Rutherford's smear campaign (a must read)

by Leolaia 198 Replies latest watchtower scandals

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  ziddina

  Can't remember - did I mark this thread?

  Marking... Just in case.
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  jgnat

  The Aelby's reply sound just like relative's missives today, as they try to justify cutting off their loved-ones. The WT history of abuse runs deep and old.
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  Leolaia

  Thanks, Knowsnothing.

  jgnat....I really loved this part: "We are living in perilous times and the wicked spirits are ever ready to take possession of our minds in any unguarded moment." Watch out for those deemunz, they can make you mentally diseased.
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  King Solomon

  Leo said:

  What Moyle was referring to in that quote was his zealous representation of the Society prior to July 1939 when he was on very good terms with Rutherford, et al., which met with Rutherford's approval.

  Ah, yes, I see it now: the disbarring reference was re: Moyle's questionable tactics that were used in prior Society court cases (and Moyle's lack of a new paragraph for an different subject threw me on first reading).

  The matters that Moyle felt were discriminatory were not private. The peer pressure concerning the drinking of alcohol was not a corporate matter. I know there weren't whistleblower laws like there are now, but when the matter came to trial in 1943, I don't think the Society's counsel made that kind of legal argument against Moyle. I'd have to check to be sure.

  I still think the attorney-client confidentiality angle is interesting to consider whether Moyle was neglecting his fiduciary duty by unauthorized disclosure (where both Rutherford and Moyle knew full-well about an attorney's responsibility NOT to disclose confidential client matters). It is largely a moot point, being that Moyle won the case; a favorable ruling basically shoots down any subsequent legal complaint.

  Leo said:

  The letter was personally addressed to Rutherford, but it was no longer private after the letter was read publically to the entire Bethel family at lunch the day the Moyles were kicked out. Did it discuss any confidential matters? I don't think the lambastings were confidential or private; they were done in front of the whole Bethel family.

  Hmmm, I dunno: here's my thinking on it.

  Moyle served as legal counsel for the WTBTS; Rutherford was CEO of the Society, and hence the 'client' (with Board of Directors as puppet).

  Resolution adopted by the Board of Directors, 8 Aug. 1939:
  "For four years the writer of that letter has been entrusted with the confidential matters of the Society....
  The members of the Board of Directors hereby resent the unjust criticism appearing in that letter, disapprove of the writer and his actions and recommends that the President of the Society immediately terminate the relationship of O. R. Moyle to the Society as legal counsel and as a member of the Bethel Family".
  
  As the client, Rutherford has every right to read Moyle's letter containing "confidential Society matters" to the Bethel family, no doubt trusting that what is said at Bethel would stay at Bethel, since the unwritten rule is that 'dirty laundry' is not aired in public (that thinking is obviously still in effect, eg child abuse cases, where the desire is to sweep it under the rug to avoid embarrassing the Society, where "discretion" is needed).

  I'd think that from a legal standpoint, ANY non-public meeting held at Bethel was considered private, as the business of the corporation. The announcement and letter wasn't made to the general public until later (the announcement came in the WT, and the letter wasn't published, IIRC).

  Of course, we'd have to get an opinion from a lawyer who knows something about the history of professional legal ethics that existed in the 1940's, and this gets messy when mixing religion with professional obligations of attorneys to their clients, where most attorneys don't LIVE in their client's corporate housing, LOL!

  ---

  From the purely theocratic (non-legal) viewpoint, the matter seems more cut-and-dry.

  As you said:
  
  Rutherford considered the Society, and himself by extension, as the "faithful and wise servant" in the parable in Matthew and Luke. This figure, in charge of pastoral duties like feeding the members of the household, was contrasted in the parable with the "evil servant".
  And is it going too far to say that Rutherford likely considered the entire Bethel family (including Moyle) as part of the Society (and hence the FWS), the ones responsible for the "feeding" of the other slaves? If so, that unwritten rule I mentioned above COULD be instituted into policy with a single re-translation of the Parable of FWS, and there would be theocratic grounds to demand the slave to be "discreet" (vs simply "wise"), i.e. keeping Bethel matters confidential. (Think of the flexibility given by use of new controls implemented since, eg "brazen conduct").
  
