"The Young Communist League
of America. Resolution Adopted by the 2nd Convention of the United
Communist Party, Kingston, NY -- January 1921." The 2nd Convention of the UCP for the first time
set in motion the establishment of a formal Communist youth organization
in the United States. This is the text of the Convention Resolution
which established the "Young Communist League, Section of
the Young Communist International." The resolution stated
that "The Party shall recognize the importance of a young
people's movement. It is the duty of the Party to prepare them
with all the means at its disposal. An intensive cooperation
between both organizations is an absolute necessity." To
this end financial support and organizational effort by the organizations
District Organizers was pledged, space in the official organ
committed to youth matters, and literature planned. An additional
legal organization "to carry on the legal work of the Young
Communist League of America" and to provide "education,
recreational, and social facilities" was called for in the
resolution, presaging the establishment of a parallel Workers
Party of America and Young Workers League in 1922.
"Fourth Statement on Unity
Proceedings," by Charles Dirba [Jan. 5, 1921] The last of four typeset leaflets
prepared for the rank and file of the Communist Party of America
detailing the status of unity negotiations with the rival United
Communist Party. Dirba notes that the CI's deadline for unity
has passed without action and that "the responsibility for
this lies entirely upon the UCP. They have refused and they still
refuse to abide by the decisions of the Comintern providing for
a joint unity convention on the basis of proportional representation."
Includes text of (1) UCP to CPA, Dec. 18 (very lengthy
reply to the CPA's challenge to supply specifics to back up its
charges of systematic membership manipulation. While its citation
of external estimates of CPA membership strength in various cities
is not compelling, its specific charges of inflation of the Lithuanian
Federation membership by including participants in legal work
as members of the underground organization, though only nominally
organized as such, seems to have merit. The additional point
seems well taken that the ceaseless torrent of epithets slung
by the CPA toward the CLP and UCP has undermined unity efforts.
"Your slanderous and unscrupulous attack upon the UCP, which
you have made through your official papers and through your paid
organizers trying to poison the minds of the membership by shouting
'centrists' and 'provocateurs,' belie your present protestations
of the unity spirit," the UCP declares.); (2) CPA to
UCP, Dec. 22 (insistence upon CI's terms for unity and declaration
that the UCP's failure to accept these terms constititued a "breach
of discipline and a flagrant violation of the mandate of the
CI."); (3) UCP Convention to CPA, circa Dec. 24 (convention
invitation of the CPA to attend a joint unity convention based
upon equal representation of the parties, with not more than
25 delegates per side due to security reasons); (4) CPA to
UCP Convention, circa Dec. 25 (rejection of proposed Unity
Convention based on equal representation with reiteration that
only the proportional representation plan of the CI was possible.
Bringing this matter before the UCP Kingston Convention is urged);
(5) UCP Convention to CPA, circa Dec. 26 (repetition of
the "concession" to hold a convention with equal representation;
request that the CEC of the CPA immediate convene its elected
convention delegates to consider this offer); (6) CPA to UCP,
circa Dec. 27 (rejection of convention based upon equal participation,
reiteration of Comintern guidelines); (7) UCP Convention to
CPA, circa Dec. 28 (request to distribute a letter to each
individual convention delegate detailing the UCP's offer for
a joint convention with 25 delegates per side); (8) CPA to
UCP Convention, circa Dec. 31 (flat rejection to "submit
your outrageous statement to our delegates individually"
and statement that "the United Communist Party must obey
the mandate of the Communist International.")
"BoI Informant's Undercover
Report of the UCP Legal Defense Convention, Chicago," by
"Mike Benton" [event of Jan. 9-10, 1921] The Department of Justice's Bureau
of Investigation (forerunner of the FBI) managed to infiltrate
the underground Communist movement with a small handful of secret
informants, including "Mike Benton" from Mason City,
Iowa -- previously employed as a labor spy for one of the city's
brickmaking firms. On Jan. 9, 1921, "Benton" traveled
to Chicago with leading Mason City radical Harry Keas, where
he attended a convention of the United Communist Party's legal
defense organization, the National Defense Committee. Sixty-three
delegates from all over the United States and Canada were in
attendance, according to "Benton," attending a marathon
13-hour session held in an inconspicuous hall attached to a saloon
located at 228 W Oak Street. "Benton" notes that the
various UCP leaders are "hard-boiled fellow that have been
revolutionaries for the last 15 or 20 years, most of them have
been indicted and some of them have got good beatings, been in
jail serving sentence, and some will be tried in the future.
They are all getting more radical every day. They are not working
as openly as they used to do and all this radical propaganda
is going to be handled through underground work." "Benton"
frantically warns his government handlers that "If the radicals
are let alone with their propaganda for a couple of years we
will have a mighty hard task to deal with them because they take
men like William Z. Foster, National Secretary of the Steel Workers
Union. He is just about to unite with the UCP. If he does he
will pull over about 150,000 union members and with them and
then the United Miners of America next."
"Open Letter to the Central
Executive Committee of the CPA, Jan. 11, 1921" by Maximilian
Cohen. Outvoted on the Central Executive
Committee of the CPA by a majority who paid little heed to the
Comintern's directive to unite with the United Communist Party
by Jan. 1, 1921, Maximilian Cohen issued this aggressive challenge
to the CEC's line regarding unity, which he viewed as being intent
on "crushing" the rival Communist organization. Instead
of printing this letter in the party press and opening its pages
to a debate of the issue, as Cohen requested, the CEC majority
instead initiated expulsion proceedings against him. This strong
pro-unity critique of CPA policy is interesting both as an analysis
of the politics of Communist unity in 1920-21 and as an object
lesson of the limits of intraparty dissent within the old CPA.
"Minutes of the Central Executive
Committee, Communist Party of America: New York City - Jan. 11-16,
1921." The
Central Executive Committee of the old Communist Party of America
held frequent extremely lengthy plenums -- taking up evenings
for the better part of a week. This plenum dealt with the issue
of Maximilian Cohen, accused of violating party discipline and
misrepresenting the position of the CEC with respect to proposed
merger with the United Communist Party. For his transgressions
Cohen was summarily suspended from the CEC and an investigating
committee appointed on the first day of the plenum -- he was
expelled from the CEC and the CPA itself on the last. The CEC
also heard the report of Karlis Jansons ["Scott"] on
behalf of the American Agency -- a body appointed to organize
sections of the RILU and Comintern in Canada and Mexico; this
group of three (including Louis Fraina and Sen Katayama) attempted
to assert authority in the merger discussions, which was rebuffed
by the CEC of the CPA. Includes details about party finances
and membership for the second half of 1920 (approximately $42,200
received and a paid membership averaging about 7,100, according
to the figures). Also included are brief reports from the 6 functioning
districts of the CPA. The Executive Secretary of the CPA at this
time was Charles Dirba, Editor of party publications was John
Ballam.
"Letter to the Executive
Committee of the Communist International in Moscow from Alfred
Wagenknecht, Executive Secretary of the United Communist Party
in New York, Jan. 12, 1921." This document was obtained by the Department of
Justice in the April 29, 1921 raid on the national headquarters
of the United Communist Party in New York. After obtaining it,
there could have been little doubt about the organization's actual
Comintern funding situation for the year. The document is the
form of a report from two CLP/UCP delegates to the 2nd Convention,
Alexander Bilan and Edward Lindgren. The two recount the official
request for appropriation from the CI for the American movement
($210,000), which was reduced by the Small Bureau of ECCI to
$110,000. This sum was to be divided as follows: $25,000 for
general organizational work, $25,000 for defense (prisoner bail
and legal fees), $25,000 for literature publication, $25,000
towards establishment of a daily English-language newspaper,
and $10,000 for IWW defense. Of this $110,000 budgeted sum for
the coming year until the next world Congress, $25,000 had been
granted as an emergency appropriation to stem the UCP's "urgent
need for money." This $25,000 had been readied in the form
of gold; this had been "taken away" from Bilan and
Lindgren at the last minute by a sub-committee of the Small Bureau,
however, and turned over to a Comrade Matsen from Norway, who
was to be in charge of getting the gold through the Allied blockade
of Soviet Russia. However, "careless handling" of the
gold had led to its loss by Matsen. Bilan and Lindgren reiterated
that they took no responsibility for the loss of the first UCP
appropriation for 1920-21, the mistake being one made by Matsen.
Thus the reality of "Moscow Gold" and the United
Communist Party of America as of Jan. 12, 1921: $110,000 budgeted,
$25,000 appropriated, $0 delivered. And the Department of
Justice's Bureau of Investigation knew this fact from this internal
document no later than May 1921.
"Report of Hungarian Organizer,"
by J. Burok" [January 12, 1921] In October of 1920, the United Communist Party
and the legal Hungarian-language Communist paper Elöre
sent organizer J. Burok on the road to firm up connections for
distribution of the Hungarian language press and to establish
groups for the underground UCP. Burok established a total of
15 groups during his 11 1/2 week mission -- 5 in Pittsburgh,
4 in Chicago, 2 in Detroit, and 1 each in Cleveland, Newark,
Milwuakee, and West Pullman, IL. This is the report which Burok
wrote upon completion of his task. The document was originally
composed in Hungarian but was seized by the Department of Justice
in the April 29, 1921 raid on the New York apartment of Helen
Ware (the Lindren/Jakira/Amter case). The Federal agents translated
the document into English and preserved it in their archives,
thus preserving the information for future historians. Burok
complains that existing branches of another left wing membership
organization, the American Hungarian Workers Federation, reduced
the number of groups he was able to form -- the cost of monthly
dues to both organizations being prohibitive. Burok recommended
a drastic reduction of the UCP dues rate for members of such
organizations.
