Book Read Free

Ike and McCarthy

Page 34

by David A. Nichols


  3. Two authors who made a particular effort to rehabilitate McCarthy’s reputation are M. Stanton Evans, Blacklisted by History (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2007), and Arthur Herman, Joseph McCarthy: Reexamining the Life and Legacy of America’s Most Hated Senator (New York: Free Press, 2000).

  4. William Bragg Ewald, Jr., Who Killed Joe McCarthy? (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984); FASP, Eyes Only.

  5. Alexis Coe ran into the same denial of access to McCarthy correspondence and related the experience in a column, “Senator, Let Us Read Your Letters,” The New York Times, Oct. 27, 2015; I was denied access in October 2013.

  6. I am indebted to my Southwestern College colleague Provost James A. Sheppard for educating me about military deception of the type in which Eisenhower was thoroughly schooled.

  7. Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 242.

  8. For a thorough discussion of this issue, see George C. Edwards III, The Strategic President: Persuasion and Opportunity in Presidential Leadership (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009).

  9. W. H. Lawrence, “New Role for M’Carthy,” The New York Times, Jan. 10, 1954; Lawrence, “Senate Enmeshed,” The New York Times, Jan. 7, 1954.

  10. Eisenhower, remarks at the National Defense Executive Reserve Conference, Nov. 14, 1957, PPP.

  PROLOGUE

  1. Douglas R. Price, e-mail to author, Sept. 4, 2011; Price, a personal aide to General Eisenhower in the campaign and later serving with the Republican National Committee, provided supporting documents for his account of the motorcade’s organization.

  2. Milton Eisenhower, interview with Herbert Parmet, June 19, 1969, DDEPL, OH-531, 26.

  3. William Bragg Ewald, Jr., Who Killed Joe McCarthy? (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984), 23.

  4. McCarthy’s June 14, 1951, speech is excerpted at length online in J. Bradford Delong, “A Historical Remembrance: George C. Marshall,” 2008; Thomas C. Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy (New York: Stein & Day, 1982), 372–75; David M. Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense: The World of Joe McCarthy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 197–200; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 25; Arthur Herman, Joseph McCarthy: Reexamining the Life and Legacy of America’s Most Hated Senator (New York: Free Press, 2000), 189–90; Harold B. Hinton, “Marshall U.S. Foe, M’Carthy Charges,” The New York Times, June 15, 1951.

  5. W. H. Lawrence, “Eisenhower to Back M’Carthy If Named, but Assails Tactics,” The New York Times, Aug. 23, 1952; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 436–37.

  6. Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 32–34; Robert Cutler, No Time for Rest (New York, Little, Brown, 1966), 288; W. H. Lawrence, “Eisenhower Wants Koreans to Bear Brunt of Fighting,” The New York Times, Oct. 3, 1952; Thomas C. Reeves, in Distinguished Service: The Life of Wisconsin Governor Walter J. Kohler, Jr. (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 2006), 282–83, accepts that Eisenhower and McCarthy had a stern conversation. According to Reeves, McCarthy told Kohler that Eisenhower did not bring up the paragraph of praise for Marshall he had planned for the speech.

  7. Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 46; Sherman Adams, First-Hand Report: The Inside Story of the Eisenhower Administration (London: Hutchinson, 1961), 40–41.

  8. Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 47.

  9. The words of praise deleted from the speech and a transcript of the speech are in the speech-writing assistant Stephen G. Benedict Papers, B4 (1), DDEPL; Jeffrey Frank, Ike and Dick: Portrait of a Strange Political Marriage (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2013), 74–75.

  10. W. H. Lawrence, “Eisenhower Scores President on Reds,” The New York Times, Oct. 4, 1952; Bill Lawrence, Six Presidents, Too Many Wars (New York: Saturday Review Press, 1972), 194–97; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 47.

