Subject File: Civil Liberties, 1948-53

ANNOUNCING

A PUBLIC MEETING
TO DISCUSS

THE PRESIDENT'S LOYALTY PROGRAM

–Speakers–

O. JOHN ROGGE
Former Assistant U. S.Attorney General

ARTHUR GARFIELD HAYS
Noted Civil Rights Attorney

THURGOOD MARSHALL
Special Counsel – NAACP

F STREET AUDITORIUM – NATIONAL PRESS BUILDING
14th and F Streets, N. W.
Wednesday, February 11, 1948 at 8:30 P.M. 

Auspices: NATIONAL LAWYERS GUILD
Admission – .50¢
_____________________________________________

"Vigilance is the price of liberty." The President's Committee on Civil Rights 
has said that "A state of near-hysteria now threatens to inhibit the freedom of 
genuine democrats". Many distinguished citizens and lawyers have said that the 
President's loyalty program is a menace to liberty – a product of that hysteria. 
The National Lawyers Guild has arranged this meeting to provide a forum for the 
public discussion of the loyalty program.  Full opportunity will be afforded for 
questions and discussion. 

[*[Apr 9, 1948]*]
REPORT OF THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON LEGISLATION OF THE 
COMMITTEE ON UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES ON PROPOSED 
LEGISLATION TO CONTROL SUBVERSIVE COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 

- - - - - - - 

NECESSITY FOR LEGISLATION

The need for congressional action to combat the subversive activities 
of the Communists and their followers in the United States cannot be questioned.  
On March 17 the President asked Congress to appropriate billions of dollars to 
build up American defenses against the potential threat of the world Communist 
conspiracy with headquarters in the Soviet Union.  It has been clearly established 
that the Communist Part of the United States is not an American political party, 
but is actually a disciplined and organic part of the world Communist movement, 
which has sections in every nation in the world, all under the direction and 
control of the master conspirators in the Politburo in Moscow. To resist the 
spread of communism abroad and ignore it at home would be an utterly inconceivable 
pattern of procedure. 

During the past 2 months the Subcommittee on Legislation heard testimony 
on this subject from some of the outstanding legal scholars and constitutional 
authorities in the United States.  Almost all of them, including many who have 
long and distinguished records as defenders of civil rights, declared that 
legislation must be passed to meet the activities of the Communists in the United 
States. 

In years past the Communist Party of the United States was lightly 
brushed aside by some as an insignificant sect of crackpots.  Today it is almost 
unanimously recognized to be a mass fifth column operating on behalf of the 
Soviet Union.  We are confronted with a problem of far-reaching perplexity – 
one of which the framers of the Constitution could have had little conception – 
and one that we have never faced before in our history, in its present aggravated 
form.  Acting alone, the Communist Party of the United States does not constitute 
a substantial threat to the Nation but, acting as it does as the American bridgehead 
of the Red Army, which has directly or indirectly crushed country after 
country under its iron heel, the Communist Party of the United States, without 
question, constitutes a clear and present danger to our national security, and 
it is the responsibility of the Congress to act now to defend the liberties which 
the Communists seek to destroy. 

THE NATURE OF THE PROBLEM

In order to meet the problem of communism in the United States, it is 
necessary to analyze the nature and tactics of the Communists.

The Communist movement is, in fact, a world-wide revolutionary political 
movement, whose purpose is by treachery, deceit, infiltration, espionage, 
sabotage, terrorism, and any other means, legal or illegal, to establish a 
Communist totalitarian dictatorship in the United States, and all other countries 
of the world, which will be subservient to the master conspirators in Moscow. 

Certain elements are necessary for the success of the party:

1. It must operate as a secret conspiratorial organization, and when 
the spotlight of publicity is turned on its actions it loses much of its effectiveness;

2. It must resort to any means, legal or illegal, to accomplish its purposes.

3. The party has found that in the United States it has greater success 
generally, operating through front organizations who disguise and hide the fact 
they are Communist dominated and controlled.  These front organizations feed the 
treasury of the party through tax-exempt contributions from fellow travelers and 
innocent dupes who are led to believe they are serving some humanitarian cause, 
rather than the interest of the Community Party. 

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4. Since the Communist Party of the United States is a part of the 
Soviet-dominated world organization, travel and communication between the Communist 
Party of the United States and affiliated parties throughout the world is 
essential to its success.  Severing the threads that bind the world conspiracy 
together, and which enable it to coordinate its activities on an international 
scale, would constitute a serious blow to the Communist Party of the United States 
and to the entire Communist conspiracy.

5.  Membership in the Communist Party of the United States should not be 
confused with membership in American political parties. The party leaders are 
knowing and willful conspirators to overthrow the Government of the United States 
by any means, in order to serve the interests of the international conspiracy and 
of the party dictatorship in Moscow. A great majority of the party members are 
knowing and willful participants in this conspiracy. Only a few may not be aware 
of the true subversive character of the party.  Around the hard core of party 
leadership are concentric rings of individuals and organizations, including dupes 
and fellow-travelers, who knowingly and unknowingly do the party's work. 

THE STATUS OF PRESENT LEGISLATION

Congress has passed several laws which were directed specifically at 
controlling the activities of the Communist Party of the United States.  The 
Smith Act made it a crime to advocate the overthrow of the Government of the 
United States by force and violence.  The McCormack Act required registration of 
agents of foreign principals.  The Voorhis Act required registration of organizations 
which are agents of foreign governments. 

Witness after witness before the subcommittee in its hearings declared 
that the provisions of all three of these acts clearly apply to the activities 
of the Communist Party members and organizations, and that proof could be 
obtained to sustain criminal convictions under these acts.  The Justice Department, 
however, has failed to enforce these acts against the Communist Party of the 
United States.  The Communist Party has, in fact, enjoyed a privileged status, 
insofar as prosecution under these laws is concerned. 

During the war, while the Soviet Union was an ally, some justification 
for this failure might have existed, but now, when the Soviet Union and its 
Communist satellites are waging a cold war against the United States and the 
other free nations of the world, such failure to proceed under existing laws 
against Communists in the United States is utterly inexcusable. 

The effective prosecution of Communists under existing laws has fallen 
generally into two categories.  First there are cases in which Communists have 
been cited for contempt by the Committee on Un-American Activities.  Although a 
number of contempt citations have been voted over the past 10 years, a commentary 
upon the effectiveness of the Justice Department's prosecution of such cases is 
that just 1 month ago Leon Josephson was the first Communist who began to serve 
a jail term as a result of sentence and conviction on a contempt charge.  The 
record of convictions in contempt proceedings has been excellent in recent months. 

The Justice Department has also begun to proceed recently against alien 
Communists who perjured themselves in many cases as to their allegiance to the 
Communist cause when they entered the United States.  It is significant that in 
some of these cases violations occurred over 15 years ago, yet only now has the 
Justice Department seen fit to prosecute. 

Had the law-enforcement authorities vigorously enforced existing laws 
against Communists in the United States, the growth of the movement would undoubtedly 
have been stultified, so that it would not constitute the serious threat 
to our national security that it does at the present time.  This apathy to, and 
coddling of, the Communists in the United States by the Department of Justice is 
in great measure responsible for the magnitude of the problem with which we are 
faced today. 

The Committee therefore recommends that the Justice Department immediately 
institute vigorous prosecution against Communists in every case where they have 
been guilty of violating existing laws.  The Congress cannot be expected to pass 
legislation directed at controlling subversive influence if such laws are to 
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become dead letters due to the failure of the Justice Department to prosecute.
The committee wishes to point out that the Federal Bureau of Investigation has
done an excellent job in investigating the activities of Communists in the United
States, but investigation without prosecution is not an answer to the problem.

RECOMMENDATIONS FOR NEW LEGISLATION

   The Committee on Un-American Activities held public hearings last year
on several bills which had been introduced to curb or outlaw the Communist Party.
Commencing on February 5, this year, additional hearings were held by the Subcommittee 
on Legislation. Perhaps the most outstanding panel of legal talent
ever to appear before a congressional committee testified concerning the bills
before the subcommittee. The witnesses were in virtual agreement as to the
proper legislative approach to the problem. The subcommittee has carefully
considered the testimony of the witnesses, having in mind the following factors;

   1. We believe it is essential that any legislation we recommend be
strictly within our constitutional framework. We do not want it to be so broad
as to possibly penalize innocent people along with the guilty. We cannot run
the risk of infringing upon the freedom of all our people in order to curb the
Communists who seek to destroy our form of government.

   2. We feel that it is essential that the legislation be effective. Too
often a cursory study of this problem leads people to believe that the answer is
very simple; that all we have to do is outlaw the Communist Party, or pass a
law requiring that its members register, and that the problem will solve itself.
This is not the case. The Communist Party in its operations presents a problem
which is something new under the sun. It changes its spots, its tactics, and 
strategy without conscience.

   3. The subcommittee believes that a democracy has the right to protect
its very life from those who would destroy it.

   Consequently, your subcommittee makes the following unanimous recommendations
to the full committee.

Rejected Proposals

   Several bills before the committee attempt to approach the problem by
outlawing the Communist movement as a political party. The subcommittee has
found it necessary to reject this approach on several grounds. Barring the
Communist Party from the ballot by Federal law would, in the opinion of the subcommittee, 
be unconstitutional, in that the States have the power to declare
what parties and individuals may qualify for appearance on the election ballots.
This opinion was shared by a majority of the witnesses before the subcommittee.

   The subcommittee also finds it advisable not to report the McDonough bill.
The committee, however, believes that that portion of the McDonough bill 
which seeks to define communism presents a salutary recommendation, and the bill 
which the committee is recommending contains such a definition.

The Subcommittee Bill

   The bill which the subcommittee is reporting to the full committee attacks 
the communist problem on four major fronts:

   1. It expands the provisions of the Smith Act by making illegal the
knowing and willful advocacy of the overthrow of the Government of the United
States by any means, for the purpose of subverting the interest of the United
States to that of a foreign Communist power. Under this provision the master conspirators 
of the Communist movement in the United States can, without question, 
be prosecuted. While force and violence is without question a basic principle
to which all party members subscribe, the present line of the party, in order to
evade existing legislation, is to avoid whenever possible the open advocacy of
force and violence. Under the provision which the committee is recommending, it

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is not necessary to prove advocacy of force and violence. It will only be 
necessary to prove knowing and willful participation in the foreign-directed 
Communist conspiracy, plus advocacy of the overthrow of the Government of the 
United States by any means with the intent to subvert the interest of the United 
States to that of a foreign Communist power. 

Through this provision of the bill, the law enforcement agencies will 
have a new weapon with which they can strike at the hard core of master conspirators 
of the Communist movement. 

2.  A great majority of the witnesses before the committee emphasized 
the necessity for constant and relentless exposure of Communist-front organizations. 
If the cloak of secrecy is removed from the purposes of and control of 
such organizations, they will, without question, wither and die, and the party 
will have suffered a substantial set-back. The committee has approved those 
provisions of the Mundt bill (HR 5852) which require the registration of 
Communist-front organizations. This bill places the responsibility for registration 
upon the officials of the organizations involved, which fulfills one 
of the recommendations which the Attorney General made concerning the Voorhis Act. 

The bill provides for administrative hearings in the Department of 
Justice in those cases where Communist Party front organizations refused to 
register voluntarily. During this hearing the organization will be given an 
opportunity to present witnesses in its own behalf, as well as being provided 
with other safeguards. Full judicial review of the findings of the Attorney 
General is provided. The subcommittee believes that this provision constitutes 
a landmark in that it provides for the establishment of proper legal procedures 
which will eventually replace the ex parte findings under the present loyalty 
order.

Full publicity will be given to the findings of the Attorney General in 
such cases, and to the registration statements. Tax exemption will be denied 
to contributors to front organizations, and they will be required to identify 
their publications, radio broadcasts, and the like, as emanating from a front 
organization. 

3. It is essential that all Communists be removed from the Government 
pay roll and the committee consequently has approved that provision of the 
Mundt bill which specifically denies Government jobs to persons who are members 
of the Communist Party. The bill also provides a penalty for Government 
officials who employ persons knowing or having reasonable ground to believe 
that they are members of the Communist Party. 

4. The committee believes that an all-out attack must be made on the 
foreign connections of the Communist Part of the United States. Without 
assistance and direction from abroad, the Communist Party of the United States 
would be a relatively impotent organization. Consequently, the committee has 
approved that provision of the Mundt bill which denies passports to members 
of the Communist Party. Additional recommendations to strike at the foreign 
connections of the Communist Party of the United States are included in the 
next section of this report. 

Additional Legislative Recommendations

1. The subcommittee recommends that the Voorhis and McCormack Act be 
strengthened. In view of the clear and present danger of the Communist threat, 
it is essential that our law enforcement agencies be provided with several alternative 
weapons with which they can attack the Communist conspiracy in its 
various forms. 

2. The subcommittee recommends the immediate consideration, by the 
Judiciary Committee of the House, of proposals which would require all aliens 
to register annually with the Department of Justice, allow the Department of 
Justice to hold deportable aliens in custody until arrangements for their 
deportation can be concluded, and provide for strict reciprocity in the granting 
of visas and in the treatment of aliens from Communist-dominated countries. 
The latter recommendation was strongly urged on the subcommittee by Admiral 
Standley, our former Ambassador to the Soviet Union, and by Congressman 
Fletcher of California. 

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3. Several witnesses before the subcommittee emphasized that the 
Committee on Un-American Activities was one of the most effective opponents of 
communism in the United States. The subcommittee recommends that the McDowell 
bill now in the Judiciary Committee, which would raise the penalty for contempt 
of Congress, be acted upon as soon as possible, so that the hand of the 
Committee on Un-American Activities may be strengthened in conducting its 
investigation of subversive activities. 

4. Strengthening of the espionage laws, so as to cope with the new 
techniques and strategy of the international Communist movement. 

OTHER RECOMMENDATIONS

1. The subcommittee suggest that the legislatures of the various 
States should seriously consider legislation which would specifically bar from 
State employment and employment in public schools all persons who are members 
of the Communist Party. A coordinated attack on the Communist problem by the 
States, as well as the Federal Government, is essential. 

2. Legislation alone is not a complete answer to the Communist problem. 
An attack must be made upon it on all fronts, if we are to meet it successfully. 
The most important element is an understanding and constant vigilance of the 
American citizens as to the true character, aims, and techniques of the 
Communist conspiracy. The many civic, patriotic, and fraternal organizations 
in the United States can be of tremendous service in emphasizing a program of 
education which will inform the people of this threat. In the words of one 
of the outstanding witnesses before our committee:

"The people should be informed, accurately and fully 
and continuously, about the nature, activities, 
strategy, and tactics of communism. This educational 
task can be in part accomplished by qualified and 
concerned private citizens." 

CONCLUSION

The subcommittee has not attempted to recommend legislation which will 
deal with so-called theoretical Communists in the United States. We are seeking 
rather to strike a body blow at the American cadre of the Soviet-directed 
Communist conspiracy. We believe that if its criminal activities are prosecuted, 
its false fronts exposed, and its foreign assistance and direction cut away, 
the movement in the United States, standing alone for what it is, will be 
overwhelmingly defeated. We are willing to permit the theories of communism 
and democracy to clash in the open market place of political ideas in America, 
but we insist that communism not be allowed to have the unfair advantages in 
this conflict of the unrestricted use of illegal means, the cloak of secrecy 
and fraud, and the assistance and direction of a foreign Communist dictatorship. 

Approved by the full committee April 9, 1948.

######

Letter from Mayor William O'Dwyer Opposing Mundt Bill
Read into the Record by Rep. Arthur Klein of N.Y.
(Congressional Record May 18, 1948)
The City of New York,
Office of the Mayor
May 15, 1948
Mr. Anthony H. Forbes,
New York Athletic Club, New York City.

My Dear Sir,

   Although your telegram criticizing my stand on the Subversive Control Act
of 1948, H.R. 5852, assumes to speak on behalf of all the Catholic war veterans, I
cannot believe that they would want to deny me the right to my opinion on a matter
of public legislation, even when such opinion does not coincide with their views.
However, I am glad to explain my opposition to the Mundt bill. In doing so, I prefer 
to reason rather than dispute with you.

   To begin with, in approaching this bill, I do so as a citizen deeply interested 
in our American democracy, particularly at this time, when the democratic
way of life is challenged as never before. Viewing it in that light, I am firmly
convinced that the bill is destructive of our fundamental right to discuss and
criticize, freely, and openly, all political questions and all political institutions
--a right that is so clearly interwoven with our other liberties that without 
it despotism or anarchy must result.

   Our Supreme Court has expressed that right in these words: "...If 
there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, 
high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, 
or other matters of opinion, or force citizens to confess, by word or act, 
their faith therein."

   We already have laws that punish treason and other criminal acts against
the security or safety of the Government; laws against individual acts or conspiracies 
to overthrow the Government, as well as laws that require the registration of agents
of foreign governments and of foreign principals. But this bill provides a dangerous 
shortcut to thought control and police-state regulation. It empowers a government 
officer to interpret and censor people's thoughts and opinions and additionally permits him 
to determine the subversiveness or disloyalty of any political, civic, or religious 
organization. Its terms are so broad, and yet so vague, as to subject innocent 
citizens to possible loss of citizenship and other heavy penalties, not for the reason 
of any act on their part but for being members of an organization suspected of entertaining 
dangerous thoughts. It would thus establish the undemocratic and dangerous 
principle of guilt by mere association, without proof of actual guilt, and 
without the safeguard of a jury trial.

   This is precisely the pattern of legislation set by the Nazis and police-
state governments for accomplishing the destruction of the rights of the people.

   This bill is dangerous and its dangers go far beyond its declared design
of curbing communism. I am opposed to communism and to police-state regulation, but
I am just as strongly opposed to adopting their methods. And that is precisely what 
this bill does.

   The more I analyze the bill the clearer it becomes that, far from protecting, 
it will go a long way toward destroying the American way of life.

   It is well for us to recall what Governor Smith said in 1923, when he
signed the bill repealing the Lusk laws, similar in their provisions, but less
drastic than the Mundt bill:

   "I am satisfied that they should not remain upon the statute books of this
State because they are repugnant to the fundamentals of American democracy. Under
the laws repealed, teachers, in order to exercise their honorable calling, were, in
effect, compelled to hold opinions as to governmental matters deemed by a State officer 
consistent with loyalty. ...Freedom of opinion and freedom of speech
were by those laws unduly shackled. ...In signing these bills, I firmly believe
that I am vindicating the principle that, within the limits of the penal law, every
citizen may speak and teach what he believes."

   On another occasion, a bill to bar from civil service persons accused of
advocating the overthrow of the government by force and violence, came before Governor
Lehman. He vetoed it and cautioned against that kind of legislation, saying:

   "Were we of this great liberal state to approve this bill today, we might
readily find tomorrow that we had opened floodgates of oppressive legislation in the
nation against religious, social, labor, and other minority groups."

   These are some-by no means all of the reasons why I am unalterably opposed 
to this bill and to this type of legislation.

   A special word to my fellow war veterans of the Catholic faith: We are but 
a part of the millions of war veterans who merged themselves in the total struggle
to preserve our American liberties. We, of all people, must remember the lessons 
taught to us by incitement against minority groups. As Catholics, we must not forget
the sufferings inflicted by the Know-Nothing Party,  the Ku Klux Klan. Nor can we


 2

forget the insidious anti-Catholic agitation directed against Al Smith in his presidential 
campaign. It is not impossible to imagine a situation where a Ku Klux
administrator, in some local community that is hostile to a Catholic minority, might 
declare a Catholic organization subversive, disloyal, or subservient to a foreign
domination. This may seem improbable, but the proposed bill opens that door, and
opens it wide, to just such fantastic possibilities.

   As a Catholic, as a war veteran, and as a citizen residing in the world's
largest city, in which 8,000,000 people, of all races, colors, creeds, and shades of 
opinion, live in peace and harmony, in the spirit of American democracy, I am 
impelled to oppose the provisions and principles of the Mundt bill.
Truly yours,
William O'Dwyer
Mayor.

Wire from Bishop Haas Opposing Mundt Bill,
To Representative Mary Norton of New Jersey
(Congressional Record, May 18, 1948
Grand Rapids, Mich., May 15, 1948.
Mrs. Mary T. Norton,
House of Representatives,
Thirteenth District, New Jersey
Washington, D.C.
 
   In my judgment, H.R. 5852 is potentially destructive of the moral and civil
rights of all Americans. As one who believes in the widest measure of individual
freedom consistent with the public interest, I beg to register my emphatic opposition
to this bill.

   Moreover, the bill contradicts itself. While it professes to combat
totalitarian dictatorships, it gives the federal government such arbitrary powers
over personal freedom to make the government, in effect, a totalitarian dictatorship. 
It is hard to see how anyone who really believes in private enterprise- unless
perhaps he is talking with his tongue in his cheek- can risk giving the government such
wide discrimination over individual conduct as does this bill.

   Communism is an evil to be removed, but it would be folly to destroy ourselves 
in removing it. The slower but surer methods of reason and Christian regard
for others, rather than a bill such as H.R. 5852, are the instruments best suited
to the task of stamping our communism.
Most Rev. Francis J. Haas,
Bishop of Grand Rapids 

Members of Senate Judiciary Committee
Republicans
Alexander Wiley, of Wisconsin
William Langer, of North Dakota
Homer Ferguson, of Michigan
Chapman Revercomb, of West Virginia
E.H. Moore, of Oklahoma
Forrest C. Donnell, of Missouri
John Sherman Cooper, of Kentucky

Democrats
Pat McCarran, of Nevada
Harley M. Kilgore, of West Virginia
James O. Eastland, of Mississippi
Warren G. Magnuson, of Washington
J. William Fulbright, of Arkansas
J. Howard McGrath, of Rhode Island

ORGANIZATIONS OPPOSING MUNDT BILL (Partial List)

Congress of Industrial Organizations
American Federation of Labor
Natl.Assoc.Advancement of Colored People
American Veterans Committee
Progressive Citizens of America
Americans for Democratic Action
American Civil Liberties Union
Civil Rights Congress
Natl. Council of Jewish Women
Friends Committee on Natl.Legislation
Natl. Lawyers Guild
Women's Trade Union League
Anti-Defamation League
United Steelworkers of America, CIO
Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen
Intl.Fur & Leather Workers, CIO
United Electrical Workers, CIO
Transport Workers of America, CIO
Amalgamated Clothing Workers, CIO
American Slav Congress
United Office & Professional Wkrs.CIO
Jewish War Veterans (Natl.)
Jewish War Veterans, (Bronx County)
United Furniture Workers, CIO
American Labor Party
Liberal Party
Communist Party
American Newspaper Guild, CIO
Mine,Mill & Smelter Workers, CIO
Intl.Longshoremen's & Warehousemen's 
       Union, CIO
Food,Tobacco & Agricultural Wkrs. CIO
American Communications Assoc.CIO
National Maritime Union CIO
Farmers Union 
United Public Workers, CIO
Independent Progressive Party, 
    San Francisco County, Calif.
United Automobile Workers, CIO
Far Equipment Workers, CIO
Chicago industrial Union Council CIO
19th Ward, Progressive Party of Cook 
        County, Illinois
Student Assembly, University of Chicago
Women's Intl. League for Peace & Freedom
Chicago Teachers Union
Muskegon (Ill.) May Day Committee
Citizens Committee to Defend the Bill of 
        Rights, Chicago
AFL Hotel & Restaurant Workers
United Rubber Workers, CIO
Brotherhood of Painters, AFL
Cleveland Joint Board, ILGWU-AFL
Intl.Ladies Garment Workers: 200 shop 
           chairmen
AFL Federated Trades Council, Reading,PA.
Episcopal League for Social Action,
160th Presbyterian Assembly held in 
           Seattle, Wash. June 1948.
The Ministerial Assoc. Madison, Wisc.
Baptists Ministers Conference (300 
           ministers)
American Jewish Congress
Natl.Religion & Labor Foundation
Congress of American Women

Rev. Thaddeus Clapp
Rev. Albert Buckner Coe
Carey McWilliams
Rev. Charles E. Dunn
Rev. Hubert N. Dukes
Rev. Ralph M. Felix
Norman Corwin
Rev. Walter Bennett
Rev. J. Edwin Elder
Rev. Armand Guerrero
Rev. Wm. D. Hammond

The following newspapers:
Akron Beacon-Journal
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Cleveland Plain Dealer
Denver Post
Christian Science Monitor
Chicago Sun-Times
New York Post
New York Daily Worker
York (Penn.) Gazette
PM
Washington Post
Philadelphia Inquirer
San Francisco Daily Peoples World
Philadelphia Daily News
Atlanta Constitution
Associated Negro Press
Indianapolis Recorder
The Witness
Philadelphia Tribune
Cornell Daily Sun
Daily Penn (Univ. of Pennsylvania)
Michigan Daily (Univ. of Michigan)
Daily Californian (Univ. of Calif.)
Brown Daily Herald (Brown Univ.)
Chicago Univ. Student Newspaper
Wisconsin Univ. Student Newspaper

The following individuals
Henry A. Wallace
Mayor William O'Dwyer
Charles Poletti
Rabbi Stephen S. Wise
Walter Reuther
Harlow Shapley
Dean Christian Gauss, Princeton Univ.
Olin Downes
Samuel Wolchok, Pres.Retail,Wholesale & 
     Dept. Store Workers,CIO
Van Wyck Brooks
Mark Van Doren
Nelson Algren
Professor Zachariah Chaffee, Harvard Law
Bishop Haas
Rt.Rev.James Pervette De Wolfe, Episcopal
     Bishop of Long Island
William Green
A.F.Whitney
Arthur Garfield Hayes
Bishop Arthur W. Moulton
Rev. Stephen Fritchman
Dr. Harry F. Ward
Harold Ickes
Dr. Albert Einstein
Leon Henderson
John Green
Paul Porter
Philip Murray
James Lawrence Fly
Wendell Berge
Barvey Brown
Osmond K. Frankel
Quincy Howe
Mark Ethridge
73 lawyers & judges of the Michigan bar.
Rev. B. S. Abernethy
Rev. Dr. Charles B. Akcley
Rev. Frank D. Adams
Thomas Mann
W.E.B.Du Bois
Rabbi Herbert I. Bloom
Rev. Dr. J. Henry Carpenter
Rev. Virgil E. Lowder
Rabbi Morris S. Lazaron
Rev. Thomas D. Ewing
Rev. William H. Geron
Rev. Paul Silas Heath

uopwa247cio

While such a policy of drawing the line between 
words and acts leaves the doors open to anti-democratic 
propaganda and racial and religious intolerance, 
no other practicable line can be drawn, for 
no agreement could be reached as to what ideas 
or programs should be suppressed. What one man 
would suppress another would tolerate, while desiring 
to suppress something else. One would demand 
the suppression of Communism, another 
Fascism, another anti-Semitism, another attacks on 
Negroes, another the Jehovah's Witnesses, etc. until 
no freedom would survive the pressures of one 
group or another.

But it is not easy to carry out in fact a principle 
so easily stated as drawing the line between words 
and acts. A twilight area exists where reasonable
men debate and where rival rights conflict. The 
courts are constantly called on for new interpretations.
Employers' free speech against unions, for instance, 
is limited at the point where it becomes 
coercive of the freedom of their employees to 
choose their union affiliations and representatives. 
Criticism of courts is punishable if made at such a 
time and place as to obstruct the administration of 
justice. Spreading rumors as to the solvency of a 
bank is punishable as an incitement to action.
Free speech in special situations is often qualified 
by other considerations. Free speech on the radio 
is limited by necessary government licenses, the
appeal to public interest, and the protection of listeners 
from insulting comment on race, religion, 
politics, nationality, etc. Conflicting rights are involved 
in picketing—a form of free speech—and 
also in the public distribution of literature, justifying 
some limitations. Special restrictions are justified
in war-time in the censorship of military information
or other material useful to the enemy.

But it will be asked whether there is not always a 
clear and present danger of action in all anti-democratic 
propaganda, and in propaganda against 
races and religions?

The answer to that in the language of the 
Supreme Court is that the danger must be great 
and the prospect of it immediate to justify interference. 
While that leaves considerable to judgment 
in each case, the burden to show the immediate 
danger is on those who would interfere.
Where speeches in public places have created 
riots, disorder, anti-racial or religious violence, such 
further assemblies may fairly be forbidden. But 
where proof of such effects is lacking, no official 
should deny freedom of assembly on his own guess 
as to the effects.
Preparations for action against the public peace 
or against any group of citizens should be prohibited. 
Thus the Ku Klux Klan was properly forbidden 
by law in many states to intimidate others by 
parading with faces concealed by masks or hoods. 
The wearing of private military uniforms and private 
military drill is properly prohibited by many 
states as obvious preparations for the use of force.
A clean-cut line between such threats of unlawful 
action and mere speech and assembly goes far to 
avoiding the evils which in other lands, and in 
parts of our own, arise from anti-democratic movements.
Generally and historically the principle of free 
speech is sound as a policy for handling public 
debate in a democracy, though it is not easy for us
all to accept the doctrine that we should accord
freely to our opponents and to ideas we hate the
same rights we claim for ourselves.

Friends of civil liberties should use these arguments 
whenever any effort is made to deny rights 
to any man or group, however unpopular or detested 
their views. Pass this leaflet on to those who
need to be reminded of the basic principle of 
rights for all without exception if the rights of 
each are to be secure.

[*[8 - 49]*]
 
WHAT DO YOU MEAN, 
FREE SPEECH?

Should the enemies of liberty and tolerance
be allowed free speech?

Should anti-democratic propaganda be 
suppressed?

Where draw the line?

American Civil Liberties Union
170 Fifth Avenue     New York 10, N.Y.
181                                  August, 1949

What Do You Mean --- Free Speech?

It should be unnecessary to repeat the underlying 
principle of our Bill of Rights, but constant demands 
to deny free speech to some detested group 
or person come even from the friends of civil liberty.  
Some wish to outlaw free speech for those 
whom they regard as "fascists" or anti-Semites, or 
reactionaries or race bigots.

They must be answered by the lessons inherent 
both in our ideals and in out experience that no 
exceptions whatever can be made to according 
freedom of speech and press to everybody without 
distinction.  The moment we begin to make exceptions
and play favorites, we lose all claim to following 
democratic principles.

The dictum attributed to Voltaire is still sound 
policy,—"I detest what you say but I will fight with 
my life, if necessary, for your right to say it."  It
recognizes three basic practical considerations for
freedom of speech: (1) that our own rights are not
safe unless our opponents have theirs equally, (2)
that the best way to avoid the violence which is 
aroused by suppression is to tolerate all views and 
doctrines, however hateful, and (3) that the common 
sense of the vast majority of us can be trusted 
to accept the good when all ideas and doctrines are
freely exposed. "Whoever knew truth to be worsted 
in a fair encounter?" asked John Milton.

Of all the arguments that challenge this position, 
the most prevalent is that we should not tolerate
those who if they got in power would suppress all 
liberty. That sounds like good sense.  But if examined, 
it at once is clear that what is proposed is 
that we shall suppress these people now so that they
will not suppress us later.  In other words, we merely 
beat them to it.  We adopt their detested politics 
and do it first.  It is just another form of the ancient 
concept of "liberty for our side," which is of course 
no liberty at all.

A democracy is founded on liberty for all sides, 
with the majority in control and with the minorities 
enjoying the unrestricted right of opposition.  
And among them anti-democratic minorities have
precisely the same rights as the pro-democratic; 
otherwise no democracy.  Even if a policy of supressing 
anti-democratic forces were adopted, to whom 
could be entrusted the power of fairly determining 
who is anti-democratic?  Benjamin Franklin once 
put it pithily in saying:  "Of course the abuses of 
free speech should be suppressed, but to whom 
dare we entrust the power of doing it?"


Our courts have on the whole maintained an 
even-handed application of American right.  Justice 
Holmes, in a noteworthy opinion involving pro-Soviet 
propagandists years ago, said:
"I think that we should be eternally vigilant 
against attempts to check the expression of opinions 
that we loathe and believe to be fraught with 
death, unless they so imminently threaten immediate 
interference with the lawful and pressing 
purposes of the law that an immediate check is 
required to save the country."

And again:
"If there is any principle of the constitution 
that more imperatively calls for attachment than 
any other, it is the principle of free thought—not 
free thought for those who agree with us, but 
freedom for the thought that we hate."

During World War II, Justice Murphy for the 
majority of the United States Supreme Court, said
in reversing a conviction for disloyal anti-war propaganda:
"Unless there is sufficient evidence from which 
a jury could infer beyond a reasonable doubt that 
he intended to bring about the specific consequences 
prohibited by the Espionage Act, an 
American citizen has the right to discuss these 
matters either by temperate reasoning or by immoderate 
and vicious invective.

Again Justice Murphy in the case of Harry 
Bridges, speaking on the rights of aliens, said:
"The Bill of Rights belongs to them as well as 
to all citizens.  It protects them as long as they reside 
within the boundaries of our land.  It protects 
them in the exercise of the great individual 
rights necessary to a sound political and economic 
democracy.  Neither injunction, fine, imprisonment 
nor deportation can be utilized to 
restrict or prevent the exercise of intellectual freedom.  
Only by zealously guarding the rights of 
the most humble, the most unorthodox and the 
most despised among us can freedom flourish 
and endure in out land."

Are there no limits on speech and propaganda in
the interest of democratic progress and tolerance?

Our historic American answer to all these questions 
is that no restraints can be put on speech itself 
without risking the destruction of our democratic 
institutions, which demand the fullest discussion 
of public issues.  To that end every idea,
every doctrine, every program, however hateful 
some of them may be, must be tolerated.  For if 
liberty is denied to one, it may be denied to others.  
Nobody's liberties are safe if anybody's are destroyed.

The right to hear is as important as the right to 
speak; for informed judgements necessary to a democracy
must be based upon hearing all sides,
whatever their character.

The line should be clearly drawn between language 
on the one hand and acts or attempted acts 
on the other, and with them, incitements to those 
acts in speech and print.  But those incitements 
must be direct, presenting, as the Supreme Court 
has put it, so "clear and present a danger" of action 
that the law is justified in interfering.  The law is 
also of course justified in interfering in those abuses 
of speech which fall under the penalties on obscenity 
(vague and unsatisfactory in legal definition)
profanity and personal libel and slander.

NATIONAL COMMITTEE TO DEFEAT THE MUNDT BILL
Room 514     
930 F Street, N.W.
Washington 4, D.C.

Jerry J. O'Connell, Chairman
Bruce Waybur, Treasurer

ACTION BULLETIN #8

May 26, 1950

Congressional Situation

        The Senate:  As indicated in our previous bulletin, pro-FEPC forces
fell 12 votes short of the necessary 64 to impose a time limit on the anti-
civil rights filibuster.  The Senate situation for the next week remains extremely 
fluid.  FEPC may be called up at any time, if there is enough demand
expressed by its supporters throughout the country.  The Administration's 
omnibus appropriations bill is due to be presented in about a week, and is expected 
to be debated for two or three weeks.  Until the appropriations bill
comes up, it is impossible to predict with any certainty what measures will be
brought on the floor, and the threat that Mundt-Nixon may be introduced during
this period remains.  For the remainder of the session--now expected to last
until early August--this committee has been unable to secure any definite
assurance from either the Democratic or the Republican leadership that the
Mundt-Nixon bill will not be brought up.  Commitments are still lacking from
a sufficient number of Senators to insure that the bill would be defeated if
it came to a vote, or even that the necessary one-third could be found to uphold 
a Presidential veto, should a veto be forthcoming.  Senate opponents of
the bill are frankly apprehensive of the possible Congressional reaction to
some new international crisis or domestic witch-hunt during the summer.

        Senate Judiciary Committee:  Another vote for recommittal of the
Mundt bill to the Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to take place Monday,
May 29.  Any important new development in the committee will be reported to
you.  A continued campaign for recommittal is indicated, not only directed at
the committee members themselves, but at other Senators who may influence
their vote.

        The House:  A Memorial Day recess is scheduled until June 5.  The Un-American 
Activities Committee hearings are still suspended, in the absence of
Chairman Wood of Georgia.  Acting Chairman Walter of Pennsylvania indicates a
dozen opponents of the bill are waiting to testify when the hearings are resumed
next month.  Additional requests from organizations, can and should be made. 
Statements to the contrary by the Un-American Activities Committee staff should
be disregarded.

Field Activity
        Local committees must continue accumulating every possible evidence
of opposition to the Mundt bill, and forwarding it to Congress and to the 
National Committee to Defeat the Mundt Bill.  We have made good use of all
material sent us so far, and have forwarded it to the appropriate members of
Congress.  Each member of the Senate has, for example, received a list of all
the national organizations opposing the bill, as well as explanations of how
it threatens labor, farm groups, and religious organizations engaged in missionary 
work.  They have also been sent the full-page analysis of the Mundt bill
by Professor Zechariah Chafee, Jr. from the Christian Science Monitor, and the
front-page editorial from the April issue of Southern Farmer.  Effectiveness
of your efforts to convince your elected representatives of the dangers to
American democracy inherent in the Mundt bill may be seen in the fact that
several members of the Un-American Committee itself now oppose its passage,
although when hearings began they were unanimously for it.  Rep. John McSweeney
(Dem., Ohio) is publicly committed against the bill.  Acting Chairman Francis
E. Walter (Dem., Pa) inserted in the Congressional Record of May 24 an editorial 
condemning the Mundt-Nixon bills from the widely circulated publication,
The Lutheran, of May 17.  The editorial declared, in part, "Passage of these
bills would aim a severe blow at the freedoms on which our country was founded
and would place sinister power in the hands of a few men."  More attention
needs to be turned, however, to members of the Senate, very few of whom have
yet publicly committed themselves against the bill.


2
Action Bulletin
National Committee to Defeat the Mundt Bill

Labor Statement

        The National Committee to Defeat the Mundt Bill this week released a
statement against the bill by leaders of organized labor throughout the country.
Although indorsement of the statement was on an individual basis, signers included 
local officials and international officers of 36 major international
unions and a number of small independent unions, as well as 6 regional labor
councils.  The internationals included 15 CIO, 13 AFL and 8 independent.  The
statement was filed with the Un-American Activities Committee for inclusion in
its printed records, and copies were sent to each committee member and each
Senator.

        The statement reads as follows:
        "We, officers of organized labor bodies representing thousands of
workers of various political affiliations emphatically oppose the Mundt Bill as
an attack upon institutions of organized labor and all American democracy.

       "We greet the opposition to the bill already expressed by virtually
all sections of organized labor - AFL, CIO, Railway Labor Executives Association,
and various independent unions. 

        "We emphatically agree with the statement of Senator Kilgore about 
the Mundt Bill:  It is fundamentally a sedition bill and, in the hands of a 
prejudiced prosecutor or national administration, can be used against organized
labor and, in fact, against other organizations, whether churches, farm, business
or any of the multitude of legitimate American organizations against which a
hostile prosecutor or administration might want to use it."

