leges were represented-not by Communist Party members; I'm speaking now of the Teachers' Union itself and the Massachusetts Federation of Teachers.

Mr. TAVENNER. Well, what were the names of the colleges who were affiliated with or a part of that district?

Mr. DAVIS. Smith was; Simmons College; I think there probably was a Wellesley local. I can't be sure. I think Tufts at times may have had representation. Amherst, I think, may have.

Mr. MOULDER. I think we should make the record clear they weren't representing those schools there at that meeting, were they?

Mr. DAVIS. No; I am not speaking now of Communists, but simply of the locals, college locals who were affiliated with the National Federation of Teachers.

Mr. CLARDY. Did each of them, however, have a Communist cell within their representation?

Mr. DAVIS. Not so far as I know. Smith is the only one I can recall that did have.

Mr. TAVENNER. Did you attend any caucus meetings at that district

Mr. DAVIS. Of

Mr. TAVENNER. Convention?

Mr. DAVIS. Of Massachusetts?

Mr. TAVENNER. Yes.

Mr. DAVIS. Yes; I think I must have attended at least one. That is why I remember the presence of Dorothy Douglas and Hulda McGarvey.

Mr. TAVENNER. Was the same procedure used in the district conventions as in the national of having a caucus of Communist Party members?

Mr. DAVIS. Yes. That met fairly infrequently because the State organization was less important than either the locals or the national. It was simply an in-between link.

Mr. TAVENNER. Can you recall the names of any Communists who met in a Communist caucus attended by you at a district convention which you have not already given us?

me.

Mr. DAVIS. No; I can't, and I attempted to recall, but none come to

Mr. TAVENNER. What was your last connection with the Teachers' Union as a members of the Communist Party?

Mr. DAVIS. It continued as long as my membership in the party continued. That is, I was a Communist, Communist Party member, within the union and that status changed, of course, when I stopped being a member of the Communist Party; but I remained active in the union and found myself in opposition to my former comrades.

Mr. TAVENNER. Did you make known in any special way the fact that you had withdrawn from the Communist Party to those that you had been formerly associated with in the Communist Party?

Mr. DAVIS. Oh, they knew it, of course, instantly.

Mr. TAVENNER. Now, your activity and that of the other members of the Communist Party in promotion of the interest of the Communist Party within the Teachers' Union was only one of the various activities, I understand

Mr. DAVIS. Yes.

Mr. TAVENNER. In which members of your cell or group engaged? Mr. DAVIS. Yes.

Mr. TAVENNER. I believe you stated that another function of your party, of your group, was to join American League for Peace and Democracy?

Mr. DAVIS. Yes; politically, in the struggle against war and fascism, that was the major popular front.

Mr. TAVENNER. Now, will you tell the committee what led up to the work of the Communist Party within that organization, as you understood it?

Mr. DAVIS. This organization had existed in various forms since at least 1933, and I think

Mr. TAVENNER. It was formerly the American League Against War

Mr. DAVIS. War and Fascism.

Mr. TAVENNER. And Fascism.

Mr. DAVIS. It grew out of an international conference, I think, in Brussels around 1933, a peace conference, and continued on an international scale from that time on and through that whole period I think it was a direct instrument of the Communist Party-one of its most important fronts.

Mr. TAVENNER. The American League for Peace and Democracy was cited for subversion and having Communists by Attorney General Tom Clark on June 1, 1948, in this language:

Established in the United States in 1937 as successor to the American League Against War and Fascism in an effort to create public sentiment on behalf of a foreign policy adapted to the interests of the Soviet Union.

The American League for Peace and Democracy was designed to conceal Communist control in accordance with the new tactics of the Communist Internationale.

Is that citation in accordance with the facts as you understood them and believed them to be?

Mr. DAVIS. Yes; it seems entirely correct, except I would add, as I did this morning, to many in the late thirties the policy of the Soviet Union seemed consistent with American interests so far as the struggle against fascism and Hitler was concerned.

Mr. TAVENNER. Now, what was the overall policy of that organization as you were connected with it?

