FBI's Cold War Arrest Plan Revealed

Declassified Docs Detail J. Edgar Hoover's Plan To Arrest 12,000 "Disloyal" Americans

(AP)  Former FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover had a plan to suspend the rules against illegal detention and arrest up to 12,000 Americans he suspected of being disloyal, according to a newly declassified document.

Hoover sent his plan to the White House on July 7, 1950, less than two weeks after the Korean War began. But there is no evidence to suggest that President Harry S. Truman or any subsequent president approved any part of Hoover's proposal to house suspect Americans in military and federal prisons.

Hoover had wanted Truman to declare the mass arrests necessary to "protect the country against treason, espionage and sabotage," The New York Times reported Saturday in a story posted on its Web site.

The plan called for the FBI to apprehend all potentially dangerous individuals whose names were on a list Hoover had been compiling for years.

"The index now contains approximately twelve thousand individuals, of which approximately ninety-seven percent are citizens of the United States," Hoover wrote in the now-declassified document. "In order to make effective these apprehensions, the proclamation suspends the writ of habeas corpus."

Habeas corpus is the right to seek relief from illegal detention, and is a bedrock legal principle.

All apprehended individuals eventually would have had the right to a hearing under Hoover's plan, but hearing boards comprised of one judge and two citizens would not have been bound by the rules of evidence.

The details of Hoover's plan were among a collection of Cold War-era documents related to intelligence issues from 1950-1955. The State Department declassified the documents on Friday.

[downsteamjim]

P.S. I''m no fan of JEdgar. I despise fascism, communism, and irrational musllims. Merry Christmas

[downsteamjim]

Hoover spent most of his time as director for Democrat administrations. T.Tinsly, why did Ambassordor Kennedy have to give up his position? Also who received the wiretaps of MLK?

[Krazcarl]

ttinsly...either your gay or not thesre is no middle ground he persequted folks to look good not because he was straight he was a cancer in our goverment ask the young men he molested.

[motherhen11]

I don''t believe that J. Edgar Hoover was gay for one minute! He was gay for a lifetime. Hoo hoo.

[watcher269-2009]

Hoover was Gaay!

here is another story about the FBI creating a 1Billion dollar database

Yet another incursion into the realm of our civil liberties. We have been slowly destroying our privacy for seven years. In that time have you grown to feel safer? It has stopped terrorists is the argument for what is being done. Really? Stop for a minute and think: If you and three friends were determined to create a terrorist event, do you seriously believe you couldn''t pull it off? Think carefully about that before answering. Particularly if you were willing to die in the process? We have not had a terrorist event for the past seven years, because the people who commit such acts have not found it in their interest to do so. That''s a reality that is politically inconvenient to talk about.

[cfin5]

Hmmm. Sounds familiar to me. Next they''ll be arresting many times more American citizens for being "disloyal globalists".......One more reason for needing a constitutional advocate in the Big Chair like Ron Paul.

[Krazcarl]

Nancy_naive...everyone knows that Hoover was a cross dressing queer even pulled boys out of juvy for hisw fun and had enough dirt on presidents they all backed down so he was given his little fiftom for over 40 years and still few have the backbone to say he was a piece of garbage...

[jw218389]

You should see Bush''s list.

Anyone that''s not a goose stepping Neo Con is headed for a FEMA concentration camp.

Remember: Werk macht frei...

[Razzl]

Most of us who lived through earlier eras of reactionary authoritarians recognize the genuine danger that Bush and Cheney represent to the republic, and must fight as hard as possible to defeat and punish them because the younger generation doesn''t have the experience to recognize the warning signs of the ambitions of the would-be oppressors...

[talk2chief]

RowdyTexan2

LOL. No. No. I think we are on the same wavelength. Besides who can predict future jobs and profits from things yet invented.

[rowdytexan2]

Posted by talk2chief at 02:14 PM : Dec 23, 2007

No, I am not against legal immigration...at a rate gaged according to jobs available for them. And on whether they have enough skills to perform those jobs and take care of themselves.

(What economic wizardry are you going to plot now?) lol

[rowdytexan2]

I think we should have a run on the Congressional incumbents. Get them OUT!

Then, any new candidates names be posted on a website known to every citizen in the US that shows every stinking business deal they''ve ever made in their life both inside and outside the US.

They should have to sell their business interests, and live off their Congressional salaries for as long as they are serving their country.

They should make campaign donations illegal, and allot $500,000 to each for their campaign stump.

They should have to post their plans to promote new legislation and have those scrutiinized as well.

And once they get elected, they should have to meet a specified effort to meet the goals for legislation that they promised and were elected to promulgate, or they''re out for non=performance at the end of their first term.

Anybody in here ever have to meet goals and outcomes in their jobs? These people need to be held accountable for their performance as well. If they can''t get done what they promised to do for lack of effort to get it done, they need to go.

[talk2chief]

Hey RowdyTexan2,

Just checking with you on our past discussion. You are not against Legal Immigration?

[rowdytexan2]

Enough is Enough. If you love America, JAIL Cheney and Bush for their war crimes. Purge congress in 2008 of all spineless complicit Democrats.

Posted by mh4cbs1 at 01:54 PM : Dec 23, 2007

Democrats??? Oh lest ye not forget the party that has been in charge for this country for about the last 20 or some years!

[myidoncbs]

"Purge congress in 2008 of all spineless complicit Democrats."

That would be a nice idea EXCEPT that, in nearly every case, the replacement would have to be a republican, one who values PARTY over country, one whose party has vowed to create eternal ONE PARTY RULE in a world that is eternally at war.

If you have an opportunity to choose a principled democrat over a spineless one, then do so. But, unfortunately, often the only choice available is between bad or worse (or sometime it''s just between horrible and execrable, etc.).

[talk2chief]

mh4cbs1

You seem to have all the answers, why don''t you run for public office?

[mh4cbs1]

This nation has always been vastly more vulnerable to Fascism from within than from any external threat - be in ''Communists'' in the film industry, or terrorists.

A nation that can be duped into Invading Iraq based on LIES, that were known to be LIES before the invasion, is a nation with one foot already in fascism quicksand.

A nation with a corporate-owned complicit Congress that does nothing to hold the war criminals accountable is a nation with the other foot in the fascism quicksand.

Many citizens are trying hard to hold on to our nation as we know it, as we watch it getting sucked down.

Enough is Enough. If you love America, JAIL Cheney and Bush for their war crimes. Purge congress in 2008 of all spineless complicit Democrats.

[michellem99-2009]

Read 1984...

[actornaught]

limbaugh''s probably pinned this article on the ceiling over his bed and is reaching for the lotion and kleenex about now...

[amazedd]

See no evil, Hear no evil, Speak no evil...
Fear no evil!
- Tommy