Finnish PresidentPehr Evind Svinhufvud gave a radio address telling participants in theMäntsälä rebellion and informed them that, with the exception of the rebellion leaders, they had the opportunity to return home without punishment before Finnish troops moved into crush the uprising.[2] Four days later, those participants who chose not to flee were captured.
U.S. PresidentHerbert Hoover consulted with Attorney GeneralWilliam D. Mitchell on the Lindbergh kidnapping. Mitchell announced afterward that every agency in theDepartment of Justice would do its utmost to assist New Jersey's state authorities, even though the kidnapping was not a federal case.[3]
Congress voted to send the proposedTwentieth Amendment to the United States Constitution to the 48 U.S. states for ratification, moving the presidential inauguration date up from March 4 to January 20 and eliminatinglame-duck sessions of Congress. The amendment would be ratified by the required two-thirds (36) of the states by January 23, 1933.[4]
Takuma Dan, the Director-General of Japan's theMitsui Corporation, wasshot to death as he was walking into the Mitsui Bank headquarters inTokyo. Dan's killing was the second successful assassination by Japan's League of Blood afterJunnosuke Inoue had been killed a month earlier.[2]
German diplomat Fritz von Twardowski was wounded by a student in Moscow who fired four shots at him before being overpowered by police.[7]
Four people were killed and 30 were injured in clashes between police and thousands of unemployed protesters outside of theFord Motor Company plant inDearborn, Michigan.[2][10]
New York state GovernorFranklin D. Roosevelt won theNew Hampshire Democratic presidential primary, the first of the state primary elections to determine delegates for the nominating convention.[11]
Charles Lindbergh's attorney received a third ransom note, informing that an intermediary appointed by the Lindberghs would not be accepted. That same day, John F. Condon, a retired school principal inthe Bronx, published an offer to act as a neutral go-between and to pay an additional $1,000.[1] Condon's offer was accepted by the kidnapper the next day and he received four more notes during the month (on March 12, 16, 21 and 30), outlining the kidnappers demands, followed by the arrangements for a ransom payment in April.
The Soviet Union refused to recognize Manchukuo as a legitimate state.[14]
An explosion at a gas plant inCamden, New Jersey killed 14 people. A fifteenth victim died the next day.[15]
Born:Ron Kline, American baseball player who was on teams in nine different major league cities between 1952 and 1970; inCallery, Pennsylvania (d. 2002)
Germany's PresidentPaul von Hindenburg gave a radio address in his one and only public speech of the German presidential campaign, emphasizing his non-party status and pledging to "oppose those who merely stand for party interests".[16]
Ireland's new prime ministerÉamon de Valera cut his own salary and that of his cabinet ministers as part of an economy drive.[17]
Adolf Hitler, the closest challenger to President Hindenburg in theGerman presidential election, issued a statement denying rumors that his Nazi Party was planning to stage acoup d'état after Sunday's voting. "The National Socialist Movement today has less reason than ever before to abandon the legal path it has taken and on which the system will be forced to its knees", Hitler's statement read. "All of the rumors circulating to the effect that the NSDAP is planning a putsch are false and to be seen as typical signs of our opponents' election campaign."[18]
Died:
Dora Carrington, 38, British artist, committed suicide with a gun two months after the death of her former lover,Lytton Strachey
Hermann Gunkel, 69, German theologian and Old Testament scholar
Ivar Kreuger, one of the wealthiest financiers in Sweden who controlled more than two-thirds of the production of matches with money raised from investors through a Ponzi scheme, was found dead from a gunshot wound in his Paris hotel room, a day before he was scheduled to answer questions from theSveriges Riksbank about the insolvency of his Kreurger & Toll Company. Sweden's State Council hastily attempted to put a moratorium on Sweden's foreign debt payments, creating a business panic.[19]
Born:Andrew Young, U.S. politician and former American ambassador to the United Nations; inNew Orleans
Died:Ivar Kreuger, 52, Swedish civil engineer and industrialist (suicide)
TheGerman presidential election was held. AlthoughPaul von Hindenburg beat runner-up Adolf Hitler by more than 7 million votes, he fell less than 1% short of the 50% majority required to win outright, so arun-off election had to be held on April 10.[20]
Sweden ordered its stock exchange closed until further notice.[21]
On the first day of trading since the suicide of Ivar Kreuger, stocks and bonds connected to Kreuger's financial empire plummeted as part of the phenomenon known as the "Kreuger Crash".[22][23]
George Eastman, 77, American entrepreneur who founded theEastman Kodak film and camera manufacturing company, shot himself in the heart after a painful illness of several years. He left a suicide note that read, "To my friends, my work is done – Why wait? GE."[24]
Patrick Reynolds, 45, Irish politician, died of wounds sustained in a shooting one month earlier on February 14.