"Circular Letter on the Closing
of the Chicago Office of the Soviet Russia Medical Relief Committee
from Charles L. Drake." [Jan. 15, 1921] The Soviet Russia Medical Relief
Committee was the medical relief arm of the Communist-directed
Friends of Soviet Russia organization. The group worked hand
in glove with the Russian Soviet Government Bureau headed by
Ludwig Martens, which served as the official purchasing agent
for the fundraising organization. Undercover investigation by
the Department of Justice's Bureau of Investigation assured that
authorities were well apprised of bitter criticism in the radical
community of the ethics and accounting practices of Soviet Russia
Medical Relief, charges levied with particular vehemence by the
Anarchist-dominated Russian radical movement of the Detroit area.
While the BoI believed that the "American Red Star League"
organization which emerged in early 1921 was a parallel organization
initiated as in response to the improprieties of the Soviet Russian
Medical Relief Committee headed by A.M. Rovin and Boris Roustam-Bek,
this document reveals an altogether different origin. Rather
than an insurgent parallel organization motivated by accountability
and fiscal reform, the Red Star League had its roots in the sudden
decision of the New York main office to terminate its Chicago,
headed by attorney Charles L. Drake. With the deportation of
Martens and the shuttering of the Soviet Bureau clearing in the
offing, the Soviet Medical Relief organization saw itself as
left with no means of transporting its sanitary and medical supplies
to Soviet Russia. The determination to shutter the Western Office
was abrupt -- two days before Christmas a letter was sent by
Secretary Joseph Michael to Drake in Chicago (reprinted here)
instructing him to immediately terminate all engagements and
close the office. Drake obtained an extension of this deadline
to Friday, Jan. 15, 1921, which was the final day of operation
of the Western Office of the Soviet Russia Medical Relief Committee.
The American Red Star League seems to have been launched immediately
thereafter, using the same physical office space being abandoned
and with Drake taking on the role of Secretary and guiding figure
of the new medical relief fundraising organization.
"Financial Report, Soviet
Russia Medical Relief Committee, Western District," by Charles
L. Drake [Jan. 15, 1921] This
report by Director Charles Drake closes the book on the 4-1/2
month tenure of the Chicago office of the Soviet Russia Medical
Relief Committee. The accounts presented here show the receipt
of over $24,500, which was offset by about $14,000 in office,
travel, salary, and other fundraising expenses. $9600 had been
sent to New York to support the Society's work, while over $800
remained on account at the time of the Chicago office's Jan.
15, 1921 termination. The discontinuance of the Western Office
comes at a time when the heaviest financial drain was being made
for organization, and before opportunity has been given to reap
the benefits that would more than justify the expenditures. Thousands
and thousands of dollars would come in from the preparatory work
already done were this office open to receive it. Those who know
even the slightest about the collection of funds on a large scale
will heartily appreciate the great financial results accomplished,
especially those cognizant of the immense obstacles to be overcome.
Systematized sabotage and organized antagonism maliciously opposed
the work from the start -- elements that would stop at nothing
to destroy the work and prevent even the slightest relief reaching
the dying women and children of Soviet Russia," Drake asserts.
"Unemployment." (leaflet
of the Communist Party of America) [circa Jan. 15, 1921] This leaflet of the "illegal"
underground CPA observes that "a terrific industrial slump
has hit this country." Retailers were overstocked, manufacturers
were unable to get orders and were cutting back production and
jobs accordingly, and farmers were forced to dump their products
on the market at prices below the actual cost of production.
"The working class could very easily consume more food,
more clothing, more of all the products that they have produced.
But under the present capitalist system of production commodities
are produced for profit and not primarily for use. The workers
get back in wages only about one-fifth of what they produce.
The rest, after deducting the portion used by the capitalist
class and their henchmen, is held for export to foreign markets.
This surplus must be sold for profit to foreign countries."
However, foreign markets were in disarray and were unable to
absorb this surplus production and a major crisis was impending.
There was only one solution, the leaflet states: "The only
way in which you can put an end to this profit system which keeps
you in poverty, misery, and degradation, and gives all the good
things of life to the rich, is to conquer political power for
your class, and make the working class the ruling class in society.
You must first destroy the present capitalist government and
establish a workers' or Soviet government in its place by force
-- just as did the workers and peasants of Russia!" The
call for the use of armed force by the working class is repeated:
"The capitalist government cannot be destroyed by peaceful
means, such as the ballot box. The ballot box is itself an instrument
of capitalist domination, cleverly developed so as to fool the
workers into believing that they gain their ends through parliamentary
action. Nor can you abolish the capitalist system by seizing
the factories without at the same time seizing the political
power.... The only way to overthrow the capitalist government
is by means of MASS ACTION -- demonstrations, protests, mass
strikes, general strikes, political strikes, and culminating
finally in open collision with the capitalist state -- armed
insurrection and civil war."
"Letter to the American Agency
of the Comintern from the Central Executive Committee of the
United Communist Party in New York, January 17, 1921." Facing a Joint Unity Convention for which delegates
were to be apportioned by actually paid membership for July-October
1920 -- a period in which the UCP averaged a somewhat inflated
4,561 and the CPA averaged 7,552 -- the UCP suddenly turned about
face, terminating their shrill "Unity Now" line and
becoming unmistakably obstructionist. This letter from UCP Executive
Secretary Alfred Wagenknecht on behalf of the CEC to the American
Agency declares that unity under the proportional representation
terms set by the Comintern is "impossible," since it
was found to be "impossible to get correct membership figures
from the Communist Party." Instead, "the United Communist
Party proposed a unity convention on the basis of equal representation.
This alone can break the deadlock," Wagenknecht declared.
He dishonestly added that "we denounce the insistence of
the leaders of the Communist Party on the execution of the letter
[calling for proportional representation] as a subterfuge behind
which they want to hide their determination to prevent unity."
In reality, the archival evidence indicates that the CPA provided
the UCP with a "clean" membership count, which the
UCP summarily rejected when they realized that they would enter
the forthcoming convention controlling just 38% of the delegates.
"Membership Series by Federation
for the (old) Communist Party of America, July 1920 to Jan. 1921."
For those of you
who like your history crunchy instead of fluffy, here are two
pages worth printing out and saving. This is an outstanding membership
series for seven core months of the old Communist Party of America,
as presented by Executive Secretary Charles Dirba to the May
1921 Unity Convention held at Woodstock, NY. Each of the seven
months is divided among the six language federations of the old
CPA (these being from big to small: Lithuanian, Russian, Ukrainian,
Latvian, Polish, Jewish) as well as the handful of "Non-Federation"
(i.e. English language) members. Percentages and quarterly averages
have been tabulated and a page of explanatory commentary provided
by Tim Davenport. In round figures, membership of the old CPA
stood at 7,000 in this period, about a third of which were members
of the Lithuanian Federation and about a quarter of which were
members of the Russian Federation. There were a shade over 200
"Non-Federation" members in the period.
"Bibliography: Press of the
Communist International (Till February 1st, 1921)." There was an explosion of interest
and activity in the revolutionary socialist movement around the
world during the first 2 years of the Communist International
which resulted in a vast literature emerging. This document lists
the official CI and English-language portions of an extensive
bibliography which appeared in the pages of the official organ
of the Comintern. Of particular note is the list of languages
in which the underground official organs of the CPA and UCP appeared.
For the CPA, in addition to English: Latvian, Ukrainian, and
Polish -- Russian not mentioned. The CPA also published an underground
Yiddish organ called Die Rot Fahne. For the UCP, in addition
to English: Hungarian, Yiddish, Latvian, Polish, Russian, Finnish,
Croatian. From June 1920 the Russian language Novyi Mir,
previously a legal publication, had been published on an illegal
basis, the bibliography notes. The bibliography is not perfect,
scholars should be made aware, listing two defunct publications
of the former CLP -- Voice of Labor (first variant) and
The Class Struggle. Also interesting are the claimed circulation
figures of the English language legal organs of the two parties:
5,000 for the CPA's The Workers Challenge and 15,000 for
the UCP's The Toiler.
"The American Red Star League:
First Aid to the Working Class." [circa Feb. 1, 1921] "The ghastly failure of the
present organized relief forces to be of any real service to
the working class and their official refusal in many cases to
help the workers where help is most needed has made necessary
the organization of a relief force that will be of, by, and for
the working class, and for the working class alone," declares
this leaflet of the newly-organized American Red Star League.
This group is said to be "organized solely for the purpose
of giving relief to members of the working class in acute need,
everywhere in the world." While aid to the working class
in war ravaged Europe was clearly a priority, the leaflet notes
that "such need is not confined to foreign countries. The
anti-labor drive which has been begun by the moneyed powers in
this country, headed by the United States Steel Corporation and
assisted by every Chamber of Commerce, will lead to terrible
conflicts and nationwide destitution." The leaflet exhorts
recipients to give financial donations to a $10 million Relief
Fund: "The workers must be prepared now to aid their own
distressed comrades. The want in Europe and Asia is terrible,
appalling, and the official relief agencies use the contributions
of Americans against the workers who are seeking to control their
own governments. We must help them!"
"Circular Letter to All District
Organizers of the United Communist Party of America From Executive
Secretary Alfred Wagenknecht, February 1, 1921." A cover letter for the first two
copies of the organ of Alexander Bittelman's "Communist
Unity Committee," sent out by Executive Secretary Wagenknecht
of the United Communist Party so that the UCP's DOs might "be
better able to meet the propaganda of this 'third party' committee."
