Mr. O’Connell. No; I don’t have any idea.
Mr. Scherer. Do you know where he lives?
Mr. O’Connell. Well, the last I knew he was living in New York. He actually, I think, comes from New Jersey and I think he is married to a banker’s daughter who comes from wealthy family, if I remember correctly, in New Jersey.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee the circumstances under which the Progressive Party contributed your services to the National Committee To Defeat the Mundt Bill?
Mr. O’Connell. Well, in connection with the—there were hearings being held in the Senate, as I stated yesterday, by a subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee in 1948. I think those hearings were being presided over by former Senator Ferguson and Senator Langer of North Dakota was a member of the committee.
If I remember correctly, we received a communication from the national office of the Progressive Party, I think particularly from Mr. C. B. Baldwin, who was then executive vice chairman, if I remember rightly, asking us to send, the Progressive Party of the State of Washington, to send somebody to Washington to testify at this hearing before the Senate Judiciary subcommittee, and I was delegated by the Progressive Party in the State of Washington to come to testify at that hearing. I also think Mr. Russell Fluent, who was chairman of the Progressive Party at that time—he was also incumbent Democratic State treasurer of the State of Washington, was also a delegate, and I think the two of us came down here to testify and I said yesterday while we were waiting to testify the hearings had been going on several days, Senator Ferguson adjourned the hearings and Senator Langer—a considerable number of the people there were upset because they had waited around to be heard and there was considerable protestation, as I remember, about the hearings being adjourned and so Senator Langer asked the people who had not testified to come to his office or, rather, his committee room.
As I remember then he was chairman of the Committee on Post Offices and Post Roads of the Senate, and we adjourned to that particular committee room and had a meeting there. I can’t remember now the precise details of the situation, whether it was Senator Langer or somebody in the group or who it was who suggested a committee ought to be formed to defeat the bill. I know Senator Langer suggested I become chairman of the committee. He had known me as a member of Congress and I have known him for a long time. North Dakota and Montana are very close together and our political situations are quite similar and so on.
So it was at that meeting it was decided I should become chairman, that I should stay to see what could be done to lobby and so forth, to see what could be done to defeat the legislation. I think arrangements were then made with the Progressive Party in the State of Washington for me to stay down here during the month or so that was necessary and to have my salary advanced by the Progressive Party.
Mr. Tavenner. What was the occasion for your return to Washington in March of 1950?
Mr. O’Connell. As I remember, the legislation had again been reintroduced. It had not cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee in 1948 by the time of congressional adjournment, then, but I think the legislation was reintroduced in the next session of Congress and if I remember correctly it passed, it had already passed the House and it was pending in the Senate, and hearings were being held and were to be held in the Senate in March of 1950.