The freedom movement lost two courageous leaders this past month, Henry Lamb and Tommy Cryer. Our movement is poorer for their passing, but our nation’s richer from their lives.
Henry Lamb is the man who first discovered Agenda 21 and sounded the alarm. He attended the international meetings and challenged participants to question the programs being proposed. He was alarmed and wanted the world to know what was coming. As he somehow managed to raise the money for his plane tickets to the UN meetings, he prepared for the trip by buying stocks of crackers and other cheap foodstuffs to take with him. That’s how he existed while most UN attendees managed to stay in the finest hotels and rent every available limo in town. Somehow, Henry managed to organize an unofficial nationwide network of radio programs and was able to broadcast directly from the UN meetings, telling the nation what the UN was up to. UN officials responded by moving him out and away from the meeting area. It didn’t stop him. He kept going back and getting the word out to activist across the nation.
People ask me how I started fighting Agenda 21. How did I learn so much? Henry Lamb is the answer. He was my mentor, my teacher, my friend. No one was more courageous or more driven to stand up for our unique Republic than Henry Lamb. Together we created Freedom 21, to organize official opposition to Agenda 21. We organized ten national conferences and produced DVDs featuring the speakers. They stand today as valuable teaching tools. Henry was a tireless advocate, traveling the nation to speak. Usually he drove in his well-worn van so he could sleep in it rather than pay for a hotel room.
In the past couple of years Henry had grown sick. He was unable to go on the radio because long conversations were interrupted by bouts of coughing. He couldn’t breath and wore an oxygen tank. But still, through the pain, he found a way to carry on. He wrote a book on global governance. He then produced a series of videos on Agenda 21. Each stands as invaluable tools for anyone wanting to know where this evil agenda came from and why it must be stopped.
During the past year, Henry was in and out of the hospital. Each visit seemed longer and more fearful than the last. But, as soon as he was able to return home, he immediately produced another newsletter or video; improved the Freedom 21 web site; answered emails from new activists eager to learn. He never hesitated to respond to any question. I sought his input for my presentation in my debate against the UN before England’s Cambridge University in 2006. Later, I gave him a copy of my main Agenda 21 speech I’ve now given across the nation. With his approval, I knew I need never doubt the accuracy of my message. He told me more than once how envious he was of me and others who were able to speak across the nation as our opposition to Agenda 21 miraculously grew. He wanted to be there, but his illness just wouldn’t let him.
Finally, on May 24th, Henry passed away. But before he went, thankfully, he was able to see great progress in the work he had started so long ago.
Tommy Cryer passed away on June 4th. I didn’t know him as well as I did Henry Lamb, but was privileged to have worked with him. Tommy was a lawyer and used his legal skills as a weapon for freedom. He took on the massive Goliath called the IRS. As he challenged them on the grounds that the tax law does not authorize collection of personal income, only profits, the IRS struck back, accusing him of being a tax cheat. They went after his law practice, tracking down his clients, warning them to steer clear of Tom Cryer, thus destroying his law practice and breaking him financially. So weakened, the IRS then decided it was time to finish him off by charging him with tax fraud. But rather than just trying to defend himself as most did, Tommy turned the tables on them by filing a motion for dismissal of the IRS charges. He claimed, among other things, that the law does not make him liable for income taxes, and that the Constitution does not authorize the Federal government to tax fees he personally earned. Rather than submitting to the usual one-sided tax court in which most Americans find themselves trapped, Tommy got a jury trial in open court, and he made his case. He was found NOT Guilty by all twelve jurors. The first to ever win on such grounds.
Tommy traveled the nation, teaching others how to stand up for their rights. He founded an organization called “Truth Attack,” and took to the airwaves, helping to set up the Liberty Works Radio Network, and hosted his own one hour show each week.
As he knew he was entering his final days, he worked to organize a new effort that he hoped would help fund our movement and build new leadership. He wrote to me in his final week asking for my assistance in getting it organized. The end came too quickly to get the job done. But, like Henry Lamb, Tommy Cryer worked to his very last day in a desperate attempt to assure freedom will survive in America.
Henry and Tommy never gave up. They believed that freedom must be our destiny. Without such souls there would be no freedom. It is they who drag the rest of us toward the light of Freedom’s torch. They’ve done their part. Now they have found their way to the place where all heroes go — the place where they can join with the others who have fought before them — the camp of Freedom’s Heroes.
Tom DeWeese is one of the nation’s leading advocates of individual liberty, free enterprise, private property rights, personal privacy, back-to-basics education and American sovereignty and independence. Go to americanpolicy.org for more information”
