Nat Hentoff: J. Edgar Bloomberg ... COINTELPRO in NY
On May 2, 1972, when news suddenly broke that FBI director J. Edgar Hoover had died in his sleep, the Savannah (Georgia) Morning News spoke for many Americans, some of us much relieved: "It was a shocker. If anyone on this earth seemed immortal, it was Mr. Hoover."
He had molded the FBI into the most fearsome official investigative presence in American history, creating far more apprehension—not only among lawbreakers—than the fabled, relentless national 19th-century Pinkerton Detective Agency ("We never sleep"). Indeed, Hoover had warned Americans to expect "an FBI agent behind every mailbox."
He intimidated presidents and members of Congress, letting it be known that he had secret files on their personal lives. But his most pervasive impact on the lives of many other Americans was his creation from 1956 to 1971 of COINTELPRO (counterintelligence program).
As I have often reported in the Voice from 1958 on, FBI agents not only persistently monitored but also infiltrated lawful anti-war, civil rights, black, civil liberties, and other groups. Posing as fellow indignant activists, agents secretly fomented bitter, disruptive divisions among some of these organizations. All of this, of course, in the name of national security against international Communism and the supposed enemies within this nation trying to undermine the government in other ways.
On March 25 of this year, I was, as if in a time machine, brought back to the Hoover years by New York Times reporter Jim Dwyer.
"For at least a year before the 2004 Republican National Convention," Dwyer wrote, "teams of undercover New York City police officers traveled to cities around the country, Canada, and Europe to conduct observations of people who planned to protest at the convention . . . They made friends, shared meals, swapped e-mail messages. . . .[Among those surveilled who had not intended to protest] were members of church groups and anti-war organizations, environmentalists, and people opposed to the death penalty."...
Read entire article at Village Voice
He had molded the FBI into the most fearsome official investigative presence in American history, creating far more apprehension—not only among lawbreakers—than the fabled, relentless national 19th-century Pinkerton Detective Agency ("We never sleep"). Indeed, Hoover had warned Americans to expect "an FBI agent behind every mailbox."
He intimidated presidents and members of Congress, letting it be known that he had secret files on their personal lives. But his most pervasive impact on the lives of many other Americans was his creation from 1956 to 1971 of COINTELPRO (counterintelligence program).
As I have often reported in the Voice from 1958 on, FBI agents not only persistently monitored but also infiltrated lawful anti-war, civil rights, black, civil liberties, and other groups. Posing as fellow indignant activists, agents secretly fomented bitter, disruptive divisions among some of these organizations. All of this, of course, in the name of national security against international Communism and the supposed enemies within this nation trying to undermine the government in other ways.
On March 25 of this year, I was, as if in a time machine, brought back to the Hoover years by New York Times reporter Jim Dwyer.
"For at least a year before the 2004 Republican National Convention," Dwyer wrote, "teams of undercover New York City police officers traveled to cities around the country, Canada, and Europe to conduct observations of people who planned to protest at the convention . . . They made friends, shared meals, swapped e-mail messages. . . .[Among those surveilled who had not intended to protest] were members of church groups and anti-war organizations, environmentalists, and people opposed to the death penalty."...