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“Unnecessary and Artificial Divisions:” Franklin Roosevelt's Quest for Religious and National Unity Leading Up to the Second World War
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 August 2013
Extract
The letters were portrayed as a goodwill gesture toward the three more dominant religious traditions in America and, as far as President Franklin Roosevelt was concerned, the world. After being carefully constructed over the preceding weeks, they were held in strict secrecy until they were released to the media on December 24, 1939. Each was written to the leader of his respective religion: as president of Jewish Theological Seminary, Rabbi Cyrus Adler represented American Jews and George A. Buttrick, president of the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America (FCC), received a letter on behalf of American Protestants, with the last letter going to Pope Pius XII, head of the Roman Catholic Church. Each letter was, at least ostensibly, a Christmas greeting. Roosevelt offered each man warm wishes and his hearty thanks for all that he had done for his people and the world. Yet Roosevelt also noted the fear and uncertainty of the time. War had again come to Europe and threatened to envelop the globe. It was the responsibility of all people of goodwill, Roosevelt argued, to come together in any way they could for the cause of peace. He hoped the three men, and those they represented, would put aside religious differences and join together for the common good.
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References
47 Roosevelt's letter to Rabbi Adler strangely also contained an explicit Christmas message. Although the letter often refers to the common faith of the religious traditions and their love for a common God, it also references the Christmas Star. He suggests that just as the shepherds first saw the star heralding the birth of Christ, so too do the common people long for a guiding light in this time of chaos and uncertainty.
48 Press Release, December 23, 1939, Folder: 1628: Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, President's Personal File, Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, New York (hereafter FDR Library).
49 The lack of attention to Roosevelt's use of religious rhetoric and attempts at a national religious unity for the sake of the war effort have more to do with the general disconnect between religious and political/military history than any particular deficiency in treatments of FDR, his administration, or the era. As with other presidents, works on FDR and religion almost exclusively revolve around his personal faith and/or his contribution to the ambiguously defined American civil religion. The superlative examples of such works are Gustafson, Merlin and Rosenberg, Jerry, “The Faith of Franklin Roosevelt,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 19 (Summer, 1989): 559–566Google Scholar; Isetti, Ronald, “The Moneychangers of the Temple: FDR, American Civil Religion, and the New Deal,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 26 (Summer, 1996): 678–693Google Scholar; Pierard, Richard V. and Linder, Robert D., Civil Religion and the Presidency (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1988), 161–183Google Scholar; and Smith, Gary Scott, Faith and the Presidency: From George Washington to George W. Bush, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), 191–220CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
50 The two more detailed treatments of Roosevelt's religious upbringing come from Guy Emery Shipler, “Franklin Roosevelt and Religion,” The Churchman, May 1, 1945 and Chris Farlekas, “He Took His God Seriously,” Sunday Magazine, April 27, 1997, Folder: Roosevelt, Franklin Delano—Religion, Vertical File, FDR Library.
51 See Dinnerstein, Leonard, Anti-Semitism in America, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), 105–149CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Kevin Schultz has given a recent, refreshing treatment of this paradox of religious bigotry and unity in Tri-Faith America: How Catholics and Jews Held Postwar America to its Protestant Promise, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 15–42Google Scholar.
52 Letter from Cyrus Adler to Franklin Roosevelt, December 24, 1939, Folder: 1628: Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, President's Personal File, FDR Library.
53 Telegram from Edward Harrigan to Franklin Roosevelt, December 23, 1939, Folder: Catholic 1939–1941 Relation to the Pope, Official File 76B, box 3, FDR Library.
54 Letter from George Buttrick to Franklin Roosevelt, December 23, 1939, Folder: 1628: Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, President's Personal File, FDR Library.
55 Letter from George Buttrick to Franklin Roosevelt, February 27, 1940, Folder: 1628: Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, President's Personal File, FDR Library.
56 “Back Temporary Vatican Mission,” Christian Century 62:6 (February 7, 1940), 189Google Scholar.
57 Letter from Rufus Weaver, et al. to Franklin Roosevelt, December 28, 1939, Folder: Catholic 1939–1941 Relation to the Pope, Official File 76b, box 3, FDR Library.
