Seven Days in May

In 1964, the Brazilian military overthrew the legal civilian government under the leadership of President Joao Goulart.  The generals feared he was tilting Brazil toward communism.  

The coup had the support of the US government under President Lyndon Baines Johnson.  In its 234 year history, the US has never suffered a military overthrow of its own.

The book, Seven Days in May, was published in 1962.  Its plot concerned a fictional attempted military takeover of the US government.  The rationale was a difference of opinion over a disarmament treaty with the Soviet Union.

The movie, Seven Days in May, was released in 1964.  It starred Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas, Frederick March, Ava Gardner, Edmund O'Brien (nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, but won by Peter Ustinov in Topkapi) and Martin Balsam.  Interestingly, Lancaster, Gardner and O'Brien all appeared in the 1946 film, The Killers.

In the book and the movie, General Scott (Lancaster), Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, plots a coup.  His assistant, Colonel Casey (Douglas), not part of the coup, discovers some suspicious information.  He informs the president (March).  O'Brien and Balsam play two of those loyal to the president.  

Gardner plays Scott's former mistress.  In The Killers, Lancaster and Gardner were also lovers, but in Seven Days in May, they have no scenes together.

The book ends with the President making the following statement:  

"Now, this country has been in existence almost two hundred years, and our roots as a republic go back much farther than that. We were given the finest Constitution ever written by men. You know, it is unique. There is no political document like it in history, because it was written all at once, from scratch, but it still has lasted and it has been adaptable to changes the founding fathers could not have dreamed of.

That Constitution and the whole governmental structure that flows from it are taught as basic subjects, bread-and- •butter, at the service academies, even more than at our other colleges and schools. The cadets and midshipmen there absorb it. And throughout their careers they live with it much more than do most civilians. They read it on their commissions, and it is part of their oath of office. They fight for it, of course, as junior officers, and as senior officers they never question its arrangements for ultimate civilian authority, no matter how much they may differ with the elected officials on some particular issue.

So, when you think about it, this is perhaps the finest tradition of our military services, and it is certainly one of the most important now, because with missiles and satellites and nuclear weapons, military commanders could take control of any nation by just pushing some buttons.

I am sure the American people do not believe that any such thought ever entered the mind of any general officer in our services since the day the country began. Let us pray that it never will."