One Flew Over The Political Cuckoo's Nest

it was all done on purpose they sure know how to manipulate people. Peace

Besides Walter Karp's brilliant account of how the Bryan Democrats helped destroy the Populist Party in 1896 in his The Politics of War, here is Carroll Quigley in Tragedy and Hope, discussing how former Soviet spy Michael Straight did the job on Henry Wallace's Communist-dominated Progressive Party in the 1948 presidential election:

"More than fifty years ago the Morgan firm decided to infiltrate the Left-wing political movements in the United States. This was relatively easy to do, since these groups were starved for funds and eager for a voice to reach the people. Wall Street supplied both. The purpose was not to destroy ... or take over but was really threefold: (1) to keep informed about the thinking of Left-wing or liberal groups; (2) to provide them with a mouthpiece so that they could "blow off steam," and (3) to have a final veto on their publicity and possibly on their actions, if they ever went "radical." There was nothing really new about this decision, since other financiers had talked about it and even attempted it earlier. What made it decisively important this time was the combination of its adoption by the dominant Wall Street financier, at a time when tax policy was driving all financiers to seek tax-exempt refuges for their fortunes, and at a time when the ultimate in Left-wing radicalism was about to appear under the banner of the Third International.

The New Republic

The best example of this alliance of Wall Street and Left-wing publication was The New Republic, a magazine founded by Willard Straight, using Payne Whitney money, in 1914. Straight, who had been assistant to Sir Robert Hart (Director of the Chinese Imperial Customs Service and the head of the European imperialist penetration of China) and had remained in the Far East from 1901 to 1912, became a Morgan partner and the firm's chief expert on the Far East. He married Dorothy Payne Whitney whose names indicate the family alliance of two of America's greatest fortunes. She was the daughter of William C. Whitney, New York utility millionaire and the sister and co-heiress of Oliver Payne, of the Standard Oil "trust." One of her brothers married Gertrude Vanderbilt, while the other, Payne Whitney, married the daughter of Secretary of State John Hay, who enunciated the American policy of the "Open Door" in China. In the next generation, three first cousins, John Hay ("Jock") Whitney, Cornelius Vanderbilt ("Sonny") Whitney, and Michael Whitney ("Mike") Straight, were allied in numerous public policy enterprises of a propagandist nature, and all three served in varied roles in the late New Deal and Truman administrations. In these they were closely allied with other "Wall Street liberals," such as Nelson Rockefeller.

Walter Lippmann Was a Member of the Mysterious Round Table Group

The New Republic was founded by Willard and Dorothy Straight, using her money, in 1914, and continued to be supported by her financial contributions until March 23, 1953. The original purpose for establishing the paper was to provide an outlet for the progressive Left and to guide it quietly in an Anglophile direction. This latter task was entrusted to a young man, only four years out of Harvard, but already a member of the mysterious Round Table group, which has played a major role in directing England's foreign policy since its formal establishment in 1909. This new recruit, Walter Lippmann, has been, from 1914 to the present, the authentic spokesman in American journalism for the Establishments on both sides of the Atlantic in international affairs. His biweekly columns, which appear in hundreds of American papers, are copyrighted by the New York Herald Tribune which is now owned by J. H. Whitney. It was these connections, as a link between Wall Street and the Round Table Group, which gave Lippmann the opportunity in 1918, while still in his twenties, to be the official interpreter of the meaning of Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points to the British government.

Mike Straight Appointed to State Department

Willard Straight, like many Morgan agents, was present at the Paris Peace Conference but died there of pneumonia before it began. Six years later, in 1925, when his widow married a second time and became Lady Elmhirst of Dartington Hall, she took her three small children from America to England, where they were brought up as English. She herself renounced her American citizenship in 1935. Shortly afterward her younger son, "Mike," unsuccessfully "stood" for Parliament on the Labour Party ticket for the constituency of Cambridge University, an act which required, under the law, that he be a British subject. This proved no obstacle, in 1938, when Mike, age twenty-two, returned to the United States, after thirteen years in England, and was at once appointed to the State Department as Adviser on International Economic Affairs. In 1937, apparently in preparation for her son's return to America, Lady Elmhirst, sole owner of The New Republic, shifted this ownership to Westrim, Ltd., a dummy corporation created for the purpose in Montreal, Canada, and set up in New York, with a grant of $1.5 million, the William C. Whitney Foundation of which Mike became president. This helped finance the family's interest in modern art and dramatic theater, including sister Beatrix's tours as a Shakespearean actress.

