feel that if you reveal to the committee your business address it might tend to incriminate you?

Mr. POTASH. With all the repressive laws we have today on our books, anything could happen.

Senator HRUSKA. And you feel your place of employment is such, that if you disclose the address of your employment that you might be incriminated and you don't want to be a witness against yourself, is that what the Chair is to understand?

Mr. POTASH. I believe I answered that question.

Senator HRUSKA. Well, the Chair will overrule the objection on the first score based upon the first amendment. The objection will be sustained on the basis of the fifth amendment.

Mr. SOURWINE. Mr. Potash, are you a member of the Communist Party, U.S.A.?

Mr. POTASH. I refuse to answer that question for the reasons given previously.

Mr. SOURWINE. I put it to you, Mr. Potash, as a fact and ask you to deny it if it is untrue, that you are not only a member of the Communist Party, U.S.A., but you are currently labor secretary of the Communist Party, U.S.A.?

Mr. POTASH. I decline to answer on the same ground.

Senator HRUSKA. If it is agreeable to the witness and his counsel, the witness may simply indicate he wishes to reassert the objection made heretofore by saying, "Same objection," and it will be understood that it will be a repetition for purposes of the record of the grounds previously asserted. Is that agreeable, Mr. Counsel? Mr. REIN. That is certainly agreeable.

Senator HRUSKA. And it will also be agreed that the ruling will be the same whether or not the Chair actually states it?

Mr. REIN. Yes, sir; it is agreeable.

Senator HRUSKA. It is so stipulated.

Mr. SOURWINE. Mr. Potash, are you a member of the Communist Party of Poland?

Mr. POTASH. I decline to answer that question.

Mr. SOURWINE. Is it not true that you became a member of the Communist Party of Poland while you were in Poland a few years ago?

Mr. POTASH. I decline to answer questions of this type.

Mr. SOURWINE. Mr. Potash, I show you a clipping from the Daily Worker of January 7, 1959, captioned "Jail Potash Following Return Here," headed by a picture bearing under it the caption "Potash," showing what appears to be a very good likeness of you, perhaps taken a few years ago.

That is dated January 7, 1957, Mr. Chairman, not 1959, the date of the article.

You have that article before you, Mr. Potash?

(No response.)

Mr. SOURWINE. I will ask you if you are the Potash referred to in that article?

Mr. POTASH. I decline to answer that question; same grounds.
Senator HRUSKA. Same ruling.

Mr. SOURWINE. Mr. Chairman, I ask that the text of this article be printed in the record at this point and that, if technical considerations permit, the photograph that appears in the article be also reproduced in the record.

Senator HRUSKA. So ordered.

(The article referred to was marked "Exhibit No. 8" and is as follows :)

JAIL POTASH FOLLOWING RETURN HERE

Irving Potash, the former union leader who served a 5-year term in Leavenworth Prison under the Smith Act is being held today in New York's West Street jail on $35,000 bail.

The charge against Potash is "unauthorized entry" into the country, Potash, who has seen his family for only 85 days in the past 5 years, returned here for a reunion with them, and had planned to surrender to officials within a day. He was arrested in a Bronxville restaurant, by an FBI agent who recognized him from his 1949 trial, before he could see his family or surrender. Appearing before Judge Frederick van Pelt Bryan in Federal court Saturday, Potash said softly:

"I have been in this country over 40 years. I have a family. from the family when I was sentenced under the Smith Act. Supreme Court will see the injustices of the Smith Act."

I was separated
I hope that the

Mrs. Mary Kaufman, his attorney, asked that he be released on $2,000 bail. She told the Court, "Among the effects taken from the defendant at the time of his arrest was an item that indicated it was his intention to surrender in this country."

Potash told the judge, "If the FBI agents had not recognized me accidentally last night, I would probably be here before you at this time on a voluntary basis by having surrendered, which I expected to do by noon today."

"Anyone who knows me," he added, "knows that I am what is considered a family man-I love my family."

His attorney explained that after Potash was compelled to leave the country his wife, Mrs. Gita Potash, his married daughter, Jean, and her three children tried repeatedly to get passports to see him, but were refused.

