Uncategorized

Courtesy of YouTube, Soviet and German forces stage a joint victory parade in the eastern Polish city of Brest, September 23, 1939.

On September 1, 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland to mark the beginning of the Second World War in Europe. On September 17, 1939, 75 years ago today, the Soviet Union, in alliance with the Germans, invaded Poland from the east. Under the terms of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of August 23, 1939, the Third Reich and USSR agreed to partition eastern Europe between themselves. The Soviets gained control of the eastern half of Poland, plus the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia; the regions of Bessarabia and northern Bukovina from Romania; and parts of Finland obtained as a result of the “Winter War” of November 1939- March 1940.

In all, the Soviet portion of occupied Poland contained over 77,000 square miles of Polish territory, with a population of over 12 million people, constituting over half of pre-war Poland’s land and nearly 40% of its population. All of these lands were annexed to the Soviet Union. The Soviet occupation also exacted a devastating human toll. At least 30,000 Poles were killed in a series of mass executions, most famously the Katyn Forest massacre of April-May 1940. Over half a million other Poles were imprisoned or deported to the Gulag system of forced labor camps or to special settlements in Siberia or central Asia. An estimated 90,000-100,000 Poles died during these deportations. (Paczkowski, “Poland, the ‘Enemy Nation’,” 372; Kochanski, The Eagle Unbowed, 137-38)

The period of Nazi-Soviet alliance ended when Hitler invaded the USSR on June 22, 1941. Virtually all of the lands annexed by Stalin under the terms of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact were reclaimed by him in the wake of the victory over Nazi Germany in 1945. Poland was compensated for its territorial losses in the east with lands in the west taken from pre-war Germany. Poland became a Soviet-dominated communist satellite after the war, and would remain so until the fall of the Soviet empire in 1989.

The following is a select bibliography of CWIS documents and other publications concerning the Soviet invasion and occupation of eastern Poland in 1939-41, as well as the re-imposition of Soviet control after World War II. It includes items from the CWIS Collection, Joyner Library’s Federal Documents Collection, and from our general collection. This list is far from comprehensive, and is merely intended to provide an introduction to our relevant holdings and a starting point for research. Please contact David Durant, Federal Documents & Social Sciences Librarian, for further assistance on this topic.

 

1. CWIS Documents on Poland Under Communism

Communist Aggression Investigation: Fourth Interim Report. Hearings before the Select Committee on Communist Aggression, House of Representatives, Eighty-Third Congress, Second Session, under authority of H. Res. 346 and H. Res. 438. Part II, 1954.  (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. C 73/5: C 73/Pt. 2)

Documentary Testimony of Gen. Izyador Modelski: Former Military Attaché of the Polish Embassy, Washington, D.C.. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-First Congress, First Session. 1949. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: M 72)

Franciszek Jarecki — Flight to Freedom. Hearing Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Third Congress, First Session. 1953. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: J 28)

International Communism: Revolt in the Satellites: Staff Consultations with Dr. Jan Karski, Mihail Farcasanu, Joseph Lipski, Monsignor Bela Varga, Bela Fabian, Stevan Barankovics, Stanislaw Mikolajczyk, Ferenc Nagy. Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Fourth Congress, Second Session. 1957. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: C 73/72)

Investigation of Communist Aggression. Tenth Interim Report of Hearings before the Select Committee on Communist Aggression, House of Representatives, Eighty-Third Congress, Second Session, under authority of H. Res. 346 and H. Res. 438. Poland, Rumania, and Slovakia. 1954.  (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. C 73/5: C 73/2)

Investigation of Communist Takeover and Occupation of Poland, Lithuania, and Slovakia. Sixth Interim Report of Hearings before the Subcommittee on Poland, Lithuania, and Slovakia of the Select Committee on Communist Aggression, House of Representatives, Eighty-Third Congress, Second Session, under authority of H. Res. 346 and H. Res. 438. 1954.  (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. C 73/5: P 75)

The Katyn Forest Massacre. Hearings before the Select Committee to Conduct an Investigation of the Facts, Evidence and Circumstances of the Katyn Forest Massacre, Eighty-Second Congress, First[-Second] Session. 7 v., 1952. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. K 15: M 38/)

Lest We Forget: A Pictorial Summary of Communism in Action [in] Albania [and other countries]: Consultation with Klaus Samuli Gunnar Romppanen, Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Sixth Congress, Second Session. January 13, 1960. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: C 73/109; additional circulating copy in Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 73/109)

Soviet Espionage Through Poland. Hearing before the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, Eighty-Sixth Congress, Second Session. Testimony of Pawel Monat. 1960. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. J 89/2: SO 8/10)

Testimony of Dr. Marek Stanislaw Korowicz. Hearing Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Third Congress, First Session. 1953. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: K 84)

Who Are They? Prepared at the Request of the Committee on Un-American Activities by the Legislative Reference Service, Library of Congress. Part 5: Josip Broz Tito and Wladyslaw Gomulka (Yugoslavia-Poland). 1957. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: W 62/Pt. 5)

 

2. Additional Sources

Cienciala, Anna M., Natalia S. Lebedeva, and Wojciech Materski. Katyn: A Crime Without Punishment. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007. (Joyner Stacks D804 .S65 K359 2007)

Foreign Relations of the United States: The Soviet Union, 1933-1939. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1952. (Joyner Docs Stacks S 1.1: 933-939)

Foreign Relations of the United States, 1941: Volume I: General, The Soviet Union. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1958. (Joyner Docs Stacks S 1.1: 1941, V. 1)

Gross, Jan Tomasz. Revolution from Abroad: The Soviet Conquest of Poland’s Western Ukraine and Western Belorussia. Expanded ed. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002. (Joyner Stacks DK4415 .G76 2002)

Kochanski, Halik. The Eagle Unbowed: Poland and the Poles in the Second World War. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012. (Joyner Stacks D765 .K5755 2012)

‘Nazi-Soviet Relations 1939-1941.‘ The Avalon Project. Yale University Law School. (an extensive online compilation of translated German documents, including the full-text of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and all related agreements.)

Paczkowski, Andrzej.”Poland, ‘The Enemy Nation’.” in Stephane Courtois and Mark Kramer (eds.) The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999. (Joyner Stacks HX44 .L5913 1999)

Snyder, Timothy. Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin. New York: Basic Books, 2010. (Joyner Stacks DJK49 .S69 2010)

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. “German-Soviet Pact.” Holocaust Encyclopedia.

