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History of the FBI
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In the 1930s and 1940s many Hollywood writers, actors, producers, and directors were suspected for communist affiliations. During this time, communism was a popular political movement in the United States, especially among young liberals. There was a growing fear of communism invading American society. By the end of World War Two an event known as the Red Scare resulted in communism become increasingly feared and hated by many in the United States. The Hollywood blacklist caused the Hollywood industry a lot of harm in its business and reputation. The House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) was created in 1938. They were focused on investigating and putting an end to Communists and Communist supporters in the American Society. Their first major attack was on the Hollywood film industry. Communists in the Hollywood industry were said to be placing subversive messages into films. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and others like Senator Joseph McCarthy pestered communists and supporters of the Communist party. McCarthy conducted “witch hunts” in effort to seek out and eliminate suspected Communists. Congressional hearings were in effect, not hearings, but trials for crimes that were not really crimes, with congressmen serving as prosecutor, judge, and jury. Unable to deprive a person of their life and liberty, they deprived him of his livelihood. If the person refused to give the names of other Communists, he or she would automatically be considered guilty. Witnesses of the trials were immediately classified as either friendly or unfriendly. Friendly witnesses answered questions concerning themselves and others. They were then cleared from the blacklist and allowed to go back to work in Holly... ... middle of paper ... ...to obtain work in the American film and television industry for many years. Some of those blacklisted continued to write Hollywood films, using false names. This allowed movies such as The Bridge on the River Kwai to be completed. Several screenwriters moved to other countries, where they were able to find work in film. Most estimates indicate that the blacklist involved approximately three hundred and twenty-five employees in film and related industries. However nearly expert believes there were over five hundred victims of the Hollywood blacklist. It wasn’t until 1961, when a director named Otto Preminger announced he was hiring a writer named Trumbo who was on the blacklist to write a move that things began to slowly change. In 1997, a group named the Writers Guild of America voted to change the writing credits of 23 films made during the blacklist period.
When the Tydings Committee issued a majority report dismissing all of McCarthy’s allegations and condemning them as “a fraud and a hoax perpetrated on the Senate of the United States and the American people.” Republican members of the American sub-committee condemned the majority report and the Democrats who signed it and McCarthy turned his defeat into a victory through the great publicity he received. Soon after Tydings report was considered pro-Communist. Like the Salem Witch Trials lack of substantial proof, many people were willing to believe McCarthy’s charges without any evidence. Soon world events seemed to be playing into McCarthy’s hands and he could use it all against the Truman administration. McCarthy’s fame grew and he because more careless, and instead of hinting nameless lists, he started naming names.
The Hollywood blacklist and the subsequent Paramount decision altered the direction of U.S. moviemaking in a big way. While both events are important in filmmaking history, the opinions on the legality, necessity, and effects of these events vary widely depending on who you ask. While the filmmaking industry management opposed the blacklist and the Paramount decision, some management executives may have taken advantage of the blacklist by negotiating stricter contracts based upon extortion, in that to be blacklisted, one only needed to be rumored to be associated with communist ties (Lewis, 2008). The employees, such as actors, directors, and writers of the large studios were also opposed to the Paramount decision and the blacklist, but the ability actors, directors, and writers to fight for and gain large contracts has improved since the Paramount decision, as it cast the studios as advantageous, money hungry totalitarian fraternities. I would argue that the Paramount decision and the
Through the 1940s and 1950s, America was beleaguered with anxieties about the menace of communism arising in Eastern Europe and China. Profiting out of such worries for the nation, young Senator Joseph McCarthy made an open charge that hundreds of "card-carrying" communists had penetrated the United States government. Although his allegations were found ultimately to be false and the Senate reproached him for improper ways, his ardent shakeup heralded as one of the most tyrannical eras in 20th-century American politics. While the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAA) had been formed in 1938 as a body to resist communists, McCarthy's charges enhanced the political nervousness of the epoch. The suspicious chase for moles, scandalously known as McCarthyism, made the life and work of a number of important cultural names in the U.S difficult, being branded as champions and supporters to leftist causes.
