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Winter, 2008
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Journal of American Ethnic History

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"Forget All Differences until the Forces of Freedom Are Triumphant": The World War II–Era Quest for Ethnic and Religious Tolerance

ROBERT L. FLEEGLER


      IN NOVEMBER 1942, Louis Adamic, a public intellectual who wrote several books about the role of immigrants in American society, authored an article in the New York Times Magazine titled "No 'Hyphens' This Time." Adamic commented on the lack of punitive action against recent immigrants during the war: "So far in this war—aside from the campaign against the Japanese group on the Pacific Coast, which was old-time exclusionism hitched to a potentially serious military problem—there has been no great hue and cry about the 'foreigners.'"1 He suggested that Americans were beginning to think anew about diversity:
The result is the partial but continuing breaking down of the belief, held by many old-line Americans, that the great diversity of backgrounds in our population is a disadvantage to the United States as a nation. The gradual deterioration of this idea has apparently been enough to prevent anti-alien hysteria, in spite of considerable attempts not unrelated to Hitler's purposes to foment it.
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      To contemporary ears, Adamic's indifferent reference to the Japanese American internment may seem incongruous. Nevertheless, his comments reflect that while the U.S. government interned 120,000 Japanese Americans during World War II, the conflict accelerated the incorporation of "white ethnic" groups such as Jews, Italians, and other descendents of the great immigrant wave of 1882 to 1924 into a broader conception of American nationhood. Adamic went on to presciently note, "It is possible that a few decades hence historians will regard this fact as one of our biggest present slices of good fortune."2 2
      Indeed, historians have often cited World War II as a key turning point in the acceptance of the Ellis Island–era immigrants. Most scholars agree that World War II accelerated the decline of nativism and the integration of immigrants from southern and eastern Europe and their children into American society.3 Wartime migrations of Americans to different regions played an important role as 27 million citizens left their homes and neighborhoods for employment in wartime industries or to join the military.4 Many left homogenous, rural communities and urban ethnic neighborhoods where they had relatively little contact with people from different national and religious backgrounds. 3
      The military experience brought disparate peoples into contact, as native-stock Americans and immigrants from various ethnic backgrounds fought and died together. In his 1944 book, A Nation of Nations, which detailed the contributions of virtually every immigrant group, Adamic wrote, "There is more getting together among Americans than ever before, more acceptance of people on the basis of their personal qualities regardless of background. This is especially true of the men in the services. There is nothing like being together in a foxhole, a bomber, or a submarine."5 A New York Evening Post headline above the obituary of soldiers from March 25, 1943, sounded this same theme: "Their Names Are Alien But—Their Blood is All American."6 4
      As a result of the changes wrought by the war, many remember World War II as a watershed in their acceptance as Americans. Paul Piscano, an Italian American architect, recalled that after the war, "The Italo-Americans stopped being Italo and started becoming Americans."7 The Jewish American baseball player Hank Greenberg agreed:
When you joined the Army, you became an American. When I broke into baseball, every time they wrote about me it had something to do with my ethnic background. When the war was over, the ballplayers were no longer referred to by their religion. I think it was an amazing change that took place.8
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      Of course, the inclusion of white ethnics came at the partial expense of other racial groups. While white ethnics fought together, African Americans and Japanese Americans fought in segregated units. Wartime propaganda, such as the platoon films, largely excluded African Americans from this new conception of American identity. Furthermore, government propaganda portrayed the Japanese enemy as a homogenous foe, sometimes using racialized rhetoric to compare them to apes and vermin.9 6
      Wartime pluralism also revealed very important limits for white ethnics that scholars have tended to downplay. Before the war, educational and propaganda programs combined two different approaches. One, which I call "contributionism," emphasized the cultural and economic benefits that immigrants brought to American life. To a certain degree, it highlighted the differences between ethnic groups and stressed the disparate contributions they made to American society. This message suggested that the United States was a "nation of immigrants" enhanced by the gifts brought by the newcomers. 7
      The radio program, Americans All ... Immigrants All, which aired in 1938–39, illustrated the contributionist perspective. In an attempt to improve public attitudes toward immigrants, Americans All featured a weekly discussion of the accomplishments of groups such as Italians and Jews.10 The press release for the show about Jews noted, "There is not one episode or crisis in our national history in which the Jews have not played a part."11 The release revealed contents of the show, which included the Jewish role in the American Revolution, among other things: "Stirring episodes deal with the help given by Jews to George Washington; their heroic participation in the War between the States and the World War and the battle against disease of misery."12 8
      In a similar vein, the American Common exhibit at the 1939–40 World's Fair in New York City displayed the cultural traditions of different groups every week. Opened for the 1940 season, the Common consisted of an open-air theater with six booths displaying arts and crafts from different ethnic groups. A pamphlet from the Department of Education of the New York World's Fair described the events planned at the Common: "During each week of the 1940 season it is expected that a different group will take over this special area. Here will be found native folk-dances, native art, and native food."13 9
      The second philosophy, which I call the "tolerance and unity" school, focused on the need to treat individual citizens equally as well as the imperative for cooperation between all Americans, regardless of race or ethnicity. It diminished the differences between groups and focused on what individuals from diverse backgrounds shared in common. This school suggested that immigrants should be accepted as American citizens because, in the final analysis, they were little different from native-stock Americans. The universalist approach of this school neglected the varied heritages brought to the United States by different ethnic groups. 10
      The World's Fair also illustrated the "tolerance and unity" school. During the week celebrating Hungarian Americans at the American Common, Frederick Sheffield, assistant United States commissioner to the exposition, explained it was important that ethnic groups work together "so that as a unit and as a nation it [United States] can put forth its very best efforts."14 During an interfaith week, Monsignor Francis W. Walsh, president of the College of New Rochelle, declared, "Any one who seeks to divide America on purely religious grounds in matters purely economic, political, or social is a public enemy of America, and if he refuses to keep his pen dry he should be banished beyond the territorial limits of the United States."15 11
      As a result of the need for national unity during the war, propaganda and educational efforts shifted significantly away from contributionism and toward the tolerance message. Many policy makers feared that the contributionist approach, by discussing the achievements of groups separately, only increased ethnic tensions. The onset of the conflict made cooperation a paramount concern as the country needed to work together to defeat Japan and Germany. Many feared a repeat of the nativist hysteria of World War I, when immigrants, and German Americans in particular, faced discrimination that hindered the war effort. During their blitzkrieg across Europe, the Nazis exploited divisions in France and other countries to speed their military victories. Japanese and German propagandists were hard at work trying to accomplish the same ends in the United States. The Office of War Information (OWI), created by FDR in 1942 to explain the war to the American people, was determined to fight these divisions by promoting an ideological view of the conflict as a battle for democracy and tolerance against fascism and intolerance.16 Private organizations such as the American Jewish Committee (AJC) and the National Conference of Christians and Jews (NCCJ) adopted a similar strategy, merging the practical wartime need for unity with the idealistic interest of eliminating nativism. Motivated by the rise of Nazism abroad as well as the growth of anti-Semitism at home, Jewish groups often led these efforts.17 An OWI official best summarized the approach of these groups: "By making this a people's war for freedom, we can help clear up the alien problem, the negro problem, the anti-Semitic problem."18 12
      Wartime propaganda and its postwar counterpart emphasized that tolerance and cooperation represented an essential part of American identity. Various public and private organs labeled discrimination based on race, religion, and ethnicity as un-American and dangerous to the nation's stability and role as a world leader. To the proponents of this view, the war's goal was not merely to defeat the nation's military enemies, but to create a more tolerant society without racial, ethnic, and religious discrimination. Tolerance and "teamwork" were essential not only to victory in World War II, but also to the successful conversion to a peacetime economy and to fighting the Cold War. While not disappearing entirely, contributionism moved into the background as the wartime message broadened the definition of Americanism to include white ethnics while largely excluding African Americans and Japanese Americans. This evolution paved the way for a definition of national identity which suggested that the children and grandchildren of immigrants should be accepted, not because of the cultural benefits provided by a more diverse polity, but rather because these immigrants shared the same basic values and ideologies as native-stock Americans.19 13
