The Liberal Arts on Trial: Charles H. Fisher and Red-Scare Politics at Western Washington College of Education, 1933-39 Ron C
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Western Washington University Western CEDAR A Collection of Open Access Books and Books and Monographs Monographs 6-2016 The Liberal Arts on Trial: Charles H. Fisher and Red-Scare Politics at Western Washington College of Education, 1933-39 Ron C. Judd Western Washington University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://cedar.wwu.edu/cedarbooks Part of the Political History Commons, and the Social History Commons Recommended Citation Judd, Ron C., "The Liberal Arts on Trial: Charles H. Fisher and Red-Scare Politics at Western Washington College of Education, 1933-39" (2016). A Collection of Open Access Books and Monographs. 9. https://cedar.wwu.edu/cedarbooks/9 This Book is brought to you for free and open access by the Books and Monographs at Western CEDAR. It has been accepted for inclusion in A Collection of Open Access Books and Monographs by an authorized administrator of Western CEDAR. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Liberal Arts on Trial: Charles H. Fisher and Red-Scare Politics at Western Washington College of Education, 1933-1939 Ron C. Judd THE LIBERAL ARTS ON TRIAL: CHARLES H. FISHER AND RED-SCARE POLITICS AT WESTERN WASHINGTON COLLEGE OF EDUCATION, 1933-39 A Thesis Presented to the Graduate Faculty of the History Department and the Faculty of the Graduate College University of Nebraska In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts University of Nebraska at Kearney By Ron C. Judd June 2016 iii Acknowledgments A study of this size and scope would not have been possible without contributions from a number of people who shared a passion for telling this story. The author offers sincere thanks to the Heritage Resources staff at Western Washington University, including Director Elizabeth Joffrion; archivists Rozlind Koester and Ruth Steele of the Center for Pacific Northwest Studies; Tamara Belts and Paul Piper of WWU’s Wilson Library Special Collections; WWU archivist Tony Kurtz; and the James W. Scott Research Fellowships. Thanks also to the Graduate History faculty at the University of Nebraska- Kearney, especially thesis advisor Dr. Linda Van Ingen; the staff at Washington State Archives in Olympia and at the Gelman Library at George Washington University; and to Hans-Joerg Tiede, associate secretary, Department of Academic Freedom, Tenure, and Governance, American Association of University Professors in Washington, D.C. Finally, a debt of gratitude is owed to my wife Meri-Jo Borzilleri, who watched a small project turn into a very large one with her usual grace. iv Abstract College president Charles H. Fisher’s transformation of Bellingham State Normal School, a small state teacher’s college, into Western Washington College of Education earned him the overwhelming respect of his peers, faculty, students, and much of the local community. His reward was an abrupt firing by Washington Governor Clarence Martin in 1938. Fisher’s ousting was engineered by a cabal of “anti-communist” citizens led by Frank I. Sefrit, the conservative editor of The Bellingham Herald. The group had ties to a range of “pro-American” groups, including the American Legion, several conservative women’s organizations, local churches, and the Ku Klux Klan. Sefrit called Fisher a communist sympathizer who fostered anti-Americanism, atheism, and “free love” on a campus infected by “Red” academics, many trained at Columbia University. College trustees in 1935 exonerated Fisher, but three years later, acceded to Gov. Clarence Martin’s insistence that Fisher be fired. Subsequent investigations described the firing as politically motivated, raising alarms about infringement of academic freedom during a period of social strife. Existing accounts of the Depression-era incident paint Fisher’s foes as oddball radicals. But the campaign did not occur in a political vacuum. Previously unknown documents about the Fisher case reveal varied personal motivations of Fisher’s foes in a town torn by political rancor, fomented by a vicious, decades-long media war. New evidence also reveals a link between the Fisher case and a concurrent national red-baiting campaign directed at academic institutions across the United States. Additional new evidence suggests that the Fisher dismissal might have been influenced by a separate financial scandal at the college in the 1930s. This study will explore Charles v Fisher’s ousting in unprecedented detail, placing it for the first time within the context of a decade of strident, ultra-conservative activism serving as what one historian has dubbed “a bridge between the two Red Scares.” vi Table of Contents Introduction .........................................................................................................................1 1. Radical Red-Baiting and Academia: An Historical Overview .....................................10 2. Bellingham: Charles Fisher’s Progressive Western Beachhead ...................................53 3. Depression-era Politics and the “Would-Be Nero of Bellingham” ..............................90 4. Red-Scare Roots Blossom: The Committee on Normal Protest .................................126 5. “Court” In Session, May 22, 1935 .............................................................................. 