1941 Franklin D. Roosevelt - America First Committee and Charles Lindbergh

In 1940, the America First Committee (AFC) was formed as the foremost non-interventionist pressure group against the American entry into World War II.  Quickly, it gained 800,000 members who were working to force President Roosevelt to keep his pledge of keeping America out of war.  The members of AFC profoundly distrusted Roosevelt and argued that he was lying to the American people.   The goal of the committee was to enforce the 1939 neutrality act and defeat the lend-lease policy of supplying the Allied Nations with warships, warplanes and other weaponry.  The AFC had four main principles:

1.     The United States must build an impregnable defense for America.
2.     No foreign power, nor group of powers, can successfully attack a prepared America.
3.     American democracy can be preserved only by keeping out of the European war.
4.     "Aid short of war" weakens national defense at home and threatens to involve America in war abroad.

The AFC boasted many prominent individuals including the future President Gerald Ford, heir to the Quaker Oats fortune R Douglas Stuart Jr. an future U.S. Supreme Court justice Potter Stewart.  But none, was as outspoken or as controversial as the aviator Charles A. Lindbergh. In 1938, Lindbergh accepted a medal from Hermann Göring, the head of Nazi Germany’s Luftwaffe, in honor of his transatlantic flight, and despite public outcry, refused to return it.   After Germany invaded Poland in 1939, his frequent praise of the German military earned him the label of "Nazi appeaser".   Still, Lindbergh continued to press on.  In his speeches, he implied that 'powerful elements' were pushing the Untied States into war.  There is no doubt, that Franklin Roosevelt was aware of both the AFC, and Charles Lindbergh.  While, Lindbergh had not yet named FDR as the one pushing us into war, there was pointing his finger in the his direction.   FDR took the opportunity in his 1941 annual address to congress to attack the AFC and Charles Lindbergh indirectly (or perhaps directly).   FDR received much rancorous applause.

"As a nation, we may take pride in the fact that we are softhearted; but we cannot afford to be soft-headed.

We must always be wary of those who with sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal preach the "ism" of appeasement.

We must especially beware of that small group of selfish men who would clip the wings of the American eagle in order to feather their own nests."

Several months later, on September 11, 1941 just three months before Pearl Harbor, Charles Lindbergh fired back in his most famous speech ever at an AFC rally in Indiana.   This time he did not hold back, mentioning Roosevelt by name.  

"The Roosevelt administration is the third powerful group which has been carrying this country toward war. Its members have used the war emergency to obtain a third presidential term for the first time in American history. They have used the war to add unlimited billions to a debt which was already the highest we have ever known. And they have just used the war to justify the restriction of congressional power, and the assumption of dictatorial procedures on the part of the president and his appointees.

The power of the Roosevelt administration depends upon the maintenance of a wartime emergency. The prestige of the Roosevelt administration depends upon the success of Great Britain to whom the president attached his political future at a time when most people thought that England and France would easily win the war. The danger of the Roosevelt administration lies in its subterfuge. While its members have promised us peace, they have led us to war heedless of the platform upon which they were elected."

America First was dissolved four days after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.   And, on May 21, 1944, Lindbergh flew his first combat mission: a strafing run with VMF-222 near the Japanese garrison of Rabaul, New Britain, in the Australian Territory of New Guinea.   Pearl Harbor changed America, and it changed Charles Lindbergh.


http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=16092
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America_First_Committee
http://spartacus-educational.com/USAfirstC.htm
http://blogs.cfr.org/lindsay/2012/09/11/twe-remembers-charles-lindberghs-des-moines-speech/
http://www.charleslindbergh.com/americanfirst/
http://media-2.web.britannica.com/eb-media/42/27142-004-A915C197.jpg
http://cp91279.biography.com/1000509261001/1000509261001_1628429998001_BIO-Biography-13-World-Leaders-Franklin-D-Roosevelt-SF.jpg