Changes

Even on the left, few authorities disagree. "My own sense of things was that Hiss had been a [Communist] party member in the Thirties and did give Soviet agents documents," wrote the late [[Harvard University|Harvard]] professor and [[John F. Kennedy|Kennedy]] administration official Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.,<ref>Arthur Schlesinger, ''A Life in the Twentieth Century: Innocent Beginnings, 1917-1950'' (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000) ISBN 0618219250, pp. 497. Schlesinger was an "unabashedly liberal partisan" (Douglas Martin, "[http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/01/washington/01schlesinger.html Arthur Schlesinger, Historian of Power, Dies at 89]," ''The New York Times'', March 1, 2007) who, it was said, "equates capitalism with sexism and racism." (Lance Morrow, "[http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,59746,00.html A Rich Circularity]," ''Time'', November 5, 2000)</ref> who concluded of Hiss, "I believe him to be guilty."<ref>Arthur Schlesinger, ''A Life in the Twentieth Century: Innocent Beginnings, 1917-1950'' (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000) ISBN 0618219250, pp. 498</ref> Berkeley professor J. Bradford DeLong, a former [[Bill Clinton|Clinton]] administration official and professed "social democrat"<ref>Brad DeLong, [http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse.pl?trx=vx&list=h-diplo&month=0307&week=d&msg=%2B1j5choBov/tLTieEa%2B0UA&user=&pw= Alger Hiss], Diplomatic History Discussion Logs (Humanities and Social Sciences Net Online), July 28, 2003</ref> writes, "Was Alger Hiss at some time a spy for the Soviet Union? Probably."<ref>J. Bradford DeLong, "[http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2007/04/kai_bird_thinks.html Kai Bird Thinks That Alger Hiss Wasn't the 'Ales' Mentioned in VENONA]," Grasping Reality with Both Hands: Economist Brad DeLong's Fair, Balanced, and Reality-Based Semi-Daily Journal, April 9, 2007</ref> Elsewhere, he elaborates: "I think that Hiss was guilty....  

Even on the left, few authorities disagree. "My own sense of things was that Hiss had been a [Communist] party member in the Thirties and did give Soviet agents documents," wrote the late [[Harvard University|Harvard]] professor and [[John F. Kennedy|Kennedy]] administration official Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.,<ref>Arthur Schlesinger, ''A Life in the Twentieth Century: Innocent Beginnings, 1917-1950'' (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000) ISBN 0618219250, pp. 497. Schlesinger was an "unabashedly liberal partisan" (Douglas Martin, "[http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/01/washington/01schlesinger.html Arthur Schlesinger, Historian of Power, Dies at 89]," ''The New York Times'', March 1, 2007) who, it was said, "equates capitalism with sexism and racism." (Lance Morrow, "[http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,59746,00.html A Rich Circularity]," ''Time'', November 5, 2000)</ref> who concluded of Hiss, "I believe him to be guilty."<ref>Arthur Schlesinger, ''A Life in the Twentieth Century: Innocent Beginnings, 1917-1950'' (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000) ISBN 0618219250, pp. 498</ref> Berkeley professor J. Bradford DeLong, a former [[Bill Clinton|Clinton]] administration official and professed "social democrat"<ref>Brad DeLong, [http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse.pl?trx=vx&list=h-diplo&month=0307&week=d&msg=%2B1j5choBov/tLTieEa%2B0UA&user=&pw= Alger Hiss], Diplomatic History Discussion Logs (Humanities and Social Sciences Net Online), July 28, 2003</ref> writes, "Was Alger Hiss at some time a spy for the Soviet Union? Probably."<ref>J. Bradford DeLong, "[http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2007/04/kai_bird_thinks.html Kai Bird Thinks That Alger Hiss Wasn't the 'Ales' Mentioned in VENONA]," Grasping Reality with Both Hands: Economist Brad DeLong's Fair, Balanced, and Reality-Based Semi-Daily Journal, April 9, 2007</ref> Elsewhere, he elaborates: "I think that Hiss was guilty....  

