Chapter VIII: Front Matter (8)

2. A concealed communist was running for public office. Motion was made that his candidacy be endorsed. Again another outcry from the opponents, but the motion passed.

3. “John Doe is a victim of injustice. We should pass a resolution to be sent to the governor demanding his freedom....” An anticommunist protested, “It’s not our business to be passing resolutions about such matters.” “A reactionary,” replies the spokesman for the communist line. “Aren’t you interested in justice?” Label your opponents as “Fascists,” “reactionaries,” “hardhearted.” The vote was taken: motion passed.

4. The communists had established a Party “front school.” Money was needed for expansion. One source: The 123 Group. Motion was made that a contribution be sent to the “school.” Passed. A tactic the communists like to use: Make noncommunists “share” the Party’s expenses.

5. Other ways: seize, if possible, the group’s bulletin or newspaper. Make it a Party mouthpiece, or at least attempt to silence or weaken its criticism. The instructions flow steadily from Party headquarters: start a letter-writing campaign, pass this foreign-policy resolution, contact a public official. The 123 Group becomes a masquerade for communist attack.

In one instance an official of The 123 Group (who was also a secret communist) was invited to testify before a congressional investigating committee about a certain economic development. What did he do? He went to the Party and asked for copies of the _Daily Worker_ and other communist background material. Now he had the Party line!

Such victories are not always easily won. One requirement is a well-planned floor strategy for all club meetings. That’s the secret of many Party successes. First, as one Party leader expressed it, “we want our mob present.” No absences are allowed. Every Party vote is needed. If a motion is to be made, who will present it? When? Early in the evening while the crowd is large? Or much later when many of the delegates, but not the communists, have gone home? How should objections be handled? If concessions must be made, which ones?

Every move is planned.

If a communist is chairman, the task is easier. He can use many parliamentary devices such as not recognizing an opposition speaker, rushing votes, ruling opponents out of order. The communists, one member remarked, always had the meetings “so well in hand” in his organization that an “outsider” had no chance of even voicing opposition.

Numerous tricks can be used; for example the diamond formation, seating members in a diamond pattern. This gives the impression, during debate, that Party supporters are more numerous than they actually are. Another is the false opposition. Selected members make foolish, silly, and stupid objections to communist proposals. The purpose: to make the communists look even better.

Communist infighting is vicious and utterly devoid of moral principle.

For several years the Party controlled The 123 Group. Time after time, the organization consisting of hundreds of members was subverted for Party purposes.

Then troubles began to appear. Some sympathizers and opportunists grew restive. Noncommunist opposition increased.

Party counterattacks were launched.

The first problem was to hold the opportunist-president in line. Vanity is a weapon in the early stages. Do everything you can to “blow up” his ego. Raise his salary (the organization pays for it, not the Party). Give him a testimonial dinner. Send him as a delegate to a convention, preferably as far away as possible. The communist vice-president will run affairs until he returns.

Frequently, as time passes, opportunists and sympathizers become “big-headed.” They don’t do what they are told. “Jack J. is feeling the effects of power,” one Party leader complained. “He’s forgetting his old factional allies.” Now stronger measures must be applied. Remind him forcefully that it is communist support which keeps him in office. “Encircle the guy,” as one Party member recommended, meaning to make him even more dependent on the Party. Perhaps cut his salary. A little “smear” campaign might be effective.

If new alignments can be made, he might be dropped. If not, he’ll be subjected to even stronger pressure. Blackmail and threats are often part of communist tactics at this stage.

Finally, six years later, The 123 Group eliminated the communist infiltration after a long, tiring battle. Here were some of the basic points the noncommunist opposition had to keep everlastingly in mind:

1. _Rally the majority noncommunist strength._ The communists, usually a minority, capitalize on the lack of interest of noncommunists. One communist member was elected to office with only 3 per cent of the total eligible vote.

2. _Remember that communism is always an evil, never a temporary good._ Often communists give the impression of working for the best interests of the group. “What do you care whether we are communists?” one Party leader asked. “We’re trying to help you.” Another quipped: “Politics don’t matter. It’s the issues that count.” That’s wrong. Any conciliation, friendship, or trust placed in communism will sooner or later be exploited against democratic society.

3. _Don’t underestimate communist ability._ Many communists are extremely intelligent. One Party leader was described by an opponent as very capable, well versed in parliamentary procedure, and possessing an excellent command of English. To think of communists as mere rabble rousers and nuisances is to risk defeat.

4. _Understand communist tactics._ Learn how they, though numerically few, are able to exert a maximum influence. Deceit is one of their strongest weapons.

5. _Stand up and be counted._ Many noncommunists hesitate to speak up in meetings. They fear to be attacked by an acid-tongued Party spokesman. They may remember Mr. So-and-So. He opposed a communist proposal several weeks ago. Now look at him. He hasn’t slept a full night for weeks. Somebody is constantly calling him on the telephone. His relatives are pestered. It’s best, they think, just to stay away from meetings or, if there, remain silent. Others, irritated, bored, or simply “fed up” with communist tactics, walk out. Just what the communists want. They have a clear field. Speak your mind. Stand your ground. Don’t be afraid to defend American liberty.

6. _Wage the fight in a democratic manner._ Emotion should never replace reason as a weapon. To pursue extralegal methods is simply to injure your cause. Fight hard, but fight according to the rules.

When communists speak of their desire to advance the cause of labor, the question should always be asked: What is their objective? In August, 1957, streetcar and bus workers went on strike in Lodz, Poland. The workers were using this means to protest against the unfulfilled promises of the leaders of the Polish Communist government. The strike was soon brought to a halt through the use of some 3000 troops with fixed bayonets and police who fired tear gas into the milling mob.

