28 July 1932-President Hoover orders the Army to disperse the Bonus Marchers

The Bonus Army, or Bonus Marchers, were a group of World War I veterans and their families who came to DC in the summer of 1932. There were about 17,000 World War I veterans, many of whom brought their families with them, raising their numbers to about 43,000 people. In 1924 Congress granted all World War I veterans service certificates, which would mature and be redeemable for cash upon maturation of the certificates. Like most bonds, the maturation date was 20 years from the issuance date, so the certificates would not be redeemable until 1945. This was no problem when the certificates were granted, but the Great Depression struck the country in 1929, and millions of people were thrown out of work and their homes. As the Depression worsened, the veterans decided that early payment of their bonus certificates would be the best way to ease their financial plight, so they assembled and marched on Washington, arriving in the city on 17 June, 1932 and setting up camp in Anacostia Flats.

The veterans organized the camp very well, setting up sanitation facilities, marking off streets in the dirt, and ensuring that only those veterans who had been honorably discharged from the Army could reside in the camp. The camp and the cause of the vets made an impact, as the House passed a bill allowing for early payment of the bonuses, but the Senate balked. President Hoover was also not in favor of early payment, as he and fellow Republicans feared adding to the country’s deficit while the Depression was weighing so heavily on the economy.

On 28 July, 1932, Attorney General Mitchell ordered the DC police to clear the camp. The police entered the camp’s perimeter, met with resistance from the vets, and the police met the resistance by firing and killing two of the veterans. When Hoover heard of this incident, he ordered the Army to move in and clear the camp. The Army, led by Major General Douglas MacArthur, assembled and marched down Pennsylvania Avenue towards Anacostia. MacArthur’s forces were augmented by 6 battle tanks from Fort Meyer, along with a cavalry unit, led by Major George Patton. When the vets saw the units moving down Pennsylvania Avenue towards them, they at first thought that the Army had assembled the parade to pay them homage, until Patton ordered “fix bayonets” and then ordered the calvary unit to charge. Tear gas was also used as the Army moved into the camp. Many of the vets and their families began to flee, and when word of this reached President Hoover, he ordered the assault to stop. MacArthur, believing that the vets represented a Communist plot to overthrow the government, disobeyed the President, and continued the assault, moving into the camp with the full force of the Army. Hundreds of veterans were wounded and several were killed during this action. The camp’s structures were then burned by the Army to prohibit the vets from re-assembling.

When President Roosevelt took office in 1933, he was not in favor of early bonus payment, but when the vets marched again on the Washington, he sent his wife, Eleanor, to visit with them and to listen to their pleas. Eleanor also convinced a large number of the vets to join the Civilian Conservation Corps, putting many of the men to work in building the Overseas Highway, linking the Florida Keys to the mainland. A great hurricane swept over the Keys on Labor Day in 1935, killing over 200 of the veterans working on the highway. Newsreels of the vets once again suffering, made the public groundswell for early bonus payment so great, that Congress granted the vets’ wish in 1936, overriding President Roosevelt’s veto of the measure.

The Bonus Army participants didn’t realize at the time that they were setting the template for better treatment of the nation’s veterans. In 1944 Congress passed the G.I. Bill of Rights, providing for low-interest loans to veterans for buying homes and starting businesses, one year of unemployment payments after leaving the service, and most significantly, generous assistance with college tuition. The G.I. Bill of Rights is perhaps the greatest result of the Bonus Army, who finally made the U.S. government live up to the words of President Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address:

“With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan”

