McCARTHYISM: TEN YEARS LATER
PROGRESSIVE "Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free" McCarthyism: Ten Years Later It was ten years ago that Senator Joseph R. McCarthy died. But the poisonous "ism" with which...
...Has any sane critic of the Administration suggested that the President and his considerable army of yea-sayers should not have the right to speak up as often and forcefully as they want, and indeed have, through all the instruments of propaganda and persuasion that the Presidency commands...
...Johnson has reaffirmed the right of protest and dissent on some days, and on others has sought to identify his critics as supporters of Ho Chi Minh...
...The enemy can hide in the jungle and in the mountains . . . where we cannot reach him without major effort...
...On the contrary, the picture that emerges from Westmoreland's own words is that of a tough, well-trained, deeply-motivated, ably-led, effectively-supplied, highly-skilled professional force...
...We know that loyalty and love of country do not express themselves only in unanimity, but also in honest dissent and loyal criticism—and our adversaries should not deceive themselves that such dissent is a sign of weakness, for in truth it is a sign of strength...
...Those who support our present policies believe this devastation and carnage is necessary to higher aims...
...or the Administration's decision to turn the FBI loose to investigate "antiwar activity...
...The end is not in sight...
...The President himself is ambivalent on the subject of dissent...
...He has rightly condemned the rowdyism and the flagburning...
...Within the past year I had occasion to share my beliefs on this subject with an American soldier in Vietnam who had written to me expressing his understandable concern over criticism of our Vietnam policy...
...To the best of our knowledge he has steadfastly refused to compromise his position on the right to dissent—a position he recently summarized by saying: "This is a nation in which the freedom of dissent is absolutely fundamental...
...I ask every American to put our country first," said the President, with the clear implication that Americans who doubt his policy of military escalation were putting their country second...
...Silent Accomplice to Horror" Vietnam is not just another political issue...
...It must be said, in fairness, that several officials in the Johnson Administration have been unequivocal in their commitment to Constitutional guarantees of free speech and freedom to petition for redress of grievances...
...This tendency shows up in its crudest form when the President exploits the posthumous award of the Medal of Honor as ceremonial occasions on which to denounce his critics and question their loyalty...
...But he has also sought to circumscribe the areas of freedom...
...Dissent is not always informed or responsible...
...He often seems to be acting out the judgment expressed by columnist Clayton Fritch-ey, who wrote: "President Johnson and his official family are all in favor of freedom of speech...
...the enemy supply system works] with surprising effectiveness...
...But even when it is not, I believe that we must recognize this is not only a price of democracy, but its very heart...
...Here, in his own words, is the General's estimate of the enemy...
...Said George Washington: "If men are to be precluded from offering their sentiments on a matter —which may involve the most serious and alarming consequences that can invite the consideration of mankind— [then] reason is of no use...
...In a recent statement, he strongly defended the right of dissent, then added: "But dissent must be responsible and we must have the equal right to state our position...
...Johnson came perilously close to stigmatizing those who do not go all the way with his Vietnam policies as unpatriotic if not downright disloyal...
...Consider these passages from the General's two major speeches last month: ". . . We have no evidence that the enemy is slowing his invasion from the North...
...I do not think," he added, "that those men who are out there fighting for us tonight think we should enjoy the luxury of fighting each other back home...
...In his March 2 press conference, for example, in attacking critics of his policy of bombing North Vietnam, the President said: "I think that the American people should know that this is a question between their President, their country, their troops, and Mr...
...More recently, Mr...
...Enemy commanders are skilled professionals...
...It was General Westmoreland, incidentally, who seemed to negate what the country has been led to believe is basic in the Administration's policy...
...or the Secretary of State's attempt to associate peace demonstrations with the "Communist apparatus...
...Even as the slaughter in Vietnam is escalating, so is the pressure—under the threat of being charged with disloyalty —for a deadening conformity and a false unity...
...It would be a distortion of the facts to suggest that the Johnson Administration has already embraced McCarthyism in its frenzied effort to justify its position on Vietnam...
...He will step up his attacks...
...In general their troops are indoctrinated, well trained, aggressive, and under a tight control...
...One thinks of Mac-Arthur, of Ridgeway, of Gavin...
