Hamilton Fish III (born Hamilton Stuyvesant Fish and also known as Hamilton Fish Jr.; December 7, 1888 – January 18, 1991) was an American soldier, author, politician and prominent isolationist from New York. He represented New York's 26th congressional district in the Hudson Valley region in the United States House of Representatives from 1920 to 1945. In the second half of his House career, Fish was a chief critic and opponent of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, especially on matters of international affairs and American entry into World War II prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Born into a political family whose legacy dated to the Dutch settlement of New Amsterdam, Fish was educated at St. Mark's School and Harvard College, where he graduated at the age of 20 before enrolling at Harvard Law School. He was elected to the New York State Assembly from Putnam County in 1913 as a member of the Progressive Party. He served three terms before enlisting in World War I, in which he commanded a company of the 369th Infantry Regiment, a unit of African-American soldiers known as the "Harlem Hellfighters." After the war, Fish was elected to the United States House as a Republican. In the House, he advocated for veterans and the anti-lynching movement. He became the body's leading anti-communist as chair of the Fish Committee, a special body established in 1930 to investigate Soviet and communist influence in the United States. He also sponsored the Lodge–Fish Resolution, expressing American support for the British establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine.
In 1932, Fish crossed party lines to privately support Hudson Valley native Franklin D. Roosevelt for president, but he soon became a leading critic of Roosevelt's New Deal legislation and Atlanticist foreign policy. Throughout the 1930s, Fish was the subject of multiple foreign influence campaigns, since he was identified by Nazi Party officials as a natural ally to their international ambitions (though he was on the record criticizing the treatment of Jews in Germany) and by British security organizations as an obstacle to American aid for Great Britain. His chief of staff, George Hill, was convicted of perjury in relation to his involvement with George Sylvester Viereck, and agents of the British Security Co-ordination office repeatedly raised money for Fish's opponents and published anti-Fish leaflets in his district. In 1941, Fish was implicated in an America First Committee franking controversy leading to William Power Maloney's grand jury investigating Nazi penetration in the United States.
After the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and German declaration of war, Fish called for unified support for Roosevelt as a wartime president. He delivered the first speech calling for a declaration of war against Japan and sought to re-enlist but was denied a commission by Roosevelt; he later returned to his criticism, arguing that Roosevelt should have prevented the Japanese strike. Like many leading isolationists, Fish's popularity waned during wartime, and he was defeated for re-election in 1944. Late in the decade, former United States Department of Justice prosecutor O. John Rogge accused Fish of Nazi sympathies. He continued to actively comment on American diplomacy and military strategy during and after the Cold War, criticizing the United Nations, John Foster Dulles, and the Vietnam War while supporting NATO, the American invasions of Grenada and Panama, and the Gulf War.
Family and early life
Hamilton Stuyvesant Fish was born on December 7, 1888, in Garrison, New York to Hamilton Fish II and the former Emily Mann. Hamilton Fish II had been a Republican member of the New York Assembly and would later serve as Speaker of the Assembly and a United States Representative. Hamilton Fish, the paternal grandfather of this article's subject, was United States Secretary of State under President Ulysses S. Grant.
In 1898, the young Fish's cousin, also named Hamilton Fish and a volunteer in Theodore Roosevelt's Rough Riders, was the first American soldier killed in action in the Spanish–American War. In his honor, Fish's father legally changed his ten-year-old son's name from Hamilton Stuyvesant Fish to just Hamilton Fish.
During his childhood, Fish attended Chateau de Lancy near Geneva, which his father had also attended. The younger Fish learned French, played soccer, and spent summers with his family in Bavaria. He returned to the United States to attend the Fay School in Southborough, Massachusetts and St. Mark's School, a preparatory school also in Southborough. In his memoirs, Fish described himself as a "B student" at St. Mark's but successful in several different sports.
Fish graduated from St. Mark's in 1906 and attended Harvard College, where he graduated in the class of 1910. He was a member of the Porcellian Club and played tackle for Harvard's football team. Standing and weighing , "Ham" Fish was highly successful as a football player; he was twice an All-America and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1954. He was the only Harvard man on Yale graduate Walter Camp's all-time All-American team. After graduating, Fish continued his involvement in football. He donated $5,000.00 for several awards to Harvard football players and organized the Harvard Law School football team, which played exhibition games with other colleges around the country. During his time at Harvard, Fish became friends with Theodore Roosevelt Jr., the son of President Theodore Roosevelt.
In 1909, at 20, Fish graduated early from Harvard with a cum laude degree in history and government. He declined an offer to teach history at Harvard and instead attended Harvard Law School. He left law school before graduating, and took a job in a New York City insurance office.
