The Cold War and Domestic AntiCommunism 2. Paul Robeson

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The Cold War and Domestic Anti-Communism2. Paul
Robeson

• History 203
• May 2, 2007

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Announcements

• Midterm questions are on the web at
  www.uoregon.edu/dapope/203midtermessays--sp07.htm
  .
• Instructions for the paper on The Oil Crisis of
  1973-74 will be on line by the end of the week.
  If you havent done a paper on the Scopes Trial
  book, your paper on the Oil Crisis book is due by
  class time on May 23.

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Some Websites on Anti-Communism and on Paul
Robeson

• Large Literature and Culture of the American
  1950s site
• The attack on comic booksa brief history
• The official James Dean website
• Joseph McCarthy A Modern Tragedy
• Paul Robeson on the Web
• Paul Robeson centennial website

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Accessing the PowerPointsAlternative Method

• Ive posted the presentations for this class in
  html format, which you can view in your browser.
  (Internet Explorer works best.) As I understand
  it, you cant download those files.
• However, if you have Microsoft PowerPoint on your
  computer, you can download the presentations for
  this course. Ive now put each classs
  presentation on the web in PowerPoint form. If
  you go to these URLs, you can open or save the
  file to your computer. Ill continue to post
  these alternative URLs on the syllabus.
• PowerPoint versions Apr. 2 Apr. 4 Apr. 9
  Apr. 11 Apr. 16 Apr. 18 Apr. 23 Apr. 25
  Apr. 30 May 2

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Cold War Politics and Culture

• Living with the Bomb
• See an interesting comparison of disaster fears
  in the 1950s and post-September 11
• Cold War and the New Politics of Family Life
• A feminine mystique?
• A male flight from commitment
• Togetherness? Juvenile Delinquency, the Comic
  Book Menace and a Generation Gap?

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Fallout Shelter FadLife Magazine, 1962
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Juvenile Delinquency

• Even though teenage crime rates were pretty
  stable in the 1950s, there was a widespread fear
  of juvenile delinquency. This hit movie expresses
  these anxieties.

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James Dean starred in only three movies and died
in an auto accident at 24. He personified angry,
alienated youth of the 1950s.
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• Fredric Werthams 1954 book attacked comic books
  as psychologically and socially destructive.
• To defend themselves, comic book publishers
  adopted a code of good behavior

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The Attack on Comic Books

• From a 1940 essay "Badly drawn, badly written,
  and badly printed - a strain on the young eyes
  and young nervous systems - the effects of these
  pulp-paper nightmares is that of a violent
  stimulant. Their crude blacks and reds spoils a
  child's natural sense of colour their hypodermic
  injection of sex and murder make the child
  impatient with better, though quieter, stories.
  Unless we want a coming generation even more
  ferocious than the present one, parents and
  teachers throughout America must band together to
  break the comic' magazine.
• According to Wertham, comic books were giving
  kids wrong ideas about the laws of physics,
  because Superman could fly! He also charged that
  comic books were implementing and re-enforcing
  homosexual thoughts because Robin was drawn with
  bare legs, that were often wide open, and that
  Robin seemed devoted and attached to only Batman.
  Dr. Wertham also stated that Wonder Woman was
  giving little girls the "wrong ideas" about a
  woman's place in society.

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The Anti-Communist Crusade

• McCarthyism before McCarthy
• Some examples Anti-Communist oaths for labor
  union leaders Alger Hiss case Trumans loyalty
  review for federal workers House Un-American
  Activities Committee and Hollywood
• Anti-Communism removes radical influence from
  American life.

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Alger Hiss, State Department Official, Charged
with Espionage
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The Hollywood Ten Charged with Contempt of
Congress
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Senator Joe McCarthy

• Tail Gunner Joe
• The Senator from Pepsi-Cola
• McCarthy discovers the Communist Menace

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McCarthyism The Rise and Fall

• McCarthys targets expand
• Eisenhower A Republican President deals with
  McCarthy
• The Army-McCarthy Hearings

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"I had to sell out my own girl--so would you! I
was under the toughest orders a guy could get! I
stood by and watched my brother slugged...I
started a riot that ran red with terror...I
learned every dirty rule in their book--and had
to use them--because I was a communist--but I WAS
A COMMUNIST FOR THE FBI."
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The Anti-Communist Crusade Interpretations

• Home Front in the Cold War Response to Espionage
  and Disloyalty
• Traditional Conservatism with a New Twist
• A Populist Crusade gone Bad
• A Strategy of Cold War Liberalism

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Paul Robeson A Forgotten Hero 1898-1976
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Paul Robesons Many Roles

• All-American Football Player at Rutgers
• Valedictorian and Phi Beta Kappa
• Columbia Law School
• Actor on Broadway and London, International Film
  Star
• Baritone with Repertoire from Gospel to Opera
• Cosmopolitan linguistRobeson spoke perhaps a
  dozen languages.

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An Artist as Political Activist

• Opposition to racial discrimination
• Support for workers in the U.S. and around the
  world
• Growing admiration for the Soviet Union.
• Robeson was never a member of the Communist Party
  but he was a committed radical who rarely if ever
  criticized the USSR.
• Robeson as a leader in mainstream African
  American politics and culture in 1930s and World
  War II years

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Robeson and the Cold War

• Communism as a dividing issue in the late 1940s
• Robeson and African American patriotism
• Jackie Robinsons reply
• Peekskill Riots 1949 Radicals isolated
• Robeson persecuted Passport revoked

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Paul Robeson Concert Attacked Peekskill, NY 1949
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