AM IDEOLOGICAL ANALYSIS

OF THE SENATE WARTIME ADDRESSES

OF ROBERT MARION LA FOLLETTE

Harry R. Gianneschi

A Dissertation

Submitted to the Graduate School of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

December . 197.5 618206 Vu.w ii Wo • ABSTRACT

Robert Marion La Follette, leading American progres­ sive, of for three terms, and U. S. Senator from 1905 to 1925, was selected by the 1957 Senate as one of five of its greatest members throughout this country’s history. In light of Ij.s subsequent praiseworthy reputation and of the popular support he maintained during most of his career, the reason for his publicly denounced "anti-war" stance in 1917 has remained a mystery to many critics. Viewing the stance as a break-away from his previous beliefs, historians have tagged him as pacifistic, ignorant, or demagogic in his approach to the war. This study was designed to investigate elements in La Follette's life and speaking which could clarify the motivation for his Senate speeches from April 4 to October 6 in 1917.

Research on this topic was devoted to an in-depth investigation of La Follette's entire speaking career. Texts of the speeches he gave during his life, editorial writings presented in La Follette's Magazine, and the personal papers of La Follette, members of his family, and close friends, all located in the Wisconsin State Histori­ cal Society Archives, were studied. Reactions were discovered in accounts by his contemporaries and the newspapers of the day. A wide cross-section of secondary sources, as critical and historical judgments, was taken into consideration. A great deal of emphasis was directed, of course, at the wartime period.

The examination of La Follette's speaking career revealed that he had formulated an individualized theory of progressivism to which he remained true throughout his life. This credo consisted of three interlocking and interdependent tenets: 1) that the Constitution, as the law of the land, must be given paramount authority in judging all political matters; 2) that the will of the people constituted the spirit of the Constitution and must be heeded for a representative government to function effectively; and 3) that the public can make proper decisions only if well-informed on the facts of any issue.

The application of this philosophy, termed La Fol- lettism, to his wartime Senate speeches confirmed La Follette's consistent adherence to the three tenets. The issue of war was secondary to a defense of his constitutionally-based theory. iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page INTRODUCTION ...... 1

Background of La Follette's political career ...... 1

Statement of problem ...... 9

Review of literature on La Follette...... 10

Historical reactions to La Follette's wartime rhetoric ...... 13

Argument and methodology of study ...... 19

"GUIDED BY THE PATTERN OF THE PAST" ...... 24

Public reaction to La Follette immediately prior to war declaration speech ...... 24

Motivation of La Follette's war­ time rhetoric found in progressive ideology ...... 28

Progressivism defined ...... 37

La Follettism defined ...... 44

Constitutionalism ...... 44

Will of the people ...... 5 3

Educated electorate...... 54

"IN THE WORLDS DARKEST HOURS" ...... 59 "Stand back of the President" issue ...... 60

Minority participation ...... 65

Denial of the people's voice ...... 67 iv

Rebuttal of Wilson's war message ...... 70

Historical summation of events leading to war ...... 77

Public reactions ...... 79

"POWER IN THE PEOPLE SUPREME" ...... 8 3

Inaccuracy of labels for La Follette's wartime rhetoric ...... 8 4

Pacifism ...... 84

Ignorance of foreign policy/isolationism ...... 87

Loyalty to constituency/ political expediency ...... 94

La Follettism embodied in April 4, 1917 speech ...... 99

Constitutionalism ...... 102

Power in the people ...... 110

Facts...... 117

"never Abandon'the fight"...... 123 La .Follettism vs. Conscription, April 27, 1917...... 124

La Follettism vs. War Profits, August through September, 1917 . 129

La Follettism for Free Speech October 6, 1917 ...... • 138

REVIEW AND CONCLUSIONS ...... 147

BIBLIOGRAPHY...... 159 I

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

Even in death, Robert Marion La Follette remained

true to the spirit embodied in the two final lines of his

beloved W. E. Henley poem, which ends, "I am the master of my fate;/ I am the captain of my soul."'*" Ironically, while

the news of La Follette's death spread throughout the

nation on that hot summer day of June 18, 1925 and eulogies

commemorating his illustrious career blossomed from almost

every town hall and village church, the one epitaph which

most appropriately embodied his lifelong contribution to

the nation was penned by La Follette himself. For, in the

top drawer of his senate chamber desk, written on a small

scrap of paper just prior to the illness which ended his

career and life, La Follette had left his legacy in the few

scribbled words, "I would be remembered as one who in the

^Robert M. La Follette, La Follette1s Autobiography (Madison, Wisconsin: Robert M. La Follette Company, 1911), p. 194. Hereafter referred to as Autobiography. The final three stanzas of William Ernest Henley's poem, "Invictus," which La Follette often used for inspirational courage, since they so well depict his career and mission, are as follows: "Out of the night that covers me,/ Black as the pit from pole to pole,/ I thank whatever gods there be/ For my unconquerable soul./ In the fell clutch of circum­ stance/ I have not winced nor cried aloud;/ Under the bludgeoning of chance,/ My head is unbowed./ It matters not how strait the gate,/ How charged with punishment the scroll,/ I am the master of my fate,/ I am the captain of my soul." 2 world's darkest hours kept a clear conscience and stood to 2 the end for the ideals of American ."

Certainly that single epitaph does not adequately

reflect the scores of more eloquently-phrased eulogies

which were given in La Follette's honor during that sad­

dening month. Those eulogies, like most others given at

the deaths of great statesmen and politicians, attested to 3 La Follette's grandest political triumphs and successes.

But, in his own way and in those few words, La Follette had

mapped the most fitting reminder of his career. A future

generation would select La Follette, along with Clay,

Calhoun, Webster, and Taft, as one of the five greatest 4 Senators in American history. Yet La

Follette himself wanted the American nation to remember

this one period when he stood almost alone against the

nation for principles he would never compromise.

2 and , Robert M. La Follette (New York: The MacMillan Company, 1953), II, 1174. . Hereafter referred to as R.M.L. 3 For more information regarding the extensive eulogies concerning La Follette's death see two cartons labeled La Follette Eulogies located in the Wisconsin State Historical Society, Madison, Wisconsin. Contained in these cartons are press clippings, editorials, and speeches pre­ sented throughout the nation following the death of Senator La Follette. 4 On April 30, 1957, Senator John F. Kennedy, as chairman, Special Committee on the Senate Reception Room, announced the above five outstanding senators pursuant to Senate Resolution 145, 84th Congress. For further details consult Holmes Alexander, The Famous Five (New York: The Bookmailer, 1958). 3

The more elaborate eulogies lauding La Follette's

triumphs were not without merit. On the contrary, a retro­

spective view of his long career in government reveals

illustrious political success. Labeled by historian George

Mowry as "one of the very fathers of progressivism," La

Follette first cast his hat into the political arena at the

age of twenty-nine, when, with almost no staff, funds, or

party support, he successfully overthrew the Republican

"boss system" in Wisconsin and was elected as the youngest 5 member of the U.S. Congress in 1885. It was a victory

which by today's standards would be analogous to an unknown

Democrat winning a party seat in Cook County against the

wishes of Mayor Richard Daly. Yet, it was only a small

signal of the things to come for La Follette.

By 1901, for example, La Follette had firmly

entrenched his name in state and national political circles

with the struggle for Governorship of Wisconsin which saw

"Fighting Bob" and his progressive cohorts emerging from

six straight years of defeat at the polls to secure the

place of leadership in the Governor's mansion. La Follette

5 For more information about La Follette's long struggle against the "boss" system, see Autobiography, especially chapters 2-6. Also consult Edward Doan, The La Follettes and the Wisconsin Idea (New York: Rinehart, 1947). For those interested in a contemporary description of Wisconsin's political system at the time of La Follette's progressive movement, the Madison and Milwaukee, Wisconsin newspapers, particularly The Milwaukee Free Press, are extremely helpful. 4 wasted no time in making up for these temporary setbacks.

In less than two terms as Governor, he made his state "the

best example of what could be accomplished under progres- 6 sive leadership." Firmly making a solid progressive

stand against political machines and monopolistic business

corporations during his four years as Governor, La Follette

was the first .state leader to have enacted into law such

now-common practices as "the direct primary, equal taxation

for public utilities, a merit system for state employees, 7 and state regulation of railroads."

As Governor, La Follette revitalized the tactic of

publicizing the candidates' roll-call votes during their 8 previous terms of office. While this is an accepted and

common practice today, in 1905 it was still "a new thing to

judge public men by their votes instead of by their

Carroll Lahman, "Robert M. La Follette," A History and Criticism of American Public Address, ed. William Brigance (New York: Russell & Russell, 1960), II, 942. 7 Gordon Hostettler, "The Political Speaking of Robert M. La Follette," American Public Address, ed. Loren Reid (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1961) , p. 112. g Often on the Chautauqua Circuit, La Follette would spend more time reading roll-call votes on important issues than on his actual speech topic. Over the years this method of striking at his opponents by telling their constituents their voting records became one of the most popular elements.of La Follette's public speaking engage­ ments. See Maryann D. Hartman, "The Chautauqua Speaking of Robert La Follette" (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, Bowling Green State University, 1969). 5

neighborly conduct and good standing in the community."

Indeed, largely because of his continued success as

Governor, La Follette has been labeled as not only the

first man to truly "embrace progressivism," but also

"perhaps the most intelligent," and "certainly the most indefatigable and uncompromising.

Just as La Follette embodied progressivism, the

state of Wisconsin typifidd progressive goals during his

term of office. Edward N. Doan has noted that La Follette

"sought to bring about changes through the orderly

processes of a government dedicated to secure the greatest

good to the greatest number. . . . His fighting leadership

brought renown to Wisconsin as a truly progressive state."H

La Follette's political triumphs, however, did not

end with the Wisconsin Governorship. Chosen as a United

States Senator in 1905, "Fighting Bob" was re-elected to that position by unprecedented majorities of Wisconsin voters until his death in 1925. Twice during that twenty- year period, La Follette was a serious contender for the

.Republican party nomination for the nation's highest I . 9 . Autobiography, p. 17 2. 10Hostettler, p. 112.

UnDoan, p. 4. 6 . . . 12 political office. In 1924 he actually ran for the

Presidency on a third-party progressive ticket, and with

"a meager campaign fund and scant organization," he

obtained "the largest popular vote ever given to an inde­

pendent movement at its first appearance in a national 13 campaign" prior to the Wallace movement of the 1960's.

When the final tabulations were in, La Follette had

received over five million votes and had garnered a

substantial third-party electoral vote of thirteen.

During the height of his political career, even

La Follette's seeming failures proved to be ultimately

successful with the American people. Gordon Hostettler,

for example, contends that "perhaps no political figure of

our century lost so many battles and won so many wars."

1 "Every presidential year," notes Hostettler, "the La

Follette controlled Wisconsin delegation would present a

12 In every presidential election from 1908-1924, Robert La Follette went to the Republican Convention with a small backing of delegates pledged to him. Mostly these delegates came out of the Wisconsin and North Dakota presidential primaries. Only once, however, in 1912 was La Follette considered a truly viable candidate for the Republican Party. Unfortunately, the progressive coalition split between La Follette and Teddy Roosevelt prior to the convention of 1912 and thus both lost all opportunity to gain control of the party nomination. La Follette refused to bolt to a third party. - Roosevelt, however, did bolt the convention with his progressive followers, and ran on a third party ticket.

13_R .M„ .TL ., p. l• x. 7 platform to the Republican national convention; and regularly dominated by conservatives the convention would defeat the proposals by overwhelming votes. Yet in 1920, when still another La Follette document was rejected, the

Wisconsin spokesman could note that eleven of the thirteen

1908 planks and fourteen of the eighteen 1912 proposals 14 had been enacted into law."

La Follette's career, then, was filled with the kind of success and popularity of which politicians' dreams and eulogies are made. Some consider his success demagogic. Not a few contemporaries and historians have claimed that "Battling Bob" was nothing more than a politi­ cal parasite. They claim he did not give direction to the progressive movement, but only followed the whims and wishes of the people in order to garner power. Stahley

Caine, for example, in the recent work The Progressive Era, claims that La Follette was a "politician at war with those in power primarily because of his enormous ambition" and that he "determined his political stance by' using a popular yardstick." "If the people wanted it," Gould continues, "he was for it."^^

14 Hostettler, p. 114. 15 Stanley Caine, "Origins of Progressivism," The Progressive Era, Lewis Gould, ed. (New York: Syracuse University Press, 1974), p. 32. 8

Yet, it is significant that La Follette himself

asked to be remembered by a period in his life when suc­

cess, both popular and political, was almost unknown to

him. During that time, he underwent what was possibly the

broadest-based vilification ever directed at a United

States Senator, when, notes biographer Holmes Alexander,

"the people, the press, and his senate colleagues ignored

and insulted him."Because of a handful of speeches

delivered in the spring and summer of 1917 opposing

America's entry into World War I and some legislation

regarding the. conduct of the War, La Follette was ridiculed,

condemned, and ostracized by large segments of the nation's 17 people and press. Certainly, he was not the only

^Alexander, p. 162. 17 In spite of the war hysteria, however, there were citizens who stood behind his wartime stand. His largest "pockets" of loyal followers consisted of farmers and laborers located in the midwestern states, primarily Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Nebraska. Unfortunately for La Follette, his anti-war stand also attracted groups that were in no way connected to his political philosophy. Large groups of German Americans continually supported La Follette as did various socialistic and pacifistic organizations. Thus La Follette was often mistakenly labeled as a socialist or a pro-German or a pacifist. While he was none of these things his wartime rhetoric oftentimes correlated quite closely to the rhetoric of the then "radical" groups and therefore fuel was added to the already negative public attitude towards him. For further information regarding these so-called radical anti-war groups see H. C. Peterson and Gilbert C. Fite, Opponents of War: 1917-1918 (Madison, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press, 1957). 9 congressional leader to speak against the war. Others in

Congress spoke and voted in a similar vein. 18

In La Follette's case, however, the same rhetorical and personal qualities that singled him out in numerous progressive victories prior to the war made him the cross­ bearer of public abuse at a time when war hysteria was pervading the country at large. Indeed, the public furor over La Follette's rhetoric in 1917 forced the U.S. Senate to bring censure charges against one of their own members 19 for one of the rare times in American history.

Although those speeches, as well as contemporary accounts of and reactions to them are readily available, no history of La Follette's political career contains a thorough or accurate description of this unpopular period in his life. La Follette's evaluation of this period as his legacy to the American people and the intensity of the public reaction indicate a need for such an investigation.

Unfortunately, like those of so many outstanding senators, congressmen, and statesmen, La Follette's political

18 George Norris, James Vardaman, A. J. Gronna, Harry Lane, and William J. Stone were the other Senators who voted no to the war resolution bill. In the House, the vote was 373 to 50. 19 For information regarding the actual Senate Hearings on La Follette see Minutes, Committee on Privileges and Elections, United States Senate, May 15, 1918, Records of the United States Senate Committee on Privileges and Elections, 65th Congress, re: La Follette Investigation, National Archives. 10 successes and achievements have received the greatest attention.

Foreseeing this problem as early as 1925, Mr. Edward

Jones of Woodhouse Smith College wrote to Mrs. Belle Case

La Follette that he hoped "many biographers within the next

few years would appear and will help undo the misrepre- , 20 sentation" of La Follette’s activities in World War I.

Fifty years later, such accounts, with the exception of

Belle Case La Follette’s eulogistic biography of her

husband, still remain to be written.

This is not to say that there has been no historical

research into Robert M. La Follette's career. . On the

contrary, an immense amount of print has already been

produced. It is to say, however, that little, if any of

this research has led to a serious or meaningful investiga­

tion of La Follette's speeches during World War I. Much of

the historical research has been devoted to La Follette's early political career in Wisconsin. Such works as Robert Maxwell's La Follette and the Rise of Progressives in

Wisconsin, Edward Doan's The La Follettes and the Wisconsin

Idea, Milton Goldstein's "The La Follette Movement in

Wisconsin," Maryann D. Hartman's unpublished dissertation

"The Chautauqua Speaking of Robert La Follette," and

20 Letter from Edward Jones to Mrs. Belle Case La Follette, July 31, 1925, in A. 0. Barton Papers, Box 12, Wisconsin State Historical Society. 11

La Follette's autobiography all focus on La Follette's 21 career while .

Many other works are overviews of La Follette's

entire political career, at best providing only skeletal

accounts of the specific World War I period. Eugene

Manning's "Old Bob La Follette: Champion of the People,"

Wallace Sayre's "Robert M. La Follette: A Study in

Political Methods," Robert S. Maxwell's La Follette, and

Belle Case La Follette's Robert M. La Follette all touch upon the activities and speeches of La Follette during . 22 1917, but only in a brief or generally superficial way.

Finally, a majority of the works discuss other specific aspects of La Follette's life and career and thus prove entirely inadequate as tools for aiding in an under­ standing of La Follette's 1917 activity. Some, such as

Carroll Lahman's "Robert La Follette as a Public Speaker,"

21 Robert S. Maxwell, La Follette and the Rise of the Progressives in Wisconsin (Madison, Wisconsin: Wisconsin State Historical Society, 1956). Edward N. Doan, The La Follettes and the Wisconsin Idea (New York: Rinehart & Company, 1947). Milton Goldstein, "The La Follette Move­ ment in Wisconsin" (Unpublished Masters Thesis, Washington University, St. Louis, 1936). Maryann D. Hartman, "The Chautauqua Speaking of Robert La Follette" (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, Bowling Green State University, 1969). 2 2 Eugene Manning, "Old Bob La. Follette: Champion of the People" (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, University of Wisconsin, 1966). Wallace Sayre, "Robert M. La Follette: A Study in Political Methods" (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, New York State University, 1930). Robert S. Maxwell, La Follette (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1969). 12

Gordon Hostettler's "The Political Speaking of Robert M.

La. Follette, " and George Allen Remington's unpublished

master's thesis "A Rhetorical Analysis of the Foreign

Policy Speeches of Robert M. La Follette, United States

Senate, 1915-1919" deal almost solely with a rhetorical 23 analysis of La Follette's speech-making abilities.

Other works, including Alan Kent's "Portrait of

Isolationism: The La Follettes and Foreign Policy" and

Kennedy Padriac's "La Follette's Foreign Policy Recon­

sidered," focus primarily on only one limited issue and 24 how La Follette treated that issue throughout his career.

While it must be admitted that Kent does refer to La

Follette's war-time speeches in his work, his research is

limited to only .those segments of the speeches which are

2 3 Carroll Lahman, "Robert M. La Follette as a Public Speaker and Political Leader" (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, University of Wisconsin, 1939). George Albin Remington, "A Rhetorical Analysis of the Foreign Policy Speeches of Robert M. La Follette, United States Senate, 1915-1918" (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, University of Illinois, 1971). Unfortunately, while Remington's title indicates some real potential regarding La Follette's speeches during the war, he does not cover the wartime speeches with the one exception of La Follette's opening argument against the war resolution bill. Remington is more concerned with rhetorical devices rather than issue analysis. 24 A. E. Kent, "Portrait in Isolationism: The La Follettes and Foreign Policy" (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, University of Wisconsin, 1956). Kennedy Padriac, "La Follette's Foreign Policy Revisited" (Unpub­ lished Masters Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1960). 13

relevant to his specific topic and therefore does not

adequately reflect the broader spectrum of La Follette's

major 1917 addresses. Still others, such as Russell N.

Baird's "Robert M. La Follette and the Press, 1880-1905,"

are far too limited in both the chronological period and 25 the issues upon which they focus.

Overall, then, while there are numerous works on

La Follette, there is a noticeable lack of material primarily concerning the Wisconsin Senator's rhetorical activities during World War I. Despite this significant lack of historical research, there exists a plethora of historical reactions toward those same activities. Quite possibly the speeches of no other political figure of this century have undergone such divergent and profuse historical evaluation and judgment on the basis of so little historical research as have Robert M. La Follette's 1917 addresses. The problem has been one of too many labels and not enough analysis. Indeed, the "misconceptions" of La Follette that Edward Jones hoped would be cleared up as early as

1925 not only remain today, but for the most part have been enlarged. Journalist Walter Millis, for example, in his Road to War: America 1914-1917, equates La Follette's speeches

^^Russell N. Baird, "Robert M. La Follette and the Press, 1880-1905" (Unpublished Masters Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1947). 14 activities during 1917 with simple . Noting that in 1917 there was "the more vulgar, the more simple-minded and evangelical form of pacifism which clung to the quaint notion that the way to establish was to put an end to war," Millis argues that La Follette lent "the grim voice 2 6 of his determined probity" to this cause.

Other historians have added indirect support to the pacifistic tag placed upon La Follette. George Mowry when discussing World War I in his work Theodore Roosevelt and

The Progressive Movement, claims that "like Bryan in tlw-

Democratic party, many progressive Republicans," including 27 La Follette, "were peace men to the end." Lawrence

Levine's biographical sketch of Bryan, entitled Defender of the Faith, and Paolo Colletta's William Jennings Bryan also link La Follette with what they label Bryan's pacifism.

Although neither author directly characterizes La Follette's stand on the war, the close proximity in which they place

La Follette and Bryan regarding the war issues implies that

La Follette approximated Bryan's ideological and moralistic . . 28 opposition to war.

2 Walter Millis, Road to War: America 1914-1917 (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1935), p. 103. 2 7 George E. Mowry, Theodore Roosevelt and the Pro­ gressive Movement (New York: Hill and Wang, 1946), p. 378. 2 8 Lawrence Levine, Defender of the Faith (New York: Oxford University Press, 1965), passim. Paolo Colletta, William Jennings Bryan: Political Puritan 1915-1925 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1969), III, passim. 15

That pacifism was La Follette's motivation has been

disputed, however. A. E. Kent, for instance, contends

that he was "not a pacifist in the strict sense" but rather was against "modern war," or war fought "in the interests 29 of economic royalists who alone profited." Belle Case

La Follette, La Follette's wife and a self-proclaimed pacifist herself, argued that her husband "had never been a pacifist." Mrs. La Follette offers two reasons for her husband's opposition to World War I. First, she contends that La Follette opposed entry into the war because he felt that the country should not "resort to war on the issue the President has raised with Germany--the right of Ameri­ cans to travel freely without risk on belligerent merchant ships." Second, like Kent, Belle Case argues that her husband opposed the war because he felt "the people--not the handful of men in positions of power" would have to "pay the full price" of the cost of the war.^

Two other historians identify similar economic grounds as the motivation behind La Follette's anti-war stance. Edward Doan, in his The La Follettes and the

Wisconsin Idea, contends that "La Follette's opposition to

Merle Curti, in Peace and War, also indicates a pacifistic tendency in La Follette, claiming that he was sympathetic to certain pacifist organizations. 29 Kent, p. 22.

R.M.L.,, p. 565. 16 war" was largely based upon "his belief that the breeches of international understanding were the economic interests who, having exploited the people of the nation to the limit, were turning to other nations and newer nations to exploit 31 for their own gain." Similarly, John Milton Cooper, in

Causes and Consequences of World War _I, argued that La

Follette's opposition was heavily based upon his belief 32 that Wilson was "pandering to Wall Street."

Others add further to the confusion by arguing that

La Follette's opposition to the war stemmed from neither pacifistic ideals nor simple antagonism towards wealthy royalists. These historians argue that he believed war would lead to a total break-down of democratic principles, especially those closely associated with the progressive movement. A. 0. Barton, a contemporary political associate of La Follette, for example, contends that "the point nearest to his heart is his opposition to the war, the one which he had the deepest and most fearful solicitude . . . was the danger that menaced liberal government as he viewed it." La Follette believed, continues Barton, "that all the advanced ground for liberal and representative government for which he and others of his kind had battled so

'’"Doan, p. 78. 3 2 John Milton Cooper, Causes and Consequences of World War I (New York: Quadrangle Books, 1972), p. 5. 17 desperately for a lifetime would be swept away by war; that labor with its hard won rights would be set back to its old servile states and that the ancient and traditional 33 American liberties would be imperiled." A similar evaluation is offered by Henry Huber, another contemporary of La Follette, in his unpublished work "War Hysteria" and 34 by Robert S. Maxwell m his La Follette.