  CHAPTER 1: THE FIRST CONFRONTATION

  1. Fred I. Greenstein, interview with Sherman Adams, cited in Michael J. Birkner, “Eisenhower and the Red Menace,” Prologue, Fall 2001, 202.

  2. DDE to G. Hauge, 09-15-53, DDEP, no. 417; DDE to Brownell, July 2, 1953, DDEP, no. 294; Eisenhower described his Soviet relationships after the war in Crusade in Europe (New York: Doubleday, 1949), 438, 460–67.

  3. DDE diary, April 1, 1953, DDEP, no. 118; Dwight D. Eisenhower, The White House Years: Mandate for Change (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1963), 268.

  4. Shanley diary, approx. March 20, 1953, BSP, B1, IV (3), 743; Eisenhower always refused to discuss running for a second term, but even following a massive heart attack and surgery in 1955–56, he did so. Insofar as possible, he wanted his presidential ambitions cloaked in a call to duty.

  5. “Enter the 83rd,” The New York Times, Jan. 4, 1953.

  6. “Cohn, Veteran Investigator at 25,” The New York Times, Jan. 3, 1953; for more information on Cohn, see William Bragg Ewald, Jr., Who Killed Joe McCarthy? (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984), 49–51; Sidney Lion, The Autobiography of Roy Cohn (Secaucus, NJ: Lyle Stuart Inc., 1988), 113; Thomas C. Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy (New York: Stein & Day, 1982), 463–66; David M. Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense: The World of Joe McCarthy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 253–56; Herbert Brownell, Jr., Advising Ike: The Memoirs of Attorney General Herbert Brownell (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1993), 257.

  7. C. P. Trussell, “Party Margin Slim,” The New York Times, Jan. 4, 1953.

  8. John D. Morris, “Senate Votes Fund to Start Inquiries,” The New York Times, Jan. 31, 1953; “McCarthy to Double Investigating Staff,” The Washington Post, Jan. 15, 1953; “The M’Carthy Inquiry,” The New York Times, Feb. 1, 1953.

  9. DDE, Inaugural Address notes, Feb. 27, 1953, WHOSS, Minnich Series, B1, Misc.; DDE diary, Jan. 16, 1953, DDEP, no. 1057. A man of action, Eisenhower was also an excellent wordsmith and often his own best editor.

  10. DDE, Inaugural Address, Jan. 20, 1953, PPP; W. H. Lawrence, “President’s Plan,” and James Reston, “Inaugural Is Held to Extend U.S. Commitments to World,” The New York Times, Jan. 21, 1953.

  11. Throughout this book, the author often refers to the president’s schedules and appointments, most of which are not explicitly cited; see the Dwight D. Eisenhower Daily Appointment Schedule, available at DDEPL, also available online from the Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia, website.

  12. Clayton Knowles, “G. O. P. Seeks Brownell Plan for Solving Snag on Wilson,” The New York Times, Jan. 19, 1953; Justin Hyde, “GM’s ‘Engine Charlie’ Wilson Learned to Live with a Misquote,” Detroit Free Press, Sept. 14, 2008.

  13. DDE, Transition Journal, Jan. 20, 1953, HCLP II, Carton 6, off-site (23), SH14, VE9; DDE diary, Jan. 20, 1953, HCLP, Lodge-Eisenhower Correspondence, Reel 28; Harold B. Hinton, “Wilson Severs Ties to General Motors,” The New York Times, Jan. 16, 1953.

  14. Harold B. Hinton, “Approval Is Likely,” The New York Times, Jan. 23, 1953; John D. Morris, “Senate Approval of 2 Wilson Aides Remains in Doubt,” The New York Times, Jan. 25, 1953; Clayton Knowles, “Eisenhower Likely to Hold Up 2 Wilson Aides,” The New York Times, Jan. 26, 1953; Arthur Krock, “Wilson Case Bad Start for New Administration,” The New York Times, Jan. 25, 1953.

