. . . enjoy the read, assuming you learned how to do that in college:
Rabid SSM Opponent Teaches at BYU Law School Named After Rabid Anti-Semite
We are talking about Mormon General Authority J. Reuben Clark, who himself was not only deeply anti-Semitic, he was also:
--a pro-Aryan Hitler sympathizer (who was investigated by the U.S. government as a possible pro-Nazi national security risk); and, if that wasn't enough
--a notorious anti-blood-mixing, anti-Black bigot.
The Mormon Church certainly has a perverse and predictable way of continuing its legacy of antipathy toward certain classes of despised minorities. As a former educator at BYU recently told me, in J. Reuben Clark's case, his name today adorns the BYU law school because he was a high-ranking, First Presidency-situated LDS Church leader--forget about his appallingly prejudiced personal history,
A review of D. Michael Quinn's biography, "Elder Statesman: A Biography of J. Reuben Clark" (Salt Lake City, Utah: Signature Books, 2002), offers this brutal assessment of the man, accurately described as Clark's "seamier side":
"As a Jew, I found his [Clark's] views utterly contemptible: 'There was one group . . . for whom Reuben expressed lifelong dislike and distrust–the Jewish people. In a 1942 letter to Herbert Hoover, he said the Jews 'are brilliant, they are able, they are unscrupulous, and they are cruel.’ Part of this explanation for his anti-Semitism was personal and part political. He expressed contempt for ‘the foul sewage of Europe’ in his 1898 valedictory, yet Mormons had traditionally gotten along very well with the small population of Jews in Utah” (p. 325). He never passed up an opportunity to express his contempt for Jews. After serving more than 10 years in the First Presidency, he wrote, 'I long ago ceased reading his [Walter Lippmann's] stuff, because he veers like a weather-vane, but I am sure always true when the wind blows from Jew-ward' (p. 328).
"In February 1941, the 'New York Times' reported that Berlin’s Nazi Party newspaper referred to the necessity of 'eliminating all Jews.' This was an echo of the LDS newspaper’s headline in 1938, 'Death for 700,000 Jews Threatened: Semites Must Get Out or Die, Nazis Declare.' Even this stark Utah report gave less than one-tenth of Adolf Hitler’s goal of killing every Jew in Europe. During the balance of 1941 and increasingly thereafter, newspapers in every major American city reported specific examples of the mass execution of Jews throughout Nazi-controlled Europe. In apparent response to such reports, LDS author N. L. Nelson wrote a book against Hitler in the early months of 1941 and referred to the Nazi 'butchery' of the Jews:
"'In his June reply to Nelson’s manuscript, Reuben defended Hitler and added, “There is nothing in their history which indicates that the Jewish race have [sic] either free-agency or liberty. ‘Law and order’ are not facts for the Jews”' (p. 335).
"Clark’s attitudes toward Blacks was equally reprehensible. Along with others of his time, he opposed intermarriage and supported the common practice of segregating blood supplies in hospitals to ensure that no white person would be infused with blood from a Black person, and thus either invalidate his priesthood or disqualify him from future priesthood. But as time progressed, so did his attitude toward Blacks. As the Church extended its missionary efforts into South America and determining blood lines became more difficult, he came to something of an accommodation in the case of some Brazilians, even 'wondering whether we could not work out a plan, while not conferring the priesthood as such upon them, we could give them opportunity to participate in the work certainly of the Aaronic Priesthood grades. (p. 354).'
"His vision of an enlarged priesthood exceeded that of Brigham Young’s. He saw a time when Blacks would hold full priesthood privileges (and not necessarily subject to Young’s prediction that this would not happen until every worthy white male received the priesthood).
"No such growth is seen in his attitude toward Jews. He remained a steadfast anti-semite until his death. And in the case of Blacks and other racial minorities, Clark argued for the civil rights of such folk, without also arguing their spiritual equality. Quinn ends this chapter in much the same way he ends other chapters. But in this case, I was disturbed: 'J. Reuben Clark was clearly a product of the 19th century. He alternately accepted and resisted the 20th century’s changing views of race and ethnicity. But supreme to him were the majesty of the law, the principle of justice for all humanity, and the expansiveness of the latter-day gospel' (p. 360).