While the communists were demonstrating their brutality and terroristic tactics against labor in Poland, American communists were giving another demonstration of how they habitually ignore the truth. William Z. Foster, as the elder statesman of the Communist Party in the United States, was saying:

One of the most striking phenomena of the capitalist world in
recent years has been the enormous extension of the workers’
fight for democracy—among other phases, to defend their right
to organize and strike.... World Socialism has enormously
stimulated this struggle.

The answer is a simple one. The communists, once in control, crush every opponent, while, in coming to power, they promise everything to soften the opposition. This opposition will be “softened,” however, only if we allow infiltration to take place before our very eyes without knowing it for what it is.

17.

_The Communist Front_

The auditorium was packed. More than 1000 delegates and observers waved their arms enthusiastically, along with some 200 others who did not fill out registration forms to avoid leaving a record of their attendance. (The _Daily Worker_ said they were in “... fear of intimidation.”) This was the founding convention of the National Negro Labor Council, a new organization dedicated to “equality,” “social progress,” and the upholding of “civil rights.” Speeches, resolutions, election of officers, everything ran smoothly. Two days later came adjournment. A new communist front had been born.

Delegates had come from all over the United States. They would now return to their home cities, start local chapters, enroll members, issue literature.

A master organizing hand was at work. One thousand individuals just didn’t arrive by accident.

The convention call was communist-inspired. For weeks in advance, local Party members had been arranging housing, running errands, securing finances.

The Council claimed that its purpose was to aid the Negro; however, the House Committee on Un-American Activities concluded that, “rather than helping the Negro worker, it has been a deterrent to him.”

The founding of the National Negro Labor Council was typical of many Party fronts created over the past generation.

Fronts probably represent the Party’s most successful tactic in capturing noncommunist support. Like mass agitation and infiltration, fronts espouse the deceptive Party line (hence the term “front”) while actually advancing the real Party line. In this way the Party is able to influence thousands of noncommunists, collect large sums of money, and reach the minds, pens, and tongues of many high-ranking and distinguished individuals. Moreover, fronts are excellent fields for Party recruitment.

A front is an organization which the communists openly or secretly control. The communists realize that they are not welcome in American society. Party influence, therefore, is transmitted, time after time, by a belt of concealed members, sympathizers, and dupes. Fronts become transmission belts between the Party and the noncommunist world. Earl Browder, when head of the Party, gave this definition: “Transmission belts mean having Communists work among the masses in the various organizations.”

Some may be newly created, or, as often happens, they may be old-line organizations captured by infiltration, like The 123 Group mentioned in the preceding chapter. They may operate nationally, regionally, or locally. Some are permanent organizations; others exist for only a day, a week, or a month.

The Party has operated hundreds of major fronts in practically every field of Party agitation: “peace,” civil rights, protection of the foreign-born, support for Smith Act “victims,” abolition of H-bomb tests, exploitation of nationality and minority groups. Some are based on specific appeal, to teachers, writers, lawyers, labor, women, youth. Many have national officers, local chapters, and substantial assets.

In addition, literally hundreds of minor fronts of all shapes, sizes, and types appear each year in everyday Party life. They serve a specific short-time purpose, then disappear. A few handbills, a rally, or a picket line, and a front has gone to work.

We must not think of fronts in terms of legitimate organizations. A few fronts collect dues, issue a newspaper, or sponsor organized activities, such as a sports program or cultural affairs. Most, however, exist only on paper. Their assets usually consist of a few office supplies, a secondhand Mimeograph machine, and a mailing list. The danger of a Party front rests not on its physical appearance or size but on its ability to deceive.

A few fronts may maintain separate headquarters, usually in a small room in an old building. Some operate from Party headquarters, a basement, or somebody’s home. Often they are found in clusters, one office serving as the headquarters for two, three, or a half-dozen fronts. The only difference is the wording of their names.

“Front schools,” where Marxist and related subjects were available for noncommunist students, have been most important to the communists over the years. In one such school it is estimated that over 100,000 individuals received instruction; in another, 75,000.

Every front, in its own way, is fighting the Party’s battles:

—sponsoring agitation campaigns;

—collecting money (fronts are one of the Party’s chief sources
of income);

—supplying speakers for noncommunist organizations (it’s
surprising the number of requests received by front groups,
especially those sponsoring “peace” and “civil rights,” for
speakers. A sympathizer or dupe who has prominence in the
community, such as a lawyer or professor, will often be sent);

—issuing literature;

—sponsoring mass rallies;

—lobbying for or against legislative bills;

—influencing key individuals whom the Party could not otherwise
reach;

—teaching Marxist doctrines.

During the recent period when most Party headquarters were closed because of a tactical shift to underground operations, fronts performed many functions for the Party. In Chapter 20, we shall see this aspect of fronts.

A single front can generate terrific communist pressure. Take this case, for example:

Time: shortly after lunch. Agnes G, executive secretary of the DEF Committee to Fight the High Cost of Living, is reading a letter.

Dan H enters the office. “It’s happened. The legislature just passed the Anticommunist Bill.”

This bill must be stopped.

As a first step Agnes dictates a letter to Professor Frank Y, a “good friend” at the university. “Issue a statement right away. This bill threatens freedom of speech. It must be vetoed.”

Then more letters are sent to teachers, clergymen, several lawyers. Contact is made with key Party members and sympathizers.

“The Anticommunist Bill has passed. Send telegrams to the governor, urging a veto. Start a petition circulating.”

