J. Edgar Hoover

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

John Edgar Hoover
J. Edgar Hoover

J. Edgar Hoover, photographed September 28, 1961
In office
March 22, 1935 – May 2, 1972
Succeeded by L. Patrick Gray
In office
May 10, 1924 – March 22, 1935
Preceded by William J. Burns
Born January 1, 1895(1895-01-01)
Washington, D.C.
Died May 2, 1972 (aged 77)
Washington, D.C.
Religion Presbyterianism
Signature J. Edgar Hoover's signature

John Edgar Hoover (January 1, 1895 – May 2, 1972), known popularly as J. Edgar Hoover, was the first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of the United States. Appointed director of the Bureau of Investigation—predecessor to the FBI—in 1924, he was instrumental in founding the FBI in 1935, where he remained director until his death in 1972. During his life, Hoover was highly regarded by much of the U.S. public, but since his death various allegations have tarnished this image.

Hoover's leadership spanned eight presidential administrations, encompassed Prohibition, the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean War, the Cold War, and the Vietnam War. During this time, the United States moved from being a rural nation with strong isolationist tendencies to an urbanized superpower.

From nearly the beginning of his career with the FBI,[1] Hoover was accused of exceeding and abusing his authority, criticism that grew especially strong in the 1960s. He is known to have investigated individuals and groups because of their political beliefs rather than their suspected criminal activity, as well as using the FBI for other illegal activities, such as burglaries and illegal wiretaps.[2] Hoover frequently fired FBI agents by singling out those who he thought "looked stupid like truck drivers" or he considered to be "pinheads."[3] He also relocated agents who had displeased him to career-ending assignments and locations. Melvin Purvis was a prime example; he was one of the more effective agents in capturing and breaking up 1930s gangs and received substantial public recognition, but a jealous Hoover maneuvered him out of the FBI.[4] It is because of Hoover's long and controversial reign that FBI directors are now limited to 10-year terms.[5]

Contents

[edit] Early life and education

Hoover was born on New Year's Day in 1895 in Washington, D.C., to Anna Marie Scheitlin and Dickerson Naylor Hoover, Sr., and grew up in the Eastern Market section of the city. Few details are known of his early years; his birth certificate was not filed until 1938. What little is known about his upbringing generally can be traced back to a single 1937 profile by journalist Jack Alexander. Hoover was educated at George Washington University, graduating in 1917 with a law degree. During his time there, he worked at the Library of Congress[6] and also became a member of Kappa Alpha Order (Alpha Nu 1914). While a law student, Hoover became interested in the career of Anthony Comstock, the New York City U.S. Postal Inspector, who waged prolonged campaigns against fraud and vice (as well as pornography and information on birth control) a generation earlier. Hoover is thought to have studied Comstock's methods and modeled his early career on Comstock's reputation for relentless pursuit and occasional procedural violations in crime fighting.

[edit] FBI career

Federal Bureau of Investigation
Abbreviation FBI
Seal of the Federal Bureau of Investigation

During World War I, Hoover found work with the Justice Department. He soon proved himself capable and was promoted to head of the Enemy Aliens Registration Section. In 1919, he became head of the new General Intelligence Division of the Justice Department (see the Palmer Raids). From there, in 1921, he joined the Bureau of Investigation as deputy head, and in 1924, the Attorney General made him the acting director. On May 10, 1924, Hoover was appointed by President Calvin Coolidge to be the sixth director of the Bureau of Investigation, following President Warren Harding's death and in response to allegations that the prior director, William J. Burns, was involved in the financial scandal(s) of the Harding administration. When Hoover took over the Bureau of Investigation, it had approximately 650 employees, including 441 Special Agents.

[edit] Gangster wars

In the early thirties, there was an epidemic of bank robberies in the Midwest orchestrated by colorful criminal gangs who took advantage of superior firepower and fast get-away cars to bedevil local law enforcement agencies. To the chagrin and increasing discomfort of authorities, such robbers were often viewed as somewhat noble in their assaults upon the banking industry, which at the time was evicting many farmers from their homesteads. That empathy reached the point that many of these desperadoes, particularly the dashing John Dillinger (who became famous for leaping over bank cages and his repeated escapes from jails and police traps), were de facto folk heroes whose exploits frequently captured headlines. State officials began to implore Washington to aid them in containing this lawlessness. The fact that the robbers frequently took stolen cars across state lines (a federal offense) gave Hoover and his men the authority to pursue them. Things did not go as planned, however, and there were some embarrassing foul-ups on the part of the FBI, particularly clashes with the Dillinger gang (actually led by "Handsome" Harry Pierpont).