Mike Straight Takes Over The New Republic

Mike Straight served in the Air Force in 1943-1945, but this did not in any way hamper his career with The New Republic. He became Washington correspondent in May 1941; editor in June 1943; and publisher in December 1946 (when he made Henry Wallace editor). During these shifts he changed completely the control of The New Republic, and its companion magazine Asia, removing known liberals (such as Robert Morss Lovett, Malcolm Cowley, and George Soule), centralizing the control, and taking it into his own hands. This control by Whitney money had, of course, always existed, but it had been in abeyance for the twenty-five years following Willard Straight's death.

The New Republic Was a Vehicle for Advancing the Designs of International Bankers

The first editor of The New Republic, the well-known "liberal" Herbert Croly, was always aware of the situation. After ten years in the job, he explained the relationship in the "official" biography of Willard Straight which he wrote for a payment of $25,000. "Of course they [the Straights] could always withdraw their financial support if they ceased to approve of the policy of the paper; and, in that event, it would go out of existence as a consequence of their disapproval." Croly's biography of Straight, published in 1924, makes perfectly clear that Straight was in no sense a liberal or a progressive, but was, indeed, a typical international banker and that The New Republic was simply a medium for advancing certain designs of such international bankers, notably to blunt the isolationism and anti-British sentiments so prevalent among many America progressives, while providing them with a vehicle for expression of their progressive views in literature, art, music, social reform, and even domestic politics. In 1916, when the editorial board wanted to support Wilson for a second term in the Presidency, Willard Straight took two pages of the magazine to express his own support for Hughes. The chief achievement of The New Republic, however, in 1914-1918 and again in 1938-1948, was for interventionism in Europe and support of Great Britain.

A New Magazine Is Created to Support the United Nations

The role of "Mike" Straight in this situation in 1938-1948 is clear. He took charge of this family fief, abolished the editorial board, and carried on his father's aims, in close cooperation with labor and Left-wing groups in American politics. In these efforts he was in close contact with his inherited Wall Street connections, especially his Whitney cousins and certain family agents like Bruce Bliven, Milton C. Rose, and Richard J. Walsh. They handled a variety of enterprises, including publications, corporations, and foundations, which operated out of the law office of Baldwin, Todd, and Lefferts of 120 Broadway, New York City. In this nexus were The New Republic, Asia, Theatre Arts. the Museum of Modern Art, and others, all supported by a handful of foundations, including the William C. Whitney Foundation, the Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney Foundation, the J. H. Whitney Foundation, and others. An interesting addition was made to these enterprises in 1947 when Straight founded a new magazine, the United Nations World, to be devoted to the support of the UN. Its owners of record were The New Republic itself (under its corporate name), Nelson Rockefeller, J. H. Whitney, Max Ascoli (an anti-Fascist Italian who had married American wealth and used it to support a magazine of his own, The Reporter), and Beatrice S. Dolivet. The last lady, Mike Straight's sister, made her husband, Louis Dolivet, "International Editor" of the new magazine.

The United Nations World

An important element in this nexus was Asia magazine, which had been established by Morgan's associates as the journal of the American Asiatic Society in 1898, had been closely associated with Willard Straight during his lifetime, and was owned outright by him from January 1917. In the 1930's it was operated for the Whitneys by Richard J. Walsh and his wife, known to the world as Pearl Buck. Walsh, who acted as editor of Asia, was also president of the holding corporation of The New Republic for several years and president of the John Day publishing company. In 1942, after Nelson Rockefeller and Jock Whitney joined the government to take charge of American propaganda in Latin America in the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs, Asia magazine changed its name to Asia and the Americas. In 1947, when Mike Straight began a drive to "sell" the United Nations, it was completely reorganized into United Nations World.

