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America First Committee
The America First Committee (AFC) was an American isolationist pressure group against the United States' entry into World War II. Launched in September 1940, it surpassed 800,000 members in 450 chapters at its peak. The AFC principally supported isolationism for its own sake, and its varied coalition included Republicans, Democrats, Progressives, farmers, industrialists, communists, anti-communists, students, and journalists – however, it was controversial for the antisemitic and pro-fascist views of some of its most prominent speakers, leaders, and members.
The AFC was dissolved on December 11, 1941, four days after the attack on Pearl Harbor and three days after Roosevelt declared war on Japan alone. It was the day of Hitler's Nazi German declaration of war against the United States as well as the Fascist Mussolini's Italian declaration of war on the United States on December 11, 1941. Their declarations of war on the United States brought it into the wider European theatre of World War II. This resulted in United States joining Britain and all the British Commonwealth countries that had been standing alone at war with Germany since shortly after its outbreak in early September 1939 after the German Invasion of Poland when Hitler had broken the terms of the Munich Agreement (France, Belgium, Holland, Norway along with the other European nations had been overrun and occupied by German forces shortly afterwards).
The AFC argued that no foreign power could successfully attack a strongly defended United States, that a British defeat by Nazi Germany would not imperil American national security, and that giving military aid to Britain would risk dragging the United States into the war. The group fervently opposed measures for the British advanced by President Franklin D. Roosevelt such as the destroyers-for-bases deal and the Lend-Lease bill, but failed in its efforts to block them.
The AFC was founded by Yale Law School student R. Douglas Stuart Jr., a Princeton graduate who was heir to the Quaker Oats Company fortune, and headed by Robert E. Wood, a retired U.S. Army general who was chairman of Sears, Roebuck and Co. Its highest-profile early official member was Henry Ford, the automotive pioneer and notorious anti-Semite, who resigned in controversy. Halfway through the committee's 15-month existence, aviator Charles Lindbergh, who had already delivered 13 speeches on the group's behalf, officially joined it and became the most prominent speaker at its rallies. Lindbergh's presence resulted in increased criticism that America First embraced overt anti-Semitism and fascist sympathies. Historian Susan Dunn has concluded that, "Though most of its members were probably patriotic, well-meaning, and honest in their efforts, the AFC would never be able to purge itself of the taint of anti-Semitism."
American isolationism of the late 1930s had many adherents, and as historian Susan Dunn has written, "isolationists and anti-interventionists came in all stripes and colors—ideological, economic, ethnic, geographical. Making up this eclectic coalition were farmers, union leaders, wealthy industrialists, college students, newspaper publishers, wealthy patricians, and newly arrived immigrants. There were a potpourri of affiliations and beliefs: Democrats, Republicans, Progressives, liberals, conservatives, socialists, communists, anti-communists, radicals, pacifists, and simple F.D.R.-haters." One of the most famous incidents occurred in February 1939 with a German American Bund organization's Nazi-sympathizing rally, held at the famous sports arena Madison Square Garden in New York City, which attracted thousands.
Much of the impetus for this isolationism came from college students, with Yale University being a particularly strong outpost of such sentiments. The America First Committee was established on September 4, 1940, by Yale Law School student R. Douglas Stuart, Jr. (son of R. Douglas Stuart, co-founder of Quaker Oats). Stuart had been part of an earlier anti-interventionist student organization at Yale Law School, one that began in Spring 1940 and included future president Gerald Ford, future U.S. Supreme Court justice Potter Stewart, and future diplomat Eugene Locke as signatories to an initial organizing letter. Other Yale students who became involved were future Peace Corps director during the Kennedy presidential administration (and brother-in-law) Sargent Shriver, and Kingman Brewster Jr., who would later become president of Yale University. Stuart dropped out of Yale to focus on the anti-intervention cause, and during Summer 1940, he and Brewster found support for the cause among politicians in Washington and party conventions, and among corporate figures in Stuart's home area of Chicago.
On September 5, the committee was publicly launched in a national radio broadcast by retired General Hugh S. Johnson, who had headed the National Recovery Administration (N.R.A.) during the early Great Depression as part of the New Deal programs combating the bad economic conditions for a while before President Roosevelt discharged him in 1934.
America First chose retired Brigadier General Robert E. Wood, the 61-year-old chairman of Sears, Roebuck and Co., to preside over the committee. Wood remained in his post until the AFC was disbanded after Germany and Italy declared war on the United States on 11 December 1941 four days after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.
