Pelley won a few thousand votes for president in 1936 on the [[Christian Party]] ticket. One of its first members was [[Gerald L. K. Smith]], himself the founder of the [[Christian Nationalist Church]] which supported [[Benito Mussolini|Mussolini]] and [[Adolf Hitler|Hitler]]. They enrolled a few white Protestants as members of a "Christian Militia", through numerous "State Encampments" and "Posts". The Silver Legion’s emblem was a scarlet letter "L", which was featured on their flags and uniforms.
While he preached against 'the international Jewish-Communist conspiracy' and the 'greediness of industrial capitalists,' Pelley never grounded his ideology in European fascism as did such writers as Lawrence Dennis. Christian millenarianism and nostalgia for a pre-industrial American utopia - the mainstays of Pelley's ideology - attracted most of his adherents. His influence waned after he dissolved the Silver Legion of America in 1940, and ended with his arrest for [[sedition ]] in 1942.
==Aims==