Father Coughlin

• Father Charles Coughlin


  Roman Catholic Priest from Detroit and a part of the radio show "The Golden Hour of the Little Flower" with around 30 million listeners.

  • At first supported the New Deal, but then recognised that it was 'Communists' and 'international bankers' which caused the crash.
  • Set up the National Union for Social Justice in 1934 and this called for currency and banking reforms - believed more money should be given to the government to help the economy.
• Social Justice Campaign

  Coughlin stated that the ND was influenced by communists and international bankers and so people shouldn't support it, he also thought such communists were using Roosevelt to achieve their aims.

  As an alternative to the New Deal, he set up the Social Justice Campaign. It called for

  • Currency and banking reforms
  • Nationalisation of parts of the US economy
  • A fairer taxation policy
• To put his ideas into action, Coughlin teamed up with Gerald Smith, a member of 'Share our Wealth' and Francis Townsend, from the Old Age Revolving Pensions, Ltd. They formed the National Union party and promoted William Lemke as their candidate for president in 1936.

  Roosevelt was a tough opponent to beat, Lemke got 828,000 votes which was nothing compared to Roosevelt's 27.8 million

  National Union lost election, and Coughlin's influence became decreasingly popular.
• Coughlin lost support also for being anti-Semitic.

  After 1938, his radio broadcasts and newspaper, Social Justice, began to criticise Jewish people.

  He accused them of being the cause for the Great Depression.

  He praised Hitler, even using parts of his speech by his propaganda minister, such views were unpopular in the USA where there were many Jewish people.

  In 1940 his radio broadcasts were banned and 2 years later so was his newspaper.

  After threats from the government for encouraging rebellion, Coughlin finally gave up and stopped writing.