Another viewpoint argues that La Follette was loyally supporting the views of his state's voters. Although recognizing that La Follette's position on the war was unpopular with the vast majority of■ Americans, John F.

Kennedy, in his Profiles in Courage, contends that the

Wisconsin spokesman was nonetheless simply carrying out the . . .35 wishes of the constituents who put him into office.

This theory is also accepted by public address historian Gordon Hostettler. Hostettler, however, adds further embellishment to this popular view by contending that although La Follette did represent his voters, his views on the war, as well as the views of his constituents

33 Unpublished, untitled manuscript found in A. 0. Barton Papers, Wisconsin State Historical Society Archives, Madison, Wisconsin. 34 Henry Huber, "War Hysteria" in Henry Huber Papers, Wisconsin State Historical Society Archives, passim. Maxwell, Lá Follette, passim. 35John F. Kennedy, Profiles in Courage (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1964), p. 263. 18 were based upon "misguided" isolationism. Hostettler states:

He voted against war with Germany, against conscription, and against American participation in the League of Nations. He did not seem to understand that the world of 1919 was vastly different from the world which, throughout most of his life, had permitted American isolation. He failed to appreciate, in its broadest scope, the responsibility inevitably devolving upon the United States for the preservation of western civilization. He was suspicious of any American involvement which might divert attention from domestic reform. In fairness, it must be added that once war was declared La Follette voted for all measures necessary for its successful prosecution, dissenting only to specific propositions and offering amendments when he felt vested interests were securing unwarranted concessions. It is also true that some of his suspicions regarding the war aims of the allies were confirmed in later years. None the less, his position was essentially misguided; but, again, it approximated that of his constituents. Isolationism, then as now, largely centered in the Midwest.36

Turning confusion into complexity, some historians freely offer labels for La Follette's stand against war, but provide no significant reasons or evidence for those labels. In The Great Departure, for example, Daniel Smith openly declares that La Follette was the leader of a "small - - - ’ 3 7 number of determined noninterventionists. " Arthur S.

Link-, in his definitive biography of , calls

La Follette at one point an "anti-war senator" and at another juncture an "obstructionist" but never gives any

n Z Hostettler, p. 121. 37 Daniel M. Smith, The Great Departure (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1965), p. 79. 19 definition of those terms or cites any evidence to prove 38 them.

Finally, there are the historians who do not evaluate the motivation for La Follette's 1917 rhetoric or the actual speeches themselves, but are c-ntent to simply offer eulogistic praise for his efforts. One such historian is Frederic L. Paxson who, in his book Pre War

Years, argues that La Follette "whether right or wrong

. . . commanded full respect" as the courageous leader of his cause. "There were few to follow him, in Congress or outside," maintains Paxson, "but he had the courage to 39 deliberately flaunt his opinion and enrage his opposition."

This same "bigger than life attitude" is also found in 40 Holmes Alexander's The Famous Five.

As is readily evident, the political activity and rhetoric of Robert M. La Follette during 1917 has created profuse and divergent reaction. Rather than aiding in understanding this important period of La Follette's career, however, tfiose evaluations have served only to add additional confusion. Much of it can be attributed to the

3 8 Arthur S. Link, Wilson: Campaigns for Progressivism and Peace (University of Princeton Press, 1965), p. 342 and p. 429. 39 ■ Frederic L. Paxson, Pre-War Years, 1913-1917 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1936), p. 419.

40,A.lexander, passim. 20

apparent lack of any significant rhetorical investigation 41 into La Follette's speeches during 1917. Too often, a

reliance on contemporary evaluations and judgments reflects the pervading war hysteria of America in 1917 more than 42 La Follette's rhetoric at that time. In other words, many have viewed La Follette's speeches during 1917 as simply "war-time rhetoric." Thus, they have isolated

La Follette's speeches during the war from other periods in his life and analyzed them accordingly.

. Of course, this technique is an accepted and even defensible method of traditional rhetorical and historical analysis. Indeed, every rhetorical historical scholar has been taught to analyze a speech or speeches in the context of the immediately surrounding environment and issues.

41 At present, Belle Case La Follette and Fola La Follette's two-volume work is the most definitive account available regarding Robert M. La Follette's speeches during World War I. Unfortunately, because it is a 'family' biography, the authors seem to spend most of their effort in an attempt to defend La Follette, rather than in describ­ ing his activities. Thus, although containing some invalu­ able information, the book is more eulogy than history. 42 . There are numerous works relating to national propaganda and the ensuing war hysteria prevalent in the United States both before and during World War I. Some of the more beneficial works include: Harold C. Peterson, Propaganda for War: The Campaign Against American Neutrality 1914-1917 (Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1939); James D. Squiers, British Propaganda at Home and in the United States from 1914-1917 (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1935); and H. C. Peterson and Gilbert C. Fite, Opponents of War: 1917-1918 (Madison, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press, 1957). 21

Unfortunately, this traditional methodology may have

distorted the varied analyses of La Follette's war-time

speaking.

By looking at La Follette's 1917 speeches simply as

they relate to the prevailing war issue, it is easy to

understand the varied historical judgments. La Follette

did indeed speak against the cruelties and stupidity of

war per se, thereby offering indications of pacifism. In

many of his major speeches, he did offer strong empathy

with the German nation, thereby laying groundwork for the

claim that he was following his heavily German Wisconsin

constituency. Even after America was involved in the war,

La Follette continued to argue for American neutrality,

thereby supporting the claims that many of his ideas were

not only misguided and outmoded, but that he was more con­

cerned with his cherished domestic reform than with the

American foreign policy which, whether right or wrong, was

the over-riding and crucial issue of the period. In a sense, all the historical evaluations contain

some elements of validity and truth. Any of the theories enjoy some historical verification. They are valid, how­ ever, only if the historian accepts two basic limitations.

First: if the speeches are viewed simply as wár-time rhetoric and therefore are placed within the limited frame­ work of the war issued and time period of the war itself., 22

Second: if only the most general and cursory examination

is given to La Follette's 1917 addresses, rather than an

in-depth investigation into the ideas and philosophies

contained within the content of those speeches.

When La Follette's 1917 speeches are taken beyond

the historical environment of the war itself, an entirely

different perspective is possible. Certainly, every

speech analysis must be set within its historical back­

ground. As Ernest Wrage has noted, "when seen against a

contextual backdrop, speeches become at once a means of

illustrating and testing, of verifying or revising general­

izations offered by other workers in social and intel- 43 lectual history." There appears to be a legitimate

debate, however, as to the best or most proper historical

backdrop which should be used.

Setting La Follette's 1917 speeches against the

larger historical framework of the progressive movement,

rather than the limited war-time framework, reveals an

entirely different, and perhaps a much more accurate,

understanding of his purpose. While La Follette was indeed

using the issues of war as topics for speaking, his

speeches were the vehicle for expounding upon his

^Ernest Wrage, "Public Address: A Study in Social and Intellectual History," Methods of Rhetorical Criticism, ed. Robert L. Scott and Bernard L. Brock (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1972), p. 111. 23 progressive philosophy. In other words, the issue of war was only the external point of focus. Close analysis of

La Follette’s 1917 oratory gives every reason to believe that the tone, content, and philosophy exhibited were comparatively the same as those in the progressive speeches given by La Follette in other periods in his life, in spite of the incidental event of war. CHAPTER II

"GUIDED BY THE PATTERN OF THE PAST"

As Senator Robert Marion La Follette sat quietly

at his Senate seat on the warm spring day of April 4, 1917, mentally preparing himself for his upcoming momentous speech against the War Resolution Bill, the public outside the Congressional walls was already unleashing the tide of vilification, condemnation, and abuse against him that was to reach its apex during the ensuing six months.'’' Prior to ever uttering the first words of his now-famous rhetor­ ical battle against America's entry into World War I, La

Follette's name was being used to replace that of Benedict

Arnold as the Republic's most villainous traitor.

Ironically, this "pro-American" backlash to La Follette's stand could not yet be linked to his actual position on the

War Resolution Bill: he had not yet delivered his first

'’"Although the campaign of vilification launched against La Follette in 1917 was indeed national in scope it is possible to obtain a very representative yet capsulized idea of the public's reaction by reading the major Wisconsin newspapers during that period. Of special significance are the Madison and Milwaukee papers including The Wisconsin State Journal, The Capital Times, The Milwaukee Journal, The Milwaukee Sentinel and The Milwaukee Free Press.. As was the tradition at that time, these newspapers often carried editorials and reprints from other major newspapers throughout the nation. 25 2 argument nor cast his initial vote. Rather, the resent­ ment was based more upon what,the public assumed he would

say and, most importantly, upon his determination to

exercise his constitutional right to say it.

Because of his actions of the previous day, during which he refused to concur with a unanimous Senate declaration in favor of the war by insisting upon his

Senatorial right to call for the "regular order"—a parliamentary rule which forced the Senate to hold the resolution bill over for a day so that discussion could take place—the nation's press, gripped by the war hysteria which was enveloping the country like an epidemic, already 3 had begun a vicious attack upon La Follette. Thus, many hours before La Follette's historic speech commenced, a campaign of vilification was already in full swing.

2 It is interesting to note here that even when La Follette was extremely unpopular, his consistency was very seldom questioned. Indeed while many other political leaders joined La Follette in public attacks against "preparedness for war" in late 1916 and early 1917, very few of them were as "predictable" in the public's eye in regards to their potential stands regarding the war itself! La Follette, however, was so consistent—some would say stubborn—throughout his entire political career in regards to philosophical issues, that the public "knew" he would oppose the war resolution bill before he ever uttered any public statement. This predictability may well have been one of the prime reasons for La Follette to be singled out by the press as the nation's chief opponent of war. 3 The Congressional Record, 65th Congress, 1st Session, Volume 55, p. 155. 26

The New York Herald gave indication of what the rest

of the nation’s leading papers were to say about

La Follette on that fateful day, when its early April 4

edition exclaimed that "Americanism will assert itself in

the Senate . '. . [because] administration leaders, thwarted

. . .in their attempt to obtain immediate consideration of

the resolution declaring a state of war between the United

States and Germany by the filibustering tactics of Senator

Robert M. La Follette of Wisconsin, pacifist leader of the

'little group of wilful men,’ intend to keep the resolution 4 continuously before the Senate until it is voted upon."

One by one, the nation’s other newspapers repeated

the Herald's editorial attitude.Nowhere, however, was the condemnation greater than in the press of La Follette's home state of Wisconsin. The Wausau Record-Herald, for

instance, while commenting that it did "not want to put

itself in contempt of the United States Senate nor endanger its postal privileges," nevertheless ventured "the mild assertion that the United States has stood for as much of his peculiar statesmanship as it can stand." "He is on the

^Editorial appearing in The New York Herald, April 4, 1917. 5 For the most part during his career, La Follette was supported more by small town newspapers and viewed with some suspicion by those in larger cities with a big business interest. See James E. Jackson's "Wisconsin's Attitude toward American Foreign Policy since 1910," M.A. Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1934, for an interesting discussion of press reactions. 27

wrong side," added the Record-Herald, "One may even 6 justifiably surmise that he is in the wrong country."

The Janesville Gazette, apparently not as concerned

with endangering its postal privilege as the Record-Herald,

simply stated that "Caesar had his Brutus, Wisconsin its

Robert M. La Follette." The Gazette went onto declare

that "every loyal citizen of the great State bows his head with shame as the news is recounted that of all the Senators

in Washington, Wisconsin's representative alone raised his

voice in protest against the unanimous consent to call for 7 passage, a question vital to the life of this nation . . ."

Even one of his own home-town presses, The Madison

Morning Democrat joined the chorus. Immediately following his denial of unanimous consent, the Democrat editorialized that "Wisconsin is disappointed, chagrined, indignant.

Exasperation must first ensue, then disgust. Senator La

Follette's ultrapacifism at a time when Tunerican merchant­ men are being torpedoed in piratical fashion presents a 8 world spectacle in pitiful isolation." The pre-speech attack on La Follette, however, was not limited merely to the press of the nation. On the

^Editorial appearing in The Wausau Record-Herald, April 4, 1917. ,7 The Janesville Gazette, April 4, 1917. 8 . Editorial appearing in The Madison Morning Democrat, April 4, 1917. 28

evening of April 3, 1917, only hours after the Senator had

demanded the "regular order," a group of students at the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology burned La Follette in

effigy and "executed an Indian war dance about the burning" 9 dummy. On that same evening, Dr. Franklin Giddings,

Professor of Sociology at Columbia University, exclaimed in

an address before the Institute of Arts and Sciences: "We

read tonight that a declaration of war that might have been

made today was delayed by one Robert La Follette. Men have

often made up lists of 'immortals.' Among the 'immortals'

whose 'immortality' is sure are Robert La Follette, William

Jennings Bryan, James Buchanan, Benedict Arnold and Judas

Iscariot. Their claim is safe.

Yet, in spite of the storm of discontent which was

raging outside the Senate chambers, La Follette sat sedately

through the hours of debate preceding what his wife later termed "The Last Stand Against War."^ Finally, at shortly

9 Wire service story appearing in The New York Tribune, April 5, 1917. ^New York American, April 4, 1917.

11 There appears to be a discrepa'n cy m• the accounts of La Follette's activities during the debates preceding his speech against the war resolution bill. The Wisconsin State Journal (April 4, 1917) indicated that La Follette was not present during the hours of debate leading up to his speech. La Follette's wife, however, in her biography states that while La Follette was indeed absent when the roll was called to begin the debates on the war bill in the early morning, he entered the chamber shortly after the roll call and remained quietly in his seat until it was his turn to speak at approximately 3:45 p.m. 29 before four o'clock, as "Senators who had been in the smoking room hurried to their seats" and as "men and women in the crowded galleries leaned forward expectantly," La 12 Follette rose to take the floor. "There was no conflict within himself," his wife Belle Case was to say in the biography she wrote of her husband many years after his death. She continued: "He had, during this period, the strength and serenity which come only from inner unity.

His steady course was guided by the pattern of the past.

He was sustained against attack by the faith that was in him. It was a simple faith, but a faith deeply rooted in the experience of his own life. Its origin must be sought in the little town of Primrose and the State of Wisconsin, where he grew up among hardworking pioneer folk from many different lands. Of the millions of words heretofore written regard­ ing La Follette's stand on the War Resolution Bill, as well as on his major speeches against various war measures dur­ ing the first few months of the war, the above statement by

Belle Case La Follette serves as an accurate assessment of the motivation behind those speeches. To understand La

Follette's rhetoric during World War I, it is, indeed,

^New York World, April 5, 1917.

13R.M.L., p. 657. 3.0 imperative to go beyond the military issues of the moment, to go beyond the surrounding national environment of war hysteria, to go beyond the Senate debates and the legisla­ tive resolutions and bills, and to put his speeches into the context of the continuing progressive struggle that was, in fact, the impetus behind La Follette’s entire political career. As Belle Case claimed, they must be viewed as part of "a steady course" that "was guided by the pattern of the past."

The mosaic on the floor of St. Peter's Cathedral, which is perceived as disheveled, kaleidoscopic colors and shapes as one stands on it, becomes a symmetrical, well- organized design when seen from the cathedral's balconies.

So too, La Follette's speeches of 1917, when viewed "up close," from the immediate perspective of the surrounding war environment of 1917, seem a confusing montage of arguments, rhetorical devices, and philosophies. This view­ point was clearly illustrated by the American correspondent to the London Times when discussing La Follette's wartime escapades a'few years after the war: "Go out into the street of any large American city, pick at random a dozen men and women and ask ‘them to tell you in a word or two what Senator La Follette is, and you shall have as many answers as there are persons. You will be told that he is a demagogue, a man with no convictions, consumed by his vanity, a patriot, a defeatist, a pacifist, the one honest 31

man in politics, a socialist, a second Lincoln, the friend 14 of the people, the enemy of monopoly and greed."

Certainly, the list of different evaluations of

La Follette's wartime activity could go on and on. Indeed,

it does. Just as certainly, each of these evaluations is,

in a very real sense, correct. For, to analyze his speeches

"up close" against the limited backdrop of war is much like,

analyzing the mosaic floor of St. Peter's "up close": it

depends upon the perspective of where you stand to make any

sense of either.

Like St. Peter's mosaic, however, each of La

Follette's wartime speeches fills a definite place in a well

organized and clearly-composed picture when they are viewed

from a distance or, in La Follette's case, when they are

viewed in the perspective of his entire political life.

Placed in the framework, or pattern, of La Follette's

career, these five speeches function as very necessary and

integral pieces in a well-composed philosophical design that 15 he had been creating for some thirty years.

14 . Edward N. Doan, The La Follettes and the Wisconsin Idea (New York: Rinehart & Company, 1947), p. 135. 15 Robert M. La Follette made his "maiden" speech in the hallowed halls of Congress on April 22, 1886, some thirty years before his senate speech against the war reso­ lution bill. His maiden speech delivered soon after he took his seat as the youngest member of the 49th Congress, dealt with a Rivers and Harbors bill then under consideration. Even in this short initial speech, La Follette exemplified his "constitutional" ideology when he argued that only 32

Thus, to evaluate La Follette's speeches of 1917

fully, it is necessary to take them out of the context of

the prevailing war issues and to put them in the context of

the progressive movement or, better yet, to place them

within the framework of La Follette's peculiar brand of

progressivism which has been commonly referred to as

"La Follettism."Although La Follette was to speak

against certain war measures of 1917, his underlying moti­

vation for those speeches had begun as early as 1885. To

La Follette, war had not provided the issues. He was not

primarily concerned with the moral, ethical, or legal

implications of war per se. Rather, the war had provided

the forum for him to speak once again to the "real" issues,

the issues of La Follette's progressivism.

It does not seem necessary, however, to go back quite as far as "the little town of Primrose," which Belle

Case La Follette claims holds the key to his attitudes, to gain a starting point for Robert La Follette's progressive philosophy. Certainly, like many other great historical

figures, a case can be made for the events of La Follette's internal improvements that were in the best interests of the national welfare should be pursued at the cost of federal funds. This attitude toward internal improvements coincides almost exactly to the attitudes of the "strict construction­ ists" during the period of 1800-1850. ■^it became a commonplace among Wisconsin news­ papers dueing La Follette’s governorship to refer to his progressive policies by this term. 33 early childhood days having made some subconscious or even conscious impact on the later development of his political theory. ’ With the exception of the interesting aside that

La Follette’s name was said to have originated from a twelfth-century ancestor who had earned the sobriquet

Le Follet—"the Reckless"—for his headlong valor in battle, there is very little of special significance in La

Follette's early life from which to predict his future political endeavors.^

It was not until La Follette was enrolled at the

University of Wisconsin in Madison that he first encountered what would serve as the initial stitches in the intricate tapestry known as La Follettism. His tremendous admiration for the speeches and writings of Robert Ingersoll began here. Through the reading of Ingersoll's books and by never missing "an opportunity to hear him speak," Robert

La Follette soon became enamoured with Ingersoll's absolute belief in humanitarian principles which parallel La 18 Follette's eventual progressive philosophy quite closely. That Ingersoll's genuine love for freedom and courage had an impact on La Follette is evident from the following paragraph taken from La Follette's autobiography:

"Ingersoll had a tremendous influence on me, as indeed he

17 Alexander, p. 153. 18 Autobiography, p. 35. 34

had upon many young men of that time. It was not that he

changed my beliefs, but that he liberated my mind. Freedom

was what he preached: he wanted the shackles off every­

where. He wanted men to think boldly about all things: he

demanded intellectual and moral courage. He wanted men to 19 follow wherever truth might lead them." La Follette might justifiably.have extended this indication of the

impact Ingersoll's belief in the human masses had on him personally to an expression of its place in La Follette's evolving progressivism. For it is indeed interesting to note that one of the major cornerstones of La Follettism, an uncompromising faith in the final judgments of common men and women, parallels one of the major themes which 20 underscored most of Ingersoll's works.

19 Autobiography, p. 34.

20A devoted agnostic, Robert Ingersoll was well known for his philosophical belief that man, not God, was the final judge of all earthly actions. At the foundation of almost every Ingersoll speech or lecture was this ultimate uncompromising attitude that man was the supreme ruler of his own destiny. Because of this thesis, Ingersoll opposed all forms, religious or non-sectarian, of control which took away man's freedom to make his own decisions. In his own way he put absolute trust in his fellow humans to make the "right" judgements. In analyz­ ing La Follette’s speeches and writings this same philo­ sophical belief in man continually arises. Indeed, the final words given at La Follette's funeral exemplified this lifelong trait when Dr. A. E. Haydon stated, "His voice was the voice of humanism in politics ... we shall remember him as one who in a cynical age loved and kept his faith in humble men and Women. He was always ready to trust the people ..." 35

Yet, while Ingersoll may have influenced the moral

and ethical foundation of La Follettism--a foundation which

was so powerful that even La Follette's most bitter

opponents could not fail to admire his unwavering honest

and fairness—-it was a speech by Edward G. Ryan, then Chief

Justice of Wisconsin, that appears to have had the strongest

influence upon La Follettism during those early university

years. Speaking to the graduating class at Madison in

June, 1873, just a few_months prior to La Follette's

entrance into the University, Chief Justice Ryan unknowingly

provided one of the strongest motivations for La Follette's

journey toward progressivism when he warned:

There is looming up a new and dark power. I cannot dwell upon the signs and shocking omens of its advent. The accumulation of individual wealth seems to be greater than it ever has since the downfall of the Roman Empire. The enterprises of the country are aggre­ gating vast corporate combinations of unexampled capital, boldly marching, not for economic conquests only, but for political power . . . already, here at home, one great corporation has trifled with the sovereign power, and insulted the state. There is a grave fear that it, and its great rival, have confeder­ ated to make partition of the state and share it as spoils. . . . The question will arise and arise in your day, though perhaps not fully in mine, "Which shall rule—who shall fill public stations--educated and patriotic free men, or feudal serfs of corporate capital?"21

La Follette himself attested to the impact Ryan's prophetic words had upon him by claiming that he "never 22 shall forget the speech." More importantly, those words

21 2 2 Autobiography, p. 23. Autobiography, p. 23. 36

spoken in 1873 found their way into hundreds of La

Follette's progressive speeches some thirty years later.

Indeed, there is little question that a La Follette

editorial written some forty-five years after that occasion 23 paralleled Ryan's speech almost word for word.

There is ample evidence to support the contention

that both Ingersoll’s demotion to humanitarianism and

Ryan's fear of monopolism's suppression of the individual

may be counted among the earliest philosophies to be

eventually absorbed into La Follette's progressive ideology.

It would be foolhardy, however, to dwell at any length upon

either of these events or, for that matter, upon any of the

particular events which ultimately provided the threads for

his progressive tapestry. Like every major philosophy,

La Follettism was not woven from a specific incident, but

from a series of items, events, happenings, and ideas that fused into an ultimate attitude. Thus, it would be inane

to itemize everything that may or may not have affected La Follettism. Whether or not its initial strands came from

Ingersoll or Ryan, whether or not they came—as some historians claim, and with some justification, since La

Follette himself supports the contention—from an early political incident with "Boss" Keyes, or whether or not

2 3 Robert M. La Follette, "The People Lost—Wealth Won," La Follette's Magazine, Volume IX (September, 1917), pp. 1-77 La Follette also often used the phrase "Who shall rule—wealth or man" in his Chautauqua speeches. 37

they stem simply from La Follette's own intellect, spirt, 24 and creativity is not of real concern here. The fact

remains that the basic tenets of La Follettism obviously

began during his early life in Wisconsin. Of far greater

importance, however, is discovering the various elements

that constitute La Follettism and how those elements con­

trolled his every thought for more than forty years of .

political life.

Although historically linked to the progressive move­

ment-historian Russel Nye claims he was "the real leader"

of Midwestern progressivism and "its greatest"--La Follette 25 never truly embraced all that is termed progressivism.

