responsibility. BYU Devotional, October 25, 1966.

“As we have progressed the mist has been removed, and in relation to these matters, the Elders of Israel begin to understand that they have something to do with the world politically as well as religiously, that it is as much their duty to study correct political principles as well as religious, and to seek to know and comprehend the social and political interests of man, and to learn and be able to teach that which would be best calculated to promote the interests of the world.” (JD 9:340)

I am only one, but I am one.
I cant do everything, but I can do something.
What I can do, that I ought to do,
And what I ought to do,
By the grace of God, I shall do!

I was out at a stake conference some months ago, and I had with me a very fine welfare worker, one of the choice men of this Church. But he was very timid; it was very hard for him to speak in conference. He went to the morning session expecting to be called upon, and he was not called because there were so many returned missionaries. And as we came to the stake president’s home for lunch, our visitor didn’t have much of an appetite. It’s always easier to speak when you’re not overly loaded with food, and so as they passed the food around he passed the potatoes by; he took just one carrot, practically no meat, and nibbled a little at his salad. In fact, he refused some lemon pie that was offered for dessert – and that takes real resistance. We went to meeting. After the meeting was over – the mother of that home had a young babe and had to miss the meeting – the son about fifteen years of age returned from the meeting, and the mother who had worried about this good welfare worker said, “Well, how did Brother So and So do?” And the son said, “Aw mom, he just as well a et.”

I have one story I want to tell you. Brother Wilkinson is a very distinguished attorney. I mean that. I wish he were free today: probably if I didn’t love this Institution so much, I’d almost insist that he be released to accompany me back to the nation’s capital. He’s the kind of man that I’d like to have as solicitor in the Department of Agriculture – one of the great departments of the Government, 78,000 employees. In the presence of Brother Stephen L. Richards the other day, I heard this story. A very fine gentleman, a Christian man, was on his death bed. Knowing that his hours Were few, he called in his attorney. He also called in his doctor. And these two distinguished men, seated on either side of his bed, visited with him briefly, and he didn’t give them anything of any great importance to consider, and finally the attorney said, “Why have you invited us here?” And this man said, “For one purpose. I’ve always been a great admirer of the Great Teacher, the founder of Christianity; I’ve always tried to pattern my life after his, and I thought, as I near the end I’d like to die between two thieves.” Well, Brother Wilkinson will forgive me for telling that story, but I heard it when we were back in Washington a few days ago.

Now, my brothers and sisters, it’s a great honor to be here this morning. I feel very humble as I look into your faces and particularly as I contemplate the assignment which has come to me so unexpectedly. I want you to know how deeply grateful I am for all the influences which have touched my life and have helped to shape my character. I’m grateful for my noble birthright, for my parentage, for the great pioneer stock from which most of us have come. I’m grateful for the opportunity of attending this institution. I’m grateful for the spirit which is here, the spirit of the Gospel. I’m grateful for the men on the faculty who have touched my life with their influence – I shall ever be indebted to them.

But more than to anyone else, this morning, I’m grateful to the girl who has been at my side now for twenty-six years. Brother Wilkinson didn’t tell you very much of the part she’s played. She has always been an inspiration to me and to our children, and if they ever accomplish anything in life, and we expect them to, she’ll be entitled to at least two-thirds of the credit. She’s carried more than half the load all the way through. She married a man who was heavily in debt. She knows what it is to live on $70 a month and maintain a home. Coming from a family of some means, she turned her back on all of that and was willing to sacrifice, to become a farmer’s wife, to go out on the experiment farm at Iowa State College, and glean squash from the field and pick nuts in order to cut down on the food bill. She’ s  been true all the way, and I pay tribute to her today. No man could ever have had, or now has, a truer companion. You know, it’s so common for us men to be in the limelight. We receive the plaudits of men, we’re honored, we’re recommended; but very often the other part of the team is hardly referred to. I’ve thought of that a great deal the past week.

Now I presume, my brothers and sisters, that you’ll be disappointed – well I

know that you’re going to be disappointed anyway, but you’ll be even more disappointed if I don’t tell you something of the rather intimate situation in connection with this call. And if I can, in just a few words, I’d like to do it for you because I feel so close to this institution. And I hope you’ll understand that it isn’ t done in any spirit of boasting, but in the hope it may be helpful. Since the call has come I have felt more like praying than anything else. Of course, I’ve done a great deal of it, and I hope I’ll have your faith and prayers because this honor is not an honor to an individual member of the Church. It’s not an honor alone to the Council of the Twelve – the leadership of the Church. I look upon it as an honor and a tribute to the Church as a whole. It is an evidence that, at last, people have come to recognize us for what we are – to recognize our standards, our ideals, our philosophy, the principles for which we stand. And so you share in this honor, and you also share in the responsibility, and to that end I seek your faith and prayers in the days ahead.