Hoover in 1935.
Hoover in 1935.

A raid on a summer lodge named "Little Bohemia" in Manitowish Waters, Wisconsin, left an agent and a hapless civilian bystander dead, along with others wounded. All the gangsters escaped. Hoover realized that his job was now on the line, and he pulled out all stops to capture the culprits. Hoover was particularly fixated on eliminating Dillinger, whose misdeeds he considered to be insults aimed directly at him and "his" bureau. In late July 1934, Melvin Purvis, the Director of Operations in the Chicago office, received a tip on the whereabouts of John Dillinger. That paid off when the gangster was cut down in a hail of gunfire outside the Biograph Theater.

Because of several highly-publicized captures or shootings of outlaws and bank robbers including Dillinger, Alvin Karpis, and Machine Gun Kelly, the Bureau's powers were broadened and it was re-named the Federal Bureau of Investigation in 1935. In 1939, the FBI became pre-eminent in the field of domestic intelligence. Hoover made changes, such as expanding and combining fingerprint files in the Identification Division to compile the largest collection of fingerprints ever.[7][8]

Hoover also helped to greatly expand the FBI's recruitment and create the FBI Laboratory, a division established in 1932 to examine evidence found by the FBI.[citation needed]

[edit] Investigation of subversion and radicals

Hoover was concerned about subversion, and under his leadership, the FBI spied upon tens of thousands of suspected subversives and radicals. Hoover tended to exaggerate the dangers of subversives, and many times overstepped his bounds in his pursuit of eliminating that perceived threat.[9]

The FBI had some successes against actual subversives and spies. For example, in the Quirin affair during World War II, German U-boats set two small groups of Nazi agents ashore in Florida and Long Island to cause acts of sabotage within the country. Although the members of these teams were apprehended, this was due entirely to the fact that one of the would-be saboteurs went to the FBI and confessed.[10] Nevertheless, President Harry Truman wrote in his memoirs: "The country had reason to be proud of and have confidence in our security agencies. They had kept us almost totally free of sabotage and espionage during the World War II".[1]

Another example of Hoover's concern over subversion is his handling of the Venona Project. The FBI inherited a pre-World War II joint project with the British to eavesdrop on Soviet spies in the UK and the United States. Hoover kept the intercepts — America's greatest counterintelligence secret — in a locked safe in his office, choosing not to inform Truman, his Attorney General McGraith, or two Secretaries of State — Dean Acheson and General George Marshall — while they held office. He informed the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of the Venona Project in 1952.

According to documents declassified in 2007, Hoover maintained a list of 12,000 Americans suspected of disloyalty with the intention of detaining them and to do so by suspending the writ of habeas corpus. Hoover submitted his plan to President Harry Truman at the outbreak of the Korean War, but there is no evidence that Truman accepted the plan.[11]

[edit] COINTELPRO years

In 1956, Hoover was becoming increasingly frustrated by Supreme Court decisions that limited the Justice Department's ability to prosecute Communists. At this time he formalized a covert "dirty tricks" program under the name COINTELPRO.[12] This program remained in place until it was revealed to the public in 1971, and was the cause of some of the harshest criticism of Hoover and the FBI. COINTELPRO was first used to disrupt the Communist Party, and later such organizations such as the Black Panther Party, Martin Luther King, Jr.'s SCLC, the Ku Klux Klan, and others. Its methods included infiltration, burglaries, illegal wiretaps, planting forged documents and spreading false rumors about key members of target organizations.[13] Some authors have charged that COINTELPRO methods also included inciting violence and arranging murders.[14] In 1975, the activities of COINTELPRO were investigated by the Senate Church Committee and declared illegal and contrary to the Constitution.[15]

Hoover amassed significant power by collecting files containing large amounts of compromising and potentially embarrassing information on many powerful people, especially politicians. According to Laurence Silberman, appointed Deputy Attorney General in early 1974, Director Clarence M. Kelley thought such files either did not exist or had been destroyed. After The Washington Post broke a story in January 1975, Kelley searched and found them in his outer office. The House Judiciary Committee then demanded that Silberman testify about them. An extensive investigation of Hoover's files by David Garrow showed that Hoover and next-in-command William Sullivan, as well as the FBI itself as an agency, were responsible.

