The Road to Abolishing HUAC

The Road to Abolishing HUAC: A Comparison of the American Civil Liberties Union and the Emergency Civil Liberties Committee

The history of the United States in the twentieth century was significantly influenced by the actions of civil liberties organizations. However, during the reign of the House of Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in the 1950s, civil liberties organizations compromised their principles and did not protest HUAC’s repression of civil liberties. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) purged its Communist members and sympathizers, condoned congressional investigating committees, and failed to defend individuals whose civil liberties had been abridged. Although the ACLU sought to censure McCarthy and called for the abolition of HUAC, its policies had shifted to the right and it rarely took direct action against HUAC. As a result, several former members of the ACLU created the Emergency Civil Liberties Committee (ECLC) in 1951 to pick up the initiative dropped by the ACLU. Corliss Lamont, a fervent defender of civil liberties who left the ACLU for the ECLC, claims that he “remained on the Board [of the ALCU] and fought for fundamental civil liberties principles as long as [he] was able to…[but] was fighting a losing battle” (Freedom 278). By 1957, the ECLC dedicated its resources to abolishing HUAC but could not engage the ACLU in its campaign. One questions why the ECLC was active in the condemnation of HUAC in the 1950s, but the ACLU was not. Historians have cited anti-Communism within the Union, a desire to preserve its reputation, and the Union’s lack of resources as reasons why it was not involved in an abolition campaign. Research best supports the claim that the ACLU did not joi...

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...LU. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1999.

Samuel Walker is a Professor of Criminal Justice at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. He earned a Ph.D. in American History and is the author of books on civil liberties, policing, and criminal justice. He is also a member of the ACLU and this book is recommended in Ellen Shrecker’s Age of McCarthyism. He claims the ACLU was inactive during the Cold War because of weak leadership, poor judgement, an effort to keep the ACLU free of communism, and the belief that cooperation with the government was the best way to defend civil liberties. That he is a member of the ACLU lends questions to the objectivity of his analysis; William Donohue notes that the book “demonstrates as much independence of thought as would a tract written by a senior member of the Pentagon on the history of the Department of Defense”.