"Statement Subscribed to the Delegates of the Emergency Convention by the Delegates of the State of California." [September 1, 1919] A document from the CLP/UCP archive seized by the New York Bomb Squad and the Department of Justice's Bureau of Investigation in April 1921. This statement was apparently read or distributed to the 1919 Emergency National Committee by the California delegation, a Left Wing body denied the seats to which they were elected by the machine of outgoing National Executive Secretary Adolph Germer. Despite being elected by overwhelming majorities of uncontested locals in their states, and despite not being opposed in person by an opposition delegation, the California delegation was ejected from the convention floor by the Chicago Police and forced to stand for hours in an anteroom where they could not hear the proceedings for which they had travelled 2,000 miles to attend. All the while, " packed delegations from other states occupied the convention floor," the statement declared. The Contest Committee stalled a decision on the California delegation for two days, thus preventing them from participation, eventually coming in on the third day of the gathering with a recommendation to deny the delegation their seats. This was overturned by action from the floor by delegates who were held to have woke up to the "despotic procedure steamrollered by the officialdom of the convention." The California delegation demanded that all contested delegations be seated, that the representation of the packed delegations from "reorganization states" be scaled down to the number of votes to which they were entitled based on actual paid membership, and the removal of the Chicago Police was demanded. The delegation -- which included Max Bedacht, James Dolsen, and John C. Taylor -- ultimately refused their seats and bolted the SPA convention to help establish the Communist Labor Party.

 

"Special Report on Radical Activities in the San Francisco District," by F.W. Kelly [Week Ending Nov. 22, 1919] Weekly Department of Justice intelligence report for the San Francisco district by Bureau of Investigation agent F.W. Kelly. Kelly details events in the ongoing Dockmen's and Shipbuilders' strikes, as well as repression against members of the Communist Labor Party and the IWW. With regard to the CLP, Kelly comments on the arrest in Oakland of J.E. Snyder, John Taylor, James Dolsen, and Max Bedacht, four leaders of the California organization. "These arrests the result of information from a confidential informant of this Department, to the effect that these men were plotting the organization of an inner circle for the purpose of killing three prominent citizens for every radical killed or injured by the activities of the American Legion," reported Kelly. Details of repressive measures against the IWW are provided for five locales: Oakland, San Francisco, Eureka/Arcata, Sacramento, and Stockton. With regard to the latter, Kelly includes the text of a letter written to the District Attorney to apply pressure for fast and severe action. As a result of this pressure, "Mr. Van Vranken telephoned this Department that new indictments would be returned November 25th against all the defendants and that the bail would be materially raised and the prosecution thereafter expedited as rapidly as consistent." More evidence of the way that the federal secret police apparatus, state law enforcement, and the legal establishment worked hand in hand in repressive activity against labor organizations and the organized left wing movement in this period.

 

"Special Report on Radical Activities in the San Francisco District," by F.W. Kelly [Week Ending Jan. 10, 1920] Weekly Department of Justice intelligence report for the San Francisco district by Bureau of Investigation agent F.W. Kelly. Kelly details the local results of the coordinated nationwide "Palmer Raid" of January 2-3, 1920 to his supervisors. "Of the 28 warrants received by the Immigration authorities for the apprehension of alien members of the COMMUNIST LABOR PARTY, 21 of the persons so covered were arrested and interviewed by this department on the night and morning of January 2nd and 3rd," he notes. No American citizens were arrested in the operation, Kelly adds, clearly indicating that a targeting of deportable aliens was central to the operation's strategic plan. Difficulty was being had proving the party membership those arrested, however, as "all records of the COMMUNIST LABOR PARTY relating to membership were either destroyed by members of the American Legion, who raided the State Headquarters at Oakland early in November, or have been kept under cover by the officials of the organization," Kelly notes. As a result "this department is now conducting an investigation at the places where those aliens denying membership have been employed, and will follow with an investigation in the neighborhood in which they reside, for the purpose of securing evidence of expression of radical convictions or acknowledgment of affiliation with this party." Agent Kelly additionally notes having paid attention to the issue of dependent families of those arrested, making arrangements with Cooperative Charaties of Oakland "for the care of the single family requiring this attention."

