Paul Robeson’s Testimony Before the Senate: Internationalism, Socialism, and Black Liberation (1948)

Senator: Is Mr. Robeson here now? All right. You may take the chair. I'll put the next one up here. Will you raise your right hand, please? You do solemnly swear. No matter now, pending before this committee, you'll tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God.

Paul Robeson: I'm here. Senator, I've been traveling a good deal about the country on various missions. I'm an artist. Singer also been in the South and the West all over, helping singing for certain charitable organizations. And, coming to the bill, I see. First is to protect the United States against so-called an American subversive activities. I presume, since the United States doesn't exist in abstraction, that it means the people of the United States, that would be more or less all right. I would think so. I'll get back to other sections of the bill. It says in section two.

The second paragraph that, in the question, the question of the necessity for the legislation that, are necessary to protect to the establishment of a totalitarian dictatorship in any country results in the ruthless suppression of all opposition to the party in power. This is what I'm interested in, this complete subordination of the rights of individuals to the state, the denial of fundamental rights and liberties which are characteristic of a representative form of government, such as freedom of speech, the press, assembly of religious worship, and result in the maintenance of control over the people through fear, terrorism and brutality. I've been all over the United States speaking and attempting to speak. And I have been experiencing in our own country today this very thing of control over the people through fear, terrorism and brutality.

This is happening in all parts of this land. Now. It seems to me that we're protecting the people of the United States, that these protections are necessary from another point of view than I can see in their so-called necessity, in this necessity. Do you believe that they are? I'm saying these are entitled to protection, even as I also, again, want to say that it says that. Yeah. He's the man. This man wasn't here, and we let him in. In his place. The complete subordinate in the same paragraph, the subordination of the rights of individuals to the state.

Denial of fundamental rights and liberties, and so forth. I. Think that, this is a complete, for example, a definition since our states are sovereign powers, so to speak, except for the rights delegated to the federal government. A complete description of, say, what happens to Negro people today in Mississippi, Alabama, many other states of the Union, and.

The necessity for legislation, it seems to me I will go into what I consider the constitutionality denial of civil rights under this bill. In fact, the whole question of our of the way we have placed this whole question in the bill. But it seems to me that the necessity for legislation that might concern, I suggest, with the committee today and and for some time to come that since in this bill, perhaps hundreds, thousands of Americans would like to speak on it, and that it should that not only today, but perhaps in the future there should be opportunity for that. But I'm tremendously interested before approaching the in detail, this bill, just to ask you a question as to why, in the light of the terror that I've seen and the denial of rights, that the lynching bill is not sort of before the Senate at this time, it hasn't come out in the committee.

Senator: I couldn't answer that.

Paul Robeson: I'm personally trying to get it out of the committee. I think that, that if there are any kind of activities that strike at the very basis of our democratic way of life that, that these that this bill certainly should come out. Both parties have have gone on record for the civil rights of the Negro people. And, it looks as though you might get through without it. So Two eleven. So I'm certainly hoping that, that, this bill will come out and perhaps even this bill could be put aside for the moment and extended later to see that these rights should be, somewhat should be guaranteed. Now, as for a bill, I see it the whole question of protecting the rights that the the people of the United States. Against the background and the whole question of communism, for example, which is brought in every minute.

Senator: Robertson. just can I can I go over my question?

Paul Robeson: I'll answer. I'll answer that in just a second.

Senator: Are you a member of the.

Paul Robeson: I will answer that in just in just a moment. Can I go on with my. Yes, I will answer that. The whole background, I would say so. I would strike at the very root of the conception of of what is in these first paragraphs, the, for example, the origin, the world movement with its origins and so forth. I mean, does Mr. Monk or whoever framed the bill understand that the origins of this kind of thing were in, say, the English Industrial Revolution and the time of Robert Owen in the in the roots of a of the poverty of England, which was responsible for the English poor and indentured servants coming to build America itself.

This isn't just spring up the other day, in some part of Europe, a part of the whole struggle of human beings to improve their lot. One of the most important sections for myself, being my own people here, the Negro people in America. So I see the whole framework of the bill in reality, from my travels about this country and otherwise, and about the world in the framework of what we understand as Americans of and what we mean by our democratic ways of life here is expressed in this paragraph that it means certain from our own American history, from the beginning of our struggle for freedom from England down through the Civil War, which freed my own people. It means, through the New Deal, an extension we have. No, we mean anything. We mean an extension of the democratic rights and full citizenship to people who do not yet have them.

