Evening star., 1947-06-30
No Witch Hunt

Although sentiment is UNDERSTANDABLE
running hard against communism in this
country, Americans can pride themselves
on the fact that they have not been letting
their emotions get the better of their heads.
Up to now, at any rate, there has been no
sign of frenzied theological witch hunt.
Operating calmly, quietly and justly, the
law itself-not blind prejudice-has gov
erned the recent series of actions taken
against certain persons and groups vari-
ously described as Communists and fellow
travellers.
In it's recent dismissal of ten employees
for example, the State Department has
acted without any blowing of trumpets
and strictly in keeping with specific con-
gressional authority having the force OF
law The ten involved-not all OF them
Communists-have been discharged not
because of their proved or suspected ideo-
logical bias, but because they have been
found, after painstaking investigation, to
have been bad security risks" That Is to
say, their loyalty to the Government has
been judged to be of sufficiently doubt
full nature to justify-legally and other
tions where they might have had access to
secret information vital to the national
welfare.
Similarly, it is not because of an ideo-
logical belief in itself that other Com
munists and whiting or unwilling fellow
travellers have run into trouble in the
courts here during the past week. Carl
Aldo Marzani, former State Department
employe, has been convicted by jury and
sentenced to prison not because Of his
Communist ties, but because of his viola
ton of the law in deliberately conceallng
those ties in order to stay on the Federal
payroll. The same thing has happened to
Gerhart Eisler not because he has been
alleged to be MoscoW's top agent in this
country, but because he has been found
guilty of contempt of Congress in his stub
born refusal to testify under oath before
the House Committee on Un-Amerlcan
Activities. So, too, with Eugene Dennis,
general secretary of the American Com
munist Party, and with the sixteen men,
bers of the Executive Board of the Joint
AntiFascist Refugee Committee
1t is worth emphasizing that in all these
cases-Marzani, Eisler, Dennis and the six
teen "anti-Fascists"-th convictions have
come after trial by jury in open court be-
fore eminently fair judges. The individ-
uals involved have been found guilty not
of practicing an ideology but of violating
specific American laWs-the kind of laws
that have sent Republicans, Democrats and
other non-Communists to Jail in the past.
1t may we'll be that some of these persons
have been wrongly convicted. If so, they
can appeal, as they apparently intend to
do. American justice-the like of which
cannot be found in that totalitarian SyS-
tenn which Communists and fellow
travellers so often praise-still leaves ave-
nues open to them and stands ready to
correct any error they can prove.
Quite obviously all this adds up to any
thing but witch hunt. Much as they
may abhor communism, the American
people and their Government are not max.
ing the mistake of trying to fight it by
tracking down its practitioners or Sympa
thizers and throwing them all into Jail.
On the contrary, those who want 1t still
have the legal right to vote for it in this
country Our heads remain the masters
of our emotions They tell us that this
liberty destroying thing will never be a
threat to our way of 'life so long as we
keep it under proper watch and demon
strate how enormously superior is our
democratic system.