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'''Annie Lee Moss''' was a a code clerk in the [[US Army Signal Corps]] in [[the Pentagon]] who was accused by [[United States]] [[Senator]] [[Joseph McCarthy]] of being a [[Communist]].

'''Annie Lee Moss''' was a communications clerk in the [[US Army Signal Corps]] in [[the Pentagon]] accused by [[United States]] [[Senator]] [[Joseph McCarthy]] of being a [[Communist]].  

==Career==

==Career==

Moss began her career as a [[US Army]] cafeteria worker and was promoted to a code clerk in the Pentagon. [[Mary Stalcup Markward]], Moss' accuser, had been working undercover for the [[FBI]] for seven years as a member of the [[Washington, D.C.]] [[American Communist Party]], and she had worked as the director of the party's membership. Markward testified before a [[Senate committee]] that the name "Annie Lee Moss" of Washington had been listed on the [[Communist Party USA|Communist Party]] membership rolls. Markward's testimony was the only [[evidence]] presented that Moss was a member of the American Communist Party, and she was not accused of being an active [[spy]] for [[Russia]].<ref>{{cite news

Moss began her career in the Federal government as a dessert cook in government cafeterias and was promoted to a code clerk in the Pentagon. In 1945, she moved to a job as a clerk in the [[General Accounting Office]] (GAO).<ref>Friedman, 2007, p. 447</ref> [[Mary Stalcup Markward]], Moss' accuser, had been working undercover for the [[FBI]] for seven years as a member of the [[Washington, D.C.]] [[American Communist Party]], and she had worked as the director of the party's membership. Markward testified before a [[Senate committee]] that the name "Annie Lee Moss" of Washington had been listed on the [[Communist Party USA|Communist Party]] membership rolls. Markward's testimony was the only [[evidence]] presented that Moss was a member of the American Communist Party, and she was not accused of being an active [[spy]] for [[Russia]].<ref>{{cite news

   | title =Committee v. Chairman

   | title =Committee v. Chairman

   | publisher=[[Time magazine]]

   | publisher=[[Time magazine]]

   | date =March 22, 1954

   | date =March 22, 1954

   | url =http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,819556-1,00.html

   | url =http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,819556-1,00.html

   | accessdate =  }}</ref> The FBI had passed this information on to the Army and the Civil Service Commission, yet the Army had still hired Moss as a code clerk, and she was given clearance to do this work.<ref>M. Stanton Evans, “[http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=689 How Senate Historian Botched Data on McCarthy],” ''Human Events’’, May 23, 2003</ref> McCarthy’s chief purpose was to find out how Moss, with her Red background, had been promoted from a cafeteria worker to a Pentagon code clerk with access to classified information.<ref>Allan H. Ryskind, “[http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=9669 George Clooney's Clueless Movie],” October 14, 2005</ref>

   | accessdate =  }}</ref> The FBI had passed this information on to the Army and the Civil Service Commission, yet the Army had still hired Moss as a code clerk, and she was given clearance to do this work.<ref>M. Stanton Evans, “[http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=689 How Senate Historian Botched Data on McCarthy],” ''Human Events'', May 23, 2003</ref> McCarthy’s chief purpose was to find out how Moss, with her Red background, had been promoted from a cafeteria worker to a Pentagon code clerk with access to classified information.<ref>Allan H. Ryskind, “[http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=9669 George Clooney's Clueless Movie],” October 14, 2005</ref>

 

In October 1949, the GAO board cleared her,<ref>Donald A. Richie, [http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/resources/pdf/Volume5.pdf “Introduction,” S. Prt. 107-84 &ndash; Executive Sessions of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Government Operations (McCarthy Hearings 1953-54), Volume 5, “Editor’s Note,” p. XV (PDF p. 17)]</ref> determining that there were “no reasonable grounds” to believe that Moss was disloyal.<ref>Friedman, 2007, p. 448</ref>