Next, a bold step: Agnes places a telephone call to the governor.

“Mr. Governor, I’m speaking for the DEF Committee to Fight the High Cost of Living. We are disturbed about the passage of the Anticommunist Bill. We feel you should veto it. Would it be possible to have our representatives meet with you?”

The governor agrees. He wants to hear all points of view. The DEF Committee sounds like one of many groups interested in this legislation.

An appointment is made.

Pressure was being built up. The front could enter where the Party never dreamed of going. Three ministers, an attorney, and a newspaperman were contacted. Would they see the governor as part of the delegation?

“I want Larry R to go along,” Agnes says. “He’s not too bright a guy, but he’s easy and willing. I can tell him what to say. Besides, he’s from a very respectable organization.”

Nothing was said about the fact that this delegation was serving a communist purpose.

Every point had to be planned. “Be sure the right people do the talking.” About one fellow the Party organizer had commented, “Better have him stay quiet.” You never know, maybe a dupe will say something out of place.

How to talk to the governor? The delegation could act like “nice, little people,” but that wouldn’t be very impressive. Or it could be vaguely threatening. The latter suggestion was ruled out as too dangerous.

Not everything went according to plan. One minister refused to go. Agnes became angry. “It takes this kind of work,” she fumed, “to see what ministers are made of—dishwater.”

A wonderful guy, if you cooperate; if not, you’re a “bum.”

The delegation was dispatched, a delegation made up chiefly of noncommunists, yet fighting for communist aims, a delegation organized exclusively by a communist front. The DEF Committee was not interested in opposing the high cost of living. _It was fighting for communism._

Fronts exist not in isolation but as part of a vast, interlaced front system. Communist pressure can be greatly increased by manipulating these organizations.

Take, for example, roof, or compound, fronts. Here a number of fronts, as in the nationality field, will form a super, over-all front such as the old American League Against War and Fascism, which at its peak claimed 7,500,000 members. Often the propaganda value is to show unity: all these organizations, representing many different nationalities, are working together for common aims.

Or consider the National Negro Labor Council, mentioned at the beginning of this chapter. This also was a roof, or compound, front created by already existing fronts. Let’s see how this works.

First, “delegates” must be “elected” to a “national founding convention.” Immediately, communist fronts across the nation “elect delegates,” and communist-controlled labor unions choose as their delegates those best suited for convention service.

At the convention all arrangements are made by Party leaders, including the selection of officers, the issuing of press releases, the passing of resolutions. This includes the actual running of the convention to ensure security. To illustrate, a newspaper reporter went to the convention. He had once been a Party member but had been expelled. On the first day of the convention one of the officials invited him outside and asked if he had been expelled. The reporter admitted that he had, and was ordered not to come back into the convention hall.

Hailed as representing “thousands of members,” the new organization is a front created out of fronts.

Another technique of manipulation is the continuing front. Here the same front is maintained by changing the name to meet current conditions. In 1940 the American Peace Mobilization was formed, urging mobilization for peace and no aid to Britain. In 1941, after Germany’s invasion of Russia, the name was changed to American People’s Mobilization, and the demands to all-out aid to Britain and a second front. This was the same group with a different name.

Again, on October 16, 1943, the Young Communist League was dissolved and the very next day the American Youth for Democracy was formed. Later the group was called Labor Youth League. All were designed to recruit young people for communism.

The continuing front is well suited for “victim” agitation cases; for example, the Committee to Save John Doe. This group, so active for Doe, had lapsed into disuse. A new “victim,” Richard Roe, was now at hand. Resurrect the old front!

That is exactly what happened. A communist arrived in town and contacted leaders of the old Committee to Save the Martinsville Seven. Where had it achieved the best results while agitating for the Seven? What were the problems? How could it best be used again?

A few days later the new front was already in action; the Committee to Save Albert Jackson, the same old faces under a new name. On Sunday morning its members were handing out leaflets in front of churches. In this instance Jackson was executed and the comrades turned to other fields.

Still another device is the satellite front, a cluster of minor fronts around a larger front. A new issue, like higher transit rates or the draining of a swamp, arises. The DEF Committee to Fight the High Cost of Living (the larger front) starts satellites, such as related committees in various sections of the city. Many of these satellites are paper organizations; however, they make a formidable showing to the uninformed.

These fronts are a vehicle for communist pressure. They are highly fissionable. From many comes one; from one come many. They can be cut, sliced, slivered, or compounded to fit any need. No wonder the Party makes so much use of them in mass agitation.

The campaign is launched, urging the veto of the Anticommunist Bill. Let’s see how the Party’s front system is brought into play.

Suddenly telegrams, letters, petitions pour in on the governor from all kinds of groups such as organizations protesting higher taxes; youth, women’s, union, and veterans’ organizations; free-speech groups; civil-rights organizations. To an uncritical eye it must seem that a wide stratum of population is interested in a veto of the anticommunist legislation. Then messages arrive from other countries (from international fronts), as if the whole world, “millions of people” as the communists like to say, is vitally interested in the bill.

Many noncommunists may oppose the legislation for a variety of reasons and express their opinions by letter, telegram, and petition. That, very emphatically, does not make them communists. They are only exercising their democratic privileges. What we are interested in here, however, is how the Communist Party, through its front system, can stimulate a vast and often effective propaganda barrage—a barrage which, within hours, can be turned off or shifted elsewhere.

Many times fronts appear bewildering in their variety; agitating on countless issues; based on different groups and occupations; and working in many ways. But actually their technique of formation is virtually identical.