  15. Emmet John Hughes diary, July 16, 1953, SGMML.

  16. JFD to Brownell, Jan. 28, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B1 (4); Cabinet Meeting, Jan. 30, 1954, Cabinet Series, B1, DDEPL; WHOSS, Cabinet Series, Minnich Series, B1, Misc.-C (1), DDEPL; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 48.

  17. “Bedell Smith: A Good Choice,” The New York Times, Jan. 12, 1953; Jeff Broadwater, Eisenhower and the Anti-Communist Crusade (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1992), 55.

  18. “A Splendid Appointment,” The New York Times, Jan. 13, 1954; Bernard Shanley diary, BSP, B1, IV (1), 599; William S. White, “Conant Replies to His Critic,” The New York Times, Feb. 4, 1953; McCarthy to DDE, Feb. 3, 1953, DDEPL, Name Series, B22, McCarthy; Persons to Stephens, Feb. 4, 1953, DDEPL, Name Series, B22, McCarthy; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 53, 56–57; White, “Committee Backs Conant and Smith,” The New York Times, Feb. 5, 19
53; “Senate Confirms Smith and Conant,” The New York Times, Feb. 7, 1953; Brownell, Advising Ike, 253–55; Irwin F. Gellman, The President and the Apprentice: Eisenhower and Nixon, 1952–1961 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2015), 102.

  19. Charles E. Bohlen, Witness to History, 1929–1969 (New York: Norton, 1973), 312; Charles Bohlen interview, Dec. 17, 1970, Columbia University Oral History Project, OH-136, DDEPL; “Bohlen May Get Red Post,” The New York Times, Feb. 1, 1953; James Reston, “6 Career Officers Picked,” The New York Times, Feb. 6, 1953; Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 212; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 468.

  20. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 212–13; DDE to Taft, March 18, 1953, DDEP, no. 92.

  21. William S. White, “Bohlen Defends Yalta Pact,” The New York Times, March 3, 1953; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 57–58.

  22. Robert Cutler, No Time for Rest (New York: Little, Brown, 1966), 320–21; Hughes diary, March 4, 1953 SGMML. Ann Whitman, Eisenhower’s secretary, was supposedly Cutler’s source for Ike’s choice of colors on a hard day.

  23. DDE, President’s Statement to Soviet People, March 4, 1953, PPP.

  24. “Message Conveying Condolences on Death of Stalin,” March 5, 1953, PPP; “Smith and Bohlen Sat Up with Soviet ‘Sick Friend,’ ” The New York Times, March 6, 1953.

  25. Mandate for Change, 267; White, “Move to Denounce Soviet Is Shelved,” The New York Times, March. 11, 1953.

  26. Drew Pearson, Drew Pearson Diaries, 1949–1959, ed. Tyler Abell (New York: Holt, Rinehart, 1974), March 5, 1953, 254; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 288.

  27. JFD to S. Adams, March 13, 1953, JFDP, White House Memoranda Series, B8, Security Matters, McLeod, Bohlen (4); “McCarthy Joins Fight,” The New York Times, March 14, 1953; William S. White, “Senate G. O. P. Is Split,” The New York Times, March 14, 1953; “Bohlen Foes Push Fight,” The New York Times, March 15, 1953; Clayton Knowles, “M’Carran Opposes Bohlen,” The New York Times, March 16, 1953.

  28. JFD to Lourie, JFD to Wiley, March 16, 1953, Taft and JFD, March 16, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B1 (2); JFD to S. Adams, March 16, 1953; JFD conversation with President, March 16, 1953; DDE and JFD, March 16, 1953, all three in JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B10 (White House).

  29. JFD to Bohlen, March 16, 1953, JFD to Wiley and Taft, March 17, 1953, both in JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B1 (2).