I think Hiss is more likely than not to be guilty of espionage. I even think that there is clear and convincing evidence that Hiss was guilty..." <ref>Brad DeLong, "[http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/2003_archives/001822.html Marking My Beliefs to Market: Soviet Espionage in America: Alger Hiss]," Semi-Daily Journal, The Semi-Daily Journal of Economist Brad DeLong: Fair and Balanced Almost Every Day, July 23, 2003</ref> Another [[Bill Clinton|Clinton]] official, National Security Advisor Anthony Lake (a member of [[Barack Obama]]'s "Senior Working Group on National Security"),<ref>Caren Bohan, "[http://www.reuters.com/article/asiaCrisis/idUSN18390929 Obama names foreign policy panel]," Reuters, June 18, 2008</ref> actually went so far as to retract<ref>"[http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/fedagencies/february97/lake_2-27a.html Nomination on Hold]," PBS NewsHour, February 27, 1997</ref> a statement&mdash;made in the wake of Hiss' death&mdash;suggesting that the evidence against Hiss was less than conclusive.<ref>"[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9407E6D8163BF934A25752C0A961958260 The Dossier on Anthony Lake]," ''The New York Times'', January 17, 1997</ref> Professed atheist<ref>Susan Jacoby, [http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/susan_jacoby/2006/12/no_atheists_still_need_apply.html No Atheists (Still) Need Apply], On Faith (newsweek.washingtonpost.com) </ref> Obama supporter<ref>Susan Jacoby, [http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/susan_jacoby/2008/02/wanted_more_hope_and_charity_l.html Hope Is Not A "Cult of Personality"], On Faith (newsweek.washingtonpost.com) </ref> Susan Jacoby writes, "I believe Hiss was guilty of both perjury and spying,"<ref>Susan Jacoby, ''Alger Hiss and the Battle for History'' (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2009) ISBN 0300121334, p. 20</ref> elaborating elsewhere, "I believe that Hiss was guilty of perjury and am about 98 percent certain that he did pass on government documents to more professional spies."<ref>Susan Jacoby, "[http://www.powells.com/blog/?p=5735 Who Owns American History?]" PowellsBooks.Blog, March 21, 2009</ref> She adds: "It has always been difficult for liberals to look objectively at evidence pointing to Hiss' guilt..."<ref>Susan Jacoby, "[http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-jacoby22-2009mar22,0,7648164.story Alger Hiss -- a case for our time]," ''The Los Angeles Times'', March 22, 2009</ref> Yeshiva University Professor Ellen Schrecker (who defends American Communist spies as demurring from "traditional forms of patriotism")<ref>Ellen Schrecker, ''Many Are the Crimes: McCarthyism in America'' (Boston: Little, Brown, 1998), p. 181; Jacob Weisberg, "[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F01E4DE1F3CF93BA15752C1A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1 Cold War Without End]," ''The New York Times'', November 28, 1999; John Earl Haynes, [http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hpcws/comment16.htm Response by John Earl Haynes], "The Cold War Debate Continues: A Traditionalist View of Historical Writing on Domestic Communism and Anti-Communism," ''Journal of Cold War Studies'', Volume 2, Number 1 (Winter 2000)</ref> concedes, "There is now too much evidence from too many different sources for anyone but the most die-hard loyalists to argue convincingly for the innocence of Hiss…."