August 24, 1954 - Communist Control Act - a podcast by Stephen Hammond

McCarthyism era. The United States’ short-lived alliance with the Soviet Union to defeat the Nazis chilled once World War II ended. And that chill turned into fears of communism throughout the world as the “Cold War” began and the Soviets asserted their control over Eastern European countries. Many Americans were concerned not only about communism abroad, but also about communism within their own borders. This post-war period, starting in the 1940s and continuing until the late 1950s, was also characterized as McCarthyism, for the communist witch-hunting carried out by Senator Joseph McCarthy and the Un-American Activities committee. People became familiar with the line, “Are you, or have you ever been, a member of the Communist Party?” For a country that prided itself on freedoms, and for a government that only years before had been an ally of the communist regime, many people were caught off-guard. In order to deal with communism at home more forcefully, Republican Senator John Marshal Butler and Democratic Senator Hubert Humphrey jointly drafted the Communist Control Act to serve as an extension of the Internal Security Act. In addition to criminalizing membership, it stated that "Communist-infiltrated organizations" were "not entitled to any of the rights, privileges and immunities attendant upon legal bodies." The act commanded substantial support from both political parties. On August 24, 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the act into law. For all the concerns, the act was used effectively only twice: in 1954 to prevent the Communist Party from getting on the New Jersey ballot, and then in 1960 to prevent the party from being considered an employer for purposes of employment insurance.

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