That would include not only one tenth of the population, the Negro people. It would include, for example, many of the Spanish American people that I saw in Pueblo, Colorado, a few months ago living in hovels under the ground. Would include many in the fruit fields of California, in the Deep South and all over America. But, but and so in, in approaching this whole problem, of of, of the struggle today in Europe and elsewhere, what has happened in, in nineteen seventy and Russia, what's happened in Yugoslavia in many places, it has to do with trying with with millions and millions of people who who are denied very basic rights, economic, social and political, of building, of trying to build a decent way of life against it has been have been many forces, the most important of which we joined hands against the forces of fascism.

Now, in going about America today, I say that those when I was in Kansas City, and I see the police beating workers over the head because they want a decent living terrorizing the people in West Virginia and all over. I say these are the, the essence of.. trying to stop, actually stop the struggle of the people to get the democratic rights, which they don't have. And I would go so far as to say that I feel, I've been in the Mr. months state in South Dakota. I was attacked by him once when I sang there, but in the whole discussion. And we can take it up in detail of defining, what is, a Communist party? What is the front organization and what has happened, in fact, throughout America where they they have terrorized people from joining any kind of liberal struggle. Just a second. That, that, that this bill has seems to me to have as its basic idea not to to help the people of the United States or any other people, but to actually stop the struggle by terrorizing people to get rights for Negro people, for workers, and for other Americans who still haven't full citizenship.

Senator: You read the bill. Mr..
Paul Robeson: I have read the bill.
Senator: All right. Now, section four, paragraph one, the certain acts that are prohibited are in section four. They've been the other is merely registration.
Paul Robeson: No, you can't dismiss the rest of the bill.
Senator: I'm not dismissing it. I'm talking about that part. Yes. Do you believe that it should be unlawful for anyone to attempt to establish in the United States a totalitarian dictatorship, the direction and control of which is to be vested in, or exercised by, or under the domination or control of any foreign government, foreign organization, or foreign individual.

Paul Robeson: We have no. But wait a minute. Of course not.
Senator: Do not you think that that should be the law?
Paul Robeson: Sure. That's all right. Now we have laws to protect that. We have laws to protect that.

Senator: What is the law now?

Paul Robeson: We have plenty of laws to take care of, of any people who would ever attempt to overthrow this government.

Senator: But what is? Mr. Hoover could take care of that anytime. That's by force or violence. The Smith Act that you're talking about.

Paul Robeson: Well, this isn't by force or violence. You could do it by other means.

Senator: What other means?
Paul Robeson: Well, penetration. You don't think that Yugoslavia wasn't taken over by the communists, do you, Mr. Robertson?

Paul Robeson: I certainly do not. I think the Yugoslav. I say this is very basic in Czechoslovakia. By no means. Let's take Czechoslovakia. Czechoslovakia. You can check yourself. I happen to be in Czechoslovakia in nineteen forty five, singing to American troops at the very end of the war. I, as a singer, was called in by the American military to sing to some checks at a big park. And I had been in Prague before the war, and I speak the language a little bit, and I was trying to find out who these Czechs were.

So finally a woman comes up to me and said, I encounter so and so and so. And I met you in Chicago during the war. I said you were in Chicago during the war, I I understand. And I suppose you expect to. And it occurred to me that maybe she was back in Czechoslovakia to get back a couple of those castles which had been taken away because those who owned the castles had helped the fascists. All I can say is, and I say this and I can be called up again on this, I felt that I saw the American military.

The only Czechs in the room happened to turn out to be Czech Collaborationists and Sudeten Germans. And I would say that the Czech people probably made a decision that under no pressure, even American pressure, would they accept the restoration of Czech fascism, that they if they were made to choose, they would choose the other way. That's the way I would suggest it. So you you as far as Yugoslavia, it seems to me I was in Yugoslavia and I saw the Yugoslav peasants suffering exactly like the Negro peasants suffered in the south. Only they weren't one tenth of the population. They were perhaps nine tenths of the population. And so when we help them destroy fascism, including King Peter, whom we now seem to have in this country floating around, I knew him as a boy there in London. Saw him around there. I think that the that what has happened in Yugoslavia came from the struggles of the Yugoslav people, who, with our help, were able to take the power. And as far as I can see, Senator, they're going to keep it.

Senator: All right, Mr. Robinson, what is an American communist? Are you to find that I consider an American communist?