When a reporter told Mrs. Potash of his arrest over the telephone, she said she was "absolutely sure" there must be some mistake.

In court, Potash explained his secret reentry: "That was the only way open to me to see my family. I couldn't see them in any other way without jeopardizing their liberty or involving them in a conspiracy."

Arguing for bail of $50,000 bail, U.S. Attorney Paul W. Williams said, "I assume that he did want to see his family. Every man does. But there has been no fair dealing with the Government." He said Potash wouldn't tell how and when he arrived in the country.

Potash is being held under the section of the United States Code that makes it a crime for a deported person to reenter or be found within the United States without permission of the Attorney General.

But Potash had never actually been deported. When he was released from prison, he was immediately rearrested on the second count of the Smith Act indictment-the so-called membership clause now before the U.S. Supreme Court. Three months later, while a deportation order was pending against him, he agreed to leave for Poland.

Mrs. Kaufman waived a hearing on the reentry charge, which carries a maximum penalty of 2 years in prison and a $1,000 fine. Meanwhile, the Immigration and Naturalization Service has filed a detainer against Potash, a notice to the marshal that plan to open a court suit against him.

Mr. SOURWINE. Mr. Potash, I show you a photostat of a news story appearing in the New York Herald Tribune, January 9, 1957, page 1.

Do you have that before you?

(No response.)

Mr. SOURWINE. Let the record show the witness is consulting with his counsel with regard to the article. You have examined the article, Mr. Potash?

Mr. POTASH. Yes, sir.

Mr. SOURWINE. I ask you, first, if you are the Potash referred to in that article?

Mr. POTASH. I am in no position to answer that question. You would have to ask the writer of this.

Mr. SOURWINE. Well, I will ask you this question, Is there anything in that article which, applied to you, is untrue or inaccurate? Mr. POTASH. Yes.

Mr. SOURWINE. What is it, sir?

Mr. POTASH. What is stated in the headline is untrue.

Mr. SOURWINE. Yes. What is that? Just read the untrue portion of the headline.

Mr. POTASH. Well, all right, I will give you it, give it back to you, and you may read it.

Mr. SOURWINE. No. You have characterized a portion of this article as untrue. I want you to tell us what is the untrue portion. Read it.

Mr. POTASH. I have said that the headline of this article is untrue. Mr. SOURWINE. May I have it, Mr. Schroeder?

The headline of this New York Herald Tribune article is

Call Potash Secret-Order Courier-Believed To Have Word from Moscow for U.S. Reds.

Is it untrue, now, that you were called a secret-order courier? Mr. POTASH. The statement is untrue. I don't-I don't say that nobody called me that but the statement is untrue.

Mr. SOURWINE. Then you mean to say you were not in fact a secretorder courier?

Mr. POTASH. That is correct.

Mr. SOURWINE. Yes. The subheading is, "Believed To Have Word From Moscow for U.S. Reds." Am I correct in my understanding you are saying that you did not bring word from Moscow for Communists in the United States?

Mr. POTASH. Correct.

Mr. SOURWINE. You are saying you did not do so?

Mr. POTASH. Correct.

Mr. SOURWINE. May I offer this article for the record, Mr. Chairman?

Senator HRUSKA. It will be received and placed in evidence in the record at this point.

(The article referred to was marked "Exhibit No. 9" and reads as follows:)

EXHIBIT No. 9

[From the New York Herald Tribune, p. 1; Jan. 9, 1957]

CALL POTASH SECRET-ORDER COURIER

BELIEVED TO HAVE WORD FROM MOSCOW FOR U.S. REDS

Irving Potash, one of the top seven Communist leaders in the United States convicted in 1949, who accepted deportation to Poland in 1955 and then slipped back into this country, was carrying secret orders to Red leaders in the United States and possibly other countries, it was reported last night.

The FBI, which arrested him at a Bronxville, N.Y., restaurant Friday night, did not confirm or deny the report. It is believed this agency and others are backtracking over the Potash trail both here and abroad.

Sending him from Moscow to Poland via Red China is linked with the concern felt by the Kremlin over unrest in satellite countries and over the present bad state of the Communist Party in the United States on the eve of its convention scheduled for February 10-12 in New York, according to experts in this field.

