#FreeThoughtThursday
A discussion of the parallels and differences between the current MAGA administration and McCarthyism of the late 1940s through the 1950s
Chapter 1
Part A
A history lesson, with relevant excerpts:
In 1947, President Harry Truman created the Federal Employee Loyalty Program, which directed the FBI to investigate government employees with “membership in, affiliation with or sympathetic association with any foreign or domestic organization, association, movement, group, or combination of persons, designated by the Attorney General as totalitarian, fascist, communist, or subversive.” In response, almost five million federal employees filled out loyalty investigation forms between 1947 and 1953; more than 25,000 cases were investigated further, costing the government millions of dollars; and only 500 to 600 people were fired or not hired. No charges were filed against anyone.[1]
Senator McCarthy plowed ahead with an investigation and 11 hearings examining the State Department’s foreign-language radio station Voice of America, which he alleged employed many communist sympathizers. None were found, but morale of the 2,000 employees plummeted, and one, Raymond Kaplan, committed suicide.
Senator McCarthy also launched an inquiry into U.S. Information Service Libraries around the world, causing what he called “Red books” written by communists or communist sympathizers to be removed from shelves and, in some locations, even burned
In other hearings, Senator McCarthy targeted professors, including those at prestigious universities such as Harvard and Columbia. In those hearings, he challenged principles of academic and intellectual freedom. As a consequence of his accusations, a number of professors lost their jobs even though he’d provided no evidence of their communist affiliation.
Earlier that year, in April 1953, President Eisenhower had issued Executive Order 10450 requiring the reinvestigation of government personnel previously suspected of disloyalty.
Edward Murrow in 1947 (Source: CBS Radio)
“No one familiar with the history of this country can deny that congressional committees are useful. It is necessary to investigate before legislating. But the line between investigating and persecuting is a very fine one, and the junior senator from Wisconsin has stepped over it repeatedly. His primary achievement has been in confusing the public mind as between the internal and external threats of communism. We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty.”
Less well known at the time but no less destructive than his targeting of Army and State Department employees was Senator McCarthy’s role in the “Lavender Scare” to discredit members of the LGBTQ community working in government. In April 1953, President Eisenhower’s Executive Order 10450 required the investigation of government employees to protect national security, including for “criminal, infamous, dishonest, immoral, or notoriously disgraceful conduct, [or] … sexual perversion.” Senator McCarthy repeatedly linked communism and the LGBTQ community, sometimes using vulgar language.[4] Some academics estimate that, during the 1950s, far more people lost their government jobs due to their sexuality than their political leanings. Historian David K. Johnson, author of The Lavender Scare: The Cold War Persecution of Gays and Lesbians in the Federal Government, stated that, “We will never know for sure, but partial statistics show that at least several thousand gay men and lesbians lost government jobs. The real number is probably much higher.”
Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine later described his PSI tenure as “a shameful chapter in American history, a time when hundreds of innocent people were paraded before a Senate subcommittee, with little regard for due process or their constitutional rights, a time when character assassination, mud-slinging, and guilt by association trumped the truth and fairness.”
Key Question
What is more important — national security or personal freedom?
Part C
Senator Margaret Chase Smith
DECLARATION OF CONSCIENCE
June 1, 1950
https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/resources/pdf/SmithDeclaration.pdf
I think that it is high time that we remem-
bered that we have sworn to uphold and
defend the Constitution. I think that it is high
time that we remembered that the Constitution,
as amended, speaks not only of the freedom of
speech but also of trial by jury instead of trial
by accusation.
Those of us who shout the loudest about
Americanism in making character assassinations
are all too frequently those who, by our own
words and acts, ignore some of the basic princi-
ples of Americanism-
The right to criticize.
The right to hold unpopular beliefs.
The right to protest.
The right of independent thought.
The exercise of these rights should not cost
one single American citizen his reputation or
his right to a livelihood nor should he be in
danger of losing his reputation or livelihood
merely because he happens to know someone
who holds unpopular beliefs. Who of us does
not? Otherwise none of us could call our souls
our own. Otherwise thought control would
have set in.
Today our country is being psychologically
divided by the confusion and the suspicions
that are bred in the United States Senate to
spread like cancerous tentacles of “know noth-
ing, suspect everything” attitudes.
Yet to displace it with a Republican regime
embracing a philosophy that lacks political in-
tegrity or intellectual honesty would prove
equally disastrous to the nation. The nation
sorely needs a Republican victory. But I do not
want to see the Republican party ride to politi-
cal victory on the Four Horsemen of Calum-
ny-Fear, Ignorance, Bigotry, and Smear.
I doubt if the Republican party could do so,
simply because I do not believe the American people will uphold any political party that puts
political exploitation above national interest.
Surely we Republicans are not that desperate
for victory.
I do not want to see the Republican party
win that way. While it might be a fleeting vic-
tory for the Republican party, it would be a
more lasting defeat for the American people.
Surely it would ultimately be suicide for the
Republican party and the two-party system
that has protected our American liberties from
the dictatorship of a one-party system.
