EatTheRich
President
What does American fascism really look like? Brief political and personal biographies to follow.
1. Joseph R. McCarthy. By exaggerating his exploits as a Marine in the war against Japan and making up lies about war profiteering, he won a primary victory against liberal Republican Bob LaFollette in 1946 and was duly elected to the U.S. Senate as a Wisconsin Republican. The influential Communist Party-controlled United Electrical workers Union supported McCarthy in order to punish LaFollette for his anti-communism, prompting McCarthy to remark, “Well, a Communist has the same right to vote as anyone else, hasn’t he?” In his early months in the Senate, McCarthy sketched out an unremarkable role as a moderate pro-business Republican, becoming known mostly for his work on behalf of Pepsi-Cola, which in return made a personal loan to him. He also controversially pushed to stop prosecution of accused Nazi war criminals. After 1950, however, McCarthy began making wild accusations about Communist influence over the State Department, soon coupled with an antigay witch hunt (although his personal lawyer, Roy Cohn, later Donald Trump’s lawyer, was himself gay). Like the other witch hunters (such as President Truman and Senator/future Vice President Hubert Humphrey on the Democratic side of the aisle), he took aim not only at communists and pseudo-communists but also at organized labor and anyone left of center, app of which he lumped together as enemies. The witch hunt initially was aimed largely at the rival Democratic Party and supported by allied Republicans, particularly rising conservative star Everett Dirksen and House maverick and future president (and leading anticommunist witch-hunter) Richard Nixon. However, the shared anticommunist and antigay presumptions of the Democratic Party left them largely unable to stop him. McCarthy also found allies in FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, Bureau of Narcotics Chief Harry Anslinger (who not only covered up McCarthy’s morphine addiction but supplied him with morphine), the Catholic Church hierarchy, and the powerful (and Catholic) Democratic Kennedy family, including fascist sympathizer Joseph Sr. as well as his more liberal sons John (future president) and Robert (future attorney general). McCarthy distinguished himself with his popularity, his dishonesty, and his personal crudeness (personally assaulting a liberal journalist, for example). He played on popular opposition to the war on Korea and concerns about rising prices, which he demagogically promised to fix, to gain support. He was outspoken in defense of Spanish fascist dictator Francisco Franco and aggressively persecuted people who’d opposed his takeover. After the election of Dwight D. Eisenhower, in which McCarthy’s accusations played a key role, McCarthy set out to challenge Eisenhower for control of the country. Eisenhower initially responded by seeking to out-witch hunt McCarthy by smearing his allies as communists, which only made McCarthy more powerful. But with the victory of the Koreans, the ruling class turned against fascism and Hot War, and McCarthy’s efforts to seize control of the Army by taking his witch hunt into the officer corps was frustrated by the military brass and Senate. McCarthy was censured by the Senate and died of complications of his alcoholism soon afterward.
2. Charles Coughlin. A Catholic priest who used radio to broadcast his propaganda. Originally a close political ally of Louisiana Democratic populist Huey Long, Coughlin began his foray into politics supporting Long’s calls for a minimum and maximum wage and denouncing the anti-Catholic Ku Klux Klan and the Soviet Union. He joined Long in supporting Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt for president in 1932 and spoke out strongly in favor of the New Deal during his early broadcasts. In the early 1930s he and his National Union for Social Justice called for “free silver” (inflationary monetary policy), increased taxes on the rich, welfare programs, nationalization of some industry and the Federal Reserve (although he strongly advocated capitalism), and protection of unions to win support from the poor. He denounced the New Deal as beholden to the bankers beginning in 1934, and increasingly began criticizing alleged Jewish influence on the Roosevelt administration. He began denouncing Jews with increased virulence and openly praised Hitler; in this he was largely supported by the Catholic Church hierarchy, receiving full support from most American Catholic leaders and only mild criticism from the pope. He was also supported by Democratic politician and fascist sympathizer Joseph Kennedy, Sr. He denounced internationalism and communism, and criticized the Roosevelt administration’s alleged sympathy for the Spanish Loyalists against Franco, whom he praised profusely. In 1936, Coughlin supported the candidacy of Republican Congressman William Lemke for president, allying himself with other radicals including Gerald L.K. Smith in the Union Party, originally intended as a vehicle for the recently assassinated Long. After the election, he came out more decidedly than ever in favor of Hitler and Mussolini, winning the support of fascist sympathizer (poet) Ezra Pound, British Union of Fascists leader Oswald Mosley, and pro-Hitler industrialist Henry Ford, who financed his dissemination of the anti-Jewish Protocols of the Elders of Zion and the formation in 1938 of the Christian Front, a militia that assaulted Jews and anti-Coughlin journalists. Coughlin and the Christian Front prompted a boycott of Jewish businesses. In 1939, with the German-American Bund and the Silver Shirts, the Christian Front helped organize a pro-Nazi rally in Madison Square Garden. However, due to the backlash from the rally, Coughlin went on to denounce the German-American Bund. In 1940, citing Roosevelt’s alleged pro-Jewish and pro-communist positions, Coughlin endorsed liberal war hawk Republican Wendell Willkie for president, but continued to oppose U.S. intervention against the Axis, including after Pearl Harbor. In 1942, under pressure from the Roosevelt administration, newly appointed liberal Catholic Bishop Edward Mooney ordered Coughlin to cease his political agitation on pain of being defrocked, and he lived out the rest of his life as an unoffending parish priest.