163 6. Rising Red Tide and a Doomed Presidency ............................................................... 210 7. Unraveling the Fisher Mystery: Investigations Old and New .................................... 274 8. Postscripts ................................................................................................................... 323 9. Conclusions ................................................................................................................. 356 10. Appendices ................................................................................................................ 393 11. Bibliography ............................................................................................................. 421 1 Introduction The Fisher Case: “Embarrassing to all concerned” Professor Herbert Hearsey, a newly hired reference librarian, never forgot the scene: It was a crystal-clear day in late September, 1941, his first day on the scenic campus at Western Washington College of Education. After a quick survey of the school grounds overlooking Bellingham Bay, he crossed College Avenue and came upon a woman working in her garden. The two exchanged pleasantries, but when Hearsey explained that he was a new college faculty member, fresh off the train from Chicago, the conversation turned gravely serious. "You know," the woman said, gesturing toward the hilltop campus, "they've had a nest of communists up there. I want to warn you." 1 The woman described herself as a member of the local chapter of Daughters of the American Revolution. She informed her new acquaintance that she and other community members had recently sent the local college president of 16 years, Charles Henry Fisher, to an early retirement. Their modus operandi had been to attend campus assemblies and events, compiling a list of "communists" and other subversives Fisher had lured to poison young, patriotic minds. They later sent this dossier to Washington Gov. Clarence Martin. And in a move that stunned the Pacific Northwest, Martin, a conservative Democrat, succumbed to the pressure by forcing the president from office. "We got rid of Fisher," the woman boasted. Hearsey remembered vividly his own astonishment and discomfort. "My blood kind of curdled because she was so vicious and 1 Herbert Hearsey interview, box 2, folder 15, Western Washington University Centennial Oral History Project Records, Center for Pacific Northwest Studies, Heritage Resources, Western Washington University, Bellingham WA., 5. 2 venomous," Hearsey recalled. "I really wanted to get away from there, because … she took so much joy in it." In historical terms, what is most surprising about Hearsey's encounter is not the basic premise of the story told by this woman. It is how successful this group was in pressuring the state's highest executive to remove a popular college president considered a national leader in progressive education. Arguably even more surprising is the time that this campaign unfolded: from 1934 to 1939. The dates of the campaign against Charles Fisher are significant because they fall directly between the two prominent "Red Scare" waves acknowledged by US historians. The first came in the wake of World War I, the second during the Cold War following World War II. Both prompted attacks on civil liberties and other freedoms by Americans fearful of perceived internal or external threats to their way of life.2 Red Scare historians have debated the existence of a so-called political "normal period" between the two scares. The little-studied case of Charles Fisher argues loudly against this notion. It suggests, in fact, that in Bellingham and other parts of the Pacific Northwest, important elements of the "super-patriot" political forces inspired by that First Red Scare barely paused to take a breath. In fact, they seemed to have been reenergized by a new perceived threat of radical, collectivist resurgence evident in the response to the Great Depression.3 2 Robert K Murray, Red Scare; a Study in National Hysteria, 1919-1920. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1955). 3 The movement gained a stamp of legitimacy by Congressional hearings on "Communist Propaganda" held in Seattle in October, 1930, under the auspices of U.S.