Reports that Major Gen. Smedley D. Butler had been approached by a group of wealthy Wall Street men, who offered him $3,000,000 with which to organize a Fascist army of 500,000 volunteers for the purpose of marching on Washington and seizing control of the United States government, were verified yesterday afternoon by the retired Marine Corps officer in his testimony before an executive hearing of the Congressional committee to investigate un-American activities in the United States.
Besides Butler, Capt. Samuel Glazier, head of the Civilian Conservation Corps camp in Elk Ridge, Md.; Paul Comly French, reporter for Philadelphia and New York newspapers, and Gerald P. Mac-Guire, employe of the New York brokerage firm of Grayson M.-P. Murphy, appeared as witnesses at the session, held in the Bar Association Building, 42 West Forty-fourth street.
Butler, it was learned, accused MacGuire of having first unfolded the scheme to him. The ex-Marine, who spent three hours with Congressmen John W. McCormack and Samuel Dickstein, said he had refused to consider the proposal because it “smacked of treason.”
DENIES CHARGES
MacGuire, discussing the charges with reporters, made a categorical denial, and complained he was being made the “goat” in an elaborate publicity stunt. He referred plaintively to his wife and five children, and expressed fear that yesterday’s developments may cost him his job.
Members of the Congressional
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