THE RISE OF McCARTHYISM

The seeming American inability to decisively defeat communism both abroad and at home led to the meteoric rise of Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin. In a speech in Wheeling, West Virginia, on February 9, 1950, McCarthy announced that he had a list of 205 known communists that were working in the State Department. McCarthy’s list was sometimes longer and sometimes smaller, and oftentimes also included prominent diplomats, scholars, and Defense Department and military figures. McCarthyism was the ruthless searching out for communists in the government that took place in this period, largely without any real evidence.

For four years, McCarthy reigned supreme in Washington, with few in power or in the news media being willing to challenge him. McCarthy offered a simple reason why the United States was not conclusively winning the Cold War: because of communists in the government. The Republican party was a semireluctant supporter of McCarthy in this era; Republicans realized that the issue of communism was getting them votes. McCarthy even accused Harry Truman and former Secretary of State Marshall of being “unconscious” agents of the communist conspiracy.

In March of 1954 McCarthy claimed in a lengthy speech that the United States Army was full of communists as well. It was at this point that McCarthy began to run into major opposition; Republican President Eisenhower (a former general) stated privately that it was definitely time for McCarthy to be stopped. Tensions between the Army and McCarthy increased when it was announced that McCarthy had asked for special privileges for an aide of his that had been drafted.

The Army-McCarthy Hearings appeared on network television, and thousands found themselves riveted to them on a daily basis. Over the course of the hearings, it was discovered that McCarthy bad asked for special favors for his aide, had doctored photographs, and had used bullying tactics on a regular basis. The end was clearly in sight for McCarthy when Joseph Welch, attorney for the Army, received loud applause when he asked McCarthy if he had any “sense of decency” and when reporter Edwin R. Murrow went on CBS News with a negative report about McCarthy and his tactics. In late 1954 McCarthy was formally censured by the Senate, His power gone, McCarthy died only three years later. The McCarthy era is now remembered as one where attack by innuendo was common and where during the investigations to “get at the truth” about communism the civil rights of many were violated.