 

"Letter to the United Communist Party in New York from Charles Dirba, Executive Secretary of the Communist Party of America in New York, circa Oct. 15, 1920." By the summer of 1920, the Executive Committee of the Communist International had lost patience with the endless factional shenanigans of the two rival American Communist Parties and it set about to end the counterproductive division of the movement by forcing unity under pain of expulsion . A two month deadline -- October 10, 1920 -- was established for the final amalgamation of the Communist Labor Party and the Communist Party of America. Unfortunately for all concerned, this ultimatum was not successfully transmitted to either of the American Parties. This shocked letter from CPA Executive Secretary Charles Dirba to the leadership of the UCP notes having discovered news of the ultimatum in the columns of the September 14 issue of Izvestiia -- on October 13, that is, three days AFTER the deadline for final union. Dirba seeks an immediate reply as to whether the UCP had been informed of this deadline. He also upbraids the rival organization for asserting a "downright falsehood" in their bulletin to District Organizers, in which they claimed that the UCP unity committee of two had been rejected out of hand by the CPA. Dirba declares that "we have no knowledge of your committee's having approached or got in touch with us in any way, and that we have not turned them down." He seeks a reply by the morning of October 18, 1920 so that the CEC of the CPA may act expeditiously in the unity matter.

 

"The Case of John P. Anderson: An Investigation by the Communist Party of America," by Charles Dirba [Hearing held March 22, 1921, transmitted April 14, 1921.] One final debunking document that effectively deals a coup-de-grace to the strange and utterly unsubstantiated theory of a purported "$3 million" Comintern subsidy to the American Communist movement in 1920 (Hayes/Klehr/Firsov, 1995).... John Anderson (née Kristap Beika) was a Latvian Federationist sent to Moscow by the suspended Federations of the Socialist Party in the summer of 1919 -- effectively the CPA's first "man in Moscow." In January 1920 Anderson and CLP representative John Reed signed a document in Soviet Russia agreeing to merge the two American parties. Before they headed home, the Comintern issued each a significant quantity of jewels and valuta for the American movement -- cumulative value in the range of $30,000 to $50,000 -- to help support the American Communist movement. Neither Reed nor Anderson made it home with jewels intact, Reed being arrested in Finland and Anderson failing to cross the Latvian frontier. Late in 1920, home in America, the Comintern representatives of the United Communist Party demanded the Communist Party account for Anderson's $25,000 in missing gems, which they were no doubt angling to collect for their own use. The appropriation of gems to the American movement seems to have been news to the CPA and a party trial ensued, the minutes of which constitute this document. Anderson explains how he checked the gems in the office of a military unit, which issued receipts that Anderson took back to the Ian Berzin and Gustav Klinger at the Comintern. The Latvian reds crossing the border with the rocks met with catastrophe, captured in the woods by white forces and summarily executed. Anderson tells his convincing tale, bitterly adding his reasoning for not joining the CPA when he finally made it home to the United States early in the summer of 1920: "When I landed in the US I found the tactics of the CP more resembling a religious sect than a political party, and I considered joining the party as a useless waste of time and energy." Copious footnotes by Tim Davenport -- quite an interesting document...

 

"Dept. of Justice General Intelligence Division Report on UCP Propaganda Mailed to Detroit, MI -- April 7-14, 1921," by J.S. Apelman. Department of Justice intelligence report for the Detroit district by Bureau of Investigation agent J.S. Apelman. Apelman's report makes clear the level of the DoJ's penetration of the Detroit district of the UCP. The "Electrical Installment Company" of Detroit, documented to be owned by Nathan Kosin and Benjamin Singerman (Singer), "is used by the radicals of this city as a distributing point for their literature, especially literature issued by the United Communist Party." Apelman details the seizure of 5 literature shipments from March and April 1921, quoting the shocking revolutionary prose from the South Slavic edition of Communist #10 at considerable length. Apelman also directly quotes the slogans on 9 of the 16 stickers manufactured by the UCP for their May Day 1921 propaganda blitz. This organized campaign proved to be a ludicrous debacle that resulted in 79 arrests, due largely to federal penetration of the Philadelphia, Pittsburgh UCP organizations, probable penetration of the St. Louis organization, and possible penetration in other districts of the UCP.

