The Plot Against America by Philip Roth
"The Plot Against America" by Philip Roth is an alternative history novel that explores a scenario in which aviation hero Charles A. Lindbergh becomes President of the United States instead of Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II. The story is narrated by a young Philip Roth, who recounts the experiences of his Jewish family living in Newark, New Jersey, as they grapple with the implications of Lindbergh's election and his pro-German sympathies, which evoke fears of rising anti-Semitism reminiscent of the atrocities occurring in Europe.
As Lindbergh's administration unfolds, the Roth family faces increasing discrimination and hostility, highlighted by a trip to Washington, D.C., where they are denied service due to their Jewish identity. The narrative introduces various historical figures and events, including a supportive rabbi who advocates for Jewish assimilation and the tragic consequences that befall families who are forced to relocate under the government's policies.
The novel culminates in violence against the Jewish community, leading to riots and the loss of lives, while Lindbergh himself ultimately flees to Germany. "The Plot Against America" serves as a cautionary tale about the fragility of civil liberties and the potential dangers of authoritarianism, echoing concerns that resonate with historical and contemporary political climates.
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The Plot Against America by Philip Roth
Excerpted from an article in Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition
First published: 2004
Type of work: Novel
The Work
In the 1940 of Philip Roth’s reimagined history, many Americans are so afraid that President Franklin D. Roosevelt is leading the country into the war in Europe that the Republican Party nominates not Wendell Wilkie but Charles A. Lindbergh, the hero who was the first to fly across the Atlantic Ocean solo. To the great consternation of American Jews, Lindbergh wins the election. Jews are concerned because Lindbergh not only has admired the German Luftwaffe but also has accepted a medal from Adolf Hitler himself, a clear sign of his pro-German sympathies.
As nine-year-old Philip Roth narrates events, the Roth family—including Philip’s father and mother, Herman and Besse, and his older brother, Sandy—and their friends in the Jewish section of Newark, New Jersey, are terribly upset by this turn of events and fear the worst. They suspect that the kinds of anti-Semitism that Hitler has propounded and is rapidly carrying out in Germany and in the parts of Europe that he has conquered will, under Lindbergh’s administration, begin to happen in the United States. The first experience that they have of this intolerance comes during a trip to Washington, D.C., where they are expelled from their hotel despite their confirmed reservations. This outrage is followed by a scene in a cafeteria where the family experiences anti-Semitic slurs. Worse events are still to follow.
Not all Jews believe as Herman Roth believes. A rabbi, Lionel Bengelsdorf, supports the new administration and soon becomes head of the Office of American Absorption. This new office is established to promote Lindbergh’s plan to disperse Jews from enclaves, such as the one in which the Roths live in Newark, to other parts of the country, thereby promoting their assimilation into the American mainstream. After years of working for an insurance company, Herman Roth is reassigned to Louisville under this plan, but rather than accept the assignment, he resigns and goes to work instead for his brother’s produce business. Sandy Roth, meanwhile, is enticed into a program called “Just Folks,” another attempt to foster Jewish assimilation, and spends the summer on a farm in Kentucky with a typical “American” family. He comes back with a southern accent and views quite opposed to those of his father. A neighbor’s family, the Wishnows, is forced to accept the reassignment and goes to Danville, Kentucky, a town near Louisville. Later, Mrs. Wishnow is killed in a violent attack against Jews as she tries to drive home one night.
Roth brings in many historical characters: Father Coughlin, the extremist Catholic priest who fulminates against Jews; Walter Winchell, the Jewish newspaper reporter whose Sunday night radio broadcasts the Roth family and their friends dutifully listen to each week, and who at one point runs for president against Lindbergh, only to be assassinated for his efforts; the German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, who is honored by a state dinner at the White House by President and Mrs. Lindbergh; Fiorello La Guardia, the mayor of New York City, who is an eloquent spokesperson and a champion of civil rights; and many others. The picture of the United States under the Lindbergh administration is a very grim, even terrifying one. Although Roth insists he intended no allusion to politics in the twenty-first century, his novel clearly posts a warning for what might happen should American civil liberties suffer increased depredations, using the Iraq War as a pretext or an excuse.
Roth even brings into The Plot Against America the notorious kidnapping case of the 1930’s, in which the Lindberghs’ infant son was stolen. In this imagined reconstruction of events, the baby is not killed (as he was in actual fact) but taken by the Nazis and brought up in Germany as a good member of the Hitler Jugend. Events at the end of the novel culminate with the disappearance of Lindbergh himself and subsequent anti-Jewish riots in many cities across the United States in which 122 Jews lose their lives. Lindbergh, however, has not been kidnapped but has fled to Germany, using the Spirit of St. Louis for his escape, and is never seen again. Eventually, law and order are restored (thanks in part to the efforts of Mrs. Lindbergh), the Democrats take over Congress, and Roosevelt wins his unprecedented third term as president.
Review Sources
The Atlantic Monthly 294 (November, 2004): 143.
Los Angeles Times, September 22, 2004, p. E1.
The Nation 279, no. 17 (November 22, 2004): 23.
New Criterion 23, no. 3 (November, 2004): 54.
The New York Review of Books 51, no. 18 (November 18, 2004): 4.
The New York Times, September 21, 2004, p. E1.
The New York Times Book Review 154 (October 3, 2004): 1.
The New Yorker 80 (September 20, 2004): 96.
Newsweek 144, no. 12 (September 20, 2004): 56.
Publishers Weekly 251, no. 28 (July 12, 2004): 44.
Time 164, no. 13 (September 27, 2004): 67.
The Times Literary Supplement, October 8, 2004, p. 21.