hopefully we will see each other along the way in the learning about mars. it think you very much. [applause] ..

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] good afternoon and welcome to the third annual gaithersburg book festival. my name is ryan, and i the vice president of the city council. it is a vibrant, diverse city. celebrates and supports the culture of articles. we're leased to you bring you the event free of chargeness thats to the generous support of our sponsors. a couple of quick announcements. first for the consideration of everyone here, please silence any devices that make any noise of any kind. second, in order to keep improving the event, we need your feedback. surveys are available here and the information booth, and online at the website.

the thoughts are important to us. please take a couple of minutes to fill out a survey and submit it. ken ackerman will be signing copies of the book and the book will be outside in the politics and pros tent. ken angerman is the author a book that partly inpyred the recent film j. edgar directed by clint eastwood. in addition to be being an author, ken is an attorney in washington, d.c. and a 35-year veteran of senior position in congress the executive branch, financial regulation, and private law. young j.young j. edgar presents a portrait of man. hunted by the preciouses of a

demanding mother and a deor it your ration of a mentally ill father. he mansioned to be in the right place at the right time. receiving a slew of job promotions at the young age. he sacrificed his personal life for his career, took on the dubious task of accord raids and deportation, and deathly ma moveds through the politics of department of justice to outlive many of his superiors including the bloc i are attorney general mitchell palmer. despite the possibility that the intentions of hoover and many others were noble in fighting red scare. the tact its insighted criticism from legal loom theirs, holmes, frankfurter, helping to foster the modern conception of civil rights. in exploring the early career almost 100 years ago, ken

touches on several themes that are strikingly pertinent to today's national hot debate over immigration, corporation, back room political deals, and of course, tension between national security and civil rights. the backdrop for the hoover's rise to power in the early 20th century was the crack down on threat for come nices and other radicals within the immigration population within the united states. some of which was real, and some of which was imagined. here in debaters burg where we celebrate diverseity those dark moments in the nation's history should give us pause. standing a few miles away from at same washington, d.c., where hoover was raised and ascended to extraordinary power, we should take this opportunity to learn from ken's they thorough and fascinatingability of the

adult difficult times. in so doing we can recommit ourselves to the value of freedom -- the pows to be and checks of balances understanding these make for a stronger, not a weaker america. so without adieu, ladies and gentlemen, ken ackerman, author of young j. edgar. [applause] thank you. can you hear me all right? okay. thanks for the terrific introduction. i thank you very much. thank you to coming out on a beautiful afternoon here in gathers burg and staying here in the c-span tent. i know, there's a lot of competition. and thank you for c-span for being the best friend of

non-fiction book writers. -- when i was first asked to be here, it was last november, and last november, you might remember the twitter and the whole washington area with the new movie "j edgar. it was coming out and name watts in it. there was a lot of interest in it about a year ago in april, they had done filming for the movie here in the washington, d.c., area. there were a lot of celebrity sightings around time. they filmed at the library of congress. many places in virginia. when the movie came out there was a big opening at museum downtown. because i had a book out of j. edgar i, i had the honor and opportunity give a lot of interviews about what hoover was like. i was hoping to get a chance to talk on civil lib tip and all

the questions were sex and the sex life. that was clearly what captured the public imagination. it was stressed mu have a. i'm sure many months later many of you wandered into the tent sigh e the name j. ed edgar are interested in the sex life. let me get out of the three main questions. one, was he gay? and what's the story of him and collide thompson? clyde thompson was the man he hired in 1928 to be the deputy at the fbi. they were close friends for the next forty years. hoover and tollson traveled together on business and personally. they had lunch together every day at the may flower hotel. when mr. hoover died, he left the bulk of estate to him. they were at least what they

called today bff. they a partnership, whether there was a marriage, whether there was more to it. they would cross the lines of something we called friends with benefit is something they kept to themselves. if anyone knew how to keep secret like that it was them. that's the reason we don't know. the fact that we don't know for sure is no big surprise. question two. what's the story of j. edgar hoover and the all-male sex parties in new york and come wearing a dress, high heels, and a bo with a? this is the one story that's probably not true. it was raised in one biography that came out in 1993. it was never independently confirmed. it was widely doubted. what's the story with him on snooping on. president kennedy e house? again, this is one that is