        "The Mundt Bill, if enacted into law, would not only destroy the right
of political dissent in our nation.  It would destroy the historical rights of 
the American people to work for peace, democracy, Negro rights and economic 
security.  In opposing this bill, organized labor is defending the right to a 
higher standard of living.  We regard this fight as part of the defense of the
whole Bill of Rights.

        "We call upon our elected representatives in the Congress, irrespective
of party affiliation, to defeat this bill.  We pledge that we will work unremittingly 
among the members of organized labor and the community at large to defeat
this iniquitous, unconstitutional, un-American measure."

Telephone Number
        New telephone number of the National Committee to Defeat the Mundt
Bill, effective immediately, is DIstrict 3205.

[*[ca 2-22-50?]*]

American Civil Liberties Union
30th Anniversary Conference Report
Held at the Hotel Waldorf Astoria, New York City, February 22. 1950

     The American Civil Liberties Union observed its 30 anniversary February 22, 1950 with a series of meetings at its annual conference 
and a dinner honoring Roger N Baldwin for his years of service to the cause of civil rights.
     Appropriately, ACLU spent little time reviewing past history during its sessions at the Hotel Waldorf-Astoria in New York. 
Instead it turned the spotlight on current threats to civil liberties -- the areas where it will work in the days to come.
     Afternoon meetings considering these threats pointed up the conference theme: "The Rough Road Ahead." Members and 
friends of ACLU heard reports to the membership on important issues, a debate on wire tapping, and discussions on four major 
problems -- civil rights in trade unions, civil liberties on the international front, the Government and civil rights, and Communists 
and the Bill of Rights.
     In the belief that ACLU supporters who were unable to attend would like a report of the conference, the Union is distributing 
this summary of the proceedings as a supplement to its monthly publication, CIVIL LIBERTIES.

GOVERNMENT AND CIVIL RIGHTS:

PANEL DISSATISFIED WITH LOYALTY PROGRAM IN 
INDUSTRY AND PROSPECTS FOR CIVIL RIGHTS BILLS

PARTICIPANTS: Chairman, Prof. WALTER GELLHORN, Columbia 
Law School; Cong. JACOB K. JAVITS; Prof. HARRY
JONES, Columbia University; WILL MASLOW, American 
Jewish Congress; THURGOOD MARSHALL, counsel NAACP; 
RAYMOND L. WISE, ACLU board member; AUSTIN FISHER, 
labor relations consultant; MARTIN GERBER, UAW-CIO.

   Pessimism over the prospects of an early favorable Congressional 
action on the civil rights program marked discussions 
of the Government's proper role in 
insuring civil liberties.
   
Chances for the civil rights program occupied 
only part of the period, however. Covering 
a related field, the panel argued whether 
Government extension of loyalty tests to private 
industry is justified. This topic was considered 
especially pertinent because of the 
alleged misuse of the loyalty program by some 
employers and because some loyalty hearing 
questions indicate that adherence to liberal 
Gellhorn suggested that the question of 
beliefs in itself is used as a test of disloyalty. 
whether Government powers are being employed to narrow rather 
than to extend individual freedoms may be involved.
 
  The most optimistic note concerning the civil rights program was 
struck in a statement read by Javits, who was in Washington for 
debate on the FEPC bill, an eviscerated version of which was 
passed by the House of Representatives the following day. Javits 
predicted that "more will be done on civil rights in the next few 
years in the United States than" in the period since the Civil War.

   Jones agreed that civil rights bills can be delayed for some 
time but cannot be blocked completely. He pointed out that the 
real problem -- so far as FEPC is concerned - is in the Senate where 
the filibuster is in effect. There, he said, the minority opponents 
very likely will prevent a vote on the bill this session.

Holy Crusade
   To overcome this minority opposition, Marshall called for a 
"holy crusade" by liberal elements. He accused the liberal Senators 
and Representatives of failure to be on the floor of Congress at the 
proper time for roll calls, in contrast to the non-liberals. The job 
getting favorable action on civil rights bills is no longer one 
for technicians and lobbyists, he said. "If liberals don't stand up 
and order Congressmen to fight these bills won't pass."

   Gellhorn accused the Federal Government of lagging behind many 
states in the drive to eliminate segregation. Along with Javits and 
Jones, he emphasized that FEPC is only one part of an extensive 
program. As a case in point, Jones mentioned the Barden bill, 
which, he said, fails to guarantee Federal aid to education funds 
for Negro children in the south. Proponents of civil rights should 
direct attention to such measures as well as to the more publicized 
ones, he said.

   After mentioning various civil rights issues, Javits declared that 
passage of the program is necessary no only to implement constitutional 
principles but also to maintain our world position as 
the chief defender of democracy.
   
"The great revolutionary stirrings in the world are among the 
colored people," he said. "Resistance to FEPC in our own country 
is not only resistance to the true American concept of the equality 
of all citizens, but is striking vitally at our capability for winning 
the cold war."
   
Maslow paid tribute to President Truman as the chief executive 
who has done more for civil rights than any of his predecessors, 
including the late President Roosevelt.
   
In the area of loyalty tests for industrial employes working on 
classified material there was less agreement among panel participants. 
Gerber opposed all loyalty tests for workers in industry. 
Wise opposed the present loyalty program but called for another, 
with proper safeguards, on the grounds that we need protection 
against spies. Fisher suggested that we try psychiatric techniques 
to ferret out disloyal persons.

Loyalty Tests
   
Gerber contended that the danger of destroying freedom of 
thought was more serious than the danger of sedition by workers.
He cited several instances where, he said, employers used security
regulations to attack unions. According to Gerber, loyalty tests in 
industry tend to infringe upon basic democratic rights. 
   
Although admitting that employers often use the security problem 
as an anti-union weapon, Wise maintained the protection against 
spies is necessary. However, he proposed scrapping the current 
loyalty program as one conceived in hysteria and politics and 
suggested curbing military power on the Industrial Employment 
Review Board by making its membership wholly civilian, with 
both labor and industry represented. The IERB is the group to 
which employees can appeal when they are refused clearance to 
work with classified material.
   
On the other hand, Fisher favored testing the minds and records 
of employees for evidence of disloyalty. Terming loyalty oaths a 
"waste of time," Fisher called for the employment of psychiatrists 
and internists to show us how to choose men for key spots.
   
"The best security against disloyalty that a democracy can provide 
for itself is to establish and enforce a high standard of mental 
health for those to whom we entrust the nation's secrets," he added. 
   Industry is not now willing to spend the time and money on 
these psychiatric methods which Fisher claimed were virtually the 
only reliable means of uncovering a predisposition to disloyalty. 
In the meantime, while FBI methods are used, he urged that accused 
employees be given full opportunity to defend themselves.
 
 SUMMARY: Two points about the civil rights program stood 
clear. Extension of the Bill or Rights and adequate protection 
of these rights are the prime responsibility of the Government. 
Parliamentary maneuvers aimed at indefinitely blocking civil 
rights bills run counter to democratic methods. Some progress
has been made in a few areas, but the panel was not optimistic 
about prospects of getting an adequate FEPC act passed.
   
The implicit dangers in the principle of loyalty tests in 
private industry were recognized, and procedures currently in 
use were deplored. The question, as stated by Gellhorn, was 
whether we oppose all extension of security procedures to 
private industry or whether we consider such procedures necessary 
and demand only that adequate safeguards be provided for 
workers subject to loyalty tests. Gerber alone held that loyalty 
tests were more dangerous to democracy than the possibility of 
disloyalty among workers. Other panel members, while criticizing 
the loyalty program setup, argued that the nation must 
be protected against sedition.

COMMUNISTS AND THE BILL OF RIGHTS:
PANEL DEBATES THE RIGHTS OF FREE SPEECH
AND ASSEMBLY IN ABSENCE OF IMMINENT DANGER

PARTICIPANTS:  Chairman, WALTER FRANK, ACLU board
member;  Prof. THOMAS EMERSON, Yale Law School;
OSMOND K. FRAENKEL, ACLU board member; LOUIS
WALDMAN, labor attorney; ARTHUR GARFIELD HAYS,
general counsel, ACLU; TERENCE McCARTHY, Peekskill investigator, 
ACLU.

        The rights of Communists in a free society-a major issue on
the civil liberties front-provoked lively debate during a panel
discussion lasting an hour and a half.  
        The argument centered around two main questions: 1) Should
Communists have the same rights as others?  and 2) How to prevent 
another Peekskill riot?  All panel members agreed that Communists 
are entitled to the full benefits of the Bill of Rights.  But
sharp divergence of opinion arose over whether they are getting
these benefits in the face of certain statutes and several recent events. 
        Discussion ranged over a wide field, covering the trial in New
York of 11 Communist leaders, the Peekskill riots last summer,
investigatory activities of the FBI, and the harassment of defense
counsel for left wing groups. 

Threats To Government
        Opening the discussion, Waldman contended that the Bill of
Rights does not advocate destruction of a government which protects 
the rights of citizens; neither does it guarantee protection of
fifth columnists or of citizens who commit perjury or treason.
These, he said, are the crimes for which Communists have been
convicted.
        Waldman described as apologists for Communism the people who
claim such convictions violate civil rights.  It was his opinion, he
said, that Communists and others who protest that civil rights are
being violated are simply taking part in a campaign to discredit
persons who try to defend the Bill of Rights.
        Waldman rejected the view that the "means justify the ends."
The objective of Communists, he said, is the destruction of free
government and the Bill of Rights.  He quoted Judge Learned Hand
as saying that "words are not only the keys of persuasion but the
triggers of action."  Waldman felt the ACLU
should support the Government fight against 
the "conspiracy of Communism," just as it
would fight to protect the Bill of Rights when
it was threatened from another quarter.
        Answering Waldman's argument, Fraenkel
reviewed the ACLU stand that the Smith Anti-Sedition 
Act is unconstitutional, particularly
as it was applied in the Government's case
against 11 Communist leaders convicted last
fall of conspiring to teach and advocate the
use of force and violence to overthrow the
Government.  Fraenkel emphasized three
points:
        It is true that words are not merely words but acts as well.
But basically the anti-sedition law is a threat to freedom of speech
because it holds that words alone may be criminal.
        The law was improperly applied against the 11 Communist
leaders because there was no "clear and present danger."  In his
charge to the jury, Judge Harold Medina ignored the late Justice
Holmes' concept of imminent danger.
        It is not the function of ACLU to support the Government in
its prosecution against the Communists.
        Fraenkel held also that the quality of government and the
teaching profession will suffer when people are prosecuted for
their views.

Legality Questioned
        Joining Fraenkel, Emerson said he felt the important question
was not whether Communists should be prosecuted but whether
their prosecution under the Smith Act was unconstitutional.  It is
dangerous to consider ideas illegal and adherence to them punishable 
by law in the absence of a "clear and present danger," he
said.  Such a concept has no limits, Emerson continued. Decisions
as to what constitutes an illegal idea would rest with the people
strong enough to suppress what they considered objectionable.
Moreover, he added, this concept tends to promote hysteria, and
it is then impossible to consider issues on the basis of their merits.
No country which has tried to suppress Communists has succeeded.
It is far better to maintain a free and open exchange of views.
Emerson objected as well to measures taken against attorneys
for left wing defendants.  He felt that six-month contempt of court
terms given to lawyers at the Communist leaders' trial were excessive.  
He considered unreasonable sentences imposed on lawyers
for labor leader Harry Bridges and O. John Rogge and in addition
cited a New Haven trial from which two attorneys were barred
because they belonged to the Civil Rights Congress, a left-wing
defense agency.  This undermining of counsels' rights he feared
would form a pattern.
        Panel members engaged in a sometimes spirited discussion concerning 
the Peekskill riots of last summer and the Cortlandt town
ordinances passed in their wake.  One of these acts barred meetings
on public highways without a permit from town authorities.  The
other prohibited meetings by groups "tending" to violate the peace, 
which could result in those attacked being liable to arrest.
        Hays held that such ordinances simply play into the hands of
Communists by magnifying their importance.  Communists are
dangerous, he said, because fear of them leads people to curtail
free speech and to tolerate intimidation and establishment of a 
gestapo.
        Waldman said he oppose the first ordinance as unconstitutional
but so believed in the purpose of the second that he volunteered
to draft it.  He described the second ordinance as necessary and 
desirable, adding that a community has the right to protect itself
from a breach of the peace.  Ways must be found, he said, to secure
order and protect liberty at the same time.
        McCarthy said that the most important fact about the riots was
that on both occasions one group was intent on exercising their 
human and constitutional rights, and another group was trying to 
prevent this.  He pointed out that the belief that synthetic boundaries
exist between people means a battle, and when this takes place,
freedom dies.  Such a belief was prevalent among the people in
Peekskill who conceived that people who held ideas different than
those of the area were aliens, and these included Negroes and Jews.

An Opinion
        Emerson asked Waldman what course the Civil Rights Congress-
sponsor of the Paul Robeson concerts at Peekskill-should have
taken.  He pointed out that the second meeting at which Robeson
appeared last September amounted to a violation of the ordinance
because of threats which had been made by persons opposing it.
Waldman answered that if Communists met in circumstances similar
to those prevailing near Peekskill, in which he said they threatened
violence, a jury would find they had intended to breach the peace.
McCarthy disagreed that they displayed a show of force.  He emphasized, 
too, that the first meeting at which no armed guard was
present and the concert-goers were attacked continually was over-looked.
        Fraenkel countered that such an ordinance would tend to place
right in the hands of the prejudice of a community.  The question
of liberty and order was confused, he said, adding that he preferred
liberty to order.  In this connection, Hays quoted the late Justice
Brandeis as saying that we are beginning to exalt order above
liberty.  He asked whether Waldman would have volunteered to
draft a repressive ordinance of the American Legion had met in the 
Peekskill area.  Waldman said there would be opposition to a Communist 
meeting in that section because the community hated 
Communists.
        Emerson rejoined the discussion to emphasize that it is the
primary duty of local authorities to protect people who want to 
exercise freedom of speech.  Edward Meyerding, executive director
of the Chicago division of ACLU reminded the group that Robeson
appeared there without incident shortly after the Peekskill riots.
ACLU appealed to the Chicago Commission on Human Relations
and to city authorities, requested veterans' organizations to refrain
from picketing the Robeson meeting, and urged newspapers to
abstain from printing inflammatory statements.
        SUMMARY: Waldman, Emerson, and Fraenkel all agreed
that Communists should have the protection of the Bill of
Rights.  They could not agree on how to deal with Communists
while protecting the freedom of all.  Waldman contended that
since Communists want to destroy the Bill of Rights they are
not entitled to all the privileges enjoyed by other groups.  He
called on ACLU to fight the Communists as it would any other
organization which threatened the Bill.
        His opponents felt that repressive measures can do untold
danger, not only by giving unwarranted importance to the
Communists but by promoting an atmosphere of fear and
hysteria.  They decried also the premise that words alone may
be illegal in the absence of a "clear and present danger."
Unless such danger is present, full freedom should be permitted.  
They held that there was no attempt to weigh the influence
of the 11 Communist leaders.
        In the case of the Peekskill riots, the problem appeared to
be one of reconciling liberty with order.  ACLU panel members
objected strongly to the implication of an ordinance under
which a person can be convicted for using language with so
called intent to breach the peace.  Waldman countered that
communities have a right to protect themselves by such means
against the dangers of violence. 



CIVIL RIGHTS AND TRADE UNIONS:
CIO, AFL SPOKESMEN DENOUNCE PROPOSED BILLS
TO CORRECT UNDEMOCRATIC PRACTICES IN UNIONS

PARTICIPANTS: Chairman, Prof. HERBERT NORTHRUP,
labor economist, National Industrial Conference Board; VICTOR
RIESEL, syndicated labor economist; CARL RACHLIN, 
counsel, Workers Defense League; IRVING ABRAMSON, national
CIO representative; WILL HERBERG, ILGWU Dressmakers
Union; Prof. PHILIP TAFT, Brown University; 
WALTER GORDON MERRITT, management attorney; STEWART 
MEACHEM, assistant to president, Amalgamated Clothing
Workers Union; MARK LEWIS, general secretary, AFL Hatters 
Union. 

CIO and AFL representatives united to oppose
legislation as a means of assuring democracy
in trade unions.
Spearheading the argument, Lewis and
Meachem first denied that undemocratic practices
were prevalent in unions. Both then contended
that legislation not only would prove
ineffective but would be, in the words of Lewis,
"dangerous and destructive of democracy.
"We would fly from evils of which we know,
and which are comparatively insignificant, to
legislation to do what only the unions themselves
can do successfully,"  Lewis said.

Meachem argued specifically against the ACLU's proposed "trade
union Bill of Rights bill," which he described as more offensive
than the Taft-Hartley law.
"The worst offenders against democracy in employment would be
ignored," he said, "while the friends of industrial democracy would
be subject to penalty and legal harassment."
Meachem claimed that under the bill an employer bent on
preventing organization of his workers would have at his disposal
a long list of so-called undemocratic practices with which he could
have his "stooges" charge the union. Moreover, Meachem said, the
employer would be encouraged to enlist the aid of informers to
report the "slightest discrepancy in union conduct and to train
provocateurs to assure that there would be something for the stooges
to report."
Merritt opposed these views. Union members, he claimed, relinquish
their individual rights for whatever collective rights are 
granted by their unions. Merritt favored legislative guarantees
against job discrimination for a man barred from his union for
specified reasons. Under his plan a board would review all questions
arising from denial of union membership.

Terrorized Into  Silence
He was supported by Taft, who believed that union tribunals
could not handle member-union disputes impartially because appeal
would be made to labor executives who were party to such disagreements.
Members thus would be "terrorized into silence," he
thought.
While primarily discussing a twin problem of rights for unpopular
minorities in unions, two other speakers endorsed some
form of regulation.  Riesel proposed for unions an organization like
the Federal Trade Commission. He also suggested that minorities
be assured of protection by the National Labor Relations Board
in instances of internal disputes.
Rachlin warned that government will step in unless unions set
up machinery to protect the rights of their individual members.
Citing discrimination against racial, religious, and other sometimes
unpopular minorities, Rachlin charged that some unions were putting
a label of "Communist" on any member they wanted to oust.
Both he and Taft alluded to the tendency of some union executives
to remain in office indefinitely.  Rachlin proposed these questions
to test the degree that individuals are protected in their unions:
What is the tenure of union officers? Is there an attitude of fear?
Are there fair procedures? Should there be free access of union
papers? Can a member be absolved from punishment to certain
instances?
Constitutional Rights
Herberg declared that every union member should be guaranteed
freedom of speech, press, assembly, and political party affiliation
within his own union.
"Unions are no longer private, voluntary organizations that may
establish their own rules without the concern of the public at large,"
Herberg said. "Labor unions are today, and almost certainly will 
continue to be, quasi-public institutions, exercising great power over
the lives and livelihoods of millions of Americans. It seems to me
essential that the basic democratic rights of these millions of 
Americans be protected in their unions as well as in state and
nation,"
Generally, Herberg said, Communists should be permitted in
unions because their exclusion often would prevent them from
earning livings. He would, however, bar them from union office
because of their allegiance to the Communist party."
Abramson supported this view.  He called Communism a "trojan
horse" determined to destroy existing free organizations.
SUMMARY: Four panel members felt that some union
activities restrict the civil rights of their members. While conceding
that restrictions do exist to a small extent, two others 
argued that no legislation is needed to correct abuses.  "In
actual practice," said one - Meachem - "such legislation would
handicap rather than help unions overcome discrimination in
the very areas where discrimination is most widespread." People
who want to promote democracy, he added, should turn their
attention to organizations other than trade unions, which are
"on the side of progress."
His attitude was disputed by Taft and Merritt, who believed
that legislation is needed to safeguard union democracy.
Herberg, while not considering the question of legislation,
contended that tolerating undemocratic procedures is inexcusable,
even for a worthy objective. He and Abramson would keep
Communists from holding union offices on grounds that they
follow a foreign dictatorship and would not be loyal to the 
union movement. Both men supported the right of Communists
in union membership. 

INTERNATIONAL CIVIL LIBERTIES:
GERMANS, JAPANESE ALERTED  ON CIVIL LIBERTIES;
LIMITED UN HUMAN RIGHTS COVENANT CRITICIZED

PARTICIPANTS: Chairman, ROGER N. BALDWIN; CHARLES
L. KADES, Japan, former Deputy Chief, Government Section,
Tokyo; MRS. TOKO MATSUOKA, Japan, board member,
Japanese Civil Liberties Union; DR. EDWARD LITCHFIELD,
Germany, former Chief, Civil Administration Division, Berlin; 
DR. WiLLiAM F. SOLLMAN, Germany, former Minister of the 
Interior in the Weimar Republic; JOHN M. CATES, Jr., Department
of State, in charge of Cultural and Human Rights
Branch, UN-ECOSOC.

Encouraging reports on measures taken to guarantee the rights
and dignity of Japanese individuals highlighted a discussion of civil
liberties on the international front. The reports were given by
 Kades and Mrs. Matsuoka, based on their observations in the
occupied country.
Kades pictured a people vigilant to protect their recently acquired
civil rights. Women, the largest single group benefiting from the
new order, are most alert in this respect, he said. They are being
joined by organized labor, insofar as it is not influenced by
Communist leaders, by lawyers, and by the Japanese Civil Liberties
Union, established after Baldwin's visit to Japan.
Mrs. Matsuoka agreed that the Japanese are actively interested in
 the problems of individual responsibility.Their yearning for freedom,
she said, led them to regard General MacArthur as a liberator.
Mrs. Matsuoka reminded her audience, however,
that the Japanese formerly were accustomed
to rely upon the government for protection
of rights.  Consequently, the importance
 of self-reliance must be emphasized.
The need for initiative in developing civil 
liberties in Germany was emphasized by both
Sollman and Litchfield.  Speaking on this point,
Litchfield declared that the Allied occupation
in Germany was directed initially into wrong
channels.  Instead of concentrating on the development
of democratic institutions, he said, 
Allied policy, should have  promoted the individual's
personal initiative and thus combatted
the absolutist concepts of the Germans.
Sollman indicated that the revival of personal initiative was lagging
in Germany.  He pointed out that most of the older people
are tired and disillusioned and that the younger ones have no

Supplement to CIVIL LIBERTIES, issue No. 80, 
March 1950, published by American Civil Liberties 
Union, 170 Fifth Avenue, New York 10, N.Y.

memories of civil rights and the struggle for political freedom.
"Most of the young people are so preoccupied with professional 
studies or worries about finding and holding a job that it is 
difficult to arouse interest for rights which seem to be rather 
abstract and theoretical," Sollman said. "Whenever the young 
Germans direct their thoughts beyond their personal fate, they 
are moved primarily by social and economic problems and national 
emotions."
There are groups of young men and women, he said, who are 
beginning to understand the importance of individual democratic 
initiative. However, German's regeneration must move simultaneously 
on two levels: economic recovery and political and educational 
reformation, for both of which they will need American help.
Kades proposed as aids to the Japanese in their growing awareness 
of civil rights an exchange of visitors by Japan and the 
United States and the donation by private U.S. agencies of material 
which explains methods of promoting civil liberties. Sollman advocated 
similar activities in behalf of Germany, as well as financial 
support for the civil liberties movement there.

Occupation Restraints

Baldwin discussed certain Japanese occupation restraints which 
seemed unreasonable. He cited the recent refusal to permit Margaret 
Sanger to visit Japan and the banning of an American book on 
the Yamashita war crimes trial. Kades defended the occupation 
decisions on these two points. He claimed that since Japan has 
very advanced birth control legislation a visit by Miss Sanger 
would have accomplished little. Kades considered the book ban 
justified because the volume was severely critical of American 
military justice procedures. He said its attack would have proved 
useful to certain Japanese groups as propaganda. Generally, Kades 
added, the occupation powers place few restrictions upon the 
Japanese, except those deemed necessary for American security.
In this connection, Litchfield stated that the Allied powers 
exercised few restraints over the Germans. Sollman held that the 
German problem is different since it is complicated by the conflicting 
interests of four powers and since Western Germany 
contains eight to 10 million displaced persons.
A discussion of chances for an international bill of rights 
was led by Cates, who presented a resume of major United Nations 
activities in this field. These he listed as a declaration and covenant 
on human rights, a convention on genocide, and three conventions 
embracing the right of news gathering, the right of correction, and 
the general rights of freedom of information.
Cates directed attention particularly to the covenant on human
rights, a proposal now under consideration to enforce certain of the
rights set forth in the declaration, which was approved by the
General Assembly more than a year ago. The United States, he said,
supports the view that complaints of human rights violations should
be brought before the UN only by a state subscribing to the
covenant and only after the plaintiff state has tried unsuccessfully
to settle the matter in direct negotiations with an allegedly offending
state.
Cates explained that this proposal represents a compromise. The
USSR and some other nations do not want the covenant to include
enforcement provisions, he said. France proposes that individuals,
and Australia that organizations, be allowed to press complaints
before the UN and that a special court be set up to consider such 
charges.
Baldwin and others objected to the State Department's caution
and conservatism on this issue. They felt that complaints by persons 
and groups should be authorized and provision made for enforcement.
In reply, Cates countered that the State Department felt it 
would not be practicable to advance beyond its present position
in view of its desire for ratification of the covenant by Congress
and by the largest possible number of countries.
SUMMARY: Progress is being made toward "selling" the
value of civil rights to Japan and Germany. But further help
is needed if these rights are to be fully appreciated and become 
part of the basic thinking of the people.
Especially important is economic aid since civil liberties have
difficulty thriving in an atmosphere of poverty and unrest.
Exchange of visitors between the United States and the two
occupied countries likewise would prove beneficial, as would
voluntary cooperation between agencies which promote democratic
thinking.
On the whole, Japanese are responding more readily to occupation
authorities than the Germans. Accustomed to authority,
they have transferred their traditional feelings of loyalty toward
government to the present regime. Germans complain not only
about economic conditions but about disagreements between
the four occupying powers and the presence of millions of
displaced persons in the Western Zones.
Objection was raised to the limited provisions for a covenant
on human rights which the State Department is willing to 
support in the United Nations. Some panel participants felt
that the U. S. should endorse the principle that individuals and
organizations- as well as governments- are entitled to file
complaints with the UN concerning alleged violations of human
rights. The State Department spokesman argued that ACLU
should endorse the Government's present stand. He described
it as one most likely to win approval of Congress and a large
number of UN member nations.

DEBATE:
IS WIRE TAPPING EVER JUSTIFIED?

Several recent court cases have emphasized the dangers of indiscriminate wire tapping as a means of catching criminals.
In this debate, Arthur Garfield Hays, general counsel of the ACLU, opposed legalizing wire tapping and suggested that police
officers who use this unlawful method be warned that they do so on their own responsibilities.
His opponent, Harmon Ducombe, former special assistant to the chief of military intelligence, U.S. Army, argued that wire tapping should be authorized for intelligence agencies in the interests of national defense.

MR HAYS: Wire tapping was once characterized by Mr. Justice
Holmes as "dirty business." On this point, Mr. Duncombe and
I will have no difference of opinion. So I start with that premise.
Is wire tapping so essential that the law should recognize this
"dirty" business as permissible in some cases?" I imagine this will
be the only issue between Mr. Duncombe and myself.
Those who feel that wire tapping is permissible under some
circumstances seem to me to regard the purpose of the Government
as primarily to catch criminals, rather than to bring about an
orderly society which will insure certain rights to all of us and a 
certain degree of privacy. Under the Federal law, wire tapping is
forbidden. But, says Mr. Duncombe, what do you do about cases 
of espionage, kidnapping, murder, and other instances where it
may be possible to catch the criminal by the use of tapping wires?

A Suggestion

I want to make a suggestion which on its
face seems startling but on consideration is
not so. Police officers faced with these extra-
ordinary cases will tap wires whether allowed
by law to do so or not, but if they tap wires
without legal warrant they do so it on their own
responsibility. They would be careful not to
tap wires in cases where public censure would
be met. Were I a high public official with the thought
that by tapping a wire I would catch 
a spy, I have no doubt I would tap the wire.
But I would be obliged to do this on my own
responsibility, and I would be ready to take
whatever criticism or censure would be imposed
upon me for having acted without the law.
On the other hand, if such things were warranted by law, we
would find wire tapping used in all sorts of cases, in unimportant
as well as important, against the innocent as well as the guilty.
It would be the usual method of catching criminals. It is too
dangerous a method to be permitted in a democratic state. We
have caught criminals without wire tapping. We shall have to
continue to do this.

MR. DUNCOMB: Wire tapping should be permitted by our
Federal intelligence agencies in the interests
of national defense, subject to proper administrative
safeguards to prevent abuse. even
searches and seizures are forbidden by the
Constitution only if unreasonable. The congressional
Pearl Harbor investigation disclosed
the great value of information obtained by
wire tapping and other interception of communications,
if properly evaluated and used.
In this atomic age, intelligence as to the activities
and intentions of our potential enemies
should be recognized as our first line of defense.
Today we are threatened by the aggression 
of a state which seeks, by methods characterized 
by secrecy and deception and including espionage, sabotage
and subversion, to extend throughout the world a philosophy and
government denying all civil liberties. The use of wire tapping to
obtain information as to such activities seems reasonable as a means
of protecting our own civil liberties.

347


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Civil Liberties 

Monthly Publication of the American Civil Liberties Union  170 Fifth Avenue New York. 10, N.Y   No. 92 MAY, 1951

Affiliates Meet 
Representatives of 10 affiliates attended 
an ACLU conference in New 
York, May 10-14. 
Delegates to the four-day meeting
 discussed policy questions, current 
civil liberties problems, plans to 
broaden and coordinate ACLU activities 
with those of other organizations, 
and proposals to increase the number 
of the affiliates. The conference ended 
after delegates attended a regular 
ACLU board meeting. 
An account of the meeting will be 
carried in the June CIVIL LIBERTIES. 

New Affiliate 
Program Set 
ACLU will intensify its efforts to recruit 
more civil libertarians for active membership 
of affiliates in the affairs of the Union.
This program, adopted by the Board of 
and to enlarge the area of participation 
Directors, will encompass five broad principles:
A larger membership.
An increase in the number of ACLU affiliates.
Added integration through inclusion of 
national ACLU members as members of 
active affiliates and affiliate members as members 
of the national organization.
Revision of procedure to increase the participation 
of affiliates and their members 
in nominating and electing ACLU Board of 
Directors and National Committee members.
More extensive consultation of affiliates
regarding policy questions.

Recognition
Recognizing that the cause of civil liberties 
is losing out to repressive forces in many 
, the Union feels that more activity is 
needed at the "grass roots" level.
Toward that end it hopes to enlist new 
members, thus expanding its volunteer corps 
for work in fields such as lower court cases, 
popular education, and legislative efforts.
With new members, ACLU could then work 
toward creating active affiliates in more of 
the 100 U.S. cities with 100,000 or more 
population, as well as encouraging more active 
participation in ACLU affairs by existing 
affiliates.
Although final authority on all matters rests 
with the Board of Directors, and while extensive 
centralization of operations is necessary, 
the Union will seek to extend affiliates' 
responsibilities on national questions.
The board proposed that biennial conferences 
be held so that delegates from affiliates 
and members of the board and National
Committee could discuss important issues.
Between meetings, the board will consult
National Committeemen and the boards of
any 10 active affiliates, or any combination
of these groups.
Majority recommendations of biennial
conferences or referendums, or contained in
answers to advice sought between conferences,
will be taken except for "vitally important"
cause.
Under new voting procedures, National
Committee members will be elected at large
by all ACLU members.  In the election for
Board members, and in other voting, an
affiliate, through its board, will cast as many
votes as it has members.


ACLU Mass Meeting Sparks 
Fight Against Censorship
Increasing threats of censorship in literature, art, and the theater were denounced at a ACLU-sponsored mass meeting in New York's Town Hall on May 9. 
Minority groups with generally laudable aims, as well as those demanding 
complete conformity with their own views, shared the blame for this
menace to democratic freedoms. 
After hearing the whole problem examined 
in detail by a distinguished panel of speakers, 
the audience of 1200 persons, by unanimous 
resolution, "condemned all censorship 
and suppression in the fields of communication,
art, and entertainment". It pledged support 
of "all appropriate methods" to combat 
censorship.
The meeting was held under auspices of 
ACLU's National Council on Freedom from 
Censorship. 
Elmer Rice, chairman of that affiliate, accused 
special interest pressure groups of 
operating against the process of democracy. 

Applause
It is easy to applause general statements
opposing censorship, he pointed out, but
much harder to deal with personal problems
arising from the freedom of any other minority
or of the majority.  Considerations of
pride, self-preservation, and economic interests,
Rice said, lead minority groups to
oppose the circulation of ideas unfavorable
to themselves.
Supporting his charge that such groups are
foremost in attempts to censor, the dramatist
cited censorship of or attempted censorship of
plays and movies by Jews, Catholics, Negroes,
and veterans' groups.  One suppressed film,
Oliver Twist, which at last has won approval
by the Motion Picture Association of America, 
is now meeting opposition of theater
owners, some of whom are banning it because
of complaints by Jewish groups.
A similar complaint was registered by
Francis Downing, associate editor of the
Catholic weekly, Commonweal.
"We need to be protected , in our freedom,
against the influence of minorities . . . enjoying
psychic or political or religious or
physical power" to enforce censorship, he
said. "Freedom is rebuked when the interests
of one group—any single group—suppresses
that which is offensive, to it alone."
Threats of political censorship against the
book industry were discussed by Donald
Klopfer, publisher and chairman of the censorship
committee of the Book Publisher's Council.
The book trade has an obligation to publish
books dealing with diverse political
and social thought so that "the democratic 
process of free inquiry and individual decision
can operate," he said.  But its responsibility
in that direction is challenged by "do
gooders" who are trying to impose conformity
by telling the industry what should be
published and the public what should be
read.  Their current insinuations  that the 
publishing field is pro-Communist could
lead to "public support for political censorship
on the grounds of national security,"
Klopfer said.

Political Opinion
Harrison Smith, president of the Saturday
Review of Literature agreed that the "danger
of censorship today lies in the realm of
international politics and opinions rather
than eroticism." he emphasized a related
danger—the force of public opinion which
results in ostracism and loss of livelihood
for writers and editors who hold unpopular
views or who have been made victims of
McCarthyism.
"This attitude on the part of the public
is truly dangerous because it leads straight
to the conception . . . that a man's work
should not be published simply because the
reader does not agree with him," Smith said.
Art is still relatively free from direct censorship,
according to Lloyd Goodrich, associate
director of the Whitney Museum, partly
becuase it is not a from of mass communication.
He noted, however, political, 
radio, and press attacks which caused the
(Continued on page 2)


Civil Liberties 
Published monthly except July and August by the 
AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION, 170 Fifth
Avenue, New York 10, N.Y. Telephone ORegon 
5-59990. Subscription: by membership, at $2, $5, $10,
$25 and up. 
Entered as second-class matter June 20, 1938 at the 
Post Office at New York, N. Y., under the act of 
March 3, 1879. Re-entered as second-class matter 
N.Y., under the act of March 3, 1879. 
Editor: ALAN REITMAN 

Court Narrows Oath Requisites

The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the 
right of Maryland to require candidates for 
state and city offices to swear that they are
 not attempting violent revolution. 
In thus acting, the high court affirmed a 
limited interpretation of one section of the 
controversial Ober loyalty oath law. Reviewing 
a Maryland state court decision on the 
law, the Supreme Court Stated: 
"We read this decision to hold that, to obtain 
a place on a Maryland ballot, a candidate 
need only make oath that he is not a 
person who is engaged 'in one way or another 
in the attempt to overthrow the government 
by force and violence', and that he is not 
knowingly a member of an organization engaged 
in such an attempt."

Ruling

The ruling was made in a test case brought
by Thelma Gerende, a Progressive party candidate
for a seat on the Baltimore City Council.
It failed to support her contention that
the oath violated the First and 14th Amendments.

The case was considered significant, however,
because of the limited nature of the 
oath which the Supreme Court affirmed. The
law originally required candidates to swear
that they did not advocate overthrow of the
government by force. In arguments before
the high court, Maryland's attorney general
pledged that state officials would honor loyalty
oaths declaring only that candidates
were not engaged in acts to bring the government's
downfall by violence.

ACLU Supports Demands For Inquiry And Reforms
To Prevent Alleged Police Brutality In New York

A civic group with which ACLU is affiliated
has called upon Mayor Vincent R. Impellitteri 
to investigate police brutality in
New York.
Urging a survey, the Citizens committee 
on Police Practices recommended also that
special training be instituted for police
serving in minority-group sections and that
public hearings be held for police accused
of violating civil rights. The New York City
Civil Liberties Committee is a member of 
the citizens group.
Pointing out that an investigation is long
overdue, the Citizens Committee reviewed
three recent cases of alleged brutality, one of
which resulted in death.

One Victim

One victim was John Derrick, who was
shot to death by two policemen a day after
his release from the Army. The officers, who
had stopped Derrick for questioning, claimed
they fired only after he drew a gun. They
were exonerated by a grand jury.
As a result of another incident, Patrolman
William A. Tierney has been indicted on assault
charges. Tierney was accused of brutally
beating Robert Cox, whom he picked up
in Times Square on a disorderly conduct
charge.
Cox' attorney declared that because of the
alleged mistreatment, the victim had suffered 
a ruptured eardrum, face and body bruises,
and possible loss of sight in one eye. He
and witnesses to the arrest denied Tierney's
charge that Cox was drunk.
George Rundquist, assistant ACLU director,
was denied permission to attend an investigation
of the case conducted by Police 
Commissioner Thomas Murphy.
The third incident involved John Harvey
Brown, whose skull was fractured during an
encounter with two off-duty patrolmen. En-route 
to work, Brown said, he was accosted
by two police as they emerged from a
tavern with drawn guns. At their command
he raised his aims, then emptied his pockets
of 80 cents and a knife. Brown suffered a
skull fracture when one of the men struck
him with a revolver butt. A New York Supreme 
Court recently awarded him $60,000.

CURB ORGANIZERS

ACLU has called for a Federal investigation
of the arrest of two CIO
union organizers in Dublin, Ga.
Investigation is sought in view of
the apparent violation of the rights of
workers in southern areas to organize
freely. The two CIO men reportedly
were arrested while meeting with 
Negro workers of a store where they
were soliciting members.

