Customer Reviews

Reds: McCarthyism in Twentieth-Century America

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Ted Morgan's `Reds', while an informative and balanced history of communism and anti-communism in the United States, suffers needlessly from bloated, journalistic narrative that adds little to his overall thesis that McCarthy and "McCarthyism" was a phenomenon that had deep roots in US history and political culture. Indeed, such a proposition is easily proven; one does not need a doctorate in history to realize the context of the Cold War, a right-wing, rural-populist reaction to the New Deal, and conservative reaction to modernity in the early twentieth-century would create conditions that would allow a figure such as McCarthy to gain political prominence. What is crucial, however, is to make an obvious argument interesting by crafting together a coherent narrative that makes the points Morgan tries to make without overwhelming the work with needless trivia.

It is in this last part that Morgan largely fails. At 614 pages the book covers too much, and, in particular, its focus on McCarthy in the latter half of the book needlessly distracts from the point that domestic communism, though a real threat to internal security in the early twentieth century, had largely been destroyed by the time McCarthy came to national attention. `Reds", in fact, is two books. The first is a concise discussion of domestic communism and the anti-communist overreaction to it in the 1950s, the second a meandering biography of McCarthy and his politics that interrupts the first, more interesting and more important part of the book. The four chapters on McCarthy could well be condensed into a single, more concise chapter.

That being said, `Reds" is, if for nothing else, valuable for its balance and relative objectivity in discussing the threat of domestic communism. Furthermore, I wholeheartedly agree with Morgan's opinion that the failure of the government to release the Verona intercepts as McCarthyism gained steam fed McCarthy and the right-wing populism that supported him. I also agree with Morgan's point that, far from being an example of institutional failure, the threat of domestic communism and McCarthyism are example of how US institutions worked to contain and constrain the threats posed by both the extreme right and the extreme left to the "American Way of Life."

Ted Morgan tells a decent story, flawed as it is by his handling of sources, lack of insight into major players and movements, and superficial biases.

With citations and notes, the book seems to aspire to offer historical significance, but Morgan is no historian. Yet he takes many of these sources at face value. The Venona project, for example, decrytped thousands of secret Soviet messages that U.S. had intercepted. Some critics, ranging from The Nation publisher Victor Navasky to historian Ellen Shrecker, criticize the decrypts at face value. Venona confirmed the identity of Soviet spies, corroborating, for example, the testimony of HUAC friendly witness Elizabeth Bentley. But as Shrecker has warned, spying organizations sometimes don't say what they mean intentionally. Sometimes spies and those in charge of them lie to make themselves look more effective and sometimes to obfuscate their messages.

Morgan also has peculiar biases. In spite of describing FBI Director Herbert Hoover's lies to Presidents, files of embarassing information on them, and dogging Martin Luther King, Morgan generally gives Hoover a pass. He seems to find endearing Hoover's pathetic attempts to tar MLK and the New Left with the brush of communism.

Morgan, almost irrationally, excoriates the Hollywood Ten for what he sees as antics during the HUAC hearings. Without evidence, he attributes their communism to the bourgeois guilt they felt over making so much money in Hollywood. He also fails to credit the fact that these people were not accused of espionage and had broken no laws by belonging to the communist party or its many front groups. Unlike some Soviet spies who came before the committee, Hollywood people were dragged through a show trial for reasons of publicity. As writers, directors, and actors, they never presented a danger to the United States.

Lastly, Morgan shows a stunning lack of insight of what made communism popular. He sees the Depression as a cause, but people are rarely moved by reason alone. There must have been something about life in the Party that made it worth living, not talking about espionage, but the rest of it.

There's enough in Reds to make it worth reading, but Morgan is a writer, not an historian, or for that matter, a deep thinker. He's more interested in telling a story with characters than understanding what makes them tick.

Mark Bail

Sloppy research ruins a good topic. The writing style is smooth. I like how the story of Soviet spies is confirmed by the Venona papers.

HOWEVER, the research is sloppy. If the publisher had a fact checker, he or she should have been fired.

Inexcusable errors. The CPUSA slogan was "Communism is 20th Century Americanism." Morgan says "Communism is Americanism."

It is Moiseye Olgin (variation of Moses), not Misha Olgin (variation of Michael).

Harry Gold lived in a house on Kindred Street with his father and brother. He did not live in an apartment.

The Federal women's prison at Alderson is in West Virginia, not near Seattle.

With mistakes such as these, can anyone trust the details in this book.

Shame on the writer and the publisher

Although educational and well-researched, the book repeats at least three classes of error:

(1) Lack of the relative objectivity such a work needs. I don't expect the author to "support" communists or anarchists, but a better effort to address their concerns and motivations might have been nice. It's not as if even such "extreme leftists" had a copyright on atrocities or pursued them to the exclusion of anything else. Too much work in this area is dominated by either rabid anti-communism or rabid apologism. Not enough middle ground.

(2) Undue presumption of reader familiarity with terminology. Terms like "Ten Days That Changed the World", "White Russians," and others appear without the reader first being familiarized with their meaning. For a book intended for general consumption, this is rather careless. People already knowledgeable about communism might not need such tips, but other readers will.

(3) Need for better editing. The text is strewn with inconsistent verb tense, sentence fragments, and other stumbling blocks. Not devastating in their effect by any means, but very noticeable nonetheless.

Like I said, 3 stars. Average.

During the 20th century, anti-communist hysteria and over-wrought fear of communism was used to destroy many innocent people. It is true that there was some communist infiltration. However, the hysteria about communism was a far greater threat to America than communism itself.