mostly true. it was j. edgar hoover who discovered hoover -- [ audible. ] that's when they discoveried the phone intercements to the white house and uncofferred that lee sayon. there were a number of overs that hoover found in 1942 when kennedy was a young naval office, the liaison was i inn gay. he told kennedy's father about it joe kennedy who tried to break up the affair. yes, hoover was on kennedy's case from the beginning. now the things that interested me in j. edgar, when i first worked on my book, young j. edgar. i had two questions in my mind. one was a question about how america treats civil liberties in the time of stress.

it was 2006, 2007, not that long after 9/11 when our country was still at the height of the war on terror. and second, the question about j. edgar hoover himself. since celebrities do come first in america. let me start with that. j. edgar hoover is one of those people who's image and legend is so big and what was to con issuesly built by friends and enemies it's hard to cut away and see what is reality and what is not. if you ask most people what they know about j. edgar before the movie come out they would make a snide remarking about the old man wearing a dress and high heel. that was the poplar image of j. edgar. it's one the thing that is probably not true. the tact is, for most of his adult life he was a national hero in america. he served as director for the

fbi for 48 years from 24 to 19 it 72. it is a remarkable achievement. he served under nine different presidents starting with calvin cool age. he served under 16 attorney generals. here you see him in the 1930s. he made his name in the 30s bringing in a serious of gangsters back when gangsters had cool names like pretty boy floyd, machine kelly, and baby face nelson. he created the image of the g-man. a clean consult effective law enforcement who got his men. he got it through scientific law enforcement. fbi crime labs, uniform crime forts and the famous fingerprint file. he built the image of the g-man through everything from action cards, bubble cards, comic

books, to movies with cabbing or its like jimmy stewart and later on tv. at the height in the 1906s. just as hard to become an agent as the fbi as it was to get into an eye vie league college. it turned out that when he died, and there were several investigations into the fbi, and hoover's regime there. it turned out mr. hoover had a pronounced dark side. he kept hundreds of thousands of files on people in this country. when i say he, he and his group at the fbi. these included not just criminal investigation files, but sex files, secret files on movie stars, presidents, senators, some in fact he used to pressure people. some that were used for blackmail. some that were used for the personal amusement. starting in the 1950s, he

approved and instigated the use of secret wiretaps, sabotage. basically whom every he thought was a -- he was the one who made the decision whether you were a submersive or not and would be subject to the tacks. by the 1960s. the civil rights leaders like martin luther king. and protest against the vietnam war. he seemed to be obsessed throughout his career with two main things. one was communism, and the other was at the fbi. when i started to write the book and look at him and talk to people about him. you hear he was one the most hated figures in the american history. he was viewed as a possibly gay man who haired gay people. who haired civil rights leader and a law enforcement officer

who put himself above the law. the question that occurred to me about j. edgar was this. how does a person get to be that way? very few people pop out of the room and decide i'm going to be a bully and build my life around that. when you look at j. edgar hoover in particular, his childhood was shockly normal. he was the yowmgest of four children. he had a lot of friends. he was the parent's favorite. he was a good student in school. he was poplar in high school. his classmates elected him the class valedictorian even though his grades made him number four. he was the member of the cay

cadet corps. the absolute power and corporation. and mr. hoover was certainly in power quite a long tide. it would apply to him. to me, there was something more going on. i view my own view is people are very much shaped by the world they see during certain impressional times of that their lives. particularly the coming of age period. the time when they get out of the house, finish school, have their first job, the first big assignment in the world. that's when people general learn to think about how the world works. for hoover, it was a very unusual time to have that experience. j edgar hoover finished law school, he went to george washington law school. he earned two degrees not one, he finished in june of 1917. that was the as the country was entering world war i. all of his classmates were going off or a lot of them were going

