While many of Truman's actions are most recognizable as regarding foreign affairs, many of his most controversial ones took place within the nation. With a rise of McCarthyism (campaign led against communism in government led by senator Joseph McCarthy) citizens groaned for actions to be made and paranoia swept the nation.
Truman's Loyalty Programs truly began during WWII with the Hatch Act. This act forbade any person with radical political view to serve in government during war time. While after the war Truman was not permissive to continue loyalty programs many close to him urged him to do so with the growing fear of communism.
Due to that as well the republican sweep during the midterms, Truman was finally compelled to enact the Temporary Commission on Employee Loyalty, subjugating persons to a loss of their job if their political views are not in line. This was quickly followed by Executive order 9835 which described procedure that could take place to investigate government officials.
Much of what Truman did to fight communism was tactical, apt, and adequate but but how he chose to fight it off on the home front is widely considered as a series of poor decisions that violated the rights of many. At the Loyalty Program's peak, some five million government officials underwent screening of their political views. His decisions as tactics would be continuously discussed, weighing in the necessity of war time, as well as the clear violation of rights.
https://www.trumanlibrary.org/dbq/loyaltyprogram.php
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Nice post, William! I like how you covered the big picture of these Loyalty Acs and how they severely impacted people's rights in America during this time. As Americans are usually very gungho about their rights and freedoms, many often wonder why there wasn't more protest to Truman's actions. After some research, I found that this was because the Cold War saw a revival of the Red Scare- a general sense of hysteria over communism. Both government and citizens alike were suspicious of Soviet influence and feared the development of a nuclear war. As such, if anyone defended those who were under investigation for working with the Russians, they were also seen as supporting the USSR and were labeled as communists and traitors. This sets off a vicious cycle where any dissent is punished, and conformity is encouraged.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Second_Red_Scare
Great post, William. I really liked how you gave an brief, overall look at the loyalty acts during the Truman era. I did a bit more research and found out that the government actually set up loyalty boards to facilitate with this process. These boards were established by executive order 9835, and used a list of "totalitarian, fascist, communist, or subversive" organizations as a reference to see if a federal employee had any questionable loyalty. In some cases, the FBI was also called in to help with its investigations. While very few people were actually found guilty, it did help Truman alleviate some pressure from his administration.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/truman-orders-loyalty-checks-of-federal-employees