The Redhunter (30 page)

Public attention to Josefa Kalli quickly ebbed. There was a memorial service in Baltimore, attended by a half dozen of the
men and women she had worked with at the Commerce Department. There was no family, and no one stepped forward asking to be
put in charge of burial arrangements and the final service. The assistant secretary of commerce then stepped in and (“I’ve
never done this before. What exactly do I do?”) asked his personnel director for help. What had to be done was pretty routine.
Police … mortuary … cremation. “But there is one less-than-routine thing I’d do if I were you, Mr. Secretary.”

“What’s that?”

“I’d call Senator McCarthy and ask him please not to attend. He’ll understand why. If he comes, the whole tabloid community
will be there and a lot of stuff will get said that won’t exactly—well, you know, help our own … personnel situation.”

Donald Sutherland said he understood.

He put in the call. He didn’t want to ask for Senator McCarthy personally. For one thing, the assistant secretary was in no
mood to chat with the senator about the reasons for Kalli’s behavior. The operator put him through to Mary Haskell. “You understand,
Mrs. Haskell, if the senator wants to speak to me I’d be absolutely delighted to do so. But I thought perhaps this business
was better handled at … this level.”

“I understand,” Mary said.

And Joe understood; in fact was grateful to be excused. His only knowledge of Josefa Kalli, after all, was what he got from
his two-hour interview with her. He had filed inquiries about her record, but he knew they would be of no effect: He would
bump into the 1948 executive order that barred legislative inquiries into personnel security records.

“So, Mary, I had two hours with her and—”he drew it from the drawer he had placed it in—”this letter, which you’ve seen.”
The letter spoke of Josefa Kalli’s fright, her despair, her reluctance to reveal names, and her decision to end it all.

“I got the hundredth request for a copy this morning. Do you intend to give it out?”

McCarthy sat back. “No. Let them speculate—and worry—about what’s in it. Let’s let the poor lady alone.”

“What if Mr. Hoover asks to see it?”

“That’s different. But if the FBI asks for it, tell them to have the director call me.”

Kalli was forgotten, but the tempest over Owen Lattimore heightened. McCarthy moved forward on his idea.

Harry had worked hard on the research, and Don Surine drew on his many sources. Joe brought in some data without saying where
he had got them. The whole package was sent to Lawrence Spivak, editor of
Meet the Press
and its principal interrogator.

The TV program was heavily advertised: Owen Lattimore on
Meet the Press.
McCarthy had said early on in the Tydings investigation that his case stood or fell on the correctness of his identification
of Owen Lattimore as a Soviet agent. McCarthy retreated on the matter of his being the “top” agent, but Lattimore remained,
week after week, the dominant figure in the Tydings investigation. It would be an important half hour.

•Millard Tydings, spending Sunday in his ample house in Baltimore, told his houseguests to be quiet, even though it was only
10:55 and the television program didn’t begin until eleven.

• Dean Acheson had come into the imposing secretary’s office at
the Department of State. He had been meeting with political advisers on the matter of Korea, but ten minutes before the hour
he said, simply: “Look, gentlemen. I have to see the Lattimore program on
Meet the Press.
It is very important to me, and very important to the department. You may join me in the Red Room or disport yourselves as
you please until eleven-thirty. All seven joined the secretary of state in the adjacent room with its brand-new twelve-inch
television.

• The First Baptist Church, on Sixteenth and O Street, was the church of the Reverend Edward Pruden, and his Sunday services
began at ten o’clock. President Truman and Mrs. Truman were regular congregants. There was this problem, namely that the Reverend
Pruden tended to deliver substantial sermons, with the result that services ended approximately one hour after they began.
On the Friday before, a White House aide—Posi Casertano—had met with Mr. Pruden. If he could manage to end the service this
next Sunday at 10:50, the president would be grateful to go from the church to the rectory next door in order to watch
Meet the Press
on Mr. Pruden’s set. No publicity, just an impromptu call by the president on his minister.