<ref>[http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hpcws/comment15.htm Article Commentary: Schrecker on Haynes.] John Earl Haynes, “The Cold War Debate Continues: A Traditionalist View of Historical Writing on Domestic Communism and Anti-Communism,” ''Journal of Cold War Studies'', Volume 2, Issue 1 (Winter 2000), pp. 76-115</ref> Kai Bird, a contributing editor at ''The Nation'' (the self-advertised "flagship of the Left,"<ref>''[http://www.amazon.com/The-Nation/dp/B000CNEFRE The Nation]'': Product Description</ref> tagged by the late [http://www.ericbreindel.org/about_eric.html Eric Breindel] "America's leading forum for Alger Hiss apologia"),<ref> Eric Breindel, "Goodies from the Venona files: Hiss’ Guilt," ''The New Republic'', April 15, 1996, reprinted in [http://fdsys.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-1996-04-18/html/CREC-1996-04-18-pt1-PgH3640.htm ''The Congressional Record'' Vol. 142, No. 50] (Thursday, April 18, 1996), p. H3645</ref> and his coauthor, Svetlana Chervonnaya of the Russian Academy of Sciences, write&mdash;in an article ''defending'' Hiss&mdash;"We do not propose to address the larger question of whether Hiss was guilty or innocent of espionage."<ref>Kai Bird and Svetlana Chervonnaya, "[http://www.theamericanscholar.org/su07/ales-birdlong.html The Mystery of Ales]," ''The American Scholar'', Summer, 2007. Bird and Chervonnaya argue that "Ales" was not Hiss, but his colleague Wilder Foote&mdash;despite the fact that Foote spent the 1930s toiling in obscurity as a newspaper editor in the wilds of Vermont, when "Ales" was working with [[Harold Glasser]] in [[Whittaker Chambers]]' [[GRU]] group. (Alexander Vassiliev’s notes on a cipher telegram from Vadim [Anatoly Gorsky], 5 March 1945, cited in John Earl Haynes, "[http://www.johnearlhaynes.org/page63.html Ales: Hiss, Foote, Stettinius?]"; Eduard Mark, “Who was ‘Venona’s’ ‘Ales’? Cryptanalysis and the Hiss Case,” ''Intelligence and National Security'', 18

I think Hiss is more likely than not to be guilty of espionage. I even think that there is clear and convincing evidence that Hiss was guilty..." <ref>Brad DeLong, "[http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/2003_archives/001822.html Marking My Beliefs to Market: Soviet Espionage in America: Alger Hiss]," Semi-Daily Journal, The Semi-Daily Journal of Economist Brad DeLong: Fair and Balanced Almost Every Day, July 23, 2003</ref> Another [[Bill Clinton|Clinton]] official, National Security Advisor Anthony Lake (a member of [[Barack Obama]]'s "Senior Working Group on National Security"),<ref>Caren Bohan, "[http://www.reuters.com/article/asiaCrisis/idUSN18390929 Obama names foreign policy panel]," Reuters, June 18, 2008</ref> actually went so far as to retract<ref>"[http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/fedagencies/february97/lake_2-27a.html Nomination on Hold]," PBS NewsHour, February 27, 1997</ref> a statement&mdash;made in the wake of Hiss' death&mdash;suggesting that the evidence against Hiss was less than conclusive.<ref>"[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9407E6D8163BF934A25752C0A961958260 The Dossier on Anthony Lake]," ''The New York Times'', January 17, 1997</ref> Professed atheist<ref>Susan Jacoby, [http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/susan_jacoby/2006/12/no_atheists_still_need_apply.html No Atheists (Still) Need Apply], On Faith (newsweek.washingtonpost.com) </ref> Obama supporter<ref>Susan Jacoby, [http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/susan_jacoby/2008/02/wanted_more_hope_and_charity_l.html Hope Is Not A "Cult of Personality"], On Faith (newsweek.washingtonpost.com) </ref> Susan Jacoby writes, "I believe Hiss was guilty of both perjury and spying,"<ref>Susan Jacoby, ''Alger Hiss and the Battle for History'' (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2009) ISBN 0300121334, p. 20</ref> elaborating elsewhere, "I believe that Hiss was guilty of perjury and am about 98 percent certain that he did pass on government documents to more professional spies."