This is not to say that La Follette was not a progressive.

Indeed, he was. It is to say that the perimeter of La

Follettism falls somewhere within the much larger and more

elusive boundaries of progressive thought in general.

The task of delimiting La Follettism within progres­ sivism, however, is not an easy one. The problem is not so much one of defining La Follette's peculiar ideology but of

24 La Follette claimed m his autobiography that a leading Wisconsin party "boss" had tried to "bribe" him early in his career and that the incident was a major factor in his decision to take the "progressive" path politically. As La Follette claimed, "Nothing else ever came into my life that exerted such a powerful influence upon me as that affair. It was,the turning point, in a way, of my career." See Autobiography, Chapter IV, pp. 135-175. 25 Russel Nye, Midwestern Progressive Politics (East Lansing: Michigan State College Press, 1951) r p. 206. 38

defining the much more confusing and complex progressive

structure of which it is but a part. Certainly, while "pro­

gressivism" and "the progressive movement" have been

popular pieces of historical jargon used to define events

and ideas existing in America in the late nineteenth century

and early twentieth century, there has not been as much

popular agreement on what those terms denote.

Take, for example, historian Arthur S. Link's state­

ment that national progressivism was "never an organized or

independent movement," and place it alongside Charles

Forcey's contention that the progressive movement, "at the

national level . . . waxed strong . . . for at least 27 fifteen years . . . and few exceed its accomplishments."

While admittedly these two statements are not necessarily

contradictory, they do indicate the difficulty in coming

to grips with standard definitions of progressivism and the progressive movement. This confusion led Stanley Caine, in

the recent work The Progressive Era, to claim that "pro­

gressivism has become a catchall, a cliche" that describes 2 8 little because it is used to "characterize too much."

q /- Arthur S. Link, "What Happened to the Progressive Movement in the 1920's?" in John Milton Cooper, Jr., ed., Causes and Consequences of World War 1^ (New York: Quadrangle Books, 1972), p. 208. 2 7 • • Charles Forcey, The Crossroads of Liberalism (London: Oxford University Press, 1961), p. xiv. 2 8 Caine, p. 34. 39 Despite Caine’s complaint, a voluminous number of works during the past quarter century have significantly added to the understanding of progressivism. While contra­ dictory judgments are still readily apparent, they are due more to the nature of progressivism than to the individual historical evaluations of it. For at its height, progres­ sivism, or the progressive era, intertwined so many different ideologies, involved so many different stratas of society, and influenced so many divergent political, moral, economic, and religious groups and theories that it is impossible to arrive at universally acceptable definitions 29 of the term and the period.

29 . Many historians have brought significant insight into defining progressivism. Some works, such as Arthur Link's Wilson : Campaigns for Progressivism and Peace, 1916- 1917, George Mowry’s Theodore Roosevelt and the Progressive Movement, Edward Doan's The La Follettes and the Wisconsin Idea, and Alfred Lief's Democracy's Norris have provided definitions for progressivism from the perspective of the various men who "led" the progressive movement. Some historians have helped denote progressivism by looking at it from a geographical or state basis: Russel Nye, Midwestern Progressive Politics ; Paul R. Fossurn, The Agrar­ ian Movement in North Dakota; Jeanette Nichols and J. G. Randall , Democracy in the Middle West, 1840-194 0 ; W. L. Ramey, Wisconsin: A Story of Its Progress ; and George Mowry, The California Progressives. Other historians have taken more divergent, but nonetheless invaluable approaches to progressivism. Charles Forcey's The Crossroads of Liberalism, for example, attempts to provide an understanding of progressivism by analyzing the writing and thoughts of the three early editor/writers of the progressive magazine New Republic. Robert Wiebe's Businessmen and Reform and James Weinstein's The Corporate Ideal in the Liberal State : 1900-1918 take the approach of looking at progressivism in terms of the contributing thoughts and ideas of businessmen, both small and powerful. 40

For want of that specific, all-encompassing definition, it may be argued that progressivism denotes a general awakening of the American conscience to the ills of

society that were at least in part a result of a period of great industrial, political, and economic growth in the

United States. Following the Civil War, Americans turned their attention to the rebuilding of a nation. Industry boomed. Great cities arose. Wealth became more and more accessible to certain segments of the American populance.

Railroads, the key to this new America, proliferated across

American soil. What was once the western "frontier" became tamed.

In this period of upwardly spiralling industrial and economic growth, however, many of the traditional American values and ideals were temporarily lost. Democracy became somewhat subservient to industrialization. The notion of equality among all Americans was soon replaced by the fact of aristocratic wealth and a distinct social stratification

Opportunity gradually lost out to business monopoly. The . land of plenty became the domain of a few. As Russel Nye describes this transition: "The nation still paid its respects to the traditional concepts of liberty and equality expressed so brilliantly by the eighteenth century but at the same time, development in economics and politics especially, pointed directly away from them. The amassing 41 of huge fortunes, the stifling of individual opportunity by monopoly, the corruption that inevitably followed politics- in-business and business-in-politics, the stratification of society that economic consolidation seemed to bring about— all these made in extremely hard to adjust old democratic ideas to contemporary practice.

By the birth of the twentieth century, a new nation- strong, powerful, and wealthy—had been built. The cost of construction had been high, however. The traditional political, moral, and economic ideals held by the American people had been part of the price. Thus came the progres­ sive movement. "In its essence," George.Mowry contends,

"the progressive movement was a great social reaction against the preceding age." It was a reaction manifested in reform, however, not in revolution.' For the progressive movement, in a very real sense, was not a "movement" at all. Rather, it was a reform impulse that permeated all facets of American life. Nor was it truly "progressive," if the root of that word is accepted as "change." On the contrary, much of progressivism was a striving for the old ideals and traditional values which had been somehow lost during America’s industrialization. "In spirit," Mowry 31 contends, "it was as old as America itself."

30..N.ye, p. 26.

31Mowry, p. 10. . 42

Originally the reform impulse called progressivism

found its roots in the midwestern farmer and laborer.

Eventually however, it pervaded all geographic and social

segments of America. "Movements with tolerable progressive

credentials," argues Lewis Gould, "have been found in the

agrarian South, among machine politicians in the city,

within technical and professional groups, the military, the

arts, as well as in the more familiar political environs of 32 middle-class America." James Weinstein lists businessmen

and even the trust magnates among those who "pressed for

ref,o rm. „33

Just as the reform impulse was widespread, so too were the aims of that impulse. Although initially progres­

sivism was a movement designed toward reforming "big business" and "government," it eventually found other

targets, including religion, conservation, art, education, and technology. Indeed, in its broadest sense, progressiv­

ism included moral, ethical, and economic, as well as

social and political, reform. Almost no segment of society remained unaligned with the reform impulse. As Otis Graham comments: All three major faiths in America, Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, experienced internal questioning and a

33Gould, p. 8. 33James Weinstein, "Introduction," The Corporate Ideal in the Liberal State: 1900-1918 (Boston: Beacon Press, 196 8), p. xiii. 43

realignment toward a greater sense of social relevance, at least in the urban areas and among religious writers and thinkers. Painting and literature reflected social themes, often critically. Legal and Constitutional thought developed a strong interest in social facts, relied on precedent. Old professions such as medicine, engineering, and the law reverberated with calls to duty, to social activism, to community as well as client service. New professions sprang up—social work, city planning, public health—where young people could prepare technical solutions to pressing moral problems. Psychotherapy emerged within psychiatry, behavioralism within psychology, and attacked their enervated parent disciplines for their lack of fervor, their lack of interest in improved human behavior, their lack of appreciation of the malleability of man and his future.34

In retrospect, then, the "progressive movement" was quite simply a reaffirmation of the traditional American values and ideals existing prior to industrialization, rather than a revolution of change. Certainly change occurred, and new ideas and concepts were formulated by progressivism. It would have been impossible to relocate old, traditional beliefs into a new modern nation without change. Russel Nye has asked, "How could the political philosophy of Jefferson and Jackson be grafted onto the 35 system of Spencer, Darwin and Rockefeller?" So too might we ask how the firmly-rooted social, moral, religious, and economic values from a traditional, agrarian society could be placed onto a nation of corporations, big cities,

340tis L. Graham, Jr., The Great Campaigns: Reform and War in America, 1900-1928 (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice- Hall, 1971), p. 26. 33Nye, p. 27. 44

railroads, and industry. The answer was to be found in progressivism.

Falling well within the broad perimeter of progres­ sive reform was La Follette's particular brand of progres­ sivism. Unlike the more all-encompassing movement,

La Follettism was limited almost entirely to the political arena.

This should not be interpreted to mean, however, that

La Follette did not recognize the necessity for other types of reform. Like other progressive leaders, whether they were in politics, education, religion, or business, their reform impulse penetrated into areas outside their immediate disciplines. La Follette, for example, was a popular spokesman for the then-emerging woman's equality movement. From his earliest days in government, he strongly supported the American Indian and repeatedly attempted to protect that particular race from unethical and corrupt business and governmental transactions. Finally, he was a powerful advocate of conservation reform. Yet taken as a whole, La Follettism was overwhelm­ ingly political in its thrust. Although occasionally displaying tangential interest in social, economic, and environmental issues, La Follette's entire career focused narrowly upon governmental reform. To him, governmental reform was the heart of progressivism. Other types of reform were dependent upon it. 45

Like progressivism in general, however, La Follette's political progressivism did not demand the development of a new or changed system. Rather, La Follettism centered upon the emergence of an organized, cohesive, and energetic program for restoring to the people the basic rights of democratic government that had been given to them in The

Declaration of Independence and Constitution, but which had been lost during America's industrialization. La Follette was not interested in building a "new" democracy. He was interested in the restoration of the "old" democracy.

A close scrutiny of the more than forty years he spent in politics uncovers the definite portrait of a man obsessed with the constitutional rights which were granted almost a hundred years earlier in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Jeffersonian in his fervent belief in a people's government,

La Follette nonetheless was able to understand that relocating Jeffersonian ideals into twentieth century society necessitated a regulatory central government.

Indeed, La Follettism might be viewed as bridging the gap between individual freedom and government regulation

Hostettler argues that he was at once "a Jeffersonian and a Hamiltonian." La Follette saw no real conflict between the two philosophies. If individual freedom and representa­ tive government were to be realities in the twentieth

■^Hostettler, p. 119. 46

century, government must control those forces in society,

including itself, which destroyed such freedom and

representation!

Always at the core of La Follettism, however, was

the firm belief in a constitutional government "of the

people, by the people, for the people." This tritely simple,

yet imaginative belief was the total breadth and depth of

La Follettism in a nutshell. Directly and indirectly, it provided the undercurrent for every La Follette speech.

Directly and indirectly, it established the foundation for

every La Follette argument. In effect, La Follette was

able to formulate a panacea, right or wrong, for every

national, state, or local problem through this one belief.

Very likely, no one political figure in American history was so singularly one-dimensional in his approach to

the vast multitude of issues which comprise a normal political lifespan. Although La Follette debated legis­

lation ranging from railroad regulation to freedom of the

seas, from direct primaries to war financing, from corporate taxation to conscription, never once did his rhetoric stray / too far from the essential tenets of the "constitutional" i foundation. / /' In a very real sense "La Follettism" was synonymous with "constitutionalism," for La Follette seemed to view his mission in life as being that of a protector of both the spirit and the letter of that document. Even at those z M times when he was ostensibly attacking proposed legislation at the state and national levels, the underlying current of his speeches emitted a constitutional position. Nowhere is this constitutional position more clearly evident than in the first few paragraphs of his famous Chautauqua speech

"Representative Government." This speech, developed over a twenty-year span of La Follette's career and representing almost in their entirety the basic principles of La

Follette's progressivism, was primarily a lecture explaining the many evils of big business and monopolistic 37 business practices. Yet, when analyzed thoroughly the underlying thread throughout the entire five- to seven-hour speech defends the constitutional rights of man. This is immediately evident in the proem of the Representative

Government speech, when La Follette declares: Betrayed by his representative the individual tax-payer is over taxed for the benefit of the corporation. Taxation without representation is as much a crime against just and equal government in 1903 as it was in 1776. Government by corporations is as destructive of the liberties of the people of this country as the exercise of the same power by a foreign monarch. The arbitrary control of the price of coal and iron and corn and wheat and beef,—whether by an extortionate transportation rate or by a monster combination, is a more absolute tyranny of the American people than quartering the army of King George upon the American colonists without their consent. There Can be no such thing as commercial slavery and individual freedom. We may have the privilege of the ballot, we may have the semblance of democracy, but industrial servitude means

37 For the text and an analysis of that speech, see Hartman. 48

political servitude. Monopoly in transportation and coal and iron and the food products, makes a pretence and a mockery of political freedom. Let us see if the time be not ripe for a New Declaration of American Independence. We are building up collossal fortunes granting unlimited power to corporate organization and consolidating and massing together business interests as never before in the commercial history of•the world, but the people are losing control of their own government. Its foundations are being sapped and its integrity destroyed. "What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" What shall it profit a nation if it gain untold wealth and its people lose their liberty?38

As can be readily seen in the above few hundred words, La Follette, although setting up a major rhetorical

attack upon big business and "monster combinations" never veered from a recognizably constitutional basis as support

for his position. While there is no question, either in the proem or in the remainder of the speech, that La

Follette was opposed to corporate monopoly, there is little to indicate that his opposition was based upon the moral, ethical, or legal grounds of monopolies per se♦ Rather,

La Follette's opposition seems well-tied to the ramifica­ tions of this corporate power upon the constitutional rights and freedoms of his fellow Americans.

La Follette even goes so far as to ask for a "New

Declaration of American Independence" which, one gathers throughout the rest of La Follette's speech, is based

o p Robert M. La Follette, "Representative Government," Appendix A, Hartman, p. 166. 49 almost entirely upon the old Declaration of 'Independence and, moreover, upon the original constitution. Maryann

Hartman’s analysis of La Follette's speech upholds this constitutional position by showing that La Follette's solution to the "problems of democracy" was simply "more 39 democracy!"

Indeed, if there remains any question as to La

Follette's underlying constitutional concern, he himself settled the issue, when he argues near the end of "Repre­ sentative Government" that: "The great essential principle of the democracy asserted in the Declaration of Independence and guaranteed by the Constitution remains the same through all time; but the maintenance, the preservation of the right from ursurpation and encroachment under changing con- 40 ditions is the duty of each day and generation." It couldn't have been stated "more clearly.

Certainly, it may be argued that "Representative

Government" is but one speech and therefore may not provide sufficient evidence to support the contention that La

Follette's every action was based exclusively upon a constitutional philosophy. It should be remembered here, . however, that La Follette gave this one speech literally hundreds of times over a twenty-five year period with

39 Hartman, p. 150. ^Hartman, p. 2 37 50

almost no changes in content. Of even more significance,

however, is La Follette's own evaluation of the speech

given in the introduction he used when delivering "Repre­

sentative Government" to a new audience:

"Representative Government" the title under which I have chosen to discuss the political issues of today, as .1 understand them, has been frequently criticized by Chautauqua managers and others interested, and I have been importuned to change it for amore "catching" phrase to the eye and ear of a popular audience. But I have adhered to it, because it seemed to me to express more truthfully than any other language, my essential purpose. And it is the best answer I can give to the question when publishers and men and women have asked me to discuss "What I stand for in politics and govern­ ment. "41

Yet, while "Representative Government" may be the

most classic and clear-cut rhetorical example of La

Follettism's constitutionalism it is by no means the only

example. On the contrary, it can be found as the under­

lying theme for the vast multitudes of La Follette's

speeches and writings throughout his entire life. It was evident, for example, in La Follette's maiden speech before the Congress in 1886, where he declared an internal

improvement bill unconstitutional on the grounds that it did not improve the "general welfare" of the majority of _ - 42 Americans.

41 La Follette Papers, Box 87. 4^Congressional Record, 49th Congress, 1st Session, Volume 17, April 22, 1886, pp. 3747-3748. 51

It was evident in La Follette's maiden campaign

speech launching his candidacy for the Wisconsin Governor­

ship in 1900. Arguing that the "convention and caucus sys­

tem" had weakened and subverted "the elementary principle

of representative government," La Follette made the major

plank of his proposed platform a direct primary which would

"place nominations in the hands of the voters" and thus 43 make "candidates directly responsible to the people."

It was evident in his famous Senate speech on the

Hepburn Act in 1906, when, in refuting the Senate's vow not

to listen to the public's clamor regarding the bill, La

Follette argued, "I respect public opinion. I do not fear

it. I do not hold it in contempt. The public judgment of

this great country forms slowly. It is intelligent. No

body of men in this country is superior to it. In a repre­

sentative democracy the common judgment of the majority must find expression in the law of the land. To deny this

is to repudiate the principles upon which representative 44 democracy is founded."

It is evident even in La Follette's supposed non­ political speeches as exemplified by his speech at the

^Robert M. La Follette, "Robert M. La Follette's First Speech," pamphlet reprinted from the Milwaukee Sentinel, Wisconsin State Historical Society Archives, p. 22. 4 4 Congressional Record, 59th Congress, . 1st Sessi• on, Volume 40, April 19, 1906, p. 5678. 52

Annual Banquet of the Periodical?Publishers Association in

1912. The occasion called for an "after-dinner" speech—a speech normally designed on a more lighthearted basis.

However, La Follette did not hesitate to use even this occasion.

Opening this "after-dinner" speech with the state­ ment that "the great issue, before the American people" centers upon "the control of their own government," La

Follette spent the rest of the evening espousing constitu- 45 tionalism. At one point he argued that the progressive movement was a "fight to maintain human liberty, the rights of all the people." 46 At another juncture, when once agai■ n ■ attacking big business, La Follette almost duplicated a segment of his representative government speech when he contended that the "supreme control of the business of the country is the triumph of men who at every step defied public opinion, the common law and criminal statutes." "The condition," he further argued, "is intolerable. It is hostile to every principle of democracy. If maintained it is the end of democracy. We may preserve the form of our representative government and lose the soul, the spirit of 47 our free institutions."

^Autobiography, p. 76 2. ’

46 Autobiography, p. 763. 47Autobiography, p. 769. 53

Although the above represents only a few sentences

drawn from literally hundreds of La Follette speeches

available, the same findings occur over and over again with

other speeches and other quotes. For, like a broken

record, La Follettism, or constitutionalism, or whatever

semantic label one chooses, repeats itself throughout

almost all of La Follette’s rhetoric. It was, indeed, his motivation for political existence.

As is obvious to even the most casual reader, La

Follette's perception of constitutionalism carried with it the corollary that the viability of the document came from the people living under its tenets. In La Follettism, the one cannot be separated from the other: constitutionalism is the glove on the hand of the people. Without the power of the people behind it, the Constitution would be but a hollow shell, a travesty of democratic principles.

La Follette advances this contention in the intro­ duction to his autobiography: We have long rested comfortably in this country upon the assumption that because our form of government was democratic, it was therefore automatically produc­ ing democratic results. Now, there is nothing mysteriously potent about the forms and names of demo­ cratic institutions that should make them self­ operative. Tyranny and oppression are just as possible under democratic forms as under any other. We are slow to realize that democracy is a life; and involves continual struggle. It is only as those of every generation who love democracy with all their might the encroachments of its enemies that the ideals of representative government can even be nearly approxi­ mated. 54

The essence of the Progressive movement, as I see it, lies in its purpose to uphold the fundamental principles of representative government. It expresses the hopes and desires of millions of common men and women who are willing to fight for their ideals, to take defeat if necessary, and still go on fighting.^8

It was this attitude which caused La Follette to assert what became a battle-cry for his form of progres­ sivism: that "the will of the people shall be the law of the land." His adament faith caused him to declare that

"the composite judgment is always safer and wiser and stronger and more unselfish than the judgment of any one individual mind. The people have never failed in any great crisis in history." 49

La Follette's faith in the people, however, was tempered by his requirement of an educated and knowledgeable electorate. Just as he insisted that the Constitution would be just so many empty words without the will of the people behind it, he acknowledged that the will of the people would be but a revelation of. prejudice without facts, knowledge, and awareness to provide a basis for their decisions. Thus, "facts" became the solid foundation upon which the basic beliefs of La Follettism were carefully constructed. La Follette himself was noted for a great reliance upon knowledge. As Governor of Wisconsin, he made

4 8„"Introduction," Autobiography, p. x. 49 Nye, p. 200. 55 it a policy "in order to bring all the reserves of

knowledge and inspiration of the university more fully to

the service of the people, to appoint experts from the

university whenever possible upon the important boards of the state."50 His quest for the facts before making a

speech or a decision as a congressman would sometimes put

two staff members to work on research. When appointed to

the Committee on Indian Affairs, an area in which he at

first had extremely limited experience, "he promptly

invested quite a little money in secondhand books about the

Indians, had treaties and public documents sent to his

rooms, and devoted himself to the study of Indian Affairs."51

Reliance upon finding out the truth for his own work

extended itself into his attitude toward his constituency.

When fighting for an idea, La Follette would begin "an educational campaign to win the understanding and support 52 of the people." In order to keep his voters in contact with leading issues and events, he would send copies of speeches "to each person on the township lists and some- times to the poll lists." 53 The importance of knowledge to

La Follette was capsulized in the subtitle to the magazine

50 Autobiography, p. 31 51 R.M.L., p. 64. 52 53 R.M.L. , p . 119. R.M.L., P 67. 56 he founded in 1909: "Ye shall know the truth and the truth 54 shall make you free."

La Follette was realist enough to recognize that the assimilation and acceptance of facts does not take place overnight. The change in Wisconsin's political situation which led to La Follette's nomination for Congress was attributed by Belle Case La Follette "to the cumulative effect of the previous years of work: To speaking campaigns ... to wide distribution of literature relating 55 to the issues, to newspaper discussion."

La Follette's patience and determination blazed a trail for the constant repetition of the facts which he knew would eventually win the people. He was to repeat this belief at many times and in many ways, as he did in his autobiography when discussing his fight against machine rule in Wisconsin:

I thought it all over. It was clear to me that the only way to beat boss and ring rule was to keep the people thoroughly informed. Machine control is based upon misrepresentation and ignorance. Democracy is based upon knowledge. It is of first importance that the people shall know about their government and the work of their public servants. "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." This I have always believed vital to self-government. Immediately following my election to Congress I worked out a complete plan for keeping my constituents informed on public issues and the record of my services in Congress; it is the system I have used in constantly widening circles ever since.56

54 La Follette's Magazine, passim. 55~> R.M.L., p. 131. 5 °6Autobiography, p. 64. 57

La Follette's attitude toward the need of the people

to know the truth in order to do what is right has not gone unnoticed. Edward N. Doan has noted that "The Jeffersonian principle of the intelligent electorate as the firm

foundation of democracy kep recurting in the utterances of

Senator La Follette .... He often used the Senate as a sounding board to echo to the people those ideas about democracy at work which he considered important. He never hesitated to repeat and repeat those ideas .... He recognized, too, the need of the people for authentic information.

Carroll P. Lahman also identified La Follette's deeply ingrained reliance upon the use of facts from which the people could form their opinions. Lahman states that

La Follette's method of going directly to the boter was

"the outgrowth of his profound faith in the soundness of the common people, once they understood the issues. To give them understanding he gave them facts, often unadulterated figures and statistics at great length or in 5 8 unbelievable quantities."

These were the techniques and beliefs to which

Robert Marion La Follette clung, whether in the limelight of general applause or the searchlight of overwhelming criticism. He would never cease to doggedly follow his

S^Doan, p. 98. ^Lahman, p. 946. 58

course of educating the people so they could make reasoned

judgments and insist upon governmental actions that would

fulfill the requirements of the Constitution.

It was these techniques and beliefs that fortified

Robert Marion La Follette as he prepared to denounce the

issues of the war which he thought ignored them. His good

friend Henry Huber commented on this steadfast faith:

"La Follette, war or no war, hysteria or no hysteria, stood

firmly on the progressive principle . . . that if the

Constitution, with its guarantee of freedom of speech,

means anything at all it should be followed irrespective of

accidents of history, and that being at war is no excuse to

suspend the Constitution." It was these techniques and

beliefs that constituted La Follettism. It was to these

techniques and beliefs to which La Follette would once again

return in denouncing the war issues which crossed his

heartfelt political philosophy.

