After the U.S. air strikes against Syria in April, some questioned whether Donald Trump has abandoned his campaign platform of “America First.” The phrase has elicited comparisons with language used by the American First Committee, the powerful isolationist group founded in 1940 to oppose any material support for Britain in its war against Nazi Germany. But it wasn’t the first political movement to use the slogan.
Thompson served three terms as Chicago’s mayor, from 1915 to 1923 and then again from 1927 to 1931. When campaigning for his first term, Thompson stumped on his image as a cowboy (his wealthy father owned a ranch), a former star athlete, and a can-do alderman.
In 1926, Thompson marshaled together a new faction in the Illinois Republican Party: America First. Voters expecting detailed positions against corruption or gangs were instead treated to promises of big infrastructure projects and pledges to fight against American involvement with the World Court and the League of Nations (which, incidentally, Hearst also hated). Thompson’s education platform pledged to purge textbooks of British propaganda, which disregarded “Polish, German, Irish, and other heroes” of the American Revolution, and demeaned George Washington. Thompson obsessed over one college textbook that dared label Washington “a rebel.”
The Democrats themselves distributed racist campaign literature, and Dever, a former judge, failed to mobilize voters. Thompson won his reelection bid.
In Thompson’s defense, Hearst chided the mayor’s detractors, writing in a Chicago Herald-Examiner editorial, “Undermining patriotism was no cause for laughter.” Voters, however, had tired of Thompson’s culture war, which went as far as demanding that Chicago’s flag have five-pointed “American” stars. The six-pointed stars, according to Big Bill, were British.
