"The Situation," by Eugene V. Debs [pub. Aug. 1, 1894] Reprinted here for the first time is this contemporary account of the causes behind the strike of the 4,000 employees of the Pullman Palace Car Company which escalated into a massive sympathy strike embroiling a major part of the nation's railroads. "There is not a strike on record which, upon investigation, does not disclose the fact that labor had been cruelly wronged," Debs declares, adding that "history will declare, when peace is restored" that the 1894 strife "had its origin in the venality, despotism, and oppression of George M. Pullman." Debs does not utter any accusation that the violence linked to the strike was related to the hired thugs of Pullman and his associates. Instead, Debs depicts violence as an inevitability in the conflict between capital and labor: "It is not only not strange but natural that in the contention for supremacy by the forces of right and the forces of the wrong, deeds of violence should sometimes occur. It is human nature -- it is history, and history will repeat itself until the day of darkness comes for our land, when plutocrats are supreme, or think themselves supreme." Debs' outlook of the strike's prospect is grim. "It must be said that the situation is full of premonitions that the worst has not been reached. There are no encouraging symptoms. The outlook is in all directions disheartening. Around the horizon and overhead naught but storm clouds meets the vision," he states.

 

"Proclamation to the Members of the American Railway Union: Terre Haute, Indiana -- June 1, 1895," by Eugene V. Debs Written statement issued by Gene Debs to the members and supporters of his American Railway Union at the time of the Supreme Court's upholding his 6 month jail term for "contempt of court." The ARU had fought the good fight on behalf of the 4,000 employees of the Pullman Palace Car Co., Debs declares: "To crush the American Railway Union was the one tie that united them all in the bonds of vengeance; it solidified the enemies of labor into one great association, one organization which, by its fabulous wealth, enabled it to bring into action resources aggregating billions of money and every appliance that money could purchase. But in this supreme hour the American Railway Union, undaunted, put forth its efforts to rescue Pullman's famine-cursed wage slaves from the grasp of an employer as heartless as a stone, as remorseless as a savage and as unpitying as an incarnate fiend." Debs is defiant in the face of the Supreme Court's upholding of his 6 month sentence without trial, likening American lawlessness to that of Tsarist Russia: "In the grasp of despotic power, as infamous and as cruel as ever blackened the records of Russia, I treat with ineffable scorn the power that without trial sends me and my official associates of the American Railway Union to prison. I do not believe, nor will I believe, that my brothers, beloved of our great order, will throw their courage away and join the ranks of the enemy, while their comrades, the victims of worse than Russian vengeance, are suffering in prison."

 

"The Federal Government and the Pullman Strike: Eugene V. Debs' Reply to Grover Cleveland's Magazine Article," by Eugene V. Debs [circa July 7, 1904" The 10 year anniversary of the seminal 1894 Pullman Strike was the inspiration for former President Grover Cleveland to pen a tendentious history of the event, published in the pages of McClure's magazine. Cleveland's one-sided misrepresentation of the affair drew the ire of former head of the American Railway Union, Eugene V. Debs, who wrote this lengthy article in reply (rejected by McClure's and ultimately published in the pages of The Appeal to Reason). Cleveland's triumphalist self-vindication was based on inaccurate information; Cleveland had seemingly not even bothered to consult the report of his own hand-picked commission to investigate the strike, Debs states. The strike had been peacefully and effectively won by the strikers, Debs indicates, before the organized railway managers in collusion with a railroad lawyer appointed by President Cleveland as special counsel to the government, gained relief through the courts via an injunction against the ARU. Working hand-in-glove with the Chicago police, the railroads had thousands of unsavory "thugs, thieves, and ex-convicts" hired as "deputy marshals," who caused acts of violence, including the burning of boxcars and the cutting of fire hoses to insure the spreading of the flames. This ploy in turn gave the Cleveland administration a pretext to intervene with federal troops -- against the explicit recommendations of the Mayor of Chicago and the Governor of Illinois. Thereafter, an effort was made to decapitate the ARU by trial of its officers for "conspiracy" -- but before documents could be brought into the trial proving the culpability of the Railway Managers' Association and winning, the trial was suddenly halted due to the suspicious "illness" of a juror. Instead, the ARU officers were summarily sentenced to jail terms ranging from 3 to 6 months for "contempt of court" by the judge -- a procedure of dubious legality which was finally upheld by a bought-and-paid-for Supreme Court composed of former corporate lawyers, in Debs' view.