ACLU Asked Clemency For Willie McGee

In the interests of racial justice and to
obviate Communist propaganda, ACLU
sought clemency again for Willie McGee.
In another telegram dispatched to Governor 
Fielding L. Wright of Mississippi, 
Union officials urged that the death sentence
imposed in the celebrated rape case be commuted
to life imprisonment. Wright failed
to act and McGee was executed on May 8th.
ACLU reiterated that the Negro defendant
was a victim of discrimination since no white
man convicted for rape in Mississippi ever
had received a death sentence.
"Although the U.S. Supreme Court has denied
a review of this case, which was sought
on the ground of discrimination in the sentence,
the denial may have been due merely
to lack of adequate legal proof," said the
wire, signed by Patrick Murphy Malin, executive
director, and Arthur Garfield Hays,
general counsel.
The discrimination charge - "obviously
true" - it added, is "bringing disrepute on
the entire U.S. and its relations abroad and
is giving . . . propaganda to Communist organizations."
ACLU never expressed an opinion on
McGee's more recent charge that the prosecution
used perjured testimony against him.
It was never able to obtain records of the
case from defense counsel to determine
whether it should intervene from the standpoint
of alleged civil liberties violations.

Convicted Twice For Draft Evasion

ACLU is seeking by conferences, publicity,
and court action to make certain that conscientious
objectors will not have to serve
more than one sentence for failure to register.
The Union's present concern is the case
of Robert Michener, 19-year-old Quaker student,
who has been sentenced to 10 years on
virtually the same charges for which he previously
served a jail term. The new sentence
is the biggest ever imposed under the Selective
Service Act of 1948. (The sentence has 
since been reduced to five years.)
Feeling that Michener has been placed in
double jeopardy, ACLU is trying to have his
sentenced vacated. Union officials also have
called Congressmen's attention to the case
and are arguing in Michener's behalf at meetings
with Justice Department and Selective
Service representatives.
Michener was attending Fort Hays (Kan.)
State College when he refused to register
for the draft and was sentenced to a year 
and a day.

After Release

After his release, the Government itself
registered Michener as 1-A, ignoring the fact
that he was a CO and that as a felon he was
not eligible for service.
When his draft board sent him a questionnaire
and orders to report for a physical,
Michener refused to comply. A half year
later he was indicted once more: for failure
to complete a questionnaire, to report for
his physical, and to report for induction.
Although Michener pleaded guilty to the
three-count charge, his attorneys argued that
the defendant already has served a term for
essentially the same offense. Michener thus
would be placed in double jeopardy if sentence
were imposed again, they said.
Despite their pleas, the court handed
down the maximum sentence of five years on
each count, but specified that two of the 
three terms would run concurrently.
The case has aroused the intense interest
of both the Friends Service Committee and
the National Service Board for Religious
Objectors who have sought to aid Michener.

ACLU Mass Meeting
(continued from page 1)

State Department to withdraw a collection
of American paintings from exhibit in Europe,
and attempts to suppress modern art
by labeling it Communist.
H. V. Kaltenborn, the radio commentator,
declared that "radio has very little censorship
today." He praised the Federal Communications
Commission for its restraint in
exercising power, the general fairness of
radio stations in regard to politics, and the
ACLU for its works in guarding against
abuses of liberties.
Lillian Gish called for freedom from censorship
in the theater. Joseph Manikiewicz,
the motion picture writer, producer, and
director, who was unable to address the meeting,
sent a telegram calling for vigilance
against censorship threats. Patrick Murphy
Malin, ACLU executive director, who presided,
also read messages opposing censorship
from leaders in magazine, radio network,
newspaper, and book publishing fields.

High Court Rules On Civil Rights

Decisions on four civil rights cases of
special interest were handed down recently
by the U.S. Supreme Court.
In one, the high court reversed the convictions 
of Walter Irvin and Samuel Shepherd, 
Negroes accused of raping a white girl
at Groveland, Fla.
The three other cases concerned Jay G.
Williams, a private detective who had used
the third degree to force confessions from 
prisoners.
In overturning the Groveland conviction,
the Supreme Court majority indicated its
decision was based on discrimination against
Negroes in jury selection.
What attracted most attention, however,
was a separate concurring opinion of Justice
Robert Jackson which declared that the
convictions should have been reversed also
because the defendants were unable to have
a fair trial in the area where it was held.

Jackson Opinion
Jackson substantiated his opinion by pointing
to newspaper and radio publicity about
purported confessions, which were not admitted
at the trial; to inflammatory material
published in the Florida press; and to
threatened violence in the courtroom. With
Justice Felix Frankfurter concurring, Jackson
wrote that the lower court should have
granted the defendants' pleas for a change
of venue or postponement of their trial until
local hostility had subsided. He added that
no Negro serving on the jury would have 
dared to disagree with the prevailing sentiment
for conviction.
 The justice's opinion made even more
meaningful an article by Dorothy Dunbar 
Bromley, ACLU board member, in the March
Harper's concerning the problems of free 
press versus fair trial. Opposing restrictions 
on the press, Mrs. Bromley suggested that
courts curb pre-trial public statements by
police, the FBI, and prosecuting attorneys.
Such action, she concluded, would increase
chances of obtaining jurors free of prejudice.

Third Degree Case
The cases against Williams were an outgrowth
of his employment by a Florida corporation
to investigate thefts of its property.
In one, the high court held that by using
third degree methods a special police officer
lays himself open to criminal prosecution
for willfully trying under "color of law" to
deprive a person of his rights, in violation
of a Federal civil rights statute.
Williams' conviction in a second case was
reversed, however. Four justices ruled that
another civil rights law under which he was
found guilty covered only constitutional
rights arising from the relationship of a
citizen and the Federal Government.
Rights violated by Williams were held to be
those involving the relationship of an individual
and the state.
In the third case the Supreme Court held
that Williams and others allegedly associated
with him in using third degree could be
prosecuted for perjury without being placed
in double jeopardy and even though three
of the associates had been acquitted of original
charges.

WANT VOLUNTEERS
We want to thank our good and
loyal volunteers who have been working
on the many important projects
which ACLU's limited staff has not
been able to undertake.
We are urgently in need of additional
volunteers-especially:
1) Library School graduate, willing
to help catalogue and build our library
into the most complete civil liberties
reference center in New York;
2) Members (non-members too)
with a few leisure hours during the
week for a variety of jobs-some interesting,
some routine, but all important.
Please phone Mrs. Levine, OR 5-5990.

Right To Satirize Govt. In Movie Is Defended

ACLU has taken issue with a newspaper
farm editor who suggested that a controversial
movie cartoon which satirized government
agricultural planning might encourage
censorship.
The film, Fresh Laid Plans, was criticized
by Alfred P. Stedman of the St. Paul
Pioneer Press, as a "one-sided political
editorial" likely to raise the question "of
drawing rules governing the use of movies
in farm politics".
While recognizing Stedman's right to oppose
the film, Patrick Murphy Malin,
ACLU executive director, expressed concern
in a letter to Stedman over "any suggestion
of censorship or suppression". Malin
pointed out that persons and organizations must be
left free to produce, and individuals left
free to see, movies of their choosing.
"Our concern that this and other films
should not be suppressed stems from our belief
that democracy lives on the presentation
of all points of view-including opposition to
governmental policies," Malin wrote.

Court Outlaws Teacher Oaths
Court cases in California and New York
highlighted the continuing fight for academic 
freedom.
Overruled in their efforts to require special
loyalty oaths from employes of the University 
of California, several of the institution's
regents intimated they would file appeals as
individuals. This action was planned in
answer to a state District Court of Appeals
ruling that a non-Communist contractural
letter for U.C. employes was unconstitutional.
The court instructed the university to
reinstate 18 faculty members-plaintiffs in a 
test case-who had been dismissed for failure 
to disavow Communist leanings in a 
special statement.
In New York meantime eight public school
teachers fired after declining to say whether
they belonged to the Communist party
brought suit for restoration of their jobs and
back salaries.

N. Y. Teachers
The New York teachers accused the Board
of Education of violating civil service law
which prohibits questions concerning political
affiliation as a test of fitness, and of attempting
to supersede the state constitution, 
which requires a loyalty statement of public
officials. ACLU contended during Board of
Education hearings for the eight ousted instructors
that political affiliation alone should
not govern eligibility to teach.
In the California ruling, the appellate court
declared unanimously that the university
teachers were public officers and as such
should not be required to make oaths of 
allegiance other than that required of all
state officials under the California constitution.

Civil Liberties Violations Reported By More Than
Half Of 33 Campus Papers Participating in Survey

Instances of civil liberties violations are
reported from more than half the 33 colleges
participating in an informal survey under
ACLU auspices.
The violations ranged from bans on controversial 
speakers to required teacher loyalty 
oaths and attempts to control reading matter.
Leading college newspaper editors undertook
the survey as part of ACLU's observance 
of Bill of Rights Day last Dec. 15. When
the last of the reports was submitted recently,
a compilation showed that on only 16 of
the participating campuses were there no reported
attempts to interfere with civil liberties.
All 33 colleges, however, reported complete
freedom of the student press.

Tabulation Shows
A tabulation showed that:
Student organizations on eight campuses
were limited by college administrations in
their freedom of choice of outside speakers
for meetings.
Because of their political views, three student
groups lost official recognition or the
right to use facilities.
Five of the schools had been investigated
by legislative or other special committees.
Six of the schools required loyalty oaths of
teachers. Similar oaths are required at two 
institutions of students working on projects
financed by Federal monies and at another
university of students taking a required military
science course.
Efforts to penalize faculty members for
political views or views expressed outside
the classrooms were reported by five of the
college editors.
Religious groups succeeded in forcing two
books off the general library shelves at one
school, while the city council in the community
of another university sought to censor
library books.
Attempts to control teaching materials
also were made by alumni groups of several
colleges, and one institution dropped a 
workers' extension course after criticism
that it had a 'Marxian bias".
Newspapers from the following colleges
took part in the survey: Univ. of North Carolina,
Maine, Florida State, Stanford, Wisconsin,
C.C.N.Y., N.Y.U., Northwestern, 
Minnesota, Harvard, Smith, Queens College,
California, Michigan, Univ. of New Hampshire, 
Columbia, Pennsylvania, Cornell,
Oberlin, Dartmouth, Utah, Southern Methodist,
Idaho, Alabama, Bard, Miami, Yale,
Swarthmore, Skidmore, Chicago, Princeton,
and Vassar.

CIVIL LIBERTIES 
'round the nation 
 
CALIFORNIA:  Appellate Department of Los Angeles Superior Court upheld two lower courts by declaring unconstitutional L.A. county ordinance requiring Communists 
to register. Decision based on protection against self-incrimination in view of California 
Criminal Syndicalism Act. . . . Northern California ACLU protested action of Yuba County 
Board of Supervisors in rescinding agreement to rent meeting hall to Jehovah's Witnesses 
at Marysville. Action taken after protests by VFW, which then engages hall for dates Witnesses 
requested. 

GEORGIA:  Legislature approved bill outlawing white hoods and burning crosses, long- 
time symbols of KKK. . . House and Senate voted to deny state funds to any white
public school admitting Negros, even under court order. Monies would be denied to all 
schools if courts ruled this act unconstitutional. . . . Piedmont College fired two staff members 
for protesting college acceptance of funds from group advocating "white supremacy " . 

MASSACHUSETTS:  Appearance of Dr. Thomas I. Emerson, president of National Lawyers Guild and Yale law professor, as speaker at civil liberties conference in Springfield 
brought sharp protest from Catholic. Msgr. George S. L. Connor, charging Guild with pro-Red 
bias, advised Knights of Columbus to organize a committee to guard Springfield's moral 
standards. Two colleges sponsoring conference strongly defended their choice to speakers. 

IOWA:  Senate rejected measure to require loyalty oaths of all public employees. 
Proposal was offered as amendment to civil defense act which provided for loyalty oaths 
from all civil defense workers. . . . Dubuque County grand jury returned no indictments 
after investigating modern novels for obscenity. PTA and other groups had sought suppression 
of certain modern reprints to which they objected. To help insure fair inquiry, officials seized copies of classics. 

WASHINGTON, D. C.:  Comedian Maurice Chevalier has been barred from U.S.
because of Communist activities. Chevalier admitted signing Stockholm peace petition but 
denied belonging to any political party. . . . Sec. John W. Bricker ( R.-O.) suggested investigation 
of Federal judges, especially those hearing cases involving admitted or alleged 
Communists. 

NEW JERSEY:  State Supreme Court upheld 1949 law requiring public school teachers 
to swear they do not believe in violent revolution or belong to groups which advocate 
such means of changing government. Ruling was on test case brought by George B. Thorp, 
discharged from Newark College of Engineering for refusing to sign oath. 

TENNESSEE:  Federal District Court ruled four Negroes were entitled to attend 
University of Tennessee professional schools because of U. S. Supreme Court decision. University
trustees had rejected Negroes' applications. 

NEW YORK:  Columbia University will undertake a two-year inquiry into academic
freedom. ACLU has offered pertinent material from its files. . . .  Actors Equity approves 
of exposing persons active in the "communist conspiracy . . . as enemies of the nation" , it
announced when asked for views on subpoena of some Equity members by House Un-American 
Activities Committee. . . . Dr. John B. King became first Negro to be nominated 
as an assistant superintendent of schools in N.Y.C. . . . Civil rights violations against Indians 
are prevalent in nearly all states with sizable Indian populations, according to Oliver La 
Farge, president of the Association on American Indian Affairs. 


Editor, Attorney Are 
Added to ACLU Board 

ACLU's Board of Directors has two new 
members and its National Committee 11 as
the result of elections by the Corporation. 
James Kerney, Jr., editor of the Trenton 
Times, and General Telford Taylor, attorney
and former war crimes prosecutor, have been 
added to the board for three- year terms. 
New National Committee members are 
Sadie Alexander, Mike Masaoka, and Millicent 
C. McIntosh, chosen for three-year 
terms; and James R. Caldwell, J. Frank 
Dobie, Frederick May Eliot, Abram L. Harris, 
Palmer Hoyt, Karl Menninger, George 
R. Stewart, and William W. Waymack, elected
for two-year terms. 
In the balloting, held to fill vacancies and 
expiring terms, the following board members 
were reelected for three years: Carl Carmer, 
Norman Cousins, Morris Ernst, H. William 
Fitelson, Walter Gellhorn, Arthur Garfield 
Hays, August Heckscher, Herbert Northrup, 
Elmer Rice, and Raymond L. Wise.  William 
L. White was relected for two years. 
Returned to the National Committee for 
three years were Thurman Arnold, Francis 
Biddle, Henry Seidel Canby , Allan K. Chalmers, 
Grenville Clark, Morris L. Cooke, 
Elmer Davis, John Dos Passos, Thomas H. 
Eliot, Walter T. Fisher, Lloyd K. Garrison, 
Frank P. Graham, Earl G. Harrison, John 
A. Lapp, Harold D. Lasswell, Max Lerner, John 
P. Marquand, Alexander Meiklejohn, Elmo 
Roper, William Scarlett, and Arthur Schlesinger, 
Jr.   
William Lindsay Young was reelected to
the committee for a two-year term. 

FEPC BILLS LAG
FEPC supporters have made little 
progress in state legislatures this year. 
Although FEPC bills of varying degrees 
of effectiveness were introduced 
in legislatures of 18 states, only one 
rather ineffective act—in Colorado—
has been passed. In addition, prospects 
for FEPC legislation still are alive in 
only two other states —Minnesota and 
Pennsylvania. 
FEPC bills were killed in the House 
or Senate of seven other states, and 
while proposed bills still are technically 
alive in three other legislatures, 
their chances for enactment are considered 
slight. No FEPC legislation 
was introduced in any southern state.


AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION 
170 FIFTH AVENUE
NEW YORK 10 N.Y. 
347 

MAY, 1951

Emergency Civil Liberties Committee
James Imbrie,
Lawrenceville, New Jersey

FOR RELEASE, MONDAY, OCTOBER 6, 1951

EMERGENCY CIVIL LIBERTIES COMMITTEE FORMED

The formation of an Emergency Civil Liberties Committee by more than 
one hundred and fifty founders was announced today by its Acting Chairman, 
Professor Paul Lehman of Princeton Theological Seminary and its Acting
Secretary, Mr. James Imbrie, retired investment banker.
The purposes of the organization are to help mobilize public opinion, 
nationally and regionally, in support of the traditional American constitutional 
guarantee of civil liberties, and to render such aid as it own to victims of 
current abridgment of these liberties in politics, education and the professions.  
The Emergency Civil Liberties Committee is pledge to a strictly 
non-partisan policy and where constitutional rights are involved, will defend 
accused or persecuted persons irrespective of politics, race, color or creed.
The Committee in its announcement cited as examples of types of cases 
in which it would take an active interest: the arrests under the Smith Act, 
as in the Communist cases; denials of passports and the right to travel, as 
in the case of Prof. John F. Fairbank; loyalty discharges, as in the case of 
the Trotskyist legless veteran, James Kutcher; and state sedition law prosecutions, 
as in the recent indictments of Prof. Dirk Struik of M.I.T. and 
Harry E. Winner, Massachusetts businessmen.
The Committee does not aim to compete with existing civil liberties 
organizations, but hopes to be able to move with dispatch in situations where 
these organizations are unable or unwilling to act.
The founders come from 39 states and include more than 50 members of
the clergy and many educators and professionals:  Among them are: Rev. Edward
F. Allen, Rev. Mark A. Chamberlin, Prof. Edwin G. Conklin, Florence Converse, 
Malcolm Cowley, Dr. Katherine Dodd, Prof. Henry Pratt Fairchild, Prof. Royal 
Wilbur France, Prof. E. Franklin Frazier, Gilbert W. Gabriel, Prof. Robert J. 
Havighurst, Dr. I.M. Kolthoff, Dr. A.C. McGiffert, Jr., Rev. Daniel L. Reed, 
Rev. Walter B. Spaulding, I.F. Stone, Dr. Richard M. Sutton, Dr. W. Lou Tandy, 
Dr. Mary Church Terrell, Rabbi Joshua Trachtenberg and Prof. Hugh H. Wilson.

The text of the Policy Guide of the new committee follows:


Emergency Civil Liberties Committee  - 2

WE BELIEVE:

1. That fundamental freedom guaranteed by the Constitution 
to all Americans, are denied by prosecutions for teaching 
and advocating ideas, under the Smith Act or similar 
legislation.

2. That the Smith Act is unwise legislation in a democracy 
and that its restrictions on freedom of speech and press 
are unconstitutional for the reasons outlined by Justices 
Black and Douglas in the case of the eleven Communists.

3. That there should be a rehearing of the case by the Supreme 
Court seeking a reversal of the majority decision and that 
the Smith Act should be repealed.

4. That in view of the doubts and qualifications expressed 
in the majority, concurring and dissenting opinions of 
the Court, prosecutions and arrests under the Smith Act 
should be suspended.

5. That all defendants in civil liberties cases are entitled
to legal counsel of their own choice.  The legal profession 
has a responsibility to see that adequate legal 
counsel is made available.

6. That the constitutional guarantee against excessive bail 
should be afforded to every defendant.

The list of founders is attached.

EMERGENCY CIVIL LIBERTIES COMMITTEE - 3
List of Founders (not complete)
Rev. Stacy Adams
Rev. Gross W. Alexander
Rev. Edward F. Allen
Walter Allmendinger
Rev. Paul Allured
Rabbi Michael Alper
Mrs. Bertha Andreson
Prof. Kurt Anderson
Robenia F. Anthony
Benjamin Appel
Dr. Glenn L. Archer
Rev. William T. Baird
Rev. Frederic E. Ball
Rev. Lee H. Ball
Edwin Bjorkman
Rev. Charles Bemis Bliss
Hans Blumenfeld
Prof. Theodor Brameld
Prof. G. Murray Branch
Dr. Louise Fargo Brown
Dr. Scott Buchanan
David Burliuk, Sr.
Rev. Dudley H. Burr
Rev. Paul W. Burres
Rev. Raymond Celkins
Rev. C. Lennart Carlson
Robert Carse
Rev. J. R. Case
Rev. Mark A. Chamberlin
Hon. John M. Coe
Prof. Edwin G. Conklin
Florence Converse
Paul Corey
Malcolm Cowley
Prof. Ephraim Cross


Frank M. Cross, Jr.
Dr. G. Harris Daggett
Dr. Jerome Davis
Rev. George H. DeBoer
Prof. John J. DeBoer
Prof. W.W Denton
Dr. Katherine Dodd
Dr. James A. Dombrowski
Mr. J. C. Drake
Dean David Dunn
Rev. Samuel W. Eaton
Dr. J. Edwin Elder
Dr. Lewis A. Eldfrige, Jr.
Dr. Leo Eloesser
Rev. Joseph M. Evans
Philip Evergood
Prof. Henry Pratt Fairchild
Rev. J.E Feller
Rev. Hugh B.Fenke
Rev. George A. Fisher
Rev. Joseph Fletcher
E. S. Fraley
Hon. Clemens F. France
Prof. Royal Wilbur France
Lewis C. Frank, Jr.
Prof. E. Franklin Frazier
Elizabeth P. Frazier
Dr. Richard A. Freedman
Gilbert W. Gabriel
Dr. and Mrs. Morton W. Garfield
John C. Granbery
Rev. Armand Guerrero
Rev. Albert J. Hallington
Dr. Alice Hamilton
Prof. C.H. Hamlin
Prof. Talbot Hamlin


P. M. Hammond
Rev. Sidney B. Harris
Rev. Fred. L. Harrison
William Harrison
Prof. Robt. J. Havighurst
William J. Hays
Mrs. Grace Heintz
Rev. Chester E. Hodgson
Rev. Elmer J. Hostetler
Daniel Howard
Rev. Kenneth DeP.Hughes
Mr. James Imbrie
Dr. Eugene Jasinski
Rev. Albert W. Kauffman
Rev. David O. Kendall
Rev. J. Spencer Kennard, Jr.
Max I. Kohrman
Dr. I. M. Kolthoff
Dr. Walter Landauer
Sidney Laufman
Mr. C. L. Lee
Rev. W. Colin Lee
Dr. Paul Lehman
Prof. Ronal B. Levy
Miss Florence H.Luscomb
Rev. Paul L. McClure
Rev. John P. McConnell
Dr. A.C. McGiffert, Jr.
Robert F. Mack
Rev. Howard G.Matson
Horace S. Meldahl
Rev. E.A. Mellon
Dr. Jacob Melnick
Prof. Clyde R. Miller
Judge Stanley Moffatt
Mr. Cavendish Moxon


EMERGENCY CIVIL LIBERTIES COMMITTEE - 4
List of Founders, cont.
Rev. C. Edwin Murphy
Prof. Sumner B. Myers
Dr. W. C. Newman
Prof. Erwin Panofsky
Meyer Parodneck
Rev. Edward L. Peet
Nels Peterson
Willard B. Ranson
Rev. Daniel L. Reed
Rev. J. W. Reed
Bertha C. Reynolds
Rev. James L. Rhinesmith
Dr. John G. Rideout
Dr. Harry W. Roberts
Prof. Robert A. Rosenbaum
Sol Rottenberg
Rev. James P. Russell
Rev. Vernon Sanderson
Rabbi Maurice H. Schatz
Nat M. Schostak
Rev. Otto Schulze
Dr. Vida D. Scudder
Rev. Harry E. Shaner
Bill Shneyer
Mrs. Eva Sikelianos
Hon.C L. Simmons
Irving L. Smith


Dr. Louise Pettibone Smith
Rev. Walter A. Smith
Herschel Solomon
Forrest B. Spaulding
Rev. Walter B. Spaulding
John M. Weatherwax
Abraham Welanko
George H. Wharam
Prof. Paul L. Whitely
Rev. Elwin L. Wilson
Prof. Hugh H. Wilson
Rev. Cornelius H. Witt
Dr. Ernst Wolff
Dr. Leona Wolff
John C. Wright
Rev. Fred Zimmerman
Dr. Dillon Wesley Throckmorton
Judge Edward P. Totten
Rabbi Joshua Trachtenberg
Rev. Ernest J. Troutner
A. M. Trudeau
Mrs. Jeanette S. Turner
Mrs. E. H. Tyndale
Mrs. Mary Van Kleeck
Eda Lou Walton
Rev. Raymond A. Waser
Dr. Richard M. Sutton


Howard Edwin Sweeting
Dr. W.Lou Tandy
Rev Alva W. Taylor
Rev. Kenneth R.Teed
Rabbi Samuel Teitelbaum
L.E. Terrell
Dr. Mary Church Terrell
Rev. D.L.Thomas
John E. Thorne
Rev. J.C. Thornton
I.F. Stone
Rev. Charles M. Styron

CIVIL LIBERTIES
MONTHLY PUBLICATION OF THE AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION
NUMBER 104
APRIL 1952
 
RADIO PROGRAM
WMCA, a New York radio station,
 is presenting "The Battle for the
 Schools" Monday and Friday nights, 
9:30 to 10 PM. Mrs. Dorothy Dunbar 
Bromley, a member of the Union's 
Board of Directors, is acting as com-
mentator in this series on freedom in 
the schools. The April 11th program 
is on the Scarsdale situation, and, on
April 14, Clyde Hill, Director of Yale's 
School of Education, will speak on
"The Citizens Act."

Now, Says Chafee, 
Is "Period of Struggle"
   "We are in a period of struggle once more," 
said Zechariah Chafee, Jr., in his Roger
Baldwin Civil Liberties Foundation lecture 
on March 12th.  "All the water that ran under 
the bridge for a quarter of a century after 1917 
is now coming back under the bridge in
waves of intolerance."
   Mr. Chafee, author and professor of law 
at Harvard University, spoke on "Thirty-five
Years with Freedom of Speech" to an enthusiastic 
audience of 1,000 at Columbia
University.
Four Periods
   Since 1917, he said, the fight for free 
speech has fallen roughly into four periods.  
First came the Period of Struggle and Criminal 
Prosecutions—the era of sedition acts and 
super-patriotism—ending in 1920.  The next 
decade was the Period of Growth when peacetime 
sedition laws were rejected, when the 
Supreme Court recognized free speech as a 
basic liberty to be protected "from impairment 
by the states."  These were also the
years, Chafee pointed out, of the "solid establishment 
of the American Civil Liberties 
Union."
Achievement
   From 1930 to 1945 was a Period of 
Achievement during which the Supreme 
Court, under Chief Justice Hughes, struck 
down as unconstitutional one anti-free speech
statute after another.  In 1945, Chafee said, 
a second Period of Struggle began.  But it is
a different struggle this time: the dangers of 
espionage are greater, while the strength of 
the extremist radicals—numerically—is less.  
Further, the resistance to suppression is
weaker now than in 1917-1920.  And the suppression
this time takes a more subtle form: 
courts are superseded by proceedings where 
there are no juries, no supervision by judges,
and only vague definitions of wrongdoing.
   What can be done to restore basic American
freedoms?  The attack, said Chafee, must 
be concentrated on public opinion rather than 
on court action alone.  "The best safeguard 
against inroads on freedom of speech lies in 
the ferment in thoughts of the young and of
those who will not let themselves grow old."
   Professor Chafee's lecture will be published 
by the Baldwin Foundation, and the ACLU 
will purchase copies for distribution to interested 
members.

Radio-TV Expose Published:  
"The Judges and the Judged"
   April 9th is the publication date for "The Judges and the Judged," the ACLU's long-
 awaited report by Merle Miller on black-listing in the radio-television industry.
   Mr. Miller is a member of the Union's Board of Directors and author of "That
Winter" and "The Sure Thing."  The book is being published by Doubleday & Company
for general public sale at $2.50. (See page 3 for special offer to ACLU members.)
   "The Judges and the Judged" brings out 
into the open the methods by which "Red
Channels" and the weekly newsletter Counterattack 
function as the source of radio's 
fear-inspired "anti-Communist" hiring policies. 
Miller also exposes the techniques used
by pro-Communists to black-list right-wingers.
   "This book," says Robert E. Sherwood in
his forward, "tells with accuracy and objectivity 
a factual story of subversion and 
sabotage of freedom in the United States of 
America at a time when the cause of freedom 
throughout the world is in mortal peril."
   The 220-page volume is based on many 
months of investigation in which Mr. Miller, 
ACLU Assistant Director Alan Reitman, and 
other Union staff members and volunteers 
took part.  Interviews were held with executives 
of radio and TV networks and stations,
with advertising agency chiefs, writers' and 
actors' agents, officials in corporations buying 
radio-TV time, officers of unions and guilds, 
and with representatives of the entertainment 
world's trade organizations.  Also queried 
were government officials, past and present, 
from the FBI, the FCC and Congress.
   With these interviews as background, the
investigators spent many hours with the editors 
of Counterattack and with individuals 
listed in "Red Channels."  Wherever possible, 
Mr. Miller uses the actual words of those
interviewed and allows the facts to speak 
for themselves.
   An introduction by the ACLU Board Chairman 
Ernest Angell and Executive Director
Patrick Murphy Malin outlines the Union's 
policies on the large problem of black-listing, 
from whatever source—anti- or pro-Communist.
   "The Judges and the Judged" is copyrighted
by the ACLU which will receive all 
royalties from its sale until the costs of the 
Union's investigation, some $5,000, have been 
met.  After this point royalties will be divided 
evenly between Mr. Miller and the ACLU.

MALIN IN WEST
Patrick Murphy Malin, the Union's 
Executive Director, spent the month of 
March conferring with local ACLU 
branches and groups considering affiliation
in Southern California, San Francisco, 
Portland, Seattle, Salt Lake City, 
and in Colorado.

CIVIL LIBERTIES
Published monthly except July and August by the AMERICAN 
CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION, 170 Fifth Avenue, New 
York 10, N. Y. Telephone ORegon 5-5990. Subsciption: 
by membership, at $2, $5, $10, $25, and up. 
Entered as second-class matter June 20, 1938 at the Post 
Office at New York, N. Y., under the act of March 3, 
1879. Re-entered as second-class matter October 11, 1949 
at the Post Office at New York, N. Y., under the act of 
March 3, 1879.
Editor: JEFREY E. FULLER

A Letter to the Editor
Dear Sir: 
In my opinion, most of the criticism directed 
against "Red Channels" has been guilty 
of the very same offenses alleged against the 
book itself. For example, in the December 
1951 issue of CIVIL LIBERTIES, Mr. Elmer Rice 
was quoted as describing "Red Channels" as 
a "vicious publication that destroys characters 
by innuendo and veiled accusations."
There is no innuendo or veiled accusation 
in "Red Channels." This 213-page book 
is composed of three parts. The Introduction, 
which I wrote, summarizes Communist aims 
and methods in "colonizing" and otherwise 
exploiting radio and TV. It took as its text 
a statement by J. Edgar Hoover, from which 
same statement were derived the title, "Red 
Channels," and the cover illustration of a 
red hand seeking to grasp a microphone. 
I made it painfully clear that the Communists 
had used not only Party members and reliable 
sympathizers, but also had exploited 
"many well meaning innocents."
The second part, an Alphabetical Index of 
Names, listed 151 individuals in radio and 
TV, together with a compilation of their 
previously reported connections with groups 
and causes cited as Communist or Communist 
fronts. This compilation was made by me 
and the publishers of Counterattack, with 
whom I am not otherwise connected. It 
was meticulously and copiously documented. It 
was prefaced by a conspicuous warning that 
some individuals listed might not have believed 
in, sympathized with, or even recognized 
the causes they had advanced. 
The third part of the book gave thumbnail 
descriptions of the various organizations 
listed.
As an ACLU member myself, I call upon 
civil libertarians to first read "Red Channels" 
before they seek to exercise a form of censorship 
against it.
VINCENT W. HARTNETT

Mass. CLU Meeting Weighs 
ACLU Integration Proposal

ACLU members in Massachusetts were invited 
to a meeting of the C.L.U. of Mass. in 
Cambridge on April 2nd. The CLUM called 
the meeting to obtain approval for a plan to 
integrate the membership of the ACLU and 
CLUM under which all members in the 
Commonwealth will belong to both state and 
national Civil Liberties Unions. 
The CLUM in mid-March protested Public 
Safety Commissioner Daniel I. Murphy's instructions 
to police to warn book dealers not 
to sell "U.S.A. Confidential."

ELMER RICE ON "RED CHANNELS"

A distinguished figure in the American theatre, Elmer Rice has 
been a member of the Union Board of Directors since 1933. He 
has led the ACLU in its fight against censorship through his chairmanship 
of the Union's National Council on Freedom from Censorship.
Mr. Rice has also been a prime mover in struggle against blacklisting 
practices in the radio and television world. Last November 
he cancelled his contract with The Celanese Theatre, a TV program, 
charging that at least one actor he had recommended for a 
part in one of his plays had been turned down "not upon artistic 
but upon 'public relations' (i.e. political) considerations."

Late in February Elmer Rice rejoined Celanese Theatre after 
satisfying himself that neither it nor its advertising agency, Ellington 
& Co., would use blacklists in casting its productions.

CIVIL LIBERTIES is pleased to be able to print Mr. Rice's seven-point 
reply to Vincent Harnett's communication at the left. 

1. As far as I know, no attempt has been 
made to "censor" "Red Channels," least of 
all by the ACLU. On the contrary, the ACLU 
has expressed its willingness to combat any 
attempt to interfere with the publication of 
"Red Channels" or Counterattack.

2. The cover of "Red Channels" (to which 
Mr. Hartnett wrote the anonymous introduction) 
reads: "The Report of Communist Influence 
in Radio and Television, Published by 
Counterattack." Mr. Hartnett's attempt to 
dissociate himself from Counterattack is, 
therefore, not only irrelevant but disingenuous. 

3. "Red Channels" lists numerous so-called 
Communist-front organizations and 151 individuals, 
alleged to be affiliated with one or 
more of these organizations. There is absolutely 
nothing in the book to show that any 
of these individuals has exerted any "Communist 
influence" on radio or television, as 
implied on the cover. I call that inexcusable 
and misleading innuendo.

Documentation

4. Mr. Hartnett's "meticulous and copious" 
documentation consists, in the main, of references 
to such "dependable" sources and The 
Daily Worker and The New Masses; of unauthenticated 
"citations" from the report of 
the House Committee on Un American Activities, 
which in turn quotes verbatim from 
the report of the California Fact-Finding 
Committee on Un-American Activities (the 
Tenney Committee), itself another of the 
chief sources of the "Red Channels" citations. 

The objectiveness and reasonableness of the 
Tenney Committee's "fact-finding" may be 
judged by its citation of practically every 
well-known liberal in the United States (including 
Roger Baldwin, 12 citations; Morris 
L. Ernst, 5; Osmond K. Fraenkel, 7; Arthur 
Garfield Hays, 10; Whitney North Seymour, 
3; Norman Thomas, 5); and such "Communist-
front" organizations as the ACLU, the 
American Jewish Congress, the Screen Writers' 
Guild and (cross my heart!) the National 
Institute of Arts and Letters. To single out 
and publicly stigmatize individuals on the 
basis of such "documentation" is, to my way 
of thinking, to be guilty of cynical recklessness. 

5. By including several self-avowed Communists 
in its listing, "Red Channels" has, 
by the well-known technique of guilt by association, 
pointed the finger of suspicion at 
everyone listed. No attempt at differentiation 
is made, except for a few general statements 
(obviously inserted for the purpose of avoiding 
libel suits) to the effect that some of 
those listed have been "inveigled" or are 
"unconscious." Therefore, to the uninformed 
reader or to the liberal-baiting reader, everyone 
listed is tarred with the same brush. 
I cannot believe that the use of such methods 
is unintentional.

Employment

6. Everyone in the entertainment world 
knows it is difficult, and in many cases impossible 
for those listed in "Red Channels" 
to find employment in radio and television--
even for those who have made public disavowal 
of Communist sympathies or have 
testified under oath that they are not Communists. 
(Around Rockefeller Center, "Red 
Channels" is often referred to as "the Bible 
of the radio-television industry.") Far from 
attempting to stem this indefensible and Un-
American black-listing, Counterattack has persistently 
continued to urge its readers to 
protest the appearance of listed individuals on 
radio and television programs.

7. Anyone who criticizes "Red Channels" 
immediately becomes a target for Counterattack. 
I have been through this, so I know 
what I am talking about. The publishers of 
Counterattack know very well that I have 
been actively fighting Communism for years. 
Yet, in issue after issue, they try by innuendo 
to link me with the Communist movement, 
associating me with some organizations from 
which I resigned in protest, years ago; and 
with others whose very names are unfamilar 
to me. 

Let no believer in civil liberties be fooled. 
The Communists would consider themselves 
lucky if they could exert one-tenth the influence 
on radio and television that is being 
exercised by McCarthy and his stooges, the 
publishers of Counterattack.
ELMER RICE

NEW PAMPHLETS
Four new pamphlets are now available
to ACLU members:
The Black Silence of Fear, by Supreme
Justice William O. Douglas;
reprinted by the ACLU from the New
York Times Magazine. (8 pages, No.
20, 5¢)
Are U.S. Teenagers Rejecting Freedom?,
a Look reprint on the findings
of Purdue poll-takers who queried
15,000 young people on their thoughts
regarding civil liberties. (3 pages, No.
31, 10¢)
Loyalty in a Democracy, a Public
Affairs Committee roundtable report
 by leaders in the civil liberties field.
(32 pages, No. 38, 25¢)
What to Do About "Dangerous" 
Textbooks, by Edward N. Saveth, a
Commentary article on this increasingly
perilous situation. (12 pages,
No. 39, 10¢)
Single copies of each of these are
free to Contributing Members (dues of
$5 and up) on postcard request-and
at prices indicated to others. In quantities
of 25 or more, prices are lower.
Order by number, and remind the
ACLU of your membership status.

High Court Upholds N.Y. Loyalty Act;
Douglas, Black Dissent on Principle

Early in March, by a 6-3 vote, the U.S.
Supreme Court upheld New York State's 
Feinberg Law which bars from the public
schools any teacher belonging to an organization
deemed subversive. The ACLU had
argued, in an amicus curiae brief, that the
act "curtails freedom of thought, speech and
association, amounts to a bill of attainder
and an ex post facto law, and establishes
unfair procedures for determining individual 
guilt. . . . "
The court's majority opinion, written by
Justice Minton, held: (1) School officials have
the right and duty to screen teachers "as to
their fitness to maintain the integrity of the
schools." (2) "One's associates past and present,
as well as one's conduct, may properly
be considered in determining fitness and
loyalty. From time immemorial, one's reputation
has been determined by the company
he keeps." (3) If a teacher does not choose
to comply with "the reasonable terms laid
down by the proper authorities," he has not
been deprived of any right to free speech or
assembly. (4) There is nothing unconstitutional
in making membership in a listed organization
grounds for dismissal. This is 
merely the setting up of a rule of evidence.
Justice Frankfurter dissented on a technical 
point-that none of the defendants had 
yet been damaged by the law, and that the
constitutional issue was therefore abstract nad
speculative.
Justices Black and Douglas dissented on 
principle."I have not been able to accept,"
said Douglas, "the recent doctrine that a
citizen who enters the public service can be
forced to sacrifice his civil rights. . . . The
law inevitably turns the school system int
a spying project. . . . The prejudices of the 
community come into play in searching out 
the disloyal. . . . A 'party line'-as dangerous
as the 'party line' of the Communists-
lays hold. It is the 'party line' of the orthodox
view, of the conventional thought, of the
accepted approach."