off to fight in the army in europe. hoover should have been and would have been the top choice in the military. he was the star of the school debate team. he was the star of the school track team, as i mentioned he was head of the cadets which was the junior rotc group. he would have been very eager to go on. he couldn't. right at that time, his father lost his job with the government, he had been a government printer for forty years. he lost his job without a pension. hoover had to provide money for the family. so he could not go. instead, hoover got what became his first job. which he got through a family personal connection at the justice department. he worked for something called the war emergency bureau. as a young lawyer, it was a terrific job to get. this was the part of the justice department responsible for all

the interesting legal questions that came up involving the war. which at that time included registration of foreigners, the jailing of dissenters, the rounding up of immigrants. the crackdown against germans. rounding up of germans and austrias. the tracking of cab stories. things of that nature. that was hoover's first job. and then his first big assignment came after the war in 1919 where faith would put young j. edgar in the middle of a very strange time in america, the red scare. which followed world war i. and resulted in the biggest breaches of civil liberty in american history hoover at the middle what we know today as the palmer. to make sense of this. i'm going to tell you a little bit the red scare briefly.

it sounds almost silly to say it today ninety years after the fact. for a period of nine months from mid 1919 to early 1920, it was the mainstream view in america among rational, well-informed, well-intentioned people among well-educated liberal conservatives, we were on the verge of a russian-style worker lead revolution right here in the u.s.a. again, it wasn't just the fringe groups who saw it. it was the leaders of government, the media, academics, and businesses. there are a lot of reasons why it happened i'll brief let me tell you a couple. world war i let a very sour aftertaste in people's mouths. we don't talk very much about world war i. this was an earlier speaker in the tent talking about it. we generally hide it. with a bit of an embarrassment.

we try to confuse it world world war ii. it was good war. the war against fashionism we defeated the hitler, the japans. world war i was a stinker. on some 16 million people died in world war i included 7 million civilians. it was a slaughter beyond comprehension. up until the moment we went into. , most americans looked at it as a pointless blood bath between all european monarchties. something we had nothing to do with. wood row wilson was elected president because he kept us out of. once we went in, we went in all the way and had little room for people disagree. after the war was over, and the bloodshed ended, rather than celebrating peace and having parades. we sought new ways of turmoil

around the world and in america. the cause of the turmoil was the rise of -- we look at the russian revolution and think of it as something that happened in russia. the rush an revolution was a global event. following the success of -- there were socialist uprising all across europe and south america and around the gone. in germany, hungry, argue tee ya, italy. we'll talk about in a minute, possibly america. for the period of late 1919, early 1920 no one knew how it was going come out. and russia, itself the russian civil war after the revolution was threatening to become a world war. we americans sent 8,000 troops as parts of an international expedition their force to fight the red in russia to fight the revolution. we were shooting against the red

army during the entire period. here in the united states, in 1919, there was a rising waive tide of violent and uphelve. there was a outbreak of race ray yachts, lynching, shooting, political clash, red flag parades. very violent parades. economy was in turmoil. inflation was out of control. millions of soldiers came home with no jobs. some 3 million workers went on strike that year, and there were general strikes in seattle and win pay. most of the leaders tended to be left-wing socialists. no excuses, no apologies. that's what they were. proud of it. at the time there was nothing illegal about it. there was nothing wrong. it. the head of the socialist party got over million votes of president running multiple

times. a appropriate party. you might degree with them. they had the right to say what they want. most americans were the faces of the radicals were. they weren't just imgrants they were -- people who sproak strange languages with unpronounceable last names who lived together in big cities. joined clubs that no one else could join and were used senior sufficiently. all of this in june 1919 when there was a waive of bombings around the country. nine of them in one night included one that was portrayed in the movie at the home of mitchell palmer in nearby washington, d.c. him and his wife, and daughter had gone upstairs to bed. it was a little after 11 p.m.