Wagenknecht relates Bittelman's saga -- failing to be able to
keep the Jewish federation neutral in the CPA/CLP split, then
joining the UCP. Bittelman was offered the job of editor of the
UCP's legal Jewish newspaper, but he declined, seeking to edit
a narrow theoretical journal instead. Wagenknecht says he then
led 15 Jewish members out of the UCP and into the CPA -- which
accepted the rank-and-filers and refused membership to Bittelman!
Outside of both organizations, Bittelman established his "Communist
Unity Committee" so as to "establish a leadership for
himself," Wagenknecht says.
"In the Matter of Abraham
Zanan, Under Telegraphic Warrant of Arrest: Philadelphia -- Feb.
11, 1921." (Interview of Abraham Zanan of the CPA by A.G.
Benkhart, Immigrant Inspector.) Attempting a social history of the early American
Communist movement is problematic. While there are many hundreds,
even thousands, of Slavic and Baltic and Hungarian names and
addresses recorded in the voluminous records of the Department
of Justice's Bureau of Investigation -- readily available on
microfilm as part of the National Archives and Records Administration's
collection M-1085 -- these are ultimately faceless mentions of
individuals deported from or absorbed into America without leaving
a trace. Those interrogation transcripts which are extant, a
fraction of the larger whole, tend to be uninformative , the
prisoners understandably tending to lie and obfuscate in the
interest of self-preservation rather than to truthfully enlighten
their interrogators. This particular document, however, provides
a significant glimpse at the history of American Communist Party
life "from below," from the perspective of a committed
rank and file member. Abraham Zanan answered the questions of
Immigration Inspector A.G. Benkhart fully and truthfully because
he was (somewhat lamentedly) seeking deportation to Soviet
Russia. Zanan was a 20 year old unemployed garment cutter from
Philadelphia, a member of the Young Peoples Socialist League
(youth section of the Socialist Party) from 1915 and the Yiddish
language federation of the Socialist Party of America not long
thereafter, a founding member of the Communist Party of America
who departed the old CPA with the Ruthenberg group in 1920 to
membership in the United Communist Party. Zanan provides details
of group life in the UCP, with meetings held at rotating homes
at irregular intervals, rare activity in distributing the leaflets
of the organization, the organization collecting its 75 cent
monthly dues without the use of receipt stamps or party cards.
Zanan attempts to explain to the inspector the UCP's position
on force and violence, that it was both defensive and inevitable
in the struggle for state power. He takes umbrage to the government's
assertion that he and his party are "Anarchist" or
against all organized government -- these being, along with the
charge advocacy of force and violence, the sole statutory rationale
for state repression of the Communists. Unable to find employment
in his trade for a protracted period and not seeking to be a
burden to his family, Zanan turned himself in to the authorities
on Feb. 3, 1921, and confessed his party membership, believing
himself to be a fugitive from justice since the unsuccessful
raid of his home during the so-called Palmer Raids of Jan. 2/3,
1920. He sought deportation to Soviet Russia, believing that
he might there find employment and make a living, despite the
testimony of his mother and uncle, included here, to keep the
"good boy" Zanan in America.
"British Espionage in the
United States: A Secret Memorandum Prepared by the United States
Dept. of Justice, Feb. 15, 1921." This secret US Department of Justice memorandum,
forwarded under a cover letter by J. Edgar Hoover, reviews the
activities of the British Intelligence Service in America. "There
are several classes of investigation which the British were,
and I assume still are, particularly interested in. These included
Sinn Féin activities, Hindu activities, Negro activities
(especially as they affect and became part of the activities
of all darker peoples), International radical organizations and
individuals, and radical affairs of all kinds in the United States,"
the memo states. The memo dates Britain's active pursuit of intelligence
on radicalism in America to the spring of 1918, when Robert Nathan
arrived from England. A lengthy list of known and suspected British
agents is provided, including Marcus Garvey of the Universal
Negro Improvement Association, Rev. R.D. Jonas, Louis Fraina,
Big Jim Larkin, Santeri Nuorteva, and former Bureau of Investigation
and Lusk Committee investigator Raymond W. Finch. Some of these
identifications are dubious. With respect to Fraina, the memo
states that "sometime ago, approximately 6 months,"
an unnamed "prominent State Department official was advised
by Sir Basil Thompson, head of the British Secret Service"
that Fraina "had been in the employ of the British Secret
Service, but at that time, he was not." The memo states
that "when Fraina returned to England after the Amsterdam
conference of the 3rd International [Feb. 10-11, 1920] he was
placed in jail. I have been confidentially informed that Fraina
at this time was subjected to a thorough examination by the British
authorities and whether or not he was actually placed upon a
salary basis with them is unknown but he shortly thereafter departed
for Russia where today he is in the intimate confidence of the
Soviet authorities." This specific account of Fraina's path
to Moscow is at odds with the existing literature (Draper, Buhle)
as well as the State Dept. memo of March 5, 1920 and the Hicks/MID
memo of Nov. 2, 1920, it should be noted.
"Report on the United Communist
Party," by BoI Undercover Employee "P-140" [Feb.
15, 1921] This
report of a Hungarian employee of the Department of Justice's
Bureau of Investigation paints the United Communist Party of
America in most alarming tones: "I beg to report that I
established the fact that it is the intention of the United Communist
Party to try to establish within this year the Dictatorship of
the Proletariat." The unidentified "P-140" emphatically
declares: "It is namely known that the local factions of
the Third International are receiving from Moscow all the directions.
It is the intention of the Communists of Europe to celebrate
the 1st of May with a general strike and the Communists of America
adopted the same program. I was informed by the people who are
members of the Communist Party to the effect that the laborers
of this province are provided with arms." "P-140"
also sensationally adds: "I will also mention a few new
points in connection with my investigation of the Wall Street
explosion. I was always positive that the outrage was done by
the communists, but now I obtained proofs to that effect. The
young man who is known only under the name of "Rudy"
told me that a great deal of this affair is known to the "comrades"
in Detroit, who are the most revolutionary elements." Slightly
unhinged and factually erroneous reports like this one stoked
the fires of the engine of repression, culminating in the mass
arrests in Philadelphia during the night of April 25/26 and the
raid of UCP headquarters in New York City on April 29, 1921.
"Statement to the Members
of the Communist Party of America and United Communist Party
from the American Agency of ECCI, Feb. 17, 1921." Unable to bring the two parties to an immediate
unity convention, the designated "American Agency"
of the Executive Committee of the Communist International proposed
the formation of a six member "National Council," formed
on an equal basis. The parties were to terminate their dueling
official organs and the National Council was to issue a joint
official organ on behalf of "The Communist Party of America
(Unified)" -- a publication which would be produced under
the authority of two editors, one hailing from the UCP and the
other from the CPA. This proposal for unity put forward by the
American Agency (Janson, Fraina, and Katayama) was accepted with
revisions by the CEC of the United Communist Party, but rejected
by the Communist Party of America, probably because it merged
the two groups on a basis of organizational equality rather than
according to organizational size. "We shall accordingly
report to the Executive Committee that we cannot break the deadlock,
and we shall make definite concrete suggestions to the Communist
International on how to break the deadlock and how to realize
actual unity -- unity of a character which shall give factional
control to neither party," the statement declared. Members
were urged not to make factional hay from the impasse, to stay
in their current organizations, and to be patient and allow the
CI "time to act, finally and authoritatively."
"Ludwig C.A.K. Martens,"
by Arturo Giovannitti [Feb. 18, 1921] Lengthy and politically-charged prose poem in
honor of the deportation of unrecognized Soviet ambassador Ludwig
Christian Alexander Karlovich Martens, written by the noted radical
Italian-American labor activist and poet. In Giovannitti's poem
Revolutionary Russia is likened to Revolutionary America of 145
years earlier -- but the long-awaited visitor from afar, coming
in the name of freedom and liberty has no one to welcome him
appropriately, the original American revolutionaries being long
dead and replaced instead by tax collectors and policemen and
royalty-worshiping bureaucrats and aristocrats. Only the poor
and downtrodden American workers, the "stillborn,"
are in a position to welcome Martens and his mission and to bid
him and that mission an appropriate farewell,
"And a clod from the grave of John Brown to spread over
the grave of John Reed."
"Summary of the Central Executive
Committee's Report to the Extraordinary 3rd Convention of the
Communist Party of America." An extended excerpt of the report delivered by
the CEC to the delegates at the February 1921 convention of the
CPA held in Brooklyn and published in the organization's membership
bulletin. This obscure document was saved for posterity in the
pages of the theoretical journal of the British Communist Party,
where it was published it for the edification of the members
of the CPGB. Excellent detail on the old CPA's organizational
size and finances in the aftermath of the departure of C.E. Ruthenberg,
I.E. Ferguson, and others to join the CLP in forming the United
Communist Party of America. Includes copious footnotes for the
contemporary reader by Tim Davenport.
"The American Red Star League
$10,000,000 Relief Fund to Save the Women and Children of Soviet
Russia: A leaflet of the American Red Star League." [leaflet,
circa Feb. 1921] This
leaflet by the new American Red Star League, a left wing rival
medical relief organization to the American Red Cross, presents
much of the case made by Irwin St. John Tucker in a longer pamphlet
published by the Red Star League at about the same time. "Confronted
with the terrific destitution in Europe as a result of wars and
blockades, the working class of America has been asked to give
generously for the relief of suffering in those countries. Millions
of dollars have been raised in America for the relief of Europe.
How much of this money has actually been of service to the working
class? Two MILLION dollars' worth of medical supplies desperately
needed in Russia were burned by the American Red Cross in the
Crimea to prevent it falling into the hands of the Workers' Government.
