Rating: 
Summary: Feared and Smeared
Review: Feared and Smeared
"Joseph McCarthy: Re-Examining The Life and Legacy of America's Most Hated Senator" is a truly outstanding biography of one of the most controversial men in American political history. Previous biographies on the controversial senator from Wisconsin have focused on the politics of the Cold War and Red Scare during the 1950's. Author Arthur Herman takes a look at the actual facts and circumstances surrounding the life and times of Joe McCarthy to explore his historical situation.
Herman properly synthesizes all of the earlier works from William F. Buckley's 1950's "McCarthy and His Enemies" through the tomes of Ellen Schrecker and Thomas Reeve. The result is an objective, unbiased look at what McCarthy accused others of doing and also what he himself did during those times. Herman looks at McCarthy's actions and statements and asks some basic questions: was there a basis for the claim? Where others saying the same thing? Could a reasonable person objectively come to the same conclusion, anti-communist predispositions aside?
Today, we know that many of the claims accusing people of communism, espionage, or of being a security risk have been borne out by the revelations following the collapse of global communism. We know much more today about CPUSA subversion of American democracy from the 1930's through the 1950's (see, "In Denial" and "Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage In America" by Haynes/Klehr and "The Haunted Wood" by Weinstein/Vassiliev for the extent of communist penetration in America). Herman relies heavily on many post-1990's analyses which have buttressed the claims of anti-communists like McCarthy.
There are three key elements that Herman continually revisits throughout the book. First, Joe McCarthy was a Midwesterner and most of his opponents were East Coast elites. Second, he was a conservative Republican while most of them were liberal Democrats. Third, he was a Roman Catholic -- most of the people who despised him were aristocratic WASPs or liberal Jews. True, the substance of McCarthy's actions and words is what most animated his opponents and supporters (his early aides included a Catholic, Bobby Kennedy, and Jew, Roy Cohen). Herman's book is the first to note that McCarthy aroused tension along party, ideology, religion, class, and social status. Among most Americans -- even after the Army hearings -- McCarthy was still looked upon very favorably. Working class Americans generally supported McCarthy; elites in media, academic, and political circles despised him.
Another unique focus of Herman's biography is his focus on the interplay between McCarthy and segregationist Democrats. One might expect Southern Democrats who were conservative on matters of national security to side with McCarthy. However, McCarthy was opposed to segregation and favored civil rights for blacks. This helped turn Maryland Senator Millard Tydings strongly against McCarthy to the point where McCarthy helped bring about his defeat in 1950 with a handpicked candidate (McCarthy's wife worked on Tydings' opponent's campaign). Blacks and Catholics voted heavily for the Republican candidate that year. Tydings would continue to be a thorn in McCarthy's side until his death and Tydings' Southern Democrat allies, including Stennis and Eastland of Mississippi, would help censure McCarthy in late 1954. Herman focuses extensively on Tydings throughout the book and racial issues aside, the two Senators probably had more in common than they disagreed on. Their personality and party differences, however, turned what would be a normal political dispute into a vicious deathmatch.
Herman's book also focuses on the vote to censure McCarthy. All 44 Democrats voted for censure, corralled by newly anointed Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson. But one senator was incapacitated: John Fitzgerald Kennedy of Massachusetts. He was reportedly going to vote for censure. It would have taken guts for a Northeastern Democrat to vote against it. Or would he have? His brother Bobby had worked for McCarthy on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations and Papa Joe was a big anti-communist supporter (McCarthy had even once dated the Kennedy girls). The final vote to censure was 67-22 but many of those supporting censure later regretted their votes (Southern Democrats among them) and the use of the Senate for McCarthy's memorial ceremony after his death indicates that many censure supporters probably did not believe in the substance of the charges against McCarthy.
Herman drills into the reader that much of what Joe McCarthy is alleged to have been involved in -- the Rosenberg trial, HUAC, blacklistings -- had nothing to do with McCarthy or his Senate committee. Many first-time students of McCarthy are surprised at these misstatements of fact. Herman also points out that while McCarthy made mistakes and was wrong at certain junctures, so were his opponents. Much of what he was accused of doing and ultimately censured for were in fact offenses which were also employed against him. To assert that McCarthy was guilty of something unique to his own personal madness while excusing his critics is not a fair and balanced account of the historical record.