The clergyman was delighted and winked at Miss Casertano. “I’ll make certain the last hymn ends at ten-fifty. On the other
hand, I shall certainly make it a point not to end the service
too
early. That would give the president time to return to the White House, and I wouldn’t want that! I’d be honored to have
him as my guest, even if it is only for a half hour.”

• Don Surine had suggested the entire staff view the program on the senator’s set in the office, but Joe said no. He didn’t
want the press to sniff out that McCarthy attached that much importance to it.

You watch it here. I’ll watch it at Jeanie’s house. At Jeanie’s mother’s house.” He turned to Harry. “Want to come?”

Harry nodded. “Wouldn’t miss it. I don’t have a television set.”

• Ed Reidy called Sam Tilburn from Indianapolis. “You going to watch it at home? So am I. Give me a call after it’s over, okay?”

—Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. This is Larry Spivak bringing you
Meet the Press.
Our guest today is Professor Owen Lattimore. Mr. Lattimore, as everybody knows, has been the principal target of Senator
Joe McCarthy, who two months ago charged that there were
two hundred and five Communists in the State Department. There is a dispute over that figure, but he did charge that there
were a number of loyalty and security risks in government, and he named Owen Lattimore as his primary target.

Mr. Lattimore is a Far East specialist, teaching at Johns Hopkins. He is the author of many books, including
The Desert Road to Turkestan.
Our panelists are four journalists who will be introduced later.

Welcome, Mr. Lattimore.

—Thank you, Mr. Spivak. I am glad to be here.

—Mr. Lattimore, you said on February fifteenth that you had no association with the Department of State. You also said, “I
am the least consulted man of all those who have a public reputation in this country as specialists in the Far East.” But
Mr. Lattimore, in 1941 President Roosevelt appointed you personal political adviser to Chiang Kaishek, then head of state
of China, and you remained in Peiping until 1942. What is your comment on that?

—Well, Mr. Spivak, that was a special appointment and it was outside the, the purview of the State Department.

—But surely the State Department was concerned about what you reported on China?

—Well, we like to think the State Department is aware of
everything
that goes on that can in any way affect foreign policy.

—Mr. Lattimore, after you got back to Washington you were made the chief of Pacific Operations for the Office of War Information.
Surely that is one, well, one front of the State Department?

—The Office of War Information was created after Pearl Harbor, Mr. Spivak, and it would be incorrect to think of it as a part
of the State Department—

—In 1944, Mr. Lattimore, Vice President Henry Wallace made his famous visit to Siberia and to China. That was the trip about
which he wrote, representing forcefully the Soviet position on the issues of 1944, having to do with bringing the war to an
end and planning the peace. You accompanied Vice President Wallace on that trip. Would you not call that an official connection?
Surely the State Department was concerned with the diplomatic impact of the trip of the vice president of the United States?

—Well, Mr. Spivak, I have—I’m not denying it—a, er, considerable professional reputation in my own field. And the vice president
obviously
wished to have one or more people in his entourage with whom he could consult on historical and cultural matters, Russian
and Chinese—

—Mr. Lattimore, in 1945 President Truman appointed you as a member of the Pauley Reparations Mission to Japan—

—Look, Mr. Spivak, that was a purely technical assignment—

•“I didn’t know that,” Harry Truman said, “about Lattimore and the Pauley commission. Why the hell didn’t somebody tell me
that? Make a note to find that out. Make a note for me to call Mr. Acheson as soon as I get back.”

“Yes, Mr. President.” Presidential Assistant Ellery Grew took out his notebook.

—Mr. Lattimore, in 1949 you attended a State Department conference on China policy. And—wait just a minute, Mr. Lattimore—yet
you have said, I quote you, again, February fifteenth, “I have never been in the State Department.” Mr. Lattimore, I have
a photostatic copy of a letter signed by you and directed to Mr. Benjamin Kizer, dated June 12, 1942. The last paragraph of
that letter reads, “My home address is as typed above, and my home telephone is Towson 846-W. I am in Washington about four
days a week, and when there can always be reached at Lauchlin Currie’s office, Room 228, State Department Building; telephone
NAtional 1414, extension 90. Yours very sincerely, Owen Lattimore.”