 

 

 

This post is in support of the exhibit “25th Anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall”, which will be available in Joyner Library from September 15 until November 15. The exhibit is located on the 1st floor hallway leading to Research & Instructional Services. Dean William Downs and Dr. Jill Twark will present a lecture on “The Berlin Wall:  A Historical and Photographic Exhibit to Commemorate the 25th Anniversary of its Fall” at 4:30 PM on Monday, September 15, in Room 2409, Joyner Library.

Erected by the Soviets in 1961 to stem the massive population flow from East Berlin to West Berlin, the Berlin Wall became the embodiment of the Cold War struggle between the U.S.-led west and the Soviet bloc. Ultimately, the wall came to symbolize the failure of Soviet communism to offer a viable alternative to liberal western capitalism. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 marked the end of the Cold War, the demise of communist East Germany and Soviet hegemony in eastern Europe, and just two years later, the Soviet Union itself. It paved the way for the reunification of Germany and subsequent growth of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and European Union.

The following is a select bibliography of items available in Joyner Library that are relevant to the Berlin Wall and the history of the German Democratic Republic (GDR: the communist East German state that existed from 1949-1990). It includes items from the CWIS Collection, Joyner Library’s Federal Documents Collection, and from our general collection. This list is far from comprehensive, and is merely intended to provide an introduction to our relevant holdings and a starting point for research. Please contact David Durant, Federal Documents & Social Sciences Librarian, for further assistance on this topic.

 

1. CWIS Documents on the GDR and Berlin Wall

An American Prisoner in Communist East Germany. Hearing Before the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws, of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, Eighty-Fifth Congress, Second Session. 1958. (Joyner Docs CWIS Y 4. J 89/2: P 93/7)

Analysis of the Khrushchev Speech of January 6, 1961.  Hearing Before the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws, of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, Eighty-Seventh Congress, First Session. 1961 (Joyner Docs CWIS Y 4. J 89/2: K 52/3) -June 16, 1961 assessment by scholar Dr. Stefan T. Possony. Includes analysis of Khrushchev’s actions in Berlin just prior to the wall going up.

The Erica Wallach Story. Report by the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Fifth Congress, Second Session. 1958. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: W 15) -The account of a woman arrested in the GDR and imprisoned from 1950-1955.

International Communism (Testimony of Ernst Tillich). Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-fourth Congress, Second Session. 1956. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: C 73/69) -Testimony regarding current conditions in East Berlin by a West Berlin-based activist.

Soviet Political Agreements and Results: The Words of American Statesmen who Negotiated With Soviet Representatives Since 1959.  Staff Study for the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws, of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, Volume II. 1964 (Joyner Docs CWIS Y 4. J 89/2: SO 8/6/V. 2) -Contains substantial material on the 1961 Berlin crisis.

Who Are They? Prepared at the request of the Committee on Un-American Activities by the Legislative Reference Service, Library of Congress. Part 4: Walter Ulbricht and Janos Kadar. 1957. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: W 62/Pt. 4) -Ulbricht was leader of the GDR from 1950-1973.

 

 

2. Additional Federal Documents on the GDR and Berlin Wall

At Cold War’s End: U.S. Intelligence on the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, 1989-1991. Benjamin B. Fischer (ed.) Center for the Study of Intelligence, Central Intelligence Agency, 1999.  (Joyner Docs Stacks: PREX 3.2: C 67)

Background: Berlin, City Between Two Worlds. Office of Public Affairs,U.S. Department of State, 1952. (Joyner Docs Stacks: S 1.74: 39)

Background: Berlin, City Between Two Worlds. Rev. ed. Office of Public Affairs,U.S. Department of State, 1960. (Joyner Docs Stacks: S 1.74: 61)

Background: Berlin-1961. Office of Public Services, Bureau of Public Affairs, U.S. Department of State, 1961. (Joyner Docs Stacks: S 1.74: 64/2)

Berlin Crisis: A Report on the Moscow Discussions, 1948, Including text of a note addressed to the Soviet Government on September 26 by the Governments of the United States, the United Kingdom, and France. U.S. Department of State, 1948. (Joyner Docs Stacks: S 1.74: 1)

The Berlin Crisis: Report to the Nation by President Kennedy, July 25, 1961. Office of Public Services, Bureau of Public Affairs, U.S. Department of State, 1961. (Joyner Docs Stacks: S 1.74: 63)

Current Foreign Policy: Berlin, The Four-Power Agreement. Office of Media Services, Bureau of Public Affairs, U.S. Department of State, 1971. (Joyner Docs Stacks: S 1.74: 73)

East Germany Under Soviet Control. Office of Public Affairs, U.S. Department of State, 1952. (Joyner Docs Stacks: S 1.74: 34)

Focus, Berlin: USIA in Action: United States Information Agency, 1963. (Joyner Docs Stacks IA 1.2 B 45)

Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963: The Berlin Crisis, 1962-1963. Office of the Historian, U.S. Department of State (Joyner Docs Stacks S 1.1: 1961-63, V. 15)

Grathwol, Robert P. and Donita M. Moorhus. American Forces in Berlin: Cold War Outpost, 1945-1994. U.S. Department of Defense, Legacy Resource Management Program, Cold War Project, 1994. (Joyner Docs Stacks: D 1.2: B 45/2)

The Soviet Note on Berlin: An Analysis. Public Services Division, U.S. Department of State, 1959. (Joyner Docs Stacks: S 1.74: 52)

 

3. Additional Sources

Childs, David and Richard J. Popplewell. The Stasi: The East German Intelligence and Security Service. New York: New York University Press, 1996. (Joyner Stacks DD287.4 .C45 1996)

Engel, Jeffrey A. The Fall of the Berlin Wall: The Revolutionary Legacy of 1989. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. (Joyner Stacks D860 .F35 2009)

Gelb, Norman. The Berlin Wall: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and a Showdown in the Heart of Europe. New York: Times Books, 1986. (Joyner Stacks DD881 .G45 1986)

Maier, Charles S. Dissolution: The Crisis of Communism and the End of East Germany. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1997. (Joyner Stacks DD289 .M34 1997)

Naimark, Norman M. The Russians in Germany: A History of the Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945-1949. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1995. (Joyner Stacks DD285 .N35 1995)

 

 

In the summer of 1948, Mary Wolfe Price made history when she became North Carolina’s first ever female gubernatorial candidate. That same summer, however, Price also dealt with headlines of a much more negative nature. In six appearances before congressional committees, Elizabeth Bentley, a self-confessed former Soviet spy, had identified Price as a secret Communist Party (CPUSA) member who committed espionage on behalf of the Soviet Union.  Price denied the charges, and many historians came to see Bentley’s accusations as a crude McCarthyite effort to silence a voice for progressive social change. Post Cold War archival revelations, however, have forced a reassessment of this view.