 

"Letter to S.S. McClure in New York from Eugene V. Debs in Terre Haute, July 22, 1904." On the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Pullman Strike of 1894, McClure's magazine published a lengthy article on the affair by former President Grover Cleveland. Cleveland's one-sided account inspired strike leader Eugene Debs to write an extensive article in reply. This Debs article was rejected by publisher S.S. McClure, who wrote to Debs that "Instead of giving a plain narrative of the strike seen from your point of view, you have taken up most of your space in calling to witness the unfairness of the other side and abusing the same." He invited Debs to rewrite the piece for publication -- which Debs rejected in no uncertain terms with this July 22, 1904 letter. Debs replied that "If a statement of absolute facts taken from the official records and made in decorous language is not a 'sober' statement it is simply because the facts do not admit of sober treatment. I quite realize that there is "nothing so eloquent as the facts," but when the facts prove the highest public official of a great nation to have debauched his trust at the behest of corporate capital they may not appear so eloquent to him or to his friends, but they lose none of their charm of eloquence for men whose record and character are such that they can face the facts without fear of dishonor." Debs adds that "In answering Mr. Cleveland I wrote under great restraint to keep within the bounds of prudent expression and I would rather far have the article rejected than have it appear emasculated, a miserable apology, deserving of contempt."

 

"Apostrophe to Liberty," by Eugene V. Debs [Aug. 27, 1904] Short florid prose poem dripping with florid language and dedicated to the importance of liberty by the 2-time Presidential candidate Gene Debs: "If liberty is ostracized and exiled, man is a slave, and the world rolls in space and whirls around the sun a gilded prison, a domed dungeon, and though painted in all the enchanting hues that infinite art could command, it must stand forth a blotch amidst the shining spheres of the sidereal heavens, and those who cull from their vocabularies of nations, living or dead, their flashing phrases with which to apostrophize Liberty, are engaged in perpetuating the most stupendous delusion the ages have known. Strike down liberty, no matter by what subtle and infernal art the deed is done, the spinal cord of humanity is sundered and the world is paralyzed by the indescribable crime."

 

"First Authentic News of Cleveland May Day Demonstration," by Hortense Wagenknecht [event of May 1, 1919] Valuable first-hand account of the May Day 1919 Cleveland Riot -- the result of an unprovoked attack by Cleveland police and ultra-nationalist "patriots" against a peaceful procession and assembly of thousands of working class Clevelanders held under the auspices of the Socialist Party. Hortense Wagenknecht -- at the time the temporary State Secretary of the Socialist Party of Cleveland -- contends that the police attack was made against the assembly of supporters gathered in the Cleveland town square, rather than the more committed (and potentially more aggressive) marchers. "No more than 200 of the marchers in the parade ever entered the Square," Wagenknecht states. Mounted police and army trucks drove straight into the crowd, swinging drawn clubs. Fist-fights erupted and gang violence was practiced by the forces of so-called "law and order" against the demonstrators. "Those who attacked the marchers in every instance we can learn of, were not the bystanders, but police, detectives, APLs, soldiers, sailors, and hoodlums, who were selected for the work beforehand. These last were in the main youths from the ages of about 14 to 25 years, and many were drunk. Soldiers stood about in groups in many sections, pointing out to these ruffians who were willing to do their bidding, any who appeared to be 'Reds' or who had on red ties or badges. These were torn from the persons wearing them, and if protest was made by the wearer, the soldiers rushed to the spot and a free-for-all fight ensued. Hundreds of men were without hats and collars, and showed the marks of having their ties removed by these defenders of DEMOCRACY. Streets and sidewalks were strewn with bits of red cloth, with here and there spatterings of blood." Two were killed and hundreds hurt in the riot.

 

"Left Wingers Capture the Ohio Socialist Convention: Resolve to Rule or Wreck National Party -- 'Communist Party' to Be Formed," by Joseph W. Sharts [events of June 27-29, 1919] On June 27-28, 1919, the Socialist Party of Ohio held its state convention in Cincinnati. The gathering was attended by about 55 delegates -- the big majority of which were supporters of the Left Wing movement in the Socialist Party. This news account by SP Regular Joseph Sharts notes that the convention, after 3 hours of debate, voted 47-7 in favor of a pre-prepared state program presented by C.E. Ruthenberg of Cleveland which "declared unequivocally for the 'Left Wing,' viz. for limiting political action, relegating it to a mere auxiliary and subordinate position under industrial action, cutting out all agitation for immediate palliative measures, such as municipal ownership, and insisting upon the abolition of the entire capitalist system through the dictatorship of the proletariat." The day following the convention was held the Ohio state picnic of the Socialist Party, which was addressed by Ruthenberg, Charles Baker, Margaret Prevey, and John Keracher of Detroit.