      FDR led the way in promoting the message of tolerance and national unity. As early as January 2, 1942, Roosevelt criticized employers who were firing loyal aliens, declaring that such actions were "engendering the very distrust and disunity on which our enemies are counting to defeat us."20 In a fireside chat on February 23, 1942, FDR was explicit in directly connecting tolerance to the success of the war effort: "We Americans will contribute unified production and unified acceptance of sacrifice and effort. That means a national unity that can know no limitations of race or creed or selfish politics."21 FDR continued to use the same rhetoric throughout the conflict. Campaigning in Boston on November 4, 1944, he declared that religious intolerance had no place in American life.22 14
      Roosevelt's comments regarding tolerance did not usually extend beyond European immigrants, whom he viewed in a far more positive light than Asian immigrants. He repeatedly praised the achievements of eastern and southern European newcomers but offered no such remarks regarding Japanese or Chinese Americans. FDR evinced a long history of suspicion toward the Nisei and Issei communities dating back to the 1920s, which informed his support for the Japanese American internment.23 Furthermore, when he announced the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1943, Roosevelt made no comment on the contributions made by the Chinese American community to the war effort, merely saying that "an unfortunate barrier between allies has been removed" and that "the war effort in the Far East can now be carried on with greater vigor and a larger understanding of our common purpose."24 15
      FDR often expressed an ideological view of the war's aims. "The United Nations are fighting to make a world in which tyranny and aggression cannot exist; a world based upon freedom, equality, and justice; a world in which all persons regardless of race, color or creed may live in peace, honor, and dignity," he declared on March 24, 1944.25 Roosevelt repeated those sentiments in his Boston campaign speech, saying, "They [our soldiers] also are fighting for a country and a world where men and women of all races, colors and creeds can live, work, speak and worship—in peace, freedom, and security."26 16
      Propaganda posters produced by the Office of War Information stressed the need for cooperation between racial and ethnic groups. One poster declared, "TEAMWORK among all nationalities, groups and creeds made America great. That same teamwork now will spread our victory."27 Others read, "In Unity There Is Strength" and "Together for Victory."28 Some posters equated bigotry with a lack of patriotism. One included a headline that said, "Our enemies' orders to their spies in the U.S.A," above a letter signed by Hitler, Mussolini, and Hirohito. The letter said, "Divide labor and management, turn class against class and spread religious hatred." The caption instructed citizens to "FIGHT un-American propaganda." Another urged, "Don't fall for ENEMY PROPAGANDA—Against our Government—Against Our Allies—Against Catholics, Jews, or Protestants." The poster said below, "Remember—Hitler and the Japs are trying to get us to fight among ourselves."29 17
      Echoing this sentiment, one poster displayed the text of President Roosevelt's Executive Order 8802 of 1941 banning racial discrimination in military production. Another showed a number of people working on a tank with names that represented a cross section of ethnic groups, including Cohen, Lazzari, Kelly, and Dubois, with the caption, "Americans All." Below that, the poster paraphrased 8802: "It is the duty of employers and labor organizers to provide for the full participation of all workers without discrimination because of race, creed, color, or national origin."30 18
      Although not the dominant message, traces of contributionism appeared in these images. One poster read, "This is America" in large letters with "Keep it Free" scrolled at the bottom. In between, it described the country as a "melting pot of liberty-loving people from all corners of the earth. People of different origins, faiths, cultures—all cemented together into one great nation by their passions for freedom." Another featured an immigrant saying, "I'm an Ellis Island American. I left the old country to be free—and nobody is going to take that freedom away. That's why I'm fighting on the production line—to help destroy the enemies of freedom. Let's keep'em rolling."31 19
      The OWI delivered a similar message to foreign-language newspapers concerning their coverage of the war. At the time, future California U.S. senator Alan Cranston served as the chief of the Foreign Language Division of the OWI. In August 1942, he told a group of foreign language newspaper editors that their colleagues in underground newspapers overseas would ask them to: "Unite! Stand together against the forces of aggression. Forget all differences until the forces of freedom are triumphant. Print nothing that will divert attention from the all-important task of defeating the Nazis and the Fascists."32 20
      Believing the foreign-language press was more susceptible to enemy propaganda, the OWI provided a list of recommendations for that press's coverage, which are especially helpful in discerning the priorities and rationales behind government propaganda efforts. The first recommendation emphasized the ideological nature of the war: "This is not a racial or a national war, but a war against dictatorship and for the freedom of people of every race, color, and creed." They also suggested that reporters minimize divisions between ethnic groups: "We must close our ranks against the common enemy, the Axis. Strife within groups in this country weakens our war effort." In practical terms, this meant avoiding any news stories "which tend to promote long-standing dissensions among Americans of different extractions. We must forget all differences until the forces of freedom are triumphant."33 21
      Director Frank Capra's famous Why We Fight movie series contained similar messages. The films were a series of seven movies commissioned by the Pentagon to explain the reasons for the war. In episode 7, War Comes to America, which discusses religious life in America, the narrator says, "Churches. We have every denomination on earth. 60 million of us regularly attend. And nobody tells us which one we have to go to." As the narrator reads this statement, the images of several churches appear on the screen, as well as one of a synagogue. In this film, a synagogue is simply another "church" rather than a place of worship for people of a different religion. This rhetoric and imagery promoted tolerance for non-Christian faiths by implying that all religions are essentially the same.34 22
      The short film, The House I Live In (1945), starring the young Frank Sinatra, expressed an almost identical point of view. Sinatra sees a mob of children attacking another young kid and asks them why they are picking on this one child. One of the children responds, "We don't like his religion," and another says, "Look mister, he's a dirty ..."—but before he can complete his sentence, Sinatra cuts him off. The singer tells them that they are behaving like Nazis:
Religion makes no difference. Except maybe to a Nazi or somebody as stupid.... God created everybody. He didn't create one people better than another. Your blood's the same as mine. Mine's the same as his. Do you know what this wonderful country is made of? It's made up of a hundred different kinds of people and a hundred different ways of talking and it's made up of a hundred different ways of going to church. But they're all American ways.35
 Sinatra, like the narrator of the Why We Fight episode, reflects the universalist approach of wartime propaganda. Both Sinatra and Capra largely eschew discussing the disparate cultural contributions of various faiths; instead, they cite the similarities between different religions as the primary reason for religious tolerance.		 23
      Sinatra tells the children about the cooperation between Colin Kelly, a Presbyterian pilot, and Meyer Levin, his Jewish comrade, when they attacked a Japanese battleship after Pearl Harbor. "You think maybe they should have called the bombing off because they had different religions? Think about that fellas. Use your good American heads. Don't let anyone make suckers out of you," declares Sinatra. Ol' Blue Eyes concludes the film by singing, "The House I Live In," in which he celebrates the contributions paradigm, crooning, "All races and religions ... That's America to me."36 24
      Sinatra's performance of the "The House I Live In" also revealed that African Americans were excluded from the new definition of Americanism. One section of the song, which contained references to black civil rights, was excluded from the film. This version of "The House I Live In" spoke of "The words of old Abe Lincoln, of Jefferson and Paine, of Washington and [Frederick] Douglass, and the task that still remains!"37 25
      Hollywood war films also featured themes of unity and cooperation.38 Movies such as Bataan (1943), Gung Ho (1943), Guadalcanal Diary (1943), and Pride of the Marines (1945) showed soldiers from different groups working together to defeat the nation's enemies. Each of these "platoon" films had a variety of characters, usually including a southerner, a Jew, an Italian, and a native-stock American. Like The House I Live In, the films demonstrated the limits of the wartime message, as blacks rarely appeared, and Asians were nonexistent, except as Japanese villains. African American groups protested their limited presence in these movies; Walter White, head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), complained to OWI director Elmer Davis that "the Negro has been very largely confined in the films to comic or menial roles."39 26
      These films downplayed the ethnic backgrounds of the various characters and presented a cross section of ethnic types that were obvious to people of the time. In Pride of the Marines, a gun with both a Star of David and a shamrock painted on it depicts the importance of cooperation. More often, the message is simply implied. The audience sees soldiers from different ethnicities and religions working together without prejudice hindering their efforts. "The diversity roster varied from one film to another," observed Gary Gerstle, "but the stock characters were the Anglo-Protestant, the Irish Catholic, and the eastern European Jew."40 27
