Red Scare and McCarthyism target domestic radicals (1 gen 1947 anni – 1 gen 1959 anni)

Descrizione:

The suspicion of subversives that helped to thwart the Fair Deal turned into a much wider Red Scare that would prove longer lasting and farther reaching than the one that followed World War I (see “The Red Scare” in Chapter 21). Many Americans believed that Communists and Communist sympathizers posed a significant threat to American life. There were legitimate reasons for concern, including leaks of information to the Soviet Union from the highest levels of government. Soviet intelligence records released after the 1991 disintegration of the USSR showed that an assistant secretary of the treasury, White House aids, scientists and technicians working on the Manhattan Project, and hundreds more across departments and agencies passed secrets to Moscow. How was this to be explained and what, many inside and outside of government asked, ought to be done about it?


Many who leaked information were idealistic New Dealers, who entered government at a moment when the Soviet-backed Popular Front made communism appear merely a more left-leaning version of liberalism and progressivism, and thus sympathetic to many liberals. But passing secrets to another country, even a wartime ally, was simply indefensible to many Americans — particularly when it came to atomic secrets. Historians generally conclude that the flow of information to the USSR had largely ceased by 1947, due to vigorous counterintelligence and the departure of many amateur spies for careers in the private sector. But the danger of espionage and Communist sympathizers remained potent — and ripe for political opportunism.


The meteoric career of Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin marked both the height and the rapid decline of the Red Scare. In February 1950, the previously unremarkable McCarthy delivered a bombshell during a speech to the Republican Women’s Club in Wheeling, West Virginia: “I have here in my hand a list of 205… a list of names that were made known to the Secretary of State as being members of the Communist Party and who nevertheless are still working and shaping policy in the State Department.” McCarthy would cite different numbers in different speeches, and never released any names or proof. But he had gained the attention he sought from the press and the public (see “Firsthand Accounts”).

For the next four years, McCarthy waged a virulent smear campaign from his position as chair of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Critics who disagreed with him exposed themselves to charges of being “soft” on communism. McCarthy was distinctly unsuccessful in proving communist influence in the government, but he rose to national prominence by aggressively grilling witnesses he called before the committee and through his appearances on radio and television. He was poor at investigating but skilled at publicity. Truman condemned McCarthy’s accusations as “slander, lies, [and] character assassination,” but could do nothing to curb him. McCarthy’s fellow Republicans largely refrained from publicly challenging the outspoken senator and, on the whole, were content to reap the political benefits. McCarthy’s charges almost always targeted Democrats.

Despite McCarthy’s failure to identify a single Communist in government, other developments gave his charges credibility with the public. The dramatic 1951 espionage trial of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, followed around the world, was fueled by what had become known as “McCarthyism.” An electrical engineer who worked with the U.S. Army Signal Corps, Julius Rosenberg passed atomic secrets to the Soviets in the 1940s. After a contentious trial in which Julius and Ethel were both convicted, the Rosenbergs were executed in 1953. Documents released decades later confirmed Julius Rosenberg’s guilt, though not Ethel’s. Their execution remains contentious — in part because some felt that anti-Semitism played a role in their sentencing. Also fueling McCarthy’s investigations were a series of trials of American Communists between 1949 and 1955 for violation of the 1940 Smith Act, which prohibited Americans from advocating the violent overthrow of the government. Though civil libertarians and two Supreme Court justices vigorously objected, dozens of Communist Party members were convicted. McCarthy was not involved in either the Rosenberg trial or the Smith Act convictions, but these sensational events lent his wild charges some plausibility.

In early 1954, McCarthy finally overreached with an investigation into subversive activities in the U.S. Army. When lengthy hearings — the first of their kind broadcast on the new medium of television — brought McCarthy’s tactics into the nation’s living rooms, support for him plummeted. The senator’s bullying and self-serving accusations, captured by live television cameras broadcasting coast to coast, offended Americans who had previously only read about McCarthy in newspapers and magazines. In December 1954, the Senate voted 67 to 22 to censure McCarthy for unbecoming conduct. He died from an alcohol-related illness three years later at the age of forty-eight. His name became the symbol of a period of political repression of which he was only the most flagrant manifestation.


These 1954 hearings contributed to the downfall of Senator Joseph McCarthy by exposing his reckless accusations and bullying tactics to the huge television audience that tuned in each day. Some of the most heated exchanges took place between McCarthy (center) and Joseph Welch (seated, left), the lawyer representing the army. When the gentlemanly Welch finally asked, “Have you no sense of decency sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?” he fatally punctured McCarthy’s armor. The audience broke into applause because someone had finally had the courage to stand up to the senator from Wisconsin.

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