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Home , American Left, John Reed (journalist), Joseph McCarthy, McCarthyism, Red Scare

MCCARTHYISM ENCYCLOPEDIA OF POPULAR CULTURE

McGinley, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Herman Wouk, and others. that even when speech is protected to the extent that it is in the United Circulation and advertising revenues quickly improved, and McCall’s States, it is still vulnerable to attacks from those who wish to limit the solidified its position as one of the trade-designated ‘‘Seven Sisters’’ right of others to disagree with them. of women’s-service magazines. In 1966, McCall’s hired 23 year-old During the early days of industrialization in the , Lynda Bird Johnson, the President’s oldest daughter, as a contributor the country played host to a large, active . American in an effort to appeal to young, college-age readers. workers began to join labor unions and engage in strikes. The surge of Several years later, the corporation that owned McCall’s was immigrants who brought with them a of radicalism influ- absorbed by Norton Simon, and the publication later became part of enced native workers who felt exploited by low wages and long the women’s-magazine group at Company. working hours to protest against the factory owners. By the 1930s, the Robert Stein, who served as editor during the late 1960s, put heavy American was in full swing. Socialist leader emphasis on research organizations to supplement the editorial staff Eugene Debs called it ‘‘the red decade,’’ and author Daniel Aaron with in-depth information. In 1994, the Times women’s group, which dubbed it ‘‘a time of smelly orthodoxies.’’ The 1930s began with also included Family Circle, Child, and other publications, was sold worldwide depression and ended with storm clouds of war around the to Gruner & Jahr USA Publishing, a part of the German media giant world. In the throes of economic famine, the country was vulnerable Bertelsmann AG. Soon afterwards, Kate White, who had been to differing visions and created by upheaval and despair. McCall’s editor-in-chief since 1991, left to become editor of Redbook American intellectuals—introspective, disillusioned, and articulate— and was replaced by Sally Koslow. By the mid-1990s, McCall’s was became the voice of a people whose world had ceased to be the reporting a monthly circulation of around 4.6 million. Among the expected bulwark against want, instability, and insecurity. American online services being offered by the publication at the end of the Communists believed that could provide a model 1990s was ‘‘Parents.com,’’ a joint website resource that drew on the for economic stability and social justice. The heyday of the American editorial expertise of McCall’s and three other national publications: Communist party began with a party that was 70 percent foreign-born Child, Family Circle, and Parents. and ended with a party that was 44 percent professional and white collar natives. —Edward Moran A large number of joined the Communist party for social as well as ideological reasons. Clubs, such as the FURTHER READING: Clubs, provided a home for fledgling writers and artists and those who ‘‘McCall’s.’’ http://www.mccalls.com. May 1999. needed to belong to something in which they could believe. Speeches by Communist party officials frequently centered around the defeat of ‘‘Parents.com.’’ http://www.parents.com. May 1999. and had mass appeal to the disillusioned portion of the Reed, David. The Popular Magazine in Britain and the United States. American population. Richard Crossman writes in The God That London, The British Library, 1997. Failed that such individuals ‘‘had lost faith in democracy and were Tebbel, John. : A Compact History. New willing to sacrifice bourgeois liberties in order to defeat fascism. York, Hawthorn Books, 1969. Their conversion, in fact, was rooted in despair—a despair of Western values.’’ Tebbel, John, and Mary Ellen Zuckerman. The Magazine in America: However, as the 1930s progressed, many Americans began to 1741-1990. New York, , 1991. reexamine their attraction to communism. A number of events Wood, James Playsted. Magazines in the United States. New York, influenced the decline in communism’s popularity, including the The Ronald Press Co., 1978. ’s within the and the Non-Aggres- sion Pact he signed with Adolph Hitler in 1939. Alfred Kazin spoke for American Communists as a whole when he cried: ‘‘It was wrong to make common cause with Hitler, wrong to expose the world to McCarthyism war.’’ Following World War II, the fear of communism became an entrenched element in American society as the Soviet-Ameri- Despite the fact that Americans pride themselves on constitu- can alliance slowly deteriorated. In 1947 President Harry Truman tional protections for free speech, there have been many attempts to signed an that barred communists, fascists, and other limit speech in the United States. Beginning in 1789 with the First totalitarians from the national payroll. Also included in the ban Act, Congress has passed laws banning diverse kinds of were individuals who were guilty of ‘‘sympathetic association’’ speech: criticism of the government, speaking out against war, with undesirables or their organizations. The stage was set for associating with the Communist party, obscenity, slander, libel, Joseph McCarthy. ‘‘fighting words,’’ and seditious speech that attempts to overthrow Joseph McCarthy (1908-1957) was born near Appleton, Wis- the government. None of these limits have been so controversial or so consin. He received a law degree in 1935 but was not a success as a damaging as the attempt by Senator Joseph McCarthy in the to lawyer. McCarthy handled only four cases in his nine months of the United States of anyone remotely connected with the practice, bragging that he supported himself by playing poker. While Communist party. His unsubstantiated charges led to wrecked lives practicing law, McCarthy was accused of destroying judicial records. and careers in all walks of life. The inherent irony of McCarthyism— He won his first election by claiming that his 66-year-old opponent the name given to the attempts to seek out and criminalize those was ‘‘73’’ or ‘‘89’’ and was too old to govern. He joined the Marines suspected of sympathizing with communism—was that by the time of during World War II but left early to launch an unsuccessful bid for his ‘‘,’’ American Communism was all but dead. The the Senate. He would later falsely claim that he had been wounded lesson to be learned from his hysteria and the ensuing witch hunt is in action.

