Published anonymously by The Bookmailer, it was likely written by far-right activist Revilo P. Oliver, a founding member of the John Birch Society and classics professor.
The protagonist, John Franklin, is a member of the Rangers, the resistance to the regime; their struggle to restore America is recounted in the letters between him and his elderly uncle.
The book's preface is dated 17 July 1989, with the historian contextualizing the letters, though he vows to "step aside" and let the reader take their own interpretation from them.
They give increased power to the United Nations, who eventually have their foreign fighters, mostly Chinese, occupy the country, suspending the right of the people to defend themselves due to America's "historic psychological genocide" against the black population.
In 1973 they begin a guerrilla war against the government, utilizing small cells to increase their secrecy and engaging in large-scale acts of sabotage, including at least fourteen murders recounted by Franklin.
Slowly, the Rangers win over the American populace, who help the war effort by sabotaging the system, which buckles the government's distribution and manufacturing capabilities.
In 1976, the Rangers finally take control of Washington, D.C., inspiring similar revolts worldwide in countries with left-wing governments, including in Russia, China, England, Ireland, and France.
At the end of the book, it is discovered that Mr. Harrison, a black Ranger and minor government officeholder, is constitutionally obligated to become president.
[3][4] The actual author is probably far-right activist Revilo P. Oliver,[2][5] a founding member of the JBS and classics professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; according to Jeffrey Kaplan his work was known for "dry intellectual prose".
Most members viewed race as a distraction from what they thought was the true issue, fighting a worldwide communist conspiracy, but there was a separate contingent motivated more by racism.
As a result, The John Franklin Letters acquired a reputation of being an insurgency how-to manual and inspired direct action to a degree unlike prior books like it.
[13] In his authorized biography The Fame of a Dead Man's Deeds,[3] The John Franklin Letters was cited by William Luther Pierce as the most direct inspiration for his novel The Turner Diaries,[11] a book which has been linked to numerous acts of terrorism and murder.
[15][8] Kaplan said that despite the preference for constitutionalism over race in the book, Oliver's racism was clear, but that it was "couched in the dogma of much of the radical right which saw Black people as indolent and somewhat malevolent, but essentially innocent pawns of the Jews.
[7] Kaplan noted the book's "dogged faith in America and its Constitution" as contrasting with the views of later racist works of its ilk, as did its lack of "future millennial paradise".
Berger of the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism noted the book as "unabashedly right-wing in orientation" and "foremost a work of anti-Communist propaganda".
[18][4] He compared it to the book The Iron Heel in its explanation of its ideology, though in contrast to that work called it "admirably succinct" in doing so.
McAlear argued that it provided "the foundation" for The Turner Diaries, and said its usage of "a new political timeline" stemming from initially real historical events was taken up by Pierce in that book.