Mr.
Schiff: Hi, welcome to "FBI 100, A Closer
Look." I'm Neal Schiff of the Bureau's Office
of Public Affairs along with FBI Historian Dr.
John Fox. John, J. Edgar Hoover was the FBI Director
for 48 years starting in 1924. But it was 1919,
Hoover, a lawyer, working at the Department of
Justice and he prepared a major, special report?
Dr.
Fox: "Yes Neal at the time Hoover was the
head of the General Intelligence Division which
was created by the Attorney General to look into
the radical situation. There had been a series
of terrorist attacks earlier that year and the
Department of Justice was trying to figure out
what was going on. One of the first things Hoover
had to do for the Attorney General was to report
on the newly formed Communist Party of the United
States. And he drew up a very long brief about
that."
Mr. Schiff: What did Hoover write about?
Dr. Fox: "Well he wrote about the creation
of the organization. He wrote about its leadership.
He wrote about what it believed in and why he
believed that it was a revolutionary organization
aimed at overthrowing the United States government."
Mr.
Schiff: John, how serious did the FBI and
the Department of Justice take the issue of the
Communist Party and its impact in the United States?
Dr.
Fox: "Well at that time they took it very
seriously; 1919 had been an awful year. There
had been thousands of strikes; America was recovering
from just coming out of the war; there was a lot
of economic unrest. We had a major influenza outbreak
that killed millions of people worldwide. Things
were very chaotic and it was thought that this
revolutionary fervor was a real threat to domestic
security."
Mr.
Schiff: From the FBI's Public Affairs office,
along with Bureau Historian Dr. John Fox, I'm
Neal Schiff with "FBI 100, A Closer Look."
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