Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in It Can’t Happen Here, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
American Fascism
Liberalism and Tolerance
Morality and Resistance
Political Communication and Mass Media
Summary
Analysis
The data that Sissy Jessup found in Shad Ledue’s notebook helps the New Underground piece together the Corpos’ graft scheme. But in April, Julian Falck tells Sissy that he wishes she would stop spending time with Shad Ledue and Emil Staubmeyer. Sissy reminds Falck that Ledue keeps giving her valuable information. Falck warns that Ledue could rape her, but Sissy says that this would be a small price to pay to save people from the Corpos.
Sissy Jessup is willing to take great personal risks to help stop the Windrip government’s abuses. With her connections to the New Underground and proximity to Shad Ledue, she has a unique opportunity to take down the local Corpo administration, and she refuses to squander it. Unlike the majority of Americans, who cope with the new regime by ignoring other people and focusing on their own safety, Sissy decides that saving others is more important than protecting herself.
Themes
At dinner that night, Shad Ledue dresses like a caricatured “City Villain,” and Emil Staubmeyer’s date is an aging widow who wears too much makeup. The couples drink cocktails and eat bland sandwiches in Ledue’s opulent but boring hotel suite, and then Staubmeyer and his date leave. Ledue asks Sissy for a kiss. Even though it makes her sick, she pretends to be as innocent and coy as she can. She thinks about how all the men she has dated—except Julian Falck—have tried to seduce her in exactly the same way but all still believe in their own unique prowess.
By highlighting Ledue and Staubmeyer’s poor sense of style, Lewis suggests that they are impostors—ordinary, foolish men who have stumbled on power and money through no fault of their own. While they view themselves as elites who deserve their status, in reality, they only have power because they are both loyal to their higher-ups in the government and too incompetent to threaten them. In other words, Ledue and Staubmeyer’s attitude shows how fascism hands power to the people least worthy of exercising it.
Themes
Ledue clumsily puts his hand on Sissy’s knee and accuses her of still thinking of him as nothing more than her family’s farm hand. She replies that she fondly remembers growing up with Ledue around (which is a lie). She also says that her father Doremus also used to work as a farm laborer (which she thinks is a lie, but is actually true). Ledue clumsily pulls Sissy toward him, but she says that he’s manly enough to be gentle with her. He asks if she really likes Julian Falck—she says no, but starts fantasizing about working with Julian to help Ledue’s next victim escape. She asks Ledue whom he’s arresting next, but he suspects that she’s trying to get information out of him. She says no—she just wants to watch him arrest someone. But he won’t give her a name.
Ledue’s grotesque, overconfident advances reflect his inflated ego and absurd sense of entitlement. Just like the millions of Americans who foolishly thought that Buzz Windrip would personally make them rich, Ledue foolishly thinks that he’s the sexiest man in town, when he’s really one of the most revolting. Specifically, he thinks that his government job has changed him, making him respectable and attractive. But in reality, his off-putting personality hasn’t changed at all, and his government job only makes him far more repugnant to the people living under his tyranny.
Themes
Ledue maniacally grabs at Sissy’s breasts, and she starts to yell in fear. She tells him that he wouldn’t want to be with the kind of woman who has sex with a man right away. She stands up, sees Ledue’s keys in his bedroom, and then asks to wash her face in the bathroom. Ledue agrees, and she goes into the bedroom, locks the door, and uses a pencil to make a rubbing of the keys. But it doesn’t work, and Ledue starts banging on the door. She quickly powders her face, runs out to the salon, and tells Ledue that she has to leave. In the hallway, she meets Julian Falck. She’s distraught because she feels like a terrible spy.
Sissy’s worst fear nearly comes to pass: Ledue tries to assault her, and she knows that because of his position in the government, he will never face punishment for anything he does to her. Fortunately, the brutish Ledue still sincerely believes that Sissy is attracted to him, so he contains himself. In fact, he never even realizes that he has made Sissy uncomfortable, or that she clearly has ulterior motives for meeting with him. Thus, while she’s by no means a very good spy, she gets away because Ledue is simply too oblivious to recognize what she’s doing.
Themes
Get the entire It Can’t Happen Here LitChart as a printable PDF.
However, Sissy does convince Julian Falck to join the Minute Men and start collecting intelligence from the inside. They plan to stage a public breakup in order to convince the townspeople that Julian has switched sides—but when they meet to do it, Sissy is so frightened to see Julian in a Minute Men uniform that she yells and embraces him.
Sissy’s experience inspires Julian to also become a spy. This shows one reason why resistance to tyranny is so much more effective when it’s organized: activists can help one another become more effective by sharing tactics, information, and inspiration. Meanwhile, Sissy and Julian’s fake public breakup is a comic inversion of her meeting with Ledue: with Ledue, she struggled to pretend to love a real Minute Man, but now, she struggles to express her real love for a fake Minute Man.
Themes
