Science fiction has its own history its own legacy of what's been done what's been superseded what's so much part of the furniture it's practically part of the fabric now what's become no more than a joke... and so on. It's just plain foolish as well as comically arrogant to ignore all this to fail to do the most basic research.
At issue in the Hiss Case was the question whether this sick society which we call Western civilization could in its extremity still cast up a man whose faith in it was so great that he would voluntarily abandon those things which men hold good including life to defend it.