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
During his two years as president, Buzz Windrip grows bitter, lonely, and frustrated. He hates that Canada, Mexico, and South America refuse to join the U.S. empire, that his aides refuse to stroke his ego, and that his bodyguards beat him at poker. While Windrip wallows in self-pity, Lee Sarason is slowly gaining power over the Corpos. Eventually, everyone knows that Sarason really runs the show.
The novel’s concluding section begins with this chapter, which sets aside the story of Doremus Jessup and takes a look at the inner workings of the Windrip administration instead. After the inauguration, Windrip’s insatiable appetite for power and attention starts to destroy him from the inside out. Even after transforming the entire U.S. to satiate his thirst for power, he constantly feels unfulfilled, so he makes increasingly unrealistic demands on the people around him—and increasingly gives up on governing.
Themes
But Windrip cares as much about Sarason’s opinion of him as the country’s. When he notices their friendship souring, Windrip gives one of Sarason’s duties—leadership over the Minute Men—to Dewey Haik. He hopes that Sarason will get angry, then ask for forgiveness and rekindle their friendship. But Sarason coldly ignores him instead. Windrip even gifts Sarason an expensive TV set, but Sarason doesn’t budge. Furious, Windrip nearly sends Sarason to jail. Then, Perley Beecroft quits the vice presidency, infuriating Windrip even more. But he can’t kill Beecroft, so instead, he has a dozen random people executed in the concentration camps.
Sarason knows that Windrip cares more about people’s opinion of him than actually running the U.S. government, so he learns to accumulate more power by manipulating Windrip’s emotions. Meanwhile, Lewis uses Windrip’s farcical attempts to win back Sarason’s favor and bone-chillingly arbitrary executions to suggest that, at its core, fascism is really about projecting juvenile emotions onto politics. Specifically, both fascist leaders and their followers use politics not to achieve specific policy ends, but rather to satisfy their fantasies of power, domination, and popularity.
Themes
Windrip is so frightened of getting assassinated in the White House that he lives in a nondescript, heavily guarded 12-room hotel suite instead. One day, Lee Sarason visits, and Windrip suggests taking control of the Minute Men back from Dewey Haik or hiring Osceola Luthorne to help run it. Embarrassed, Sarason reveals that the government has already killed Luthorne. Windrip complains that the newspapers don’t carry any useful information anymore, and that he liked Luthorne because of the jokes he made during their poker matches. In fact, just like Shad Ledue, Windrip feels desperately empty and lonely.
Windrip lives in a hotel room, in a constant state of stress and panic—just like he did on the campaign trail. His fear of assassination may be a joke about Huey Long (who was assassinated just before this book’s publication). Of course, when Sarason explains that the administration has already assassinated Luthorne, this makes Windrip’s fear of assassination look both frighteningly legitimate and deeply ironic. It seems legitimate because it shows that Sarason is making life-or-death decisions without Windrip. And it seems darkly ironic because Windrip’s administration is murdering so many people that he can’t even keep track of them all. Finally, Windrip’s feeling of alienation shows that fascism destroys social bonds everywhere in society, even at the very top.
Themes
Windrip tells Sarason about his plans for a great empire and suggests that he might make Sarason the “Duke of Georgia” or “King of Mexico.” Sarason coldly replies that this would be “very amusing,” and then he changes the subject and suggests imprisoning Perley Beecroft for treason. Windrip says no, because Beecroft is his friend. Sarason agrees, then returns home, where he lives with a number of strapping young Minute Men.
This conversation suggests that Windrip makes arbitrary, emotional decisions on the spur of the moment, while Sarason is trying to fulfill a grand, secret scheme. Lewis jokes about Sarason’s sexuality (insinuating that he’s gay) in order to mock the popular conspiracy theory that fascists (particularly Nazis) were really gay men who wanted to build a militaristic society around their strict ideals of masculinity. Instead, Lewis traces fascism to the combination of desperation, populist politics, and technological change in the interwar period—not an obscure gay conspiracy. Of course, the reality is more jarring than the conspiracy because it implies that fascism really can happen anywhere, and that ordinary people really can participate in it.
Themes
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Later, at a cabinet meeting, Lee Sarason reveals that Perley Beecroft has fled to Canada and joined Walt Trowbridge’s resistance. Rebellions are also sprouting up in the Midwest—Minnesota and the Dakotas are even considering secession. Windrip angrily yells at his advisors, particularly Sarason, and insists that the Midwest loves him. Sarason proposes bringing Americans back together by starting a war with Mexico—Webster R. Skittle and Senator Porkwood dislike the idea, but Dewey Haik and Hector Macgoblin love it. Windrip insists that, even though the U.S. is destined to conquer Mexico, it’s not ready yet. He worries that, if their regime arms too many people, it might just get overthrown. In fact, he even says that Sarason was wrong to create the Minute Men. But Sarason points out that Windrip keeps contradicting himself on this point, and he walks out of the room. Windrip says that he can’t stand Sarason’s ungratefulness.