Supplies to the value of 10 MILLION dollars were allowed to rot
at Archangel because the Red Cross would not permit the starving
and dying Russians to use them." Capitalist machinations
in Russia, Hungary, Austria, Italy, and elsewhere had given a
political coloration to the Red Cross' work, while "under
the leadership of Herbert Hoover a joint committee of relief
organizations has been formed, which is openly using the funds
collected for anti-labor propaganda," the leaflet asserts.
In response to this ideological orientation of the American Red
Cross, the American Red Star League had been formed. "THE
AMERICAN RED STAR LEAGUE is organized as First Aid to the Working
Class in every country. Our first and most pressing duty is to
save the women and children of Soviet Russia!" the leaflet
declares. Financial contributions to the organization for its
work are solicited.
"30,000 Babies Starving!!
A leaflet of the American Red Star League," by Charles L.
Drake [circa Feb. 1921] This
leaflet of the new American Red Star League makes use of a cable
of the American Friends' Service Committee from Moscow highlighting
the shortage of milk, cod liver oil, and soap in Moscow which
had resulted in an infant mortality rate estimated at an astronomical
40%. "America's warehouses are full to bursting with good
things. Let us send them to Russian babies! In the name of Humanity,
ACT NOW!" the leaflet implores, noting that a $10 donation
"will save 10 Russian babies."
Constitution of the [old] Communist
Party of America, Section of the Communist International, as published in the March 1, 1921, issue of The
Communist by the old (preunification) CPA. This document
of organizational law was adopted by the 3rd Convention of the
old CPA, held in Brooklyn, New York, during February 1921 and
attended by about 30 delegates. This constitution outlines the
structure of the organization and its relationship to its component
Language Federations, who were characterized as being subject
to the "dictatorship and control of the Party."
"Organization Rules of the
Young Communist League of America (Adopted by the National Committee
of the YCL)." [circa March 1921] According to the literature, there was no organized
youth section of the American Communist movement until a founding
convention of the Young Communist League held at Bethel, CT on
April 20, 1922. This document from the Comintern Archive indicates
that fully a year earlier the United Communist Party was moving
to establish just such an organization at a First National Convention
"in the near future." This document sets down the basic
structure of the organization that was to follow -- the "Young
Communist League of America -- Section of the Young Communist
International." The YCLA was to be an underground organization
build on the UCP model, with local groups of no more than 10
members which elected their own group organizer, who in turn
participated in the "city central unit." Dues were
to be 25 cents a month, the initiation fee was to be 50 cents,
and the organization was to work for "the communist education
of the young workers; active participation in the struggle to
overthrow capitalism; (defense of the proletarian dictatorship
and the workers soviets after the seizure of power); reorganization
of labor; and the cultural development of the working youth along
the lines of communist principles." Based upon this and
a programmatic document in the archives, it now seems likely
that some sort of formal underground American communist youth
organization existed in 1921 -- earlier than previously believed.
"Workingmen of America! Stand
By Soviet Russia!" (leaflet of the Communist Party of America)
[March 1921] Some
483,000 copies of this CPA leaflet were produced in an effort
to rally the American working class to the defense of Soviet
Russia. "Do not be fooled by the lying and prostitute capitalist
press! Victorious Soviet Russia means a triumphant working class.
If Soviet Russia is defeated, the whole advancing working class
movement will be halted for years to come and black reaction
will set in. Show the arrogant and murderous capitalists and
imperialists of America, England, and France that we, the workingmen
of America, are in full sympathy with Soviet Russia," the
leaflet urges. Not only defensive action, but offensive revolutionary
action is advocated: "Let us resolve to break the chains
of wage slavery. Let us prepare for the overthrow of the hypocritical
and bloody capitalist state and establish in its place the Soviet
Republic of America. Let us destroy the REPUBLIC OF THE RICH
and erect the REPUBLIC OF LABOR. Let us join hands with the Soviet
Republics of the World in the glad confederation of free peoples
united by the bonds of working class solidarity."
"Third International Events
in America," by A.J. McGregor [March 1921] Commentary on the underground
Communist Party of America and United Communist Party from the
pages of the official organ of the Proletarian Party of America.
McGregor states that unity negotiations between the CPA and UCP
were said to be moving forward slowly, although other communist
groups (such as the PPA) were not invited to participate in the
negotiations. Given all the secrecy, McGregor notes that "It
is far easier to follow the developments of the movement in far
off Russia or Armenia than to know what is going on at home.
Of course, if one were a police-spy it might be different."
McGregor cites Lenin in support of the assertion that any sound
principle taken too far can be transformed into absurdity, which
is exactly how he views the CPA/UCP mania for underground organization.
When "the entire work of a party must at all times be conducted
in secret; and that in order to be truly revolutionary a communist
party must of necessity be an outlaw organization, then the principle
is transformed and made absurd," McGregor states. Anticipating
the course of events in the CPA by nearly 2 years, McGregor argues
that organization of the communist movement as an underground
organization with camouflaged legal work means disaster : "To
adopt such a plan of organization means simply that we would
sever our connection with the general working class movement
and turn the workers over to the gently nursing of the reactionary
Socialist Party." Instead, primary party organization and
function should be open, with the secret parallel organization
called for by the Comintern to consist of "only the tried
and experienced members" functioning alongside the open
organization. McGregor additionally observes that "it would
be the height of folly to advertise that such an organization
existed."
"Martens Files Libel Suit
Against the Washington Post." [event of March 2,
1921] Around the
first of March, 1921, claims were made in the Washington Post
against head of the Russian Soviet Government Bureau, Ludwig
Martens, charging that he he was a member of the American Communist
Party, had directed secret organizations aiming at the overthrow
of the American government, had associated with and incited criminal
anarchists, and that he was himself a German revolutionist. The
Post additionally editorialized in favor of delivering
Martens "over to the tender mercies of Noske, who knows
how to deal with Sparticides, Bolsheviki, and their ilk."
Martens responded through his lawyer, former Senator Hardwick,
who hired additional counsel in order to bring suit against the
Post. "Their contention is that the above and other
allegations by the Post are utterly false and are refuted by
the official record of the Senate hearings," this news account
from the Socialist press declares. The Post's editorial
offensive against Martens was seen as part of a final effort
by an increasingly desperate Department of Justice and the Lusk
Committee of New York to justify their policy of repression of
Martens and his Soviet Government Bureau in New York.
"NJ Court Frees Communist."
[Walter Gabriel] News report in The Toiler [event of March
3, 1921 This short
article from the UCP legal weekly, The Toiler, announces
the March 3, 1921 release of former New Jersey State Secretary
of the Communist Labor Party Walter Gabriel. Gabriel had been
arrested as part of the January 1921 Palmer Raids and was sent
to prison for 2-10 years for ""advocating the overthrow
of the government of New Jersey and the government of the United
States by force." The New Jersey Supreme Court overturned
this decision, however, ruling that mere belief in the need for
overturning either the state or federal governments was not sufficient
to constitute an offense against the state of New Jersey. At
the time of the decision, Gabriel's attorney, Rose Weiss, claimed
that the New Jersey court's invalidation of sections of the New
Jersey law could have an impact on similar laws passed in other
states, many of which were modeled after the New Jersey provisions.
"Special Report on Undercover
Operations in the UCP by the Department of Justice's Bureau of
Investigation at Mason City, IA," by Special Agent H.W.
Hess [March 4, 1921] This
extensive report by Bureau of Investigation Special Agent H.W.
Hess reviews the information gathered by the undercover operations
of the Bureau. B.C. Keeler of the Mason City Brick & Tile
Co. had placed his undercover operative ("Mike Benton")
at the service of the BoI; this individual had worked himself
into the good graces of the local organization of the United
Communist Party, headed by cartoonist and writer Harry Keas,
a founding member of the Communist Labor Party. The BoI believes
that "Carl Alton," UCP District Organizer for the Chicago
District, was a pseudonym for Ludwig Katterfeld -- an assertion
which has not been positively confirmed at this time. Also figuring
largely in the Chicago District of the UCP were Edgar Owens of
Moline, IL, and Harry Keas of Mason City, IA. A Dec. 12, 1920
visit to the district by CEC member Edward Lindgren is recounted;
Lindgren is represented as having made the (preposterous) claims
that "the Russian government would have 5,000 agents in
this country within 6 months; that the Russian Soviet Government
was appropriating $120,000 per year in the support of the United
Communist Party." This document includes an extensive set
of footnotes by Tim Davenport clarifying various esoteric points
and misstatements.
"Report of the United Communist
Party's District Organizer 10 [San Francisco] to Exec. Sec. Alfred
Wagenknecht in New York, March 7, 1921," by W. Costley.
This is terrific stuff, a colorful
local report that social historians will be able to sink their
teeth in, chronicling the affairs of the United Communist Party's
California District Organizer, W. Costley. Costley is outspoken
in his advocacy of open, legal political action: "...To
my way of thinking the results are not commensurate with the
time and expense put into the work. I attribute the slow growth
of the movement here to the fact that the right sort of open
work up to the present has not been done, because we have had
no comrades capable of doing it. I find myself so busy doing
the routine work of the office and attending on men whom I know
are good timber. But this is slow work when you have to spend
time and money in calling on a party three or four times before
you catch him and when you finally see him he has to read up
and decide what he will do." Instead, at open meetings great
numbers might be addressed and directed into party work simultaneously,
Costley notes, with literature sales covering the cost of the
operation. Costley bemoans the attitude of the Finns in not wanting
to jump into the UCP and transfer ownership of their halls to
the party: "It made me as mad to the bone to see them have
the psychology of the bourgeoisie deeply embedded in their systems,
and I told them so. And I told them furthermore that they were
covering themselves with disgrace by refusing to enlist in the
ranks NOW, and every moment of delay was a discredit to them."