1. Mary Price

Mary Wolfe Price was born in Madison, NC in 1909, the 10th child of a poor tobacco farmer. Highly intelligent, she overcame her disadvantaged circumstances to attend the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and graduated in 1930. Price moved to New York in 1933, and in 1939 obtained a job at the New York Herald Tribune as secretary to the renowned columnist Walter Lippmann. She worked for Lippmann until 1943. After spending some time in Mexico, and then working in an executive position for a union, Price returned to North Carolina in the summer of 1945 and helped organize the North Carolina Committee of the Southern Conference for Human Welfare (SCHW). The SCHW was a strong advocate for labor rights and opponent of segregation. Price became secretary-treasurer of the committee, then executive secretary. At the end of 1947, Price resigned from her position with SCHW in order to help organize the North Carolina chapter of the newly-formed Progressive Party.

The Progressive Party was a left-wing third party created to support the 1948 presidential candidacy of Henry Wallace, Vice-President from 1941-1945, who had been left off of the 1944 ticket in favor of Harry Truman. Wallace and the Progressives ran on a platform of opposition to Wall Street, support for civil rights, and a foreign policy calling for accommodation of the Soviet Union. This led many to charge that the Progressive Party was a “front” organization secretly controlled by the CPUSA, a charge the Progressives vehemently dismissed as “red baiting.” Price played a leading role in creating the Progressive Party’s North Carolina chapter, and was subsequently elected chair. She helped organize the Wallace campaign in North Carolina.

2. Bentley’s Charges

On July 30, 1948, a woman named Elizabeth Bentley would appear before a subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Expenditures in Executive Departments. Her testimony would prove to be a bombshell. Bentley testified that she had secretly joined the CPUSA in 1935, and had been part of an extensive communist espionage apparatus that had penetrated the US government and furnished information to the NKVD, the Soviet secret police. Bentley’s espionage activities ended when she turned herself into the FBI in November 1945.

At the prompting of North Carolina Senator Clyde Hoey, Bentley stated that she had known Mary Price since about February 1941, that Price was a secret CPUSA member, and that Price had given her information from Walter Lippmann’s files to be passed on to the Soviets. In the next two weeks, Bentley subsequently appeared five times before the House Un-American Activities Committee, where she expanded upon her allegations against a number of individuals, including Mary Price.

While overshadowed by the accusations of Soviet espionage leveled at individuals such as Alger Hiss and Harry Dexter White, the charges against Price were widely publicized in North Carolina. According to historian Thomas W. Devine, the accusations against Price were actually regarded with skepticism in the North Carolina media, but did provide added fuel to the Progressives’ critics, some of whom were eager to tar any opposition to segregation as being communist-inspired. Price herself fully denied Bentley’s  charges, calling them “fantastic.” She summarized her reaction to the allegations in a 1976 oral history interview:

That’s my memory of it and I fell sure that’s right, because I know that my reaction was that this was a putup job to discredit the Progressive party, when the reporters came to see me in the office in Greensboro, my to my surprise, to tell me about this Elizabeth Bentley before the House Un-American Committee in Washington. She had said that she was an agent of the Soviet Union and she had been assisted by me. She got much publicity, you know. (Interview with Mary Price Adamson, 122)

While Price admitted knowing Elizabeth Bentley, she denied any involvement in espionage or the CPUSA:

I knew her on the basis that I had met her casually in New York as one does, and when she found out that I lived in Washington, and again, as I do, I had a bed in my apartment and said, “Look, if you haven’t got a place to stay, you can sleep over at my apartment.” I just didn’t think about it at all. So, she never asked to sleep there but she would call up and say she was on an expense account and how would I like to have dinner? Well, I just didn’t see anything in it but a casual business. (Interview with Mary Price Adamson, 122-3)

3. Price, Bentley, and Venona: Post Cold War Revelations

For many years, scholars tended to take Price’s denials at face value. Historian Mary Frederickson, who conducted the 1976 oral history interview, never asked if the charges were true, asking instead “Did you ever consider suing Bentley for libel?” (Interview with Mary Price Adamson, 125) Similarly, Sayoko Uesugi, in a 2002 article, stated that Bentley’s “charge was absurd.” (Uesugi, “Gender, Race, and the Cold War,” 305)  Starting in 1995, however, revelations from both American and Soviet archives have challenged this verdict and forced historians to reassess the question of Price’s guilt.

In 1995, the National Security Agency released the records of a 1940s program called Venona, which involved intercepting and decoding Soviet intelligence communications between Moscow and NKVD officers in the U.S. Among other revelations, the documents intercepted via Venona have greatly substantiated the truth of Elizabeth Bentley’s 1948 testimony and largely confirmed that those she identified were, in fact, engaged in espionage on behalf of the CPUSA and USSR, including Mary Price. Additional archival confirmation was provided by Russian journalist Alexander Vassiliev, who was briefly permitted to research Soviet intelligence archives in the mid-1990s and recorded extensive summaries of the documents he found.

The materials found in the Venona and Vassiliev files show that Mary Price, along with her sister Mildred, were both secret members of the CPUSA. Mary worked for the NKVD from 1941-1944, passing along information from Lippmann’s files. Lippmann had extensive connections with the highest levels of the U.S. government, and his files contained a great deal of sensitive information that never went into his columns. The NKVD thus greatly valued Price’s work. In addition to her own espionage, Price also recruited Duncan Lee, an officer with the OSS, forerunner of the CIA, as a Soviet source. Price served as his contact and handler, a relationship greatly complicated by the fact that the two had an affair.

The strain of espionage took a toll on Mary Price and was likely one of the main reasons she quit her job with Lippmann. In 1944, she asked CPUSA head Earl Browder to reassign her to “political work,” and her relationship with the NKVD ended. She was likely still a CPUSA member when she ran for governor. In the end, the Progressive Party campaign fared poorly in North Carolina, as it did nationwide. Mary Price eventually moved to California, where she died in 1980.