The Relationship of Mike Straight and Communists

Mike Straight was deeply anti-Communist, but he frequently was found associated with them, sometimes as a collaborator, frequently as an opponent. The opposition was seen most clearly in his efforts as one of the founders of the American Veterans Committee (AVC) and its political sequel, the Americans for Democratic Action (ADA). The collaboration may be seen in Straight’s fundamental role in Henry Wallace’s third-party campaign for the Presidency in 1948. The relationship between Straight and the Communists in pushing Wallace into his 1948 adventure may be misjudged very easily. The anti-Communist Right had a very simple explanation of it: Wallace and Straight were Communists and hoped to elect Wallace President. Nothing could be further from the truth. All three—Straight, Wallace, and the Communists, joined in the attempt merely as a means of defeating Truman. Straight was the chief force in getting the campaign started in 1947 and was largely instrumental in bringing some of the Communists into it, but when he had them all aboard the Wallace train, he jumped off himself, leaving both Wallace and the Communists gliding swiftly, without guidance or hope, on the downhill track to oblivion. It was a brilliantly done piece of work.

Communists Oppose the Truman Doctrine

The Communists wanted a third party in 1948 because it seemed the only way to beat Truman and destroy the Marshall Plan. They hated the President for the "Truman Doctrine" and his general opposition to the Soviet Union, but, above all, because he had prevented the postwar economic collapse and the American relapse into isolationism, both of which the Communists had not only expected but critically needed. It was obvious to everyone that a two-party campaign in 1948 would give the vote of the Right to the Republicans and the vote of the Left to the Democrats, with the victory decided by where the division came in the Center. In such a situation neither Straight nor the Communists could influence the outcome in any way. But a third party on the Left, by taking labor and other Left-wing votes from Truman, could reduce the Democratic totals in the major states enough to throw those states and the election to the Republicans. Why Straight wanted to do this in the critical months from September 1946 to April 1948 is unknown, but he clearly changed his mind in the spring of 1948, abandoning poor, naive Henry Wallace to the Communists at that time. A possible explanation of these actions will be given later.

Mike Straight Supports Henry Wallace

What is clear is that Mike Straight had a great deal to do with Wallace in the autumn of 1946 when the former Vice-President broke with Truman and was fired from the Cabinet. The break came over a Wallace speech, very critical of American policy toward Russia, given before a wildly biased pro-Soviet audience in Madison Square Garden on September 12, 1946. At the time Truman told reporters he had approved the speech before delivery (a version which Wallace still upholds), but within a few days, Secretary of State Byrnes forced the President to make a choice between him or Wallace. and the latter was dismissed from the Cabinet. Out of the government, without a platform from which to address the public, Wallace's political future looked dim in the early autumn of 1946. Straight provided the platform, by giving him his own editorial chair at The New Republic (announced October 12, 1946). For the next fifteen months the Wallace campaign was a Straight campaign. The latter supplied speech-writers, research assistants, editorial writers, office space, money, and The New Republic itself. Technically Wallace was editor, but the magazine staff and expenditures steadily increased in directions which had little to do with the magazine and everything to do with Wallace's presidential campaign, although this effort was not announced to the public until a year later, in December 1947.