 

"Department of Justice Surveillance Report of the Activities of Edward Lindgren, April 27-30, 1921," by Dan E. Tatom ***CORRECTED VERSION*** This file was posted last week; this corrects a misspelling of the surname of the agent who shadowed Edward Lindgren from Pittsburgh to New York City. This operation lead to a raid on the National Headquarters of the United Communist Party, housed in the apartment of Helen Ware.

 

"In Re: Communist Activites -- John E. Siebert, aliases Lindgren, Flynn, Landy, Lang, and Smith. by Al Weitsman [Events of April 29, 1921] Department of Justice Bureau of Investigation report by one of the Special Agents assigned to trail United Communist Party organizer "John Siebert" (believed by them to be the real name of Edward Lindgren), who had been shadowed to New York by an agent of the Bureau from Pittsburgh. This account provided additional fine detail about events leading up to his arrest. Most interesting for the fact that even though there was a major, multi-state effort to trail Lindgren, set in motion by an informer in the top ranks of the Pittsburgh UCP organization, and despite reams of surveillance reports on the American Communist movement, the Bureau of Investigation still did not know LIndgren's real name. Evidence that the constantly changing pseudonyms of the underground movement did their work in keeping the hundreds of agents and informers of the Bureau of Investigation off balance.

 

"Re: A. Jakira (formerly reported as Jakera and Jackera and Iakira): United Communist Party: National Secretary," by C.J. Scully [April 30, 1921] A summary of Bureau of Investigation file information on Abram Jakira, recently arrested at the headquarters of the UCP, prepared by New York City Special Agent in Charge C.J. Scully. Scully's synopsis of file material includes the verbatim quotation of an extensive report by Special Agent M.J. Davis that illuminates the technical aspect of the Communist Labor Party's literature production in 1919 (as well as the operating procedure of the DoJ's Bureau of Investigation). A flyer entitled "HANDS OFF SOVIET RUSSIA" was printed for Jakira and the CLP by the Chatham Printing Co., proprietor of which was Alexander Trachtenberg. Trachtenberg's bookkeeper, Abraham Goodman, was an informant for the Department of Justice and brought the leaflet to their attention, keeping the Bureau of Investigation apprised of the shop's doings on behalf of the radical movement. This work was said to have been paid for cash-in-advance and kept off the books by Trachtenberg so as to avoid a paper trail. Abram Jakira was the recipient and distributor of the finished printed publications; the Department of Justice was intent on proving that he was but a transmission mechanism for funding from the office of Ludwig Martens (the Russian Soviet Government Bureau). Trachtenberg initially denied having produced the "HANDS OFF SOVIET RUSSIA" leaflet at all, a claim which bookkeeper Abraham Goodman pronounced to be a lie in a further interview with the Bureau. The story is picked up in a later file item, in which four agents of the Bureau of Investigation served a search warrant on Trachtenberg's print shop, and found there 10,000 party cards printed for the Communist Party of America, postcards printed for the CLP, a Yiddish language edition of The Class Struggle (a CLP publication), and leaflets for the Newark branch of the CLP. In the course of his interview with the BoI, Trachtenberg implicated the print shop of CLP member Eugene Krug for having printed the Ukrainian language official organ of the CLP -- although a still later document in this series indicates the the DoJ already had an informer in that establishment as well.

 

"In Re: Communist Activities -- Special Report," by C.J. Scully [May 1, 1921] A summary of the operation which netted the arrest of Edward Lindgren, Abram Jakira, and Israel Amter in a raid on the National Headquarters of the United Communist Party. This account is written by the Special Agent in Charge of the New York Office of the Department of Justice's Bureau of Investigation -- the commander at the desk rather than the agents on the street. As such, Scully is in position to provide the important tidbit that the operation to trail Lindgren from Pennsylvania to New York related to a belief that he was leaving "to attend a convention of Communist deputies." Rather than tracking Lindgren back to UCP headquarters, the secret police believed that he was leading them to the site of a convention -- thus the scale of the operation and the eagerness to launch an immediate raid. Two other things bear mention about this report: first, it once again indicates the extreme difficulty that literally HUNDREDS of BoI agents, undercover operatives, and informants had in connecting the thousands of ever-changing party pseudonyms with the actual individuals. Even after days of tracking him, based on top level intelligence inside the Pittsburgh UCP apparatus, it was an extremely lengthy process for the authorities to positively identify the man they called "Flynn" and later tentatively identified as "Siebert" as Edward Lindgren. One sees such difficulty again and again in the Bureau of Investigation's files. Secondly, the ease of a warranteless raid on a residence by the New York Police's Bomb Squad stands in marked contrast to the difficulty the BoI had in seizing and opening the mail deposiited by Lindgren in a postal mail box. Requests needed to be made of postal officials to hold this mail and then a formal search warrant obtained -- an altogether different standard of legality and privacy rights than that afforded the domicile.

