SYNOPSIS Public hearings on Communist activities among seamen and on waterfront facilities were held in Washington, D.C., on June 6, 7 and 8, and on June 23, 1960. In opening the hearings, the chairman of the committee stated: In Parker v. Lester, decided October 26, 1955, and in Graham v. Richmond, decided November 5, 1959, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, respectively, following a series of decisions by the Supreme Court, for all practical purposes ruled invalid the entire security screening procedures administered by the United States Coast Guard. Prior to these decisions, under the Merchant Marine screening program which had been authorized by law in 1950, the United States Coast Guard had screened off over 1,800 seamen from merchant vessels. Since these court decisions and subsequent rulings following them by the Federal district courts, hundreds of seamen who had been screened off merchant vessels as security risks have procured seamen's documents. Numerous other seamen heretofore screened off merchant vessels have now applied for seamen's papers. In other words, our entire seamen security program has been virtually destroyed. The chairman also explained the provisions of a bill introduced by him as follows: Under date of April 5, 1960, I introduced in the House H.R. 11580, which is pending before the Committee on UnAmerican Activities, to amend the Subversive Activities Control Act of 1950 so as to provide that no individual who wilfully fails or refuses to answer, or falsely answers, certain questions relating to Communist activities, when summoned to appear before certain Federal agencies, shall be employed on any merchant vessel of the United States or within certain waterfront facilities in the United States. This bill is patterned after a California statute which was held valid by the United States Supreme Court in the case of Nelson and Globe v. County of Los Angeles, decided February 29, 1960. In this case, the Supreme Court examined a provision of the California code which made it the duty of any public employee when summoned before an appropriate Government agency to give the information of which he was possessed on communism and other subversive activity. The California code provides for dismissal of any such public employee who fails or refuses to appear or to answer the questions propounded. In sustaining the validity of the California statute, the court found that, notwithstanding the public employee's invocation of the fifth amendment, his refusal to reply to the questions propounded was sufficient basis for his discharge because the State may legitimately predicate discharge on refusal of a public employee to give information touching on the field of security. My bill not only attempts to deal with the problems of Communists on vessels, but also a related area in which it would appear that legislation is needed, namely, on waterfront facilities which, if in the hands of Communists or if penetrated by Communist agents, could create a grave threat to our internal security. Vice Admiral James A. Hirshfield, Assistant Commandant of the Coast Guard, accompanied by Commander Lawrence D. Connor and the Chief Counsel and Assistant Chief Counsel of the Coast Guard, testified on the history of the screening program of merchant seamen and the impact on that program of certain court decisions. He pointed out that approximately 1,800 seamen whose applications for seamen's papers have been denied by the Coast Guard are, pursuant to these court decisions, now eligible on application to be issued seamen's papers. Admiral Hirshfield expressed the view that the legislation introduced by the chairman of the committee would help the screening program. Respecting the threat to the internal security posed by Communists on ships or waterfront facilities, he stated: Anyone familiar with the work of men who follow the sea Shea Gorden Trosten, an instrument worker, of Bridgeport, Connecticut, testified that he had been a member of the Communist Party from 1943 to 1951, and that he had subsequently served as an undercover operative for the FBI until his appearance before the committee. While in the Communist Party, he said, he had been a rank-and-file member of its Waterfront Sections in New York City and Port Arthur, Texas, and that he had attended Waterfront Section meetings in New Orleans and in England, Belgium, and France. He had also attended the Communist Party Jefferson School of Social Science in New York City and had been a member of the National Maritime Union. The major activities of Communist seamen, Trosten stated, were to get Communist Party members elected to positions of influence in the union and to carry out Communist Party policy aboard ship. He also testified that Communists carried American Communist Party propaganda to Europe, where they delivered it to party con tacts. It was common practice, he said, for Communist cell meetings to be held on ships. Asked for appraisal of the threat to the security of the United States posed by Communists on merchant vessels or waterfront facilities, Mr. Trosten replied: I feel this way: It is a line of communication, one of our first lines, on merchant ships, and to have Communists aboard ship is naturally a dangerous thing at a time now when the cold war is still going on. It is not difficult for a Communist to go to sea with all the restrictions. There are Panamanian seamen's books, there are still passports. I remember when my papers were taken away I went to a Panamanian consul in Houston, Texas, I had an American passport, I paid my passage and shipped out on a Panamanian flagship. When asked how Communist seamen could be used for smuggling of couriers or espionage agents, he replied: It is not too difficult to cover a man up on a passenger ship where you have a crew of about 600 or 700, like the United States or the America or the Constitution. You find them in the steward's department, and he can ride over and back with practically no detection by anybody, because there are so many aboard. In reply to a question as to whether Communist Party members were increasing or decreasing in numbers in the maritime industry, Mr. Trosten expressed the view that— at the present time the party is campaigning to increase its Mr. Trosten identified a number of seamen known by him to be members of the Communist Party. Loron Whitney Wardwell, a chef, of Rochester, New York, testified that he had served in the merchant marine as chief steward, chief cook and second cook, and butcher and baker from 1945 to 1953, at which time he was expelled from his union as a "left-winger" when it was taken over by the American Federation of Labor. He was then unable to obtain employment on merchant ships. He also testified that he had been a member of the Waterfront Section of the Communist Party from 1949 