==The case==

==The case==

*The [[US Army]] charged her with being card number 37269 in the [[American Communist Party]], saying she was issued the card in 1943. <ref>{{cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=Mrs. Moss Is Accused As Card-Carrying Red. |url= |quote=[[Washington, DC]], August 5, 1954 ([[Associated Press]]) A report that Annie Lee Moss was given a Communist party membership book for 1943 resulted in her suspension for a second time from her job with the [[Army Signal Corps]]. |publisher=[[New York Times]] |date=August 6, 1954 |accessdate=2007-09-25 }}</ref>

*The [[US Army]] charged her with being card number 37269 in the [[American Communist Party]], saying she was issued the card in 1943. <ref>{{cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=Mrs. Moss Is Accused As Card-Carrying Red. |url= |quote=[[Washington, DC]], August 5, 1954 ([[Associated Press]]) A report that Annie Lee Moss was given a Communist party membership book for 1943 resulted in her suspension for a second time from her job with the [[Army Signal Corps]]. |publisher=[[New York Times]] |date=August 6, 1954 |accessdate=2007-09-25 }}</ref>

*Andrea Friedman, associate professor of history and of women and gender studies at Washington University in St. Louis, reports finding a variety of evidence that Moss was "most likely a member, briefly, of the Communist party." This included a list of ‘party recruits’ that identified Moss, membership lists from two Communist party branches and various party committees containing Moss’s name and address, the number of her Communist Party membership book, and receipts for ''Daily Worker'' subscriptions. <ref>{{cite news |first=Andrea |last=Friedman |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=The Strange Career of Annie Lee Moss: Rethinking Race, Gender, and McCarthyism |url=http://www.historycooperative.org/cgi-bin/justtop.cgi?act=justtop&url=http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/jah/94.2/friedman.html                        |quote=Annie Lee Moss is hardly a household name. She had her fifteen minutes (or so) of fame in March 1954, when Edward R. Murrow dedicated an episode of his television news show, See It Now, to her appearance before Sen. Joseph McCarthy's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. McCarthy had charged that Moss, an African American civilian Pentagon employee who allegedly had access to top-secret coded messages, was a card-carrying member of the Communist party (CP). Murrow's broadcast went a long way toward discrediting those claims; ultimately, Moss remained an army clerk, laboring in obscurity until her retirement in 1975, at age sixty-nine. When she reappeared in George Clooney's 2005 paean to Murrow, Good Night, and Good Luck, she had been long forgotten by all but a coterie of McCarthy scholars and right-wing apologists for McCarthyism. |publisher=[[The Journal of American History]] |date= |accessdate=2007-09-25 }}</ref>

*Andrea Friedman, associate professor of history and of women and gender studies at Washington University in St. Louis, reported "substantial, if contested, evidence possessed by the U.S. government of her [Moss's] involvement in the [Communist] party. That evidence&mdash;consisting of perhaps a dozen pieces of paper&mdash;included a list of “party recruits” that identified Moss by name, race, age, and occupation; membership lists from two Communist party branches, the [[Communist Political Association]], and various ad hoc committees containing Moss’s name and address, as well as the number of her CP [Communist Party] membership book; and receipt records from 1945 for ''Daily Worker'' subscriptions that included Moss’s name and amounts paid."<ref>{{Citation|first=Andrea |last=Friedman |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=The Strange Career of Annie Lee Moss: Rethinking Race, Gender, and McCarthyism |url=http://www.historycooperative.org/cgi-bin/justtop.cgi?act=justtop&url=http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/jah/94.2/friedman.html                        |quote=Annie Lee Moss is hardly a household name. She had her fifteen minutes (or so) of fame in March 1954, when Edward R. Murrow dedicated an episode of his television news show, See It Now, to her appearance before Sen. Joseph McCarthy's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. McCarthy had charged that Moss, an African American civilian Pentagon employee who allegedly had access to top-secret coded messages, was a card-carrying member of the Communist party (CP). Murrow's broadcast went a long way toward discrediting those claims; ultimately, Moss remained an army clerk, laboring in obscurity until her retirement in 1975, at age sixty-nine. When she reappeared in George Clooney's 2005 paean to Murrow, Good Night, and Good Luck, she had been long forgotten by all but a coterie of McCarthy scholars and right-wing apologists for McCarthyism. |publisher=[[The Journal of American History]] |date= |accessdate=2007-09-25 }}</ref>

==See also==

==See also==