26 July 1956-Nasser nationalizes the Suez Canal

Gamel Abdul Nasser

Leader of Egypt 1952-1970

Gamel Abdul Nasser, the dictator of Egypt, saw himself as the unifying force in the Arab world. The British saw him as a usurper who had overthrown the Egyptian King Farouk in 1952. The French saw him as a growing concern to their interests in the Middle East, as Nasser was supplying arms and assistance to the rebels France was battling in Algeria. The Israelis saw him in the same light, as Nasser supplied arms and assistance to Palestinians in the Gaza Strip (which would remain Egyptian territory until the Israelis conquered it during the Six Day War). The United States had mixed feelings about Nasser. On the one hand he was seen as an example of countries throwing off their shackles of European imperialism, but on the other hand he was also seen as an irritant to two of our most important NATO allies, the UK and France. The U.S. ambivalence turned to open hostility when Nasser made plans to purchase arms from Czechoslovakia. Purchasing arms from a Communist country which was in the firm orbit of the Soviet Union was anathema to U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, an ardent Cold warrior. Nasser went one step further on 16 May 1956, when Egypt recognized the People’s Republic of China. Dulles looked for a way to punish Nasser for his transgressions, and the best way was to cancel an International Monetary Fund loan to Egypt for the construction of a dam on the Nile.

Nasser had hoped to construct the Aswan High Dam to generate more electrical power for his struggling nation, and the cancellation of the IMF loan infuriated him. Egypt simply did not have the internal funds for the construction, and while Nasser had no problems buying arms from Communist nations, he was leery of allowing Soviet technicians into his country for the construction of the dam. Looking around for ways to generate revenue, he cast his eyes on the Suez Canal.

In 1956 the Suez Canal was run by a semi-private/semi-public British and French consortium. Ships paid fees to transit the canal, and the fees went back to Paris and London, despite the fact that the canal was on Egyptian soil. Nasser realized that if he seized and nationalized the canal, those fees would go to Egypt, and that he could use the money to build the dam and for other purposes. On 26 July he gave a speech in Alexandria, damning the western powers for their meddling in the internal affairs of Middle Eastern nations. In the middle of his speech, he deliberately uttered the name “Ferdinand de Lesseps”, the Frenchman who had built the canal in the 1800s. The mention of de Lesseps’ name was a signal to Egyptian armed forces to move in and seize the canal’s operational centers and offices. Nasser informed the British and French that the canal was now Egyptian property, and that the stockholders would be paid the price of their shares at their values when the market closed that day.

Nasser’s actions shocked the West, and the Conservative government of Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden was especially shocked. Eden came under intense pressure from his backbenchers to do something about the canal seizure and Nasser. That “something” would become the Arab-Israeli war of 1956.

25 July 1914-Serbia accepts almost all of Austria-Hungary's demands; Austria-Hungary breaks diplomatic relations with Serbia

The ultimatum which Austria-Hungary delivered to Serbia on 23 July 1914 had the tone of a victor nation to one that had been utterly vanquished; yet Serbia had not been vanquished by Austria-Hungary, and the Serbian government had no responsibility for the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand. Although the assassin, Gabriel Princip, was a Serb, and the terrorist group to which he belonged was composed of Serbian/Slavic nationalists, the government in Belgrade had absolutely nothing to do with the financing or organization of the group or Princip’s assassination. To put this event in the context of another famous 20th century assassination: Lee Harvey Oswald murdered President John F. Kennedy. Two days later, Oswald was murdered by Jack Ruby. To the casual observer it would appear that whoever wanted Kennedy dead also wanted Oswald dead, but unless there was direct evidence linking the murder of Kennedy to the murder of Oswald, all one has is coincidence.

Coincidence notwithstanding, Austria-Hungary was determined to obliterate Serbia and its “meddlesome influence” amongst the Slavic inhabitants of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The ultimatum demanded the suppression of any and all publications critical of Austria-Hungary; all schoolbooks presenting propaganda against Austria-Hungary must be withdrawn; Serbian officials holding feelings against Austria-Hungary must be dismissed from their posts, and that the judicial inquiry into the assassination must be overseen by Austro-Hungarian officials.

Unaware that Austria-Hungary, egged on by Germany, wanted nothing but war with Serbia, the United Kingdom and Russia pressured the Serbs to be as conciliatory as possible in responding to the ultimatum. Sazonov, the Russian foreign minister, even went so far as to say that if war came between Austria-Hungary and Serbia, Belgrade should not put up a fight but allow for occupation, then appeal for arbitration and settlement at either the International Court at The Hague, or by the Great Powers (Russia, France, Italy, Germany, the United Kingdom). With this type of pressure from Serbia’s main ally, Russia, Belgrade said that it would comply with all of Austria-Hungary’s demands except for the last: allowing Austro-Hungarian officials to oversee the judicial inquiry into the Archduke’s assassination.