 

"A Message from Convict No. 9653," by Joseph W. Sharts [Aug. 21, 1919] In August 1920, State Secretary of the Socialist Party of Ohio, Alfred Wagenknecht, dispatched Marguerite Prevey of Akron and Joseph Sharts of Dayton to Atlanta Federal Penitentiary to obtain imprisoned Socialist leader Gene Debs' signature on legal documents seeking his release on a writ of habeas corpus on the basis of his punitive transfer from Moundsville (WV) Federal Penitentiary to Atlanta. At his first meeting with the committee (including Debs' Atlanta lawyer) he hesitated, asking for time to think about the proposal. The next day, Debs again balked, asking for 30 more days to further consider the matter. With regards to the Left/Right factional war in the Socialist Party, Sharts quotes Debs as saying that "he had implicit faith in the intelligence of the rank and file of the movement and their ability to come to a common understanding without any compromise of revolutionary principles; and that their present differences can be reconciled." Debs finds fault with the position of both sides in the factional war, with Sharts indicating that Debs felt that "One side in the present controversy has overemphasized industrial action at the expense of political action. But the other side has overemphasized political action to the exclusion of industrial action and has temporized too much with craft unionism." The principle of state autonomy was supported by Debs as a possible means of determining whether each state adopted or failed to adopt a program including "immediate demands."

 

"Socialist Convention Held at Chicago," by Joseph W. Sharts [Sept. 1, 1919] Valuable first-hand account of the pivotal 1919 Emergency National Convention of the Socialist Party beginning in Chicago on Aug. 30, 1919. Sharts, a SP Regular lacking the pugnacious attitude common during the summer of 1919, tells the tale of dominance of the convention by an effectively-run machine. "Along the left-hand side of the room ran a railing, and out beyond this railing were the seats for the spectators. Here the "Lefts" were packed, pressed, crammed, suffocating; while inside, although the big hall was full, there was comfortable elbow-room," Sharts writes. The pivotal test of strength came in the election of the contest committee, which was headed by Right Winger Jacob Panken of New York. As the contest committee slowly and methodically conducted its inquisition of challenged delegates and acrimony erupted on the floor of the convention upstairs, "an ominous sound" began to be heard from the billiard room downstairs -- "the singing of songs, sharp outbursts of applause. The Left Wingers have started their rival convention without waiting the action of the old organization on the contests." A press deadline unfortunately limits Sharts' account to the early stages of the convention.

 

"'Death for Me or Release for All,' Says Debs: 'I Trust in My Comrades,'" by Joseph W. Sharts [event of Sept. 20, 1919] News account of a follow-up visit to imprisoned Socialist leader Gene Debs at Atlanta Federal Penitentiary by Dayton, Ohio Socialist Joseph Sharts. Sharts' visit was to receive the final word from Debs about whether to proceed with a habeas corpus appeal on his behalf -- a procedure put on a 30 day delay by Debs at an August 21 meeting with Sharts and Marguerite Prevey. Debs declines to allow action taken for him as an individual by his comrades: ""I have studied this matter for 30 days. Every instinct in me is against my making an individual fight for liberty while my comrades rot in jail! Woodrow Wilson and his political crowd sent me here from Moundsville [WV] to kill or break me. I shall stay until I die or he is forced to release us all. My faith is in the rank and file of my comrades." With regard to the split in the ranks of the Socialist Party, Sharts quotes Debs directly: "'The rank and file of the Socialist movement have no quarrel with each other,' he declared. 'It is the leaders always, and those who want to be leaders, who keep up factional differences and stir up new ones.'"