•“God almighty,” Dean Acheson pointed his finger at his aide, ignoring the seven senior officers grouped around the television
set with him. “Lauchlin Currie’s office! Lauchlin Currie isn’t just a McCarthy target. He was FDR’s administrative assistant
for foreign affairs
and,
we now know, a member of the Silvermaster spy ring!” He stopped. He wanted to hear.

—Mr. Lattimore, my information is that when Mr. Currie went away for a period of time he would ask you to take care of his
mail at the White House. That question was raised during the Tydings investigation. You have most vehemently denied this.
But I have seen a letter, I have a copy here, written by you to Mr. E. C. Carter of the Institute
of Pacific Relations. The date on that letter is July 15, 1942. The first paragraph of it reads, “Dear Carter: Currie asked
me to take care of his correspondence while he is away and in view of your telegram of today, I think I had better tell you
that he has gone to China on a special trip. This news is absolutely confidential until released in the press.”

—Well, er, I have to admit my memory lapsed on that particular point, Mr. Spivak—I think I was doing Mr. Currie merely a personal
clerical favor—

•Senator Tydings was absolutely silent. His wife watched him. Even his guests playing dominoes stopped, turning their attention
to the little man with glasses asking all those questions and the other man with the little mustache, sitting opposite, answering
them.

—Mr. Lattimore, the reason Senator McCarthy has leveled his accusations is of course that he charges you with being a Communist—No
no,
I’m
not asserting this, Professor Lattimore. I’m not asserting that you are or have been a Communist. I’m asking you questions.
And of course the question most people have been asking about you is: Are you, or were you, pulling an oar for the Communists,
in the Soviet Union and in China? I have here one of your books,
Solution in Asia
—

•“That’s
my
book!” Harry said excitedly. “The book I told you about—”

“Quiet, Harry!”
Joe stopped him. “Listen.”

—The book carries—here, on the jacket—a blurb. A brief account of what’s in the book. My information is that such accounts
are provided by the book publishers but that their content is always okayed by the author. Now this blurb reads, “He—”that’s
you, the author—”shows that all the Asiatic people are more interested in actual democratic practices such as the ones they
can see in action across the Russian border, than they are in the fine theories of Anglo-Saxon democracies which come coupled
with ruthless imperialism. … He—”that’s you, Mr. Lattimore—”inclines to support American newspapermen who report that the
only real democracy in China is found in Communist areas.”

•Dean Acheson stood up, walked to the set, and turned it off. There was silence. One counselor said, “Don’t you want to hear
what Lattimore says?”

“No,” Acheson said. “Bloody fool. And he has gready strengthened the hand of that terrible … man. Let’s get back to the subject
of Korea. We must continue our efforts, gentlemen, and I am sure they will be successful, to prevent any military action there.”

•Ed Reidy’s phone rang. “Gee …
whiz!
Sam. That was human slaughter. Do you figure Lattimore bailed out at all in those last ten minutes?”

“He did as much as you can do, Ed, with those half dozen arrows sticking out of his chest.”

“What will the Tydings people do?”

“They’ve got a problem. But they can’t drop Lattimore. They’ll have to try to smother the whole thing with academic tributes
and testimonials and hate-Joe-McCarthy talk. There’s no way they can just hand Lattimore over to Joe McCarthy.”

“Sam, have you dug into Lattimore’s articles and books, especially in the last year or so?”

“I’ve poked about. What’re you especially interested in, Ed?”

“I’m wondering whether he’s made recommendations on the Korean scene. It looks real bad over there. Might be good if you poked
into the
Readers Guide
or some of the professional journals.”

“Will do, Ed.”

At Mrs. Kerr’s house the telephone rang. A few minutes later it rang again. The press had tracked down Joe McCarthy.

Jean came in from the kitchen with a bottle of champagne.