The Curtain Rises
The green-walled courtroom in Washington's Federal District Court building was small (40 x 38 ft.) for the largest sedition trial in U.S. history.* The ever-present question before the court was big: can a democracy defend itself legally?
Each of the 28 men and two women on trial last week faced ten years in prison, a $10,000 fine. The charge: the 30 had conspired to overthrow the U.S. Government in favor of a Nazi dictatorship, and had tried to demoralize the armed forces. The probable defense: the accused were merely enjoying their constitutional right to free speech when they expressed such sentiments as:
¶ "The Japanese attack upon Pearl Harbor was deliberately invited by the public officials of the U.S."
¶ "The Government of the U.S. and Congress are controlled by Communists, International Jews and plutocrats."
¶ "The cause of the Axis powers is the cause of justice and morality and . . . any act of war against them is unjust and immoral. . . ."
Colorful Cast. The accused were a strangely assorted crew. Handsome Joe McWilliams, the soapbox fiührer who used to berate the Jews and laud Hitler on Manhattan street corners, got top billing in the indictment ("United States of America v. Joseph E. McWilliams, et al"). Quiet, swart Lawrence Dennis, U.S. fascism's No. 1 intellectual, sat glumly near benign-faced James True, organizer of America First, Inc., and inventor of the "kike-killer" (Pat. no. 2,026,077), a short rounded club made in two sizes (one for ladies). Chicago's Mrs. Elizabeth ("The Red Network") Dilling, leader of the "Mothers' Crusade" which once sprawled noisily in the halls of the Senate office building, wore a big, rose-trimmed hat and a becoming new dignity.
Mrs. Dilling looked coldly at her codefendant, peppery Mrs. Lois de Lafayette ("T.N.T.") Washburn, who favored delighted photographers with a stiff-armed Nazi salute. Florid, convivial Edward James Smythe, onetime speaker at Bund and Ku Klux Klan rallies, held up proceedings for two days while FBI agents were sent to fetch him, spluttering indignantly, from a fishing trip near the Canadian border. There were also George Deatherage, founder of the Knights of the White Camellia; Howard Victor Broenstrupp, alias the Duke of St. Saba, alias Count Cherep-Spiridovich, etc. Nine of the defendants were already interned or in jail. They arrived by police van. Among them: famed, shrewd Propagandist George Sylvester Viereck, good friend of ex-Kaiser Wilhelm II; the Silver Shirts' William Dudley Pelley; onetime Bundleader Gerhard Wilhelm Kunze.