Emigrant Psychoanalysts in the USA and the FBI Archives

Abstract

Interest in the fate of the German psychoanalysts who had to flee Hitler's Germany and find refuge in a new nation, such as the United States, has increased. The ‘émigré research’ shows that several themes recur: (1) the theme of ‘loss’ of one's culture, homeland, language, and family; and (2) the ambiva-lent welcome these émigrés received in their new country. We describe the political-social-cultural context that existed in the United States during the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. Documentary evidence found in the FBI files of three émigré psychoanalysts, Clara Happel, Martin Grotjahn, and Otto Fenichel, are then presented in combination with other source material. This provides a provisional impression of how each of these three individuals experienced their emigration. As such, it gives us elements of a history. The FBI documents suggest that the American atmosphere of political insecurity and fear-based ethnocentric nationalism may have reinforced their old fears of National Socialism, and contributed to their inclination to inhibit or seal off parts of them-selves and their personal histories in order to adapt to their new home and become Americanized. They abandoned the rich social, cultural, political tradition that was part of European psychoanalysis. Finally, we look at these elements of a history in order to ask a larger question about the appropriate balance between a liberal democratic government's right to protect itself from internal and external threats on the one hand, or crossover into the blatant invasion of civil rights and due process on the other.

Wilhelm Reich's self‐censorship after his arrest as an enemy alien: The chilling effect of an illegal imprisonment

“…The authors, writing with Mary Hill, return to this question in their 2004 article, ‘Emigrant psychoanalysts in the USA and the FBI archives’. In a section entitled ‘Sounds of Silence,’ Goggin and Goggin claim that: “The FBI surveillance carried out on the émigré psychoanalysts contributed to a self‐imposed silencing of their political views” (Goggin et al ., , p. 78). Goggin and Goggin note that a form of silencing of Marxist psychoanalysts actually began in Europe, with the attempts by Anna Freud and Ernest Jones, with Sigmund Freud's approval, to make psychoanalysis “politically neutral” so that it might continue in Germany under National Socialism (Goggin et al ., , pp.…”

“…As exemplars of their analysis, they discuss in some detail the files on Clara Happel, Martin Grotjahn and Otto Fenichel. Of the three only Clara Happel was arrested as an enemy alien: she was taken into custody a few days before Reich and was paroled on 20 January 1942; she committed suicide three years later (Goggin et al ., , p. 80). Her experiences led to suicide; did Reich's lead to self‐censorship?…”

“…The head of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, began his career working for Attorney General Palmer, of the notorious Palmer raids which took place during the US's first ‘Red Scare,’ in 1919–1920. That Red Scare “was an exaggerated reaction to the demands of and strikes by labor organizations, many of whom were immigrants…” (Goggin et al ., , p. 76; see also Goldstein, , p. 551).…”

In all questions, my interest is not in the individual people but in the analytic movement as a whole. It will be hard enough here in Europe in the times to come to keep it going. After all, we are just a handful of people who really have that in mind &

“…327 It is beyond the scope of this paper to describe how this complex settlement was achieved and all the difficulties the refugees had to face. Jacoby (1983), Palmier (1987), Fisher (1992, Kirsner (2000), Blum (2003) and Goggin et al (2004) have all dealt in great detail with the difficulties that Die Linke had to face even in California, particularly during the late 1940s and early 1950s during the era of Senator Joseph McCarthy. But just think of what happened particularly in the New York Psychoanalytic Society with the arrival of the Viennese, and the splits caused by Horney, Radó and so on.…”

Contemporary psychoanalytic views on the experience of immigration.

“…In addition, many of these analysts experienced an ambivalent reception in their adoptive countries. In the United States and elsewhere, these analysts adapted to ethnocentrisms and anti-Semitism, which, once more, raised anxiety about safety and annihilation (Gifford, 2003; Goggin, Goggin, & Hill, 2004). It has been noted that in their efforts to cope with the challenges of dislocation, and to establish a sense of safety in the countries in which they had sought new lives, many analysts abandoned the social, cultural, and political traditions that had been an inherent part of psychoanalysis in Europe (Jacoby, 1986), tending, instead, to “seal off parts of themselves and their personal histories” (Zaretsky, 2005, p. 11).…”