For one whom the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists tags "Britain's leading anti-communist scholar", Michael Polanyi is having a lot of trouble with the McCarran Act. In January 1951 Polanyi applied for a visa to take over the chair of Social Philosophy at the University of Chicago. The State Department told him on June 26, 1952, that "he was a person inadmissable into the U. S. under the provisions of (the McCarran Act). These relate to certain political beliefs or activities; and to membership in or affiliation with certain organizations."

A teaching fellow in government and her husband, a former teaching fellow in economics, think Polanyi has been railroaded. For the last six months Warren and Virginia McClam have been writing to the State Department, Senator-elect Kennedy, Senator Lodge, and the American Civil Liberties Union in the hope that someone will get the decision revoked.

Despite the fact that Senators Fulbright, Benton, and Douglas petitioned for a reconsideration, Polanyi's case has not been reviewed.

Blasted Marxism

Polanyi recently published a collection of essays. "The Logic of Liberty," in which he sharply criticizes subordinating science to Marxism. He was one of the founders of the Society for Freedom in Science which flourished in England during the '30's and early '40's. In 1949 Princeton awarded him an honorary Doctor of Science Degree. The citation called him "a veteran campaigner against those who would take from science the freedom she requires for the pursuit of truth."

Mrs. McClam studied under Polanyi at the University of Manchester. "There was no occasion during that time," she said, "and I came to know Professor and Mrs. Polanyi rather well--when I had reason to believe that he had any sympathy whatsoever for Communism or the Soviet government, and furthermore his writings attest to this fact."

Polyanyi has been in this country several times and once taught for six months at the University of Chicago. His permanent appointment began on October 1, 1951, and though he had sent in his visa application some eight months before, the State Department could not locate the papers until September 30. The delay cost Polanyi his post, but luckily the University of Manchester renewed his professorship. The University of Chicago immediately offered him a visiting professorship for the following year and set a squad of lawyers on the case. The Rockefeller Foundation then backed up Polanyi with a $12,000 study and travel grant.

Iilterate Consul

After months of pleading for a hearing, Polanyi finally saw the U. S. vice-consul in Liverpool. Later Polanyi claimed that the consul had not read a page of his writings.

"He asked me on which side my sympathies were in the last war and whether my writings were concerned with justifying the regime of communism in Russia."

Several months later, after changing his request for an immigration visa to a visitor's permit, Polanyi get the final cryptic refusal.

Mrs. McClam said, "I believe that as a matter of public interest and in justice to Professor Polanyi as well as to the many other notable people involved, the State Department must give specific reasons for its actions. . . Otherwise, how can one know whether to criticize the State Department or the law or whether indeed there is even a basis for such criticism. So far two letters and one telegram to Dean Acheson are un-answered.

This month's Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists devotes much of its issue to a discussion of the Polanyi case. In it Percy W. Bridgman, Higgins University Professor, phrases a defense of Polanyi.

"I know of few people whose fundamental philosophy and sympathies can be regarded as more on the side of the democracies in the present struggle against Russia," Bridgman says. "And I believe it would be a grievous mistake not to admit him to this country and that this should be done at once.

Two Contacts

Polanyi thinks that the State Department might have refused him because of the two contacts he had with pro-Russian groups, both at a time when he was attacking Soviet scientific method. The Society for Cultural Relations with the USSR approached him in 1940. This was just after Arthur Koestler had dedicated his anti-communist. "The Yogi and the Commissar" to Polanyi. Polanyi never took part in the group's activities, and claims his sole purpose in joining was to use translations of Russian works which the group could procure for him. He said the society was not pre communist when he joined, but he quit a year later when he discovered that the organization had become Communist dominated.

The other occasion was in 1942 when he addressed the League for Free German Culture about Soviet shackles on scientists.

"After my address there were adverse comments from the floor. . . . Yet even I was surprised when. . . I received an official letter from the council of the institute stating disapproval of my views as expressed in the lecture. I realized then that this organization was under Communist control and wrote back condemning their attitude in the sharpest terms."

Although the State Department is still being evasive, the McClams have got some encouragement from Lodge and Kennedy. They also hope the replacements of both the chief of the visa division and the Liverpool consul might living a reconsideration of the case.