<ref>Susan Jacoby, "[http://www.powells.com/blog/?p=5735 Who Owns American History?]" PowellsBooks.Blog, March 21, 2009</ref> She adds: "It has always been difficult for liberals to look objectively at evidence pointing to Hiss' guilt..."<ref>Susan Jacoby, "[http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-jacoby22-2009mar22,0,7648164.story Alger Hiss -- a case for our time]," ''The Los Angeles Times'', March 22, 2009</ref> Yeshiva University Professor Ellen Schrecker (who defends American Communist spies as demurring from "traditional forms of patriotism")<ref>Ellen Schrecker, ''Many Are the Crimes: McCarthyism in America'' (Boston: Little, Brown, 1998), p. 181; Jacob Weisberg, "[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F01E4DE1F3CF93BA15752C1A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1 Cold War Without End]," ''The New York Times'', November 28, 1999; John Earl Haynes, [http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hpcws/comment16.htm Response by John Earl Haynes], "The Cold War Debate Continues: A Traditionalist View of Historical Writing on Domestic Communism and Anti-Communism," ''Journal of Cold War Studies'', Volume 2, Number 1 (Winter 2000)</ref> concedes, "There is now too much evidence from too many different sources for anyone but the most die-hard loyalists to argue convincingly for the innocence of Hiss…."<ref>[http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hpcws/comment15.htm Article Commentary: Schrecker on Haynes.] John Earl Haynes, “The Cold War Debate Continues: A Traditionalist View of Historical Writing on Domestic Communism and Anti-Communism,” ''Journal of Cold War Studies'', Volume 2, Issue 1 (Winter 2000), pp. 76-115</ref> Kai Bird, a contributing editor at ''The Nation'' (the self-advertised "flagship of the Left,"<ref>''[http://www.amazon.com/The-Nation/dp/B000CNEFRE The Nation]'': Product Description</ref> tagged by the late [http://www.ericbreindel.org/about_eric.html Eric Breindel] "America's leading forum for Alger Hiss apologia"),<ref> Eric Breindel, "Goodies from the Venona files: Hiss’ Guilt," ''The New Republic'', April 15, 1996, reprinted in [http://fdsys.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-1996-04-18/html/CREC-1996-04-18-pt1-PgH3640.htm ''The Congressional Record'' Vol. 142, No. 50] (April 18, 1996), p. H3645</ref> and his coauthor, Svetlana Chervonnaya of the Russian Academy of Sciences, write&mdash;in an article ''defending'' Hiss&mdash;"We do not propose to address the larger question of whether Hiss was guilty or innocent of espionage."<ref>Kai Bird and Svetlana Chervonnaya, "[http://www.theamericanscholar.org/the-mystery-of-ales-2/ The Mystery of Ales]," ''The American Scholar'', Summer, 2007. Bird and Chervonnaya argue that "Ales" was not Hiss, but his colleague Wilder Foote&mdash;despite the fact that Foote spent the 1930s toiling in obscurity as a newspaper editor in the wilds of Vermont, when "Ales" was working with [[Harold Glasser]] in [[Whittaker Chambers]]' [[GRU]] group. (Alexander Vassiliev’s notes on a cipher telegram from Vadim [Anatoly Gorsky], 5 March 1945, cited in John Earl Haynes, "[http://www.johnearlhaynes.org/page63.html Ales: Hiss, Foote, Stettinius?]"; Eduard Mark, “Who was ‘Venona’s’ ‘Ales’? Cryptanalysis and the Hiss Case,” ''Intelligence and National Security'', 18