Now it has come as a great surprise. It is true that four years ago I was approached regarding a cabinet post by one of the candidates who expected to be elected – expected it with sure confidence, at least a confidence that I have never witnessed in an election – but frankly this time the matter had never entered my mind. In a telephone call from Senator Watkins on Thursday night, the 20th of November, he asked if I knew that there was developing a great “ground-swell” as he called it, of support for me as Secretary. This was my first intimation that I was being considered. I said no, I knew nothing about it. And I was truthful. I had been in Washington only a few days before. It had not been mentioned. I was there on business with Brother Stephen L. Richards. We’d had Interviews with representatives of the Indian Service, the Department of State, General Hershey of Selective Service. We participated in the dedication of the Chevy-Chase building. I had called at some of the offices of national farm organizations. But nothing was said about it. Brother Watkins wanted to know what the attitude of the Church would be. I replied, “There’s only one man who can answer that, and that’s the President of the Church. I don’t know what his attitude would be. My life is devoted to this work, but I’d be glad to try and do anything the President of the Church asks me to do.”

The next morning as I parked my car on the parking lot at the Church Office building, I met Brother McKay as he was parking his car. We have a habit of  going down rather early in the morning. Very seldom do I get there before he does. And he said, “I received a very important telephone call last night. ” And he said, “Brother Benson, my mind is clear on the matter and if the opportunity comes, I think that you should accept. I said, “Brother McKay, I can’t believe that it will come,” and gave my reasons. The next day Brother Mark Peterson and I started for Provo to attend to some business incident to the division of the Sharon Stake. On arrival in Provo the call from Eisenhower Headquarters, that my wife had predicted earlier, came and reached me in this city. And when I learned of it the first place I thought of was the campus of the B. Y. U. where I could get by myself in some little office and quietly consider the matter. I talked to the President of the Church before I even accepted the telephone call, because they said that General Eisenhower’s office was calling. The call was simply a request to come to New York City for an interview, and frankly, even then, I thought that probably they were considering several men and they wanted a chance to look at some of them with whom they were not acquainted. I took the plane that night and went to New York City for the interview.

I can say to you frankly, my brothers and sisters, I didn’t ‘want to be Secretary of Agriculture. I can’t imagine anyone in his right mind wanting it. Because I know something of what it entails; I know something of the crossfires, the pressures, the problems, the difficulties. Because as Brother Wilkinson has been good enough to indicate, I was rather close to the Department of Agriculture, although not a part of it, while living for five and a half years in Washington. I’ve always feared, in a way, getting into politics. I’ve never had any particular desire in that direction. I’ve always had a deep interest in seeing men elected to office who represented the ideals and standards which have meant so much to me in my life, and I would always rather support someone else than to actually hold political office. It was with that feeling in mind that I went in to meet, for the first time, General Eisenhower. I’m sure that he would not object if I told you very briefly what transpired. His brother, Milton Eisenhower, whom I had met, was there. He at one time was in the Department of Agriculture; he at one time was president of Kansas State College, and now is president of  Pennsylvania State College, both of them land-grant colleges .We were together for about thirty minutes, and at the outset it was made very clear that the decision had been made. There was no one else under consideration.

Then I gave three or four very good reasons, I thought, why I should not be a member of the Cabinet. In the first place I indicated ,that I had been a supporter of Senator Taft. Although not an active supporter, I had lent my name to a Citizens for Taft Committee. I thought Senator Taft was well qualified. I’d know him in Washington, admired his integrity, and his capacity. And I said to the General, “It isn’t because I haven’t admired you, but I haven ‘t known you; I’ve never seen you until today. And I’ve always thought it would be a little better, other things being equal, not to have a military man in the White House. Now I want you to know that.”

He said, “That’s perfectly all right.”

I said for my next reason, “I come from a state that is usually considered rather unimportant agriculturally. Even my native state of Idaho is not one of the leading agricultural states. It’s been the custom to select the Secretary of Agriculture from the great farm belt of the Middle West. What’s going to be the reaction if you select a man from Utah to be your Secretary of Agriculture when we’ve only got about three percent of our land under cultivation? I know there are several good men in the Middle West who would like to be secretary. And at least three of them I could wholeheartedly support; they’d make good secretaries, and they’ve been working hard for you and surely you owe them something.” And fourthly I said, “I wonder about the wisdom of calling a clergyman, a minister of the Gospel, to be a Secretary of Agriculture. What will be the reaction from other religious groups, from people generally?”

