Lindbergh denounces Roosevelt's attack as he resigns (4-28-41)

The Pittsburgh Press (April 28, 1941)

AVIATOR DENOUNCES ROOSEVELT’S ATTACK

Sees ‘no honorable alternative’ to resigning; President had deplored ‘minority’ view

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Col. Lindbergh, who resigned from the United States Army Air Corps Reserve today because of criticism leveled at him by President Roosevelt, is shown above in one of the few pictures ever made of him in uniform. He was on active duty with the Army, making a survey of technical facilities, when this photo was taken.

New York, April 28 (UP) –
Col. Charles A. Lindbergh in a letter to President Roosevelt today announced that he was resigning as colonel in the United States Army Air Corps Reserve.

Col. Lindbergh told the President that his remarks in a White House press conference on April 25 left him “no honorable alternative to tendering my resignation.” Col. Lindbergh wrote:

I am, therefore, forwarding my resignation to the Secretary of War.

The letter, released here, follows:

My Dear Mr. President:

Your remarks at the White House press conference on April 25, involving my reserve commission in the United States Army Air Corps, have, of course, disturbed me greatly. I had hoped that I might exercise my rights as an American citizen, to place my viewpoint before the people of my country in time of peace, without giving up the privilege of serving my country as an Air Corps officer in the event of war.

But since you, in your capacity as President of the United States and Commander-in-Chief of the Army, have clearly implied that I am no longer of use to this country as a reserve officer, and in view of other implications that you, my President and my superior officer, have made concerning my loyalty to my country, my character, and my motives, I can see no honorable alternative to tendering my resignation as colonel in the United States Air Corps Reserve.

I am, therefore, forwarding my resignation to the Secretary of War.

I take this action with the utmost regret, for my relationship with the Air Corps is one of the things that has meant most to me in life. I place it second only to my right as a citizen to speak freely to my fellow countrymen, and to discuss with them the issues of peace and war which confront our nation in this crisis.

I will continue to serve my country to the best of my ability as a private citizen.

Respectfully,
CHARLES A. LINDBERGH

In his April 25 press conference, President Roosevelt criticized Col. Lindbergh and others in this country who express the opinion that the Axis will defeat Britain. He compared them to the Copperheads of the Civil War period.

The President said he was sorry that there were people with such mentalities in high places where they could write or talk. He declared that Col. Lindbergh and others who think as he does constitute a small American minority.

Their viewpoint, Mr. Roosevelt told his press conference last Friday, is like that of the appeasers who wanted George Washington to surrender to the British during the hardships of Valley Forge.

Those who say that the dictatorships are going to win are wrong, he continued. The American people, he said, were going to fight for democratic processes.

Mr. Roosevelt said some people here are adopting a rather curious attitude, which has not been thought through. That, he said, is the idea – like one expressed in an editorial he had read that morning – that there is a new order in the world.

A person of this attitude, Mr. Roosevelt went on, says out of one side of his mouth that he doesn’t like dictators; and on the other side that the democracies are going to be defeated. Therefore, he continued, this person says that while he does not like dictators he might as well accept them.

The President said such an attitude was not good Americanism, but that it was the attitude of a minority of the people.

In the Civil War, both the North and the South accepted the aid of liberty-loving peoples from other countries. Both sides, on the other hand, let certain people go, the President said. For example, he said there was Vallandigham who wanted to make peace in the Civil War from 1863 on because he said the North could not win.

The President’s reference was to Clement Vallandigham, who was so active in seeking to bring about a peace in the Civil War that Northern authorities banished him to the South.

Asked why the Army had not ordered Col. Lindbergh to active duty, the President indicated at the Friday press conference that he was uncertain whether the flier had resigned his reserve commission.

Isolationist leader

Col. Lindbergh in recent months has been a leader of the nation’s isolationist group and, as a member of the America First Committee, has made anti-war speeches and written anti-war articles the major premise of which was that Great Britain cannot win the war even with American aid.

Last Wednesday night in a mass meeting in Manhattan Center here, he declared that:

The British government have one last desperate plan remaining; they hope that they may be able to persuade us to send another American expeditionary force to Europe, and to share with England militarily, as well as financially, the fiasco of this war.

