John Francis Cronin SS (October 4, 1908 – January 2, 1994) was a Catholic priest of the Society of Saint Sulpice, who was an early advisor on anticommunism to freshman U.S. Representative Richard M. Nixon.
"[2] In 1938, Archbishop Michael J. Curley of Baltimore asked Father Cronin to establish a School of Social Action to instruct Catholic clergy in the church's teachings on labor, which was later expanded to parishes.
By early February 1947, U.S. Representative Charles J. Kersten had taken the newly elected Richard M. Nixon on several trips to Baltimore to meet with Cronin.
At that time, Cronin shared with Nixon his 1945 privately circulated paper "The Problem of American Communism in 1945",[3] with much information from the FBI's William C. Sullivan (who by 1961 would head domestic intelligence under Hoover).
"[7] When Whittaker Chambers testified before the House Committee on Un-American Activities in August 1948 and said that Hiss was a Communist, Nixon had already known about the charge from his conversations with Cronin.
However, despite his strong opposition to Communism, Cronin criticized Joseph McCarthy and similar anticommunists in the United States, whom he accused of fostering national disunity.