Treason of the Clerks

Nearly a decade ago John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr, having gathered much valuable material in the archives of the defunct USSR, published The Secret World of American Communism. That book exposed as sentimental whimsy the notion that the American Communist party was a “courageous and idealistic band of rebels” who made useful contributions to the republic; it was instead, Haynes and Klehr showed, a group of flunkies slavishly obedient to Josef Stalin’s commands. Four years later, in Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America, the two scholars used newly available documents from the Venona Project—a top-secret American code-breaking operation—to demonstrate the real damage done by the Communist spy rings of the 1930s and 1940s.

In their new book, Haynes and Klehr turn from writing history to writing about it. They catalog the activities of a corps of zealots in the academy who have refused to accept the archival revelations of the last decade. Far from being baffled and disheartened by the evidence that accumulated so rapidly in the 1990s, these scholars are doing their best both to extenuate the sins of the American Communists and to make light of the Soviet purposes they furthered in this country.

About the Author

Michael Knox Beran

Michael Knox Beran, a lawyer and writer, is the author of WASPs: The Splendors and Miseries of an American Aristocracy.

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Nearly a decade ago John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr, having gathered much valuable material in the archives of the defunct USSR, published The Secret World of American Communism. That book exposed as sentimental whimsy the notion that the American Communist party was a “courageous and idealistic band of rebels” who made useful contributions to the republic; it was instead, Haynes and Klehr showed, a group of flunkies slavishly obedient to Josef Stalin’s commands. Four years later, in Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America, the two scholars used newly available documents from the Venona Project—a top-secret American code-breaking operation—to demonstrate the real damage done by the Communist spy rings of the 1930s and 1940s.

In their new book, Haynes and Klehr turn from writing history to writing about it. They catalog the activities of a corps of zealots in the academy who have refused to accept the archival revelations of the last decade. Far from being baffled and disheartened by the evidence that accumulated so rapidly in the 1990s, these scholars are doing their best both to extenuate the sins of the American Communists and to make light of the Soviet purposes they furthered in this country.