Memorandum re Generoso Pope and the U.S. Treasury, with Attachments

Please return to: alson 3230 SSB Miss Katherine C. Blackburn August 17, 1943 TRUMAN Charles Olson HARRY "NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND RECORDS LIBRARY U.S. SERVICE" Generoso Pope and the U.S. Treasury GOVERNMENT The appointment of Generoso Pope to a new Treasury position demonstrates again the dangers of the United States Treasury's policy in regard to foreign language groups in this country. Pope's appointment repeats the pattern established soon after Pearl Harbor, when the Treasury Department commenced appointing Italian War Bond Committees dominated by Fascists, the worst example being a New York Committee, where the anti-Fascists refused to go on a committee including Gene Pope, whereupon the Treasury appointed Pope and a dozen other Italians with Fascist records to a Committee containing not one anti-Fascist. We constituted ourselves the loyal opposition at that time. Now has the new face of Generoso Pope and his two papers, Il Progresso Italo-Americano and Corriere D'America, lessened the danger of Government approval of Gene Pope. After Pearl Harbor he played the official patriotic line, and since the invasion of Italy, has gone further and is now attempting to play the anti-Fascist game. However, the Italian Americans do not forget the long story of Pope as the "advertising manager of Mussolini and Fascism in America". One Italian leader put it this way on July 13: "I feel confident that this government will realize that Mr. Pope's 'democratic' appeals could have a value if backed by a moral stand and a consistent political line. As this is not the case, they sound false and have an opposite result both on Italian and Italian- American masses." Government approval of Gene Pope discredits the policy of the United States not only amongst the groups in this country, but also amongst the Italian people in Italy. I am attaching the following exhibits: 1. A statement of Generoso Pope's ownerships and interests. 2. A photo of Pope giving the Fascist salute in Rome in 1937. 3. Figures proving that Pope may be "the best salesman in the Italian group", as Austin Daly, Director of the Treasury's New York State Com- mittee's Foreign Origin Section characterized him on August 8, but the "best salesman" for a Fascist Italy, not for a Free America. These figures show the vast amount Pope raised for the Italian Red Cross in 1935, plus one ton of gold, including 20,000 wedding rings - compared with the very small amount he has been able to raise for the American Red Cross for this war. This exhibit contains also proof that instead of using this money for the Italian Red Cross, Pope turned it over to Mussolini's Italian Treasury.