"McCarthyism" is a term coined in the 1950s to describe activities associated with Republican Senator Joseph R. McCarthy of Wisconsin during the second Red Scare in which Americans were concerned about Communist infiltration.
McCarthyism described practice of public accusations of disloyalty to the United States
McCarthyism described the practice of publicly accusing government employees of political disloyalty or subversive activities and using unsavory investigatory methods to prosecute them. It was mostly associated with Joseph McCarthy himself and his investigations as chair of two Senate committees.
The term McCarthyism first appeared in in a March 1950 Washington Post editorial cartoon by Herbert Block. The cartoon depicted four leading Republicans trying to push an elephant to stand on a teetering stack of 10 tar buckets. The topmost Republican in the cartoon was labeled “McCarthyism.”
Accusations of disloyalty to the United States were particularly frequent between 1950 and 1954. This was a period of intense suspicion sometimes referred to as the second Red Scare, during which the U.S. government was actively engaged in countering communism — in particular, the Communist Party of the United States of America.
As evidenced by congressional passage of the Subversive Activities Control Act of 1950, a majority of Congress believed the Communist Party constituted an active conspiracy that was loyal to a foreign power and dedicated to the clandestine infiltration of U.S. cultural and political institutions.
Nathaniel Mills, a suspended General Electric Co. employee, is removed from the court room where Sen. Joseph McCarthy's Senate Committee on Un-American Activities were held in Boston, Jan. 16, 1954. Mills threw the hearing into an uproar when he accused McCarthy of "conspiring with the company and getting the jobs of General Electric people." (AP Photo/Peter J. Carroll)
The Supreme Court’s 6-2 decision in Dennis v. United States (1951) upholding the constitutionality of the convictions of Communist Party leaders Eugene Dennis, William Z. Foster and 10 others for advocating the violent overthrow of the U.S. government in many ways lent support to this belief.
Most scholars consider McCarthyism to be an outgrowth of the Palmer raids and the first red scare of the 1920s, and the Smith Act of 1940, which made it illegal to advocate, abet or teach the desirability of overthrowing the U.S. government.
McCarthy's investigations often called 'witch hunts'
McCarthyism was most on display when Joseph McCarthy, as chairman of the Senate Committee on Government Operations and the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, spearheaded investigations of Communist Party members and sympathizers who were employed either in the U.S. government or by government contractors.
Anti-McCarthyites would later refer to these congressional investigations as “witch hunts.”
During his 10 years in the Senate between 1947 and 1957, McCarthy and his staff became notorious for making outlandish accusations that, though initially directed to government employees, would later include Americans from all walks of life.
People lost jobs after being accused of being Communist
Because he systematically engaged in public accusations of political disloyalty or subversion with little regard for evidence, Senator McCarthy would later himself be accused of victimizing those who appeared before his committee and suppressing basic civil rights and liberties.
The men and women accused in both the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations and the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) hearings had little chance to exonerate themselves once their identities were revealed to the public. Simply being accused of Communist sympathies was sufficient to damage or end many careers because those accused could not otherwise argue their innocence.
The widespread persecution of Communists and Communist sympathizers began to abate only after Senator McCarthy’s testimony in the so-called Army-McCarthy Hearings in 1954 produced an unfavorable backlash.
The widespread persecution of Communists and Communist sympathizers began to abate only after Senator McCarthy’s testimony in the so-called Army-McCarthy Hearings in 1954 produced an unfavorable backlash. In this photo of the hearings, Maj. Gen. Miles Reber, right, sits with his hand to his face during questioning, April 22, 1954. Meanwhile, Sen. Joseph McCarthy (R-Wisc.), looks toward Reber from his position at far end of committee table. (AP Photo)
Supreme Court ruling in 1957 protects advocacy of ideas
In 1957, the Supreme Court decision in Yates v. United States put an end to the Smith Act prosecutions by requiring that the government prove that a defendant actually took concrete steps toward the forcible overthrow of the government; merely advocating it in theory would not suffice.
Because McCarthyism rested largely on smearing people’s reputations and careers rather than presenting factual evidence that supported the allegations, the Yates decision effectively put an end to such a practice.
McCarthy assumed mere discussion of communism was dangerous
The criticisms of McCarthyism, and of Senator McCarthy in particular, are threefold.
- First, he ruined the reputations and lives of many people by accusing them without credible evidence.
- Second, he used accusations of Communist sympathies to counterattack anyone who criticized his methods.
- And, third, he argued against freedom of speech because much of his rhetoric assumed that any discussion of the ideas underlying communism was dangerous and un-American.
The victims of McCarthyism — that is, those who were called by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations and the House Un-American Activities Committee — were either denied employment in the private sector or failed government security checks.
In the film industry alone, over three hundred actors, writers, and directors were denied work in the industry through the informal Hollywood blacklist, which prompted some to go into exile overseas.
From the viewpoint of McCarthy supporters, at the time it was essential to identify foreign agents and suppress “radical organizations.” McCarthy and his followers believed subversive elements posed a danger to the national security of the country and so justified such extreme measures, even if they included the denial of civil liberties.
McCarthy and his followers believed subversive elements, such as those who were sympathetic to communism, posed a danger to the national security of the country and justified the denial of civil liberties. In this photo, men examine publications in a New York federal courthouse on March 12, 1957 where a subcommittee of the House of Un-American Activities Committee held a hearing. From left: Irving Fishman, Deputy Collector of Customs in New York, a witness before the committee; Richard Arens, director and counsel for the committee; and Gordon Scherer, a member of the U.S. House of Representative from Ohio. The subcommittee opened four days of hearings into the dissemination and sources of Communist propaganda. (AP Photo/John Rooney)
McCarthyism today is associated with suppressing political viewpoints
Today, McCarthyism is synonymous with any perceived government activity that suppresses unfavorable political or social views by limiting or undermining vital civil rights and liberties under the pretext of maintaining national security.
As understood, it is a means of government harassment that includes blacklisting with intent to pressure people to follow popular political beliefs. Thus anyone who makes insufficiently supported accusations or engages in unbalanced investigations against persons in an attempt to silence or discredit them is said to be practicing McCarthyism. This practice in effect represents both a denial of due process and a fundamental breach of civil liberties, thereby violating the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution.
Supreme Court has referenced McCarthyism in First Amendment decisions
The U.S. Supreme Court has referenced McCarthyism in several of its First Amendment decisions.
For example, the Court explained in the library filtering decision, United States v. American Library Association (2003), that the American Library Association adopted its Library Bill of Rights in response to McCarthyism.
Justice William O. Douglas was a consistent critic of McCarthyism. He specifically criticized the phenomenon in his concurring opinion in the college student free-expression decision Healy v. James (1972) and in his concurring opinion in the political broadcasting decision Columbia Broadcasting System v. Democratic National Committee (1973).
This article was originally published in 2009. Dr. Marc G. Pufong is a specialist in Public Law and Professor of Politics, Public Law and Courts at Valdosta State University. Dr. Pufong’s teaching interest and research focuses on constitutional law and judicial politics, international law and politics and human rights and conflicts. He is also co-author of three books including Georgia State Politics: The Constitutional Foundations, 7th edition (2016) with Lee M. Allen and Researching Constitutional Law, 4th edition (2013) with Albert P. Melone.