By 1939, Assistant Secretary of State Adolf A. Berle was a Guild member. According to the NLG's "A History of the National Lawyers Guild 1937-1987", two factions arose as early as 1940. External events driving these factions included the Spanish Civil War (started 1936), the Hitler-Stalin Pact (1939), and the Russian invasion of Finland (1940). One faction, led by Berle and Ernst, supported New Deal policies. The other, led by Osmond Fraenkel and Thomas I. Emerson, supported Freedom of Speech and Press as well as Anti-Fascism (seen at the time as a Popular Front stance, thus pro-Communist). Other issues supported by Fraenkel, Emerson, the National Executive Board and many chapters included: support for Loyalist Spain, criticism of J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI, and support for labor unions. Berle and Ernst recommended anti-communist oaths, which Fraenkel and Emerson opposed. Many Berle and Ernst supporters left the NLG by 1940. During the NLG's 1940 convention, newly elected president Robert W. Kenny of California and secretary Martin Popper of New York sought to persuade members to return. During a phone call from Kenny, Berle gave him a short list of lawyers to leave as a simple matter of "cleaning house": Kenny rejected the request. David Scribner, civil rights and labor lawyer, was a member of both the IJA and the NLG.