...Indeed, Secretary of State Dean Rusk linked the demonstrations in New York and San Francisco with the "Communist apparatus" although he was careful to add that he did not mean to indicate that all those who oppose Administration policy in Vietnam were Communists...
...But this group represents only a minute, if rowdy, portion of the great and growing protest against the official Vietnam policy...
...The strength of America," he assured the nation, "can never be sapped by discussion...
...What the month before had been a "united commitment to free discussion" had now become "the luxury of fighting each other...
...The Progressive does not condone— indeed, it regards as utterly contemptible—the reckless, irresponsible personal attacks on the President and his aides by the juvenile exhibitionists— young and old—in the peace movement who find excitement in character assassination and emotional release in the use of sexual symbolism as a substitute for honest, intelligent debate...
...It is nonsense, moreover, for Mr...
...Richard N. Goodwin Former White House aide May 7, 1967 Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey, once a towering force in liberal leadership, has been almost as ambivalent as his Chief on the subject of freedom of speech...
...He rests and regroups...
...Every day fellow human beings are being crippled and scarred and killed...
...His leadership is good and his men are tough and tenacious...
...William Wallace Ford Brigadier General, Retired Amherst, Massachusetts...
...In Westmoreland's case, the General seemed to refute his own argument that it is dissent at home that encourages the foe in Vietnam to keep up the fight...
...Perhaps one of the most shocking trends toward McCarthyism in the White House was on display on the day of the anti-war marches in New York and San Francisco last month...
...Hardly a month afterward, at a Democratic clambake in Chicago, Mr...
...In a statement that was widely interpreted as a rebuke to Rusk, his chief, Goldberg said that "The right to dissent is basic in the American system" and "is never to be equated with disloyalty...
...On the contrary, Mr...
...Only the most vigilant resistance to the first steps along the road to the revival of McCarthyism will enable us to prevent the dilution, or the destruction, of the freedom in America that the Johnson Administration insists it is fighting to achieve for Vietnam...
...It is this confusion of counsel, this conflict over goals, that widens even further the gap in credibility which has disfigured the Johnson Administration since shortly after the 1964 Presidential election...
...For anyone who dissents in his heart, not to dissent with whatever weapons he has—words or speeches, petitions or demonstrations—is to find in the secret depths of his own mind the silent accomplice to horror...
...The White House chose that day to announce that the President had received a report from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover on "anti-war activity" in the United States...
...He will continue his buildup...
...Overall enemy strength has nearly doubled...
...they are only against the exercise of it...
...As we said at the time, it would be difficult to phrase a judgment of disloyalty in more skillful terms...
...He proclaimed the American purpose to be to "prevail" over the foe although the avowed goal of the Administration's policy is supposed to be a negotiated settlement...
...Many of his old friends were deeply saddened to see their one-time hero wrap himself in the flag in a manner that shows little respect for that stirring symbol of America...
...This strikes us as a wholly unacceptable limitation on freedom of speech...
...If called, I am quite ready to serve again...
...or the charge by the commanding general in the field that anti-war protests are "unpatriotic...
...There was nothing in the General's reports to suggest a collapsing foe who would surrender or come to the negotiating table if only the dissenters in the United States would shut up and rally around the President...
...Ambassador Goldberg has set a splendid example for the Johnson Administration, but there is little or no evidence that the Administration will assume his position...
...For our purpose we find wholly adequate the Webster definition, "McCarthyism: the use of indiscriminate, often unfounded, accusations, sensationalism, inquisitorial investigative methods, etc., ostensibly in the suppression of Communism...
...He has been most careful to affirm the First Amendment freedoms...
...It is a freedom not only to be cherished dearly but to be defended jealously at all times...
...Others disagree...
...His operational planning is meticulous...
...Perhaps the most outspoken aide of the President on this score is Ambassador Goldberg, the chief American delegate to the United Nations...
...Everyone can take whichever side of the matter that he wants to...
...I consider it the highest patriotism...
...There are others...
...the freedom of speech may be taken away and, dumb and silent, we may be led like sheep to the slaughter...
...We must be prepared for more bitter fighting...
...Stalwart heroes of the Army and of West Point, who also learned well the motto "Duty, Honor, Country," have counseled against a land war in Asia...
...I am still trying...
...The President climaxed that bitter outburst by denouncing those who disagreed with him as "Nervous Nellies" who "break ranks under the strain" and "turn on their own leaders, their own country, and their own fighting men...