The orders Potash carried were of such top priority urgency that they could be trusted only to a reliable party member, which is believed to be the reason he was picked to risk almost certain arrest-which followed quickly on his return to the United States.

Potash, 54, was convicted in 1949 of conspiring to teach and advocate violent overthrow of the U.S. Government. A former vice president of the International Fur and Leather Workers' Union, he served 3 years and 5 months of a 5-year term in Leavenworth Penitentiary, getting time off for good behavior.

He was immediately rearrested on a second count of his original indictment, and voluntarily agreed to deportation to his native Poland rather than stand trial on the new charge.

A hint of the importance attached to his case-although the charge against him presently is only that of illegal reentry-was given at his arraignment in New York Saturday, when U.S. Attorney Paul W. Williams, opposing reduction in his $35,000 bail, said he still is "a top leader in the Communist Party *** may be a courier * * *"

Investigators brushed aside his statement that he risked returning here merely to visit his family and planned to surrender voluntarily after doing so. He was picked up in a restaurant, not at the home of his wife and three unmarried children.

There is reason to speculate that Potash's mission may have been to supplement or supersede that of another deported former Communist leader in the United States, John Williamson, who also served time here for advocating violent overthrow of the Government before being sent back-unwillingly in his caseto his native England.

HE WAS AGENT

Williamson, it was revealed by the New York Herald Tribune in a London dispatch in October, was the channel through whom orders were transmitted from Moscow to the Communist conspirators in the United States.

Williamson is the author of a column entitled "The American Scene," published in the London Daily Worker. Last summer he visited the Soviet Union, where he may have received instructions at the same time they possibly were issued to Potash.

Returning to his London column, Williamson reflected the great concern of Moscow over "anti-Soviet slanders" in the United States, even in the party press, and published what purported to be an "order" from Moscow, which was summarized at the time as follows:

(1) American Communists are to stop immediately "all anti-Soviet slanders." (2) There must be no attempt to oust William Z. Foster as chairman of the Communist Party, U.S.A.

(3) Marxism-Leninism is basic. Peaceful transition is only voting socialism. There must be a revolutionary transition from capitalistic society.

(4) Eugene Dennis must “under all circumstances” remain as American party secretary.

(5) "Contents of this communication are to be published in the United States." These points were made at a time when there was an undercover fight in the party here to unseat Foster, who is 75 and ailing. Foster is favored by Moscow despite his age and health because of his unswerving allegiance to "basic" Leninism at a time when other elements are exhibiting "dangerous" symptoms of independence as a result of the downgrading of Stalin by the present rulers of the Kremlin.

Senator HRUSKA. Is there any other way in which this news story is incorrect, Mr. Witness?

Let the record show the witness is perusing the news clipping. Mr. POTASH. For the rest of it, I decline to answer on the same grounds.

Mr. SOURWINE. Mr. Potash, I show you two newspaper clippings, one from the Sunday Star of Washington, D.C., on Sunday, January 6, 1957, which is also accompanied by what appears from the caption there to be an AP wirephoto of you; and a second article from the New York Times of January 5, 1957, page 3.

The Star article is captioned, "Potash, Ex-Red, Begs United States for Another Chance." The Times article is captioned, “Returning Red Seized by FBI." The first question: Are you the person in the picture captioned as "Potash"?

Mr. POTASH. Again, you will have to ask the writer of this story. Mr. SOURWINE. Don't you recognize your own picture, Mr. Potash? Mr. POTASH. I decline to answer that question.

Senator HRUSKA. On the same grounds?

Mr. POTASH. On the same grounds.

Senator HRUSKA. Same ruling.

Mr. SOURWINE. The second question: Is there anything in either one of these articles which as applied to you is inaccurate or untrue? (No response.)

Mr. SOURWINE. I want to give you an opportunity to point it out, if there is.

(No response.)

Mr. SOURWINE. I guess it is only proper

Mr. POTASH. Any reference to courier or anything of that sort is false. As for the rest, I decline to answer.

Mr. SOURWINE. Would you read those articles, please?