Dorothy Thompson

"Some time ago, Mr. Donald Flamm, of radio station WMCA, put Father Coughlin off the air on the ground of a policy enunciated by all the large networks that time must not be sold on the air for one-sided controversial opinion but that active controversy must be confined to sustaining programs, where the time is given free and where both side« can be heard.

"The answer of Father Coughlin’s supporters was not to raise the important public questions of whether or not this is a good policy, and whether or not it is being violated by Father Coughlin and others, and what actually constitutes controversy and who ought to decide it. The answer was to cry that Mr. Flamm was suppressing free speech and to proceed to organize economic sanctions—in the form of advertisers’ boycotts—against Mr. Flamm’s station.

"At the same time these same followers have organized boycotts against other speakers with different opinions.

"But this action is itself a complete travesty of the fundamental idea of free speech. For if the answer to policy or opinion is boycott, who can, eventually, risk having an opinion?

"All along the line, in American life, we are settling ideas by economic sanctions.

"The German-Americans who boycott Jewish shops are using force to support ideas. So are the Jews who boycott German shops.

"We need new techniques to combat ideological penetration in our own country, and it seems to me we ought—if we are true to our traditions—to establish them in the realm of law, rather than of economic sanctions. And this applies to capital and labor, and politics, and everything else.

"Ideological penetration occurs through the medium of free speech.

"But what is “free” speech? Is the publication of anonymous and defamatory literature against a racial or religious group of American citizens “free” speech?

"Have propaganda organizations the right to solicit funds without giving a regular and open accounting to the public of the sources and exact disposition of those funds?

"The Dies committee would do well to consult the best possible legal advice as to how we can make “free” speech also responsible speech, and how we can prevent it from being abused by those who only use it in an attempt to destroy it, and with it our democracy."

--"Free Speech in a Democracy"

Evening Review/Feburary 8, 1939

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Dorothy Thompson (1893 - 1961)

1939

Eduardo

Helena Independent/January 1, 1939

The Results of Lima

Fort Worth Star-Telegram/January 1, 1939

Our Own Horoscope

Norfolk Ledger-Dispatch/January 2, 1939

Line of Defense for U.S.

Against Terrorization in Europe Today

Spokane Spokesman-Review/January 23, 1939

A "Secret" Shakes the World

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette/February 4, 1939

When Hitler Preaches Peace

Fort Worth Star-Telegram/February 5, 1939

Free Speech in a Democracy

Evening-Review/February 8, 1939

German People Don't Like Pogroms

Daily Oklahoman/February 22, 1939

Miracle: A Unified Continent

Fort Worth Star-Telegram/April 23, 1939

The Summer and the President

Roanoke Times/August 8, 1939

Right to Work Theory is Warmly Challenged

Roanoke Times/August 10, 1939

The Spending-Lending Program

Roanoke Times/August 14, 1939

The Challenge to the Opposition

Roanoke Times/August 15, 1939

We Hardly Have a Foreign Policy

Roanoke Times/August 17, 1939

To Get Rid of One Man
The Whole World May Go to War
Spokesman-Review/September 1, 1939

What is Happening Now Was Bound to Happen

Spokesman-Review/September 4, 1939

So Europe is At War
Spokesman-Review/September 7, 1939

Sound, Powerful Weapon in This War

Spokesman-Review/September 8, 1939

Diary Between Peace and War
Spokesman-Review/September 11, 1939

German Broadcasts Sizzle with
Propaganda Against the Allies
Spokesman-Review/September 14, 1939

Senator Borah and Neutrality
Spokesman-Review/September 19, 1939

Lindbergh and His Propaganda
Spokesman-Review/September 22, 1939

How Nazism Promotes "America First"