Part 13

Upon return from the service I tried to become as active as possible in the party work, tried to restore organization of the party apparatus. I was first advised by Mr. Andrew Remes when he came--he had just returned from the service ahead of me. He advised me that when he was in the service, evidently, Mr. Huff, who had been left in charge of the district, had permitted the entire district to collapse, because when he came back from the service--I am speaking of Mr. Remes--he told me there was not a single functioning branch of the Communist Party in the entire district, that it took him several weeks to get together the membership of any one branch. And he could only do it by legwork, walking from house to house, to the old addresses of the people he knew before he went into the service. And he was dumfounded to find that condition existing.

When he had gone in the service the party numbered in the neighborhood of 5,000 in this district.

In other words, it was baffling to us as to why that thing had happened.

Later on I came to the conclusion that Mr. Huff was either representing the Federal Bureau of Investigation or somebody else who was as opposed to the party as anybody could be because I couldn’t account for any explanation for that development.

I soon found that I was running into a stone wall. Everything I proposed by way of reorganization or by way of organizational activities--I, for instance, felt that a fundamental policy of the party was to concentrate in the mass production industries, to concentrate in basic industries. I had always been taught that that was one of the party’s chief concerns.

But, lo and behold, when I approached the district leaders asking for assistance to concentrate on making a strong party in the steelworkers, they said, “Oh, we’re not interested in them. We have got other problems that are more important to us than just a bunch of steelworkers.” Which was an attitude expressing to me a certain contempt for the workers, which didn’t go very well because I have the greatest respect for men who have the audacity to try to work for a living. And I didn’t like this business of people who were sitting up on top sneering, speaking about the membership in such a cursory way.

Mr. TAVENNER. Did the question of Communist Party activity in veterans’ organizations come up at that time?

Mr. DENNETT. Yes; it did.

Mr. TAVENNER. Just touch on it very briefly, please, because we have very little time.

Mr. DENNETT. I was called to a fraction meeting of returned veterans to try to work out some kind of veterans’ policy, and some of these veterans reported boastfully that they had just walked into some veterans’ posts and had captured the leadership--no trouble at all.

I chastised them for being so naive as to think that the Communists could capture a veterans’ organization when the purpose of the veterans’ organization was to oppose the Communist Party. And I told them they were foolish to undertake such a task and that they shouldn’t embark upon that policy. They told me I was nuts and that they knew what they were doing because they had the success of having captured a post.

Mr. TAVENNER. Time, however, proved that you were correct, did it not?

Mr. DENNETT. I think it did.

Mr. TAVENNER. You said both you and your wife were disciplined by the Communist Party.

Mr. DENNETT. That is true.

When I returned from the service it didn’t take very long before rumor was circulated to the effect that I was alleged to be an FBI agent.

Mr. MOULDER. Was your wife a member of the Communist Party, too?

Mr. DENNETT. Yes, sir.

Mr. TAVENNER. I would like to say at this point that it is not the practice of this committee, and it is not my practice to ask a witness any questions relating to the activities of his wife. There have been several occasions when witnesses felt that, in order to give the complete story to the committee, it was necessary to speak of their wife’s activities. But when they did, they did it on their own volition. Therefore, I am not asking you any questions with regard to your wife. If you mention her it is purely on your own volition.

Mr. DENNETT. To explain this disciplinary action I have to advise that my former wife and I were expelled from the party on the same document with the same explanation, the same reasons. The documentary evidence will bring her into this part of it.

And the account which I wish to make about the discipline against her is of far more importance than the discipline against me, although I am convinced that the purpose of the discipline was to get me out of their hair.

It seems as though some people in the district leadership did not like to be reminded of what the party policy used to be, and they objected to my reminding them of the zigzags which they had followed in the intervening period.

I was trying to find some way of bringing them to what I considered to be the official party position, and they seemed to have an entirely different attitude than I.

It resulted finally in a series of meetings with the district disciplinary body known to me originally as a control commission. The last I heard it was called a review commission. But, in effect, it amounts to a kangaroo court because, in my case, they started out with this rumor that I was an FBI agent, asked me to explain it, and all I could do was explain that my former wife had done something which they had authorized. And Mr. Huff admitted that he authorized it.

It is true that it ultimately led her to make certain reports which did contribute to the war effort by way of eliminating bottlenecks which she found in various parts of the war production industry. But this had been approved by Mr. Huff.