1. Joseph R. McCarthy. By exaggerating his exploits as a Marine in the war against Japan and making up lies about war profiteering, he won a primary victory against liberal Republican Bob LaFollette in 1946 and was duly elected to the U.S. Senate as a Wisconsin Republican. The influential Communist Party-controlled United Electrical workers Union supported McCarthy in order to punish LaFollette for his anti-communism, prompting McCarthy to remark, “Well, a Communist has the same right to vote as anyone else, hasn’t he?” In his early months in the Senate, McCarthy sketched out an unremarkable role as a moderate pro-business Republican, becoming known mostly for his work on behalf of Pepsi-Cola, which in return made a personal loan to him. He also controversially pushed to stop prosecution of accused Nazi war criminals. After 1950, however, McCarthy began making wild accusations about Communist influence over the State Department, soon coupled with an antigay witch hunt (although his personal lawyer, Roy Cohn, later Donald Trump’s lawyer, was himself gay). Like the other witch hunters (such as President Truman and Senator/future Vice President Hubert Humphrey on the Democratic side of the aisle), he took aim not only at communists and pseudo-communists but also at organized labor and anyone left of center, app of which he lumped together as enemies. The witch hunt initially was aimed largely at the rival Democratic Party and supported by allied Republicans, particularly rising conservative star Everett Dirksen and House maverick and future president (and leading anticommunist witch-hunter) Richard Nixon. However, the shared anticommunist and antigay presumptions of the Democratic Party left them largely unable to stop him. McCarthy also found allies in FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, Bureau of Narcotics Chief Harry Anslinger (who not only covered up McCarthy’s morphine addiction but supplied him with morphine), the Catholic Church hierarchy, and the powerful (and Catholic) Democratic Kennedy family, including fascist sympathizer Joseph Sr. as well as his more liberal sons John (future president) and Robert (future attorney general). McCarthy distinguished himself with his popularity, his dishonesty, and his personal crudeness (personally assaulting a liberal journalist, for example). He played on popular opposition to the war on Korea and concerns about rising prices, which he demagogically promised to fix, to gain support. He was outspoken in defense of Spanish fascist dictator Francisco Franco and aggressively persecuted people who’d opposed his takeover. After the election of Dwight D. Eisenhower, in which McCarthy’s accusations played a key role, McCarthy set out to challenge Eisenhower for control of the country. Eisenhower initially responded by seeking to out-witch hunt McCarthy by smearing his allies as communists, which only made McCarthy more powerful. But with the victory of the Koreans, the ruling class turned against fascism and Hot War, and McCarthy’s efforts to seize control of the Army by taking his witch hunt into the officer corps was frustrated by the military brass and Senate. McCarthy was censured by the Senate and died of complications of his alcoholism soon afterward.
2. Charles Coughlin. A Catholic priest who used radio to broadcast his propaganda. Originally a close political ally of Louisiana Democratic populist Huey Long, Coughlin began his foray into politics supporting Long’s calls for a minimum and maximum wage and denouncing the anti-Catholic Ku Klux Klan and the Soviet Union. He joined Long in supporting Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt for president in 1932 and spoke out strongly in favor of the New Deal during his early broadcasts. In the early 1930s he and his National Union for Social Justice called for “free silver” (inflationary monetary policy), increased taxes on the rich, welfare programs, nationalization of some industry and the Federal Reserve (although he strongly advocated capitalism), and protection of unions to win support from the poor. He denounced the New Deal as beholden to the bankers beginning in 1934, and increasingly began criticizing alleged Jewish influence on the Roosevelt administration. He began denouncing Jews with increased virulence and openly praised Hitler; in this he was largely supported by the Catholic Church hierarchy, receiving full support from most American Catholic leaders and only mild criticism from the pope. He was also supported by Democratic politician and fascist sympathizer Joseph Kennedy, Sr. He denounced internationalism and communism, and criticized the Roosevelt administration’s alleged sympathy for the Spanish Loyalists against Franco, whom he praised profusely. In 1936, Coughlin supported the candidacy of Republican Congressman William Lemke for president, allying himself with other radicals including Gerald L.K. Smith in the Union Party, originally intended as a vehicle for the recently assassinated Long. After the election, he came out more decidedly than ever in favor of Hitler and Mussolini, winning the support of fascist sympathizer (poet) Ezra Pound, British Union of Fascists leader Oswald Mosley, and pro-Hitler industrialist Henry Ford, who financed his dissemination of the anti-Jewish Protocols of the Elders of Zion and the formation in 1938 of the Christian Front, a militia that assaulted Jews and anti-Coughlin journalists. Coughlin and the Christian Front prompted a boycott of Jewish businesses. In 1939, with the German-American Bund and the Silver Shirts, the Christian Front helped organize a pro-Nazi rally in Madison Square Garden. However, due to the backlash from the rally, Coughlin went on to denounce the German-American Bund. In 1940, citing Roosevelt’s alleged pro-Jewish and pro-communist positions, Coughlin endorsed liberal war hawk Republican Wendell Willkie for president, but continued to oppose U.S. intervention against the Axis, including after Pearl Harbor. In 1942, under pressure from the Roosevelt administration, newly appointed liberal Catholic Bishop Edward Mooney ordered Coughlin to cease his political agitation on pain of being defrocked, and he lived out the rest of his life as an unoffending parish priest.