The case of Mary Price, beyond being a fascinating piece of North Carolina history, also has interesting historiographical implications. It is a good example of how new archival revelations can indeed occasionally overturn established historical interpretations. It also adds context to the longstanding debate between traditionalist and revisionist historians on the nature of the American Communist Party. Traditionalist scholars have emphasized the doctrinaire, conspiratorial nature of the CPUSA, as well as its subservience to the Soviet Union. Revisionists have focused on the genuine commitment of many CPUSA members to labor rights and ending racial discrimination. The life of Mary Price embodies both aspects of the CPUSA and shows the difficulty of disentangling them.

CWIS Sources:

Export Policy and Loyalty. Hearings before the Investigations Subcommittee of the Committee on Expenditures, United States Senate, Eightieth Congress, Second Session. Part 1, July 30, 1948. (Not yet part of CWIS Collection: Available in ProQuest Congressional; ECU users only)

Hearings Regarding Communist Espionage in United States Government. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eightieth Congress, Second Session. July 31-Sept. 9, 1948. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4.Un 1/2:C 73/6)

Report on Southern Conference for Human Welfare. Committee on Un-American Activities, U.S. House of Representatives, Eightieth Congress, First Session. June 16, 1947. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: Un 1/RPT. 592)

Other Original Sources:

Cold War International History Project: Venona Project and Vassiliev Notebooks Index and Concordance

Documenting the American South: Interview with Mary Price Adamson, April 19, 1976

Wilson Center Digital Archive: Vassiliev Notebooks 

Secondary Sources:

Bradley, Mark A. A Very Principled Boy: The Life of Duncan Lee, Red Spy and Cold Warrior. New York: Basic Books, 2014. (On order for Joyner Library)

Devine, Thomas W. Henry Wallace’s 1948 Presidential Campaign and the Future of Postwar Liberalism. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2013. (Joyner Stacks: E748 .W23 D48 2013)

Haynes, John Earl, Harvey Klehr and Alexander Vassiliev. Spies: The Rise and Fall of the KGB in America. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009. (Joyner Stacks: UB271.R9 H389 2009)

Olmsted, Kathryn S. Red Spy Queen: A Biography of Elizabeth Bentley. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002. (Joyner Stacks:HX84.B384 O45 2002)

Uesugi, Sayoko. “Gender, Race and the Cold War: Mary Price and the Progressive Party in North Carolina, 1945-1948.” The North Carolina Historical Review, 77 (3), 2000.

In the summer of 1948, Mary Wolfe Price (1909-1980), a Rockingham County native, was in the process of making history as the first woman to run for governor of North Carolina, on the Progressive Party ticket. On July 30, 1948,  she and her campaign would receive some extremely unwanted publicity, when she was identified before the Senate Committee on Expenditures in Executive Departments as a secret communist party member and former Soviet agent. Price was named by Elizabeth Bentley, a confessed former Soviet espionage operative who identified dozens of individuals as having been part of a communist spy ring inside the U.S. government during World War II. Bentley would expand on her testimony about Price and others in five appearances before the House Un-American Activities Committee between July 31-August 11, 1948, making headlines in North Carolina and across the nation.

Price strongly denied Bentley’s charges, and would continue to do so for the rest of her life. For several decades, Price would be portrayed as a victim of baseless, McCarthyite persecution. Since 1995, however, post Cold War archival revelations have forced historians to reconsider this view.

Please see our forthcoming August post for a detailed account of the Price-Bentley controversy and what we now know about it.

Correction (9-8-14): Mary Price had not yet been nominated as a candidate for governor when Elizabeth Bentley testified about her before Congress. For the full story, see the following post: https://sites.ecu.edu/cwis/2014/09/08/cwis-north-carolina-topic-2-1948-the-spy-who-ran-for-governor/

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MO2iiovYq70

Courtesy of YouTube, footage of Army attorney Joseph Welch’s famous denunciation of Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-WI), during the Army-McCarthy hearings, June 9, 1954: “Let us not assassinate this lad further, Senator. You have done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?”

June 9th marks the 60th anniversary of one of the most iconic moments in 20th Century American politics, the televised confrontation that marked both the beginning of the end of one of the controversial politicians in American history, as well as the instant when, in the words of author Robert Shogan, “television became the dominant force in American politics.” This was when a Boston lawyer named Joseph Welch would rebuke Senator Joseph R. McCarthy (R-WI) with a phrase that would resonate in American culture down to the present day, defining for many the negative side of countersubversive anti-communism.

 

1. The Rise of Joe McCarthy

McCarthy, elected to the Senate in 1946 after serving as a Marine intelligence officer in World War II, would first make his name as a “red-hunter” in February 1950. That month, McCarthy gave a blockbuster speech in Wheeling, WV, alleging widespread communist infiltration of the U.S. State Department. The resulting firestorm of controversy made McCarthy a national figure, revered by many countersubversive anti-communists, but hated by many moderates and liberals.

McCarthy thrived on the notoriety. He would remain in the news by making numerous charges of communist sympathies and even Soviet espionage against current and former officials in the State and Defense departments. On June 14, 1951, McCarthy made his infamous “a conspiracy so immense” speech, in which he viciously attacked the former Army Chief of Staff and Secretary of State George C. Marshall. “Without putting it in so many words,” as historian David M. Oshinsky put it, McCarthy “called the general a traitor to his country.” (Oshinsky, A Conspiracy so Immense, 200)

 

2. McCarthy vs. the Army

McCarthy would reach the pinnacle of his power in 1953. With Republicans winning a Senate majority in the 1952 congressional elections, McCarthy assumed the chairmanship of the Senate Committee on Government Operations and its Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (SPSI). As Chair of SPSI, McCarthy now had an institutional platform from which to launch investigations of real and alleged communists in the U.S. government.

After investigating such agencies as the Voice of America and the Government Printing Office, McCarthy and SPSI soon focused on the U.S. Army as a suitable target. SPSI launched inquiries of suspected disloyalty among Army civilian workers, as well as among servicemen at the Army Signal Corps facility at Ft. Monmouth, NJ. These investigations led to an increasingly bitter confrontation between Senator McCarthy and the Army, punctuated by the Wisconsin senator’s angry grilling of Brigadier General Ralph Zwicker at a hearing in February 1954. In March, the Army demanded that McCarthy fire his lead counsel, Roy Cohn, or else they would release a dossier documenting Cohn’s demands that the Army grant favorable treatment to David Schine, a McCarthy staffer drafted into the Army the previous year. McCarthy refused, and the Army released the dossier on March 11, 1954. McCarthy responded by accusing the Army of trying to blackmail him and otherwise obstruct SPSI’s efforts to investigate Army security lapses.

