The A to Z of U.S. Diplomacy from World War I through World War II by Martin Folly & Niall Palmer

Author:Martin Folly & Niall Palmer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scarecrow Press
Published: 2010-03-14T16:00:00+00:00

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LA FOLLETTE, ROBERT M. (1855–1925). Politician Robert M. La Follette, who served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives (1885–91), governor of Wisconsin (1901–6), and U.S. senator (1906–25), was the best-known progressive politician in the United States during the first quarter of the 20th century. Though a Republican, he was often in conflict with the party’s conservative, procapitalist policies. He created resentment among party managers by opposing “boss politics” and demanding electoral reforms that would curb party influence at the state level. La Follette was one of the principal opponents of U.S. entry into World War I, claiming the United States was being tricked into war in order to boost the profits of big business, particularly arms manufacturers. Like Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan, La Follette also suspected the administration of pro-British sympathies. His opposition to the 1917 declaration of war (he was one of six senators to vote against it) earned him the bitter hostility of the American press and many of his colleagues. Later, he opposed ratification of the Treaty of Versailles. La Follette ran for president as an independent in 1924 and won the electoral votes of his home state and nearly 5 million votes nationwide.

LAMONT, THOMAS (1870–1948). Banker Thomas Lamont was a partner in the J. P. Morgan company with John Pierpont Morgan Jr. He owned the New York Evening Post from 1918 to 1922 and served as one of the two Treasury Department representatives in the U.S. delegation to the 1919 Paris Peace Conference. Lamont went on a semiofficial mission to Japan in 1920 to safeguard U.S. economic interests in East Asia. He did not, however, support a tough response to Japan in the Manchurian Crisis (1931).

Lamont sympathized with fascism in Italy and in 1925 arranged a $100 million loan to dictator Benito Mussolini. He went on special missions to several countries, including China and Mexico, to negotiate loans and give financial advice. He was a delegate to the 1933 London Economic Conference. Lamont was a member of the League of Nations Association and as an internationalist was involved with the Nonpartisan Committee for Peace through Revision of the Neutrality Law and the Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies. He was acting head of J. P. Morgan during the 1929 Wall Street crash and was elected chair of the company in 1943. After World War II, he made a large donation toward the restoration of Canterbury Cathedral in Great Britain.

LANDIS, JAMES MCCAULEY (1899–1964). The son of missionaries, James Landis was born in Japan. He was a student of Felix Frankfurter at Harvard Law School and served on the Federal Trade Commission (1933–34), the Securities and Exchange Commission (1934–37), and as a regional and then national director for the Office of Civilian Defense (1941–43). He was director of Economic Operations in the Middle East, based in Cairo, Egypt (1943–45). After World War II, he was chair of the Civil Aeronautics Board (1946–47). He was legal counsel for Joseph P. Kennedy, and he was dean of Harvard Law School (1938–46).

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