On 25 July the Serbian government replied to the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum, giving in to all the demands except the participation into the judicial inquiry, protesting that to do so would violate their constitution and laws on criminal procedure. The Serbs also suggested that the entire matter be handed over to the International Court or to the Great Powers for arbitration. All the Great Powers were relieved that the Serbs had been so accommodating; all that is except Austria-Hungary and Germany. When the Austro-Hungarian ambassador to Serbia, Baron Giesl, was given the Serb reply to the ultimatum, he glanced at it just long enough to see what the Serbs had not agreed to. Finding the one refusal, he figured that his country now had sufficient grounds for war, and boarded the train from Belgrade to Austria-Hungary. Upon his arrival in Austro-Hungarian territory, he telegraphed the Serb “refusal”, which prompted Vienna to break diplomatic relations with Serbia. The headlong rush into war was gathering more steam.

23 July 1914-Austria-Hungary delivers an ultimatum to Serbia on the Assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand

The tinderbox of Europe-1914
On 28 June, 1914, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, was assassinated in Sarajevo. The assassin, Gabriel Princip, belonged to a Serbian terrorist society called the Black Hand. Austria-Hungary blamed the Serbian government for funding and controlling the Black Hand, but the Serbian government vehemently (and truthfully) denied any responsibility for the actions of the terrorist group. Nevertheless, Austria-Hungary saw the assassination as a golden opportunity to crush Serbia once and for all.
The Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary was a swollen polyglot by 1914. The empire was dominated by Austrians and the Magyars of Hungary, both minority groups in a nation dominated by Czechs, Slovaks, Serbs, Croats, and a host of other Slavic people, most of whom longed for their own countries. The independent Slavic nation of Serbia acted as a magnet for those hopes, serving as a source of ethnic unrest against Emperor Franz-Joseph of Austria-Hungary. Austria-Hungary never missed an opportunity to humiliate Serbia on the world stage, the latest act of humiliation taking place in 1908 with the annexation of the Serbian provinces of Bosnia-Hercegovina. That annexation had nearly caused a war between Austria-Hungary and Russia, as Russia saw one of its roles on the world stage as protector of Europe’s Slavic peoples. Germany, Austria-Hungary’s powerful alliance partner, forced the Russians to back down by threatening war, which Russia in 1908 was in no condition to fight, having just been defeated by Japan in 1905.


After the assassination of Franz-Ferdinand, Austria-Hungary swiftly made plans for a quick invasion and occupation of Serbia, and Germany approved of these plans, provided they were carried out swiftly before the other European great powers could react. Throughout the month of July Germany constantly harangued Austria-Hungary to take swift action against Serbia. Germany believed that if Austria-Hungary did nothing against the “Slav menace”, the Austrian Empire would implode and shatter into independent states, destroying Germany’s one certain ally, and leaving Germany to face France, the United Kingdom and Russia alone should war come one day. Accordingly, when the Austro-Hungarian ambassador to Germany informed Kaiser Wilhelm II that Austria-Hungary intended to “deal with Serbia”, the Kaiser gave his full endorsement and a blank check to Austria-Hungary for war.


All of Europe knew that something was going to happen with Serbia, but the ultimatum delivered to Belgrade by Vienna on 23 July shocked all the powers. The note charged that “the murder of Sarajevo was prepared in Belgrade”. It contained the following demands:


All Serbian publications critical of Austria-Hungary must be suppressed.
All schoolbooks presenting propaganda against Austria-Hungary must be withdrawn
All Serbian government officials, army officers, and schoolteachers holding these views must be dismissed
Specific officials and officers named in the note must be arrested
All of the above changes must be monitored by Austrian officials inside Serbia
Austrian officials must be allowed to participate in the judicial inquiry into the plot behind the murder of Archduke Francis Ferdiand


With this ultimatum, the fuse to World War I was lit.

