9. Silencing Father Coughlin was a tasked FDR assigned to Kennedy
Father Charles Coughlin was a former FDR supporter who turned against the president in 1934, excoriating him on radio broadcasts and newspapers and magazine articles as a “tool of the rich”. By 1934 Coughlin was broadcasting to his large audience, many of whom were Catholic and all of whom were far-right, antisemitic messages which also demanded the federal government nationalize the railroads, the financial industry, communications, and other industries. Near the end of the decade Coughlin, who like Kennedy was Irish-Catholic, was supporting many of the policies of the Nazis and the Fascists in Europe.
After Kennedy warned the president that Coughlin was becoming “very dangerous” FDR tasked him with finding a way to silence him. Kennedy approached then Auxiliary Bishop of Boston, Francis Spellman, who in turn contacted Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, Secretary of State for the Vatican. Coughlin was finally silenced through a combination of Church orders and changes to broadcast licensing regulations which deemed the airwaves a “limited national resource”, regulated as publicly owned. Cardinal Pacelli later was elevated to the papacy, serving as Pope Pius XII.