Herman notes that McCarthy's excesses, his drinking, and his dependence on flawed subordinates (such as Roy Cohen) all contributed to McCarthy's biggest mistake: he alienated what should have been his strongest supporters with his flair for the dramatic and verbal hyperbole. Senate colleagues, J. Edgar Hoover, Richard Nixon, President Eisenhower -- these are some of the people who distanced themselves from McCarthy when he began to choose his opponents poorly. Going after the State Department for communist subversion was one thing -- but the United States Army? Hoover could have helped McCarthy, but his recklessness threatened to compromise Hoover's espionage sources (notably, the Venona intercepts).
Arthur Herman's book sheds new light and proper perspective on a subject that is often debated with emotion and clichés, rather than facts and reason. M. Stanton Evans' forthcoming biography on Joe McCarthy will probably be the final word on that chapter, but Herman's book is a worthy predecessor.
Rating: 
Summary: mccarthy rexamined but not exonerated
Review: herman wrote a somewhat slender but information packed book. The reading style is easy and if you have an interest in this time period you will find it an enjoyable read. Herman like other conservative revisionist historians blames Roy Cohn and Dave Schine for McCarthy's downfall.That is somewhat like blaming Paula Jones for Clinton's impeachment.Herman makes a powerful case that Owen Lattimore was a Soviet agent . This is important because Herman himself points out that Lattimore coined the term McCarthyism so anything that impinges on Lattimore's credibility gores a long way in exonerating MCCarthy. Herman refuses to go to the next level in totally exonerating MCcarthy. This left the reader in wondering what Herman's point is. It could be that exonerating McCarthy is for the liberal establisment likesaying the earth is flat.Herman a University professor might note what happened to Ron Radosh after he wrote the Rosenberg File pulls his punches in exonerating MCCarthy. The book is an important counterwight to the more lurid anti MCCarthy mythology out there.I noticed one mispelling in the first name of one of the Rosenberg co conspirators but in spite of such mistakes I recommend liberals and conservatives to buy this book Liberals would be made to think about thier complicity in supporting Stalinism and conservatives will get powerful ammunition.
Rating:
Summary: McCarthy Upheld
Review: I recently finished reading this biography of Joseph McCarthy by Arthur Herman and was impressed by his skill at handling the controversial senator. Herman is one of the few biographers who explain that McCarthy was trying to uncover security risks working for the United States government, not going after individual communists. McCarthy didn't care about them. Mr. Herman also takes great care in handling sensitive issues surrounding McCarthy, including his demeanor (admittedly, not exactly the best), his upbringing, and that pesky list of 57 (or was it 205? or 81?) communists. Also included in this work is evidence that McCarthy was respected by his colleagues and the public at large. Majorities of Americans supported McCarthy's work. Most people were not afraid of McCarthy -- they were afraid of communists leaking sensitive government information to the Soviets. This is the best work written about McCarthy that doesn't malign him as a madman out to destroy the lives and infringe upon the liberties of individual Americans. This is a fair assessment and criticism of America's most controversial politician.
Rating: 
Summary: Watching Joe
Review: I would recommend "Point of Order", a video of highlights from the
1954 Army/McCarthy hearings, to anyone with an interest in the Wisconsin senator's methods or personality. I understand that some
sort of neo-conservative feeling is behind McCarthy apologism (a sentiment that I never dreamed could even exist before stumbling upon this book). Even if Cohn and Schine caused the senator's -ultimate- downfall (and I would agree wholeheartedly), it only takes ten or fifteen minutes of Joe's TV performances to make you realize that he was an obtuse, obnoxious, overstuffed disgrace to his office. He was an inept and deeply-flawed legislator (and I evaluate him strictly on his performance as a public servant).
Rating: 
Summary: Great theory but waaaay too long
Review: I've met Arthur Herman before and he's a great guy but so I mean this in the nicest way. It put me to sleep. His theory is a bold and very engaging one, McCarthy was right! I agree with this theory and read his book hoping page after page to get to the good stuff. But it never came. Instead he wastes hundreds of pages on tangent issuses and a rehash of what we already know about McCarthy. He does have some great dacts about how poor McCarthy has been distorted by the media, but these facts are few and fleeting. If you hope to get a different view of McCarthy you will be disapointed.
