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Another of the group, Chambers said, was Harry Dexter White, who rose to be Assistant Treasury Secretary and chief U.S. fiscal architect of the World Bank and International Fund. Chambers did not say positively of White—as he did of Alger Hiss—that he was a C.P. member, but White "was certainly a fellow traveler. . . and perfectly willing to cooperate."
Chambers said that he and Hiss became close friends in Communism and that he had tried to persuade Hiss to join him in breaking with the party. Chambers' story: "I went to the Hiss home one evening at what I considered considerable risk to myself, and found Mrs. Hiss at home. Mrs. Hiss is also a Communist [and] attempted while I was there to make a call, which I can only presume was to other Communists . . . But I quickly went to the telephone and she hung up . . . Mr. Hiss came in shortly afterwards and we talked and I tried to break him away from the party . . . He cried when we separated . . . but he absolutely refused to break. His reasons were simply the party line." Chambers said he also tried to get Harry White to make the break: "He left me in a very agitated frame of mind and I thought I had succeeded. Apparently I did not."
Chambers' own break had put him in fear of his life. For a year, he said, "I lived in hiding, sleeping by day and watching through the night, with gun or revolver within easy reach." In 1939, after the Stalin-Hitler pact, Chambers took his story to Adolf Berle, then Assistant Secretary of State. But nothing came of his warnings. In 1943, Chambers told his story to the FBI. Chambers did not spare himself. Did he consider himself disloyal to the U.S. during his Communist days? Said he: "Certainly."
On the Opposite. Two days later, tall, handsome Alger Hiss strode briskly before the committee. He was there at his own request. His voice was positive as he gave his answer to Chambers' accusation. It was, he said flatly, a lie; he had never been a Communist, never followed the party line. He did not know Chambers; he had never laid eyes on him. Hiss smiled grimly through a reading of Chambers' story. Said Hiss of all its details: "I am testifying the exact opposite." He had heard of Chambers only once; FBI men had come to his office in New York City and mentioned the name.
He admitted that he did know almost all of the others Chambers had named. He and Lee Pressman had been on the Harvard Law Review together and had worked in Henry Wallace's Agricultural Adjustment Administration. John Abt and Nathan Witt had been on the same staff. He had also "casually" known Charles Kramer. South Dakota's Karl Mundt spoke up: "It looks like someone has committed perjury."
Pursuit of Truth. Up against this sharp contradiction in testimony, which left the committee wondering which witness to believe, Karl Mundt sent investigators scurrying off to New York City in a big-headlined pursuit of the truth. Witness Chambers was heard again, in secret. In Brooklyn, the investigators located a man who, Karl Mundt announced, would crack the Communist spy ring wide open.