 

3. The Army-McCarthy Hearings

In the wake of this controversy, Senator McCarthy stepped down as Chair of SPSI. The subcommittee decided to conduct its own, public investigation of the “charges and countercharges” between McCarthy and the Army. As a party to the controversy, McCarthy was not allowed to sit on the subcommittee, but was permitted to attend and cross-examine witnesses. The Army’s appointed counsel, a Boston lawyer named Joseph Nye Welch, was given the same privileges. The hearings, which were televised live, began on April 22, 1954.

Over the course of the hearings, McCarthy found himself increasingly frustrated by the seemingly mild-mannered Welch. In Shogan’s words, McCarthy “endured Welch’s well-bred, taunting voice, his cultured sarcasm, his grating fondness for self-deprecation. And all the while the senator saw his own reputation  . . . slowly crumbling away.” McCarthy’s frustrations came to a head on June 9th. In the middle of Welch’s questioning of Roy Cohn, the senator from Wisconsin interjected to note that a young lawyer in Welch’s law firm, Fred Fisher, had once been a member of the communist-affiliated National Lawyers’ Guild. This despite the fact that Welch had made a deal with Roy Cohn not to bring up Fisher in return for not referring to Cohn’s draft deferrals, a deal that McCarthy had approved:

Senator MCCARTHY. Not exactly, Mr. Chairman, but in view of Mr. Welch’s request that the information be given once we know of anyone who might be performing any work for the Communist Party, I think we should tell him that he has in his law firm a young man named Fisher whom he recommended, incidentally, to do work on this committee, who has been for a number of years a member of an organization which was named, oh, years and years ago, as the legal bulwark of the Communist Party, an organization which always swings to the defense of anyone who dares to expose Communists. (Special Senate Investigation, pt. 59, 2426-2427)

Welch’s devastating response to McCarthy’s heavy-handed maneuver would become one of the most memorable quotes in American political history:

Let us not assassinate this lad further. Senator. You have done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency? (Special Senate Investigation, pt. 59, 2429)

This exchange has come to epitomize McCarthy’s brazenly confrontational style of public debate, what Oshinsky has described as “his windy speeches, his endless interruptions, his frightening outbursts. his crude personal attacks.” (Oshinsky, A Conspiracy so Immense, 464) It marked the culmination of a months-long decline in McCarthy’s popularity.

The Army-McCarthy hearings concluded on June 17, 1954. Their main impact was to deal an irreparable blow to McCarthy’s prestige and popularity. The Senate would vote to censure McCarthy in December, 1954, after which the senator from Wisconsin faded from the headlines until his death in 1957. His name would become a byword for all the excesses of the post WWII campaign against domestic communism.

 

CWIS Sources:

Army Signal Corps – Subversion and Espionage. Hearings before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Government Operations, United States Senate, Eighty-Third Congress, First (-Second) Session, pursuant to S. Res. 189. 1953-54, 11 pts. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4.G 74/6: AR 5/)

Communist Infiltration Among Army Civilian Workers. Hearing before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Government Operations, United States Senate, Eighty-Third Congress, First Session, pursuant to S. Res. 189. 1953. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4.G 74/6: C 73/2)

Communist Infiltration in the Army. Hearings before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Government Operations, United States Senate, Eighty-Third Congress, First (-Second) Session, pursuant to S. Res. 189. 1953-54, 4 pts. (Joyner Docs CWIS Y 4.G 74/6: C 73/3)

Executive Sessions of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Government Operations, 1953-54. 2003, 5 v. + index. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4.G 74/9: S.PRT. 107-84/)

Hearings on S. Res. 301. Hearings before a Select Committee to Study Censure Charges, United States Senate, Eighty-Third Congress, Second Session, pursuant to the order on S. Res. 301 and amendments. 1954, 2 pts. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4.C 33/4: H 35)

Special Senate Investigation on Charges and Countercharges Involving: Secretary of the Army Robert T. Stevens, John G. Adams, H. Struve Hensel and Senator Joe McCarthy, Roy M. Cohn, and Francis P. Carr. Hearings before the Special Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Government Operations, United States Senate, Eighty-Third Congress, Second Session, pursuant to S. Res. 189. 1954, 71 pts. + index. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4.G 74/6: ST 4/)

State Department Employee Loyalty Investigation. Hearings before a Subcommittee of the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, Eighty-First Congress, Second Session, pursuant to S. Res. 231. 1950, 3 pts. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4.F 76/2: St2/2/)

 

Additional Sources:

Morgan, Ted. Reds: McCarthyism in Twentieth-Century America. New York: Random House, 2003. (Joyner Stacks: E743.5 .M578 2003)

Oshinsky, David M. A Conspiracy so Immense: The World of Joe McCarthy. New York: Free Press, 1983. (Joyner Stacks: E748.M143 O73 1983)

Shogan, Robert. No Sense of Decency: The Army-McCarthy Hearings: A Demagogue Falls and Television Takes Charge of American Politics. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2009.  (Joyner Stacks: UB23 .S53 2009)

 

 

 

The American South was not a major focus of congressional countersubversive investigations,  for a number of reasons. The primary one was that the Communist Party of the USA (CPUSA) was much weaker in the south compared to the industrial northeast and the west coast. In addition, a number of those countersubversive investigations that did touch on the south were actually investigations of radical right-wing organizations, such as the Silver Legion of America in the 1930s, or the Ku Klux Klan in the 1960s. Despite all this, from the 1920s to the 1950s the CPUSA was active in the American South in areas such as labor organizing and civil rights. Such efforts did attract the attention of congressional countersubversive investigating committees, much of whose membership was motivated by a desire to label all efforts at union organization and African-American equality as communist inspired.

The following is a brief bibliography of publications stemming from congressional investigations of real and alleged communist activity in the American South. It is not a comprehensive list, and, as primary source documents, these items should be used judiciously and in concert with relevant secondary historical studies.