      Like other forms of wartime propaganda, the platoon films underscored the values Americans held in common. One of the first images in Guadalcanal Diary is of a Catholic priest leading an interfaith service on a navy ship. One of the soldiers says to another, "Say Sammy, your voice is OK." Sammy responds, "Why not? My father was a cantor in the synagogue."41 The message is clear: people of all religions are working together to win the war. 28
      As with many aspects of wartime propaganda, filmmakers manipulated the tolerance message to suit wartime needs. Whereas 1930s Hollywood movies had shown Chinese peasants exploited by Chinese warlords, the stereotypical characters changed following Pearl Harbor. Now viewers saw the Chinese peasants, who had become allies of the U.S., being exploited by Japanese warlords.42 29
      The 1943 edition of National Brotherhood Week, which the National Conference of Christians and Jews (NCCJ) had started in 1934 to promote understanding between different religious groups, also reflected this perspective. Everett Clinchy, the president of the NCCJ, invoked the same ideas as the OWI posters in a CBS Radio address. Clinchy discussed American soldiers in their training camps: "Do you realize what goes on in these camps? They make teams. Yes, teams like basketball teams and baseball teams, only these are fighting for our country's big ideas." Like the Hollywood films, Clinchy praised the ethnic platoon. "Listen to the roll-call of the families which have relatives in the service along with yours and mine,—Anderson, Bonet, Fernandez, Garcia, Goldstein, Jones, Kelly, Palegolos, Wysocki ... the men who know that we don't have to fear anybody as long as the nation ticks together like the wheels of a clock."43 30
      The motto for Brotherhood Week 1943 was "Brotherhood: Democracy's Shield Against Intolerance and Oppression," a significant shift from the "Make America Safe For Differences" slogan of 1939. The literature instructed religious groups to have a priest, a minister, and a rabbi deliver the message of tolerance to their congregations, so that all major faiths were represented. Declaring that all forms of prejudice must be rejected, one such trio reiterated that the mission was "to proclaim and illustrate by acting at home these principles of justice, amity, understanding and cooperation among men of all religious persuasions and racial origins upon which human brotherhood depends and to commend them to the world."44 31
      While emphasizing tolerance, Brotherhood Week did not entirely discard contributionism. Clinchy also asked rhetorically in his radio address, "What is the American Idea? It is the big idea that on a continent 3,000 miles wide people of 47 Old World nationalities have come to live together as one nation." He also noted that Americans can often be divided by religion and ethnicity and that these divisions did not necessarily present a problem. Clinchy elaborated, "The only danger is that each might build the walls of separation too high so that they do not know what their neighbors are thinking or doing and do not understand them or cooperate with them."45 Differences were acceptable, he argued, as long as they were not too great. 32
      I'm an American Day, a holiday started by the Justice Department in 1939 to celebrate immigration, offered a similar wartime message. This observance grew dramatically during the war, from two hundred participating communities in 1939 to five hundred in 1943.46 Some observances were quite large, with 675,000 people attending the 1942 celebration in Central Park.47 The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) published a guide, "Gateway to Citizenship," to the staging of these ceremonies in 1943. The celebration centered on an induction ceremony for new citizens, speeches on the meaning of being an American, and patriotic songs. 33
      The speeches, editorials, and celebrations associated with the day offered familiar themes. "Hitler has moved heaven and earth to break our spirit by dividing us," thundered one 1943 speech editorial, adding that "His propagandists have tried to start American Catholics, Protestants and Jews quarrelling among themselves." Another speech, in 1944, celebrated the virtues of tolerance. "Real Americanism—the only Americanism any of us can accept without reserve—is based on respect for human beings, the conviction that the true worth of an individual has no relation to his birthplace, religion, or color."48 34
      As with the platoon films, I'm an American Day's festivities revealed how African Americans could be excluded from the more expansive definition of American identity. While New York City mayor Fiorello LaGuardia asked Walter White to serve as a member of his holiday committee every year during the war, it seems likely that blacks played a less prominent role in many communities. Chester Gillespie, an attorney in Cleveland, wrote White before I'm an American Day 1942 to suggest an alternative version of the immigration celebration: "I believe Negroes all over the country should call May 17th 'I Am an American Too' day and in connection there—with huge mass meetings should be held. Such action seems necessary because the government has officially set Negroes apart from the American people."49 35
      Still, some observers believed the tolerance message would eventually have implications for the status of American blacks. Most famously, Gunnar Myrdal's study, An American Dilemma (1944), suggested that the World War II–era ideology of the United States exposed the contradiction between American ideals and practices. Myrdal, a Swedish sociologist analyzing race relations in America, noted that the war required the United States to profess ideas of tolerance and equality to combat the fascist doctrines of the Nazis and the Japanese. "The Negro problem has taken on a significance greater than it ever had since the Civil War," concluded Myrdal. "The world conflict and America's exposed position as the defender of the democratic faith is thus accelerating an ideological process which was well under way."50 36
      American education joined the fight for tolerance during the war. In 1944 the National Education Association, the nation's largest teachers' union, made "education for tolerance" a priority for that year. As with other groups, the intercultural education movement shifted from a contributionist approach to promoting unity and cooperation, as the Service Bureau for Intercultural Education became simply the Bureau of Intercultural Education.51 "The basic idea upon which intercultural education rests is simple," declared the American Jewish Committee's (AJC) magazine in 1943: "It is that members of one culture group can be taught to get along with members of other groups within the framework of a democratic society." 37
      Unlike the Americanization campaigns of the World War I era, intercultural education did not seek to eliminate group differences.52 Instead, intercultural education exposed students to the cultures of different immigrant groups. Students visited ethnic restaurants and neighborhoods, prominent figures from different groups appeared at classrooms, and schools held joint celebrations of Christmas and Chanukah. These programs focused on the similarities between peoples. "Folk dances, folk music, historical pageants, and native costumes emphasize the 'sameness' of all people in their joys, sorrows, etc. rather than the 'strangeness' of different groups," according to the AJC.53 A poster in one of the classrooms summarized this perspective: "America—A Nation of One People From Many Countries."54 38
      The military also promoted tolerance in its ranks. Every week, the Orientation Section of the Information and Education Division, Army Service Forces (ASF), distributed a discussion outline on important issues. Groups of soldiers were supposed to discuss the topic for a minimum of an hour a week during a period called Army Talk.55 The subject of Army Talk no. 70 for May 5, 1945, was prejudice, and the message was a familiar one. "The man who spreads rumors," ASF Manual M 5 declared, "particularly rumors about any group—racial, religious, or national is doing Hitler's or Tojo's work." The manual asked the soldiers why racial and religious discrimination was harmful. The army replied, "History has taught us that when we discriminate against one segment of people, we set a pattern that may be used against other groups."56 39
      Army regulations also facilitated interfaith cooperation, as standard operating procedure required chaplains to accommodate the religious needs of soldiers from traditions different than their own. In fact, religious leaders actively participated in the rituals and celebrations of other faiths; in one case, an Episcopal minister conducted a Passover seder when no rabbi was available. It was very common for a priest, a rabbi, and a minister to lead jointly funeral services for fallen soldiers. Cooperation did not always come easily, of course, and sometimes these policies forced religious conflicts to the surface. Declaring that his faith did not recognize the legitimacy of other religions, a Catholic chaplain once refused to provide volunteers for a seder. As a whole, though, military protocol, like Brotherhood Week, buttressed the idea that the United States was a "Judeo-Christian nation."57 40
      "Car cards" appeared in buses, subways, and streetcars during the war with the same theme. These cards featured various protolerance and anti-prejudice messages, such as, "If You Hear Anyone Condemn a fellow American Because of Race or Religion ... Tel'em Off [sic]" and "We Fought Together ... Let's Work Together." Another showed a child crying while saying, "I Am So An American!" The rest of the card responded, "You Bet, Sonny ... No Matter What Your Race or Religion!"58 41
      These messages were ubiquitous during the war. Dr. Samuel Flowerman, research director of the American Jewish Committee, noted in a speech at the Waldorf Towers on November 30, 1945: "You have seen full page ads, you have seen billboards, you have seen match folders driving home the unity message; Catholics, Protestants, and Jews having fought together and lived together and died together and the need for unity in the post-war period." He noted the breadth of these efforts: "On the radio more than 216 individual stations broadcast every day some message of unity.... Way over a quarter million books have been distributed in libraries, hoping that people will understand and people will change their own ideas and get them across to others."59 42