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America First Committee
The America First Committee (AFC) was an American isolationist pressure group against the United States' entry into World War II. Launched in September 1940, it surpassed 800,000 members in 450 chapters at its peak. The AFC principally supported isolationism for its own sake, and its varied coalition included Republicans, Democrats, Progressives, farmers, industrialists, communists, anti-communists, students, and journalists – however, it was controversial for the antisemitic and pro-fascist views of some of its most prominent speakers, leaders, and members.
The AFC was dissolved on December 11, 1941, four days after the attack on Pearl Harbor and three days after Roosevelt declared war on Japan alone. It was the day of Hitler's Nazi German declaration of war against the United States as well as the Fascist Mussolini's Italian declaration of war on the United States on December 11, 1941. Their declarations of war on the United States brought it into the wider European theatre of World War II. This resulted in United States joining Britain and all the British Commonwealth countries that had been standing alone at war with Germany since shortly after its outbreak in early September 1939 after the German Invasion of Poland when Hitler had broken the terms of the Munich Agreement (France, Belgium, Holland, Norway along with the other European nations had been overrun and occupied by German forces shortly afterwards).
The AFC argued that no foreign power could successfully attack a strongly defended United States, that a British defeat by Nazi Germany would not imperil American national security, and that giving military aid to Britain would risk dragging the United States into the war. The group fervently opposed measures for the British advanced by President Franklin D. Roosevelt such as the destroyers-for-bases deal and the Lend-Lease bill, but failed in its efforts to block them.
The AFC was founded by Yale Law School student R. Douglas Stuart Jr., a Princeton graduate who was heir to the Quaker Oats Company fortune, and headed by Robert E. Wood, a retired U.S. Army general who was chairman of Sears, Roebuck and Co. Its highest-profile early official member was Henry Ford, the automotive pioneer and notorious anti-Semite, who resigned in controversy. Halfway through the committee's 15-month existence, aviator Charles Lindbergh, who had already delivered 13 speeches on the group's behalf, officially joined it and became the most prominent speaker at its rallies. Lindbergh's presence resulted in increased criticism that America First embraced overt anti-Semitism and fascist sympathies. Historian Susan Dunn has concluded that, "Though most of its members were probably patriotic, well-meaning, and honest in their efforts, the AFC would never be able to purge itself of the taint of anti-Semitism."
American isolationism of the late 1930s had many adherents, and as historian Susan Dunn has written, "isolationists and anti-interventionists came in all stripes and colors—ideological, economic, ethnic, geographical. Making up this eclectic coalition were farmers, union leaders, wealthy industrialists, college students, newspaper publishers, wealthy patricians, and newly arrived immigrants. There were a potpourri of affiliations and beliefs: Democrats, Republicans, Progressives, liberals, conservatives, socialists, communists, anti-communists, radicals, pacifists, and simple F.D.R.-haters." One of the most famous incidents occurred in February 1939 with a German American Bund organization's Nazi-sympathizing rally, held at the famous sports arena Madison Square Garden in New York City, which attracted thousands.
Much of the impetus for this isolationism came from college students, with Yale University being a particularly strong outpost of such sentiments. The America First Committee was established on September 4, 1940, by Yale Law School student R. Douglas Stuart, Jr. (son of R. Douglas Stuart, co-founder of Quaker Oats). Stuart had been part of an earlier anti-interventionist student organization at Yale Law School, one that began in Spring 1940 and included future president Gerald Ford, future U.S. Supreme Court justice Potter Stewart, and future diplomat Eugene Locke as signatories to an initial organizing letter. Other Yale students who became involved were future Peace Corps director during the Kennedy presidential administration (and brother-in-law) Sargent Shriver, and Kingman Brewster Jr., who would later become president of Yale University. Stuart dropped out of Yale to focus on the anti-intervention cause, and during Summer 1940, he and Brewster found support for the cause among politicians in Washington and party conventions, and among corporate figures in Stuart's home area of Chicago.
On September 5, the committee was publicly launched in a national radio broadcast by retired General Hugh S. Johnson, who had headed the National Recovery Administration (N.R.A.) during the early Great Depression as part of the New Deal programs combating the bad economic conditions for a while before President Roosevelt discharged him in 1934.
America First chose retired Brigadier General Robert E. Wood, the 61-year-old chairman of Sears, Roebuck and Co., to preside over the committee. Wood remained in his post until the AFC was disbanded after Germany and Italy declared war on the United States on 11 December 1941 four days after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.