Mitchell Palmer: The Case Against the Reds (1920 CE)
The climate of repression established in the name of wartime security during World War I continued after the war as the U.S. government focused on communists, Bolsheviks, and “reds.” This anticommunist crusade climaxed during the “Palmer raids” of 1919–1921, when Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer’s men, striking without warning and without warrants, smashed union offices and the headquarters of Communist and Socialist organizations.
In this brief review of the work which the Department of Justice has undertaken, to tear out the radical seeds that have entangled American ideas in their poisonous theories, I desire not merely to explain what the real menace of communism is, but also to tell how we have been compelled to clean up the country almost unaided by any virile legislation. Though I have not been embarrassed by political opposition, I have been materially delayed because the present sweeping processes of arrests and deportation of seditious aliens should have been vigorously pushed by Congress last spring. The failure of this is a matter of record in the Congressional files…
Like a prairie-fire, the blaze of revolution was sweeping over every American institution of law and order a year ago. It was eating its way into the homes of the American workmen, its sharp tongues of revolutionary heat were licking the altars of the churches, leaping into the belfry of the school bell, crawling into the sacred corners of American homes, seeking to replace marriage vows with libertine laws, burning up the foundations of society.
Robbery, not war, is the ideal of communism. This has been demonstrated in Russia, Germany, and in America. As a foe, the anarchist is fearless of his own life, for his creed is a fanaticism that admits no respect of any other creed. Obviously it is the creed of any criminal mind, which reasons always from motives impossible to clean thought. Crime is the degenerate factor in society…
…By stealing, murder and lies, Bolshevism has looted Russia not only of its material strength but of its moral force. A small clique of outcasts from the East Side of New York has attempted this, with what success we all know. Because a disreputable alien—Leon Bronstein, the man who now calls himself Trotzky—can inaugurate a reign of terror from his throne room in the Kremlin, because this lowest of all types known to New York can sleep in the Czar’s bed, while hundreds of thousands in Russia are without food or shelter, should Americans be swayed by such doctrines?
Such a question, it would seem, should receive but one answer from America.
My information showed that communism in this country was an organization of thousands of aliens who were direct allies of Trotzky. Aliens of the same misshapen caste of mind and indecencies of character, and it showed that they were making the same glittering promises of lawlessness, of criminal autocracy to Americans, that they had made to the Russian peasants. How the Department of Justice discovered upwards of 60,000 of these organized agitators of the Trotzky doctrine in the United States is the confidential information upon which the Government is now sweeping the nation clean of such alien filth. . .
Multiple Select Question
According to the text, why does Palmer express concerns regarding Communism? (choose 2)
A.
Palmer believed that Catholic immigrants would bring ruin the United States.
B.
Palmer believes Bolshevism is a system in which the government robs its people of their liberties, promotes anarchy, and incites violence.
C.
Palmer insists that the American tradition of individual liberty and voluntary cooperation was vital to shaping American society
D.
Palmer expresses concern that communism was infiltrating American institutions and defends his deportation of communists by declaring that a year ago communism was a “blaze of revolution” that was “sweeping over every American institution of law and order.”
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The correct choices based on the text are:
B. Palmer believes Bolshevism is a system in which the government robs its people of their liberties, promotes anarchy, and incites violence.
D. Palmer expresses concern that communism was infiltrating American institutions and defends his deportation of communists by declaring that a year ago communism was a “blaze of revolution” that was “sweeping over every American institution of law and order.”
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