      Flowerman's observation reveals how widespread the message of tolerance and national unity had become during the conflict. At the same time, the contributionist message, which formed an equal part of prewar pluralism, no longer had the same prominence. As a result, the war brought about a liberalization of attitudes toward recent immigrants, but in a way that tended to play down their cultural and economic contributions. The message of wartime pluralism seemed to be that ethnic diversity was acceptable because everyone was very close to being the same. 43
      Toward the end of World War II and in its immediate aftermath, government and private organizations began to emphasize that the tolerance essential to winning the war was also vital to the survival of postwar America. They feared that nativism, while submerged during the war, lurked beneath the surface and that domestic bigots were poised to take advantage of any instability that might occur while the country returned to a civilian footing. Jewish organizations again took a leading role as the American Jewish Committee, fearing that Nazi propaganda during the 1930s and 1940s had exacerbated ethnic divisions, advocated the cause of postwar pluralism:
Today the time has come for informing the American people of the dangers to American life and to American prosperity which the animosities resulting from this propaganda involve, and which will continue to use Hitler's methods to promote their own selfish methods.60
 		44
      Appeals during Brotherhood Week offered similar warnings about the dangers of the postwar world. FDR's Brotherhood Week message for February 1945 suggested, "It is a solemn duty for us to keep our country free of prejudice and bigotry so that when our fighting men return they may find us living by the freedom for which they are ready to give full measure of devotion."61 A speech-editorial for Brotherhood Week declared, "Though the battle moves in our favor, we can lose it even in victory. Though we win by arms, we shall all go down to destruction if the spirit of brotherhood dies."62 45
      Progressive groups such as the AJC and the NCCJ were not the only organizations concerned about intolerance and disunity following the war. Eric Johnston, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a conservative business group, gave a speech stressing that prejudice hindered economic growth. The AJC paraphrased a version of his talk for distribution:
True economic progress demands that the whole nation move forward at the same time. It demands that all artificial barriers erected by ignorance and intolerance be removed.... I repeat: Intolerance is poor economy. Prejudice does not pay. Discrimination is destructive. These are things that should be manifest to the American people if we are to counteract the pestiferous labors of race and hate-mongers.63
 Johnston's belief that discrimination harmed prosperity would become a central theme after the war. He continued, "Let's not apologize for the amazing variety of our human material here in America. Let us rather glory in it as the source of our robust spirit and opulent achievements," adding that Americans need to be reminded that the country "receives more than it gives" from immigrants.64		 46
      Hollywood movies also began to highlight the need for tolerance in the postwar world. In Pride of the Marines, another multiethnic platoon is fighting on Guadalcanal. The movie revolves around Al Schmid, a soldier who is blinded while fighting for his life during the battle. After Schmid is wounded, he is sent to a military hospital to recover. He convalesces with a number of other wounded soldiers, who are concerned about their prospects in the postwar world. 47
      Lee Diamond, a Jewish soldier who was wounded with Schmid, stresses the need to continue wartime cooperation. "One happy afternoon when God was feeling good, he sat down and he thought up a rich beautiful country, and he named it the USA.... Don't tell me we can't make it work in peace like we do in war. Don't tell me we can't pull together." The film reiterates the need for tolerance in postwar America. While on a train back to the East Coast to receive a medal, Schmid fears that his blindness will make him unable to obtain employment. Diamond tells him that a lot of people will have problems after the war. Schmid replies, "What problems have you got? You're in one piece ain't you.... When you go for a job there ain't nobody gonna say we don't have a use for ex-heroes like you." Diamond tells him that he could face discrimination as well: "There's guys that won't hire me because my name is Diamond instead of Jones. Cause I celebrate Passover instead of Easter. Don't you see what I mean.... You and me ... we need the same kind of world. We need a country to live in where no one gets booted around for any reason."65 48
      The war's conclusion did not relieve the anxieties of the protolerance coalition, as these groups continued to fear that ethnoreligious disunity and prejudice posed an imminent threat to the nation's social and political health. The Ad Council, an organization founded in 1942 to make public service announcements during the war, declared, "Our nation no longer has the supremely unifying cause of victory. The trend will be to stop pulling together, to stop working for the common good. Group clashes promise to be renewed, old hatreds revived; new war-born discords seem almost inevitable."66 Some feared that unless wartime unity continued, the United States might undergo some kind of political cataclysm. The AJC added, "If the present system is allowed to proceed unchecked, it can undermine the American system. It may lead to revolution or dictatorship in which no cultural or economic group would be secure, in which freedom from fear and want would become a lost memory."67 In his speech at the Waldorf Towers in November 1945, Flowerman warned the audience about the internal threat: "the war of machines and bullets has ended temporarily, not in all parts of the world, but the war of ideas has not even begun. We are just in the early stages of the war of ideas." Referring to domestic bigots, he said, "The enemy is not over there; the enemy isn't in the Pacific, the enemy is here."68 49
      National Brotherhood Week's growing popularity exemplified the continuity with wartime themes as the NCCJ's summary of Brotherhood Week 1946 suggested it was the biggest and most successful ever: "It topped all previous years. Never was it more evident that Brotherhood Week has been taken over by the nation at large, and made it its own."69 Equally revealing was the message for 1946. The slogan, echoing wartime propaganda, was "In Peace as in War TEAMWORK!" President Truman wrote a letter in support of the goals of Brotherhood Week, declaring, "The teamwork of the armed forces won the war. The spirit of teamwork should extend to our national life. As we united for victory, we must unite for peace."70 50
      The week focused on the common bonds between Protestants, Catholics, and Jews. Three Supreme Court justices of different faiths, Felix Frankfurter, Harlan Stone, and Frank Murphy, stood on the steps of the Court for a newsreel in support of Brotherhood Week.71 A radio roundtable between members of the three faiths emphasized the same idea. The Protestant said, "It's a strange thing, but what has become the burning necessity of modern times brings us back to the age-old teachings of the three religions we represent. The core of three religions is the brotherhood of men, under God."72 51
      There were traces of the contributionist message that was central to the 1939 celebration. Frankfurter declared in a newsreel:
The unfolding of our republic is the story of the greatest racial admixture in history. Of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence, 18 were of non-English stock. Foreign-born citizens from almost every land fought in the war for independence, helped to save the union, and in conspicuous numbers are found on the honor rolls of the two world wars.73
 The NCCJ also suggested that schools produce plays illustrating the contributions of various groups to American life.74		 52
      The overriding message, however, focused less on contributions than intergroup cooperation. Truman's letter in support of Brotherhood Week 1947 reinforced this theme: "Democracy rests upon brotherhood. Justice, amity, understanding and cooperation among Protestants, Catholics, and Jews throughout the nation are cornerstones of our democracy.... With them we can maintain our national unity and keep up the teamwork needed in peace as in war."75 53
      I'm an American Day followed a similar course after the conflict. The celebration continued its enormous growth, expanding from five hundred communities in 1943 to 1,100 communities by 1945.76 In 1946 the Justice Department suggested a number of approaches for material to be published or broadcast on the day. They first emphasized the need to continue wartime unity during peacetime. Other suggestions included, "draw attention to the rich contributions to American thought and life, to her arts and science, by her foreign-born citizens" and "combat the doctrines that would divide and weaken this Nation by pitting one group of Americans against another."77 54
      Unsurprisingly, the celebrations tended to be concentrated in states with significant immigrant populations. According to the INS, thirty-five states had at least one city with multiple I'm an American Day celebrations, and such observances were usually in large and medium-sized cities in the Northeast and the Midwest. Boston, New York City, and Pittsburgh as well as other major metropolitan areas held festivities every year between 1939 and 1945. Smaller communities with diverse populations like Fort Wayne, Indiana, and Fall River, Massachusetts, observed the day at least five times in the same time frame. The fifteen states that did not feature cities with multiple celebrations were predominantly in the South and the West (See Figure 1).78 55
      Minneapolis's observance of I'm an American Day 1947 provides an illustration of a typical community's celebration. The morning featured a music program followed by a talk by Mayor Hubert Humphrey and the presentation of certificates of citizenship to new arrivals to the country. With the certificates, the new Americans pledged to protect the Constitution and "to oppose all efforts to divide the American people and to sow the seeds of bigotry and prejudice among them."79 Humphrey added, "The United States of America owes its greatness as a nation to the diversity of the peoples of all races and nationalities who have, over the generations, migrated to our shores."80 Detroit's observance offered a similar array of events. In addition to a talk by the mayor, academics lectured the new Americans on the responsibilities of citizenship, including the necessity of voting.81 Both celebrations included speeches and radio performances by people of various racial and ethnic groups. 56