Court Dismisses N.J. Bible Case

The constitutional questions involved remained
undecided when, in early March, the
U.S. Supreme Court dismissed the appeal
from a N.J. court's decision upholding a local
law which requires the daily reading in public 
schools of the Lord's Prayer and from the 
Old Testament.
The dismissal was solely on technical
grounds, a 6-3 majority of the court holding,
through Justice Jackson's opinion, that the
daughter of one of the plaintiffs had graduated,
rendering the case "moot," and that the
other plaintiff, a tax-payer, had suffered no
particular injury.
Justice Douglas, with Justices Reed and
Burton, dissented, observing that "the issues
are not feigned; the suit is not collusive; the
mismanagement of the school system that is 
alleged is clear and plain. . . . It is odd
indeed to hold there is no case or controversy
within the meaning of the Constitution."
The ACLU had filed a brief contending
that the practice of Bible reading was unconstitutional
because it violated the principle 
of separation of church and state.

H. H. Wilson Scores Enemies of Freedom
Professor H. H. Wilson of Princeton University's
Department of Political Science
charged at the Union's March 22 public meeting
in New York that the forces attacking
academic freedom were seeking the "subversion 
of the democratic process."
These forces, said Prof. Wilson "are fundamentally 
authoritarian" and "though they
drape themselves in words like 'freedom' and 
'individualism' they have a contemptuous
attitude toward human beings and human
intelligence." Leaders of the attacks on schools
and colleges, he said, include Sen. Pat McCarran,
Sen. Joe McCarty, Allen A. Zoll of
the National Council on Education, and William
F. Buckley, author of the book, "God
and Man at Yale."
Other speakers at the conference on "The
Classroom - Battleground for Freedom in 
1952" included David I. Ashe, former president
of the United Parents Ass'n, Edwin
Linville, social studies teacher at the N.Y.
High School of Music and Art, and Prof.
Arthur C. Cole of Brooklyn College, Chairman
of the ACLU's Academic Freedom Committee-
which sponsored the affair along 
with the NYCLU. The Rev. John Paul Jones
chaired the conference.
Mr. Ashe, while making clear his opposition 
to New York's Feinberg Law, emphasized
that in his opinion Communists have 
no right to teach.
Formal citations for their support of academic
freedom last year were awarded to
Look magazine, to the trustees of Sarah Lawrence
College, to the Ohio State chapter of
the American Association of University Professors,
to the University of California Group
for Academic Freedom, and to The American 
Scholar and its editor, Hiram Haydn.

How Did McCarthy Get Secret Data, Asks ACLU
In March the ACLU called upon the Loyalty
Review Board to search out the "disloyal 
person" who leaked secret data to Sen. Joseph
R. McCarthy regarding loyalty hearings allegedly
held on Philleo Nash. At the same 
time the Union renewed its plea that the
Board recommend to the President that "all
charges against an individual be disclosed in
every detail and that individuals concerned
be given the right to confront and cross-
examine their accusers, except in cases where
our counter-espionage system would really be
impaired."

Special Price to Members On "Judges & the Judged"
Arrangements have been made to supply
ACLU members with copies of "The Judges
and the Judged" at a special price. A 220-
page Doubleday book with a bookstore price
of $2.50, it will be sent postpaid to ACLU 
members for $1.75. Please read instructions
carefully.
Fill out coupon below, attach your check
made out to DOUBLEDAY & COMPANY,
and mail to the ACLU at address shown.
-----------
AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION
170 Fifth Avenue, New York 10, N.Y.
I am a member of the American Civil Liberties 
Union. Please have Doubleday & Co.
send me ....... copies of "The Judges and the
Judged" at $1.75 postpaid. I enclose my
check, made out to DOUBLEDAY & COMPANY,
for $............
PLEASE PRINT NAME AND ADDRESS
NAME .................
ADDRESS...........
CITY........... ZONE......STATE.....

CIVIL LIBERTIES
'ROUND THE NATION

Connecticut:  The State Board of Education turned down a proposed teachers' loyalty 
oath, saying, "Loyalty is a quality of mind and spirit and cannot be forced or sustained 
by any external means such as the swearing of an oath."

New York:  The State Assembly passed unanimously in March a bill to end discrimination against Negroes and other minorities in hotels and restaurants.

Ohio: The Cleveland CLU demanded fair play for the folk-singing Weavers, who were banned from local TV shows because of their allegedly leftist leanings. . . . A new ACLU chapter has been formed in Youngstown with the Rev. John H. Burt its temporary chairman.

Kentucky:  The FBI is investigating a reported "reign of terror" against members of the United Mine Workers Union in Clay and Leslie counties.

Indiana:  Of 118 Indianapolis Protestant churches queried, 23 said they would not accept visitors of races other than that of their parishioners, 41 did not reply. Of 44 saying they would accept other races, 19 had Negro congregations. 

California:  Three major Hollywood trade organizations have announced that the movie industry no longer intends to be a silent target for attacks from "irresponsible pressure groups." The "Wage Earners Committee of the USA's" slurs on movie-makers for their alleged left-wing leanings are partly responsible for this new showing of strength. 


Government Starts Work 
On McCarran Act Camps
Although the Justice Department has refused 
to talk about it, the government has 
apparently started work on five camps to 
handle subversives in the event of war. Sites 
picked so far include Tule Lake, Calif., Avon
Park, Fla., Florence and Wickenburg, Ariz., 
and El Reno, Okla. 
The camps would be used under the provisions 
of the McCarran Act which charge 
the Attorney General with rounding up and 
holding all persons likely to commit sabotage 
in case of war, insurrection or a specially-
declared national security emergency. Reports 
from Washington indicate that as many as 
15,000 people are ticketed for seizure when 
and if. 
Senator James O. Eastland, D., Miss., 
wants action now in this regard. In mid-January 
he asked Congress to declare "a state of 
internal security emergency" as a move toward 
"placing under lock and key as soon as possible 
thousands of Communist conspirators now in this country."

CENSORSHIP
New York University will hold an
open conference on "The Protection of
Public Morals Through Censorship" at
the NYU Law Center in two sessions,
April 28 and May 5, at 8:00 PM.
Speakers will include Elmer Rice,
James N. Landis, Horace M. Kallen
and Goodwin B. Watson. $2 registration
fee, covering both sessions, should
be sent to Henry Sellin, Division of
General Education, NYU, N.Y. 3.

Chicago Division Tests Illinois Election Law
The Union's Chicago Division is challenging
Illinois' controversial election law which
requires 25,000 signatures on a nominating
petition and not less than 200 signers from
each of the 50 counties in the state. In effect,
the law means that no small party can get
on the ballot.
Opposition by the Chicago Division helped
kill an Illinois bill that would have altered
radically the state's test for "sexually dangerous"
people. The present law applies only to
"criminal sexual psycopathic persons," but 
the proposed law would have extended the 
definition to include persons with "uncontrolled
impulses." The ACLU said the bill
would have made possible the commitment 
of individuals who are not insane, psychotic,
or mentally defective.

NYCLU Challenges City Vagrancy Law
The constitutionality of New York City's 
vagrancy law was challenged by the NYCLU
in a brief filed March 6th in the Court of 
Appeals in Albany, the state's highest court.
Under the law more than 600 men were
arrested as "hoodlums" in a general roundup
ordered by then Acting Mayer Impellitteri
to prevent election disorders in November
1950.
Emanuel Redfield, the New York ACLU's 
attorney handling the case, claims that the
statute violates the 13th and 14th Amendments
because, in effect, it imposes involuntary 
servitude and deprives citizens of their
liberty without due process of law.
The ACLU's New York branch last month
also registered its opposition to two bills introduced
in the state legislature. One, designed 
to prevent racketeering in boxing and
wrestling, the NYCLU attacked as a violation
of due process. The other, the Travia-
Erwin bill intended to curb political contributions
from labor Unions, the NYCLU
criticized as "legislation denying the spirit, if
not the letter, of the First Amendment, which
protects free speech and the right of the
people to petition for a redress of grievances."

UN Makes Little Progress On World Civil Liberties
Only a few halting steps toward world-
recognized civil rights were taken by the 
recent UN General Assembly in Paris. Two
international covenants are now to be prepared-
one on civil and political rights, the 
other on economic and social- by the Human 
Rights Commission for the 1952 fall Assembly.
Some real progress was made in extending 
rights of self-government in trusteeship and
non-self-governing territories, largely because
of rising nationalist movements, backed in 
the UN chiefly by Arab and South American countries.


AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION
170 FIFTH AVENUE
NEW YORK, 10, N.Y.
347

APRIL, 1952

Mrs. Mary Church Terrell
1615 S Street N.W.
Washington 9, D. C.

[*duplicate*] 
National Committee to Repeal the McCarranAct
2 Stone Street
New York 4, N.Y.
BOwling Green 9-2558
[*May 15, 1952*]

INITIATORS
Dr. Frank Aydelotte
Bishop James C. Baker
Miss Emily Green Balch
Prof. G. A. Borgese
Dr. Abraham Cronbach
Bishop Benjamin D. Dagwell
Dr. Edwin T. Dahlberg
Dr. Mark A. Dawber
Mrs. Welthy Honsinger Fisher
Prof. E. Franklin Frazier
Rev. John Paul Jones
Rabbi Leo Jung
Bishop Gerald Kennedy
Prof. Robert Morss Lovett
Dr. John A. Mackay
Bishop Francis J. McConnell
Mr. Carey McWilliams
Dr. Alexander Meiklejohn
Dr. Albert W. Palmer
Bishop Edward L. Parsons
Dr. Linus Pauling
Prof. Ralph Barton Perry
Dr. Edwin McNeill Poteat
Mr. Frank Rosenblum
Dean John B. Thompson
Prof. Paul Tillich
Mrs. M. E. Tilly
Dr. Charles J. Turck
Rev. Pierre van Paassen
Prof. Oswald Veblen
Bishop W. J. Walls

PLANNING COMMITTEE
Dr. Mark A. Dawber
Mrs. Welthy Honsinger Fisher
Prof. E. Franklin Frazier
Rabbi Leo Jung
Edward S. Lewis
Prof. Robert S. Lynd
Prof. Arthur L. Swift, Jr.
Dean John B. Thompson
Olive O. Van Horn

Dear Friend:

When President Truman vetoed the McCarren Act on
September 22nd, 1950, he aid: "We will destroy all that
we seek to preserve, if we sacrifice the liberties of our
citizens in a misguided attempt to achieve national 
security."

Our Committee is dedicated to the important task of
mobilizing support for H.R. 3118, the bill introduced by
Congressman Adolph J. Sabath of Illinois which provides
for repeal of the McCarran Act. In the repeal campaign
we need the support of every citizen.

Recent press reports of the setting up under the
McCarran Act of five concentration camps emphasizes anew
the necessity for immediate repeal of the Act. On January
16th, Senator James O. Eastland of Mississippi introduced
a bill asking Congress to declare "a state of internal
security emergency" in order that the detention camp provisions 
of the McCarran Act could go into effect at once.
Enclosed is a flyer on the concentration camp issue, and
a reprint of I.F. Stone's article in the Compass.

Officers of the National Committee to Repeal the
McCarran Act sent a vigorous telegram of protest and an
Open Letter to President Truman urging him to direct the
Department of Justice to cease immediately the setting up 
of concentration camps. A delegation also went to Washington
to protest to the Attorney General the carrying out
of these un-American measures.

We urge you to wire or write President Truman protesting
the setting up of concentration camps. Wire or
write your Congressman and Senators, urging them to speak
out publicly (either in Congress or through press statements)
against this action. Urge your Congressman to 
support H.R. 3118, the Sabath repeal bill.

The time is short -- we must act now! Won't you also
send us as generous a contribution as possible so that the
McCarran Act -- which is a blot on our American democracy --
can be removed, and the serious threats to our way of
life implicit in it ended.

Cordially yours,

Dean John B. Thompson

Rabbi Leo Jung

Olive O. Van Horn

For the Planning Committee
NATIONAL COMMITTEE TO 
REPEAL THE McCARRAN ACT

Encls.cc.
St.,fl.
env.

The following page illustrates some separate parts of different Newspapers with the intention of rejection of creating concentration camps around the border of United States. 

        NO CONCENTRATION CAMPS FOR THE U.S.A
Yet, preparations are under way for such camps.... under the provision of the deadly McCarran act which president Truman himself said "makes a mockery of the Bill of Rights" 

 Under the McCarranact, should there be a invasion, a declaration of war or an insurrection in aid  of a foreign enemy, the Attorney General is charged with the responsibility for apprehending and detaining all persons who "probably will engage is, or probably will conspire with others to engage is, acts of espionage or of sabotage..."

    Wire to write President Truman asking that he direct the the Department of Justice to cancel at once plans for setting up concentration camps.  DO IT TODAY ---- TOMORROW MAYBE TO LATE!

    Wire or write your Congressman and Senators demanding that they protest  the establishment of concentration camps.

    Urge your Congressman to support U.S 3118 the Sabath Bill providing fore repeal of the McCarran Act .

The Detention Camps For 'Subversives'
By I.F. Stone

THE TRUMAN ADMINSITRATION, as I showed Friday, is preparing for "limited" war with China a la MacArthur this year if and when the truce talks break down, as it now seems likely they will. Extended war abroad will be accompanied by extended repression at home. This may explain the mystery at the Department of Justice about camps it is getting ready for "subversives"
James V. Bennett, the Federal Director of Prisons, at a hearing before the Senate Appropriations Committee last July, asked $775,000 "to take over and operate six stand-by camps in connection with the detention of persons who might be picked up as subversives in accordance with the provisions of McCarran Act."
Bennet told Senator McCarran, who presided at the hearing, "The whose purpose of this program. Mr. Chairman, is just to have some place where we can put these people in the event a war is declared or a major emergency comes into effect." Even a "limited" war with China would certainly be "a major emergency."

THERE ARE TWO POSSIBLE REASONS for the secretive attitude at the Justice Department. One is that the preparation of these camps points toward war. The other is that the Administration does not want too much discussion in advance about the law under which these camps could be filled with "subversives."

The most important point the White House may wish to keep hidden, particularly from its liberal supporters, is this: The camps are being set up for use under the Emergency Detention Act of 1950. This is Title II of the McCarran Internal Security Act of 1950 which President Truman vetoed on Sept. 22, 1950, and Congress passed over his veto. Under the provisions of this Act the President need not utilize the emergency detention provisions unless he wants to.
The preparation of these camps is not a measure required by the law. It is a measure decided upon by the President. The responsibility is his. A step which would take this country closer to Fascism than anything which has yet happened in its history depends on the President even under the McCarran Act. He is preparing to take that step, though he won applause from liberals for objecting in his veto message that such detentions would be unconstitutional.
LET US LOOK AT THAT ACT, Public Law 831 of the 81st Congress, Title II, the Emergency Detention Act, provides that in the even of an invasion of the United States, an insurrection within the United States or a declaration of war by Congress, the President "is authorized" to make public proclamation of an "Internal Security Emergency."
The Act does not direct or require the issuance of such a proclamation. It authorizes the President to leave one "if" he finds such a proclamation "essential to the preservation, protection, and defense of the Constitution, and to the common defense and safety of the territory and people of the United States." The proclamation is discretionary with the President.

Arrests for detention under the Act are also discretionary. Section 103 provides, "Whenever there shall be in existence such an emergency, the President, acting through the Attorney General, is hereby authorized"-- notice again, "authorized," not "directed"--"to apprehend and by order detain... each person as to whom there is reasonable ground to believe that such person will engage in, or probably conspire with others to engage in, acts of espionage or sabotage."
THE PRESIDENT OBJECTED to this in his veto message, saying that "under our legal system to detain a man not charged with a crime would raise serious Constitutional questions unless the writ of habeas corpus were suspended." The Act specifically provides for review by the courts on writ of habeas corpus. 
The President is sworn to uphold the Constitution. In a veto message he called these provisions unconstitutional. There have been notable instances in our history when a President refused to commit an act he considered unconstitutional even when directed by Congress. In this case Congress did not direct but merely "authorized" use of detention camps for "subversives" in time of war. 
True, Senator Eastland (D-Miss.) introduced a bill on Jan. 16, two weeks after the news about the preparation of these camps leaked into the press, which would by concurrent resolution of Congress declare the existence of an internal security emergency and "place into full effect" the detention provisions of the McCarren Act. But Truman was ahead of him. The Administration may, indeed, support the Eastland resolution in order to give it authority to detain "subversives" without a declaration of war.
THE PROVISIONS OF THE EMERGENCY DETENTION ACT which Truman vetoed and now plans to utilize embody pure police state practice. To lock a man up because he will "probably" commit a crime is to do something one could only do justify if one had clairvoyant foreknowledge of the future. It is the good old Nazi custom, "preventive arrest."
The Emergency Detention Act provides for hearings after arrest, for a Board of Detention Review and for appeals to the Federal courts, but in these proceedings "the Attorney General or his representative shall not be required to furnish information the revelation of which would disclose the identity or evidence of government agents or officers which he believes it would be dangerous to national safety and security to divulge."
In other words, men may be detained for months or years in these concentration camps without even telling them on just what evidence they are being held. Under such circumstances, as in loyalty proceedings, where a similar rule prevails, there would be no way for an innocent man to rebut evidence against him.
At the same time, under the law, the Board of Detention Review could be shown secret evidence "the full text or content of which cannot be publicly revealed for reasons of national security." The judges would be shown evidence in secret which the accused would have no way of rebutting. Hearings and appeals under such procedures would be a mockery.
THIS IS AN ELECTION YEAR. Truman began his Smith Sedition Act roundup sin the last election year, 1948. Will he stage new roundups under the Emergency Detention Act this year as another way of striking fear into anyone who may oppose expansion of war?

To the NATIONAL COMMITTEE TO REPEAL THE McCARRAN ACT
2 Stone Street
New York 4, N.Y.
(A self-addressed envelope is enclosed for your convenience.)

I would like to become a sponsor of the National Committee
to Repeal the McCarran Act.

Here are names and addresses of people I think could help in the 
repeal campaign: 
Name 
Address
(Use reverse side of this sheet for additional names.)

Herewith my contribution of $________ to help carry on the
campaign to repeal the McCarran Act. (Checks should be made out
to the NATIONAL COMMITTEE TO REPEAL THE McCARRAN ACT.)

Name 
Street
City 
Zone
State




To the NATIONAL COMMITTEE TO REPEAL THE McCARRAN ACT
2 Stone Street
New York 4, N.Y.
(A self-addressed envelope is enclosed for your convenience.)

I would like to become a sponsor of the National Committee
to Repeal the McCarran Act.

Here are names and addresses of people I think could help in the 
repeal campaign: 
Name 
Address
(Use reverse side of this sheet for additional names.)

Herewith my contribution of $________ to help carry on the
campaign to repeal the McCarran Act. (Checks should be made out
to the NATIONAL COMMITTEE TO REPEAL THE McCARRAN ACT.)

Name 
Street
City 
Zone
State

The Editorial Page
Daytona Beach, Fla., April 27, 1952
The Sunday News Journal 
NEWS-JOURNAL CORPS., OWNER
Julius Davidson, Publisher
Herbert M. Davidson, Editor

Entered as second-class matter Oct. 21. 1936 at 
the post office at Daytona Beach, Fla. under the 
Act of March 3. 1879. Published every Sunday morning 
at 128 Orange Avenue. Daytona Beach Fla.

The publisher's liability for an error will not 
exceed the cost of the space occupied by the error

MEMBER OF THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
The Associated Press is entitled exclusively to the 
use for republication of all the local news printed 
in this newspaper as well as AP news dispatches.

Evening and Sunday or morning and Sunday .35 
weekly. 1.50 monthly. All three combined. 55 weekly, 
2.35 monthly Sunday only .45 a month. Longer 
periods on weekly basis

What Is Subversive?

Singled out by a New Jersey Group 
which is supposed to be representative of 
"good" citizens of this country, has been 
Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune, in a manner 
only too characteristic of the smear technique 
which infests the U.S. today.

An American Legion Auxiliary "postponed" 
hearing her speak, because of 
charges she is "subversive."

The time has come, then, to raise the
 question: what is being subversive?

Is it subversive of our American traditions 
and ideals for a Negro woman to 
build a school in the South, starting it on 
a dump heap and raising it by personal efforts 
over more than 40 years to an accredited 
college with properties worth 
more than a million dollars?

Is it subversive to employ a remarkable 
administrative ability, not for personal 
profit, but to raise the living and educational 
standards of a submerged section of 
our population?

To speak with such conviction constantly 
in favor of peace and justice and human 
rights that great leaders in our Nation, including 
two Presidents, have listened and approved?

To live a blameless life for four score 
years, according to the precepts of the Sermon 
on the Mount, carrying out every step 
of the way the teachings of Jesus?

To make the campus of the school she 

founded a site where true democracy is 
practiced, with no bars raised against anyone 
because of race, color or religion?

To love young people and serve as their 
leader over a lifetime, instilling in them the 
ideals of human brotherhood?

To summon the leading women of the 
U.S. in a conference whose aim was the 
mobilization of all women everywhere in a 
crusade for peace and understanding?

Or is it subversive to smear, without 
cause, a woman of great achievement, to 
humiliate her publicly and to interfere with 
her democratic right of free speech?

Those of us who have known Mary McLeod 
Bethune through the years, from the 
days of her physical vigor, when she labored 
with her own hands, teaching by example 
as well as precept, to today, when 
time has cut down her physical forces and 
turned to snow the tresses which frame her 
wonderful black face, know the answer to 
these questions without equivocation.

In the fullest meaning of the word Mary 
McLeod Bethune has been and is a true 
American in spirit and in deed. No smear 
can destroy the harvest of her lifetime of 
service to her country. Her record needs no 
"checkup."

But episodes such as the attack made 
upon her in New Jersey can make us fear 
for the ideals which have been the basic 
philosophy of our Nation. Who is safe from 
the true subversive? - L.R.D.

[*[ca 3-16-52?]*]

... "they have rights who dare maintain them."
--James Russell Lowell

call to a
CITIZENS EMERGENCY DEFENSE
[*Save*]
CONFERENCE
TO DEFEND THE SMITH ACT VICTIMS
Sunday, March 16, 1952   
City Center
135 West 55th Street, New York City

Conference Starts: 1:30 P.M.     Public Session: 7:30 P.M.

"No matter how it is worded, this (the Smith Act) is
a virulent form of prior censorship of speech and press,
which I believe the First Amendment forbids."
SUPREME COURT JUSTICE
Hugo Black

"We deal here, however, not with ordinary acts but
with speech, to which the Constitution has given a
special sanction. . . ."
SUPREME COURT JUSTICE
Wm. O. Douglas

TO ALL SUPPORTERS OF THE BILL OF RIGHTS 
TO ALL LABOR UNIONS
TO ALL RELIGIOUS, FRATERNAL, PROFESSIONAL AND CIVIC ORGANIZATIONS

Fellow Americans:

The rights of free speech, press and assembly -- the very heart of the Bill of Rights -- are in deadly peril today.  If we do not act fast we shall all lose the right to speak our minds on public questions -- on peace, on labor's needs, on Negro rights, against anti-Semitism, on our ideas for a better America and a better world.

Senator McCarthy and Louis Budenz with impunity attack leaders of labor and the Negro people, liberals in the arts and sciences, ex-New Dealers and one-time Wilkie Republicans.  Even officials of the Administration which initiated the loyalty witch hunt and the Smith Hunt prosecutions are themselves under attack now.

Today 51 men and women stand indicted throughout the country under the Smith Act.  Some are already undergoing trial.  Sixteen face trial March 3 in New York.

They are charged with violating the Smith Act, the law which Supreme Court Justice Black called a "virulent form of prior censorship of speech and press."  They are charged not with committing any illegal acts, but with speaking, writing and organizing, that is, with a "conspiracy" to "teach and advocate" the doctrines of their political party, the Communist Party.  If convicted, they face five-year sentences. 

Powerful voices are beginning to speak out against the Smith Act.  Justices Black and Douglas have termed it unconstitutional.  The CIO national convention denounced the 1949 conviction of the eleven Communist leaders and the new prosecution.  President Hugo Ernst of the Hotel and Restaurant Works, AFL; Secretary-Treasurer Frank Rosenblum of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers, CIO, and President Albert J. Fitzgerald of the United Electrical Workers, Independent, have denounced the Smith Act.

Americans for Democratic Action has demanded repeal of the Smith Act, as has the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the Civil Rights Congress and many other organizations.  Varied newspapers like the St. Louis Post Dispatch, the Oklahoma Black Dispatch, the Madison Capital-Times, the New York Post, the Daily Compass, the Daily Worker and the Catholic Worker have denounced the Smith Act.  Rep. Adolph Sabath, chairman of the House Rules Committee, has pledged himself to introduce a bill to repeal the Smith Act.

The growing campaign for repeal merits the widest support.  But it must be accompanied by a powerful movement to united people of varied opinions in defense of the constitutional rights of those now facing prosecution.

The great cases of the past -- the Tom Mooney case, the Sacco-Vanzetti case, the Scottsboro case -- brought forth vigorous united movements of popular resistance to injustice through the defense of the victims of persecution.

Such a united movement is an immediate necessity.  Such a movement requires taking no position on the political program of the defendants.  It requires only a defense of their constitutional rights.

To organize such a movement, dedicated to the defense of the men and women now being prosecuted under the Smith Act and the consideration of the problems created by a new Alien and Sedition Act period, we, the undersigned, invite you to attend, and your organization to send representatives, or observers, to a conference to discuss and act upon these issues.

The conference will be held Sunday, March 16, 1952, at 1:30 P.M. at the City Center, 135 West 35th Street, New York.  A public session will start at 7:30 P.M.  Prompt action on your part will be deeply appreciated.  Conference registration fee is $2.00 including attendance at the public session.  A $1.00 admission fee will be charged those attending the public session only.

Sincerely,
CITIZENS EMERGENCY DEFENSE CONFERENCE

INITIATING SPONSORS
(Partial List)
I. F. STONE, Columnist, N. Y. Daily Compass
PROF. HENRY PRATT FAIRCHILD, Prof. Emeritus, New York University 
REV. HERMINIO L. PEREZ, First Spanish Presbyterian Church, New York
JAMES IMBRIE, Lawrenceville, N. J.
MRS. CHARLOTTA BASS, Nat'l Chairman, Sojourners For Truth and Justice
ARTHUR MILLER, Playwright
DR. ALPHAEUS W. HUNTON, Sec'y Council on African Affairs
BEN GOLD, President, Int'l Fur & Leather Workers Union
ALBERT PEZZATI, Int'l Executive Board of Mine, Mill & Smelter Workers Union
JOHN T. McMANUS, Managing Editor, National Guardian
CLIFFORD T. McAVOY, N. Y. Legislative Director, United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers Union
PROFESSOR ROBERT MORSS LOVETT, Educator, Former Governor, Virgin Islands

(Organizations listed for identification purposes only)

Cut Out and Mail

CREDENTIAL

To: CITIZENS EMERGENCY DEFENSE CONFERENCE
401 Broadway, Room 2219, New York City

I would like to attend the Conference on March 16 as a --
DELEGATE
OBSERVER
INDIVIDUAL

Name
Address
County   City
Organization

Please enclose Registration Fee of $2.00 including attendance at Public Session.
NOTE: Registration will start at 12 Noon.  The Conference will start promptly at 1:30 p.m.  The Public Session will start promptly at 7:30 p.m.

[ca 1-28-52]
JACK HALL-ILWU

JACK HALL-ILWU
ILWU
Published By
International Longshoremen's And
Warehousemen's Union
451 Atkinson Drive
Honolulu, T. H.

Foreword
JACK Hall has been indicted. He is accused of conspiring since 
1945 to overthrow the government of the United States by
force and violence. He is accused of talking, planning, discussing,
sitting. He is not accused of committing a single act of
force. He is not accused of committing a single act of violence.
Jack Hall was appointed ILWU Regional Director for Hawaii
on June 1, 1944. He was selected for the job because of his
proven ability and his record in trade union work. His work since
his name became synonymous with ILWU and the gains made
under his leadership by the ILWU membership and by the people
of the Islands generally will stand forever as one of the most rapid
social and economic developments in the history of the world labor
movement.
Thousands of people working together built the ILWU. History
is made up of the collective acts of individuals. The following story 
deals with the highlights of Jack Hall's life. The history of Jack
Hall from 1944 onward is only recounted briefly, for it is fresh in
the minds of our membership. It is, in fact, the history of the 
ILWU itself.
The so-called "crimes" with which Jack is charged are not an
honest issue in this case. His right to do or not to do these things
as a United States citizen is guaranteed by the first Amendment
of the United States Constitution. His right to do or not do these
things as a Union member is guaranteed by the ILWU Constitution.
The real issues in the coming trial of Jack Hall are hidden behind
a smokescreen. The real issues are the hundreds of open legitimate
acts which Jack did commit on the record as Regional Director of
the ILWU, authorized by and in the name of the ILWU membership.
This means the Union is on trial and we the Union members
who form and decide the policies of this Union are on trial.

THE EARLY STRUGGLE
1938 - Get Jack Hall -1951
The politicians say Jack Hall is a clear and present danger 
to the people. They say he has conspired to teach and 
advocate the overthrow of the United States Government 
by force and violence. They say Jack Hall is a criminal and when 
they walked into Jack's house at 6:00 a.m. on August 28th, 1951, 
they treated him like a common criminal. Jack had been up until 
3:00 a.m. that morning negotiating against a September First sugar 
strike deadline, so when the cops walked in at this crucial point in 
history he wasn't too surprised. 
This early morning in 1951 was not the first time Jack Hall 
was arrested as a clear and present danger to the people. Jack once 
was the negotiator for the Inland Boatmen in their strike against 
Inter-Island Steam Navigation Company, Jack was standing by at 
a pier-head meeting of the rank and file. Suddenly police Sergeant 
Allen Taylor jumped Jack, got Jack's arm twisted behind his back 
and kneed him viciously. Next he threw Jack in the patrol wagon 
and worked him over on the way to the Courthouse.
Jack was slated to make a speech before the Inter-Professional 
Association that same night and of course didn't show up. Next 
day a Committee of the Professional people checked with Chief 
Gabrielson on Hall's arrest. They were concerned with this sort 
of attack on Labor's right to organize peacefully. They were informed 
that Hall had been arrested because he "might have made a speech 
that might have started a riot and some one might have gotten 
hurt."  The charges against Jack were drummed up to put fear into 
the Inland Boatmen and fear into Jack Hall. It didn't work. This 
all happened in February 1938.

But a lot of things had happened since Jack Hall got off a 
ship in Honolulu in 1935. He was that 21 year. In later years 
people asked Jack how come he got off the ship in Honolulu that 
year. Jack said, "Well, I had been in and out of Honolulu many 
times on Matson and Dollar Line ships and knew the Territory 
needed organization. Everybody was scared to death, unemployment 
was terrific. The system of economic control was complete. 
There were blacklists and a system of espionage. They really were 
kicking people around. The sailors and firemen had just opened 
hiring halls and were trying to organize the longshoremen. The 
SUP Business Agent asked me to help. It looked like a good place 
to pitch in."
Jack was right. Hawaii was a good place to pitch in and Jack 
really did. 

A Little History
Jack had grown up just like anybody. He was born in Ashland, 
Wisconsin, on February 28, 1914. He was raised in Southern 
California and went to sea in 1931 after he graduated from 
Huntington Park High School. Jack sailed as an ordinary seaman,
as an able bodied seaman and as a carpenters mate and he joined 
the Sailors Union of the Pacific. He was a veteran of the 1934
Maritime Strike, and the 1935 tanker strike. Jack learned the hard 
way while the going was rough. As a sailor, he had visited many 
ports of the Far East and the South seas and the exploitation of 
non-Caucasians by Caucasians that he found in Hawaii was no 
surprise. 
Roosevelt had taken office in 1933 and the NLRA had given 
Labor on the mainland a new lease on life—but not in Hawaii. 
The working people of Hawaii who needed a new lease on life 
were having a tough time finding out that it was possible. Hawaii 
was the private estate of the Big 5 and still the Hawaii whose
spokesman R. A. Cooke, President of the HSPA had said in 1930, 
"I can see little difference between the importation of foreign 
laborers and the importation of jute bags from India."
Hawaii has been called the melting pot of races, but it was 
also a boiling pot of labor unrest. Many times before 1935, workers 
who could stand no more of Big 5 oppression had gone on strike, 
2


with always one ending—defeat. Labor in Hawaii hemmed in by 
Employer restrictions and propaganda, pursued by the plantation 
police and the blacklist, had organized before and lost. 
They lost because Unions were organized along racial lines and
were broken by the Employers because of racial lines.

Without Unity -- Death
In 1909, Japanese workers who were being paid $18 per month
on the plantations, struck for $22.50 per month, the wage that
was already being paid to Portuguese and Puerto Rican laborers
for the same work.  The HSPA imported Portuguese, Korean and
Hawaiian workers from Honolulu to work as strike breakers at
more than double the wages of the Japanese strikers.  The strike
was broken.
In 1920, Filipino and Japanese workers organized into separate
Unions and went on strike on Oahu.  The Employers drove a wedge
between the two racial unions building up a hate-the Japanese
campaign.  Over 12,000 plantation people were evicted from their
homes by plantation police and more than 6,000 drifted into
Honolulu.  An influenza epidemic was raging in Honolulu and
more than 1,200 people, strikers and their families, died in one
month.  After six months on the bricks the strike was broken and
members were urged to go back to work with the "spirit of Aloha."

In 1924, 1,600 Filipino workers struck on Kauai. Police and the
National Guard were used against the strikers. Sixteen strikers were
killed and 60 were sent to prison for four-year terms. The strike
leader, Manlapit, was exiled to the Philippines after serving a two-
year jail sentence. Labor in Hawaii was crushed for ten years. The
blacklist was hard at work.
When Jack Hall got off the SS Mariposa in 1935, he brought 
with him the detailed knowledge of the success of the 1934 West
Coast Maritime Strike, “An injury to one is an injury to all” and 
this time “one” and “all” meant all working people regardless of
race, creed, color, political affiliation or nationality.
Hawaiian workers had watched the success of the 1934 Maritime
strike with eager eyes, but Fear was still the lid on the boiling pot
-Fear of the blacklist and unemployment, Fear of the plantation
police, Fear of deportation, all adding up to one thing- Fear of
the Big 5. Most Hawaiian workers didn’t know about the Roosevelt
New Deal and those who did had a hard time believing. Jack 
Hall knew about it and needed a way to tell the people about it.
And it happened that the Voice of Labor had given birth to its first 
edition the week Jack got here and it had no funds and no help
and that’s where Jack fitted in. 


The Voice is Heard
Jack was never one to grab the glory or the credit. He became
Hawaiian Labor’s handyman. Hawaii was a great place to 
work in those days for a young man whose idea of “getting
ahead in life” was to bring the working people with him. All over
the islands workers were asking questions, fighting back in small
groups, looking for answers. The seeds of the rising surge of Labor
on the Mainland were here but there were no means of passing the
word from group to group. Big 5 newspapers and radio blanketed 
the field with Boss propaganda and hate for the New Deal and the
rising mainland labor movement. There was a terrific need for a
labor paper and the Voice with Jack Hall’s help filled that need.
The Voice and Jack exposed the slums and the sweatshops of
Honolulu to the people on the outside islands and told the people
of Honolulu how the local merchants of Hilo who were friendly
to the longshoremen when they struck in Hilo in 1935 were black-balled 
by the Hilo Chamber of Commerce.
Jack laid bare the interlocking control of the Big 5 in language
that every plantation worker could understand. He exposed the
enormous profits that were made and compared them to the 
miserable wages of the day. He laid bare the innermost workings
of the Industrial Association and its system of spying and black-listing 
of workers who honestly expressed their belief in Unions.
He exposed the horrors of Kaneohe Hospital and showed the
causes of tuberculosis in the Honolulu slums. He stripped away
the sham of the Republicans and Democrats and showed the people
the Big 5 behind them and let the people know exactly how the
Sugar Plantations were cursing the “New Deal” out of one side of
their mouths and demanding still bigger subsidies from the Agricultural 
Adjustment Act out of the other. And when Representative
Willie Crozier tried to set up a Third Party to combat the rottenness,
Jack let the people know why.

The Hub of the Wheel

    When the Castle & Cooke longshoremen held a meeting to
discuss Union in 1935 the Boss put a $.10 wage increase into effect
the next day.  Even talking paid off, and reading about it gave a
lot of people a lot of ideas.
    When the Hilo longshoremen struck in 1935, the Honolulu
longshoremen walked out in sympathy, the people of Kauai and
Maui understood and got the Union's side of the story and when
the Hilo longshoremen won West Coast conditions in 1936, every-
body heard about it, and hearing about it and finding out how it
was done gave everybody strength and took a big bite out of Fear.
Workers, even in small groups who were fired and blacklisted for
asking for a wage increase read about other workers in other islands
doing the same thing and realized they were not alone.  They read
too about the new National Labor Relations Board and how to
file Unfair Labor Practice charges against the Boss and get back
on the job with back pay.  The Voice showed the people the New
Deal and how to use it.
    Jack Hall was for sure the "handyman" of the new labor movement 
in Hawaii.  He told the people of the successes of labor on
the mainland and how they won them.  He told them what their
rights were under the laws and he told them which laws stunk
and needed changing and explained to people how and why they
should use their power to vote to better their conditions.  Working
people from all over the islands wrote in to Jack to tell him their
story and to ask his advice.  He was the hub of the wheel and labor
that grew in size every day.
    Jack had to take several trips to sea in this period to get enough
money so that he could keep the paper going and keep alive at
the same time.  So Jack was in the 1936 Maritime Strike too, when
the Lurline, his ship for the time, was tied up in Honolulu.  Jack
was Chairman of the Publicity Committee in Honolulu during the 
strike.
    In 1937 the longshoremen on Kauai struck for recognition.
Honolulu longshoremen also struck and many were locked out
when they returned to work.  Jack advised calling on the NLRB.
Trial Examiners came to Hawaii and on the facts had to back up
the youthful Union.

                                                   6


    Hawaii's last one-race strike took place at Puunene on Maui in
1937 when 1,000 Filipino members of Vibora Luviminda went on
strike, and Jack Hall was there to help organize it, to urge the
organization to take in workers of all races.  The strike was long
and bitter and workers were evicted from their homes by plantation
police.  They were arrested on trumped-up charges and though gains
were won on the return to work many strikers were blacklisted.
The gains only applied to a small group of workers.
    All through the strike the Voice supported the strikers and
exposed to the general public the cruel and inhuman tactics of the
Bosses.  But on the return to work the Voice drew the lesson from
the results that has ever since been watchword and the key to
the success of the ILWU.  Workers of all races must be in one
big Union.
    The CIO came into being that year and the longshoremen of
Hawaii moved with their brother longshoremen on the West Coast
into the CIO under the banner of the ILWU.  Jack Hall, through
the Voice called for a wide program of organization along industrial 
lines and brought real understanding of the principles of the
new rising movement in the Nation.  At that time, the CIO was
young and vigorous and no relation to the present run-from-the-top 
organization.

