“The California Report” on The John Birch Society

In 1963, the California Senate released a document that put The John Birch Society on trial in the court of public opinion. “The California Report” — officially the Report of the Senate Factfinding Subcommittee on Un-American Activities — claimed to examine whether Robert Welch’s organization was “un-American.” What it produced instead was a record of Cold War suspicion, legislative pressure, and at the very end, an admission that the charges did not hold.

The investigation unfolded with Welch himself inviting scrutiny. He sent a telegram to Governor Pat Brown and Senator Hugh Burns, volunteering to appear before their committee. Burns acknowledged the offer but announced the inquiry would proceed in executive session, through affidavits and staff investigations rather than public hearings. Almost immediately, newspapers amplified the controversy. Critics of the Society demanded it be denounced as fascist; members just as forcefully demanded their accusers be exposed as Communist operatives. The committee soon faced an avalanche of letters — evidence of how deeply the Society’s presence in California unsettled the political establishment.

Yet for all the sensationalism — claims of secrecy, fascism, and anti-Semitism — the committee had to concede in its final conclusion: “Our investigation and study was requested by the society, which had been publicly charged with being a secret, fascist, subversive, un-American, anti-Semitic organization. We have not found any of these accusations to be supported by the evidence.”

That single sentence speaks louder than all the innuendo preceding it. “The California Report“ tried to cast a patriotic, anti-Communist organization as suspect. Instead, it left behind a document that inadvertently cleared the Society of the most damning charges. For students of Cold War politics, state repression, and the long contest over American sovereignty, this report is indispensable. It shows how government power can be bent toward intimidation, but also how the facts, once laid out, could not be made to condemn. (1963, 62pp)