New York State Assembly (1914–16) Since Fish's father had served as Assistant Treasurer of the United States in Theodore Roosevelt's administration, and Fish himself had befriended Roosevelt's son at Harvard, he actively supported Roosevelt in the 1912 primaries against President William Howard Taft. Fish attended the 1912 Republican National Convention with his father and was dismayed when Taft was nominated despite popular support for Roosevelt. Fish joined Roosevelt in bolting the Republican Party and, with assistance from his father, he was appointed chair of the Putnam County Bull Moose Party. They campaigned for Roosevelt in the general election but, despite Roosevelt's defeat, Fish remained a committed Progressive.
In 1913, Fish ran for Assembly against Republican county political boss John Yale, whom Fish later remembered as "thoroughly corrupt." In a largely rural county facing challenges from industrialization and modernization, Fish's message of limiting private influence in government without limiting the exercise of private liberties was popular. Yale ultimately withdrew from the Assembly race in favor of a political ally, whom Fish easily defeated running on an anti-corruption platform. As a progressive, Fish enjoyed the support of former President Roosevelt and a friendly relationship with Roosevelt's distant cousin Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a State Senator and resident of Hyde Park in neighboring Dutchess County. Before Fish's election, Fish and Senator Roosevelt collaborated on a plan to establish direct primary elections in 1912. The two men would continue cordial relations for the next two decades; after Franklin left Albany to become Assistant Secretary of the Navy, he continued to assist Fish with patronage requests and securing federal contracts for his insurance firm, the John Paige Insurance Company.
As an Assemblyman for three terms, Fish championed progressive social and political reforms, including the reform of the New York state primary election system, a widow's pension, penal reforms, and workmen's compensation. With support from Theodore Roosevelt, Fish opposed a bill which would allow insurance companies to bypass the workmen's compensation scheme to settle claims and attacked the Speaker of the Assembly, Thaddeus Sweet, for misuse of public funds and hiring political allies for no-show jobs. Though Fish never substantiated his allegations, he won public applause.
Military service
Prior to the United States entering the First World War, Fish was captain of Company K, 15th New York Infantry. When the 15th was mobilized for Federal service, Fish accepted an offer from Col. William Hayward to retain his position in the 369th Infantry (as the 15th New York was re-designated following mobilization). The 369th was a unit of African American enlisted men with white officers (and a few African American officers at the start of the war)Staff writer (August 10, 1942). "Summer Politics." Life, vol. 13, no. 6, pp. 28, 31-32. Archived from the original. which came to be known as the "Harlem Hellfighters." The 369th Infantry was assigned to the 93d Division.
The summer after President Wilson's declaration of war against Germany (in April 1917), Fish and about two thousand soldiers began training at Camp Whitman (in New York). In October 1917, the unit was ordered to Camp Wadsworth (in South Carolina) for further training. In November 1917, the regiment boarded the USS Pocahontas, destined for France, although shortly thereafter the ship returned to shore due to engine problems. After another aborted departure, the ship left on December 13, 1917. Despite colliding with another ship and not having a destroyer escort to protect against German submarines, the regiment reached France. (Fish complained to Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt about the lack of an escort.)
Fish and his unit landed in Brest on December 26 and were placed under the control of the French army by U.S. General John J. Pershing. Altogether, the 369th Infantry spent 191 days on the front lines, the longest of any American regiment. It was also the first Allied regiment to reach the Rhine River. Fish received the Silver Star and the French War Cross 1914–1918.Brooks, Steve (May 2009). "Hamilton Fish: The Tomb of the Unknowns was his idea." American Legion Magazine, p. 46. In addition, Fish and his sister Janet, who had been a nurse near the front lines, were both later inducted into the French Legion of Honor for their wartime service.
Fish was promoted to major on March 13, 1919. He returned to the United States on April 25 and was discharged on May 14.Harvard's Military Record in the World War, p. 327. He continued as a member of the Organized Reserve Corps until 1948, and attained the rank of colonel.
Fish later credited his service with the 369th Infantry for his long support for civil rights in Congress. In 1922, 1937, and 1940, Fish joined with other Republicans and northern Democrats to pass anti-lynching bills, each of which was defeated in the Senate. During debate on the Military Appropriations Bill of 1941, Fish succeeded in adding an amendment to ban racial discrimination in the selection and training of military personnel, which was credited as an important step leading to desegregation of the military. Fish continued to advocate for the equal treatment of Black servicemen throughout World War II, remarking in 1944, "Fourteen millions of loyal Americans have the right to expect that in a war for the advancement of the 'Four Freedoms,' their sons be given the same right as any other American to train, to serve, and to fight in combat units in defense of the United States in this greatest war in its history."
U.S. House of Representatives (1920–45) Fish represented the Hudson Valley in the U.S. House from November 2, 1920, until January 3, 1945, after he was defeated running for what would have been his thirteenth term in office.