During this time a variety of Americans were accused of being Communists or communist sympathizers and were victims of aggressive investigations by government committees and agencies.
What is McCarthyism? It is the public onslaught of an individual or an individual’s character by means of baseless and uncorroborated charges, basically the repudiation of a person’s reputation. Joe McCarthy was the Wisconsin senator that evoked this era of fear and paranoia by inflaming the current fear of world domination by the Communist party that enveloped the Nation. He did this by announcing that he had discovered “57 cases of individuals who would appear to be either card carrying members or certainly loyal to the Communist Party, but who nevertheless are still helping to shape our foreign policy.” (McCarthy, 1950, p. 2), later the amount of implicated individuals rose to 205. These accusations launched McCarthy into the national spotlight where he then began his smear campaign against many well-known Americans, which was commonly referred to as “witch-hunts”. Because of McCarthy’s actions, up to 12, people lots their jobs hundreds were incarcerated. He then turned his sights to book banning because he claimed there were 30,000 books written by all shades of Communists. After his lists were made public all were removed from the Overseas Library Program. But he was not finished yet, he then assailed members of the entertainment business. He had writers and actors brought to trial. Many of these people were blacklisted and worse, all without a single shred of evidence. When people spoke out against McCarthy they were thrown onto the communist train, until enough people came forward to rebuke McCarthy’s unprecedented tactics. At this point he fell from political power into dishonor on December 2, 1954. This ended the McCarthy era, but not the atmosphere of paranoia that lingers in the nation today.
Governmental structures, local and federal, set up various un- American activites committees. These committees were set up solely to find and prosecute communists, or suspected communists. They drew the attention of the American public in every city that they were, furthering the panic of the "red scare."
In 1950 Joseph McCarthy, a U.S. Senator from Wisconsin, began a crusade of anti-communism (Bartlett). In this period of time “the widespread accusations and investigations of suspected Communist activities in the U.S.” became known as ‘McCarthyism’ (Reeves). Many events happened during the McCarthyism era to justify his suspicions; Communism was spreading throughout Czechoslovakia and China, and North Korea invaded the South –which started the Korean War (Reeves). The accusations of Communism spread to all branches of public works; entertainment, clergy, teachers, and journalists were all investigated (Reeves). Blacklisting first appears at this time. Many people had to take oaths, swearing that they were not Communist, just to keep their jobs (Reeves). When McCarthy first began, he said that Communists made up the majority of the State Department, but when the Senate looked into it they reported no sings of Communism (Reeves). In 1949 McCarthy said to have gotten his inf...
America has endured many difficult times throughout history. One such time is known as the McCarthy era. During the early 1950's, "witch hunts" occurred of suspected communists. One only needed to be suspected of communism to be accused. Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin, in order to gain political power, capitalized on the fear of communism in the United States in the early 1950's by falsely accusing innocent citizens of political corruption, thus creating a lasting impact on the government, entertainment industry, and history of America.
The change in the U.S. can be said to be a social revolution. People were growing sick of the same old movies, they wanted a change and Hollywood needed to deliver or else they would lose their audience to the TV. In the early 60's, the studios were still afraid of the blacklisting so the films were still very safe. An example of this is the film Sound of Music (1965). This was a film about a musical family that needed to escape the Nazi presence. Although the movie is based on a true story, they still follow the same old idea of a nice family, who must escape from the clutches of evil. Basically, the movie is saying good guys win and bad guys always lose. Sure this how most films are made but there is no sense of change, no differences in the style or way it was made. Since there was no change, the public was not interested. The TV was much more convenient and kept the publics interested.
