The New McCarthyism: Today, Speaking With the Wrong Group Can Get You 15 Years In Prison

The Patriot Act goes even further than the Hollywood blacklists that forced a generation of artists, intellectuals, and activists into unemployment and exiled abroad.

Photo Credit: Mike Licht, Notion

At the beginning of the McCarthy Era, my great uncle Adrian Scott -- an acclaimed Hollywood producer and screenwriter -- was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee to account for his political affiliations. Now sixty years later, when most of us want to believe that that kind of suppression is long behind us, the Supreme Court is about to consider how far we've really come. I believe we are retracing our most dangerous steps.

Adrian was one of the so-called "Hollywood Ten," a group of high-profile artists and entertainers who were the first of many called before Congress to explain their association with the Communist Party. He and nine colleagues chose to invoke their rights of freedom of speech and association. He stood up to HUAC, saying, "I do not believe it is proper for this committee to inquire into my personal relationships, my private relationships, my public relationships." For invoking his First Amendment rights, my great uncle spent nine months in jail. His Hollywood career was destroyed, he was forced to write under another name, and eventually he had to leave the United States entirely to find work.

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