 
Figure 1
    Figure 1. Communities Prominent in the Celebration of I'm an American Day, 1939–1945.
    Source: "Roll-Call of Communities Prominent in the Observance of Citizenship (I Am an American) Day," U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, 1945.
 
 
      Materials surrounding I'm an American Day repeatedly emphasized that Americans should not judge people on the basis of their race, color, or creed. One suggested editorial for 1947 exhorted, "Whenever a man is refused a job because of his parentage or religion; wherever a hooded gang can keep a man from voting; wherever folks are kept from speaking their minds without fear, American security is in danger."82 57
      These festivals and holidays were only one of the ways organizations promoted the tolerance message. The American Jewish Committee's Department of Public Information sponsored the First American Exhibition on Superstition, Prejudice, and Fear. The exhibit, held at the American Museum of Natural History in New York in August 1948, contained an area known as the Hall of Prejudice. This section featured, among other things, a quiz called "How Much Do You Know About the Human Races?" The answers to the quiz demonstrated that every nation is an amalgamation of different races, and that the "strongest nation," the United States, contained the greatest mixture.83 The exhibit also included illustrations from books like the Races of Mankind, by Ruth Benedict, which criticized theories of scientific racism. One sign in the exhibit said, "Judge a person for himself, not for His Color, Race or Creed."84 58
      Hollywood also produced a number of films decrying bigotry in the immediate postwar years, most notably Crossfire (1947) and Gentlemen's Agreement (1947). These two films told very different stories about anti-Semitism but promoted the same message about the necessity of tolerance. In Crossfire, Robert Young and Robert Mitchum play a policeman and a military officer who investigate the murder of a Jewish man. In Gentlemen's Agreement, Gregory Peck portrays a reporter who pretends to be a Jew in order to write a story about anti-Semitism in America. Both films were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1947, with Gentlemen's Agreement receiving the award. While the films discuss anti-Semitism, they also analyze the broader theme of the universal nature of prejudice and its overall dangers to society. 59
      In both films, traditional anti-Semitic stereotypes are visible. During the war, there were persistent rumors that a disproportionate number of draft dodgers were Jews. In Crossfire, Montgomery (Robert Ryan), the soldier who turns out to be the killer, claims to have not met the victim, Joseph Samuels, until that evening. He tells Captain Finlay (Young), "Of course ... seen a lot of guys like him." Finlay says, "Like what?" Montgomery responds, "Oh you know, guys that played it safe during the war. Scrounged around keeping themselves in civvies. Got swell apartments. Swell dames. You know the kind." Finlay replies, "I'm not sure that I do. Just what kind?" Montgomery elaborates, "Oh you know. Some of them are named Samuels. Some of them got funnier names."85 In Gentlemen's Agreement, a coworker assumes that Phil Green (Peck) must have been in public relations rather than in the trenches during the war because he seems like a "clever guy."86 60
      The films both stress the need to look beyond the more odious forms of anti-Semitism and examine the genteel prejudice that exists in America among people who do not consider themselves bigots. In Gentlemen's Agreement, Green's editor tells him he wants to get beyond the overt anti-Semites and root out "the people who would never attend an anti-Semitic meeting or send a dime to Gerald L. K. Smith."87 In Crossfire, Finlay says, "This business of hating Jews comes in a lot of different sizes. There's the you can't join our country club kind. And you can't live around here kind. And yes, you can't work here kind. And because we stand for all of these we get Monty's kind. He's just one guy. We don't get him very often ... but he grows out of all the rest." In both films, all forms of prejudice, even the most "harmless," are seen as equally threatening. 61
      The movies emphasize the similarities between ethnic and religious groups. In Gentlemen's Agreement, Green's son asks him, "What are Jews anyway? I mean exactly." Green responds, "There are lots of different churches. The people who go to that particular church are called Catholics. Then there are people who go to other churches and they're called Protestants. And there others who go to still different churches and they're called Jews. Only they call their kind of churches synagogues or temples." This language echoes the approach of wartime films like Why We Fight and The House I Live In. Green adds, "You can be an American and a Protestant or a Catholic or a Jew. Religion is different from nationality." Green also reproaches his Jewish secretary for her shock when he reveals that he is a Gentile. In a variation on Shylock's "Hath not a Jew eyes" speech from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, he declares, "Same face. Same eyes. Same nose. Same suit. Same everything. Here take my hand. Feel it. Same flesh as yours, isn't it? No different today than it was yesterday, Miss Wales. The only thing that's different is the word Christian."88 62
      Along the same lines, Crossfire demonstrates that any kind of prejudice is the problem, not merely anti-Semitism. Finlay has to convince Leroy, a GI from Tennessee, to help him obtain evidence against Montgomery. Leroy says, "I don't see that this is any of my business anyway." Finlay asks, "Has Monty ever made fun of your accent?" Leroy replies, "Sure. Lots of times." Finlay says:
Why? He calls you a hillbilly doesn't he? Says you're dumb. He laughs at you because you are from Tennessee. He's never even been to Tennessee. Ignorant men always laugh at things that are different. Things they don't understand. They're afraid of things they don't understand. They end up hating them.
 		63
      Finlay also tells Leroy that his grandfather was killed for being an Irish Catholic a century ago in Philadelphia. Perhaps reflecting the paucity of information about immigrants in history books, Finlay says, "That's history, Leroy. They don't teach it in school. But it's real American history just the same." He continues, "Thomas Finlay was killed in 1848 just because he was an Irishman and a Catholic. It happened many times.... And last night Joseph Samuels was killed just because he was a Jew." Further universalizing the experience of prejudice, Finlay concludes, "Hating is always the same. Always senseless. One day it kills Irish Catholics, the next day Jews, the next day Protestants, the next day Quakers, it's hard to stop, it can end up killing men who wear stripe neckties, or people from Tennessee."89 64
      National civil rights organizations reiterated Finlay's message that all types of prejudice affected all minorities. At its national conference in 1947, the NAACP passed a resolution on racial and religious tensions, declaring that, "In defending the rights of Negroes, we recognize the fact that what happens to one minority group effects [sic] all the others," adding, "we must combat the continuing wave of anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic, anti-Oriental, anti–foreign born feeling in this country."90 Rabbi Irving Miller, president of the American Jewish Congress, discussed similar themes when he addressed the NAACP convention of 1950: "Through the thousands of years of our tragic histories we should have learned one lesson and learned it well: that the persecution at any time of any minority portends the shape, quality and intensity of the persecution of all minorities."91 65
      As Myrdal had predicted, the postwar period witnessed important advances for African Americans. Jackie Robinson broke the color line in major league baseball when he debuted for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, and President Truman integrated the military in 1948. Public displays of virulent racism became less respectable as Mississippi senator Theodore Bilbo's blatantly bigoted rhetoric, which had largely gone unnoticed before the war, became a source of national controversy. Indeed, the Senate refused to seat Bilbo in 1947 because he had incited violence against black voters during his reelection campaign.92 66
      The tolerance message remained visible in educational programs into the late 1940s. The Ad Council launched a campaign called "United America" in June 1946 to attack prejudice. According to the Ad Council's 1946–47 annual report, the campaign's "objective is to promote American unity by the lessening of inter-faith and inter-racial prejudices."93 Like Brotherhood Week, the campaign echoed the wartime themes of unity, cooperation, and the dangers of prejudice and discrimination. 67
      All of the 1949 ads concluded by emphasizing that tolerance was an essential element of American identity: "Make sure that you are not spreading rumors against a race or religion. Speak up, wherever you are, against prejudice, and work for better understanding. Remember that's what it means—to be a good American citizen."94 One ad reiterated that rumors about different ethnic groups posed just as much danger to American unity today as they had during World War II, adding, "But perhaps we don't know that rumors are just as dangerous today as they were during the war. Because—rumors about other groups, other religions and other races always threaten our national unity—without which we cannot hope to survive."95 68
      By this time, international themes were becoming more prominent in these programs, partly to counter Soviet propagandists who were attempting to use the discrepancy between American rhetoric and practice as a tool in the Cold War.96 A radio spot for I'm an American Day in 1949 noted, "Today they [immigrants] join with their fellow-Americans in telling the world that it's great to live in a land where bigotry and discrimination are on the run, where human rights and brotherhood are on the rise, where there's equality, opportunity and justice for all."97 John Sullivan, general chairman of Brotherhood Week 1950 and a former secretary of the navy, declared, "Our aims and our objectives are not limited to the creation of a more dignified and amicable life within our own borders, for we know beyond doubt that today the biggest question for the entire world is whether the human spirit is to remain free or is to be swallowed up by totalitarianism."98A speech from the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW), a conservative veteran's group, for Brotherhood Day 1949 echoed this sentiment: "The V.F.W. believes that [brotherhood] can be our effective answer to the communist and fascist enemies who foster DIS-unity among our own people in an effort to conquer the very foundation of American democracy."99 69
      The VFW's involvement in the antidiscrimination campaign reveals how much this language became part of postwar American thought and rhetoric, if not practice.100 Most of the programs promoting tolerance came from liberal organizations such as the NCCJ and AJC. The VFW's rhetoric for Brotherhood Week 1949, however, was virtually identical to that of the progressive groups. "Some of our people forget that American Protestants and Catholics, Gentiles and Jews, Japanese-Americans, Negroes and men of many other racial origins have fought shoulder to shoulder under one flag—the Stars and Stripes."101 70
      World War II laid the groundwork for the greater inclusion of the descendents of southern and eastern European immigrants during the postwar period. Discrimination by no means disappeared in the immediate postwar years; anti-Catholic feeling continued to manifest itself in attacks by some observers on the "authoritarian" nature of Catholicism and its supposed incompatibility with American democracy.102 Jewish groups remained very worried about the persistence of anti-Semitism. Nevertheless, poll after poll revealed that traditional forms of religious and ethnic prejudice were less virulent after 1945. The wartime message of tolerance and unity, however, facilitated this greater inclusion of white ethnics by emphasizing that these groups were little different from native-stock Americans or each other. The contributionist ideology, which focused more on the unique cultural benefits brought by these different groups, faded into the background. This message, however, would slowly gain strength during the 1950s and 1960s as Americans became increasingly appreciative of the cultural and economic assets provided by the "nation of immigrants." 71


