Fighting Son by Jonathan Kasparek

Author:Jonathan Kasparek
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780870205309
Publisher: Wisconsin Historical Society Press

CHAPTER SIX

A Stolen Utopia

In January 1935, Phil became governor for the second time. Much had changed in the four years since he last took the oath of office. Although Old Bob La Follette remained a compelling icon, new figures now influenced Wisconsin politics. President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s candidacy in 1932 had cost Phil the governorship and forced Progressives to form their own party as a means of keeping liberal forces united. However, establishing a clear identity in the 1930s was even more challenging than it had been in earlier years. As much as Progressives squabbled among themselves in the 1920s, opposition to conservative Republican presidents had at least provided them a sense of purpose that was greatly diminished by the New Deal.

Also frustrating to Progressives was the fact that opposition to the president placed them in company with liberals whose radical agenda was much farther to the left than their own. Although both Wisconsin and Minnesota produced successful third parties that advocated a more ambitious reform plan than Roosevelt offered, the appearances of Charles Coughlin, Huey Long, Charles Townsend, and Upton Sinclair posed more controversial challenges to Roosevelt. All bore superficial resemblance to Old Bob and to a lesser extent Phil. Like Phil, Coughlin frequently criticized the reductionist policies of the New Deal. He turned from an enthusiastic supporter to a perpetual faultfinder, making some of the same arguments that Phil did against the Agricultural Adjustment Administration and the National Recovery Administration. By 1934, Coughlin, too, began calling for national political realignment and created the National Union for Social Justice, a proto-political party advocating nationalized utilities and monetary reform. His physical collapse in 1936 just as he began to deliver an address endorsing Union Party presidential candidate William Lemke removed him from the public eye, but he left a lingering impression of what an “American Fascist” might look like.1

The ideas of Dr. Francis Townsend also bore superficial similarities to those of the Wisconsin Progressives; Phil’s call for redistribution of wealth was echoed in the demands of the elderly California physician, who created a national movement by promoting a monthly pension for everyone over sixty. Supposedly, if the sum (which fluctuated between $150 and $200) was spent in one month as planned, it would generate an economic recovery. Although an old-age pension was a part of the Progressive platform, it was intended to be aid to those who could no longer make a living themselves, not an economic fix. When Townsend teamed up with real-estate promoter Robert Clements, the simplistic plan became a sensation. Townsend clubs sprang up across the nation, especially in the West and Midwest, and in January 1935, John S. McGoarty introduced the plan in the House of Representatives. Even after the passage of the Social Security Act, Townsend’s followers remained a significant political force.2 There was an important difference between this scheme and Progressive ideas: Townsend’s plan was predicated on the idea that the nation had too few jobs and too many workers. Progressives argued just the opposite, that there were enough potential jobs for everyone.

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