FATHER and MOTHER DIVINE at
The Unity Mission Church, Philadelphia, PA.
PEACE
764-772 S. Broad Street Philadelphia 46, Pennsylvania
June 12, 1947 A.D.F.D.
Dr. Edward Warner
President, International Civil Airlines Organization (I.C.A.O.)
1529 McGregor Street
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Dear Dr. Warner:
It has been brought to my attention that you are the President of the I.C.A.O., an International Airlines Organization, and that there are and have been many different disasters in connection with the airline transportation, through which many lives have been blotted out, even to the most recent crashes here in the States.
At the La Guardia Field, Thursday night, May 29th, 1947, some forty-two persons were killed and on May the 30th, Decoration Day at Port Deposit, Maryland, a plane crashed, destroying and mutilating beyond identification, some fifty three persons; and many other such disasters have occurred in the aviation field of science. Investigations have been made and no doubt, the whole field of aviation technical is under investigation. Apparently, they cannot find the cause for these crashes and disasters in the field of science.
It is a definite fact that your concern, of which you are in control, is motivated by prejudice, division and strife. That, as I have long since declared, will cause the airplanes not to stay in the air. It is written:
'Where there is division, there is strife' ; and it is also written: 'Divided we fall.'
FATHER DIVINE signing Letters.
Therefore Dr. Warner, I appeal to you, as the representative of a great international enterprise, to take steps immediately to bring an end to all segregation and discrimination and prejudice and selfishness in your field of study, of science and invention; and immediately demand the enactment of the Bill of Rights of the Constitution of the United States of America, with equity and justice to be executed accurately in every activity in business, profession, labor and trade and in every field of activity, even domestically, socially; and even in your immediate lineage, institute equity and justice and impregnate the minds of all of the subjects of those with whom you are concerned, with equity and equality for everybody, so that by these means, in keeping with our great national statesman, Abraham Lincoln, the subjects of all of these enterprises and institutions might have a New Birth of Freedom, even the whole nation and our civilization, that such governing forces and the authorities of the authorities and the governments and controlling authorities of these enterprises and institutions with which we are concerned, might not perish from the earth.
For without a new birth of Freedom from all racism, sectarianism, Fascism, barbarism, Nazism, Hitlerism and all other divisions of segregation, JimCrowism, as It is called, as well as all of the selfish, discriminatory practices of men, being brought to an abolition, this government and those fundamentals upon which you lean, will perish from the earth, for such cannot continue to have access in the land, for the LORD reigneth and truly,
'Righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne. - Psalms 97:2
The many tornadoes, floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanoes and other storms, as the cosmic forces of nature, do work havoc and go forth rampant in the land where wickedness, vice and crime abound.
Therefore, as I have aforesaid, the airplanes will not stay in the air and a good many of them will continue to refuse to leave the ground, motivated by prejudice, division, selfishness and strife, for the Mouth of the LORD has declared it! Trains will not stay on the track and ships will not stay on the ocean filled and controlled with and by prejudice, division, racism, Nazism, Fascism and strife, with all of those detestable tendencies of men that try to destroy and put some up and some down, all because of the color of their skins and because of their racial or national origin.
Yet, there are many good thinking and just persons who are made subject to vanity unwittingly, and at times, forced into tolerating, condoning and endorsing segregation, discrimination and oppression, such as has caused the lives of millions to be destroyed.
Therefore, unto you and unto all officials and executives of these great enterprises and even to the national and international traffic commission and all representatives and to each of our great national governments and their representatives, I do appeal and request the honor of your office, your official and executive duty and authority, to put into action every ounce of your energy, your authority, minds and attention in eradicating these terrible vices and crimes against humanity that have caused the loss of the lives of millions.
When the nations of the earth were ignoring Mussolini's acts of aggression, I contacted him by communication, protesting his invasion of Ethiopia. He ignored MY request. Later, Virginio Gayda, his mouthpiece, publicly announced according to radio and press reports, that the United States could never be the leader for the other nations of the earth because of 'FATHER DIVINE and HIS fifty million followers.' Mussolini might have been alive today had he taken cognizance of MY Message to him, but no doubt he may have thought I was foolish. Yet it is written:
'The foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men.' - 1 Corinthians 1:25
Even back in 1932 and '33 I petitioned representatives of government to bring an end to the oppression, suppression and persecution of the Jews in Germany and in all other countries, but they did not take cognizance of it. To ward off the invasion of Czechoslovakia and the onslaught of inhuman warfare, I petitioned the various heads of government by cablegram:
Why not propose purchase of coveted Czechoslovakian territory, with Sudetens helping to pay for annexation, substituting cooperation and Peace for terrible inhuman warfare consequences?
There were many different proposals I made so that our civilization and these democracies in which we live might be saved the cost in lives, in money and in resources, of another inhuman war, but they did not take cognizance of them.