...I besought my newly-elected Representative in 1964 to try to keep us from further involvement in Vietnam...
...The Highest Patriotism' The following is an excerpt from a letter to The New York Times May 3, 1967: The time has come to strike down the implication that whoever does not follow blindly and uncomplainingly in the steady expansion of this war is somehow unpatriotic...
...A year ago Mr...
...Both Secretary of State Rusk and General William C. Westmoreland struck a neo-McCarthyite note when they accused critics of Administration policy of prolonging the war, lacking in patriotism, and playing into the hands of the Communists...
...Just what is "responsible" dissent...
...The Johnson Administration was busy on other fronts in attempting to establish exclusive rights to patriotism...
...I volunteered in World War I and served every day in that war, every day in World War II, and every day during the Korean War...
...But the poisonous "ism" with which he scared and scarred his country did not go to the grave with him...
...I voted in 1964 for the Presidential candidate who opposed escalation of the conflict...
...When George Christian, the President's press secretary, was asked whether Hoover's report raised charges of Communist influence in the demonstrations, he said, "I can't go into the details of the reports...
...This crude device was clearly employed to intimidate critics of Administration policy generally, and to deflate, in particular, the impact on public opinion of the impressive marches by conveying the impression that the demonstrators, by their "antiwar activity," were marching under a cloud of suspicion of disloyalty...
...Humphrey to insist that "we [the Administration] must have equal right to state our position...
...We are united in our commitment to free discussion...
...dissenters will capture control of American policy...
...A good deal of scholarly nonsense has been written about the psychosocial meanings of McCarthyism...
...Defense Secretary Robert S. Mc-Namara, by all accounts, is one of them, despite the avalanche of criticism that has swept over him...
...or the assertion of our ambassador to South Vietnam, now happily retired, that criticism of Administration policy "helps the Communists" and "prolongs the war...
...Johnson seemed compassionately disposed toward critics of his Vietnam policy...
...How else does one explain the President's insistence that the country must choose between him and his Communist counterpart, Ho Chi Minh...
...And who sits in judgment...
...Ho Chi Minh and the troops that he is sending in from the North...
...But against the backdrop of the dictionary definition, it seems clear to us that the Administration is tending in that direction and that the pace will accelerate as the war widens, dissent multiplies, and military "victory" remains as elusive as ever—and as the 1964 "Presidential campaign draws closer...
...More than a century and a half before McCarthyism—which is, after all, an ancient evil bearing a modern name—the first President of the United States saw and warned against the consequences of stifling dissent...
...The buildup of enemy forces has been formidable...
...Goldberg then read a part of his reply to the soldier: "It is my deepest conviction that the right of dissent is central to the freedom for which we fight...
...On another recent occasion he said: "The ferocity of war must be for us not an incitement to hatred...
...As Joseph C. Harsch pointed out in The Christian Science Monitor, Westmoreland's estimate of the military condition of our adversary in Vietnam destroyed his own thesis that North Vietnam and the Vietcong expect to win the war by waiting for mounting rejection of Johnson Administration policy in the United States...
...He continues to recruit and retrain...
...It is hardly the picture of an adversary reeling in defeat, a foe clinging to a lost cause because of his desperate, last-chance hope that U.S...
...The fires of fear and hate that he kindled survived in areas of McCarthyism throughout the country...
...This does not release me from the duty, nor deny me the right, of trying to keep my country on a prudent and enlightened course...
...Recently, in what was described as an emotion-charged speech to the Texas legislature, the Vice President, according to The New York Times, brought his audience "almost to a frenzy of applause by reciting portions of the pledge of allegiance to the flag in a resounding voice...
...And they are being refueled today, however unintentionally, by men in high places who feel the compulsive need to shame critics of their Vietnam policy into silence...
...Moreover, by moving steadily closer to impugning its critics as disloyal, the Johnson Administration is descending to the level of the least and lowest of its adversaries...
...He lashed out at those who seek a ceasefire, although a ceasefire is precisely what the Administration, through Ambassador Arthur J. Goldberg, has asked United Nations Secretary General U Thant to achieve...
...Johnson himself is relying more and more on emotional appeals to patriotism and he is proceeding on the specious assumption that patriotism demands blind and total acceptance of official policy...
Vol. 31 • June 1967 • No. 6