Mr. DAVIS. It was to a large extent a neighborhood organization and was intended to draw in people who were not primarily intellectuals, to educate them, to get them to take, as citizens, the political line which the Communist Party desired to see followed. It was not a tightly organized society.

Mr. TAVENNER. And that political line was to oppose Hitler?

Mr. DAVIS. But it also included defense of the Soviet Union, as they say.

Mr. TAVENNER. And defense of the Soviet Union?

Mr. DAVIS. Yes.

Mr. TAVENNER. Now, did the policy of that organization change and even the character of the organization change?

Mr. DAVIS. After the pact?

Mr. TAVENNER. Yes.

Mr. DAVIS. It tried to continue but it collapsed. The position the Soviet Union was following in the fall of 1939 was so inconsistent with

the previously stated objectives of the league that I think the Communists abandoned it and started other organizations in its place, such as the Peace Mobilization, the Yanks Are Not Coming Committees, and so on.

Mr. TAVENNER. Well, the American Peace Mobilization organization really took up where the other organization, American League for Peace and Democracy, left off.

Mr. DAVIS. That's my impression; yes.

Mr. TAVENNER. And the change in the Communist Party line was that it was necessary when the pact had been signed between Soviet Russia and Germany to then criticize the United States for preparing for war and calling it a warmonger.

Mr. DAVIS. Yes; the war was declared to be an imperialist war. (Representative Morgan M. Moulder left the hearing room at this

point.)

Mr. TAVENNER. And that change took place almost as quickly as the signing of the pact, didn't it?

Mr. DAVIS. Yes; there was a week of confusion in which the Communist Party publications were uncertain as to what line to take, but after about a week they got the line which was completely inconsistent with what had gone before.

Mr. TAVENNER. Well, what effect did that have upon the professors at Harvard who were members of this Communist Party group?

Mr. DAVIS. It was extremely unsettling. I started to break at once, within that week, but then I wondered if there was any justification for this strategy. I thought possibly the Soviet Union, knowing that Hitler was going to war anyway, had tried to make a bargain that would save as much territory as possible from Hitlerism; and so I decided to wait, to give them the benefit of the doubt, but after I had waited about a month and a half, or 2 months, I knew I could not accept this and resigned.

Mr. TAVENNER. Well, during that period of time were you visited by functionaries of the Communist Party who endeavored to give the party line or the new party line to your group?

Mr. DAVIS. Indeed, yes; it was a period of intense activity, especially 'among professional groups because they realized how profound a shock this was to genuine anti-Fascists and they had to work desperately to hold the line to keep people from breaking. There were a succession of meetings-very long meetings.

Mr. TAVENNER. And, as you look back upon it now, was this just not another effort on the part of the Communist Party to dictate to its members how they should think

Mr. DAVIS. Certainly.

Mr. TAVENNER. And act upon any given subject?

Mr. DAVIS. Certainly, except that in this country it had to take the form of persuasion, since they had no means physically of keeping a person from leaving the party. Therefore, they had to do it through argument and pressure of all kinds.

Mr. TAVENNER. But was opposition tolerated among those who remained in the party?

Mr. DAVIS. Not opposition; no. There was a period of discussion, as they called it, before the new line was formed; but, once the new line was formed, then criticism of it would lead to expulsion.

Mr. TAVENNER. So, if a person desired to remain a Communist he had to agree with the Communist Party line that was handed down to him?

Mr. DAVIS. Yes.

Mr. TAVENNER. Now, who were those who attempted to control the thought of you professors at Harvard on that subject?

Mr. DAVIS. They were the official leaders of the party in New England, and if I'm not mistaken Frankfeld was still there at that time-oh, yes; I am sure he was. He was the principal speaker.

Mr. TAVENNER. Now, were there any other organizations which you were directed or induced to become active in? I mean organizations which were not Communist organizations?

Mr. DAVIS. There was an association of scientific workers, I remember, but those who joined that were scientists and not the members of the group generally.

Mr. TAVENNER. Was it a union?

Mr. DAVIS. No; it was a more or less informal voluntary organization of scientific workers.

