Westbrook Pegler
Westbrook Pegler | |
---|---|
Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S. | |
Died | June 24, 1969 Tucson, Arizona, U.S. | (aged 74)
Pen name | Westbrook Pegler |
Occupation | syndicated newspaper columnist |
Spouse | Julia Harpman Pegler (first), Maude Wettje Pegler (second) |
Francis James Westbrook Pegler (August 2, 1894 – June 24, 1969) was a Pulitzer Prize-winning U.S. journalist described as "one of the godfathers of right-wing populism".[1] He was a newspaper columnist popular in the 1930s and 1940s for his opposition to the New Deal, labor unions, and anti-lynching legislation.[2]
As an ardent proponent of
Background
James Westbrook Pegler was born on August 2, 1894, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the son of Frances A. (Nicholson) and Arthur James Pegler, a local newspaper editor.[5]
Career
Journalism career
Westbrook Pegler was the youngest American war correspondent during
In 1925, Pegler joined the
Pegler worked closely with his friend
In 1944, Pegler moved his syndicated column to the
Contempt for Franklin Roosevelt
Pegler supported President
Pegler's views became more conservative in general. He was outraged by the New Deal's support for labor unions, which he considered morally and politically corrupt.[6]
Opposition to the New Deal
At his peak in the 1930s and 1940s, Pegler was a leading figure in the movement against the New Deal and its allies in the labor movement,[6] such as the National Maritime Union. He compared union advocates of the closed shop to Hitler's "goose-steppers." The NMU sued Hearst and Associated Press for an article by Pegler, settled out of court for $10,000.[10] In Pegler's view, the corrupt labor boss was the greatest threat to the country.
By the 1950s, Pegler was advocating government dissolution of the
Support for removal of Japanese and Japanese-Americans from the West Coast
At the beginning of World War II, Pegler expressed support for moving Japanese-Americans and Japanese citizens out of California, writing "The Japanese in California should be under guard to the last man and woman right now and to hell with habeas corpus until the danger is over." [13]
Feud with Eleanor Roosevelt
After 1942 Pegler assailed Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt regularly, calling Mrs. Roosevelt "La boca grande", or "the big mouth". The Roosevelts ignored his writings, at least in public.
Recent scholars (including Kenneth O'Reilly, Betty Houchin Winfield, and Richard W. Steele) have reported that Franklin Roosevelt used the FBI for the purposes of wartime security, and ordered sedition investigations of isolationist and anti-New Deal newspaper publishers (such as William Randolph Hearst and the Chicago Tribune's Robert R. McCormick). On Dec. 10, 1942, FDR, citing evidence Eleanor Roosevelt had gathered, asked the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover to investigate Pegler, which it did; the bureau eventually reported that it had found no sedition.[14] In the end, nothing came of it except Pegler's lifelong distaste for Eleanor Roosevelt, often expressed in his column.
Pulitzer Prize and anti-union activism
In 1941 Pegler became the first columnist to win a Pulitzer Prize for reporting, for his work in exposing racketeering in Hollywood labor unions, focusing on the criminal career of Willie Bioff and the link between organized crime and unions.[5] Pegler's reporting led to the conviction of George Scalise, the president of the Building Service Employees International Union who had ties to organized crime.[15] Scalise was indicted by New York District Attorney Thomas E. Dewey, charged with extorting $100,000 from employers from three years. Convicted of labor racketeering, Scalise was sentenced to 10–20 years in prison.[16]
As historian David Witwer has concluded about Pegler, "He depicted a world where a conspiracy of criminals, corrupt union officials, Communists, and their political allies in the New Deal threatened the economic freedom of working Americans."[17]
In the winter of 1947, Pegler started a campaign to draw public attention to the 'Guru Letters' of former Vice-President Henry A. Wallace, claiming they showed Wallace's unfitness for the office of President he had announced he would seek in 1948. Pegler characterized Wallace as a "messianic fumbler," and "off-center mentally." There was a personal confrontation between the two men on the subject at a public meeting in Philadelphia in July 1948. Several reporters, including H. L. Mencken, joined in the increasingly aggressive questioning. Wallace declined to comment on the letters, while labelling some of the reporters "stooges" for Pegler.[18] At the conclusion of the meeting, H. L. Mencken acidly suggested that every person named "Henry" should be put to death, offering to commit suicide if Wallace was executed first.
Controversy in later career
In the 1950s and 1960s, as Pegler's conservative views became more extreme and his writing increasingly shrill, he earned the tag of "the stuck whistle of journalism."
President Harry S. Truman in his famous letter to Paul Hume, music critic for The Washington Post, referred to Pegler as a guttersnipe, and yet a gentleman compared to Hume, for the latter's criticizing his daughter Margaret's singing.
His attack on writer
In 1965, referring to Robert F. Kennedy, Pegler wrote: "Some white patriot of the Southern tier will spatter his spoonful of brains in public premises before the snow flies."[21] Kennedy was assassinated three years later, though by a Palestinian Arab.
Personal life and death
On August 28, 1922, Pegler, a Roman Catholic, married Julia Harpman, a onetime
Pegler died age 74 on June 24, 1969, in
Awards
- 1941: Pulitzer Prize for coverage of labor racketeers[5]
Legacy
Parodies
Pegler's distinctive writing style was often the subject of parody. In 1949,
...which brought together such Commie-loving cronies as you know what I think of Eleanor Roosevelt.
