Founding Father

Radio Priest: Charles Coughlin, the Father of Hate Radio, by Donald Warren (Free Press, 416pp., $27.50)

MOST Americans who know anything at all about the Thirties “know” there was a native fascist movement which was a clear and present danger to democracy, and that one of its leaders, Charles Coughlin, was a Roman Catholic priest who spewed anti-Semitic propaganda over network radio. It is a short step from such “knowledge” to the conclusion of the anonymous author of the present book’s flap copy that Coughlin “paved the way for modern demagogues such as Gordon Liddy and Rush Limbaugh.” There is a certain amount of truth in all these claims—even the last one, tendentiously put though it is—but truth, like God, is in the details, and the details of Father Coughlin’s spectacular career, which are accurately set forth in this tediously written but factually sound academic study, are far more interesting than the caricature that has passed into historical legend.