First Beat Up Jack Hall

    And so by February 1938, Labor in Hawaii was on the march
and the Boss wheels on Merchant Street had it figured that it was 
time to give the rising movement another kick in the groin, and
Jack Hall, standing by a pier-head meeting of the new Inland
Boatmen's Union, their elected negotiator, got it.  The handyman
of Hawaiian Labor, the advisor of the rising revolt against the Big
5, the Voice of Labor, got it.  And few were fooled then in 1938
just as few are fooled today.  Jack wasn't beaten up and jailed
because he was a clear and present danger to the community, or
because he might have made a speech that might have caused a 
riot that might have caused someone to get hurt.  He was beaten
up and jailed because he might do just what he went ahead to do
in spite of the beating - namely, to help build and lead a fighting,
successful labor movement in Hawaii.

                                                   7

Yes, Jack was a "clear and present danger" all right.  But not
to the community and not to the people of Hawaii.  Jack had
shown very clearly by that time, after three years of hard work,
that he was a "clear and present danger" to the Employers' flush
pocketbooks and to their 24-hour-a-day control over the lives of
their employees.  And he was a "clear and present danger" to Big 5
control over the life of the islands.  He was a "clear and present
danger" in the same way that Truth is a clear and present danger
to those who would hide it.

Then The Rank and File
    The attack on Jack Hall was not the only kick in the groin
of 1938.  By August of 1938 the Bosses decided it was time to
give the rank and file their share too.  So they manned a ship with
scabs who went through the Inland Boatmen's picket lines and
sailed for Hilo.  At Hilo, longshoremen picketed in spite of police
who were lined up with tear gas and tommy guns and rifles and 
bayonets borrowed from the National Guard.  The pickets were
shot down by the police, shot in the back and bayoneted in the 
back, and 51 pickets were injured and crippled by shots and bayonet
wounds.  No, it wasn't just the leadership that got the works from
the bosses.  The rank and file got theirs too.  Only just a little bit
later. 
    In spite of the attacks, Jack Hall, the Voice of Labor and
Hawaiian Labor kept moving forward.  It was clear that Labor in
Hawaii didn't have a chance with the Big 5 controlling the politicians 
and the police force was making the laws.  Bayonet scars


proved that.  The Voice of Labor called for political action and
Jack led in organizing the Progressive League on Kauai.  Union
men and other candidates, supporters of labor, ran with the Progressive
League backing.  J.B. Fernandez was elected to the Territorial 
Senate defeating Kekaha plantation manager, Lindsay Faye.
Fernandez, working closely with Jack Hall, busted wide open the
closed circuit in the Legislature and proposed a Wage and Hour 
Act for Hawaii with a 40-hour work week and a $.25 minimum 
wage and a Little Wagner Act.  The Voice of Labor passed the
word on this and won wide support and interest.
    Meanwhile the Voice of Labor dug into all of the angles of
community life, pointing out how the widely circulated report of
the Public Health Committee of the Chamber of Commerce on
Tuberculosis in the Islands neglected completely to tell about the
causes of Tuberculosis in Hawaii.  The Voice filled in what the
Chamber of Commerce left out.  And still more, the Voice plugged
for better schools in Hawaii showing the people how the constructive 
proposals of the PTA were given the complete run-around
by the politicians.

Off to Kauai
    In 1939, the Voice finally ran out of funds, and Jack moved
to Kauai to work for the Local unions in longshore, sugar and pineapple 
and for the Progressive League of Kauai.  His pay was room
and board—$18.00 a month.
    Yes, Jack went to Kauai and the Voice of Labor was still for
a little while.  But not really - since 1937 the Kauai longshoremen 
with Jack's help had been quietly organizing the plantation
workers at McBryde Sugar Company and at Kauai Pine.  They
weren't experienced organizers but they knew the score.  And little
by little they were making progress.  They had elected J.B. Fernandez 
to the Senate and they had a voice in island affairs.  The
big Boss wheels in Kauai were wondering just a little if they didn't
have a bear by the tail.  They had a right to wonder.  Jack became
an organizer for UCAPAWA-CIO and the ILWU but the principles 
he fought for were those of ILWU through and through.  All 
the time he was organizing he plugged for political action because
he knew and his friends knew that sooner or later the chips would
be down.  The lessons of the Hilo slaughter weren't far behind
and the bayonet wounds were still fresh.
9

Company Time -- 24 Hours??
In 1939 Frank Silva was fired from McBryde plantation because 
he played soccer for the Kauai Pine team, so the Manager said.  
Frank Silva was a section luna who believed in and worked for 
the Union and he figured that after pau hana his time was his 
own.  The McBryde bosses said Frank was disloyal because he 
played soccer for Kauai Pine.  A row started that didn't wind up
until 1951.  The question simply was whether or not a plantation
worker had a right to do, act, or think as he pleased on his own
time, or whether he was married to his Boss 24 hours a day.  (It 
wasn't until 1951 that the Union got it in the Sugar contract that 
House Rules don't cover a sugar worker in his spare time.)
Jack Hall and the new paper of the Progressive League of 
Kauai, The Kauai Herald, came to Frank's support and made such 
an issue of the firing that the Governor had to appoint a fact-finding 
Board to investigate.  The Board found that Silva was right, 
he had been fired for Union activity, and the McBryde bosses were 
all wrong.  But McBryde still didn't put Silva back to work.  Then 
the chips got down.


The First Breakthrough
Lihue Plantation, the largest plantation in the Islands at that 
time, an AmFac baby, laid the law down to the Kauai longshoremen.  
They laid it down simply.  They told the longshoremen to 
do longshore work only or day hana work only but not both, and 
both was the only way the longshoremen had made a bare living 
for many years.  The longshoremen gave Lihue Plantation a simple
answer.  They went on strike. 
Jack Hall was with the strikers from the start.  He helped 
them rent quarters in the Nawiliwili skating rink so they'd have 
a place to live when they got kicked out of their Plantation-owned 
houses.  And they were kicked out, as expected, by the plantation
police.
Jack lived with the strikers at the skating rink and at the Port 
Allen Strike Camp and helped them get food and clothing from 
the plantation workers.  Meanwhile the strikers went ahead and 
finished organizing McBryde Plantation and Kauai Pine and held
NLRB elections.  They got recognition and negotiated the first 
Sugar and Pine union contracts in the history of Islands.
Over on Oahu the longshoremen took strength from the Kauai 
longshoremen and held NLRB elections at Castle & Cooke and 
McCabe and they won the elections hands down.  And even the
AFL won new bargaining agreements in Honolulu at the Moana 
and Alexander Young hotels, as workers all over the islands picked 
up strength from the strikers in Kauai.  During the strike Jack told
the story in the Kauai Herald and when elections came up the 
Progressive League of Kauai elected another Senator, Clem Gomes,
and gave Labor another vote in the Island Senate.  In winning,
Gomes beat a Big 5 plantation owner, Elsie Wilcox, and then both
of Kauai Senators were pro-labor.
The strikers on Kauai won Island-style and that means save 
face for the Bosses.  Thousands of workers won recognition in Kauai 
and Oahu but the Kauai longshoremen were forced back to work 
without an on-the-spot gain.  Their victory was negotiated in Honolulu 
for the Castle and Cooke longshoremen and the McCabe longshoremen. 
It meant 10 cents an hour more for Hilo and then to 
Kauai and overtime guaranteed on Saturdays and Sundays and new 
penalty rates and recognition all down the line.  The Bosses claim
11

they whipped the Kauai longshoremen but at last the longshoremen
had a recognized union in all the major ports except Kahului.  
So who won?  When the smoke had cleared, 2,000 more island 
workers were under union contract.

Back to Honolulu -- The Herald 
Not long after the end of the Kauai strike, Jack Hall was asked 
by the longshoremen and the AFL Hotel Restaurant and Bartenders
union to come with the Kauai Herald over to Honolulu.  This 
was done.  And starting out fresh where the Voice left off, the new
Herald launched into a program aimed at consolidating the new 
gains and preparing the ground for more organization.
In this year, 1941, the clouds of intensified discrimination were
creeping in.  The anti-Japanese sentiment was being whipped up
throughout the Islands and the Herald was the lone forceful defender 
of those proud and faithful people of Hawaii who were of 
Japanese origin.  The Herald spoke out, too, against the jim-crowing 
of Hawaiians on Midway, Palmyra, and Samoa where they were 
working on Navy installations.  It protested vigorously against the 
discrimination in wages that were offered on defense projects to 
island workers as against imported mainland workers.
The Herald started the battle against the plantation perquisite
system, pointed up to the public at large how the plantations defrauded 
the workers and made large savings in taxes.  It called for
a little Wagner Act to provide for orderly organization of field 
workers.  At the same time the Herald plugged for settlement of 
unfair labor practices by the employees through the machinery of 
the NLRB.  Dozens of workers were reinstated with back pay as 
a result of the campaign and most of the charges that the earlier 
Voice had brought against the Employers were proved.
By November of 1941 Labor was in shape for a drive on Sugar 
and Pineapple, the fortress of the Big 5.  In November, Jack Hall 
stood up before a mass meeting in Aala Park in Honolulu and 
called for a mass organizing drive in Sugar and Pine.  The wheels 
were set to roll -- and then came Pearl Harbor.
12


WARTIME AND VICTORY
From 1935 to 1941, Jack Hall, the architect of the new house 
of Labor in Hawaii, had laid the foundations of success. 
Close to 10,000 workers were in unions.  Jack Hall, the 
spokesman of freedom and dignity for the workers of Hawaii, had 
drawn out the plans for the building of a union in Sugar and Pine, 
island-wide and island-strong.  The bombs that dropped on Pearl
Harbor and threw the United States into the second World War 
stopped the construction of Labor's house for the moment, but the 
foundations were strong and ready.  Those foundations were the
new rank and file and the new leaders who had gone through the
struggles of this period.
The War brought censorship and a paper shortage that cancelled 
out the Herald and the relocation of Japanese aliens and 
the restrictions and intimidation focused on Japanese-Americans 
combined with the curfew, Martial law and the blackout made 
Union organization impossible for a time.  In the last issues of the 
Herald Jack called for fair treatment of the Japanese population 
of the Islands, pled their cause and was their champion.  (And at 
the same time, on the mainland, Louis Goldblatt, then Secretary 
of the California CIO Council, and representing the ILWU appeared 
before a congressional committee and protested the relocation 
of Japanese-Americans.  Now that the shooting is over and tempers 
have cooled, all the world recognizes that the ILWU was right—
not one single act of sabotage was committed by a Japanese-American.)
Jack had lived on skimpy rations and strike soup kitchen food 
for most of his six years in Hawaii.  He had slept on newspapers 
spread on tables in the office of the Voice and Herald more nights
than he could count.  Physical discomforts were nothing to Jack 
when Labor had a chance to move . Now the war was the thing

and Jack looked for and took a job at the Hawaiian Air Depot
at Hickam Field.
    Jack married Yoshiko Ogawa of Olaa, Hawaii, the daughter of
a plantation worker and for the first time in ten years he had a 
home.  A year later Jack and Yoshiko had a baby daughter, Michele
Yoshika Hall.
    On April 1, 1942, Jack was appointed to the job of Labor Law
Inspector of the Territorial Department of Labor and Industrial 
Relations.  He was released from his job at the Hawaiian Air Depot
through the personal action of Lieutenant Colonel W. Bicknell, G-2
officer in charge of Internal Security in the Hawaiian Department
of the United States Army.  Jack's loyalty was cleared at that time
by Robert Shivers in charge of the FBI in the Territory.  In this
job Jack watched carefully over the rights of Labor under the Wage
and Hour laws and more than $150,000.00 in back wages due
workers were uncovered and paid largely through his efforts.  He
rose to the job of Senior Inspector based on his record and his
ability.


    Immediately following Pearl Harbor, Hawaii was put under
the control of the Military Governor.  Wages were frozen.  Men
were frozen to their jobs, military courts took the place of the 
civilian courts.  Union officials and organizers were treated as suspect 
people and Big 5 company officials moved into military jobs.
Big Business in Hawaii and the Army got married.  In less than a
year Union membership in the Islands had dropped from close to
10,000 down to less than 4,000.
    Plantation workers frozen to their jobs for as little as $1.50 a
day watched defense workers from the Mainland take over Pearl
Harbor jobs at $1.50 per hour.  The NLRB was hindered from
functioning under the Military Government and all requests to
Washington to set up a War Labor Board in Hawaii was without
success.
    By 1944 the plantation workers were crying for justice and
unionization.  At first AFL and CIO forces planned to organize
jointly, putting all plantation workers into an independent Union,
but attacks from the AFL Central Labor Council broke up this effort
at labor unity, planned originally to carry on organization with a
minimum of conflict in the interest of the war effort.  This was
planned by Jack working with both AFL and CIO leaders.
    The Honolulu longshoremen dug into their treasury and started
the drive to organize sugar.  The Independent Marine Drydock and
Shipbuilding workers cooperating with the longshoremen moved
on Hawaiian Pine.  The AFL moved independently and split labor
movement was in store for Hawaii.
  
ILWU Selects Jack Hall

    At this point Matt Meehan, International Representative for
the ILWU came down to Hawaii to lend a hand.  Meehan looked
the situation over and talked the situation over very carefully with
local union people, officials and rank and file.  He found the answer
in Jack Hall.  Jack, who had been the handyman of Labor in the 
pre-war years, who had laid out the plans for the organization of
Sugar and Pine at the Aala Park meeting in November, 1941,
Jack Hall who had the friendship and confidence of thousands of
workers on every island, was the man.  He was given the biggest
and toughest job in the Islands, ILWU Regional Director.

                                                  15

In his new job, with the full support of the Mainland ILWU,
Jack was able to give real leadership and drive to the work he had
carried on in the pre-war days. Jack had written the original draft
for a "little Wagner Act" in 1940 to make it possible to organize
the plantation field workers in an orderly, peaceful way. Now in
1944 the revived ILWU jumped into political action and 16 representatives
and 8 senators endorsed by labor were elected. The Little
Wagner Act became a reality.
And as far back as 1939 Jack had pointed out that sugar plantation
workers were being deprived of their rights under the Fair
Labor Standards Act and were getting short-changed on their overtime
by the Big 5. In his new job, Jack was able to pull in the
Union attorneys, and as a result, $1,500,000 in back pay was paid
out to plantation workers.

The Riding Tide
The Union plunged into its organizing campaign with strength
and success. Starting with less than 5,000 members the Union
mounted the campaign which by 1946 had brought the membership
up to 33,000. The ILWU was recognized as a force with
rights in the community and was given recognition when Regional
Director Jack Hall was appointed a member of the New War Labor
Board. In 1945 after much investigation of his loyalty, Jack was
appointed by Governor Stainback to the Honolulu Police Commission
and to the Territorial Labor Appeals Board with these words,
"Know ye, that reposing special trust and confidence in the patriotism,
integrity, and abilities of Jack Hall, I have nominated, and,
by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, do appoint him
member, Labor Appeal Board." He also appointed Jack to the Committee
for Hawaiian Statehood which, based on his record, Jack
richly deserved.
In 1946 came the great Sugar Strike. After 77 days of complete
solidarity in the midst of the greatest red-baiting attack in Hawaiian
history, the Union won through and came out with the first clear
labor victory in Hawaiian history. The Employers had shot the
works and the Union had won and was here to stay. And in the
closing days of the sugar strike in the 1946 Territorial elections,
CIO-PAC, directed by Jack Hall, elected 35 labor-endorsed candidates,

16


and for the first time the Republican Party lacked a majority
in both houses. CIO-PAC also helped to re-elected Republican Joseph
R. Farrington, Delegate to Congress against the opposition of Democrat
William Borthwick who was supported by Governor Stainback.
Labor was established not only as an economic force but
also a political force in the islands. It marked the end of a period.
The Big 5 counter-attack began.

17

FIGHTING THE COUNTERATTACK 

The all-out red-baiting campaign conducted by the Employers 
themselves during the Sugar strike was a flop. Police brutality 
measures of the kind that had been used to break the 
pre-war strikes were out of line now that the Union was a recognized 
power in the community and at the polls. The Big 5 had to 
find new methods of union busting. 
Immediately following the end of the Sugar strike, Governor 
Stainback led off by demanding that Jack Hall resign from the 
Honolulu Police Commission . Nothing better than this to demonstrate 
the turn of events. At the same time, the employers conceded 
a thirty-cent wage increase to the longshoremen who were geared 
to strike for the hiring hall. The Employers were unprepared for 
another all-out battle, and they conceded a large chunk of cash to 
avoid the fight just then. 
Yet by June of 1947 the Employers had found a weakness in 
the Union in the Pineapple canneries. And by trickery, they set 
up the Pineapple lockout, which though it was over in one week, 
was a flash defeat for the union. That was the first step in their 
counterattack. 

 The Sleeping Pill 
 In the fall of 1947 the Employer offered an 8-cent raise to the 
sugar workers. This raise, since known as "the sleeping pill," was 
designed to show the workers a benevolent attitude while the main 
Employer program was developing. The heart of their program on 
the National scale was the Taft-Hartley Act which has been lobbied 
through Congress, by the NAM, the Big 5, and the rest of the coalition 
of the Big Employer interest. 
This Taft-Hartley Act, which introduced the "red issue" into 
the old Wagner Act and cut the guts out of labor's "magna carta," 


provided the basis of Employers suing unions and became the cornerstone 
of the Employer attack. The Taft-Hartley Act placed the 
finger of suspicion on the motives and private life of every union 
official. It was made to order for the Big 5. 
The ILWU conducted a militant fight against the Taft-Hartley 
Bill, exposing it for a rotten piece of union-busting law designed 
to turn the Labor unions into crawling company unions. The Employers, through their agents, lined up a disgruntled ex-communist 
and minor ex-official of ILWU, Ichiro Izuka, an ardent supporter 
of Governor Stainback, to sign a pamphlet fingering many 
Union officials and rank and filers as reds. It wasn't just the fingering
that counted. That was the least. It was the kickoff of the 
Big Lie, the planned, calculated attack on the Union , which has 
been repeated over and over, that "the Union is run through a pipeline 
from Moscow and not by the ILWU membership." 
 Izuka was followed by another Employer agent, Amos Ignacio, 
who tried to organize a Union of 4,000 Big Island workers to withdraw 
from the ILWU.  His program, of course, was cooperation 
with Stainback and the Employers against the ILWU. 
Timed with the Ignacio revolt, Jack's wife, Yoshiko Ogawa 
Hall, was fired from her job with the Territorial Department of 
Social Welfare. It came on the last day of her one-year probationary 
period. 
19

Unity at Hilo
A rank and file delegated Conference in Hilo, held on January 2nd, 1948, wound up Ignacio and his revolt. Not a single plantation left the ILWU. In secret referendum, sugar workers voted overwhelmingly to stay with the ILWU.

This delegated conference in Hilo was more than just a conference on affiliation. It was a real test of Article III of the ILWU Constitution, a cornerstone of ILWU policy. Here it is:
The objects of the organization are:
First, to unite one organization, regardless of religion, race, creed, color, political affiliation or nationality, all workers within the jurisdiction of this International;
Second, to maintain and improve the wages, hours and working conditions for all of its members;
Third, to educate the membership of this organization in the history of the American labor movement and in present day labor problems and tactics; 
Fourth, to secure legislation in the interest of labor and to oppose anti-labor legislation.
(Our Constitution was adopted by referendum vote of the ILWU membership and can only be changed by referendum vote.)
Over the years, many people have questioned why the ILWU has been so open to membership by all people. The answer has been clear - history has shown that only by including all workers who are willing to work in the Union in a democratic trade union way can we have a true democratic union. And this principle must apply in all areas. For example here in Hawaii, the brutal beating the Bosses gave to racial Japanese Unions, and Filipino Unions showed clearly that separate racial unions were no good for workers and only good for the Employers. On the West Coast longshoremen learned that lesson in 1919, that black and white had to be organized in one Union. That year the Employers imported Negroes from the deep South who had never heard of Unions to break an all-white longshore strike. Years later many of these same Negro longshoremen became leading members of the Union when black and white longshoremen together organized for keeps in 1934.

20


We'll Join No Witchhunts
In Stockton, California, after the end of the war in 1946, two Japanese members of local 6, ILWU, returned to their jobs from relocation camp. The American Legion and the Valley newspaper screamed that these Japanese-Americans were a terrible danger to the Community. It resulted in refusal of white workers to work along their side. In the face of the possible loss of the entire Stockton local and in the face of blasting attacks by the newspaper and radio, the ILWU enforced its Constitution and the white workers returned to their jobs and worked with the returned Japanese-Americans.
Some few rank and filers have sometimes asked, "Why does the ILWU membership always vote to support leaders attacked as Communist?" And the answer to that too is simple: -
The membership of the ILWU know that all policies of our Union are governed by the ILWU Constitution and are decided by the membership by democratic vote and not by any dictation or outside force. As long as our Union speaks up honestly and is willing to fight the employers when necessary for better wages and working conditions and as long as our Union criticizes the Government for legislating against the people and as long as we expose the political corruption of Government, we will be attacked. Attacking leadership is the oldest method in the world for breaking up an organization.
The American Legion has bitterly, viciously and falsely attacked our Union, yet we have many Legionnaires among our members. The Republican Party of Hawaii is the party of the

Big 5 and has worked since the beginning of our Union to bust 
us. Yet many of our members are Republicans. Many times when 
the organizations to which these members of our Union also belong 
have attacked our Union during strikes, other rank and file members 
have asked, "How come we don't kick those guys out of our 
Union?" 
But the answer is always simple and it's in Labor History and 
it's in our ILWU Constitution.  As long as any worker lives up
to the decisions of the membership and lives up to our Constitution,,
he belongs in our Union.  He can belong to any organization, meet 
with any group of people, hold caucuses, think, speak, teach, advocate, 
and express his views on the floor of the membership meeting. 
As long as he tries to carry out his ideas in a democratic trade union 
way and abides by the decision of the majority, he is okay for this 
union, even though all the rest of us may disagree with him. 
The same principle applies to the right of Communists to be 
members of our union. Anyone, including Communists, may hold 
office, be elected to official position, express his opinion. But always 
our union's position is the same, any member may do all these 
things but only by rights voted to him by the membership. 

The Membership Rules
At the Hilo Conference, Lou Goldblatt, Secretary-Treasurer of 
the International ILWU, summed up on the issue of communism 
and the Union as follows: 
"Communism is not an issue in the ILWU—it never has 
been and it never will be an issue in the ILWU. We are 
Union men and women working together for improved 
wages, better working conditions, better hours, better education 
for our families and a decent, regular life. That is the 
beginning and the end of the ILWU program.  We will not 
be controlled or governed by any outside groups, by any outside 
political groups, by anybody from the outside. The 
ILWU will govern its own affairs, and no political party, no 
racial group , no religious group, as such shall govern the 
affairs of this union. The union will be run by the members. 
Further, we will not tolerate any clique or any group or any 
factional bunch within the union attempting to govern or 
run this organization. Next, no individual holding office in
the ILWU will be permitted to use that office to push for
22


his own personal ideas no matter what they may be and will 
be compelled to use that office only for the ILWU program, 
as laid down by the rank and file. That is the way this union 
has been built and that is the way it will run." 

And the following statement of principles was adopted and was
later made a part of the Constitution and By - Laws of Local 142: 
"1.  THE ILWU IS AN AMERICAN INSTITUTION 
founded on the principles of American democracy. We are  
dedicated to the welfare of our membership and to a better 
life for the people in the communities in which we live. 
2.   THE CONSTITUTION OF THE ILWU and the structure 
of its organization is a living, daily example of democracy 
in action. This constitution provides for the fullest expression 
of the democratic process. It imposes an obligation 
and a duty on the entire membership to safeguard, to use, 
and to strengthen their democratic rights by active participation 
in the life of the union. 
3.   THE ILWU IS GOVERNED by the principles and policies 
formulated through the democratic machinery of the 
union.   No political party, Communist, Republican, Democratic 
or other, and no racial or religious group shall determine
our policies. 
4.   THE AFFAIRS OF THE UNION are the property of 
the membership and the membership alone.  No clique, or 
group of any nature shall dominate its work or govern its 
affairs. 
5.   ALL OFFICERS AND LEADING MEMBERS are obligated 
and intrusted by reason of their office to carry out the 
policies of the union as determined by the membership. Acceptance 
of office is acceptance of this obligation, and no 
office in the union or union funds shall be used for the advancement 
of personal or private objectives or gains. 
6.   THIS UNION will not be a party to any witch-hunt 
or red-baiting campaign. The individual opinions and beliefs 
of the members are their own, and the democratic machinery 
of the union extends equally to the protection of the individual 
in his right to hold his own convictions. 
THESE ARE THE PRINCIPLES that have guided this union
since its formation. They stand on their own merits. They 
guarantee the maintenance of our organization, the security
 of our membership , and our basic rights as Americans."
23

Olaa Lockout Defeated 
  But the attacks on the Union continued and when sugar negotiations 
rolled around in the Fall of the year, 1948 , the Sugar Plantations 
were in asking for wage cuts, claiming the ILWU was 
wrecking Hawaiian industry. 
   The Union exposed the phoney loss-bookkeeping, but still the 
Employers locked out the workers at Olaa plantation for refusing 
to accept a 17.2% wage cut. Finally, after a 69-day battle, the 
Union won.  The Company was forced to settle for only a five-cent 
wage cut. The same had been agreed to at Onomea and offered to 
Olaa before the lockout in recognition by the Union of special 
problems. 
    The Employers had taken a trial run at large-scale wage-cutting 
and lost, but the daily red-baiting was taking its toll on the Union 
strength. 
   By 1949, when the Longshore contract was open , Hawaiian 
Longshoremen had fallen 32 cents behind their brother West Coast 
longshoremen in post-war gains. Same companies, same ships, same 
cargo—the longshoremen demanded 32 cents to at least make up 
the post-war losses. The Big 5, planning to maintain colonial wages 
for non-haole island workers, froze at a 12-cent offer before the 
strike deadline. This was the Big Employer push. 

 Longshore Beats the Odds
  With the support of the West Coast the longshoremen won 
out after 176 days on the bricks. They had to fight off every conceivable 
type of attack to win , but they won. All forces of Government
 were mobilized against them. Acts 2 and 3 put the Territory 
in the strevedoring business with profits maintained for the Big 5. 
An all-out red-baiting campaign was put on by the Governor, 
Employer fronts, and the Employer Newspapers. Even the Bridges 
case was revived again by the Truman administration. 
  Attempts to deport Harry Bridges have gone on ever since the 
ILWU was organized based on the lie that Harry was a Communist. 
Harry was cleared by the Supreme Court in 1945 but still the attack 
did not stop. Harry Bridges was indicted again along with Bob 
Robertson and Henry Schmidt while Henry Schmidt was helping 
the Hawaiian longshoremen win their 1949 Longshore Strike and
24

Bob Robertson was helping the San Francisco Bay Area Warehousemen
win their battle for continued existence.  At the time of their
indictment Tom Clark, the then Attorney General (and now a
Truman Supreme Court Justice), pointed out frankly and publicly
that the indictments should serve to break the Longshore Strike in
Hawaii.  But the Union won.  And still the attacks didn't stop.
25


Compliance Solved Nothing
By the end of 1949, it was clear that the fight of Unions to knock out the Taft-Hartley law by refusal to comply was lost. The vast majority of Unions throughout the country had buckled under the pressure and had complied and their officials had signed the non-Communist affidavits required to permit the Union to use the NLRB election machinery. For the ILWU there was little value in refusing to comply after the fight to knock out the law was lost. So, at the turn of the year, the Island ILWU officials signed the non-Communist affidavits. Jack Hall as an appointed Regional Director was not legally required to sign. However, since it was clear to everyone that the only purpose of the affidavits was to put union officials on the spot, Jack climbed on the spot with the rest of the elected officials and signed the first ILWU non-Communist affidavit. The affidavit, certifying that the signing official was not a member of the Communist Party, laid the individual open to framed charges of perjury. It put the finger on every official. It was a gross violation of personal freedom. It solved nothing as far as stopping attacks on the Union were concerned but it laid the way open for the union participating on the ballot in NLRB certification elections.
In the spring of 1950, the House unAmerican Committee held hearings in Hawaii supposedly to investigate "Communism" in the islands. But again it was the same. The hearings were only handled to smear the Union and spread the same Big Lie that the Union was not controlled by the membership. Twenty-seven ILWU people including Jack, refused to participate in the smear, standing on their Constitutional rights. They were cited for contempt of Congress along with 12 outside individuals in the famous "Case of the 39." All were cleared of contempt and freed by the Federal Courts. But the Pineapple Companies figured the attack was working fine and moved to throw out industry-wide bargaining at the end of the year. The coordinating of the red-baiting attacks and the Employer Union-busting moves were getting clearer all the time.

The Pine Plot
Under the guise of a "voluntary" wage increase the Pineapple Companies made their offer on a plant-by-plant basis for the first 

26


time in five years of collective bargaining history. Their plan worked fine until they made their offer on Lanai. There the Union-busting wagon broke down.
The Lanai plantation had been the testing ground for pineapple speedup and layoff plans and the strong Lanai unit refused to accept the Pineapple offers. Hawaiian Pine was so anxious to carry through their plan that they threatened to let the whole crop rot, which they did.
Meanwhile, the Hawaiian longshoremen won a minimum 20-cent wage-pension package bringing their total gains from the 1949 stroke to at least 41 cents per hour, and sugar workers, tired of trading wage increases for Employer hoomalimali, moved to prepare for strike action. Four years of peace had seen the gains of the 1946 Sugar strike slowly disappearing under high prices, and Employer speedups and layoffs. 

Sugar Wins - Lanai Wins
The mobilization in Sugar was led by jack Hall, so it was no surprise when at the start of negotiations, the House of unAmerican Committee sprung its delayed stool-pigeon, Jack Kawano. They had been saving him for the occasion. Poor Jack Kawano, had been completed discredited as a Union man by his failure to carry out his work as a Union leader during the 1949 Longshore strike and by his attempt to get longshoremen to accept the sell out Fact Finding wage offer of 14 cents - (less than the West Coast had just received). His statement made a big publicity splash in the papers but didn't raise a ripple in the ranks of the Union. Everyone recognized Kawano's attempt to sell the Big Lie again at the start of sugar negotiation as just another sad attempt on the Employers' part at union busting, and on Kawano's part to make a few fast bucks. 
So in the closing days of sugar negotiations there was one shot left in the Employers' red-baiting gun - arrest Jack Hall. And on August 28th, 1951, the FBI picked Jack up.
The Sugar Negotiations Committee wouldn't meet without Jack and he got out on bail. The plantation supervisors ran around the fields like rabbits looking for a break in the union ranks but the only furrows were in the soil. The Employers settled then and a

27

great victory was won for sugar workers. A whole new contract and a 13 -cent package of wages, paid holidays, and greatly improved union security. 
    Fifteen days later, Hawaiian Pine threw in the sponge and all the Pineapple companies granted a 7-cent wage increase to all pineapple workers along with major gains for the pineapple workers in seniority and union security , and a return to Industry-wide bargaining. It was a great victory.       

28


THIS IS IT 

The pork chop gains of ILWU at the start of '52 were like this :

 Longshore base rates had gone up from 60 cents an hour before the union in 1940 to $1.76 plus either 5 cents more or pensions due in January 1952 subject to decision of the rank and file, 
and 
Sugar base rates had gone up from as low as 19 cents an hour before the union in 1944 up to a base rate of 91 cents per hour in 1951, 
and 
Pineapple base rates had gone up from as low as 55 cents per hour before the union in 1945 to $1.16 in 1951, 
and 
Miscellaneous base rates as low as 55 cents per hour had gone up to from $1.10 to $1.19. 
And with this, went many other gains such as paid vacation, and paid holidays, and sick leave, and Union security , and seniority and the right to live your own life after pau hana, and no discrimination for race , creed or color , all in the union contracts. 
So in spite of the attacks , Sugar won, Longshore won, Pineapple won, Miscellaneous won. 
But the Employer switch from police brutality to the use of the legal arm of government leaves the major attack of the Employers still in progress. Jack Hall must go to trial. 
The fight for the life of the union has switched from the picket line to law courts. Employer's hoomalimali is setting in again while the Truman legal eagles do the job on the union. We are moving into a period where the Employers' best salesmen will plug the Big Lie. 
Single out the people in our Union who have been attacked and you will find them among the most militant and self-sacrificing leaders and rank and filers that we have in our ranks. Because there is hysteria today against Communists in our country is no more reason for our Union to back down than because there was hysteria in Stockton against the Japanese-Americans at the end of the War. In our Union we judge people by their trade union record and protect them according to their trade union rights. 
29

Harry Bridges was jailed in July of 1950 because he spoke up 
in his Longshore meeting for a cease-fire in Korea. His words were 
described as traitorous. Yet now a year and one half-later and 
hundreds of thousands of lives later the identical cease-fire that 
Harry proposed is being negotiated.

Our Union is firmly built on the principles of the Bill of Rights 
of the United States Constitution and most particularly the First 
Amendment which reads:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of 
religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging 
the freedom of speech or of the press or of the right of the 
people peaceably to assemble and to petition the Government 
for a redress of grievances.-----

and we will stand and fall as a Union in our defense of these right for our Union and for membership as individuals.

Our leaders are attacked not because they may or may not be 
communist or anything else but because of the policies adopted by
the ILWU membership for which they are the spokesmen. At any
point that we of the ILWU fail to support our leaders regardless
of their race, creed, color, political affiliation, or nationality, we will
soon be a company union.

Over 25,000 ILWU members in Hawaii and countless thousands
of other people of the islands who know Jack Hall and the ILWU,
know from their own experience that no actions are taken by this
union except by vote of the rank and file and under the ILWU
Constitution.

The thousands who know Jack personally, who have heard him
speak, who have seen the results of his sixteen years of work in 
these islands, know him as the teacher and the advocate of a fair
standard fo living, racial equality, and the dignity of the human
being. Whatever may be his private thoughts these are his own
right. The right and privileges that he has helped to win for the 
working people of the Islands against the most powerful combination
of employers in the world should at least belong to him
too. Jack has asked nothing of this life for himself, only the rewards
that come to all members of the Union; his ambitions have
been for the common good, not for himself. his ambitions have
been for us, the Union.

The attack on Jack Hall is our battle, a Union battle.
30


AN INJURY TO ONE IS AN INJURY TO ALL

Published January 28, 1952
Honolulu, T. H.
Price 15 Cents

ILWU MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION BUILDING
451 Atkinson Drive--Honolulu, Hawaii

[ca 2-7-53]
You're invited to this 
FOLK-SONGFEST
featuring
Peoples Artists from N.Y.
Betty Saunders
Leon Bibb
SAT.
FEB. 14th
8:30 p.m.
Program of traditional and
modern folksongs includes
some purty good gee-tar
strumming...you'll like it!
at the WEICHBROD'S
8321 TAHONA DRIVE SILVER SPRING
DIRECTIONS: Go straight out New Hampshire Avenue past
University Lane...Go one block past stoplight at Merrimack,
then turn let at outdoor phone booth on Quebec St. Go
three blocks then turn left on Tahona Drive...to the 
second house from the corner on the left hand side.
REFRESHMENTS AND A SWELL TIME ASSURED! BRING YOUR FRIENDS!
Auspices: Washington Committee to Defend the Bill of Rights
DONATION: ONE DOLLAR

On Wednesday Evening at 8.30         the WASHINGTON COMMITTEE
TO DEFEND THE BILL OF RIGHTS will hold
a mass meeting to protest the arbitrary and wholesale arrest
of men and women for merely speaking their minds, writing
their opinions and meeting with their friends.
I. F. Stone..unintimidated columnist for the New York Daily Compass
will be the principal speaker.
Washington Peace Chorus
Mary Church Terrell..distinguished Washington author, educator
and leader of the Negro people
Edward E. Fisher..president of Local 471 of the Cafeteria workers
will share the platform
Dr. Marcus I. Goldman..scientist and chairman of the Committee
will preside.
VICTIMS of the thought control arrests will be present.
It is YOUR VOICE which will bestilled if the march toward
thought control is not halted.
Admission Free             Oddfellows Hall
9th & T Sts n w
Wednesday, Nov. 14, 8.30 p.m.

THE BAPTIST MINISTERS CONFERENCE of Washington, D.C. and vicinity , in a message to White House: 
" The Baptist Ministers Conference of Washington , D.C. and Vicinity most humbly petition you to temper justice with mercy in the case of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. Since no one has ever paid with his life for the crime of which they stand guilty, it is our prayer that these two be spared the supreme penalty. "
 
WILLIAM L. PATTERSON, Executive Secretary of the Civil Rights Congress. From an article entitled " The Rosenberg Case and the Negro People " in the January issue of " Freedom": 
" Substitute the word 'spy' for the word 'rapist'-or ' murderer,' as in the case of the innocent Rosa Lee Ingram of Georgia-- and the Rosenbergs might well be black..  The cry " Free the Rosenbergs! " should ring out through an America seeking freedom. The fortunes of Negro America are in the balance with those of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. The Rosenbergs must not die ! " 

LEON BEVERLY, President, Local 347 , United Packinghouse Workers of America, CIO:
" I feel that in view of the grave doubts existing in the Rosenberg case, and in the midst of the war hysteria and the increased attacks being made on minority groups , particularly Negros, that the death sentence is too severe. 
" The negro people , therefore, have an especial interest in the Rosenberg case and I urge that they join in asking clemency for the Rosenbergs." 

EARL B. DICKERSON, lawyer 
REV. JOSEPH EVANS, Community Church 
SIDNEY JONES, lawyer
MRS. IDELLUMBLES, educator
REV. HARRY WALDEN, Grant Memorial A.M.E. Church 
Excerpts from " Chicago Open Letter " to the White House:
" Mr. President, Americans are a merciful people. It is justice tempered with the utmost regard for life which has always distinguished our American courts of law. Do not let this harsh and unprecedented sentence stand. We appeal to you , as President of the United States, to exercise your power and act at once to grant clemency to Ethel and Julius Rosenberg."

If you agree that , as long as doubt of the Rosenbergs' guild remains, their lives should be spared, we urge you to write and wire the President and the Attorney General now! 

CLEMENCY TO THE ROSENBERGS!

GRANT THE ROSENBERGS A NEW TRIAL NOW ! 

