As remembered by Dick Huemer in Funnyworld number 22.
Almost immediately after the outbreak of World War II, Walt Disney formed a liaison with Henry Morgenthau, Jr., then President Roosevelt’s Secretary of the Treasury, to produce, at the government’s expense, a propaganda animated cartoon film to be called The New Spirit, ostensibly designed to bolster the morale of the American people—as if they needed any bolstering against Hitler and his passel of hoodlums—as well as (if they should happen to get hold of a print) knock the knockwurst out of his arrogant Nasties. […]