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1948. Arthur Drayton was dismissed from government service after 25 years as a postal clerk under President Harry Truman's Loyalty Order. "Guilty" of being a member of the International Worker's Order, proscribed by the Attorney General, the poems and plays he wrote were held against him at his loyalty hearing. |
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They asked me why I joined the IWO. I told them it provided an outlet for me to discuss social issues with Black people like myself, and to present programs on Negro history. I liked the organization. I liked the people in it. They told me it was subversive. At the end, they asked if there was anything I wished to say. I remember I had this outraged feeling of having to testify in this manner in a free country. Was it because I was Black? Most people I knew who were expelled from the Post Office were Blacks or Jews. I thought of Socrates having to testify. I told them being called disloyal sickened my heart and weighed on my soul. Then I quoted these lines from Othello:
Good name in man or woman, dear my lord, |
