4 ms·

If we're going to discuss McCarthyism, we need to remember that the US government was riddled with soviet spies during the Roosevelt administration[1][2][3][4].

If we're going to discuss McCarthyism, we need to remember that the US government was riddled with soviet spies during the Roosevelt administration[1][2][3][4]. Communist spies outside of government were also instrumental to soviet espionage efforts, including the theft of nuclear technology[5][6]. McCarthy was responding to real threats, although my high school history class didn't talk much about them. Members of the Communist Party USA were instrumental in the Soviets obtaining weapons to destroy life as we know it and the lesson we take from the period is that McCarthy was a bad guy. McCarthy wrote a book arguing that the Soviet Union was the real winner of WWII[7], thanks to the help of willing US accomplices. Looking at the map of Europe before and after the war you have to admit the guy has a case. But who would read a book by Joseph McCarthy? [1] http://foseti.wordpress.com/2013/03/06/harry-dexter-white/ http://foseti.wordpress.com/2013/03/06/harry-dexter-white/, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Dexter_White http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Dexter_White [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Silvermaster http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Silvermaster [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perlo_group http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perlo_group [4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alger_Hiss http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alger_Hiss [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Rosenberg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Rosenberg [6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whittaker_Chambers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whittaker_Chambers [7] http://foseti.wordpress.com/2012/08/19/review-of-americas-retreat-from-victory-by-joseph-r-mccarthy&#x2F http://foseti.wordpress.com/2012/08/19/review-of-americas-re...;

einhverfr 13y ago
Espionage efforts are one thing, but when people are jailed for "inciting rebellion" for the "crime" of distributing the writings of Karl Marx, the undeniable fact that there were lots of spies here (as we had lots of spies there) falls so far short of justifying the sorts of abuses that went on. The government argued that the Communist Party USA had no right to spread political ideas in the US, and targetted lawyers who dared to defend them. Whatever the extent of Soviet spying in the US (and it would have been extensive for obvious reasons, as with the other side), the McCarthy era was an assault on the foundations of democracy in this country. If you want to justify that because the threat is real, I suppose we should just give up on this whole Constitutional Rights thing....
- newnewnew 13y ago
  Of course, there is no moral equivalence between US spies and Soviet spies, since there is no moral equivalence between subjugation to the totalitarian soviet state (which soviet spies were fighting for) and the liberal democratic capitalism of what remained of the West. Violence is a nasty thing. But violence in service of slavery is a far nastier thing than violence in defense of human rights and freedoms.
  - einhverfr 13y ago
    That's an interesting defence of McCarthyism, that we must do away with American liberty because otherwise we will lose it to the Soviets.
    - re_todd 13y ago
      +1 best summary of McCarthyism ever.
- smsm42 13y ago
  >>> Espionage efforts are one thing, but when people are jailed for "inciting rebellion" for the "crime" of distributing the writings of Karl Marx, Could you provide a bit more information on this - who was jailed solely for distributing the works of Karl Marx and for how long?
  - einhverfr 13y ago
    Actually, that is what Yates v. United States turned on and why after the Supreme Court said that distributing literature could not be sufficient but must be paired with actual concrete steps to make it happen there was only one further conviction under the Smith Act (for a Communist Party member who was also a martial arts instructor). Read Yates v. United States. The conviction was reversed and it brought an end to Smith Act prosecutions of the Communist Party. Decision at: http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0354_0298_ZS.html http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0354... Oral argument at: http://www.oyez.org/cases/1950-1959/1956/1956_6 http://www.oyez.org/cases/1950-1959/1956/1956_6 Yates also largely overruled Whitney v. California (and set up the formal overrule in Brandenburg). It is worth noting however that although the Supreme Court (this was decades before Yates) held that Communist Party membership itself could be subject to prosecution, Brandeis's concurrence apparently lead the governor of the state to pardon Whitney.
leifaffles 13y ago
See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venona_project http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venona_project
nostrademons 13y ago
McCarthy isn't vilified because he was wrong; he's vilified because his efforts to prove himself right nearly turned America into the thing he most despised. Part of living in a liberal democratic state that trusts its citizens is understanding and accepting that some of those citizens will abuse that trust, and then dealing with those individuals on a case-by-case basis rather than assuming that everyone will abuse it. It's very much like the folks who insist they should never get into a relationship because they might get hurt, or never found a startup because it might fail. That's the point. We choose to live with that vulnerability because it makes the moments where it doesn't fail so much sweeter.
- smsm42 13y ago
  He was very far from turning American into anything, even more into a Stalinist dictatorship which denies basic rights to life and liberty, routinely starves off, murders and imprisons millions of citizens and has no concept of human rights to speak of. He may falsely accused some people of being communist sympathizers, and he may cost some people that associated with communists their jobs (to appreciate it, think about current Congress discovering there are multiple Al Qaeda agents in all levels of government and trying to investigate it, and people answering "I'm taking the Fifth" when asked if they have had any ties with Al Qaeda). But nothing even close to turning America into the thing he most despised - i.e. Stalinist USSR.
  - anonyfuss 13y ago
    It's scary to see how many closet fascists are here on ycombinator.
    - smsm42 13y ago
      Please look up the word "fascist" in the dictionary next time before using it.
      - anonyfuss 13y ago
        You seem to need it more. Let me help: "n. an adherent of fascism or similar right-wing authoritarian". Sounds about right. Mussolini said: "Fascism, sitting on the right, could also have sat on the mountain of the center ... These words in any case do not have a fixed and unchanged meaning: they do have a variable subject to location, time and spirit. We don't give a damn about these empty terminologies and we despise those who are terrorized by these words" Quoting Robert Paxton's "The Anatomy of Fascism": facism is "... a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion." McCarthy was obsessed with "The Red Menace", and was willing to abandon just about any ethical or legal constraint to both cleanse the United States, and to spread his idea of Americanism. He enlisted industry, traditional elites, and whatever political support he could find his obsessive pursuit of cleansing the US of communism (and homosexuality). What's especially scary is that you write off his wholesale destruction of careers and lives as an ethically justified approach to the problems of the Cold War (and his problems with homosexuality), despite the tactics baring a striking similarity to the CCCP's enforcement of party politics through social, commercial, and direct governmental intimidation. We're lucky that McCarthy was never truly unleashed on the Red Menace; your implied support of him and his tactics is abhorrent.