Col. Lindbergh said the United States was being led toward war by a minority which had great power but “does not represent the American people.”

‘Smear campaign’ charged

William S. Thomas, son of Socialist leader Norman Thomas, came to Col. Lindbergh’s support today in a statement charging that the flier was the target of “a cruel and vicious campaign of slander and smear.”

Mr. Thomas said:

To call Col. Lindbergh a Fascist, a Nazi or a Fifth Columnist is absurd.

Col. Lindbergh has given up his privacy and sacrificed himself to point out the truth as he sees it to America. The facts have borne him out when he calls attention to England’s plight – a plight from which he is trying to save us.

Fourteen years ago, America took Charles Lindbergh to her heart as her greatest hero. His stand today is just as courageous as his flight to Paris, and he has become a greater hero to all sincere thinking Americans who believe that only through America’s peace at this time can democracy be saved for the world.

Col. Lindbergh’s appointment as colonel in the United States Army Air Corps Reserve was one of the many honors he received immediately after his historic flight to Paris in May 1927. He received the appointment on June 12, 1927.

On active duty

In April 1939, Col. Lindbergh was assigned to active duty with the U.S. Army to make a survey of technical research facilities available to the Air Corps. His findings were kept confidential.

When assigned to active duty, he had just returned from Europe where he had studied aviation facilities of leading nations, including Germany and Russia. At that time, some military authorities credited him with more knowledge of aviation developments in Europe than any other American.

Just prior to his return to America, Col. Lindbergh had submitted a secret report to government officials on Germany’s air force, urging that the United States speed its research facilities to keep abreast of the totalitarian nations.

His visit to Russia created a controversy when unsubstantiated reports were published in Great Britain that he had told British officials that the Russian Air Force was overrated. Russian aviators condemned him for purportedly violating their hospitality.

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STIMSON WILL DECIDE ABOUT RESIGNATION

Washington, April 28 (UP) –
War Department officials said today that Col. Charles A. Lindbergh’s letter of resignation as an Army Air Corps reserve officer has not been received, but that when it comes, it will be up to Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson to accept or reject it.

They said that such resignations customarily are not accepted during an emergency but that there is no ironclad regulation forbidding acceptance. The Secretary of War, they said, must decide each issue.

Since Oct. 29, 1940, the Army has had a regulation that prevents reserve officers on active duty from resigning during the emergency. Col. Lindbergh, however, was not on active duty.

The White House made no comment on Col. Lindbergh’s letter.

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He has 222 days until the real regret sets in.

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More like 223, but hey.

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Well, I was counting from today.

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That’s alright. Anyway, have you received my message?

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The Pittsburgh Press (April 29, 1941)

WAR DEPARTMENT ACCEPTS LINDBERGH’S RESIGNATION

Early wonders whether famed flier will return German medal to Hitler; Stimson acts quickly after letter giving up commission is received

Washington, April 29 (UP) –
The War Department today accepted the resignation of Col. Charles A. Lindbergh as a member of the Army Air Corps Reserve.

Scarcely an hour before the War Department action, White House Secretary Stephen T. Early said Col. Lindbergh’s resignation request:

…leads me to wonder whether he is returning his decoration to Mr. Hitler.

Mr. Early referred to the Order of the German Eagle conferred on the flier four years ago.

Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson accepted Col. Lindbergh’s resignation soon after receiving it this morning. The text of the actual letter of resignation was not made public.

Col. Lindbergh announced yesterday in a letter to President Roosevelt he was resigning his commission because the President criticized him at a press conference last Friday for his isolationist views and anti-war activities.

Col. Lindbergh had been a member of the Army Air Corps Reserve since March 14, 1925, when he was commissioned a second lieutenant.

He was given a National Guard captaincy Nov. 6, 1926, and held a dual commission. He was commissioned a colonel in the reserve June 7, 1927, after his famous transatlantic flight to Paris, and was re-appointed June 7, 1932, and June 7, 1937.

He last served a tour of active duty in the office of the Chief of Air Corps from April 19 to May 2, 1939. He did special survey work on the Air Corps set up and requirements at that time, although his reports were never made public.

