Harvey Klehr

Harvey Elliott Klehr (born December 25, 1945) is a professor of politics and history at Emory University. Klehr is known for his books on the subject of the American Communist movement, and on Soviet espionage in America (many written jointly with John Earl Haynes).

He was born in Newark, New Jersey. He received his undergraduate degree from Franklin and Marshall College in 1967. He received his doctorate from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1971, after defending a dissertation entitled The Theory of American Exceptionalism.

Klehr later recalled that his interest in the American radical left had been shaped by the domestic political upheaval of the era of the Vietnam War during which he had attended college. In 2010, Klehr wrote:

"...I originally intended to study traditional American politics, but became distracted by the upheavals of the era. I considered myself on the political left, but hardly a revolutionary. Some of my friends and classmates, however, were associated with the Southern Student Organizing Committee (SSOC), a spin-off of Students for a Democratic Society....

"Two political events from those tumultuous years gave me my lifetime research agenda. During the 1968 presidential election, a number of radicals, including some I knew, supported George Wallace for president. They certainly had no sympathy for the Alabama governor, but argued that his election would precipitate an American revolution. Their rationale was that a dose of fascism would prepare the way for American radicalism....

"After the American incursion into Cambodia in 1970, student protestors held a mass meeting on the Chapel Hill campus. A number of speakers called for a student strike to shut down the university. My advisor, Dr Lewis Lipsitz, had been one of the most prominent leftists on campus for many years.... When Lew urged the crowd not to strike since a university should not be closed down, he was booed.

...
Wikipedia