Debunking the Progressive Lie About Ezra Taft Benson!

On my Facebook page, I regularly share quotes and conference talks from apostles, prophets, and other Church leaders on a wide variety of topics. But I realized something, whenever I shared anything from Ezra Taft Benson I got hate mail demanding I stop sharing his talks or quotes, saying something along the lines of, “Don’t you know he was chastised by the First Presidency for denouncing Socialism? You should not share his talks/quotes.”

At first, I was amused by their comments, as the guilty always take the truth to be hard, and that it was simply people rejecting the parts of the gospel that disagree with their political ideology. But then I kept getting the comments/messages and I realized that this lie is far more believed than I thought. So, I decided I’d debunk this progressive lie once and for all. The claim? That socialism is OK. Ezra Taft Benson was a rogue. AND that when he denounced it that he got in trouble for talking about it.

This lie rests on four claims that rely on ignorance, half-truths, or bald-faced lies to be believed. Once each claim is resolved, this lie falls apart exposing those who repeat it as either ignorant or nefarious.

1st. Ignorance of how the official Conference Reports are created.

The Claim: “The Church editing of Ezra Taft Benson’s conference addresses is proof he was rogue”
The Explanation: This is a classic example of a common tactic of Satan. Satan loves using something that is factually accurate but then manipulating it in such a way that it leads to a false conclusion. So let’s break it down. Were some of Ezra Taft Benson’s conference talks edited? Yes. They were. But you need to understand what that means, and to understand that, you need to understand the correlating council of the Church.

The Church has a correlating council whose membership includes the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. One of the jobs of this council is to approve the conference report. The Conference report is the official record of the General Conference. It is basically the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve’s way of giving their stamp of approval for each talk. If there is something they feel needs to be edited (misspeak, something that is not correct, or simply something they don’t think should be published), then they invite the speaker to edit the talk before the official release of the Conference Report.

Nowadays, most talks are written before General Conference, reviewed, and approved before Conference even starts. Because of this, most members are not aware that talks, historically, have been edited. I have personally listened to all the recordings of General Conference (1969-2021), over 3600+ talks, I can’t tell you how many times I have heard AMAZING stories or quotes only to find that the text associated with them is missing or heavily edited. This includes Ezra Taft Benson, but also Thomas S. Monson, Boyd K. Packer, and others. In the case of one talk, they removed it completely from the conference report due to its sensitive nature, but then printed it as a pamphlet to be given to bishops. I highlight this to point out that we do NOT know the reasons for edits; so don’t assume.

With the knowledge of understanding how the correlating council compiles the official conference report, and how the editing of talks was routine, you are prepared to debunk the first pillar of ignorance that this lie rests upon. When you hear this claim that Ezra Taft Benson’s talks were edited as proof he was rogue, you will know it is NOT true.

2nd. Ignorance of Church History.

The Claim: “Only Ezra Taft Benson talked about Socialism. Everyone else talked about Communism”
The Explanation: It is true that Benson talked a lot about Socialism. But it is false that he was the only apostle who did. In fact, understanding the above information about the correlating council means that the First Presidency and Quorum of the 12 approved of Ezra Taft Benson’s talks as recorded in the conference reports. Furthermore, there are multiple talks by others like Marion G. Romney, David O. McKay, and J. Reuben Clark Jr. absolutely undressing and attacking Socialism. There is even a First Presidency Statement (and we know how much progressives love those lately) denouncing Socialism!

A simple search on Conference Corpus shows the word “Socialism” being used over 100 times and as far back as 1850! With an additional 17 for “Socialist” (with 329 for “Communism” and another 138 for “Communist”) and this is just the OFFICAL Conference Reports, there are over 9 pages of results from a search of “Socialism” on the Church’s official website with 4 more pages if one searches “Socialist” For the abovementioned quotes including the First Presidency Statement see this amazing collection of quotes:

The Ultimate Collection of Latter-day Saint Prophets and Apostles Denouncing Socialism and Communism: Over 50 Quotes From More Than 10 Prophets and Apostles.

3rd. Those were Cold War Era statements and don’t apply anymore.

The Claim: “Because these quotes were given during the Cold War, they don’t apply anymore and can be ignored”
The Explanation: Yes, many of these statements were given during the Cold War, and some even mention current events and the USSR/Russia. But, it is important to realize that many quotes, though they were given during the Cold War, are not about the Cold War. In many of these talks, they go on to explain the doctrinal reasons why Socialism or Communism are bad. For example, this talk Marion G. Romney gave at BYU. It compares Socialism to the United Order and goes over the doctrines of how the two are incompatible, he details and I quote:

If, in the meantime [while we wait for the Lord to command us to live the United Order again], socialism takes over in America, it will have to be displaced, if need be, by the power of God, because the United Order can never function under socialism or “the welfare state,” for the good and sufficient reason that the principles upon which socialism and the United Order are conceived and operated are inimical.

President Marion G. Romney, Conference Report, April 1966

This talk thoroughly denounced and undressed socialism and exposed it as being against the gospel. The Prophet loved it so much he asked him to give it again in General Conference, which he did a few weeks later. For the full talk see the below video:

4th. They have not been repeated recently, and therefore don’t apply anymore.

The Claim: “That was 40 years ago, no one has said it recently”
The Explanation: This claim has been used to attack not just the statements of Ezra Taft Benson and other dead prophets, but almost anything not talked about in the last year or two. It stems from a false thesis: because something is old it is no longer applicable.

Let’s just talk about the thesis of their argument for a second. This thesis, that would throw away 40-year-old quotes from an apostle, by necessity would also justify throwing away any passage from any prophet ancient or modern that has not been repeated lately. Could you imagine this thesis being used and applied to the Book of Mormon? Doctrine and Covenants? Or the Bible? It could be used to discard everything! “Oh 2nd Nephi might be great, but that was not repeated by 4th Nephi, or in the D&C, it is not valid anymore.”

The entire argument sounds illogical. Not only that, Elder Bednar denounced this thesis just last year in General Conference when he said, “Some Church members opine that emergency plans and supplies, food storage, and 72-hour kits must not be important anymore because the Brethren have not spoken recently and extensively about these and related topics in general conference. But repeated admonitions to prepare have been proclaimed by leaders of the Church for decades. The consistency of prophetic counsel over time creates a powerful concert of clarity and a warning volume far louder than solo performances can ever produce.”

It does not matter if the statement was given in 2002, 1982, 1942, or even 600 BC. We adhere to the most recent revelations on the topic as the authority still.

Therefore What?

Now that you know these four things, you are able to rebut the lie about Ezra Taft Benson. Not only that, you are prepared to handle other attacks and anti regarding statements from Church leaders and have confidence in the quotes you share. For more on this topic of authoritative quotes see:

How Can I Tell if a Quote From a General Authority is Authoritative?