Evening star., 1942-02-22
Viereck Defense Expected to Take Week
By CARTER BRooKE JONES.

other prominent persons as the
Government, under a somewhat
? technical charge, sought to uncover
the inner workings of Nazi promo
ton schemes in America.
The trial was recessed by Justice
r. Dickinson Let's from Friday
/. night to Tuesday morning with the
Governments case not quite COM
pleted, but expected to be finished
before the noon recess at the next
session.
Emil Morosini and Daniel F.
Cohalen, jr., defense attorneys, said
: yesterday they probably would take
the better part of the week for their
testimony. They indicated they
expected to put the defendant on
: the stand.
While the defense has not been
revealed in detail, Mr.. Morosini
said in his opening statement to
the Jury that he would prove George
Sylvester Viereck had been a loyal
! American citizen for many years
and his only interest, in concerning
himself with propaganda, was to
keep this country out of another
European war.
Prominent Witnesses.
Among the defense witnesses who
have been summoned to appear this
week are Secretary of State Hull,
Secretary of the Treasury Morgen-
thau, Senator Guffey, Democrat, of
Pennsylvania; J. Edgar Hoover, di-
. rector Of the Federal Bureau of In
vestigation; Emil Hurja, former
analyst for the Democratic National
Committee, now publisher of the
Pathfinder: Representative Day and
Sir Willmott Lewis, Washington
correspondent of the London Times.
/ Viereck, German born author and
publicist, widely known for more
than 80 years, is charged with fail
ing to disclose fully the activities
which he was required to report in
supplemental statements following
his registration at the State De-
partment as a German agent.
In his registration, he reported his
German employers as the German
Library of Information, an agency
supported by the Reich; Munich
newspaper and an individual who
wanted to publish The 100 Families
That Rule the CBritish) Empire" !"
The indictment charges that in the
additional statements he had to file
every six months he failed to ac-
count for his propaganda activities.
What these activities were is the
gist of the issue which the Govern
ment has raised.
William Power Maloney and Ed
ward j. Hickey, jr., special prose-
cutors from the Justice Department,
have tried, through a sequence of
witnesses, to show by direct and
circumstantial evidence that Viereck
pulled the strings that made anti
British and isolationists propaganda
move in Washington and elsewhere.
Fish Supplies Fireworks.
Representative Fish, Republican,
of New York, n-interventionist
leader in the House before Pearl
Harbor, had been a storm center
of the investigation by. the special
District grand jury, and when he
took the stand, as one OF the flnal
witnesses for the Government, the
expected fireworks exploded.
Mr.. Fish, asked if there were not
a coincidence between the views
expressed by Viereck in his book,
'Spreading the Germs of Hate" an
expose of German propaganda in
the last war, and the outspoken
New Workers. views as a Congress
man." denounced such an impli-
cation as a lie" and demanded of
Justice Let's the right to reply to
insults"
Mr.. Fish admitted he had known
the defendant for many years. SO.
he explained, did every other public
official from New York, including
the President. Mr.. Fish said he had
known Viereck only as IAN Amer1-
can citizen of long and good stand
ing" and had regarded him as IAN
man, a great publlclst. "
The witness said he had not known
until the indictment of Viereck that
the defendant was registered Ger
man agent.
Asserting that no piece of Nazi
ever had gone out from
his Office with his knowledge and
consent, Mr.. Fish explained that his
former clerk, George Hill, had car
ried on a business outside office
hours and not in the Representa-
tive's Office as private contractor" )"
hiring girls to mail out extra copies
Of speeches for members OF Con-
gress.
Didn't Recall Introduction.
Mr.. Fish saw nothing wrong in
this, but explained that he had
known nothing about it. 1t was
possible, he conceded, that he had
introduced Hill to Viereck, as Hill
testified, but Mr.. Fish said he had
no recollection of it.
Mr.. Fish said he had been in
touch with Viereck when he was
writing anti Communist articles for
national magazines at a time, in
1880, when the Fish committee to
combat Communism was conducting
Investigations.
Hill testified that Mr.. Fish, com
ing out of his private office with
Viereck one day, directed the clerk
to use the Representatives mailing
list and send out 125, 900 copies of a
speech by the late Senator Lun-
deem, Minnesota Farmer-Laborite,
under the Senator's frank. Details,
said Hill, were left to Viereck and
Senator Lundeen and he was in
frequent touch with both. The mail
ing list, this witness said, was de-
rived largely from an organization
headed by Mr.. Fish, the Committee
to Keep America Out of Foreign
Wars.
Hill also said he got a "tip" of
500 from Viereck the first time they
met and $50 on another occasion.
- Got Material in Record.
The former clerk described hand
ling number of commissions for
Prescott bennett, then chairman
of the Islands for War Debts Com
mittee, formerly the Make Europe