Consumed by Hate, Redeemed by Love

by Thomas A. Tarrants

  Shortly afterward, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a ruling banning prayer and Bible reading in public schools. I was shocked. When I was in grade school, my teachers briefly read the Bible to us and prayed at the start of each day. What was wrong with that? Why abolish it? I felt that something was seriously wrong in America. To me, it was clear that the government was now undermining the very principles on which America had been built.

  A month later, civil rights leaders brought together a quarter of a million people from around the country to protest for civil rights in the nation’s capital. Here, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his famous “I Have a Dream” speech at the Lincoln Memorial.

  These events were part of a major social upheaval in the South and elsewhere in America. What had been considered normal for decades in our part of the country was now being challenged and attacked by the federal government: segregation was being abolished, states’ rights were being trampled on, and Christianity was being repudiated. How could this be happening? It felt as though the established order of society was being overturned—and by our own government. These rapid social changes were very disorienting for me and many others. And they fed fear and anger.

  * * *

  In the summer of 1963, my dad received some material in the mail from the Draft Goldwater Committee. I read it and got involved in getting signatures on petitions that were enclosed in the letter. Goldwater’s book The Conscience of a Conservative showed that he was patriotic and looked like a good alternative to Kennedy. He seemed to be a strong leader who would fight Communist aggression, rein in government overreach, and hopefully halt desegregation. The people I met during this brief period were good, upstanding citizens and conservative in political orientation but not extremists. I wish I had stopped there.

  But after pursuing this for a number of weeks, I stumbled on some literature from the John Birch Society, which exposed me to additional troubling concerns and took me to a different level. I had never heard of the organization, but they had members in Mobile. After talking with some of them and reading their literature, I concluded that they were patriotic Americans. The Birchers were very concerned about the spread of world Communism and its growing influence in America, including its influence on the civil rights movement, which they opposed.

  As I read more John Birch literature and then books such as Masters of Deceit by J. Edgar Hoover, I became increasingly alarmed about the spread of Communism around the world and in the United States. According to Hoover, Communist infiltration of the U.S. government and subversive activities in America were a real danger. If the director of the FBI saw Communism as such a serious threat to America, that settled it for me.

  The John Birch Society was also concerned about the United Nations gaining control over the nations of the world and establishing a one-world government. Much of this coincided with what I had seen unfolding over the past several years, and I found it very disturbing. I now viewed the United Nations as a sinister threat to our national sovereignty. If the Birchers were correct, the United States was in danger of an imminent Communist takeover. I came to believe the nation was like a large and beautiful edifice that was being eaten away from within by termites. America could collapse at any time.

  The impact of this viewpoint radically changed my outlook on life. As I saw it, the world was gradually being swallowed up by international Communism—Russia in 1917, Eastern Europe in 1945–46, China in 1947, Indochina in 1954, and Cuba in 1959. Tens of millions of people had been killed in the process. And the only nation strong enough to resist its spread was itself being undermined from within.

  Communists had even infiltrated the U.S. government. Alger Hiss and others at the U.S. State Department were cited as examples. Klaus Fuchs, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, and other spies in our nuclear program had given atomic secrets to the Soviets. Other Communist spies were still at work in the government and in the civil rights movement. Worst of all, most Americans seemed either unaware or unconcerned. To me, the situation seemed far too serious to be solved by electing Barry Goldwater. My interest in him evaporated, and I moved into the Birchers’ orbit.

  Looking back, I realize that I did not grasp the complexities of issues. I saw everything in terms of stark extremes, failing to consider possible areas of gray, and I gravitated toward simple answers to complicated questions. I had come to believe that the West was in the midst of an epic life-or-death struggle with worldwide Communism, which had penetrated America and was gaining ground. While such a struggle was real, I believed things were far worse than they actually were. This aroused fear in me and resulted in my emotions dominating my reason as I grappled with these concerns. It also intensified my patriotism.

  As a high school student, I had not yet developed skills in critical thinking. I didn’t investigate and reason through these issues very well. Nor did I seek the insights of older, wiser people with more experience in life. I accepted the pronouncements of charismatic or noteworthy personalities. My dad’s idea of working through normal political and legal processes to address these problems made no sense to me. Based on what I was reading and hearing, I regarded such methods as futile and hopeless, because those in power either didn’t understand the dangers or were afraid to act. All this propelled me toward extremism. I thought of myself as part of a small minority who could see the impending social and political disaster. I had a duty to warn the masses and to be engaged in the struggle. Psychologically, this sense of mission gave me a purpose and significance that I had never had.

  I was coming to believe that this imminent threat to our nation had to be countered with direct action before it was too late. Somebody had to do something. The fear and anger I developed toward the perceived enemies of America began to feed a new emotion: hatred. At the age of seventeen, I was unwittingly leaving true patriotism behind and moving into the dark world of far-right extremism. And though supposedly a Christian, I was also leaving behind the moral values I had been taught and giving myself over to an increasingly self-indulgent, amoral lifestyle, which I still deeply regret.