  30. Dulles to DDE, March 17, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B10 (White House); Bohlen, Witness to History, 323; introduction by Avis Bohlen to 2nd edition of Charles Thayer, Bears in the Caviar (Montpelier, VT: Russian Life Books, 2015), 16. The account is based on Thayer’s diary, Charles W. Thayer Collection, Harry S. Truman Library, Independence, MO. For a detailed account of the origins of the perception that the State Department was a nest of striped-pants homosexuals, see Robert D. Dean, Imperial Brotherhood: Gender and the Making of Cold War Foreign Policy (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2001), 97–145; highlights from the FBI report on Bohlen are recounted on 123–24, 134–35.

  31. McCarthy, speech, approx. March 17, 1953, JFDP, White House Memoranda Series, B8, Security Matters, McLeod, Bohlen (4); William S. White, “Dulles to Evaluate F.B.I. Bohlen Study,” The New York Times, March 17, 1953; James Reston, “Dulles Facing Test Today,” The New York Times, March 18, 1953; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 58.

  32. JFD to Stephens and S. Adams, March 18, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B10 (White House); Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 57; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 287; Bohlen, Witness to History, 322.

  33. Jay Walz, “Dulles Says Clearing Bohlen Was Job for Him,” The New York Times, March 23, 1953; Arthur Krock, “Another Proof That McCarthy Isn’t the Boss,” The New York Times, March 19, 1953; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 57–58; Bohlen, Witness to History, 324.

  34. William S. White, “Senate Unit Backs Bohlen,” The New York Times, March 19, 1953; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 57–58; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 470; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 289; DDE, News Conference, March 19, 1953, PPP.

  35. JFD to AWD, March 21, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B1 (2); Bohlen, Witness to History, 323; Dean, Imperial Brotherhood, 134–35.

  36. “Ex–F.B.I. Man Picked for Security Chief,” The New York Times, Feb. 26, 1953; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 262–64.

  37. S. Adams to JFD, March 19, 1953, two calls, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B10 (White House).

  38. JFD to McLeod, S. Adams, Hagerty, Brownell, DDE, March 20, 1953, JFDP, White House Memoranda Series, B8, Security Matters, McLeod, Bohlen (4).

  39. Dulles to Hagerty, Lourie, and S. Adams, March 20, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B10 (White House).

  40. JFD to McLeod, March 20 and 21, 1953, Brownell, March 20, 1953, JFDP, White House Memoranda Series, B8, Security Matters, McLeod, Bohlen (4); Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 290; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 58.

  41. William S. White, “Dulles Holds Firm,” The New York Times, March 21, 1953; Murray Marder, “Secretary Is Accused of Security Overriding,” The Washington Post, March 21, 1953; John D. Morris, “M’Carthy Balked in Bohlen Fight,” The New York Times, March 23, 1953.

  42. JFD and Brownell, March 21, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B1 (2); JFD Memorandum for Phleger, March 23, 1953, JFDP, White House Memoranda Series, B8, Security Matters (3); Conversations—DDE, JFD, Brownell, March 22, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B8, Security Matters, McLeod, Bohlen (3); Brownell to DDE, March 23, 1953, DDE diary, B4, Phone Calls (2), DDEPL; JFD and Taft, March 23, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B1 (2).

  43. William S. White, “G. O. P. Chiefs Join to Score M’Carthy,” and James Reston, “Main Issue in Bohlen Case,” The New York Times, March 24, 1953; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 472; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 290.

  44. JFD, phone conversations with Taft, Brownell, and Wiley, March 24, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B1 (2), and White House Memoranda Series, B8, Security Matters (3); Brownell, Advising Ike, 255.

  45. JFD, Taft to JEH, Brownell, March 24, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B1 (2).

  46. Notes by Reap and McCardle, March 24, 1953, JFDP, White House Memoranda Series, B8, Security Matters (3); William S. White, “2 Senators Study F. B. I. Bohlen Data,” The New York Times, March 25, 1953; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 472; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 291; Brownell, Advising Ike, 255.