In 1956, several years before he targeted King, Hoover had a public showdown with T.R.M. Howard, a civil rights leader from Mound Bayou, Mississippi. During a national speaking tour, Howard had criticized the FBI's failure to thoroughly investigate the racially-motivated murders of George W. Lee, Lamar Smith (activist), and Emmett Till. Hoover not only wrote an open letter to the press singling out these statements as "irresponsible" but secretly enlisted the help of NAACP attorney Thurgood Marshall in a campaign to discredit Howard.

[edit] Response to Mafia and civil rights groups

In the 1950s, evidence of Hoover's unwillingness to focus FBI resources on the Mafia became grist for the media and his many detractors, after famed muckraker Jack Anderson exposed the immense scope of the Mafia's organized crime network, a threat Hoover had long downplayed. Hoover's retaliation and continual harassment of Anderson lasted into the 1970s. Hoover has also been accused of trying to undermine the reputations of members of the civil rights movement. His alleged treatment of actress Jean Seberg and Martin Luther King, Jr. are two such examples. It is of great irony that Hoover, considered by most peoople to be guilty of flagrant racist acts in his persecution of King and others, was probably more responsible than anyone else for the virtual destruciton of the Ku Klux Klan which he considered to be a dangerous subversive group. So successful was Hoover in destroying the Klan that at one time, one out three KKK members was believed to be an active FBI informant.

Hoover personally directed the FBI investigation into the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The House Select Committee on Assassinations issued a report in 1979 critical of the performance by the FBI, the Warren Commission as well as other agencies. The report also criticized what it characterized as the FBI's reluctance to thoroughly investigate the possibility of a conspiracy to assassinate the president.[16]

[edit] Late career and death

Presidents Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy, and Lyndon B. Johnson each considered firing Hoover but concluded that the political cost of doing so would be too great.[17]

Hoover maintained strong support in Congress until his death in 1972 from the effects of high blood pressure. [18] Operational command of the Bureau passed to Associate Director Clyde Tolson. Soon thereafter, President Nixon appointed L. Patrick Gray, a Justice Department official with no FBI experience, as Acting Director, with W. Mark Felt remaining as Associate Director.

[edit] Legacy

Hoover was a consultant to Warner Brothers on a 1959 theatrical film about the FBI, The FBI Story, and in 1965 on Warner Brothers' long-running spin-off television series, The F.B.I.. Hoover personally made sure that Warner Brothers would portray the FBI more favorably than other crime dramas of the times.

In 1979, the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) under Senator Richard Schweiker, which had re-opened the investigation into the assassination of President Kennedy, reported that Hoover's FBI "failed to investigate adequately the possibility of a conspiracy to assassinate the President." The HSCA further reported that Hoover's FBI "was deficient in its sharing of information with other agencies and departments." As a result, various conspiracy theories abound regarding the negligence of Hoover's leadership in performing due diligence with regard to the JFK assassination.[19]

The FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C. is named after Hoover. Because of the controversial nature of Hoover's legacy, there have been periodic proposals to rename it. In 2001, Senator Harry Reid sponsored an amendment to strip Hoover's name from the building. "J. Edgar Hoover's name on the FBI building is a stain on the building," Reid said.[20] The amendment was not adopted by the Senate.

[edit] Personal life

FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and Associate FBI Director Clyde Tolson.
FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and Associate FBI Director Clyde Tolson.

Hoover was a lifelong bachelor, and since at least the 1940s, rumors have circulated that he was homosexual, but no hard evidence of these claims has yet arisen.[21] It has also been suggested that his long association with Clyde Tolson, an associate director of the FBI who was also Hoover's heir, was that of a gay couple.[22] Some authors have dismissed the rumors about Hoover's sexuality and his relationship with Tolson in particular as unlikely,[23] while others have described them as probable or even "confirmed",[24] and still others have reported them without stating an opinion.[25] Attorney Roy Cohn,[26] an associate of Hoover during the '50s investigations of Communists and himself a closeted homosexual, opined that Hoover was too frightened of his own sexuality to have anything approaching a normal sexual or romantic relationship.

Hoover described Tolson as his alter ego: the men not only worked closely together during the day, but also took meals, went to night clubs and vacationed together.[27] The exceedingly close relationship between the two is often cited as evidence that the two were lovers, though some FBI employees who knew them, such as Felt, say that the relationship was merely "brotherly". Agents also report that Tolson was picked up first and dropped off last by the vehicle that transported Hoover to and from his office every day.