The Admission of the Communists

In the meantime, from the spring of 1947 onward, the Communists came in. It would not be strictly true to say that Straight ''brought them in," but I believe it is fair to say that he "let them in." For example, one of the first to arrive was Lew Frank, Jr., brought in hy Straight, who later insisted that he did not realize that Frank was a Communist. As a matter of fact, there was no evidence that Frank was a member of the Communist Party, but Straight knew exactly where Frank stood politically since they had engaged, on opposite sides, in a bitter struggle between Communists and anti-Communists for control of AVC. In this, Frank had been a member of the Communist caucus within AVC's national planning committee (as Straight told David A. Shannon in 1956), and followed every twist of the party line in this whole period. This party line became the pattern for Wallace's formal speeches, since Frank was his most important speech-writer over a period of eighteen months from early 1947 to October 1948. More than this, Frank accompanied Wallace on his endless travels during this period. In the autumn of 1947 these three, Wallace, Frank, and Straight, made a trip to the Mediterranean and were given an audience together by the Pope on November 4, 1947. On his return from this journey, Wallace was a changed man; his mind was made up, to run against Truman on a third-party ticket. The announcement was made public in The New Republic in December.

The End of Communism in the U.S. as a Significant Political Force

Straight continued to work for Wallace for President, and The New Republic remained the center of the movement for almost four more months, but something had changed. While he was still working for Wallace as President and allowing the Communists into the project, he was simultaneously doing two other things: working openly, and desperately, to prevent the new third party from campaigning on any level other than the presidential, by blocking everywhere he could Communist efforts to run third-party candidates for state or congressional offices in competition with the Democrats; much less publicly, he worked with his anti-Communist friends in labor, veteran, and liberal groups to prevent endorsement of the Wallace candidacy. As a consequence, the Communists were destroyed and eventually driven out of such organizations, notably from the CIO-PAC (the great political alignment of labor and progressive groups). As David Shannon wrote in The Decline of American Communism (1959), "The Communists' support of Wallace shattered the 'left-center' coalition in the CIO; for the Communist unions, the Wallace movement was the beginning of the end. The coalition began to dissolve almost immediately after Wallace's announcement." What this means is that Wallace's campaign to defeat Truman destroyed completely the remaining vestiges of the Popular Front movement of the 1930's, drove the Communists out of the unions and all progressive political groups, and drove the Communist unions out of the labor movement of the country. This ended Communism as a significant political force in the United States, and the end was reached by December 1948, long before McCarthy or J. Edgar Hoover or HUAC did their work. The men who achieved this feat were Wallace and Straight....

Communist Research Group Publishes Plans in The New Republic

During the winter of 1947-1948, Lew Frank recognized that he was incapable of handling the complex issues raised in Wallace's many speeches. Accordingly, he joined a "Communist research group" which met in the Manhattan home of the wealthy "Wall Street Red," Frederick Vanderbilt Field. The chief members of this group, probably all Communists, were Victor Perlo and David Ramsay. This pair drew up for Wallace an attack on the Marshall Plan and an alternative Communist plan for European reconstruction, which was published in The New Republic on January 12, 1948, was presented by Wallace to the Marshall Plan "Hearings" of the House Foreign Affairs Committee on February 24th, but was subsequently repudiated by Straight. In the three months following the Perlo article, Straight was busy sawing off the limb on which Wallace now sat with the Communists. He discharged from The New Republic payroll all those who were working for the campaign rather than for the magazine, and the office on East Forty-ninth Street once again settled down to publishing a "liberal" weekly. In protest at this reversal, his managing editor, Edd Johnson, resigned. If Mike Straight planned to do what he did do to the Communists in 1946-1948, that is, to get them out of progressive movements and unions, he pulled off the most skillful political coup in twentieth century American politics. It is not clear that he did plan it or intend it. But as a very able and informed man, he must have had some motivation when he began, in 1947, the effort which he knew might defeat Truman in 1948. While the evidence is not conclusive, there are hints that another, more personal, motive might have been involved, at least partly, in building up the Wallace threat to Truman's political future. It concerns the Whitney family interest in overseas airlines."

Michael Straight, in his 1983 memoirs, After Long Silence, disputes Quigley's assertions.

But there in more to Straight than he lets on. See Allen Weinstein and Alexander Vassiliev, The Haunted Wood: Soviet Espionage in America -- The Stalin Years, published in 2000, and Roland Perry's Last of the Cold War Spies: The Life of Michael Straight -- The Only American in Britain's Cambridge Spy Ring, published in 2006.