 

"Communist Labor Heads Arrested! Infamous Freeman Act Again Used to Crush Political and Industrial Activity Among Ohio Workers," by Joseph W. Sharts [event of Oct. 16, 1919] News account from the (Regular) Socialist Party of Ohio official organ, the Miami Valley Socialist, edited by Joseph Sharts of Dayton. Sharts notes the Oct. 16 arrest of 5 prominent leaders of the Communist Labor Party in Ohio under the state's criminal syndicalism statute, the ironically named "Freeman Act." Those arrested included Alfred Wagenknecht, National Secretary of the new Communist Labor Party; L.E. Katterfeld, national organizer of the CLP; Elmer T. Allison, editor of The Ohio Socialist; Charles Baker, state organizer; and Walter Brunstrup, Secretary of the Cuyahoga County Committee of the CLP. Sharts characterizes the arrests as the "latest incident of the White Terror in Ohio" and declares that "everyone personally acquainted with these radical leaders knows that if they spoke at any meeting they were careful to avoid making statements that would violate the Freeman Act." Sharts notes that the Freeman Act was also being used to battle unions on behalf of the employers, citing the recent arrest of 9 striking coal miners in Harrison County, members of the United Mine Workers Union. Sharts calls for Ohio workers to make use of the initiative process to overturn the Freeman Act via the ballot box.

 

"Ruthenberg Acquitted by Court Order at Cleveland: Cincinnati Socialists Raided," by Joseph W. Sharts [events of Nov. 18, 1919] News account by Joseph Sharts of the Miami Valley Socialist (Dayton, OH) reporting on two simultaneous events -- the freeing of Cleveland radical leader C.E. Ruthenberg by judicial instruction on charges of having incited the May Day 1919 Cleveland Riot that resulted in 2 deaths and hundreds of injuries and arrests when a peaceful crowd was charged by club-swinging policemen on horseback and driving motor vehicles and beatings were administered by Right Wing thugs with police encouragement. At the same time that Ruthenberg was being released from the trumped-up charges preferred against him, Socialist Party headquarters in Cincinnati were gutted by a mob of Right Wing "100% American" "patriots." Sharts sees historical precedents for Right Wing mob action: "In all ages there have existed bands of bravados and swashbuckling bullies who have been in the pay of nobles and privileged classes and have sought to strike terror among the commons whose slowly accumulating strength has made the dominant families apprehensive," he states, noting that Rome, Renaissance Italy, Stuart England, and the old regimes of revolutionary France and Russia had made use of mob rule in defense of the old order.

 

"Inside Story of Cincinnati Raid: American Legion Rioters Led by Professional Strikebreakers; Machinists' Desk Rifled," by Joseph W. Sharts [event of Nov. 18, 1919] Dayton Socialist journalist Joseph Sharts makes like Paul Harvey and offers "the Rest of the Story" about the November 18, 1919 gutting of the Socialist Party's office at Cincinnati by a Right Wing mob. Most of the gang of 300 were members of the Robert E. Bentley Post of the American Legion, Sharts charges, a group which marched en masse down Vine Street at 10:30 pm after having assembled to make plans. "Then began the systematic plunder and pillage of Socialist properties. Bundles of radical literature were brought out and heaped up in the street on the tarwood pavement and set afire by the young gentlemen, who had never read a line of Socialist literature in their bright young lives. Policemen were present under the leadership of Lieutenant Messerschmidt; but the eminent respectability of the mob and the "patriotic" nature of the performance, as well as the unpopularity of the party whose property was being burglarized and plundered, caused the police to stand politely aside." The gang had been headed by Jack Manly, secretary of the Cincinnati branch of National Metal Trades Association, and Algie Cooper, a professional strikebreaker, Sharts states, noting that the local of the International Association of Machinists had rented space in the Socialists' hall. In the course of the raid, conducted under the watch of the police, Sharts charges that a desk belonging to the Machinists and containing confidential papers "was broken open and rifled of its contents, while literature lay piled around it untouched!"

 

"Ben Hanford -- A Song and A Sword," by William M. Feigenbaum [Jan. 30, 1920] This article by New York Socialist journalist William Feigenbaum commemorates the 10th anniversary of the death of two-time Socialist Party Vice Presidential candidate Ben Hanford -- printer and author. In addition, Feigenbaum notes that his colleague on the staff of the New York Call was a "great orator." "There never was a man, with the exception of Gene Debs, who so captured the imagination of the workers," Feigenbaum declares. "He was clear, and logical, and burning. His slight figure, his physical frailties would be forgotten as his piercing eyes would bore through you, as his eloquent words would ring out, 'The working class, may it ever be right, but right or wrong, the working class,' were the words with which he would close his greatest speeches." Hanford's final effort, fundraising to save The Call despite the cancer which would ultimately kill him, is melodramatically recounted, as are his final words, said to have been scrawled on a piece of paper as he drew his final breaths: "I WOULD THAT MY EVERY HEART'S BEAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN FOR THE WORKING CLASS, AND THROUGH THEM FOR ALL HUMANITY." An example of the quasi-religious aspect of Socialism and a demonstration that hagiography was by no means the exclusive property of any one tendency of American radicalism.

