(See Cover)
"Man is born to do something," says restless Joe McCarthy. Joe is doing something. His name is in headlines. "McCarthyism" is now part of the language. His burly figure casts its shadow over the coming presidential campaign. Thousands turn out to hear his speeches. Millions regard him as "a splendid American" (a fellow Senator recently called him that). Other millions think McCarthy a worse menace than the Communist conspiracy against which he professes to fight.
McCarthy does not face some questions which the nation cannot evade:
1) Precisely what has McCarthy done?
2) Is his effect on the U.S. good or bad?
3) Does he deserve well of the republic, or should he be treated with aversion and contempt?
The Charge. McCarthy's jump from obscurity to the national limelight began nearly two years ago, when he made a speech in Wheeling, W. Va. He said: "I have here in my hand a list of 205, a list of names made known to the Secretary of State as being members of the Communist Party and who nevertheless are still working and shaping policy in the State Department." Next day in Salt Lake City, he declared: "I hold in my hand the names of 57 card-carrying Communists" working in the State Department. Ten days later, on the Senate floor, he cited 81 "cases," particularly "three big Communists." Said McCarthy: "While there are vast numbers of other Communists with whom we must be concerned, if we can get rid of these big three, we will have done something to break the back of the espionage ring within the State Department."
In a nation that had finally learned (without any help from McCarthy) that it was locked in a life-or-death struggle with world Communism, these charges were as grave as any that could be made. The underlying accusation was that its State Department was harboring Communists, knew they were Communists, and was doing so deliberately. To investigate these charges, the Senate set up a committee headed by conservative Democrat Senator Millard Tydings of Maryland.
McCarthy, who had said that he "held in his hand" the names of 205 Communists then in the State Department, did not give the Tydings committee the names of 205. He did not give it the names of 57. He did not produce the name of even one Communist in the State Department.
Logically, that failure might have been expected to end the rocketing flight of Joe McCarthy. That it was a beginning, not an end, is partly explained by McCarthy's personality. Another man, humiliated by failure to produce evidence he said he held, would have retreated and wiped a bloody nose. McCarthy, who was a boxer in college, says: "I learned in the ring that the moment you draw back and start defending yourself, you're licked. You've got to keep boring in." This is not necessarily true of either boxing or politics—but Joe McCarthy thinks it is true.