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Book Review Of Joseph Mccarthy's Nightmare In Red

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February Non-Fiction Book Report
Fried, Richard M. Nightmare In Red. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990. Print.
The book, Nightmare In Red, is about the McCarthyism era and the upcoming of the House Un-American Activities Committee. The book lays out details of how regular Americans to politicians and celebrities were being accused of being communists, having connections to communists or advocating freely to be communist. The book also shows the effect of Joseph McCarthy to the public during the McCarthy era, as he was the direct cause of publicizing ordinary to well-known Americans to communist ties, as the effects of publicizing brought what is known as the “Red Scare” in the United States and Americans feared communism. I choose to read Nightmare In Red for …show more content…

Alger Hiss was a United States government official and government official Whittaker Chambers eventually threw Hiss under the bus leading Hiss to be “the central symbol in America’s struggle over domestic communism” (17). Hiss tried denying multiple times that the accusations were lies and he was innocent of anything Chambers implied but “on January 21 1950, a jury found Hiss, and attorney with a once-promising career in the State Department, guilty on two counts of perjury - for having lied about his Communist connections in the 1930’s” (17). This eventually sent Hiss to be in a federal penitentiary for four years and also his testimony exposed many politicians such as Richard Nixon and the New Deal. I found this event interesting as Alger Hiss was actually never found guilty of having Communist ties and everything known as of that time were just speculations. I also found this interesting as the Hiss case also exposed many other politicians and associations but those people were never mentioned to be questioned or tried to

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The speech made McCarthy famous and led Congress to begin investigating supposed communists in the government. McCarthy later gave Congress the names of State Department employees he claimed were traitors. Those individuals lost their jobs, even though McCarthy never supplied evidence to prove their guilt” (Joseph McCarthy). McCarthy used a list he made up to gain notoriety with

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The first example of McCarthy’s failure, was his exploitation of a nation’s widespread paranoia. The paranoia was the result of the remains of World War II, and the ongoing Cold War (History.com Staff, 2009). The possibility that there were communists invading and corrupting the U.S government became a daunting reality to many people and “for many Americans, the most enduring symbol of this “Red Scare” was Republican Senator Joseph P.

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