most of the fighting.
If opinions clashed, Colorado was involved. The Fowler Progress Club had
been entertained during the week at the home of Mrs. Eugene Stewart. The
guest speaker was Mrs. F. H. Trimble, the State Defense Chairman. She talked
about women’s part in national defense. The club then stepped up and purchased
a book of defense stamps. Turning to more congenial topics, Mrs. R. D. Lowder
then presented a paper on homebuilding and furnishing, while Mrs. John Bre-
vard enlivened and enlightened the proceedings with her talk about “Antiques
FIGURE 2.2 “America First” costume in Fourth of July parade at Vale, Oregon.
Photo by Russell Lee. Courtesy of Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ppmsca-12886.
16 Last Sunday at Peace: November 30, 1941
and Heirlooms.” Mrs. Trimble concluded with an open forum on national
defense.
What was most interesting about the choice of editorials in the November 30
New York Times Sunday Edition was that none of them dealt with the war in
Europe or the looming crisis in Asia. The newspaper editorialized on “Class Liti-
gation.” Its editorial writers foresaw no 1941 tax changes, commented on “Jobs
for Teachers,” and paid their respects to “Mr. Churchill at 67.” They wrote rever-
ently about a “New House of God,” the just-opened Cathedral of St. John the
Divine, and closed with a sensitive essay on “Moonlight.”
If The Times did not stake out an editorial position that Sunday on isolation-
ism versus intervention, its letter writers to the editor certainly did. Robert Aura
Smith of New York wrote that he had just completed a lecture tour in Wisconsin,
Minnesota, Iowa, and Missouri, conducting discussion groups on American policy
among businessmen, bankers, teachers, and students. He had found no champions
of isolationism. Among the 4,000 persons interviewed or represented, he had
found only one admitted isolationist, a congressman from central Wisconsin. Any
expression of nonisolationist sentiment was greeted with warm applause even in
Milwaukee’s German precincts, and that was less than twenty-four hours after a
large America First rally. In general, Mr. Smith found an attitude more of resigna-
tion than of crusading. What had been done had been done and the involvement
of the United States was not a fairy tale but a fact. There was a sidebar. Mr. Smith
reported that many of his respondents lacked a high degree of confidence in the
domestic policies of the administration. Labor policy and strikes were a concern.
But overall Mr. Smith concluded that any emergency would find the Midwest
“extravagantly loyal in its devotion to the declared causes of the United States.”
Alfred P. Jones of Pittsburgh suggested a world commonwealth, a combination
of democratic nations as an intermediate step toward further development. His
proposal echoed Alfred Streit’s then-current call for Union Now between Britain
and America.
A negotiated peace with Hitler? Hans Schmidt of Chicago wrote that peace
with Hitler would mean the doom of decency and liberty. But the alternative, he
presciently forecasted, was a long war and the total destruction of Germany.
The peace of the American nation seemed still a matter of debate and choice.
Meantime, the dark clouds of war were towering ever higher in Asia. America was
on the sidelines, but for how long? It was making preparations.
Notes
1.
New York Times , November 30, 1941, 1
2. New York Times , November 30, 1941, 10
3.
Washington Post , November 30, 1941, 10
4.
Chicago Tribune , November 30, 1941, 1
3
FACING THE GATHERING STORM
A Nation at Peace: Stand-Off
On October 16, 1941, Prince Fumimaro Konoye, 1 Princeton educated and in the arena of Japanese politics considered to be relatively moderate, had tendered his
resignation; the Emperor accepted it, expressing suitable regrets. On the next day,
FIGURE 3.1 Prime Minister of Japan Hideki Tojo.
Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
18 Last Sunday at Peace: November 30, 1941
General Hideki Tojo succeeded Konoye as Prime Minister. The Emperor indi-
cated to Tojo that he should not feel bound by any prior discussions or policies.
In modern Japan, there had always been tension and a competition for power
and influence between the navy and the army. The army was expansionist. Its
leaders derived from the Samurai tradition, and Tojo was nothing if not a hard-
liner. The navy had always had a more global outlook, formed and trained as it had
been in the traditions of Britain’s Royal Navy.
Tojo confirmed his bona fides as a hardliner in his statement of November 29.
Hostile nations, he said—and he named the United States and Britain explicitly—
were trying to exploit the peoples of Asia for their own interest and profit. He was
gratified, he said, by the unified efforts of three nations, Japan, Manchuria, and
China’s puppet Nanking government, “to eliminate exploitation by America and
other Western nations with a view of cutting these accursed chains from your feet
so that a new era may be ushered in wherein you will be able to live in peace and
happiness.” Chiang Kai-shek, he said, was dancing to the tune of Britain, America
and communism.
