Second Red Scare

The Second Red Scare was a period of anti-communist political repression in the United States during the 1950s. During this period, U.S. authorities imprisoned hundreds of people and over 10,000 lost their jobs. Senator Joseph McCarthy began the Second Red Scare in February 1950 when he claimed that over 200 U.S. State Department officials were secretly communists. He later expanded his list to thousands of government officials. The Internal Security Act required communist and anti-imperialist organizations to report all of their members to the U.S. government. In 1954, Congress passed the Communist Control Act, preventing communists from having passports or holding government office.