He expresses a wish to begin open work and suggests "Albric"
[Bertram Wolfe] as a potential candidate for the DO position.
He also seeks to launch a free speech fight in Oakland, to pave
the way for a return of Bob Minor and other radical speakers.
"Debate on the Press and
the Society for Medical Aid to Soviet Russia at the 3rd Russian
All-Colonial Congress: New York City," by Bureau of Investigation
Undercover Agent "P-132" [March 8, 1921] The Russian All-Colonial Congresses
were ostensibly non-partisan biannual gatherings of the "Russian
colony in the United States and Canada" sponsored by the
anarchist Union of Russian Workers. This material is an extract
from the report of the 3rd Russian All-Colonial Congress was
provided by "P-132," a Russian-speaking undercover
Special Agent of the Bureau of Investigation (a full BoI employee
who wrote his own reports, as opposed to a paid informer who
funneled information to a reporting Special Agent). Topics of
debate here are the ideological line to be pursued by the new
official organ of the All-Colonial and the financial controversy
over the Detroit branch of the Medical Aid to Soviet Russia organization.
With regard to the press, the All-Colonial (Union of Russian
Workers) had launched a paper called Amerikanskaia Izvestiia
[American News] to replace the suppressed anarchist weeklies
Rabochii i Krest'ianin and Khleb i Volia. Calls
were made by anarchist delegates to the 3rd Congress for the
publication to adopt an explicitly anarchist line. Delegate Mikhailov
declares" "Comrades, you all know that we are Anarchists.
Why should we cover up our beliefs and teachings by organizing
schools and various educational societies? And that applies to
Amerikanskaia Izvestiia. Once for all we ought to say
clearly that it is an Anarchist newspaper and establish definitely
its true character and purpose." This perspective is opposed
by Delegate Sivko, who states: "You are an Anarchist; well,
I am a Communist, and if you demand the Anarchist policy I demand
the Communist, and I will never consent that Anarchist propaganda
be taught through Amerikanskaia Izvestiia." Despite
their control of the convention, the multi-tendency orientation
of the newspaper was maintained by the final resolution of the
3rd All-Colonial Congress. That same evening a "special
meeting or session" was held to deal with the alleged improprieties
of the Medical Aid to Soviet Russia organization. At this "special
session," the same "Communist" delegate Sivko
(probably a communist-anarchist as opposed to a CPA member) detailed
the fraudulent practices which he uncovered in the Detroit organization
of the Medical Aid for Soviet Russia organization. Rovin, Saks,
Mendelsohn, and Boris Roustam-Bek are accused of having pocketed
organizational funds, nearly $2,000 being unaccounted for by
a snap audit. A parallel (anarchist) Medical Aid to Soviet Russia
organization had been launched. Adding color is the comment by
"P-132" that "during [Sivko's] speech several
members of the Communist Party were trying to break up the meeting,
but they were beaten up by members of the Union of Russian Workers,
especially by Kiselev, who threw them down the stairs."
"Letter to Attorney General
of the US Harry Daugherty in Washington, DC from Secretary of
Commerce Herbert Hoover in Washington, DC." [March 16, 1921]
New Secretary
of Commerce Herbert Hoover lost little time in preferring charges
against the American Red Star League, which he did with this
letter to new Attorney General Harry Daugherty a short time after
the installation of the new Republican administration of which
he was a part. Hoover was provided with printed material of the
Red Star League by the mayor of Portland, Oregon, who noted the
group's charge that Hoover had aided anti-labor forces during
the conduct of his activities as American food administrator
in Europe. Hoover writes to Daugherty of the American Red Star
League: "I am certain there is no method on earth by which
these people can send either shipments or money into Russia,
and aside from the bold character of its literature, my impression
is that this group will stand investigation from the point of
view of fraud." Such an investigation followed, resulting
in a report issued by special assistant to the Attorney General
Warren W. Grimes around the 1st of May 1921.
"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...
"Revolutionary Industrial
Unionism versus Armed Insurrection." (leaflet of the Industrial
Workers of the World) [circa April 1921] This is a rare document, a fairly thorough and
quite explicit exposition of the revolutionary strategy of the
Industrial Workers of the World, presented in comparison and
contrast to the revolutionary strategy of the American Communist
movement. The Communist strategy is regarded as being a product
long on enthusiasm and short on thoughtful analysis: "Inspired
by the success of the Russian Revolution, many who formerly put
their faith in the ballot are now advocating armed insurrection
in the United States. But these people ignore the difference
between conditions in Russia at the time of the Revolution, and
those now existing in this country." The leaflet notes that
unlike in peasant Russia, with its small and weak capitalist
strata, in the US capitalism had held sway for a number of years
and grown large and strong. "To have a reasonable chance
of success by armed insurrection the workers would need to have
as large and well equipped an army as the capitalists,"
the leaflet declares, noting that "A good percentage of
the workers would support the capitalists" and that those
remaining "are unarmed and the great majority are untrained
in the use of arms. They have no military organization. They
have no means of securing arms." The result of the strategy
of armed insurrection, pitting primitive hand-weapons against
machine guns and poison gas, would be an unimaginable bloodbath
and crushing of the workers. To this is contrasted the strategy
for victory of the IWW: "It aims at the root of all capitalist
power, control of industry. It advocates organization of the
workers in industry in such a way that they can control industry.
The power of the workers is neither political nor military, but
Industrial. This is the greatest power in the world, it is the
foundation that underlies all other forms of power." The
leaflet declares that "The workers alone can carry on production"
and observes that "in case of civil war between labor and
capital, whichever side controls industry will win." Therefore,
it is the steady growth of industrial organization that will
prove decisive, in the IWW's view. In a revolutionary situation,
transportation of enemy soldiers could be sabotaged and production
of armaments halted by the direct action of the workers organized
in Revolutionary Industrial Unions. "The best tactics on
the part of the workers is to avoid armed insurrection unless
it is actually forced upon them and work by all means in their
power to increase their control of industry. In case of civil
war, the success of the workers will be measured by the amount
of control they exert over industry. Complete control of industry
would mean complete and bloodless victory while lack of control
would mean bloody slaughter and inevitable defeat," the
IWW leaflet insists.
"The Story of Alex Howat,"
by James P. Cannon. [April 1921] Article from the legal Communist monthly The
Liberator on Alexander Howat, one of the most important left-wing
labor leaders of the day as President of District 14 of the United
Mine Workers of America. Cannon deals at length with his fellow
Kansan's protracted battle with the Southwestern Coal Operators'
Association, who had made use of the Kansas legislature to establish
an Industrial Court as a mechanism for suppressing labor discord.
Lack of support by the UMWA for Howat's cause was alleged to
be a contributing factor in the mine owners' uninterrupted battle
with Howat.
"Financial Report of the
National Office, United Communist Party of America. As of April
1, 1921." Although
a few conservative spinmeisters will doubtlessly remain in denial,
here's what the archives actually show were the quarterly revenue
and expenses of the United Communist Party in Q1 of 1921. The
legendary "several million dollars in valuables" said
to have been funneled to the American Communist movement in 1920
seem to have...... vanished! Plain and simple, the inflation-era
nominal ruble values (tsennosti) listed in document RTsKhIDNI
f. 495, op. 82, d. 1, l. ? were ineptly misinterpreted in The
Secret World of American Communism [Yale, 1995, listed as
"Document 1"]. A fairly vast number of archival documents
demonstrating the financially-strapped condition of the American
Communist movement in 1920-21 were blythly ignored by the authors
of this collection, Messrs. Haynes, Klehr, and Firsov. An HOAC
newsgroup poster challenging their dubious assertion was brutally
run down on page 73 of Haynes' and Klehr's 2003 diatriabe, In
Denial. Whoops! Now we know: According official figures provided
in the report of Executive Secretary Alfred Wagenknecht's to
the May 1921 Unity Convention at Woodstock, New York (source
of this document), the UCP received $25,000 out of $50,000 disbursed
in Moscow, the rest failing to arrive. This was the SUM TOTAL
of the UCP's funding up to the time of the May 1921 Unity
Convention. This document shows line items for Comintern and
other external subsidies totalling a shade over $18,000 for the
quarter -- about double the organization's dues stamp revenue
for the period. (Another document for the old CPA shows a single
subsidy of $19,500 received in the 10 1/2 months from July 1920
until the May 1921 convention). Let there be no mistake: this
represented a very significant percentage of the early American
Communist movement's total income, something in the range of
1/3 to 1/2 for the UCP, though far less than that for the old
CPA. Now compare this reality to the claims made...
"The Workers' Council:
An Organ for the Third International," by Benjamin Glassberg
[April 1, 1921] Unsigned
lead editorial announcing the formation of a new publication
aiming to "become the expression of revolutionary Socialism"
and to carry agitation for the Third International "into
working class circles that have never been reached before."
The Workers' Council was clearly intended as a publication
rather than as a political organization, and was closely linked
to the Left Wing still inside the Socialist Party. Secretary
of the Editorial Board was Benjamin Glassberg, and Secretary
of the publishing association which produced the journal was
Walter M. Cook -- a person depicted as a sort of Party Regular
alter-ego of Julius Gerber and Adolph Germer in the pages of
Theodore Draper's history of the early Communist American Communist
movement. Mounting frustration with the Socialist Party is clear,
the organization being characterized as "vacillating between
the Second and the Third International, standing upon a platform
of ineffectual reforms and parliamentarism of the kind that have,
since the war, been discarded by every European socialist party
outside of the Second International" and thus "not
today the instrument of revolutionary working class education
and action."