  With that hypothesis in mind, realize that Moyle almost immediately leaked confidential Bethel matters (which he'd only become aware of via his presence at Bethel, serving his client) by showing his letter containing that confidential information to many others who were NOT at Bethel (Philbeck, etc), but R&F JWs in the field.

  As you said:
  
  Moyle was really torn on what to do with the letter. On the one hand, he wanted to defend his good name and let everyone see what it was that he in fact wrote. But he also felt that might inflame things further, so he decided to hold back and have only several people read it.
  In his testimony in the civil trial, he said that "there were many requests to see that letter after the September 1st Tower came out. I quite generally turned down the requests. I did show the letter to a few personal friends". First zone servant Harvey Fink asked to read the letter in August. Fink stated in his trial testimony: "The first I saw of the letter was when Mr. Moyle returned. I did not know of any other person outside of my wife who had read the letter, and she read it at the same time I did. Mr. Moyle did not read that letter to my knowledge to anyone else".
  In your #35 post, Moyle said this self-incriminating statement:
  
  Olin R. Moyle to Mrs. Frances Hunter, 19 October 1939:
  
  I understand the story has been circulated in the east that I have been busy circulating a false letter against the judge. That is not true. I have shown copies of my letter to him to a few friends -- less than a dozen -- and that is all.I don't think I would be doing anything wrong if I did circulate the letter, because I didn't tell him any lies in it, but it wouldn't be good policy and would be conducive towards division and dissension.

  That's a mea culpa, saying he showed it to "a few" and later upping the estimate to "less than a dozen"? Loose lips!

  BTW, as you know, any number greater than "no one" is apostasy per Rutherford. As we know now, Moyle's sister leaked copies of the letter to those in the congregation, resulting in a mass defection. Interesting that Moyle later engages in some denial, thru the use of lawyerly weasel words:

  Post #53:

  Olin R. Moyle to R. H. Barber, 5 January 1940: "I have followed your good advice in large measure. I have not discussed the matter except with a few personal friends, and, reports to the contrary notwithstanding, I have not been circulating or publishing the letter to JFR.

  So while Moyle may not have "circulated or published" the letter, he played no small role in getting the letter into the hands of those who DID get it out there, whether intentionally or not.

  I suspect Rutherford took it as not just an betrayal of the Bethel family (an attempt to "cause disturbance among the bretheren" as Rutherford said to Fink), but also as abandonment of Moyle's fiduciary responsibility as an attorney (a retaliatory strategy shot down after losing the trial, of course).

  So isn't that all the more compelling reason to get revenge with Moyle by using the eyebrow-raising word, "discreet" in the "Parable of the Faithful and Wise Servant"?

  The timing seems close enough for the Moyle incident to be fresh on the GB's collective memory (note that Knorr signed the board of directors letter denouncing Moyle, so he was a first-hand witness to the need for discretion at Bethel to maintain secrets).

  From Wikipedia:

  In October 1946, the president of the Watch Tower Society,Nathan H. Knorr, proposed a fresh translation of the New Testament, which Jehovah's Witnesses usually refer to as the Christian Greek Scriptures. [10] Work began on December 2, 1947 when the "New World Bible Translation Committee" was formed, composed of Jehovah's Witnesses who claimed to be anointed.

  So a question that is probably ultimately unanswerable (if only circumstantial evidence):

  If not for "Moyle Gate" (which had other profound effects on WT policy), WHY did the NWT committee use the word "discreet" vs ALL the other translations, before and since, that have used "wise"? That word just strikes me as an odd choice for translators to pick out of thin air without a compelling reason....
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  Leolaia

  Of course, we'd have to get an opinion from a lawyer who knows something about the history of professional legal ethics at that time, and this all gets messy when mixing religion with professional obligations of attorneys to their clients, where most attorneys don't LIVE in their client's corporate housing, LOL!

  I don't know law, so I don't know if Moyle's workplace and living conditions would have been matters of confidentiality (in terms of legal fiduciary duty) outside of his practice of law....or if Moyle still owed fiduciary duty after his termination on August 8th....or if such a breach is defensible when it is self-defense against libel.