59 Henry Huber Papers Wisconsin State Historical Society Archives, p. 137. 55

CHAPTER III

"IN THE WORLDS DARKEST HOURS"

Robert Marion La Follette began his speech opposing

American entry in war with the reading of a telegram from a "North Dakota Farm Woman," protesting "on behalf of her son against the slaughter of war."’ Almost prophetically, the telegram, which had not been part of La Follette's prepared speech, had been handed to him as he walked to the floor to deliver what he believed to be a speech on behalf 2 of "the hard-working folk of America." Thus, buoyed by this small reaffirmation of his chosen course, La Follette commenced his speech. He knew all too well that the words he was about to express would add fuel to the already existing flames of public condemnation and vilification surrounding him. Yet, as had been the case so many times in his past when facing public ridicule for making stands on issues he felt were right, La Follette drove straight ahead. Certainly,

"unpopularity with his colleagues and with the press had never fazed La Follette in the past." Historian Allen Kent

’'New York Herald, April 5, 1917. 2 R.M.L., p. 652. 60 was to say in later years, and they could not "be expected 3 to make him alter his stand on the great' issue of war."

On the contrary, "the war clamor and denunciation of the press were as a whisper in his ears” when compared to the overwhelming importance of the issue that now confronted 4 . La Follette. It was an issue that had been the very heart and soul of La Follette's thirty-year career in politics.

It was, once again, the issue of the protection and promul­ gation of the human rights and freedoms handed to all

Americans through the Constitution.

Wasting no time, and fearing no adversity, La

Follette opened his manuscript speech with the lines:

"Mr. President, I had supposed until recently that it was the duty of senators and representatives in Congress to vote and act according to their convictions on all public matters that come before them for consideration and decision.

"Quite another doctrine has recently been promul­ gated by certain newspapers, which unfortunately seem to have considerable support elsewhere, and that is the 5 doctrine of 'standing back of the President'. . . ."

3Kent, p. 145. ^R. M. L., p. 652.

^The text used for La Follette's speech against the War Declaration resolution was a pamphlet entitled "'Old Bob' La Follette's Historic U.S. Senate Speech Against the Entry of The United States Into The World War" (Madison: 61

With these few words, La Follette clearly delineated

the major theme upon which he was to build his rhetorical

attack. He was not going to directly oppose war nor was he

going to speak immediately to the War Resolution bill.

Rather, he was going to speak to the prevailing congres­

sional attitude towards Presidential power - the doctrine

of standing back of the President.

La Follette was not rhetorically unprepared for the occasion. Although "he had had little consecutive time to prepare a speech during the day and two nights following the President’s request for a declaration of war," the

constitutional dangers of the prevailing attitude of sup­ porting the President in times of crisis had been on his mind for quite some time.^ Indeed, La Follette had been arguing the same principles upon which he was about to speak for over a year.

During that preceding year, however, America was still strongly neutral, and the thought of war was still beyond the nation'sexpectations. Thus, the warnings went unnoticed and unheeded. Ironically, they were now to re- ekietge at a time when’neutrality was no longer secure in

Progressive Publishing Co., 1937). The pamphlet, "repro­ duced' in full’ from The Congressional Record," was checked for accuracy against the Congressional record. Hereafter the pamphlet will be noted as Text. ' . ' 6R. M,L. , p. .656. 62 the minds of Americans and when following presidential action meant war itself.

La Follette opened his arguments against the "stand back" doctrine by claiming that such a doctrine denied his constitutional and congressional rights to speak. First,

La Follette argued that the supposed "patriotic" doctrine of "standing behind the President" did in fact deny the

"duty of senators and representatives in congress to vote and act according to their conviction." It also prevented conscientious consideration of a ques'tion "certain to involve the lives and fortunes of many.of our people and, it may be, the destiny of all of them and of the civilized 7 world as well."

Contending that "for myself I have never subscribed to that doctrine and never shall," La Follette simply stated that he would "support the President in the measures he proposed when" he believed "them to be right," and he would "oppose measures proposed by the President when" he believed them "to be wrong." "The fact that the matter which the President submits for consideration," continued

La Follette, "is of the greatest importance is only an additional reason why we should be sure that we are right and not to be swerved from that conviction or intimidated 8 in its expression by any influence of power whatsoever."

*7 8 Text, p. 1. Text, p. 1. 63

Second, La Follette argued that not only did such a doctrine pre-empt his right to his convictions but that it presupposed presidential infallibility in decision-making.

La Follette did not believe that such infallibility existed.

He only needed to cite the instance of the armed ship bill of the month before to support his point.

Using an accurate, if short, historical examination/

La Follette traced the events following the armed ship bill which demonstrated presidential fallibility. La Follette argued that, at the time of the armed ship bill, the same prevailing "standing back of the president" doctrine had not only caused "a portion of the irresponsible and war- carzed press" to publish "the most infamous and scurrilous libels on the honor of the senators who opposed that bill," but more importantly it had stopped any adequate considera­ tion of the bill to take place. Indeed, "the representa­ tives of the president on this floor then having that bill in charge saw fit," announced La Follette, "by methods I do not care to characterize, to prevent my speaking upon the measure and giving to the country such information as I had 9 upon the subject." Yet, despite the lack of real discussion, despite the prevention of necessary congressional input, and

9 Text, p. 2. 64 despite the actual authority of Congress, the prevailing

"stand back doctrine" had allowed the President to "arm our merchant ships with guns and gunners from the Navy and send them into the prohibited 'war zone.'"^

Less than a month later, La Follette continued, the

President admitted his error in judgment and even went so far as to take "the same view of arming merchant ships that was entertained by at least some of the senators, including myself, who opposed 'the armed ship bill' when it was before us for consideration." Thus, after reading to the Senate exact excerpts from the President's message and similar excerpts from his own speech which had been denied a hear­ ing, La Follette concluded:

If the president was wrong when he proposed arming the ships; if that policy was, as he now says, "certain to draw us into the war without either the rights or the effectiveness of belligerents," is it so certain, he is right now when he demands unqualified declaration of war against Germany? If those members of congress who were supporting the president then were wrong., as it appears from the president's statement now they were, should not that fact prompt them to inquire carefully whether they are right in supporting the proposed declaration of war? If the armed-ship bill involved a course of action that was hasty and ill advised, may it not well be that this proposed declaration of War, which is being so hotly pressed, is also ill advised? With that thought in mind let us, with the earnestness and the singleness of purpose which the momentous nature of the question involves, be calm enough and brave enough to examine further the issue,H

10Tm ext, p. 1, . 11Text, p. 8. 65

Having established his arguments supporting his constitutional right as well as his congressional duty to voice his convictions and having established the first fallacy in the "stand back of the President" doctrine, La

Follette next moved to establish the second constitutional danger of that doctrine. No longer was La Follette arguing simply for his own personal rights. The question was now a broader and greater one. The dangerous "doctrine" followed by his colleagues and the press was, in effect, going against one of the very principles upon which democratic government was founded—the constitutional responsibility of minority participation.

That the denial of minority participation was endangering democracy was established by La Follette through the testimony of a "member of the British parliament" who had had "some opportunity to observe" the "new spirit of intolerance . . . existing in America.":

In England we feel that the theory of democracy requires the fullest and frankest discussion of every measure. We feel that the minority has a right to respectful hearing. This is the only way you can carry on a democracy, and keep it a democracy. Another strange thing I find is that in America you seem to expect that when the minority is beaten it will at once capitulate, declare it has been in the wrong, and join the majority. This is not a democracy either. In England during the Boer war and this war, but especially in the Boer war, there was an organized minority in Parliament--there always has been in time of war. In the Boer war this minority was led by no less a person than David Lloyd-George. If you make it an American policy that when the majority has once spoken the right and duty of the 66 minority to express itself and fight for what it believes in ends, you have lost your democracy. There is no safety or wisdom in trying to suppress thought or force men to silence.33

Yet, the denial of the minority voice was not simply

a constitutional problem. More important to La Follette

was his belief that, by endangering the constitutional law

of minority participation, the much greater "spirit" behind

that law was being refuted. For, he contended, "the rights which the constitution confers upon a minority . . . are but carrying out what was in the minds of the framers of

the constitution; that you may have from time to time in a

legislative body a majority in numbers that really does not represent the principle of democracy; and that if the question could be deferred and carried to the people it would be found that a minority was the real representative of public opinion." It was for this same feason that the framers of the constitution wrote into it the veto power of the president and also "armed the minority of the one-fifth the body" of congress "with the power to filibuster" and the "power to demand a roll call--not a roll call, as some of the state constitutions provide, only upon matters of which carry appropriations, but a roll call on every single question upon which it pleases one-fifth" 14 of the congressional body. 19 *

19 14 Text, p. 6. Text, p. 6. Text, pp. 6-7. 67

Thus, it was not simply an implication that a

minority voice should be heard. Indeed, the minority role

was "one of those checks provided by the wisdom of the

fathers to prevent the majority from abusing the power they

chance to have, when they do not reflect the real judgments,

the opinions, the will of the majority of the people that

constitute the sovereign power of the democracy." "It was

the foresight of the makers of the constitution of this great government of ours," concluded La Follette, that

"real democracy" and not just "the semblence of democracy" 15 would be perpetuated.

This logical establishment of the principle that a minority in Congress may very well be representative of the majority of the nation's populace provided the foundation

for the final constitutional argument of La Follette's speech. To La Follette, the major flaw in the doctrine of

"standing behind the President" was not simply that it infringed upon the above-mentioned constitutional safe­ guards, but rather that it denied the very democratic principle that had been the foundation of American Democracy, the principle that in a representative government the government must be representative of the people. In support of his contention that the American people were "being denied expression," La Follette read to the

’’^Text, p. 7. 68

Senate a few of "the some 15,000 letters and telegrams" he

received from throughout the nation. They were letters and

telegrams which proved that "nine out of ten" offered

"unqualified endorsement" of La Follette's "course in opposing war with Germany on the issue presented.More

important, to La Follette they were "the most authentic record of the thought of the hardworking folk of

America.* • ..17

He opened with a telegram from the city of Monroe in his home state of Wisconsin which reported: "Monroe election votes on referendum on war question. For peace,

954; for war 95" and then spent close to ten minutes read­ ing "a few selected hastily” telegrams. From Massachusetts came the information that out of "20,000 postal cards" sent out, "the returns thus far show 66 per cent against war. 18 . . ." From Flint, Michigan, came the telegram, "Vote taken this afternoon in third precinct, first ward; Question, Shall we enter war on European soil? Results—for war 26, 19 . against war 130." A telegram from New Ulm, Minnesota 20 noted "485 votes . . . against war to 19 for war."

^^Text, p. 2.

17R.M.L., p. 652.

l^Text, p. 2. 19m o Text, p. 3. 2 0 Text, p. 4. 69

After he read these letters supporting his conten­ tion that the people were opposed to war, La Follette then expressed a major reason for his speech, his belief in the supreme power of the people.

"There is always lodged," La Follette argued, "and always will be, thank the God above us, the power in the people supreme. Sometimes it sleeps, sometimes it sleeps the sleep of death. . . . It may be suppressed for a time, it may be misled, be fooled, silenced . . . but sirs, the 21 sovereign power of the people never dies."

Having made his "confession of faith" in the people,

La Follette then warned:

I think, Mr. President, that it is being denied expression now. I think there will come a day when it will have expression. The poor, sir, who are the ones called upon to rot in the trenches, have no organized power, have no press to voice their will upon thie question of peace or war; but, oh, Mr. President, at some time they will be heard. I hope and I believe they will be heard in an orderly and a peaceful way. I think they may be heard from before long. I think sir, if we take this step, when the people today who are staggering under the burden of supporting families at the present prices of the necessaries of life find those prices multiplied, when they are raised a hundred percent, or 200 per cent, as they will be quickly, aye, sir, when beyond that those who pay taxes come to have their taxes doubled and again doubled to pay the interest on the nontaxable bonds held by Morgan and his combinations, which have been issued to meet this war, there will come an awakening; they will have their day and they will be heard.

21 Text, p. 7. 70

It will be as certain and as inevitable as the return of the tides, and as resistless, too.22

Thus, armed with his belief in the supreme power of

the people, buttressed by his belief that the people did

not want war, and reinforced with constitutional grounds

for his beliefs, La Follette turned to what Walter Millis

describes as a "deliberate and coldly logical dissection of

the President's War Message" and "the assumptions which 2 3 underlay it." It was now time, according to La Follette,

"when the public mind should be calm, not inflamed." It

was a time, he continued, "when accuracy of statement" was

"vitally essential to presenting the issues to the Congress 24 and to the people of the country."

With those words, La Follette began his refutation

of the President’s message. It was as though he was the

defense attorney at a trial in which Wilson was the

prosecutor and the Senate was the judge. La Follette care­

fully dissected each of the President's major points of evidence for them. It was, however, to the jury--the

American people—that he was really speaking.

La Follette opened his "defense" with a refutation

of the President's claim that Germany had violated her May,

1916 submarine pledge, "that passenger boats should not be

22 _ Text, p. 7. 23Millis, p. 451. 24 Text, p. 9. 71 sunk, and that due warning would be given to all other vessels . . . when no resistance was offered or escape attempted." Using the actual May letter sent by the German government for evidence, La Follette illustrated to the nation that President Wilson had conveniently taken the

German promise out of the original context in which it had been presented. He read from the German letter:

The German government . . . notifies the govern­ ment of the United States that the German Naval forces have received the following orders: In accordance with the general principles of visit and search and destruction of merchant vessels recognized by inter­ national law, such vessels, both within and without the area declared as naval war zone, shall not be sunk without warning and without saving human lives, unless these ships attempt to escape or offer resistance. But neutrals cannot expect that Germany, forced to fight for her existence, shall, for the sake of neutral interest, restrict the use of an effective weapon if her enemy is permitted to continue to apply at will methods of warfare violating the rules of international law. Such a demand would be incompatible with the character of neutrality, and the German government is convinced that the government of the United States does not think of making such a demand. ... Accordingly the German government is confident that, consequence of the new orders issued to its naval forces . . . the government of the United States will now demand and insist that the British government shall forthwith observe the rules of international law universally recognized before the war as they are laid down in the notes presented by the United States to the British government on December 28, 1914 and November 5, 1915. Should the steps taken by the government of the United States not attain the object it desires, to have the laws of humanity followed by all belligerent nations, the German government . . . must reserve itself complete liberty of decision.25

25 Text, pp. o8 -9n. 72

Thus, La Follette argued, it was "perfectly apparent"

that "the promise, so called, of the German government was

conditioned upon England's being brought to obedience Of

international law . . . " "Since no one contends," La

Follette continued, "that England was brought to conduct in

accordance with international law, and even the poor

protests our government has lodged against her shows that

she has not done so, was it quite fair to lay before the

country a statement which implies that Germany had made an

unconditional promise which she has dishonorably violated?"

"Would it not have been well to say also," La Follette

concluded, "that it was England, not Germany, who refused to obey . . . the rules of international law . . . would it not have been fair to say that Germany offered to cease absolutely . . . the use of submarines in ... an unlawful manner if England would cease from equally palpable and cruel violations of international law?" Having determined the conditional nature of Germany's pledge to America as the real reason for her continued sub­ marine attacks, La Follette directed his attack at Wilson's second point, that "the present German warfare against commerce is a warfare against mankind. It is a war against 26 all nations" without "discrimination."

26,„ n Text, p. 9. 73

Once again La Follette implied that the President

was not revealing the entire truth. It was in fact our

inability to remain truly neutral by enforcing international

regulations upon both belligerents, as per Germany's

"conditional" pledge, that had placed only the United States

and not the other neutral nations on the brink of war.

"If it is true, as the president says, that 'there

has been no discrimination'" La Follette questioned, "that

Germany has treated every neutral as she has treated us, is

it not peculiar that no other of the great nations of the earth . . . Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands, Switzerland,

Denmark, Spain, and all the great Republics of South

America . . . seem to regard Germany's conduct in this war 27 as a cause for entering it?" On the contrary, La

Follette continued, the other neutral nations were not con­ sidering war with Germany, but more significantly were asking whether "we are seizing upon this war to consolidate 2 8 and extend our imperialistic policy?" After citing South American and Mexican apprehension of the United States' policy and claiming that "the sympathy of Norway, Sweden, and other countries close to the scene of war is already with Germany," La Follette closed his refutation by arguing that American entrance

2 7 Text, p. 9. 2 8 Text, p. 10. 74

"will not only prolong" the war, but will "vastly extend 29 areas by drawing in other nations."

Having "clarified" Wilson's first two contentions,

La Follette turned the full weight of his extensive rhetorical powers against the President's statement that the United States had "no quarrel with the German people"3^ only with the German government and that this war was "for the things we have always carried nearest to our hearts—

for democracy, for the right of those who submit to 31 authority to have a voice in their government."

Noting sarcastically that such "a sentiment" would

"appeal to American hearts," La Follette nonetheless contended that it "was idle to talk of a war upon a govern­ ment only." "If we are to enter upon this war ..." La

Follette commented, "let us throw pretense to the winds, let us be honest, let us admit that this is a ruthless war against not only Germany's army and her navy, but against her civilian population as well." That, to La Follette, was to cooperate "with England and her allies in starving to death the old men and women, the children, and the sick and 32 maimed of Germany," as well as to fight her "government."

29 Text, p. 10. 30 * 32 30 Text, p. 10. 33Text, p. 11.

32Text, p. 11. 75

Yet, La Follette continued, if the nation was willing

to accept the notion that war could be made against a

government, it must also accept the reverse of that idea—

that this was a war in support of the allied governments.

Indeed, countered La Follette, Wilson himself supported this contention when he stated that the United States would undertake "the utmost practicable cooperation in council

and action with the governments now at war with Germany" and would extend "to those governments . . . the most liberal 33 fxnanclal credits." To La Follette such support was directly contradictory to Wilson's claim of a war for Democracy:

When we cooperate with those governments we endorse their methods, we endorse the violations of inter­ national law by Great Britain, we endorse the shameful methods of warfare against which we have again and again protested in this war; we endorse her purpose to wreak upon the German people the animosities which for years her people have been taught to cherish against Germany; finally when the end comes, whatever it may be, we find ourselves in cooperation with our ally, Great Britain, and if we cannot resist now the pressure she is exert­ ing to carry us into the war, how can we hope to resist, then, the thousandfold greater pressure she will exert to bend us to her purposes and compel compliance with her demands? We do not know what they are. We do not know what is in the minds of those who have made compact, but we are to subscribe to it. We are irrevocably, by our votes here, to marry ourselves to a non divorcable proposition veiled from us now. Once enlisted, one in the co-partnership, we will be carried through with the purposest whatever they may be, of which we know nothing. 54

33Text, p. 10.

3 4Text, p. 11. 76

Finally, La Follette refuted the President's claim

that it was a "war for democracy" by arguing that the

American government was denying basic democratic principles in order to fight a war to preserve these same principles for other nations. "Are the people of this country being so well represented in this war movement," asked Battling

Bob, "that we need to go abroad to give other people 35 control of their governments?" He continued:

Will the president and the supporters of the war bill submit it to a vote of the people before the declaration of war goes into effect? Until we are will­ ing to do that, it ill becomes us to offer as an excuse for our entry into the war the unsupported claim that this war was forced upon the German people by their government "without their previous knowledge or approval." Who has registered the knowledge or approval of the American people of the course this congress is called upon to take in declaring war upon Germany? Submit the question to the people, you who support it. You who support it dare not do it, for you know that by a vote of more than 10 to one the American people as a body would register their declaration against it. In the sense that this war is being forced upon our people without their knowing why and without their approval, and that wars are usually forced upon all peoples in the same way, there is some truth in the statement; but I venture to say that the response which the German people have made to the demands of this war shows that it has a degree of popular support which the war upon which we are entering has not and never will have among our people. The espionage bills, the conscription bills, and other forcible military measures which we understand are being ground out of the war machine in this country is the complete proof that those responsible for this war fear that it has no popular support and that armies suf­ ficient to satisfy the demand of the entente allies can­ not be recruited by voluntary enlistments.36

35 Text, p. 12. 3^Text, pp. 12-13. 77

Having contested the constitutionality of the "stand back of the President" .doctrine and having refuted the validity of Wilson's war declaration speech, La Follette turned to the finale of his speech—a historical summation of the events leading to war. Leaving the more emotional and persuasive style behind him, La Follette followed what was almost a lecture format as he reviewed as "briefly as possible, but with absolute accuracy and fairness, the events occurring since the-commencement of the present

European War, which have brought" the United States "to the 3 7 very brink of war with the German Empire."

Step by step, La Follette traced American policy in regard to the European conflict. He contended once again that Wilson's declaration of war was not a result of

Germany's conduct but rather was the result of American refusal to remain neutral through her reluctance to enforce international law equally between both belligerent powers.

He stated: It is Germany’s insistence upon her right to blindly destroy with mines and submarines in the area she has declared as war zone all ships that enter there, that causes the whole trouble existing between us and Germany today. It is for this, and this only, that we are urged to make war. Yet in asserting this right or in sinking the ships in the proscribed area without warning,•Germany is doing only that which England is doing in her pro­ scribed area, without consent.33

33Text, p. 13. 33Text, p. 26. 78 To support his claim, La Follette relied almost

solely upon inartistic proofs-—testimony, official state

letters and papers, excerpts from international law docu­

ments. Point by point, La Follette painstakingly exposed

American's lack of neutrality. Point by point, La Follette

informed his audience that England was as much an aggressor

as Germany.

"The present administration made a fatal mistake,"

La Follette lectured. It "has assumed that it could

enforce to the very letter of the law the principles of

international law against one belligerent and relax them as 39 . to the other." It was this mistake rn principle, La

Follette argued, that was the real reason for war

declaration:

I am talking now about principles. You cannot distinguish between the principles which allowed England to mine a large area of the Atlantic ocean and the North sea in order to shut in Germany, and the principle on which Germany by her submarines seeks to destroy all shipping which enters the war zone which she has laid out around the British Isles. The English mines are intended to destroy without warning every ship that enters the war zone she has proscribed, killing or drowning every passenger that cannot find some means of escape. It is neither more nor less than that which Germany tries to do with her submarines in her war zone. We acquiesced in England's action without protest. It is proposed that we now go to war with Germany for identically the same action upon her part.40

Having supported his viewpoint with hard facts and precise quotations, La Follette concluded his speech:

39Text, p. 27. 4°Text, pp. 26-27. 79

Had the plain principle of international law announced by Jefferson been followed by us, we would not be called on today to declare war upon any of -the belligerents. The failure to treat the belligerent nations of Europe alike, of both Germany and Great Britain, is wholly accountable for our present dilemma. We should not seek to hide our blunder behind the Smoke of battle, to inflame the mind of our people by half truths into the frenzy of war, in order that they, may never appreciate the real cause of it until it is too late.. I do not believe that our national honor is served by such a course. The right way is the honor­ able way. One alternative is to admit our initial blunder to enforce our rights against Great Britain as we have enforced our rights against Germany; demand that both those nations shall respect our neutral rights upon the high seas to the letter and give notice that we will enforce those rights from that time forth against both belligerents and then live up to that notice. The other alternative is to withdraw our commerce from both. The mere suggestion that food supplies would be withheld from both sides impartially would compel belligerents to observe the principle of freedom of the seas for neutral commerce.41

The predictable reactions from the press and his

contemporaries were at once immediate and negative. Almost

before La Follette had sat down, Senator John Sharp Williams

of Mississippi was on the Senate floor to attack La

Follette. "Mr. President," Williams began, "if immortality

could be attained by a verbal eternity, the Senator from

Wisconsin would have approximated immortality." "We have waited," continued Williams, "and have heard a speech from him which would have better become Herr Bethmann-Hollweg, of the German Parliament, than an American Senator. In

fact, he has gone much further than Herr Bethmann-Hollweg

4^-Text, p. 30. 80

ever dared to go. I heard from him a speech that was pro-

German, pretty nearly pro-Goth, and pro-Vandal, which was

anti-American President and anti-American Congress and

anti-American people." He tells me, Williams finally con­

cluded, that the American Congress is "about to involve the

American people in war! The man who says that is a knave 42 or a fool."

