03.+McCarthyism

==== McCarthy got his start when Alger Hiss was convicted of perjury for denying that he was a Soviet spy. Because Hiss worked for the government, Republicans began firing accusations at Truman for not being tough on subversive activity within his own government. Thus, Truman issued an executive order requiring that all government employees be checked for possible ties to the Soviet Union. McCarthy injected himself into this situation on February 9, 1950, when he gave a speech waving a piece of paper around saying, "I have here in my hand" a list of subversives in the State Department. There was no list--McCarthy was a liar. ====

==== Nevertheless, the accusations made headlines, but McCarthy went further. He believed that the Secretary of State, Dean Acheson, himself may be involved with Communist activities because he may have been shielding possible Communists in the State Department. To get even more publicity, McCarthy accused General George Marshall of the same thing. When McCarthy's integrity was questioned, he simply waved off the critics by saying, "I don't answer accusations, I make them." By 1953, McCarthy had become one of America's most notorious senators and Anti-Communists. ====

==== McCarthy continued his Anti-Communist campaign until 1953, when he became "chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. He quickly put his imprint on that subcommittee, shifting its focus from investigating fraud and waste in the executive branch to hunting for Communists. He conducted scores of hearings, calling hundreds of witnesses in both public and closed [|sessions] ." ====

==== But it was not until the spring of 1954 when McCarthy took the national spotlight. He accused the Army of "lax security" at a top-secrete military installation. The Army responded saying "that the senator had sought preferential treatment for a recently drafted subcommittee aide." But McCarthy retorted that the Army was attempting to cover up subversive Communist activities. Thus, McCarthy stood down as the chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations to take place in the historical spectacle known as the Army-McCarthy hearings. ====

==== Senator McCarthy launched his first attack at Major Irving Peress, a dentist stationed at Camp Kilmer, refusing to answer questions on the Loyalty Oath questionnaire regarding his affiliation with subversive groups. Yet, Peress was cleared by the Army's Loyalty Board, composed of high-ranking officers and respected civilians, but this only led to McCarthy targeting the Loyalty Board. As a result, Brigadier General Ralph W. Zwicker, the Camp Kilmer commander and a decorated war hero, was interrogated and humiliated by McCarthy when he appeared before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. However, the general, having received orders from above not to disclose certain information, dodged some of McCarthy's questions. Furious with this, McCarthy called him a "'Fifth Amendment general . . . unfit to wear the uniform', [and accused] him of not having even "the brains of a five-year- [|old].'" Later, the transcripts of these interrogations were leaked to the public, and McCarthy's belligerent arrogant rhetoric became apparent to many of his supporters. ====

==== However, McCarthy's "'Waterloo'" proved to occur during the 188-hour televised Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations hearings on his charges of conspiracy against the Army. However, the most memorable moment, and McCarthy's downfall, came during a confrontation with Boston attorney Joseph N. Welch, the special counsel for the army. Before the hearings, McCarthy agreed not to attack Fred Fisher, a lawyer in Welch's law firm, who had belonged to a leftist group known as the Lawyers' Guild. In exchange, Welch agreed not to ask questions about Cohn's, the chief counsel of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, avoidance of military service or his rumored homosexual affair. However, as Welch became increasingly sarcastic during the hearings, McCarthy went back on his promise, and this was Welch's response: (see video to the right) ====

==== When the moment passed, it is reported that McCarthy turned to Cohn and asked "What Happened?" What happened is that Welch showed to nearly 20 million Americans McCarthy's ambivalence regarding the value of the constitution, his arrogance, his belligerence, and his lack of evidence .====

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This was McCarthy's rise and fall. After the hearings came to a close, and the Communist scare slowly lost some of its momentum, McCarthy became a target for the media and the American public. Rumors about his drunkenness, dishonesty, bigotry, and suspected homosexuality came to the surface. McCarthy remained a powerful figure until November of 1954, when the Republicans lost control of the Senate. He was replaced as chair of the Senate Government Committee on Operations and of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. "[Also] as a result of his attacks on the army, McCarthy had also lost the support of many Republicans. On December 2, 1954, a Senate resolution, introduced by Republican senator Ralph E. Flanders, officially censured the increasingly disgraced and alcoholic Wisconsin legislator on a vote of 67-22 for conduct 'contrary to Senate [|traditions] .'" Most Americans hoped that McCarthyism would disappear from the American political landscape, but it still lingers today. Conservatives like Ann Coulter still apotheosize McCarthy as some sort of defender of the American ideal. Nevertheless, the Army-McCarthy hearings remind America of the dangers to the constitutional freedoms that all citizens are guaranteed to have. =====