Essay:ADL Falsifies FBI Communist Party Membership

Extracted from Laird Wilcox, The Watchdogs: A Close Look at Anti-Racist "Watchdog" Groups, Editorial Research Service, 1999, p. 64-65. (PDF) ISBN 0-993592-96-5

In 1961 an FBI memorandum noted that an ADL pamphlet, The Profile of Communism - A Fact-By-Fact Primer, contained a false reference to an alleged March, 1960 FBI estimate of Communist Party membership as “approximately 10,000.” The Bureau noted that “no public statements on the size of the Communist Party, USA, have been issued by the Bureau since 1957, at which time the membership was placed at 17,000.”208

During November of 1942 a number of FBI memoranda were produced relating to several disinformation operations by American Jewish organizations. One of these regarded a report in the 2 November 1942 edition of the New York Times quoting American Jewish Congress official Benjamin Levine commenting on anti-Semitism in the United States:

“”"The growth has been so rapid in recent months,” Mr. Levine said, “that J. Edgar Hoover, F.B.I. chief, is greatly frightened by it.” He disclosed that F.B.I. investigations had revealed that only 30 percent of the Nazi agents in the country were assigned to industrial sabotage. “The others,” he said, “have but one instruction, and that is to spread hatred for the Jews. It is only by this method that they can undermine democracy.

A memorandum from Assistant to the Director Louis B. Nichols to Assistant Director Clyde Tolson noted that a check of the files has been unable to find any statement by Hoover even approximating that used by Levine. Hoover had said no such a thing and the attribution was a hoax.209

In 1985, after years of attempting to gain access to the resources of the FBI, the Bureau succumbed to political pressure from the Reagan White House. An FBI memo was distributed to all FBI SACs (Special Agent in Charge) in cities where the ADL had a field office. It read:

“”Enclosed for each receiving office is a copy of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) 1984 status report for the Ku Klux Klan and Neo-Nazi and two (2) lists of ADL regional offices including identify of Regional Director. Each office is requested to review the attached documents. The Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith (ADL) has undertaken to monitor and report the activities of domestic terrorists (sic) groups.... It was also established that each FBI office contact each [ADL] Regional Office to establish a liaison and line of communication to promptly receive all allegations of civil rights violations.210

Thus began the collaboration between a religious special interest group and the premier law enforcement agency of the United States. As years have passed the penetration of the FBI by the ADL has increased dramatically. The ADL stepped up its indoctrination of FBI personnel dramatically. A 1991 issue of an ADL publication bragged:

“”ADL Washington representatives have participated in FBI-sponsored regional hate crime training conferences for law enforcement officials from more than 300 of the nation’s largest cities and counties.211

Footnotes

205 Ibid, File #100-530-453, Memorandum dated 12 August 1965, from W. C. Sullivan to R. W. Smith, Subject: Review of Pamphlet, Report on the Ku Klux Klan, by Arnold Forster and Benjamin R. Epstein.

206 Ibid, File #100-530-(final digits not shown), Memorandum dated 22 September 1966 from W. C. Sullivan to F. J. Baumgardner, Subject: Investigation of Klan Organizations, Racial Matters - Klan.

207 Op Cit.

208 FOIA-PA request #312724, File #100-530 (final digits now shown), Memorandum dated March 21, 1961, Subject: The Profile of Communism – a Fact-By-Fact Primer, Prepared by the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, Book Review, Central Research Matter.

209 Ibid, File #100-530-82, Memorandum dated November 9, 1942 from L. B. Nichols to Mr. Tolson.

210 Federal Bureau of Investigation, AIRTEL dated 4 February 1985, Subject: Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith (ADL) Information Concerning Civil Rights Violations.

211 “ADL and FBI Collaborate on Hate Crime Reporting,” Frontline Focus (November 1991), 5.