The press was only a few hours behind Senator

Williams. The Wisconsin State Journal argued that "Senator

La Follette did not represent the great pride, patriotic

people of Wisconsin in the speech he delivered . . .in the

Senate of the United States. His truest friends will call

it his mistake." "It is nothing short of pathetic,"

continued the Journal, "to witness a man like La Follette

. . . now leading himself to the encouragement of autocracy. 4 3 And that is all it is."

Another Wisconsin paper, the Milwaukee Sentinel,

reiterated the same philosophy when it stated, "Certainly

the tactics of Senator Robert M. La Follette . . . are not things to which Wisconsin, either now or in the years to

come, can point to with pride." From the Eau Claire Leader,

came the simple but biting words, "our Senior Senator wants

4 Congressional Record, 65th Congress, 1st Session, Volume 55, April 4, 1917, pp. 234-235. 43"La Follette's Mistake," Wisconsin State Journal, April 6, 1917, p. 16. « 81 wants a war all his own, but what is he fighting for? 44 Certainly not the honor of the country." The Wausau

Record-Herald, still another Wisconsin newspaper, contended that "The Wisconsin Congressmen who voted against the war resolution will never be able to satisfactorily explain their reasons. . . . Like La Follette, they look upon and decide every question" from the standpoint of how their 4 5 actions "will effect their personal political projects."

Nor was the reaction limited to La Follette's home state. .The Boston Evening Transcript described the speech as "the disloyal culmination of a career of selfish

Ishmallitism."

"It will naturally be the end of him," observed the

Transcript. "Hereafter any cause or purpose that he advo­ cates will be damned . . . standing alone against his own country and for his country's enemies, he is gone and fallen 46 . . . Henceforth, he is the Man without a Country."

The New York Times argued that the "speeches of the pacifists" did not "amount to a noteworthy distraction."

"Senator La Follette's effort to mask the issue by quibbles over the respective methods of England and Germany in

44"with Our State Neighbors," Comments from other state newspapers appearing in the Milwaukee Sentinel, April 11, 1917, p. 8. 45 Wausau Record-Herald, April 6, 1917. ^Boston Evening Transcript, April 5, 1917. 82 conducting war and by exalting comfort over duty may not only be forgiven, but rejoiced in, since it drew from 47 Senator Williams that outburst" of condemnation. Joining the Times in the smear against "pacifist" La Follette was the Chicago Herald, which concluded, "The event's of the last few days have brought out clearly the bankruptcy of the peace-at-any-pricers. Today their sole asset is a ticket to oblivion and the hopeful recollection of the unforgettable sneer with which Senator La Follette nailed 48 the President’s words of soberness and patriotism."

Perhaps a little more kindly, but nonetheless as negative was the editorial comment of the Kansas City Star, which read, "Senator La Follette knew his speech . . . could not prevent the war. He knew it could only give aid and comfort to his country’s enemies. Its practical effect would be to increase the cost of lives necessary to end 49 this struggle for democracy."

4^"The Nation Speaks," New York Times, April 6, 1917, p. 12. A Q . Chicago Herald, April 5, 1917, p. 4. 4^Kansas City Star, April 5, 1917, p. 1. CHAPTER IV

"POWER IN THE PEOPLE SUPREME"

In spite of the torrential flow of negative criti­

cism from his contemporaries and the resulting confused

historical reactions, the War Declaration Speech of Robert

Marion La Follette, when placed within the ideological

framework of his entire political career, contradicts many

of the existing evaluations. Indeed, when viewing the

speech through this perspective, taking into consideration

La Follette's philosophy and motivation and the actual

theme, arguments and structure of his speech, it is

apparent that many of the historical judgments have been*

based upon a misunderstanding and misinterpretation of both

La Follette and the speech itself. It is also apparent

that much of the contemporary reaction to La Follette was

largely due to a misrepresentation of the speech because of

the existing patriotic propaganda and was hysteria then pre vailing in the United States.’'

’'It is interesting to note that both the New York Times and the New York Herald, whether on purpose or not, printed supposed quotes from La Follette's speech which did not appear in original speech transcript located in the Congressional Record. Indeed, it was through a misrepre­ sentation by the Associated Press of a La Follette speech in St. Paul on October 2, 1917 that almost caused his expulsion from the Senate. See La Follette1s Magazine, December, 1917, p. 6, for a presentation of the facts.

BOWLING GREEN STATE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY. 84

To simply label the speaker and the speech

"pacifistic," for example, as some contemporaries and historians have done, is to not only deny La Follette's attitudes toward war both prior to and during World War I, but more importantly to deny the actual content of the speech itself. Indeed, if one is to accept the fact that

La Follette was a pacifist, then it must also be accepted that he became one on the eve of war and then reversed that philosophy the day after was was declared!

Certainly an analysis of La Follette’s attitude toward war prior to April 5, 1917, does not seem to indi­ cate pacifistic tendencies. During the Spanish-American conflict, for instance, La Follette was a strong and ardent supporter of President McKinley's decision to go to war.

Indeed, in a speech given in 1900, La Follette reaffirmed his belief in the Spanish-American War when he declared:

When a Republican administration and. congress finally began war with Spain, it was to end wrongs and outrages, the horrible character and extent of which could be no longer endured. We declared our unselfish purpose and our determination to secure for Cuba the opportunity for self-government. No such exhibition of pure, lofty, disinterested devotion to the cause of freedom was ever given in the world's history. We took the necessary steps to prosecute the war with vigor. We blockaded the ports of Cuba and landed our army on the island. We captured Porto Rico and closed her harbors, cutting off Spain from her depot of supplies. Her fleet in the Pacific was a constant menace to our coast line. Dewey was ordered to find and destroy that fleet. He sailed through the darkness into Manila Harbor, found the fleet at daybreak on the morning of May 1, 1898, and sent it to the bottom of the bay before noon. He called for troops to preserve his 85

victory, and ammunition for his fleet, threatened with the arrival of Camera's fleet byway of the Suez Canal. Both troops and ammunition were sent, and every American citizen bid them God-speed. Our troops reached Manila, engaged the Spanish, defeated them, and on the 13th day of August, they surrendered, and we took formal possession of the Philippine islands.3

In 1914, La Follette's actions and attitudes toward thè then potential Mexican War do not totally support a pacifist role. Admittedly, La Follette did speak against any official declaration of war with Mexico because he believed it was a fruitless war for "big business" profits, but nonetheless he did not oppose President Wilson's decision to send American troops into Mexico "to seize" Vera

Cruz. Although this seizure involved heavy fighting and high fatalities on both sides, La Follette, in an editorial in his magazine, wanted it known "in every capital of the world that the President has the support of a united 3 country at his back." Add to these two incidents the claim of his wife,

Belle Case, a devout pacifist herself, that La Follette was 4 . . "never a pacifist," and La Follette's own contention given in March, 1917: "I am not an extremist, I do not say there may not be supreme principles for which men must fight to the Death as a last resort," and there is significant

"Robert M. La Follette's First Speech," September 19, 1900, Pamphlet reprinted from the Milwaukee Sentinel, p. 6. 3 4 R.M.L., p. 496. R.M.L., p. 565. 86 5 contrary evidence to claims of La Follette’s pacifism!

Yet, even if it could be conceived that La Follette had changed his prior attitudes on the eve of World War I, the pacifist tag is unsupportable. For while he did indeed vote against the Declaration of War, his voting record dur­ ing the war clearly shows that he supported over 95 per 6 cent of all war measure bills. Certainly that record can­ not be interpreted as an example of unqualified pacifism!

Nowhere is there stronger evidence against the pacifism label, however, than in the actual speech against the War Declaration bill itself. Although in "outward appearance," the speech may offer an implication of

"pacifism" in that it was delivered in opposition to declar­ ing war with Germany, an internal investigation of the content does not support this implication. Ironically, not once, during the entire four-hour speech did La Follette talk against war per se. Nor did he ever involve himself t with the ethical or moral questions concerning war per se.

On the contrary, the only evidence contained within the speech as to La Follette’s attitude toward the idea of war came in the final two paragraphs when he indicated an attitude actually in support of war by contending that the

5"The Armed Ship Bill Meant War," La Follette's Magazine, March, 1917, p. 2. ®La Follette published his wartime voting record in La Follette's Magazine, December, 1917. 87

nation does have the duty to "enforce" its rights against 7 belligerent nations.

On equally slippery footing with the "pacifist"

labelers are the contemporaries and historians who have

evaluated La Follette's April 5th speech as a reflection of

an isolationist attitude and/or as a result of his lack of

familiarity with and understanding of foreign affairs.

Certainly there are few who will question that La Follette's personal interests centered overwhelmingly upon domestic problems and national affairs. To contend, however, that

La Follette was an isolationist or had had little under­ standing of foreign policy is to highly oversimplify and overstate the situation.

Two recent studies devoted specifically to La

Follette’s foreign policy, for example, contradict these evaluations. Kennedy Padriac, in his work "La Follette's

Foreign Policy Reconsidered," argues that "isolationism is an inaidequate and often misleading description of La

Follette's foreign policy. 'Fighting Bob' never conceived 8 of American nonparticipation in ." Alan Kent was even more direct in his assault on these prevailing attitudes when he declared that both the 1908 and 1912 platforms revealed "that La Follette was dealing with

7 Text, p. 30. 8 Padriac, p. 105. 88

foreign policy issues some years before the First World War

turned his thoughts so completely toward the nation’s 9 interest m affairs abroad."

Indeed, while La Follette did not work directly on

any senate committees dealing with foreign policy, his twelve years in the Senate prior to Wilson's Declaration of

War forced him to become involved in questions associated with foreign affairs, especially in regards to tariff resolutions and the Seaman's Act which bears his name. In addition, in both his attempts at the Republican presi­ dential nomination, in 1908 and 1912, La Follette supplied platforms that dealt directly with foreign affairs issues.

Yet, disregarding these "marginal" experiences, La

Follette was almost totally embroiled in foreign affairs from the outbreak of the European war in 1914 to his speech against American entry in April, 1917. During that period . his rhetoric, both in the Senate and in La Follette's

Magazine is almost entirely devoted to issues directly tied to foreign affairs. While speaking on an issue does not necessarily provide evidence of a man's knowledge of that issue, such a conclusion is hard to accept in La Follette's case. Noted as an astute student of any issues he would have to discuss, La Follette always stressed investigation more than any single element of speech preparation. He,

^Kent, p. 28. 89 himself, claimed early in life that it was "incumbent on the reformer to come equipped with a complete mastery of all the information upon which the established order is , ' „10 based.

That his complete devotion to researching issues was his general practice is attested to by every rhetorical study made about La Follette's speaking. Carroll Lahman, one of the first and possibly the most definitive student of La Follette, notes that "For important messages and political speeches the first step was to call on authorita­ tive sources for accurate information. Often special research was done by someone, usually a young university- trained man, designated for the task. The next step was for him and Mrs. La Follette—for on such occasions they often worked together--to surround themselves with endless stacks of source material and bury themselves in personal research away from interruptions."33

Thus, it is reasonably difficult to accept the premise that La Follette was ignorant of foreign affairs and international policy. His three-year embroilment with foreign-related issues is almost impossible to pass over. Nor, during this period is there any evidence of an isolationist attitude. Although La Follette never veered

3°Autobiography, p. 444.

33Lahman, p. 952. 90

from the path of "strict neutrality," he did not envision

American isolation. On the contrary, during this period La

Follette pushed for both a Conference of Neutral Nations

for Peace and an International Peace Tribunal. In regards to the latter, La Follette stated: "To compose the differences of nations and to maintain , we favor the creation of an International Tribunal to which shall be referred for final settlement all issues between nations, and upon the establishment of such a Tribunal we favor action by our government toward general disarmament of nations of the world; and that an adequate International

Army and Navy be maintained under the command of such Tri- 12 bunal to enforce its decrees." Certainly, an "International Army" and a "World

Court" do not appear to be elements of isolationism. On the contrary, they later became elements of the League of

Nations proposal and the --concepts which brought the United States into truly international status.

Once again, however, the best evidence refuting the historical claims of La Follette’s supposed disconcern for and limited knowledge of foreign affairs lies within the April 4th speech itself. Indeed, rather than a display of ignorance, many of La Follette's contentions during the

April 4th address have withstood the historic test of time

12 "Compare These Platforms," La Follette's Magazine, September, 1916, p. 3. 91 for their farsighted accuracy. La Follette warned, for example, that American entry into war with the allied governments.would not be, as Wilson contended, a fight for democracy, but would be an endorsement of the purposes and demands of the allied governments--purposes and demands of which we were as yet unaware. As he stated: "We do not know what is in the minds of those who have made the compact, but we are to subscribe to it. We are irrevocably, by our votes here today, to marry ourselves to a non- divorcable proposition veiled from us now. Once enlisted, we will be carried through with the purposes, whatever they 13 may be, of which we know nothing."

The prophesy of this.statement is difficult to contest in light of the peace negotiations which took place in Versailles following Germany's surrender. Indeed, not only did the United States become aware, as La Follette had predicted, of numerous secret treaties which had been made by the allied preceding United States involvement into war but, such were the demands of the allied governments that the United States Senate ultimately did not ratify the

Versailles treaty. During the speech, La Follette also claimed that history would find the "real cause of the war" to be based upon the premise that "England would tolerate no commercial

l^Text, p. 11. 92 rivalry" and that "Germany would not submit to isolation."

Slightly over two years later, after war had ended,

President Wilson in a public speech in St. Louis became one of the first historians to fulfill this prediction when he argued, "The real reason that the war we have just finished took place was that Germany was afraid her commercial rivals were going to get the better of her, and the reason why some nations went into the war against Germany was that they thought that Germany would get the commercial advantage of them."1514

Finally, much of La Follette's speech was based upon the contention that the United States had not remained

"neutral" because of her collusion and cooperation with

Great Britain, regarding that nation's refusal to adhere to international law. Although there still remains specula­ tion as to whether this "collusion and cooperation" was done on purpose, there are not a few historical accounts that attest to La Follette's embittered remarks. Robert Lansing, then the Secretary of State, remarked in later years, for example, that American protestations against

Britain's violations "were long and exhaustive treaties which opened up new subjects of discussion rather than closing those in controversy. . . . Everything was submerged

14Text, p. 14. 15 St. Louis Post Dispatch, September 6, 1919. . 93 in verbosity. It was done on purpose. It insured continuance of the controversies and left the questions unsettled, which was necessary in order to leave this country free to act and even to act illegally when it entered the war. ,

Ernest May in his work, The World War and American

Isolation 1914-1917, while not as specific as Lansing, also upholds the "collusion" premise. To May, much of Wilson’s and America's policy prior to actual entrance into war was based upon a preservation of Anglo-American peace." Thus,

"grave as were the threats to accord," May argues, "the 17 forces that made for its preservation were stronger."

Significantly, then, contentions of La Follette's lack of knowledge of foreign affairs and the resulting claims of isolationism seem to fade under the light of con­ trary evidence. Certainly, this is not to say that La

Follette's judgment and analysis in his war declaration speech should not be questioned. It is to say, however, that he did indeed have substantial knowledge upon which to base those judgments.

■J A . Robert Lansing, War Memoirs (New York: Bobs- Merrill, 1935), p. 128. 17 May, p. 434. For more discussion on the collusion theory, see also Edwin Borchard and W. P. Lage, Neutrality for the United States (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1937) and Edward Grey, Twenty-five Years (New York: Frederick Stokes, 1937). 94

• Finally, there are those contemporaries and

historians who have adjudged La Follette's April 4th speech

as resulting from a "constituency" motivation. While this

"constituency" philosophy does offer valuable insight into

La Follette's underlying reasons for opposing war, it is, in

and by itself, too limited and too simplistic to be viewed

as the primary motivation for his rhetorical action.

Certainly, a major reason for La Follette's speech

of April 4, 1917, was his intuitive belief that the American

people, including those of his beloved state of Wisconsin,

did not want war. His statements both prior to April 4th

and in the content of the speech itself support this ideal.

Indeed, almost one-fifth of his four-hour speech opposing

American entry into war is directly related to supporting

this concept. To say, however, that on that crucial evening of 1917, La Follette was echoing the sentiments of his

constituency in opposing a war declaration against Germany

is difficult to support. There is a difference between not wanting war philosophically and not supporting war pragmatically. Such was the case of the Wisconsin people and the nation at large in 1917. While La Follette remained true to his constituents' philosophical opposition to American entry into war, he did not echo their more recent sentiments sup­ porting war pragmatically in the face of Wilson's 95

declaration and the surrounding world events which lead to

that declaration.

From the point of America's potential involvement in

the then European conflict to the eve of America's entrance

in World War I, a great change had come about in the minds

of the nation's populace, including Wisconsin. This change

is reflected in the Wisconsin newspapers from 1915 until

April, 1917. In 1915 and 1916, the Wisconsin press,

"buoyed by public opinion" was almost in its entirety behind the preservation of "strict neutrality" and American non- involvement in war. This public attitude is reflected in

La Follette's tremendous election victory in November of

1916--a victory he perceived rightly as a "tremendous 19 vindication of his course" against war. It is also reflected in Wilson's comment following the 1916 campaign":

"I do not believe the American people would wish to go to 20 war no matter how many Americans were lost at sea."

With the breaking of diplomatic relations with

Germany in early 1917, however, a breaking point was sharply drawn. The populace became more and more inclined toward the expediency of supporting President Wilson's course of action. As James Jackson stated, "The severence

18. ~ 7 Jackson, p. 21. 19 Kent, p. 35. 2 3 May, p. 4 2 2. 96 of diplomatic relations marked the turning point . . . from this point forward, with the exception of the Socialist

Milwaukee Leader, every Wisconsin newspaper swung into position behind the President in his policy toward _ „ 21 Germany.

The tension between philosophical opposition to war and expedient support of the President's actions remained with the people of America and Wisconsin until Wilson's actual declaration on April 2, 1917. Although at that juncture there was still powerful feelings opposing war, the nation was ready to accept the stark reality of Wilson's demands. Quite possibly an editorial appearing in the

Columbia (Indiana) Evening Republican, April 2, 1917, best summed up the existing tension in the people between not wanting war and the expediency, of war when it stated that

Midwesterners would not meet "a declaration of war joyously and with a smile on their lips. Rather they will meet it with a deep feeling of responsibility, a feeling that if the test has come they must meet it and be men." A similar sentiment was also reiterated in the Milwaukee Free Press which argued "when the country calls to arms, this Wisconsin people, despite its various . . . sympathies, knows but one nation, one flag and one government . . . and they respond'

21 Jackson, pp. 36-37. 97 2 2 with a loyalty unsurpassed in any other commonwealth."

Thus, as La Follette spoke against war, he may have been, in effect, voicing his constituents' earlier philosophical attitudes toward opposing war, attitudes which had prevailed for almost two years. He was not, how­ ever, echoing their recent and more fervent beliefs in the expediency of going to a war which had come about through

Wilson's actions. Therefore, his opposition to war given three days after Wilson's Declaration was in opposition to his constituents, not in conjunction with them.

It is for this reason that the claims of "political expediency" also appear inconsequential when evaluating

La Follette's course of action. He knew perfectly well that the American populace, including Wisconsin, had changed from opposition to war to expedient support of President Wilson's actions. He sincerely believed that in their hearts the public did not want war, but he was also aware that they were supportive of the President.

Although he reasoned that the public's support was based largely upon "war hysteria," jingoism, and their lack of understanding of the real issues—presidential usurption of the war making power and American failure to remain neutral—he nonetheless knew he was flying in the face of popular support in opposing Wilson. Indeed, almost a month

2 2 Editorial entitled "Wisconsin to the Front," Milwaukee Free Press, April 9, 191.7, p. 4. 98 prior to his war declaration speech, La Follette was fully

aware of the public's changed attitude. He was aware of it to the extent that as he prepared his speech opposing

Wilson's armed neutrality concept on March 4, 1917, he could agree with his close friend, Andrew Funeseth,that the 2 3 public would "crucify" him. He was aware of it to the extent that on that same day he would wire his wife that because of his opposition to Wilson he "must take the gaff" 24 from the nation's people. Finally, he was aware of it to the extent that quite a bit of the family correspondence between March and April in 1917 dealt directly with discus­ sions of the public clamor against La Follette's opposition 25 to the President.

Obviously, these varied, and often conflicting, interpretations of La Follette's April 4 speech would not have been proposed if they were totally groundless. It is indeed possible to pluck words and phrases from the speech which could justify such labels—and without violating the

23 R.M.L., p. 625. 24R.M.L., p. 625.

25 For example, in a March 5, 1917 letter to Robert La Follette, Belle Case stated, "you are sure to be terribly maligned and misunderstood and probably the general public will never get on to the absurdity and dangerous trend of Wilson's usurpation of power, but oh, what a deep satisfaction wells up from within that all these long years of disciplining and hardening have made you ready to meet this crisis and stem the awful tide of destruction without fear of its consequences to yourself," R.M.L., p. 625. 99 scholarly injunction against "wrenching" quotations. What has been violated in these interpretations is a sober, methodical analysis of La Follette the man and La

Follettism, the philosophy as a basis for these judgments.

If the same historical judgment which identifies La

Follette’s pr'evious words and actions as progressive leader­ ship at its best can then claim that he indulged in a wild, headlong flight of thoughtlessness during World War I, they are simply not based on a thorough enough comprehension of his motivation.

La Follettism has here been defined as a philosophy based upon three interlocking and interdependent tenets:

1. The Constitution of the United States as the final authority in all governmental matters;

2. The will of the people as the force behind the Constitution, serving as its power basis; and

3. Truth and knowledge as the proper source for the decisions made by the people. La Follette never wavered from this credo. Nothing raised his hackles faster than an encroachment upon the powers set forth in the Constitution. Let a rule be bent a little, and he would leap to its defense, appeal to the people to set things right again, and give factual evidence for why they should do so. The pattern was set into a mold into which he would pour the issue at hand. No matter of what consistency the "setting solution" of the issue was made, the shape his approach to it formed was the same 100

"mold" of La Follettism.

Thus, many La Follette critics have studied the

texture of the material, the color of the dye, the few bubbles that may have formed. Too many, to cite an old phrase, haven't seen the forest for the trees. The over­

all shape of his ideas have eluded them because they failed to step back and actually look at "the whole."

In the same way, we could perhaps say that La

Follettism was a transparency clearly outlining the pattern its originator projected before, the public. The topics on which he spoke might be likened to colored and detailed overlays placed over one or all of the main tenets. Peel off an overlay, and the original transparency remained.

Again, critics have too often based their conclusions on analyses of the transparencies, all the while ignoring the pattern underneath that gave substance and meaning to what was said. At the very least, the overlays might be said to have clouded the view of those seeking to delineate

La Follette's purposes.

Once the film is lifted, however, it becomes almost embarrassingly simple to identify the structure of

La Follettism which provided a foundation for all the

Senator's speeches. The April 4, 1917 speech, as a case in point, embodies the entire philosophy as It was brought to bear upon the issue of standing back of the President. 101 Before such an analysis is made, it should first be

pointed out that he never wrote a speech that existed in

total isolation from his others. Maryann Hartman has noted,

for instance, that his "Representative Government" speech

"seems to have grown out of his earlier speaking experience.

. . . Previous speeches . . . included "The Menace of the

Machine," "The Dangers Threatening Representative Govern- 26 ment,' and 'Manhood or Money?'"

