MANNING JOHNSON EXPOSED BLACK LIVES MATTER 60 YEARS AGO – Manning Johnson (1908-1959), a high-ranking Communist Party USA member, renounced communism in 1940 and dedicated himself to exposing its plans and methodology for the overthrow of America using racial strife. In 1958, he authored Color, Communism and Common Sense, the preface to which was written by Archibald Roosevelt, a son of President Theodore Roosevelt. Chapter one, “In the Web,” begins like this: “Ten years I labored in the cause of Communism. I was a dedicated ‘comrade.’ All my talents and efforts were zealously used to bring about the triumph of Communism in America and throughout the world. To me, the end of capitalism would mark the beginning of an interminable period of plenty, peace, prosperity and universal comradeship. All racial and class differences and conflicts would end forever after the liquidation of the capitalists, their government and their supporters. Being an idealist, I was sold this ‘bill of goods’ by a Negro graduate of the Lenin Institute in Moscow. Little did I realize until I was deeply enmeshed in the Red Conspiracy, that just and seeming grievances are exploited to transform idealism into a cold and ruthless weapon against the capitalist system–that this is the end toward which all the communist efforts among Negroes are directed. Indeed, I had entered the red conspiracy in the vain belief that it was the way to a ‘new, better and superior’ world system of society. Ten years later, thoroughly disillusioned, I abandoned communism. The experiences of those years in ‘outer darkness’ are like a horrible nightmare. I saw communism in all its naked cruelty, ruthlessness and utter contempt of Christian attributes and passions. And, too, I saw the low value placed upon human life, the total lack of respect for the dignity of man, the betrayal of trust, the terror of the Secret Police and the bloody hand of the assassin, during and since, those fateful years when I embraced communism. My zeal, training, both theoretical and practical, combined with loyalty and willingness to sacrifice, changed me from a novice into a dedicated red–a professional revolutionist. Consequently, I climbed rapidly to the National Committee, the highest governing body of the Communist Party in America. Thus, as a participant on the highest level of the communist conspiracy in America, I observed the cold, calculating, ruthless nature of red power politics and political warfare, stripped of all its illusory propaganda and idealistic cover.”
(Friday Church News Notes, August 21, 2020, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)