"Given Clark’s refusal to condemn the attempted extermination of the Jews by Nazi Germany, it seems that his view of 'justice for all humanity' was somewhat constricted. I would have appreciated this exception being noted in Quinn’s too-broad, in my view, statement."
(Jeff Needle, under "Reviews--'A Biography of J. Reuben Clark Elder Statesman'" at:
http://signaturebooks.com/2010/06/reviews-elder-statesman-a-biography-of-j-reuben-clark/)
As Germany rose to a position of regained strength prior to World War II (after its disastrous defeat in World War I as the war's instigating aggressor, whereupon it was punished severely by the Treaty of Versailles), it did not help matters that Clark--a former Undersecretary of State in the Calvin Coolidge administration and a high-ranking General Authority--was such a virulent anti-Semite. Among other indicators of his deep anti-Semitic bias, Clark eventually passed along some notorious anti-Jewish propaganda to my grandfather, Ezra Taft Benson:
"April 24, 1939--First Counselor J. Reuben Clark requests U.S. department of State to assist immigration of two Mormons: 'She and her husband are Aryan natives and nationals of Switzerland.' In contrast, Clark privately urges State Department not to help Jewish children to leave Nazi Germany if their parents are trying to send them to United States. . . .
"June 24, 1941--Counselor J. Reuben Clark advises Mormon 'against your assuming as truth the most of the criticism you see leveled against Hitler and his regime in Germany. I visited Germany twice within the last half-dozen years . . . Hitler is undoubtedly bad from our American point of view, but I think the Germans like him.' Because of such statements, federal intelligence agencies investigate Clark in Utah as possible pro-Nazi subversive. . . .
February 5, 1949--First Counselor J. Reuben Clark recommends anti-Semitic 'PROTOCOLS OF THE ELDERS OF ZION' to Ernest L. Wilkinson, soon to be president of Brigham Young University. In Dec. 1957 Clark makes similar recommendation to Apostle Ezra Taft Benson, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture. This may be reason Benson organizes secret surveillance of employees (especially Jews) in U.S. Department of Agriculture."
(see repost of RFM contributor "baura," entitled "On This Day in Mormon History," at:
http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,420695,421669#msg-421669)
More on Clark's anti-Black prejudice:
"Utah's racial discrimination did not occur by happenstance nor did it continue into modern times by accident. It was promoted by the highest leaders of the state's dominant church. As late as 1941, Counselor J. Reuben Clark used the word [rhymes with 'trigger'] in his First Presidency office diary."
"In 1953, a First Presidency secretary informed a white Mormon that '[t]he L.D.S. Hospital here in Salt Lake City has a blood bank which does not contain any colored blood.' According to presidency counselor J. Reuben Clark, this policy of segregating African-American blood from the blood donated by so-called 'white people' was intended 'to protect the purity of the blood streams of the people of this Church.'"
(D. Michael Quinn, "Prelude to the National "Defense of Marriage” Campaign: Civil Discrimination Against Feared or Despised Minorities," originally published in "Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 33:3, pp. 1-52," reproduced with permission at:
http://www.affirmation.org/against_marriage_equality/prelude.shtml)
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So, Brigham Young University (itself named after a rabid racist and Mormon Church president/"prophet") names its law school after J. Reuben Clark, another high-ranking Mormon Church leader and rabid hater of despised minorities.
From that law school we now hear tirades against gays being spewed by paid Mormon-Church employees. Inveighing against same-sex marriage, Wardle writes in his bigoted, Mormon-believer broadside:
"The [recent] Brown decision [against Utah's anti-cohabitation law] departs from both constitutional history and deeply rooted social mores. Nothing in the Constitution (not its text or history or precedents) forbids states to ban adulterous cohabitation.
"Laws prohibiting adultery are deeply rooted not only in American legal and moral tapestry but in the legal and social fabric of most civilized societies. Sexual fidelity to one’s spouse is a core, basic element of marriage, and has been for millennia, not merely in American law but in virtually all cultures and societies in the world.
"While those values at times have been honored in the breach rather than the observance, they have persisted as deeply important principles of not just family and social organization but as foundational constitutional values. The form part of the moral substructure upon with our constitutional superstructure is based.
