Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism

The 2023 nonfiction work Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism, by Rachel Maddow, traces the spread of Nazi propaganda throughout the US in the lead-up to World War II. Maddow draws parallels between the interwar period and the present day, showing that today’s far-right movement has a “prequel.” In the years before World War II, pro-Nazi US citizens disseminated antisemitic and authoritarian beliefs throughout the country, forming paramilitary cells and planning insurrections of the US government. In the deeply researched Prequel, Maddow follows the story of these citizens, including federal elected officials who supported the Nazi regime, and the other US citizens who fought against them. Maddow brings her extensive experience as a broadcast journalist to the work, weaving a complex story together from decades of evidence.

This guide refers to the 2023 Kindle edition published by Crown.

Content Warning: The book contains mentions of antisemitism and antisemitic violence, including direct quotes of antisemitic comments and slurs. Some chapters mention racism against Black people, especially Chapter 3, which also includes a photograph of a lynching. This guide summarizes the events of the book without reproducing racial slurs or outdated terms to describe race.

Summary

The Prologue introduces George Sylvester Viereck, a German-born American who became a Nazi agent and eventually the central orchestrator of Nazi Germany’s propaganda campaign in the US. Chapter 1 follows several Harvard graduates who became active proponents of fascism in the US in the early 1930s. In Chapter 2, the text discusses Huey Long, a US senator and Louisiana governor. A populist leader with a huge, devoted following, Long is considered to have sought dictatorship in the US. Running on a platform of wealth equality, he largely fulfilled his campaign promises but was deeply corrupt as well as violent, rumored to have kidnapped and planned to murder his enemies. Chapter 3 explores connections between anti-Black racism in the US and antisemitic policies in Nazi Germany. The Nazis sent an agent to study at an Arkansas law school, regarding the US as the world leader in racist law. The German lawyer concluded that US law was based on the idea that white people needed protection from all other races, and that the US could preserve its idealistic founding documents while simultaneously relegating Black people to second-class citizenship.

Chapter 4 recounts how on September 9, 1935, Long was shot while walking through the state capitol and later died of his wounds. More than 100,000 supporters attended his funeral. In Chapter 5, the text describes Lawrence Dennis, a fascist American intellectual. An employee of the US State Department in the 1920s, Dennis later became an open critic of the US government. During meetings with the Nazis, Dennis suggested that they emulate how the US treated Black people; the book’s epilogue reveals that Dennis was actually biracial, born to a white father and a Black mother, and had renounced his family and passed as white. Chapter 6 discusses how radio priest Charles Coughlin, a friend of Long’s, gained popularity. Chapter 7 introduces reporter Arnold Sevareid, who in 1936 infiltrated the Silver Shirts, a secretive antisemitic group founded by William Dudley Pelley. While Sevareid managed to get his Silver Shirts exposé published on the front page of the newspaper, his piece was edited to read as mocking and lighthearted rather than as a warning about a serious and growing antisemitic threat.

In Chapter 8, the text describes lawyer Leon Lewis, the son of Jewish German immigrants. To counter the Nazi plots in the US, he started a volunteer spy ring. Chapter 9 recounts how even Kristallnacht (the Night of Broken Glass) failed to spur significant antisemitic protests in the US. The Dies Committee was formed in the spring of 1938 to investigate “un-American” propaganda in the US. Chapter 10 describes how, in August 1938, the committee interviewed the first witness to testify about fascism, John C. Metcalfe. Chapter 11 continues to describe the Dies Committee hearings.

In 1939, Warner Bros. released Confessions of a Nazi Spy, a movie based on true events that had transpired months earlier. Chapter 12 discusses how the founders of Warner Bros., Jewish Americans Jack and Harry Warner, fought to get the film made and released, making concessions to get it past censors. It became popular and made US citizens aware of Nazi attempts to infiltrate the US. As noted in Chapter 13, isolationism remained the dominant US sentiment even after Germany attacked Poland, leading France and Britain to declare war on Germany. Around this time, a man named Denis Healy began to infiltrate an organization called the Christian Front. FBI agents followed Healy closely as he observed the group acquiring weapons and ammunition, conducting target practice, and planning to kill members of Congress. Chapter 14 describes how John F. Cassidy and 16 other members of the Christian Front were arrested in 1940 and charged with planning to overthrow the US government and take weapons from the US military. The Department of Justice put O. John Rogge, the head of its criminal division, in charge of the case, but the jury hung. Chapter 15 describes a mysterious plane crash in which one of the passengers killed was US Senator Ernest Lundeen, the founder and chairman of the Islands for War Debts Committee, which pressured President Franklin D. Roosevelt to seize Caribbean island territories from Britain as payment for Britain’s World War I debts.

In August 1940, the Dies Committee heard testimony from a witness named Henry Hoke, a professional advertiser who ran the publication The Reporter of Direct Mail Advertising. Chapter 16 describes how Hoke’s documented and warned about Nazi propaganda in the US. He discovered that the Nazis were sending out propaganda for free, using the franking privileges of US senators. Chapter 17 describes how Special Prosecutor William Power Maloney guided a grand jury to weigh evidence that Germany had worked with US congressmen to spread Nazi propaganda in the US. Chapter 18 describes Viereck’s efforts to orchestrate the Nazis’ propaganda campaign in the US. He collaborated with Senator Lundeen, advising Lundeen to form the Islands for War Debts Committee as an excuse for Lundeen to use his franking privileges nationally. Viereck then started sending propaganda nationwide in this manner. Congressman Hamilton Fish, Lundeen’s ally, assisted Viereck in these efforts. Fish referred Viereck to his staffer George Hill and told Viereck that he could use the mailing list compiled by Fish’s own committee. As noted in Chapter 19, Maloney won the convictions of George Sylvester Viereck, George Hill, and Laura Ingalls by July 1942. However, the US Supreme Court overturned the decision in the Viereck case, and Senator Burton Wheeler pressured the attorney general to replace the prosecutor.

Chapter 20 notes that the new prosecutor was O. John Rogge, who failed to win a conviction in the 1940 Christian Front trial. Judge Edward C. Eicher presided over the trial, which began in April 1944. It quickly devolved into chaos as the defendants and defense attorneys intentionally caused disruption throughout the trial. Chapter 21 describes how several months into the trial, Judge Eicher died in his sleep of a heart attack, and many attributed his death to the stress of the trial. Rogge continued to collect evidence. In 1946, when the sedition trial still had a slim chance to resume, Rogge and his team traveled to Germany to interview captured Nazi officials during the Nuremberg Trials. They returned to the US with evidence that Germany had started to orchestrate a propaganda operation in the US long before the two countries were at war. Chapter 22 describes how Rogge asked for a two-week leave of absence to go on a speaking tour of the US, alerting the public to Nazi propaganda efforts in the US. Senator Wheeler grew angry when he found out about Rogge’s comments and convinced President Harry S. Truman to have Rogge fired. While Rogge was unsuccessful in publicizing his findings, the book’s conclusion notes that it is important for US citizens to understand this history and the fight for democracy so that the country can continue this worthwhile fight in the present day.