The Cold War at Home Section 16.2 Leader of the witch-hunt, Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin

Objectives At the end of this lesson, you should be able to: Describe the HUAC Describe the state of the communist party in the late 1940s & why people joined Identify Alger Hiss, Whittaker Chambers, Richard Nixon, and the Pumpkin Papers Describe Truman’s domestic policy towards communism Identify Joseph McCarthy and McCarthyism Identify the Hollywood Ten

Atomic Age Yet another hydrogen bomb test

What was the HUAC? House of Un-American Activities Committee Congressional committee formed during New Deal as way of discrediting FDR for allowing communists Resurrected during the Cold War Members were mostly conservative &/or reactionary some were demagogues, political opportunists Above: HUAC in session; below: one of the first well-known victims gets wrongly accused

Capture from a video portraying one of the hearings: SO reminiscent of The Crucible!

Describe the American Communist Party in the 1950s: Small Had its heyday during Great Depression Included liberals, workers, intellectuals, artists, students Against laissez-faire economic system of US Not associated with evil, oppressive governments yet Lost popularity after WWII and news of Stalin’s brutality Above: bread line during Depression; below: the Rosenbergs in jail

Who was Alger Hiss? High ranking government official Clerk to Oliver W. Holmes, member of FDR staff at Yalta President of Carnegie Endowment for International Peace –Peace organizations were suspected of trying to weaken the US Labeled as a Soviet operative by Whittaker Chambers (editor of Time magazine) Above: Alger Hiss; below: Whittaker Chambers

Alger Hiss Useless blank capture from clip on Hiss and Chambers

What were the Pumpkin Papers? Hiss was questioned by Richard Nixon at HUAC –caught Hiss lying about whether he had ever known Chambers but lacked evidence for conviction Chambers showed investigators a pumpkin with microfilm of secret documents –Apparently typed on Alger Hiss’ typewriter Convicted of perjury Nixon became famous as an anti- communist crusader Above: Alger Hiss at hearing; below: Richard Nixon with prosecutor Roy Cohn

Describe Truman’s Anti-Communist policy at home. Said there was an “enemy within” Instituted Federal Employee Loyalty Program Government employees fired for openly criticizing US foreign policy, supporting equal rights for women, reading socialist books, attending foreign films Loyalty Board investigated 3 million employees –3, 000 forced to resign or fired –No proof of espionage ever found Truman vetoed McCarran Act –Made it extremely difficult to be in communist party –Congress overrode his veto Above: President Truman; below: another sham hearing

Julius Rosenberg led to court; clip also deals with pop culture reflecting fear of spies

Who was Joseph McCarthy? Senator, opportunist, demagogue Claimed (in a speech) to have a list of 205 names, all of communists working in the State Department Headed the Senate subcommittee of Investigations Ruined the reputations of dozens of officials without a shred of evidence Viewed as a patriot (at first) McCarthyism= the use of intimidation and unfounded accusations in the name of fighting communism Accused the army of communism! Was discredited and censured (condemned) by the Senate, finally, and died not long thereafter Above: another photo of McCarthy; below: cartoon implying McCarthy was a fraud

Capture shows LA; clip is about Hollywood and the witch hunt there

Hollywood Ten Presentation Some of the Hollywood Ten shown approaching the courthouse

Who were the Hollywood Ten? Prominent writers, directors who had been members of the communist party Included Dalton Trumbo HUAC used their prominence and fear of communism to gain publicity H. T. pleaded the 5 th, were accused of contempt of Congress, and sentenced to 1 year in jail –Blacklisted by Hollywood (unable to find work in film industry) Above and below: members of the Hollywood Ten

Long, powerful clip depicts examination of one of the H.T. by HUAC