 

"John Reed is Dead," by Robert Minor [Oct. 30, 1920] The Oct. 17, 1920 death of Jack Reed, the representative of the Communist Labor Party (and United Communist Party) to the Executive Committee of the Communist International gave the American Communist movement its first martyr to the cause. This article by cartoonist and Liberator editor Robert Minor celebrates the integrity and dedication of the late American writer. Reed turned his back on the pampered Philistinism of American literary circles, Minor indicates, dismissing the bourgeoisie that seeks to surround itself with young writers as drunk, addled, and stupid. "If the young artists are grateful, they become more and more like the people that surround them, and slowly they lose their art. They sink into the position of clowns for the besotted aristocracy, in private life, and they become writers of excited drivel for the magazines and the book market, drivel without real connection with life," Minor declares. But Reed rejected the ordinary life of the hot young writer, causing the bourgeoisie to erupt. "The propertied classes in America shook with rage at John Reed. In every city is a committee of businessmen called a Grand Jury, which has the function of picking out all persons who endanger the private ownership of the palaces and automobiles and country estates. Two of these Grand Juries -- one in New York and one in Chicago -- picked out John Reed as a criminal, indicted him, and demanded that his voice be smothered in jail. Reed eluded them and went back to Russia," Minor notes. "It all goes to show that the artists are ours, the artists belong to the workers, and to be artists at all they must dream -- dream of things that frighten Tsars and Grand Juries -- dream of workmen in palaces. Art Belongs to the Revolution. John Reed belonged to the workers," Minor concludes. Includes photo of John Reed distributed in commemoration by the UCP.

 

"The Workers League." [unsigned article in The Toiler, Oct. 1, 1921] This article in a primary English-language legal organ of the Communist Party of America announces the formation of "a new political party of labor" -- the Workers League. This New York City-based forerunner of the Workers Party of America was not intended to engage in parliamentarism as a means of winning state power through the ballot box. Rather: "While the Socialist Party is committed to bourgeois parliamentarism and political reform, the Workers League refuses to stimulate illusions in the minds of the workers as to the possibility of improving their long under the present economic order and with parliamentary activity as an instrument. The Workers League enters politics to unmask it. It seeks to enter Congress and other legislative bodies not to urge reform but to voice the wrath of the workers at their terrible situation. With the parliamentary tribune as a sounding board it plans to spread forth over the country the message of international solidarity, the challenge of the irreconcilable class conflict."

 

"Statement to the Communist International Issued to John J. Ballam ["John Moore"] by the CEC of the Central Caucus Faction's Communist Party of America, Jan. 22, 1922." This document prepared for the Executive Committee of the Communist International outlines the rational behind the split of the Central Caucus faction from the regular Communist Party of America. The insurgents represented themselves as the continuers of the old CPA, the United Communist Party, and the unified CPA, depicting their Jan. 7-12, 1922 Convention as an "Emergency Convention" that was part of an unbroken series. The regular CPA's position on the Legal Political Party, the Workers Party of America, is presented as the sole reason for the split. A series of charges are made. According to this document, the regular CPA had (1) engaged in secret negotiations with "certain groups who had recently left the Socialist Party" without informing the minority members of the CED; (2) had refused to call a special convention of the party to determine the question; (3) had suspended and disconnected 3,000 members without hearing, in violation of party and Comintern rules; (4) had suspend the CEC minority (Dirba, Ballam, Ashkenuzi) in violation of the party constitution. The Workers Party is held to be "not the legal political machinery of the CP of A under the control and discipline of the illegal party." Rather, CPA members were said to have been "absorbed" within the "centrist" WPA. Not more than 3,000 CPA members are said to have joined the WPA, 2,000 remained aloof, and another 5,000 had cast their lot with the Central Caucus' "Communist Party of America," which Ballam represented. "All members of the CP of A who have joined the Workers Party have left the Communist Party, which according to its constitution adopted at the Joint Unity Convention, held May 1921, prohibits the members of the CP of A from joining or being members of any other political party or organization," the statement declares.