Toward the conclusion of MY proposals that were made for National and International Defense, I also proposed the unification of the Three Americas, which would have been much easier than the cost to humanity of the twenty-two million, sixty thousand estimated killed plus the injured and the one trillion, one hundred fifty-four billion dollars in armament, military materials, plus the property damage estimated at more than two hundred thirty billion, nine hundred million dollars.
When I proposed the unification of the Three Americas, many asked where we would get the money from to make all of the Americas One Democracy; but where did the United States get the three hundred seventeen billion, six hundred million dollars expended for war materials alone, by the United States? Such a unification might not only have saved this Nation and the Allied Nations such great expense, but it might have arrested the Axis Nations from continuing in the way of aggression and thus saved them from destroying millions of their own subjects and spending an estimated four hundred sixty-eight billion, nine hundred thirty-nine million dollars in war materials and the total destruction of property in some areas, many times greater even than the destruction in England, according to the authorities.
Yet, all of this could have been avoided had they taken cognizance of MY Message; but because of prejudice, bigotry, racism, Hitlerism, Fascism and all of the isms combined, such as I have aforementioned, that create division and strife and cause the loss of millions of lives, they failed to hearken unto MY Voice.
The cosmic forces of nature, the creative forces and even Nature itself, work destructively because of prejudice and bigotry. There is no escape for prejudice and division, for retribution is sure and retribution is assured for crime does not pay!
Just think of all of the Axis Governments, how the empires they had built went down in defeat by continuing their prejudice, division and strife, propagating and advocating racism, in short, races, creeds and colors. And not only the governments were defeated but even the representatives of those respective governments which have fallen, for the crimes they committed, many have been executed. They are held responsible for the atrocious crimes committed by their governments when they were in authority.
I hope the whole world will take cognizance of these thoughts I have conveyed, as well as all who are concerned, for unless they all, who are filled with prejudice, division and strife of any kind, repent and turn from their sins, they shall also in the like manner perish.
As with a state or community, so with a nation; and as with a nation or country, as mentioned, so with a state or community or an organization and all of its representatives.
Men seek to segregate themselves and place restrictions on deeds and papers and other supposedly legitimate contracts and agreements, for the purpose of prohibiting the free access of all citizens to buy property and to live wheresoever they choose, and by such prejudice, division and strife, by making such restrictions in such agreements and contracts and deeds and titles, the very ground itself is cursed, for it is written:
It shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command you this day; that all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee:
'Cursed shalt thou be in the city, and cursed shalt thou be in the field. - 'Cursed shall be thy basket and thy store. - 'Cursed shall be the fruit of thy body, and the fruit of thy land, - the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy sheep. - 'Cursed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and cursed shalt thou be when thou goest out. - Deuteronomy 28:1519
Then I say, you can see why floods and storms and hurricanes and tornadoes and fire, pestilence and disasters are destroying the lives of increasing numbers, for of those who refuse to hearken unto the voice of GOD, it is written:
'His children are far from safety, and they are crushed in the gate, neither is there any to deliver them.' - Job 5:4.
Where prejudice, division, bigotry and strife exist, disaster also exists or follows and the Texas City fire, the floods in the Middle West and the many airplane crashes, train wrecks and automobile wrecks attest this fact; for as with a nation, so with an individual, and as with a place locally, in any locality, so with a nation universally.
Then I say, I hope that all who are concerned, as well as all mankind, will take cognizance of this Message, for I have made this appeal not for any benefit that I may derive as a Person, but that millions of lives may yet be saved, even as I desired to save the twenty-two million, sixty thousand lives reported dead by this last great inhuman World War; for without a change of heart and mind and characteristics through a New Birth of Freedom under GOD, for which Abraham Lincoln prayed and which I have come to bring, mankind cannot hope to become to be even as this leaves ME, as I AM Well, Healthy, Joyful, Peaceful, Lively, Loving, Successful, Prosperous and Happy in Spirit, Body and Mind and in every organ, muscle, sinew, joint, limb, vein and bone and even in every ATOM, fibre and cell of MY Bodily Form.
Respectfully and Sincere, I AM
s/ REV. M. J. DIVINE
(Better known as FATHER DIVINE)
REV. MJD/r
P. S. This is an open letter, and a copy to be sent to the International Traffic Commission and other representatives in federal and state government, so that they may be able to ascertain the cause of these great disasters, such as the different airplane crashes as mentioned in the body of this letter.
REV. M.J.D.
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The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company has returned the September rent check of union organizer Jesse Kessler, who permitted a N - - - - family to use his Stuyvesant Town apartment.
The company, which won a suit seeking to force it to rent to N - - - - s, charged Mr. Kessler had violated his lease by 'permitting others to occupy your apartment.'