Paul Robeson: I know one, I know one. He grew up with me. We came up together. He went to Amherst. I went to Rutgers. I was interested in that because, judge, judge Stone, I took law at Columbia University. He was the dean of personal property at the time, and he was an Amherst man who played football. We used to talk about this. Now, this fellow grew up with me, who was born in Georgia, went through all sorts of, as a Negro boy, justices and, and, and, and injury to his dignity. Every five minutes he came north, went to Harvard Law School. And, a dear friend of mine through all my life still is. He is today on the city council of New York City, a man who is fighting and has made a tremendous struggle for the rights of the Negro people in Harlem and all through the United States? And I know no American that I'm prouder to know. And he is an American communist on on the on the on the administration, what they stand for.

Senator: What's his name?

Paul Robeson: No. What do they stand for? They stand as far as I can see, for, complete equality of the Negro people in America, which I would like to see in every respect. It might interest me to know, but in going about the country, I asked university students, when did they think that the Negro people would be completely free in America like anybody else? Not special freedoms, economic, some kind of special freedoms. They said to me, a thousand years, a thousand years. So I'm interested in a party and in people who who, like the Scottsboro case, who risk their lives, who make every effort of any possible kind to see that the Negro people secure their rights. So the forces of labor.

Senator: Do you think that's what communism stands for.

Paul Robeson: That's what America stands for. It stands for me. I say this is my basic point.

Senator: Well, that's what I want.

Paul Robeson: My basic point is that wait a minute, where did communism come from? I'm taking it from the first paragraph. It started against the background of the sufferings of the English people in the mills in the great Industrial Revolution, which which resulted in the slavery of my people in America. Now, in this struggle, when I say something in this struggle, as I would put it, of the few against the many in history, that is why did we found the American government? What happened? Why did Cromwell come over in England in sixteen twenty? Sixteen forty? Because he said, no divine right of kings. And in order to see that in English history, they had to chop off Charles's head. And we had to to have a revolution in seventeen seventy six, we had to have a civil war to see that somewhere people begin to get their rights. So the French Revolution. So I see history as a struggle of the great mass of people to someway get a get some fair return for their labor and a decent chance to live. Now, this is what going on in America, Senator.

Senator: Let's get down to what? American communism.

Paul Robeson: What I'm saying. To me, it's a they are they are a part of this whole struggle, the interest. So I can only define it against this background. You can't say in one breath center that that it's American companies, an offshoot of Russian communism. That's what I want to know. I say no, what is it? Under the domination. I say, what is Russian Communism an offshoot of? Did did did did did did Marx or Lenin or just spring up out of the head of the thing? No. These came out of the social conditions of Europe. Now in communism began in England, not in Russia. And let me say.

Senator: So today, are you an American communist?

Paul Robeson: Just let me finish the point. I'll answer the question. Now, in Scandinavia today, in Scandinavia today, They have decided to solve these problems of all the resources of the nation being in the hands of a few people by co-operative methods, that is the General Electric which controls electricity in this country. They more or less put them out of Sweden by co-operative means. In England today they have taken over the railroads, coal banks by socialist means, that is, by public ownership. Now this oughtn't to be any mystery to the American people. We have TVA. New Zealand is a socialist country. We this is a part of the struggle of people to get control of some of the wealth, instead of leaving it in the hands of the few. I see communism as nothing but an extension of of great public ownership of the main means of resources, like the railroad workers said the other day. And the coal mines, if they're that important, Senator to the United States, that every time there's a national emergency, this is life or death to the to the American people. Doesn't it occur to you that instead of beating the workers on the head, that maybe the government should own the down the railroads and the coal mines. Well, this is this is the whole struggle of which communism is a part. This is a part of the conceptions of the struggles of human beings for ages. And you can't move communism out anywhere in the world.

Senator: Well, then do I understand? So American communism is you must have, say, an American socialist. What's an American Democrat? American is part of the Russian system. But do you know that American democratic principles stem directly from the French Revolution and our own revolution? They're very revolutionary ideas. They are very revolutionary ideas in fascist Greece today. These are very revolutionary revolution. Let's get down to some of the facts in the bill. Now, I ask you the question. You said you'd answer it. Are you an American? Are you an American communist?

Paul Robeson: Today, Senator Ferguson, that question has become the very basis of the struggle for American civil liberties. Nineteen or more. And many of the most of of of some of the most brilliant and distinguished Americans are about to go to jail for failure to answer that question and I'm going to join them if necessary. I refuse to answer the question.

