Church League of America presents Ronald Reagan on The Welfare State
Abstract
Originally organized in 1937 to protest the US Supreme Court nomination of Hugo Black, the Church League of America is best-known for the red-baiting tactics used by Baptist minister Major Edgar C. Bundy, the group's most-famous leader during the 1950s and 1960s. With the goal of outing people and acts in US government that Bundy held to be "subversive," the Church League amassed what it eventually referred to as the largest "pro-freedom and antisubversive" archive in the United States. As a sign of the Church League's prominence amidst anti-communist conspiracy propagators, this archive ultimately included many of the files used by Senator Joseph McCarthy to support his celebrated Congressional hearings during the 1950s.
While the Church League was centrally-run from its headquarters in Wheaton, Illinois, it did arrange local events such as the film screening advertised in the pictured flyer. Although the specific film advertised is unclear, Ronald Reagan began to speak frequently on conservative themes in the early 1960s. He decried "socialized medicine" as early as 1961 and famously became a rising star in the Republican Party with his 1964 "A Time for Choosing" speech in support of Barry Goldwater. As the seat of the legislative branch of government, the US Capitol building was a particularly popular icon for conservatives wishing to invoke a government whose laws they perceived to encroach on individual freedom.