More on the John Birch Society

I wish William Barrante [The Constitution and Threats to America, February 22] had viewed the John Birch website <www.jbs.org>, which I cited in my recent article [Understanding the John Birch Society, February 15], rather than quoting something that may or may not be true or might be taken out of context. Maybe on that same website he could find information about the quote he attributed to Robert Welch ["Dwight David Eisenhower is a conscious agent of the communist conspiracy"] and the context in which it was spoken, if it was even said at all. It is obvious that half-truths and so-called quotes have been used to discredit just about every group of people at one time or another.

Regarding Dwight D. Eisenhower, he was human like the rest of us, and he was also a member of an elite group of power players. Being human, I'm sure he made mistakes—but once you are in that group of power players, your mistakes and faults are minimized by whatever the press lets the "great unwashed" (i.e., the people) hear. Funny, I don't remember hearing Eisenhower express dismay over the fact that Communist Russia gained access to Berlin before us, or the fact that countries like Poland were, with the swipe of a pen, forced to live under oppressive domination after the war. Is that what Robert Welch was thinking? Again, the Society's monthly bulletin update and extensive video library are effective tools to show where upcoming bills are leading us as a nation.

Personally, my gut tells me FDR did act like a "Dictator in Chief" when he outlawed the owning of gold coins by United States citizens. Gold was used as lawful money for thousands of years before that socialist and his con men broke a nation in many more ways than one. As the ancient Chinese said, "Disperse the money, collect the people."

Regarding the Federal Reserve, it is neither federal nor reserve. It is a private concern that has never been scrutinized by an audit, and very few people know the names of the stockholders, either. This unbacked "fantastic elastic" could be stretched but would not bounce back at the issuers. This unconstitutional feat goes on simply in that there is no space provided on their checks (dollar bills) for endorsements. This is against Article 1, Section 10 of our Constitution. Its power is fueled by the Sixteenth Amendment—the income tax.

So we do have a Constitution—somewhere between where Mr. Barrante and Marcel LeRoy [U.S. Constitution Undermined, February 15] envision it. But I must ask this question: Why haven't these "Emergency Acts" been rescinded? This fact only provides fuel for Marcel LeRoy's theories.