September 22, 1922 – Formation of the Right-Wing American Political Group, Sentinels of the Republic

The Sentinels of the Republic, a right-wing political group, was formed on this date in history out of the merger of a number of smaller groups. It was created to fight both governmental centralization and what they called “socialism.”

As Steven Usdin pointed out in his book Bureau of Spies, pp. 69-70:

The group sent editorials on a regular basis to 1,300 newspapers denouncing as un-American progressive initiatives that put the interests of ordinary people above those of the rich. Child-labor laws, maternity benefits, unemployment insurance, and the distribution of birth-control information, were, according to the Sentinels, steps down the path to godless communism.”

Cartoon promulgated by the Sentinels

It may go without need for explanation that the Sentinels group was funded by tycoons, including members of the du Pont, Pew, and Pitcairn families.

[The du Ponts made their fortune in the gunpowder manufacturing business, then expanding into other areas. It is now known for polymers, merging in 2017 with Dow to create DowDuPont, the world’s largest chemical company in terms of sales.

The Pew family founded the Sun Oil Company, a huge success, which enabled them to support the family’s beliefs.

The Pitcairn fortune came from railroad and oil investments, as well as plate glass. Raymond Pitcairn was a national chairman of the Sentinels of the Republic. He was also the group’s primary benefactor: in early 1935 he single-handedly revitalized the Sentinels with a donation of $85,000, more (more than $1,564,409.49 in 2018 dollars.]

The Great Hall in Raymond Pitcairn’s mansion, called Glencairn, now a museum

But they weren’t the only prominent people of that era belonging to the Sentinels. There is a rather shocking list of notables of the time who subscribed to their tenets:

• Louis Arthur Coolidge, Treasurer of the United Shoe Machinery Corporation, former journalist and political publicist, served as private secretary to U.S. Sen. Henry Cabot Lodge, 1888–91
• James Jackson, Treasurer and Receiver-General of Massachusetts, former New England Chairman of the Red Cross
• Herbert Parker, former Massachusetts Attorney General
• Charles Sedgwick Rackemann, partner in the Boston law firm Rackemann, Sawyer & Brewster
• Alfred P. Sloan, the long-time president and chairman of General Motors
• Boyd B. Jones, a lawyer and former U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts
• Henry F. Hurlbert, former District Attorney of Essex County, Massachusetts
• Maurice S. Sherman, newspaper editor
• Frank F. Dresser, Massachusetts attorney
• Katharine Torbert Balch, President of the Massachusetts Women’s Anti-Suffrage Association

In 1924-1925 the Sentinels got national attention when they successfully swayed Massachusetts opinion against the Child Labor Act. (It was Bolshevistic, they claimed.) They also charged that proponents of the Child Labor Act wanted to remove children from the influence of their families and the authority of their parents.

In 1934, the Sentinels successfully campaigned against a proposed tax law that would have required publication of personal financial data, including an individual’s gross income. They described the proposed law as an “outrageous invasion of privacy.” After receiving thousands of letters and telegrams opposing the legislation, Congress backed down.

Nevertheless, as Usdin writes:

The tycoons who funded the Sentinels felt compelled to distance themselves from it in 1936 after an investigation by Senator Hugo Black revealed both their funding of the organization policies and its hateful nature. Black released a letter in which Sentinel representatives referred to FDR’s policies as ‘Jewish Communism’ and asserted both that middle-class Americans longed for an American Hitler and that the ‘fight for western Christian civilization can be won: but only if we recognize that the enemy is world-wide and that it is Jewish in origin.’”

The Black Commission even uncovered written correspondence between Sentinel member Cleveland Runyon and Alexander Lincoln, the organization’s president, in which the latter wrote that the “Jewish threat” to the United States was a “real one” and added that “I am doing what I can as an officer of the Sentinels.” The former responded that the “old-line Americans of $1200 a year want a Hitler.”

By the 1940s, the tide of opinion had turned against what was now known as fascism, and the Sentinels lost most of their support base, funds and influence. Finally, in 1944, they disbanded.