As an American, I condemn a Republican
Fascist just as much as I condemn a Democrat
Communist. I condemn a Democrat Fascist just
as much as I condemn a Republican Commu-
nist. They are equally dangerous to you and me
and to our country. As an American, I want to
see our nation recapture the strength and unity
it once had when we fought the enemy instead
of ourselves…
STATEMENT OF SEVEN REPUBLICAN
SENATORS
1. We are Republicans. But we are Americans
first. It is as Americans that we express our
concern with the growing confusion that
threatens the security and stability of our coun-
try. Democrats and Republicans alike have con-
tributed to that confusion.
2. The Democratic administration has initially
created the confusion by its lack of effective
leadership, by its contradictory grave warnings
and optimistic assurances, by its complacency
to the threat of communism here at home, by
its oversensitiveness to rightful criticism, by its
petty bitterness against its critics.
3. Certain elements of the Republican party
have materially added to this confusion in the
hopes of riding the Republican party to victory
through the selfish political exploitation of fear,
bigotry, ignorance, and intolerance. There are
enough mistakes of the Democrats for Republi-
cans to criticize constructively without resorting
to political smears.
4. To this extent, Democrats and Republicans
alike have unwittingly, but undeniably, played
directly into the Communist design of “confuse,
divide, and conquer.”
5. It is high time that we stopped thinking
politically as Republicans and Democrats about
elections and started thinking patriotically as
Americans about national security based on in-
dividual freedom. It is high time that we all
stopped being tools and victims of totalitarian
techniques-techniques that, if continued here
unchecked, will surely end what we have come
to cherish as the American way of life.
Chapter 2
Modern Similarities
Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/02/eradicating-anti-christian-bias
ESTABLISHMENT OF THE RELIGIOUS LIBERTY COMMISSION
Attorney General Pamela Bondi Hosts First Task Force Meeting to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias in the Federal Government
We Need Prayer: A Return to Respect, Responsibility, and Reverence in our Nation’s Schools. A Blog Post from ED’s Center for Faith
Exclusive: Christian leaders blast Trump’s “anti-Christian bias” unit
https://www.axios.com/2025/05/01/christian-leaders-denounce-white-house-task-force
The Supreme Court Is About to Let Religion Ruin Public Education
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/05/supreme-court-oklahoma-catholic-charter-school
It seems to me, there is a direct comparison between the mid 19th Century “Committee on Un-American Activities” and the modern “RELIGIOUS LIBERTY COMMISSION”. The outcome of which will be the same, if not worse, levels of abuse, discrimination and justification to terminate employees, interfere with government contracts, and possible incarceration all in the name of eradicating “anti-Christian” bias. Why not a more generic “anti-religious” bias? Or better yet, why not an “anti-secular bias”? Why is this MAGA movement so focused on enabling & endorsing one set of beliefs, over any other? The answer is obvious… absolute power & control under theocratic authoritarianism.
This country established itself, and its founding documents, as a rebuke against state sponsored religion. It was a monarchy, divinely inspired & anointed, against which we rose up to establish a secular democracy, where every individual is equally free to practice, or not practice, whatever faith, doctrine or belief system they prescribe to, that helps them manage challenges in life, that helps them understand the world, that helps them feel welcome in their community (…so long as it doesn’t harm someone else) These efforts by the MAGA administration do anything but uphold those sacred tenants of individual liberty and the separation of church & state. This “anti-christian bias” taskforce is a direct assault on our Constitution, our secular multicultural society, and as Senator Margaret Chase Smith states, ignores some of the basic principles of Americanism:
The right to criticize.
The right to hold unpopular beliefs.
The right to protest.
The right of independent thought.
Chapter 3
Differences & Discussion
What is most apparent is that this modern witch hunt and campaign to coerce conformity & compliance is not limited to a junior Senator, but is now entrenched in all Federal agencies and granted authority & privileges by essentially all three branches of government.
What brought McCarthy to a stop was ultimately his attacks on the military, and public exposure of his behavior which alienated even members of his own party. However, we now live in an age where the military has been purged of leadership to be replaced with loyalists, and exaggerated & offensive behavior of politicians is normalized, even celebrated. Our society is so numb & desensitized to the tactics used by McCarthy, considered highly inappropriate at the time, that it seems now nothing is off limits or seen as uncivilized or unbecoming of the office.
Read the language again of Republican Senator Margaret Chase Smiths DECLARATION OF CONSCIENCE. Can you imagine a modern Republican saying any of these things about someone in their own party, let alone the current President? There was certainly partisanship in her words, yet even she admits there is a line her own party should not cross.
Sadly, I don’t know what external pressures will affect change against this assault on our values & freedoms, even personal safety. Economic activism, distributed protests, boycotts & general strikes may be the most effective non-violent options. Voter drives, registration and deep canvassing, getting the non-voter to vote, especially locally may help turn the tide…assuming we continue to have free & fair elections. And community engagement & outreach cannot be overlooked to help change hearts & minds of the opposition…but that is a generational impact.
Unfortunately, I feel it will take the GOP themselves imploding & having a moment of reckoning, some internal fracture, that will interfere, delay or halt the MAGA movements attacks on secular government, civil liberties, constitutional protections, religious freedom, due process, environmental stewardship, public education, health, safety & well-being…and on, and on.
I’m concerned and I think you should be too. Let me know your thoughts!