Mr. TAVENNER. What was the purpose in having the members of your group to infiltrate that group of scientists?

Mr. DAVIS. I don't know because I didn't take part in it, you see, since I wasn't a scientist; but I knew there was a good deal of interest in it on the part of some members of the group.

Mr. TAVENNER. Well, was it true that only those Communists who were scientists were asked to unite with that group?

Mr. DAVIS. So far as I remember; yes.

Mr. TAVENNER. Did you hear any discussions which would indicate the purpose of infiltrating this group of scientists?

Mr. DAVIS. NO; I don't recall discussions. It would be pure inference on my part. Some of the members in Cambridge were also responsible for founding the magazine Science and Society which is a broad theoretical quarterly which has continued until the present time.

Mr. TAVENNER. Were you urged to become active in any other group or organization that you can now recall?

Mr. DAVIS. No; I don't remember any specific suggestions. Com-' munists always worked principally in their professional or trade unions.

Mr. TAVENNER. Well, let us turn now, then, to the second division of the activities of your group, that is, the conduct of Marxist study groups. Will you tell us about that, please?

Mr. DAVIS. It was fairly easy to form them because at this time, again for the reasons I stated this morning, there was lively interest in Marxism; and though I think persons joining these groups had some idea that the instructors were close to the Communist Party they, nevertheless, were ready to discuss Marxism with them, and in some cases actually the persons whom the party secured were not actually party members but were intellectual social scientists who knew a good deal about Marxism and were willing to discuss it before a group. Mr. TAVENNER. And what was the Communist Party purpose in establishing these Marxist groups?

Mr. DAVIS. They had a double purpose; first, to disseminate Marxism, which is one of their important principles always and every

where; and also these were very-it was a very good way of recruiting members into the Communist Party because if members of these study groups seemed convinced of the truth in Marxism, then they were urged to join the party.

Mr. TAVENNER. Do you recall any instances in which members of the faculty at Harvard were recruited to the Communist Party through the Marxist group studies?

Mr. DAVIS. I can't recall the names because I don't remember now by what process the various parties came into the party, but I am sure it was effective in 2 or 3 cases at least.

Mr. TAVENNER. Would you describe it as an effective means of recruiting persons into the Communist Party?

Mr. DAVIS. Extremely effective among intellectuals, yes, because intellectuals ordinarily joined immediately at least for theoretic or intellectual reasons.

Mr. TAVENNER. Were those study groups provided in any manner. by functionaries of the Communist Party on a higher level?

Mr. DAVIS. Not directly; no. They encouraged the formation of them, but they left this to the members of the teachers' group who were better able to persent it to other teachers.

Mr. TAVENNER. Did these study groups include the issuance of Communist Party literature to the individuals and the requirements of study of particular documents and books in which the Communist Party was interested at the time?

Mr. DAVIS. Yes, but primarily these were the classics, Marx' Das Kapital, the works of Engels, and so on.

Mr. TAVENNER. The Communist Manifesto

Mr. DAVIS. Yes.

Mr. TAVENNER. I assume was one. State and Revolution?
Mr. DAVIS. Yes.

Mr. TAVENNER. Left-Wing Communism?

Mr. DAVIS. I don't know that they were-that they would deal with quite so a sectarian work with a broad group.

Mr. TAVENNER. I believe you said Das Kapital

Mr. DAVIS. Yes.

Mr. TAVENNER. Was one of the studies.

History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union?

Mr. DAVIS. No; that again was a little too immediately a party document and might alienate intellectuals.

We were, however, instructed to distribute that book as widely as possible.

Mr. TAVENNER. But you thought it was a little dangerous or the group thought it was a little dangerous to do so until the person invited in had become well indoctrinated in Marxian theory?

Mr. DAVIS. Yes; that is right.

Mr. TAVENNER. Generally.

Did you read and study any of the works of Foster?

Mr. DAVIS. Foster?

Mr. TAVENNER. Yes, the head of the Communist Party of the United States.

Mr. DAVIS. Not systematically, but members, themselves, were expected to keep up with all the relevant party literature and it was very often brought to meetings for the use of members.

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