It stinks. The whole thing stinks. You stink.[25]
Mad also parodied him as "Westbank Piglet" in one panel (p. 2) of its first comic book parody Superduperman
Quotes
Interest in Pegler was briefly revived when a line originally written by him appeared in Republican Vice-Presidential nominee Sarah Palin's acceptance speech at the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota.[26] "We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty and sincerity and dignity", she said, attributing it to "a writer."[27] The speech was written by Matthew Scully, a senior speech writer for George W. Bush.[28]
In a column about Palin's use of the quote,
Writings
Pegler's literary agent was George T. Bye, who was also Eleanor Roosevelt's agent.
Pegler published three volumes of his collected writings:
- T'ain't Right, 1936
- The Dissenting Opinions of Mister Westbrook Pegler, 1938
- George Spelvin, American and Fireside Chats, 1942
See also
- Will H. Kindig, Los Angeles City Council member condemned by Pegler
References
- ISBN 9781458766717. Retrieved 2023-05-15.
- ISBN 9781136712531. Retrieved 2023-05-15.
- ISBN 9780684854533. Retrieved 2023-05-15.
- ^ a b Farr (1975)
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m "James Westbrook Pegler Papers". Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum. 13 November 2017. Retrieved 14 April 2020.
- ^ a b c d Frank, Thomas (September 10, 2008). "The GOP Loves the Heartland To Death". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved December 18, 2021.
- ^ Farr, Finis. Fair Enough: The Life of Westbrook Pegler. 1975, New Rochelle NY: Arlington House.
- ISBN 9780190466787. Retrieved 2023-05-15.
- ^ "The Press: Mister Pegler", Time, 10 October 1938.
- ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-08-15. Retrieved 2008-10-16.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ^ a b McWhorter, Diane (4 March 2004). "Dangerous Minds: William F. Buckley soft-pedals the legacy of journalist Westbrook Pegler in The New Yorker". Slate.
- ^ Pegler column in Milwaukee Sentinel Feb. 24, 1954 Archived 2016-03-12 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Masaoka, Mike (1987). They Call Me Moses Masaoka: An American Saga. William Morrow and Company. p. 78.
- EBSCO
- ^ "The Pulitzer Prizes". The Pulitzer Prizes. Retrieved 2021-10-14.
- S2CID 143544135.
- ^ Witwer, p.551.
- ^ Pegler's column for July 27th, 1948 'In Which Our Hero Beards 'Guru' Wallace In His Own Den.'
- ^ Emery, Edwin. The Press and America, Prentice-Hall, 1962, pp.569.
- ^ Pilat, Pegler (1973)
- ISBN 9780393057775
- ^ Whitman, A., "Westbrook Pegler, Caustic Columnist, Dies at 74", The New York Times, June 25, 1969.
- ^ Parody of the Virginia O'Hanlon/Francis P. Church exchange in the New York Sun, 1897.
- ^ Collected in More in Sorrow, Wolcott Gibbs, 1958. New York: Henry Holt.
- ^ Mad Magazine #31
- NYTimes.com. Retrieved 2008-10-17.
- ^ Frank, Thomas (September 10, 2008). "The GOP Loves the Heartland To Death". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 2012-11-01.
- ^ "The Man Behind Palin's Speech". Time. September 4, 2008. Archived from the original on September 5, 2008.
- ^ Frank, T.: "The GOP Loves the Heartland to Death". The Wall Street Journal, September 10, 2008
Further reading
- Farr, Finis. Fair Enough: The Life of Westbrook Pegler. 1975, New Rochelle NY: Arlington House.
- slate.com.
- Pilat, Oliver. (1973), Pegler, Angry Man of the Press, Greenwood Press.
- Witwer, David. "Westbrook Pegler and the Anti-union Movement", Journal of American History (2005), 92#2.
- Witwer, David. Shadow of the Racketeer: Scandal in Organized Labor (2009) excerpt and text search
- See Westbrook Pegler vs. Ed Sullivan, legal citation 6 Az App 338, 432 P. 2d 593 (Arizona Court of Appeals 1967) which dealt with a previous summary judgment ending Pegler's lawsuit against his nemesis Sullivan. This was reversed when Sullivan's New York show in January 1964 "caused an event to occur" in Tucson AZ which was an "invasion of Pegler's privacy". Sullivan was then required to respond in damages.
External links
- 'Rabble Rouser' Critique and analysis of Pegler's work by conservative William F. Buckley, Jr., published in The New Yorker.
- 'In Which Our Hero Beards 'Guru' Wallace In His Own Den' Pegler's own account of his confrontation with 1948 Progressive Party candidate Henry Wallace(here given the derogatory nickname of "Bubblehead").
- 'Suffer Little Children' AKA 'The Jewish Children'. Pegler's harrowing 1936 description of the fate of Jewish children in Nazi Germany.
- Pegler's FBI files hosted at the Internet Archive
- Syracuse University - J. Westbrook Pegler Papers
- Herbert Hoover Presidential Library - James Westbrook Pegler Papers
- US National Archives - Pegler, J. Westbrook (James Westbrook), 1894-1969