Part 6

Mr. WHEELER. Would you advise the committee of your occupational background prior to your present occupation?

(The witness confers with her counsel.)

Mrs. PIERCE. I wish to invoke the fifth amendment on this question.

Mr. WHEELER. On all prior occupation?

Mrs. PIERCE. Yes, sir; that is on all prior occupation.

Mr. WHEELER. Isn’t it a fact that you worked for the United States Government at one time?

Mrs. PIERCE. On this question, too, I wish to invoke the protection of the fifth amendment.

Mr. MOULDER. Do you mean to say that your employment in the United States Government may tend to incriminate you?

Mrs. PIERCE. I have already stated my answer, sir.

(The witness confers with her counsel.)

Mr. MOULDER. If investigation, Mr. Wheeler, reveals the witness’ employment, then I suggest that you ask the question according to what your investigation has revealed, the specific questions which she can answer.

Mr. WHEELER. Have you ever been employed by the United States Post Office Department?

Mrs. PIERCE. I decline to answer that question for the reasons previously stated, sir. And I would like to explain that I fear that answering these questions may lead to other questions which might tend to incriminate me.

Mr. WHEELER. Were you dismissed from this position because of security reasons?

Mrs. PIERCE. I decline to answer that question for the reasons previously stated.

Mr. WHEELER. Have you been a paid employee of the Civil Rights Congress of the city of Seattle?

Mrs. PIERCE. I decline to answer that question for the reasons previously stated.

Mr. WHEELER. Do you know Mrs. Barbara Hartle?

Mrs. PIERCE. I decline to answer that question, sir, for the reasons previously stated.

Mr. WHEELER. She testified that you were a member of the Georgetown Club of the Communist Party, King County. Is that a statement of fact on the part of Mrs. Hartle?

Mrs. PIERCE. I decline to answer, and invoke my protection under the fifth amendment.

Mr. WHEELER. Were you active in any way with the Progressive Party here in the State of Washington?

Mrs. PIERCE. I decline to answer that for the reasons previously stated, sir.

Mr. WHEELER. Mr. Chairman, I think it is quite obvious that we are not going to get the information we desire from this witness.

I have no further questions.

Mr. MOULDER. May I ask the witness where you were born?

Mrs. PIERCE. I was born in Martinsburg, W. Va.

Mr. MOULDER. And when did you come to the State of Washington?

(The witness confers with her counsel.)

Mrs. PIERCE. I believe it was in 1942 or possibly 1943. I am not certain.

Mr. MOULDER. Were you married at that time?

Mrs. PIERCE. No, sir.

Mr. MOULDER. Did you come to Washington alone?

Mrs. PIERCE. Yes, sir.

Mr. MOULDER. Did you have employment when you arrived or did you have to seek employment after you arrived?

(The witness confers with her counsel.)

Mrs. PIERCE. On this question, sir, I wish to invoke my privilege under the fifth amendment.

Mr. VELDE. Mr. Chairman, I fail to see how that could possibly tend to incriminate her or lead to incrimination. I suggest that the witness be directed to answer the question.

Mr. MOULDER. The witness is directed to answer the question.

(The witness confers with her counsel.)

Mrs. PIERCE. Sir, this is a question which I would like very much to answer, and answer fully, but I feel that it might lead either to other questions which might incriminate me or to a waiver of my right to claim the protection of the fifth amendment, and I therefore do claim protection of the fifth amendment.

Mr. MOULDER. Are you now a member of the Communist Party?

Mrs. PIERCE. Again I claim the protection of the fifth amendment.

Mr. MOULDER. Have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?

Mrs. PIERCE. I claim the protection of the fifth amendment on that question, too.

Mr. MOULDER. Are you now employed?

Mrs. PIERCE. I have already answered that question.

Mr. MOULDER. Then would you care to answer again?

Mrs. PIERCE. Well, I could answer it again the same as I did before. I am employed now.

