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Home , Alger Hiss, Cold War liberal, Harry Dexter White, Whittaker Chambers

The Trials of . Trials of Alger Hiss

• Why did it matter?

• Why does if matter?

• Was Hiss a Communist and a Soviet spy? Alger Hiss, , 1904- , 1996

 upper-middle class childhood

 Hopkins and Harvard Law

 Frankfurter and Holmes

 marriage and promising career

Source: https://algerhiss.com/alger-hiss/photo-album/ Alger Hiss

 called to FDR’s  reforming American agriculture  Nye Committee  working at the State Department  Dumbarton Oaks, Yalta, UN  Carnegie Endowment  all by age 42 –  what does this accelerated career suggest? April 2, 1901-July1961

Source: https://spartacus-educational.com/USAchambersW.htm Whittaker Chambers

 dysfunctional childhood household

 from runaway to Columbia Univ. dropout

 salvation in Communist Party

 communist underground Whittaker Chambers

 the god that failed

 book editor at Time Magazine

 anti-communist crusader Harry S. , May 8, 1884 – December 26, 1972 President of the

Source: https://millercenter.org/president/truman Harry S. Truman

Iowa farming family

World War I soldier

politics: personal integrity as part of corrupt Democratic machine

unspectacular term in US Senate

Democratic Party choice for VP in 1944 as “southern” candidate Truman as President

 unprepared for presidency

liberal

internal security measures

stunning election of 1948

Fair Deal and Korean War Richard M. Nixon, January 8, 1913-April 22, 1994 U.S. Congressman, California

1946 Nixon Campaign Flyer. Source: Wikipedia  Richard M. Nixon

 small-town California childhood

 lack luster law career

 WWII naval service  post-war meteoric rise as Republican politician  red bating and negative campaigning Cold War Background of the Hiss Case

• Persistent Anti- – The Post WWI Cold War Background of the Hiss Case Communist Party USA Cold War Background to the Hiss Case We Were Sitting Ducks

Communist Defendants in the Dennis Case with their Supporters Cold War Background to the Hiss Case Roosevelt to Truman Roosevelt and Truman on the Campaign Trail Cold War Background to the Hiss Case Cold War Background of the Hiss Case Liberal Anti-Communism

John F. Kennedy Lyndon B. Johnson Hiss and Chambers before HUAC HUAC Hearings, August 5, 1948

I am not and never have been a member of the Communist Party. I do not and never have adhered to the tenets of the Communist Party. … To the best of my knowledge, I never heard of Whittaker Cambers until 1947, when two representatives of the federal Bureau of Investigation asked me is I knew him and various other people….I said [to the FBI] I did not know Chambers. So far as I know, I have never laid eyes on him, and I should like the to have the opportunity to do so.

Alger Hiss’s prepared opening statement given when he first testified before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC). President Truman Responds to HUAC Hearings. August 5th • Question: Mr. President, do you think that the Capitol Hill spy scare is a “red herring” to divert public attention from inflation?

• The President: Yes, I do… No information has been revealed by the committees’ investigation that has not long since been presented to a Federal grand jury….[nor] disclosed in the past few days … that has not been known to the FBI. Chambers testifies in before Nixon and two other HUAC Members, August 7, 1948

Hiss was a member of a cell whose purpose was to “infiltrate the Government in the interest of the Communist Party.”

Hiss is a man of great simplicity and a great gentleness and sweetness of character, and they (Alger and Priscilla) lived in extreme simplicity.”

Chambers describes Hiss personal life in detail including fact that he is an avid birder who once saw a PROTHONOTARY WARBLER near Glen Echo on the Potomac. Prothonatory Warbler Hiss Testifies Second Time, in New York, August 16, 1948

 Hiss says he knew “George Crowley”

 Acknowledges renting apartment to him

 Mentions love of birds and sighting of Prothonatory Warbler

 Spars with Nixon over lie detector test Commodore Hotel: Nixon, Hiss and Chambers, then August 17, 1948 now HUAC Hearings, , 1948

The story has spread that in testifying against Mr. Hiss, I am working out some old grudge, or motives of revenge or hatred. I do not hate Mr. Hiss. We were close friends, but we are caught in a tragedy of history. Mr. Hiss represents the concealed enemy against which we are all fighting, and I am fighting. I have testified against him with remorse and pity, but in a moment of history in which this Nation now stands, so help me God, I could not do otherwise.

Whittaker Chambers’s testimony to the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Whittaker Chambers on “,” August 27, 1948 Whittaker Chambers on “Meet the Press,” August 27, 1948

Alger Hiss was a Communist and may be now. Hiss Sues Chambers for Slander, September 28, 1948

 Hiss on Chambers: mental instability, homosexuality, alcoholism, former communist, liar

 Chambers on Hiss: agent, not merely communist Evidence of Espionage

State department documents

….and pumpkin papers from farm Evidence of Espionage Trials of Alger Hiss

May – July 1949: I

- : Perjury 2

five years in prison Aftermath: Why Did it Matter?

 bridge to Joseph McCarthy

 career of

 Rutgers 5th Amendment communists

 Watergate Joseph McCarthy Harry Dexter White Harry Dexter White

I should like to state that I am not now and never have been a Communist, not even close to becoming one. … My creed is the American creed. I believe in the , , freedom of thought, freedom of the press, freedom of criticism, and freedom of movement. ... I believe in the right and duty of every citizen to work for, to expect and to obtain an increasing measure of political, economic, and emotional security for all, and I am opposed to discrimination in any form, whether on the grounds of race, color, religions, political belief or economic status. …

I consider these principles sacred. I regard them as the basic fabric of our American way of life, and I believe in them as living realities and not as mere words on paper. …

Harry Dexter White, Opening Statement to HUAC, 13 Nixon’s Career Nixon’s Career Cold War at Rutgers Cold War at Rutgers Sir Moses I. Finley Cambridge University Cold War at Rutgers Richard Schlatter, Historian, Provost, Vice President, and Acting President of Rutgers Watergate Trials of Alger Hiss in Print

1952 1962 A Definitive Study?

Published 1978, 1997, and 2013 Venona Reagan and Chambers. 1984