November 10, 1940: Joe Kennedy Blows His Chance

The Kennedy family, 1938. Joe Sr. at center, with Ted on his lap.

JFK behind him, Bobby behind Ted, and Joe Jr. at right of top row.

November 10, 1940: A quote in The Boston Sunday Globe turns Joseph P. Kennedy from a man with a political future into persona non grata.

Joseph Patrick Kennedy was born on September 6, 1888 in Boston, the son of a Massachusetts State legislator, the grandson of a man who fled the Irish potato famine of the 1840s. Joe didn't quite belong to the street-level Boston Irish, and he certainly didn't belong to the city's English Protestant "Yankee" establishment -- and both groups let him know. This put not just a chip, but an entire potato on his shoulder: He saw anybody who wasn't openly a friend as an enemy. The saying, "Don't get mad, get even" has been attributed to him.

He took advantage of his father's connections, and got into Harvard University, outdoing the old Yankees at their own games. He did so again by making a fortune in the stock and commodity markets. He became the youngest president of any bank in America. During World War I, he became the manager of a shipyard, where he met the Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. In the 1920s, he made money legally through the film studio that became RKO, and illegally through bootlegging liquor with Prohibition in effect.

Apparently, he started the family's fascination with actresses. His wife, Rose, daughter of former Mayor and Congressman John F. Fitzgerald, a.k.a. "Honey Fitz," found out about his fling with actress Gloria Swanson, and gave him an ultimatum: Gloria, or the kids -- at the time, numbering 8. Joe chose the kids, and there would be a 9th, Edward Moore Kennedy, later to be known as Ted.

When Roosevelt, recovering from polio and rebuilding his career by getting elected Governor of New York, ran for President in 1932, Joe Kennedy led New England's support for him. FDR rewarded him by appointing him to run first the brand-new Securities and Exchange Commission -- thinking, Joe had broken a lot of the old rules, so who better to enforce the new rules -- and then the U.S. Maritime Commission.

FDR was re-elected in 1936. At the time, no President had ever run for a 3rd consecutive term. And the Vice President, John Nance Garner, was from Texas, and no Southerner had been nominated by a major party since 1848. So it was widely thought that the Democratic nomination for President would be open in 1940. At the very least, it would come down to Garner against whoever could unite the North against him.

But there was another "None of these had ever... " going on: No Roman Catholic had ever been elected President. Alfred E. Smith, FDR's predecessor as Governor of New York, had been the only Catholic nominee of a major party, in 1928, and had gotten clobbered.

Two prominent Catholic politicians thought they had a serious chance for the Democratic nomination in 1940. But they were both Bostonians: Joseph P. Kennedy, and James Michael Curley, the once-popular Mayor of Boston, who had been a rival of Honey Fitz. In 1936, Curley had gotten himself elected Governor of Massachusetts. He was older, higher-ranking, and had a lot more of what would later be called "political I.O.U.s" than Kennedy. But he also had a criminal record, including a brief prison stint.

But by the dawn of 1938, Curley's Governorship had proven poor, and his bid to be elected to the U.S. Senate that year was doomed. In contrast, FDR appointed Kennedy to a post he had strongly lobbied for: U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain. He would be the 1st Irishman, of any faith, to be America's "Ambassador to the Court of St. James." It wasn't a Governorship, or a Senate seat, but it gave him a national profile. At the age of 50, it looked like he was a man with a big political future.

Joe reveled in his post, and so did the rest of the family. They went to balls, dinners, regattas, and horse racing derbies. King George VI and Queen Elizabeth invited them to spend a weekend in April 1939 at Windsor Castle, where the younger daughters, Patricia and Jean, played with the royal daughters, the Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret. This was a few weeks before the King and Queen went to America to visit the Roosevelts. Joe liked that he had met the Windsors sooner than FDR.

But Nazi Germany was on the march, and British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain supported "appeasement" of Germany, letting them have what they wanted if it would avoid a World War II, because, at that point, both Britain and France still had fresh memories of World War I, and were terrified of going to war again, and were unprepared for it. And Ambassador Kennedy supported the Chamberlain government.

It didn't work, and on September 3, 1939, Chamberlain received a Declaration of War from Parliament. Kennedy had seen Germany's war machine, and wanted America to stay neutral. FDR wanted to aid Britain. In May 1940, the Nazis invaded and conquered the Low Countries: The Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. In June, it invaded and conquered France.

If not for Hitler, it is unlikely that FDR would have crossed the Rubicon of running for a 3rd term. But he did, because -- due to the effects of Congressional elections on the Democrats in 1938, and on the Republicans in 1930, 1932, 1934 and 1936 -- he didn't see anyone in either major Party who could stand up to Hitler in case Britain fell. Garner still stood neutral, and so FDR wouldn't even take him for a 3rd term as Vice President. (He took Secretary of Agriculture Henry Wallace instead.) And he was not going to take a "defeatist" like Joe Kennedy, who saw what might have been his best chance taken by FDR.

Chamberlain, already sick with cancer -- he would be dead before the year was out -- retired as Prime Minister. Winston Churchill, the foremost anti-Nazi in the country, was named Prime Minister. He was determined to oppose the Nazis with everything Britain had, including (he was hoping) more aid from America.

The royal family stayed put in London: The Queen said, "The children will not leave without me, and I will not leave without the King, and the King will never leave." After Buckingham Palace took some bombing damage from German aircraft, the Queen said, "Now, we can look the East End in the face."

