TheMillerCircle.org

During the early 1930s, with the depression deepening, and as FDR was trying to implement his array of new federal programs, a group of wealthy individuals and major corporate leaders formed an anti-FDR political action organization, the "American Liberty League " (ALL ). The ALL was heavily funded but oddly out of step with the times, as they wanted to promote a return to the old days before income tax, where government was restricted to delivering the mail: they wanted a return to the first Gilded age of the late 19th Century (too bad they didn’t live long enough to enjoy the one we are in now). The primary focus of this group was to resist the increased federal regulations that FDR was trying to implement, such as Social Security, which they oddly labeled (simply to put fear into the opposition) as the end of Democracy and the first step towards Fascism in America. The group was not exclusively Republican, as Democrat Al Smith (Democratic nominee for Presidency in 1928), is credited for organizing it, but it was very heavily funded by industrialists, including Dupont, U.S. Steel, General Motors, U.S. Rubber and among the figures supporting this organization was Prescott Bush , grandfather of our current president. It’s estimated that the ALL funneled from $500.000 to $1.5 million to resist FDR’s policies, though many feel this group was sufficiently out of step with reality that they aided rather than impeded the programs of The New Deal .

A dark side to the ALL was evident when they were accused of attempting the violent overthrow of FDR . The central figure who revealed this plot was U.S. Marine Corps Major General Smedly Butler , a highly decorated WW I officer who was awarded the Medal of Honor twice. Known as "The Fighting Quaker," Butler was strongly anti-interventionist and his book "War is Racket" was perhaps the first book to speak with authority on how industrialists profited from war. A career military officer, Butler was deeply patriotic and denounced as American Imperialism the war interventionist policies that benefited the wealthy by serving corporate interests. Butler was such a popular war hero that his book, derived from a public speaking tour on the topic and later condensed in Reader’s Digest , was highly praised.

Known as the Business Plot or the Plot Against FDR , Butler claimed he was approached by a lawyer representing the ALL (Butler was a registered Republican but voted for FDR in 1932) and asked to raise an army of 500,000 men (he was extremely popular with the soldiers of WW I and appeared before the group that protested their lack of promised pay, helping to diffuse a potentially serious riot in Washington DC). He initially went along with the plot to learn more about it, but revealed his story to the McCormack-Dickstein Congressional Committee. The Committee’s report came out and acknowledged the existence of a plot, but did not reveal any names. Butler was outraged, since he provided names to the committee, who responded by saying such information would be released when properly vetted, but it never appeared. So Butler went public with his charges and provided names that included many prominent leaders, including Douglas McCarthur. But, the mainstream media did not give this issue much play. Articles by John Spivak, who claimed to have read the original committee transcript, supported Butler’s contention that the magnitude and seriousness of the plot had been minimized in the committee’s watered-down report. But, because he entangled his articles with charges about "Jewish conspiracies" they were not given much traction. No copy of the original hearing transcript has ever been produced.

The BBC did a documentary on this subject which appeared a year ago and a complete video version of it can be viewed at the brasschecktv site. There is one theory that claims the plotters were neutralized through an agreement with FDR . The ALL organization eventually fizzled and disappeared by the early 1940s. However, in reading the comments of Butler, you get an idea about how hostile and agitated the business leaders were in their opposition to FDR and The New Deal . It’s a fascinating story even if we never learn the truth about the details or those who were actually involved. The identified lawyer who supposedly approached Butler denied everything. Butler’s story has been revived a bit because of the ALL membership of Prescott Bush, who was a war profiteer. His relationship with our current imperialist president, GW Bush, paints a picture of some type of genetic homogeneity. We have yet to discover the Nazi gene, but if it exists, it’s probably a developmental surface recognition cue protein that serves to guide normal connectivity of brain structures to the frontal lobes, where many of our more social attributes develop and reside. Mutation of the gene and voila, you’re a Nazi or a crazed Texas Tower assassin.

When you read stories about the 1930s, you understand how the right wing anticommunist movement was dominant over our political landscape and surfaced with a vengence right after FDR’s death and the end of WW II. Perhaps that most fascinating (to me) element to this period was the eventual hearing and removal of Robert Oppenheimer’s security clearance in 1954, through a completely contrived and illegal AEC committee action. Yet, that single act effectively neutered scientists from participating in political decision-making about the use of the atomic bomb, or the development and use of the hydrogen bomb; it set a new course for the unfettered march towards militarism that characterizes us today. If there is a candidate for an evil scientist, it’s Edward Teller, a former friend and employee of Oppenheimer who vehemently testified against him at the hearing. When Oppenheimer heard that the US Air Force, through SAC (Strategic Air Command) had most major cities in Russia targeted for an atomic bomb at the first sign of trouble, he called them "crazy." When he (with most other scientists who worked as Los Alamos) labeled the much more powerful hydrogen bomb a weapon of genocide, those inside of the government looked at Oppenheimer as a menace and they planned to eliminate his influence and visibility: they convinced Eisenhower that Oppenheimer had to go and so he did. Ironically, as Eisenhower said goodbye at the end of his administration, and warned us about the "military-Industrial complex," he knew more about it than anyone else, for it was his administration that made sure it got started and was well nourished in the first place, with the production of huge new quantities of nuclear bombs and the entrenchment of the irreversible arms race, something that our current president only wants to increase and prolong. We are still playing the nuclear card today.