By the time the Smith Act trial of five St. Louis Communist leaders had ground through its 18th and final week, both prosecution and defense could agree on one point: the FBI has a tight hold on the U.S. Communist Party.
Early in the trial the defendants got a major shock when the U.S. called the Rev. Obadiah Jones as a prosecution witness. The Rev. Mr. Jones, Negro pastor of Mt. Tabor Baptist Church, was local chairman of the Communist Civil Rights Congress, and such a notorious Communist that the Baptist Ministerial Alliance had expelled him in 1953. Quietly, he testified...
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