"Report to the 2nd World
Congress of the Young Communist International by the Young Communist
League of America and the United Communist Party of America,
April 1921." This
document by Young Communist League of American national organizer
"H. Edwards" fully substantiates the theory that there
was a communist youth section in America one year previous to
the "April 1922" date claimed in the literature. Edwards
gives the April 1921 Jena World Congress of the YCI a brief synopsis
of the history of the radical youth movement in America. After
the split of the Socialist Party in 1919, the SP's Young People's
Socialist League was similarly effecte. "Edwards" states
that "many of the younger comrades left the League and the
remaining part of the League as a whole decided to remain independent
of any party while the controversy between the two Communist
parties was going on." The SP regulars fought to gain control
of the organization, League members were unclear of their mission,
financial crisis set in, and the YPSL's national organization
dissolved. "Only a few of the local or sectional organizations
of it managed to remain more or less intact," says "Edwards."
While the CPA and CLP indicated support in principle of a youth
section, it was not until the 2nd Convention of the United Communist
Party in January 1921 that real work began to organize a Young
Communist League of America. In the subsequent three months,
leaflets and a pamphlet were prepared, provisional rules drawn
up, and organizational work done in the main cities with a UCP
presence, resulting in the organization of "about 20 groups."
"At the earliest possible moment a national convention of
the YCL will be called, at which time the members will outline
the ways, means, and policies of the organization and elect their
own officials," the national organizer stated.
"Then and Now, April 6, 1917
- April 6, 1921." (leaflet of the Communist Party of America)
[April 6, 1921] The
date at the heart of this document, April 6, 1917, was the date
of American entry into the European bloodbath, a war which left
over 10 million dead and millions more wounded or maimed. On
this the 4th anniversary of Wilson's about face on the question
of American participation, the Communist Party asks the American
working class to make an assessment of whether promises about
the war were delivered upon and whether the escapade was worth
the price. "The capitalists wanted war because they could
greatly increase their profits. And increase them they did beyond
those of any other country. The United States before the war
was a debtor nation. Today the capitalists through their government
in Washington hold a mortgage on almost every other country in
the world," the leaflet declares. It adds: "But the
capitalists didn't do the fighting. They stayed at home and hired
out to their government for one dollar a year. Their sons were
placed in positions that afforded security for life and limb.
The working class was called upon to do the fighting and the
paying and to produce the munitions of war." Conscription
was instituted and Communist and IWW political objectors "were
ground under the Iron Heel with the brutality of the Russian
Tsars. The capitalist White Terror stalked through the land."
The lessons of the world war are clear, the leaflet indicates:
"There can be no peace while the few have the power to exploit
the masses. The road to peace lies through world revolution."
To this end: "The working class -- the overwhelming majority
of the people - must become the ruling class. They must establish
their own government -- the DICTATORSHIP OF THE PROLETARIAT --
THE WORKERS' GOVERNMENT IN THE FORM OF SOVIETS. This Workers'
Government will suppress the counter-revolution of the capitalists.
It will take over the factories and the railroads and the land.
This Workers' Government will gradually introduce the Communist
Society."
"Report to UCP Executive
Secretary Alfred Wagenknecht in New York from William Costley,
UCP DO10 in San Francisco, April 6, 1921." This report from the United Communist
Party's San Francisco District Organizer, William Costley, deals
in large part with the UCP's relationship with American blacks
-- a fact which is particularly interesting given the fact that
DO Costley was himself a black American. "You tell me to
take those [blacks] in the party that are qualified. There are
none hereabouts," Costley remarks, adding that a single
correspondent in El Paso, Texas was "the only one I would
pass." Costley tells Wagenknecht that "the Negroes
are not a reading people, the most progressive communities have
no general bookstore, there is non operated by them in the US.
If you want them, special literature must be written from them.
They practically know nothing of the class struggle and pending
worldwide revolt of the working class. But they can be depended
on to get in strong when the time comes for action." Costley
also notes that German UCP groups (primary party units) in the
bay area had collected $150 for the defense fund, which would
be reported in his subsequent financial statement to the center.
"Debs Tried Out One Big Union
of Railroads: Plan Weakened Craft Bodies, Says Foster,"
by William Z. Foster [April 6, 1921] This article distributed by the Federated Press
by the former syndicalist and future Communist leader emphasizes
Foster's anti-dual union perspective. While the spirit behind
the effort of Gene Debs to establish a militant industrial union
of railway workers in 1893 is embraced, Foster ultimately declares
that the ARU's "brilliant" early victory only lead
to "overconfidence" and a smashing of the union. "The
advent of the American Railway Union, as is always the case with
dual organizations, did great harm to the railroad craft unions.
All of them were weakened and some nearly destroyed. Thousands
of their best members quit them to take part in the ARU, only
to find themselves blacklisted out of the railroad service later
because of the lost strike," Foster declares. He adds that
"The case of Debs himself is a striking example of the damage
done. When he resigned his position as General Secretary-Treasurer
and editor of the official journal of the Brotherhood of Locomotive
Firemen in order to form the ARU, he was a great force for progress
in the old unions. Had Debs stayed with them he would have been
a big factor in their future development. But he was lost to
them, and that they have suffered much in consequence no unbiased
observer will deny." Foster does not recognize or emphasize
that the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen, from whence Debs
sprung, was a fraternal and benefit society rather than a union
per se -- providing cultural opportunities and accident insurance
rather than engaging in collective bargaining.
"Soviet Russia Called by
Communist Worst Tyranny in World." [Milwaukee Leader
on Morris Zucker] [April 8, 1921] This short article from the pages of the Milwaukee
Leader sheds a bit of additional light on the strange case of
Morris Zucker, an active member of the Left Wing Section of Local
New York who upon being released from prison left for Soviet
Russia without passport or papers, becoming quickly entangled
with the Soviet Secret Police upon arrival. Once release from
prison and expelled from the country, Zucker bitterly denounced
the Soviet regime in the mainstream press of the day. This article
notes that Zucker left the United States in Sept. 1920 and arrived
in Soviet Russia only in November -- and that he was arrested
by the Cheka (as an accused spy) after only 3 days in the country.
"Conditions steadily are becoming worse. What little foreign
trade Russia is able to get is of no help to the people, who
everywhere are the victims of tyranny and go about in a hopeless
attitude because of the great and constant red terror,"
Zucker is quoted as declaring from Estonia.
"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.
"Soviets Would Trade American
War Prisoner for Convicted Communist: Would Swap Kirkpatrick
for Either Larkin or Gitlow." News report in The Toiler
[April 16, 1921] This
news report, originating with Soviet Russia's official ROSTA
Press Agency, states that the Soviet government stood ready to
swap an American military prisoner, Captain Kirkpatrick, captured
during the Red Army's offensive against Baron Wrangel in 1920.
In exchange for Capt. Kirkpatrick, the Soviet government is said
to have sought the pardon of one of two political prisoners incarcerated
in American penitentiaries -- either New York journalist Benjamin
Gitlow or Irish labor leader "Big Jim" Larkin. Gitlow's
sentence had been affirmed by the Appellate division of the New
York Supreme Court on April 1, 1921, pushing his case back into
the news and quite likely serving as an inspiration for the Soviet
prisoner trade offer. The article details a visit by American
journalist Louise Bryant to the Andronevsky Prison Camp where
Capt. Kirkpatrick was held, which was portrayed in glowing terms
as a model facility by Bryant. Nevertheless, the original ROSTA
account is quoted as saying that "Captain Kirkpatrick feels
very peeved because the United States government has not made
decisive efforts to secure his release and has requested political
friends here to intercede in his behalf." Hope is held up
for the possible future prisoner exchange, given the more tempered
perspective of the new Harding administration towards wartime
political prisoners compared to the draconian Woodrow Wilson
regime.
"On Unity: Telegram Sent
Jointly to the Communist Parties in America by their Representatives
in the Communist International," by Nicholas Hourwich and
Max Bedacht [April 21, 1921] Brief cable sent from the Moscow-based representatives
of the Communist Party of America and United Communist Party
to their respective Central Executive Committees disavowing the
authority of the "American Agency" of the Comintern
to establish specific preconditions for a unity convention --
such details to be left to be decided by the convention iteslf.
The cable reads: "Authorized by [ECCI] to state [American
Agency] has no authority to press 5 conditions. Equal basis [in
size of party delegation] and [neutral] chairman [Unity Convention]
with voice but no vote is enough and all is necessary. Other
conditions are not pertaining to preliminary arrangements and
are subject to decision of [Unity Convention]."
"W.D. Haywood Now in Russia,
Chicago Rumor." [Milwaukee Leader] [April 21, 1921]
Official history
of the life of William D. "Big Bill" Haywood emphasizes
the fact that he was driven from the country by arbitrary and
draconian judicial fiat. What is not emphasized, however, is
the way that in fleeing from imprisonment Haywood broke faith
and discipline with his former organization, the Industrial Workers
of the World, and the codefendants with whom he was sentenced
-- who were engaged in trying to win their freedom as a group
as political prisoners from the late European war. This news
report from the pages of Victor Berger's Milwaukee Leader
breaks the news of Haywood's flight from justice (using that
term loosely) as part of a group of 7 delegates to the Founding
Congress of the Red International of Trade Unions, who sailed
from New York on March 31, 1921 for Stockholm. Haywood had failed
to report back to Leavenworth Prison after the failure of his
appeal before the US Supreme Court, prompting Chicago District
Attorney Charles W. Clyne to engage the Department of Justice
in a nationwide search for Haywood.