Rating: 
Summary: Conflicting Cold War Visions: McCarthy and the "Wise Men"
Review: In November 1999, The New York Times Magazine heralded Senator Joseph McCarthy 's "rehabilitation," and author Arthur Herman, an adjunct professor at George Mason University, recently weighed in with this book, which seeks to portray the early 1950s Wisconsin politician as a well-intentioned participant in public discourse about a legitimate issue. We must be careful with facts and terms. Herman is absolutely correct in writing that "most of what people ordinarily mean when they talk about the 'red scare' - the House Un-American Activities Committee; anti-Communist probes into Hollywood, labor unions, and America's schools and universities; the Rosenberg trial; blacklisting in the media and schoolteachers fired for disloyalty - had nothing to do with McCarthy." Herman is equally correct that McCarthy's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations "had a specific duty to investigate communism in the federal government and among government employees." The essence of Herman's interpretation is that, when that narrow record is carefully examined, McCarthy and McCarthyism were not as bad as commentators of the period and many historians contend. In some respects, McCarthy's rise was remarkable. According to Herman, his life was "a typical American success story: son of a poor Wisconsin dirt farmer...to U.S. senator." Unlike many of the government officials against whom he latter battled, McCarthy was a product of hard times and conditions: McCarthy "left school at fourteen to start his own business, raising chickens and buying a truck to drive the eggs to market." In contrast, opponents such as Harry Truman's Secretary of State Dean Acheson, the leader of the informal group known as the "Wise Men," formed "the core of America's foreign policy establishment." What resulted, according to Herman, was "a cultural clash." The feelings were mutual. For the Wise Men and their allies in Washington, D.C., according to Herman, "there was no opponent they despised more than Joe McCarthy. He was working class: they were varsity class. He was hairy, loud, and sweaty; they were cool, clean, and antiseptic." According to Herman: "The furor over McCarthy and McCarthyism obscured the fact that the Wise Men made more than their share of mistakes," including the Berlin crisis and blockade, China, and the Korean War. That is fair. The error of McCarthy and his supporters was the lurid deduction that these mistakes evidenced a widespread Communist conspiracy within the federal government. For McCarthy, at the very least, the policymaking elites were not taking the international-communist threat seriously enough. According to Herman, McCarthy believed "[t]here were those who were soft on issues like communism, and those who were not," which "was reflected in McCarthy's fight against the 'silk handkerchief liberals' who frustrated his efforts to ferret out Communists in government." McCarthy obviously seethed with class resentment. McCarthy's anti-State Department campaign began in November 1949, when he accused it of being "honey-combed and run by Communists." On February 9, 1950, in Wheeling, West Virginia, McCarthy gave his now-famous speech, declaring: "I have here in my hand a list of 205 - a list of names that were made known tp the Secretary of State as being members of the Communist Party and who nevertheless are still working for and shaping policy in the State Department." In the ensuing controversy, McCarthy insisted that he had "the names of 57 people identified as Communists and security threats in the State Department." Herman acknowledges that the "confusion McCarthy fostered over whether he was talking about 205 Communists, or 57...gave birth to his reputation for recklessness, obfuscation, and untruth." On February 20, "McCarthy went to the Senate floor to deliver a formal denunciation of the State Department's security program." The six-hour speech created a furor. Herman bluntly acknowledges that "McCarthy found himself on very shaky ground" in claiming that "he had found a cabal of Communists in the State Department,"and "the bald truth was that McCarthy did distort several ['bald summaries' of an investigation of security risks at the State Department] in order to make his point." Nevertheless, McCarthy ran rampant for the next three years. Hoever, beginning in early 1953, according to Herman, McCarthy "had a long spell of choosing poor targets for his public anti- Communist campaigns, each of which served only to antagonize the White House and even fellow Republicans." By the end of 1954, McCarthy was finished, and after the Senate voted 67-22 to "condemn" him, McCarthy became "an institutional pariah." The sociology of McCarthy's support has been long debated. Herman rejects the theory that the McCarthyite core came from "'a coalition of the aggrieved,' men and women who had never come to terms with the world created by the New Deal or World War II." Herman writes that McCarthy's supporters, "[f]ar from being aggrieved or resentful...had found fresh opportunities and prosperity in postwar America," and "were anxious about whether those opportunities could continue and what America's future would be if Communists and their sympathizers were allowed to dominate the world outside." If McCarthyism was revolutionary, in this view, it was a revolution of rising expectations. Herman explains that McCarthy's core was in the rural midwest, the south, and ethnic neighborhoods in northeastern cities. According to Herman, "American Catholics were more inclined to support McCarthy than any other group," because many Catholics felt that "anticommunism was their issue." In my opinion, this is the ultimate issue: Did McCarthy act in good faith. If McCarthy had an objectively honest belief that the Truman administration was insufficiently concerned about internal security, especially in federal government agencies, some of McCarthy's excesses - such as what Herman refers to as the "crude mishandling of sensitive information" - might be excused. But, if McCarthy recklessly or intentionally disregarded the truth, he deserves history's judgment as "America's most hated senator." Herman's "reexamination" of McCarthy is carefully researched and extensively annotated, but most of the sources are secondary, so there is practically nothing new here. Readers sympathetic to McCarthy, or at least to the possibility there was a genuine internal threat to national security in the early 1950s, may be convinced by Herman's argument. I was not.