The same pattern repeats itself: Windrip views all political decisions as referendums on his own popularity, while Sarason explores genuine policy solutions that will allow the regime to maintain power. Clearly, the New Underground movement is well-organized and poses a substantial threat to the regime. This gives important context to the preceding several chapters. From Doremus Jessup’s perspective in Vermont, it wasn’t clear if the New Underground was accomplishing anything at all, but this passage affirms that his efforts were actually crucial to building a broad coalition against the government. Finally, the administration’s debate about invading Mexico shows how fascist regimes use imperialist wars to at once convince the public that they are fulfilling the nation’s destiny and to distract the public from their failures.
Themes
That night, Lee Sarason, Dewey Haik, and Hector Macgoblin visit President Windrip in his hotel room. Sarason holds a dagger, and Windrip calls out to him. Windrip even reminds Sarason about the time he lent him money to go visit his dying mother. Sarason and Haik decide that it’s better to send Windrip into exile than kill him. In 10 days, Windrip is in Paris, spending the millions of dollars he stole as president. The world quickly forgets him.
This coup d’état should be no surprise—readers learned about it at the end of the last chapter. But this chapter has illustrated why Sarason viewed the unstable, narcissistic, sentimental Windrip as unfit to govern. While Sarason sticks to ruthlessly promoting his self-interest, Windrip isn’t even committed to real fascist principles, just his own popularity. This combination allowed them to succeed in the campaign—Sarason plotted everything, while Windrip just connected with people. But Sarason and his allies now believe that this is no longer a viable strategy for running the country.
Themes
The rest of the administration quickly joins forces to support President Lee Sarason, who announces to the country that the cabinet has ousted Windrip for embezzling money and making treasonous anti-war agreements with Mexico. Sarason starts appointing his favorite young Minute Men to high government offices and holding orgies at the White House, like a Roman emperor.
Other officials quickly switch their loyalties from Windrip to Sarason because they care primarily about power, not ideology. In other words, they never truly believed in Windrip’s message—they just hoped that he would give them power and money if they supported him. Now that Sarason has taken over, they do the same thing once again.
Themes
Yet thousands of idealistic Corpo supporters and Minute Men immediately oppose the new Sarason regime. These people, like General Emmanuel Coon, deeply believe in Windrip’s message. They think that despite all the bloodshed, the Corpos are really trying to build an equal, orderly, authentically American alternative to communism and consumerism. They don’t think the government is abusing its powers, because they don’t read about it in the news—and they know that the news is honest. So, they’re shocked when Sarason ousts Windrip.
After glimpsing the Windrip dictatorship’s atrocities and following Doremus Jessup’s ordeal in Vermont, readers might be astonished to learn that many Americans still genuinely believe in Windrip’s message and platform. But readers should also remember that Windrip has successfully prevented most Americans from accessing truthful news about his administration. Thus, his supporters’ continued belief in him again speaks to propaganda’s immense power, which can even persuade people to ignore the contrary evidence right in front of them. Ironically, Windrip’s propaganda is so successful that it backfires—many Americans refuse to support a fascist government without him at the head.
Themes
Lee Sarason and Dewey Haik demand a war—they think it will unify the country, scare foreigners, and make them look heroic. Sarason writes a nonsense poem about Mexican women marrying American men, then turns it into a military song and starts holding drills. But Hector Macgoblin warns Sarason that Haik is after him. Sure enough, a few weeks later, Haik shoots Sarason and declares himself the new president. Macgoblin flees to Haiti.
Sarason’s coup d’état ultimately destabilizes the government even further. Since there are no longer any independent institutions to ensure an orderly transfer of power, Haik can easily do to Sarason precisely what Sarason did to Windrip. And their manufactured imperial war shows that Lewis fully understood fascism’s most dangerous tendencies even years before they led to the breakout of World War II. Fascists understand national greatness in terms of power and domination, so they inevitably try to extend their reach—and control their population—by starting wars.
Themes
Dewey Haik is far more extreme than Windrip or Sarason. He prioritizes efficiency over all else, so he officially abandons Windrip’s $5,000-a-year promise, fires all the feeble soldiers and overly corrupt officials (like Francis Tasbrough), and orders the Minute Men to save time by beating fewer prisoners and executing more. He even enlists ministers to preach the virtues of his war with Mexico and spy on their congregations. Under “the good king Haik,” nobody opposes the government and lives to tell the tale.
Haik abandons the pretenses that Windrip and Sarason used to disguise their sadistic, elitist, greedy policies. In other words, he takes fascism further than his predecessors, openly using violence and terror to rule the U.S. with an iron fist. But it’s no surprise that he does this successfully: Windrip has already made it possible by dismantling democracy’s checks and balances. Without these checks and balances, anyone who manages to overthrow the president gets to become a dictator, so the most ruthless and violent officials—like Haik—take power. This is Lewis’s greatest argument against fascism: by distributing power based on strength, it encourages conflict and brutality inside the government, in society at large, and in foreign policy.
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