Master of Deceit: J. Edgar Hoover and America in the Age of Lies

330 Pages·2012·10.46 MB·English

by  Marc Aronson

Prologue: Blackmail
PART ONE: NOTHING IN THIS BOOK MATTERS UNTIL YOU CARE
ABOUT COMMUNISM
: John Reed and Revolution
CHAPTER 1
: The Rise of J. Edgar Hoover: The First Secret
CHAPTER 2
: “There Will Have to Be Bloodshed”
CHAPTER 3
: “We’re Going Back to Russia — That’s a Free Country”
CHAPTER 4
: Legal Rights: Hoover vs. Louis Post
CHAPTER 5
PART TWO: THE WAR OF IMAGES
: Clyde: The Second Secret
CHAPTER 6
: Public Enemy Number One: John Dillinger
CHAPTER 7
: The Crisis of Capitalism: The Third Secret
CHAPTER 8
PART THREE: THE TURNING POINT: SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES
: The Secret Assignment
CHAPTER 9
PART FOUR: THE FIGHTING WAR
: Great Injustice
CHAPTER 10
: Hoover’s War
CHAPTER 11
PART FIVE: THE WAR OF SHADOWS
: The Hope of the World
CHAPTER 12
: Tailgunner Joe
CHAPTER 13
PART SIX: THE AGE OF FEAR
: Loyalty
CHAPTER 14
: No Decency
CHAPTER 15
PART SEVEN: THE LAND OF LIES
: The Specter
CHAPTER 16
: The Descent
CHAPTER 17
: COINTELPRO
CHAPTER 18
Epilogue: Master of Deceit, Then and Now
How I Researched and Wrote This Book
Notes
Bibliography
Image Credits
Acknowledgments
FACT: In November 1964, William Sullivan, an assistant director of the
FBI, set out to blackmail Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
FACT: Sullivan was not only one of the highest-ranking FBI officers; he
also had good reason to believe he would succeed J. Edgar Hoover as
the head of the organization — if only he could overcome his terrible
mistake of having once defended Dr. King.
THE INSIDE STORY: On November 24, an FBI agent boarded an
airplane from Washington to Miami in order to mail a package. The box
held audiotapes and an anonymous letter, probably written by Sullivan.
“King,” the letter warned, “there is only one thing left for you to do. You
know what it is. . . . You are done. There is but one way out for you. You
better take it before your filthy, abnormal, fraudulent self is bared to the
nation.” Though the letter was deliberately ambiguous about what “way
out” Dr. King should take, King believed the note was telling him to
commit suicide.
How could one of the most honored and trusted law officers in
America conspire to destroy Dr. King? How could he imagine that
blackmail leading to suicide was legal? Hoover, the longtime head of the
FBI, was furious at King for criticizing his men. And he was certain that
King was a pawn under Communist influence, which meant that he had
to be exposed, marginalized, and neutralized. Stopping the “reds”— the
Communists — was more important to Hoover than anything: laws,
rights, even human lives. The plot against Dr. King opens a window into a
dark past — a time of secrets and lies, an era when Hoover both
protected America and betrayed the principles that define its system of
government.
The plot against King was not a strange, onetime fluke. It was the
product of a time when a branch of the government — our government —
believed that its mission to defend against revolutionaries was more
important than any law. This book is a journey back into that age of war
and cold war, into the time that produced J. Edgar Hoover. Whenever
America faces threats, there will be those who offer us security — at a
price. That price may be your privacy or the freedom of a classmate or
the life of a leader. We cannot know how we will react to the next crisis —
but we can learn by revisiting, and reliving, the last one.
The FBI released this letter twice, selecting different words and sentences to black out. It has not explained
the odd logic behind the choices. The second version can be seen here.

The background image here comes from the same issue of the Liberator quoted in chapter 3.