Let’s look briefly inside a communist front and see how it operates. At the center is always the Party, organizing, manipulating, seeing that the right persons are in charge. Noncommunists might well ponder this comment by a Party organizer:

Experience has shown that most sponsors are unwilling to give
of themselves sufficiently to stop the secretary from directing
policy.

So true! The communists realize that if the secretary (or other key officer) is a communist (almost always a concealed member), the Party can dominate the organization. Let the letterhead glitter with noncommunist names: president, vice-president, members of the executive board. They serve as lightning rods, camouflaging the communist interest. To the sponsors, the prestige; to the communists, the power.

Around this communist core come layer after layer of noncommunists. As we have seen in Chapter 15, great emphasis is placed on attracting noncommunists, the more prominent the better, into communist propaganda work. These noncommunists, by allowing their names to be used as sponsors, giving testimonials, or appearing at front rallies, are aiding the Party. It cannot be emphasized too often how the communists attempt to exploit for strictly partisan purposes the legitimate interests of noncommunists in social and economic problems, world peace, civil rights, and so forth.

Most important to fronts are mailing lists containing the names of persons to whom literature can be sent. Perhaps you have received such propaganda in the mail and wondered whence it came. Party-front mailing lists are compiled in many ways—from telephone books, directories, membership rolls of infiltrated organizations (“loaned” by concealed members). Then the daily press is followed. Front headquarters may jot down the names of officers in noncommunist organizations. You never know. Someday they might “come in handy.”

Party fronts are aggressive. To wait for the noncommunist is wrong. Seek him out. “We must get into the neighborhoods more and into the home.” Through rallies, parades, picket lines, forums, debates, circulation of literature, fronts are constantly seeking public support. They operate on the main streets of America.

Another thing: The agitation is always practical. Talk about peace, jobs, and the price of milk, not Marx’s ideas of revolution. Link the struggle with “the fight for pork chops.”

Peace is an everyday issue and ... should involve the
housewife, the woman who has to wrestle with budgets in the
hopeless struggle with taxes, high prices and a shrinking pay
check.

In one instance, for example, a cookbook was issued by a front, a “dollar stretcher” containing low-priced menus. Here is the point. These recipes will help, somewhat. But, Mrs. Housewife, you can never hope for a stable economy (where prices are always low) until “peace” (Soviet style) is achieved.

That’s mixing propaganda with eggs and butter, sugar and salt.

Many times, trick “come-ons” are used. Consider communist-sponsored forums, for instance. Here are some Party-suggested topics:

—Are American marriages a failure?

—How to find an apartment.

—Should the voting age be reduced to eighteen years?

—Future of youth, what is it?

—Can heart disease be cured?

—Can cancer be cured or prevented?

—How to become a cultured person.

What have these to do with communism? Nothing. But they bring listeners within talking distance.

If one thing won’t work, maybe another will, such as a special celebration, in which a front sponsors an exhibit of “peace” literature or Russian photographs. Then there are round-robin letters, chain telephone calls, forums for high school science teachers. One front sold “Christmas seals.” Another was planning to put out a leaflet. “Fine,” commented an associate, “but be sure to add the inscription which appears on the Statue of Liberty. That’ll make it sound better.” Festivals and rallies, often featuring foreign “dignitaries,” attract hundreds, even thousands. Don’t forget to conduct polls on the street, always securing through partisan manipulation “proof” that the “people” support points advocated in the Party line.

Communist Parties around the world collaborate whenever it will advance their cause. Some years ago a women’s conference was convened in Paris, France, and out of it grew the Women’s International Democratic Federation.

Long before the Paris gathering the Communist Party went to work promoting delegations of American women. One hundred telegrams were sent out from Communist Party headquarters in New York City to leaders of various women’s organizations, announcing that they had been chosen as delegates and inviting them to attend a meeting at the home of the chairman of the committee. A temporary Committee on Cooperation with the International Women’s Conference came into being to make arrangements. An expediter was appointed to get passports, and a special rate of 495 dollars for a round trip by plane was secured. And so the ladies went to Paris, many without the slightest idea that the affair had been promoted by the Communist Party.

Out of the Women’s International Democratic Federation grew its American affiliate, the Congress of American Women. Shortly after the Congress had its first meeting, the National Committee of the Communist Party met in New York City. At this meeting one of its members discussed the importance of the Women’s International Democratic Federation to the Communist Party. This high Party official then stated that the Party did not then control the newly created Congress of American Women, and that the communists needed to “infiltrate it more.” The Congress has since been designated as a subversive organization by the Attorney General, the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee, and the House Committee on Un-American Activities.

Earlier in this chapter we spoke of international fronts. The following is an example:

An envelope was postmarked at Prague, Czechoslovakia, addressed to an American college. Inside was a printed letter signed by the Prorector and Secretary of Charles University, Prague, formerly renowned as a great European educational institution, now a communist propaganda front. The letter opened:

We send you the Proclamation of the Charles University against
the use [by the United States] of the bacteriological warfare
in Korea and urge you to express your views on the named
Proclamation.

Enclosed was the “PROCLAMATION of the Academic Community of the Charles University....”

As you read the message, note the propaganda techniques employed:

1. _The appeal prostitutes the reputation of a well-known university for propaganda purposes_: “We, professors, lecturers and the other scientific workers of the Charles University in Prague, one of the oldest universities of the world....”

2. _The appeal allegedly is based on humanitarian and scientific grounds_: “With full responsibility to our human and scientific consciences we have considered the danger which threatens all of humanity through the crimes that are being committed by the American imperialist army.”

