The Red Scare

Paranoia and Persecution in the U.S.A

Roots of Communist Fear

Throughout the first half of the 20th century, American leaders were concerned about subversive activity in the United States.

• Civil unrest during the Progressive Movement• Russian Revolution (1917)• Communist Party in America

Could a socialist/Marxist revolution take place in the United States?

First Response to Fear1938 House Un-American

Activities Committee (HCUA) established to investigate un-American and subversive activities.

1940 The Smith Act makes avowing or circulating subversive ideas punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

Cold War Anxiety

Race to make the atomic bomb:

1945 America tests the first atomic weapon in New Mexico.

1949 USSR tests its first atomic weapon.

Communist-backed conflicts:

China, Czechoslovakia, and Korea fuel fears of the

domino effect.

1947 Truman’s “loyalty board” investigated government employees for Communist affiliation. No espionage was uncovered, but 500 people lost their jobs.

Suspicion Grows

1948 Hollywood

Blacklist Formed

The Hollywood 10 became the most famous victims of the communist witch hunt.

They refused to cooperate with HUAC claiming that the committee’s questions violated their constitutional rights.

They were cited for Contempt of Congress and sentenced to prison terms ranging from six months to one year.

Other screenwriters and actors saved themselves by implicating colleagues.

Entertainers accused of Communist sympathies were banned from the film industry.

Fears Confirmed

In 1948, code breakers deciphered a World War II Soviet cable concerning America’s progress on the atomic bomb.

The report was written by Klaus Fuchs, a scientist who had worked on the Manhattan Project.

Here was proof that the world’s most secret weapons project had been

infiltrated!

• German-born scientist who had fled Germany to Britain and then the United States.

• Recruited to the Manhattan Project in 1943.

• Confessed to espionage in 1950 and sentenced to 14 years in prison.

• Upon release, continued his scientific career in East Germany.

Klaus Fuchs

The Alger Hiss Case1948-1950

• In 1948, Whitaker Chambers, a respected journalist and editor of Time magazine, testified before HUAC.

• He claimed to have been a member of the Communist Party during the 1920’s and 1930’s and a courier of information to Soviet agents.

• He accused Alger Hiss of giving him classified documents for transmittal to the USSR.

Whitaker Chambers

“I am not and never have been a member of the Communist party.”

Hiss testifying before HUAC

Alger Hiss

•Hiss denied the allegations against him.

•He was convicted of perjury and sentenced to five years in prison.

•He spent the rest of his life trying to prove his innocence.

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg

First Americans convicted and executed for treason in peace time

• Between 1946 and 1950 Julius worked with his brother in-law David Greenglass in a small surplus war-material business.

• Greenglass had previously worked on the atomic bomb project at Los Alamos, New Mexico in 1944 and 1945.

• In 1950 David Greenglass was arrested and indicted on charges of spying.

• Greenglass testified against the Rosenbergs. He was sentenced to prison and released in 1960.

• The Rosenbergs were tried by jury in March 1951 and found guilty.

• They were executed on June 19, 1953.

Senator Joseph McCarthy

On February 9, 1950, Joseph McCarthy made a speech declaring that the State Department had been infiltrated by communists.

During the next three years, he repeatedly accused various high-ranking officials of subversive activities.

The McCarthy hearings were widely publicized in the press, on the radio, and on television

Few had the courage to questionMcCarthy’s investigative methods for fear of themselves being accused.

McCarthy was finally censured by Congress for his dubious allegationsagainst government officials as wellas artists such a Arthur Miller andLangston Hughes.

Aftermath of the Red Scare

• Whitaker Chambers and Alger Hiss both wrote best-selling novels telling their stories.

• History suggests that the Rosenbergs may have been involved in spy activities, but their trial was a farce, and their executions were motivated by Cold War fear and anti-Semitism.

• In 1996, the State Department obtained documents from Russia that they believe confirm Alger Hiss was a Soviet spy.

And something like that could never happen

today…