Communist infiltration of Hollywood motion-picture industry : hearing before the Committee on Un-American activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-second Congress, first session (1951)

1442 COMMUNISM IN MOTION-PICTURE INDUSTRY Hcwever, I will say this, that when I broke my organizational ties with the party, I did not break all of my idealogical ties, and this is a problem that every Communist has to go through before he can get out of the party. I recommend to the Communists today that are here and that are looking for a way out, and I am sure some of them are, I would point out to them today that their comrades can't watch them all the time; that you can go to the public library and you can get the other side of the story—I did. You can read Freda Utley's moving book, The Dream That Was Ours, that showed how the Com- munist Party betrayed her and how they betrayed the working class. You can read that in the private of your room. You can read Eugene Lyons' numerous books exposing communism. If there ever was a man that can expose communism it is Eugene Lyons, because he at one time had a dream. He, too, was an idealist. He went to Moscow, he was a correspondent there for many, many years, and rapidly he was disillusioned at the brutality that he saw, at the lies that he lis- tened to. As a result he has written books that are documented so that nobody but an ignoramus can deny that they are facts. This is the wav I got out of the Communist Partv. I had to make an organizational break and then I had to make an idealogical break. The organizational break had to come first and then I had to have time to once more think freely. You don't think in the Communist Party, you surrender your right to think. You put your right to think in hock to Stalin, and you pay usurious interest all the time your right to think is in hock. I think it is the surest kind of hypoc- risy that these Communists picketing out here today talk about this committee denying them the right to think. They haven't got any right to think, they gave it to Stalin. What are they talking about I This is sheer nonsense. They can't make a move, they can't open their mouths until they get the party line. The party line is one thing to- day and the party line is another thing tomorrow. They have en- slaved themselves, no committee has enslaved them. This Nation has not enslaved them or denied them their freedom. They sold their freedom years ago when they signed that little application card. The only way they can get it back is to terminate their association with a subversive and anti-American organization. Mr. Tavenner. You made your break before Korea, didn't you ? Mr. Ashe. I did. I made my break before the Hitler-Stalin pact. However, 1 was still with the Spanish Refugee Committee and I lis- tened to some of the Communists, trying to reconcile it. It was very amusing. Mr. Tavenner. What is your view of the duty of a member of the Communist Party since Korea? Mr. Ashe. The duty of a Communist Party member is not only since Korea, but at all times and under all conditions to act as a disci- plined Communist Party member. I don't think I need to tell the comrades in the room that, they know it. And that discipline includes looking out first, last, and always for the interest of the Soviet Union to the exclusion of any conflicting interests of their own country. They don't hesitate to do it but they like to do it in the dark. Mr Tavenner. In the course of your vast experience as a function- ary in the Communist Party, what was the practice with reference to the