And then when I was on the pan, Mr. Huff first admitted that he had authorized her to engage in this activity, then later denied that he had done so, and used the allegation that I was an FBI agent as the excuse to cause my expulsion from the party, mainly and, in my judgment, solely because I was in total disagreement with them on policies relating to civil rights, policies relating to Veterans’ Administration and veterans’ work, and policies relating to organization in basic industry.

And the civil rights question was extremely important to me because in the organization of civil rights struggles it was my conception that if you are going to fight for civil rights you have to fight for civil rights for everyone. And when we attempted to organize a civil rights congress at the outset with that purpose in mind, and that as our declared effort, we were advised that the Communist Party could not afford to waste its time fighting for civil rights for everybody, that they were only interested in fighting for civil rights for members of the Communist Party.

Mr. TAVENNER. Is that one of the matters on which you disagreed with the Communist Party?

Mr. DENNETT. It certainly was. Mr. Andrew Remes advised me personally that that was the situation, the party was in so much difficulty that it had to restrict its efforts to the defense of the Communist Party and that the Civil Rights Congress was created solely for that purpose.

I ceased to have any interest in it whatsoever, and, as a consequence, one thing led to another, and they finally expelled us with a notice on the early week of October 1947.

Mr. VELDE. You were removed from the party then. Membership was taken away from you for about the same reasons that you were removed from the bureau, from the district bureau?

Mr. DENNETT. That is true.

Mr. VELDE. That was about 6 years before?

Mr. DENNETT. That is true.

Mr. VELDE. Do you mean they spent all that time trying to change your mind about civil rights?

Mr. DENNETT. Well, there was an intervening period in which I was away, you know. I was in the service.

Mr. VELDE. That is right.

Mr. DENNETT. There were several breaks there.

Mr. TAVENNER. I believe you were in the service from 1943 practically through the year 1945.

Mr. DENNETT. That is true.

Mr. TAVENNER. I do not want you to go into great detail, but I believe the record should be a little clearer on the character of work in which your wife was actually engaged, which you say was authorized by the head of the Communist Party.

Mr. DENNETT. A stranger approached her and asked her if she would submit reports to him about any bottlenecks that she found in war production. He advised her that he had been informed that she was a very well-informed person, knew a lot of people, and would be capable of doing this work. She didn’t know what to make of it. So she wrote to me while I was in the service asking my opinion, and I told her to hold off until I got back on furlough.

At that time I suggested to her that she take it up with the district leadership of the party, which she did, and got this approval.

The nature of that work she found----

Mr. TAVENNER. That had nothing to do with reporting to any agency of Communist Party activities as such?

Mr. DENNETT. No; it did not.

Mr. TAVENNER. But it was just a matter of reporting things which interfered with the war effort in industry?

Mr. DENNETT. That is true.

Among the things that she found, some of the outstanding things, was one occasion pertaining to the Tacoma shipyards. She learned by various sources--friends that she knew in the labor movement--that the shipyard had been in operation for a period of around 10 months or more and still didn’t have a ship on the ways. She made a number of inquiries as to how they could account for such a thing, and at one point she ran across a name that rang a bell with her.

She started to do a little probing, and found out that this name was the same as that of a person who had been removed from the navy yard some time before, either 2 or 3 years before, maybe. It might have been longer than that. But the person had been removed as a Fascist. He was known to be a member of a Silver Shirt organization.

Lo and behold, this person turns up as the production supervisor or superintendent in this particular shipyard.

Anyway, she submitted a report of all the information she had gathered on the subject. Within a couple of weeks’ time this person was removed from his position, and within a short time afterward ships were on the ways in that shipyard and production started booming. We could only draw a conclusion that her information had, certainly, some value.

Mr. TAVENNER. We will be very much interested to hear of other occasions, but, because of the shortness of time, we will have to move on.

The point is, that before undertaking that type of work your wife conferred with the leadership of the Communist Party and obtained approval.

Mr. DENNETT. That is true.

Mr. TAVENNER. Then take it up from there and tell us what occurred.

Mr. DENNETT. That was part of the story on which this allegation of FBI agent thing arose.

When I was first confronted with the story I recounted this whole thing in every detail to the leader of the section. The person was Mr. Jim Bourne. Mr. Jim Bourne told me to sit tight, do nothing, say nothing until I heard from the district.

I waited from March until June 1947, and still had no word from them. About sometime in June I was invited to a meeting which was called by the Communist Party for the purpose of preparing its defenses from the anticipated attack which would come from the Canwell committee investigation which was about to open.