Senator: You refuse to answer. You refuse to.

Paul Robeson: This is an invasion of my right of secret ballot. Senator Ferguson, if you want to know whether I am. The Communist Party is a legal party like the Democratic Party, the Republican Party. I'm going to vote pretty soon. If you want to send some government officials to take my ballot away. A secret ballot, my constitutional right, he can see just what I am.

Senator: I see, have you a communist card in any communist organization, any state, Mr. Robson?

Paul Robeson: That is. I consider it part of the other question. Then I refuse to answer.

Senator: Yeah, I see, and it's it's a party that doesn't disclose. That's what I want to tell you.

Paul Robeson: I don't know, maybe if I were a Republican, maybe I wouldn't disclose it either. I would say come to the ballot box and see it. I'm not used to what the Republicans do. All I know, the Communist Party is a legal party in the United States and making a magnificent struggle on many fronts.

Senator: I mean, communist just just refused to disclose whether other members of it.

Paul Robeson: Well, I say, since you've met because you we they today you have made this this, this goes to the very heart of the bill. I say that this whole hysteria and the bill is a part of that hysteria. To use this not not only to break, not not to hurt communists, but really to break the civil liberties of every section of the American people, the rights of labor, the rights of liberals. This is why this is a very basic, you know, something about the Communists of America.

Senator: You've been you've been, you know, something about the Communists in America, many dear friends. Yes.

Paul Robeson: It's perfectly true.

Senator: And you you think they've done a magnificent job but isn't? Yes. You think they've done a magnificent job in America? That's your opinion. And do you know that it is a fact that they, outside of, of their membership, declined to disclose that they are communists?

Paul Robeson: Well, I think that they might be. This this can be determined. The Supreme Court's going to have to rule on that, I think.

Senator: But no, isn't that a fact that except among themselves, they decline to make it public that they are communist or not communist?

Paul Robeson: I would say that if it weren't a basic problem of civil liberties, it goes to the very heart of the struggle in which the denial of these civil liberties, of which I believe this bill to be a part. That's the reason I'm here. This would not be so at all.

Senator: have you ever been to Russia?

Paul Robeson: Oh, yes. Yes, yes.

Senator: And, have you, studied in Russia?

Paul Robeson: Oh, no. Never studied there. I went there as an artist.

Senator: You never attended any of the..

Paul Robeson: Far as as far as that's concerned, you don't have to go to. You don't have to go to Russia to read Marx and Lenin. No, I understand they didn't. They didn't give it to me at Rutgers. Incidentally, I went to college, but I read it.

Senator: Yes, but you've read it since.

Paul Robeson: That's right.

Senator: You didn't study in any school?

Paul Robeson: No. No, no. Do you know this purely as an artist and knew nothing about it when I first went in nineteen thirty four? Nothing about you, do you know? Only to see.

Senator: Do you know the head of the Communist Party in Russia, Mr. Stalin? Do you know? No, I've never met. Mr.. You've never met. How much time have you spent in Russia?

Paul Robeson: I was there for over a period. Let's say between thirty four and thirty seven. I was there two weeks, three weeks, three months. What is much more interesting, I should think, Senator, is that my boy went to school there for two or three years, and my one boy. One year boy, because I found in Russia a complete absence of race prejudice, a complete absence. What? The first question, the first time in my life, Senator, that I was able to walk the earth with complete dignity as a human being. So I took my boy there. He's now at Cornell. And let me tell you what happened to him.

Senator: What age was he when he was eight or nine years old?

Paul Robeson: Well, he was just a just a boy. Very important age. Yes. Very important.

Senator: What school did he attend?

Paul Robeson: He went to a school in Moscow, a public school? Public school? Public school? Yes. Now he came. He came to. He's in Cornell. He's been back in America many years. Went to high school. But in Russia, I'm not experiencing this race prejudice today in America. He's going to fight for his people and fight in the progressive section of American life with a much easier than I can, for example, because if somebody would suddenly call me a name here in the room, I don't think I would do anything about it, but I'm sure I'd be, I would be, I'd have a tendency to get up and want to knock the guy down. Now he has no feeling of any kind of threat, because he knows that he lived in a part of the world where there was no such thing as color prejudice. So he's going to be able to make a very, very important contribution, I think, to American life. Now, this is what I did for him. That's the reason he went, you know, whether or not the American communist owes any allegiance to the red flag.