On the same day, Tokyo radio declared that the United States had rejected all
of Japan’s efforts to live in peace. Japan had been patient to the utmost limit, the
broadcast said. It had given the United States every possible opportunity to coop-
erate and live together in friendship. The conclusion was ominous:
We are now in the very last act of this drama and let the whole Japanese
Nation stand like one man behind its leaders for the highest and ultimate
proof in her history. 2
*
Facing the gathering storm, the President sought refreshment in a weekend in his
beloved Warm Springs, Georgia, where he had found comfort and recuperation
from polio. He came by train to Newnan, where he transferred to an automo-
bile for the forty-mile ride to Warm Springs. He made his way through a crowd
eager for a glimpse of their president. There were brief formalities, handshakes
with Mayor C. G. Smith, Sheriff A. L. Potts, and Chief of Police W. B. Sanders.
Bodyguard Tommy Qualters threw a black cape with a velvet collar over FDR’s
shoulders. The drive to Warm Springs under a bright sun through the autumnal
countryside was, The Atlanta Constitution reported, “something of a triumphal procession.” Word had gotten around of the President’s route, and yards and crossroads
along the route were jammed with people waving “howdy” to him. The President
smiled and waved back. People stopped in their cars wondering about the delay;
when they saw the President, they jumped out and waved their hats.
If the President had come to Warm Springs for a rest, The Constitution observed
that he needed it. When he emerged from the train, he had looked tired indeed,
paler than usual, and with the famed Roosevelt shadows under his eyes. But the
hard work of managing the ultimate crisis had not diminished the President’s
famous geni
ality, as the greeters clapped and cheered.
At the President’s favorite retreat, the Little White House, a detachment of
Marines in full dress played the presidential ruffles and flourishes. After a brief stay,
Facing the Gathering Storm 19
the gates opened and the President emerged. At the wheel of his own car, a dark
blue Ford with its top down, he drove to a nearby cottage where he had a reunion
with his longtime secretary, Margaret “Missy” Lehand. He would speak at a Warm
Springs dinner that evening. 3
The President did not underestimate the seriousness of the situation in a speech
at dinner to the patients of the Warm Springs Foundation. “I think we can offer
up a little silent prayer that these people will be able to hold a Thanksgiving more
like an American Thanksgiving next year. That is something of a dream, perhaps.”
He went on to say: “In days like these it is always possible that our boys at the
military and naval academies may actually be fighting for the defense of these
American institutions of ours.”
He ended his talk by calling upon Americans to appreciate their blessings, bless-
ings that had been lost to many nations and peoples across the world. 4
Shortly after, it was revealed that the President would cut short his visit to
Warm Springs in response to the belligerent statement by Tojo that had exacer-
bated an already critical situation.
The President warned other nations that his country was united behind a pol-
icy of opposition to aggression anywhere on earth. He wrote this expansive state-
ment in reply to a letter from Senator Guy Gillette, Democrat of Iowa, a consistent
opponent of the Roosevelt foreign policy and a steady vote against measures that
would implement it.
Senator Gillette’s letter recounted his opposition to many of the administra-
tion’s enactments based on a sincere belief in their unwisdom. He had not sur-
rendered his convictions, but he told the President:
As one who opposed the action the Congress has taken, and as one who
recognizes the need for the present unified mobilization of all our national
strength and resources for a victorious attainment of the goals for which we
are now committed, I am taking the liberty of addressing this letter to you as
President of my country and Commander-in-chief of her forces, tendering
my support and service in any capacity or activity where I can be of assistance
in the work which we have before us to do and for the purpose of enlisting
myself and all that I have in service for the duration of the emergency.
To this handsome statement, the President replied in kind. He expressed his
gratification and went on to say:
That there is debate or that there are statements of conflicting opinion prior to
the decision should not be taken by persons abroad as an indication of lack of
cohesion among our people, though that mistake is sometimes made. While
there have been expressions of different views in regard to our foreign policy,
I have always felt that those differences were of degree but not of principle.
I have been confident that we Americans believe in the defense of our
country and that such differences as existed concerned only the time and
place to begin that defense or the methods to be employed to secure ade-
quate protection to the ideals of political freedom for which our govern-
ment has ever striven. 5
20 Last Sunday at Peace: November 30, 1941
Preeminent among Southern journalists, Ralph McGill of The Atlanta Constitution
observed that FDR came from time to time to Warm Springs for the same reason that
Scarlett O’Hara went back to Tara. It was about regaining strength, encouraging the
soul, and building confidence in the face of the tasks ahead. To the President, McGill
wrote, Warm Springs was a talisman of luck and success in facing great problems.
