PRESIDENT REAGAN SAYS THE SOVIET UNION IS AN "EVIL EMPIRE"
Orlando, Florida (JFK+50) On March 8, 1983, President Ronald Wilson Reagan, speaking to the members of the National Association of Evangelicals*, referred to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics as an "evil empire."
The President spoke in the Citrus Crown Ballroom of the Sheraton Twin Towers Hotel here in Orlando.
Although the 40th POTUS had previously condemned totalitarianism and predicted the inevitable collapse of communism, it was the first time he used the term "evil empire."
The President said the Soviets are...
"the focus of evil in the modern world..." and exhibit
"aggressive impulses of an evil empire."
Paul Kengor points out, however, that Mr. Reagan did not pretend his own country had been guiltless of evil in its own history. The President pointed out the denial of equal rights to minorities, racism, anti-Semitism and other forms of ethnic and racial hatred.
By June 1988, President Reagan's harsh view of the U.S.S.R. had mellowed when he visited Mikhail Gorbachev** in Moscow.
*NAE, headquartered in Washington, D.C., is an association of evangelical denominations, organizations, schools & churches. NAE represents 40 Christian denominations & 45,000 churches.
**Mikhail S. Gorbachev (1931-2022) served as Secretary General of the USSR 1985-1991 & head of state 1988-1991. MSG moved from Marxism-Leninism to social democracy by the early 1990s. He won the Nobel Peace Prize & was instrumental in ending the Cold War.
SOURCE
"Truth Sets You Free: Reagan's 'Evil Empire' Speech," by Paul Kengor, March 7, 2023, Providence, www.providencemagazine.com/