Mr. MOULDER. Where are you now employed?

Mrs. PIERCE. At the Tacoma Country and Golf Club.

Mr. MOULDER. How long have you been employed there?

Mrs. PIERCE. I decline to answer under the privilege of the fifth amendment.

Mr. MOULDER. Do you mean to say the length of time you have been employed there would tend to incriminate you? Is that your reasoning on that?

Mrs. PIERCE. I have already stated my answer, sir.

Mr. MOULDER. Any questions, Mr. Velde?

Mr. VELDE. No questions.

Mr. MOULDER. The witness is excused.

The committee will stand in recess until tomorrow morning at 9 o’clock.

(Whereupon, at 4:50 p. m., the subcommittee was recessed, to be reconvened at 9 a. m., Saturday, March 19, 1955.)

INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SEATTLE, WASH., AREA

SATURDAY, MARCH 19, 1955

UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES, _Seattle, Wash._

PUBLIC HEARING

A subcommittee of the Committee on Un-American Activities met, pursuant to recess, at 9:30 a. m., in Room 402, County-City Building, Seattle, Wash., Hon. Morgan M. Moulder (chairman) presiding.

Committee members present: Representatives Morgan M. Moulder (chairman) (appearance as noted) and Harold H. Velde.

Staff members present: Frank S. Tavenner, Jr., counsel, and William A. Wheeler, staff investigator.

Mr. VELDE. The subcommittee will be in order, and we will proceed, Mr. Counsel.

Mr. TAVENNER. I would like to recall Mr. Eugene V. Dennett to the stand, please.

TESTIMONY OF EUGENE VICTOR DENNETT, ACCOMPANIED BY HIS COUNSEL, KENNETH A. MacDONALD--Resumed

Mr. TAVENNER. Mr. Dennett, will you come forward, please.

When your testimony was suspended yesterday we were inquiring into the activity of the Washington Commonwealth Federation. In the course of your testimony on that subject no mention was made of the Workers Alliance.

To what extent was the Workers Alliance affiliated with that organization?

Mr. DENNETT. It was one of the principal affiliates in the early days, and it had regular representatives on the Washington Commonwealth Federation board. One of the most prominent of those was a person by the name of Harry C. Armstrong, who was better known as Army Armstrong. He later became a legislator, and I think he was at one time the head of the Workers Alliance.

Mr. TAVENNER. At the time he was head of the Workers Alliance and active in the Washington Commonwealth Federation was he also a member of the Communist Party?

Mr. DENNETT. At first he was not. But the Workers Alliance, of course, was one of the organizations in which the Communist Party worked very actively, and ultimately Mr. Armstrong became a member of the Communist Party. I knew him when he was a member of the Communist Party.

Mr. TAVENNER. Was he active in Communist Party affairs?

Mr. DENNETT. Yes, he was quite active in the Communist Party affairs for a short time. He later had differences with the party over policy, and became too much of a Democrat to suit the Communists, and came to a parting of the ways with the Communist Party.

Mr. TAVENNER. Can you give us the names of any other individuals, active in the work of the Washington Commonwealth Federation or any of its component parts, who were known to you to be members of the Communist Party during that time?

Mr. DENNETT. Well, my random recollection is a little bit too unreliable to go on. I think that I mentioned all of the principal ones yesterday with the exception of Mr. Armstrong, whom I have explained this morning.

Mr. TAVENNER. During the period that the organizational work was being done by the Communist Party within the Washington Commonwealth Federation was there in existence in the State of Washington an organization known as the Washington Pension Union?

Mr. DENNETT. That is correct, there was. That was a organization which came into existence principally because the Governor of the State had ordered some cuts in the pension, or the assistance to the old-age groups. It was prior to the organization of anything.

Mr. TAVENNER. Prior to the organization of what?

Mr. DENNETT. Of the union, of the Old-Age Pension Union.