 

"Letter of Protest to ECCI from John J. Ballam ["John Moore"], Special Representative of the Central Caucus Faction's CPA, March 18, 1922." John Ballam's arrival in Moscow to argue the case of the Central Cacus faction's "Communist Party of America" before the Executive Committee of the Comintern was not met with open arms, prompting Ballam to pen this letter of protest. "These comrades in America sent me to the EC of the CI expecting to obtain at least a complete and thorough hearing and investigation of the causes and incidents leading up to the present deplorable situation in the American Communist movement. At the instigation of Comrades Carr [Ludwig Katterfeld] and Marshall [Max Bedacht] the proceeding s of the commission appointed by the EC to report upon the American situation were hurried and the investigation far from satisfactory. There was no stenographer present and no adequate interpreter. From my observation the commission kept no records and called no witnesses. I had no opportunity to present documents..." Ballam declares. "If the EC of the CI wishes to support Comrade Carr [Katterfeld] and his friends in the face of a growing and determined opposition not only among the comrades who have given me their mandate to represent them, but also among the faction directly represented by Carr [Katterfeld] and Marshall [Bedacht] the consequences will rest squarely upon the EC," Ballam brashly warns. "We demand from the Comintern adequate guarantees that our membership rights shall not be violated, and cannot yield, under the circumstances, unless such guarantees are provided," Ballam insists, adding that a thorough investigation of the American inner-party situation is called for.

 

"Testimony to the Executive Committee of the Communist International, March 18, 1922," by John J. Ballam John Ballam's heated letter of protest to ECCI on behalf of the Central Caucus faction seems to have been the cause for an immediate Executive Session of the American Commission, during which the Ballam was probably taken to the proverbial woodshed. This stenographic document, regrettably limited to Ballam's comments, shows Ballam as a defiant loser of the factional war mediated by the CI. "The Executive Committee seems to be determined that we must go back without guarantees as to our membership rights, that I must go back and insist on the waiving of these rights. I will not do so. We will not join the Fourth International. We will not join the Second International, nor the Two-and-a-Half International. We will stay outside the Communist International, if we must, and we will fight, but within one year the Communist International will recognize the Communist Party of America that I represent, or they will recognize nobody. The Workers Party, as at present led, will not last one year. Its divergent elements pulling against each other in all directions will split it in pieces without any assistance from us," Ballam declares. Ballam accuses the regular CPA of undergoing liquidation in the process of attempting to organize the WPA.

 

"Letter to Grigorii Zinoviev in Moscow from John Ballam ["John Moore"] in Moscow in Regard to the American Situation, March 24, 1922." Less than a week after his defiant performance before a session of the American Commission of the Executive Committee of the Communist International, Central Caucus faction representative in Moscow John Ballam had thought better of his strategy of threats and bluster, as this note to the President of ECCI demonstrates. Now, Ballam was amenable to compromise, if not quite contrite: "In the interests of the Communist movement in America I am prepared to agree to the disbanding of the faction which I represent and to work for the policies of the Comintern, which, as a soldier in the revolutionary ranks I cannot oppose," he writes. A set of policies is proposed by Ballam "in order to protect these comrades in their membership rights; and to avoid the danger of further disagreement and splits." These suggestions include the appointment of a 3 person commission to attend all meetings of the Central Executive Committee of the reunified party -- with voice but not vote -- the commission to consist of Ludwig Katterfeld of the regular CPA, Ballam of the Central Caucus faction's CPA, and a mutually agreed-upon representative. The commission of 3 was to have access to all books and records of the party, including the list of contacts in the localities. Mikhail Borodin is proposed by Ballam as the decisive third member, with Ballam adding that he had met with Borodin and Borodin had agreed to accept the assignment. The commission was to study the American party situation and to make a thorough report to the Comintern. In addition, Ballam strongly suggested the convocation of a convention of the reunified party, with the call issued within 30 days of factional unity and the convention itself to be held within 30 days of the call. (This latter suggestion seems to have been followed, with the Bridgman Michigan unity convention taking place just under 60 days after the June 25 formal date of reunification.)