Senator: As far as I know, the Supreme Court has been put up only once. So I refuse to pass on it. No, no, I'm asking you what you know. You've been traveling all over.

Paul Robeson: Oh, no, no I don't. Why why would they? Why that? As far as I know, the American Communist is interested in improving as far as possible. Certainly a lot of the people here of the people who suffer as well as in other parts of the world where this where this becomes a struggle.

Senator: Do you know whether or not the American Communists believe in world revolution?

Paul Robeson: Well, I don't know.

Senator: You don't know that. But I don't. And do you know whether they they do believe in in allegiance to the Communist Party or communism in Russia? Do you what? That they owe allegiance to.

Paul Robeson: No, I don't think that I would say no to anybody. Anything I know about it. I don't think they have nearly as much allegiance to Russia as certain Americans seem to have today. Say to a fascist Greece or to Turkey or to Abdullah Transjordania.

Senator: You you have addressed communist meetings in America, have you?

Paul Robeson: President Wilson gave a definition of this, that of the concentration of power in a few hands in the struggle of the New Deal against the so-called economic royalists, in which he defined this concentration of power as the essence of fascism. I'm I would like, I would like, I would like Mr. Hoover to be sure he's got Mr. DuPont and Forrestal and the people. This is very difficult because they are. Our government today isn't so easy to get to the basis of what might be potential American fascism. That's what frightens me. And I don't see enough about that in the bill.

Senator: Doesn't this bill cover? No, I don't. A dictatorship, whether it be fascist or communist, you cannot say that you cannot define fascism or communism by totalitarian dictatorship. I disagree with the very. This, again, is misleading the American people. That is it during the war.

Senator: What's your definition of fascism?

Paul Robeson: I would say to me, the essence of fascism is two things. Let's take the more obvious one first, racial superiority. The kind of racial superiority that led a Hitler to wipe out six million Jewish people. That that can result any day in the lynching of Negro people in the South or other parts of America. The denial of their rights, the constant daily denial to any Negro in America, no matter how important whoever may be of his essential human dignity, a thing which no other American would accept. This daily insult to his dignity as a human being. This is the essence of fascism. Now the second thing is no, but the most important thing, which is the reason this can be, is the power of the resources of a nation in the hands of the few, in the hands of the few, and the use of the state power as Hitler or Mussolini, or the police in Kansas City to to to beat down any attempts to strive toward any kind of democratic rights or freedoms, even though that be law enforcement, even though it be law enforcement. I say, even though I would say this is the very essence of the thing, we find always that law enforcement in this case, is the protection of the property of the few people who are the potential of fascism.

Senator: Now, what is the essence of communism in America, in your opinion?

Paul Robeson: The essence of communism here, anyway, is this what is? Every day I read in the paper what does what does communism thrive on? All this kind of what? Where? What will you tell me, Senator? Where does the where would you expect to buy your companies? Would you expect to find, say, that Mr. DuPont would be a communist?

Senator: Well, I think in America today, we can expect to find them anywhere.

Paul Robeson: Oh, yeah? Well, no, I would say that. I mean, it isn't a question of wealth.

Senator: Oh, very much so. Do you think so?

Paul Robeson: Not a question. Not just not. No, I'm talking about not a question of wealth in this case, a question of wealth, where it comes like in America today as far as that's concerned. Where in, in the end take the South. Would you tell me. You tell me who controls the wealth. See, you gave me. No, let me give you the point.

Senator: Well, wait a minute. You gave me the essence of fascism. Now I'd like to have the essence of.

Paul Robeson: Okay, let me give. Let me give it to you, because I. I just came from my experience. I didn't make these things up. So I'm in the South. My father was a slave a few weeks ago. I'm standing in North Carolina on the very soil on which my father was a slave. Now, when I go into the whole history of our civilization, one hundred million Negroes from Africa torn to pieces and died in the slave trade on our backs in America, the very primary wealth of America built on our backs. Cotton taken to the New England textile mills. What do we get from it today? Poverty. Insult. Inferior station in life. No opportunities. Who controls the wealth? A few people, a few people now. Somewhere to me, by whatever means.

Today. What? By what? At certain times, like in our own history, these means have been revolutionary. In other times. Evidently not. But somewhere, to me, communism is interested in seeing that those people who are oppressed, who suffer that somewhere they represent those people in their struggle toward freedom. Now that's the essence of communism, and the essence of communism here is the same as the essence of communism in Russia. I would say it's the same universally. It has to do with the struggles of the Russian people against the Tsarist depression. It's universal.