 

"CPA Condensed Cash Statement, Feb. to May 1921, Including Federations, But Not Including Payments to and from the National Office and the Federations: Presented to the Joint Unity Convention, Woodstock, NY - May 15, 1921." This is a very esoteric budget document, but specialists in the history of the early American Communist movement will probably immediately recognize its import. For me, at least, this document has led to a fundamental rethinking about the nature of the old CPA, for it shows that the organization truly was a "federation of federations." Five of the old CPA's 6 Language Federations possessed assets at least twice the size of the National Office of the organization. The same 5 possessed printing plant in excess of the National Office. Three of them retained substantial real estate holdings. Three of them spent more money than the National Office on literature production, and a fourth spent approximately the same amount as the National Office. These were clearly fully functioning political organizations in their own right, not tiny social groups of members speaking a common language. It is little wonder that the "Federation Issue" stood so large on the landscape as the primary issue impeding merger efforts between the UCP and the old CPA for so long and fueling the Central Caucus split that erupted in late November of 1921.

 

"The Tulsa Massacre!" -- leaftlet of the unified Communist Party of America [June 1921] Full text of a shrill revolutionary leaflet issued in the wake of the extreme racist terror levied on June 1, 1921 against the black population of Tulsa, Oklahoma. "There is only one appeal that will stop the fiendish and bloody outrages -- that is the appeal to organized force. The only language that the bloodthirsty capitalist of America can understand is the language of ORGANIZED POWER," the leaflet declares. "For the Government of the US is nothing but the organized expression of the WILL of the CAPITALIST CLASS. The Government of the US is nothing else but a ruthless DICTATORSHIP of the RICH over the POOR. It is in the interest of both the Negro and the White WORKERS to destroy this CAPITALIST GOVERNMENT, root and branch. Shoulder to shoulder, and heart to heart, the workers of ALL races must UNITE to establish in this country a WORKERS' GOVERNMENT -- THE SOVIET REPUBLIC OF AMERICA." The leaflet does not absolve the white working class from culpability for the standing state of affairs: "If the Negro worker can be used against the White worker, who is to blame? We have refused to allow our colored brothers to join our unions. We have repeated all the idiotic accusations against their race. We have foolishly allowed ourselves to be swayed by race prejudice. We have failed to ORGANIZE the Negro workers. We have refused to treat him as our own, our equal BROTHER in the CLASS STRUGGLE. WE ARE TO BLAME."

 

"Weekly Radical Report for Pittsburgh, PA for the Week Ending Oct. 1, 1921. [Extract]," by H.J. Lenon An extended section of the weekly report by Department of Justic Bureau of Investigation Special Agent H.J. Lenon on radical activities in Pittsburgh -- in this case those of the unified Communist Party of America. There can be no doubt to any careful reader of this report that the DoJ's penetration of the highest level of the UCP in Pittsburgh through an undercover operative or particularly thorough informer was carried over into the Pittsburgh organization of the unified CPA. This extensive report containing copius detail from "read and destroy" bulletins of the National Office to the District organizations. "The Communist Party is in bad FINANCIAL condition," Lenon declares, adding that the party had initiated a number of changes for reasons of economy, including the discontinuation and consolidation of newspapers, the reduction of wages of party workers, and the elimination of party offices. Further, disorganization was rampant within the party's ranks: "We find a badly SPLIT up organization developing more wings than the SP had. Here we have the LEGAL, ILLEGAL, POLITICAL, ECONOMIC, and a mixture of everything. The party organizes and disorganizes at will, leaving in its wake a mass of confusion..." This dysfunctional organization was comically ineffectual: "Most of their activity centralizes around districts where the leaders reside, like Cleveland, Pittsburgh, New York, Chicago, Detroit. In cities where the SP has any strength the Communists usually spend most of their time fighting with the SP. It is always easy to detect the Communists in action, for they always condemn the SP, agitate for the Soviet Republic, etc., also use plenty of the Bolsheviki terms of expression. Supposed to be underground but they LOVE TO RECOMMEND THE COMMUNIST TACTICS. Mostly all intellectuals in the red movement like to display their extreme Bolsheviki radicalism. Being a red Communist is something that will not be underground."