 

"Cable to the Central Caucus Faction's Communist Party of America in New York from John J. Ballam ["Moore"] in Moscow, March 27, 1922." Text of a terse cable for the Central Caucus faction's man in Moscow, John Ballam, to his party comrades in New York announcing that an end to the factional controversy had been brokered before the Executive Committee of the Comintern. Ballam states that the Central Caucus faction's CPA should stop all competition with and attacks upon the regular organization. Ballam indicates as well that a representative is coming from ECCI. Under terms of the deal, the rights of all opposition members are to be guaranteed at an upcoming convention, Ballam notes, adding that "our [faction] must obey decision of [the Comintern] or [be expelled]."

 

"Declaration Resolving the American Situation by L.E. Katterfeld ["Carr"] for the Communist Party of America (Majority) and John J. Ballam ["Moore"] for the Minority Group, March 29, 1922." ***NEW EDITION -- STANDARDIZES TYPOGRAPHY AND ADDS NAME OF A CI SIGNATORY (RAKOSI)*** John Ballam was elected by the Central Caucus faction-CPA's Emergency Convention of Jan. 7-12, 1922 as an international delegate to the Comintern, where he traveled to state his group's position in the bitter factional controversy. Ballam was met with a stinging rebuke from the American Commission of the ECCI which saw the regular CPA's establishment of a Legal Political Party to be in tune with the directives of the 3rd Wold Congress of the Comintern and the Central Caucus' secession to be destructive and undisciplined. Ballam soon acclimated himself to the situation in Moscow and as a disciplined adherent of the Comintern, was won over to the CI's perspective. This document details the process for reunification -- a halt to issuance of printed propaganda by the Central Caucus faction, members to rejoin the regular party without discrimination within 60 days, all of the Central Caucus faction's property and records to be turned over to the CPA majority group. When he got home, Ballam's agreement was immediately scrapped by the Central Caucus faction, who continued the factional strife up to the ill-starred Bridgman, Michigan unity convention in August.

 

"Where I Stand -- And Why," by Emil Herman [April 7, 1922] Article by the former State Secretary of the radical Socialist Party of Washington Emil Herman -- a victim of Wilson administration repression during the world war -- on why he was choosing to remain with the Socialist Party despite speculation to the contrary. Upon his Christmas 1922 release after nearly 3 years in the Federal Penitentiary at McNeil's Island, Washington. Herman made an assessement of the political situation that had developed since 1919. He saw the heavy hand of the Justice Department behind the 1919 Socialist Party split: "It is apparent to me that the programs of the Communist Labor and the Communist Parties which resulted from the ill-advised Left Wing split from the Socialist Party were in great part written by agents of the Department of Justice and that this was true to a still greater extent of the program of the United Communist Party, which was a fusion of the two first-mentioned organizations. They swallowed hook, bait, and line of the programs imposed upon them, and having adopted the illegal programs, were, of course, driven underground." While the rank and file party members involved were individuals with honest intentions, circumstances had led them to form the Workers Party of America -- which Herman characterizes as similar in form and strategy to the Socialist Party of America. "The Left Wing offshoot from the Socialist Party, having made the illegal and ill-fated underground attempt to organize the workers for revolutionary activity through the United Communist Party now recognize their mistake, return above ground in the Workers Party, and find themselves advocating practically the same program which they formerly advocated through the Socialist Party and which the Socialist Party still advocates," Herman declares. The other contenders -- the Farmer-Labor Party and the Socialist Labor Party -- are dismissed by Herman as (respectively) "merely a repetition of Socialist Party principles" and " a small, critical, and comparatively ineffective group." Herman proclaims he has a 25 year history as a Socialist and that the Socialist Party most closely approximates his political views. "It is impossible for me to be a quitter in this time of crimes and imminent change," Herman writes, therefore he would cast his lot with the SPA.

 

"Letter to Max Bedacht ["James Marshall"], Acting Executive Secretary, CPA, from Joseph Kowalski ["A. Gorny"], Secretary of the Polish Bureau, CPA, June 17, 1922." Short note from Joseph Kowalski, head of the Polish Bureau of the underground CPA (depicted as a Muscovite supervillian in DoJ gumshoe Jacob Spolansky's laughably melodramatic and factually sparse Cold War tome, The Communist Trail in America) to the acting head of the CPA, Max Bedacht. This communication emphasizes the utter poverty in which the CPA was enmeshed during the first half of 1922. Peeking up from behind his propaganda-laden desk, the shrewd Communist boss Bedacht must have let out a low whistle as he glanced furtively at the words of the Polish-American Bolshevik superrevolutionist detailing his progress in fulfillment of his nefarious tasks: "For the last few weeks all the work in Polish Bureau was hampered on account of lack of money. Theses are out and same ought to be translated. This cannot be done, because we have no typewriter and after all I have not a place were I could perform party work. In such circumstances I cannot accomplish the duties which were given to me by CEC and Pol[ish] Bureau, and therefore I cannot take any responsibility." The only way out of the "serious situation" was for Kowalski to submit his resignation, which he was doing forthwith, the letter indicates.