 

 1. House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) Investigations

Communist Infiltration and Activities in the South. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Fifth Congress, Second Session. 1958. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 73/95; circulating copy in Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 73/95, currently checked out)

Investigation of Communist Activities in the New Orleans, La., Area. Hearing Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Fifth Congress, First Session. 1957. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 73/73/)

Investigation of Communist Activities in the North Carolina Area. Hearing Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Fourth Congress, Second Session. 1956. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 73/63/; circulating copy in Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 73/63, currently checked out)

-Transcript of hearings held in Charlotte, NC from March 12-14, 1956.

Investigation of Communist Activities in the State of Florida. Hearing Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Third Congress, Second Session. 1954, 2 pts. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 73/54/; circulating copy of pt. 1 in Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 73/54/pt.1)

Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the United States, Volume 10. Hearings Before a Special Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Seventy-Sixth Congress, First Session. 1939. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: Un 1/V. 9-10)

-Contains the testimony of Fred Beal, a disillusioned former communist who had been involved in the CPUSA’s campaign to organize the 1929 Gastonia, NC textile workers’ strike. Beal’s testimony can be found from pages 6006-6042.

Report on Southern Conference for Human Welfare. Committee on Un-American Activities, U.S. House of Representatives, Eightieth Congress, First Session. June 16, 1947. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: Un 1/RPT. 592)

-The Southern Conference for Human Welfare (SCHW), active from 1938-1948, was alleged to be a CPUSA front organization.

Testimony of Paul Crouch. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-First Congress, First Session. 1949.  (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 88; additional copy in Joyner Hoover: HX89 .A4 1949F)

-Crouch (1903-1955), a North Carolina native, was a longtime CPUSA member before turning anti-communist informant.

 

2. Other Congressional Investigations

Communism in the Mid-South. Hearings Before the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and other Internal Security Laws of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, Eighty-Fifth Congress, First Session. 1957. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. J 89/2: C 73/16)

Southern Conference Educational Fund, Inc. Hearings Before the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and other Internal Security Laws of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, Eighty-Third Congress, Second Session. 1954. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. J 89/2: So 8)

-The Educational Fund, a SCHW spinoff organization, was likewise alleged to be a CPUSA front.

 

3. Secondary Sources

Billingsley, William J. Communists on Campus: Race, Politics, and the Public University in Sixties North Carolina. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1999. (Joyner Stacks: LC72.3.N67 B55 1999; currently checked out)

Honey, Michael K. Southern Labor and Black Civil Rights: Organizing Memphis Workers. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1993. (Joyner Electronic Collection E-Book: ECU users click here)

Kelley, Robin D.G. Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists During the Great Depression. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1990. (Joyner Stacks: HX91.A2K45 1990)

Korstad, Robert Rodgers. Civil Rights Unionism: Tobacco Workers and the Struggle for Democracy in the Mid-Twentieth-Century South. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003. (Joyner NC Stacks: HD6515.T6 K67 2003; two copies)

Lieberman, Robbie. Anticommunism and the African American Freedom Movement: “Another Side of the Story.” New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. (Joyner Stacks: E 185.61 .A585 2009)

Record, Wilson. The Negro and the Communist Party. New York: Atheneum, 1971. (Joyner Stacks: E185.61 .R29 1971)

Salmond, John A. Gastonia, 1929: The Story of the Loray Mill Strike. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1995. (Joyner NC Stacks: HD5325.T42 1929 G377 1995)

Taylor, Gregory S.. The History of the North Carolina Communist Party. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 2009. (Joyner NC Stacks: HX91.N8 T39 2009; 2 copies)

Taylor, Gregory S. The Life and Lies of Paul Crouch : Communist, Opportunist, Cold War Snitch. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 2014. (Joyner Stacks: E748.C949 T39 2014; currently in process/available on request)

 

 

The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) went through a number of different phases in its long and controversial history.  Having enjoyed a brief beginning in 1934-35, HUAC was reborn as the House Special Committee on Un-American Activities in 1938. Known as the Dies Committee after its chairman, Rep. Martin Dies, Jr. (D-TX), the committee made headlines as it investigated communist, Nazi, fascist and Japanese activities deemed subversive. The Dies Committee, and its chairman, placed a particular focus on pursuing communist and other radical left activities, examining such bodies as the Federal Theater Project and seeking to draw links between the Roosevelt Administration and New Deal and the Communist Party (CPUSA). In the words of historian Richard Gid Powers:

The information the Committee collected in the thirties still forms the foundation for much of what we know today about communism in that decade. But the Committee really was not all that interested in simply collecting and publishing facts on the Communist Party and its activities. It was far more intent on using that information as ammunition for red-smearing attacks on the administration, attacks on the union movement, and attacks on unpopular opinions and associations. (Powers, Not Without Honor, 128)

This legacy would be embodied in the final act of the Dies Committee, the release of a publication that would provide much of the raw data used by self-appointed “red hunters” to determine candidates for blacklisting in the 1950s.

 

J.B. Matthews and Appendix IX

The individual most directly responsible for collecting the information used by the Dies Committee was its chief investigator, Dr. Joseph B. (J.B.) Matthews. A former Methodist missionary who held a divinity degree, Matthews turned to socialism in the early 1930s. He soon became what was known as a “fellow traveler”, a non-communist who agreed with the communists on almost every issue and participated in numerous communist-led organizations. He had a falling out with the communists after a CPUSA-led strike at Consumers’ Research, where Matthews was a top official. During the course of this strike, Matthews was publicly vilified by the CPUSA, an experience that turned him into a bitter opponent of the party.

Matthews testified before the Dies Committee in August 1938 as an expert witness on the CPUSA and its many front organizations, drawing on both his personal experiences and on a voluminous set of files he had begun to accumulate. Shortly afterwards, Dies hired Matthews to serve as the committee’s chief researcher. “For the next six years,” in the words of historian Robert M. Lichtman, “under Matthews’s guidance, the committee directed its fire at alleged Communists and left-leaning New Deal officials, even during World War II when anti-communism was not in vogue.” (Lichtman, “J. B. Matthews”, 7)

By 1944, the Dies Committee was in serious political trouble. The committee’s mandate was set to expire, and it looked likely that it would not be renewed. Dies himself, facing a serious political challenge from the Congress of Industrial Organizations’ Political Action Committee (CIO-PAC), as well as health issues, decided in May that he would not run for reelection. In its final act, however, the committee would use J.B. Matthews’s files to strike one last blow against CIO-PAC and its other opponents.

