2016 - Page 3 of 4 - Richard M. Langworth

Marshall: “Noblest Roman of Them All”

14 May 2016 Comments 0 Comments

Johns Hopkins University Press releases this month the seventh and final volume of The Papers of George Catlett Marshall: “The Man of the Age,” October 1, 1949 – October 16, 1959. It was masterfully edited by Mark Stoler and Daniel Holt under the auspices of the Marshall Center. It joins its predecessors presenting the papers of one of the greatest generals and statesmen of his age (1880-1959). I quickly assigned it for review by the Hillsdale College Churchill Project, for its many references to Churchill in George Marshall’s final phase. This and the previous volume are indispensable for anyone wishing to understand the complicated international scene immediately after World War II.…

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Trump on Women: Should’ve Said Something Else

7 May 2016 Comments 0 Comments

Something Mr. Trump said reminded me of a piece Winston Churchill wrote in 1947: The Dream. But he might not entirely relish the reminder. (And this is not, believe me, any attempt to compare Trump to Churchill.)

The Dream is a stylish short story about Churchill’s imaginary conversation with the ghost of his father, Lord Randolph Churchill, who died in 1895. In a touching, rather sad conversation, the 73-year-old Winston relates to the 45-year-old Randolph all that has happened since 1895, without disclosing the roles he himself had played.

They discuss elections. Lord Randolph asks, “What is the franchise?”

“Universal,” his son replies.…

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Thatcher to Congress, 1985: Worth Remembering

28 April 2016 Comments 0 Comments

Margaret Thatcher, in her thoughtful and prescient remarks, posted by the Hillsdale College Churchill Project, reached back into history to recall how far the English-Speaking Peoples have come since victory in World War II, and how much remained to accomplish. Like Churchill, Lady Thatcher would be pleased that for the most part, they met the tests before them, in his words, with “a stern sentiment of impartial justice, and above all the love of personal freedom, or as Kipling put it: ‘Leave to live by no man’s leave underneath the law.’”…

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“Boneless Wonder” vs. “Dodgy Dave”

20 April 2016 Comments 0 Comments

"I remember when I was a child, being taken to the celebrated Barnum’s circus, which contained an exhibition of freaks and monstrosities, but the exhibit on the programme which I most desired to see was the one described as 'The Boneless Wonder.' My parents judged that that spectacle would be too revolting and demoralising for my youthful eyes, and I have waited 50 years to see the Boneless Wonder sitting on the Treasury Bench." —WSC, 1931

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Bombing Japan: Churchill’s View

19 April 2016 Comments 4 Comments

Scott Johnson of Powerline (“Why We Dropped the Bomb,” 13 April) kindly links an old column of his quoting an old one of mine with reference to President Obama’s visit to Hiroshima and the atom bombing of Japan.

Johnson links a lecture by Professor Williamson Murray, which is worth considering, along with Paul Fussell’s classic essay in The New Republic, “Thank God for the Atom Bomb,” which makes you think, though some consider it a rant. Fussell wrote:

John Kenneth Galbraith is persuaded that the Japanese would have surrendered surely by November without an invasion.…

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cruz churchill — Ted Cruz (L). Maybe if he’d smoke a cigar? (Daily Telegraph)

Senator Cruz: Minor Misquote, Major Misinterpretation

16 April 2016 Comments 1 Comment

Ted Cruz, speaking on 5 April, “sparked an outcry” by misquoting Churchill: “If we open a quarrel between the past and the present, Cruz intoned, “we risk the future.”

The London Daily Telegraph reported: The references drew a swift—and fierce—reaction from social media.” Social media is not a likely place to contemplate the fine points of history. It wasn’t in this case, as you can read in the newspaper article.

What Cruz said was “…risk the future.” For Churchill it was more than risk. In his “Finest Hour” speech, 18 June 1940, Churchill told Parliament: “If we open a quarrel between the past and the present we shall find that we have lost the future.”…

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National Winston Churchill Day 2016

12 April 2016 Comments 0 Comments

National Day of Celebration: April 9th?

Published 9 April 2016 by the Hillsdale College Churchill Project

Why does the United States designate April 9th as National Churchill Day? Why not, for example, May 10th? That was the day in 1940 when, with liberty in retreat, he became Britain’s prime minister, sure that he knew a good deal about it all, certain he would not fail, impatient for the morning….

But April 9th has a certain national significance for Americans. That was the day, in 1963, when President Kennedy proclaimed Sir Winston an honorary citizen of the United States.…

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Lehrman on Churchill and Lincoln

24 March 2016 Comments 0 Comments

Lewis E. Lehrman, co-founder of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, offers a compelling two-part comparison of Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill at the Hillsdale College Churchill Project. (To read in entirety, start here.)

Mr. Lehrman is author of Lincoln at Peoria: The Turning Point (2008) and Lincoln “by littles” (2013). Uniquely among the Lincoln scholars I’ve heard on Churchill, he has as fine a grasp of the English statesman as he does the American president. He tells me he regards each as the outstanding figure of his respective century. No argument there.

1. Lehrman on Preparation for Greatness

Excerpt: President Lincoln and Prime Minister Churchill found themselves challenged by wars of national survival.…

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Ty Cobb: Inconvenient Truths

10 March 2016 Comments 0 Comments

Leerhsen set out with the typical view of Ty Cobb, only to encounter scores of inconvenient truths missed or ignored by earlier biographers, whose work inspired the sick portrait in Ken Burns's documentary, Baseball. Cobb was no saint—Leerhsen documents his flaming temper and readiness for brawls—but most of the other allegations are either vastly exaggerated or demonstrably false. Cobb was 180 degrees from the popular image of a racist, murdering, spike-flying, child-hating misanthrope, who steamed stamps off the envelopes kids sent him for his autograph.

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Chartwell and Churchill, 1955

1 March 2016 Comments 0 Comments

Chartwell, 1955— Here is one of the finest—as it is the most revealing—portraits of Churchill at Chartwell we can read, by the Oxford historian A.L. Rowse, who spent a memorable day at Churchill’s home.

It gives an insightful view of Churchill and Chartwell ten years after World War II, not without pathos and sadness, for even now he was beginning to reflect that he had “achieved a great deal, only to achieve nothing in the end”: a thought however inconceivable in his case, but worth pondering by us all. Read full article at Hillsdale College Churchill Project.…

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