  I don't see Covington making a claim of a fiduciary breach, at least as far as I can see so far; he charges Moyle with libel and claims that Society's articles were in response to that. FWIW he made the argument that JWs are all "official publishers" of the corporation, and the publication of "Information" in the Watchtower was "a privileged communication ... made by the defendants in the discharge of a private, legal and moral duty to inform all of Jehovah's witnesses of any believed or supposed disloyalty" (p. 1676). If I am reading that right, it seems to claim that the Society's publication of those articles in the Watchtower was an internal and private matter within the corporation as a whole. What does this mean for Moyle? He didn't make a breach to parties outside the corporation; he related information about Bethel as a publisher (no longer representing the Society as counsel) to other publishers, and the information concerned matters known to other publishers at Bethel. I see no legal argument that disclosure of matters concerning Bethelite publishers to publishers outside Bethel represented a breach of some sort. But I don't know really....it's an interesting question.

  Moyle was definitely sloppy about the letter. He would have had a better legal case if he had only waited at least until Mr. Howlett's visit (which first broadcasted "Information") or at least until early October when the article was published. He would not have needed to have proven the truth of his letter if he had waited. It is clear in his early letters that he feared a smear campaign was in the works, and C. J. Woodworth confirmed it to him in a letter to Moyle (though Woodworth's refutation of Moyle never appeared in Consolation afaik), and then in September Moyle was torn between keeping the letters private and releasing them to tell his side of the story. It looks like he waffled between these.

  Apparently the question of burden of proof came down to determining who published the letter first. Covington argued that Moyle did so in late August to the Aeblys (who had requested to see it), and then to others soon thereafter. Moyle's attorney argued that Rutherford was the first to publish it by reading it in front of the entire Bethel family on August 8th.
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  Leolaia

  Moyle's reply to the Aeblys' letter:

  #57:
  Olin R. Moyle to Fred and Jessie Aebly, 1 Feb. 1940: "You have entirely missed the point of my request for an explanation. If you with sublime ignorance of the situation at Bethel and the facts in the case want to decide that I have committed an offense in giving reasons to Judge Rutherford for leaving Bethel, that is your privilege and I have no argument with you over it. No human creature has yet been placed on such a high and exalted plane that one cannot call attention to such of wrongful acts, but if you want to think otherwise you of course have the right to do so. The point of my argument is this: You with others sign a statement falsely accusing me of sending letters throughout your area. If there was any circulation in your area you are the one that did it for I did not send any copies down there other than the one I loaned to you on request. Now you attempt to justify yourself by stating I circulated it elsewhere without request. The stories of widespread circulation of this letter are exceedingly mysterious and I would like very much to know the names of those to whom I have sent it without request.
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  Leolaia

  The January 15, 1940 Watchtower published another anti-Moyle resolution:

  

  This illustrates the no-win situation that Moyle was in. It was "malicious" to make a protest about Bethel conditions. It dishonors Jehovah's name to make them. He was doing the work of the Devil in breaking the morale of the congregation. Defending yourself against personal attacks by telling your side of the story is "justifying yourself".
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  RayPublisher

  Riveting thread Ms Leolaia.

  ...More! We need MORE!
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  VM44

  Thanks Leo for this series on Rutherford's smear campaign against Moyle.

  I think it needs to be clarified what Moyle might have meant by his statement that he "did not circulate" the letter.

  As you pointed out, he did show the letter to some people. He also refused some requests for the letter that he received.

  When the letter was read at Bethel, it became public and ceased to be private.

  It was Rutherford who decided, not Moyle that the contents of the letter be made known!.

  The congregation reporting that Moyle was distributing the letter and giving talks about it appears to have been "circulating" gossip as fact.

  The Watchtower was also kept stirring up things by publishing "loyalty" testimonies from individuals condemning the man.

  Rutherford attitude towards Moyle was this, "You libel me privately, I'll libel you publicly!"
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  frankiespeakin

  Solomon,

  I think the only way Moyle could be convicted of violation of client/attorney confidentiality is if he revealed something about a case he was working on as an attorney for Rutherford.

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attorney%E2%80%93client_privilege

  Attorney–client privilege is a legal concept that protects certain communications between a client and his or herattorney and keeps those communications confidential.

  There are a number of exceptions to the privilege in most jurisdictions, chief among them:

  1. the communication was made in the presence of individuals who were neither attorney nor client, or disclosed to such individuals,
  2. the communication was made for the purpose of committing a crime or tort,
  3. the client has waived the privilege, for example by publicly disclosing the communication.