Of course, there is no moral equivalence between US spies and Soviet spies, since there is no moral equivalence between subjugation to the totalitarian soviet state (which soviet spies were fighting for) and the liberal democratic capitalism of what remained of the West.

Violence is a nasty thing. But violence in service of slavery is a far nastier thing than violence in defense of human rights and freedoms.

That's an interesting defence of McCarthyism, that we must do away with American liberty because otherwise we will lose it to the Soviets.

+1 best summary of McCarthyism ever.

>>> Espionage efforts are one thing, but when people are jailed for "inciting rebellion" for the "crime" of distributing the writings of Karl Marx,

Could you provide a bit more information on this - who was jailed solely for distributing the works of Karl Marx and for how long?

Actually, that is what Yates v. United States turned on and why after the Supreme Court said that distributing literature could not be sufficient but must be paired with actual concrete steps to make it happen there was only one further conviction under the Smith Act (for a Communist Party member who was also a martial arts instructor).

Read Yates v. United States. The conviction was reversed and it brought an end to Smith Act prosecutions of the Communist Party.

Decision at: http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0354...

Oral argument at: http://www.oyez.org/cases/1950-1959/1956/1956_6

Yates also largely overruled Whitney v. California (and set up the formal overrule in Brandenburg). It is worth noting however that although the Supreme Court (this was decades before Yates) held that Communist Party membership itself could be subject to prosecution, Brandeis's concurrence apparently lead the governor of the state to pardon Whitney.