A Heated Senate; ‘No Sense of Decency’

Review by Bill Doughty

Another book adds to the understanding of McCarthyism and how it infected the body politic in the United States but failed to destroy the U.S. military and other pillars of democracy –– despite leaving lasting ailments.

Robert Shogan presents vignettes and the cast of characters in “No Sense of Decency: The Army-McCarthy Hearings: A Demagogue Falls and Television Takes Charge of American Politics” (Ivan R. Dee Publisher, 2009).

Shogan shows how the U.S. Senate in the early 1950s, aided and abetted by a willing media, fueled McCarthy’s conspiracy theories and attacks on democracy under the veil of patriotism. President Eisenhower said, “It saddens me that I must feel ashamed for the United States Senate.”

McCarthy’s legacy is one of lies and prevarication, breaking of norms, disrespect for rules and codes of conduct, prioritizing personality over substance, and a love for power and personal ambition over public interest.

In our previous post, we covered other parallels between McCarthyism and Trumpism as revealed in Larry Tye’s “Demagogue.” Shogan’s “No Sense of Decency" reveals more links and parallels. 

For instance:

Gen. George Marshall

McCarthy’s slander of war heroes, including General Marshall, a leader in World War II and a chief military advisor to President Truman as well as Secretary of State (p. 75) reads like Donald Trump’s reported disrespect for fallen soldiers and his slander of Senator John McCain, a Navy veteran and Vietnam War POW.

McCarthy attacked opponents’ family members, including Maj. Gen. Miles Reber’s brother as part of his Big Lie conspiracies. (p. 146)

Despite haranguing people who used the fifth amendment, McCarthy became known as the “Fifth Amendment Senator” when he, himself, was under investigation. (p. 244)

McCarthy weakened and divided his Republican Party but ironically brought about some bipartisanship in how the Senate eventually dealt with him, leading to a vote for censorship. (p. 248)

Shogan writes:

“The Senate faced a tortuous choice. For many of its members, conscience and a sense of obligation toward the legislative body whose prerogatives McCarthy now professed to be defending inclined them in favor of censure. But for many –– including those leading toward censure –– political considerations raised a red flag. McCarthy may have lost ground with the majority of Americans, but he still had a hard cadre of supporters, and these partisans felt bound even closer by the threat of censure.”

Sen. Joseph McCarthy

In the end, McCarthy refused to apologize.“He now wanted to become a victim and to use his martyrdom to expand and strengthen his own personal political base outside the Republican Party,” Shogan writes.

The characters in the Senate seventy years ago during the McCarthy hearings included young John F. Kennedy, democratic leader Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard M. Nixon, Stuart Symington, Everett Dirkson, Margaret Chase Smith, and Prescott Bush (father and grandfather of future presidents). Many of the senators were military veterans of World War II; some fought in World War I or in earlier conflicts.

Studying the list of senators from the 82nd and 83rd Congress (during McCarthy’s reign of terrorizing), it’s fascinating to see how many were born before the turn of the 20th century. Their parents or grandparents fought in or lived through the Civil War. The oldest senator in the group, Theodore F. Green of Rhode Island, was born in 1867 and served as a first lieutenant in the Spanish-American War.

Senator John F. Kennedy

All of the senators lived through the 1918 pandemic, including JFK, born May 29, 1917 and Russell Billiu Long, born Nov. 3, 1918. Long, who served as a Navy lieutenant in World War II, commanded a landing craft transport vessel. (He was the son of Louisiana governor and senator Huey Long.) None lived long enough to see the current coronavirus pandemic.

“No Sense of Decency” is a well-written, fast-paced accounting of the people, legacy, politics, and characters surrounding Joe McCarthy and McCarthyism.

“The politics of fear and paranoia, while they ebbed and flowed, never really went away,” Shogan concludes.

Reading about the history of the Cold War in general and McCarthyism in particular provides an insight to help understand current surrealism –– as well as other isms and ailments in its wake.