"Haywood Joins Communists;
Quits IWW." [Milwaukee Leader] [April 23, 1921] This Federated Press news account
quotes unnamed friends of bail jumper Bill Haywood to the effect
that Haywood "has joined the Communist Party and has definitely
severed all connection with the IWW." Haywood had "definitely
aligned himself with the Communist Party" about the first
of 1921, according to this account. Trying to keep hopes alive
for a pardon of the mass of IWW political prisoners left in limbo
by Haywood's ill-timed and self-centered flight, attorney for
the IWW prisoners Harry Weinberger said, "In my opinion
the failure of Bill Haywood or of anyone else to appear for imprisonment
can in no way affect the broad principle of political amnesty,
which includes the Industrial Workers of the World, and which
the administration should immediately put into effect."
"Letter to the Central Executive
Committee of the United Communist Party in New York from Max
Bedacht ["James A. Marshall"], Representative of the
UCP to ECCI in Moscow, April 25, 1921." First of a flurry of 5 letters
to the CEC of the United Communist Party about the urgent need
for immediate unification with the Communist Party of America
penned between the last week of April and the third week of May
by the UCP's man in Moscow, Max Bedacht. Bedacht notes that the
stock of the American Communist movement had fallen to its nadir
among the councils of the Comintern: "Matters have reached
the point that the [ECCI leadership] considers the American branch
more as a nuisance than as a bona fide [viable Communist organization].
I know that you will say: 'But why don't you tell them and explain
to them.' I will answer that nobody wants to listen to me, that
most of the doors are closed to me, and that wherever one of
the doors is reluctantly opened, they do not leave me in doubt
that they consider me but one of those more numerous 'representatives,'
each one of whom had a different story to tell." Bedacht
states that Grigorii Zinoviev had stated definitely that "as
far as [the Comintern] is concerned, there will be no further
action. Its last decision [on the American situation, calling
for unification with a drop-dead deadline of June 1, 1921] is
final." Unless such union were achieved, both the UCP and
CPA would be barred from the forthcoming 3rd World Congress of
the Comintern and a new Communist Party established in America
ignoring the previously existing organizations, Bedacht warns.
Bedacht details the twisted saga of the Comintern's "American
Agency" of Janson, Fraina, and Katayama, noting that the
group initially "had full power to settle [the unity] question
once and for all." However, the AA had shown itself unable
to take "decisive action," forcing ECCI to grudgingly
take up the American question again. Thereafter, the American
Agency had lost its backing as a plenipotentiary force. Bedacht
quotes Zinoviev as saying "it would seem very peculiar indeed
if this agency, so long unable to fulfill its mission, would
again be instructed to do the thing which it proved itself unable
to do." Consequently, Zinoviev had told Bedacht that the
unity matter now rested with the Americans themselves.
"The Philadelphia Red Raids,"
by Erasmo S. Abate [raids of April 25/26, 1921] During the night of April 25/26,
1921, some 38 members and sympathizers of the American Communist
movement were arrested in Philadelphia in conjunction with the
planned distribution of May Day leaflets and charged under the
state Anti-Sedition Act, which called for penalties of 1-20 years
in prison and a fine of up to $10,000. This article from the
UCP's legal English language weekly, The Toiler, details
the background and judicial outcomes of many of these cases.
One meeting in a private residence was raided without warrant,
Erasmo Abate recounts, resulting in the arrest of 12 men and
women "upon the seeming presumption that a meeting of the
United Communist Party was being conducted there." The police
ransacked the home, stealing "valuable articles" and
$100 in cash, and raiding the wine cellar -- "the 'honest'
guardians of the law got drunk, came to a fight, and shot each
other," Abate notes. Pennsylvania test cases of the state's
Anti-Sedition Law had gone both directions, with a defendant
named Harry Belavsky convicted and the constitutionality of provisions
of the law seriously questioned by the court in the case of W.B.
Brukas. All 38 defendants of the April 25/26 raid were released
on $5,000 bail, with an additional $1,000 tagged on to 20 defendants
who faced possible deportation. An appeal for funds on behalf
of the "Workers Defense and Relief Committee of Pennsylvania"
is made.
"Department of Justice Surveillance
Report of the Activities of Edward Lindgren, April 23-28, 1921."
by Clarence D. McKean. This
Department of Justice Bureau of Investigation report reveals
two interesting facts about the underground American Communist
movement. First: how was an illegal organization able to distribute
illegal literature, fliers with print runs runniing into the
hundreds of thousands? "It was decided to distribute the
May Day leaflets at the discretion of the distributors, with
the limitation that the literature must be put out some time
after dark Friday night [April 29] and before daylight the following
morning." Such bulk literature drops in the dead of night
must have been terrifically ineffective. Second, the encyclopedic
contents of every meeting which Lindgren attended, detailed in
this document, make it clear that the UCP apparatus was penetrated
by a DoJ agent at the very highest level in Pittsburgh -- either
the DO or the SDO. Further: it was this top-level penetration
in Pittsburgh that set in motion the raid and arrest of Lindgren,
Jakira, and Amter in New York City. "Much of the information
contained in this report was received from a confidential source;
therefore, the Bureau Offices furnished with copies are respectfully
requested to handle the information contained herein in such
a manner as not to embarrass our informant," Agent McKean
notes. The arrest was made far, far away from where the tail
picked up -- the secret agent's identity was preserved.
"Roger Baldwin Raps Haywood's
'Desertion.'" [Milwaukee Leader] [April 29, 1921]
Roger Baldwin,
Director of the American Civil Liberties Union, issued a sharp
critique of Bill Haywood's decision to jump bail and flee to
Soviet Russia rather than return to Leavenworth Penitentiary
in the Spring of 1921, following loss of his appeal to the Supreme
Court of the United States. Baldwin criticizes the "ordinary
Communist propaganda, intended to justify Haywood's desertion
of the IWW defense organization and of his bondsmen, by stressing
his new allegiance to the Communist Party, whose members are
under a discipline which admits no personal judgment or other
loyalties." Baldwin continues that "We do not question
Haywood's motives. We do question the spirit and methods of a
movement which has so little concern with loyalty to the elementary
obligations of good faith to one's fellows."
"Department of Justice Surveillance
Report of the Activities of Edward Lindgren, April 27-30, 1921,"
by Dan E. Tatom This
Bureau of Investigation document records the first-hand account
of the activities of the Pittsburgh-based agent who followed
UCP leader Edward Lindgren from Pittsburgh to New York by train,
en route to a sensational raid on UCP headquarters and Lindgren's
arrest. Agent Tatom stayed in another berth of the same railway
sleeper car used by Lindgren and kept him under close observation
throughout the trip. He missed connections with his relief in
the crowded Pennsylvania station in New York City on the next
day, but managed to tag with Lindgren through the streets of
New York until Lindgren stopped and the location could be phoned
in to headquarters. Tatom then helped follow Lindgren as he made
a multi-box mail drop of illegal newspapers, peeling off the
surveillance at one mailbox to have the mail carrier band and
and hold Lindgren's mail until a search warrant could be obtained.
This is indicatiive that there were legal constraints on seizing
and opening mail to which the DoJ/BoI was subject.
"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.
"Department of Justice Surveillance
Report of the Activities of Edward Lindgren, Abram Jakira, and
Israel Amter, April 29-30, 1921," by Edward Anderson. Warrants? We don't need no stinking
warrants... Surveillance
and arrest report in the case of Lindgren, Jakira, and Amter.
Having trailed the UCP National Organizer from Pittsburgh to
New York City by train, DoJ gumshoes and the NYC Bomb Squad saw
their quarry, Edward Lingren, pass a package to Abram Jakira;
they followed Jakira as he carried it to the apartment of Helen
Ware. "Agents noticed a number of suspicious characters
going into this house, so Detective Murphy called up Sergeant
Gegan of the Bomb squad, who said that he would be right over
to raid the place." A valuable trove of United Communist
Party documents and literature was seized in the raid (kindly
saved for posterity by the fuzz), and Lindgren, Amter, and Jakira
carted off to jail, where they were held initially without bail,
later set at $50,000.
"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.
"Red Headquarters Are Raided
Here; Revolt Plan Bared: Bomb Squad and Federal Agents Seize
Literature Calling for May Day Revolution: Two Found in Apartment:
Documents Indicate They are High Officials of Russia's Third
International: Third Arrested in Theatre: Is Delegate to "Underground
Convention" -- Papers Show Moscow Directed Conspiracy Here."
[April 30, 1921] Unsigned New
York Times report of the April 29, 1921 raid on the National
Headquarters of the United Communist Party in New York City.
The melodramatic reporter's account here is amended with numerous
footnotes by Tim Davenport comparing assertions made to the documentary
evidence present in Bureau of Investigation agent reports and
files. The most interesting aspect of the report is its function
as a record of the way the Bureau of Investigation saw the United
Communist Party: a group comprised of a majority of Russians,
Poles, and Italians, often illiterate, with "a surprisingly
large number of Negroes" and particular strength in the
mining districts of Pennsylvania and West Virginia -- a band
plotting bloody insurrection at the behest of Moscow. This was
a manifestation of popular fear and prejudice rather than objective
reality but is nonetheless an important snapshot of official
mentalité driving the repression.
"Don't Be So Sure of Your
Job!" (leaflet of the United Communist Party) [circa May
1921] Aside from
publishing newspapers and giving speeches to one another at various
meetings and conventions, the only "revolutionary"
activity conducted by the underground Communist movement of the
early 1920s involved the periodic mass distribution of cheaply
printed newsprint leaflets. These were printed in runs running
into the hundreds of thousands and then stealthily scattered
around various industrial cities of the north over the course
of one or a few dark nights. This "leaflet no. 2" of
the United Communist Party from the spring of 1921 attempts to
turn the fear of unemployment into mass strike action: "Force
the government to take care of [the unemployed]! Fight for shorter
hours with no reduction of pay, so they can get back on the job!