They were interested exactly like universal in this sense. Senator Ferguson, you see, I don't. Again, I must stop you from what is an American today. Here's what I mean. An American here. So you try to link every American who believes something with this country or that country. Now, Mr. Marshall is on record today that we are no longer American, Senator Ferguson. We are defending Western civilization, whether it's in Italy, Greece, even in Turkey. They've become the great defenders of Western civilization. Now we have got we as Americans today are in a world, some kind of world struggle, which we are no longer Americans. We are a part of the world. So you can't isolate this in this sense. Now, I say to Mr. Marshall, and I say, as an American, I was in Europe. Now, if there are Americans who want to support Franco in Spain, Let him go ahead. I was in Republican Spain singing for troops who were fighting in Spain. Yes, sir.

Senator: Mr.. Do you understand if this law. So this is this has nothing to do. You can't do it. No, I don't see the American Communist doesn't. He's an American, as far as I know.

Paul Robeson: If this law is passed in Jefferson's time, he was an American, not a Frenchman. That's what I see.

Senator: If this law is passed, then the Supreme Court holds it constitutional. Do you believe that it should be lived up to. If this law is passed? Yes. Or any law passed, and I say, I declare, I sincerely hope the Senate won't pass it. And I sincerely hope that the that the Supreme Court will be carried out unconstitutional. But if they do, do you then believe that the people should live up to it?

Paul Robeson: Well, I'm sure that I would live up to it in every in in in by trying in every possible way to have it taken off the books.

Senator: Well, but wouldn't you, wouldn't you live under it? Wouldn't you say that it was the law and therefore it was binding upon you? He's arguing that point. That's what it means.

Paul Robeson: Nobody's arguing that point.

Senator: Well, Mr. Foster told us Saturday Friday that he would not obey it if it were, in what sense would he not obey it? Just he wouldn't obey it. You mean he would obey it?

Paul Robeson: Well, I don't know what his, his thinking was, but he said that he would not obey it. He didn't believe that it should be obeyed. That wasn't right. Wasn't registered right away.

Senator: Registered? Well, you are right. Registered? Well, then you would violate the law.

Paul Robeson: Then I would violate the law.

Senator: Oh I see. So then you would violate the law and you would feel that you were.

Paul Robeson: I would say this to me, I would I would fight as a I would really fight it as a as a real piece of American fascism.

Senator: You see what I'm what I'm talking about is after it's declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, then you would defy it.

Paul Robeson: Let me put it this way, Senator. Let's suppose a Frenchman at a certain time is now faced with a law passed by Vichy. Would you expect that Frenchman to have observed it under the Vichy government?

Senator: No, it wouldn't be the law.

Paul Robeson: Why not? Because they were. They were friends at that period. Yes, but they were the government of France. There's a new government there now, and I'm not talking about at that time. Would you have expected those men who helped our American boys come up and destroy?

Senator: Well, is that the way you classify this law?

Paul Robeson: I would specify it exactly in that way.

Senator: I see. Then you would not act. Then you would not obey it.

Paul Robeson: That's right. As an anti-fascist, I would not obey.

Senator: Now, you, you've recited here that your father was a slave. That's right. You are now independent.

Paul Robeson: Am I independent? Well, are you waiting, Senator?

Senator: You were independent economically. You occupy a high position in American society. You're proud of it. You've been a service in many ways. Now, that's all been achieved in one generation. Can you think of any other country on the face of the earth for such an opportunity has been.

Paul Robeson: Yes, partly. I would say that. Yes, I would say that.

Senator: Not one. Now, you don't mean to say that Russian people have any opportunity at all to be anything more than slaves, does it? Or you said a while ago, infinitely more opportunity.

Paul Robeson: Senator, you said a while ago you were full of communism or approved of communism for the deeds of some. Oh, yes. Yeah. They've liberated the whole people in many.

Senator: Liberated the whole people. They've liquidated them mostly.

Paul Robeson: No no no no no no, not nearly every liquidated as many as the Negroes were liquidated in slavery or could be liquidated today in many parts of the South.

Senator: Well, now there's nobody being liquidated in America today.
Paul Robeson: Well, why do we have. Why should why should the lynching bill be on the on the calendar practically now? Anti-Lynching bill? Well, I don't know why it should be. Why all this excitement about civil rights if they aren't necessary?