I reluctantly went to the meeting because I felt I was under a cloud. However, I did go. I am glad I did because they did discuss the whole question of these investigating committees, and it gave me some insight as to my rights under the fifth amendment of the Constitution of the United States. It was thoroughly discussed in this meeting, and we understood that that was the sole and only real protection that a person had if he wanted to avoid testifying.

However, during the course of that meeting I spoke to a leader of the party, asking what was happening to my case. He advised me to speak to Mr. Huff. I spoke to Mr. Huff about it and Mr. Huff, as a result of it, arranged a meeting of the control commission.

The control commission called me to a meeting within a week’s time. We reviewed the whole situation, the whole case, and I told them every single thing I knew about it. They asked me to submit a written statement. I did exactly that. I detailed everything that I knew about the situation in the statement.

I declined to sign the statement, however, because at that time I feared that their practices and methods were a little bit too loose, and I feared it might fall into the wrong hands and be used against me.

However, they accepted the statement, but they did not like what was in it.

They called me to another meeting, and at the second meeting they upbraided me and accused me of everything under the sun, and we finally broke up in rather a violent battle over whether or not they were trying to help the working class or not.

That occurred some time in August.

By October Mr. John Lawrie, the chairman of the control commission, visited our home, demanded our books, our party books.

We reluctantly gave them to him, protesting that we understood that a person had a right to be charged and tried, hear witnesses, and that sort of thing.

He said, “Well, you will get a statement.”

About a week later we did receive a statement. The statement was an expulsion notice from the Communist Party.

No charges had ever been actually preferred, no opportunity for trial had been granted us, and we were blasphemed and accused of everything under the sun which is looked upon as a crime by the members of the Communist Party.

This statement was circulated to all the Communist Party sections, and evidently it reached other hands, because shortly afterward some security agencies of the Government called me up and asked me what was going on. I told them I didn’t know, and I declined to talk with any of them, and I have never talked to any of them except on one occasion when Mr. John Boyd asked that I stop by the Immigration Bureau Office.

I did stop by there. He asked me a number of questions then, and I refused to be of any assistance to him whatsoever at that time. That was shortly after the expulsion.

Now, the most important part of this disciplinary action is what I have to say at this time, because immediately after receiving this notice, we received rumors to the effect that the Communist Party members in the union of which my former wife was the president, which was the United Office and Professional Workers of America, Local 35--I heard the rumor that they were going to come into that meeting that night and demand her removal from the organization.

Mr. TAVENNER. You mean that the union members were going to demand----

Mr. DENNETT. I heard the Communist Party members in that union were going to make a demand in that union that my former wife be removed from office and be removed as a member of that union because the party had disciplined her.

The situation in that union was very peculiar. It was a union of about 65 members, and there were no more than a half-dozen persons in it who were not members of the Communist Party.

That seems incredible, but the reason for it is that most of the persons who were members of the union were working as secretaries in various union offices, or were working for some individual employer with whom there were no collective-bargaining contracts and there were no regular functions of a union. It was simply a home where these people could pay dues and use the union label wherever they wanted to for their own convenience. As a matter of fact, that is the reason why the Communist Party usually uses the union label on its circulars or letters, because it has members in the Communist Party office who were members of that union.

This particular expulsion drew the attention of the Communist Party to us, and especially to my former wife. They knew that the steelworkers union was bitterly anti-Communist. They didn’t dare to try to make any approaches to the steelworkers union to have me thrown out, but they did have absolute control, they thought, in the office workers union, and they thought they would take their revenge on my former wife by proceeding against her.

When I learned of this I went to the office of the party and asked for the district leadership to give me an audience.

They treated me like scum under their feet when I went in their office because I had just been expelled. However, I did speak to them and advised them that I heard this rumor, that I urged them not to be as foolhardy as that because to do so would attract public attention. And if that was done it would do irreparable harm to that union and might also bring down a great deal of criticism on the entire labor movement for something for which the labor movement itself was not at fault but was something for which the Communist Party was at fault.

I, therefore, asked them if they would be so considerate as to allow my former wife to resign her position if it was inconvenient for them to have her in that position.

She had no desire to remain in it any longer than necessary. She thought she was rendering them a service and thought she was rendering the union a service by holding that position.

But they said they would not take their advice from expelled members.

So they proceeded that night to introduce a mimeographed proposal preferring charges against my former wife.

Now I have borrowed this from a person who has kept the file because he was prevailed upon by my former wife and myself to act as her counsel during the course of that proceeding, and he kept a complete file.