Fight for opening up trade with Soviet Russia, so there will
be work!" These strikes would be met with opposition, the
leaflet noted: "Of course, the courts will issue injunctions
against us. The government will send troops against us. Soldiers,
police, thugs, legionnaires, and vigilantes will be lined up
against us." There was a solution, however, painted in rosy
hues: "The Russian workers showed us what to do. They overthrew
their BOSSES' government and set up a WORKERS' Government. They
took over the industries and ran them ONLY for the workers. They
threw out all idlers and bloodsuckers! They put an end to unemployment.
They became the OWNERS OF THEIR JOBS!"
"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.
"Spies and Traitors! [re:
Morris Zucker]" [Published circa May 1, 1921] This is a short, unsigned news
snippet from the 16th and final issue of the United Communist
Party's official organ making note of the return of Morris Zucker
from Soviet Russia. Zucker, formerly a leading figure in the
Left Wing Section of the Socialist Party and a founding member
of the Communist Labor Party, traveled to Russia in November
1920 and soon ran afoul of the Cheka, who imprisoned him as a
suspected spy, only releasing him towards the first of April
1921 on condition of his immediate departure from the country.
Zucker is characterized as a "traitor to the workers"
and a "turncoat," since "he comes back a 'disillusioned'
man! It is his intention to agitate against the Russian Government!"
The short news item closes with a rather ominous warning: "Is
Zucker a traitor and spy? If he is, let him take care!"
Includes a brief biographical footnote on Morris Zucker.
"May Day: Labor's International
Holiday." (leaflet of the Communist Party of America) [distributed
for May 1, 1921] Another
in a series of CPA leaflets intended to agitate for insurrection.
"The bosses - the capitalist class -- have organized to
crush you. They openly declare that they intend to smash your
unions - destroy your resistance -- reduce your wages and bring
you to the level of serfs. This May Day you must demonstrate.
Let us answer their challenge. Let us resolve this May Day to
prepare for the REVOLUTION," the leaflet declares. Unless
dramatic action were soon taken, the prospects facing American
workers were grim, in the leaflet's estimation: "What are
the prospects which confront us if the capitalist slave drivers
remain in power? Nothing but new wars, slavery, billions upon
billions of taxes, poverty, starvation, and perpetual oppression."
No punches are pulled as to the means of the necessary change:
"The Government of the US was established by FORCE; it is
maintained by FORCE; it will be destroyed by FORCE." Only
in Soviet Russia would the workers be celebrating May Day as
"free men," the leaflet states. "This May Day
let us resolve to PREPARE for the destruction of the capitalist
government and the establishment of a WORKERS' GOVERNMENT --
The Dictatorship of the Proletariat -- in America. Let us ORGANIZE
to build a SOVIET REPUBLIC in America. The road to working class
freedom lies through REVOLUTION," the leaflet concludes.
"May Day of Revolution."
[UCP leaflet written by Israel Amter] [distributed for May 1,
1921] This 1921
May Day leaflet of the United Communist Party features the purple
prose of Israel Amter, author of a legendary and laughable leaflet
of similar vintage which attempted to use hysterical verbiage
to singlehandedly create a revolutionary situation out of a Brooklyn
streetcar strike. The concert violinist Amter shrilly declares:
"We, American Workers, will no more stand the tyranny of
the bosses and of their government. We have had enough. The United
States Government stands for the bosses against the Workers!
It uses the law-making bodies, the courts and its troops against
the Workers. THEN WE MUST DESTROY THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT!
We must overthrow it and put in its place a Workers' Government.
We must uphold the Workers' Government with a strong army, to
crush the bosses and all who support them! We must prepare for
the Revolution - there is no other way! May Day of Revolution
is here! * * * LET US PREPARE FOR THE REVOLUTION!"
"Stedman's Red Raid,"
by Robert Minor. [May 1, 1921]
Full text of a
pamphlet produced by the UCP's Toiler Publishing Association
detailing a particularly disgusting footnote to the 1919 split
of the Socialist Party. Minor indicates that in the immediate
aftermath of Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer's anti-red raid
of January 2, 1920, Socialist Party attorneys Seymour Stedman
and Lazaras Davidow attempted to expropriate the assets of the
Socialist Party of Michigan under the flimsy pretext that as
"Communists" the expelled Michiganites of the party's
holding company were participants in a criminal organization
which "advocated the overthrow of the government by force
and violence." At bottom of this scheme was a Detroit headquarters
building owned by the Michigan party, represented by Minor as
having approximately $90,000 of equity. Stedman issued a Bill
of Complaint paralleling the criminal charges of the state against
the unfortunate Michigan party members already jailed for alleged
violation of the state's Criminal Syndicalism law. He then red-baited
the members of the legitimate holding company on the stand in
an attempt to have the property awarded to a hastily gathered
and miniscule Michigan "organization" retaining ties
to the national SPA. Minor states that when they were at last
confronted about their uncomradely behavior by concerned Socialist
Party members, Stedman and Davidow thereafter lied and mislead
their inquisitors as to their actions and had a further smoke
screen laid by SPA National Executive Secretary Otto Branstetter
with a fallacious news release of his own to the socialist press.
A sordid tale of greed, deceit, and foul play...
"The American Red Star League:
A Report by the Bureau of Investigation," by Warren W. Grimes
[circa May 1, 1921] This
is the final report of the Department of Justice on an investigation
set in motion by Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover on March
16, 1921. Hoover had charged that the American Red Star League
was raising money under false pretenses, as he was certain "there
is no method on earth by which these people can send either shipments
or money into Russia." In response, the Bureau of Investigation
had analyzed the claims and activities of the American Red Star
League, a radical competitor to the American Red Cross to see
if charges of fraud could be sustained. Grimes indicates that
the American Red Star League had been "created after numerous
protests by local communists against the misappropriation of
funds collected by the Soviet Russia Medical Relief Society"
headed by A.M. Rovin and Boris Roustam-Bek. "The affairs
of that Society were turned over to a committee of the United
Communist Party of Detroit and Chicago," Grimes states,
with Charles L. Drake, formerly head of the Western Office of
the Soviet Russian Medical Relief Society, and Mrs. Moses Stroud
the most active individuals behind the new organization. Officers
of the American Red Star League included Drake as Secretary,
Illinois labor leader Duncan McDonald as President, Swan Johnson
as Treasurer, Rev. Irwin St. John Tucker as organizer, Dr. R.B.
Green as medical adviser, and Lincoln Steffens as lecturer. Grimes
concludes: "From the information at hand, I can find nothing
tangible on which to base an assumption of fraud or, in
fact, a violation of any law. Inevitably, of course, there will
be irregularities -- there always have been in organizations
of this kind. The Soviet Russia Medical Relief Society experienced
them -- and this very scheme grew out of those irregularities.
But the evidence shows that both organizations have at least
made shipments. While the 'Declaration of Principles' and the
personnel of the directorate clearly indicate the likelihood
of both questionable faith and propaganda opportunities which
undoubtedly will be worked to the limit; and while the activities
of the organization and its officers should and will be followed
closely, there appears nothing on which the Department could
take extraordinary action at present."
"Appeal to American Workers."
(leaflet of the American Bureau, International Council of Trade
and Industrial Unions [RILU]) [May 1921] Before the role was filled by the Trade Union
Educational League (TUEL), the program of the Red International
of Labor Unions was advanced in the United States by the "American
Bureau of the International Council of Trade and Industrial Unions."
This is a rare early leaflet of the "American Bureau,"
produced in a run of 40,000 copies and distributed by the Communist
Party. A grim situation faces the world, the leaflet indicates:
"The specter of starvation haunts the entire world. Victors
and vanquished of the late war alike tremble before it. This
breakdown of the whole fabric of capitalism is accompanied by
a savage drive upon the workers by the massed power of the employing
class. The Master Class has declared war on Labor. This war rages
in all countries." White terror was being employed around
the world -- in the United States as well as Hungary; an open
shop campaign had been launched to break American unions; 4 million
American workers remained unemployed; new wars were plotted.
In response, the leaflet advocates an opening of trade relations
with Soviet Russia to provide a willing market for American products
and to restore industry. Further, workers are urged that their
own international organization is necessary to fight the international
organization of the capitalists in the League of Nations. The
International Council of Trade and Industrial Unions (RILU),
based in Moscow, is just the organization needed by workers,
the leaflet claims, standing in stark opposition to the "capitalist
international" as well as the "yellow Amsterdam international,"
whose " traitorous leaders, whose hands are stained with
the blood of 13 million workers." The social democratic
Amsterdam International is cast in a particularly noxious light,
as "agents of the bourgeoisie in the camp of the workers."
American workers are urged to take up the issue of international
affiliation at local union meetings and to influence their national
unions to affiliate with RILU: "You cannot remain neutral.
There can be no neutrality between the workers and the capitalists.
You are for the dictatorship of the workers or you are for the
dictatorship of the capitalists."
"Letter to the Central Executive
Committee of the United Communist Party in New York from Max
Bedacht ["James A. Marshall"], Representative of the
UCP to ECCI in Moscow, May 4, 1921." Second of a flurry of 5 letters to the CEC of
the United Communist Party about the urgent need for immediate
unification with the Communist Party of America penned between
the last week of April and the third week of May by the UCP's
man in Moscow, Max Bedacht. A range of matters are covered, including
the need for the American party to send (open) addresses to receive
Comintern publications by mail, the establishment by the UCP's
European Comintern contact "Latimer" of an office in