3. _The appeal is directed to scientific teachers in universities._ The idea is that an appeal from a member of one profession or occupation to another is more effective than random appeals. This device is often used, with Russian writers, artists, musicians addressing their “counterparts” in America: “We address ourselves to you, scientific workers of universities of all countries....”

4. _The weight of scholarly backing is designed to influence opinion._ (If scientists in this university say the charges are true, they must be true.) For example:

These facts prove that the armies of the American
interventionists have repeatedly used bacteriological weapons.

* * * * *

From the American airplanes bombs were dropped containing
different kind of insects, rats, etc., which were infected
with plague, cholera and other epidemic diseases, and infected
foodstuffs as well.

* * * * *

... we are ashamed to think of those American members
of medical science who have committed themselves to the
preparation of these repulsive crimes.

5. _Action is recommended_: “We urge you to refuse to place your scientific knowledge at the service of mass extermination of mankind.... Protest not only in your activity as teachers and in your work in the scientific press, but with your governments as well!”

The proclamation is designed to make a lie believable, to paint the United States as a murderer and the Soviet Union as a protector of peace, thanks to a dignified and “respectable” front.

Most of this communist propaganda would be laughable except for its deadly seriousness. The Party is not kidding. This is live ammunition designed to capture, maim, and kill. To regard communist fronts and their propaganda as foolishness is to risk our freedom.

Examine the communist attitude toward parades, for example. Most people think of parades as a time of interest and commemoration. Not the communists. Parades are weapons of propaganda, another form of front.

Listen to these Party instructions, for example, concerning parades, issued by the old Central Committee of the Party before it was abolished:

The marchers must be well mannered. Walk in rhythm. Don’t be “a line of stragglers shuffling along like a tired and discouraged army in retreat.”

The result is that the value of the demonstration as a means
of impressing and winning over or neutralizing hostile people
along the line of march is lost.

Here are a few things that should be remembered:

Every two or three hundred marchers should be led by a band,
a bugle or fife and drum corps. We need scores of bands, with
plenty of brass instruments.

Banners and placards! Do not be “stingy with the length of sticks.” Cut out the fancy lettering. It is difficult to read.

Use good English. “Some slogans are so bad grammatically, that people are amused at seeing them.” The fewer the words the better. Don’t just “slap” slogans on cardboard. Make sure they are “politically correct.”

More advice: carry placards “on a slight angle, with wording facing the sidewalks.” Scatter them through the parade; avoid bunching. Streamers: too much pulling causes ripping; not enough causes folding.

A favorite field for communist fronts is the election campaign for public office. Running communist candidates for city council, mayor, governor, even for the presidency of the United States, is an old Party habit. Never has the Party, running under its own name, been able to secure many votes. In instances where Party candidates have run under their own colors, their defeats have almost invariably been disastrous. Party candidates have run five times (1924 through 1940) for the presidency of the United States and in 1932 achieved their highest percentage of the total vote cast—a mere 0.3 per cent, or 102,991 out of almost 40,000,000 votes cast. Three times the percentage was 0.1, and once, 0.2. In instances, however, where the Party has maneuvered political alliances, it has achieved more success, as shown by the election of Benjamin J. Davis, Jr., and Peter Cacchione, both well-known communists, to the City Council of New York City in the 1940’s. Yet these campaigns give training in agitation and enable the Party to smear rivals, scream its propaganda, and cause unrest.

Party candidates also frequently run in concealed capacities. Board-of-education campaigns are well suited to communist exploitation. Usually running as independents, Party candidates can conceal their true affiliations. Moreover, national and international issues that would betray their basic sentiments, such as the Russian intervention in Hungary, are not likely to arise. In such campaigns Party-sponsored candidates are invited to parent-teacher meetings, community centers, public forums, to participate in radio debates (when the time is donated), and speak in the homes of private citizens. “The Citizens (or Independent) Committee for ——” takes the candidate where, as a communist, he could never dream of going. The Party, behind the scenes, works overtime stuffing propaganda into envelopes, passing out cards, drumming up enthusiasm.

The results are often amazing. William Z. Foster in one of his books boasts that in Cleveland, Ohio, “A. Krchmarek, Communist candidate for the school board, received 64,213 votes,” while in California, “the well-known Communist, Bernadette Doyle, polled the big total of 613,670 votes on a nonpartisan ticket as candidate for Superintendent of Public Schools.” Krchmarek and Doyle both ran on independent, nonpartisan tickets and were not identified on the ballot as communists. In another instance a Party member, also running in a concealed capacity, failed by only a few votes to be elected a city official. He was supported by two anticommunist newspapers that had no way of knowing his Party background.

This is the communist-front movement. Its strength rests on deceit and its ability to attract the support of noncommunists.

Fronts, however, can be detected. You, as an alert citizen, can do much to weaken their influence. Here are a few tests:

1. Does the organization espouse the cause of Soviet Russia?
Does it shift when the Party line shifts?

2. Does the organization feature as speakers at its meetings
known communists or sympathizers?

3. Does the organization sponsor causes, campaigns, literature,
petitions, or other activities sponsored by the Party or other
front organizations?

4. Is the organization used as a sounding board by, or is it
endorsed by, communist-controlled labor unions?

5. Does its literature follow the communist line or is it
printed by the communist press?

6. Does the organization receive consistent favorable mention
in communist publications?

7. Does the organization represent itself to be nonpartisan,
yet engage in political activities and consistently advocate
causes favored by the communists? Does it denounce both
fascists and communists?

8. Does the organization denounce American foreign policy while
always lauding Soviet policy?

9. Does the organization utilize communist double talk by
referring to Soviet-dominated countries as democracies,
complaining that the United States is imperialistic, and
constantly denouncing monopoly-capital?