Holds two U.S. medals

Col. Lindbergh holds the Distinguished Flying Cross, awarded June 1, 1927, for his Paris flight, and also the Congressional Medal of Honor, which was conferred upon him March 21, 1928.

Mr. Early’s reference to the German decoration given to Col. Lindbergh was directed at the medal which was pinned on him by Field Marshal Hermann Göring when Lindbergh was visiting Berlin. It was awarded for distinguished flying achievement.

Mr. Early said that Col. Lindbergh’s letter of intention to resign, which he addressed to Mr. Roosevelt and made public yesterday, had not yet been received at the White House. Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson also was said not to have received a resignation request from Col. Lindbergh.

Sharply critical of the fact Col. Lindbergh made public his letter before it reached the President, Mr. Early said this was the second case in which the flier made public a communication to Mr. Roosevelt before it was in the President’s hands.

Mr. Early said the first time Col. Lindbergh made public a communication to Mr. Roosevelt before it reached the White House was in 1934 when the President cancelled all private airmail contracts and turned over to the Army Air Corps the jobs of carrying such mail.

Mr. Early said:

Newspapers printed a telegram on Monday morning which had been released on Sunday afternoon. The White House did not get the telegram until about 10 a.m. Monday.

Questioned on loss

Asked whether Mr. Roosevelt would consider Col. Lindbergh’s resignation a loss to the Air Corps, Mr. Early said:

From what the President indicated last Friday, he [Col. Lindbergh] wouldn’t have any duties even if he continued to hold his commission. Now there is a commission that someone else can hold.

In his letter to Mr. Roosevelt, announcing his intention to resign his commission, Col. Lindbergh referred to the President’s criticism of his anti-war activities and said that the remarks had left him no alternative but to withdraw from the Air Corps Reserve roster.

I had hoped that I might exercise my rights as an American citizen, to place my viewpoint before the people of my country in time of peace, without giving up the privilege of serving my country as an Air Corps officer in the event of war.

Resignations of reserve officers, if not on active duty, during emergency periods are not usually accepted or encouraged. There is no ironclad rule against it and the Secretary of War has complete power to make the decision.

Under current Army regulations, reserve officers of the rank of captain upward are not permitted to resign their commissions if they are on active duty.

Rep. Clare E. Hoffman (R-MI), in a speech prepared for the Congressional Record, said President Roosevelt’s comparison of Col. Lindbergh with Civil War Copperheads demonstrated that the President’s

…anger and intolerance, rather than sober judgment, rode him into a harsh and inaccurate comparison.

‘Leave it to Ickes’

If the President wishes to retain some of the respect which the people should have for a President, he will do better to leave the name-calling to his hatchet man Ickes [Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes].

The President makes no contribution to national unity by charging those who disagree with him with being traitors to their country.

The President has no more right to characterize others as Copperheads than have we to describe him and those who believe that the interest of Britain come first, as Benedict Arnolds.

Sir Gerald Campbell, British Minister to the United States, told the American section of the International Chamber of Commerce last night that Col. Lindbergh’s recent statement that Britain misinformed other European nations about her ability to aid them was “untrue.”

Sir Gerald did not mention Col. Lindbergh by name, but referred to “a speech made in New York last Wednesday” in which a “sneer or a smear was leveled at England.” Col. Lindbergh spoke then in New York at a meeting sponsored by the America First Committee.

Sir Gerald said the size of the British Expeditionary Force sent to France was determined by the French general staff.

He rejected Col. Lindbergh’s contention that Britain still hopes to persuade this country to send another expeditionary force to Europe, pointing out the Prime Minister Winston Churchill has said Britain does not want America’s manpower.

He said:

I would not mention that [Col. Lindbergh’s] speech, if it were simply a matter of American defense or offense at home or abroad; those are things for America and Americans to decide and it would be wrong for me even to refer to it; …but when Great Britain is actually enjoined to surrender, to stop fighting, to make peace – a negotiated, false, inconclusive peace… then I feel that I am entitled to express my opinion and make a protest, for it surely is our business to decide whether we are going to abandon the victims of German aggression in Europe whom we are pledged to free, and it is for us to choose whether we are going to hide our heads in shame and dishonor ever more.

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