the bomb went in front of the door. if they would have stayed downstairs, they would have been killed. later that night when they started investigating, they found a pile of pink pam fetes. pamphlets written on pink paper written by up until the bomb went off in the house-a leading progressive in america. he had been a champion as a member of congress of women's suffer ranch of laws against child labor, labor unions, he

was a quaker pacifist. when wood row wilson asked him to be secretary of war, palmer turned him down. he made him attorney general after the war not in order to be a hardline, he was a moderate. he roadwaysed 51 prisoners who had been jailed under the espionage. he freed about 2,000 germans who were being held. he disbanded americans protectively. all the steps as goo good will jesttures after the war. there's something about having a bomb go off in your house and having your family almost murder that tends focus the mind. and literally within 4 24 mitchell palmer changed from being a mod resist to cracking down. he decided then and there, and he the backing of congress, he

had the backing of the public, the newspaperrers, and even though wood row -- 0 to go do something to stop the violence. he put a team together, they connected the dots as best as they could. they did not know who the radicals were. they did not know who planted the bombs. they felt they had to act before any more violence occurred. they decided on a massive crack down to get as many reds after the street as they could. to return the operation, palmer decided to tap the best young man to lead it. that brings us back to, i hope, our friend mr. hoover. so who is j. edgar hoover in 1919? he was a young lawyer. he was two years out of law school. living at home with his parents, who had gotten his first job

through a political friend. however, during the time that he had been in president palmer's office and at the justice department, he had been promoted repeatedly. he had been given pay raises. difficult assignments and was viewed as a rising young star in the office. he made a good impression at every step. he dressed well, he had an eye for detail. a clean desk, good organization, he volunteered for assignments, he did them well, he works nights and weekends. he studied issues, collected data, always had answers to questions, was extremely confident. if you know any people like this in your workplace, be very careful. what happened with president obama palmer's leadership and management? they went off and launched the

palmer. this cartoon shows the basic strategy of the palmer raids. it's not showing it? there we go. there you see uncle sam kicking the red alien back where they belong. they found a provision of the wartime immigration statute that allows them to do that. if you had a person who was quote, unquote, affiliated with a radical organization, that was basically all you needed to send them out of the country. for a period during the period 77 about three months from november 18919 to january 1920, the justice department working with local police and vigilante private groups conducted raids in over thirty cities and town ace cross america from portland, maine, to port land oregon. during the period they arrested between 5 and 10,000 people. no one has an exact number. they were looking for people

connected to the communist party and related groups. these were not seen. they were tough, many of them violent. the largest group of them took place on january 2, that was a weekend. it was new year's eve weekend when many people were having parties and events. when they would conduct a raid at the party, they would arrest all the dancers, all the musician, all the waiters, everyone in the parking lot. everyone they could find, the idea is they would bring in everyone and sort out later who were the real reds who were the people who needed to be deported. they had no arrest warrants. they had a limited number of deportation warrants in the immigration bureau, they had no search warrants, or intertaxes initially conducted in secret. no family members, no lawyers issue allowed. bail was generally set at 5 to

$10,000. it was the time when the typical worker earned $5 a day. $5,000 bail was a ton of money. many were held for weeks. there were no prisons big enough to hold all the people. they were bringing in load after load that weekend. the arrests were bad enough. they soon became very public. even worst what came out about all of the thousands of people had the opportunity for a hearing. because even in 1919, 190, before you could deport someone from america. you had the right to immigration hearing. where you had the ability to explain yourself. and it turned out that when these people were brought in for the hearing, most of them had almost nothing to do with radical socialism. their names appeared on lists. the way your name would appear as a communist at that point,

the communist party had been created in the summer of 1919, if you joined a union and you signed your name as on the list of union members, those memberrerships were passed around from group to group and you would find yourself on a member hership object communist party. if you were like eugene and you went to the meeting of the socialist party it was perfectly legal. you signed a memberrership list. that could end up the communist party.

they'll teach you how to play the violin. also telling is the thousands who were rounded up, only about half a dozen carried guns. the rest were mostly unarmed. the number of guns was no larger than a typical cross section of people in the united states at this time. still by the end of january, the raids were very, very popular and mitchell was a candidate for president of the united states. so what turned the public around? i'm a little tight on time. i'll be brief. one of our strengths as a country when when we go through the periods of stress and crackdown. we are very good at producing a small number of brave people who will step forward and face the mob and try to calm things down.

