Evil Empire speech

• 1. Origins And Drafting

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  Anthony R. Dolan, Ronald Reagan's chief speechwriter in 1983, coined the phrase evil empire for the president to use. Dolan had included similar language in a draft for Reagan's June 1982 speech before the British House of Commons in London. Reviewers flagged and struck that phrasing from the earlier draft. On the 19th of June 1981, during a meeting with Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew, Lee referred to the Soviet Union as an empire which extended across Eurasia. According to Lee's memoirs, Reagan's ears pricked up at the word empire. He told Richard Allen to use that word more frequently when describing the Soviet domain. Dolan included the phrase evil empire in drafts for Reagan's speech at the National Association of Evangelicals' 41st annual convention. White House staffers who saw drafts of the speech, including David Gergen, repeatedly struck the evil empire portion. The speech eventually reached Reagan with the evil empire portion included, despite staffer critics concluding the event would be minor and unlikely to attract attention.

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• 2. The Orlando Address

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  Reagan spoke at the 41st annual convention of the National Association of Evangelicals on the 8th of March 1983, in the Citrus Crown Ballroom of the Sheraton Twin Towers Hotel in Orlando, Florida. This marked his first recorded use of the phrase evil empire to refer to the Soviet Union. Yes, let us pray for the salvation of all of those who live in that totalitarian darkness, he said. He urged the audience to beware the temptation of pride while discussing nuclear freeze proposals. He declared that they are the focus of evil in the modern world. The audience applauded Reagan's speech after these remarks. A band played him off with the song Onward, Christian Soldiers. Reagan left the evil empire phrase and did not substantially alter the draft's strongly anti-communist tone when he reviewed it himself.

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• 3. Contemporary Press Reaction

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  Contemporaneous press criticized the speech as inflammatory during its initial release. Critics worried the speech portended negatively for arms negotiations with the Soviet Union. The Christian Science Monitor argued that Reagan's rhetoric would encourage an arms race. They stated it would some day, in logic, point toward war. During a 1984 presidential debate, Reagan reiterated his assessment of the Soviet Union. He said he believed many things they had done were evil in any concept of morality. In Moscow, the Soviet state-run press agency TASS said the words demonstrated the administration could think only in terms of confrontation. They labeled it bellicose, lunatic anti-communism. The Soviet Union alleged the United States was an imperialist superpower seeking to dominate the entire world.

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• 4. Diplomatic Legacy

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  During his second term in office, in May, June 1988, more than five years after using the term evil empire, Reagan visited Mikhail Gorbachev. Gorbachev was at the time General Secretary of the Soviet Union and a reformist leader. When asked by a reporter whether he still thought the Soviet Union was an evil empire, Reagan responded that he no longer did. He explained that when he used the term it was another time, another era. In a speech, Gorbachev said of Reagan's statement that the Soviet Union took note of that. Journalist Lou Cannon concluded that Gorbachev listened carefully to the message of peace that Reagan had brought with him to Moscow. This meeting occurred while the Cold War was nearing its end.

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• 5. Rhetorical Analysis

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  G. Thomas Goodnight characterized the evil empire speech as part of the rhetorical side of the Cold War. He argued it reshaped public perceptions of nuclear warfare. In the speech, Reagan depicted nuclear warfare as an extension of an age old struggle between good and evil. By characterizing the Soviet Union as an evil empire, the speech justified demurrals on peace proposals. Historian John Lewis Gaddis called the speech the completion of a rhetorical offensive designed to expose what Reagan saw as the central error of détente. He argued it could not have been better calculated to feed the anxieties afflicting Soviet leadership at the time. According to literature professor Leerom Medovoi, the speech directed the Evangelical audience's attention to domestic policy. It characterized American liberals as additional enemies in a culture war Reagan called a test of moral will and faith.

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