Most Americans have grown up believing that during the 50's, a junior senator from Wisconsin exploited the paranoia of millions to boost his own undistinguished career. From his investigation of the Voice of America broadcast service, to the U.S. Army, Senator Joseph McCarthy claimed that many government agencies had been infiltrated by the Communists.
Even most conservatives still accept the common view of Senator McCarthy. But today many authors, including William Norman Grigg, Medford Stanton Evans, and Ann Coulter, believe his place in history deserves a new look.
Here’s a quick look at some facts:
The Soviet Union had used Communist, leftist, or just plain greedy U.S. citizens to carry out espionage activities in America since the 20’s.
The GRU worked throughout the 1930’s to create a network of spies in FDR’s administration. These included Alger Hiss, Lee Pressman, and John Abt.
American editor and writer Whittaker Chambers spied for the Soviets but later denounced Communism. Chambers testified against Alger Hiss for perjury and espionage in 1948. A list of other accused Soviet spies working with Chambers included:
Victor Perlo, head of the Aviation Section at the War Production Board. He later joined the Treasury Department;
Henry Collins, who worked for the National Recovery Agency and the Agricultural Adjustment Administration;
Donald Hiss, Alger’s brother, Donald worked for the State Department;
Lee Pressman, assistant general counsel of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration;
Nathaniel Weyl, an author;
Charles Kramer, who worked for the Department of Labor;
John Herrman, author, who worked for the AAA;
Nathan Witt, employed by the Labor Department and the AAA;
Marion Bachrach, office manager for Representative John Bernard;
and George Silverman, employed by the Railroad Retirement Board, Federal Coordinator of Transport, U.S. Tariff Commission, and NRA.
Other liberal Americans tied to the Soviets included Jacob Golos and Elizabeth Bentley. Nathan Gregory Silvermaster and Harry Dexter White, two Treasury Department officials, were Communists.
Journalist Walter Duranty of the New York Times won a Pulitzer Prize in 1932. Duranty’s work was highly biased in favor of the Soviets, and he even covered up Josef Stalin’s forced famine of the Ukranians. The Pulitzer has never been revoked.
Joe McCarthy was attacked by liberals for his 1953-54 investigations of security at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. In 1979, Senator Barry Goldwater addressed the reason the Army's secret Fort Monmouth operations had been moved to Arizona in his book With no apologies:
Carl Hayden, who in January 1955 became chairman of the powerful Appropriations Committee of the United States Senate, told me privately Monmouth had been moved because he and other members of the majority Democratic Party were convinced security at Monmouth had been penetrated. They didn't want to admit that McCarthy was right in his accusations. Their only alternative was to move the installation from New Jersey to a new location in Arizona.
Carl Bernstein, son of American communists Albert and Sylvia Bernstein, released a book titled Loyalties: A Son’s Memoir in 1989. Albert Bernstein voiced fear that the book would prove all of McCarthy’s claims right:
You're going to prove [Sen. Joseph] McCarthy was right, because all he was saying is that the system was loaded with Communists. And he was right. ... I'm worried about the kind of book you're going to write and about cleaning up McCarthy. The problem is that everybody said he was a liar; you're saying he was right. ... I agree that the Party was a force in the country.
The truth is, hundreds of American liberals had secret ties to the Soviet Union. Joseph McCarthy’s claims may not have been so far-fetched after all.
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