The same process can be identified in the content of his "Historic U. S. Senate Speech Against the Entry of The

United States Into The World War." The issue of standing back of the President was one he had attacked from the moment he detected it. On December 7, 1915 he had been

"greatly disturbed as he heard the President advocate legislation providing for a strong preparedness program" which reversed "the policy he had advocated the previous 27 year." Shortly afterward, the President tried to force

Congress to vote down measures warning American citizens to refrain from traveling on belligerent vessels. As Belle

Case noted at that time, "All the usual machinery for exerting pressure on Congress to 'stand behind the President' 2 8 was set in motion."

°Hartman, p. 76. 2 7 R.M.L., p. 550. 28R.M.L., p. 555. 102 Once La Follette spotted what he considered an

infringement on the rights set forth in the Constitution,

his battling blood asserted itself. Here indeed was an

issue on which to take a stand. in fact, the issue was in

itself a defense of the very heart and soul of La Follettism:

the letter of the Constitution.

His insistence upon relying on the Constitutional

"word" had been demonstrated early in his congressional

career. When dealing with a point about taxation that was

causing much puzzlement, La Follette went so far as to

search out a letter by one of the original writers in order

to clarify the issue. He found it to be "a valuable docu­

ment in its exposition of the views of the framers of the 29 Constitution."

La Follette was prepared to fight, alone if need be,

for his precious Constitution. He first entered the battle

on March 10, 1916, a year before the same arguments on the same issue would lead to his public condemnation. With no

hesitation, "he took issue with the President in his recent

extraordinary demand that Congress should vote down reso­

lutions warning or requesting American citizens to refrain

from travel on belligerent vessels. This demand had

’raised an issue of the gravest importance to the future well-being of our Government."'^

29 30 Autobiography, p. 122. R.M.L., p. 558. 103 What it boiled down to was how the Presidential

powers set forth in the Constitution should be interpreted.

On one side of the argument was President Wilson whose version had been outlined in his book, Constitutional

Government in the United States:

The initiative in foreign affairs, which the President possesses without any restriction whatever, is virtually the power to control them absolutely. The President cannot conclude a treaty with a foreign power without the consent of the Senate, but he may guide every step of diplomacy, and to guide diplomacy is to determine what treaties must be made, if the faith and prestige of the government are to be main­ tained. He need disclose no step of negotiation until it is complete, and when in any critical matter it is completed the government is virtually committed. Whatever its disinclination, the Sen.ate may feel itself committed also.33

La Follette, needless to say, held "a fundamental difference of opinion regarding the constitutional limita­ tion of Presidential power which later, when translated into 32 action, often brought the two men into direct conflict."

Wilson's view was untenable, according to La Follette, because "if the President is clothed with such unlimited power, if in conducting foreign affairs he can go unhindered of Congress to the limit of making war inevitable, and if the Congress has no alternative but to accept and sanction his course, then we have become a one-man power, then the

31 Woodrow Wilson, Constitutional Government i• n the United States (New York: Columbia University Press, 1911), pp. 7 7- 7 8. 32R.M.L., p. 559. 104

President has authority to make war as absolutely as though

he were Czar of Russia." He defended his position by

declaring "he did not believe that the framers of our

Constitution ever intended to invest a President with such

power" and by "citing historical precedents to support his

opi. ni. on."„33

Since proponents of the "standing back of the

President" stance had succeeded in tabling the bills on the

topic of American passengers traveling on belligerent ships,

La Follette had to wait until 1917 to again counter what he

considered the President's usurpation of power. On

February 26, Wilson "asked Congress for authority not only

to supply merchant ships with defensive arms, but 'to employ

any other instrumalities or methods' that might 'be neces­

sary and adequate to protect our ships and our people in 34 their legitimate and peaceful pursuits on the seas.'"

This was too much for La Follette. Bob, Jr.'s letter to his mother reflected what had probably been the

judgment discussed with his facher over lunch after Wilson's

speech: "Well the President has been down and asked for everything he needs to pull off a little war all his own."

The Armed Ship bill which was introduced in the Senate the

following day "violated the letter and the spirit of a

33R.M.L., p. 559.

34R.M.L., p. 602. 105

fundamental provision of the Constitution ’which expressly

vests the war power in Congress,' a provision without which 35 'the Constitution could not have been adopted.'"

His course made more difficult by publication of the infamous Zimmermann telegram, by public outcry, through administrative pressure, and because of presentation of a pro-bill round robin, La Follette nonetheless organized a filibuster. An anonymous warning that a plan to force a vote was afoot was "evidence that Senators were planning to violate what Bob believed were important constitutional rights." This only served to increase "his determination to invoke every parliamentary device to get the message to the country.

Proponents of the bill were not able to block the filibuster. The bill was stopped. Looking back on this event, La Follette was able to note with satisfaction that

"it prevented the surrender to the President of the war­ making power. That was a real service to democracy—to 3 7 constitutional liberty." The proponents of the Armed Ship bill had been suc­ cessful in one way, however. They had managed to prevent

La Follette from speaking on the issue. Belle Case

35R.M.L., p. 603.

R.M.L., p. 616. 3 7 R.M.L., p. 644. 106

suggested that he devote the March issue of his magazine to

his arguments, pressing home the point that Wilson was

asking for the "unlimited autocratic power that the Kaiser

and Czar and all the other crowned heads of Europe and Lord

Grey asked for. . . . The people who say stand by the

President, right or wrong, are doing exactly what the people 3 8 of Germany and England and all the European nations did."

He proceeded to do just that. The opening paragraph of that issue defends his actions: "I was opposed to the

Armed Ship Bill. Under my oath as a Senator it was my duty to do everything legitimately within my power to defeat it, and I exercised my constitutional rights and discharged my constitutional obligation to defeat the measure, in so far 39 as permitted by the tyrannical action of a majority."

After discussing the techniques used to try and force the bill through the Senate, La Follette turned to the real issue—the unconstitutional usurpation of the war-mak­ ing powers by President Wilson. The Senator claimed that

"if the language of the bill does not seek to confer authority which would leave it in his DISCRETION to MAKE

WAR, then there is no power in human language which could accomplish that result." ‘The bill was "contrary to the letter and spirit of the Constitution," the point being

38R.M.L.,>p. 639.

39"The Armed Ship Bill Meant War," La Follette1s Magazine, March, 1917, p. 1. 107

"again and again affirmed in the Constitutional debates that it would be dangerous to the liberty of the people to place the war-making power, and the control of the Army and

Navy in the hands of the Executive." He and his fellow- filibusterers were, on the other hand, "exercising their rights and discharging their obligation under the Constitu- 40 tion" in trying to stop the bill.

Is it any wonder that La Follette "seemed to smile a little cynically" on April 2, 1917 when Wilson proposed 41 that the United States Senate declare war on Germany?

For all practical purposes, Wilson had already foisted the event onto the country. The battle was lost, but La

Follette chose to go down fighting. Despite his warnings,

Wilson's interpretation had carried the day. Come what may, he felt compelled to again present his constitutional arguments against allowing the President to weld war-making powers. The final battle began quietly enough, almost as though he was totally unconcerned with the vilification he knew would follow upon his pronouncements: "Senator

La Follette was unmoved; 'I ask,' he said, with his 42 peculiarly exasperating smile, 'for the regular order.'"

40"The Armed Ship Bill Meant War,".p. 2.

41Milwaukee Journal, April 3, 1917. 42Millis, p. 444. 108

Might not this particular smile be tinged with irony? Here was La Follette, fighting for the Constitution in the face of presidential and public opposition—and using constitu­ tional means, to boot.

He was not following a whim or fancy, but "fulfilling the duty of senators and representatives to vote and act according to their convictions on all public matters that come before them for consideration and decision." La

Follette's personal conviction had always been to follow the Constitution. Thus, he was forced to object once again to an unconstitutional measure: "I know of no course to take except to oppose, regretfully but not less firmly, the demands of the executive." The war itself was not the topic of the day. The issue was the same one he had been arguing 43 for a year: "standing back of the President."

The Senator repeated his argument that Wilson's arming of merchant ships had been "without authority from 4 4 Congress" and thus unconstitutional. On the other hand, those men who had filibustered the bill and who had been subsequently labeled as "willful" had in fact done so . 45 through "obedience to . . . their oaths of office."

4 3 Text, p. 1. 4 4 Text, p. 1. 45 Text, p. 2. 109

After citing a number of public declarations for his

view, La Follette launched into a defense of the use of the

filibuster and the roll call by the minority as rights con­

ferred through "the foresight of the makers of the . 46 Constitution of this great government of ours." La

Follette's tacit implication here was the contract between

the Constitutional sanction given to filibustering as

opposed to the constitutional denial of the war-making

powers which Wilson had assumed.

Even more infuriating to La Follette than the

President's nibbling away of Congressional powers, however, was the President's denial of the second tenet of La

Follettism-—that the will of the people shall be the law of the land. This "power in the people supreme" was "being . . . . „47 denied expression now. To understand how La Follette could make such a brazen denial of the public opposition to his stand, it is necessary to again review the previous year's actions. In

La Follettism, the tenet of constitutionalism went hand in hand with the will of the people. In the same way, the

Senator's defense of the Constitution during the year pre­ ceding America's entry into the war had run a parallel course with his plea that the people be consulted.

46 Text, p. 7. <-4 7Text, p. 7. 110 La Follette was completely immersed in his belief

that the people of the United States should be truly repre­

sented by their government. His declaration that "the will

of the people shall be the law of the land" became a motto

for his form of progressivism and a banner under which he

had taken up many a battle. His daughter Fola attested

that this belief was the "burning conviction behind his 4 8 determined opposition to a declaration of war."

The May, 1916 issue of La Follette1s Magazine came out strongly on the war issue by emphatically insisting for popular representation. "Consult the People!" its headline proclaims. In a boldface section, La Follette editorial­ ized, "I BELIEVE THAT ON A QUESTION LIKE THIS, THE GRAVEST

THAT CAN POSSIBLY COME BEFORE THE PEOPLE OF A NATION, MORE

THAN ON ANY OTHER PROBLEM OF NATIONAL POLICY OR WELL-BEING,

THE PEOPLE SHOULD BE CONSULTED."

Slightly over a month after his speech against the unconstitutionality of "preparedness," he proposed a practical solution to how to easily ascertain public opinion: "I introduced on April 29 in the Senate, a bill which provides simple and adequate machinery by which the qualified voters may give to Congress their sentiments" through empowering the Bureau of the Census to gather the information through a referendum.

48 R.M.L., p. 665. Ill

His consideration of the Constitution in even a

matter as significant as following the will of the people

is illustrated in his avowal that the method "avoids

constitutional difficulties by making this vote PURELY

ADVISORY. ... It makes no attempt to hamper Congress in

the exercise of its constitutional duties."

La Follette seems to have assumed that the bill

would not pass. "The day is coming when the’people, who

always pay the full price, are going to have the FINAL SAY

over their own destinies," he predicted, even while admit­

ting, "That day is not yet here." His patient determination

to continue the battle if he must prompted him to declare,

"We should all strive to hasten its coming."

La Follette closed with a final jab at the

President’s attempt to assume war-making powers, the consti­

tutional battle he was waging simultaneously with the

referendum issue: "Let us have an advisory vote upon this

matter of war . . . through which the voice of the people . . . shall INDEED reach the ears of those who represent

them and who have, under the Constitution, the sole power 49 to declare war." Imagine La Follette's chagrin, then, when accused of < being "willful" by fighting the Armed Ship bill. President

Wilson could not have hit upon a more successful method

49"consult the People!"La Follette's Magazine, May, 1916, p. 1. 112 calculated to send the Senator into near-apoplexy than to demand what La Follette considered unconstitutional rights, and then blandly suggest that the men who had opposed him

"were not representing the people by whose suffrages they , „ 5 0 are here.

Thus, when La Follette argued his case on April 4,

1917, the constitutional issue was inevitably linked with the denial of public input. The President himself had joined the two, but La Follette would have introduced the topic in any case. The two tenets of La Follettism were too closely aligned for him. to omit his appeal to the will of the people. Asserting that "I know of no graver charge that could be made against the official conduct of any member of this body than that his official action was the result of a

'willful'—that is, an unreasoned and perverse—purpose,"

La Follette cited message after message, offered by "many of my colleagues on both sides of this floor" to illustrate that he had indeed followed public reaction. Several pages of his manuscript are devoted to quoting these 15,000 messages, none out of ten of which were "an unqualified endorsement of my course in opposing war with Germany on the . „51 issue presented.

58Text, p. 2.

51Text, p. 2. 113

He explained that the framers of the constitution had intended to create "not the semblance of democracy but real democracy" in which "back of congresses and statutes and back of presidents" exists "the supreme power, the sovereign power of the people, and they can correct our errors and mistakes and our wrongdoing." This power was 52 "being denied now." Always more important to La Follette than the words of the Constitution was the impetus which maintained them: the will of the people. The last lines of La Follette's Autobiography acknowledge this ultimate source of power: "I believe, with increasing depth of conviction, that we will, in our day, meet our responsi­ bility with fearlessness and faith; that we will reclaim and preserve for our children, not only the form but the 5 3 spirit of our free institutions."

Showing that the President was not only unconstitu­ tional, but wrong-headed as well, La Follette begged that the issue be put to the supreme test. "Will the president and the supporters of the war bill submit it to a vote of the people before the declaration of war goes into effect?"54 he questioned. He knew they would not and could not, since he was sure such a vote would bring defeat for

52 Text, p. 7. 5 * 5 3 Autobiography, pp.760-761. 54 Text, p. 12 . 114

the measure: "the espionage bills, the conscription bills,

and other forcible military measures which we understand

are being ground out of the war machine in this country is

the complete proof that those responsible for this war fear 55 that it has no popular support."

Subsequent historians and critics have clucked

condescending over the pitiful spectacle of poor, misguided

La Follette claiming not only to know the will of the

people but to know that their will was against war. Such a

claim would seem to be easily refuted by the presence of

the war-crazed mobs protesting his actions even while he

delivered this speech. La Follette, however, thought and

spoke in absolutes. Kent has noted that "his penchant for painting in blacks and whites, instead of subtle shades of

gray, always tended to betray him.

The Senator chose to ignore the momentary outcry for war as merely the temporary "will of the people." What he was referring to was an ideal, eternal, arid permanent "WILL

OF THE PEOPLE." He would refuse "to modify his beliefs because the herd seemed to be marching in another

direction," 5 7 because he believed he could see past any maverick activities to the real direction towards the truth

33Text, pp. 12-13.

56Kent, p. 12.

37Kent, p. 148. 115 inherent in the people's fundamental beliefs. The world might view him as "one of those queer offshoots of 5 8 civilization who simply cannot keep step with the masses," but he viewed the world as moving inexorably toward the ultimate awareness of truth.

Perhaps this viewpoint can best be exemplified in a statement made by La Follette about Theodore Roosevelt.

Noting that although he was ."the keenest and ablest living interpreter of what I would call the superficial public sentiment of a given time," La Follette nonetheless contended that he was not able to "distinguish between that which is a mere surface indication of a sentiment and the building up by a long process of education of a public opinion which is 59 as deep-rooted as life."

This attitude caused Roosevelt "either through a desire to get immediate results, or through a misunderstand­ ing of the really profound depth of that public sentiment . . . to get what little he could then, rather than to take a temporary defeat and go on fighting . . . for legislation that would be fundamentally sound. It goes without saying that La Follette had accepted temporary defeats throughout his career, only to bounce back

5 8 Worcester Telegram as reprinted in Milwaukee Sentinel, October 3, 1917, p. 8.. 5 ^Autobiography, pp. 388-389.

6^Autobiography, p. 389. , 116 and renew the battle. It was for this reason that he hated to settle for compromises and would rather accept "no bread." His belief was that "half a loaf is fatal whenever it is accepted at the sacrifice of the basic principle sought to be attained." Any compromise called for "the most thorough and complete mastery of the principles involved, in order to fix the limit beyond which not one 61 hair's breadth can be yielded."

It was faith in the enduring, absolute, underlying will of the people which led La Follette to spend the lion's share of his speech in recounting the events which led up to America's entry into war. He was well aware that the people's thoughts were then held in thrall by the war craze. Thus, he spoke to the eventual awareness they would achieve when they once again returned to the fundamentals.

It was thus La Follette's duty to reveal these facts, in preparation for the time when that eternal will would "have expression." He claimed that "it will be as certain and as inevitable as the return of the tides, and as resistless, „62 too. It was to the deeply-held convictions, then, that he was speaking—and not to any superficial "brain storm of 6 3 war hysteria." His faith in their adherence to the

6’'Autobiography, p. 38 8. 82Text, p. 7. 83La Follette's Magazine, June, 1916, p. 15. 117 abiding truths had led him to editorialize in October, 1916 that "the mass of people have not been convinced by the false alarm" of military "preparedness." Indeed, "the real sentiment of the people as a whole was not rightly estimated by Congress," because "there is a wiser judgment, a truer test." The people "are much too wise and intelligent to be deceived by a counterfeit call to serve selfish interests."

Ever an optimist, La Follette announced that "men are still thinking! They will not be stampeded. They are weighing the possibility of danger. They are weighing the cost. And weighing it well." Although his hopes for staying out of war would be dashed in just a few months, he still clung to his faith: "The people understand. Their calm, deliberate, studied judgment is AGAINST all this war 64 preparation. AND THEIR JUDGMENT WILL.PREVAIL."

There is little doubt that his viewpoint was tremendously idealistic. The question of whether there is such a thing as universal truth has been a metaphysical moot point for centuries. A discussion of it would be superfluous here. The fact remains that La Follette believed in it. He need but set the facts before the people, and they would ultimately arrive at the proper,

64"The People Understand," La Follette1s Magazine, October, 1916, p. 1. 118 65 "true conclusions.

Thus, devoting the major portion of his April 4 speech to citing the actual events was no political chicanery intended to postpone entering the war for a few more precious moments. Steeping the public in the facts was a necessary step towards the struggle for ultimate truth and formed the third basic tenet of La Follettism.

If the people were mired in ignorance, freedom was impos­ sible. The Constitution could work only through the will of the people which in turn must be formed through truth.

It is clear, then, why he claimed that "Democracy is based upon knowledge." Knowledge of the truth was "vital to self- government."^8

La Follette's expressed belief in the facts dated back to his days as a lawyer. He had formed the opinion then that "it is facts that settle cases; the law is always

85It is interesting to note that Otis L. Graham, Jr. claims that many progressives "thought that it would be enough to speak out, breaking the silence that concealed the social crisis: individual enlightenment would follow, and wrongs would be voluntarily corrected. " The Great' Campaigns: Reform and War in America, 1900-1928 (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1971), p. 27. See also Rush Welter's Popular Education and Democratic Thoughts, in which he develops the thesis that progressivism was mainly an effort in public education, not in political action. La Follette's use Of educating the public went beyond this naive and simplistic attitude. He held with keeping the facts con­ tinually before the people so that they might form opinions, rather than with expecting a one-shot presentation to create immediate results. ^Autobiography, p. 64. 119 the same. And this rule applies to things of larger importance than criminal cases. Facts count high every­ where. . . . In no other one thing does a public man more surely indicate his quality than in his ability to master actual conditions and set them forth with clearness.

Neither laws, nor opinions, nor even constitutions, will finally convince people: it is only the concrete facts of 4. „6 7 concrete cases.

Remington has noted that "The dominating character­ istic of Senato,r La Follette's Senate speeches is his extensive and encyclopaedic use of facts and statistics"-- a characteristic which Senator Wayne Morse claimed was "the chief contribution of La Follette liberalism to American thought."5 8

He had become convinced of "the serious interest of our people in government, and their willingness to give their thought to subjects which are really vital and upon which facts, not mere opinions, are set forth, even though 69 the presentation maybe forbidding." When he refuted the President's April 2, 1917 message, it was "a time of all times . . . when accuracy of statement is vitally essential to presenting the issues to the Congress and to the people

6 VAutobiography, pp. 41-42. 88Remington, p. 81.

6 9 Autobiography, p. 67. 120 70 of the country." Thus, he read quotations from that message, commenting upon their implications in order to fully inform the public.

He felt called upon to go beyond the current happenings, however, and "to review as briefly as possible, but with absolute accuracy and fairness, the events occurring since the commencement of the present European war, which have brought us to the very brink of war with 71 the German empire." By the time he had finished, the facts of the case had covered more than two-thirds of his presentation.

The facts, to be sure, were very important to La

Follette. He reasoned that any movement was based upon

"the slow development of powerful forces working in our social life. Sound ideas seize upon the human mind.

Opinions ripen into fixed convictions. Masses of men are drawn together by common belief and organized about clearly 72 defined principles." This process, as he noted, was not an overnight phenomenon, but a series of gradual, painstaking steps. In light of this attitude, perhaps La Follette was not such a moon-struck dreamer after all. He did not necessarily think

70 Text, p. 9. ^Text, p. 13.

72Autobiography, p. 750. 121

he would be immediately vindicated in his stand on the war.

Certainly he was convinced that eventually his views would

be reassessed, re-evaluated, and re-instated. When that

happened, "Oh, Mr. President, . . . they will be heard. 73 . . . they will have their day and they will be heard."

It was confidence in this eventual outcome that had

kept him faithful. He had proclaimed that "the fundamental

principles of democracy involved have worked themselves

profoundly into my convictions, and the struggle could not

have been sustained, year after year, often in the face of

disappointment and defeat, had I felt less deeply the 74 eternal justice of the end sought to be attained." .

La Follette's April 4, 1917 address against America's

entry into World War I, then, could be considered a classic model of the philosophical formula he used in arriving at his conclusions. It made no difference to him whether he was fighting "monster combinations," railroad subsidies, infringement on Indian rights, or mistreatment of seamen.

He felt duty-bound to protect the rights of the people as .

far as the limits of the Constitution would allow.

Thus, while others might decide to go all out in favor of war, La Follette continued to follow his lonely, loyal journey down the well-worn path of his beliefs. He

73m Text, p. 7.

Autobiography, p. 759. 122 had not yielded to a perverse streak prompting him to argue for the sake of argument. He had not developed a moral aversion to war itself. He had not capitulated to what he considered the temporary dementia of a war-crazed public.

He was merely doing what he had always done, come what may. i as

CHAPTER V

"NEVER ABANDON THE FIGHT"

Shortly after three a.m. on the morning of Good

Friday, April 6, 1917, the final vote on the War Declaration

Resolution was heard and American entrance into World War I

became official. The declaration had passed the Senate by

a vote of eighty-two to six and the Congress by a tally of

three hundred and seventy-three to fifty.

La Follette's stand against war was now a moment of

the past. America was at war. Once again, as had been the

case so many times in his long career, defeat was to be the

immediate result of La Follette's efforts. Yet, as in the

past, La Follette looked upon defeat only as a stimulation

to "better fighting." For while the issue of war was no

longer in question, the issues of constitutionalism and

representative government still remained. The speeches and actions of La Follette in the Senate throughout the rest of

1917 attest to the Senator's abiding adherence to the

tenets of La Follettism in his approach to the war.

Whenever he attacked, it was not to impede the process of the war but to keep the war from impeding the process of representative government as he saw it. Of all the war measures brought before the Senate in 1917—over

100 in number--he voted against only three. To illustrate 124

his support of most war measures, La Follette went so far as to publish his voting record for that period.’’ The

attacks, when they did come, applied La Follettism to the

topic of war, just as it had been applied to whatever topic

was at hand before the war. His speeches could be said to

have almost interchangeable parts, restructured to fit each

bill he argued against.

The "first prepared speech he had delivered since the

declaration of war" was against the Conscription bill. At eleven thirty on the night of April 27, 1917, he "offered

an amendment calling for an advisory referendum to allow

the people of the United States to register their opinion 2 on an issue which affected them so profoundly."

The main issue was again the Presidential usurpation of war-making powers that he denied: "the main purpose" of the bill, he declared, "is to clothe one man with power."

La Follette feared Wilson’s encroachment upon powers not given to the executive: "that the person we propose to clothe with this power of life and death over our children happens to be the President only serves to increase the

iniquity of the proposal, for the power once granted will attach to the office, and will be exercised so long as this

’’La Follette1 s Magazine, December, 1917.

