Alger Hiss convicted of perjury
In the conclusion to one of the most spectacular trials in U.S.history former State Department official Alger Hiss is convicted of perjury.He was convicted of having perjured himself in regards to testimony about his alleged involvement in a Soviet spy ring before and during World War II.
Hiss served nearly four years in jail but steadfastly protested his innocence during and after his incarceration.The case against Hiss began in 1948 when Whittaker Chambers an admitted ex-communist and an editor with Time magazine testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee and charged that Hiss was a communist in the 1930s and 1940s.Chambers also declared that Hiss during his work in the Department of State during the 1930s had passed him top secret reports.Hiss appeared before HUAC and vehemently denied the charges stating that he did not even know Chambers.Later after confronting Chambers face to face Hiss admitted that he knew him but that Chambers had been using another name at the time.
In short order Chambers produced the famous Pumpkin Paperscopies of the documents he said Hiss passed him during the 1930s.They were dubbed the Pumpkin Papers because Chambers kept them hidden in a pumpkin in his pumpkin patch.Charges and countercharges about the spy accusations soon filled the air.Defenders of Hiss such as Secretary of State Dean Acheson declared that President Trumans opponents were making a sacrificial lamb out of Hiss.
Truman himself declared that HUAC was using red herrings to defame Hiss.Critics fired back that Truman and Acheson were coddling communists and that Hiss was only the tip of the icebergthey claimed that communists had penetrated the highest levels of the American government.Eventually Hiss was brought to trial.Because the statute of limitations had run out he was not tried for treason.
Instead he was charged with two counts of perjuryfor lying about passing government documents to Chambers and for denying that he had seen Chambers since 1937.In 1949 the first trial for perjury ended in a deadlocked jury.The second trial ended in January 1950 with a guilty verdict on both counts.The battle over the Hiss case continued long after the guilty verdict was handed down.
Though many believed that Hiss was a much-maligned official who became a victim of the anticommunist hysteria of the late-1940s others felt strongly that he was a lying communist agent.Until his death at the age of 92 on November 15 1996 Hiss never deviated from his claim of innocence.
