ns fears and made the attacks on domestic communists, particularly the American CP, justified. Winston Churchills memorable "iron curtain" speech in Fulton, Missouri, in the presence of Truman, clearly underlined that the Cold War was in full swing. The outbreak of the Korean War in 1950 deepened the scare. J Edgar Hoovers 1947 testimony before the HUAC contributed to the vision of many about communist threats as he demonized the USSR and shaped the Red menace and scare. In his words: "Every American communist was, and is, potentially and espionage agent of the USSR."
President Trumans policymakers did perceive the USSR and communism as a threat to America and the free world. However, Americans had just come out of a depression and a war. How does the President convince the American people to rearm and to allocate resources to fight communism abroad? Besides, his Republican competitors won the Congressional elections of 1946 and accused him of being soft on the communists. The President and his administration deliberately fueled the scare in pursuit of their foreign policy objectives by magnifying the threat of communism at home and abroad. The FBI under Hoover, the anti-communist network and ambitious Republican politicians like Mundt, Parnell, Nixon and others, spearheaded by McCarthy, took full advantage of the conjuncture, and used the scare to let loose seasons of repression and persecution of communists and non-communists alike.
The involvement of the Federal Government, particularly the Executive Branch helped transform the communist threat into a national obsession. Washington defined the elimination of communist influence as a top priority. In the 1940s and 1950s, every agency joined the anti-communist crusade, including the FBI, the State Department, the Post Office Department and the INS. Congress, Federal Bureaucrats and judges debated and implemented policies to deal with domestic communism. In the opinion of Ellen Schrecker: "although the phenomenon got its name from a member of the Senate (McCarthy), it was the Executive Branch of the Government that wielded the most influence over the development of McCarthyism. It stimulated concern about national security and established the main mechanisms through which anti-communist campaign was to operate." This was borne out when in early 1947 President Truman issued a draconian, anti-communist Executive Order.
TRUMANS EXECUTIVE ORDERS
On March 12, 1947, President Truman addressed a Special Session of Congress and sought aid for Greece and Turkey in his bid to ensure that the USA support "free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." At the domestic front, on March 22, 1947, he issued Executive Order No. 9835 in which the procedures for the administration of an employee Loyalty Program in the Executive Branch of the Federal Government was outlined. It stipulated that a loyalty investigation of every person entering any Department or Agency of the Executive Branch of the Federal Government had to be done. As for those already employed, the Order authorized investigations. All personnel, who were found to be "disloyal," were to be dismissed by the Head of their Agency or Department.
Loyalty Boards were established throughout the Federal Government. In practice, it became a witch-hunt as increasingly information on personnel was submitted by the FBI. That Agency prepared secret files that were compiled from unknown informants. The major concern was to verify if any federal employee was a member of the CP or had any association with any acquaintance who might have been a party member. Accusations of direct or indirect connections with the CP could not be contested or disproved by employees since they were denied due process. Informants identities were kept secret. During the period when an employee was being investigated, he or she was suspended from work. But it was not only the CP which was on the blacklist as a subversive organization, but also a number of other organizations which the Attorney General arbitrarily