21 July 1914-Buckingham Palace Conference on the Irish Home Rule Bill Begins

King-Emperor George V, King of the United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland,
Emperor of India, 1910-1935
By the summer of 1914 the “Irish Question” had reached a boiling point in the United Kingdom. Parliament, controlled by the Liberal Party of Prime Minister Herbert Asquith, had passed an Irish Home Rule Bill. Previous Home Rule bills had passed when the LIberals were in control of the House of Commons, but they had always been vetoed by the Conservative-dominated House of Lords. The Parliamentary Reform bill of 1911 had severely curtailed the Lord’s veto powers, so the Home Rule Bill had passed and gained the Royal Assent by the summer of 1914. The bill would allow for Ireland to govern itself with regards to internal affairs, which in any other territory granted dominion status would not have been a problem. Ireland was different.
The province of Ulster, also known as Northern Ireland, had a Protestant majority with strong ties to the British Union of England and Ireland. A Home Rule bill would give power to Ireland’s Catholic majority, severely curtailing the power of the Protestant majority in Ulster. Catholics in Ireland, along with those Protestants who cherished independence above loyalty to the Union, insisted that all of Ireland, Ulster included, had to be included in the newly semi-independent Ireland of Home Rule. Ulster insisted that it have the right to opt out and remain tied to the United Kingdom. Both sides were arming themselves with illegally smuggled weapons, alarming both King George V and Prime Minister Asquith. There was a strong possibility that the UK could be torn apart by civil war over Ireland.
King George, who had spent a great deal of time in Cork as a naval officer, felt that if he got all the parties together at Buckingham Palace, some sort of compromise could be reached without resorting to violence. He summoned the Ulster representatives, those who wanted Home Rule, and Prime Minister Asquith to Buckingham Palace for a conference on 21 July, 1914. The conference went on for 3 days without any concrete resolution, but tempers among the Irish nationalists and Unionists were cooled. An agreement in principle was also reached that if Ulster were to opt out, the entire province would leave, not just certain counties. Tempers were still running hot, but they began to cool as the crisis of World War I began to heat up on 24 July, 1914.

20 July 1944-FDR is nominated for a 4th Term

Senator Truman and President Roosevelt-1944

When the Democrats convened in Chicago for their 1944 convention, there was little doubt that President Roosevelt would be re-nominated. Since he had already shattered the 2-term tradition in 1940, and the United States was in the midst of fighting World War II, it only seemed logical to re-nominate the current occupant of the White House. The fight came down to the nomination of the Vice President. In 1944 the VP was Henry Wallace, whom Roosevelt liked, and who was also the favorite of the party’s left wing. Wallace’s problems lay with the more conservative Democrats in the South and Midwest, who were becoming alarmed at Wallace’s admiration of the Soviet Union and his unwavering embrace of labor unions. And while not publicly mentioned, there were serious doubts about Roosevelt’s health. Many delegates wondered if Roosevelt would live to finish a fourth Presidential term, so the VP selection became even more critical. By 1944 FDR’s health was in serious decline. 20 years of great physical exertion to overcome his polio handicap, coupled with smoking 2 packs of cigarettes a day, had led to hypertension, emphysema, congestive heart failure, and angina.




FDR wanted to fight for Wallace, but as more and more delegates and party bosses told him that he would lose the vote on Wallace, he reluctantly agreed to their suggestion of Missouri Senator Harry Truman to be VP. Roosevelt barely knew Truman, but the Senator had established a solid reputation as chairman of a Senate committee overseeing fraud and waste in government war contracts. Additionally, Truman was from the moderate Midwest state of Missouri, and was not part of the “lunatic” fringe wing of the Democratic Party.



Roosevelt was not present at the convention, which was common practice in the days before television. He was on his way to Hawaii for a strategy conference with Admiral Nimitz and General MacArthur. This was the last time that a major party nominee would be absent from a Presidential nominating convention.