The N - - - - family, Mr. and Mrs. Hardine Hendrix and their son, 5, meanwhile have moved into another apartment in Stuyvesant Town because the Kessler family returned from vacation. They were provided with an apartment by Dr. Lee Lorch, former City College Instructor.
PEACE
764-772 S. Broad Street
Philadelphia 46,PA.
Mr. Leroy A. Lincoln, President
Metropolitan Life Insurance Company
1 Madison Avenue
New York, New York
Mr dear Mr. Lincoln:
MY attention has been called to an act of discrimination by the organization of which you are the President, the Metropolitan! Life Insurance Company, which has refused to rent apartments to Afro-American citizens in your Stuyvesant Town apartments in New York City.
I AM writing to you, as an organizational father, that those under you and affiliated with you might escape the disasters that follow in the wake of prejudice, discrimination, bigotry and segregation. When you segregate in the Northern Middle Atlantic States and in a State that has passed the FEPC Bill and the Civil Rights Bill, all evidences reflect as if though you desire to endorse segregation and discrimination, which bring on such disasters as have claimed the lives of millions in recent years.
The Law of GOD is Universal and when men segregate and try to prohibit some of their fellowmen from enjoying the same rights and privileges because of prejudice, bigotry, division and strife, they automatically bring upon themselves the wrath of GOD. Hence, I appeal to you, even as I appealed to Dr. Edward Warner, the President of the International Civil Airlines Organization (I.C.A.O.) to use every ounce of your energy, your authority and influence to eradicate all prejudice. division and segregation from every branch of your company; for I do not desire to see happen again, such disasters as the Winecoff Hotel fire in Atlanta, Georgia, on December 7th, 1946, when one hundred twenty-one were killed.
It may sound like foolishness, but had Adolf Hitler taken cognizance of MY Message to him before the start of the most inhuman World War II, it would have saved the forty-five million, two hundred thirty-three thousand, four hundred thirty-six lives that have been recorded killed and missing from the latest available records, as well as the expenditure of hundreds of billions of dollars in war materials, not to mention the total property destroyed.
It is not a supposition. it looks terrible in the European countries where thousands and thousands are starving there. The transgressions and iniquities of their political fathers, by being converted into Hitlerism, Fascism and their doctrines of prejudice. segregation, hatred and division, have been visited upon them. Yet, the same identical doctrine which Hitler propagated, is being propagated by the company of which you are the organizational father. However, the same GOD is alive today who visited the iniquities of Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo and their associates on them and on their political offsprings, organizational offsprings, and even their physical natural children, as it is written:
I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me, - 'And showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. - Deuteronomy 5:9,10.
You can see, read and hear every day, numerous accounts of the iniquities of the parents which are visited upon them and their children; for acts of prejudice. bigotry, segregation and intolerance have preceded such tragedies as the terrible fire in the Coconut Grove night club in Boston on November 28, 1942, in which four hundred ninety-one were killed and over two hundred injured.
That is just one of many of which you, no doubt, are aware. There was the fire in the Gulf Hotel in Houston, Texas, September 7th, 1943 in which scores were injured and forty-nine killed. Prior to many such tragedies, I had Personally warned those in charge to discontinue their acts of prejudice, segregation and discrimination.
it has been something like it was in 1917 when Mother Divine and I went down to Rockaway Beach and ordered bath houses. They said, 'You can't get a bath house here,' or words to that effect. That was at a public beach, but they thought the water was too good for ME to go into; however, I said, 'If WE cannot go in, nobody else will go in!' Shortly after that, tar came up in the water at Rockaway Beach as never before and spoiled the whole season.
A similar incident occurred in Miami in 1947, when some of MY followers who happened to be of a dark complexion, wanted to go in bathing in Miami, but the authorities would not allow them to go on the beach or into the water and threatened to have them put into jail, even though they did allow dogs to go in the water. They wrote ME about the incident and within a few days, tons of dead fish came up in the water and were washed ashore on the Florida beaches for miles and miles, and there was such a stench the people could not stand it and the beaches were deserted. Bathing was impossible. Millions of dollars were reported lost by resort owners, and the cost of digging ditches to bury the dead fish was tremendous. They called it the 'Red Tide' but whatsoever the scientific cause, the real mental and spiritual cause was prejudice, segregation and division.
The very same prejudice was displayed in New York State of a recent date, when Mother and I and some of MY Staff went as guests of one of the residents of Sayville, down to the beach to look at the Great South Bay. The citizens of Islip township, through their officers, did not want ME and MINE. to even look at the Great South Bay. They had signs up, which they said they intended to enforce,
'For the residents of the Township of Islip only.'
WE left and within a week, seaweed and stinging jellyfish came up in the Bay, making it impossible for the citizens themselves, to swim in the water. That is not in Florida, but in New York State, that presumably has passed the Civil Rights Bill in its State legislature. But I have warned them, as I AM warning you, to get rid of prejudice and discrimination.