I have here the original of the charges that were preferred against her, and the substance of it is simply this: That they were asking for my former wife to be expelled from that union and from the office of president in that union simply because she had been expelled from the Communist Party on a kangaroo court proceeding. And the names of the signers are here and in their own original handwriting. Some of them have been called before this committee before.

Mr. VELDE. Is that for expulsion from the United Office and Professional Workers Union or from the party?

Mr. DENNETT. No. This is the charges that were preferred in the Office Workers Union by members of the Office Workers Union who were also--they must have been members of the Communist Party. I didn’t know of them of my own knowledge, but my former wife did, and it is in their handwriting. Their names are there in their own handwriting. And I think the committee would like to know this and have this as a matter of record.

Mr. TAVENNER. Will you read the names into the record.

Mr. VELDE. If you are sure that they are all members of the party.

(The witness confers with his counsel.)

Mr. DENNETT. My counsel raised the same question, Mr. Tavenner, that inasmuch as I cannot testify of my own knowledge about their membership, that perhaps it is not proper for me. However, this is the document which was used in that union.

Mr. TAVENNER. Let me ask you a few preliminary questions.

Were you given a written notice of expulsion by the Communist Party?

Mr. DENNETT. Yes, we were.

Mr. TAVENNER. Can you identify language in that expulsion notice as being virtually the same language as in the notice of charges given by the union to your wife?

Mr. DENNETT. It certainly is. In both instances they accuse her of the crime of being an informer for the FBI.

Mr. TAVENNER. We will not take time now to analyze those documents, but I would like for them to be in evidence, and, in light of the fact that the names signed have not been shown by evidence to be members of the Communist Party, I ask that that part of the document be deleted until investigation has established whether or not they are members of the party.

Mr. MOULDER. As requested by counsel, without objection, it is so ordered.

Mr. TAVENNER. I would like for the document to be marked “Dennett Exhibit No. 10.”

(The document above referred to, marked “Dennett Exhibit No. 10,” is filed herewith.)

DENNETT EXHIBIT NO. 10

We, the undersigned, prefer charges against Harriette Dennett, President, United Office and Professional Workers of America, Local 35, for violation of the Constitution of the National Union under the following Articles:

ARTICLE II, Section 3. “No person whose interests are deemed to lie with the employer as against the employees shall be eligible for membership.”

ARTICLE II, Section 5, Obligations of Members. “... to bear true allegiance to, and keep inviolate the principles of the union; ... and to promote the interests of our members in harmony with the best interests of our country.”

ARTICLE VI, Section 9, Obligations of Local Union Officers. “... to perform all your duties as required by the laws of the Union and the instruction of the membership ... and that you will do everything in your power to forward the interests of the organized labor movement.”

We have certain evidence clearly revealing that Harriette Dennett has made regular reports to the Federal Bureau of Investigation over a long period of time for which she has received payment. We are convinced that no honest trade unionist would have connections with any police body, especially the FBI, and still serve the best interests of the Union.

Let as examine the role of the FBI. Organized labor recognizes that law enforcing agencies are absolutely necessary in the protection of public and private property, prevention of crime, and safeguarding our welfare. However, various police bodies, both Federal and local, have always allied themselves with the employers in economic struggles. In strikes, the U. S. Army and National Guard have smashed picket lines and arrested union leaders, and, in conjunction with the courts, have framed them, had them imprisoned, deported, and even executed.

The FBI especially, acting as the undercover arm of these police forces, while it has done a commendable job in the apprehension of criminals, has constantly used its prestige and power in aiding employers and local police agencies in their efforts to weaken and destroy unions by hunting down progressive and militant trade unionists and having them blacklisted from their jobs.

In the Bridges Case, witnesses were either paid or intimidated by the FBI to testify falsely. They did not hesitate to use wiretapping, dictographing, and other devices, although illegal. At the present time, John Santos, long-time leader of the Transport Workers Union, is undergoing an ordeal very similar to that of Bridges. Strenuous efforts are being made to deport him because he has earned the enmity of powerful transit and utility corporations. He is charged with being an alien “red.” And, once again, the FBI is playing a key role in this hearing by rounding up questionable anti-labor characters to testify against him.

According to the La Follette Civil Liberties Committee, the Pinkerton Detective Agency was found to have 300 operatives enrolled in unions as members, _of whom at least 100 were union officials_--of them 14 presidents of locals, one national vice-president, 14 trustees, and 20 local union secretaries.

We are at present witnessing an attack upon a union in our own city as a result of the combination of discredited labor leaders, the un-American Canwell Committee and the Seattle P-I and its FBI agent and strike-breaker, Fred Niendorff.