Dear Editor
DEAR EDITOR Praises Ryan's Article on De-segregation in the South The March 29 issue of The New Leader is a gem. As usual, I am unable to skip over any articles in the issue. Permit me, however,...
...My own investigations have convinced me that Mr...
...But even if those states are willing to accept it at Combs's face value, does that make the Nations point--that there are G-Men on the California campus--any more valid...
...Mankiewicz renders no service to the cause of academic freedom when he beclouds the issue by talking about "liberal McCarthyism.'' Grafton, N. Y. Granville Hicks I would be extremely unhappy and dismayed to find myself in sharp disagreement with Granville Hicks, whose articles in The New Leader and elsewhere I have admired...
...Hicks is quite correct in his reference to the Combs testimony...
...But the suggestion is dismissed in the very next sentence, where it saysr as I quoted, that "the contact-man program can function only in the way described by Combs...
...Hicks and New Leader readers generally that they were outside the scope of my brief report...
...In fact, the statement by Senator Burns, Chairman of the California committee, confirmed "large part of what Combs had said...
...Particularly is this true in view of the fact that, in California, investigating committees can--and invariably do--grant immunity in advance for possible prosecutions arising out of testimony, thus effectively removing whatever protection the Fifth Amendment might afford and permitting contempt actions for failure to answer on grounds of self-incrimination...
...But it is point (3) which demands earnest consideration...
...John Denham...
...It is admittedly not perfect, but I rested my conclusions originally, and do so now, on the proposition that it is "liberal McCarthyism" to assume the worst automatically when the facts point in other directions...
...Mankiewicz says, Walter Gerstel made the same suggestion in his Nation article...
...Hicks's paragraphs in order: 1. Mr...
...But the point I wished to make in my article was that it is a kind of McCarthyism to assume that Combs's testimony is automatically true, and that, in spite of explicit denials by the colleges involved and good bit of evidence elsewhere, the program must be functioning in the way he described...
...Indeed, Senator Burns's letter to Mr...
...But his article ignores three points of fundamental importance: (1) Until Combs's statements have clearly been disproven, suspicion and fear will continue to lurk in the colleges of California...
...He testified, further, that each of the major colleges had a full-time agent who was trained in counter-Communist activities and was working closely with the Committee, and he described in some detail the qualifications of three of these agents...
...This is a problem that ought to be thoroughly investigated...
...I agree that they are of fundamental importance, and I think a consideration of the following facts will convince Mr...
...3. Mr...
...New Haven, Conn...
...Combs was lying as outrageously as Mr...
...Hicks accuses me of ignoring three points of fundamental importance...
...Frank Mankiewicz Voices Appreciation for Articles By Thomas, Niebuhr and Herberg Just a note to say how pleased I am with your magazine...
...Hicks, to my reading, seems directly to undercut Combs's testimony...
...Mankiewicz says, I have seen no unequivocal denial of Combs's testimony...
...He is also probably right in suggesting that Combs's testimony was intended to keep the Jenner The New Leader welcomes readers' comment, regardless of point of view...
...by Stephen P. Ryan...
...In California, since 1941, a state employe (specifically including professors at the state university) is automatically dismissed and ineligible for future employment by the state if he is in contempt of any state investigating committee...
...New York City Frank R. Crosswaith Chairman, Negro Labor Committee Holds Mankiewicz 'Beclouds Issue' on College Spying Readers of Frank Mankiewicz's article, "Liberal McCarthyism in California'' [The New Leader, March 29], may, I am afraid, lose sight of the real issue...
...Contrary to what Mr...
...Hicks's objections to my article suggests that we are not in disagreement at all...
...Hicks has "seen no unequivocal denial of Combs's testimony.'' Insofar as the San Francisco area is concerned, the denials of President Sproul of the University of California, President Sterling of Stanford, and President Leonard of San Francisco State, as well as that of Chancellor Kerr of the Berkeley campus of the University of California, were carried prominently the day after Combs's testimony was made public by the Jenner Committee...
...Chancellor Kerr had occasion only last week, at a student "gripe session...
...Hicks--and lie is not alone --urges that the universities attempt to secure a perjury indictment of Combs, or his dismissal by the Burns Committee...