NOTES

I would like to thank Andrew Huebner and Alan Petigny for their very helpful comments on this article. I would also like to thank Gabe Rosenberg for constructing the map.

1. New York Times Magazine, November 1, 1942.

2.  Ibid.

3.  David Bennett, Party of Fear: From Nativist Movements to the New Right in American History (New York, 1995), 285. Bennett wrote, "By war's end, nativism was all but finished." John Blum discussed the greater acceptance of Jews and Italians in V Was for Victory: Politics and American Culture during World War II (New York, 1976), 154, 175. He wrote, "More important, the President's order [ending the enemy alien status of Italians] marked the beginning of the end of Italian American separatism. As in the past, Italian Americans, like Irish or Polish or Scandinavian Americans, preserved much of their ethnicity, but henceforth, increasingly, they did so from choice rather than necessity." About Jews, he echoed this sentiment: "Nevertheless, wartime prosperity, the increasing geographic mobility of Americans, the homogenizing effects of shared dangers in battle, the essential contributions of Jewish refugee scientists, and the stunned reactions to the Nazi gas chambers, continued to facilitate for American Jews acceptance by the society in which they lived." These works and others like them have influenced books that synthesize extended periods of American history. Eric Foner concurred in Story of American Freedom (New York, 1998), 237. He wrote, "By the end of the war, the new immigrant groups had been fully accepted as ethnic Americans, rather than members of distinctive and inferior 'races.'"

4.  Richard Polenberg, One Nation Divisible: Class, Race, and Ethnicity in the United States since 1938 (New York, 1980), 54.

5.  Louis Adamic, A Nation of Nations (New York, 1944), 5–6.

6. New York Evening Post, March 25, 1943.

7.  Studs Terkel, "The Good War": An Oral History of World War Two (New York, 1984), 138.

8. The Life of Hank Greenberg, director Aviva Kempner (Fox, 1999).

9.  John Dower, War without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War (New York, 1986), 3–32. Some scholars have shown that the war did accelerate the acceptance of Chinese Americans, who were viewed in a more positive light because they were associated with an Allied government. See K. Scott Wong, Americans First: Chinese Americans and the Second World War (Cambridge, MA, 2005).

10.  Nicholas V. Montalto, A History of the Intercultural Education Movement, 1924–1941 (New York, 1982), 155–58. Montalto notes that program's designers hoped to prevent a repeat of World War I–era anti-immigrant hysteria and to help pave the way for the admission of European refugees fleeing Nazism.