Rating:
Summary: McCarthy as distinct from McCarthyism
Review: Most of us non specialists, I guess, have gleaned our knowledge of McCarthy from movies such as Citizen Cohn and from a succession of negative biographies. Although Herman is well aware of the senator's failings - naive trust in Roy Cohn and David Schine who brought him down, awesome tactlessness, alcoholism - the author has done an excellent job in giving us a more balanced portrait. The book is perhaps less a biography than an incisive analysis of McCarthy in the US political whirlwind of the 1940s and early 1950s. Chapter 17 on his legacy is quite brilliant. The senator emerges as a man who was rightly concerned with communist infiltration in government, but lacked the overall political skills to avoid being damned in the longer term. Herman's detailed grasp of recently released primary sources, on Alger Hiss for example, is convincingly used. And where there are still legal doubts - on the odd case of Annie Lee Moss for instance - Herman deftly shows us McCarthy was on the right track after all. This reviewer would have liked a spot more attention to players such as Judge Kaufman, Cardinal Spellman and even FBI director Hoover, but Herman has written a brilliant revisionist tract.
Rating:
Summary: Incredible ? the Facts cut through the fiction !!!
Review: Reading bits and pieces over the years (check into the released soviet archives sometime), I was shocked at the revealing of truths from what was once thought of as myths ... conclusion - McCarthy was right (key word here - Venona)! From the facts I have read (separately), this book is the best I have seen that has tied-in and covered the story well. In retrospect, I could not believe the BS and the intensity of the anti-McCarthy foes; they knew better AND (more than anything else) WERE HORRIFIED OF THE EXPOSURE that J. McCarthy brought upon them. Close examination of the 30's, 40's, and 50's reveals a profound establishment of patterned and proactive approaches to meet the goals of soviet as well as internationalist communists (some aspects of these are still imbedded in our country today, but with no direction). But, Joseph McCarthy broke them and desecrated their HIGHEST revered commandment, "Thou Shalt Not Be Exposed" (reference The 3rd Communist International document); this Was a great set-back for communists and, in all honesty, J. McCarthy WON. Marxist/Leninists cut back in a lot of areas after this event, because one thing was for certain ... they could not afford any more incidences like this. Successfully damning J. McCarthy but understanding that THEY MAY NOT SURVIVE ANOTHER TYPE OF EXPOSURE OF THIS MAGNITUDE. Their next try was the disastrous (late 60's) New Left incident (lesson learned - unstable and acid dropping hippies do not make good commies) and then in the 80's the more ingenious, subversive domino trick (but of the external nature, with the USA being dessert) - only to be curbed (and then ultimately defeated) by Ronald Reagan and (martyr) Larry McDonald - AND DONE IN TRUE MCCARTHY SPIRIT! The McCarthy era was the communist's biggest set-back period in the USA. Under the wraps, the repercussions of the exposure were most devastating. A lot of hard work had been done in this country by the communists, with the ingenious networking and coordination of dedicated and duty-orientated adherents - in the true light of Lenin's idealistic revolutionary character. McCarthy stopped the highly organized, intellectual and productive Marxist movement and diverted its PATH from taking over in the USA internally; it never truly gained momentum afterwards. What Joseph McCarthy failed to realize was the breath and depth of the communist character and soul. The harshness and brutality of the attacks on McCarthy and co. were (in essence) a disclosure of an evil and misguided (but determined) will. Welded on an abnormal dogma of vicious misconceptions, SIMILAR IN CONCEPT ONLY TO NATIONAL SOCIALISM (...) IDEOLOGY, these attackers knew the game plan (all to well) of bombarding and destroying the enemy at all costs (another Lenin inclusion). Turning the tables as though J. McCarthy and co. were the "bad guys". If Joseph McCarthy, Roy Cohn and co. had been more well-read on material in the philosophical/political/psychological areas of communism, they would have been better prepared