...Last year, this was broadened to include any failure to answer any question relating generally to Communist activities before any committee, court or board, whether or not the witness was in contempt...
...4. Mr...
...Armed with these laws, any legislative committee could wreak terrible destruction upon almost any faculty it chose...
...He testified not only that more than a hundred subversives had been discharged but also that at least that many had been prevented from getting jobs...
...As to point (2), the Jenner Committee has indeed recommended the "California Plan" to other states...
...2) The Jenner Committee, in a report dated July 17, 1953, recommended that other states "should give consideration to the program adopted by the State of California.'' (3) If Mr...
...I thought I could do without The New Leader, but I miss it...
...Fresno, Calif...
...Indeed, a close reading of Mr...
...Mankiewicz is right in asserting that no such full-Hedged spy system exists on the California campuses as Combs described...
...It seems to me that The New Leader sees present-day problems in their true perspective...
...but discussing two different things...
...In spite of what Mr...
...Taking Mr...
...Norman Thomas's article, "The Threat to Freedom" [The New Leader, March 1], Reinhold Niebuhr's "Democracy and the Party Spirit" [March 15], and Will Herberg's "Government by Rabble-Rousing" [January 18] are all examples of why I am renewing my subscription...
...Permit me, however, to express my special appreciation of "Will the South Accept Desegregation...
...Where Combs refers to "trained, full-time counter-Communist agents," Burns talks about "not necessarily'' trained "liaison officers" who have had "some experience.'' 2. It says something about American journalism that so able a researcher as Mr...
...Hicks is right in citing my erroneous assertion that the Nation article did not mention the possibility that Combs's testimony was intended to keep the Jenner Committee out of California...
...Maspeth, N. Y. Anne B. McGlinchy Readers Toss Bouquets To 'The New Leader' Please renew my subscription...
...to place his denial on the record once again, with "reiteration of what I said in ray article: that he was the "contact man,"" that, there had been no contact between him and the Burns Committee, but that he thought it a good idea to keep Communists off the faculty...
...Berkeley, Calif...
...If the universities have ever taken an official stand on the matter, I have been unable to find any record of it...
...For space reasons, however, we prefer letters under 300 words...
...After all, Richard E. Combs, chief counsel of the California State Committee on Un-American Activities, did appear before the Jenner Committee on March 19, 1953, and did testify under oath that eleven California colleges were cooperating with the Committee and that, as a result of this cooperation, more than one hundred faculty members had been removed in less than - year...
...They are people who, in the main, have had some experience in this field and can therefore evaluate the records of suspected subversive individuals...
...I hope this article will be distributed widely, particularly in the South...
...On July 30, 1953, in reply to an inquiry from me, Senator Burns wrote: "The colleges have named liaison officers to work with us in exchanging information [who] are not necessarily full-time investigating agents...
...But a careful consideration of two California laws indicates why this has not been done...
...E. EviNGER The New Leader is the best I've read...
...This might be disproof enough, but the suspicion and fear remain...
...Thus, while the Nation conceded a political motive to Combs in one sentence, it credited him with the whole truth in the next...
...Might I suggest " paraphrase: "Until anti-Communism is effectively taken from the hands of those who operate at the level of loyalty oaths and public investigations, suspicion and fear will continue to lurk, not only in the colleges hut elsewhere.'' And if this is so, then it is the Nation article, and not mine, which does a disservice to the cause of academic freedom by confusing myth with reality and encouraging fear rather than wisdom...
...Committee out of California...
...It is the only magazine that I read cover to cover, regardless of how rushed I am...
...1) Until Combs's statements have clearly been disproven, suspicion and fear will continue to lurk in the colleges of California...
...Mankiewicz and I believe, he might well be indicted for perjury and certainly ought not to be allowed to remain in so important a position as that of chief counsel of the California committee...
...Senator Burns enclosed a copy of Combs's testimony "in order that you may be fully informed...
...Since the legislature has this power, the remarkable thing, to my mind, is that the "contact man'' system has not done more damage...
...Combs's testimony has been directly challenged and denied by the very people he said were collaborating, by the very institutions he cited...
Vol. 37 • April 1954 • No. 16