It seems as though there was an attempt to cut on the relief, and some of the relief authorities thought that they could cut the benefits to the elderly people and there would be little protest for it. But Howard Costigan, being very alert to the political possibilities, spoke about it on the radio and, in response to that speaking, received many, many calls by telephone and by letter asking him to do something about it. He didn’t know what to do.

He came to the party of people and explained to us afterward that he was perplexed but he was going to call a mass meeting and ask these people to come and make their protests in public.

He did exactly that. The meeting was overwhelmingly successful; far more elderly people arrived than he expected. The hall was packed to overflowing, and he had to call more meetings to satisfy their desire to express their protest. During the course of that, Costigan, not knowing what else to do, suggested that they set up a permanent committee to continue their protest against this form of relief cut. The old-age people responded so vigorously that they themselves determined that they must have a union. And they chose the name of Old-Age Pension Union.

At first, I believe, Costigan was not an officer of it. As a matter of fact, he felt that he had more than he could carry handling the work of the Washington Commonwealth Federation. So he asked the party people to find him some help to see if he could carry on this extra work that needed to be done. And, through the efforts of Mr. Lowell Wakefield, they found a person by the name of William J. Pennock who was a very able man. And Bill Pennock assisted Costigan in all of his work when he was in the Washington Commonwealth Federation.

Later when the time came to organize the Old-Age Pension Union, Pennock assisted Costigan in finding people to head up that organization.

(At this point Representative Morgan M. Moulder entered the hearing room and assumed the chair.)

Mr. DENNETT. In the very beginning the original leaders who held the original titles of president and vice president of the Old-Age Pension Union were not members of the Communist Party. They were chosen by these old-age pension people, knowing them to be public-spirited persons, and I don’t know whether it is proper to identify those persons or not at this point.

Mr. TAVENNER. No. The committee would not be interested in going into that phase of the matter.

You mentioned a person by the name of Lowell Wakefield. Will you tell the committee what you know of his activities?

Mr. DENNETT. Lowell Wakefield was a member of the Communist Party. He did come from the East on his assignment by the central committee to work in this district. However, after he had worked here a comparatively short time he came into dispute with the succeeding leader who came, Mr. Morris Rappaport, and ultimately Mr. Wakefield left the Communist Party and I believe that he has had no connection with the Communist Party for a great many years.

Mr. TAVENNER. The point you are making is that in its inception this union, the Old-Age Pension Union, was not of a Communist origin or of a Communist character.

Mr. DENNETT. No; it was not. But the Communist Party recognized that the terrific response that Costigan received meant that here was a potential group of people capable of doing enormous amounts of political work.

Remember, please, their situation: They were retired; they had ceased working daily on a job. Therefore, they had the leisure time to do what they wanted to do in most instances or at least in many instances. The result was that some of these people could go out and peddle leaflets and knock on doors. They constituted an enormous political strength. And the Communist Party conceived the idea that these people certainly would be the most able people to carry on political programs if they could be won to support such a program.

So the Communist Party set about to do exactly that in the pension union.

Among those who were urged to go into the pension union to work vigorously was a person by the name of Thomas C. Rabbitt.

Tom Rabbitt became a very powerful and influential man in that organization. He did so very largely because he succeeded in being elected to the Washington State Legislature as a Democrat, and, in the State legislature as a State senator, was able to embarrass the governor and the administration on their promises to aid the elderly people on the pension program. His efforts were heralded as making a real--well, he was considered to be a real political leader because he had succeeded in a situation where it was vitally important.

My counsel reminds me that Mr. Rabbitt has been before this committee, and he appeared in your executive session last June.

Mr. Rabbitt found that there was an enormous amount of work to be done in that organization, and he had to call for help. And he built up a comparatively important machine with which he worked.

Mr. TAVENNER. You have told us that the Communist Party, upon seeing the great potentialities in this new organization, decided to do something about it. Tell the committee just what it did and the methods it used to gain control of the Old-Age Pension Union.