In contrast, Kennedy and his family retreated to the countryside during the bombings of London. In so doing, he damaged his reputation with the British people. This move prompted the Prime Minister's son, journalist Randolph Churchill, to say, "I thought my daffodils were yellow until I met Joe Kennedy."

In a London music hall, to the tune of "Disobedience" by Winnie-the-Pooh creator A.A. Milne -- with its refrain of "James, James, Morrison, Morrison," not exactly predicting the lead singer of The Doors -- someone sang:

Joe, Joe

Kennedy, Kennedy

went to the Court of St. James

where he was frequently seen

with the King and the Queen

at cricket and other games.

Said Joe, Joe

Kennedy, Kennedy

before England went to war:

"Swapping stories

with Dukes and with Tories

is what God intended me for!"

But when the bombs

began to fall

all over London Town

said Joe, Joe:
"I must go.

England has let me down."

Who let who down?

On October 22, FDR recalled Kennedy, ending his Ambassadorship. Still, Kennedy agreed to support FDR over the last few days of the campaign, in exchange for FDR supporting his son, Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., in a run for Governor of Massachusetts in 1942. (Joe Jr. had been a Delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 1940, but had not voted for FDR there.) Joe Sr. gave a nationwide radio speech, urging Irish-Americans, and Catholics of all ethnicities, to stand up and vote for FDR. FDR told Kennedy he was pleased with the speech.

On November 5, FDR won a 3rd term, defeating the Republican nominee, Wendell Willkie. The following Sunday, November 10, with the Battle of Britain seemingly still going -- the Luftwaffe had stopped attacking on October 31, for weather reasons, and this is now accepted as the end date of the battle, but nobody knew that in 1940 -- an interview with Kennedy, in Boston, by Louis M. Lyons, appeared in his hometown paper, The Boston Sunday Globe:

He said, "It's all a question of what we do with the next six months. The whole reason for aiding England is to give us time... As long as she is in there, we have time to prepare. It isn't that they are fighting for democracy. That's the bunk. She's fighting for self-preservation, just as we will if it comes to us... I know more about the European situation than anybody else, and it's up to me to see that the country gets it."

He added, "Democracy is finished in England. It may be here."

That was it: The nation as a whole turned on Kennedy for that statement, much as a similar statement killed the political career of aviation hero Charles Lindbergh the following year. If he was thinking that the U.S. could keep out of war, enabling him to be elected President in 1944, and enabling Joe Jr. to be elected Governor in 1942, such thoughts came to a crashing end. He had blown his chance: At the age of 52, he had never run for public office, and never would, and would never serve in public office again.

Kennedy's 3 older sons all enlisted in the U.S. Navy. Robert did not see combat. In 1943, John F. Kennedy became a hero in the Pacific Theater of the war. But the following year, stationed in England, Joe Jr. volunteered for a dangerous mission, and was killed in an accident before it could reach the enemy. He was 29.

Joe Sr. spent the rest of his life blaming FDR for the death of Joe Jr. Joe Sr. knew that his chance of being President was gone, so he had moved his hopes onto Joe Jr., as the eldest son. Now, he moved the hopes to the 2nd son, John, a.k.a. Jack. In 1946, Jack was elected to the House seat that had once been held by his grandfather, Honey Fitz -- and by Honey Fitz's old rival, Curley -- and had been intended for his brother Joe. In 1952, he was elected to the Senate.

When Jack ran for President in 1960, he enlisted the help of Franklin D. Roosevelt Jr., and it proved invaluable. (Apparently, old Joe didn't extend his grudge to FDR Jr.) In the general election campaign, JFK frequently used FDR as a model for the kind of Administration he would run if elected, saying that FDR "got America moving again," and that he wanted to do the same.

FDR's successor, Harry Truman, wasn't as supportive. Since, still, no Catholic had yet been elected, the old line used on Al Smith, "If he wins, the Pope will take over America," was used. But Truman, from the old Kansas City political machine, knew what really went on in politics, and said, "It's not the Pope that worries me, it's the Pop!" Jack won, and, as an elder statesman of the Democratic Party, Truman paid proper respect to his Party's leader, and came to realize that he was, if a young man, then one of substance.

But Joe Sr. suffered a paralyzing stroke in 1961, and could do nothing as Jack was assassinated while starting his re-election campaign in 1963, Bobby was assassinated while running in the Primaries in 1968, and Ted damaged his chances with a car crash in 1969. Joe died 4 months after that crash, on November 18, 1969, at the age of 81.

Strangely, though there had been 6 Jameses, 5 Johns and 4 Williams, there had never been a Joe to become President until 2020. But when it did, with Joseph Robinette Biden Jr., it was with an Irish Catholic.

*

November 10, 1940 was a Sunday. These games were played in the NFL:

* The football version of the New York Giants lost to the Cleveland Rams, 13-0 at the Polo Grounds.

* The football version of the Brooklyn Dodgers beat the Washington Redskins, 16-14 at Ebbets Field.

* The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Philadelphia Eagles, 7-3 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh.

* The Detroit Lions beat the Chicago Bears, 17-14 at Briggs Stadium (later Tiger Stadium) in Detroit.

* And the Green Bay Packers beat the Chicago Cardinals, 28-7 at Comiskey Park in Chicago.

Baseball was out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. There were 2 games in the NHL:

* The New York Rangers and the Detroit Red Wings played to a tie, 2-2 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

* And the Chicago Black Hawks beat the Montreal Canadiens, 3-1 at the Montreal Forum.