 

"Letter to the CPA Federation Director from Boodman ["R. Robins"], Secretary of the Lettish [Latvian] Federation Bureau, CPA, in Boston, Nov. 13, 1922." An interesting (albeit esoteric) document shedding some light on the aftermath of the Central Caucus faction split of 1922. Opposition to reunification is known to have been concentrated in the ultra-radical Latvian Federation. This report from (loyalist) CPA Latvian Federation Secretary Boodman ["Robins"] provides concrete numbers. There was clearly no rush to rejoin the party, with only 31 Latvian Federation members coming back to regular CPA by the June 25, 1922 date of reunification, with all but one of these hailing from the Chicago District. There was absolutely no motion from the Boston, New York, and San Francisco districts -- centers of the irreconcilable Central Caucus CPA/United Toilers Party. Federation membership stood at 452 after the reunification, with the bulk of the Federation's members in three districts -- Boston, New York, and Chicago. Other radical Latvian groups not connected with the CPA's Latvian Bureau existed in Philadelphia, Detroit, and elsewhere, the document indicates.

 

"Letter to the Bureau of the Jewish Federation, CPA from Abram Jakira, Secretary of the CPA, Nov. 13, 1922." This letter from the head of the underground CPA, Abram Jakira, emphasizes that not every individual coming from Moscow to work in the Communist Party of America bore the Comintern's cachet. "Comrade Arkadieff" (doubtlessly a pseudonym) had written to Jakira complaining that he had been excluded from sessions the Central Executive Committee of the party and shunted aside. Instead, he apparently represented himself as a Comintern plenipotentiary in charge of the Jewish Federation. Jakira makes "Arkadieff's" status clear to the Jewish Bureau under which he worked in no uncertain terms: "Com. Arkadieff declares that the Executive of the CI sent him for work in America. That is quite true. But thereupon he draws incorrect and unsupported conclusions. He believes that he is not under the discipline of the American party. That is sheerest nonsense. No one can work in the CP of A without being 100 percent under the discipline of the CEC. That a member of the CP of Russia was sent by way of the CI to work in the CP of A does not in the least denote that he is a representative of the CI, or has anything to do with the CI." Jakira seeks to put an end to the "foolish legend" that "Arkadieff" had an sort of mission to perform for the Comintern and to place him under CPA discipline. "Please inform Com. Arkadieff that he either must work under the discipline of the Party or there will be no room for him in the American Party," Jakira warns.

 

"As to the Labor Defense Council," by Eugene V. Debs [March 1925] Although initially organized by the Communist Party as a broad-based non-party legal defense organization to aid the victims of the August 1922 raid on the party's convention at Bridgman, Michigan, by 1925 the Legal Defense Council had begun to take a more partisan cast. Lips began to wag about the presence of Socialist Party National Chairman Eugene V. Debs on the LDC's letterhead -- to the effect that Debs was, in deeds if not in words, sympathetic to the Communist cause. This prompted a reply by Debs in the official organ of the Socialist Party to discount any such speculation. "was organized to provide defense for Communists prosecuted under so-called criminal syndicalism and other laws because of their activities in the labor movement, the purpose of the defense being the preservation of the right of free speech, free assemblage, and other civil rights in the United States. I gladly accorded to this body the use of my name in raising funds and consented to be named as Vice President in its list of officers. I did this not so much for Foster, Ruthenberg, Minor, and others as individuals, but to back then up in the defense of their civil rights. That fight is also my fight," Debs declares. He bitterly notes that while the Communist Party "refused to lift a finger to help me out of prison," he nevertheless stood ready to defend the civil rights of Communists. Debs forcefully states that the "surreptitious" reports of his support of the Communists as against the Socialists are "on a par with some other falsehoods published in Communist organs to which my attention has been called." After this statement of his true allegiance, Debs insists that "if hereafter any Communist whispers it into your ear that I am with the Communists in anything except their right to free speech and other civil rights, just answer by turning your back upon him and leaving the vulgar falsifier to himself."

 

 

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