Late in 1944, fearing that the end of the committee meant that J.B. Matthews’s voluminous files would disappear with it, a subcommittee of the Dies Committee authorized the official publication of Matthews’s files as what became known as Appendix IX. Titled Communist Front Organizations, with Special Reference to the National Citizens Political Action Committee, the seven volume set numbered 2,138 pages. Only 7,000 sets were produced by the Government Printing Office, and these were distributed to a number of government agencies and private individuals. According to Lichtman, “The index to Appendix IX… contained the names of 22,000 individuals and organizations—many Communist, many not. (Lichtman, “J. B. Matthews”, 8)

Ironically enough, Matthews’s fears for the safety of his files ultimately proved to be unnecessary. In early 1945, a parliamentary maneuver by Rep. John Rankin (D-MS) not only saved HUAC, but turned it into a permanent House committee. The newly-created HUAC, realizing the problems that could be caused by public access to “the raw and undifferentiated character of the information in Appendix IX,” recalled the document. (Lichtman, “J. B. Matthews”, 9) A few copies of Appendix IX survived, however, and in the hands of professional countersubversives soon became a key source of names for blacklisting within the entertainment industry.

Appendix IX was reprinted in 1963 in three volumes by a publishing house in California. While original 1944 editions are extremely rare, copies of the 1963 reprint can occasionally be found. Joyner Library’s J. Edgar Hoover Collection on International Communism, which contains over 5,000 titles related to communism and anti-communism, held two copies of Appendix IX, one of which they have generously provided to the Cold War & Internal Security Collection. The CWIS Collection thanks Joyner Library’s Manuscripts & Rare Books Department for their generosity in helping to fill this gap in our collection.

 

Appendix IX:

Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the United States. [Hearings] Seventy-Eighth Congress, Second Session on H. Res. 282. Appendix, Part IX: Communist Front Organizations, With Special Reference to the National Citizens Political Action Committee. 1944, 3 v. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4.UN 1/2:UN 1/944/APP./; also available in Joyner Hoover E743.5 .A412)

 

Additional Sources:

Goodman, Walter. The Committee: The Extraordinary Career of the House Committee on Un-American Activities. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1968. (Joyner Stacks E743.5 .G64)

Lichtman, Robert M. “J. B. Matthews and the ‘Countersubversives’: Names as a Political and Financial Resource in the McCarthy Era.” American Communist History, 5, 1 (2006): 1-36. DOI: 10.1080/14743890600763848

Powers, Richard Gid. Not Without Honor: The History of American Anticommunism. New York: Free Press, 1995. (Joyner Stacks E743.5 .P65 1995)

The following is a select list of documents from Joyner Library’s Cold War & Internal Security (CWIS) Collection that discuss Ukraine, along with additional relevant federal documents. Most focus on the plight of Ukraine under Soviet rule, especially in the 1930s, when over 3,000,000 Ukrainians died from a famine deliberately used by the Soviet regime to break peasant resistance to the collectivization of agriculture and popular support for Ukrainian nationalism. (Werth, “Great Ukrainian Famine”) While, like all primary sources they should be used with care, these documents offer some historical perspective on the current Russo-Ukrainian conflict.

1. CWIS Documents on Ukraine

The Crimes of Khrushchev: Part 2. Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Sixth Congress, First Session. September 1959. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: K 52/Pt. 2)

Facts on Communism: Volume II: The Soviet Union from Lenin to Khrushchev. Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Sixth Congress, Second Session. December 1960. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: C 73/108/V. 2)

The Human Cost of Soviet Communism: Prepared at the Request of Senator Thomas J. Dodd, for the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws, of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate. 1970 (Joyner Docs CWIS Y 4. J 89/2: SO 8/19)

Investigation of Communist Takeover and Occupation of the Non-Russian Nations of the U.S.S.R. Eighth Interim Report of Hearings before the Select Committee on Communist Aggression, House of Representatives, Eighty-Third Congress, Second Session, under authority of H. Res. 346 and H. Res. 438. 1954.  (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. C 73/5: R 92)

Lest We Forget: A Pictorial Summary of Communism in Action [in] Albania [and other countries]: Consultation with Klaus Samuli Gunnar Romppanen, Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Sixth Congress, Second Session. January 13, 1960. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4 Un 1/2: C 73/109; additional circulating copy in Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. Un 1/2: C 73/109)

The Soviet Empire: A Study in Discrimination and Abuse of Power. Prepared by the Legislative Reference Service, Library of Congress at the request of the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and other Internal Security Laws of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate. 1965. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4. J 89/2: SO 8/5/965)

 

2. Additional Federal Documents on Ukraine

Commission on the Ukraine Famine Act: Hearing before the Subcommittee on International Operations of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, House of Representatives, Ninety-Eighth Congress, Second Session. October 3, 1984. (Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. F 76/1: Uk 7/2)

Favoring Extension of Diplomatic Relations with the Republics of Ukraine and Byelorussia. Hearings before the United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Special Subcommittee on House Concurrent Resolution 58, Eighty-Third Congress, First Session. July 15, 1953. (Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. F 76/1: Uk 7)

Focus on Serious Challenges Facing Ukraine: Briefing of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe. May 1994. (Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. Se 2: Uk 7/2)

Human Rights–Ukraine and the Soviet Union: Hearing and Markup before the Committee on Foreign Affairs and its Subcommittee on Human Rights and International Organizations, House of Representatives, Ninety-Seventh Congress, First Session, on H. Con. Res. 111 ; H. Res. 152 ; H. Res. 193. 1981. (Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. F 76/1: H 88/18)

Investigation of the Ukrainian Famine, 1932-1933: Report to Congress. Commission on the Ukraine Famine, 1988. (Joyner Docs Stacks Y 3. Uk 7: F 21/988)

Oral History Project of the Commission on the Ukraine Famine. Commission on the Ukraine Famine, 1990, 3 v. (Joyner Docs Stacks Y 3. Uk 7: F 21/990/v.1-3)

Ukraine’s Presidential Election: The Turning Point?: Briefing of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe. November 16, 2004. (Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. Se 2: Uk 7/3)

The Ukrainian Elections: Implications for Ukraine’s Future Direction: Briefing of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe. October 25, 2007. (Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4. Se 2: Uk 7/4)

 

 

3. Web-based Federal Resources About Ukraine

CIA World Factbook: Ukraine. March 2014.