"Likewise, marriage has required the union of man and woman for millennia. In fact, it is only in the past 15 years (and only in a handful of jurisdictions) that marriage has been redefined to allow same-sex marriage. Today, only 16 of 193 sovereign nations (8%) have legalized same-sex marriage--it is forbidden and legally rejected in nearly 92% of the nations of the world.
"There is an important reason why gender-integration has been a core component of marriage in all societies across all time. It lays the foundation for the equality of both genders and for equal respect for the contributions of both genders throughout society. It protects and reinforces the mother-father family, which is the basic social institution.
"When marriages are disregarded and trivialized by public officials, as by the judges in the Brown and Kitchen rulings, that weakens the institution of marriage and subverts the integrity of the relationship of marriage.
"Societies in which marriage is weakened and trivialized suffer severe consequences. History shows that the dependent, the young, the weak, and the aged pay a heavy price when marriage is weakened. . . .
"That some federal judges might have personal views about 'modernizing' Utah’s marriage law to embrace novel forms of marriage and diminish the meaning of marriage is not surprising. However, that they would abuse the power of their office to rewrite Utah’s marriage laws to impose those views upon the people of this state is wrong and deeply troubling.
"It is truly unfortunate that the judges in these two cases forgot basic principles on which our constitutional system is predicated. Those principles include not only respect for gender-integrating marriage but also for judicial self-restraint.
"In both cases, the courts displayed a remarkable disrespect for the institution of marriage. Both judges severely abused judicial power. Because marriage matters, state and county officials should vigorously and effectively appeal the unjustified."
("Op-Ed: Illegitimate and Wrong Marriage Rulings," by Lynn D. Wardle, "Salt Lake Tribune," 4 January 2014, at:
http://m.sltrib.com/sltrib/mobile3/57347336-219/marriage-rulings-judges-constitutional.html.csp )
_____
Wardle speaks of honoring history when it comes to societal customs, mores, law and precedent. Perhaps he is unaware of the fact that as part of Nazi Germany's "moral purification" program, Hitler's henchmen--in the name of societal customs, mores, law and precedent-- rounded up gays and sent them to concentration camps:
"The Nazis posed as moral crusaders who wanted to stamp out the 'vice' of homosexuality from Germany in order to help win the racial struggle. Once they took power in 1933, the Nazis intensified persecution of German male homosexuals. Persecution ranged from the dissolution of homosexual organizations to internment in concentration camps.
"The Nazis believed that male homosexuals were weak, effeminate men who could not fight for the German nation. They saw homosexuals as unlikely to produce children and increase the German birthrate. The Nazis held that inferior races produced more children than 'Aryans,' so anything that diminished Germany's reproductive potential was considered a racial danger.
"SS chief Heinrich Himmler directed the increasing persecution of homosexuals in the Third Reich. . . . [T]he Nazis generally did not target non-German homosexuals unless they were active with German partners. In most cases, the Nazis were prepared to accept former homosexuals into the 'racial community,' provided that they became 'racially conscious' and gave up their lifestyle.
"On May 6, 1933, students led by Storm Troopers (Sturmabteilung; SA) broke into the Institute for Sexual Science in Berlin and confiscated its unique library. Four days later, most of this collection of over 12,000 books and 35,000 irreplaceable pictures was destroyed along with thousands of other 'degenerate' works of literature in the book burning in Berlin's city center. The remaining materials were never recovered. Magnus Hirschfeld, the founder of the Institute and a pioneer in the scientific study of human sexuality, was lecturing in France at the time and chose not to return to Germany.
"The destruction of the Institute was a first step toward eradicating an openly gay or lesbian culture from Germany. Police closed bars and clubs such as the "Eldorado" and banned publications such as 'Die Freundschaft' ('Friendship'). In this early stage, the Nazis drove homosexuals underground, destroying their networks of support. In 1934, the Gestapo (secret state police) instructed local police forces to keep lists of all men engaged in homosexual activities. Police in many parts of Germany had in fact been doing this for years. The Nazis used these 'pink lists' to hunt down individual homosexuals during police actions.
"On June 28, 1935, the Ministry of Justice revised [Germany's anti-homosexual law known as ] Paragraph 175. The revisions provided a legal basis for extending Nazi persecution of homosexuals. Ministry officials expanded the category of 'criminally indecent activities between men' to include any act that could be construed as homosexual. The courts later decided that even intent or thought sufficed.