2R.M.L., p. 733. 125 nation shall last."

The President was assuming powers that were totally out of his reach: "under the Constitution, Bob declared there was no authority for drafting an army to be sent 4 across the seas to foreign lands." This was in turn' stifling the powers that rested in Congress. Instead of the legislative branch outlining the conduct of the war, the impetus towards backing the President had brought the country "upon times in the United States, with all its boasted principles of democracy and freedom, where freedom of debate ... is brought under the iron rule of driving legislation through without deliberation, without the possibility of the Senate being in attendance upon the debate."5

La Follette seems to have been particularly bitter about the President’s power-mongering move, coming as it did in the wake of the War Declaration and Espionage bills.

He had earlier in debate on the Conscription bill given vent to a certain amount of spleen in his heavily sarcastic comment that "if we want to conscript in accordance with

3 "Draft and Democracy," La Follette1s Magazine, May, 1917, p. 2. These excerpts from the Conscription bill speech were checked for accuracy against the Congressional Record, 65th Congress, 1st Session, Volume 55, April 27, 1917, pp. 1354-1364. 4 R.M.L., p. 734. 5 "Draft and Democracy," p. 2. 126 the President's advice, why not say so and leave off the

false and misleading but just-sounding title of 'universal

military training.

Spleen or not, he was convinced that granting war

powers to the President would irrevocably destroy the

balance of power set forth in the Constitution. Arming

"the executive branch of the government with the power that

this bill proposes, to select the men to constitute the

army" would inevitably lead to "the beginning of the end of. 7 our constitutional government."

La Follette's answer to the problem was embodied,in

the amendment to the bill which he proposed: let the will of the people be heard. He noted that "it seems never to

occur to these champions and heralds of democracy to permit

the PEOPLE to express themselves upon any of the matters 8 vital to their interest."

The argument for the people's will to be heeded seems also to have been somewhat inspired by La Follette's irritation at what he considered the president's impudence.

He thought Wilson was steamrolling legislation through

Congress, snubbing his nose at the people all the while.

^Comments on the Conscription bill, Congressional Record, 65th Congress, 1st Session, Volume 55, April 24, 1917, p. 1062. 7 "Draft and Democracy," p. 4. 8 "Draft and Democracy," p. 3. 127

La Follette's pre-speech interpretation of. the President's remarks on conscription—in which "the sentiment is grand, the diction perfect"--reveals his astonishment at what he considered its flagrant flouting of the people's opinions.

In an ironic tone, he noted that "by implication it says,

'you may have been willing to have offered yourself freely,

I don't know; I will not take any chances on you; obey 9 your master's voice and come whether or no.'"

Master's voice, indeed!’ Here was an issue La

Follette labeled as "scarcely less vital to the people than the declaration of war itself."38 Thus, in a tandem argu­ ment supporting the Constitution and the people's will, he was prepared "to urge as strongly as lean that the voters shall have an opportunity to express themselves by an advisory vote,"33 which would be "made advisory in order to 12 avoid any constitutional difficulty." This method was m fact the same referendum he had espoused toward the war declaration issue. His support of the need for such a vote came once again through the use of factual and historical data.

"Comments," p. 1062. 38"Draft and Democracy," p. 4.

33"Draft and Democracy," p. 4. 12 "Draft and Democracy," p. 5. 128

Truth had been hidden, warped, and ignored throughout the

war debates, according to La Follette. He thought that "we

commenced this war with the people suffering under a misap­

prehension of the facts. We are now trying to put this 13 selective draft over m the same way."

He was going to rectify the lack of concrete evi­

dence. Early in the speech he claimed that "for such action

as it is proposed to take by this, bill under present con­

ditions there is no precedent in all our history, and, I

believe, there is none in the history of any people making 14 the slightest claim to freedom." He proceeded to

illustrate this claim by "reading from Daniel Webster’s 15 argument on a Conscription bill proposed in 1814." He

demonstrated that men in countries intimately involved in

the war—Canada, Australia, and Ireland—had joined of their

own accord. He explained why the Civil War draft law had

been such a disastrous failure. He closed his speech with

an analysis of the motivation behind the President's speech

of January 22 on his plan for peace, which, La Follette X 6 noted "was made before we became a party to the conflict."

13"Comments," p. 1062.

14"Draft and Democracy," p. 2.

15R.M.L., p. 734.

18 "A Just and Durable Peace," concluding arguments to "Draft and Democracy," La Follette's Magazine, May, 1917, p. 1. 129

Here once more was the model of La Follettism at work. That the Senator's philosophical beliefs were violated by passage of the bill on May 1, 1917 is evident in his belief that "the Supreme Court had correctly interpreted the Constitution ninety years before when it declared that the President's power to call out the state militia was limited to cases of actual invasion or insur- rection. „ 17

He opposed the Conscription bill so strongly that he did not intend to let the matter drop either when it was passed or when the Supreme Court reversed "its previous decision a few months after the passage . . . and sustained the Government's right to draft men in the state militia and elsewhere for service in foreign lands."

In order to keep the public informed on this issue, he sent "out by mail the speeches he made, the amendments he offered." Repealing the draft law was one of the issues he considered important enough to include in a proposed election platform, so that the question could indeed be 18 brought before the people. When La Follette next delivered a speech in the

Senate, it was to promote the will of the people which had been rejected in deciding the Conscription bill and which

17R.M.L., p. 736.

18R.M.L., p. 737. 130 was being ignored in deciding "the bill to provide revenue 19 to defray war expenses, and for other purposes."

This issue caused the only inversion of the constitution-people-facts formula he followed in his other war-time Senate speeches. Instead, it follows a people- constitution-facts organization, using the same tenets but rearranging them to refocus his main attack and perhaps for some relief from the constant repetition of the pattern as used in the other speeches.

The "speech" La Follette made to attack items in this bill was actually a series of speeches given August 21,

September 1, and September 10, 1917 on the topics of

"Taxation of Surplus Incomes," "War Profits Tax," "Increase the Pay of Soldiers Required to Serve in Foreign

Countries," and "Is It Disloyal to Advocate Just Taxation of War Profits and Surplus Income?"

Admittedly, these speeches deal more with methodology than with ideology. Instead of the bond technique for raising war revenue proposed by the President, La Follette was advocating a tax system which would apply to the war effort a percentage of new profits made as a direct consequence of the war.

■^Reference cited in each reprint of La Follette's taxation speeches. See "Taxation of Surplus Incomes," August 21, 1917 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1917), p. 1. 131

This time, La Follette was not primarily motivated by violations of the constitutional tenet in his philosophy.

This time, the basic rights of the people were being trampled underfoot. If the eternal justice in which he believed was ever to have its day, then the people must be considered. "I am no prophet," he declared, "but I am 20 greatly mistaken if the people accept this majority bill."

Raising funds by bond issues would saddle the people

—who were already forced to participate through conscription--with the entire cost of the war. It was the people who "pay the cost of the war, though not directly taxed a dollar for it. They pay it in increased prices and in excessive hours of labor. They pay it in service not on the battle fields butw herever men and women toil in the dreary occupations of life. More than all, they pay it 21 with their blood and their lives."

La Follette appealed time and time again to his fellow Senators to judge the bill in terms of its fairness to the American people. "This may be a principle new in war finance," he announced, "but is the very least that the masses of the people should be asked to accept, and it is 22 much less than even-handed justice would demand for them,"

2 0 "Taxation of Surplus Incomes," p. 25. 21 "Taxation of Surplus Incomes," p. 25. 2 2 "Taxation of Surplus Incomes," pp. 24-25. 132

He insisted again that "the public, Mr. President, . . . 23 will not be blindly led," and that "this war is unpopular 24 in this country."

He even went so far as to warn the Senators that a final retribution would be awaiting them if they continued to deny the interests of the people. He noted that "we were not elected by the people of this country upon the issues with which we are dealing here" and thus "we have no commission, so far as the votes that selected us to come to this body are concerned, which determines for us the views of the people upon these extraordinary questions that are coming up."

Nonetheless, he was sure that the will of the people would again assert itself: "But, mark you, as sure as the sun shines and God reigns, there will be a review before the people of this legislation . . . and if you do not think that the people of this country are taking account of what 25 is going on here you are not rightly informed."

His reply to "the Senator from North Dakota" that a tax upon big business would be "too onerous a burden" was almost a cry of agony wrung from the heart of La Follettism:

33"War Profits Tax," September 1, 1917 (Washington: Government Rrinting Office, 1917), p. 15. 34"Increase the Pay of Soldiers Who are Required to Serve in Foreign Countries," September 10, 1917 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1917), p. 31. 2 5 "Taxation of Surplus Incomes," p. 9. 133

But, Mr. President, underlying these words of the Senator from North Dakota, and of the chairman of the Finance Committee, and of every man who has given utterance to such sentiments in this debate, is the most pregnant admission that has been made in this entire discussion. That admission is this: That it is the wealth of this country that can stop this war and that it will stop it unless it is permitted to make exorbitant profits out of it. That is the plain grisly fact that the argument of the Senator from North Dakota uncovers and lays bare to the view of the Senate and of the country and, I may say, to the world, also. The people—the 100,000,000 people of the country—do not count. The 2,000,000 or 5,000,000 boys who are going to be put into the trenches do not count. Their parents, their families, their dependents, do not count. Of the 2,000,000 young men you are drafting for trench service under the first draft act, at least 80 per cent of them do not want to go, so far as published reports of exemption claims indicate their attitude. It is fair to assume that a much larger percentage of their parents and members of their families do not want them to go. But that is not the thing that is going to stop the war, according to the arguments of the Senator - from North Dakota. These young men are tied hand and foot. They are bound by the unbreakable chains of the draft law. They need no longer to be reckoned with; it seems to make but little difference to the United States Senate what you do as to them. Their wishes are immaterial according to the logic of the Senator, but it is the wealth and wealthy that must not be offended by what we may do here. They must not be made to feel the pinch of a little taxation or forsooth we will, to quote the language that has been used in this debate, "dampen their ardor and destroy their war spirit."26

La Follette recognized his old enemy, big business, in this issue: "When any plan is discovered by which the sacrifices of the war must be borne equally by all, the rich and the poor, the strong and the weak, the rulers and

"Is It Disloyal to Advocate Just Taxation of War Profits and Surplus Incomes?" September 10, 1917 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1917), p. 31. 134 those ruled over—when that plan is discovered, I say there 27 will be no more war." To La Follette, big business was again steam-rolling over the will of the people, stripping away their hgrd-won rights. All this without an attempt to ascertain the thoughts of the people or a -whimper of pro­ test from their representatives.

This was an utter denial of La Follettism. Big business rather than the will of the people was deciding the course the government should take, plunging it into a war to which the people were committed without so much as a fare-thee-well. To add insult to injury, according to La

Follette, the interests of big business demanded that the people then shoulder the expense for a war they had not wanted to enter. This attitude was clearly evinced in an editorial headline he wrote after his taxation proposal was defeated. The banner reads: "The People Lost--Wealth

W.. on. „28 The Senator's answer was simple enough: take the burden off the shoulders of the people, who only lose dur­ ing war, and place it on the corporations which stood to gain through war. Otherwise, "here it is that . . . the just demands of the people to be relieved a little from the burdens of this war are to be ignored, and a financial

2^"War Profits Tax," p. 3.

2 8La Follette's Magazine, September, 1917, p. 1. 135 policy adopted which can only bring disaster to our forces 29 in the field and discontent to our people at home."

It was in promoting this method for funding the war that he turned once again to the constitutional tenet of his philosophy. It should be recalled that the counterpoint to La Follette's denial of presidential war-making powers was his insistence upon congressional responsibility for forming war policies. This conviction had led him to introduce a War Aims resolution on August 11, 1917. He- then felt "that it was important Congress should assert its proper authority and declare the war aims of the United States."38 That "its assertion of the rights of Congress 31 was unwelcome to the Administration" goes without saying.

He had expressed this idea in an editorial in June,

1917. He noted then that "arguments as to the power of

Congress to shape the war policy and . . . opposition to the usurpation of power on the part of the Executive are potent so long as the Constitution remains the law of the land.". He maintained that it was "the right and duty of .32 the law making body to shape the war policy."

38"war Profits Tax," p. 28. 3OR.M.L., p. 750. 31R.M.L., p. 756. 32 "The Right of the Citizen to Oppose War and the Right of Congress to Shape the War Policy," La Follette1s Magazine, June, 1917, p. 3. 136

A plank he had proposed for up coming election campaigns was "that it is the right and the duty of Congress to determine upon the motives, the cause, and the objects of any war when it commences, or at any time during the 33 progress of its existence."

Thus, even in these speeches dealing with technical methods of raising funds, La Follette appealed to his fellow Senators to assert their rights by deciding on war policy. "Senators, we have the opportunity now," he announced, "to levy a tax upon war profits never before taxed at all in this country or in any other before this war, ... upon surplus incomes never taxed at a rate any- 34 thing like fair by this Government."

He later exhorted them to make their own decisions, not be blindly led by pressure to accept the committee recommendation, declaring that "it behooves Members of the

Senate with respect to this new proposition which it is presented, in view of the history of this bill in the

Senate, to scan it carefully and to form their own 35 judgment." At a time "when thrones are tottering and cabinets are changing almost daily because they do not represent the popular will," he declared, "this is not a

33R.M.L., p. 737. 34"Taxation of Surplus Incomes," p. 7.

35"War Profits Tax," p. 15. 137 time to adopt a weak, halting, and unjust financial policy 36 for the conduct of the war."

The Senator may have been guilty of doing some proverbial "wishful thinking" on this matter. He seems to have conceived of this as a chance for the legislative branch to reassert itself, to regain some of the ground it had lost by ceding the war-making powers to the President.

His disappointment with the defeat of his proposal was that

Congress "had failed to fulfill its responsibility as the legislative branch of the Government; that under the

Constitution Congress had the right to determine the objects and purposes of every war in which the United States was engaged."33

Nevertheless, he had once again taken the stand for

La Follettism. Considering that it took three separate occasions for him to deliver his message, it is easy to assert that he was again relying on the use of facts from which the truth could be gleaned to support his contentions.

This is the aspect of his philosophy that is most readily apparent in the scrutiny of the speeches. The Senator spent page after page of his manuscript reviewing events, citing historical precedents, quoting expert testimony, pre­ senting data, and explicating charts, tables, graphs,

36 "Taxation of Surplus Incomes," p. 13. 37 R.M.L. , p. 76 8. 138 statistics, and lists.

His effort had no immediate effect except temporary

public support. Although he had been denounced as a

traitor for his insistence upon Congress's right to declare

the war aims, La Follette was joined by even Theodore

Roosevelt, who considered La Follette his archenemy, in pro­ moting war profits taxation. This aura of acceptance did not last long, however. First, his proposal was soundly defeated, never to receive sanction in any war engaged in by the United States to the present day. Then, on September 20, 1917, a speech given by the

Senator in St. Paul was misquoted and caused an outcry for his expulsion from the Senate. This outcry precipitated what "many consider one of the finest speeches Bob ever delivered in the Senate": his "Defense of the Rights of 3 8 Free Speech." . . While "everyone assumed that Bob intended to discuss the St. Paul speech and the disloyalty charges that had been made against him" in the speech he had announced for

October 6, 1917, La Follette himself had decided to speak to the more fundamental constitutional issue. His opinions on this issue were life-long ones, but his current motivation had been originally prompted by the passage of the Espionage bill which had become law on

38R.M.L., p. 763. 139

June 15, 1917. He had considered it "the worst legislative

crime of the war because it menaced freedom of assembly,

freedom from unwarranted search and seizure, and other

rights which had been won by generations of struggle and

sacrifice." Throughout debate on the bill, La Follette had

"supported every amendment which sought to prevent drastic 39 restrictions of free speech, free press, and free assembly."

One of the six Senators who voted against it, he found himself the target for one of the provisions within months of its passage into law. Ironically, a major part of his delivery in defense of free speech had originally been 40 intended as the text of his St. Paul address.

Of course, the recent invective heaped upon him had had something to do with his decision to speak on October 6.

However, he declared that if he "alone had been made the victim of these attacks," he would not have taken "one moment of the Senate's time for their consideration." He himself would allow "neither the clamor of the mob nor the voice of power" to turn him "by the breadth of a hair from the course" that he had marked for himself "guided by such knowledge" as he could obtain and "controlled and directed by a solemn conviction of right and duty."

39 R.M.L., p. 732. 40 - R.M.L., p. 763. 140

More vital than any personal ,attack upon his repu­ tation was the fact that "the most, sacred constitutional rights guaranteed to every American citizen are being violated." They were being denied one of the basic rights upon which the country had been founded and for which the s Constitution had been written to protect: the right to free speech.

The Senator noted that "the mandate seems to have gone forth to the sovereign people of this country that they must be silent while those things are being done by their Government which most vitally concern their well­ being, their happiness, and their lives." This attitude was being foisted onto them as their duty during a war, which it certainly should not be.

To be certain, "the right to control their own government according to constitutional forms is not one of the rights that the citizens of this country are called upon to surrender in time of war." On the contrary, war represented a time when "more than all, the citizen and his representative in Congress . . .must maintain his right of free speech. More than in times of peace it is necessary that the channels for free public discussion of govern- 41 mental policies shall be open and unclogged."

43”Defense of the Rights of Free Speech," reprinted a-s "La Follette's Complete Speech," La Follette' s Magazine, December, 1917, p. 4. 141

The voice of the people should not be gagged, but

should be "heeded upon the great questions arising out of

this war," including "how the war shall be prosecuted"

because it was "necessary to the welfare, to the existence,

of this Government."

In order to prove his point that the right of free

speech must be preserved in wartime, La Follette proceeded

to cite authorities "which cover both the right of the

people to discuss the war in all its phases and the right

and the duty of the people's representatives in Congress to 42 declare the purposes and objects of the war."

Lo and behold, La Follette had surprised them all.

He was not debating about a misquote. He was not solely

concerned with the right of free speech except as a

constitutional issue which illustrated exactly what he had been saying all along. He was making a beeline straight for the old, familiar territory of the power in Congress to conduct the war as advised by the will of the people who needed to know the truth of the issue.

An informed La Follette scholar, however, would feel little surprise, merely a comfortable flash of recognition.

Here again was the series of premises upon which he based his arguments throughout the war. Using the same arguments, he blamed the whole problem on Congress's having allowed

42 "Defense," p. 5. 142 the President to usurp the war-making powers. This: had

caused the United States to enter "a war the awful conse­ quences of which no man can foresee, which, in my judgment, could have been avoided if the Congress had exercised its constitutional power to influence and direct the foreign 43 policy of this country."

So here it was again:? La Follette’s insistence that

"the Congress must exercise in full the war powers entrusted to it by the Constitution." If. it had done so in the first place, there would have been no war, no Espionage bill, no Conscription bill and no need for him to be then exhorting Congressmen to follow their duties.

Arguing for the powers of Congress to remain right there, La Follette quoted from Section 8, Article I of the

Constitution. He noted that evidence from "the debates that took place in the constitutional convention” showed that "the Constitution was so framed as to vest in the

Congress the entire war-making power" because "the framers of the Constitution knew that to give to one man that power 4 4 meant danger to the rights and liberties of the people."

In addition, it meant that "the people would be called upon to wage wars in which they had no interest or to which they 45 might even be opposed."

4 3„ Defense," p. 8. 44„ 45 Defense," p. 8. Defense," p. 9. 143

The power was so placed in the assumption "that ■

debate would be free and open, that many men representing

all the sections of the Country would freely, frankly, and

calmly exchange their views, unafraid of the power.of the

Executive, uninfluenced by anything except their own

convictions, and a desire to obey the will of the people

expressed in a constitutional manner." The people could wield the power of the vote easily because "Congress, particularly the House of Representatives, was assumed to be directly responsible to the people and would most nearly represent their views." In addition, before the draft, the people could force a settlement of any war to which they were opposed by a simple means of not volunteering to fight it."46

La Follette cited precedents and legal authorities to illustrate that the President did not have the even implied power to declare war, because it was in fact "the constitutional duty of the President to respect the policy 47 of the Congress in that regard." The weakness of the 65th Congress had allowed it to cede its authority over war powers to the President, something La Follette considered "an evasion of a solemn duty . . . not to exercise that power at this critical time

"Defense," p. 9. 4 7 "Defense," p. 10. 144

in the Nation's affairs." Because of this, it bowed to the

President's wishes even so far as to sacrifice the rights

of the people. Thereby, it trespassed upon the revered ground of the second tenet of La Follettism.

The Senator did not mention his previously proposed

"advisory vote" on the people's will in this matter. The issue went far beyond advise. Any such ceding of authority must be "made deliberately by an amendment to the Consti­ tution proposed and adopted in a constitutional manner."

Claiming that it was universal knowledge that "no amendment to the Constitution giving the President the powers suggested would be adopted by the people," La Follette declared that it was up to Congress to wrest back the usurped powers because "it becomes still more imperative each day that Congress should assert its constitutional power."

Thus, the power structure established in the Constitution would be maintained, Congress would decide the war policies, 4 8 and the people would retain their right to free speech.

The speech was the last utterance given by Robert M.

La Follette on the issue of war: "About the middle of

January, 1918, Senator La Follette dropped out of Senate 4 9 . deliberations on the war problems." It was because his son had been stricken with "an anemia aggravated by a

48"Defense," p. 11. 4 9 Doan, p. 92. 145

streptococcic infection" and he had refused to leave the boys side.

In that last war policy speech, in all his other war-time addressed, as well as in his peace-time rhetoric, he had expounded the principles which sustained him throughout his political struggles. With patience and fortitude, he continued to do battle in defense of the three major tenets of La Follettism: that the Constitution must be followed to the letter and intent of its framers; that the will of the people must form the spirit and impetus behind the Constitution; and that basic truth and educated knowledge must be provided as the foundation for the will of the people. He continued fighting for it throughout the rest of his life. On March 4, 1919, for instance, he joined a filibuster designed to protect the natural resources imperiled by the Deficiency Appropriation bill. At.that time he declared that "it was high time 'to rebel against any power whether it comes directly from the Executive or from congressional "steering committe," which attempts to coerce Senators Into playing the shameful part of auto­ matons and blindly voting measures' without an opportunity to discuss or amend them."51

5 0 Doan, p. n9 -3 . 51R.M.L., pp. 946-947. 146

This same adherence to his.principles can be seen in

the outlined points in the title of his speech on -a league of nations:

VOTES ON VITAL RESERVATIONS TO MAKE THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS A REAL LEAGUE FOR PEACE BY —

I.--Insuring to All Peoples the Right of Self- Government.

II.--Abolishing Conscription.

III.—Giving the People of All Nations a Referendum Vote on War.

IV.--Limitation of Armaments.

V.--Prevention of Forcible Annexations.

VI.—Prohibiting the Use of Mandates Over Weaker States for Exploitation of the Inhabitants and Resources of the Country.52

Perhaps the most appropriate illustration of La

Follette’s stance came after Harding had been elected

President. The Senate had congratulated him and he had 53 "expressed his thanks with customary eloquence." Then, as the oft-cited story goes, Harding passed by La Follette, clamped him on the shoulder, and exhorted him to "Be good,

Bob." La Follette glanced at him and replied, "I'll be busy making you be good." True to form, the Senator "was soon in his heyday again, exposing the Harding Administra­ tion scandals and denouncing the sins and sinners of both parties" —all, to be sure, in the name of La Follettism.

5 2 "Votes on Vital Reservations," November 18, 1919 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1919) , p. 1. 53Alexander, p. 162. 54Alexander, pp. 162-163. H7

CHAPTER VI

REVIEW AND CONCLUSIONS

Before it was severely limited by interest and necessity, this study was originally conceived as an investigation of anti-war rhetoric. At that time, the Viet

Nam protests were in full swing; therefore, a comparative or developmental study of the ideas and techniques presented in anti-war speaking from World War I to the late-

1960's was perceived as both topical and enlightening.