John F. Condon, the intermediary between the Lindbergh family and the kidnapper of their baby, received a baby's one-piece sleeper pajamas in the mail, sent as proof by the kidnapper of the baby's identity.[1]
Nazi headquarters throughoutPrussia were raided by police looking for evidence of a Nazi plot to plunge the country into civil war. Hitler issued a statement calling the raids "a political maneuver inspired by anxiety over the intended rescue from defeat of theSocialist Party at the forthcoming diet elections", stating further, "I have long known that the raids were planned. Minister [Carl]Severing knows that the seizure of power by the National Socialists is only a question of time, but this maneuver will not save his party from coming to ruin."[27]
The German government declared an "Easter truce" from March 18 to April 3, forbidding open air political meetings, political speeches and distribution of political posters and leaflets.[27]
The United States announced that it would refuse to recognize the Japanese puppet republic ofManchukuo.[28]
Chauncey Olcott, 73, American stage actor, singer and songwriter who was profiled in the 1947 filmMy Wild Irish Rose
Harry Powers (Harm Drenth), 38, Netherlands-born American serial killer who murdered at least five women in his home inQuiet Dell, West Virginia, was hanged in the West Virginia Penitentiary
Theodor Duesterberg essentially withdrew from the second round of the German presidential election when theNationalist Party that backed him announced it would not be participating.[31]
Mexican bandits derailed a train 12 miles (19 km) north ofQuerétaro, killing two passengers. The ensuing attack was quickly repulsed by a small guard and one bandit was slain.[35]
Chief Buffalo Child Long Lance (pen name for Sylvester Clark Long), 41, African-American journalist, writer and actor who claimed to have been a Cherokee Indian; from a gunshot wound presumed to be a suicide
Ilya Ivanovich Ivanov, 61, Russian biologist and animal breeder known for his experiments with artificially inseminating female chimpanzees with human sperm in an attempt to create a hybrid species
Born:Walter Gilbert, U.S. geneticist and 1980 Nobel Chemistry laureate for his work in determining the sequence of nucleotides in nucleic acid; inBoston
The Irish government released an official statement declaring that theIrish Free State had the right to modify the constitution by removing theOath of Allegiance to the King, and that the results of the recent election constituted a mandate to do so.[37]
Nazi publications were banned across Germany for durations varying from five to fourteen days after publishing attacks that were supposedly endangering theWeimar Republic. The Communist newspaperThe Red Flag was also banned for five days.[39]
A Japanese government spokesman said that Japan would quit theLeague of Nations if it asserted undue pressure over the situation in Manchuria and Shanghai and that the dispute could only be settled through direct talks with China.[42]
British pastorHarold Davidson was brought before court to answer charges that he had pursued and molested young girls. The case became a notorious tabloid sensation.[45][46]
Died:Filippo Turati, 74, Italian sociologist, criminologist and Socialist politician
John F. Condon received a new demand from the Lindbergh baby's kidnappers threatening to raise the amount of the ransom demanded from $70,000 to $100,000.[1]
Born:Ted Morgan, Swiss-born French-American writer, inGeneva (d. 2023)
^"U. S. Orders Out Secret Agents in Lindbergh Hunt".Chicago Daily Tribune. March 3, 1932. p. 2.
^Cashman, Sena Dennis (1998).America Ascendant: From Theodore Roosevelt to FDR in the Century of American Power, 1901–1945. New York University Press. p. 278.ISBN978-0-8147-1566-6.
^Powell, John (March 5, 1932). "China Refuses Parley to End War With Japs".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 1.
^Allen, Jay (March 5, 1932). "League Demans Japan Take Her Troops from Shanghai".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 8.
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