19 July 1870-Emperor Napoleon III declares war on Prussia, starting the Franco Prussian War

Emperor Napoleon III

By the spring of 1870, Otto von Bismarck had nearly achieved the primary goal of his life: uniting the Germanic states under the leadership of Prussia into a a single German Empire. Two short wars with Denmark and Austria had resulted in the expansion of Prussian territory and the creation of a North German Confederation, dominated by Prussia; however, Bismarck was not satisfied. The Confederation was not an Empire. The one sure way of forming an Empire would be to unite all Germans against a common enemy. France was that enemy.
The France of Emperor Napoleon III had two foreign policy goals: remaining the strongest power in continental Europe, and ensuring that the German states never united into a single Empire. Prussia’s victories over Denmark in 1862 and Austria in 1866, and the subsequent formation of the North German Confederation, alarmed France. Bismarck decided to use France’s fears as a tool for a united German Empire. All he had to do was to provoke France into war, making Prussia and the German states the “victim”. The tool of provocation soon presented itself via Spain.


In 1870 Spain overthrew its monarch, Queen Isabella II, but still desiring to be ruled by royalty, Spain offered the throne to Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern, a distant cousin of King Wilhelm I of Prussia. Leopold needed Wilhelm’s permission to accept the throne, and Wilhelm told Leopold to turn down the offer. Bismarck realized that this was the opportunity he had been waiting for: something that could be used to goad France into war. He knew that France would never accept a German prince on the Spanish throne, as that would surround France with German states--Spain to the west; the North German Confederation to the east. Bismarck persuaded King Wilhelm to change his mind and have Prince Leopold accept the offer of the Spanish throne.


Word of the acceptance reached the French on 3 July, 1870, causing great waves of alarm. The French government demanded that Prince Leopold withdraw his acceptance of the Spanish throne immediately, and King Wilhelm, not desiring war with France agreed. That should have been the end of it, but France went one step too far. The French ambassador to Prussia met the King at the spa resort of Ems, and demanded that in addition to Prince Leopold refusing the throne of Spain, Prussia must never, ever authorize a renewal of the candidacy of any German prince for the throne of Spain. King Wilhelm replied rather cooly to the demand, and walked away from the ambassador. He then telegraphed Bismarck the details of the meeting. Bismarck now realized that he had the perfect tool for goading France into war. He took the King’s telegram, and edited the words so that it appeared that the King spoke harshly to the French ambassador, insulting both the ambassador and the honor of France. With the telegram, known in history as the Ems Dispatch, now edited to incite passion in France, Bismarck released it to the world press on 14 July, 1870: Bastille Day in France, the highest day of French honor.


When the telegram was read by the French public , war fever swept the country. French newspapers demanded war the next day, and German states rallied to Prussia. Both countries mobilized their armies and called up reserves, and on 19 July, Emperor Napoleon IiI perfectly played his role as Bismarck’s dupe, and declared war on Prussia. The Franco-Prussian war was now underway, a war born of “honor” and of Bismarck’s perfect use of a pretext to obtain what he truly wanted: a powerful, united German Empire, dominated by Prussia.

18 July 1969-Senator Edward Kennedy and the Chappaquiddick Incident

Mary Jo Kopechne

Summer, 1969. Richard Nixon is President, having narrowly defeated Vice President Hubert Humphrey in the 1968 race for the White House, but the ghost in that campaign was Senator Robert Kennedy (D-New York). His life and campaign for the Democratic nomination were cut short on 5 June, 1968, when he was assassinated just moments after winning the California Democratic primary. Humphrey won the Democratic nomination at the Chicago convention, but he was tied to President Johnson and continuing the war in Vietnam, which was anathema to the “real” Democrats, and to those who yearned for the mythical Camelot of President John Kennedy. With the death of Robert Kennedy, Senator Edward “Ted” Kennedy was left as The One, the sole surviving Kennedy. There was already serious talk of his running against Nixon in the 1972 campaign, which sent shivers down the the spines of Nixon and his White House aides. All talk of of a 1972 campaign came to an end after the Chappaquiddick incident of 18 July, 1969.


