Old Missoula

Club Hears of Social Europe From Professor – 1935

Dr. S. Stephenson Smith Relates Rise of Fascism and Naziism.

The rise of two men, both World war veterans; one a post-war publisher, the other showing symptoms of later frenzied developments, was revealed to Kiwanians at their Grill café luncheon meeting Tuesday, when Dr. S. Stephenson Smith told of Fascism and Naziism.

Dr. Smith, professor on the English staff at the University of Oregon, is in Missoula teaching at the summer session here.

The rise of Fascism, described by Dr. Smith, pictured Mussolini in 1921 as an obscure publisher who had fought in the World War and who had emerged imbued with a number of strange ideas regarding the original Socialist party. Mussolini was, to use his own term, a National Socialist.

Paradoxically enough, when the Fascist party preaches freedom to the working class, Dr. Smith said, the money used by Mussolini and later by Hitler in Germany, came from big business interests.

The rise of Fascism in all its “black-shirted” enthusiasm was explained by Dr. Smith, who then told of the paranoiac determination toward power as evidenced by Adolph Hitler.

He said that in Germany the feeling of inferiority had become so intense succeeding the World War that it was more than necessary to find a national “blow-off” for the people – consequently the Jew was chosen to bear this burden. The steady climb of both Hitler and Mussolini was related by Dr. Smith who stated that both rulers had in reality duped the people, for the precepts of their platforms pointed toward betterment of the working classes – a thing which has not come about.

Dr. Smith held up for ridicule the methods both dictators use to maintain a public following. He said that the policies of both appeal to the lower emotions in the people, those of hatred and bitterness; that propaganda was circulated to a degree that made people subservient, and that the strict muzzle tied in to the voicing of public opinion either by mouth or press made the policies of Nazism and Fascism “damnable.”

L. J. Garrison urged members to attend the Kiwanis International state convention at Havre next Sunday and said that so far a number had signified their intention to be present. He asked members to register for the trip as soon as possible.

Guest at the Tuesday meeting were L. A. Campbell of Helena, Garrett G. Dokter, Harold Gray and C. A. Pitchford of Aberdeen, Wash.

The above article appeared in The Daily Missoulian on August 7, 1935.

Hitler invaded Poland four years later on September 1, 1939.

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