Mr. DENNETT. It concentrated first at the top levels of the organization. It wanted to get strong leadership there capable of carrying two important points: first, that they carry on a relentless struggle for better and more welfare assistance to the aged people so as to insure their loyalty and support among those members; they wanted, next, to be certain that a large body of people became ardent supporters and friends of the Soviet Union so that it would be possible to defend the political policies of the Communist Party in that respect and to give assistance to the Communist program in this area.

Mr. TAVENNER. Mr. Chairman, as indicated by his testimony, the knowledge of this witness is very great concerning the scientific features of communism and how it operates in the Northwest.

Because of the limit of time, we have had to confine ourselves to the high spots. I will ask, if we are to conclude his testimony today, that Mr. Dennett confine his testimony chiefly to his own activities and circumstances surrounding them; otherwise we will be unable to complete what we had planned today.

Mr. MOULDER. Yes. As you say, it is very important testimony. We are grateful to receive it. I believe any additional information which he might wish to submit could be submitted in writing to the committee at a later date. I mean after we have concluded our hearings.

Mr. TAVENNER. Mr. Chairman, it is obvious we will have a great deal of work ahead of us in connection with documentary information which he has at hand, as well as to give this witness time to explain fully the implications of his statements today.

Mr. MOULDER. It may be possible when the hearings are held in Los Angeles in June that additional hearings could be held here to complete the testimony of Mr. Dennett.

Mr. TAVENNER. Certainly further consideration will have to be given to that.

I wanted to make this explanation principally so the committee would understand that I have asked the witness to confine his testimony today principally to his own activities. I did not want the committee to feel that the witness was attempting to relate what he had done alone as a matter of his own choice.

Mr. DENNETT. Thank you.

Mr. MOULDER. Mr. Dennett can be subpenaed to appear in California when hearings are held there; the subcommittee could resume hearings here at a later date if we feel it is necessary to secure his additional information.

Mr. TAVENNER. Continuing with the subject of the old-age pension, were you active in it in your individual capacity?

Mr. DENNETT. No; I was not. I spoke before it on a number of times on invitation of the leaders to indicate some labor support because I was representing the State CIO at that time.

Mr. TAVENNER. Tell us briefly to what extent was the Communist Party successful in the accomplishment of the two purposes you stated the Communists had in interesting the leadership of the old-age pension unit.

Mr. DENNETT. As I indicated at the outset, the first leaders of the pension union--president, vice president, and some of the other officers--were anti-Communist people. And it did not take too long before they came into conflict with those Communists who were trying to make certain that the organization carried out these purposes which I have indicated.

I believe that the first president of the organization left it very quickly. Later on another person took over as a president of the organization, who was a member of the Communist Party, and he remained a leader for quite a long time. Ultimately he got into conflict with the Communist Party, and the Communist Party did what we call a hatchet job on him.

Mr. TAVENNER. Who was he?

Mr. DENNETT. A man by the name of N. P. Atkinson. And Atkinson was expelled from the party. And when he was expelled from the party he was also pushed out of the pension union.

Mr. TAVENNER. After Communist Party overtures to the leadership of the union was any effort made to capture the rank and file?

Mr. DENNETT. Yes. There was a considerable effort made. A person by the name of William J. Pennock, whom I have mentioned before, who is now deceased--Pennock was a very successful figure in this work because he was such a tireless worker.

(Representative Harold H. Velde left the hearing room at this point.)

Mr. DENNETT. He worked day after day, every day, and had a very pleasing personality and was a very successful man in convincing the ordinary person that the program and policies they were pursuing were the best for the organization. And I think it should be recognized that certainly those efforts of the organization to maintain a standard of decency and comfort for public assistance for the elderly people is something which should be recognized as proper. It is something which should not be condemned because the Communists were trying to use that as a basis for successfully planting its other ideas in the ranks of the organization. And I hope no one will condemn the elderly people for trying to improve their own economic position, which they were trying to do in the pension union.