So Roosevelt had come back to Georgia. He had scored “most amazing suc-
cesses.” He had kept the country out of war, that is to say a war with an expedi-
tionary force in Europe and a Navy actively fighting the foe. Yes, the Navy was
on patrol and, yes, there would be an occasional engagement and, yes, some ships
would be lost. But, he cheerfully observed, it presently looked as if there was no
need to send an expeditionary force to Europe and, even better, “If Japan keeps
out we will not have to send one anywhere.”
So McGill, acknowledging Japan as the big problem, thought that with the
President’s Warm Springs visit, the Roosevelt luck might triumph and in a seri-
ous diplomatic crisis the country would emerge peacefully. “If Japan makes an
agreement with this country,” he concluded, “and stays out of the war on the Axis
side, ‘The Old Master’ will have scored the greatest of his international triumphs.” 6
*
At New York’s Astor Hotel an audience of a thousand heard three knowledgeable
speakers address the Far Eastern crisis: Tyler Dennett, former advisor to the State
Department and past president of Williams College; Wilfred Fleischer, former man-
aging editor of the Japan Advertiser and Tokyo correspondent for The New York Herald Tribune ; and Henry Luce, publisher of Time , Life , and Fortune . They didn’t agree.
Mr. Dennett thought the prospect of a Pacific war a “phenomenon” in history,
because of the very real compatibility of the economic and cultural interests of
the United States and Japan. He viewed the United States as a long-time friend
of Japan and found it both “foolish” and “utterly stupid” that Japan might try to
gain by force what it could otherwise achieve through patience. But the United
States would not, he said, be intimidated.
Mr. Fleischer took a decidedly different point of view. To him Japan had no
liking for America. The two countries were in agreement on no major issue. He
doubted the current negotiations could advance much farther, and concluded that
the country had come to a most dangerous pass in its relations with Japan and
stood closer to war with Japan than at any time in the history of the relations of
the two countries.
Henry Luce admired the courage and the accomplishments of the Chinese
people and was confident of their ultimate victory. He pointed to a strong tide
of public opinion in favor of China (of which he was cheerleader-in-chief) and
complained that government policy had failed to do what the public (or at least
Henry Luce) wanted done. 7
On the same day in a different venue, Professor Pierre Laurin, a longtime scholar
and teacher at the University of Hanoi, offered a racier assessment of the Far East-
ern situation. Japan, he said, was simply “bluffing.” In a war between Japan, the
United States, and Britain, he boldly asserted, Japan would be defeated in a year. 8
Facing the Gathering Storm 21
In its News in Review, the Houston Chronicle reported that the talks between
Japanese envoy Saburo Kurusu and the State Department appeared to be near an
end. It summarized Washington’s attitude: that the United States would never
withdraw aid from China, would never appease Japan, and would never recognize
territory acquired by Japan through aggression; and finally, that America would
fight to uphold its rights in the Pacific.
All this was emphasized by the Chronicle ’s Washington correspondent, Howard
Brayman. The relationship between the United States and Japan had never been
so critical and so strained. So thoroughly basic and fundamental were the differ-
ences between the two countries that he found it hard to imagine what kind of a
settlement could be reached between the two sides.
What if Japan from its Indo-China bases should attack Thailand, which could
then serve as a base for an attack on Singapore, or should cut the Burma Road, life-
line to China? Such developments, extremely serious in themselves, would imme-
diately raise the question whether to allow continuing Japanese aggression in the
Pacific until the war in Europe ended, and then to put Japan back in its place, or
to move now, by military and naval action, to halt Japan’s expanding empire.
*
In few places was the debate between proponents of isolationism and interven-
tion more intense than in the halls of Congress. Five Republican members of the
House of Representatives journeyed to Britain to examine Britain’s war effort.
If they remained divided as to the extent of American aid to Britain, the isola-
tionists in the group confessed to having had to revise some of their opinions.
Their basis for withholding aid to Britain had been the need for war material at
home in the face of the threat of war in the Pacific. The question was not, they
said, whether we should enter the war. It was rather whether Japan or Germany
was the more logical opponent. But they all agreed that the visit had increased
understanding of the common problems of the two countries.
The representatives saw important changes taking place in Britain: a leveling of
class distinctions, nationalization, and important health and food programs. They
lunched with the Prime Minister and Mr. and Mrs. Churchill and attended ser-
vices at Westminster Abbey after inspecting heavily bombed areas. 9
*
Nothing could more clearly exemplify Japanese attitudes than resolutions
adopted at a great rally in Tokyo celebrating the first anniversary of the signing
of the treaty between Tokyo and its Nanking puppet, and also of a joint declara-
tion for mutual collaboration among Japan, Nanking, and Manchuko. The reso-
Crucible of a Generation Page 4