Issued by : 
NATIONAL COMMITEE TO SECURE JUSTICE IN THE ROSENBERG CASE 
1050 Sixth Avenue, New York 18, N.Y. BRyant 9-9694 
209 

The Negro People Speak Out on the Rosenberg Case

" … As one who has lived richly in America, who love America and respects America, 
I plead with you, Mr. President, to stay the executioner and let the Rosenbergs live. " 
From a letter to the White House 
MRS. MARY CHURCH TERRELL 


The Negro People Speaking Out on the Rosenberg Case

Few issues have so stirred the world as has the case of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. 
Sentenced to die in the electric chair on the charge of " conspiracy to commit espionage, " the Rosenbergs have never ceased maintaining their innocence. " We are the victims of a cold-war political frame-up, " they insist. Their imprisoned co-defendant Morton Sobell has similarly never ceased asserting his innocence. 
  Millions of people , throughout the United States and abroad, have expressed grave doubts of the verdict and the sentence against the Rosenbergs and have urged the President to spare their lives. 

Among other world figures who have sent messages to Pres. Eisenhower requesting that he grant clemency are His Holiness Pope Pius XII, 2400 U.S. Protestant ministers, and many leading Rabbis.  
  On February 17, the U. S. Circuit Court of Appeals confirmed the doubts of many people by granting the Rosenbergs a stay of execution to allow their case to be appealed once more to the Supreme Court. 
In granting the stay of execution , Appeals Court Justice Jerome N. Frank said: 
" There are substantial questions of law. I would certainly not want to preclude their appeal to the Supreme Court. I would not want that to be on my conscience. 


We present below the statements of a few representative Negro leaders who have spoken out in the effort to defend American justice by saving the Rosenbergs' lives. 

JUDGE HUBERT T. DELANY , noted jurist. From address to National Lawyers Guild Convention, Feb. 21, 1953: 
" An amendment of the Constitution forbids cruel and unusual punishment., and the punishment of electrocution in this case is cruel and unusual. It is completely unprecedented in such cases.  " 

THE AFRO - AMERICAN . From an editorial entitled " Four Good Reasons, " 
January 31, 1953: 
" Justice will be served if the death sentences given Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, convicted of atomic espionage, are commuted to life sentences. 
" The feeling is inescapable that the severe sentences would not have been passed had not this couple been members of a minority group... There are also grave doubts in this case. One is that the government based its case almost exclusively on the uncorroborated testimony of a free-lance spy, who by involving the Rosenbergs managed to escape the death penalty and secure for himself a 15-year sentence..." 

MRS. MARY CHURCH TERRELL, Educator. From a letter to the White House: " I do not know whether they are guilty or not. I am not an expert on atomic science, but I do know that many persons whose knowledge and devotion to this country I respect deeply do believe there is some doubt about their guilt. Many more devoted Americans think that even if they are guilty , death in the electric chair is a punishment to severe... As one who has lived richly in America , who loves America and respects America, I plead with you , Mr. President, to stay the executioner and let the Rosenbergs live . " 

W.C. HUESTON, Grand Secretary , Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World. From a letter to President Eisenhower: 
" I am not going into the guilt or innocence of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, but I am joining in the petition to commute the sentence to life imprisonment, or a lesser term. " 

DR. W.E.B. DU BOIS , Historian, Educator, Former Minister to Liberia: 
" These are difficult times for all Americans, for all the world; but no plea of inconvenience nor suspicion of bias or indifference must let us smear our souls with the blood of the innocent or vindictively punish a crime such as this with the unprecedented sentence of death. " 


THE BOSTON CHRONICLE . From an editorial entitled " Clemency for the Rosenbergs, " November 29, 1952: 

" … So full is the atmosphere today of "guilt by association " because of hostility to the Soviet Union that the mere accusation of complicity with espionage agents of the government is tantamount to conviction by most American juries. 
" Already the Rosenberg case has quite unjustly given aid and comfort to rabid anti-Semites to the same degree and in the same measure as any case in which a Negro is convicted of some horrendous crime feeds anti-Negro sentiments. The President should extend executive clemency to the Rosenbergs…" 

PAUL ROBESON , Artist: 
" The death sentence against Julius and Ethel Rosenberg is the bitter fruit of the current war hysteria. Axis Sally, Tokyo Rose, Ilse Koch-- who made lurid careers out of the barbarous killings of innocent victims in World War II-- go free, Krupp, the maker of munitions which killed U. S. soldiers, retires from jail to the comfortable quarters of his West German villa. But in the United States a young couple is doomed to the electric chair on the basis of flimsy evidence... It is clear duty of the President to intervene in this case for the preservation not only of the lives of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, but of the constitutional liberties of the whole people. " 

HAROLD E. WARD , union leader in Local 108, F.E., United Electrical , Radio and Machine Workers of America, Chicago: 

"I know what hours of torture this family must have endured in this past year, for , last December, I faced the electric chair myself. Had I been put to death , my children would be fatherless, my wife a widow. 
"I was charged with murdering a scab during a strike at the Chicago International Harvester plant. I was innocent, but that made no difference to the newspapers, the radio , and television experts... I was fortunate in having my union behind me. They knew I was innocent and rallied to my defense, raising sufficient funds to guarantee the best possible legal defense and go to make public the true facts of my case. 
"I was found 'Not Guilty'. 
"It did not happen this way with the Rosenbergs. They had no one to back them up. There was no challenge to what the newspapers and radio said. The jury got a one-sided picture. One of the witnesses against the Rosenbergs was proven to be a liar recently -- in a sworn affidavit by the F.B.I. How would the jury have voted if they knew then that this witness had lied ? The Rosenbergs will never have a chance of proving their innocence unless they remain alive. "

SUGGESTED BY-LAWS
1: The name of the organization shall be THE WASHINGTON COMMITTEE OF THE AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION

2: The object of the organization shall be to defend freedom of speech, press 
and assemblage and other civil rights guaranteed by the Constitution of 
the United States.

The organization shall be affiliated with the American Civil Liberties 
Union, Inc., and shall conduct its work in accordance with the general 
principles and tactics established by the national organizations. The 
COMMITTEE shall not endorse or oppose any candidate for office, nor shall 
it take action on any issue outside the jurisdiction of the government of 
the United States or of its political sub-divisions. 

3: All persons are eligible to membership in the organization upon a declaration 
to support the stated purposes and the payment of a membership fee 
of $1.00 or more per annum. A member may be expelled by majority vote 
of the members of the organization.

4: The organization's affair shall be directed by an executive committee 
elected by the members at an annual meeting to be held during the month 
of January. The members shall be notified of the time and place of the 
election not less than two weeks prior to the election meeting.

The election shall be conducted in the following manner: where there are 
two or more candidates for any office, voting shall take place by ballot. 
Members unable to be present shall vote by proxy or by mail.  Membership 
lists shall be available for copying or use except upon express authorization by the 
executive committee and then only for purpose directly related to the 
work of the organization. The conditions off this provision shall also 
be the regular practice of the committee concerning the use of such lists.

 5: The executive committee shall consist of a Chairman, a Vice Chairman, a 
Secretary, a Treasurer, the Chairman of permanent committees, and such 
national officials or representatives as may reside in the District of 
Columbia. The executive committee shall act as the directing body of the 
organization to carry out the policies adopted by the membership in
regular sessions meet as occasion requires, but not less often than once
a month.

6: Meetings of the general membership may be called at any time upon order
of a majority of the executive committee, and shall be called by that
organization upon receipt of a petition requesting such meeting submitted
by fifteen or more members in good standing.

7: A quorum for the conduct of business at any membership meeting shall
consist of at least of the members in good standing. A quorum
at meetings of the executive committee shall consist of one-third of the 
membership of that committee.

8: Vacancies in any office may be filled by the executive committee until
the next membership meeting. The executive committee may authorize the
employment and compensation of one or more persons to conduct the work
of the organization, or may provide for compensation to any of the
officers or members. Persons thus employed shall work under the direction
of the executive committee, but may in case of disagreement with the
committee, put such disagreement before the membership for final decision.

9: In carrying out the work of the organization, cooperation may be established
to promote any campaigns for civil liberty or the defense of any
individual or organization whose rights are attacked, but the organization
shall not be identified with joint enterprises unless specifically authorized 
by theexecutive committee. No discrimination shall be shown in the 
choice of persons or issues defended, and all cases and issues involving 
denial of civil liberty or the violation of civil rights shall be aided
impartially to the extent of the organization's facilities. Questions as
to whether particular cases or issues fall within the field of civil
liberty shall be determined by the executive committee, or, on appeal by
the membership, and on request by the executive committee, the advice of
the Board of Directors of the American Civil Liberties Union.

An Appeal...
IN DEFENSE OF
NEGRO
LEADERSHIP
The time has come to halt the growing attacks upon Negro
leaders!
We, the undersigned Negro Americans, call upon our people 
everywhere to speak up in defense of all those Negro leaders
being persecuted because they fight hard for our democratic
rights.
We call upon the officers of federal, state and local governments
to discharge their public trust by protecting the democratic
rights of our leaders and the whole Negro people.
HARRY T. MOORE (deceased)
W. E. B. DU BOIS
BENJAMIN J. DAVIS, JR.
W. J. WALLS
CHARLOTTA BASS
GEORGE W. CROCKETT, JR.

Paul Robeson, William R. Hood, Mary McLeod Bethune, Roosevelt Ward, W. A. Hunton, Benjamin Careathers, Claudia Jones, Pettis Perry, William L. Patterson, Charles A. Hill, Moranda Smith (deceased), Coleman A. Young

trouble with the law, with public opinion, or with hoodlum assassins. 
   Hundreds of our most devoted and militant leaders are now being pilloried in the daily press, or barred from speaking in public halls, or arrested and beaten by the police alleged "disorderly conduct" or some other trumped-up charge. They are being being prosecuted in the courts, or "investigated" by the Un-American Activities Committee, or hounded by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Some have been forced to leave the country; others are barred from travel abroad; and more than a few have been murdered with impunity by hate crazed enemies of Negro freedom.
   No matter whether these leaders are Communists, non-Communist or anti-Communist, the "explanation" is most always the same. They are labeled "subversive" or "communistic," or "undesirable aliens," or "dangerous trouble-makers." 

First, the Communists - Then...
   Negro leaders active in the Communist Party are singled out for special persecution; but the attacks extend far beyond the Communists.
   Benjamin J. Davis, Jr., member of the National Committee of the Communist Party and twice elected to the City Council of New York, is confined in a federal prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, and denied even the right to correspond with his friends.
   Mr. Davis, long a powerful fighter for Negro Rights on many fronts, was convicted for alleged violation of the Smith Act. His "crime" was "conspiracy to teach and advocate" the theoretical principles of the Communist Party. Mr. Moore, militant leader in the Negro's fight for the right to vote and for decent schools, was killed by the bomb of unknown assassins. Ku Klux Klan leader William Hendrix "explained" that the N.A.A.C.P. leader got "involved in a communistic crowd."
   Communist leader Ben Davis and N.A.A.C.P. leader Harry Moore are symbolic of the widespread attacks now being directed against militant Negro leaders of all shades of opinion.

Just Think of It!
   To be charged by the Un-American Activities Committee with associating with so-called "subversive organizations" leads to the barring from a New Jersey high school of one of the most eminent educators and civic leaders of the United States, Mrs. Mary McLeod Bethune.
   To argue vigorously in Federal Court against conviction of his clients, Communist leaders indicated under the Smith Act, brings a "contempt" citation and six months in prison to an outstanding Detroit attorney, George W. Crockett, Jr.
   To fight against segregated schools brings arrests for N.A.A.C.P. President Dr. W. A. Fingal and other leaders in Cairo, Illinois, and threats of death to Mrs. J. J. Hannibal, in Kingston, North Carolina.
   To lead the fight for the lives of Willie McGee, the "Martinsville Seven," the Trenton Six" and other victims of Jim Crow frame-ups brings two trials for alleged "contempt of Congress" for the Executive Secretary of the Civil Rights Congress, William L. Patterson - the charge growing out of a hearing at which Georgia's Representative Lanham called the C.R.C. leader a "G-d black s.o.b.," and tried to attack him physically.
   To support a Negro veteran moving into a lily-white neighborhood in Cicero, Illinois, brings mob destruction of the apartment house and police arrests for N.A.A.C.P. Attorney George Leighton and other leaders - for "conspiracy to lower property values"!
   To become and active leader of the Progressive Party brings discharge from his position to a professor of philosophy at the University of Minnesota, Dr. Forrest O. Wiggins.
   To fight hard for Negro rights, African freedom and peace brings public abuse, barring from concert halls and denial of the right to travel abroad to the great people's artist, Paul Robeson.

 These are just a few examples of the mounting drive against hundreds of Negro leaders who defy the Jim Crow policies of our country and fight hard for the full citizenship rights of our people. There will be hundreds more unless we put a stop - RIGHT NOW - to this unjust persecution of Negro leadership.


Real Target - The Whole Negro People

  These growing attacks against Negro leaders are really directed against Negro citizens as a whole. They are designed to frighten off our leaders and curb the mounting struggles of the masses of our people against the rising tide of "white supremacy" during these years of war hysteria - especially since our country has been waging war against the colored peoples of China and Korea, and helping imperialist governments suppress the liberation struggles of other colored peoples in Asia and Africa.
  For every Negro leader attacked there are thousands of rank and file Negro citizens beaten or killed by the police, "lynched" in the courts on frame-up charges, bombed in their homes, denied the right.
  These efforts to intimidate and isolate militant Negro leaders are part and parcel of a growing campaign to suppress the whole broad struggle for Negro rights - to "keep the Negro in his place."
  WE HERE DECLARE TO ALL ENEMIES OF NEGRO FREEDOM - WHETHER THEY BE OUTLAW HOODLUMS OR OFFICIALS OF GOVERNMENT: SIRS, YOUR EFFORTS WILL FAIL! THE NEGRO PEOPLE WILL KEEP ON FIGHTING FOR THEIR RIGHTS, EVER MORE POWERFULLY, UNTIL THE VERY LAST VESTIGE OF JIM CROW OPPRESSION HAS BEEN WIPED OFF THE FACE OF OUR LAND!

The Smith Act - Fountainhead of Oppression

  The drive now under way against militant Negro leadership is greatly strengthened by a whole series of executive and legislative measures designed to silence all serious opposition from any quarter to basic foreign and domestic policies of the Federal Government.
  The democratic rights of Negroes and all other Americans are being seriously undermined by the so-called "Loyalty Oath" purges of Federal employees and public school teachers; the curbing of trade union rights under the Taft-Hartley Act and the other measures; the exercise of thought-control and the building of concentration camps under the McCarran Act; the wholesade round-up and deportation of aliens; the new restrictions on West Indians coming to this country under the McCarran-Walter Act; and especially the prosecution of Communist leaders for alleged violation of the Smith Act.
  Among these and other repressive measures, by far the most immediate and serious threat to the democratic liberties of all citizens - indeed, the main fountainhead of current trends toward the suppression of free speech and free association - is the 1940 thought-control law sponsored by Howard W. Smith, poll-tax representative from Virginia for more than twenty-one years.
  The Smith Act makes it "criminal conspiracy" to teach or advocate or circulate almost any ideas which hired stool-pigeons can testify imply "intent" to overthrow the government by force and violence - even though the indicted person is not charged with one single act or speech calling for such overthrow.
  Referring to the eleven national leaders of the Communist Party convicted under this Act, Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black declared: "These petitioners were not charged with an attempt to overthrow the Government . . . . The charge was that they agreed to assemble and how to talk and publish certain ideas at a later date . . . . No matter how it is worded, this is a virulent form of prior censorship of speech and press, which I believe the First Amendment forbids." Mr. Justice William C. Douglas called these convictions "dangerous to the liberties of every citizen."
  This is why two eminent Negro attorneys - Richard E. Westbrooks and Earl B. DIckerson, of Chicago - urged the Supreme Court to reconsider its decision upholding the conviction of the Communist leaders under the Smith Act. They argued: "In the first place, advocacy of fundamental changes in government so as to extend democratic protection to the Negro people might well be equated, under the broad terms of the Court's decision, with the advocacy of the violent overthrow of the Government . . . . The inevitable effect of the decision is to undermine, if not destroy, effective protest with regard to government practices and policies inimical to the welfare of Negroes."
  Six Negro leaders of the Communist Party have already been victimized by the Smith Act. Henry Winston, National Organization Secretary, was convicted along with Benjamin J. Davis, Jr. and nine other members of the National Committee. Miss Claudia Jones, Secretary of the National Women's Commission, and Pettis Perry, Secretary of the National Negro Commission, are now on trial in New York. James E. Jackson, Southern Regional Director, and Benjamin Careathers, leader in the Negro community of Pittsburgh, are under indictment.
  Henry Winston and James Jackson have been sought by Federal authorities since the summer of 1951 - the first political refugees we have had in this country since before the Civil War - since the days when Fredrick Douglass was a "fugitive from justice" and a price hung over the head of Harriet Tubman.
  It is horribly unjust that these Communist leaders - or any other Americans - should be prosecuted and imprisoned for nothing more than their political beliefs. It is criminal that their wives, children, relatives, friends and neighbors are now being hounded and persecuted day and night by the F.B.I. It is sinister and alarming that the "witch-hunt" hysteria whipped up around the Smith Act trials is being used as a cover for wholesale attacks against Negro leadership by all the flag-waving, white-supremacist enemies of democracy throughout our country.
  The warning of Attorneys Westbrooks and Dickerson is tragically confirmed by the increasing number of unwarranted attacks against Negro leaders during this period of Smith Act prosecutions. Our "right of protest" is, indeed, being undermined; and without this right the Negro people can have no hope of winning full citizenship.
  The spokesmen of our Government proclaim their fervent desire to "extend democracy" everywhere throughout the world. Let them direct a little more of their democratic fervor toward the defense and extension of democracy here at home!

WE DEMAND AN END TO THE PERSECUTION AND MURDER OF NEGRO LEADERS!
(PARTIAL LIST OF SPONSORS)
Rev. Edward D. McGowan, N. Y.
Mrs. Ada B. Jackson, N. Y.
Bishop Cameron C. Alleyne, Pa.
Bishop Reverdy G. Ransom, Ohio
Mrs. Mary Church Terrell, D.C.
Rev. Charles A. Hill, Mich.
Atty. George A. Parker, D.C.
Rev. Joseph M. Evans, Ill.
Mr. Joseph Johnson, Jr., Cal.
Mrs. Andrew W. Simkins, S.C.
Mr. G. L. Porter, Ill.
Archbishop David William Short, Iowa
Rev. J. Henry Patten, Pa.
Mr. Carlton Moss, Cal.
Dr. Carlton B. Goodlet, Cal.
Mr. Owen Middleton, N. Y.
Mr. Lee Morgan, Ohio
Mr. Bernard Lucas, Ohio
Dr. Ralph F. Hanley, Ind.
Mr. Deighton Osborne, N. Y.
Mr. Leon Beverly, Ill.
Mr. Doxey A. Wilkerson, N. Y.
Mr. Ewart Guinier, N. Y.
Prof. H. D. Smith, S. C.
Prof. G. Murray Branch, Ga.
Miss Viola M. Brown, N. C.
Mr. Larkin Marshall, Ga.
Mr. Louis E. Burnham, N. Y.
Mrs. Esther Cooper Jackson, N. Y.
Mr. Richard C. Henderson, Ind.
Dr. W. Alphaeus Hunton, N. Y.
Mr. William L. Patterson, N. Y.
Mr. Coleman A. Young, Mich.
Rev. O. B. Smith, Cal.
Mr. Charles Collins, N. Y.
Mr. Joseph Banks, N. Y.
Mr. James Malloy, N. Y.
Rev. Harold S. Williamson, N. Y.
Dr. Forrest O. Wiggins, Minn.
Mr. Robert S. Robinson, Cal.
Mr. Eddie Pinckney, N. Y.
Mrs. Liddie Banks, N. Y.
Rev. H. M. Hutchings, Mass.
Mr. William Harrison, Mass.
Capt. Hugh Mulzac, N. Y.
Mr. James W. Ford, N. Y.
Miss Ethel Goodman, Ohio
Mr. Edward M. Webb, Ohio
Mr. Bertram Washington, Ohio
Mr. Raymond Dennis, Ohio
Mr. George Lee, Cal.
Mr. Lawrence Turner, Cal.
Mr John Forrester, Cal.
Mr. Roger Boyd, Cal.
Mr. Sidney Moore, Cal.
Mrs. Marguerite Robinson, Cal.
Mr. Clarence T. R. Nelson, Ohio
Mr. Lee Cain, Mich.
Mr. Andrew Nelson, La.
Mrs. Thelma Slappy, N. Y.
Miss Laura Hall, N. Y.
Dr. Edward C. Mazique, D. C.
Mr. Cyril Philips, N. Y.
Mrs. Maude White Katz, N. Y.


RECENT VICTIMS OF ATTACKS AGAINST NEGRO LEADERSHIP

BASS, CHARLOTTA-former publisher of CALIFORNIA
EAGLE; President of National Council of Sojourners for
President of the U.S.; leader in peace movement; denied
passport rights for travel abroad.
BETHUNE, DR. MARY McLEOD-founder of Bethune-
Cookman College; President of National Council of Negro
Women; former executive in National Youth Administration;
leader in many civic enterprises; called "subversive"
by Un-American Activities Committee, barred from
speaking in high school of Englewood, N. J.
BROWN, DR. CHARLOTTE HAWKINS-President of
Palmer Memorial Institute; eminent civic leader; called
"subversive" by Un-American Activities Committee.
CAREATHERS, BENJAMIN-former organizer for CIO
steel union; leader of unemployed movement during
1930's; community leader of Communist Party in Pittsburgh,
Pa.; indicted under Smith Act.
CROCKETT, GEORGE W., JR.-outstanding Detroit attorney; 
former Chairman of F.E.P.C. Committee of
United Automobile Workers-CIO; defense counsel in trial
of national Communist leaders; cited by judge for "contempt
of court" for being "to zealous" in defense of 
clients; served 5-months term in prison.
DAVIS, BENJAMIN J., JR.-son of renowned Republican
leader of Georgia; defense lawyer in Herndon and
other Negro-rights cases, twice elected to New York City
Council; member National Committee of Communist
Party, and publisher of DAILY WORKER; convicted under
Smith Act, serving 5-year prison term.
DU BOIS, DR. W. E. B.-world renowned scholar, author,
lecturer, educator; Co-Chairman of Council on African
Affairs and of American Peace Crusade; prosecuted as
"foreign agent" at age 83, acquitted; denied passport
rights for travel abroad.
FINGAL, DR. W. A.-President of N.A.A.C.P. in Cairo,
Ill.; arrested with others for encouraging parents to enroll
children in "white" schools which courts had declared 
must be opened to Negro pupils.
GILBERT, LT. LEON-serving with U.S. Army in Korea;
charged with "disobeying orders of a superior officer";
sentenced to death by all-white court martial, later commuted
to 20 years at hard labor and loss of all Army
rights and privileges. 
HANNIBAL, J. J. - Chairman of Citizen's Committee
fighting for non-segregated schools in Kinston, N. C.; received
anonymous threats of death, her home guarded by
Negro neighbors.
HILL, REV. CHARLES A.-outstanding minister and civic
leader in Detroit; called before Un-American Activities 
Committee and subjected to insult and abuse as a "subversive";
one son threatened with loss of commission as
Captain in Air Corps and another son with loss of job
at U.S. arsenal because of father's public activities.
HOOD, WILLIAM R.-officer of United Automobile
Workers-CIO; Chairman of National Negro Labor Council;
called before Un-American Activities Committee and
subjected to abuse and slander as a "subversive"
HUGHES, LANGSTON-eminent poet of the Negro people,
his works hailed throughout the world, barred from
appearances before university and other audiences on
grounds of "subversive activities."
HUNTON, DR. W. ALPHAEUS-for many years on faculty
of Howard University; Executive Secretary of Council on
African Affairs; former Trustee of Civil Rights Bail Fund;
cited for "contempt of court" because he refused to reveal
names of several thousand contributors to Bail Fund;
served 5 months in prison.
JACKSON, JAMES E., JR.-founder of Southern Negro
Youth Congress; former organizer of tobacco workers
union; World War II veteran; alternate member of
National Committee of Communist Party and Southern
Regional Director; indicated under Smith Act, now a
political refugee.
JASON, WILLIAM C., JR.-postal employee in Philadelphia;
Chairman of Welfare Committee of National Alliance
of Postal Employees; along with other postal employees,
threatened again with loss of job unless they can
prove loyalty, even though cleared of "subversive" charges
some time ago by Loyalty Review Board.
JONES, CLAUDIA-came to U.S. from Trinidad, B.W.I.,
at age of 9; former leader in Young Communist League;
member of National Committee of Communist Party and
Secretary of National Women's commission; denied citizenship
on political grounds; now on trial under Smith 
Act.
McCRAY, JOHN-editor of LIGHTHOUSE AND INFORMER;
leader of right-to-vote movement in South
Carolina; fighter for election of Negroes to public office;
arrested and imprisoned on a technical frame-up charge.
McPHAUL, ARTHUR-Executive Secretary of the Detroit
Civil Rights Congress; called before Un-American Activities
Committee and subjected to abuse and slander as a
"subversive," cited for alleged "contempt of "Congress."
MOORE, HARRY T. - Florida State Coordinator of
N.A.A.C.P.; leader in the fight for the vote and for
decent schools; murdered, along with his wife, Mrs. Harriet
Moore, by the bomb of assassins still at large.
PATTERSON, WILLIAM L.-National Executive Secretary
of the Civil Rights Congress; key leader in many campaigns
for Negro rights; initiator of the U.N. petition,
WE CHARGE GENOCIDE!; called "subversive" by Un-
American Activities Committee; twice tried (and acquitted)
for "contempt of Congress"; called a "G----d
black s.o.b" by Representative Lanham, of Georgia, who
tried to attack him physically at a Congressional hearing.
PERRY, PETTIS-community leader in Los Angeles, Calif.;
received 65,000 votes in 1938 as candidate for State
Equalization Board; candidate for Congress in 1940;
member of National Committee of Communist Party,
Secretary of National Negro Commission, and Chairman
of National Farm Commission; now on trial under
Smith Act.
ROBESON, PAUL-world renowned actor and singer; Co-
Chairman of the Council on African Affairs, leader of
the world peace movement; militant fighter for Negro
rights and for freedom of colonial peoples; called "subversive"
by the Un-American Activities Committee; pilloried
in the press; barred from leading concert halls in
the U.S.; denied passport rights to travel abroad by the
U.S. State Department because "he has been extremely
active in behalf of independence of the colonial peoples
of Africa. . . ."
ROBINSON, THERESA-former public school teacher in
Washington, D. C., and head of Women's Civil Rights
Division, Improved Benevolent Protective Order of Elks
of the World; active in the world peace movement; called
"subversive" by the Un-American Activities Committee;
denied passport right to travel abroad; hounded to
death by attacks on her "loyalty."
SIMMONS, LE BRON-outstanding attorney and civic
leader in Detroit; active in many struggles for Negro
rights; called before the Un-American Activities for Committee
and subjected to abuse and slander as a "subversive."
SMITH, FERDINAND C.-native of Trinidad, B.W.I.; former 
National Secretary of the National Maritime Union-
CIO; a founder of the National Negro Labor Council;
deported as an "undesirable alien."
SMITH, MORANDA-South Atlantic Regional Director of
CIO Food and Tobacco Workers; militant leader of strike
against Reynolds Tobacco Workers; (Camels cigarettes) in
Winston-Salem, N. C.; called "subversive," pilloried in
the press, threatened by Ku Klux Klan just three days before
she died of a stroke.
TAYLOR, PAULINE-civic leader in Youngstown, Ohio;
active in the peace movement; denied passport rights
for travel abroad on grounds of "subversive activities."
WALLS, BISHOP W. J.-eminent leader of the A.M.E.
Zion Church; active in the peace movement; called "subversive"
by the Un-American Activities Committee.
HAROLD WARD-Financial Secretary, Local 108, U.E.;
Farm Equipment Workers Union; indicted for alleged
murder of strikebreaker, in chain of strikebreaking
moves by International Harvester, only evidence being
testimony of "mystery" witness.
WARD, ROOSEVELT-national leader of the Labor Youth
League, residing temporarily in New York; active in the
fight for Negro rights and for peace; charged with technical
failure to notify his New Orleans, La. draft board of
change of address, convicted and sentenced to prison-
although Government officials admit they were continually
aware of his public activities and whereabouts.
WIGGINS, DR. FORREST O.-formerly on the faculty of
Howard University; teacher of philosophy at Minnesota
University; fired because of his activities as a leader of
the Progressive Party.
WINSTON, HENRY-former leader of Young Communist
League; World War II veteran, cited for "conspicuously
meritorious and outstanding performance of military
duty"; member National Committee of Communist Party
and National Organizational Secretary; convicted under
Smith Act, now a political refugee.
YOUNG, A. COLEMAN - outstanding labor leader in
Detroit; Executive Secretary of the National Negro Labor
Council; called before the Un-American Activities Committee
and subjected to slander and abuse as a "subversive."


LET US UNITE IN MILITANT DEFENSE OF NEGRO LEADERSHIP!


The "Subversive" Label
  Things have reached such a state in our country that almost any 
Negro leader who dares to fight hard for Negro rights is headed for 
trouble with the law, with "public opinion," or with hoodlum 
assassins.
  Hundreds of our most devoted and militant leaders are now being 
pilloried in the daily press, or barred from speaking in public halls, 
or arrested and beaten by the police for alleged "disorderly conduct" 
or some other trumped-up charge. They are being prosecuted in the 
courts, or "investigated" by the Un-American Activities Committee, 
or hounded by the Bureau of Investigation. Some have been 
forced to leave the country; others are barred from travel abroad; 
and more than a few have been murdered with impunity by hate-
crazed enemies of Negro freedom.
  No matter whether these leaders are Communists, non-Communists 
or anti-Communist, the "explanation" is most always the same. 
They are labeled "subversive" or "communistic," or "undesirable 
aliens," or "dangerous trouble-makers."

First, the Communists-Then . . .
  Negro leaders active in the Communist Party are singled out for 
special persecution; but the attacks extend far beyond the Communists.
Benjamin J. Davis, Jr., member of the National Committee of the
Communist Party and twice elected to the City Council of New
York, is confined in a federal prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, and
denied even the right to correspond with his friends.
Harry T. Moore, Florida State Co-ordinator of the National Association
for the Advancement of Colored People-together with his
wife, Mrs. Harriet Moore-is DEAD.
Mr. Davis, long a powerful fighter for Negro rights on many
fronts, was convicted for alleged violation of the Smith Act. His
"crime" was "conspiracy to teach and advocate" the theoretical principles
of the Communist Party. Mr. Moore, militant leader in the
Negro's fight for the right to vote and for decent schools, was killed
by the bomb of unknown assassins. Ku Klux Klan leader William
Hendrix "explained" that the N.A.A.C.P. leader got "involved in a 
communistic crowd."
Communist leader Ben Davis and N.A.A.C.P. leader Harry Moore
are symbolic of the widespread attacks now being directed against 
militant Negro leaders of all shades of opinion.

Just Think of It!

* To be charged by the Un-American Activities Committee with
associating with so-called "subversive organizations leads to the
barring from a New Jersey high school of one of the most eminent
educators and civic leaders of the United States, Mrs. Mary
McLeod Bethune.
* To write and speak for Negro rights and for peace brings prosecution 
as a "foreign agent" and denial of passport rights to one of
the greatest scholars this country ever produced, the 84-year-old
Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois.
* To argue vigorously in Federal Court against conviction of his
clients, Communist leaders indicted under the Smith Act, brings
a "contempt" citation and six months in prison to an outstanding
Detroit attorney, George W. Crockett, Jr.
* To fight against segregated schools brings arrests for N.A.A.C.P.
President Dr. W. A. Fingal and other leaders in Cairo, Illinois,
and threats of death to Mrs. J. J. Hannibal, in Kingston, North 
Carolina.
* To lead the fight for the lives of Willie McGee, the "Martinsville
Seven," the Trenton Six" and other victims of Jim Crow frame-ups 
brings two trials for alleged "contempt of Congress" for the
Executive Secretary of the Civil Rights Congress, William L.
Patterson-the charge growing out of a hearing at which Georgia's
Representative Lanham called the C.R.C. leader a "G-d black
s.o.b," and tried to attack him physically.
* To support a Negro veteran moving into a lily-white neighborhood
in Cicero, Illinois, brings mob destruction of the apartment
house and police arrests for N.A.A.C.P Attorney George Leighton
and other leaders-for "conspiracy to lower property values"!
* To become an active leader of the Progressive Party brings discharge
from his position to a professor of philosophy at the University
of Minnesota, Dr. Forrest O. Wiggins.
* To fight hard for Negro rights, African freedom and peace brings
public abuse, barring from concert halls and denial of the right to
travel abroad to the great people's artist, Paul Robeson.
There are just a few examples of the mounting drive against hundreds
of Negro leaders who defy the Jim Crow policies of our
country and fight hard for the full citizenship rights of our people.
There will be many hundreds more unless we put a stop-RIGHT
NOW-to this unjust persecution of Negro leadership.

Real Target-The Whole Negro People

These growing attacks against Negro leaders are really directed
against Negro citizens as a whole. They are designed to frighten off
our leaders and curb the mounting struggles of the masses of our
people against the rising tide of "white supremacy" during these
years of war hysteria-especially since our country has been waging
war against the colored peoples of China and Korea, and helping 
imperialist governments suppress the liberation struggles of other
colored peoples in Asia and Africa.
For every Negro leader attacked there are thousands of rank and
file Negro citizens beaten or killed by the police, "lynched" in the 
courts on frame-up charges, bombed in their homes, denied the right
to vote, and forced into poverty by increasing job discrimination.
Moreover, it is no accident that those Negro leaders singled out for
attack are precisely the ones who fight hardest to establish the dignity
and full citizenship of the masses of our people.
These efforts to intimidate and isolate militant Negro leaders are
part and parcel of a growing campaign to suppress the whole broad
struggle for Negro rights-to "keep the Negro in his place."
WE HERE DECLARE TO ALL ENEMIES OF NEGRO FREEDOM
- WHETHER THEY BE OUTLAW HOODLUMS OR
OFFICIALS OF GOVERNMENT: SIRS, YOUR EFFORTS WILL 
FAIL! THE NEGRO PEOPLE WILL KEEP ON FIGHTING FOR
THEIR RIGHTS, EVER MORE POWERFULLY, UNTIL THE
VERY LAST VESTIGE OF JIM CROW OPPRESSION HAS
BEEN WIPED OFF THE FACE OF OUR LAND!

The Smith Act-Fountainhead of Oppression

The drive now under way against militant Negro leadership is
greatly strengthened by a whole series of executive and legislative
measures designed to silence all serious opposition from any quarter
to basic foreign and domestic policies of the Federal Government.
The democratic rights of Negroes and all other Americans are
being seriously undermined by the so-called "Loyalty Oath" purges
of Federal employees and public school teachers; the curbing of trade
union rights under the Taft-Hartley Act and other measures; the
exercise of thought-control and the building of concentration camps
under the McCarran Act; the wholesale round-up and deportation
of aliens; the new restrictions on West Indians coming to this country
under the McCarran-Walter Act; and especially the prosecution
of Communist leaders for alleged violation of the Smith Act.
Among these and other repressive measures, by far the most immediate
and serious threat to the democratic liberties of all citizens
-indeed, the main fountainhead of current trends toward the suppression 
of free speech and association-is the 1940 thought-
control law sponsored by Howard W. Smith, poll-tax representative
from Virginia for more than twenty-one years.
The Smith Act makes it "criminal conspiracy" to teach or advocate
or circulate almost any ideas which hired stool-pigeons can
testify imply "intent" to overthrow the government by force and
violence-even though the indicted person is not charged with one
single act or speech calling for such overthrow.
Referring to the eleven national leaders of the Communist Party
convicted under this Act, Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black declared:
"These petitioners were not charged with an attempt to overthrow
the Government. . . . The charge was that they agreed to
assemble and to talk and publish certain ideas at a later date. . . .
No matter how it is worded, this is a virulent form of prior censorship
of speech and press, which I believe the First Amendment
forbids." Mr. Justice William C. Douglas called this convictions
"dangerous to the liberties of every citizen."
The Smith Act poses a very special threat to Negro citizens. We
have got to "teach and advocate" changes in the many Jim Crow
laws and practices of federal, state and local governmental agencies.
Thus we always run the risk that some paid "informer" will appear
in court to testify that our intent, despite our words and deeds to
the contrary, is to "overthrow the Government by force and violence."
This is why two eminent Negro attorneys-Richard E. Westbrooks 
and Earl B. Dickerson, of Chicago-urged the Supreme Court
to reconsider its decision upholding the conviction of the Communist
leaders under the Smith Act. They argued: "In the first place,
advocacy of fundamental changes in government so as to extend
democratic protection to the Negro people might well be equated,
under the broad terms of the Court's decision, with advocacy of the
violent overthrow of the Government. . . . The inevitable effect of
the decision is to undermine, if not destroy, effective protest with
regard to government practices and policies inimical to the welfare 
of Negroes."
Six Negro leaders of the Communist Party have already been victimized
by the Smith Act. Henry Winston, National Organization
Secretary, was convicted along with Benjamin J. Davis, Jr. and nine
other members of the National Committee. Miss Claudia Jones, Secretary
of the National Negro Commission, are now on trial in New
York. James E. Jackson, Southern Regional Director, and. Benjamin
Careathers, leader in the Negro community of Pittsburgh, are under
indictment.
Henry Winston and James Jackson have been sought by Federal
authorities since the summer of 1951-the first political refugees we
have had in this country since before the Civil War-since the days
when Frederick Douglass was a fugitive from justice" and a price
hung over the head of Harriet Tubman.
It is horribly unjust that these Communist leaders-or any other
Americans-should be prosecuted and imprisoned for nothing more
than their political beliefs. It is criminal that their wives, children,
relatives, friends and neighbors are now being hounded and
persecuted day and night by the F.B.I. It is sinister and alarming
that the "witch-hunt" hysteria whipped up around the Smith Act
trials is being used as a cover for wholesale attacks against Negro
leadership by all the flag-waving, white-supremacist enemies of
democracy throughout our country.
The warning of Attorneys Westbrooks and Dickerson is tragically
confirmed by the increasing number of unwarranted attacks against
Negro leaders during this period of Smith Act prosecutions. Our
"right of protest" is, indeed, being undermined; and without this
right the Negro people can have no hope of winning full citizenship.
The spokesman of our Government proclaim their fervent desire
to "extend democracy" everywhere throughout the world. Let them
direct a little more of their democratic fervor toward the defense and
extension of democracy here at home!

