November 1939: FBI Establishes Detention Program for Wartime

Director of the FBI J. Edgar Hoover orders the bureau to begin preparing a list of individuals to be closely monitored and/or detained in the event of a national emergency or war. The list is to be comprised of persons considered to have strong “Nazi” and “Communist tendencies.” The FBI is ordered to collect information on suspected individuals from employment records, school records, newspapers, and “confidential sources of information.” The list will become part of the FBI’s Custodial Detention Program in 1940 (see November 1940-1943). [New York Times, 10/23/1975; Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, 5/1976, pp. 412]