  About this time, one of the Birchers told me of a mysterious figure living in our area who was involved in anti-Castro guerrilla activities. The failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba a couple of years earlier left some Cuban exiles wanting to continue covert military action. During those days numerous anti-Castro groups were engaged in guerrilla warfare and commando raids on Cuba. A staunch anti-Communist, this man had been on raids to Cuba himself. He was active in securing support and supplies for such groups in Florida.

  Although my contact with him was brief, the exposure introduced me to the exciting but shadowy world of clandestine activities and international intrigue. I assumed these efforts were sanctioned and covertly supported by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and because it was anti-Communist, I saw it as a heroic and patriotic effort to fight Communist aggression.

  This experience intensified my interest in guerrilla warfare, counterinsurgency, sabotage, intelligence work, and clandestine operations. I read many books from the public library on these subjects during the months and years that followed, becoming well versed in these areas. I also developed a great interest in firearms and marksmanship. I studied in such detail that I could identify and operate a number of the nation’s military small arms and cite their specifications.

  My parents were unaware of how rapidly my thinking was evolving and the direction it was taking me. As I raised some of my concerns with my father, he tried to allay them by giving me historical perspective. He thought the social and political changes under way would run for a number of years, then swing back to a more normal point. But that long-range view didn’t register with me.

  By the end of the summer of 1963, I was becoming increasingly radical. I had made significant progress in preparing myself to help protect America from the evils that were threatening to destroy her. I merely needed some practical experience. The desegregation of Murphy High School in Mobile provided the first
opportunity.

  5

  DESCENDING INTO DARKNESS

  The racial integration of Alabama’s public schools began in September 1963, while I was a high school student. Earlier in the year, two federal court rulings targeted Mobile’s public schools for integration. Segregationist organizations called for rallies and organized conferences in an effort to mobilize people and plan resistance. As the opening day of school drew nearer, tensions mounted throughout the state of Alabama but were particularly strong in Mobile.

  Again and again, I heard responsible people charging that states’ rights were being violated, the Constitution was being undermined, one-world government was on the horizon, Communists controlled the civil rights movement, desegregation would result in interracial marriage, and all of this would lead to the fall of “white Christian civilization.” My parents had not raised me to be a racist, but this kind of inflammatory rhetoric helped me become one.

  When school began on September 4, 1963, I seemed like many other seventeen-year-olds. I had a driver’s license and a desire to get out and about town and have fun. But inside I was also an angry, frustrated teenager. In addition to my troubled home life and my unrecognized inner conflicts and tensions, I was furious at the idea of the federal government forcing my state and high school to integrate—especially in view of the alleged Communist influence in the civil rights movement. The arrogance of it was staggering. The impact was now personal. My already huge payload of anger and frustration was exceeded only by my sense of personal grievance.

  The U.S. government seemed to be going right along with what the Communists wanted—just like what I was being taught about the growing Communist menace in America. My radical influences were being proven correct. Southern values—indeed the whole Southern way of life—were under attack. My inner turmoil at this disorienting social upheaval would eventually produce tragic consequences. To my anti-Communism, I had added a strong dislike for the federal government for trampling states’ rights and forcing integration. I was about to add hatred for black people for desegregating my school and Southern society in general.

  I arrived on the huge campus of Murphy High School about half an hour before the two black girls were to arrive for registration. Already on the campus were dozens of U.S. marshals, Alabama state troopers, and Mobile city police, all backed by armed National Guard troops in jeeps. I was outraged at what looked and felt like the armed occupation of my high school. The show of force—especially military force—was intimidating. It felt as if the government was against the people. Surely, they expected trouble and were taking no chances.

  I talked with other students to see what resistance was planned. No one knew of any. I was shocked. I tried to encourage friends and groups of students to make a protest of some sort, but my efforts were in vain. What a spineless bunch, I thought in disgust. Later that morning, however, a group of students did demonstrate in protest, and a small riot ensued, but I had already left and had no part in it.

  I was so incensed by the situation that I telephoned Governor George Wallace’s office in Montgomery and asked to speak to him directly. Though I didn’t get through to him, I respectfully warned his office that tension was high and trouble was likely if he didn’t take action to block the desegregation.

  The principal at my school was told of my call by state officials. He labeled me a troublemaker and suspended me for several days. My first day back in school, I began harassing the two black girls, and I encouraged others to do the same. I called them all sorts of hateful, derogatory names. I even hit and shoved them when I thought I could get away with it. Had they been boys, I probably would have tried to beat them up.

  On November 22, 1963, the school’s public address system interrupted classes to broadcast throughout the school that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas, Texas. I was sitting in my Latin class at the time and remember it well. Early reports were unclear, but soon came the announcement that the president had been killed. Although the news was shocking, like so many others in the South, I was not sorry to hear it. Kennedy’s strong anti-Communist position had been eclipsed by his support for the civil rights movement. That poisoned his image for many Southerners.

