Birchers: How the John Birch Society Radicalized the American Right

Historian Dallek (Defenseless Under the Night) argues in this comprehensive and enlightening account that the John Birch Society’s organizational and political model catalyzed a decades-long radicalization of the modern Republican Party. Named after an American missionary killed by Chinese communist forces, the Society was founded in 1958 by “a small band of anti–New Deal businessmen” under the leadership of retired candy executive Robert Welch. Dallek details a steady program of expansion in the 1960s on the back of innovative organizing strategies, including the use of high-profile, single-issue campaigns to attract new members. With growth, however, the secretive pragmatism of the earliest Birchers gave way to public outbursts of wild-eyed conspiracy mongering. Though the Society’s influence faded in mid–1970s, its conspiratorial style and staunch opposition to federal regulations were taken up by conservative media outlets and activists like the Koch brothers (whose father was a founding member), giving rise to a “toxic fringe” that “eventually cannibalized the entire [Republican] party.” Dallek sheds valuable light on the Anti-Defamation League’s efforts to infiltrate the Birchers, and incisively analyzes how establishment Republicans’ attempts to “hav[e] it both ways” by relying on the support of rank-and-file Birchers while distancing themselves from the group’s “racism, antisemitism, and conspiracy thinking” backfired. This is a treasure trove for political history buffs. (Mar.)