  47. McCarthy, speech, March 25, 1953, JFDP, White House Memoranda Series, B8, Security Matters, McLeod, Bohlen (2); Gellman, The President and the Apprentice, 93–94.

  48. William S. White, “Bitterness Marks Debate on Bohlen,” The New York Times, March 26, 1953, Bohlen, Witness to History, 330; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 474; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 291–92.

  49. DDE, News Conference, March 26, 1953, PPP; William S. White, “President Terms Bohlen Best Man,” The New York Times, March 26, 1953; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 473.

  50. “M’Carthy Insists Bohlen Is Unfit,” The New York Times, March 29, 1953; Robert Albright, “Vote Termed Personal Victory for President,” The Washington Post, March 28, 1953; the “no more Bohlens” quote is cited in Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 475, taken from William S. White, The Taft Story (New York: Harper, 1954), 239; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 58–59.

  51. “Bohlen Sworn In,” The New York Times, March 30, 1953; Shanley diary, approx. March 20, 1953, BSP, B1, IV (3), 743.

  CHAPTER 2: “DON’T JOIN THE BOOK BURNERS!”

  1. “Greek Shipowners to Stop Red Trade,” The New York Times, March 29, 1953; Edward Ryan, “Greek Owners of 242 Ships Bar Red Trade,” The Washington Post, March 29, 1953; Thomas C. Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy (New York: Stein & Day, 1982), 486.

  2. “Two Secretaries of State,” The Washington Post, March 31, 1953; William S. White, “M’Carthy Loses a Battle,” The New York Times, March 29, 1953; Joseph Alsop, “Matter of Fact,” The Washington Post, April 1, 1953; David M. Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So I
mmense: The World of Joe McCarthy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 292–95.

  3. Stassen to JFD, March 30, 1953, JFDP, Tel. Call Series, B1 (1); C. P. Trussell, “Stassen Charges M’Carthy Impedes Red Cargo Curbs,” The New York Times, March 31, 1953; Murray Marder, “Stassen Says McCarthy Harmed U.S.,” The Washington Post, March 31, 1953; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 295–96; William Bragg Ewald, Jr., Who Killed Joe McCarthy? (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984), 161; Michael Birkner, “Eisenhower and the Red Menace,” Prologue, 33, no. 3 (Fall 2001), 202.

  4. McCarthy to DDE, March 31, 1953, Name Series, B22, McCarthy, DDEPL; DDE to McCarthy, April 1, 1953, DDEP, no. 112; Irwin F. Gellman, The President and the Apprentice: Eisenhower and Nixon, 1952–1961 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2015), 94–95; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 486–87.

  5. State Department Press Release, Apr. 1, 1953, JFDP, Gen. Corres. & Memo. Series, B3 (Me). Dulles assigned an aide to record verbatim what the senator said to reporters; notes on McCarthy & press, Apr. 1, 1953, JFDP, Gen. Corres. & Memo. Series, B3 (M3); State Department Press Release, Apr. 1, 1953, JFDP, Gen. Corres. & Memo. Series, B3 (Me); Arthur Krock, “In the Nation: Just a Little Careless,” The New York Times, Apr. 3, 1953; Joseph and Stewart Alsop, “Matter of Fact,” The Washington Post, Apr. 15, 1953; Murray Marder, “Thanks Him for Data on Aid to Reds,” The Washington Post, Apr. 2, 1953; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 487; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 296–97.

  6. DDE, News Conference, April 2, 1953, PPP; Murray Marder, “Ike Is Calm,” The Washington Post, Apr. 3, 1953; Reeves, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy, 487; Oshinsky, A Conspiracy So Immense, 297; Ewald, Who Killed Joe McCarthy?, 70.

  7. Bullis to DDE, CF/OF, B317, 99–R, Joe McCarthy, DDEPL; DDE to Bullis, May 18, 1953, DDEP, no. 193; DDE to Phillips, June 5, 1953, DDEP, no. 229.

 

‹ Prev