It Can't Happen Here

Lorinda sells her remaining interest in the Tavern and becomes Titus’s live-in housekeeper in order to divert suspicion about their activities. The news causes a minor scandal in town, but people are more concerned with not having enough to eat. With Lorinda now living at the headquarters of the New Underground cell, Jessup is able to regularly spend evenings with her, with Buck’s approval. Jessup finds her even more physically attractive and the two begin acting more like a regular couple. Jessup has come to find their revolutionary spy activities romantic and fun; he dreams that they will either succeed in their mission and head to Bermuda or die in each other’s arms.

One morning in mid-March, after waking up together, Lorinda points out that both of them have become more cautious in their activities, and that she fears that they have been prioritizing their relationship over the revolution. She confesses that she has been ordered to go to Beecher Falls, on the Canadian border, in order to start another New Underground cell under the guise of opening a tea room. Jessup realizes that the move was her idea, which she confirms, telling him that “the world's in chains, and I can't be free to love till I help tear them off” (282). Lorinda adds that she wishes things were different and that they could have been together when they were younger. She then leaves that same day.

It’s now April 1938, and Sissy is to have dinner in the evening with Ledue and Staubmeyer, hoping that Ledue will brag about his graft and corruption to her, as well as who he is considering sending to the concentration camp next. Julian objects, worried that Ledue will rape her. Sissy tells him she’s not concerned by the possibility if it allows her to help people.

After dinner at Ledue’s new private hotel suite, Ledue sends Staubmeyer away and attempts to kiss Sissy, bragging that he’ll soon be a Commander. Sissy demurs, and tells Ledue that she thinks of him as her oldest friend, and asks him to protect Jessup. Sissy attempts to get Ledue to reveal details of who they’ll send to the concentration camps next, but he gets suspicious and begins to sexually assault her. Sissy makes an excuse to flee to the bathroom, where she tries and fails to make a rubbing or mold of Ledue’s keys. Quickly fleeing the hotel suite, Sissy runs into Julian in the hallway; Julian was preparing to kill Shad if he’d done anything to Sissy. Sissy reassures him that nothing happened and tells him that she didn’t get any information.

Sissy’s courage with Ledue gives Julian the impetus to join the Minute Men in order to pass information to Jessup’s cell. The two fake a breakup, and Julian also stages a public falling-out with the Jessup family. After joining the Minute Men, Julian meets Sissy every evening in a secluded grove to pass on information. The first time Sissy sees him in uniform, she panics, and begins to realize the enormity of the situation they are all in.

The chapter beings by describing the massive propaganda apparatus of the Corpo state, which by now includes: college presidents; former war correspondents; former governors; former union leaders; and former PR men from large companies. Corpo-run papers by this point print only Corpo propaganda and devote more and more space to comic strips. Under the direction of Macgoblin, Hollywood is heavily subsidized by the state and is forced to produce films that show the glory of the Minute Men and the Corpo state.

The folksy humor and pioneer independence that characterized the first year of Windrip’s regime have vanished, and America now resembles any other fascist state. Jessup realizes that all dictatorships share much in common: an environment of apprehension, denials of faith, random violent arrests, show trials, and the promise to make everyone richer (and then engaging in fraudulent accounting to show they had).

By this point, the size of the Army and the Minute Men has grown so large that it worries even loyal Corpos, and the regime finds itself struggling to pay for the swollen armed forces. Windrip forcibly increases production of goods via threats, then expropriates those goods and sells them cheaply overseas to raise revenue. As people have less and less to eat, the Corpos begin seizing seed grain from farmers, who can no longer grow more and are forced into starvation. Taxes are imposed on all recreational and leisure activities and between the taxes and the fear of spies, even young people no longer engage in leisure.

With Lorinda gone, Jessup finds himself losing his romanticized notion of revolution and envying those working from outside America. He also feels that their amateur spy work is futile in the face of the enormous Corpo propaganda machine. While he can no longer find a good reason to keep “seeking after righteousness in a world which so hated righteousness” (297), Jessup nonetheless continues his work.

In June 1938, Francis Tasbrough comes to speak to Jessup at his home. Tasbrough tells him that Col. Haik is taking over as Secretary of War, and is also replacing Sarason as High Marshall of the Minute Men. This has opened up a position for District Commissioner, which Tasbrough is being considered for. He asks Jessup to support him by claiming that Jessup was won over to Corpoism by Tasbrough. If Jessup goes along with this, Tasbrough promises to put Jessup back in charge at the Informer or give him any other position he likes. Jessup turns down the offer, which greatly offends Tasbrough.