Richard Nixon

== U.S. House of Representatives (1947–1950) ==
{{see also|1946 California's 12th congressional district election}}
[[File:Nixonflyer1946.jpg|thumb|left|Nixon's 1946 congressional campaign flyer]]
Republicans in [[California's 12th congressional district]] were frustrated by their inability to defeat Democratic representative [[Jerry Voorhis]], and they sought a consensus candidate who would run a strong campaign against him. In 1945, they formed a "Committee of 100" to decide on a candidate, hoping to avoid internal dissensions which had led to previous Voorhis victories. After the committee failed to attract higher-profile candidates, Herman Perry, manager of Whittier's [[Bank of America]] branch, suggested Nixon, a family friend with whom he had served on Whittier College's board of trustees before the war. Perry wrote to Nixon in [[Baltimore]], and after a night of excited conversation with his wife, Nixon gave Perry an enthused response. Nixon flew to California and was selected by the committee. When he left the Navy at the start of 1946, Nixon and his wife returned to Whittier, where he began a year of intensive campaigning.{{sfn|Parmet|pp=91–96}}{{sfn|Gellman|pp=27–28}} He contended that Voorhis had been ineffective as a representative and suggested that Voorhis's endorsement by a group linked to Communists meant that Voorhis must have radical views.{{sfn|Parmet|pp=111–113}} Nixon won the election, receiving 65,586 votes to Voorhis's 49,994.{{sfn|Gellman|p=82}}

In June 1947, Nixon supported the [[Taft–Hartley Act]], a federal law that monitors the activities and power of labor unions, and he served on the [[United States House Committee on Education and Labor|Education and Labor Committee]]. In August 1947, he became one of 19 House members to serve on the [[Herter Committee]],<ref name=Final>
{{cite web
|title=Final Report on Foreign Aid of the House Select Committee on Foreign Aid
|publisher = Marshall Foundation
|url=http://www.marshallfoundation.org/library/wp-content/uploads/sites/16/2014/04/Studies_Prior_to_the_Marshall_Plan.pdf 
|date=May 1, 1948
|access-date = May 30, 2020
|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20151221035849/http://www.marshallfoundation.org/library/wp-content/uploads/sites/16/2014/04/Studies_Prior_to_the_Marshall_Plan.pdf
|archive-date = December 21, 2015
|url-status = live}}</ref> which went to Europe to report on the need for U.S. foreign aid. Nixon was the youngest member of the committee and the only Westerner.{{sfn|Gellman|pp=105–107, 125–126}} Advocacy by Herter Committee members, including Nixon, led to congressional passage of the [[Marshall Plan]].{{sfn|Morris|p=365}}

In his memoirs, Nixon wrote that he joined the [[House Un-American Activities Committee]] (HUAC) "at the end of 1947". However, he was already a HUAC member in early February 1947, when he heard "Enemy Number One" [[Gerhard Eisler]] and his sister [[Ruth Fischer]] testify. On February 18, 1947, Nixon referred to Eisler's belligerence toward HUAC in his maiden speech to the House. Also by early February 1947, fellow U.S. Representative [[Charles J. Kersten]] had introduced him to Father [[John Francis Cronin]] in Baltimore. Cronin shared with Nixon his 1945 privately circulated paper "The Problem of American Communism in 1945",<ref>{{cite web
| first = John Francis
| last = Cronin
| authorlink = John Francis Cronin
| title = The Problem of American Communism in 1945: Facts and Recommendations
| publisher = A Confidential Study for Private Circulation
| url = http://mdhistory.net/hiss/cronin-report.pdf
| date = October 29, 1945
| access-date = July 26, 2017
| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130514131612/http://mdhistory.net/hiss/cronin-report.pdf
| archive-date = May 14, 2013
| url-status = live
}}</ref> with much information from the FBI's [[William C. Sullivan]] who by 1961 headed domestic intelligence under [[J. Edgar Hoover]].<ref name="NixonV1">
{{cite book
| first = Stephen E.
| last = Ambrose
| authorlink = Stephen E. Ambrose
| title = Nixon Volume I: The Education of a Politician 1913–1962
| publisher = Simon and Schuster
| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Q-5zAgAAQBAJ
| pages = 144–147
| date = March 18, 2014
| access-date = July 26, 2017| isbn = 978-1-4767-4588-6
}}</ref>
By May 1948, Nixon had co-sponsored the [[Mundt–Nixon Bill]] to implement "a new approach to the complicated problem of internal communist subversion{{nbsp}}... It provided for registration of all [[CPUSA|Communist Party]] members and required a statement of the source of all printed and broadcast material issued by organizations that were found to be Communist fronts." He served as floor manager for the Republican Party. On May 19, 1948, the bill passed the House by 319 to 58, but later it failed to pass the Senate.{{sfn|Nixon|1978|loc=Running for Congress: 1946}} The Nixon Library cites this bill's passage as Nixon's first significant victory in Congress.<ref>{{cite web |title=Timeline |url=https://www.nixonlibrary.gov/thetimes/timeline/ |url-status=dead |publisher=Nixon Library |access-date=April 2, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170403015648/https://www.nixonlibrary.gov/thetimes/timeline/ |archive-date=April 3, 2017}}</ref>
[[File:Congressman Richard Nixon, Yorba Linda, circa April 1950 (5494854338).jpg|thumb|Nixon in [[Yorba Linda, California]], {{ca|April 1950}}]]

Nixon first gained national attention in August 1948, when his persistence as a House Un-American Activities Committee member helped break the [[Alger Hiss]] spy case. While many doubted [[Whittaker Chambers]]'s allegations that Hiss, a former [[United States Department of State|State Department]] official, had been a [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] spy, Nixon believed them to be true and pressed for the committee to continue its investigation. After Hiss filed suit, alleging defamation, Chambers produced documents corroborating his allegations, including paper and [[microfilm]] copies that Chambers turned over to House investigators after hiding them overnight in a field; they became known as the "[[Pumpkin papers|Pumpkin Papers]]".{{sfn|Black|pp=129–135}} Hiss was convicted of [[perjury]] in 1950 for denying under oath he had passed documents to Chambers.{{sfn|Gellman|pp=239–241}} In 1948, Nixon successfully [[cross-filed]] as a candidate in his district, winning both major party primaries,{{sfn|Morris|p=381}} and was comfortably reelected.{{sfn|Nixon Library, Congressman}}
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