My Dad was the one that started my interest in this subject, Hopkins, back when I was a kid in the late 50s, before he died. He had spent some time in Russia during the war, convoy duties, and hated the Commies based on the treatment of the Russian people by their masters, his personal observation. I was ten or twelve years old and the subject of Harry Hopkins came up and my father said he was a Commie spy, I was too young to question the reasoning behind the observation but it hung in my mind. My father believed that Roosevelt was the first dictator of the USA, he was in his twenties during the depression and had strong political views. Currie and Hopkins were close advisors to FDR , in the White House, and he didn't meet a commie he didn't like, like his wife, for a short while any way. If you look at some of the positions that he took as Governor of NY, Power Athority and others, he was bent to the left. Commie, I don't know. My Grandfather thought that every Rat from Bryant on down was a commie in one form or another, but he was rather extream.Harry Hopkins had money problems with that divorce of his. The money he got from the Commies helped relieve those problems.
Harry Hopkins also took the lead in sending the feeble Roosevelt to Yalta, even though he wasn't physically able to handle it.
At Yalta Stalin showed a diplomatic virtuosity he never equaled before or after and Roosevelet was dead in about another month.
I read Robert Sherwoods bio of Hopkins and I could never figure the dude out.
Until the latest Bio on Hiss I could never figure out the relationship between the Hisses and Hopkins and there was a relationship, to my mind anyway. Hisses wife was active in the social work cabal in NYC where Hopkins made his name before FDR became Governor. FDR appointed Hopkins as Tsar of welfare in NY State.
If you look at the organizing activities of the commies in the last 80 years they go for the gutter. Hopkins had the support of the leftist immigrent communities in NYC and FDR needed that support to get elected.
Where was Hopkins educated and what were the political views of those that educated him, look at Addams house for an example.