1
00:00:06,692 --> 00:00:10,852
Imagine that one day,
you're summoned before a government panel.

2
00:00:10,852 --> 00:00:13,307
Even though you haven't 
committed any crime,

3
00:00:13,307 --> 00:00:15,612
or been formally charged with one,

4
00:00:15,612 --> 00:00:19,062
you are repeatedly questioned
about your political views,

5
00:00:19,062 --> 00:00:21,083
accused of disloyalty,

6
00:00:21,083 --> 00:00:25,652
and asked to incriminate your friends
and associates.

7
00:00:25,652 --> 00:00:30,482
If you don't cooperate,
you risk jail or losing your job.

8
00:00:30,482 --> 00:00:35,062
This is exactly what happened in
the United States in the 1950s

9
00:00:35,062 --> 00:00:40,173
as part of a campaign to expose
suspected communists.

10
00:00:40,173 --> 00:00:42,962
Named after its most 
notorious practitioner,

11
00:00:42,962 --> 00:00:49,573
the phenomenon known as McCarthyism
destroyed thousands of lives and careers.

12
00:00:49,573 --> 00:00:54,402
For over a decade, American political 
leaders trampled democratic freedoms

13
00:00:54,402 --> 00:00:57,274
in the name of protecting them.

14
00:00:57,274 --> 00:00:59,418
During the 1930s and 1940s,

15
00:00:59,418 --> 00:01:04,313
there had been an active but small
communist party in the United States.

16
00:01:04,313 --> 00:01:06,322
Its record was mixed.

17
00:01:06,322 --> 00:01:09,443
While it played crucial roles in wider 
progressive struggles

18
00:01:09,443 --> 00:01:11,484
for labor and civil rights,

19
00:01:11,484 --> 00:01:14,794
it also supported the Soviet Union.

20
00:01:14,794 --> 00:01:18,163
From the start, the American 
Communist Party faced attacks

21
00:01:18,163 --> 00:01:20,793
from conservatives and business leaders,

22
00:01:20,793 --> 00:01:26,083
as well as from liberals who criticized
its ties to the oppressive Soviet regime.

23
00:01:26,083 --> 00:01:30,784
During World War II, when the USA
and USSR were allied against Hitler,

24
00:01:30,784 --> 00:01:35,333
some American communists actually
spied for the Russians.

25
00:01:35,333 --> 00:01:38,965
When the Cold War escalated
and this espionage became known,

26
00:01:38,965 --> 00:01:43,814
domestic communism came to be seen
as a threat to national security.

27
00:01:43,814 --> 00:01:45,754
But the attempt to eliminate that threat

28
00:01:45,754 --> 00:01:49,213
soon turned into the longest lasting
and most widespread episode

29
00:01:49,213 --> 00:01:52,735
of political repression 
in American history.

30
00:01:52,735 --> 00:01:54,695
Spurred on by a network of bureaucrats,

31
00:01:54,695 --> 00:01:55,695
politicians,

32
00:01:55,695 --> 00:01:56,785
journalists,

33
00:01:56,785 --> 00:01:58,014
and businessmen,

34
00:01:58,014 --> 00:02:03,465
the campaign wildly exaggerated
the danger of communist subversion.

35
00:02:03,465 --> 00:02:05,225
The people behind it harassed anyone

36
00:02:05,225 --> 00:02:08,074
suspected of holding 
left-of-center political views

37
00:02:08,074 --> 00:02:11,934
or associating with those who did.

38
00:02:11,934 --> 00:02:14,285
If you hung modern art on your walls,

39
00:02:14,285 --> 00:02:16,295
had a multiracial social circle,

40
00:02:16,295 --> 00:02:19,125
or signed petitions against
nuclear weapons,

41
00:02:19,125 --> 00:02:21,975
you might just have been a communist.

42
00:02:21,975 --> 00:02:23,636
Starting in the late 1940s,

43
00:02:23,636 --> 00:02:26,175
FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover

44
00:02:26,175 --> 00:02:30,467
used the resources of his agency
to hunt down such supposed communists

45
00:02:30,467 --> 00:02:33,478
and eliminate them from any
position of influence

46
00:02:33,478 --> 00:02:36,389
within American society.

47
00:02:36,389 --> 00:02:39,478
And the narrow criteria that Hoover
and his allies used

48
00:02:39,478 --> 00:02:41,478
to screen federal employees

49
00:02:41,478 --> 00:02:44,369
spread to the rest of the country.

