“…why does any honest, patriotic, intelligent citizen of America prefer socialism to free enterprise? Is it not in free enterprise that free agency, a divine gift to every human being, finds an environment favorable to growth and development and to living in harmony with our beautiful doctrine of eternal progression? …Yes, it is repentance or industrial slavery. Which will you choose?”
The position of this Church on the subject of Communism has never changed. We consider it the greatest satanical threat to peace, prosperity, and the spread of God’s work among men that exists on the face of the earth.
To have been on the wrong side of the freedom issue during the war in heaven meant eternal damnation. …The issues [in this life] are the same: “Shall men be compelled to do what others claim is for their best welfare” or will they heed the counsel of the prophet and preserve their freedom?
We need everyone to engage back when we’re nominating the candidates in the first place; that’s where we need more engagement. And how does this start? It really starts at home…
The Constitution is, in short, a limitation on government.
And that law of the land which is constitutional, supporting that principle of freedom in maintaining rights and privileges, belongs to all mankind, and is justifiable before me. …whatsoever is more or less than this, cometh of evil.
People who are willing—and we have some of them in this country—to trade freedom for security, are sowing the seeds of destruction and deserve neither freedom nor security.
This freedom must be continually guarded as something more priceless than life itself. Any program that would tend to weaken this freedom is inherently dangerous and should be guarded against.
If we are living the gospel, we will feel in our hearts that the First Presidency of the Church not only have the right, but are also duty bound under heaven to give counsel on any subject which affects the temporal or spiritual welfare of the Latter-day Saints, regardless of whether or not some men may think such counsel may have political implications.
We see abroad today on every hand, and to some degree in our own land, the spread of coercive man-made systems, which are contrary to eternal principles… such as communism, fascism, or any form of state control.