WE DEMAND AN END TO THE PERSECUTION AND MURDER OF NEGRO LEADERS!
(PARTIAL LIST OF SPONSORS)

Rev. Edward D. McGowan, N. Y.
Mrs. Ada B. Jackson, N. Y.
Bishop Cameron C. Alleyne, Pa.
Bishop Reverdy G. Ransom, Ohio
Mrs. Mary Church Terrell, D.C.
Rev. Charles A. Hill, Mich.
Atty. George A. Parker, D.C.
Rev. Joseph M. Evans, Ill.
Mr. Joseph Johnson, Jr., Cal.
Mrs. Andrew W. Simkins, S.C.
Mr. G. L. Porter, Ill.
Archbishop David William Short, Iowa
Rev. J. Henry Patten, Pa.
Mr. Carlton Moss, Cal.
Dr. Carlton B. Goodlet, Cal.
Mr. Owen Middleton, N. Y.
Mr. Lee Morgan, Ohio
Mr. Bernard Lucas, Ohio
Dr. Ralph F. Hanley, Ind.
Mr. Deighton Osborne, N. Y.
Mr. Leon Beverly, Ill.
Mr. Doxey A. Wilkerson, N. Y.
Mr. Ewart Guinier, N. Y.
Prof. H. D. Smith, S. C.
Prof. G. Murray Branch, Ga.
Miss Viola M. Brown, N. C.
Mr. Larkin Marshall, Ga.
Mr. Louis E. Burnham, N. Y.
Mrs. Esther Cooper Jackson, N Y.
Mr. Richard C. Henderson, Ind.
Dr. W. Alphaeus Hunton, N. Y.
Mr. William L. Patterson, N. Y.
Mr. Coleman A. Young, Mich.
Rev. O. B. Smith, Cal.
Mr. Charles Collins, N. Y.
Mr. Joseph Banks, N. Y.
Mr. James Malloy, N. Y.
Rev. Harold S. Williamson, N. Y.
Dr. Forrest O. Wiggins, Minn.
Mr. Robert S. Robinson, Cal.
Mr. Eddie Pinckney, N. Y.
Mrs. Liddie Banks, N. Y.
Rev. H. M. Hutchings, Mass.
Mr. William Harrison, Mass.
Capt. Hugh Mulzac, N. Y.
Mr. James W. Ford, N. Y.
Miss Ethel Goodman, Ohio
Mr. Edward M. Webb, Ohio
Mr. Bertram Washington, Ohio
Mr. Raymond Dennis, Ohio
Mr. George Lee, Cal.
Mr. Lawrence Turner, Cal.
Mr. John Forrester, Cal.
Mr. Roger Boyd, Cal.
Mr. Sidney Moore, Cal.
Mrs. Marguerite Robinson, Cal.
Mr. Clarence T. R. Nelson, Ohio
Mr. Lee Cain, Mich.
Mr. Andrew, Nelson, La.
Mrs. Thelma Slappy, N. Y.
Miss Laura Hall, N. Y.
Dr. Edward C. Mazique, D.C.
Mr. Cyril Philips, N. Y.
Mrs. Maude White Katz, N. Y.

Our Appeal

We, whose names appear on the preceding page, speak as loyal 
American citizens who are eager to protect and strengthen the 
democratic principles and practices of the United States—for all 
people, regardless of race, creed, national origin or political belief.

We also speak as Negro Americans; and we especially insist upon 
the exercise of full democratic rights by the Negro citizens of our 
country. We will always insist upon this right. We will not be
silenced by the epithets "subversive," or "communistic," or "trouble-maker," 
or anything else.

We are genuinely alarmed at the mounting wave of attacks upon 
Negro leadership throughout our country; for we well understand 
the serious threat which these attacks pose for the liberties of our 
people as a whole.

We appeal to Negro Americans everywhere, regardless of political 
belief or affiliation, to united in a sustained campaign of struggle to 
the increasing persecution of Negro leaders.

Specifically, we call for support in pressing the following 
demands upon the leaders of federal, state and local governments:

1.  Stop hounding and persecuting Negro leaders who speak up and 
fight hard for Negro democratic rights. 

2.  Appoint a representative Citizens Committee to investigate the 
murder of Mr. and Mrs. Harry T. Moore, of Mims, Florida, and 
to recommend whatever steps are necessary to assure the arrest
and prosecution of their assassins.

3.  Make the Department of Justice and the Un-American Activities 
Committee investigate and prosecute vigorously all those individuals, 
organized groups, publications and agencies of government 
that seek actively to abridge or destroy the democratic rights of
Negro citizens.

4.  Grand amnesty to Benjamin J. David, Jr., Henry Winston and 
their associates; and stop all prosecution for political teaching and 
advocacy under the Smith Act.

5.  Restore the passport rights of Mrs. Charlotta Bass, Dr. W. E. B. 
Du Bois, Paul Robeson and all other Negro citizens now barred 
from travel abroad solely because of their militant fight for Negro 
rights and for peace.

6.  Enact fair employment practice legislation, with effective enforcement 
provisions. Pass similar FEPC measures in all state legislatures 
and city councils.

7.  Take all necessary executive and legislative steps to guarantee 
equal democratic rights to Negro citizens in voting, in appointment 
and election to public office, in the courts, in public education, 
in public health and housing, in the armed forces, and in 
freedom from physical attack and lynch terror.

8.  Pass Representative Adolph Sabath's Bill to Repeal the Smith 
Act. (H.R. 7493). Repeal all other repressive legislation, especially 
the severe restrictions on immigration from the West Indies 
in the McCarran-Walter Act, the anti-labor Taft-Hartley Act, and 
the thought-control and concentration camp McCarran Act.

More than a century ago, in 1829, the militant abolitionist leader, 
David Walker, addressed his famous Appeal . . . to the Colored 
Citizens of the World, but in particular, and very expressly, to those 
in the United States of America. He admonished our forefathers: 
"Never make an attempt to gain our freedom or natural rights from 
under our cruel oppressors and murderers, until you see your way 
clear—WHEN THAT HOUR ARRIVES AND YOU MOVE, BE 
NOT AFRAID OR DISMAYED; for be you assured that Jesus 
Christ the King of heaven and of earth who is the God of Justice 
and of armies, will surely go before you."

We have come a long way since the days when David Walker 
called upon our people to struggle against "those enemies who have 
for hundreds of years stolen our rights"; but the path to our freedom 
still lies ahead through struggle. AND WE SEE OUR WAY 
CLEAR, THE HOUR IS HERE WHEN WE HAVE GOT TO MOVE!

We appeal to Negro organizations and individuals throughout the country to speak up 
against the persecution of our leaders. We call upon our friends of the Negro people to support 
our demands.

(Please detach, fill out, and mail promptly.)
NATIONAL COMMITTEE TO DEFEND NEGRO LEADERSHIP
1660 Fulton Street * Room 21 * Brooklyn 13, New York (Phone: PResident 8-2057)
Dear Sirs:
As a Negro American who believes in democracy, I am in full agreement with your "Appeal in Defense of Negro 
Leadership."  I wish to cooperate with the Committee's work in the following ways: (Check one or more of the following)
_______1. Please list me as an endorser of the "Appeal."
_______2. Please list me as a member of the National Committee.
_______3. I enclose $_____________ to help finance the Committee's work. 

Name (PRINT) ___________________________________________
Address _________________________________________________
Post Office ______________________________________________

Sponsored by
NATIONAL COMMITTEE TO DEFEND NEGRO LEADERSHIP
1660 Fulton Street, Brooklyn 13, N.Y.

LIST OF PERSONS WHO SENT LETTERS TO CONGRESSMAN KERR 
RE CONGRESSMAN DIES' CHARGES AGAINST 
MRS. MARY MCLEOD BETHUNE

Alexander, Mrs. Lillian H., President, Women's Auxiliary to the 
National Medical Association, 48 Webster Pl., Orange, N. J.
Alexander, Dr. Will W., Special Assistant, War Manpower Commission, 
Social Security Building, Washington, D. C.
Austin, Miss Elsie, Grant President, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, 
143 W Street, N. W., Washington, D. C.
Barnett, Mr. Claude A., The Associated Negro Press, 
3507 South Parkway, Chicago, Illinois.
Bell, President William H. Alcorn A. & M. College, Alcorn, Mississippi
Bluford, President F. D., A. & T. College of North Carolina, 
Greensboro, N. C.
Bolin, Judge Jane, Domestic Relations Court, East 23rd St., New York City
Bousfield, Mrs. Maudelle B., Member Women's Advisory Committee, War Manpower Commission, 244 E. Pershing Road, Chicago, Illinois.
Bray, Bishop James A., President, Chicago Interdenominational Council of 
Negro Churches, 4805 Forrestville Avenue, Chicago, Illinois.
Brown, Dr. Charlotte Hawkins, President, Palmer Memorial Institute, 
Sedalia, North Carolina
Brown, Mr. S. Joe, Past Commander, Lincoln Post No. 126, Dept. of Iowa 
American Legion, 207 6th Avenue, Des Moines, Iowa.
Brown, Mr. Willard L. Attorney-at-Law, 1002 1/2 Washington Street,
Charleston, West Virginia.
Burgess, Mr. John P., Itinerant Teacher Trainer Vocational Agriculture
State Agricultural and Mechanical College, Orangeburg, S. C.
Carroll, Mr. Robert R., Principal, Scott High School,
Glen Rogers, West Virginia.
Carter, Mr. Elmer A., Unemployment Insurance Appeal Board,
342 Madison Avenue, New York City, N. Y.
Clark, President Felton, G., Southern University, Scotlandville, La.
Clark, Principal J. F. J., Garnet High School, Charleston, West Virginia
Clement, Dr. Rufus E., President Atlanta University, Atlanta, Ga.
Cochrane, Mr. Warren R., Executive Secretary, Young Men's Christian Assoc.,
22 Butler Street, N. E., Atlanta, Ga.
Davis, President John M., West Virginia State College, Institute, W. V.
DeBerry, Mr. William N. Dunbar Community League, Inc.,
643 Union Street, Springfield, Mass.
Dombrowski, Mr. James A., Executive Secretary, Southern Conference for
Human Welfare, 202 Presbyterian Building, Nashville, Tenn.
Embree, Dr. Edwin R., Julius Rosenwald Fund, 4901 Ellis Ave., Chicago, Ill.
Hale, President W. J., Tennessee A. & I. State College, Nashville, Tenn.
Hamilton, Colonel West A., Prairie View State N. & I. College,
Prairie View, Texas
Hayes, Mr. Roland, 58 Allerton Street, Brookline, Massachusetts
Hill, President Leslie Pinckney. Cheyney Training School for Teachers. 
State Teachers College, Cheyney, Pennsylvania.
Holmes, Dr. Dwight O. W., President Morgan tate College, Baltimore, Maryland

- 2 - 

Holmes, Reverend John Haynes, The Community Church of New York,
Ten Park Avenue, New York City, N. Y.
Howard, Mr. Charles P., 515 Mulberry Street, Des Moines, Iowa
Hughes, Mr. Ray E., Chr., Board of Trustees of Wilberforce University
28 1/2 South High Street, Columbus, Ohio.
Hull, Principal Bruce H., Simmons High School, Montgomery, W. Va.
Hunter, Miss Jane E., President Ohio State Federation of Colored Women's
Clubs, 4450 Cedar Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio.
Johnson, Dr. Charles S., Fisk University, Nashville, Tenn.
Johnston, Mr. J. H., Pres., Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools
For Negroes, Virginia State College, Petersburg, Va.
Jones, Mr. Harry H., Attorney-at-Law, 25 Fourteenth St., Wheeling, W. Va.
King, Bishop Lorenzo H., Atlantic Coast Area, The Methodist Church,
250 Auburn Avenue, Atlanta, Ga.
Lanier, Mr. R. O'Hara, Acting President, Hampton Institute, Hampton, Va.
Leo, President J. R. E., Florida A. & M. College, Tallahassee, Fla.
Lewis, President Ira F., Pittsburgh Courier Pub. Co., 2628 Centre Ave
Pittsburgh, Penna.
MacCracken, Dr. Henry Noble, President Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, N.Y.
McAllister, Rev. C., Pres., The Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance
1657 Walker Street, Des Moines, Iowa.
Murphy, Mr. Carl, Editor, Afro American, 628 N. Eutaw St., Baltimore, Md.
Oxnam, Bishop G. Bromley, Resident Bishop of the Boston Area,
581 Boylston Street, Boston, Massachusetts.
Patterson, Mr. P. L., Executive Editor The Pittsburgh Courier, Pittsburgh, Penna.
Randolph, Mr. A. Philip, International President, Brotherhood of Sleeping 
Car Porters, A.F. of L. 217 W 125th St., New York, N. Y.
Scott, Mr. Emmett J., Dir. Employment & Personnel Relations Shipyard No.4,
Sun Shipbuilding and Dr. Dock Company, Chester, Penna.
Sheperd, President James E., North Carolina College for Negroes, Durham, N. C.
Spaulding, Mr. C. C., Pres., N. C. Mutual Life Ins. Co. Durham, N. C.
Spivey, Dr. Ludd M. Pres., Southern College, Lakeland, Florida
Staupers, Mrs. Mabel K., Exec. Secy., Natl. Assoc. Colored Graduate Nurses,
1790 Broadway, New York, N. Y.
Terrell, Mrs. Mary Church, 1615 S St., N. W., Washington, D. C.
Thomas, Mr. Jesse O., Natl. Organizations Div. Treasury Dept., Wash., D. C.
Thompkins, Mr. William J., Recorder of Deeds, D. C., Washington, D. C.
Tobias, Dr. Channing H., Senior Secy. for Colored Work, National Council os
Y.M.C.A.'s. of the U.S.A., 347 Madison Ave., New York, N. Y.
Trenholm, Mr. HO Council, Office of Executive Sec'y, American Teachers
Association, Box 271, Montgomery, Ala.
Wade, Prin. J. F., Buffalo High School, Accoville, W. Va.
Washington, Mr. Forrester B., Dir. Atlanta University School of Social Work,
247 Henry Street, S. W., Atlanta, Ga.
White, Mr. Walter, Sec'y., N.A.A.C.P., 69 Fifth Avenue, New York, N. Y.
Wilson, Mr. J. Finley, Grand Exalted Ruler I.B.P.C.E.W., Box 1824, Wash., D. C.
Wise, Rabbi Stephen S., Synagogue House, 40 West 68th St., New York, N. Y.
Wright, Mr. Arthur D., Pres., Southern Education Foundation, Inc.,
726, Jackson Place, N. W., Washington, D.C
Wright, Principal Carter., Summer High School, 1015 Avery St.,
Parkersburg, West Virginia.
Wright, Bishop R. R., Jr., Presiding Bishop, Thirteenth Episcopal District
The A.M.E. Church, Box 5, Wilberforce, Ohio.
Young, Mr. P. B., Editor, Journal and Guide, 710 E. Olney Street,
Norfolk, Virginia.

The Test of a Teacher
professional excellence
or political conformity?

FOREWORD

    The Teachers Union of New York presents in this pamphlet 
the summation by defense counsel in the trial of Mr.
David L. Friedman, a New York City school teacher, because
we believe the arguments go to the very heart of the current,
widespread attacks on academic freedom, whether in the form
of loyalty oaths, investigating committees, or political inquisitions 
by Superintendents and Boards of Education or Boards
of Regents.
    Mr. David L. Friedman, an English teacher with a record of
25 years of outstanding service in the school system had been
suspended without pay on May 3rd, 1950.  He was charged by
Dr. William Jansen, Superintendent of Schools, with "insubordination" 
and "conduct unbecoming of a teacher" because of 
alleged membership in the Communist Party and refusal to
answer questions about membership.  Seven other teachers,
whose trials followed, were suspended at the same time for
refusal to answer the question, "Are you or were you ever a
member of the Communist Party?"  However, they were not
charged with membership.  The Superintendent, it is clear, is
attempting in these trials to establish not only his right to dismiss 
Communists, but to question all teachers who he believes
are members of the Communist Party or, in his own words 
"closely connected with" the Communist Party.
    The eight teachers are noted for outstanding teaching records, 
and for contributions in the field of education.  As
[1]

leaders and active members of the Teachers Union, they have
played an important part in campaigns for salaries, pensions,
increased educational budgets, academic freedom, and in the
fight against any display of bias and bigotry in the classroom.
    Mr. Friedman's trial which lasted from September 18th
through October 11th, had some curious aspects.  For the first
time, the Board of Education delegated its responsibility to
some one outside the school system and appointed as Trial Examiner 
Mr. Theodore Kiendl, a prominent corporation lawyer
unacquainted with the problems of the schools.  The prosecution
was not undertaken by the legal staff of the Board of Education,
as is customary, but by the Corporation Counsel of the City of 
New York and at least three of his assistants.  The prosecution
relied entirely on the testimony of paid professional informers
like Louis F. Budenz, Joseph Kornfeder and a police spy. 
    The Corporation Counsel, John P. McGrath, with newspaper
headlines in view, opened the trial with a flamboyant and
highly emotional speech charging Mr. Friedman with being a 
fifth columnist, a potential quisling, with using "oblique" methods 
of inculcating the doctrines of Marxism-Leninism, and with
being bound by the "iron discipline" of the Communist Party
to disobey directives of his School Superiors.
    Yet not one supervisor, teacher, student, or parent was
called to testify to the truth of these charges.  The only school
official called by the prosecution was Superintendent Jansen,
who verified the fact that he had summoned and questioned
Mr. Friedman and that Mr. Friedman had refused to answer.
Under cross examination he admitted that he had not investigated 
Mr. Friedman's classroom conduct prior to suspending
him; that he had no information from any source that Mr. Friedman
                                               [2]


Friedman had used his classroom to promulgate Communist doctrine
or that he had ever advocate violent overthrow of the government.
    Towards the end of the proceedings, the Trial Examiner
asked Mr. McGrath, "But you do not contend that there is any
affirmative proof of any affirmative action taken by this respondent 
in the classroom?"  To this the Corporation Counsel
replied, "We have not adduced any proof of any specific classroom 
acts."  And in the course of the trial Mr. Kiendl remarked, 
"I have heard no proof of any conduct unbecoming a
teacher on the part of your respondent in the classroom or in
his extra-curricular activities, and unless there is some proof
to that effect, I should proceed on the assumption - that his
conduct in that respect was exemplary."
    Professor Thomas I. Emerson of Yale who was actually on
the witness stand waiting to testify, and other scholars and educators, 
who were called by the defense as experts on academic
freedom and on the dangers to education inherent in such trials,
were not permitted to testify.  The Trial Examiner sought to
narrow the issues to the question of whether Mr. Friedman was
a member of the Communist Party and whether it had been
proved to his satisfaction that the Communist Party advocated
the violent overthrow of the government.  "I do not see," said
Mr. Kiendl, "that academic freedom is even remotely involved..."
    The Trial Examiner also ruled out almost all questions by
which the defense sought to prove its charge that the admittedly
low state of morale among teachers, the growing demand for
an investigation of bias and bigotry in the schools, and the
pending investigation of graft and corruption in the purchase
                                              [3]

of materials and in repair of school buildings made a diversion
in the form of a "red hunt" desirable.

It was clear at the end of the trial that Mr. Friedman was
beyond any doubt an excellent teacher with an unblemished
record-- but that this was considered irrelevant in determining
his fitness to teach. From the presentation of the Corporation
Counsel and the remarks and questions of the Trail Examiner
(quoted in the body of this pamphlet) the theory emerged that
a teacher could be dismissed not because of anything he had
done or said, but because he might some time in the future
indoctrinate his pupils. Thus the theory of guilt by association, and 
its corrolary, preventive dismissal. 
However on the final day of the trail, Mrs, Rose Russell,
Legislative Representative of the Teachers Union, Mr. Nathan
Witt and Mr. Harold Cammar, attorneys for Mr. Friedman, in
summing up for the defense broke out of the narrow limits imposed
by the Trial Examiner up to that time. We are not including
Mr. Witt's statement -- a brilliant analysis of attempts
by the prosecution to circumvent the Civil Service Law --because
of its technical character.
Mrs. Russell and Mr. Cammer presented a plea, buttressed
by scholarly research, for reason against hysteria, for consideration
of actual conduct as against the notion of potential
guilt, for intellectual freedom as against trails of books and
ideas, and for the protection of teachers and children from the
intimidating and stultifying effects of heresy trials.
We present their statements as they appear in the official
record of the trail with a few minor omissions necessitated by
space limitations. The heading have been added by the editors 
of this pamphlet.
[4]


Statement by
Mrs. Rose Russell

UNFOUNDED CHARGES
When we opened our case, or, rather, at the very beginning
of these proceedings, we said that no case would be
made of unbecoming conduct. The hearing has
fully borne out our contention. Mr. Friedman's twenty-four-year
record as a teacher stands as an enviable record, of which any
school system should be proud. His character, his relations with
his supervisors, his fellow teachers, his pupils with the community,
have been forced to concede that his conduct as a teacher has
been exemplary. This alone should cause the case to be dismissed.

On the other hand, the Corporation Counsel has made a 
number of very serious charges against Mr. Friedman. In his
opening charge, at the beginning of this proceeding, Corporation
Counsel McGrath said that Mr. Friedman was required to
perform acts which were contrary to the standards of conduct
prescribed for teachers in the employ of the Board.

He said, further, that Mr. Friedman accepts the iron discipline
of the Communist Party, which requires every Communist
to follow the directives of the leaders, whether he agrees
with them or not, and that Mr. Friedman sought to stir up class
[5]

struggles and to advance the interests of Soviet Russia over our
own country, if necessary, and that he obeyed this doctrine.
    Mr. McGrath said, further, that Mr. Friedman followed 
the Party line without questioning all of its gyrations and thereby 
gave up the academic freedom which he claims to be championing.  
The Corporation Counsel charged that Mr. Friedman
is a professional revolutionary, a Marxist, and a disciplined
member of a quasi-military organization.  He charged that Mr.
Friedman educated the masses to the need of the violent overthrow 
of the state.  Mr. McGrath said that it was Mr. Friedman's
duty to work unceasingly in all his activities to inject the idea
of the need for a class struggle, to prepare the masses for the
propitious moment when a revolution would be successful and
a dictatorship of the proletariat established.
    Mr. McGrath said that Mr. Friedman was expected to guide
and direct the hatred of children for the bourgeois public school
system in order to be able skillfully to inject Marxist doctrines
into his teaching.
    The Corporation Counsel charged that Mr. Friedman was 
told to write new school text books and to rewrite history from
the Marxist viewpoint; that he was required to create and use
every opportunity to inculcate and spread Communist doctrines.
    The Corporation Counsel charged that Mr. Friedman was 
adept in the use of the oblique method to inject Marxist-Leninist
analyses in the minds of his pupils.
    He charged that unfavorable contrasts are thus made between 
political, social and economic conditions here and in
foreign countries, which suggest that it would be wise and
profitable to emulate the foreign examples, particularly if they
are Russian.
                                                  [6]


     Mr. McGrath charged that Mr. Friedman is engaged in
creating a fifth column in our midst, and charged that he is
engaged in disorganizing and weakening the internal structure
of our government by class struggles, civil disorder, mass 
strikes, mutiny and disaffection in the armed forces.
    Mr. McGrath charged that Mr. Friedman resorts to all kinds
of unprincipled lies, tricks and distortion, wherein words lose
their ordinary meanings, and that he engages in the species of
double-talk whereby words mean one thing to the initiated and
the opposite to all others.
    Mr. McGrath charged that Mr. Friedman has been taught
to rid himself of any scruples, and that he regards honesty and
straightforward dealings as bourgeois prejudices.  He charged
that Mr. Friedman is a fifth columnist in our schools and a 
potential quisling on our payroll.  He charged that Mr. Friedman 
is an advocate of the destruction of our civil liberties and
our free institutions.
    Not one charge has been proved - no testimony offered to
prove any of these charges, no evidence to support these charges,
and our efforts to disprove them were rejected.  For this alone,
the charges should be dismissed.

LESSONS OF THE LUSK LAWS
    This is a serious hearing.  This is not an ordinary case.  This
is not a case in which a teacher has been absent without authorization 
for whatever reason, whether it be in the case of some
whose names were cited yesterday, for unknown causes, dereliction 
of duty, or whether it be out of habitual drunkenness.
    This is a case which goes to the heart of the democratic
education process and the effects of which will be felt not only
                                               [7]

in the school system of New York City, and not only throughout
the public school system of our country, but throughout the
whole world.
    In many ways it is reminiscent of the Lusk Laws, and in our
charge that the proceeding is unfair and based upon unfair
charges, it recalls a comment which was made by Professor
Howard K. Beale in his classic study, "Are American Teachers
Free?" which was published under the auspices of the Commission 
on the Social Studies in the Schools of the American Historical 
Association, and which, by the way, Superintendent
Jansen had never heard of.  Professor Beale says, on page 36,
speaking of the issues that arose during the Lusk Law period,
        "In New York there were elaborate hearings, defense counsel
        and all the paraphernalia of a trial, even though the decision
        was determined in advance by the war hysteria of the men
        conducting the proceedings."
    It will be recalled that the Lusk Laws were first introduced
in 1919 and vetoed by Governor Alfred E. Smith, and in his
veto message, Governor Smith said, in 1920,
        "The traditional abhorrence of a free people of all kinds of
        spies and secret police is valid and justified and calls for the
        disapproval of this measure.  The test established is not what
        the teacher teaches, but what the teacher believes, and the effect
        of the bill would be to make the Commissioner of Education
        the sole and arbitrary dictator of the personnel of the teaching
        force of the State in the public schools.  This bill must be judged
        by what can be done under its provisions.  It permits one man
        to place upon any teacher the stigma of disloyalty, and this,
        even without hearing or trial.  No man is so omniscient or
        wise as to have entrusted to him such arbitrary and complete
        power, not only to condemn any individual teacher but to
        decree what believe or opinion is opposed to the institutions of
        the country."
    Professor Beale points out that the passage of the Lusk
Laws, which took place during the administration following
                                              [8]


Governor Smith's, "led to an orgy of investigation and persecution," 
and the New York City school system had so disastrous
an experience with it that in 1923, when Governor Smith was
again governor, after an interval of one term, the New York 
City Board of Education, which had previously supported the
Lusk Laws, reversed its position unanimously and endorsed the
movement for repeal, pointing to the fact that its experience
had shown that teachers felt "as though they had a policeman
at their heels."  And then, in 1923, when Governor Smith was
once more the executive officer of the State, he signed the repeal
bills and said this:
        "The Lusk Laws are repugnant to the fundamentals of American 
       democracy.  Teachers, in order to exercise their honorable
        calling, were, in effect, compelled to hold opinions as to governmental 
        matters deemed by the state officer consistent with
        loyalty.  Freedom of opinion and freedom of speech were, by
        these laws, unduly shackled, and an unjust discrimination
        was made against the members of a great profession.
        "In signing these bills" - (that is, the repeal bills) - "I
        firmly believe I am vindicating the principle that, within the
        limits of the Penal Law, every citizen may speak and teach
        what he believes."

REMOTE AND UNRELATED EVIDENCE

    The proof of Mr. Friedman's conduct as a teacher was unfairly 
circumscribed, and unlimited latitude given to evidence
concerning others in no way connected with him.
    It will be recalled that during the first days of the proceeding 
we listened to long accounts of the experiences of a Mr.
Kornfeder and Mr. Budenz, their travels, their alleged conversations 
with persons, some known, some unknown, their meetings 
in mysterious places, their readings, their alleged discussions.
    In those days, as it was more and more obvious that no
                                         [9]

connection was being made between the testimony given and
Mr. Friedman, the impression might have been gained that
Mr. Friedman was being held responsible for The Communist
Manifesto of 1848, for the 1905 revolution in Russia against
the tsar, for the writings of Lenin and Stalin and for the writings
of many others, for the Bolshevik revolution of 1917, for Mr.
Kornfeder's park bench meetings, for his conversations - 
alleged conversations - with Stalin's secretary, for Mr. Budenz's 
spiritual experiences from one faith to another.

    The efforts of Mr. Friedman's counsel to object to having
such evidence received were denied.  No connection was made
during that testimony and there still has not been any connection 
made between that testimony and Mr. Friedman.

    For days, the forgotten charge was the charge of unbecoming
conduct as a teacher, for which Mr. Friedman was allegedly
being tried; and he was being threatened with dismissal from
the post in which he had faithfully served for a quarter of a 
century, not for anything he did or said, not for the actual influence 
that he had upon his pupils, but because of what his
words and acts were assumed to be, because of what others said
certain doctrine was alleged to mean.

NO FAULT FOUND WITH RECORD

    In the end, no fault was found with Mr. Friedman's twenty-five 
years as a teacher, and he can well say with Socrates, as
Plato wrote in the Apology of Socrates, translated by Benjamin
Jowett - 
        "For if I am really corrupting youth and have corrupted some
        of them already, those of them who have grown up and become
        sensible that I gave them bad advice in the days of their youth
        should come forward as accusers, and if they do not like to
        come themselves, some of their relatives, fathers, brothers or
                                                 [10]


        other kinsmen should say what evil their families suffered at
        my hands.  Why should they, too, support me with their testimony?  
        Why, indeed, except for the cause of truth and justice
        and because they know that I am speaking the truth."

    Mr. Friedman's counsel made efforts to find out how the
Superintendent of Schools arrived at the concept that membership 
in the Communist Party, or in any organization, constitutes
conduct unbecoming a teacher.  These efforts were frustrated,
for the Corporation Counsel objected.  The Superintendent of 
Schools has not explained, either in this proceeding or to the
teachers at any time, how this new criterion for judging a
teacher can be justified.

PREMISE NOT SUBJECTED TO REASON

    Indeed, it can be seen that a premise put forward by the
Corporation Counsel, namely, that membership in the Communist 
Party involves unbecoming conduct, is expected to be
accepted as a dogma - not to be questioned, not to be subjected
to the scrutiny of reason, not to be examined, not to be verified,
not to be proved, but to be accepted as the conclusion - and
the myth becomes truth.

    Teachers have a right to know on what basis they are
being judged.  The Superintendent of Schools is not in this proceeding 
merely as any witness called in to testify to this or that.
He is the administrative officer, the administrative head of the
largest school system in the country and, perhaps, in the world.
He is the administrative officer of a school system employing
36,000 teachers and some four or five thousand other employees
and serving nearly a million children and many adults, both
directly and indirectly through their parenthood of the children
in the schools.
                                                [11]

EVASION OF RESPONSIBILITY

    He has a responsibility far beyond that of anyone else to
maintain our public schools in health, in sanity, in decency and
in democratic relationships between teacher and teacher, teacher
and supervisor, between teacher and pupil and between teacher
and community.
    He cannot delegate to the Corporation Counsel the determination 
of what constitutes conduct unbecoming a teacher.
It must be his decision by which he stands.  It must be a policy
determined by himself and the Board of Education, which is
the policy-making body of laymen responsible to the City of 
New York for the good conduct of our public schools.
    Neither the Superintendent nor the Board of Education can
delegate these functions and this responsibility to anybody else.
The issue cannot be seen as a narrow and legal one, but as one
which is most basic, most fundamental to the whole educative
process.
    It is for this reason that we opposed the appointment of an
outsider as an examiner - any outsider, no matter who he 
might be.
    The point that I make is that the proceedings were characterized 
by the delegation of the policy-making function of the
Board of Education and of the Superintendent of Schools to the
Corporation Counsel and that they were conducted by an outside
Trial Examiner.  In both instances, the concern was with legal
issues and not with educational policies, and perhaps for that
reason the testimony of educational experts was excluded in a
hearing where they should have been the leading witnesses if,
indeed, a trial were required at all.
    For after the Corporation Counsel is through with this trial
                                          [12]


and resumes - I should not say resumes - but leaves the issue
of education, and after the Trial Examiner is through with this
proceeding and returns to his other activities, the schools remain
and the consequences of this proceeding remain.  They cannot
be ignored and, above all, the cannot be ignored by the Superintendent 
of Schools and the Board of Education.

USE OF SPIES AND INFORMERS

    The hearing, furthermore, was disgraced by the character
of the witnesses produced by the Superintendent of Schools in
support of his charge.
    I shall leave the question of witnesses Kornfeder and
Budenz to later on in the statement, but let us go to witnesses
Patterson and Horvath.
    In his classic study, "Free Speech in the United States,"
Professor Zechariah Chafee wrote, on Page 215:

        "The existence of spies is one of the worst evils of seditious
        legislation, whether directed toward prosecution or deportation.  
        Espionage goes with an Espionage Act.  Informers have
        been the inseparable accompaniment of government action
        against the expression of opinion since the time of Tiberius.
        "If political utterances are made criminal, secret police are
        indispensable to discover that the crime has been committed
        at all, and the spy often passes over an almost imperceptible
        boundary into the agent provocateur who instigated the
        utterences he reports and then into the fabricator who invents 
        them."

    Professor Chafee quotes Sir Erskine May in his "Constitutional 
History of England" as follows:
    "The freedom of a country may be measured by its immunity
from this baleful agency."  And he further quotes from May:

        "The relations between the government and its informers are
        of extreme delicacy.  Not to profit by timely information were

                                                    [13]

a crime. But to retain in government pay and to reward spies
        and informers who consort with conspirators and their sworn
        accomplices, and encourage while they betray them in their
        crimes, is a practice for which no plea can be offered.
        "No government, indeed, can be supposed to have expressly
        instructed its spies to instigate the perpetration of crime, but 
        to be unsuspected, every spy must be zealous in the cause which
        he pretends to have espoused, and his zeal in a criminal enterprise 
        is a direct encouragement of crime.
        "So odious is the character of the spy that his ignominy is
        shared by his employers against whom public feeling has never
        failed to pronounce itself in proportion to the infamy of the
        agent and the complicity of those whom he served."

    If, indeed, informers are held in such low repute in government 
generally, how much more should we resist and resent
and deplore and reject the use of spies in a public school system,
against teachers upon whom the effect can only be to increase
their natural timidity, and to increase the terror which always
accompanies periods of hysteria.
    When we recall what Governor Smith said about the Lusk
Laws, we can understand why this Superintendent and this Board
of Education should have profited by its experience - the experience 
of the New York School System.
    What are the effects of the use of such witnesses against
teachers?  Suspicion in the school room, teachers mistrusting each
other, teachers afraid of pupils, teachers afraid of parents as
well as of each other.
    Is this a healthy atmosphere in which to conduct our public
schools?  The Superintendent says he has the right to summon
teachers to ask them this question, and their refusal to answer
would be ground for charges of insubordination.
    What is the teacher to do who knows that he honors the testimony 
of spies and informers?  Won't this teacher ask himself,
"Will the Superintendent believe me or will he believe the paid
                                            [14]


spy?  Had I not better retain my rights and my dignity as an
American citizen and my belief in the American Constitution
and deny him the right to inquire into my beliefs and political
associations?"

GREATEST DANGER TO FREEDOM

    Education is always one of the first victims when suppression 
is abroad.  To say, as was done in this proceeding, that 
academic freedom is not an issue is somewhat like a Salem
trial in which the pious and exemplary life of the woman accused
of being possessed of devils is deemed irrelevant - while witchcraft 
itself is declared not to be an issue, its subjection to reason
and documentary proof is ruled out, including its consequences
not only to the immediate victim about to be sacrificed on the
altar of superstition, but also to the health and sanity of the
whole community.
    How can one justify the exclusion of what is the heart of this
issue from the whole proceeding?  Will it be understood in the
educational world throughout this country - throughout the
world?  No, indeed it will not.
    One of the witnesses Mr. Friedman's counsel was prepared
to call, who was excluded from this proceeding, Professor Helen
Merrell Lynd, Professor of Social Philosophy of Sarah Lawrence
College, in her brochure entitled, "The Nature of Freedom in
Liberal Education," says:

        "In our time, and particularly to education in our time, the
        greatest danger to freedom is the threat of suppression."

She quotes Raymond B. Fosdick, formerly president of the
Rockefeller Foundation, who said recently:

        "With the possible exception of John Adams' administration,
        there is a risk today in being a liberal that has never existed
                                           [15]

before in the history of the Republic."
        
Professor Lynd goes on to point out that:

        "Mr. Fosdick, with copious illustrations, spelled out his meaning 
        as follows: 'That any person who supports any cause, from
        international exchange of students to extension of civil rights,
        which is also supported by Communists, is likely to be denounced 
        as a knowing front for Communists or as a dupe.'
        This situation presents risks to everyone connected with liberal
        education, students, teachers and administrators.  These threats
        are specifically embodied in such legislation as the Feinberg
        Act in New York State and similar legislation in Maryland
        and Massachusetts, imposing restrictions on political thought
        and activities of teachers, and in so-called investigating committees 
        in California, Washington, Illinois and other states."

Professor Lynd goes on to say,

        "We find it easy to tolerate, even to welcome, the heresy of
        another time and place, but our own heretics, we say, are
        different.  We marvel at the suppression of John Huss; we
        deplore the exiling of Roger Williams; we are eloquent in the
        denunciation of the persecution of Galileo or Socrates, but
        our own heretics, the so-called 'corruptors of our children' are
        really dangerous and our only recourse is to have them drink
        the hemlock.  They do not conform to our traditional pattern
        of what heretics should be or, as we frequently put it, they do
        not fall within the pattern of our traditional political parties."

HERESIES OF THE PAST

    But we should recall that while Galileo's judges decreed that
the earth was flat and stationary and Galileo was forced to recant, 
saying under his breath, 'It does move', the judges and
their decrees have been rejected by history, but Galileo remains
and the earth does move.
    We should recall that the theocratic bigots who drove Roger
Williams out of Massachusetts are forgotten, but Roger Williams
is honored in American history for his founding of the most
democratic of the American colonies, when he was driven out
and fled to Rhode Island.
                                             [16]


    Is it not true that long after his other achievements have been
forgotten, Alfred Smith will be remembered throughout American 
history for generations to come for what he said when he
vetoed the Lusk Laws, and later when he helped to have them 
repealed?

WORDS OF EDUCATORS

    This proceeding, which listened to men like Kornfeder
and Budenz, but would not hear the testimony of Professor
Thomas I. Emerson, a leading expert in the field of civil liberties
and academic freedom, should hear from some of them now,
from the workers in the educational vineyard to whom our public 
schools are precious, and who have dedicated their lives and
their talents, and some their genius, to the building of this
great bulwark of our democracy.
    Let us listen first to a product of our own public schools, one
who took part in the persecutions of 30 years ago, who was, in
effect, a leading spirit in those persecutions - John L. Tildsley,
who was an Associate Superintendent of Schools.
    When, after the first world war, the Public Education Association 
of New York set up a Reconstruction Committee to undo
the damage of the repression, it pointed out that during the war
educational authorities everywhere had done serious damage to
our highest ideals of intellectual freedom and teaching efficiency.
        
        "They have substituted propaganda for truth, and have
        brought about a kind of intellectual reign of terror against
        those teachers suspected of independent opinion. John L. Tildsley, 
        one of the prime persecutors of wartime pacifists and
        radicals in New York, has decided that the violation of freedom, 
        even in stress of war, was a great mistake."

