Joseph McCarthy is the political figure most commonly associated with the anti-Communist hysteria of the 1950s, but Patrick McCarran (1876–1954) was equally virulent. The senator from Nevada was nominally a Democrat, but his politics were firmly reactionary, consistently at odds with Roosevelt and Truman. As chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, he wielded enormous power, getting his way by threatening to slash budgets. Ybarra, a former reporter for the Wall Street Journal,
meticulously details McCarran's political fights, especially over immigration, which he calls the senator's "white whale, a submerged beast threatening doom." The infamous McCarran-Walter Act had the purported intention to keep subversives out of the country, but its real impact was to keep European refugees (especially Jews) from immigrating. In addition to chronicling McCarran's excesses, though, Ybarra gives equal weight to the evidence that some Communists did manage to infiltrate the federal government, as well as to the "professional ex-Communists" ready to identify real or imagined former comrades. Though this multitrack approach makes the chronology somewhat confusing, the overall result is a chilling testament to one well-placed man's destructive influence over foreign policy and domestic liberty. By favoring careful documentation over demonization, Ybarra's hefty account offers a welcome new perspective on the origins of the Cold War. 32 pages of b&w photos. (Sept. 28)