11.  Press release, 1 February 1939; Americans All, Promotion and Follow-Up; Records of Special Programs and Projects; Records Relating to Radio Programs, 1935–1941, Americans ... All, Immigrants ... All-Brave New World; Records of the Office of Education, RG 12; National Archives at College Park, Maryland (NACP henceforth).

12.  "What the Recordings Are About," Promotion and Follow-Up; Special Programs and Projects; Records Relating to Radio Programs; Office of Education, RG 12; NACP.

13.  "Teaching the New York World's Fair, No. 1," Century of Progress International Exposition—New York World's Fair Collection, Group 820, Box 38, folder 5, Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut.

14. New York Times, July 7, 1940.

15.  Ibid.

16.  Allan M. Winkler, The Politics of Propaganda: The Office of War Information, 1942–1945 (New Haven, CT, 1978), 1–6.

17.  Leonard Dinnerstein, a leading authority on anti-Semitism, suggests that American anti-Semitism peaked during the war years. Dinnerstein, Anti-Semitism in America (Oxford, 1994), 105–49.

18.  Polenberg, One Nation Divisible, 46.

19.  Many scholars have discussed the drive for tolerance in the years before and during the war. For instance, see Philip Gleason, Speaking of Diversity (Baltimore, 1992), 153–88; Richard Steele, "The War on Intolerance: The Reformulation of American Nationalism," Journal of American Ethnic History 9 (Fall 1989): 9–35; Richard Weiss, "Ethnicity and Reform: Minorities and the Ambience of the Depression Years," Journal of American History 66 (December 1979): 566–85; and Nicholas V. Montalto, A History of the Intercultural Education Movement, 1924–1941 (New York, 1982). For instance, Steele notes how the tolerance approach gained strength at this time: "It seems fair to conclude that by 1942 a more liberal view significantly challenged the bigotry that had long dominated public attitudes and national policy. The propaganda effort introduced the general public to ideals that had earlier captivated social scientists, educators, religious leaders, and others. In this process, however, it probably undermined any hope the cultural pluralists may have had for national acceptance of their vision of America" (Steele, "The War against Intolerance," 31). While each of these pieces dealt with part of this story, they did not follow the evolution of these ideologies from the war to the early postwar period. Thus, they do not show both the full shift away from contributionism and toward tolerance during and after World War II.

20.  Franklin D. Roosevelt, The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, vol. 11 (New York, 1950), 6.

21.  Franklin D. Roosevelt, Nothing to Fear: The Selected Addresses of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (New York, 1946), 321.

22.  Franklin D. Roosevelt, The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, vol. 13 (New York, 1950), 398.

23.  Greg Robinson, By Order of the President: FDR and the Internment of the Japanese Americans (Cambridge, MA, 2001).

24.  Franklin D. Roosevelt, The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, vol. 12 (New York, 1950), 548. The Chinese Exclusion Act, passed in 1882, banned all Chinese immigration to the United States.

25.  Ibid., 103.

26.  Roosevelt, Nothing to Fear, 431–32.

27.  OWI Poster, 44–PA-1869, Records of the Office of Government Reports, RG 44, NACP.

28.  Ibid, 44–PA-414A; 44–PA-2151, NACP.

29.  Ibid, 44–PA-1477; 44–PA-660, NACP.

30.  Ibid, 44–PA-352, NACP.

31.  Ibid, 44–PA-2049; 44–PA-165, NACP.

32.  Address by Alan Cranston, Chief, Foreign Language Division, Office of War Information, before the Editors and Publishers of Foreign Language Newspapers in New York City, August 25, 1942, Speech Materials, Public Relations Files, 1940–54, Education and Americanization Files; Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), Record Group 85; National Archives Building, Washington, D.C.(NAB henceforth).

33.  Ibid.

34. Why We Fight, director Frank Capra (Special Service Division, Army Service Forces, 1942–44), episode 7.

35. The House I Live In, director Mervyn LeRoy (RKO, 1945).

36.  Ibid.

37.  The African American singer Paul Robeson often performed this version of the song. It is not exactly clear when he began to do so, but he must have started sometime after the summer of 1942, as the lyrics contain references to the Battle of Midway (June 1942). Paul Robeson: The Original Recording of "Ballad for Americans" and Great Songs of Faith, Love, and Patriotism (Vanguard, 1989 ed.). Robeson and the language of "The House I Live In" emerged from the Popular Front culture of the 1930s, when the alliance of the Communist Party with American liberals produced art and literature that promoted a pluralistic definition of citizenship. Eric Foner explained that the Popular Front suggested "ethnic and racial diversity was the glory of American society," adding that, "Museum exhibitions, murals sponsored by the Works Progress Administration, the federally sponsored 'people's theater,' and Hollywood films all rediscovered the American people and expanded its definition to include the new immigrants and their children, and even non-whites." See Foner, Story of American Freedom, 212.

38.  See Thomas Doherty, Projections of War: Hollywood, American Culture, and World War II (New York, 1999), 139–48, for a thorough look at these films. See also Gary Gerstle, American Crucible (Princeton, NJ, 2001), 204–10. Gerstle observes how these films were one of the primary forces behind the image of the multiethnic platoons, which included white ethnics but excluded blacks.

39.  "Letter from Walter White to Elmer Davis," NAACP Papers, Part II, Box A462, Folder 5, Library of Congress, Manuscript Reading Room, Washington, D.C. The OWI worked closely with Hollywood on the content of these films during the war.

40.  Gerstle, American Crucible, 205

41. Guadalcanal Diary, director Lewis Seller (Fox, 1943).

42.  Richard Oehling wrote that during the war, "The warlords and soldiers simply had to be put into Japanese uniforms." See Oehling, "The Yellow Menace: Asian Images in Film," in The Kaleidiscopic Lens: How Hollywood Views Ethnic Groups, ed. Randall Miller (Englewood, NJ, 1980), 196–97. Reflecting the integration of the military, the combat films of the early 1950s featured a more multicultural cast. Steel Helmet, a Korean War film released in 1951, shows a unit with black and Nisei soldiers. Go For Broke, released the same year, portrayed the exploits of the all–Japanese American 442nd combat division during World War II.

43.  "America's Big Idea," 2, National Conference of Christians and Jews Collection (NCCJ henceforth), Brotherhood Week 1943, Box 5, Social Welfare History Archives (SWHA henceforth), Elmer L. Andersen Library, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis.

44.  "A Call to the Churches of America," NCCJ, Box 5, Brotherhood Week 1943, SWHA.

45.  "America's Big Idea," 5, SWHA.

46.  "Brief Suggestions on Citizenship Recognition Ceremonies for 'I'm an American Day Committees,'" INS, Holidays and Holydays, I'm an American Day, 1941–54, YIVO Institute for Jewish Research (YIVO henceforth), American Jewish Historical Society (AJHS henceforth), New York, N.Y.

47.  "Letter from Walter White to Mayor LaGuardia," Papers of the NAACP, Part II, General Office File, 1940–55, Box A319, Folder 3, "I'm an American Day," 1941–49, Library of Congress, Manuscript Reading Room, Washington, D.C.

48.  "I'm an American Day," 1944, 4, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Box 98, Holidays and Holydays, 1942–50, I'm an American Day, Articles, Editorials, and Speeches, YIVO, AJHS.

49.  Papers of the NAACP, Part II, General Office File, 1940–55, Box A319, Folder 3, "I'm an American Day," 1941–49, Library of Congress, Manuscript Reading Room, Washington, D.C.