This well-written, long book about the anti-communist hysteria, the actual communist infiltration, and Joe McCarthy is even-handed and well- researched. It does not come down on either side, but does remind us of the terrible cost to the innocents and non-communists during the witch-hunt period of the 40s and 50s. During this time, many innocents were falsely accused of communist influence, and their lives were ruined.

even today, this pernicious and destructive McCarthyism is used to destroy people. What is McCarthyism? It is the use of accusations without proof, the use of 3rd level connections, the use of fear to create action. And most importantly, it is the use of the power of the government to compell action by fear. This aspect of McCarthyism continues in the Bush Administration today.

It is the heart of the Republican Party even today.

The Epilogue is particularly valuable and interesting. He provides a brief history of the HUGE amounts and types of FBI, CIA and other agencies meddling in the civil rights movements (surveillance of King, etc), the youth movement of the 60, and the Nixon debacle. The sheer amount of federal meddling and illegal activities continue to appal all but the most blatant partisan, and remind us that McCarthyism was not a phenomena of McCarthy, but a pervasive and continuing attempt of the right to retain power. In many ways, McCarthyism is fascism, and the book helps in that understanding. At the end, the Epilogue reminds us that the greatest threat to the liberties and values of America is the pervasive apparatus of the State, as wielded by liars like Hoover and deranged power-mad republicans like Nixon. Compared to these actual threats, the Communist Party is pretty weak tea.

I enjoyed the book, and found it quite interesting.

Unlike most books on McCarthyism, Reds by Ted Morgan begins with the Bolshevik takeover of Russia in 1917. Morgan argues, with some persuasiveness, that the internal subversion of America by pro-Soviet forces began right then and there.

The U.S. Government mobilized to fight this menace and as a result, the Cold War according to Morgan really began in 1917, instead of 1947 as traditional historians would have you believe. In Morgan's narrative, the fight against Communist espionage and treason in America had periods of intense public awareness (1919-1920, 1947-1954) and other, longer periods of public indifference such as the 1930's.

Morgan's book is an uneven effort. It alternates between intensely interesting portions and utterly boring parts. It does have the distinction of offering an unusually balanced portrayal of Senator McCarthy's activities as being "an exaggerated reaction to a real threat."

Overall, Reds by Ted Morgan rates 4 out of 5 stars.

You must skip the last section of the epilogue where Mr. Morgan smears Reagan (no mention of "Tear Down This Wall") and George W. Bush. It's a hatchet job that unfortunately casts a partisen shadow over the book that precedes it: a very interesting look at communism on American soil and the country's reaction.

Mr. Morgan gets some facts wrong (the Hollywood Ten were held in contempt for refusing to answer under the 1st amendment - not the 5th) but also uncovers lots of information especially on how deep the communists reached into the Roosevelt administration and specifically how Kremlin controlled the CPA.

It was the loyalty oath programs begun by President Truman that began modern "McCarthyism." Unfortunately Joe was too drunk, insecure, or politically tone-deaf to know when to back off.

Despite his overt political agenda - Mr. Morgan writes a pretty good history of a very real enemy that lived within our borders.

Why would the world need another book on McCarthyism? Maybe in part because of the "recent" release of the Venona transcripts, which reveal equally the very real presence of Comintern agents in the U.S. government and McCarthy's basic irrelevance in combatting it. It's good that Morgan really plunged into these and other transcripts, but all too often his narrative sounds like a grinding-through of yet another transcript selection. But I imagine there was a mountain of information to slog through, and in all fairness his writing is crisp and coherent.

What's not so coherent is Morgan's objective with this book. It really starts to fall apart in the Epilogue. He evidently views "McCarthyism" as a general American political trait, displayed in Hoover's subversion of Martin Luther King, the government's response to student radicals of the '60's, Nixon's suveillance of his enemies, then finally the lead-up to the current Iraq war. It seems like a real stretch to see a thread of commonality in all this, much less to identify that thread as "McCarthyism".

So, if you want to be an ideologue and conclude the book's no good because you read only the Epilogue, the joke's on you. Read the book but skip the Epilogue and you'll have gained some fresh insights into the true extent of Communist infiltration of the U.S. government, the steps taken in response, and the efforts of some to politically capitalize on the threat after it had already waned.

I have worked my way through half of "Reds" and I think its truly an outstanding book. For people seeking an understanding of the origins of the "Red" scare and its continuing impact, this is the place to begin. The one criticism that I do have is that it does get bogged down in the details of history at times, but that doesn't alter the book's significance or usefulness. But, at the same time, I do marvel at the documentation assembled in this book. If the Bush lovers and other far right demagogues don't like this book its because actual events don't conform to their distorted views.

First: contrary to another's reviewer's comment (that seemed to fuel his position), the correct name for HUAC IS 'House Un-American Activities Committee' - "House Committee on Un-American Activities" is a 'generic' (and incorrect) title.

That having been resolved, this is an amazing chronicle of the birth and rapid development of Soviet Communism. The point of this book is to give the reader a comprehensive overview of the US culpability in the development of the Soviet system, all the way back to Wilson and FDR.

This is, no doubt, a difficult lesson, but it is outlined in (sometimes tedious) detail. And it leads us to try to understand the Post-9/11 "American Democratization" of the world we are now experiencing in other parts of the globe.

If you are one who is interested in the US machinations of this period, this is a work that reveals much to be discussed.