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Gulags in America? Hoover Tried

He sought approval to jail 12,000 'disloyal' citizens without trial

By Kevin Spak,  Newser Staff

Posted Dec 22, 2007 5:56 PM CST

(Newser) – J. Edgar Hoover wanted to round up 12,000 Americans he deemed disloyal in 1950, suspend habeus corpus, and lock them up in military and federal prisons, the New York Times reports. In a newly declassified letter, the FBI chief urges President Truman to approve the plan and tell the populace the Soviet-style arrests were necessary to “protect the country against treason, espionage, and sabotage.”

The names of the those arrested would be drawn from a list Hoover had spent years compiling. Their only recourse from “permanent detention” would be a hearing with one judge and two citizens, which would “not be bound by the rules of evidence.” There’s no evidence that Truman even considered the proposal, which came just after the start of the Korean War, the Times notes.

Then-FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover is seen in this 1972 black-and-white file photo. When Eugene McCarthy ran for president in 1968, he promised to fire Hoover, who had outlasted presidents from Calvin Coolidge to John F. Kennedy. Before long, McCarthy was denigrated in a fat FBI file as too misguided...
Then-FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover is seen in this 1972 black-and-white file photo. When Eugene McCarthy ran for president in 1968, he promised to fire Hoover, who had outlasted presidents from Calvin...   (Associated Press)
This file photo shows former FBI director J. Edgar Hoover.
This file photo shows former FBI director J. Edgar Hoover.   (Archive Photos)
  (Shutterstock)
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