Description
Book SynopsisAs one of a handful of American scholars allowed to review documents in newly opened Soviet archives, John Haynes has used fresh evidence to shed new light on the United States' confrontation with communism at home. In a succinct survey, Haynes traces the buildup of the American Communist party (CPUSA) in the twenties and thirties, focuses on the heyday of popular anticommunism from 1945 to 1960, and follows the relative decline of anticommunism as a political issue in the sixties and seventies. Along the way he describes the chief episodes, figures, and institutions of cold war anticommunism, showing how earlier campaigns against domestic fascists and right-wingers provided most all of anti-communism's tactics and weapons. And he dissects the various anticommunist constituencies, analyzing their origins, motives, and activities. Haynes draws on new and incontestable evidence that the Soviet Union heavily subsidized the CPUSA from its earliest days; maintained an underground organization in Washington in the 1930s that reported to the CPUSA and in turn to Moscow on U.S. government activities; and placed CPUSA members in the wartime OSS and OWI, the government's major intelligence and propaganda agencies. He also confirms much of Elizabeth Bentley's 1940s accusations of Communist infiltrations. American Ways Series.
Trade ReviewA solid academic analysis of the American communist movement that draws on recently declassified Soviet documents. * Kirkus *
An antidote to the melioristic revisionism about the Communist Party, so prevalent in mainstream circles of American historiography. -- Arnold Beichman * The Washington Times *
Table of ContentsPart 1 Preface vii Part 2 COMMUNISM AND ANTICOMMUNISM 3 Chapter 3 The Soviet experience. Origins of American communism. Red Scare. Heyday of the movement. Part 4 FASCISM AND WORLD WAR II 17 Chapter 5 Threat of fascism and fifth columns. Antifascist response in the United States. Roosevelt's foreign policy. The Nazi-Soviet pact. Part 6 THE ROAD TO THE COLD WAR 37 Chapter 7 Disillusion of the peace. Wartime promises—the case of Poland and domestic repercussions. Communist espionage: Amerasia, Gouzenko, the Rosenbergs. Part 8 THE HOUSE COMMITTEE ON UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES 64 Chapter 9 Early focus on fascism. Dies Committee. Postwar Hollywood hearings. Bentley revelations. Chambers and Hiss. Part 10 VARIETIES OF ANTICOMMUNISM 89 Chapter 11 Evangelical Christians. Catholics and ACTU. The Socialist attack. Trotskyism. Lovestone and labor. Part 12 THE STRUGGLE FOR THE SOUL OF AMERICAN LIBERALISM 113 Chapter 13 Popular Front liberals. Niebuhr and Americans for Democratic Action. State politics. Murray and CIO drive against Communists. Part 14 PARTISANSHIP AND ANTICOMMUNISM 137 Chapter 15 Party politics in the anti-Communist era. Rise and fall of McCarthy. Part 16 ANTICOMMUNISM AT HIGH TIDE 163 Chapter 17 Federal offensive against American Communists. Personnel security programs. FBI activites. The literature of exposure. The uses of anticommunism. Part 18 THE END OF THE ANTI-COMMUNIST ERA 190 Chapter 19 Death of Stalin. Decline of the CPUSA. Influence of the Vietnam War. Part 20 Selected Readings 201 Part 21 Index 205