"On October 26, 1936, Himmler formed within the Security Police the Reich Central Office for Combating Abortion and Homosexuality. Josef Meisinger, executed in 1947 for his brutality in occupied Poland, led the new office. The police had powers to hold in protective custody or preventive arrest those deemed dangerous to Germany's moral fiber, jailing indefinitely--without trial--anyone they chose. In addition, homosexual prisoners just released from jail were immediately re-arrested and sent to concentration camps if the police thought it likely that they would continue to engage in homosexual acts.
"From 1937 to 1939, the peak years of the Nazi persecution of homosexuals, the police increasingly raided homosexual meeting places, seized address books, and created networks of informers and undercover agents to identify and arrest suspected homosexuals. On April 4, 1938, the Gestapo issued a directive indicating that men convicted of homosexuality could be incarcerated in concentration camps. Between 1933 and 1945 the police arrested an estimated 100,000 men as homosexuals. Most of the 50,000 men sentenced by the courts spent time in regular prisons, and between 5,000 and 15,000 were interned in concentration camps.
"The Nazis interned some homosexuals in concentration camps immediately after the seizure of power in January 1933. Those interned came from all areas of German society, and often had only the cause of their imprisonment in common. . . . Prisoners marked by pink triangles to signify homosexuality were treated harshly in the camps. According to many survivor accounts, homosexuals were among the most abused groups in the camps.
"Because some Nazis believed homosexuality was a sickness that could be cured, they designed policies to "cure" homosexuals of their 'disease' through humiliation and hard work. Guards ridiculed and beat homosexual prisoners upon arrival, often separating them from other inmates. Rudolf Hoess, commandant of Auschwitz, wrote in his memoirs that homosexuals were segregated in order to prevent homosexuality from spreading to other inmates and guards. Personnel in charge of work details in the Dora-Mittelbau underground rocket factory or in the stone quarries at Flossenbürg and Buchenwald often gave deadly assignments to homosexuals.
"Survival in camps took on many forms. Some homosexual inmates secured administrative and clerical jobs. For other prisoners, sexuality became a means of survival. In exchange for sexual favors, some Kapos protected a chosen prisoner, usually of young age, giving him extra food and shielding him from the abuses of other prisoners. Homosexuals themselves very rarely became Kapos due to the lack of a support network. Kapo guardianship was no protection against the guards' brutality, of course. In any case, the Kapo often tired of an individual, sometimes killing him and finding another on the next transport. Though individual homosexual inmates could secure a measure of protection in some ways, as a group homosexual prisoners lacked the support network common to other groups. Without this help in mitigating brutality, homosexual prisoners were unlikely to survive long.
"One avenue of survival available to some homosexuals was castration, which some criminal justice officials advocated as a way of "curing" sexual deviance. Homosexual defendants in criminal cases or concentration camps could agree to castration in exchange for lower sentences. Later, judges and SS camp officials could order castration without the consent of a homosexual prisoner.
"Nazis interested in finding a 'cure' for homosexuality expanded this program to include medical experimentation on homosexual inmates of concentration camps. These experiments caused illness, mutilation, and even death, and yielded no scientific knowledge.
"There are no known statistics for the number of homosexuals who died in the camps."
("Persecution of Homosexuals in the Third Reich," under "Holocaust Encyclopedia," presented by the United States Holocaust Museum, at:
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005261)
And, finally, did you know that both the Mormon Church and many of its rank-and-file members supported Hitler's rise to power?
(For a history of Mormon German support of Hitler and the Nazis, see: "All in Favor, So Manifest by "Sieg Heil!": Church-Encouraged LDS German Support of the Nazis During World War II, Parts 1 and 2," by Steve Benson, "Recovery from Mormonism" discussion board, 10 September 2012, at:
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CC4QFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fexmormon.org%2Fphorum%2Fread.php%3F2%2C632848&ei=iVPMUo-PHcTfrQHmzIGYAw&usg=AFQjCNGXOSq3AyKaU_xl_FIHzgrvqpfH4w&bvm=bv.58187178,d.aWM)