Due to State repression and other internal tensions within the Left movements in the United States at the time, CPUSA turned inwards to inspect, surveil, and purge itself of members who were deemed undesireable. The San Francisco County Personnel Committee was charged with investigating Party members to be expelled in the name of the survival and success of CPUSA.

Members of the Party could be expelled for any of the following reasons: 1. Being or suspected of being a state agent, spy, or informant. 2. Being or suspected of being a factionalist such as a Trotskyist or Lovestoneite whose ideology was deemed "impure" by the central leadership. 3. Being or suspected of being a social deviant whose presence in the Party was a threat either to social unity or further State repression. The beliefs and identities targeted in this category include white chauvinists; people with a history of debt, gambling, alcoholism, and receiving psychiatric care; or people who experience same-sex attraction or engage in sexual promiscuity. 4. Associating with former Party members who had been expelled for one of the reasons listed above.

These files reveal the motivations behind the Committee and the mechanisms by which the internal investigations and expulsions occurred.