Introducing his incisive new book, American Marxism, Mark Levin writes,
The counterrevolution to the American Revolution is in full force. And it can no longer be dismissed or ignored, for it is devouring our society and culture, swirling around our everyday lives, and ubiquitous in our politics, schools, media, and entertainment. Once a mostly unrelatable, fringe, and subterranean movement, it is here—it is everywhere. You, your children, and your grandchildren are now immersed in it, and it threatens to destroy the greatest nation ever established, along with your freedom, family, and security. Of course, the primary difference between the counterrevolution and the American Revolution is that the former seeks to destroy American society and impose autocratic rule, and the latter sought to protect American society and institute representative government. The counterrevolution or movement of which I speak is Marxism.
For me, Levin’s warning strikes a chord because of my experience as a young lawyer in the mid-1980s on a legal study tour of the Soviet Union. Years earlier as an undergraduate, I had studied Russian history and the Russian language, as well as Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto, but I was unprepared for what I and my fellow lawyers would witness during our two-week tour.
Colossal images of Lenin and Marx stared down at us from tall buildings, a stern reminder that we were in fact being closely monitored. Several in our group reported having their luggage clandestinely inspected in their hotel room while they were out for the day. At the airport as we were preparing to leave the country, one of our party was singled out for intense interrogation in a room adorned with photos taken of him during the tour.
But it was the oppression of the marvelous Russian people we met that was most heart-rending. A few of these brave souls dared to reach out to us, asking about our lives and sharing details of their own. One drastic difference between our two nations had to do with religion, which the Manifesto—Lenin’s inspiration for his Russian Revolution—called “the opium of the people.” Marching to the same tune, the godless Soviet government confiscated religious property, harassed believers, and taught atheism in the schools.
Marx also advocated abolishing the nuclear family, which he held to be a bourgeois invention designed to perpetuate class inequality via transfer of private property through inheritance. The family was to be replaced by the union of individuals as a purely private matter, with children educated on a communal basis. The Soviets’ early efforts to move toward that goal were soon seen to be unsustainable, although the family remained under the strict control of the state.
Overall, touring the Soviet Union seemed almost like visiting another planet, an experience entirely foreign to freedom-loving Americans. On the first leg of our homeward journey after flying from Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg) to Helsinki, I had an unexpected experience as we walked through the airport to change planes. It was as if a great weight was suddenly lifted from my shoulders and I felt the exhilaration of the freedom I had for so long taken for granted and then been deprived of for two weeks. Hours later when our plane touched down in New York, the entire group erupted in cheers and applause. We were back on American soil, the land of the free and the home of the brave.
I am certain none of us could have imagined that the Marxism we had seen enslave the Russian people would in a few short decades grow like a cancer here in America until it threatened family, faith, and the freedom purchased with the blood of patriots. In that world-changing American Revolution, one of the galvanizing factors for independence was Thomas Paine’s Common Sense. Mark Levin’s American Marxism may similarly prove one of the galvanizing factors in our fight to preserve what the Founders gave us.
“What is occurring in our country is not a temporary fad or passing event,” he writes. “American Marxism exists, it is here and now, and indeed it is pervasive, and its multitude of hybrid but often interlocking movements are actively working to destroy our society and culture, and overthrow the country as we know it.” Demonstrating the insidious ways Marxism has extended its tentacles throughout American society, Levin also calls us to action.
We must rise to the challenge, as did our Founding Fathers, when they confronted the most powerful force on earth, the British Empire, and defeated it. I closed my book Liberty and Tyranny, which was published a short twelve years ago, with President Ronald Reagan’s fateful and prescient observation, which compels our attention especially now for it is more imperative than ever: “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.” PATRIOTS OF AMERICA, UNITE!
We at IOF applaud the clarion voice of Mark Levin. For the sake of our future and that of our children, we urgently invite all to join in defense of our precious heritage of family, faith, and freedom.