Evangelist Franklin Graham has brought renewed attention to one of the most widely circulated radio essays in American broadcasting history: Paul Harvey’s “If I Were the Devil.”
In a post on X, Graham encouraged people to listen to the segment, and the post prompted many to describe Harvey’s words as prophetic and eerily relevant to today’s cultural debates.
Listen to Harvey’s broadcast in Graham’s post below.
Harvey first broadcast the commentary on April 3, 1965, and later updated it. Speaking as the devil, he sets his sights on the United States as the prize he wants most, and lays out a plan that relies on persuasion rather than force.
The plan starts with faith. The devil whispers to Americans the same message he gave Eve, that they should do as they please. He tells the young that the Bible is a myth and that people invented God, convinces them that bad is good and good is old-fashioned, and teaches the old to put their trust in Washington.
From there, the plan turns to culture. Harvey’s devil pushes entertainment toward ever more lurid content, spreads narcotics, alcohol, and pills, and sets families, churches, and nations against themselves while profit-hungry media fan the flames. Schools sharpen students’ minds but neglect their emotional discipline, until campuses need drug dogs and metal detectors. Courts and lawmakers push God out of public life, churches trade faith for psychology, and holidays lose their meaning.
Harvey’s devil also targets work and family: redistributing wealth until ambition dies, promoting state-run gambling, warning against excess devotion to hard work, patriotism, and morality, and convincing the young that marriage is outdated.
The essay closes with its well-known twist, as Harvey concludes that if he were the devil, “I’d just keep right on doing what he’s doing.”
Harvey, the longtime ABC radio host known for his distinctive delivery and his signature sign-off, “Good day,” died in 2009. Decades later, the broadcast continues to circulate, and its renewed reach through Graham’s post highlights enduring concerns about national values and division in American life.
Readers can read the full transcript at American Rhetoric.