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Elizabeth Gurley Flynn over the partition of Finland by Germany and the Soviet
Union. But international affairs were, in reality, only a minor factor in growing red
scare. The real target was the workers' movement and the CIO itself, and the
Communist Party was in large part a straw target. The Congressional Committee
Investigating Un-American Activities, chaired by Martin Dies, had for many
months been chasing Communists with much fanfare and fervor, as a way to
intimidate the labor movement and the broader left. In early 1940, the Dies
Committee trained its sights on the Baltimore Communist Party, precipitating a
raid on the party's offices, then dragging leading Maryland Communists to
Washington to testify ostensibly on subversive materials found in the raid. Dr.
Albert Blumberg, secretary of the Maryland party and an activist in the CIO from
its inception in the region, refused to answer most of the committee's question and
was, for months, threatened with jail. Later that year the committee found
supposed evidence of fraudulent signatures on Baltimore CP election petitions,
and, in a major media event, several Communists, including Dorothy Blumberg,
wife of Albert Blumberg, were tried and convicted on charges stemming from this
investigation.^

Still, in late 1939, red-baiting and factionalism were relatively moderate, and
the left-center alliance, though battered, was holding. All in all, despite limitations,
the CIO in the Baltimore region could, at the end of the decade, look back with
some satisfaction and look forward with some optimism. Even though the
Baltimore workers' movement was not as militant or as highly organized as some,
the border town of Baltimore had become - especially when compared to 1930 or
even 1935 — a real labor movement town.