10. Have outstanding leaders in public life openly renounced
affiliation with the organization?

11. Does the organization, if espousing liberal, progressive
causes, attract well-known, honest, patriotic liberals, or does
it denounce well-known liberals?

12. Does the organization consistently consider matters not
directly related to its avowed purposes and objectives?

These are some ways, direct and indirect, of the above-ground Communist Party, which is working against all of us. But this is only one arm of a gigantic pincer. The other is underground.

18.

_Communism and Minorities_

The Communist Party from its very inception has held itself out as the “vanguard of the working class,” and as such has sought to assume the role of protector and champion of minorities. It directs special attention, among others, to Negroes and nationality groups. Actually the vast majority of Negroes and members of foreign-language groups have rejected communism for what it is: a heartless, totalitarian way of life which completely disregards the dignity of man.

In the case of the Negro minority the Comintern began in 1928 to lay down a specific Party line for the guidance of comrades in the United States. According to Comintern instructions, Negroes were to be considered as an “oppressed race.” The Party was told to carry on a struggle “for equal rights,” but “in the South ... the main Communist slogan must be: _The Right of Self-Determination of the Negroes in the Black Belt_.”

Communist leaders, faithfully following Moscow’s instructions, promptly started a campaign of agitation. In nominating James W. Ford, a Negro, to run for Vice-President of the United States on the Communist Party ticket in 1932, with presidential candidate William Z. Foster, C. A. Hathaway, then a member of the Party’s Election Campaign National Committee, reiterated instructions received in a 1930 Comintern resolution:

In the first place, our demand is that the land of the Southern
white landlords ... be confiscated and turned over to the
Negroes....

Secondly, we propose to break up the present artificial
state boundaries ... and to establish the state unity of
the territory known as the “Black Belt,” where the Negroes
constitute the overwhelming majority of the population.

Thirdly, in this territory, we demand that the Negroes be given
the complete right of self-determination; _the right to set
up their own government_ in this territory and the right to
separate, if _they_ wish, from the United States.

Hence, “equal rights” and “self-determination” in the Black Belt became the Party’s chief slogans for Negroes. By “self-determination” the Party meant what Stalin had said: “... the right of the oppressed peoples of the dependent countries and colonies to complete secession, as the right of nations to independent existence as states.”

As for the “Black Belt,” or as one article termed it, the “new Negro Republic,” the communists have given various descriptions. In 1948 they described the Belt as extending through twelve Southern states: “Heading down from its eastern point in Virginia’s tidewater section, it cuts a strip through North Carolina, embraces nearly all of South Carolina, cuts into Florida, passes through lower and central Georgia and Alabama, engulfs Mississippi and the Louisiana Delta, wedges into eastern Texas and Southwest Tennessee, and has its western anchor in southern Arkansas.”

By 1952 the communist concept of the Black Belt had been narrowed to “at least five Southeastern states, with port outlets at Charleston on the Atlantic and Mobile on the Gulf, encompassing the bulk of Mississippi, and a good section of South Carolina, Georgia and Alabama.”

As we know from cumulative evidence, the Party’s position toward Negroes is determined not by concern for their welfare but obedience to Soviet foreign policy. As World War II approached, for example, the Party switched its tactics regarding “self-determination” in the Black Belt. Instead of calling for the immediate and revolutionary overthrow of white landlords, as the Comintern had originally instructed, the Party now switched these demands to a purely theoretical and propaganda level: “... It is clear that the Negro masses are not yet ready to carry through the revolution which would make possible the right to self-determination.” Why the shift? To satisfy the Party’s united-front program, which demanded that the Party work harmoniously with other groups to strengthen the Soviet Union.

The World War II period found the Party cynically abandoning any alleged struggle for Negro rights. The aim was to help not Negroes but Moscow. “When we fought for the right of Negro workers to enter industries we often fought for such jobs mainly in the interest of the war effort.” Earl Browder in 1945 admitted that as early as 1942 the Party had adopted the theory that “... the struggle for Negro rights must be postponed until after the war....” The Negro, in communist eyes, was a mere pawn, to be manipulated for the attainment of Party aims.

It became obvious that the Party, despite great efforts, had failed to win over even a significant minority of Negroes. Negroes resented the Party’s severe criticism of Negro clergymen who had been vigorously denouncing communism. Earlier the Party had been unable adequately to justify Russia’s aid to Italy in its invasion of Ethiopia. American Negroes had realized that the Party was a fraud and a deception and that it was willing to betray the Negro to better serve Soviet Russia.

In early 1956 the Party decided to modify its advocacy of “self-determination,” realizing that Negro opposition to communism was growing. In making this change, communists said they would still consider the Negroes as constituting a national as well as a racial minority.

Eugene Dennis, resuming his old post as General Secretary of the Communist Party (in 1956) after serving a prison term for violation of the Smith Act, said:

In re-appraising our position on self-determination in the
Black Belt, our Party should emphasize, as never before, that
the struggle for Negro rights and freedom, north and south
of the Mason-Dixon line, has emerged as a general, national
democratic task, upon the solution of which depends the
democratic and social advance of the whole nation, particularly
of the workers and farmers.

The Party’s claim that it is working for Negro rights is a deception and a fraud. The Party’s sole interest, as most American Negroes know, is to hoodwink the Negro, to exploit him and use him as a tool to build a communist America.

The Party has made vigorous efforts to infiltrate the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). This organization in 1950 authorized its board of directors to revoke the charter of any chapter found to be communist-controlled. Nevertheless the Party has tried various infiltration tactics:

—In Philadelphia, the Party secured NAACP applications and
instructed Party members to join.

