Bonus Army 1932 and BLM 2020

One of the (perhaps) silver linings in the COVID-19 pandemic and the stay-at-home life is time to read. I have been reading more than usual over the past three months and remain thankful for my own library as well as public libraries. The Amazon Kindle has been great. After finishing a book the other evening, I scrolled through my Kindle library and came upon a book I have read in the past, The Glory and the Dream: A Narrative History of America, 1932-1972 by William Manchester. First published in 1974, I remembered it as a good read and a then-contemporary social history, so I opted to open it and re-read it now. The prologue is titled Rock Bottom and tells the story of the Bonus Army in  1932.


If you Google “Bonus Army” you will bring up many links. Basically, World War I veterans were promised in 1924 a bonus, to be paid in 1945. The onset of the Great Depression found many of these men destitute, starving, and desperate. Thousands of them marched to Washington, D.C. to ask the government to pay the bonus early. Congress at first refused to meet them. The House of Representatives did vote to pay the bonus early. The Senate voted this down and President Hoover had already said he would veto any such legislation. Hoover declined to meet with the marchers, had the White House gates locked, and had barricades erected for a block around the White House in all directions. The veterans were encamped in several sites in the District, one of which was the ground now occupied by the National Gallery of Art and the Federal Trade Commission.


The D.C. police were ordered to push the marchers out of the capitol. The marchers resisted and some of the police opened fire, killing one of the marchers. Hoover then ordered the U.S. Army under General Douglas MacArthur to force the veterans out. MacArthur had a cavalry troop and tanks under George Patton, as well as infantry with fixed bayonets, attack the camp on what is now the National Gallery of Art site. Tear gas was fired. Shots were fired. The White House announced that the men clashing with the police were “entirely of the Communist element.” In the end, MacArthur defied his orders (he was good at that his entire career) and men, women, and children were killed.


That was late July 1932. Now jump to June 2020 and the Black Lives Matter protest in Washington, D.C. The current president, Donald Trump, orders military police of the National Guard and other federal law enforcement agencies to clear Lafayette Park. His Attorney General, Bill Barr, complies, having announced the protesters were all antifa. Nonviolent, unarmed protesters were tear-gassed. Some were shot with rubber bullets. Mounted patrols helped force these protesters out. And in strides Trump, with his daughter behind carrying a bible in a $1500 handbag so that a photo op could occur in front of a church.


As I read the prologue of Manchester’s book, the parallels could not have been more striking.  Separated by almost 88 years, we see two presidents who were/are incapable of responding to existential threats to the United States. Manchester described “a frightened, frustrated administration” in 1932; in 2020, Peter Nicholas describes a president who is terrified of protest. Hoover felt that anyone who disagreed with him was unpatriotic; so does Trump. Trump cites MacArthur and Patton as his heroes and pressed Secretary of Defense Esper and Commander of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Milley to bring in active-duty military (not the National Guard) to put down the protesters, just as when Hoover summoned the Army to crush the Bonus protesters. Both Hoover and Trump, frightened little men who were both in beyond their depth, were content to abrogate the Constitution when it suited their needs. I would ask you to read Manchester’s opening and see what you think.

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