Keller The Liberals and J. Edgar Hoover

Rise and Fall of a Domestic Intelligence State
Course Book
ISBN: 978-1-4008-5988-7
Verlag: De Gruyter
Format: PDF
Kopierschutz: 1 - PDF Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 230 Seiten

Reihe: Princeton Legacy Library

In the super-heated anticommunist politics of the early Cold War period, American liberals turned to the FBI. With the Communist party to the left of them and McCarthyism to the right, liberal leaders saw the Bureau as the only legitimate instrument to define and protect the internal security interests of the state. McCarthyism provided ample proof of the dangers of security by congressional investigation. In response, liberals delegated extensive powers to J. Edgar Hoover--creating a domestic intelligence capacity that circumvented constitutional and legal controls. This balanced account of the link between liberal leaders in the United States and the growth of the FBI will appeal to a broad audience of readers interested in the American political climate. William Keller identifies a tension between liberalism and the security of the state that can never be fully resolved, and analyzes the exact mechanisms through which liberals and liberal government came to tolerate and even venerate an authoritarian state presence in their midst.

The author shows how the liberal offensive against domestic communism succeeded both in weakening McCarthyism and in disabling the Communist party in the United States. What was the cost of these successes? Keller's answer assesses the liberal community's contribution to changes in the FBI between 1950 and 1970: its transformation into an independent, unaccountable political police.

Originally published in 1989.

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Autoren/Hrsg.

Keller, William W.

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtswissenschaft Allgemein
• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politikwissenschaft Allgemein Politische Studien zu einzelnen Ländern und Gebieten

Inhaltsverzeichnis

FrontMatter, pg. i
Contents, pg. vii
Preface, pg. ix
Abbreviations, pg. xi
A Note on Sources, pg. xiii
CHAPTER ONE. Domestic Security in a Modern Liberal State, pg. 1
CHAPTER TWO. The Liberal Theory of Internal Security, pg. 28
CHAPTER THREE. A Politics of Equivocation: The Liberals, the Klan, and Dr. King, pg. 72
CHAPTER FOUR. The End of the FBI-Liberal Entente, pg. 111
CHAPTER FIVE. Rise of a Domestic Intelligence State, pg. 154
CHAPTER SIX. Conclusion, pg. 190
Selected Bibliography, pg. 201
Index, pg. 213