        And ten years after 1923, in the year 1933, Tildsley confessed
        "The writer was largely responsible for these dismissals.  He 
        believes now the dismissals were a mistake and due to war
                                              [17]

emotionalism.  The harm thus done to freedom of teaching and
        to the intellectual and moral integrity of teachers far outweighs
        the harm that might possibly result from retaining the
        teachers."

    Here we have a man big enough in spirit to recognize his
error and confess it publicly and to devote himself for years
afterwards until his recent death, to a defense of freedom, a
defense of freedom in teaching, particularly. 
    Dr. Jansen cited, as one of the sources upon which he drew
in coming to his conclusion that membership in the Communist
Party would be ground for charges against a teacher, a resolution
adopted by the National Educational Association, the NEA.  It is
interesting indeed that Dr. Jansen overlooked the voices in the
NEA who opposed this, and the fact that the NEA alone of all
educational associations, fell by the wayside in the matter of
the determination of educators, following the disasters in the
twenties, never again to allow themselves to become part of
another drive to suppress independent thought and freedom of
education.
    Unlike the NEA, the American Public Administration Association, 
the American Association of Law Schools, the Editorial
Board of the Journal of Legal Education, the American Association 
of University Professors, the American Philosophical
Society, the Eastern Sociological Society, Association of Mathematics 
Teachers, and numerous educators of the highest stature
in the country, do not agree.
    Here is what Professor Alonzo Myers said at the NEA
Convention itself only a few months ago, in July.  "Teachers have
become scared rabbits, and are afraid of being labels Reds."
In an address on "Freedom to Teach, Freedom to Learn," Dr.
Meyers said that:
                                               [18]


        "in most schools, and colleges, there are just too many things
        that we do not dare talk about.  Teachers are called subversive
        for what they think, rather than for what they do.  The threat
        to civil liberties and academic freedom is greater that it has
        ever been."  And he called the Feinberg Law in New York
        State "the most vicious and dangerous legislation ever enacted 
        against the teaching profession."

    At this same meeting, Dr. Martin W. Essex, Chairman of
the NEA Committee on Tenure and Academic Freedom, reported 
as follows:

        "A greater degree of overt and voluntary censorship exists
        in the nation's schools today than ever before.  The situation
        is critical.  Teachers are afraid to discuss controversial issues 
        in the classroom for fear of being branded as 'Red', 'Progressive', 
        or 'Radical'."

    It is interesting to note that in commenting on the attacks
on academic freedom, the words "Red", "Progressive" and 
"Radical" are used virtually interchangeably.
    From the many statements on this question from leading
educators such as Chancellor Hutchins of the University of
Chicago, President Harold Taylor of Sarah Lawrence College,
Professor Carl Van Doren and Professor Walter Gellhorn of
Columbia, Dr. James Killian, President of the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, and many, many others, I should like
to select one or two brief ones to quote here.  Chancellor Hutchins,
in June, 1949:

        "The test of a teacher is whether he is competent.  If we apply
        any other test than competence in determining the qualifications 
        of teachers, we shall find that pressures and prejudice
        will determine them."

POTENTIAL COMMISSION OF AN ACT

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Do you mean by competence
just the ability to teach?
                                          [19]

MRS. RUSSELL:  His professional competence.
    
    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Do you mean an ability to
teach?  Can you imagine a teacher who had professional competence, 
from the standpoint of ability to teach, and might be
extremely dangerous to entrust with the education of our youth?
    
    MRS. RUSSELL:  Only if I should say you have in mind
some trait which would be criminal or bordering upon the
criminal or an immortality bordering upon the criminal.
    
    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Would you say something
in the nature of bordering on the possibility of indoctrinating the
minds of those pupils to the overthrow and destruction by force
and violence of our American institutions?
    
    MRS. RUSSELL:  Actual indoctrination to that effort would
be considered incompetence as a teacher.  That is why we maintain 
that objective teaching, which includes the principle of non-indoctrination, 
is a very precious principle and must not be lost.
And a teacher who indoctrinates his own views or the views of
any religious or political faith thereby makes himself incompetent.  
But it must be in the teacher's own acts, his own conduct,
and not an assumption, not an unproved allegation particularly
in the case that we have before us where, for 25 years, the
teacher has shown that no such charge has been or can be made
against him.
    
    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Mrs. Russell, if we agree
that actual indoctrination, as we have been discussing it, is
tantamount to incompetence on the part of the teacher, and
would be possible cause for removal, would you go as far as
to say that the possibility of such indoctrination at some propitious 
time of the teacher's selection would be likewise proof
of incompetence?
                                          [20]


    MRS. RUSSELL:  I would not hold that the potential commission 
of any act is justifiable grounds for a punitive action.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Isn't that what this comes
down to really?

    MRS. RUSSELL:  It is worse than that.  It is an assumed
potential commission of an act.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  We will assume, Mrs.
Russell, for the purpose of this discussion, that the teacher in
question, whoever it may be, is a member of the Communist
Party, that that party has, as one of its basic doctrines, the
violent overthrow of our Government by force and violence,
that that teacher is bound to conform to what we roughly call
the Party Line, but that he has never affirmatively done anything 
to carry out that doctrine, but that he is prepared, when,
if and as in the opinion of that party it becomes propitious
and advisable to follow that Party Line, and to indoctrinate
or attempt to indoctrinate the pupils of our public schools with
that philosophy, would you then say that under those circumstances 
his competency as a teacher, his ability and his particular 
pedagogical art was sufficient to immunize him against
removal from the public school system?

    MRS. RUSSELL:  I could not accept the hypothetical
premise you have set forth.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  You don't accept any of
my premise.  You say the proof does not establish it, but if
you assume it does, would you then agree with me that there
might be some plausible argument against the competency of
that teacher to teach in our public school system, and possibly
poison the minds of our children and grandchildren in that
                                          [21]

direction and by that "in that direction," I mean the destruction 
of our American institutions by force and violence.

    MRS. RUSSELL:  Not 'against his competency'.  I would go
with you to this extent, that if you are going to make hypothetical 
assumptions of that sort, then you must extend the
hypothesis to any other group which has or allegedly has a
very rigid doctrine and discipline.  You would have to extend
it to Jehovah's Witnesses. You would have to extend it to
Catholics.  And, incidentally, this happened before.  We have
always opposed it and stood for the freedom of every individual 
to be judged by his own acts and competence, and not
by any alleged requirement of any group with which he may
or may not be associated.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Mrs. Russell, wouldn't it
be possible to extend the doctrine to any group or society that
has for its objectives the unconstitutional or unlawful situation?
Certainly it would not be extended to the mere rigidity of the
doctrine of a party or society that has for its objectives the 
constitutional changes in our American form of government,
but confining it to the unconstitutional changes, those are
changes that are accomplished by force and revolution, by
forced insurrection, by force of arms, by violence or by other
unlawful means.
    Is it your position, representing Mr. Friedman in this case,
that assuming there is proof that he is a Communist, assuming
that there is proof that the party to which he belongs as an
active member or belonged as an active member is engaged in
the process of teaching or advocating the use of force to overthrow 
the government of the United States - in that situation,
the fact, if it be a fact, that he has nothing against his teaching
                                            [22]


record in the school, nothing of any kind to indicate that he is
not qualified to teach and teach competently the particular
subject that he teaches, that thereby he is immune from investigation 
by the Superintendent of Schools, and immune from
charges of the character that are made against him in this
proceeding?

    MRS. RUSSELL:  I think that you have made certain statements - 
regardless of whether they are attributed to the Communist 
Party or any other group which, if true, would mean
that such a group was illegal and engaged in unlawful activity
and therefore subject to penalties.  That, I think, opens up an
entirely different question.  But we are not concerned with
that here.  We are concerned here with the interpretation made
by the Corporation Counsel and his witnesses of what this
party stands for.  So far as we know - and we are not here to
defend that party or organization - so far as we know, it has
not ever been convicted of that charge in any tribunal, and
we maintain the right of Mr. Friedman and the right of any
teacher in this school system and in any other, as a right of
academic freedom, to be judged by his own competence and
performance.
    That extends to the teacher regardless of what his beliefs
may be, and regardless of what his associations and affiliations
may be, so long as he doesn't misuse his position to indoctrinate
or promote his particular faith, so long as he is, as in this case,
not merely competent but exemplary, and has been so for a
quarter of a century.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Assume, Mrs. Russell, that
a hypothetical teacher, not Mr. Friedman, but some hypothetical 
teacher was a Communist, actively imbued with all the
                                            [23]

doctrines of that party, and that one of the doctrines was the
violent overthrow of the Government, but that he, in his discretion, 
decided to conceal that situation entirely from every
activity in which he was engaged as a teacher, but to wait for
the time to become ripe, when he thought he could advocate
that sort of doctrine with some chance of success, do you think
the Superintendent of Schools would have to wait or the
Board of Education would have to wait to make charges against
that teacher and to remove him from the school system until
he actually acted affirmatively?

    MRS. RUSSELL:  So long as we have a system in this
country of punishment for acts and not for thoughts.  I don't
see how we could apply any other test or guide in the treatment 
of the teacher or citizen generally.
    You could not even be sure that those were a person's
thoughts or intentions, but only some one else's idea of what
his thoughts and intentions were, unless you had evidence that
he was acting upon them.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Then we don't agree upon
my premise.  Understand, I am not trying to get you to admit
that the proof establishes anything.  I respect your view that
the proof does not establish that he was a communist, or that
the Communist Party was what the Corporation Counsel contends 
it was.  But if we assume those things, do you think, and
do you urge before me, to adopt the proposition that the
Superintendent of Schools in that situation is not warranted
in initiating some disciplinary proceeding, and that the Board
of Education is not warranted in concluding that such a teacher
should be removed from the public schools and not subject
our children and our grandchildren to the exposure of the
possibility of that teacher's becoming active in that enterprise
                                          [24]


at some undetermined but possibly close time in the immediate 
future?

    MRS. RUSSELL:  As far as my own view on that question
is concerned, I think that I cannot state it more succinctly than
I have in terms of the judgement of any individual by his acts
and not by any thoughts or intentions or alleged thoughts or
intentions.

ACTIONS AGAINST CATHOLICS

    MRS. RUSSELL:  I would like to say once again that regardless 
of whether the issue were that of a member of the
Communist Party, we should remember that in the history of
repression against teachers and against citizens generally, there
was a time - and in the documents which I have - not so very
far and long ago in our own history, when the very same
charges are made about Catholics.  They were restricted and
they were not permitted to teach.
    There were restrictions, and they were not permitted to
teach because they were regarded as agents of a foreign power,
and a foreign power that sought world domination.  It was
said that they put the interests of another power above the
interests of this country, and that at any time they were required 
to indoctrinate they must do so because they had an
obligation to overcome error on the part of others.
    We rejected that as a test of teachers.  And even if there
may be people who feel that way, if they do not carry it out
in their conduct and their actions, they cannot be penalized
for what they think or for what someone else thinks they
may think.
                                       [25]

TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  In that Catholic situation
you refer to, was there any contention advanced that the Catholic 
religion might seek the overthrow of our government by
force and violence?

    MRS. RUSSELL:  In Professor Howard Mumford Jones'
introduction to his book, "The Primer of Intellectual Freedom,"
which was published last year in 1949, he says, "Shall Communists 
be allowed to teach American Youth?"  And then he
gives the various reasons why, as indicated here in the course
of these proceedings, and summarized by you, some people
believe that they should not be allowed to teach.  Then he asks:
"Shall Roman Catholics be allowed to teach American Youth?"
And he says,
 
        "The question may come as a shock to the very persons who
deny Communists the right to teach.  Nevertheless, the oldest
lecture foundation at the oldest American college had as one
of its specific purposes the duty of exposing the errors of
the Church of Rome, an assignment that has been allowed
gracefully to lapse, so convinced were hundreds of thousands
of Americans a century ago that Roman Catholics owed
their primary allegiance to a foreign power engaged in secret
activities looking toward the capture of the United States
Government and were so indoctrinated by an absolute theory
of history, philosophy and the rest as to close the mind; that 
they created a political party called the 'Know Nothings,'
determined to reduce Roman Catholics to a perpetual condition 
of second class citizenship, by denying them, if they
could, the right to hold positions of trust in the Government,
the Army, the Navy, and so far as possible, education."

SUPPRESSION OF MASONS

    In fact, he goes on to show that in an earlier period the
same thing was applied to Masons, who were supposed to be
in some form of conspiracy with the Jacobins of the French
                                           [26]


Revolution, and therefore engaged in secret activity to capture
the Government, and Jefferson was made a target of those
who wanted to drive the Masonic order out and to prevent its
members from being allowed to teach.  And if you go on back, 
you will find that this kind of inquiry, and this kind of intolerance 
toward people with different ideas and especially
in each period of history, new and seemingly dangerous ideas
- you will find that the same pattern of fear and repression
and inquiry was engaged in by those who were in control of
Government and its various agencies, including education.
    For this reason, we feel that the schools above all must be
kept free of this type of repression.  And that is why, Mr.
Kiendl, we call these witch hunts.  Not because it is an easy
word to use, but because a witch hunt is precisely a trial of
people not for anything they have done, but for some alleged
mysterious powers or obligations which no one can prove,
which no one tries to prove.  And the more the witch denies the
charge, the less he is believed and the likelier he is to be
burned at the stake.
    We want our schools free of that, and that is why we ask
that these charges be dismissed.

                                       [27]

Statement by Mr. Harold Cammer
DOCTRINE NOT TRIABLE
    MR. CAMMER: My first starting point is, what is actually
on trial here is the doctrine of Marxism-Leninism, whatever
that is, or the Communist Party, and we say and it has been
said many, many times that doctrine is not triable, that no
conclusion can be made nor any findings made by you with
respect to doctrine, because it is not susceptible of proof, of
evidence.
    Historically, in this country and in early times, men have
always characterized views and doctrine which are contrary
to their vested interests as subversive, as dangerous, as disruptive, 
as evil, as bad, and men can prove - and men have
proved to the satisfaction of reasonable men, men as honest
and sober as anyone in this room - that such doctrines are evil
and subversive and bad and hostile.
    The clearest statement that I have been able to find concerning 
the impossibility of trying doctrine is found in a letter
from George Nicholas, which he wrote to a friend in connection 
with the Alien and Sedition laws, and he there said:

        "Now it must be obvious that very few charges that will be
        brought...will be founded on a single or simple fact that
        will be capable of being proved by testimony as might be
        done in the case already put, of a charge brought against a
        man for stealing a horse.  That original writings contain not
                                          [28]


        only facts, but partly reasoning and deductions drawn from
        those facts; and the object of the latter must generally be
        illustrated by the reasonings and deductions drawn from the 
        facts and not from the facts themselves; and the libel, if it is
        one, will consist generally in what is contained in that reasoning
        and those deductions, and not in the facts.  But defense
        can be given only of the truth of the facts, and no testimony
        can be brought to prove the truth of opinions stated as arising
        out of those facts.  The consequences therefore must be either
        that A will be found guilty of the charge brought against him
        because he does not prove the truth of that which is incapable
        of being proved; or that he will be found guilty or acquitted 
        according to the political sentiments of his jury."
    Mrs. Russell adverted earlier to past instances of persecution, 
of unpopular and, shall we say, heretical groups, and
you inquired of her whether, in those situations, the charge
was that the group involved sought to overthrow the government 
by force and violence.
    We have had our experience, sir, in this country with the
Alien and Sedition laws, and trials were held under those laws
before great judges, before jurors, and, as a result of one of
those trials reported in Wharton's State Trials, on page 47,
the Chief Justice of Massachusetts pronounced the judgement
that the followers of Jefferson were - and I quote - "apostles
of atheism, anarchy, bloodshed and crime," and other judgment 
on doctrine were passed by the Alien and Sedition judges,
Chase, Iradell and Addison.
    The witchcraft trials in Salem were not the product of
ignorant and untutored men.  They were conducted by fair
men, with due process of law, formal due process of law, and
had the support of such persons as Sir William Blackstone, our
great jurist, Samuel Johnson, and Joseph Addison, the English
essayist.
                                           [29]

THE BUDENZES OF ANOTHER DAY

    In this country, in the early 1820's, there was a great
crusade against Masonry, and one William Morgan, the Budenz
of his day, a renegade Mason, wrote a book and began a series
of lectures in which he alleged that the usages, oaths and obligations 
of the Masons were secret and conniving and that-
and I quote-
 
        "the whole system of Masonry belongs to the power of darkness, 
        of iniquity, compounded of Judaism, heathenism, infidelity 
        and professed Christianity, and that its tendency is to
        subvert the moral government of God.  The scriptures are now
        fulfilling before our eyes in the present indications of the
        final overthrow of that long-celebrated institution."

    As a result of his activities and of the activities of other
renegade Masons, who, Professor Gustavus Meyers tells us,
made their renunciation an ostentatious affair, anti-Masons
at that time hailed them as valiant spirits whose testimony
could not be refuted, instead of seeing in these renegades
pliant opportunists.  This were greeted the Budenzes, Pattersons 
and Kornfeders of another day, and the parallel has
been repeated here.  But it was on the basis of such testimony,
the testimony of such "experts" on Masonry, that a fierce campaign 
against Masons came to this state particularly, as a result
of which the Masonic Lodges dropped from six thousand to
fifty.  Masons were not allowed to teach, they were driven from
public employment, and doctrine was charged in that fashion,
the doctrine of Masonry.
    Reference has been made to the persecution of Catholics,
to the proof also by renegade and apostates, in books which
had wide circulation and ran into successive editions and were
very profitable to their authors, that the Catholic Church was
                                           [30]


an unlawful conspiracy to bring Popery to this country, to
establish foreign government, to overthrow our government,
and the leading expert of his day on this question was a renegade 
priest and he proved in his books and writings that
the Bible that was used by Catholics was corrupted; that the
Papal See was usurped and had enthroned tyranny; that monks
and nuns were not only useless but dangerous, and in particular, 
nuns were miserable slaves.  He stigmatized Cardinals as
modern types of ancient Roman pagan senators.  A Cardinal,
he said, was really a spy and inquisitor for the Pope; and came
to America for the sole purpose of opposing, persecuting and 
fighting against the Protestant portion in the community.  As a
result of his testimony and the testimony of other renegades,
like Rebecca Theresa Reed, who wrote a sensational book
entitled, "Six Months in the Convent" - and that was so profitable 
that she then wrote a supplement to "Six Months in a 
Convent" - as a result of Catholics were found to be dominated
by foreign influences, and hearings were held, and they were
excluded from the public schools.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Mr. Cammer, are you trying 
to persuade me now that I should ignore in toto all the 
evidence that was given by Mr. Kornfeder and Mr. Budenz
as the result of these historical precedents that you are reciting?

    MR. CRAMMER:  I say, your Honor, you are incompetent
in a legal sense to pass any judgment on the meaning of
Marxist-Leninism or any other doctrine.  I say, as long as you
are, no judgment from you on that question can possibly
settle anything.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Why do you not, then,
                                         [31]

indicate to me, if you have any argument to sustain it, how it
was that the Court of Appeals in the Dennis Case, took exactly
the opposite point of view?  There, as I understand it - and,
if I am wrong, you correct me - the convicted defendants took
the position that the evidence of Mr. Budenz should not be
admissible, and in disposing of that alleged error, Judge
Learned Hand stated unequivocally that he was an expert.
Here is his answer:

        "He was as well qualified as an expert to know what that
        meaning was, a meaning of such terms as Marxism-Leninism,
        as anyone could be.  We cannot see any more reason to exclude
        his testimony than to exclude the evidence of any other parts
        of the mutual understanding of the defendants."

        He goes on to say:

        "His other testimony, there were certain passages in the Constitution 
        which were innocent on the face but meant other
        things."

and he says this was so patently competent testimony that it
needs no discussion.
    There the charge against Budenz that you are making seems
to me to have been, to some extent, rejected by the Court
of Appeals.

    MR. CAMMER:  No, sir.  I am glad you asked that question, 
because this hearing has been permeated with the notion
that the Dennis case in some way controls this case.
    In the Dennis case, eleven defendants were tried for intending 
to organize a conspiracy to teach and advocate the
overthrow of government by force and violence.  Through that
trial, and in his charge to the jury Judge Medina charged the
jury that irrespective of what the teachings and doctrines of
the Communist Party might be, these eleven defendants were
                                            [32]


tried for their own intentions, for their own acts and statements, 
and not for the acts and statements of others, and
irrespective of whether their intent to effect that kind of an
organization was or was not effected.
    My point is, sir, that you can prove and I can prove and any 
person can prove that any doctrine we do not like or do like is
good or bad.  I have earlier in this case, adverted to the fact that
it is possible to prove that Capitalism is good or bad depending
on your own predilection.  It is possible to prove that Communism 
is good or bad, depending upon your own predilection.
It is possible to prove, and it has been proved, I suppose, to the
satisfaction of a former Justice of the United States Supreme
Court that the Democratic Party under Truman is the party of
Socialism.  That is what Mr. Justice Byrnes, or Jimmy Byrnes,
recently said.  And it has been proved, at least to the satisfaction
of a former United States Senator and a leading lawyer in this
city, Mr. John Foster Dulles, that our present Government is so
bureaucratic as to require a rebellion on the part of the American 
people.  He said that in a speech when he was campaigning
last year. 
    It has been proved to the satisfaction of reasonable people
that the CIO is wonderful or that it is subversive and against
American institutions.  It has been proved that the American
Federation of Labor is good or bad, depending on your viewpoint; 
that it is dedicated to the overthrown of our form of government 
or that it has raised the American standard of living,
and so with the Knights of Labor, so with the foreign born, 
so with Jews - they are Communists or they are international
bankers - and that has been "proved" time and time again.
    My point is, sir, that theory and doctrine, as distinguished
                                           [33]

from facts, cannot be proved in a court of law, cannot be proved
in any hearing under any circumstances, and can be proved
only in life as the people accept particular theories or doctrines
to the extent that they find those doctrines or theories correspond
to their own experience in life.
    Even if we were to say that doctrine and dogma are provable 
in court, even if we could say that Communism can be
shown to be this, that or the other thing in a court of law, we
say to you, sir, that you cannot make that finding on the basis
of testimony of professional informers and police spies, such
as you have had in this hearing.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Before you come to that,
Mr. Cammer, may I ask you to enlighten me as to what you
understand this language to mean in the Dennis case, "There
was abundant evidence, if believed, to show that they were all
engaged in an extensive, concerted action to teach what indeed
they do not disavow, the doctrines of Marxism-Leninism.  These
doctrines were set forth in many pamphlets put in evidence at 
the trial, the upshot of which is indeed such that an honest jury
could scarcely have found otherwise."  Then he goes on to say, 
"This doctrine of violent overthrow of the Government, forceful
overthrow of the Government, or other unlawful means."
    Now, in referring to the doctrines of Marxism-Leninism
there, and the proof of those doctrines, Judge Learned Hand
indicated there that doctrines of Marxism-Leninism can be tried
in courts of law.

    MR. CAMMER:  I think it is a tragic opinion, but quite 
apart from that, what Learned Hand was there discussing was
the doctrine as intended and understood by these defendants.
He was not trying doctrine in the abstract, and the whole
                                          [34]


opinion, the whole trial, is around that central theme that the
Communist Party is not on trial in this case, only the defendants,
the eleven defendants' intentions or aspirations with regard to
what they understood and wanted the Communist Party to be
was on trial, but not the Communist Party as such.
    We made this suggestion earlier in the hearing:  That if the
Board of Education wanted to hire somebody to make a true
meaning as to what Marxist-Leninist theory was, the most
profitable way was to take the writings of Marxism-Leninism
and study them, perhaps in the library or elsewhere.
    That was a suggestion made in all seriousness, because we
submit that you cannot take the doctrine of Marxism-Leninism,
a world-wide doctrine, expressing a social-political philosophy
which touches all of human life in precisely the same way that
some philosophers are materialists or idealists or pragmatists
or Marxist-Leninists, and undertake to understand that doctrine
on the basis of testimony by Kornfeder, Budenz and Patterson.
    I submit, sir, in all respect, it is an obscene spectacle to try
to understand writings, serious writings which are to be found
in all universities and libraries, and which have been printed
in hundreds of millions of copies throughout the world and
which run back a hundred years, the most recent being ten
or fifteen years ago, and which have moved and won, perhaps, a
billion people in this world as adherents, in such an unscholarly
way, by such despicably low characters as Kornfeder, Budenz
and Patterson.
    I submit to you, sir, that no one would be interested in the
opinion of those characters on the most routine question.  You
would not give a pepper corn for Mr. Kornfeder's opinion on
a simple matter like profit-sharing, or on any social question.
                                           [35]

To have them paraded in here by the Superintendent of Schools
as experts on as complicated a doctrine as Marxism-Leninism is
a most revolting and disgusting spectacle.

BATTLE OF THE BOOKS

    We do not have to be guided by that kind of testimony with
excerpts taken out of context and carefully put into evidence as
though they were loaded revolvers in a Magistrate's Court.
Books - instruments of crime, as they were treated in this 
hearing room!  These evil, bad things - that is all the evidence
we had here - books!
    The Supreme Court, in the Schneiderman Case, had had an
opportunity to examine the same classics which were introduced
in here, with one exception, perhaps, "The History of the Communist 
Party in the Soviet Union."  It has given lengthy discussion 
to Stalin's "Foundations of Leninism" and Lenin's 
"Imperialism" and "State and Revolution," and in the Schneiderman 
case that Court concluded, in a similar proceeding, that
the doctrine of Marxism-Leninism, as advocating the overthrow
of the government by force and violence was not established,
and it has not been established here.  I would like to comment
in this connection on the fact that the books which were introduced 
into evidence, even though they were brought in by
professional informers and police spies, as though they were
dangerous weapons or secret writings, are all publicity sold - 
none of them was produced from secret files.
    The evidence makes clear that extensive efforts have been
made to sell them to the public and not to conceal them, and
that they have not been smuggled around as some secret code
or doctrine.  The books themselves, whether or not one agrees
                                           [36]


with them, one must recognize are known throughout the world
as part of the literature of the social sciences.

    TRIAL EXAMINER KIENDL:  Mr. Cammer, are you prepared 
to concede that some of the very books, some of the very
passages, some of the very pamphlets that were introduced in
evidence here were the pamphlets and books and passages
referred to in Judge Hand's opinion in the Dennis case, where 
he said:

        "It is unnecessary to quote in detail the many passages in the 
        pamphlets and books published and disseminated by the defendants 
        which flatly contradict their declarations that they
        mean to confine the use of force or violence to the protection
        of political power once lawfully obtained.  The presentation
        proved this part of the case quite independent of the testimony
        of the witnesses although the jury might have relied upon
        that had it stood alone."

    MR. CAMMER:  I assume they were, and I also assume
they were in the Schneiderman case, where the Supreme Court
differed with Judge Hand on this precise question.
    Now, if we are going to take matters out of context, take
isolated passages from here and there, what are we going to
say about Lincoln's First Inaugural Address, which is inscribed
on the south wall of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, where
he says that:

        "This country and its institutions belong to the people who
        inhabit it, and whenever they grow weary of the existing government 
        they can exercise their constitutional right to amend
        it or their revolutionary right to overthrow and dismember it."

What shall we say of Jefferson, who wrote:

        "I hold that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing
        and is as necessary in the political world as storms in the
        physical"?
                                               [37]

Or when he said about Shay's Rebellion:

        "God forbid that we should ever be twenty years without
        such a rebellion.  What country can preserve its liberties if 
        its rulers are not warned from time to time that its people
        preserve the spirit of resistance?  Let them take arms.  The tree
        of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood 
        of patriots and tyrants."

    Does Jefferson therefore stand for the proposition that government 
must be overthrown by force and violence?

    What of our own Declaration of Independence, which says:

        "Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of
        these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it
        and to institute new government."

    In what way is that different from the version of Marxism-Leninism 
peddled in this hearing for twenty-five dollars a day
plus expenses?  And what is the difference between Marxism-Leninism 
as explained here, and what John Adams wrote when
he said:

        "The right of a nation to kill a tyrant in case of necessity
        can no more be doubted than to hang a robber or to kill
        a flea"?

    And was it advocating the overthrow of our government by
force and violence when Alexander Hamilton said, that:

        "The people, if we trade birthrights, may exert their original
        right of self-defense and overthrow their usurpers"?

    And when Thoreau wrote that:

        "All men recognized the right of revolution"?

    And in our own time when Mr. Justice Rutledge in 1947, at
the University of Kansas, referred to:

        "the inalienable right of revolution which our fathers exercised 
        in the Declaration of Independence"?
                                                [38]


    Do those excerpts out of context, as general statements,
establish that those speakers advocated the overthrow of our
government by force and violence?
    The Supreme Court said, discussing these very classics
brought in here as tools of crime by the Corporation Counsel,

        "Books, book burnings, the difficulties of this method of
        proof" - reading excerpts they were talking about - "are here
        increased by the fact that there is unfortunately no absolutely
        accurate test of what a political party's principles are.  Political 
        writings are often over-exaggerated polemics, bearing the
        imprint of the period and the place where written.  Philosophies 
        cannot generally be stated in vacuo.  Meaning may be
        wholly destroyed by lifting sentences out of contexts instead
        of constituting them as part of an organic whole."

    And I submit, sir, that we have had an exhibition of the
most unscholarly, unworthy way of proving a doctrine or discussing 
a doctrine, and as indecent a way as we could possibly
have.

ON GUILT BY ASSOCIATION
 
    My next point, sir - and this is related to the general argument: 
Mr. Friedman had been subjected to the unconstitutional
charge of guilt by association.  He has been tried here because
Mr. Kornfeder went to Russia on a false passport, because
Mr. Patterson did what he says he did, and lots of other things.
    Now, there has been a lot of other talk about guilt by association.  
I just would like to refer - I do not have it at hand
but I can quote it quite accurately - when Alfred Smith was
running for President in 1928, there was a public letter addressed 
to him in the "Atlantic Monthly," which was the concern
of many Americans, that as a Catholic he would be subject to
                                          [39]

answering to the Pope.  And Governor Smith, answering that
letter, said:

        "Are all Catholics poured from the same mold?  Is every 
        Catholic to be held responsible for everything said in the
        Encyclical?"

    And we say here, especially in view of the fact that these
witnesses testified that their machinations were concealed even
from the rank and file of the Communist Party, that not every
member of the Communist Party can be held responsible for
the Communist Party or for what each and every member of
the Communist Party has been alleged to have done over twenty
years.

DUE PROCESS OF LAW

    My next point is that in this case we have been denied due
process because we have gone far, far from the issues even as
outlined in this proceeding, and all I need say about that is
that under the charged and specifications as narrowed by the
bill of particulars, we were directed to a period from 1944 to
1947.  Instead, we have been wandering to a period from 1920,
during the Palmer raids, when Mr. Kornfeder was in Spain,
and how he got here, and whether he spoke or did not speak
English, all of those things, to things that Mr. Patterson is supposed 
to have done or remembered with his miraculous memory,
to Mr. Budenz' flirtations with various opinions and ideas - 
everything except the period mentioned in this case.

"EXPERTS" DISAGREE

    Now, in that connection, sir, on the question of experts, we
say that the proof of our position that you cannot try dogma is
proved by these very experts.
                                           [40]


    You have different definitions of democratic centralism from
Patterson and from Kornfeder, and there are clear definitions
in the books.  You have different definitions of the proletarian
dictatorship from Patterson and Kornfeder.
    You have testimony that secret names were used in a conspiratorial 
and illegal way, and all of these witnesses come
in with their own names, and the police spy comes in with a
paper which she says she got somewhere along the way with
a correct name, allegedly correct name, of Mr. Friedman and
no false names.
    All of these inflammatory, prejudicial things brought out
by these witnesses, are contradicted by each other, and I submit
no one knows what to believe from that kind of testimony.
    But more significantly, we have from the police spy a picture 
of the Communist Party which completely destroys the
conspiratorial picture of the Party presented by Kornfeder
and Patterson, and Budenz.
    We have the testimony of a woman who says she wanted to
join, she wrote a letter, she got a phone call, she came to a meeting; 
everyone acted in a perfectly normal way, names were
used.  And what did they discuss here?  Did they discuss Kornfeder's 
meetings with Stalin's secretary?
    They discussed strikes, support of strikers.  Certainly no one,
whether one sympathizes with labor or not, no one can possibly
say that that is an illegal activity.  They discussed support for
the election of Marcantonio, assuming her recollection on that
point was correct.  Certainly that was a proper and legal activity,
whether or not one disagrees with Marcantonio; support for the
designation of Wallace as Secretary of Commerce; certainly a
                                           [41]

proper and legal activity, regardless of whether one agrees or
disagrees with Wallace; Jim Crow, the fight against Jim Crow,
and that sort of thing; the situation in Greece.
    They listened to speakers discuss Marxism-Leninism, and
they do not have to listen to that only under "proper" auspices.
There was a lot of discussion about more democracy in this
organization, contrary to Kornfeder's notion or testimony that
Stalin sits over there and sends orders to Friedman, and stuff
like that.
    You have one picture of the organization from the police
spy, a totally difference underground picture from Kornfeder,
Budenz and Patterson.
    And even if Patterson were to be believed, there was nothing
conspiratorial about the meeting to which he testified , to organize 
students for a March on Washington in connection with the
Scottsboro case, or whatever it was.
    It is perfectly clear now that the true defendant in this case
is the Communist Party.  You refused intervention to the Communist 
Party when they came in here and asked to be heard,
and the only finding, the only way in which you could find
Friedman subject to dismissal is by a finding by you against
the Communist Party, that it is an illegal organization.
    The Communist Party is not before you, sir.  Neither you
nor the Board have jurisdiction over the Communist Party, and
under any principles of American or Anglo-Saxon or common
law justice, no finding of guilty can be made against the Communist 
Party unless it is before you, unless you have given to
it notice and an opportunity to be heard, and you denied that
opportunity to it. 
                                               [42]


    So that we are here trying an absent defendant.  We are not
trying Mr. Friedman.  And we submit that under established 
principles of justice and due process, no finding can be made
against the Communist Party in this case, and because of that,
the proceeding must be dismissed.

EXERCISE OF RIGHTS

    Now, our seventh point, sir, is that all of the acts which are
charged against Mr. Friedman flow from his exercise of rights
guaranteed against infringement by the First Amendment to the
Federal Constitution, and by the Bill of Rights to the State
Constitution.
    Everything testified to here involving Mr. Friedman related
to the exercise by him of the right to read, the right to think,
the right to listen, the right to march in May Day parades, the
right to support strikers, and so on.
    None of those things, the exercise of none of those things,
can be abridged by punishment.  In the United States against
Lovett, removal from public office, is equal to criminal punishment.  
The Court held that removal from public employment
was the equivalent of conviction for crime and, therefore, subject
to bill of attainder provisions of the Constitution.

IMPROPER MOTIVES

    We have been denied due process by the denial to us
of the opportunity to prove that the charges preferred against
Mr. Friedman originated in bad faith on the part of the Superintendent 
and from improper motives.
    Now, it is important that citizens are subject only to charges
                                         [43]

brought by prosecuting authorities in good faith, and that they
are immune to charges brought by public officials in bad faith.
    Mr. Friedman has been in the school system for twenty-four
years.  The Superintendent chose to dismiss Mr. Friedman, or
to suspend him or to prefer charges against him, at a time when,
after three years of superintendency, of Dr. Jansen's superintendency, 
the school system was in the most chaotic and deplorable 
condition that it has ever been.
    Extra-curricular activities have been discontinued on the
part of teachers, the high school students were on strike.  The
Mayor of this city, Mr. O'Dwyer, was under severe criticism for
the mistreatment, for the brutality to which he had subjected 
the pupils when they met in City Hall a day or two before they
suspensions.  Board Member Marshall had but shortly previously
made charges that there was a concerted effort on the part of
the other Board members to conceal graft and corruption in the 
administration of the Board of Education.
    At that moment, after twenty-four years of service by Mr.
Friedman, the Superintendent, going around, hiding his own
inadequacy and incompetence under charges that subversive
influences were somewhere at work, at that moment he chose to
suspend Mr. Friedman and seven other teachers, and he chose
to suspend seven other Jewish teachers, and we were deprived 
of the opportunity to prove that there has been a consistent
pattern by this incompetent Superintendent to hide his bigotry
and prejudice by consistent disregard of misconduct in the classroom 
by teachers of the non-Jewish faith, and by the way in
which he calls out the fire engines and personally takes charge
of every job where there is a complaint made about a Jewish
teacher.
                                             [44]


    I might say that we are not only ones who accuse
Superintendent Jansen of this bias and bigotry, and knuckling
under.  The press of June, 49' showed that Bishop Gilbert and a 
host of parents' organizations were accusing him of the very
same thing, and he made promises to investigate and correct
the situation, and has not done a thing about it, and it is an
open and notorious fact.
    I have many newspaper clippings to demonstrate it, and I
would not want you nor anyone else to get the impression that
this is a concoction by us because we have these charges.
    I think the Superintendent's bias and prejudice is best illustrated 
by the drastic action he took against these eight Jewish
teachers because they refused to answer his questions concerning 
their political affiliations.

WIDE CONTROVERSY

    Now, sir, I submit that even though you may ultimately find
that Superintendent Jansen had a right to put these questions,
and even though the Board and the Courts may ultimately
sustain them, the question is not free from doubt.
    There is a wide controversy in the academic world today,
sir, as you know, concerning the right of authorities to put this
question.  Yesterday's Times contains a long and moving letter
from the Provost Marshal Emeritus of the University of California 
imploring his colleagues to adhere to their position and
not to answer these questions.  The faculties of Yale, Harvard
and Princeton have publicly and recently denounced efforts by
supervisors to put questions concerning Communist membership
and affiliation.
                                              [45]

    At best, the situation warranted a proper test in a calm
atmosphere with opportunity for discussion, and did not require
treatment as though a police sergeant were browbeating a witness
suspected of a crime.
    Dr. Jansen was courteously requested to permit the attend-
ance of counsel.  Several letters were written to him.  He ignored
these letters.  His tone of voice in that interview was that of a cop
calling in a suspect somewheres.  And certainly the drastic action
against eight teachers, when one test case would have been 
sufficient, suspending them, demonstrates his bias and his prej-
udice against these teachers, against Jewish teachers.
    Now, there was no insubordination here.  We submit, sir,
that a teacher has the right to question the authority, in a 
proper way, in a courteous way, in a civil way, even though he
himself is subjected to discourtesy, of his superior to put this
question.  It is a difficult question.  The refusal was not wilfull,
but in the exercise of good faith, in the exercise of the right to
make a test of this very, very important constitutional and edu-
caional problem.  And it would be unfair, we submit, under the
circumstances, to find Mr. Friedman guilty of insubordination.






                                              [46]   

Published by
THE TEACHERS UNION, LOCAL 555. U.P.W
206 West 15 Street
New York 11, N.Y.


116

Transcribed and reviewed by contributors participating in the By The People project at crowd.loc.gov.