And he said, “Suppose we consider the last question first. ” Then he added, “Surely you believe that the job to be done is spiritual. Surely you know that we have the great responsibility to restore confidence in the minds of our people in their own government – that we’ve got to deal with spiritual matters.” Then he went on and answered the rest of the objections. When he came to the end he said, “We’ve got a great job to do. I didn’t want to be President, frankly, when the pressure started.” But he said, “You can’t refuse to serve America! We’ve got a great job to do and I want you on my team.”

Well, my brothers and sisters, no true American could refuse such a request from the President elect, even though I told him I had already received, what in my eyes was a greater honor than he could bestow. So of course, I accepted. Now I know that many of you who are here today have supported the Governor of Illinois. I know many of you have supported Senator Taft and others, and that’s perfectly all right; that’s our great American privilege. I hope and pray that we always have freedom of choice, one of the great eternal principles that the God of Heaven intends his children to enjoy. But now, the American people have spoken, and General Eisenhower is to be inaugurated, January 20th, and on that date he becomes our President. And regardless of our political affiliation, regardless of where our sympathies have been, it becomes, in my humble judgement, our obligation, our duty as American citizens, as Latter-day Saints, to give him our faith and prayers because he’ll need them. And so I ask for that support for him, for all the members of the Cabinet, for all of those whom you have elected, representing the people of the United States to serve in positions of leadership in this great nation. With that support, with your faith and with your prayers, we cannot fail – without that support, we cannot succeed. I know that as I know that I live.

I love this great country. I always get a thrill when I go to the nation’s capital. I know, many people say that’s one place they wouldn’t live. I love Washington, D.C. This may sound almost like treason, but I had no desire to move back West to live, I was so happy there with the work I was doing. I don’t know that I’ll be so happy again there in this position, But I love all that is associated with Washington – the ideals of our Government, the great men who have represented us there, the great statesmen. I get a thrill every time I go into the Nation’s Capital, and on Friday night when I was there just before the Chevy­Chase Building was, dedicated, I did something I have wanted to do for years. I went into the Capitol and I stood there in the great Statuary Hall, and I noticed to my great joy, over in one corner, under a lovely light, a statue of the great pioneer Mormon leader, the Prophet of God, Brigham Young. And I recalled that, a few years before while living in Washington I had gone there frequently and sometimes stood there meditating, wondering if the time would ever come when the people of this country would permit Utah to be represented in one of her favorite sons. I remember one time while standing there, that one of the Senators came through – as I remember now it was Senator Ashhurst from Arizona – and he greeted me, and I said to him, “Senator, why is it that Utah is not represented here in the Hall of Fame?”

He said,  “Mr. Benson, surely you know why.”

I said, “I think I do, but I’d like to hear it from your lips. You’ve been a friend of our people.”

And then he told me that even during his service in the Senate, an effort had been made at one time to get approval from a certain committee for President Brigham Young to represent Utah. At that time the prejudice was still in existence, and the committee apparently refused to approve it. But as I stood there on the 20th of this last month, I thrilled as I saw President Brigham Young’s likeness there taking his place in the circle among the great. And then I did something – as I mentioned – that I wanted to do. I walked from the Capitol Building, down straight through the mall, on the grass, down to the Washington Monument, and from there down to the Lincoln Memorial. ‘It is one mile and a quarter from Capitol Building to the Washington  Monument, three-quarters of a mile from there on. As I walked, I reviewed in my own mind the history of this, the greatest nation under heaven. And I hope, my young brethren and sisters, that you do not this Institution without taking a good course in American History. I mean that sincerely. I think one of the weaknesses in our educational system today in many parts is the fact that students leave the institutions where they get their education knowing but very little about our American Background, the fundamental, basic concepts of our American way of life.

You may recall, those of you who have been in Washington, that between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial there’s what is called a “reflecting pool”. And I stood there on the side of it and could look in one direction and see the Lincoln Memorial reflected in the water. This time the sun had gone down and the lights were on. Looking in the other direction the Washington Monument was visible. Then by stepping over to one corner, I could see all three reflected in the pool – the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington  Monument and the Capitol Building. Then I went up into the Lincoln Memorial and I read those inscriptions on the wall. I presume that never in my life has there come to my heart such a feeling of gratitude and thanksgiving for my citizenship in this land, choice above all others. It’s a great blessing to live in America. It’s a great blessing to have the opportunity to enjoy the freedoms which are ours today. I have seen people, thousands of them, who have lost the freedom which is ours, where they can no longer meet, as we meet here this morning, and express themselves  as  they  see fit, where they no longer have freedom of movement,  freedom  to  select their  own  jobs, their own educational opportunities, freedom to speak their minds, to write what they wish – freedom of enterprise. In many parts of the world today these rich blessings of freedom no longer exist.

