>> how would you describe the society's platform. prof. mulloy: more broadly, they wanted to turn back the advance of the new deal. they wanted to reduce the influence of the government in american life. they had conspiratorial believes, so they believed most dwight eisenhower was part of a conspiracy. they were proactive. like other organizations, they actually did things. when you got their newsletter, you would be asked to write a letter, signed a petition.

it was activism in doing something, rather than just complaining about things. did that conspiracy theory about eisenhower gain traction? prof. mulloy: not really. disavow thelater thing that it was a liberals, other republicans, conservatives, and the media jumped upon. you can't be serious about this, right? you are really claiming that eisenhower is a communist agent? it was the thing that discredited than the most while they were trying to gain traction. >> did their efforts have any influence politically? prof. mulloy: sure. is in recentiety times forgotten, but they were a significant part of the 1960's political landscape. they generated questions in the house, questions in the senate,

presidential statements. say they played a much more significant role in the development of conservatism during the period then they usually get credit for. the tendency is to dismiss them as a lunatic fringe, but it helped them up bridge 1950's that of the to 1970's and 1980's. they trained to a generation of conservatives to show them how to pursue their causes, to get into politics, and it was important for those reasons. >> did you have a sense at their height, how large their society was? estimates are about 100,000 total members. but i think more broadly, they had millions of members who were sympathetic, and many people had

similar beliefs to them, even though they did not join the society. despite the relatively small size, i think they had a big impact on american culture. >> how did the establishment republican party responded to the society? prof. mulloy: it buried. some republicans and some democrats are members will stop -- were members. barry goldwater knew many members personally and never criticized the leadership or conspiratorial believes. other conservatives, for example, bill buckley, one of the leading conservatives, came to see them as a liability to conservatism as a whole, splitting up the conservative movement. the goldwaterfter defeat, the republican establishment determined they need to get rid of the purchase -- needed to get rid of the n

birchers. the republican leader at the time said that the john's burts society -- the john birch society is not a part of the republican party anymore. they kind of declined afterward. >> did ronald reagan have any particular views? prof. mulloy: reagan is interesting, because he liked goldwater and new mini birchers personally. -- many birchers personally. he learned a lesson from barry goldwater, and also richard who suffered in 1962. theld reagan handled accusations against him, so he distanced himself from the society. he basically said, i stand by my views, they stand by theirs. he was very skillful in

distancing himself from the society. did the john birch society change the republican party in any way? prof. mulloy: i think it helped them shift it to the right. it took a while for goldwater and the burgers to have that influence, but it moved it in a more conservative direction. it paved the way for reagan's eventual victory, the activism, energy, enthusiasm, and dedication to the cause. i think it really helped that side considerably to become a major part of the republican party. canast question for you, you tell me a little bit about the resources you used in your research? i understand there is a secret nature about them? yeah.mulloy: temperatures are a secretive organization. it does not allow independent researchers access to their archive. ironically, you can go to moscow and look at kgb archives, but you can't look at the john birch society's.

i looked at press reports, theressional records, and is one archive called the wilcox collection, and i spent some time in their. they have a lot of john birch and american opinions that were published. i was able to get information on those sources and archives. >> darren mulloy, thank you very much. prof. mulloy: thank you. announcer: you are watching american history tv, all weekend, every weekend on c-span3. to join the conversation, like us on facebook. all weekend long, american history tv is joining our comcast cable partners to showcase the history of hattiesburg, mississippi. to learn more about the cities on our current tour, visit c-span.org/citiestour.

we continue now with our look at the history of hattiesburg. reason did anybody want to come and kill my daddy? it was a result of orders from the head of the klan, "go annihilate him." and they killed my whole family. -- they came to kill my whole family. he was a civil right activist in hattiesburg who worked to try to get african-americans registered to vote. at the shady grove thech, he was a teacher of sunday school and also sang in the choir. he owed a small grocery store, a sawmill, and he grew commercial cotton.