to 1953 and an informant for the FBI in the Communist Party until 1954. Mr. Wardwell testified that it was extremely serious to national security for Communists to have access to merchant vessels and port facilities; that they could tie up waterfronts and could also serve as a "perfect front" for Communist courier services to Europe and the Far East at any time. He testified that Communist Party propaganda was distributed on every ship he had ever worked on and that the function of the Waterfront Section of the Communist Party was to take complete control of unions, various committees, to disrupt various organizations and to, I would say, create havoc on the waterfront. He also testified that it was not difficult for Communists to obtain seamen's papers when Communists held positions of influence in unions: It is common knowledge that seamen's papers are very easily acquired as long as you have one or two comrades that are in the higher units of your union. They are given letters to various comrades and sent to the Coast Guard, and thereby issued seamen's papers. Then they are able to ship out. Mr. Wardwell testified that he had known two or three hundred seamen who were Communist Party members. He identified ten such seamen who had been screened off American merchant ships under the Coast Guard security program and who had recently been issued seamen's papers as a result of court decisions. Donald William Jackson, of New York City, appeared in response to a subpena. He invoked both the first and fifth amendments in refusing to testify whether he presently held seaman's papers; if he was currently a member of the Communist Party; if he had arranged to ship out as a seaman in the next few days; and if he had worked as a seaman in the last few years. There was displayed to Mr. Jackson a document from the United States Coast Guard certifying that he had recently procured seaman's papers, but Mr. Jackson refused to answer any questions concerning the document. Rudolf Kaunitz, of New York City, appeared in response to a subpena. He invoked the fifth amendment in refusing to testify as to whether or not he was currently a member of the Communist Party; if he held seaman's papers; if he was a member of the Seamen's Defense Committee; and if he proposed to ship out within the next few weeks. He admitted attending a meeting of the Youth Against the House Un-American Activities Committee held at the Woodstock Hotel in New York City the previous Friday, June 3, 1960. He said that Frank Wilkinson had addressed the meeting concerning the riots which occurred during committee hearings in San Francisco, but invoked the fifth amendment when asked if he knew Wilkinson as a member of the Communist Party. Kaunitz attacked the committee and in doing so quoted from literature he had obtained at this meeting. There was displayed to Mr. Kaunitz a document from the United States Coast Guard certifying that he had recently procured seaman's papers, but Mr. Kaunitz refused to answer any questions concerning the document. Louis Becker, recently a clerical worker in New York City, invoked the fifth amendment in refusing to state whether or not he was currently a member of the Communist Party or whether he had been a seaman during the past 5 years and planned to resume this occupation: whether he held seaman's papers; whether he had knowledge of activities of persons known to him to be Communist Party members, which activities were carried out under direction of the Communist Party; and whether he had attended the Youth Against the House Un-American Activities Committee meeting at the Woodstock Hotel. There was displayed to Mr. Becker a document from the United States Coast Guard certifying that he had recently procured seaman's papers, but Mr. Becker refused to answer any questions concerning the document. Peter Goodman, of New York City, who was identified in the instant hearings by Loron Wardwell as a person known by him to be a Communist Party member, testified that he had been a plastic moldmaker for the last 5 years. He invoked the fifth amendment in refusing to testify if he was presently a member of the Communist Party and if he currently had seaman's papers. He also invoked the fifth amendment in refusing to testify whether witness Loron Wardwell's identification of him as a Communist Party member was true; whether he had told the youth attending the Woodstock Hotel meeting that he was not a member of the Communist Party and whether, in addressing that meeting, he had expressed the hope that Communist-inspired demonstrations against the committee during the current hearings would exceed those which took place in San Francisco. During the course of his testimony the following excerpt from the speech he delivered at the Woodstock Hotel was introduced into the record: Some of us who have carried this fight over a period of time have learned not to stand in the way of history. We expect to get ourselves back into the industry-reestablish ourselves and in the long run I think that the maritime industry is meant to be one of the militant sparkplugs of the labor movement as it was in time gone by. There was displayed to Mr. Goodman a document from the United States Coast Guard certifying that he had procured seaman's papers, but Mr. Goodman refused to answer any questions concerning the document. Stanley Milton Hauser, a student at the City College of New York, also invoked the fifth amendment when asked if he was a member of the Communist Party at "this instant," and if he held papers as a ship's radio operator. After witness Loron Wardwell identified Hauser as a person known to him as a Communist Party member and a member of the goon squad of the Waterfront Section of the Communist Party of New York City, Hauser invoked the fifth amendment in refusing to affirm or deny these identifications. He also invoked constitutional privileges when asked if he had ever transmitted radio messages at the direction of a person known to him to be a member of the Communist Party. There was displayed to Mr. Hauser a document from the United States Coast Guard certifying that he had been issued seaman's papers in 1957, but Mr. Hauser refused to answer any questions concerning the document. Henry Bernard Kasbohm, of Great Neck, New York, testified that he had been employed as a building superintendent since 1950. He invoked the fifth amendment, however, when asked if he now held, but had previously been denied, seaman's papers; if he was currently a member of the Community Party; if he had attended Communist Party training schools; and if he intended to ship out as a seaman in the near future. There was displayed to Mr. Kasbohm a document from the United States Coast Guard certifying that he had procured seaman's papers, but Mr. Kasbohm refused to answer any questions concerning the document. |