Louis Beam

{{short description|American white supremacist, conspiracy theorist and neo-fascist}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Louis Beam

| image = Louis Ray Beam Jr. (FBI).jpg

| alt =

| caption = FBI ten most wanted poster as fugitive #414

| birth_name = Louis Ray Beam, Jr.

| birth_date = {{birth date and age|df=y|1946|8|20}}{{cite web | title=Louis Ray Beam Jr.: Racist Leader Headed for Downfall? | website=Southern Poverty Law Center | date=2002-06-18 | url=https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2002/louis-ray-beam-jr-racist-leader-headed-downfall | access-date=2023-02-26}}

| birth_place = Lufkin, Texas

| death_date =

| death_place =

| party =

| nationality =

| other_names =

| occupation = Political activist, Author, Journalist

| movement = Christian Identity
Neo-fascism
Neo-Nazism
White supremacism
Antisemitism

| known_for = Political commentary
The first important proponent of leaderless resistance within the white supremacist movement

| notable_works = Inter-Klan Newsletter & Survival Alert, Essays of a Klansman, The Seditionist

}}

{{Neo-Fascism|People}}

Louis Ray Beam, Jr. (born August 20, 1946) is an American white supremacist, conspiracy theorist and neo-fascist.

After high school, he joined the United States Army and served as a helicopter door-gunner in Vietnam.{{cite book |title=Gods of the blood: the pagan revival and white separatism |last=Gardell |first=Mattias |year=2003 |publisher=Duke University Press |isbn=978-0-8223-3071-4 |page=350 }} He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.{{Cite web |title=Louis Beam |url=https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/individual/louis-beam |access-date=2022-08-08 |website=Southern Poverty Law Center |language=en}} Once he returned to the United States, he became a Klansman, leading a maritimeDees M. & Corcoran J. Gathering Storm: America's Militia Threat (1997) photo with caption Louisiana KKK element and Klan rally in Texas against government help to Vietnamese immigrant fishermen.{{cite book |title=The fiery cross: the Ku Klux Klan in America |last=Wade |first=Wyn Craig |year=1998 |publisher=Oxford University Press US |isbn=978-0-19-512357-9 |page=393 }}{{Cite book |last=Belew |first=Kathleen |title=Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America |publisher=Harvard University Press |year=2019 |edition=paperback |location=London and Cambridge, MA |pages=46}} He was also the leader of the Texas Emergency Reserve, a militia that was disbanded by the courts in 1982 as a result of a lawsuit filed under Texas anti-militia law by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).{{Cite book|title=On the fault line : race, class, and the American patriot movement|author=Gallaher, Carolyn|date=2003|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|isbn=0742519732|location=Lanham, Md.|oclc=50554807}}Belew, Bring the War Home, 37. The lawsuit was brought by SPLC after the militia harassed Vietnamese fishermen during the 1981 fishing season.

Beam was using Camp Puller near Houston in 1980 to train militia, including children as young as eight years old, in armed guerrilla tactics; the camp was shut down after publicity led to protests, and parents complaining that they were not aware of the children's activities at the camp.{{Cite news|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1980/12/06/111824164.html?pageNumber=8|title=PARAMILITARY CAMP IS CLOSED BY OWNER; Lethal Training for Klan Members Stirs a Strong Public Protest|work=The New York Times |access-date=2017-08-14|language=en}} The Boy Scouts Council of Houston rejected a charter request from the troop at Camp Puller.{{Cite news|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1980/11/26/111315057.html?pageNumber=25|title=Woman Asserts Scouts Planned to Hunt Aliens|work=The New York Times |access-date=2017-08-14|language=en}} Videotape shown during the shrimper hearing had Beam saying, "We're going to assume authority in this country."{{Cite news |last=AP |date=1981-05-13 |title=Around the Nation; Videotapes of Klan Leader Shown at Shrimper Hearing |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/13/us/around-the-nation-videotapes-of-klan-leader-shown-at-shrimper-hearing.html |access-date=2017-08-14 |issn=0362-4331}} He moved to Idaho afterwards and became active with Aryan Nations in the early 1980s.{{cite book |title=Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism, and the Politics of Identity |last=Goodrick-Clarke |first=Nicholas |year=2003 |publisher=NYU Press |isbn=978-0-8147-3155-0 |page=233 }}

He was arrested November 6, 1987, at home with his wife in Guadalajara, Mexico. During the arrest, Beam's wife opened fire and critically injured a Mexican police officer. He was wanted as a fugitive #414 of the FBI ten most wanted list on charges of seditious conspiracy to violently overthrow the U.S. government.{{Cite web |title=Mexican police have arrested a white supremacist leader named... - UPI Archives |url=https://www.upi.com/Archives/1987/11/09/Mexican-police-have-arrested-a-white-supremacist-leader-named/2995563432400/ |access-date=2024-11-15 |website=UPI |language=en}}

In 1988, he was later acquitted in a separate case of conspiring to overthrow the government. He is considered to be the first important proponent of the strategy of leaderless resistance within the white supremacist movement.{{cite book |title=The New Terrorism: Fanaticism and the Arms of Mass Destruction |last=Laqueur |first=Walter |year=2000 |publisher=Oxford University Press US |isbn=978-0-19-514064-4 |page=[https://archive.org/details/newterrorism00walt/page/110 110] |url=https://archive.org/details/newterrorism00walt/page/110 }}{{Cite web|url=http://www.historycommons.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=us_domestic_terrorism_tmln&haitian_elite_2021_organizations=us_domestic_terrorism_tmln_ku_klux_klan|title=US Domestic Terrorism: Ku Klux Klan|website=www.historycommons.org|access-date=2018-02-19|archive-date=2016-06-30|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160630101119/http://www.historycommons.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=us_domestic_terrorism_tmln&haitian_elite_2021_organizations=us_domestic_terrorism_tmln_ku_klux_klan|url-status=dead}}Belew, Bring the War Home, 109.