Early 1943-1971: FBI Maintains Detention List for National Emergency

The FBI maintains a “Security Index” of US citizens that are to be targeted for surveillance and/or detention in the event of a national emergency or war. The list is carried over from the FBI’s Custodial Detention Program, which was abolished by the attorney general in 1943 (see 1943 and November 1940-1943). A government source tells the New York Times that the purpose of the Security Index is to “assist in rounding up people who might commit sabotage or espionage” in the event of a disaster. The index is at first composed mostly of suspected communists, but is later expanded to include a wide range of political groups. By the 1960s, names on the list include professors, teachers, labor union organizers, authors, journalists, doctors, scientists, and clergymen. The names on the Security Index are broken down into three categories: leaders of “subversive” groups, supporters of such groups, and supporters of such groups considered to be violent. At its peak in the late 1960s, the FBI’s Security Index reportedly lists more than 26,000 citizens. FBI Special Agent M. Wesley Swearingen will later say the number is actually much higher, claiming 50,000 people are on the list in Chicago alone. Sources will later tell the New York Times that the list includes several people who pose “no genuine internal security threat.” The list is utilized by the FBI’s secret COINTELPRO program, which is used to discredit anti-war and other “New Left” groups. The Security Index will be transferred to the Administrative Index within the FBI in late 1971 (see Late 1971). [New York Times, 8/3/1975; New York Times, 10/23/1975; New York Times, 4/29/1976; Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, 5/1976, pp. 420-421; Chicago Tribune, 3/2/1986]