58 Telegram from Randolph Gregory to Franklin Roosevelt, December 24, 1939, Folder: Catholic 1939–1941 Relation to the Pope, Official File 76b, box 3, FDR Library.
59 Telegram from Eddie Clayton to Franklin Roosevelt, December 23, 1939, Folder: Catholic 1939–1941 Relation to the Pope, Official File 76b, box 3, FDR Library.
60 “Ambassadorial Rank for Social Purposes,” Baptist and Reflector 106:2 (January 11, 1940), 2Google Scholar.
61 Smith, Noel, “At Last the Showdown Has Come,” Baptist and Reflector 106:2 (January 11, 1940), 3Google Scholar.
62 Unsigned internal memorandum, December 28, 1939, Folder: 1628: Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, President's Personal File, FDR Library. The FCC likely represented less than they actually claimed on their rolls and held definitive influence with even fewer of their members.
63 Personal Letter from Franklin Roosevelt to George Buttrick, March 14, 1940, Folder: 1628: Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, President's Personal File, FDR Library.
64 The Roosevelt administration tried very hard to both curtail dissent of the draft and diffuse responsibility for any failures in the implementation of the draft, not least of which was the creation of draft boards throughout the country. General Lewis Hershey, second director of the draft, once explained that the boards served to “absorb the [public's] shock” over being forced to send their young men into the military. Kennedy, David M., Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929–1945 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 632–634Google Scholar.
65 Press Release, October 29, 1940, Folder: 1628: Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, President's Personal File, FDR Library.
66 Letter between Franklin Roosevelt and Pope Pius XII, September 3, 1945, in Taylor, Myron, Wartime Correspondence between President Roosevelt and Pope Pius XII (New York: Macmillan, 1947), 61–62Google Scholar.
67 For a detailed discussion of the correspondence and the context behind Roosevelt's “three-fold” strategy to secure aid to the Soviet's, see Miner, Steven Merritt, Stalin's Holy War: Religion, Nationalism, and Alliance Politics, 1941–1945 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003), 221–227Google Scholar.
68 Presidential press conference, October 1, 1941, cited in “The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in the Soviet Union,” U.S. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1941, 1:1000–1001.
69 Preston, Andrew, Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith: Religion in American War and Diplomacy (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012), 360Google Scholar.
70 “Religion: God and Lend-Lease,” Time, October 13, 1941.
71 The New York Times published a transcript and analysis of the speech the following day. Frank L. Kluckhohn, “Answer to Enemy” and “President Roosevelt's Navy Day Address on World Affairs,” New York Times, October 28, 1941, 3–5.
72 It is, of course, difficult to accurately ascertain the internal motivations of historical actors or the authenticity of their actions. However, evidence can point in one direction or another. In the case of Roosevelt's belief that Hitler was a far greater threat to religion than the Soviet Union, he expressed the belief in private as well as in public statements, including in a personal and confidential memorandum to Myron Taylor. See memorandum from Franklin Roosevelt to Myron Taylor, September 1, 1941, Folder: State Department, Myron C. Taylor . . . Miscellaneous [1 of 4], Confidential File, box 48, Harry S Truman Presidential Library and Museum, Independence, Missouri.
73 Little, Thomas E., “Message of the Director General,” Bulletin of the American Protestant Defense League, 7:10 (May 15, 1941), 1Google Scholar, Folder: Protestant 1933–1942, Official File 76a, box 2, FDR Library.
74 Charles Clayton Morrison, Christian Century 62:12 (March 20, 1940).
75 In an ultimately terse exchange of letters between Roosevelt and a fellow Freemason, John Cowles, Roosevelt expressed these views on religion's role and responsibilities in the public sphere. When Cowels disagreed, Roosevelt was surprised and offended, as he had been by the reaction of so many American Protestants. See exchange of letters between Franklin Roosevelt and John H. Cowles from January 12, 1940 to February 8, 1940 in 6454 Cowles, John H. President's Personal File, FDR Library.
76 Letter from Franklin Roosevelt to Edwin Hughes, April 9, 1939, Folder: 5866, President's Personal File, FDR Library.