In the 1910s and 1920s, the Watch Tower Society, then associated with the Bible Student movement, was outspoken in its statements against other religious groups and of the Catholic Church in particular.^[4] The Bible Students believed religion to be a “racket and a snare” and refused to be identified as a specific denomination for some time. It was not uncommon for members to carry placards outside churches and in the streets, proclaiming the imminent destruction of church members along with church and government institutions if they did not flee from “false religion”. The Watch Tower Society’s 1917 book, The Finished Mystery, stated, “Also, in the year 1918, when God destroys the churches wholesale and the church members by millions, it shall be that any that escape shall come to the works of Pastor Russell to learn the meaning of the downfall of ‘Christianity’.”^[5]

Citing The Finished Mystery, the United States federal government indicted the Watch Tower Society’s board of directors for violating the Espionage Act on May 7, 1918 for condemning the war effort. They were found guilty and sentenced to 20 years imprisonment; however, in March 1919, the judgment against them was reversed, and they were released from prison. The charges were later dropped.^[6] Patriotic fervor during World War I fueled persecution of the Bible Students both in America and in Europe.^[7]

In 1917, following the death of Charles Taze Russell—the founder of the Bible Student movement—Joseph Franklin Rutherford became president of the Watch Tower Society, and a leadership dispute within the society ensued; those who remained associated with the society became known as Jehovah’s witnesses in 1931.