 

"Letter No. 13 to the Central Executive Committee of the Workers Party of America in New York from Israel Amter in Moscow, May 16, 1923." One of the periodic updates by American CI Rep Amter detailing events in Moscow for the Workers Party of America at home. Amter obliquely details terms of Comintern support for an English language daily newspaper (using fractions code to hide the actual numbers). He emphasizes that "the understanding, I want to repeat, is that we will get what I asked for" in terms of financial support from the CI. As for the CI's requirement that a portion of the funds for the Daily Worker be raised by the American Party itself, "what they want is the assurance that the party will make the proper effort to help itself," Amter observes. Amter makes note of a May 1923 war scare over sabre-rattling by Great Britain. "The threat of rupture of relations with Great Britain has produced a tremendous effect. Hundreds of thousands of workers spontaneously protested against the attitude of the British government and the danger of war. And yet, although the Russian workers want peace, there is the greatest determination in case war should result. The demonstrations were even more gigantic than the May Day demonstrations. And these demonstrations show the wonderful power of the Party -- they show the enormous influence that the Party wields."

 

"Letter No. 16 to the Central Executive Committee of the Workers Party of America in New York from Israel Amter in Moscow, June 26, 1923." Periodic update by the WPA's Rep to the Comintern Israel Amter detailing events in Moscow for the party leadership at home. In this lengthy communique, Amter notes recently attending sessions of the Profintern with Charley Janson [Scott, Johnson]. At one of these Amter says " I got into the trade union resolution the clause that : 'It is the duty of every member of the Communist International to join his union and work actively with the Communist faction, i.e. in the revolutionary opposition movement,' etc. etc.... That will be a great aid in getting the comrades to join. In fact it was pointed out that no one should be allowed to be a member unless he joins -- that it should be regarded as a matter of course that he joins a union." This reflects once again the way that the early Comintern and Profintern were a two way street -- not a narrow circle of bureaucrats blindly issuing dictatorial and universally binding instructions, but rather a centralized organization with international representation and input. In other matters, Amter notes that 3rd quarter funding for the WPA remains locked up: "The next will go forward ONLY AFTER YOU HAVE SENT A STATEMENT." A fundraising campaign to establish an English language daily newspaper is greenlighted, the origin of the idea for the Comintern to provied a targeted grant only after the WPA makes an earnest effort to raise funds itself is reveal to have started with Amter, who writes: " I myself proposed that what they would do for us should be done only when and if we did our share - as stated. They accepted. I knew that would spur on our members to greater efforts." Amter asks for more WPA literature to be sent and for closer ties of American defense organizations with the MOPR. "It is necessary to centralize and coordinate all the prisoners' relief activities so that international actions can be achieved," Amter declares, indicating that the Labor Defense Council and National Defense Council should affiliate themselves with the Moscow-based international organization forthwith.

 

Lenin: The Great Strategist of the Class War, by A. Lozovsky; Translated with introduction by Alexander Bittelman. [Sept. 1924] Full text of a pamphlet published in September 1924 as no. 14 of the Labor Herald Library by the Trade Union Educational League. Part of the campaign to formulate and detail the new concept "Leninism," which in the introduction Bittelman defines as "the theory and practice of working class struggle. It is the accumulated experience of the battling armies of the proletariat against capitalism reflected by the mind of a genius." The main body of the pamphlet is written by A. Lozovsky, head of the Red International of Labor Unions (Profintern). Lozovsky characterizes Lenin as self-critical, realistic, an uncompromising enemy of reformism, an original revolutionary theorist, an astute political statesman, a committed internationalist, and a skilled mass organizer. "Lenin was one of those men by whom humanity marks its historical path, concerning whom legends are being told in his lifetime, and the farther we go from the date of his death the clearer will stand before us Lenin's greatness and immortality," Lozovsky enthusiastically states.

 

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