Report on blacklisting : 1 Movies ([1956])

Record Details:

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to cooperate with the Committee but was dissuaded by his wife. The other, a screenwriter, kept a memorandum of what happened in Gang's office. This is what he wrote: "My agent informed me that inquiry here and there at different studios had convinced her that I was not employable in the in- dustry. Her advice to me was to find some way to clear myself. She told me that this could be done with the help of attorney Martin Gang. My reply was that inasmuch as I was opposed to any kind of political screening in order to secure work, and inasmuch as such screening was forbidden by law,* I did not want to engage in any kind of subterfuge which would only result hi one individual's escaping the blacklist while the blacklist itself and the principle in- volved would not be touched. But on my agent's repeated urging that I might at least investigate what plan Martin Gang had, I accepted. "On Wednesday, October 17, 1951, accompanied by my wife so that I might later be in a position to discuss with her whatever suggestions or terms Martin Gang might propose, I went to Mr. Gang's office. . . . "Mr. Gang began by rejecting the use of the word 'blacklist.' Again and again he stopped me during our conversation to make me use another word. There was no blacklist, he asserted re- peatedly. The studios had no blacklist, but certain organizations did have lists of names and had announced that they would picket any theatre showing pictures on which any of these names appeared. Since such picketing would result hi loss of income as a result of * There is a California Act setting forth that "no employer shall coerce or influence or attempt to coerce or influence his employees through or by means of threat of discharge or loss of employment to adopt or follow or refrain from adopting or following any particular course or line of political action or political activity." The California Supreme Court, however, has decided that this statute does not prohibit an employer's discharging persons whose loyalty to the nation has not been estab- lished to the satisfaction of the employer, because disloyalty or "subversive" activity is not a protected "political activity." 89