50
00:02:44,369 --> 00:02:45,809
Soon, Hollywood studios,

51
00:02:45,809 --> 00:02:46,818
universities,

52
00:02:46,818 --> 00:02:48,179
car manufacturers,

53
00:02:48,179 --> 00:02:51,228
and thousands of other public
and private employers

54
00:02:51,228 --> 00:02:57,159
were imposing the same political tests
on the men and women who worked for them.

55
00:02:57,171 --> 00:03:00,441
Meanwhile, Congress conducted 
its own witchhunt

56
00:03:00,441 --> 00:03:04,600
subpoenaing hundreds of people
to testify before investigative bodies

57
00:03:04,600 --> 00:03:08,960
like the House Un-American 
Activities Committee.

58
00:03:08,960 --> 00:03:12,351
If they refused to cooperate,
they could be jailed for contempt,

59
00:03:12,351 --> 00:03:16,310
or more commonly, fired and blacklisted.

60
00:03:16,310 --> 00:03:18,680
Ambitious politicians, like Richard Nixon

61
00:03:18,680 --> 00:03:20,431
and Joseph McCarthy,

62
00:03:20,431 --> 00:03:23,711
used such hearings as a partisan weapon

63
00:03:23,711 --> 00:03:26,501
accusing democrats 
of being soft on communism

64
00:03:26,501 --> 00:03:30,821
and deliberately losing China
to the Communist Bloc.

65
00:03:30,823 --> 00:03:33,832
McCarthy, a Republican senator 
from Wisconsin

66
00:03:33,832 --> 00:03:38,652
became notorious by flaunting
ever-changing lists of alleged communists

67
00:03:38,652 --> 00:03:41,283
within the State Department.

68
00:03:41,283 --> 00:03:43,094
Egged on by other politicians,

69
00:03:43,094 --> 00:03:45,803
he continued to make 
outrageous accusations

70
00:03:45,803 --> 00:03:49,403
while distorting or fabricating evidence.

71
00:03:49,403 --> 00:03:53,523
Many citizens reviled McCarthy
while others praised him.

72
00:03:53,523 --> 00:03:57,533
And when the Korean War broke out,
McCarthy seemed vindicated.

73
00:03:57,533 --> 00:03:59,873
Once he became chair

74
00:03:59,873 --> 00:04:04,344
of the Senate's permanent subcommittee
on investigations in 1953,

75
00:04:04,344 --> 00:04:06,613
McCarthy recklessness increased.

76
00:04:06,613 --> 00:04:12,704
It was his investigation of the army that 
finally turned public opinion against him

77
00:04:12,704 --> 00:04:15,334
and diminished his power.

78
00:04:15,334 --> 00:04:17,765
McCarthy's colleagues 
in the Senate censured him

79
00:04:17,765 --> 00:04:22,914
and he died less than three years later,
probably from alcoholism.

80
00:04:22,914 --> 00:04:24,895
McCarthyism ended as well.

81
00:04:24,895 --> 00:04:27,743
It had ruined hundreds, 
if not thousands, of lives

82
00:04:27,743 --> 00:04:32,134
and drastically narrowed the American
political spectrum.

83
00:04:32,134 --> 00:04:35,834
Its damage to democratic institutions
would be long lasting.

84
00:04:35,834 --> 00:04:39,165
In all likelihood, there were both
Democrats and Republicans

85
00:04:39,165 --> 00:04:43,545
who knew that the anti-communist
purges were deeply unjust

86
00:04:43,545 --> 00:04:48,415
but feared that directly opposing them
would hurt their careers.

87
00:04:48,415 --> 00:04:51,344
Even the Supreme Court failed
to stop the witchhunt,

88
00:04:51,344 --> 00:04:54,454
condoning serious violations
of constitutional rights

89
00:04:54,454 --> 00:04:57,334
in the name of national security.

90
00:04:57,334 --> 00:05:01,117
Was domestic communism an actual
threat to the American government?

91
00:05:01,117 --> 00:05:03,675
Perhaps, though a small one.

92
00:05:03,675 --> 00:05:08,000
But the reaction to it was so extreme
that it caused far more damage

93
00:05:08,000 --> 00:05:10,350
than the threat itself.

94
00:05:10,350 --> 00:05:13,500
And if new demagogues appeared
in uncertain times

95
00:05:13,500 --> 00:05:17,626
to attack unpopular minorities
in the name of patriotism,

96
00:05:17,626 --> 00:05:19,995
could it all happen again?