I don’t know how you feel, my brethren and Sisters, but I’d rather be dead than lose my liberty. I have no fear we’ll ever lose it because of invasion from the outside, but I do have fear that it may slip away from us because of our own indifference, our own negligence as citizens of this land. And so I plead with you this morning, that you take an active interest in matters pertaining to the future of this country. And if the time should come when you are associated with groups that take delight in tearing down our American way of life, then they seem to enjoy pointing out the weaknesses of our free enterprise system – and it has weaknesses; it has weaknesses because it’s operated by men and women who are full of weaknesses – but when those times come, when our system is criticized, just keep in mind the fruits of the system, the great blessings that have come to us because of our American way of life. No group of people have ever attained the standard of living which is ours. And so let’s become acquainted with what has been accomplished. It’s all right to criticize; it’s all right to try and improve our American way of life; but in doing so, 1et’s not surrender, let’s not give up, let’s not jeopardize that system which has made America great.

Just one further thought, and then I won’t tire you longer. I have great hope for the youth of Zion. I believe firmly, my brethren and Sisters, that there’s no group of young people in the whole world who have the opportunities which are yours. I believe firmly that in the days ahead this nation is going to demand and need the leadership of men and women who have’ been trained in the home, in the church, in the school as you have been trained, who have your ideals, who are guided by the principles which guide your lives. You are going to be needed in positions of leadership. And I am confident that, while the world may not live our standards, in the days ahead they are going to look for men and women to fill positions of trust, who have the courage, the faith and the good common sense to live according to the teachings and standards of this great Church, the only true Church upon the face of the whole earth – God’s Kingdom restored again to bless mankind.

And I hope and pray, my brethren and sisters, that as those calls come we will be true to the great trust that God has placed in us, and we can only be true to that trust if we are true to the principles and standards for which this Church stands – because those standards and those ideals are part of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They are true. They are the way of life which the God of Heaven has prescribed for his children, and their foundation is spirituality, faith in God, faith in all that’s pure, good, holy and uplifting. God help us to prepare ourselves for the assignments ahead and to measure up in every particular, guided always by the eternal principles upon which the Church and Kingdom of God have been established, and upon which this nation has been founded, and this great educational institution.

As I close I think of the words of the Apostle Paul, as he stood before King Agrippa making his defense – Paul, a persecutor of the Saints, converted to Christianity through a glorious manifestation. And there as he stood before King Agrippa in chains, the king permitted him to make his own defense. And I remember that as he made his defense, outlining the mission of Christ, referring to this thing called Christianity, he said in substance, to the king, “Surely, King, you must have heard of this new movement, for,” he said, “this thing has not been done in a corner.” How well that applies to Mormonism today. Yes, persecutions have come in the past. Our people have endured much. I think of the Prophet in Liberty Jail. I think of the brethren who were shot down by mobs. I think of the missionaries and the persecutions that met them.

I think of that great struggle referred to by Brother Wilkinson when Senator Smoot was trying to take his seat in the Senate. The hearings went on for weeks. I went through those hearings a year ago, four great volumes with one thousand pages each of testimony. It was easy to see before I had read very far that it was not Reed Smoot who was on trial; it was the Church and people whom he represented. Our Standard Works, private papers of the First Presidency, confidential items were placed in the records. Finally the President of the Church was placed on the witness stand, not for hours but for days. And I wonder if the Lord didn’t have a hand in it. I sometimes think, too, that one of the reasons why he permitted, yea, directed some of the early leaders of the Church to enter into the sacred relationship of plural marriage was for the purpose of publicizing his people. Men’s ways are not God’s ways. Maybe it’s his way of getting Mormonism before the world.

No, “this thing has not been done in a corner”. The hand of God has been directing His Church and His people. And so it will be in the future. While honors may come to us conferred by men, and those honors are important, of course they are. No honor will ever come to a member of this Church in the political world that will equal or even approach the honor which comes to a man when he is ordained to a high office in the Church and Kingdom of God – when he has conferred upon him the holy priesthood, that which is eternal, that which is most priceless. God help us, my brothers and sisters, to cherish the priceless blessings which are ours through membership in the Church, that our testimonies may continue strong, that we may love the priesthood, love the Church and all that it stands for. And may we at the same time be true Americans, true to our way of life, true to the eternal principles upon which this nation has been established, I humbly pray, thanking you, and thanking my Heavenly Father for this privilege of looking into your faces this morning. I pray God’s blessings to attend you always in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.