Ted Kennedy attended a cook out on Chappaquiddick island, which is a small island off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard. The cook out was a get-together for the “boiler room” girls, who were young women who had done the grunt work (stuffing envelopes, yard signs, manning phone banks) of Bobby Kennedy’s campaign in 1968. At 2315 on 18 July, Senator Kennedy stated that he was leaving, and one of the girls, Mary Jo Kopechne, stated that she wished to leave as well, and would the Senator mind giving her a ride back to her hotel in Edgarton, on Martha’s Vineyard. Kennedy then asked his chauffeur for the keys to his car, and both he and Kopechne left together. Later it became known that Kopechne didn’t tell anyone else that she was leaving, and both her purse and hotel key were still at the cookout location.


Somehow, Kennedy got off the main road to the ferry landing, which was paved, and ended up on a dirt road that led to Dyke Bridge, a narrow wooden bridge with no guardrail. Just before he reached the bridge, Kennedy applied his brakes, which sent the car careening off the dirt road into Poucha pond, which is swept regularly by powerful tidal currents. The car ended up at the bottom of the pond, on its roof. Kennedy managed to escape and swim free, but Mary Jo did not. Kennedy testified at the inquest that he entered the water several times trying to help Mary Jo get free from the car, but it was dark and the current was strong. After several rescue attempts, Kennedy walked back to the site of the cookout, passing several houses where he could have called for help and reported the accident. Once back at the cookout, he enlisted the help of two friends, Joseph Gargan and Paul Markham, to return to the scene of the accident, where they also tried diving down to the car in order to help Mary Jo, but it was to no avail. The men insisted that Kennedy had to report the incident immediately, but he did not. Kennedy swam the 500-foot channel back to Edgarton, changed his clothes, and collapsed into bed. Later the hotel manager testified that Kennedy called the front desk to complain about noise from a party taking place near his room.


By the next morning the tide had begun to shift in Poucha Pond, and the partially submerged car was seen by two fishermen, who quickly called the sheriff. Kennedy still had not reported the accident, despite a heated argument with his friends, Markham and Gagan, both of whom were vehement that the accident had to be reported. Kennedy then went to a pay phone to call other advisors about what to do, but he didn’t make an official report until he heard that the sheriff had been notified and that a recovery team had found Mary Jo’s body.


I was 9 years old when this happened, and all I remember of that weekend was the Apollo XI moon mission. That was what most of the country, and indeed the world, were focused on that weekend, but once that story receded, all eyes turned to Kennedy and his actions at Chappaquiddick island. Wild rumors erupted that he was driving drunk, that he and Mary Jo were having an affair, that the affair had resulted in a pregnancy, which is why he drowned her. His behavior that evening helped fuel the rumors. Everything he did that evening, from not using his chauffeur, not realizing he was driving on a dirt road, not stopping at the first house he saw after the crash and heading back to the house where the cookout was held, and above all, not reporting the accident, made anything he subsequently said seem suspicious and self-serving. My parents, die-hard Democrats, never quite believed him after this tragedy, and it surfaced with a vengeance when he challenged President Carter for the Democratic nomination in 1980. The tragedy was also the fodder for savage jokes about Kennedy. After the Three Mile Island nuclear plant accident, one bumper sticker was made that said “More people died at Chappaquiddick than at Three Mile Island” (there were no fatalities at Three Mile Island).


My life covered all of Senator Kennedy’s political career. I was 2 when he entered the Senate in 1962, when he won the special election for his brother’s Senate seat (JFK won the White House narrowly in 1960, defeating VP Nixon in one of the closest Presidential races in U.S. history), and I was 49 when he died. To this day I don’t understand his actions, or lack thereof, on 18 July 1969. The Chappaquiddick tragedy most effectively ended any hope he had for the White House, proving that in American politics, what is forgivable at the local and state level may not be forgivable on the national stage.

The Abdication of Belgium's King Leopold III-17 July 1951

King Leopold III, with his first wife, Astrid. 