Tolson inherited Hoover's estate worth approximately USD$551,000 and moved into his home, having also accepted the American flag that draped Hoover's casket. Tolson is buried a few yards away from Hoover in the Congressional Cemetery.

Hoover's biographer Richard Hack[28] reports that Hoover was romantically linked to actress Dorothy Lamour in the late '30s and early '40s, and that after Hoover's death, Lamour did not deny rumors that she'd had an affair with Hoover in the years between her two marriages. Hack additionally reports that during the '40s and '50s, Hoover so often attended social events with Lela Rogers, the divorced mother of dancer and actress Ginger Rogers, that many of their mutual friends assumed the pair would eventually marry.

In his 1993 biography Official and Confidential: The Secret Life of J Edgar Hoover, Anthony Summers quoted a witness who said to have seen Hoover engaging in cross-dressing and homosexual acts on two occasions in the 1950s.[29][30] Summers also said that the Mafia had blackmail material on Hoover, and that as a consequence, Hoover had been reluctant to aggressively pursue organized crime. Although never corroborated, the allegation of cross-dressing has been widely repeated, and "J. Edna Hoover" has become the subject of humor on television, in movies and elsewhere. In the words of author Thomas Doherty, "For American popular culture, the image of the zaftig FBI director as a Christine Jorgensen wanna-be was too delicious not to savor."[31] Most biographers consider the story of Mafia blackmail to be unlikely in light of the FBI's actual investigations of the Mafia.[32]

Grave of J. Edgar Hoover in Congressional Cemetery (Washington, DC, USA)
Grave of J. Edgar Hoover in Congressional Cemetery (Washington, DC, USA)

Hoover has been described as becoming increasingly a caricature of himself towards the end of his life. The book, "No Left Turns," by former agent Joseph L. Schott, portrays a rigid, paranoid old man who terrified everyone. For example, Hoover liked to write on the margins of memos. According to Schott, when one memo had too narrow margins he wrote, "watch the borders!" No one had the nerve to ask him why, but they sent inquiries to the Border Patrol about any strange activities on the Canadian and Mexican frontiers. It took a week before an HQ staffer realized the message related to the borders of the memo paper.[33] Schott has also stated that the mistakenly increased border activity during this period resulted in the arrest of American Communist Party leader Gus Hall.

African American author Millie McGhee[34] claims in her 2000 book Secrets Uncovered to be related to J. Edgar Hoover.[35] McGhee's oral family history holds that a branch of her Mississippi family, also named Hoover, is related to the Washington, D.C., Hoovers, and that further, J. Edgar's father was not Dickerson Hoover as recorded, but rather Ivery Hoover of Mississippi. Genealogist George Ott investigated these claims and found some supporting circumstantial evidence, as well as unusual alterations of records pertaining to Hoover's officially recorded family in Washington, D.C., but found no conclusive proof. J. Edgar Hoover's birth certificate was not filed until 1938, when he was 43 years old.

[edit] Honors

[edit] See also

[edit] Writings

J. Edgar Hoover was the nominal author of a number of books and articles. Although it is widely believed that all of these were ghostwritten by FBI employees,[37] Hoover received the credit and royalties.

