Left out in the cold: The arrest of W. E. B. Du Bois and the reaction of the African American community to the Red Scare

This thesis is a study of the 1951 arrest of W. E. B. Du Bois. The arrest was a product of Cold War culture that had enveloped the United States following World War Two. Du Bois was charged with acting as an undeclared foreign agent which, in the Cold War era, implied complicity with the Soviet Union. Du Bois had established the Peace Information Center to distribute the Stockholm Peace Appeal that asked that both the Soviet Union and the United States agree not to use nuclear weapons in any first strike. The charges of disloyalty brought a variety of reactions from the African American community that illustrate the impact of Cold War culture. This thesis will argue that the African American community had by 1951, adopted Cold War cultural norms. Furthermore, African Americans, rather than being passive in the creation and dissemination of Cold War culture, were active participants in its extensive reach. (Abstract shortened by UMI.).