Ware group (CPUSA)
Encyclopedia
The Ware group was a covert organization of Communist Party USA
operatives within the United States
government in the 1930s, run first by Harold Ware
and then by Whittaker Chambers
.
. By 1934, the group had grown to some 75 members, divided into cells. Members initially joined Marxist study groups and then into activities on behalf of the Party. They shared a belief that Marxist ideologies were the correct way to approach the problems of the ongoing Great Depression
.
The Ware group started among young lawyers and economists hired by the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA). This New Deal
agency reported to the Secretary of Agriculture but was operated independently of Department of Agriculture bureaucracy.
Harry Dexter White
, then Director of the Division of Monetary Research in the United States Department of the Treasury
, was also allegedly affiliated with the group.
J. Peters
, who had introduced Whittaker Chambers to Harold Ware the year before, placed Chambers in charge of the Ware Group.
Communist Party USA
The Communist Party USA is a Marxist political party in the United States, established in 1919. It has a long, complex history that is closely related to the histories of similar communist parties worldwide and the U.S. labor movement....
operatives within the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
government in the 1930s, run first by Harold Ware
Harold Ware
Harold Maskell "Hal" Ware was an American Marxist regarded as one of the Communist Party's top experts on agriculture....
and then by Whittaker Chambers
Whittaker Chambers
Whittaker Chambers was born Jay Vivian Chambers and also known as David Whittaker Chambers , was an American writer and editor. After being a Communist Party USA member and Soviet spy, he later renounced communism and became an outspoken opponent later testifying in the perjury and espionage trial...
.
Background
Harold Ware founded this group. Ware was a Communist Party (CP) official working for the federal government in Washington, D.C.Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
. By 1934, the group had grown to some 75 members, divided into cells. Members initially joined Marxist study groups and then into activities on behalf of the Party. They shared a belief that Marxist ideologies were the correct way to approach the problems of the ongoing Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
.
The Ware group started among young lawyers and economists hired by the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA). This New Deal
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...
agency reported to the Secretary of Agriculture but was operated independently of Department of Agriculture bureaucracy.
Notable members
Alleged members of the Ware group include:- Alger HissAlger HissAlger Hiss was an American lawyer, government official, author, and lecturer. He was involved in the establishment of the United Nations both as a U.S. State Department and U.N. official...
- Lee PressmanLee PressmanLee Pressman was a labor attorney and a US government functionary publicly exposed in 1948 for having been a spy for the Soviet foreign intelligence network during the middle 1930s...
- John AbtJohn AbtJohn Jacob Abt was an American lawyer and politician. He spent most of his career as chief counsel to the Communist Party USA ....
- Charles KramerCharles KramerCharles Kramer, originally Charles Krevisky, was an American economist who worked for U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt as part of his brain trust. Among other contributions, he wrote the original idea for the Point Four Program. He also worked for several congressional committees and hired...
- Nathan WittNathan WittNathan Witt was an American lawyer who is best known as being the Secretary of the National Labor Relations Board from 1937 to 1940...
- Henry Collins
- George SilvermanGeorge SilvermanAbraham George Silverman was a mathematician and statistician who graduated from Harvard University.-Biography:...
- Marion BachrachMarion BachrachMarion Bachrach was the sister of John Abt and also a member of the Ware group, a group of government employees in the New Deal administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt who were also members of the secret apparatus of the Communist Party of the United States in the 1930s...
- John HerrmannJohn HerrmannJohn Theodore Herrmann was the person who introduced Whittaker Chambers to Alger Hiss.-Biography:He was born in Lansing, Michigan in 1900. He lived in Paris in the 1920s, as part of its famous expatriate American writers' circle, when he met his first wife, Josephine Herbst in 1924...
- Nathaniel WeylNathaniel WeylNathaniel Weyl was an American economist and author who wrote on a variety of social issues. A member of the Communist Party of the United States from 1933 until 1939, after leaving the party he became a conservative and avowed anti-communist...
- Donald HissDonald Hiss-Biography:Donald Hiss was born on December 15, 1906, in Baltimore, Maryland. He graduated from Johns Hopkins University and the Harvard Law School....
- Victor PerloVictor PerloVictor Perlo was a Marxist economist, government functionary, and a longtime member of the governing National Committee of the Communist Party USA...
Harry Dexter White
Harry Dexter White
Harry Dexter White was an American economist, and senior U.S. Treasury department official, participating in the Bretton Woods conference...
, then Director of the Division of Monetary Research in the United States Department of the Treasury
United States Department of the Treasury
The Department of the Treasury is an executive department and the treasury of the United States federal government. It was established by an Act of Congress in 1789 to manage government revenue...
, was also allegedly affiliated with the group.
Handover
Ware died of injuries sustained in an automobile accident near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in August 1935.J. Peters
J. Peters
J. Peters was the most commonly known pseudonym of a man who last went by the name "Alexander Stevens" in 1949. Peters was an ethnic Jewish journalist and political activist who was a leading figure of the Hungarian language section of the Communist Party USA in the 1920s and 1930s...
, who had introduced Whittaker Chambers to Harold Ware the year before, placed Chambers in charge of the Ware Group.