Prince Leopold became King Leopold III of Belgium upon the death of his father, King Albert I. Albert, a much beloved monarch, is best known for his steadfast leadership of his country and its armed forces during the German invasion and destruction of large portions of Belgium during World War I. King Albert heroically rejected German’s ultimatum of 2 August, which demanded that Belgium allow the German army to pass through Belgium without resistance. He then led his army in stubborn resistance against the German army, slowing its advance, thus allowing the British and French armies to be somewhat better prepared when the Germans crossed the French frontier later in August.
Albert’s son, Leopold, watched as his father addressed the Belgian parliament on 3 August 1914. In that speech King Albert stated that Belgian neutrality had been guaranteed by all the great European powers in 1830, and that accepting the German ultimatum would signify the end of Belgium as an independent nation. The American Ambassador, who was present during Albert’s speech, and who observed Prince Leopold watching his father, wrote in his diary “What are the thoughts in that boy’s mind? Will this scene ever come back to him in after years? And how? When? Under what circumstances?”
The American ambassador, Mr. Whitlock, had no idea that he was eerily predicting the future. After Leopold became King upon the death of his father, Albert, in 1934, he strengthened Belgium’s fortifications against Germany, but he withdrew from the alliance with France and the UK, hoping that Belgium’s stated neutrality would spare it from German invasion should war once again occur. War did occur again, as on 10 May, 1940, Germany invaded Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and France. As in 1914, Belgium’s resistance and fierce artillery fire slowed the German forces down, but by withdrawing from the alliance with France the UK, King Leopold, who under Belgium’s constitution was commander in chief of Belgium’s armed forces, was unable to properly coordinate with the Allies, leading to chaos. This chaos led to a constitutional crisis in Belgium on 27 May, 1940, when King Leopold acted unilaterally and surrendered to Germany. Days earlier the King had a bitter confrontation with the Belgian Prime Minister and cabinet, where he stated that it was his intention to surrender, but to remain in Belgium with the army, rather than evacuate to London with other Belgian ministers to form a government in exile. Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands left her country aboard a Royal Navy destroyer shortly before Germany conquered her country on 15 May. Leopold had no intention of following her example. His ministers stated that surrender was not solely the prerogative of the monarch, and throughout the war the Belgian ministers in London stated that the King did not speak for the Belgian government. Leopold did not cooperate with the Germans during their occupation of Belgium, and when he tried to exercise his authority as king, the Germans made him a prisoner, and in 1944, on the orders of SS Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler, he was arrested and deported to Germany, and later he was sent to Austria. In May of 1945 the U.S. Army freed Leopold from German captivity, but his actions during the war made his return to Belgium impossible. Leopold remained in exile in Switzerland while the Belgian government decided what to do. A commission was held to determine whether the King had committed treason by surrendering without the consent of the elected government, and in 1946 the commission cleared him of treason; however, this still did not pave the way for Leopold’s return to Belgium.
The government decided to put the return of the King to a vote, and in 1950 57% of Belgians voted that the King should be allowed to return and assume the throne, but the vote showed how deeply the country was divided. In the Walloon (French speaking) part of Belgium and among Socialists, 42% of voters wanted the King to return, yet in Flanders (Flemish speaking) and among Christian Democrats, 70% of voters wanted him back. Even with 57% of the whole population voting for his return, Leopold’s arrival in Brussels in 1950 produced devastating riots and strikes across the country. The strikes turned violent, with 3 protesters being killed when the police opened fire on a crowd. In Walloon, the people stopped flying the Belgian flag and began flying the flags of an independent Walloonia, signaling that armed resistance to the King’s return was possible. With the country on the brink of civil war, King Leopold decided to abdicate on 1 August, 1950, in favor of his son, Baudoin. The abdication took effect on 17 July, 1951, when Baudoin became the fifth King of the Belgians.
The story of King Leopold III shows the limits of constitutional monarchy during times of crisis. It also shows the need for clear delineation of powers between the elected government and the monarchy. Every country will face a crisis of leadership, and how leaders respond to the crisis will define both them and their nations. Leopold acted incorrectly during the invasion of Belgium in 1940, but his decision to abdicate in favor of his son showed great leadership, sparing his nation significant violence and disunion.