- Committee for the First Amendment
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The Committee for the First Amendment was an action group formed in September 1947 by actors in support of the Hollywood Ten during the hearings of the House Un-American Activities Committee. It was founded by screenwriter Philip Dunne, actress Myrna Loy, and film directors John Huston and William Wyler.
Other members included Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Henry Fonda, Gene Kelly, John Garfield, Edward G. Robinson, Judy Garland, Vincente Minnelli, Katharine Hepburn, Paul Henreid, Dorothy Dandridge, Jane Wyatt, Ira Gershwin, Billy Wilder, Sterling Hayden, June Havoc, Evelyn Keyes, Marsha Hunt, Groucho Marx, Lucille Ball, Danny Kaye, Lena Horne, Robert Ryan, and Frank Sinatra.
On October 27, 1947, the group flew to Washington, D.C. to protest HUAC hearings. Their involvement was ineffective, and membership in this group came to be regarded with suspicion[1]. Ira Gershwin, for one, was called before the California anti-Communist Tenney Committee and asked to explain his participation[2].
Bogart, Garfield, and Robinson later wrote articles stating that they were "duped" into supporting the Hollywood Ten (both Garfield and Robinson were later blacklisted). The March 1948 issue of Photoplay published an article by Bogart, "I'm No Communist".[3] In this article, he claimed that he and other members of the Committee did not realize some of the Hollywood Ten were really communists.
References
- ^ City of nets: a portrait of Hollywood in the 1940's By Otto Friedrich, page 380
- ^ Gershwin: with a new critical discography By Edward Jablonski, page 350
- ^ "I'm No Communist", Photoplay (March 1948)
Categories:- Political organisation stubs
- Hollywood blacklist
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