This was a group that declared their communist beliefs to the American Government and eventually had gained enough recognition to have hundreds of people on the list. The Hollywood Ten, Unfriendly Ten, or Hollywood Blacklist had a brief couple of instances that caused controversy and affected various lives of numerous people that were involved in the Hollywood filmmaking industry (Dickinson). Lastly, these events in history have shown the significant clashes of the political parties in various countries because of the fact that they demonstrate the controversy that was caused through the rises and falls of communism. The Hollywood Ten is a memorable group that contributed to Communism and the era of its
Of course, after a couple of years, the paranoia faded away and the laws and legislations created during this time of panic were no longer regarded with such rigor. But after World War II, a new wave of the Red Scare hit the United States as many began to fear the continuing dictatorship in Germany as well as the now upcoming rise of communism in Italy and Japan. The spread of this non-capitalist and non-democratic ideology sparked new fear in American citizens which sparked a new set of acts and legislations to follow in the next decade. HUAC, the House of Un-American Activities Committee, played a specifically huge role in the Red Scare during this time, encouraging the suspicions of communist spies in the country. It became a norm to suspect your neighbour of espionage (McCarthyism) and even those who you do not know: the Hollywood Ten, ten film producers accused of communist affiliations and later on blacklisted for refusing to deny these accusations. The Red Scare had once again become the standard and the nation embraced it with political
The educational website Shmoop, which has many contributors with Ph.D.’s and Masters from top universities, states that, “Fear- utterly justifiable fear- transformed American Communists from a minor nuisance into a national obsession.” America was fine with the idea that there may have been witches or Communists in their country, but it was when the leaders blew the issues out of proportion that it created widespread fear of not only the communists and witches, but also of being accused of being one of the wrong-doers. In addition to the constant, widespread fear, those who were accused had their lives ruined in the blink of an eye. While the people who were blacklisted during the Red Scare may have had it worse than the accused during the Salem Witch Trials, the people in Salem still had their reputations hurt by their connections to the trials. Professor Schwartz pointed out that during the Red Scare, the filmmaking studios relied on bank financing, but the banks were reluctant to give the studios the money because of their “communist ties.”
The blacklist was employ in the period of “Red Scare”. The people who were in the blacklist were disreputable by the society and were not able to get a job in some areas.
Joseph McCarthy’s negative influence first manifested itself through his ambition to gain political power. He used his senatorial position to litigate persons who were thought to be part of the Communist Party. Examples this would be the targeting of the Hollywood Ten. These were citizens in the film industry who were cited for contempt of Congress after refusing to answer the questions of McCarthy. The author of The Crucible, Arthur Miller, was even cited for contempt of Congress when he refused to identify writers that attended communist meetings. He went on to explain how the House Un-American Activities Committee, or HUAC, was deceitfully informing citizens that the Soviet way of controlling culture could be successfully exported to America. According to professor and historian Regin Schmidt, when McCarthyism was at its height, only 1% of the public was worried about the internal threat of Communism. This fact shows how manipulative and cynical the government was when fueling the fire of the anti-communist movement.
In the 1950s, innocent people were accused of being Communist sympathizers and were deprived of their livelihood. They were blacklisted, meaning no one would hire them because they had been labeled as Communists, and they were not accepted in society. Some people gave the committee names of their associates to keep themselves out of trouble. But not everyone did this. Some stood up for themselves and spoke out against the court regardless of what would happen. This was a big sacrifice and it proved that they had integrity. One of these was John Howard Lawson, who was one of "The Hollywood Ten". He went on trial before the committee and claimed that they were encroaching on his rights as an American citizen. He even told the committee, "I am not on trial here, Mr. Chairman. This committee is on trial here before the American people. Let us get that straight." He was not afraid of the committee and told them exactly what he thought. When they tried to bully him into telling them what they wanted, he responded by saying, "I am glad you have made it perfectly clear that you are going to threaten and intimidate the witness, Mr. Chairman." They threatened to hold him in contempt of court for trying to speak against them, and they refused to read his statement. He was excused from the stand after accusing the committee of "using the old technique, which was used in Hitler Germany in order to create a scare."