  * * *

  Around that time, someone gave me a copy of the Thunderbolt, a newspaper published by the National States Rights Party (NSRP), which contained articles purporting to show that black people were intellectually inferior to whites, that white women were in danger of being raped by black men, that race mixing resulted in cultural decline, and that the Communist threat and the civil rights movement were both Jewish in origin. This seemed plausible to me, so I sought further understanding from the NSRP, a far-right organization that was active in protesting the desegregation. I first met the leader of the Mobile chapter at the local NSRP office. He helped me see that it was a waste of time to make Murphy High School a priority in the fight against integration and Communism. There were bigger battles to be fought, battles that would have a much greater impact. Soon after meeting him, I became active in the local NSRP, though my involvement would be short-lived.

  I discovered that the NSRP was essentially a neo-Nazi group with beliefs almost identical to the various Ku Klux Klan groups. Founded in 1958, they were a much smaller organization than the Birchers, who were not neo-Nazi. Moreover, they were a different type of people. For the most part, the Birchers I had met were educated professionals, established in the community, and opposed to anti-Semitism and to violence. The NSRP was just the opposite—not well educated, very anti-Semitic, and publicly opposed to violence but secretly open to it.

  I often went to the local office to learn more about how the Jews were behind both global Communism and the U.S. civil rights movement. As I continued to read the Thunderbolt, it reinforced what I had been hearing. Its book reviews, articles, and advertisements repeated the message of anti-Semitism and neo-Nazism. One of the books I bought was The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, purportedly the minutes of meetings by Jewish leaders outlining their plans for world domination. It painted a picture of a secret, powerful conspiracy that aimed to influence the press, the economy, the political system, and much more to gain increasing control over the Gentile world. This gave me the framework for a conspiratorial view of world affairs that was filled in later by other anti-Semitic literature, all of which aroused fear and anger.

  Adolf Hitler said, “The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly—it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over.”1 There is truth in this idea, which psychologists call the “illusion of truth” effect.2 This phenomenon explains what was happening to me at age seventeen, as I was filling my head with a few extreme ideas, repeated again and again in different ways.

  Anti-Semitism was not a natural progression for me. Just the opposite, in fact. I had known a couple of Jewish girls in grade school and liked them both, and they liked me. My grandmother had worked for a jewelry store owned by a respected Jewish family in Mobile. They had treated her well, and she always had good things to say about them. Although I had picked up a slight negative attitude toward Jews from my Greek friend who had exposed me to the Hitler recordings, I had no animosity toward them. But what I was now hearing and reading was changing my attitude toward Jews dramatically.

  I spent even more time with another NSRP member, an older guy who was a good friend of the organization’s leader. He met me at least once a week, sometimes more. Since I was not involved in any sports or after-school activities, it fit right in with my social schedule. When school let out in the afternoons, he would take me to a coffee shop, or we would go to his house. Sometimes we would just drive around and talk. We listened repeatedly to the recorded sermons and lectures of Dr. Wesley Swift, an anti-Semitic and racist former Methodist minister from California who preached white supremacy. His sermons influenced my beliefs and attitudes toward Jewish people more than anything else. Swift
’s racist theology, called Christian Identity, would eventually give rise to the violent and dangerous Aryan Nations movement, which is still active today.

  Swift claimed that he taught the true Christian religion. Starting with ideas of a little-known sect called British Israelism, which contends that white northern Europeans are actually descendants of the ten lost tribes of Israel, he created an anti-Semitic, racist theology. Swift preached that those who are now called Jews are not true Israelites but are descended from the ungodly line of Cain. (Cain, the first son of Adam and Eve, was said by Swift to be the offspring of the Devil, who seduced Eve.) True Israelites are those who are descended from the godly line of Seth, the third son of Adam. Most of them were deported to Assyria when Israel’s ten northern tribes were taken captive in 722 BC. These tribes later migrated to northern Europe and are the ancestors of the Anglo-Saxon peoples found in Europe (and now in America and elsewhere). It is from this bloodline that Jesus was supposedly descended.

  According to Swift, the pseudo-Jews of today are an evil, anti-Christian race, and key leaders among them have long been secretly conspiring to gain control of the world through Communism and race mixing, both of which they used as tools. Black people, Swift taught, were subhuman, had no souls, and were being used by the Jews to intermarry with whites, to generate a mongrel race that would be more easily controlled. In the last days, the evil line of Cain and the godly line of Seth would engage in mortal combat. With God’s help, the line of Seth would prevail. It was therefore important for all those of the line of Seth (white European stock) to prepare themselves by obtaining weapons and munitions of various sorts and learning to use them as they await the coming battle.

  Not knowing the Bible very well, I overlaid the little understanding I did have with this dangerous religious ideology, not realizing the errors I was embracing. Swift’s ideology appealed to me because it reinforced my prejudices and gave them a religious justification.