Gun Control and Freedom, Part 3

                The liberty principle for this Freedom Friday is the simple fact that knowledge and the Right to Keep and Bear Arms protect us.  History and circumstances have proven over and over that armed citizens are free citizens because we provide our own security.  Gun registration and gun confiscation always precede the government-directed mass murders of their own citizens.   

                I love the movie entitled The Sound of Music and consider it a wonderful story of a family living in a beautiful country and lots of beautiful music.  My deepest desire as a mother was to be like Maria and to lead and teach my children with love, music and fun times; however I fell far short of my goal.  I did not pay particular attention to the historical background of the story until I read the story of Kitty Werthmann.  I knew that the Nazis did terrible things, but it was all part of history; I did not think it had anything to do with my life.  I now think differently.

Ms. Werthmann is now 85 years old living in the United States, but she was an 11-year-old child in Austria when the German army occupied her country.  Snopes dot com lists her story as “undetermined;” Skeptoid dot com  claims that Kitty Werthmann is a real person who lived through the Nazi occupation of Austria and who immigrated to the United States in the 1950s.  She has told her story hundreds of times, written a book, produced a DVD, and made television appearances.  Skeptoid has some problems with the way Ms. Werthmann compares what happened in Austria to what she believes is happening in the United States.  Skeptoid accepts the truth of Ms. Werthmann’s historical story, but he disagrees with her about the possibility of the same type of things happening in the United States.  His article is interesting, but the comments are much more enlightening.

                Ms. Werthmann entitles her story “America Truly is the Greatest Country in the World.  Don’t Let Freedom Slip Away.”  Her story about the Nazi takeover is chilling and aligns with what we learn from the history books.  The Nazis did not “invade” Austria suddenly; they took control of the Austrians little by little over a five-year period.  Those who listen to the words of Ms. Werthmann and then ponder the situation in America today can certainly make a comparison that is scary.  Anyone who denies that we could lose our freedoms in America – or votes away our liberties – is simply in denial.  Freedom is definitely not free, and we must always be ready to defend it.

                “What I am about to tell you is something you’ve probably never heard or will ever read in history books.  I believe that I am an eyewitness to history.  I cannot tell you that Hitler took Austria by tanks and guns; it would distort history.  We elected him by a landslide – 98% of the vote.  I’ve never read that in any American publications.  Everyone thinks that Hitler just rolled in with his tanks and took Austria by force.  In 1938, Austria was in deep Depression.  Nearly one-third of our workforce was unemployed.  We had 25% inflation and 25% bank loan interest rates.  Farmers and business people were declaring bankruptcy daily.  Young people were going from house to house begging for food.  Not that they didn’t want to work; there simply weren’t any jobs.  My mother was a Christian woman and believed in helping people in need.  Every day we cooked a big kettle of soup and baked bread to feed those poor, hungry people – about 30 daily.

                “The Communist Party and the National Socialist Party were fighting each other.  Blocks and blocks of cities like Vienna, Linz, and Graz were destroyed.  The people became desperate and petitioned the government to let them decide what kind of government they wanted.

                “We looked to our neighbor on the north, Germany, where Hitler had been in power since 1933.  We had been told that they didn’t have unemployment or crime, and they had a high standard of living.  Nothing was ever said about persecution of any group – Jewish or otherwise.  We were led to believe that everyone was happy.  We were promised that a vote for Hitler would mean the end of unemployment and help for the family.  Hitler also said that business would be assisted, and farmers would get their farms back.  Ninety-eight percent of the population voted to annex Austria to Germany and have Hitler for our ruler.

                “We were overjoyed, and for three days we danced in the streets and had candlelight parades.  The new government opened up big field kitchens and everyone was fed.  After the election, German officials were appointed, and like a miracle, we suddenly had law and order.  Three or four weeks later, everyone was employed.  The government made sure that a lot of work was created through the Public Work Service.  Hitler decided we should have equal rights for women.  Before this, it was a custom that married Austrian women did not work outside the home.  An able-bodied husband would be looked down on if he couldn’t support his family.  Many women in the teaching profession were elated that they could retain the jobs they previously had been required to give up for marriage.