[Autumn 2003], pp. 54–55, 57–88, 62, 64; John Ehrman, "[https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol51no4/pdf-files/Ehrman_Alger_Hiss_Again-Web%20(U).pdf Once Again, the Alger Hiss Case]," ''Studies in Intelligence,'' Vol. 51, No. 4, December 2007; John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr, "[http://hnn.us/articles/37456.html Hiss Was Guilty]," History News Network (George Mason University), April 16, 2007</ref> ''Nation'' columnist Eric Alterman likewise writes, "I take no position on guilt or innocence."<ref>Eric Alterman, "[http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb1367/is_199604/ai_n6387312/ I Spy With One Little Eye]," ''The Nation'', April 29, 1996</ref> Even long-time ''Nation'' publisher Victor Navasky, "instead of forcefully arguing that Hiss wasn't guilty as he once did ... now acknowledges that Hiss wasn't telling the truth when he testified that he didn't know Whittaker Chambers."<ref>Jacob Weisberg, "[http://www.nytimes.com/1999/11/28/magazine/cold-war-without-end.html?sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all Cold War Without End]," ''The New York Times'', November 28, 1999</ref> Navasky, now chairman of the ''Columbia Journalism Review'',<ref>[http://www.cjr.org/about_us/masthead.php Columbia Journalism Review: About Us: Masthead]</ref> doesn't like the word "espionage," however, preferring "exchanges of information among people of good will" that happened to be in "violation of law."<ref>Victor Navasky, "[http://www.thenation.com/doc/20010716/navasky/print Cold War Ghosts]," ''The Nation'', July 16, 2001</ref> (As critics have noted, such "exchanges" only went one way.)<ref>Glenn Garvin, "[http://www.reason.com/news/show/29095.html Fools for Communism: Still apologists after all these years]," ''Reason'', April 2004</ref> Regarding Hiss, Isserman, probably the best regarded of the left-wing scholars of Communism, concludes: "Let's face it, the debate just ended."<ref>Jacob Weisberg, "[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F01E4DE1F3CF93BA15752C1A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1 Cold War Without End]," ''The New York Times'', November 28, 1999</ref>

[Autumn 2003], pp. 54–55, 57–88, 62, 64; John Ehrman, "[https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol51no4/pdf-files/Ehrman_Alger_Hiss_Again-Web%20(U).pdf Once Again, the Alger Hiss Case]," ''Studies in Intelligence,'' Vol. 51, No. 4, December 2007; John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr, "[http://hnn.us/articles/37456.html Hiss Was Guilty]," History News Network (George Mason University), April 16, 2007</ref> ''Nation'' columnist Eric Alterman likewise writes, "I take no position on guilt or innocence."<ref>Eric Alterman, "[http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb1367/is_199604/ai_n6387312/ I Spy With One Little Eye]," ''The Nation'', April 29, 1996</ref> Even long-time ''Nation'' publisher Victor Navasky, "instead of forcefully arguing that Hiss wasn't guilty as he once did ... now acknowledges that Hiss wasn't telling the truth when he testified that he didn't know Whittaker Chambers."<ref>Jacob Weisberg, "[http://www.nytimes.com/1999/11/28/magazine/cold-war-without-end.html?sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all Cold War Without End]," ''The New York Times'', November 28, 1999</ref> Navasky, now chairman of the ''Columbia Journalism Review'',<ref>[http://www.cjr.org/about_us/masthead.php Columbia Journalism Review: About Us: Masthead]</ref> doesn't like the word "espionage," however, preferring "exchanges of information among people of good will" that happened to be in "violation of law."<ref>Victor Navasky, "[http://www.thenation.com/doc/20010716/navasky/print Cold War Ghosts]," ''The Nation'', July 16, 2001</ref> (As critics have noted, such "exchanges" only went one way.)<ref>Glenn Garvin, "[http://www.reason.com/news/show/29095.html Fools for Communism: Still apologists after all these years]," ''Reason'', April 2004</ref> Regarding Hiss, Isserman, probably the best regarded of the left-wing scholars of Communism, concludes: "Let's face it, the debate just ended."<ref>Jacob Weisberg, "[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F01E4DE1F3CF93BA15752C1A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1 Cold War Without End]," ''The New York Times'', November 28, 1999</ref>