50.  Gunnar Myrdal, An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy (New York, 1944), 997, 1004.

51.  Stuart Svonkin, Jews against Prejudice: American Jews and the Fight for Civil Liberties (New York, 1997), 64. He wrote, "Whereas the Service Bureau under DuBois (1934–1941) had stressed the distinctive cultural contributions of particular racial and ethnic groups ... the reconstituted bureau emphasized 'unity and understanding among all cultural groups,' a message specifically designed to fit wartime demands for social cohesion."

52. American Jewish Committee (AJC) Reporter, April 1944, 6.

53. AJC Reporter, May 1944, 6.

54. AJC Reporter, April 1944, 6.

55. Common Ground, Autumn 1945, 24. Louis Adamic edited this journal.

56.  Ibid, 25, 28.

57.  Deborah Dash Moore, GI Jews: How World War II Changed a Generation (Cambridge, MA, 2004), 118–55.

58. Anti-Defamation League (ADL) Bulletin, October 1952, 3.

59.  Samuel H. Flowerman speech at Waldorf Towers, November 30, 1945, AJC Records, RG 16, DIS-15, Scientific Research Subject Files, General Subject Files, 1945–48, Blaustein Library (BL henceforth), New York, N.Y.

60.  "Details of Plan," 1945, 2, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Box 168, Mass Media, 1944–48, Intergroup Relations, YIVO, AJHS.

61.  "Brotherhood Week Is a Fighting Week," January 9, 1945, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Box 97, Holidays and Holydays, 1946–60, National Brotherhood Week, YIVO, AJHS.

62.  Ibid. The files listed some items as potential speeches and some items as potential editorials for Brotherhood Week. It is not always clear which was which.

63.  "Prejudice is Bad Business," 4, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Mass Media, Bigotry and Prejudice, Educational Kit- WWB, YIVO, AJHS.

64.  Ibid., 4.

65. Pride of the Marines, director Delmer Daves (Warner Brothers, 1945).

66.  "Program Information Exchange: Recommendation for an Advertising Campaign on American Unity," 1946, 1, AJC Records, RG 347.17, Gen-10, Box 14, Mass Media, Bigotry and Prejudice, Advertising and Public Relations, 1946–1951, YIVO, AJHS.

67.  Ibid., 1.

68.  Flowerman speech, 16, BL.

69.  "Brotherhood Week in 1946," 1, NCCJ, Box 5, Brotherhood Week 1946, SWHA.

70.  "Problem No. 1 for Americans," NCCJ, Box 5, Brotherhood Week 1946, SWHA.

71.  "Brotherhood Week in 1946," 4, SWHA.

72.  "The Good World of the Future," 2, 11/14//45, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Box 97, Holidays and Holydays, 1945–59, Brotherhood Week, Radio and Television, YIVO, AJHS.

73.  "U.S. Justices Plead for Tolerance," February 14, 1946, Universal Newsreels, RG 200, Vol. 19–47, NACP.

74.  "Problem No. 1 for Americans," SWHA.

75.  "Letter from Truman to Clinchy," NCCJ, Box 5, Brotherhood Week 1946, SWHA.

76.  "'I'm an American Day,' a Fact Sheet for the Use of I'm an American Day Committees," INS, 1, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Box 98, Holidays and Holydays, 1941–54, I'm an American Day, YIVO, AJHS.

77.  Ibid., 3

78.  Papers of the NAACP, Part II, General Office File, 1940–45, Box A319, Folder 3, "I'm an American Day," 1941–49, Library of Congress, Manuscript Reading Room, Washington, D.C.

79.  "Memo from Minnesota Jewish Council," May 29, 1947, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Box 98, Holidays and Holydays, 1941–54, I'm an American Day, YIVO, AJHS.

80.  Ibid.

81.  "Eighth Annual Welcome to New Citizens," May 18, 1947, AJC Records, RG 347.17, Gen-10, Box 98, Holidays and Holydays, 1941–54, I'm an American Day, YIVO, AJHS.

82.  "The Watchword is Vigilance," 1, May 18, 1947, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Box 98, Holidays and Holydays, 1942–50, I'm an American Day, Articles, Editorials, and Speeches, YIVO, AJHS.

83.  "Memo on Exhibit on Superstition, Fear, and Prejudice," October 5, 1946, 5, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Box 14, Exhibits, Bigotry, and Prejudice, 49–61, YIVO, AJHS.

84. AJC Reporter, September 1948, 5.

85. Crossfire, director Ed Dmytryk (RKO, 1947).

86. Gentlemen's Agreement, director Elia Kazan (Fox, 1947).

87.  Ibid. Gerald L. K. Smith was a populist, anti-Semitic demagogue during the 1930s and 1940s.

88.  Ibid.

89. Crossfire.

90.  "Resolutions Adopted by the National Conference of the NAACP, Washington D.C., June 28, 1947," Papers of the NAACP, Part I, 1909–1950, Reel 12, Group II/Series A/ Box 40, 1947 Annual Convention, File: Resolutions, 0119, "Resolutions Adopted," Rhode Island College, Providence, RI.

91.  "Address by Rabbi Irving Miller to the 41st Annual Convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Boston, Massachusetts, July 21, 1950," Papers of the NAACP, Part I, 1909–1950, Reel 12, Group II/Series A/ Box 148, File: Speeches (1–2), "Address of Rabbi Irving Miler," Rhode Island College, Providence, RI.

92.  Robert L. Fleegler, "Theodore Bilbo and the Decline of Public Racism, 1938–1947," Journal of Mississippi History 68 (Spring 2006): 1–27.

93.  "1946–1947 Ad Council Annual Report," AD Council Annual Reports, 1942–2000, Record Series 13/2/202, Box 1, Folder: Ad Council Annual Report, 1946–47, University of Illinois Archives (UIA henceforth), Urbana, IL. In 1949, the AD Council noted in an introduction to proofs of these ads that, "In the past few years newspapers in the United States have run thousands of ads which are especially prepared by volunteer advertising agencies."

94.  "Proof of Ad Council Ads," Ad Council Historical File, 1942–97, Record Series 12/2//207, Box 7, United America (Anti-Prejudice, 1949), UIA.

95.  "Do You Know a Rumor?—when you hear one," Ad Council Historical File, 1942–97, Record Series 12/2//207, Box 7, United America (Anti-Prejudice, 1949), UIA.

96.  See Mary L. Dudziak, Cold War Civil Rights: Race and the Image of American Democracy (Princeton, NJ, 2000), and Thomas Bortelsmann, The Cold War and the Color Line: American Race Relations in the Global Arena (Cambridge, MA, 2001).

97.  "I'm an American Day, 30 Second Spot," AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Holidays and Holydays, 1945–49, I'm an American Day Radio and Television, YIVO, AJHS.

98.  "Brotherhood for Peace And Freedom," Papers of the NAACP, Part II, Box A387, Folder 3, Library of Congress, Manuscript Reading Room, Washington, D.C.

99.  "Letter from Mark Kinsey to Joseph J. Wolfson," January 12, 1949, AJC Records, RG 347.17.10, Gen-10, Holidays and Holydays, 1945–57, Brotherhood Week, Articles, Editorials, Speeches, YIVO, AJHS.

100.  The notion of promoting tolerance to fight the Soviet Union in the Cold War would become even more prevalent in the 1950s. Virtually every public event regarding immigration and every political debate over immigration policy would stress the idea that intolerance hindered our ability to win the allegiance of the decolonizing world. See Robert Fleegler, "A Nation of Immigrants: The Rise of Contributionism, 1924–1965" (PhD diss., Brown University, 2005), 134–84.

101.  Ibid.

102.  For instance, Paul Blanshard, American Freedom and Catholic Power (Boston, 1949). Blanshard first put forth this argument in a series of articles in the Nation in 1948.

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