314 ENCYCLOPEDIA OF POPULAR CULTURE MCCARTHYISM

Senator Joseph McCarthy

After winning an election to the Senate, McCarthy paid little running for political office. Constitutional scholars acknowledge that attention to the early days of the so-called Red Scare. But as the Cold both laws were clearly in violation of the First Amendment’s protec- War escalated, Americans felt more vulnerable to the threat of tion of freedom of association. Limiting access to the ballot is always communism. fell to the communists, the Soviet Union explod- a distinctive threat to democracy. Nonetheless, in Barenblatt v. ed its first atomic bomb, and and Julius and Ethel United States in 1959, the Supreme Court insisted that its repeated Rosenberg were accused of spying for the enemy. After being refusal to view the Communist Party as an ordinary political party left identified as the worst United States senator in a 1949 poll, McCarthy it without First Amendment protections. Mandated loyalty oaths for mentioned to supporters that he needed a cause to improve his image. government employees, including teachers, also violated protected He found it with the threat of communism and erroneously stated that freedom of association. Following the example of Congress, many 284 communists were employed by the State Department. Despite the states passed their own loyalty oaths. In New York state, as many as fact that none of these individuals remained at the State Department, 58 teachers and 200 college professors lost their jobs. Approximately McCarthy declared on the floor of Congress that he had ‘‘proof’’ of 20 percent of those eventually called to testify before state and widespread communist activity in the government of the United States. congressional investigating committees were college teachers and Throughout the Red Scare, McCarthy never documented a graduate students. single communist in a government job. However, he amassed enor- By 1954, a blacklist was in place in both the fields of education mous power with his false claims. He insisted that the past twenty and entertainment. Few who lost their jobs in either field were ever years of Democratic government had been ‘‘a conspiracy so im- reinstated. The political witch hunt promoted by Joseph McCarthy in mense, an infamy so black as to dwarf any in the history of man.’’ In the 1950s caused great harm and suffering. Beloved entertainers, such 1950, Congress passed the McCarran Internal Security Act, virtually as , were forced out of the United States because of outlawing communism in the United States. This was followed in the hysteria. Producers, actors, and writers, were blacklisted. Without 1954 with the Communist Control Act, forbidding communists from jobs, many were unable to support their families. Most of the people