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ Hack, Richard Puppetmaster: The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover. (2007). Phoenix Books. ISBN 1597775126
  2. ^ Documented in Cox, John Stuart and Theoharis, Athan G. (1988). The Boss: J. Edgar Hoover and the Great American Inquisition. Temple University Press. ISBN 0-87722-532-X.  and elsewhere.
  3. ^ Schott, Joseph L (1975). No Left Turns: The FBI in Peace & War. Praeger. ISBN 0-275-33630-1. 
  4. ^ Purvis, Alston; and Tresinowski, Alex (2005). The Vendetta: FBI Hero Melvin Purvis's War Against Crime and J. Edgar Hoover's War Against Him. Public Affairs, pp 183+. ISBN 1-58648-301-3. 
  5. ^ U.S. Code Title 28, part 2, chapter 33. sec. 533, Confirmation and Compensation of Director; Term of Service (b)
  6. ^ Federal Bureau of Investigation - Directors, Then and Now
  7. ^ "More Fingerprints Called Necessary. J. E. Hoover Urges Criminologists At Rochester To File Records In The Capital Bureau.", New York Times, July 23, 1931. Retrieved on 2008-04-17. 
  8. ^ "Washington Develops a World Clearing House For Identifying Criminals by Fingerprints.", New York Times, August 10, 1932. Retrieved on 2008-04-17. "Through the medium of the fingerprint, the Department of Justice is developing an international clearing house for the identification of criminals." 
  9. ^ See, for example, Cox, John Stuart and Theoharis, Athan G. (1988). The Boss: J. Edgar Hoover and the Great American Inquisition. Temple University Press. ISBN 0-87722-532-X. 
  10. ^ Ardman, Harvey (February, 1997), “German Saboteurs Invade America in 1942”, World War II magazine (HistoryNet.com), <http://www.historynet.com/world-war-ii-german-saboteurs-invade-america-in-1942.htm> 
  11. ^ "Hoover Planned Mass Jailing in 1950.", New York Times, December 23, 2007. Retrieved on 2008-04-15. 
  12. ^ Cox, John Stuart and Theoharis, Athan G. (1988). The Boss: J. Edgar Hoover and the Great American Inquisition. Temple University Press, pg. 312. ISBN 0-87722-532-X. 
  13. ^ Kessler, Ronald (2002). The Bureau: The Secret History of the FBI. St. Martin's Paperbacks, pp 107, 174, 184, 215. ISBN 0-312-98977-6. 
  14. ^ See for example James, Joy (2000). States of Confinement: Policing, Detention, and Prisons. Palgrave Macmillan, pg. 335. ISBN 0-312-21777-3. , Williams, Kristian (2004). Our Enemies In Blue: Police And Power In America. Soft Skull Press, pg. 183. ISBN 1-887128-85-9.  and Churchill, Ward and Wall, Jim Vander (2001). Agents of Repression: The FBI's Secret Wars Against the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement. South End Press, pp 53+. ISBN 0-89608-646-1. .
  15. ^ Intelligence Activities And The Rights Of Americans (1976). Retrieved on 2006-10-25.
  16. ^ Report of the Select Committee on Assassinations of the U.S. House of Representatives. The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (1979). Retrieved on 2006-10-25.
  17. ^ Hack, 2007
  18. ^ a b "J. Edgar Hoover, 77, Dies", New York Times, May 3, 1972, Wednesday. Retrieved on 2008-03-11. 
  19. ^ [1].HCSA Conclusions, 1979.
  20. ^ King, Colbert I. (May 5, 2001), “No thanks to Hoover”, The Washington Post, <http://www.polkonline.com/stories/050701/opi_hoover.shtml> 
  21. ^ Terry, Jennifer (1999). An American Obsession: Science, Medicine, and Homosexuality in Modern Society. University of Chicago Press, pg. 350. ISBN 0-226-79366-4. 
  22. ^ Cox, John Stuart and Theoharis, Athan G. (1988). The Boss: J. Edgar Hoover and the Great American Inquisition. Temple University Press, pg. 108. ISBN 0-87722-532-X. 
  23. ^ For example,
    Felt, W. Mark and O'Connor, John D. (2006). A G-man's Life: The FBI, Being 'Deep Throat,' And the Struggle for Honor in Washington. Public Affairs, pg. 167. ISBN 1-58648-377-3. ,
    Jeffreys-Jones, Rhodri (2003). Cloak and Dollar: A History of American Secret Intelligence. Yale University Press, pg. 93. ISBN 0-300-10159-7. ,
    Cox, John Stuart and Theoharis, Athan G. (1988). The Boss: J. Edgar Hoover and the Great American Inquisition. Temple University Press, pg. 108. ISBN 0-87722-532-X.  "The strange likelihood is that Hoover never knew sexual desire at all."
  24. ^ For example,
    Percy, William A. and Johansson , Warren (1994). Outing: Shattering the Conspiracy of Silence. Haworth Press, pp 85+. ISBN 1-56024-419-4. ,
    Summers, Anthony (1993). Official and Confidential: The Secret Life of J Edgar Hoover. Pocket Books. ISBN 0-671-88087-X. 
  25. ^ For example,
    Edited by Theoharis, Athan G. (1998). The FBI: A Comprehensive Reference Guide. Oryx Press, pp 291, 301, 397. ISBN 0-89774-991-X. ,
    Doherty, Thomas (2003). Cold War, Cool Medium: Television, McCarthyism, and American Culture. Columbia University Press, pp 254, 255. ISBN 0-231-12952-1. 
  26. ^ Hack, 2007
  27. ^ Cox, John Stuart and Theoharis, Athan G. (1988). The Boss: J. Edgar Hoover and the Great American Inquisition. Temple University Press, pg. 108. ISBN 0-87722-532-X. 
  28. ^ Hack, Richard Puppetmaster: The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover. (2007). Phoenix Books. ISBN 1597775126
  29. ^ Summers, Anthony (1993). Official and Confidential: The Secret Life of J Edgar Hoover. Pocket Books. ISBN 0-671-88087-X. 
  30. ^ Lehmann-Haupt, Christopher. "Books of The Times; Catalogue of Accusations Against J. Edgar Hoover.", New York Times, February 15, 1993. Retrieved on 2008-04-16. 
  31. ^ Doherty, Thomas (2003). Cold War, Cool Medium: Television, McCarthyism, and American Culture. Columbia University Press, pg. 255. ISBN 0-231-12952-1. 
  32. ^ See for example Kessler, Ronald (2002). The Bureau: The Secret History of the FBI. St. Martin's Paperbacks, pp 120+. ISBN 0-312-98977-6. 
  33. ^ Schott, Joseph L (1975). No Left Turns: The FBI in Peace & War. Praeger. ISBN 0-275-33630-1. 
  34. ^ Millie McGhee biography
  35. ^ McGhee, Millie L. (2000). Secrets Uncovered: J. Edgar Hoover--Passing for White?. Inland Empire Services. ISBN 0-9701822-2-8. 
  36. ^ Citation and Remarks at Presentation of the National Security Medal to J. Edgar Hoover.
  37. ^ See, for example:
    Anderson, Jack (1999). Peace, War, and Politics: An Eyewitness Account. Forge Books, pg. 174. ISBN 0-312-87497-9. ,
    Powers, Richard Gid (2004). Broken: the troubled past and uncertain future of the FBI. Free Press, pg. 238. ISBN 0-684-83371-9. ,
    Theoharis, Athan G. (editor) (1998). The FBI: A Comprehensive Reference Guide. Oryx Press, pg. 264. ISBN 0-89774-991-X. 
  38. ^ "Conspirators Against the American Way.", New York Times, March 9, 1958. Retrieved on 2008-04-17. 