Since Robert M. La Follette was identified in many sources as the spokesman for pacifism during World War I, the initial investigation undertaken was directed at his speeches during that time period. It quickly became apparent that either La Follette was a very poor spokesman against war or was not dealing with the war at all in his rhetoric. The questionable nature of La Follette's anti-war stance was of enough interest to shift the focus of the study from the broad spectrum of anti-war speakers to this individual. Further study soon posed the immediate question, however, of how the subject should be approached.

The traditional approaches employed in rhetorical studies are given many names. William A. Linsley, for instance, cites the "ethical," "truth," "pragmatic," 148

"artistic qualities," "contribution," and "relativistic" theories as the "traditional standards for judging preferred by most critics who have expressed their impression of a ’good' speech."1

Some of these techniques can be lumped together as the "effect method" in rhetorical criticism. One specific type of effect, as cited by Ernest G. Bormann, involves the

Great Man Theory in which the "scholar who attempts to evaluate the effectiveness of a speech, or speaker . . . assumes as part of his viewpoint the notion that these 2 speakers affected history." Lester Thonssen and A. Craig

Baird have noted that in speech criticism, "the judgment concerns the effect of the discourse, or response."*3

To apply the "effect method" to La Follette's war­ time rhetoric, however, was deemed unfair both to his reputation as a progressive leader and to his own conception of the purposes of the spoken word.

An examination of the immediate effect of the speeches given in 1917, for example, would produce extremely

1William A. Linsley, "Approaches to Criticism," Speech Criticism: Methods and Materials (Dubuque: Wm. C. Brown, 1968) , p; 2. 2 • Ernest G. Bormann, Theory and Research m the Com­ municative Arts (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1965), p. 2 00-. 3 Lester Thonssen and A. Craig Baird, "Methods m the Criticism of Public Address,” QJS, XXXIII (April, 1947), p. 136. 149

negative conclusions. Following their delivery, he was

abused verbally, burned in effigy, made the target of round-

robins and vicious letters. The public outcry against him

rose to such a pitch that a formal expulsion inquiry was made into his motives. By the standards of the "effect method," he would seem to have failed miserably.

This assessment, however, would negate La Follette's

avowed intention of using the Senate floor, not to mention the Chautauqua circuit and the county fairground, as a public forum in which to set forth ideas which the people would gradually accept as the basis for their opinions.

Time and again it has been demonstrated in this study that he was committed to using "a long educational campaign to 4 prepare the way" for building these new attitudes. He could thus be assumed to have spoken in 1917 in order to give the people the facts, not necessarily to change the

Senate vote. Thus', it would be most unscholarly and unethical to ignore La Follette's dependence upon the effects of time and oft-repeated facts to form public opinion. On the other hand, even if the "effect method" is assumed to take future results into account, a study of them would be fraught with difficulty, and the lines of direct effect would be drawn so thin as to make any argument in their favor extremely

4 Autobiography, p. 199. .150 tenuous and questionable.

The major problem would be in determining how far to trace the chain of effects. Would the impact of La

Follette end with the life of the man in 1925? Would it end with the gradual diminishment of the progressive movement?

Would it be possible to trace a direct, or even indirect, effect to the present day?

Although formal planks he proposed for various

Republican election platforms can be shown to have eventually been adopted as a direct result of his determined efforts, the same cannot be said for the wartime issues he raised.

The same issues have been debated ever since World War I and have still not been resolved. Viet Nam draft resisters, for instance, often declared that conscription violated their rights as American citizens. Could this not be labeled as the result of the issue La Follette raised in World War I, keeping the idea alive so that it would re-emerge during another national crisis?

If so, what should be done with the war profits tax proposal? All American wars or police actions have been financed through bonds since World War I. Should a student evaluating the effects of the Senator's speeches then claim that he failed utterly in creating his stated purpose? Or should he perhaps declare that La Follette's proposal has not yet come into its own, and therefore base his conclu­ sions as to the effects of those wartime speeches on 151

predictions of how future wars may be financed?

The decision was reached that this study could not

be done to any degree of satisfaction through use of the

"effect method." The other alternative was to turn to the

traditional techniques which could be collectively termed

the "rhetorical critique method." In this type of analysis,

"scholarship furnishes the critic with a set of standards.

to guide his evaluation . . . and a context of ...

rhetorical traditions to aid "him in making judgments about 5 the work." Many noted rhetorical scholars have promoted

this method. Wayland Maxfield Parrish, for example, has

insisted that "the critic's concern is not with the literal results of the speech, but with the speaker's use of correct method; not with the speech's effect, but with its effectiveness.

The high place of honor in the rhetorical field which has been given to this method has induced countless studies based upon the rhetorical techniques outlined by experts. The 1940's and 1950's saw the use of Aristotelian analysis at its zenith. The 1960's elevated Burkian, and to a lesser extent Toulmin, analyses to places of prominence.

Even some of the more modern techniques proposed, such as

5 Bormann, p. 225. ^Wayland Maxfield Parrish, "Introduction," American Speeches, ed. Parrish and Marie Hochmuth (New York: David McKay, 1954), p. 12. 152

semantic analysis, base their conclusions upon a pre­

conceived set of standards.

Analyzing La Follette's wartime Senate addresses by

any of these rhetorical standards, however, would again

have resulted in negative conclusions. If the speeches are considered anti-war and then analyzed in terms of this

label, they make a poor showing indeed. It would be

difficult for the critic to fathom' how La Follette attained

his reputation as an outstanding orator, when he made such

poor use of rhetorical techniques in his anti-war stance.

According to the anti-war label, he could be shown to have

had a poor grasp of the war issues and to have used weak

arguments and analyses in his discussion of them. In fact,

he would seem to have completely avoided speaking directly

to the immediate issue of war. The present study, then,

was given impetus when the facts and the traditional methods

' refused to jibe. The accumulated data seemed to create

its own pattern by which it could be be delineated. This pattern was here termed La Follettism, the philosophical

structure of the Wisconsin Senator's individual brand of

progressivism. Viewing the wartime Senate addresses of La

Follette as they reflected this pattern was therefore

labeled an ideological analysis of them. In order to clearly illustrate that La Follettism was

the guiding force behind the Senator's political

activities and that an ideological analysis of his wartime ' 153

addresses was an appropriate method of investigation, this

study first established how this progressive philosophy had

developed during La Follette's early political career. He

was clearly in the progressive camp from the beginning,

creating during his Governship of Wisconsin what has been

considered a model of proprogressive government. His

individualized progressive philosophy, however, was strongly

colored with concepts he had adopted from Robert G.

Ingersoll and Edward G. Ryan, among others. His personal

viewpoints combined with the various aspects of progres­

sivism he had encountered and at last gelled into a logical

and comprehensible framework. Once created, La Follettism

was loyally espoused throughout his political life.

From a thorough sifting of La Follette's words and

deeds throughout that political life, it was possible to

glean the basic tenets of his philosophy and use them as a

basis for speech analysis. That philosophy was observed

as having three interlocking and interdependent tenets.

The first was La Follette's determined adherence to the Constitution of the United States as the final authority in

any situation involving the functions of federal government.

He insisted that the word and spirit of this document must be preserved’ and followed in their purest forms.

The second tenet established the people of the country as the power behind the Constitutioni Their will was of paramount concern to La Follette: without it, the 154

words set forth were hollow and empty. If the Constitution

was to form the basis for the proper management of the

government, La Follette thought that the people who were

governed by it had an almost sacred sanction by which to

validate its course. In order that La Follette's f philosophy work as he envisioned it, it was necessary for

the people to be knowledgeable about all aspects of the

government and the issues with which it treated. Thus, his

third tenet demanded an educated electorate which based

its decisions on truth, not on prejudice or misunderstanding.

A perusal of the speeches given throughout La

Follette's lifetime gives ample support for the contention

that the basic tenets of his philosophy indeed provided the

basis for his political rhetoric. Because of the contro­

versial nature of his Senate wartime addresses and the

divergent reactions to them, those speeches provide an

extremely apt illustration of La Follettism as it was

followed by its originator even in the face of war hysteria

and public condemnation. These 1917 addresses clearly reveal La Follette's

unwavering devotion to his own progressive principles and can thus be considered case studies of the man's political

philosophy. Despite the war and the maniacal public worship

of it, La Follette clung to his view of government in the

speeches he gave in the Senate from April 4 to October 6 in

1917. 155

The first occasion on which he spoke was in answer

to President Wilson’s War Declaration. On April 4, he

immediately set forth the Constitutional issue: that the

President of the United States did not have war-making powers. He insisted that this power was invested in the

legislature which should make a decision as to entering the war only after the people of the country had been consulted.

Their decision should be in turn based upon whole truth he strove to present in his detailed and factual reiteration of the events leading up to the President's War Declaration.

Here indeed was a concrete example of La Follettism.

The next Senate speech he delivered, against the

Conscription bill, duplicated the same arguments. On

April 27, he asked for an advisory referendum to ascertain the public reaction to consctiption. He thought the bill put too much power in the hands of the President--an event which denied the structure of government established by the Constitution. Once again he used an immense amount of factual evidence to support his contention and to acquaint the public with the facts. A series of speeches given August 21, September 1, and September 10, again illustrated the basic beliefs held by La Follette. Directed against the bond technique as financial support for the war, these addresses showed that the people had not been given consideration in this matter.

He insisted that the legislature had the constitutional' 156

power to' determine the course of the war, including its

financing, and should set a fair course for the people by

taxing excess profits made as a direct result of war trade.

This concept was supported with an abundance of factual

evidence.

On October 6, La Follette delivered his last speech

during the war. Precipitated by public outcry against a

comment by La Follette which had in fact been misquoted,

he began the address by asserting that the right to free

speech existed even in time of war. The main body of the

text, however, was once again concerned with La Follettism.

He argued that the power to conduct the war lay in the

Congress. This body had allowed the President to usurp his

powers, without even first consulting the people. The

Constitution itself along with numerous precedents and

legal authorities as evidence were the facts he used to

support his claim that any such shift in power could be

allowed only through a constitutional amendment. His son’s illness prevented La Follette from speaking

in the Senate throughout the remainder of the war. Had

this nof happened, we can assume that he would have con­

tinued to fight for his basic beliefs, even as he had before the war and as he did after the war. Throughout his life,

La Follette exemplified the idea behind the dictum, "to thine own self be true." La Follette was forever true to

La Follettism. 15 7

The discoveries made in this study could have

several ramifications for future students of rhetoric and

especially for future students of La Follette's rhetoric.

In a general way, this work could guide future studies of

speakers and their works as ideological analyses. It is

recommended that such studies try to allow the words and

actions of the speakers studied to determine their own

perimeters by careful study of the speaking event within the

contextual backdrop of the personality of the speaker and

the surrounding historical events.

Such studies could determine consistency or incon­

sistency throughout a speaker's life, as well as providing

evidence to prove or disprove existing labels. As a case in

point, the speeches of John C. Calhoun were long considered

examples of secessionist rhetoric and analyzed as such.

Recent studies, however, have developed the thesis based

upon his own writings and a more careful investigation of

his speeches that secessionism was not a part of his

philosophy at all. As applied to La Follette specifically, this study

might provide a basis from which to carefully analyze

speeches from other periods in his life. Thus, La

Follettism as it was directed at big business, social problems, and other current issues could be more fully delineated. 158

.In addition, this study's analysis of the Senate wartime addresses of Robert La Follette could provide a framework within which studies using the traditional methods of rhetorical analysis could more precisely examine how and why he continued to preach his philosophy from the Senate podium. Such studies would be enlightening adjuncts to a study of his philosophy, perhaps by illustrating how he used logic, appeals, proofs, and artistic qualities to promote his ideas, perhaps by exploring his concepts of truth or desire for concrete effect. BIBLIOGRAPHY

A. MANUSCRIPT COLLECTIONS

The following collections are all located in the Wisconsin State Historical Society Archives.

Anderson, Rasmus. Papers.

Barton, A. 0. Papers.

Beck, Joseph. Papers.

Blaine, John. Papers.

Coffman, Edward M. Tape of Governor in restricted area.

Davidson, James 0. Papers.

Ekern, Herman. Papers.

Gross, Edwin. Papers.

Haugen, P. Nils. Papers.

Husting, Paul.. Papers.

Jansky, Cyril. Papers.

La Follette, Belle Case. Papers.

La Follette, Fola. Papers.

La*Follette, Philip. Papers.

Nelson, John. Papers. Phillip, Emmanuel. Papers.

Roe, Mrs. Gilbert. Papers.

Rosa, Charles D. Papers.

Stone, James. Papers.

Thompson, James. Papers. 160 B. BOOKS

Alexander, Holmes. The Famous Five. New York: The Book- mailer, 1958.

Baker, Ray Stannard.. Woodrow Wilson : Life and Letters. 8 vols. New York: Knopf, 1927-1939.

Bitzer, Lloyd F. and Edwin Black, eds. The Prospect of Rhetoric. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hâll, 1971.

Blum, John. The Republican Roosevelt. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1954.

Bormann, Ernest G. Theory and Research in the Communir cative Arts. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1965.

Brigance, William Norwood, ed. A History and Criticism of American Public Address. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1943.

Coletta, Paolo. William Jennings Bryan, III: Political Puritan 1915-1925. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1969.

Cooper, John Milton. Causes and Consequences of World War I. New York: Quadrangle. Books, 1972.

Crighton, John C. Missouri and the World War, 1914-1917. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1947.

Cronon, David E. The Cabinet Diaries of Josephus Daniels, 1913-1921. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1963.

Cummins, Cedric C. Indiana Public Opinion and the World War, 1914-1917. Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Bureau, 1945.

Davis, Alan. Spearheads for Reform: The Social Settlements and the Progressive Movement, 1890-1914 . New York: Oxford University Press, 1967.

Degler, Carl N. The Age of the Economic Revolution, 1876- 1900♦ Atlanta: Scott, Foresman, 1967.

Doan, Edward. The La Follettes and the Wisconsin Idea. New York: Rinehart, 1947. 161

Dupey, Ernest R. Five Days to War: April 2-£, 3917. Harrisburg, Pa.: Stackpole, 1967.

Forcey, Charles. The Crossroads of Liberalism. New York: Oxford University Press, 1961.

Fowler, W. B. British-American Relations 1917-1917: The Role of Sir William Wiseman. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969.

Gould, Lewis, ed. The Progressive Era. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1974.

Graham, Otis L. The Great Campaigns : Reform and War in America, 1900-1928. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice- Hall, 1971.

Hicks, John D. The Populist Revolt.

Holt, James. Congressional Insurgents and the Party System. 1909-1916. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967.

Ingersoll, Robert G. The Life and Letters of Robert G. Ingersoll. London: Watts, 1952.

Kennedy, John F. Profiles in Courage. New York: Harper and Row, 1964.

Kolko, Gabriel. The Triumph of Conservatism. New York: Free Press of Glencoe, 1963.

La Follette, Belle Case and Fola La Follette. Robert M. La Follette. 2 vols. New York: MacMillan, 1953.

La Follette, Robert M. La Follette's Autobiography. Madison: Robert M. La Follette Co., 1913.

Lansing, Robert. Papers Relating to the Foreign Relation's of the United States : The Lansing Papers, 1914-1920. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1940.

Leopold, Richard. The Growth of American Foreign Policy: A History. New York: Knopf, 1962. Levin, Gordon, Jr. Woodrow Wilson and World Politics: America's Response to War and Revolution. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968. Levine, Lawrence W. Defender of the Faith. New York: Oxford University Press, 1965. 162

Link, Arthur S. Wilson: Campaigns for Progressivism and Peace, 1916-1917. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965.

Linsley, William A., ed. Speech Criticism: Methods and Màterials Dubuque: Wm. C. Brown, 1968.

Marqulies, Herbert. The Decline of the Progressive Move­ ment in Wisconsin, 1890-1920. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1968.

Maxwell, Robert S., ed. La Follette. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1969.

Maxwell, Robert S. La Follette and the Rise of the Progres­ sives in Wisconsin. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1956.

May, Ernest R. The World War and American Isolation, 1914- 1917. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1959.

May, Henry. The End of American Innocence: A Study of the First Years of Our Times, 1912-1917. New York: Knopf, 1959.

Millis, Walter. Road to War.: America, 1914-1917. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1935.

Morison, Elting, ed. The Letters of Theodore Roosevelt. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1951-1954.

Morrissey, Alice. The American Defense of Neutral Rights, 1914-1917. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1939. Mowry, George. Theodore Roosevelt and the Progressive Movement. New York: Hill and Wang, 1946.

Nye, Russell B. Midwestern Progressive Politics. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1951.

Oliver, Robert T. History of Public Speaking in America. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1965.

Osborn, George C. John Sharp Williams. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1943.

Parrish, Wayland Maxfield and Marie Hochmuth, eds. American Speeches. New York: David McKay, 1954. 16 3

Paxson, Frederick. Pre-War Years, 1913-1917. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1936.

Paxson, Frederick. American Democracy and the World War: America at War, 1917-1918. New York: Cooper Square, 1966.

Peterson, H. C. Propaganda for War: The Campaign Against American Neutrality, 1914-1917. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1939.

Peterson, H. C. and Gilbert C. Fite. Opponents of War: 1917-1918. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1957. • .

Pringle, Henry. The Life and Times of William Howard Taft: A Biography. New York: Farrar and Rinehart, 1939.

Reid, Loren, ed. American Public Address. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1961.

Scott, Robert L. and Bernard L. Brock, eds. Methods of Rhetorical Criticism: A Twentieth Century Perspective. New York: Harper and Row, 1972.

Seldes, Gilbert. The Stammering Century. New York: Harper Colophon, 196.5.

Smith, Daniel M. The Great Departure. New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1965.

Stone, Ralph. The Irreconcilables: The Fight against the League of Nations. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1970. Thelen, David. The New Citizenship : Origins of Progres­ sivism in Wisconsin. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1972. Thonssen, Lester, A. Craig Baird, and Waldo W. Braden, eds. Speech Criticism. New York: Ronald Press, 1970.

Torelle, Ellen. The Political Philosophy of Robert M. La Follette as Revealed in His Speeches and Writings. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1920.

Tumulty, Joseph. Woodrow Wilson as 1^ Knew Him. New York: Doubleday Page, 1921.

Wehle, Louis. Hidden Threads of History: Wilson through Roosevelt. New York: MacMillan, 1953. 164

Weinstein, James. The Corporate Ideal in the Liberal State 1900-1918. Boston: Beacon, 1968.

Wiebe, Robert H. Businessmen and Reform: A Study of the Progressive Movement. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962.

Wilson, Woodrow. Constitutional Government in the United States. New York: Columbia University Press, 1911.

Young, Donald, ed. Adventure in Politics : The Memoirs of Philip La Follette. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston,1970.

Young, George Berkeley. Politics, Strategy, and American Diplomacy: Studies in Foreign Policy, 1873-1917. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968.

C. UNPUBLISHED WORKS

Baird, Russell N. "Robert M. La Follette and the Press, 1880-1905," Masters Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1947. Goldstein, Milton. "The La Follette Movement in Wisconsin, Masters Thesis, Washington University, St. Louis, 1936. Hartman, Maryann D. "The Chautauqua Speaking of Robert La Follette," Doctoral Thesis, Bowling Green State University, 1969. Huber, Henry. "War Hysteria," Unpublished manuscript in Henry Huber Papers, Wisconsin State Historical Society Archives. Jackson, James Ernest. "Wisconsin's Attitude toward American Foreign Policy Since 1910," Masters Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1934. Kent, Alan Edmond. "Portrait in Isolationism: The La Follettes and Foreign Policy," Doctoral Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1956. Lahman, Carroll. "Robert M. La Follette as a Public Speake and Political Leader," Doctoral Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1939. 165

Manning, Eugene. "Old Bob La Follette: Champion of the People," Doctoral Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1966.

Mayhue, Frederick Vincent. "American Neutrality, 1914- 1917," Bachelors Thesis, University of Illinois, 1929.

Padriac, Kennedy. "La Follette's Foreign Policy Revisited," Masters Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1960.

Remington, George Albin. "A Rhetorical Analysis of the Foreign Policy Speeches of Robert M. La Follette, United States Senate, 1915-1919," Doctoral Thesis, University of Illinois, 1969.

Sayre, Wallace. "Robert M. La Follette: A Study in Political Methods," Doctoral Thesis, New York State University, 1930.

D. PERIODICALS

Bliven, Bruce. "Robert M. La Follette's Place in Our History," Current History, XXXII (August, 1925), 716-722.

Brown, Francis. "La Follette: Ten Years a Senator," Current History, XLII (August, 1935) , 475-480. Hard, William. "Robert M. La Follette," Reviewal Reviews, LXX (September, 1924), 275-279.

La Follette, Robert M. La Follette's Magazine, 1909-1918.

Started on April 9, 1909 as a weekly magazine, La Follette's Magazine offers possibly the most vital source of information relative to the Senator's career. All issues between 1909-1918 were consulted. Of special significance to his wartime rhetoric are Volumes VII (1915), VIII (1916), IX (1917), and X (1918) . Ogg, F. A. "Robert M. La Follette in Retrospect," Current History, XXXVIII (February, 1931), 685-691.

Sullivan, Mark. "Looking Back on La Follette," World's Work, XLIX (January, 1925), 324-331. 166

Warren, Earl. "Robert M. La Follette, Sr.," Wise Magazine of History, XXXVIII (Summer, 1955), 195-198.

E. NEWSPAPERS

The following newspapers were sources of investiga­ tion for articles and editorials on Robert M. La Follette during the year 1917.

Bement Register (Illinois).

Boston Evening Telegraph.

Boston Evening Transcript.

Cairo Bulletin (Illinois).

Champaign Daily Gazette (Illinois).

Chicago Defender.

Chicago Herald.

Chicago Tribune.

Courier-Journal (Louisville, Kentucky).

Daily Free Press (Carbondale, Illinois).

Davenport Democrat (Iowa).

Illinois State Journal (Springfield). Illinois State Register (Springfield).

Kansas City Star. Lawrenceburg Register (Indiana) .

Manchester Guardian (Massachusetts).

Milwaukee Daily News. Milwaukee Free Press.

Milwaukee Journal.

Milwaukee Sentinel. 167

National Labor Tribune (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania).

New York Herald.

New York Times.

Sheboygan Press (Wisconsin).

Southern Illinoisian (Carbondale).

St. Louis Globe Democrat.

Vero Weekly Bull (Florida).

Wall Street Journal.

Washington Post.

Wheeling Majority (West Virginia).

Wisconsin State Journal.

F. SPEECHES

All of La Follette's Senate speeches during World War I can be found in the various volumes of the Congres­ sional Record. The following speeches were also put into pamphlet form or were reprinted in La Follette's Magazine.

"La Follette's Complete Speech: Senator's Defense of the Rights of Free Speech in the United States Senate on October 6," La Follette's Magazine, November, 1917.

"Old Bob La Follette's Historic U.S. Senate Speech Against the. Entry of the United States into the World War," Delivered in the United States Senate on April 4, 1917. Madison: Progressive Publishing Co., 1937.

"Robert M. La Follette's First Speech," Delivered in Milwaukee on September 19, 1900. Reprint from the Milwaukee Sentinel, 1900. "Secret Treaties," Delivered in the U.S. Senate on November 18, 1919. Washington: Government Printing Office, ■1919. 168

"Speech Insuring All Peoples the Right of Self-Government," Delivered in the U.S. Senate on November 18, 1919. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1919.

"Taxation of Surplus Incomes and Increase Pay of Soldiers Who Are Required to Serve in Foreign Countries." Delivered in the U.S. Senate on August 21 and September 10, 1917. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1917.

"Vital Votes on Taxation of Incomes and War Profits," Delivered in the U.S. Senate on September 10, 1917. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1917.

"Votes on Vital Reservations to Make the League of Nations a Real League for Peace," Delivered in the U.S. Senate on November 18, 1919. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1919.

"War Profits Tax and Is It Disloyal to Advocate Just Tax­ ation of War Profits and Surplus Incomes?" Delivered in the U.S. Senate on September 1 and 10, 1917. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1917.