Share Our Wealth
Share Our Wealth Society was a movement begun during the Great Depression by Huey Long, a governor and later United States Senator from Louisiana. In February, 1934, Senator Huey Long announced during a nationwide radio address that he was forming the Share Our Wealth Society, dedicated to the redistribution of the nation's wealth.
Long had originally been a supporter of the New Deal policies of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, but starting with the formation of the Share Our Wealth Society, he began advocating for a more radical program that Roosevelt was unwilling to embrace. He claimed considerable support across America, boasting that the "Share our Wealth" movement had over 27,000 branches and nearly 7.5 million members. The official slogan of the Share Our Wealth movement was "Every Man a King," which also became the title of a song co-written by Long in 1935 to promote his proposal.
The key planks of the Share Our Wealth platform included:
- No person would be allowed to accumulate a personal net worth of more than 100 to 300 times the average family fortune, which would limit personal assets to between $1.5 million and $5 million. Annual capital levy taxes would be assessed on all persons with a net worth exceeding $1 million.
- Every family was to be furnished with a homestead allowance of not less than one-third the average family wealth of the country.
- Every family was to be guaranteed an annual family income of at least $2,000 to $2,500, or not less than one-third of the average annual family income in the United States.
- No person would be allowed an annual income in excess of 100 to 300 times the average annual family income. Income taxes would be levied to ensure this.
- An old-age pension would be made available for all persons.
The death of Huey Long
Huey Long was a populist, extremely popular in his home state of Louisiana, but many saw his Share Our Wealth proposal as an unworkable plan that threatened the more moderate reforms of Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal. Many also suspected that Huey Long was planning on using the Share Our Wealth Society as a vehicle for mounting a third party challenge to Roosevelt during the 1936 Presidential election. Any Presidential ambitions which Long might have had were cut short by his assassination on September 8, 1935, in Baton Rouge.
After Long's assassination, the control of the Share Our Wealth Society fell to Gerald L.K. Smith. Smith brought the Share Our Wealth Society into a brief coalition with the followers of radio priest Charles Coughlin and old-age pension advocate Francis Townsend in support of the short-lived Union Party, a third-party effort which ran William Lemke of North Dakota for President in 1936. The Share Our Wealth movement eventually fell apart.
After the demise of "Share Our Wealth," Gerald L. K. Smith continued to be active in politics giving speeches at large events. Late in his life, Smith became increasingly interested in the topics of Jewish influence in America and the role of Jews in the Communist conspiracy.
