Overman Committee - Bolshevism Hearings

Bolshevism Hearings

The Overman Committee's hearings on Bolshevism lasted from February 11 to March 10, 1919. More than two dozen witnesses were interviewed. About two-thirds were violently anti-Bolshevik and advocated for military intervention in Russia. Some were refugees of the Russian Diaspora—many former government officials—who left Russia because of Bolshevism. The overriding theme was the social chaos the Revolution had brought, but three sub-themes were also frequent: anti-Americanism among American intelligentsia, the relationship between Jews and Communist Russia, and the "nationalization" of women after the Soviet revolution.

Stevenson produced a list of 200—later reduced to 62—alleged communist professors in the United States. Like lists of names provided during the German propaganda hearings, this list provoked an outcry. Stevenson declared universities to be breeding grounds of sedition, and that institutions of higher learning were "festering masses of pure atheism" and "the grossest kind of materialism". Ambassador to Russia David R. Francis stated that the Bolsheviks were killing everybody "who wears a white collar or who is educated and who is not a Bolshevik."

Another recurring theme at the hearings was the relationship between Jews and communists in Russia. One Methodist preacher stated that nineteen out of twenty communists were Jews; others said the Red Army was composed mainly of former East Side New York Jews. However, after criticism from Jewish organizations, Senator Overman clarified that the Committee was discussing "apostate" Jews only, defined by witness George Simons as "one who has given up the faith of his fathers or forefathers."

A third frequent theme was the "free love" and "nationalization" of women allegedly occurring in Soviet Russia. Witnesses described an orgy in which there was no "respect for virtuous women"; others who testified, including those who had been in Russia during the Revolution, denied this. After one witness read a Soviet decree saying that Russian women had the "right to choose from among men", Senator Sterling threw up his hands and declared that this was a negation of "free love". However, another decree was produced stating, "A girl having reached her eighteenth year is to be announced as the property of the state."

The Senators were particularly interested in how Bolshevism had united many disparate elements on the left, including anarchists and socialists of many types, "providing a common platform for all these radical groups to stand on." Senator Knute Nelson of Minnesota responded: "Then they have really rendered a service to the various classes of progressives and reformers that we have here in this country." Other witnesses described the horrors of the revolution in Russia and speculated on the consequences of a comparable revolution in the United States: the imposition of atheism, the seizure of newspapers, assaults on banks and the abolition of the insurance industry. The Senators heard various views of women in Russia, including claims that women were made the property of the state.