—In Louisiana, the Party’s District Organizer instructed all
Negro Party members to join the NAACP and urge the creation
of a youth organization, and to form committees to encourage
Negroes to register to vote.

—In Gary, Indiana, a Party member, also an NAACP member,
promoted the signing of petitions to pass a city ordinance.

—In Cincinnati, a Party Organizer instructed that Party members
call the NAACP and urge the holding of a city-wide mass
meeting. When calling, they should claim to be members of the
NAACP.

The NAACP’s national leadership has vigorously denounced communist attempts at infiltration. In 1956, when the NAACP and other organizations sponsored a National Conference on Civil Rights in Washington, the Party attempted to “move in,” and started promoting the conference. The NAACP countered by screening the delegates.

Similarly, in 1957, in the Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom in Washington, the Party again attempted to move in and tried to exploit the pilgrimage as a rallying point for unity. NAACP leaders publicly told the communists that they were not welcome, and steps were taken to keep them off the platform. One outstanding Negro leader even tried to cancel the pilgrimage to prevent communists from propagandizing the event. Concerning Paul Robeson, who has long fronted for the communists, he stated: “... the boat is waiting to take him to Russia....” He added that he would raise the necessary funds to defray expenses. In Philadelphia, a Negro clergyman told the Baptist Ministers Conference that the Negro people did not want the communists interfering with their problems.

One of the most effective anticommunist measures I have heard of is the following: The NAACP had a meeting in Norfolk, Virginia, presided over by a clergyman. The minister opened the meeting with the simple statement that if any members of the Communist Party were present they would be excused. Silence ensued, with no person leaving. Then the chairman, starting with the front row, asked each individual if he were a communist. All entered denials until he got to the back of the room, where the state organizer for the Communist Party was sitting with a white woman. When asked the question, he tried to evade, but the minister pinned him down. The state organizer then stated that he did not think it was proper to ask such a question. The minister calmly replied, “You are excused,” and the couple left.

The Communist Party has stated: “The Negro race must understand that capitalism means racial oppression and Communism means social and racial equality.” Many Negroes, however, have learned by bitter experience how fraudulent and deceitful communists are. For example, Richard Wright, the Negro novelist, tells in the book, _The God That Failed_, why he rebelled against communist thought control. In describing how at the time he left the Party he was assaulted on a Chicago street, he wrote, “I could not quite believe what had happened, even though my hands were smarting and bleeding. I had suffered a public, physical assault by two white Communists with black Communists looking on.”

In Buffalo, New York, at a Party meeting, a Negro comrade stated that many Negroes felt they were joining a union when they were recruited into the Party. The comrade, however, was stopped at this point and not permitted to speak further. In many cases Negroes have been recruited by deceptive methods with the hope that once in the Party they would be converted to communism. In one New York State club the functionary learned that thirty members thought they were joining a union rather than the Communist Party. The matter was investigated, and it turned out that a Negro woman had become overly enthusiastic in a membership drive. She had not fully explained the nature of the organization being joined.

In San Francisco, Party functionaries were concerned about a club where Negro members predominated, although the club was actually controlled by white members. It was ordered that the role of the white members be decreased. The functionaries also instructed that the club be carefully watched to prevent scandals, and warned that, while scandals must be prevented, care should be exercised not to convey the impression that white girls should not mix socially with Negroes or vice versa. Some of the Negro wives were becoming suspicious, as it seemed they were being pushed into the background after their husbands joined the Party.

The Communist Party, while preaching “equality,” still differentiates between races. For example, in the 1957 convention of the Party, an accurate record of the delegates was kept. The breakdown was as follows: 209 males, 78 females; 54 Negroes, 2 Mexicans, and 1 Puerto Rican. The hypocrisy of the Party was clearly shown when it required each delegate to register his race, although for years the Party publicly has campaigned to have the blank for “race” removed from all questionnaires.

Communist leaders have been complaining bitterly about the turnover of Negro members and of the Party’s inability to indoctrinate any large number of Negroes. Information we have received follows a regular pattern: Negroes are rejecting communism.

A Negro in the Midwest became interested in the Party because
it claimed that Negroes were treated as equals. Later he was
unjustly accused of consorting with a white non-Party member.
He quit.

* * * * *

A Negro in Illinois started going to Party social functions
and became impressed with communist talk of “equality.” But
when he attended more advanced meetings and heard the United
States constantly denounced, he came to the conclusion that the
communists were under the domination of Russia. He left the
Party.

* * * * *

A Negro woman, recruited in Chicago, was rapidly promoted by
the Party. Then she noticed an incident involving a Negro man
who got into difficulties on his job, but the Party refused to
support him. She concluded that the Party was interested in
neither trade unionism nor the welfare of Negroes. She quit.

* * * * *

A Negro in New York joined the Party because he felt it was
championing his race. After a period of Marxist instruction,
he was told to secure a job with a work gang at a pier and
to recruit other Negroes into the Party. He came to the
conclusion that the Party was not interested in him as a Negro
but only as a tool to recruit other Negroes. He quit.

* * * * *

A New England Negro also became interested in the Party when he
learned of its alleged interest in helping his race. But upon
becoming a member he discovered that the Party’s interest was
strictly vocal, and nothing concrete was done to help Negroes.
Moreover, he disliked the Party’s denunciation of God and
religion. He quit.

As early as 1922 the Comintern approved a subsidy of 300,000 dollars for propaganda among American Negroes. In 1925 the Soviets requested that a group of Negroes be selected to come to Russia for training in propaganda work. A dozen were recruited. One of these, returning to the United States three years later, brought with him a draft for 75,000 dollars to help pay for propaganda work among his race.

