Term paper on Pre-Pearl Harbor Debate between Isolationists and Interventionists

As international conflicts and crises erupted during the mid-1930s—the Italian-Ethiopian War, the Spanish Civil War, Germany’s reoccupation of the Rhineland, the Munich Pact, Japan’s war against China—both neutrality legislation and popular opinion kept the United States aloof. Detachment became more difficult when World War II erupted. The America First Committee spearheaded the drive for continued isolationism, but others, such as the Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies, urged differently. Meanwhile, President Franklin D. Roosevelt successfully fought for changes in the neutrality laws, executed a destroyers-for-bases deal with Great Britain, and convinced Congress to pass the Lend-Lease Act. Pearl Harbor ended the isolationist-internationalist debate.
Suggestions for Term Papers
1. Analyze the isolationist movement from the mid-1930s until Pearl Harbor.
2. Discuss the participation of American volunteers in the Spanish Civil War.
3. Discuss the consequences of the Lend-Lease Act.
4. Analyze the debate over foreign policy and the 1940 presidential election.
5. Discuss American fascist organizations and sympathizers in the years before Pearl Harbor.

Suggested Sources: See entry 40 for related items.

REFERENCE SOURCES

The ABC Companion to the American Peace Movement. Christine A. Lunardini. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 1995. Concentrates on people, organizations, and events attempting to keep the United States out of war or promoting peace during the twentieth century.

Anti-intervention: A Bibliographical Introduction to Isolationism and Pacifism from World War I to the Early Cold War. Justus D. Doenecke. New York: Garland, 1987. Extensive bibliographic coverage of pacifism, neutrality, and foreign relations.

Guide to American Foreign Relations since 1700. Richard Dean Burns, ed. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 1983. Covers isolationism, manifest destiny, national security, and other social, political, and economic topics.
The Literature of Isolationism: A Guide to Non-Interventionist Scholarship, 1930–1972. Justus D. Doenecke. Colorado Springs: R. Myles, 1972. Identifies writings on pacifism and foreign relations.

GENERAL SOURCES

Chalberg, John C., ed. Isolationism: Opposing Viewpoints. San Diego: Greenhaven, 1995. Good topical treatment of pro and con on foreign relations, neutrality, and isolationism in the United States.

Foster, H. Schuyler. Activism Replaces Isolationism: U.S. Public Attitudes, 1940–1975. Washington, DC: Foxhall, 1983. Traces the dispute from prewar 1940 to the fall of Vietnam.

Powaski, Ronald E. Toward an Entangling Alliance: American Isolationism, Internationalism, and Europe, 1901–1950. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1991. Good examination of U.S. neutrality issues with Europe for the first half of the twentieth century.

Rossini, Daniela. From Theodore Roosevelt to FDR: Internationalism and Isolationism in American Foreign Policy. Staffordshire, UK: Ryburn Publishing/Keele University Press, 1995. Brief examination of foreign relations during the first half of the twentieth century.

SPECIALIZED SOURCES

Guinsburg, Thomas N. The Pursuit of Isolationism in the United States from Versailles to Pearl Harbor. New York: Garland, 1982. Provides a detailed examination of U.S. foreign relations between the wars.

Holbe, Paul Sothe, Isolationism and Interventionism, 1932–1941. Chicago: Rand McNally, 1967. Sixty-page overview of U.S. foreign relations over the critical nine-year period.

Jonas, Manfred. Isolationism in America, 1935–1941. (1966). Reprint. Chicago: Imprint Publications, 1990. Publication treating in depth the critical period before World War II.

Ketchum, Richard M. The Borrowed Years, 1938–1941: America on the Way to War. New York: Anchor Books, 1990. The contest between internationalism and isolationism in the prewar years.

Roots, Roger. Montana’s Lost Cause: Isolationism and the Montana Congressional Delegation, 1937–1946. Big Timber, MT: Sweet Grass, 1997. Recent study of isolationism in the state of Montana.

Schacht, John N., ed. Three Faces of Midwestern Isolationism: Gerald P. Nye, Robert E. Wood, John L. Lewis. Iowa City: Center for the Study of the Recent History of the United States, 1981. Collection of papers presented at a conference under the sponsorship of the publisher.
BIOGRAPHICAL SOURCES

Smith, Glenn H. Langer of North Dakota: A Study in Isolationism, 1940–1959. New York: Garland, 1979. Good study of Senator William Langer’s politics. From the publisher’s Modern American History series.

AUDIOVISUAL RESOURCES

Potter, Anthony. Between the Wars. Return to Isolationism. Great Neck, NY: 8 videocassettes. Relevant topical treatment is provided in this 8-part series; the first one, Versailles: The Lost Peace/Return to Isolationism, is a 60-minute reissue of the original 1978 video by Alan Landsburg Productions.

WORLD WIDE WEB

Churney, Linda J. America’s Wars, 1898–1945. 1977. http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1978/3/78.03.06.x.html Detailed course guide from the Yale–New Haven Teaching Institute; excellent five-page narrative of prewar U.S. policy as an evolutionary development from the Spanish-American period. Fine outline and good bibliographies for teachers and students.