                “Our education was nationalized.  I attended a very good public school.  The population was predominantly Catholic, so we had religion in our schools.  The day we elected Hitler (March 13, 1938), I walked into my schoolroom to find the crucifix replaced by Hitler’s picture hanging next to a Nazi flag.  Our teacher, a very devout woman, stood up and told the class we wouldn’t pray or have religion anymore.  Instead, we sang “Deutschland, Deutschland, Uber Alles,” and had physical education.

                “Sunday became National Youth Day with compulsory attendance.  Parents were not pleased about the sudden change in curriculum. They were told that if they did not send us, they would receive a stiff letter of warning the first time.  The second time they would be fined the equivalent of $300, and the third time they would be subject to jail.  The first two hours consisted of political indoctrination.  The rest of the day we had sports.  As time went along, we loved it.  Oh, we had so much fun and got our sports equipment free.  We would go home and gleefully tell our parents about the wonderful time we had.

                “My mother was very unhappy.  When the next term started, she took me out of public school and put me in a convent.  I told her she couldn’t do that and she told me that someday when I grew up, I would be grateful.  There was a very good curriculum, but hardly any fun – no sports, and no political indoctrination.  I hated it at first, but felt I could tolerate it.  Every once in a while, on holidays, I went home.  I would go back to my old friends and ask what was going on and what they were doing.  Their loose lifestyle was very alarming to me.  They lived without religion.  By that time unwed mothers were glorified for having a baby for Hitler.  It seemed strange to me that our society changed so suddenly.  As time went along, I realized what a great deed my mother did so that I wasn’t exposed to that kind of humanistic philosophy.

                “In 1939, the war started and a food bank was established.  All food was rationed and could only be purchased using food stamps.  At the same time, a full-employment law was passed which meant if you didn’t work, you didn’t get a ration card, and if you didn’t have a card, you starved to death.  Women who stayed home to raise their families didn’t have any marketable skills and often had to take jobs more suited for men.

                “Soon after this, the draft was implemented.  It was compulsory for young people, male and female, to give one year to the labor corps.  During the day, the girls worked on the farms, and at night they returned to their barracks for military training. Just like the boys.  They were trained to be anti-aircraft gunners and participated in the signal corps.  After the labor corps, they were not discharged but were used in the front lines.  When I go back to Austria to visit my family and friends, most of these women are emotional cripples because they just were not equipped to handle the horrors of combat.  Three months before I turned 18, I was severely injured in an air raid attack.  I nearly had a leg amputated, so I was spared having to go into the labor corps and into military service.

                “When the mothers had to go out into the work force, the government immediately established child care centers.  You could take your children ages 4 weeks to school age and leave them there around-the-clock, 7 days a week, under the total care of the government.  The state raised a whole generation of children.  There were no motherly women to take care of the children, just people highly trained in child psychology.  By this time, no one talked about equal rights.  We knew we had been had.

                “Before Hitler, we had very good medical care.  Many American doctors trained at the University of Vienna…. After Hitler, health care was socialized, free for everyone.   Doctors were salaried by the government.  The problem was, since it was free, the people were going to the doctors for everything.  When the good doctor arrived at his office at 8 a.m., 40 people were already waiting and, at the same time, the hospitals were full.  If you needed elective surgery, you had to wait a year or two for your turn.  There was no money for research as it was poured into socialized medicine.  Research at the medical schools literally stopped, so the best doctors left Austria and immigrated to other countries.  As for healthcare, our tax rates went up to 80% of our income.  Newlyweds immediately received a $1,000 loan from the government to establish a household.  We had big programs for families.  All day care and education were free.  High schools were taken over by the government and college tuition was subsidized.  Everyone was entitled to free handouts, such as food stamps, clothing, and housing.