[edit] References and further reading

  • Lowenthal, Max (1950). The Federal Bureau of Investigation. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 0837157552. 
  • Schott, Joseph L (1975). No Left Turns: The FBI in Peace & War. Praeger. ISBN 0-275-33630-1. 
  • Garrow, David J. (1981). The FBI and Martin Luther King, Jr., From 'Solo' to Memphis. W.W.Norton. ISBN 0-393-01509-2. 
  • Powers, Richard Gid (1986). Secrecy and Power: The Life of J. Edgar Hoover. Free Press. ISBN 0029250609. 
  • Gentry, Curt (1991). J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets. Plume. ISBN 0-452-26904-0. 
  • Theoharis, Athan (1993). From the Secret Files of J. Edgar Hoover. Ivan R. Dee. ISBN 1-56663-017-7. 
  • Beverly, William (2003). On the Lam; Narratives of Flight in J. Edgar Hoover's America. University Press of Mississippi. ISBN 1-57806-537-2. 
  • Stove, Robert J. (2003). The Unsleeping Eye: Secret Police and Their Victims. Encounter Books. ISBN 1-893554-66-X. 
  • Summers, Anthony (2003). Official and Confidential:The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover. Putnam Publishing Group. ISBN 0-399-13800-5. 
  • Charles, Douglas (2007). J. Edgar Hoover and the Anti-interventionists: FBI Political Surveillance and the Rise of the Domestic Security State, 1939-1945. Ohio State University Press. ISBN 978-0814210611. 

[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:
Government offices
Preceded by
William J. Burns
as Director of the Bureau of Investigation		 Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
1924 – 1972		 Succeeded by
L. Patrick Gray
Honorary titles
Preceded by
Everett Dirksen		 Persons who have lain in state or honor
in the United States Capitol rotunda
May 3 – May 4, 1972		 Succeeded by
Lyndon B. Johnson
v • d • e
Directors of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Finch • Bielaski • Allen* • Flynn • Burns • Hoover • Gray* • Ruckelshaus* • Kelley • Adams* • Webster • Otto* • Sessions • Clarke* • Freeh • Pickard* • Mueller
* denotes acting
Seal of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Persondata
NAME Hoover, John Edgar
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION FBI director
DATE OF BIRTH January 1, 1895(1895-01-01)
PLACE OF BIRTH Washington, D.C., United States
DATE OF DEATH May 2, 1977
PLACE OF DEATH Washington, D.C., United States