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Shofar FTP Archive File: people/e//ellison.james/elohim-city


Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy,alt.politics.white-power
Subject: Paranoia as Patriotism: Elohim City
Summary: 

Archive/File: pub/orgs/american/adl/paranoia-as-patriotism/elohim-city
Last-Modified: 1995/08/29

                       Elohim City

Founded in the mid-1980s by Robert G. Millar, a U.S. resident
alien from Canada with ties to The Covenant, the Sword and the
Arm of the Lord (CSA), Identity encampment Elohim City is
located on the rugged and mountainous Oklahoma-Arkansas
border. _The Toronto Star_ described the encampment as a place
of white supremacy and anti-Semitism that is "among a growing
number of gun-toting, right-wing religious camps across the
U.S." The Canadian paper said that Elohim City has been
identified as a "neo-Nazi type" camp by U.S. Justice
Department officials and as a "hate group" by the Oklahoma
Human Rights Commission.

Elohim City "elder" Zera Horton Patterson III said in a May
13, 1985 _Arkansas Gazette_ article that "community members
did not think of themselves as 'white supremacists,' but as a
'chosen people' charged by God with the responsibility of
serving and leading others." Patterson continued "Jesus said,
'He who is the greatest among you, let him be their servant.'
Jesus was the servant of all men and in that sense He was the
Supreme One, the supremacist because He was the servant. So
that's the way we are supremacists in that sense."

Elohim City founder Robert Millar has been connected to
leaders of other Identity-type movements. He tried to raise
money for CSA leader Jim Ellison's bond following Ellison's
1985 arrest for illegal weapons possession. He also served as
a character witness on behalf of Richard Wayne Snell, a CSA
member who was serving a life sentence in Arkansas for the
1984 murder of an Arkansas state trooper. Snell was executed
by the State of Arkansas on April 19, 1995 - the same day as
the Oklahoma City bombing - for the earlier murder of a pawn
shop owner in 1983. According to _New York Daily News_
columnist Michael Daly (April 23, 1995), "The Rev. Robert
Millar arranged for Snell's body to be shipped to Elohim City
[for burial]."

The February 24, 1987 _Arkansas Gazette_ noted that a Federal
grand jury in Fr. Smith, Arkansas was investigating members of
the CSA, The Order, the Posse Comitatus and the KKK, and
reported that "Rev. Robert Millar of Elohim City, Oklahoma has
said that he was brought to Ft. Smith for questioning. He said
that he was asked about an alleged plot to kill Federal Judge
H. Franklin Waters of Fayetteville, former U.S. Attorney Asa
Hutchinson of Ft. Smith and FBI special agent Jack Knox of
Fayetteville, all of whom took part in the 1985 prosecution of
CSA leaders."

In August 1993, _The Balance_, a publication of CAUSE
Foundation - a legal defense group whose head, attorney Kirk
Lyons, has described himself as an "active sympathizer" of his
far-right clients' causes - made reference to Elohim City. It
said that on July 9, 1993, members of the Adair County
Sheriff's Office in Muldrow, Oklahoma visited Elohim City,
describing it as "an Identity religious community led by the
Rev. Robert G. Millar." It said that they "were there to warn
Pastor Millar of a possible BATF [Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco &
Firearms] raid on their church and homes."

Stating that the law officers were looking for a suspect
wanted for alleged possession of an unregistered machine gun
who was "known to be around Elohim City," the publication
declared: "We believe that this information distributed to the
law enforcement agencies is a prelude to a Branch
Davidian-type raid. There are many parallels between the
Branch Davidians and Elohim City. Both are known to be opposed
to the government, are a religious separatist community, and
have legal weapons to defend themselves." It added: "As a
preemptory [sic] measure, Rev. Millar has signed a power of
attorney to empower CAUSE Foundation to represent him and his
parishioners should a confrontation with government develop."

Unlike the CSA and some other militant Identity encampments,
Elohim City continues to exist. (Anti-Defamation League,
17-18)

                       Work Cited

Anti-Defamation League. [Special Report] Paranoia as Patriotism:
Far-Right Influences on the Militia Movement. 1995.



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