Civil Rights Congress - Labeled As Communist

Labeled As Communist

Soon after it was founded, the CRC became a target of the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) and the Internal Revenue Service. A 1947 report to HUAC charged: "Having adopted a line of militant skullduggery against the United States with the close of World War II, the Communist Party has set up the Civil Rights Congress for the purpose of protecting those of its members who run afoul of the law." The group denied these charges and provided a list of sponsors, including Representatives Adam C. Powell, Senator Glen H. Taylor, and Atlanta University President Rufus Early Clement. Patterson called the group "non-partisan" and described it as "the Red Cross of the defenders of peace, constitutional rights, justice and human rights".

The 1950 McCarran Internal Security Act increased government persecution of the group, and many of its leaders were jailed. The group's power weakened in 1951 when the federal government barred it from posting bail for communist defendants in the resulting trials. During the Second Red Scare, many Americans wary of the group because of its communist connections. In 1956, the CRC was declared a communist front by the Subversive Activities Control Board. It disbanded the same year.

Historian Gerald Horne attributes the labeling of the CRC as Communist to its popularity with left-wing celebrities and intellectuals (particularly African Americans):

CRC was not the Communist Party, yet it performed militant and often successful tasks, which helped to attract such luminaries; and herein one begins to comprehend the exegesis of the term "Communist front." Although Americans for Democratic Action would not be tagged a "Democratic Party front" or the Wall Street Journal or New York Herald Tribune would not be tagged as. "G.O.P. fronts," seemingly only organizations that were influenced and led by another political party--the Communist Party--would be subjected to such pejorative designations; and this was done for partisan political reasons, because CRC was clearly competing with these opposing forces for the "hearts and minds" of a considerable segment of the population.

The CRC was also infiltrated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. FBI agent Matthew Cvetic, who had joined the Communist Party, testified to HUAC in 1950 that the CRC was Communist-controlled and that Patterson was a Communist. He also identified as Communist a long list of politicians, celebrities, and community leaders. Various other agents surfaced to testify at anti-Communist trials. Association with the Civil Rights Congress served as justification for FBI surveillance of Lena Horne and Paul Robeson. One agent later described breaking into the CRC's Chicago offices, saying "Anything that had the name 'committee' or 'congress' the FBI assumed had to be subversive."

David Brown, secretary and then chair of the Los Angeles chapter of the CRC, served as an FBI informant from 1950–1954. He disappeared in January 1955 and attempted to fake his own kidnapping. Soon after, he unsuccessfully attempted suicide in a hotel room. He later said he felt ashamed and suicidal for being a "stool pigeon". He also testified that his pay varied from $25/week to $250/month, and that he routinely lied to FBI contacts.