einhverfr 13y ago

Espionage efforts are one thing, but when people are jailed for "inciting rebellion" for the "crime" of distributing the writings of Karl Marx, the undeniable fact that there were lots of spies here (as we had lots of spies there) falls so far short of justifying the sorts of abuses that went on. The government argued that the Communist Party USA had no right to spread political ideas in the US, and targetted lawyers who dared to defend them. Whatever the extent of Soviet spying in the US (and it would have been extensive for obvious reasons, as with the other side), the McCarthy era was an assault on the foundations of democracy in this country. If you want to justify that because the threat is real, I suppose we should just give up on this whole Constitutional Rights thing....

newnewnew 13y ago
Of course, there is no moral equivalence between US spies and Soviet spies, since there is no moral equivalence between subjugation to the totalitarian soviet state (which soviet spies were fighting for) and the liberal democratic capitalism of what remained of the West. Violence is a nasty thing. But violence in service of slavery is a far nastier thing than violence in defense of human rights and freedoms.
- einhverfr 13y ago
  That's an interesting defence of McCarthyism, that we must do away with American liberty because otherwise we will lose it to the Soviets.
  - re_todd 13y ago
    +1 best summary of McCarthyism ever.
smsm42 13y ago
>>> Espionage efforts are one thing, but when people are jailed for "inciting rebellion" for the "crime" of distributing the writings of Karl Marx, Could you provide a bit more information on this - who was jailed solely for distributing the works of Karl Marx and for how long?
- einhverfr 13y ago
  Actually, that is what Yates v. United States turned on and why after the Supreme Court said that distributing literature could not be sufficient but must be paired with actual concrete steps to make it happen there was only one further conviction under the Smith Act (for a Communist Party member who was also a martial arts instructor). Read Yates v. United States. The conviction was reversed and it brought an end to Smith Act prosecutions of the Communist Party. Decision at: http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0354_0298_ZS.html http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0354... Oral argument at: http://www.oyez.org/cases/1950-1959/1956/1956_6 http://www.oyez.org/cases/1950-1959/1956/1956_6 Yates also largely overruled Whitney v. California (and set up the formal overrule in Brandenburg). It is worth noting however that although the Supreme Court (this was decades before Yates) held that Communist Party membership itself could be subject to prosecution, Brandeis's concurrence apparently lead the governor of the state to pardon Whitney.

leifaffles 13y ago

See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venona_project http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venona_project

nostrademons 13y ago

McCarthy isn't vilified because he was wrong; he's vilified because his efforts to prove himself right nearly turned America into the thing he most despised. Part of living in a liberal democratic state that trusts its citizens is understanding and accepting that some of those citizens will abuse that trust, and then dealing with those individuals on a case-by-case basis rather than assuming that everyone will abuse it. It's very much like the folks who insist they should never get into a relationship because they might get hurt, or never found a startup because it might fail. That's the point. We choose to live with that vulnerability because it makes the moments where it doesn't fail so much sweeter.

smsm42 13y ago
He was very far from turning American into anything, even more into a Stalinist dictatorship which denies basic rights to life and liberty, routinely starves off, murders and imprisons millions of citizens and has no concept of human rights to speak of. He may falsely accused some people of being communist sympathizers, and he may cost some people that associated with communists their jobs (to appreciate it, think about current Congress discovering there are multiple Al Qaeda agents in all levels of government and trying to investigate it, and people answering "I'm taking the Fifth" when asked if they have had any ties with Al Qaeda). But nothing even close to turning America into the thing he most despised - i.e. Stalinist USSR.
- anonyfuss 13y ago
  It's scary to see how many closet fascists are here on ycombinator.
  - smsm42 13y ago
    Please look up the word "fascist" in the dictionary next time before using it.
    - anonyfuss 13y ago
      You seem to need it more. Let me help: "n. an adherent of fascism or similar right-wing authoritarian". Sounds about right. Mussolini said: "Fascism, sitting on the right, could also have sat on the mountain of the center ... These words in any case do not have a fixed and unchanged meaning: they do have a variable subject to location, time and spirit. We don't give a damn about these empty terminologies and we despise those who are terrorized by these words" Quoting Robert Paxton's "The Anatomy of Fascism": facism is "... a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion." McCarthy was obsessed with "The Red Menace", and was willing to abandon just about any ethical or legal constraint to both cleanse the United States, and to spread his idea of Americanism. He enlisted industry, traditional elites, and whatever political support he could find his obsessive pursuit of cleansing the US of communism (and homosexuality). What's especially scary is that you write off his wholesale destruction of careers and lives as an ethically justified approach to the problems of the Cold War (and his problems with homosexuality), despite the tactics baring a striking similarity to the CCCP's enforcement of party politics through social, commercial, and direct governmental intimidation. We're lucky that McCarthy was never truly unleashed on the Red Menace; your implied support of him and his tactics is abhorrent.