It should be noted that the premise of the original novel was a thinly-veiled composite of the 1944 and 1948 elections and the struggle of the Democrats to separate themselves from their incumbent Vice President, Henry Wallace, whose total compromise by Soviet agents was widely known within the Democratic Party but could not be discussed openly because of the political damage which would result.
In actual history, Wallace was bought off by being made Secretary of the Treasury, and then finally driven out of the party by the anticommunists at that time still extant within the party, led by Hubert Humphrey.
But the classic Leninist tactic of insulating the Party from criticism by accusing opponents of one’s own crimes seems to have been the basis of Condon’s novel.
Whoops.
Wallace was made Secretary of Commerce in 1945, not Secretary of the Treasury.
“In actual history, Wallace was bought off by being made Secretary of the Treasury”
Edward J Flynn, boss of the Bronx, and also DNC chaiman, travelled to Yalta with Roosevelt, and observed that he was dying. Flynn got together with his fellow Democratic bosses in a traditional smoke filled room, and together they picked Harry S Truman to be the next VP, and successor to the ailing President. Truman wasn’t eager for the job, but finally agreed to take it. President Truman eventually fired Commerce Secretary Wallace, who then ran against him in 1948 as a Progressive. In 1952 Henry Wallace published “Where I was Wrong”, in which he admitted being a dupe of Stalin. Wallace was a misguided patriot, not a traitor.