Hearings regarding the communist infiltration of the motion picture industry. Hearings before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eightieth Congress, first session. Public law 601 (section 121, subsection Q (1947)

COMMUNISM IN MOTION PICTURE INDUSTRY 365 My short film, The House I Live In, was given a special award by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for its contribution to racial tolerance. My short story, The Happiest JSIan on Earth, won the li);>8 O. Henry Meiuorial Award for the best American short story. This, then, is the body of work for which this committee ur^es I be blacldisted in the film industry — and tomorrow, if it has its way in the publishin<i and magazine fields also. By cold censorship, if not legislation, I must not be allowed to write. Will this censorship stop with me? Or with the others now singled out for attack? If it requires acceptance of the ideas of this committee to remain innnune from the brand of un-xlmericanism, then who is ultimately safe from this committee except members of the Ku Klux Klan? Why else does this committee now seek to destroy me and others? Because of our ideas, unquestionably. In 1801, when he was President of the United States, Thomas Jefferson wrote : Opinion, and the just maintenance of it, shall never be a crime in my view; nor brin.^; injury to the individual. But a few years ago, in the course of one of the hearings of this connnittee. Congressman J. Parnell Thomas said, and I quote from the official transcript : I just want to say this now, that it seems that the New Deal is working along hand in glove with the Communist Party. The New Deal is either for the Comnuinist Party or it is playing into the hands of the Communist I'arty. Very well, then, here is the other reason why I and others have been commanded to appear before this connnittee — our ideas. In common with many iVmericans, I supported the New Deal. In common with many Americans I supported, against Mr. Thomas and Mr. Rankin, the antilynching bill. I opposed them in my supjDort of OPA controls and emergency veteran housing and a fair employment practices law. I signed petitions for these measures, joined organizations that advocated them, contributed money, sometimes spoke from public platforms, and I will continue to do so. I will take my philosophy from Thomas Payne, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and I will not be dictated to or intimidated by men to whom the Ku Klux Klan, as a matter of committee record, is an acceptable American institution. I state further that on many questions of public interest my opinions as a citizen have not always been in accord with the opinions of the majority. They are not now nor have my opinions ever been fixed and unchanging, nor are they now fixed and unchangeable; but, right or wrong, I claim and I insist upon my right to think freely and to speak freely; to join the Republican Party or the Communist Party, the Democratic or the Prohibition Party; to publish whatever I please; to fix my mind or change my mind, without dictation from anyone ; to offer any criticism I think fitting of any public official or policy ; to join whatever organizations I please, no matter what certain legislators may think of them. Above all, I challenge the right of this connnittee to inquire into my political or religious beliefs, in any manner or degree, and I assert that not only the conduct of this committee but its very existence are a subversion of the Bill of Rights. If I were a spokesman for (ieneral Franco, I would not be here today. I would rather be here. I would rnther die than be a shabby 67683 — 47 24