315 MCCARTNEY ENCYCLOPEDIA OF POPULAR CULTURE who McCarthy injured were just people who dared to question the Schrecker, Ellen. The Age of McCarthyism: A Brief History with capitalist status quo. Many scholars believe that McCarthy, motivated Documents. Boston, Bedford Books of St. Martin’s Press, 1994. by a desire for personal recognition, was trying to overthrow the New ———. Many Are the Crimes: McCarthyism in America. Boston, Deal programs of Franklin D. Roosevelt and establish the Republi- Little, Brown, 1998. cans as the majority party. In such an environment, policy makers of both parties were afraid to suggest alternatives to both foreign and domestic policy for fear of being charged with . McCarthy’s tactics proved successful, and in 1952 Dwight D. Eisenhower was elected president, bringing with him a Republican- McCartney, Paul (1942—) controlled Congress. Out of 221 Republicans in the House of Repre- sentatives, 185 asked to serve on the House Un-American Activities Born to a musical family in Liverpool, England, McCartney Committee. Indeed, had used his Senate seat to fight taught himself to play guitar and in 1956 joined John Lennon’s communism and ended up with the vice presidency in 1952 and 1956. Quarrymen, later renamed the Beatles. In 1961 McCartney took up Once the Republican party was in control, McCarthy could no longer the bass to distinguish himself from the two guitarists. As the Beatles rail against communist conspiracies in the government. So he turned grew musically, McCartney produced an astonishing series of beauti- his attention to the army, and that proved to be his downfall. Outraged Americans joined with the military and johnny-come-lately politi- ful compositions, including ‘‘Yesterday,’’ ‘‘Eleanor Rigby,’’ ‘‘Pen- cians to denounce McCarthyism. Joseph McCarthy was censured in ny Lane,’’ and ‘‘Let It Be.’’ Besides being one of the most innovative 1954 and died three years later, a bitter outcast. Despite this, he has and melodic bass players in rock, and one of its greatest singers, become a cult hero to the and would have felt vindicated McCartney was also an accomplished guitarist and pianist. McCartney’s by the renewed articulation of the communist threat under Ronald solo career was the most successful of all the ex-Beatles. He managed Reagan in the 1980s. to maintain a freshness and creativity that was sometimes missing in The United States Constitution and the First Amendment can Lennon and Harrison. Often maligned as the ‘‘soft’’ and ‘‘commer- only protect the rights of American citizens when they are willing to cial’’ half of the Lennon-McCartney duo, and jealously cited as the stand up for the right to engage in free speech, to openly criticize the richest man in showbusiness, McCartney will be remembered in government and its policy makers, and to demand the inherent history as one of the greatest talents of twentieth-century popular music. democratic right to disagree with others. McCarthyism was only able to gain a foothold in the United States because people were afraid to —Douglas Cooke challenge the loud voices who claimed that democracy was most vulnerable to outside forces. Democracy in the United States has always been most vulnerable to forces within in who do not accept the right of dissent. This is the lesson to be learned from Joseph McCarthy and his cohorts.

—Elizabeth Purdy

FURTHER READING: Adams, John G. Without Precedent: The Story of the Death of McCarthyism. New York and London, W.W. Norton and Compa- ny, 1983. Crossman, Richard. The God That Failed. New York, Regnery Publishers, 1982. Diggins, John Patrick. The Rise and Fall of the . New York and London, W. W. Norton and Company, 1992. Fried, Albert, editor. McCarthyism: The Great American Red Scare; A Documentary History. New York, Oxford University Press, 1997. Fried, Richard M. Nightmare in Red: The McCarthy Era in Perspec- tive. New York, Oxford University Press, 1990. Heale, M. J. McCarthy’s Americans: Red Scare Politics in State and Nation, 1935-1965. Athens, University of Georgia Press, 1998. Klingaman, William K. Encyclopedia of the McCarthy Era. New York, Facts on File, 1996. Lately, Thomas. When Angels Wept: The Senator Joseph McCarthy Affair—A Story Without A Hero. New York, William Morrow and Company, 1973. Reeves, Thomas C. The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy: A Biogra- phy. New York, Stein and Day, 1982. Paul McCartney

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