By Joel A. Moskowitz, MD
LA JOLLA, California — The father of JFK and Bobby and Ted Kennedy was intimately involved in the world events leading up to World War II. And David Nasaw’s book The Patriarch: The remarkable life and turbulent times of Joseph Patrick Kennedy tells it all. Published by Penguin Press this much detailed albeit readable 800 pager depicts JPK as egotistical, misguided yet successful.
Joseph Patrick Kennedy has been accused of being an antisemite and a bootlegger.
Academic historian (his prefered label rather than biographer) David Nasaw refutes the bootlegger label but he doesn’t wipe the stain of being anti-Jewish away. Nasaw is the Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr, Professor of History at the Graduate Center of The City University of New York. (This reviewer is an alumnus of that instiitution when it was City College of New York or CCNY.)
Nasaw writes that Kennedy’s advocacy to appease Hitler was based on his capitalistic outlook. JPK was a friend of Charles Lindbergh who was an admirer of Germany’s policies. Charles Lindbergh held the same outspoken view (a policy of The America First Committee) that America should not get into a war with the European “players.” Kennedy shared these views.
JPK advocated that America facilitate a peaceful commerical proposal which would induce Hitler to stop his war. Chamberlin and Lord Halifax held no such delusions, convinced that Hitler was not to be trusted. Perhaps Kennedy was blind to Hitler’s wickedness and was convinced that his knowledge of business could guide America’s handling of the German dictator. What elements of antisemitism obscured his perceptions, Nasaw doesn’t clarify.
After all, JPK was, for a time, a friend of Felix Fankfurter who helped Kennedy get his sons, Joe Jr and John into the London School of Economics, where they were taught by Harold Laski. Both Frankfurter and Laski were leading Jewish intellectuals of the period.
Perhaps to his mind, his actions were impelled by his concern for the Jews. An unconfirmed glimpse into what Kennedy actually thought of the Jews was provided by an embassy aide: “Kennedy called Jews ‘kikes and sheenies’, and said that some individual Jews were alright….but as a race they stink..spoil everything everything they touch…on vandalism and assaults which the Jews suffered in Germany…’they brought it on themselves.” Kristlalnacht was unfortunate bad publicity for Hitler’s regime, Kennedy lamented. The Jews were committed to bring America into the war. His opinion was that a peaceful arrangement with Hitler was against their ‘evil’ intent. For this he was criticized by Jews.
JPK had a business interest in the the motion picture industry. He was critical of the anti-German films that Hollywood produced. It was an effort of the Jews to forward their plan for America at war, he averred. Some say that JPK was sore about the competition.
In his role as Ambassador to Britain, he was paradoxically opposed to the White Paper which limited Jewish immigration to Palestine at a time when Jews were fleeing Germany and Europe. He favored finding a place for the Jews somewhere in the British Empire. Joseph Patrick Kennedy thought that getting rid of the Jews (from Europe) would remove a motive for Hitler’s aggression.
One might understand that Kennedy’s proven ability to make piles of money, would induce him to think he knew best how to manipulate organizations that sought profit. He didn’t appreciate that Hitler was not just another businessman.
He blamed his failure to convince Roosevelt on a cabal of Jews. To call him paranoid would be incorrect. JPK had real enemies…the Jews who were hunted and were desperate. Kennedy, whatever his dislike of Jews, made efforts to find a place for the Jews. Roosevelt, ever the politician, himself blocked the rescue of the Jews. If there would be influential Jews, perhaps the Holocaust would not have had so many victims. The lesson of the Holocaust and the lack of influence Jews had on Roosevelt is a factor today in Jews supporting such organizations as the America Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC)
Nasaw’s heavy and heavily documented tomb (a labor of six years) in very readable form enlightens the reader to the life of (to his mind) a patriot.
It is an 787 page book with 57 pages of footnotes and indexes. David Nasaw was asked by the Kennedy family to write a book about JPK and he required that he receive free and full access to all their papers relating to this subject. He succeeded. This is not just a book about Joseph Patrick Kennedy and the Jews. It a story of a not particularly religious Catholic, but a man who identified as a Catholic and who was eminently successful in business. Some would say he was an exemplary father, yet a philanderer. His children went on to political careers, after the oldest (JPK Jr) lost his life defending Britian. JPK subjected his mentally retarded daughter to a lobotomy (perhaps unnecssarily) and another daughter was killed in airplane crash. He outlived four of his children.
This is a dramatic boook. Penquin is to be congratulated for publishing this interesting, well written and valuable biography.
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Moskowitz is a freelance writer based in La Jolla. He may be contacted at joel.moskowitz@sdjewishworld.com