Mr. TAVENNER. How can organizations of this type, which have a very fine purpose in view, be able to accomplish their ends without permitting the Communist Party to take them over and subvert them to the purposes of the Communist Party?

What is the best defense? What defense can they have to the Communist Party which is trying to manipulate them in the manner you have described?

Mr. DENNETT. My own experience leads me to the conclusion that the soundest defense and the soundest practice which can be pursued is that wherein we all insist upon the complete observance of the fundamental principles in the Constitution of the United States and the legal procedure of the court system in the United States, in which we first insist that all persons shall be considered to be innocent until proven guilty when charged with anything which appears to be a violation of either the Constitution of the United States or the principles of the organization that they belong to.

I say that advisedly because I have had a number of experiences, personal ones, where I have been treated as a guilty person until proven so--not in connection with Communist material either. And I observed with a great deal of interest last night’s television report of Mr. Harry Cain’s remarks on that very point.

Mr. Cain comes from the State of Washington. Some of us knew him rather well. And I might say that at one time he certainly impressed the people very strongly in this State because of this precise idea which he was expressing last night on TV.

And I cannot pass up the opportunity to remind all of us that it is a fundamental principle of our form of Government, of our democratic representation system, that we honor and dignify the individual as an individual for his own worth, and not completely subordinate this individual to the purpose of a mass and make him a faceless creature.

I think that each person is entitled to the individual dignity and the recognition of his right as an individual. And when he combines in an organization it is for the purpose of assisting in the further development of these human beings as creatures that are entitled to treatment as human beings.

(The witness confers with his counsel.)

Mr. MOULDER. What is your next question, Mr. Tavenner?

Mr. TAVENNER. Counsel is consulting the witness.

Mr. DENNETT. Counsel is calling my attention to the nature of your question asking what steps can be recommended, and he is trying to bring me back to that point a little more directly, and I appreciate it. I hope you will bear with us on it.

Mr. TAVENNER. Let me suggest this to you:

My question was not so much directed at what you mentioned as it is to this particular phase of the matter, that here is an organization which had very proper purposes: It apparently had no desire to be controlled or influenced by the Communist Party; but the Communist Party determined it was going to take it over.

Now my point is: How, from your experience in the party, could this group have successfully resisted being taken over by the Communist Party?

(At this point Representative Harold H. Velde returned to the hearing room.)

Mr. DENNETT. I think there is no one single guaranty. I think it requires a number of changes in our behavior and in our attitude in the various democratic organizations. I mean by that democratic in form; I am not referring to a party as such.

In that respect, many people in the union to which I should belong have asked me many times how could they guarantee that some untoward thing would not occur in the organization. And it has been my recommendation to them that the only guarantee anyone has is that he participate fully in the life of his own organization and not delegate and not allow his own responsibilities to be passed on to somebody else.

If you leave it to George, let George do it, you wake up some time and find that George hasn’t done it the way you would have preferred to do it or the way you would have done it had you been there.

And it is my firm conviction that one of the most hazardous parts of our democratic process is the tendency of people to leave it to somebody else to take care of their own responsibility.

If a democracy is to work, if it is to be a democracy or continue to be a democracy, it is essential that each participant, each member be a participant. That is the best recommendation I can make.

Mr. MOULDER. That is very true. In our investigations the committee has found many instances where the Communist Party leaders have been able to infiltrate into, say, a local union in the eastern section of this country because the membership did not attend the elections and did not vote and participate actively in the meetings. If there were other means of voting than to be personally present, that might be avoided.

Mr. DENNETT. I favor referendum votes myself.

Mr. TAVENNER. In other words, the point you are making is: There is a very great responsibility on each individual in his own organization regardless of the organization.

Mr. DENNETT. I would add to that, sir, if I may, please, that it is necessary that members do more than attend meetings. I mean they must have some adequate conception of the purpose of their organization.