A Country Study: Soviet Union (Former). Library of Congress, 1991.

Revelations from the Russian Archives: Internal Workings of the Soviet System. Library of Congress.

Ukraine: A Developing Story. Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe

U.S. Department of State: Ukraine.

 

4. Additional Information

Snyder, Timothy. Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin. New York: Basic Books, 2010. (Joyner Stacks DJK49 .S69 2010)

Werth, Nicolas. ‘The Great Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33‘. Online Encyclopedia of Mass Violence, 2008.

In honor of African-American History Month, here is a brief bibliography of publications relevant to African-American History from the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and its successor, the House Committee on Internal Security. Please note that this list is far from exhaustive:

Activities of Ku Klux Klan Organizations in the United States. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Ninth Congress, First (-Second) Session. 1965-66, 5 pts. + index (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: Un 1/2: K 95; circulating copy in Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4: Un 1/2: K 95)

The American Negro in the Communist Party. Prepared and Released by the Committee on Un-American Activities, U.S. House of Representatives. December 22, 1954. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: Un 1/2: N 31)

Black Panther Party. Hearings Before the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-First Congress, Second Session. 1970-71, 4 pts. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: In 8/15: B 56)

The Black Panther Party: Its Origin and Development as Reflected in its Official Weekly Newspaper The Black Panther, Black Community News Service: Staff Study. Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-First Congress, Second Session. 1970. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: In 8/15: B 56/2)

Gun-Barrel Politics, the Black Panther Party, 1966-1971. Report by the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session. August 18, 1971. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 1.1/8: 92-470)

Hearings Regarding Communist Infiltration of Minority Groups. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty First Congress, First Session. 1949-50, 3 pts. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: Un 1/2: C 73/11/)

-Pt. 1 includes testimony by baseball legend Jackie Robinson. The transcript of Robinson’s appearance can be found on p. 479-83.

Investigation of the Unauthorized Use of United States Passports, Part 3. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Fourth Congress, Second Session. June 12-13, 1956.  (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: Un 1/2: P 26/pt. 3; circulating copy in Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4: Un 1/2: P 26/pt. 3)

-Features the transcript of African-American actor/singer Paul Robeson’s only appearance before HUAC. Robeson’s testimony can be found from p. 4492-4510.

Subversive Influences in Riots, Looting, and Burning. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Ninetieth Congress, First (-Second) Session. 1968-69, 6 pts. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: Un 1/2: R 47/)

 

On January 27, 2014, the well-known folk singer and left-wing activist Pete Seeger passed away at the age of 94. In his youth, Seeger’s radical politics led him to affiliate with the Communist Party of the USA (CPUSA). He joined the Young Communist League in 1936 and the CPUSA itself several years later. After serving in the army during World War II, Seeger resumed his musical career as part of the famous folk act The Weavers. His musical prominence and continued ties to the CPUSA soon brought him to the attention of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), which by the early 1950s had adopted the mindset that communism was an alien influence that must be removed root and branch from American society.

On August 18, 1955, Pete Seeger appeared before a session of the House Un-American Activities Committee held in New York City. During his testimony before HUAC, Seeger refused to answer any questions about his political beliefs or associations. He did not, however, invoke the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution as grounds for not answering such questions. Instead, he flatly declined on principle to provide such information. As he told the committee early in his appearance:

I am not going to answer any questions as to my associations, my philosophical or religious beliefs or my political beliefs, or how I voted in any election or any of these private affairs. I think these are very improper questions for any American to be asked, especially under such compulsion as this.

I would be very glad to tell you my life if you want to hear of it. (Investigation of Communist Activities, New York Area. Part 7, p. 2449)

Seeger’s refusal to cooperate with HUAC resulted in his being indicted for contempt of Congress. He was ultimately convicted of this charge in March 1961, and sentenced to a year in prison. However, his conviction was overturned on appeal the following year.

Ironically, Seeger had already quietly backed away from the CPUSA by the time he appeared before HUAC. Eventually, he would openly abandon communism, performing at a 1982 benefit for the anti-communist Polish labor union Solidarity and condemning Joseph Stalin in his 1993 memoirs. After being blacklisted in the 1950s, Seeger reemerged in the 1960s as one of the main influences on that decade’s folk revival, while his song “We Shall Overcome” became one of the anthems of the civil rights movement. Seeger performed at President Obama’s 2009 inauguration and remained active in supporting liberal and left-wing causes until his death.

 

CWIS Sources:

The official transcript of Pete Seeger’s appearance before HUAC can be found in:

Investigation of Communist Activities, New York Area. Part 7: Entertainment. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Fourth Congress, First Session. August 17-18, 1955.  (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: Un 1/2: C 73/55/pt. 7; additional circulating copy in Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4: Un 1/2: C 73/55/pt. 7)

Seeger’s testimony can be found from p. 2447-2460. Additional CWIS documents referencing Pete Seeger include:

Communist Activities Among Youth Groups (Based on Testimony of Harvey M. Matusow). Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Second Congress, Second Session. February 6-7, 1952. (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: Un 1/2: C 73/29)

Investigation of Communist Activities, New York Area. Part 6: Entertainment. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-Fourth Congress, First Session. August 15-16, 1955.  (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: Un 1/2: C 73/55/pt. 6; additional circulating copy in Joyner Docs Stacks: Y 4: Un 1/2: C 73/55/pt. 6)

Testimony of Walter S. Steele Regarding Communist Activities in the U.S. Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eightieth Congress, First Session. July 21, 1947.  (Joyner Docs CWIS: Y 4: Un 1/2: St 3)

 

Additional Sources:

Lithwick, Dahlia. ‘When Pete Seeger Faced Down the House Un-American Activities Committee‘. Slate, January 28, 2014.

Matthews, Dylan. ‘The Washington Post picked its top American Communists. Wonkblog begs to differ‘. Washington Post: Wonkblog, September 26, 2013.

Pareles, Jon. ‘Pete Seeger, Champion of Folk Music and Social Change, Dies at 94‘. New York Times, January 28, 2014.

Radosh, Ron. ‘Time for Pete Seeger To Repent‘. New York Sun, June 12, 2007.

Wakin, Daniel J. ‘This Just In: Pete Seeger Denounced Stalin Over a Decade Ago‘. New York Times, September 1, 2007.