One Negro later was designated to attend the Lenin School, and his experience there further unmasked communist hypocrisy and the Party’s true feelings toward the Negro. He went to Russia with a delegation of students to enter the Lenin School. This young Negro, as he has since related, then “believed that through Communism a better and fairer world could be developed for all mankind.”

He was troubled, however, by the communist position in urging Negro “self-determination” and the implications of a “buffer” state in this country being carved out of the so-called “Black Belt.” Almost immediately after his arrival in Russia he “was told long stories of political persecution” by the Negroes attending the Lenin School. He was slow to give credence to these stories until he saw for himself: “I found that Negroes were special objects of political exploitation. The sacrifices and dirty work planned for the American Negro Communists as spearheads for communizing the United States made it obvious that we were considered only as pawns in a game where others would get the prize.”

Becoming more outspoken and cynical about the communist program for Negroes, he became the target of a slander campaign inside the Lenin School. Finally this young American Negro was charged and tried before a court-martial. He was guilty of disaffection. A few students, sympathizing with his position, made a bold decision to report their grievances to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Then things began to happen. Classes in the American Section of the school were suspended. Some of the instructors were disciplined.

The young Negro explained that the Comintern ordered Earl Browder, then Secretary of the Communist Party in the United States, to Moscow immediately. Browder arrived and sought to smooth things over. Eventually the young Negro returned to the United States, working for a while as a Party functionary in Detroit. One of his last jobs was to make preparations for the founding of the National Negro Congress. Then he quit because he could no longer give aid to the communists “concentrating on their most helpless, and whom they think to be, their most gullible victims: the Negro.”

The communists have created numerous fronts over the years in attempts to attract Negroes. Once a front is discredited, it is allowed to die and a new one created.

The American Negro Labor Congress came into being in 1925, and in 1930 its name was changed to the League of Struggle for Negro Rights. Within six years it had ceased to exist.

In 1935 the National Negro Congress was launched in Washington, D.C., its chief purpose being to protect Negro rights. It started out as noncommunist, and James W. Ford complained in 1936 that although “The National Negro Congress did not adopt a Communist program ... we Communists stand one hundred per cent behind it in its efforts to unite the Negro people....”

By 1940 communists had infiltrated the National Negro Congress to such an extent that when its president, A. Philip Randolph, “warned the Congress to stick to its principle and remain nonpartisan ...” the communists staged a demonstration and walked out, leaving only a third of the audience to finish hearing Randolph. This 1940 convention of the National Negro Congress passed a resolution condemning the war as “imperialist,” and drew from a communist writer the observation that the congress had “only acted in accord with the fundamental interests of the Negro people.”

In 1947 the National Negro Congress merged with the Civil Rights Congress, an out-and-out communist front which has recently dissolved.

The old International Labor Defense (ILD) also tried to influence the American Negro, and came into conflict with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People as a result of the ILD’s communist tactics in converting the Scottsboro (Alabama) Case into a vehicle for communist propaganda. In this case nine Negro boys were indicted in 1931 on charges of having raped two white girls.

After the Scottsboro boys were first convicted, the NAACP charged that the defense “fell considerably short of perfection,” and then retained the late famed Chicago criminal lawyer, Clarence Darrow, to represent the boys. In 1931 the late Walter White, then head of the NAACP, said the _Daily Worker_ accused another defense attorney, Stephen R. Roddy, “... of being a member of the Ku Klux Klan, of having conspired with the prosecution to electrocute the nine boys, of having been the inmate of an insane asylum.” According to White, the communists also charged the NAACP “as being ‘in league with the lyncher-bosses of the South,’ as plotters to ‘murder the Scottsboro martyrs,’ as sycophantic ‘tools of the capitalists.’” The NAACP withdrew from the case, recognizing that the Communist Party was interested only in promoting “Red Fascism” in America.

George S. Schuyler, an editor of the _Pittsburgh Courier_, reflected the consensus of American Negroes when he concluded, “... The record shows that where and when the Communists seemed to be fighting for Negro rights, their object was simply to strengthen the hand of Russia.”

In similar fashion the Communist Party has long considered foreign-language groups in the United States fertile fields for infiltration. Since many of the early comrades were foreign-born, agitation among national groups became a natural outlet for Party activity. In recent years the Nationality Groups Commission has coordinated agitation in this field.

The Party has attempted to use national groups, among other things, to exert pressure for changes in American foreign policy. Pressure campaigns are organized, petitions circulated, testimonials secured, hoping to make the government believe that a national group, such as the Italians, Hungarians, or Slovaks, supports the line desired by the Party. Party-controlled newspapers grind out accompanying propaganda.

Party fronts have been particularly active among national groups. The communists always make strenuous efforts to infiltrate and capture fraternal insurance societies serving national groups. As we have seen, such tactics give the Party a ready base, along with somebody else’s money, for further agitation. The Party, moreover, always likes to pose as the “protector” of national cultures. Hence, it often sponsors nationality bazaars, picnics, and dances, where costumes from native lands are worn and native music is played. After the Soviet conquest of Eastern Europe, however, the Party had increasing difficulty trying to peddle the “glories” of communism. Too much information was received from the old homelands describing true conditions behind the Iron Curtain.

Minority groups, like other patriotic organizations, have realized that no communist-created Utopia can compete with the American way of life. The ability of the communists to propagate their false doctrines is a challenge to our educational process. We need to counter communism by making the hopes and aspirations of the American ideal a reality for all to enjoy.

19.

_The Communist Attack on Judaism_