for the fight. Sizing up the situation as dealing with human beings - rational, reasonable, and of good-willed nature - was a big mistake. Because at the heart and core of the communist breeds the demon of illusion. As with the late actualized communistic State, the Soviet Union, they came out (in history) smelling like roses, when in reality, they had killed more innocent people than Nazi Germany. Only with the present day material, do we now have the truth of many misconceptions. McCarthy vindicated AND HE DID DETER COMMUNISM IN THE USA ! J. McCarthy and Roy Cohn both died some time ago (J.M. - 3 years after his disgrace). Seeing the old clips, I realized that they never fully understood the situation. Ultimately, they never saw their resultant impact on the subversive organization or the immense success of their mission. On the surface it looked EXACTLY THE OPPOSITE. And in the clips, J. McCarthy looks only depressed and distraught. Hand on forehead and eyes, that was his epitaph.
Rating:
Summary: Like A Breath Of Fresh Air!
Review: The knee-jerk loathing of Joe McCarthy is so universal and deeply entrenched that it's not likely that Arthur Herman's effort to bring to book the intellectually dishonest and inform the historically ignorant will make much more than a dent -- hard-hitting and courageous though his effort is. Mr. Herman has done an outstanding job of research and of articulating the results of his research for anyone open and curious enough to want to know the truth about Senator McCarthy and his times. To be sure, the burly Wisconsin senator had his faults and made a lot more than one or two mistakes. The true villains of the piece, however, were Soviet agents, home-bred Communist sympathizers, and addle-headed dupes. Communism was a genuine and significant threat to the national security interests of the United States and to the American way of life. Senator McCarthy and his allies made a significant contribution in bringing this threat to the attention of the American people and in battling it tooth and nail. Those who denied the reality of Communist infiltration and subversion were fools or knaves; those who continue to deny that the Soviet Union and its American-born handmaidens ever constituted a danger must also be considered either fools or knaves. I thank God for Senator Joe McCarthy, Francis Cardinal Spellman, and all those who fought the good fight. If only we had men like that today, as our culture sinks ever deeper into a sewer of depravity. I also thank God for Arthur Herman. He has written an important book. With a few insignificant caveats -- e.g., the editing leaves something to be desired -- I highly recommend it.
Rating:
Summary: McCarthy. . . The Harbinger of Modern Coservatism?
Review: This biography opened my eyes. The things that one simply assumes about Joe McCarthy and the 1950s seem to come completly unravelled in this volume. As a young conservative and a historian-in-training, I have become facisnated with the history of the 20th century conservatice movement. Herman shows us here that Joseph McCarthy had as much to do, in the long run, with the rise of the conservatives that culminated in 1980. Herman points out that the substance of many of McCarthy's charges were true: that there was communist subversion in the government, that the New-Deal/left-wing intellectuals who dominated the Roosevelt and Truman years really were lax in their reaction to it. Herman's thesis seems to be it wasn't what McCarthy was saying that was the problem, it was how he showed it off. What I most liked about the book is the abject hypocrisy is shows the left-Democrats. He mentions often that previous committees, headed up by Dems used the same tactics as McCarthy did. In fact, McCarthy seems far less powerfull in this book that in the assumed realities taught to us. While Arthur Miller rants about censorship and black listing, many of his fellow left-wing intellectuals turned a blind eye to the brutality of Stalin and the Soviet Union. Kind of reminds you of today. All in all, this book was engrossing and encompassed more that just McCarthy. It is a story about the difference between preception and truth. Herman seems accurate in is main point.. . . McCarthyism's main victim was Senator Joseph McCarthy. Very well done.
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