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| branch = United States Army | serviceyears = 1917–1919 | rank =First lieutenant | battles = World War I | footnotes = }} Wendell Lewis Willkie (born Lewis Wendell Willkie; February 18, 1892 – October 8, 1944) was an American lawyer, corporate executive, and the 1940 Republican candidate for president. A Democrat until late 1939, only months before the convention, and the sole interventionist, favoring greater U.S. involvement in World War II, in the Republican field, Willkie gained the nomination on the sixth ballot. His Democratic opponent, incumbent President Franklin D. Roosevelt, won the 1940 election with 55% of the popular vote. Willkie was born in Indiana in 1892; both his parents were lawyers, and he also became one. He served in World War I but was not sent to France until the final days of the war, and saw no action. Willkie settled in Akron, Ohio where he was at first employed by Firestone, but left for a law firm, becoming one of the leaders of the Akron bar. Much of his work was representing electric utilities and in 1929, Willkie accepted a job in New York City as counsel for Commonwealth & Southern Corporation (C&S), a utility holding company. He was rapidly promoted, and became corporate president in 1933. Franklin D. Roosevelt was sworn in as U.S. president soon after Willkie became head of C&S, and announced plans for a Tennessee Valley Authority that would supply power in competition with C&S. Between 1933 and 1939, Willkie fought against the TVA before Congress, in the courts, and before the public. He was ultimately unsuccessful, but sold C&S's property for a good price, and gained public esteem. A longtime Democratic activist, Willkie changed his party registration to Republican in late 1939. He did not run in the 1940 presidential primaries, but positioned himself as an acceptable choice for a deadlocked convention. He sought support from uncommitted delegates, while his supporters, many youthful, enthusiastically backed his campaign. As Hitler rampaged through Western Europe in the spring of 1940, many Republicans did not wish to nominate an isolationist such as Thomas E. Dewey, and turned to Willkie. His support for aid to Britain removed it as a major factor in his race against Roosevelt, and Willkie also backed the president on a peacetime draft. Both men took more isolationist positions in the final days of the race. Roosevelt won a third term, taking 38 of the 48 states. After the election, Willkie went on two wartime foreign trips as Roosevelt's informal envoy, and gave the president his full backing as nominal leader of the Republican Party. This angered many conservatives, especially as Willkie advocated liberal or internationalist causes. Willkie ran for the Republican nomination in 1944, but bowed out after a disastrous showing in the Wisconsin primary in April. He and Roosevelt discussed the possibility of forming, after the war, a liberal political party, but Willkie died in October 1944 before the idea could bear fruit. Willkie is remembered for giving Roosevelt necessary political cover in 1940, which allowed the president to aid Britain in her hour of need. == Youth, education and World War I service == Lewis Wendell Willkie was born in Elwood, Indiana on February 18, 1892, the son of Herman and Henrietta (Trisch) Willkie. Both of his parents were lawyers, his mother being one of the first women admitted to the Indiana bar. All four of his grandparents emigrated from Germany after being involved in the unsuccessful 1848 revolutions there; the Trisches initially settled in Kansas Territory before moving to Indiana after the territory was opened to slavery in the mid-1850s. The fourth of six children, all intelligent, Willkie learned skills during the nightly debates around the dinner table that would later serve him well. Although given the first name Lewis, Willkie was known from childhood by his middle name. Herman Willkie, who had come from Prussia with his parents at age 4, was intensely involved in progressive politics, and in 1896 took his sons to a torchlight procession for Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan, who had come to Elwood during his campaign. The Willkie boys had a sidewalk fight with Republican youths, and though the Willkies won their fight, Bryan did not, defeated by former Ohio governor William McKinley. When Bryan ran again in 1900, he stayed overnight at the Willkie home, and the Democratic candidate for president became the first political hero for the boy who would later seek that office. By the time Willkie reached age 14 and Elwood High School, his parents were concerned about a lack of discipline and a slight stoop, and sent him to Culver Military Academy for a summer in an attempt to correct both. Willkie began to shine as a student at high school, inspired by his English teacher; one classmate said that Philip "Pat" Bing "fixed that boy up. He started preaching to Wendell to get to work and that kid went to town." Faced with a set of athletic brothers—Edward became an Olympic wrestler—Willkie joined the football team but had little success; he enjoyed the debate team more, but was several times disciplined for arguing with teachers. He was class president his final year, and president of the most prominent fraternity, but resigned from the latter when a sorority blackballed his girlfriend, Gwyneth Harry, as the daughter of immigrants. During Willkie's summer vacations from high school, he worked, often far from home. In 1909, aged 17, his odyssey took him from Aberdeen, South Dakota, where he rose from dishwasher to co-owner of a flophouse, to Yellowstone National Park, where he was fired after losing control of the horses drawing a tourist stagecoach. Back in Elwood, Herman Willkie was representing striking workers at the local tin plate factory, and in August journeyed with Wendell to Chicago in an attempt to get liberal attorney Clarence Darrow to take over the representation. They found Darrow willing, but at too high a price for the union to meet; Darrow told Wendell Willkie, "there is nothing unethical in being adequately compensated for advocating a cause in which you deeply believe." After graduation from Elwood High in January 1910, Willkie enrolled at Indiana University in Bloomington. There, he became a student rebel, chewing tobacco, reading Marx, and petitioning the faculty to add a course on socialism to the curriculum. He also involved himself in campus politics, successfully managing the campaign of future Indiana governor Paul McNutt for student office, but when Willkie ran himself, he was defeated. He graduated in June 1913, and to earn money for law school, taught high school history in Coffeyville, Kansas, coaching debaters and several sports teams. In November 1914, he left his job there for one as a lab assistant in Puerto Rico arranged by his brother Fred. Wendell Willkie saw workers badly abused; the experience deepened his commitment to social justice. Willkie enrolled at Indiana School of Law in the fall of 1915. He was a top student, and graduated with high honors in 1916. At the commencement ceremony, with the state supreme court present, he gave a provocative speech criticizing his school. The faculty withheld his degree, but granted it after two days of intense debate. Willkie joined his parents' law firm, but volunteered for the United States Army on April 2, 1917, the day President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress for a declaration of war against Germany. An army clerk transposed Willkie's first two names, and, unwilling to invest the time to have the bureaucracy correct it, kept his name as Wendell Lewis Willkie. Commissioned as a first lieutenant, Willkie was sent for artillery training, meaning he did not embark for France until September 1918. In January of that year, he married Edith Wilk, a Rushville, Indiana librarian; the couple had one son, Philip. The war ended before Willkie reached the front, and he spent his time defending soldiers who had slipped away for time in Paris against orders. He was recommended for promotion to captain, but was discharged in early 1919 before the paperwork went through.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Wendell Willkie」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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