Christian Cuello

Honors Contemporary History

Period 1
11/19/17

To what extent was McCarthyism and the Red Scare justified in

America during the 1950s?

McCarthyism and the Red Scare were justified to a certain extent. McCarthyism . In
document one which when the speech is talking about communism and this speech is
from Senator McCarthy, McCarthy states “When a democracy is destroyed, it will not
be from enemies from without, but rather because of enemies within” McCarthy is
saying the enemies are the communists in the United States. McCarthy is emphasizing
that the people that are communist in the US is going to bring down a great nation. For
example, the Rosenbergs were communists in the U.S who leaked classified
information to the Soviets. The Rosenbergs information gave the Soviets an edge over
the US in the Cold War. The Rosenbergs information gave the Soviets an edge
because if the US was planning to do something, then the SU knew what was going to
happen and where was it going to happen. Espionage was a very common activity the
US and the SU and was conducted because of the common feud these two nations had
over what style of government was best. In the reading “Cold War at Home” it states the
story of an American communist family and how they were treated "Tony Kahn made
the neighbors uncountable because they thought his father, Gordon Kahn, was a
communist...Kahn was blacklisted... to save himself Gordon simply had to name others
as communists, but he refused... he fled to Mexico”. This show how the family’s life
changed forever because the media and government had basically made it public that
communists were horrible human beings. Fear clearly is shown in the quote because
the Kahn family was blacklisted (put a person or something on a blacklist) and was
impossible for them to find a job. The blacklisted affected the family a lot because the
Kahn’s could not do many things like find a job, get a house, and etc. It affected, also,
because the Kahn family was probably a good family, but the people would look bad at
them since the family was communist and were scared to be friend with them. People
were afraid to be friends with the family because people thought the government would
put them or jail or would execute them like the Rosenbergs. Also, the government did
not stop there and wanted Gordon Kahn to identify other communists because the
government did want the nation to suffer. It was impossible for them to work because
they were black listed. Going back to the packet, in document three, it states “Then how
do communists try to get control? Legally and illegally, anyway they can. Communism's
first big victory was through bloody revolution. Every one since has been by military
conquest, or internal corruption”. This is showing how the communists are willing to do
anything to expand the influence of communism throughout the world. This would have
created fear since the purpose of this document was to create fear and to prevent
people from joining the communist side. Also, this is showing how the Red Scare was
justified to a certain extent because the government wanted to spread fear to the people
and it was working. It was working because the people did not want to risk their lives.
Red Scare wanted to show how communism was bad, so everyone was scared to
believe or think or even be around communism because they were scared. In
conclusion, the Red Scare and McCarthyism is justified because of the constant threat
that communism presented.