(4 of 5)
"And we all remember what happened as a result of that scheme. The totally unexpected and totally unnecessary controversy about the Supreme Court split America in two. . . . While Hitler's power increased from day to day, we presented to the world the spectacle of a great people, the greatest of the democracies, torn asunder by a broil over one of our most fundamental principles.
"That was the time when Franklin Roosevelt had his golden opportunity to save world democracy in the eleventh hour—and don't forget that the very next year was the year of Munich."
He quoted the tellingly apt words which Britain's Winston Churchill had spoken in 1937: "There is one way above all others, in which the United States can aid the European democracies. Let her regain and maintain her normal prosperity. . . . The quarrel in which President Roosevelt has become involved with wealth and business may produce results profoundly harmful to ideals which to him and his people are dear. . . .
"Those who are keeping the flag of peace and free government flying in the Old World have almost a right to ask that their comrades in the New World should ... set an example of strength and stability. . . ." Wendell Willkie went on: "The loneliness of the United States is a direct result of the foreign policies of the last eight years. If Britain falls we are utterly and savagely alone. No nation on earth, except Britain, owes us anything but disillusionment and ill will.
"We must—we desperately must—rid ourselves of the fallacy that democracy can be defended with words, with poses, with political paraphernalia designed to impress the American people and no one else.
"We must send, and we must keep sending, aid to Britain, our first line of defense and our only remaining friend. We must aid her to the limit of prudence and effectiveness, as determined by impartial experts in this field.
"In the Pacific our best ends will be served by a free, strong and democratically progressive China, and we should render China economic assistance to that end. In addition I favor exploring the acquisition and development of Pacific air bases for the protection of our interests in that ocean.
"I favor the building of a defense system adequate to protect our soil from aggression from any quarter—a defense system so strong that none will ever dare to strike. . . .
"We are a commercial people, and we must therefore build up the commerce of the world. We are a peaceful people, and we must therefore strengthen peace by giving other peoples—democratic peoples —our economic support. . . ."
The impact of that speech seemed to hit not only his San Francisco hearers but the nation, and hit hard.
North he traveled, into Oregon, State of his antithetic running mate, cool, bourbon Charles Linza McNary. And here he pulled off the first great triumph of his campaign, when he met head-on and without a single weasel word the most dangerous issue he had to face: power—the public power he had fought against even more vigorously than Senator McNary had fought for it.