now, in 1920, during the red scare, the united states congress was useless. now why does that sound familiar? whrft [laughter] most members of congress had no desire to get involved. the newspapers went along with the government, they too want nod controversy. but there was a small number of lawyers who did put themselves in harm's way and standed up against hoover and the justice department. very briefly, i hope this is professor fee licks frankfurter on the screen, felix frankfurter the supreme court justice was a professor at hoovered law school. he brought a happy habe habe use corps. use action of the reds arrested in the boston area. he used the platform to bring several officials under oath and made them explain how they acted without warrants and using --

and conducted abusive searches and lead people to the streets of boston in chains on the way to prison. at that kind of action was reported in the newspapers and started to turn public opinion around. second, is clarence. there was about five years before the famous monkey trail. he was is one of the few lawyers who is willing to represent communists who were american citizens who were being prosecuted on -- our state government had is a addition laws in 190 when they conducted the raid if by accident they picked up a stt or two they would turn them to the prosecution under the. clarence represented many of them, he stood in courtrooms thick with hostility, and spoke up for free speech. the last one that i'll mention

briefly is this gentleman, he is not here today. some of you may have heard of him. his name is lewis post. he was the assistant secretary of labor at the time. which in 1920, it was the labor department that was responsible for the immigration laws. if someone was going to be deported, it was the labor department secretary who had to sign off on the deportation order. lupus post was the acting secretary at the time. the secretary -- of these files landed on his desk. he spent several days behind closed doors reading the files and realized how thin the evidence was and started turning them down. denying them. when hoover and palmer found out about that i went to the friends on capitol hill and had them file impeachment charges against louis.

most of what we know comes from the transcripts and the files of the impeachment proceedings against luis post. he stood his ground, he survived. that's why i put him on the screen today. by the time he got to the democratic national convention in 19in one that jeer, the republican had turned against the red scar who all of the disclosures about abusive arrest website abusive prosecutions and things that had gone on. the democrats in a very exciting 44 ballot contest nominated james cox as the president issue candidate. he offered to campaign with cox to -- but j. edgar hoover, who i shop on the screen again. managed to turn things around. he managed to survive the red

scare even though it was so much involved in it. it he managed to survive the transition to the warn harding administration, and the scandal following on the foot. many may 194, he was asked to be head of the bureau of investigations. the real iran irony the person who asked him to do the future supreme court justice who was one of the lawyerers who spoke up against the raid at great personal risks. hoover had managed to convince stones that he could his agent of reform. and that's how he became head of the fbi. hoover survival to the thicket was a masterpiece of bureaucratic dextery. he learned a lot of lessons. he learned a life-long distress of communism, liberal, people who would stand up under the

pretext and civil liberties and a life-long sense of empowerment to bend the rules for the country and themselves. i know, it's interesting, in talking about j. hoover to talk about his sex life and what he may or may not have done with clyde. my own feeling, the more important lessons from his life deal with how we address civil liberties in our country in times of stress. when he look back at the red scare generation. we often dismiss them, look down of them as a group that engaged in a over reaction. we today are are no different than them. we are no smarter than the people who were alive at this time. we have to be careful that we can conduct ourselves in a way that future generations will not judge us the way we judge them. with that, i thank you for you patience. i hope we have a little time for

questions. if you have question website or comments, please use the microphone so c-span can pick them up. thank you. yes, sir? use the microphone. and the tv viewers, thank you for that. >> absolutely. what was i going to say? oh, i came in late. i was wondering whether your research and book got into the later history of hoover included world war ii and the japanese exclusion? >> yep. >> did he have any part in that as well. >> very good question. i was afraid at the beginning i talked about all the questions

about hoover and the sex life. we don't want to do that again. one of the bright spots on hoover's record on civil -- the question was, what about japanese exclusion and particularly the founding of the japanese citizens during world war r on the west coast. what is the positive spots in hoover's record in civil liberties he opposed the rounding of the japanese citizens during world war ii. he had nothing against japanese. his gripes were against communist and others. he felt there was no convincing evidence they posed as a group as a security threat. he opposed them. that's something he opposed. more questions? >> what about his