Investigation of Communist activities in Seattle, Wash., Area, Hearings, Part 2United States. Congress. House. Committee on Un-American Activities
History
Investigation of Communist activities in Seattle, Wash., Area, Hearings, Part 2
United States. Congress. House. Committee on Un-American Activities
Communism -- Washington (State) -- Seattle
Mr. MOULDER. Have you any knowledge or information, whether it be
in the form of an opinion or from your experience, as to the total
Communist Party membership in this area at the present time?
Mr. DENNETT. No. I have no adequate idea about that. I think that it
must be very small. Someone asked me the other day what I thought it
was, and I said, “Well, I think the ranks of the Communist Party have
been decimated by their own foolish behavior and by the change in
public attitude. I think that has resulted in them being reduced to a
mere handful, a shell of its former self.”
Mr. MOULDER. Then you would tell us now that you have no knowledge or
information of any communistic or Communist Party activity in Seattle
at this time?
Mr. DENNETT. No. We are coming to the point of my expulsion, which
occurred 7, nearly 8 years ago. So my experience and knowledge would
have to break at that point with respect to the Communist Party itself.
Mr. VELDE. I presume you are familiar generally with the testimony
Barbara Hartle gave here?
Mr. DENNETT. I listened to it very carefully.
Mr. VELDE. She brought Communist Party activities in this area up to
date as nearly as anyone possibly could in her situation.
Would you appraise her testimony as being true as to general matters
concerning Communist activities here?
Mr. DENNETT. In all fairness to her and in all fairness to the persons
that she mentioned, I would have to say that I think Barbara Hartle was
her real self when she was here. She appeared to me to be exactly the
same as the person I knew many years before. She was very deliberate
and methodical. She always had been. And I think that she gave as
accurate an account as she could possibly do. I marvel at the ability
that she displayed in doing it, the names that she mentioned.
I have tried to explain to my personal friends--they have asked me
about it; how could a person name so many people as she did? I can
only say that Barbara was in a position where she had access to those
records. It was part of her duty to handle records of the membership.
Therefore, she would be required to know those things.
People have asked me, “Well, do you know the same people that she
knew?” And I have had to answer, “I certainly knew most of those
people.”
But I am not in a position where I could say that, of my own knowledge,
I knew those persons as members of the Communist Party.
I knew practically all of those persons in some capacity or another,
but in very few instances is it possible for me to say, of my own
knowledge, that I knew such and such a person to be a member of the
Communist Party.
And that was a very important distinction for me to make.
But I must say that it is my considered judgment that Barbara Hartle
gave very valid and very accurate information.
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