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From the writings of the Rev. Billy Graham

Dear Rev. Graham: I am outraged at the attacks on our law enforcement communities across the nation. There must be recourse to turn this around. — L.E.

Dear L.E.: Some years ago, a young policeman was carried through the hospital doors on a stretcher. Forty minutes earlier, he had tried to arrest two drunken rowdies on Market Street in the heart of downtown San Francisco. A crowd had gathered and cheered. “The people stood around gawking and laughing at me,” the officer said. “When other hoodlums tried to take away my prisoners, numbers of the crowd held my arms. One took my gun, and they let the thugs beat me. Some even joined in the assault. Nobody tried to help me. What’s happened to the people these days?”
An injured officer was the victim of a social malady that is threatening the peace of this nation. There is a growing contempt for authority and for law. In Los Angeles, officers arrested two boys who were creating a disturbance in an amusement park. Quickly the police were surrounded by a cursing, jeering mob of several hundred people. Bricks were hurled, bats and jack handles were wielded, and the police cars were overturned.
A police commissioner in New York City once said, “The police cannot fight crime and the public at the same time.” There are many contributing causes to the rioting and crime wave in the nation. Though the majority of Americans want law, order, peace, and security, an increasingly vocal minority is revolutionary in its attitude.
Until the attitude of government, the family, the home, the church, and the courts bow humbly before God, our democratic form of government is in danger of being overthrown. It is time for America to repent of sin and uphold the foundation it was built upon.
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(This column is based on the words and writings of the late Rev. Billy Graham.)