After the Red Tide had deposited tons of dead fish on her beaches, Florida did not cease to discriminate and the hurricane that swept through the State from September 16th to the 19th of 1947, cost the State more than a hundred lives and millions of dollars in property damage, according to statistics.
The same prejudice brought about the Texas Oklahoma tornado in April of 1947 in which one hundred sixty-seven were killed and damage reported to property amounting to ten million dollars.
If the former managing editor of Look Magazine, Mr. Jack Guenther, who was burned to death in the airplane crash in Bryce Canyon, Utah, in October 1947, in a terrible tragedy which killed fifty-two people - if he could speak he himself could tell you of his own personal prejudice of which I have a definite record.
Your company may have paid out accident insurance to some of the families of the victims of the St. Anthony Hospital fire in which seventy-four persons were killed on April 4th of this year. No doubt, some of the passengers in the plane crash off Puerto Rico, which claimed fifty-three lives in June, or the victims of the crash of the C-46 in Seattle, in which nine were killed and thirty-three others injured, when the plane crashed into an apartment building trapping two persons in the smouldering ruins of the building - no doubt, some of them may have carried Metropolitan Life Insurance policies. At any rate I AM sure you know of the plane crash near Santa Susana Pass in California on July 12th in which thirty-eight were killed and the crash of the Dutch KLM Constellation which crashed near New Delhi, India, killing all forty passengers and crew, including thirteen top American newspaper, magazine and radio correspondents.
The same month on July 30th, sixteen persons were killed when a Navy plane crashed into an Eastern Air Lines passenger plane near Fort Dix, New Jersey and on August 8th, of this year, fifteen passengers were trapped and killed and thirteen others injured in a Greyhound bus crash in Bloomington, Indiana.
These are somewhat minor tragedies compared with the terrible earthquake in Ecuador on August 8th, in which four thousand, six hundred were killed and an estimate of more than twenty millions of dollars' worth of property lost. The typhoon which wiped out American installations on Okinawa and left an estimated twenty million dollars' worth of damage, did not destroy so many lives, but when it reached Shanghai, China, it left two hundred thousand homeless and killed twenty-nine, besides the two who were killed on the island of Okinawa.
Then there was the hurricane last month in Florida which destroyed from twenty to thirty million dollars' worth of citrus fruit alone, not to mention the loss in other property. Also, on August 14th in Australia, the Municipal Council of Kempsey barred all aborigines living in the area from using the town's public swimming pool, and on August 29th in a flash flood, the shopping center of Kempsey was laid waste, bridges destroyed, twenty-two homes were washed away with un estimated damage to public and private property.
Just this month, on September 10th, in Canada, a Canadian Pacific Airlines DC-3 crashed, killing all of its twenty-three passengers and crew. On Friday the 9th, in a raging thunder storm off Nantucket Sound, nine persons, who tried to save themselves by tying themselves together with a rope, when their yacht became swamped by the waves, all drowned and only two of the yacht's passengers were saved.
But the most recent tragedy which is upper mostly in the consideration of the American people is the ill-fated Noronic, which caught fire at a pier in Toronto early Saturday morning, from which, according to the latest report, two hundred five are either dead or missing and of the one hundred eighty-nine injured, sixteen are seriously hurt, all because of prejudice, division, segregation and hatred.
it may work out the same with the enterprises with which the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company is connected if you and other officials of the Company do not immediately bring an end to your policy of segregation; for even though you may have won a court decision, giving you the legal right to segregate, the Law of GOD is above the laws of men and if men fail to obey GOD, they may think that GOD is indeed public enemy number one!
I have written to you the simple facts of a few disasters. There are many more which I feel assured that you are well aware, and yet of these, every one could have been avoided by the simple enactment of the Laws of GOD, of real Americanism, Brotherhood, Christianity, Democracy and true Judaism, as they are synonymous; for though
I am visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; - 'Yet I am showing mercy unto thousands, yea millions, of them that love me, and keep my commandments. - Exodus 20:5,6
I know whereof I speak, and therefore, I address this appeal to you and your associates, that through a New Birth of Freedom under GOD, this Nation and its citizens might not perish from the earth because of prejudice, division and strife; for only by a New Birth of Freedom can this people be liberated from racism, segregation and hatred and have the privilege of becoming to be even as this leaves ME, as I AM Well, Healthy, Joyful, Peaceful, Lively, Loving, Successful, Prosperous and Happy in Spirit, Body and Mind and in every organ, muscle, sinew, joint, limb, vein and bone and even in every ATOM, fibre and cell of MY Bodily Form.
Respectfully and Sincere, I AM
s/ REV. M. J. DIVINE, Ms. D. D. D.
(Better known as FATHER DIVINE)
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