Photograph of a group of demonstrators carrying picket signs denouncing the Mundt-Nixon Bill. The bill, authored by U.S. Senator Karl Mundt of South Dakota, and U.S. Rep. Richard Nixon of California, required all members of the Communist Party of the United States to register with the government. The bill passed the House of Representatives on May 21, 1948, but died because the U.S. Senate failed to adopt it. However, the bill's provisions, and even harsher measures aimed at squelching Communism, were contained in the Internal Security Act of 1950, commonly known as the McCarran Act. The demonstrators signs proclaim that citizens "would be bound and gagged" and the U.S. would become a police state "if you let Congress pass the Mundt Bill."
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