Dennis V. United States - Background of The Case

Background of The Case

The petitioners were indicted in July 1948 for violating a provision of the Smith Act. The eleven petitioners were:

• Benjamin J. Davis – Chairman of the CPUSA's Legislative Committee
• Eugene Dennis – General Secretary
• John Gates – Leader of the Young Communist League
• Gil Green – Member of the National Board
• Gus Hall – Member of the National Board
• Irving Potash - Furriers Union official
• Jack Stachel
• Robert G. Thompson – Lead of the New York organization
• John Williamson – Member of the Central Committee
• Henry Winston – Member of the National Board
• Carl Winter – Lead of the Michigan organization

The 1949 trial was presided over by Judge Harold Medina, a former Columbia University professor who had been a judge for only 18 months when the trial began. The trial was held in the Foley Square federal courthouse in New York City, and opened on November 1, 1948; preliminary proceedings and jury selection lasted until January 17, 1949; the defendants first appeared in court on March 7; and the trial concluded on October 14, 1949. Although later trials surpassed it, in 1949 it was the longest federal trial in US history.

Prosecutor John McGohey did not assert that the defendants had a specific plan to violently overthrow the US government, but rather alleged that the CPUSA's philosophy generally advocated the violent overthrow of governments. To prove this, the prosecution proffered articles, pamphlets and books (such as The Communist Manifesto) written by authors such as Karl Marx and Joseph Stalin. The prosecution argued that the texts advocated violent revolution, and that by adopting the texts as their political foundation, the defendants were also personally guilty of advocating violent overthrow of the government.

The five attorneys who volunteered to defend the communists were familiar with leftist causes and personally supported the defendants' rights to espouse communist views. They were Abraham Isserman, George W. Crockett, Jr., Richard Gladstein, Harry Sacher, and Louis F. McCabe. Defendant Eugene Dennis represented himself. The ACLU was dominated by anti-communist leaders during the 1940s, and did not enthusiastically support persons indicted under the Smith Act. However, the ACLU did provide an amicus brief for the Foley Square defendants, endorsing a motion for dismissal.

The defense employed a three-pronged strategy: First, portraying the CPUSA as a conventional political party, which promoted socialism by peaceful means; second, employing the "labor defense" tactic to attack the trial as a capitalist venture which could never provide a fair outcome to proletarian defendants; and third, using the trial as an opportunity to publicize CPUSA policies.

The defense deliberately antagonized the judge by making a large number of objections and motions, which led to numerous bitter engagements between the attorneys and Judge Medina. Out of the chaos, an atmosphere of "mutual hostility" arose between the judge and attorneys. Medina came to believe that the defense attorneys were using the trial as an opportunity to publicize communist propaganda, and that the they deliberately disrupted the trial using any means they could. Judge Medina attempted to maintain order by removing defendants who were out of order. In the course of the trial, Medina sent five of the defendants to jail for outbursts. Several times in July and August, the judge held defense attorneys in contempt of court, and told them their punishment would be meted out upon conclusion of the trial.

On October 14, 1949, after the defense rested their case, the judge gave the jury instructions to guide them in reaching a verdict. After deliberating for seven and a half hours, the jury returned guilty verdicts against all eleven defendants. The judge sentenced ten defendants to five years' imprisonment and a $10,000 fine each ($97,678 in 2012 dollars).