70 acres of cotton, a lot of cotton. dad was one of the of the naacp. it was nine men who established the naacp. at that time, they were definitely an underground organization. he felt that the opportunity to vote was the pathway to first-class citizenship. places the whites could go, the blacks could go. the courthouse was the only place where they had bathrooms for black people. white and colored doors. water fountains were even like that. they would be side-by-side and what have a white fountain and a black fountain, a colored fountain, as they called it. >> my dad and other black

citizens in the nearby town of hattiesburg, mississippi, which is only about 5.5 miles south, they would go up and pay their property tax and pay their poll tax, and my dad did that go toously, and he would the voter registration office to try to register, and then the register would refuse to register them. consequently, he was just paying a poll tax. >> he had pushed for black people to be able to vote. he knew it would make a change in their condition. before two or three days he came in and killed him, an announcement was made on the radio that people would be paying a poll tax and what not have to go all the way to the courthouse. anybody who did not have the money, he would pay it for them. the banks would not loan us any

money. banks he had already done business with, but he had to borrow money from some other source. by that time, they were getting so many threats. sleep in shifts, because we knew it was not safe for two grown people in the house to be asleep at the same time. >> they were sleeping in shifts. sons on active duty protecting them from people who wanted to take their lives will stop -- take their lives. i did not find out that until the homeless was charged and my dad lost his life. there were always guns in the house, but this one time when i , i had a wife and three kids, -- my dad had a wife and three kids, i came home and my dad said, hey, don't walk in front of the window at night,

and he told me why. that did not bother me. that was the first time i was introduced to that level of fear. end of 1965, we .topped sleeping in shifts we kept loading guns, and he was yelling at me. facilitiesd, both were firing at the same time,

and while they were burning, they were shooting in the flames to make sure, if the flames don't get you, we were due. hopefully we will kill you. they came to wipe out the family house. i raised the bedroom window. i turned around to get ready, and the window fail down, and i cannot get the window up again. i hit the window so hard with my shoulder that i fell out with the bottom sash. she got burned on both arms and her forehead, and he had got earned real bad. >> by the time my dad got out, he had stayed inside too long, that the hole in the clay and all was firing into the structure. i that time he got out, his respiratory system was parched.

i went to the hospital. said it was crime. jones, our doctor. that he was crying, so i went with betty. and then came back . they put them both in the same room at the hospital. [indiscernible] here, there ised a site along with the grocery which is about 100 feet from the house. it was still smoldering. were law-enforcement

spectators, newspeople covering the site. a highly expected man. the reaction from the community was surprising, i'm sure, to the white population, because it was a hospital. marches, the community came in defense.f they said, if it can happen to mer, it could happen to us. they laid aside their fears and said, we have got to do something. and we had a leader of the naacp who came down and organized a march. >> they went up through the black neighborhood to the courthouse. community began , and the black community put up a boycott that was so successful. andmerchants got together

met demands the community had. and the president got involved. president lyndon baines johnson. he sent a telegram to my mom expressing his regret and condolence to the family. both of them went to prison, but they did not stay that long. one of them died in prison. it was terrible, because i had to take the witness stand. i had to testify each time for them, for the grand jury to indict them. i was the lead witness every time. stand, times, i took the trying to get something done. that, at that is time, and the things we experience in this country, our , will not ever happen

again to anybody. our cities tour staff recently traveled to hattiesburg, mississippi to learn about its rich history. learn more about hattiesburg and other stops on the tour at .-span.org/citiestour you are watching american history tv, all weekend, every weekend on c-span3. proudly secretary, we give 72 of our delegate votes to the next president of the united states. ♪

announcer: next, a discussion on confederate soldiers who immigrated to brazil. was cohosted by longwood university. it is about 45 minutes. >> our second speaker today is casey clabough. is a professor t lynchburg college and editor of the james dickey review and is english graduate dec