Oppositional Failures: Two Fights Against McCarthy and Why They Fell Short

Abstract

In 1950 McCarthy began his hunt against communists in government, and helped add fear to an already paranoid anti-communist American society. Although many agreed with the notion that communists needed to be ousted from governmental posts, some did not agree with the methods McCarthy utilized and made certain that their distaste of McCarthyism became known. This paper offers a comparative analysis of the anti-McCarthy efforts of the Joe Must Go Club of Wisconsin with the efforts of Wisconsin Senator William Benton in order to find a common shortfall in their failure to stop the McCarthy movement. The evidence demonstrates that both movements failed because communication with constituents failed; both of these anti-McCarthy efforts assumed that to stop McCarthy was simply to make known how McCarthy's intolerance was against the American Creed. However, because neither movement was able to personalize the issue to individuals, both movements stalled shy of motivating the larger public to stop McCarthy.