The following is an exchange between Disney and committee chairman J. Parnell Smith.
Mr. SMITH: Do you recall having had any conversations with Mr. Sorrell relative to communism?
Mr. DISNEY: Yes, I do.
Mr. SMITH: Will you relate that conversation?
Mr. DISNEY: Well, I didn’t pull my punches on how I felt. He evidently heard that I had called them all a bunch of Communists—and I believe they are. At the meeting he leaned over and he said, “You think I am a Communist, don’t you,” and I told him that all I knew was what I heard and what I had seen, and he laughed and said, “Well, I used their money to finance my strike of 1937,” and he said that he had gotten the money through the personal check of some actor, but he didn’t name the actor. I didn’t go into it any further. I just listened.
Mr. SMITH: Can you name any other individuals that were active at the time of the strike that you believe in your opinion are Communists?
Mr. DISNEY: Well, I feel that there is one artist in my plant, that came in there, he came in about 1938, and he sort of stayed in the background, he wasn’t too active, but he was the real brains of this, and I believe he is a Communist. His name is David Hilberman.
Mr. SMITH: How is it spelled?
Mr. DISNEY: H-i-l-b-e-r-m-a-n, I believe. I looked into his record and I found that, No. 1, that he had no religion and, No. 2, that he had considerable time at the Moscow Art Theater studying art direction, or something.
Mr. SMITH: Any others, Mr. Disney?
Mr. DISNEY: Well, I think Sorrell is sure tied up with them. If he isn’t a Communist, he sure should be one.
Mr. SMITH: Do you remember the name of William Pomerance, did he have anything to do with it?
Mr. DISNEY: Yes, sir. He came in later. Sorrell put him in charge as business manager of cartoonists and later he went to the Screen Actors as their business agent and in turn he put in another man by the name of Maurice Howard, the present business agent. And they are all tied up with the same outfit.
Mr. SMITH: What is your opinion of Mr. Pomerance and Mr. Howard as to whether or not they are or are not Communists?
Mr. DISNEY: In my opinion they are Communists. No one has any way of proving those things.
Source: George Mason University
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