The Press: The Case of Senator X

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Once the scandal was announced in the Senate, however, several of those in the Senate and in the press who last year were isolationists took up the cudgels for Senator Walsh. Missouri's Bennett Clark demanded an immediate Senate investigation of "the old hussy who runs the New York Post" (38-year-old Dorothy Schiff Backer). Senators Wheeler and Nye denounced the Post's exposé as a "diabolical attempt" to smear all isolationists. Senator Nye said he knew for a fact that "a secret society" had been operating for two years to gather smear material.

Uncontrite. the Post promptly called Senator Barkley's report a "whitewash." demanded the FBI's report be made public, asked for a full Senate investigation.

It got hold of Beekman again, published his affidavit declaring the FBI had third-degreed him into admitting that he had mistaken Senator Walsh for another man, called ''Doc." from Connecticut.

The known facts made only one thing indisputable: either a serious scandal was being hushed up or a really diabolical libel had been perpetrated.