Brown, Peter C. Papers

Member, Subversive Activities Control Board, 1950-1953; Chairman, Subversive Activities Control Board, 1952-1953.

The papers of Peter C. Brown consist of transcripts of testimony, reports, and handwritten notes concerning the 1951-52 proceedings against the Communist Party of the United States before the Subversive Activities Control Board, and the results of those proceedings.

Size: 4 linear feet (approximately 8,000 pages).
Access: Open.
Copyright: The donor of the papers has also donated his copyright interest in unpublished writings in the collection to the United States of America. Records created by employees of the U.S. Government as part of their official duties are in the public domain. Otherwise, copyright interest is presumed to belong to the authors of the documents, or their heirs.
Processed by: Randy Sowell (2023).

Peter Campbell Brown was born in Brooklyn, New York on August 12, 1913. He earned an A.B. degree from Fordham College in 1935 and an LL.B degree from the same institution in 1938. He practiced law in Brooklyn and later served as an officer in the U.S. Army during World War II. In 1946, Brown became an assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York. Subsequently, he served as first assistant in the Criminal Division of the U.S. Justice Department from 1947 to 1948, as executive assistant to the Attorney General in 1948, and as special assistant to the Attorney General from 1949 to 1950.

In 1950, President Harry S. Truman appointed Brown to the Subversive Activities Control Board, an agency that had been established to investigate the extent of Communist activity and influence in the United States. Brown served as the Board’s chairman from 1952 to 1953.

After leaving the Board, Brown worked as Commissioner of Investigations and Corporation Counsel for the City of New York before returning to private law practice in 1958. He died in Port Chester, New York on July 23, 1994.

The papers of Peter C. Brown consist of transcripts of testimony, reports, and handwritten notes relating to the case before the Subversive Activities Control Board that was originally identified as J. Howard McGrath v. Communist Party of the United States of America.

The Subversive Activities Control Act of 1950 required "communist action" organizations in the United States that were part of the “world communist movement” to register with the Attorney General and publicly disclose detailed information about their operations, including the names and addresses of their members. The Communist Party of the United States refused to comply, and the Attorney General, J. Howard McGrath, petitioned the Subversive Activities Control Board for an order requiring the party to register. Hearings in the case began in the spring of 1951 and concluded in the summer of 1952. In 1953, the Board issued a report approving the Attorney General’s petition, and ordered the Communist Party to register as required by law.

The papers of Peter C. Brown are comprised of two series. The first series, the Proceedings File, contains typed transcripts of proceedings in the case, dating from May 1951 to August 1952. Also included are marginal handwritten notes correcting errors in the record. The transcripts in the collection do not record all of the proceedings; most of the first 6,500 pages, covering the period up to October 30, 1951, are missing, and there are significant gaps thereafter. As of August 14, 1952, more than 14,500 pages of testimony in the case had been transcribed, but only about half of these pages are included in the collection. The transcripts record the testimony of witnesses and the frequent clashes between the Justice Department’s attorneys (William A. Paisley and others) and the attorneys representing the Communist Party (principally, ex-Congressman Vito Marcantonio and John Abt). At issue was the extent to which the U.S. Communist Party was part of a “world communist movement” directed by Soviet authorities in Moscow. Brown was present at the proceedings as a member of the Board’s Hearing Panel, and often served as the presiding officer.

The second series, the Subject File, contains printed reports on the exhibits presented by both sides in the case, along with information about two of the principal witnesses, Benjamin Gitlow and Joseph Kornfeder. Also included are the recommended decision of the Hearing Panel, issued in 1952; the report of the entire Subversive Activities Control Board, issued in 1953; and a modified version of the Board’s report, issued in 1956 after the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the Board to correct the record of the case to reflect the Court’s conclusion that three witnesses had testified falsely during the proceedings.

The Records of the Subversive Activities Control Board (Record Group 220) are at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland. Related collections at the Truman Library include the Records of the President’s Commission on Internal Security and Individual Rights (Record Group 220).