                “We had another agency designed to monitor business.  My brother-in-law owned a restaurant that had square tables.  Government officials told him he had to replace them with round tables because people might bump themselves on the corners.  Then they said he had to have additional bathroom facilities.  It was just a small dairy business with a snack bar.  He couldn’t meet all the demands.  Soon, he went out of business.  If the government owned the large businesses and not many small ones existed, it could be in control.

                “We had consumer protection.  We were told how to shop and what to buy.  Free enterprise was essentially abolished.  We had a planning agency specially designed for farmers.  The agents would go to the farms, count the live-stock, [and] then tell the farmers what to produce, and how to produce it.

                “In 1944, I was a student teacher in a small village in the Alps.  The villagers were surrounded by mountain passes which, in the winter, were closed off with snow, causing people to be isolated.  So people intermarried and offspring were sometimes retarded.  When I arrived, I was told there were 15 mentally retarded adults, but they were all useful and did good manual work.  I knew one, named Vincent, very well.  He was a janitor of the school.  One day I looked out the window and saw Vincent and others getting into a van.  I asked my superior where they were going.  She said to an institution where the State Health Department would teach them a trade, and to read and write.  The families were required to sign papers with a little clause that they could not visit for 6 months.  They were told visits would interfere with the program and might cause homesickness.

                “As time passed, letters started to dribble back saying these people died a natural, merciful death.  The villagers were not fooled.  We suspected what was happening. Those people left in excellent physical health and all died within 6 months.  We called this euthanasia.

                “Next came gun registration.   People were getting injured by guns.  Hitler said that the real way to catch criminals (we still had a few) was by matching serial numbers on guns.  Most citizens were law abiding and dutifully marched to the police station to register their firearms.  Not long after-wards, the police said that it was best for everyone to turn in their guns.  The authorities already knew who had them, so it was futile not to comply voluntarily.

                “No more freedom of speech.  Anyone who said something against the government was taken away.  We knew many people who were arrested, not only Jews, but also priests and ministers who spoke up.

                “Totalitarianism didn’t come quickly; it took 5 years from 1938 until 1943, to realize full dictatorship in Austria.  Had it happened overnight, my countrymen would have fought to the last breath.  Instead, we had creeping gradualism.  Now, our only weapons were broom handles.  The whole idea sounds almost unbelievable that the state, little by little, eroded our freedom.

                “After World War II, Russian troops occupied Austria.  Women were raped, preteen to elderly.  The press never wrote about this either.  When the Soviets left in 1955, they took everything that they could, dismantling whole factories in the process.  They sawed down whole orchards of fruit, and what they couldn’t destroy, they burned.  We called it The Burned Earth.  Most of the population barricaded themselves in their houses.  Women hid in their cellars for 6 weeks as the troops mobilized.  Those who couldn’t paid the price.

                 “It’s true… those of us who sailed past the Statue of Liberty came to a country of unbelievable freedom and opportunity.”

                Will Americans learn from the experiences endured by Europeans?  Ms. Werthmann states very plainly what happened in her native Austria and is warning Americans that the same thing is slowly happening in the United States.  Will we heed her warning?  I hope so.  She said that Hitler took five years to implement totalitarianism in Austria.  Obama openly stated that his goal is to “fundamentally transform” America.  What will America look like after his transformation?  When we think of all the changes in the past four years, it is only right that we wonder how much more damage will be done to America in the next four years.

We must remember that America is the greatest nation in the world.  The Lord considers the Americas to be the “promised land” and “a land which is choice above all other lands.”  In order for us to maintain our liberty, we must “serve the God of the land, who is Jesus Christ.”  If we do not, we will be “swept off when the fullness of his wrath should come upon” us.  (See Book of Mormon, Ether 2:8-12.)  The Book of Mormon testifies that other nations have already been swept off the American continents.  Will America also be swept off?  I hope not because America is the world’s last best hope.  If we let our freedoms slip away, there is no other place in the world to go!