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RUSSIAN IMMIGRANT LEADERSHIP IN THE FOREIGN LANGUAGE FEDERATIONS OF THE AMERICAN SOCIALIST AND COMMUNIST PARTIES, 1917-1922
Nicholas J. Berejan
A Thesis Submitted to the University of North Carolina Wilmington in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts
Department of History
University of North Carolina Wilmington
2012
Approved by
Advisory Committee _____ ___Candice Bredbenner _____ ___________ Jarrod Tanny__________
__________Susan McCaffray__________ Chair
Accepted by
_________________________________
Dean, Graduate School
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................................ iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................................................... iv
DEDICATION ..................................................................................................................................... v
CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................ 1
CHAPTER II: FOREIGN LANGUAGE FEDERATIONS AND THE SOCIALIST PARTY ............................. 19
CHAPTER III: INTERNATIONAL SOCIALISM, THE ZIMMERWALD LEFT, AND THE SOCIALIST ......... 34
CHAPTER IV: RUSSIN EXILES AND ÉMIGRÉS IN THE UNITED STATES ............................................ 49
CHAPTER V: THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTIONS, BOLSHEVISM, AND THE CONSOLIDATION ................ 67
CHAPTER VI: THE 1919 SPLIT AND THE TWO COMMUNIST PARTIES ........................................... 82
CHAPTER VII: RUSSIAN AMERICANS, THE FEDERATIONS, AND FACTIONAL WARFARE.............. 115
CHAPTER VIII: CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................... 151
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................................ 159
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ABSTRACT
Historians have studied the American Communist movement in depth over the last sixty
years. The generation of historians that emerged from the New Left of the 1960s delved into
the history of specific subgroups, such as women, African Americans, and specific industrial and
labor unions, within the larger party. However, historians have largely failed to adequately
document the role of Russian immigrants within the early Communist Party of America.
Russian immigrants in the United States contributed greatly to the American
Communist movement. Russian-born Socialists and Communists residing in the United States
commanded considerable authority in the early years of the American Communist Party. Their
pretensions to leadership of the entire movement have been remembered as arrogance due to
their shared heritage with the Russian Bolsheviks who orchestrated the November, 1917
Revolution. Their unwillingness to cooperate fully with American-born leaders within the
movement has similarly been ascribed to their desire to control and dominate the development
of an American Communist movement.
This understanding of the role of Russian Americans in the early days of the Communist
Party of America leaves much to be desired. This thesis will demonstrate that Russian
immigrants in the Socialist and Communist movements did indeed contribute greatly to the
fractious and disunited character of the early Communist Party of America. However, were it
not for their contributions to organizing the Left Wing of the Socialist Party of America from
which the Communist movement developed, there would likely have been no Communist Party
of America such as historically existed.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My thanks go to Drs. Susan McCaffray, William Fain, Robert Spaulding, and Michael
Seidman for the accumulated courses, independent studies, and term paper assignments which
led me to this thesis topic and encouraged me to explore a topic in history that I had little
knowledge of. Were it not for their guidance and input I would have never come to understand
the joy of researching the confusing, chaotic, and profoundly interesting history of the early
American Communist movement.
I would further like to thank Tim Davenport. His tireless work transcribing and digitizing
Communist Party documents, newspapers, and literature, and making these files easily
accessible and available online, greatly facilitated my research process.
Special thanks go to my parents, particularly my father for fostering my curiosity in
history; my mother, for putting up with regular detours to museums, historic sites, and
monuments during ostensibly relaxing vacations; and my sister, for her continual support and
encouragement through this process. I would also like to acknowledge all of the friends I have
made in this program, who were always supportive, provided insight and constructive criticism,
and regularly reminded me that there was a light at the end of the Graduate School tunnel.
I would also like to thank the History Department, the Graduate School, all of the
Professors who taught me and all of the support staff who facilitated my learning.
Finally, I would like to thank my committee specifically for their guidance and assistance
throughout this process.
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DEDICATION
I would like to dedicate this thesis to my grandmothers, Anna Trojan and Olga Berejan,
who left everything they’d ever known in Europe in search of a better life in the United States.
I. INTRODUCTION
The writings on American Communism are many. As a historian of the subject once said,
“never have so many studied so much about so few.”1 Indeed, many historians have written
about the American Communist movement. However, owing to its historically contentious
nature in American political discourse, and the relatively recent addition of previously
unavailable sources and documents in the Russian archives, the field of American Communist
history is still a fertile ground for scholarship and enquiry.
Although extensive research has been conducted on the roles of specific populations
within the American Communist movement, one often neglected subgroup remains to be
examined in-depth. Russian immigrants in the United States contributed greatly to the
American Communist movement. Indeed, Russian-born Socialists and Communists residing in
the United States commanded considerable authority in the early years of the American
Communist Party. Their pretensions to leadership of the entire movement have been
remembered as arrogance owing to their shared heritage with the Russian Bolsheviks who
orchestrated the November, 1917 Revolution. Their unwillingness to cooperate fully with
American-born leaders within the movement has similarly been ascribed to their desire to
control and dominate the development of an American Communist movement. This
understanding of the role of Russian Americans in the early days of the Communist Party of
America (CPA) is faulty. It will be demonstrated here that Russian immigrants in the Socialist
and Communist movements did indeed contribute greatly to the fractious and disunited
character of the early Communist Party of America. However, were it not for their contributions
1 Harvey Klehr, The American Communist Movement: Storming Heaven Itself (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1992),
1.
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to organizing the Left Wing of the Socialist Party of America from which the Communist
movement developed, there would likely have been no Communist Party of America such as
historically existed.
Russian immigrant claims to leadership of the early Communist movement rested upon
more than a simple shared nationality or ethnicity to the Bolsheviks in Moscow. A shared
language granted them access to Leninist theory and principles which were not easily
accessible, or understood, by their American-born comrades. Russian immigrants and émigrés
in the United States translated and disseminated these ideas through the Left Wing of the
Socialist Party of America, and provided the impetus for the formation of a Communist Party in
the United States. Their rigid, inflexible adherence to these same ideas, however, led to their
preference to keep the Communist movement divided. This same unyielding dedication to the
Bolshevik program of 1917, in the face of changing international circumstances and shifting
policies of the Third International in Moscow, ultimately resulted in their marginalization within
the movement they helped to forge.
The historiography of American Communism, like the historiography of any topic, has
undergone shifts in popular scholarly opinions and leading paradigms over the past ninety
years. In his book The End of Ideology Daniel Bell characterized these shifts in terms of
generations, which he labeled the “once-born,” “twice-born,” and “after-born.” The “once-
born” historians of American Communism were contemporaries of and actively involved in the
early years of that movement. The “second-born” consisted of historians active within the
movement but who reevaluated their beliefs and the history of the Party following their own
disillusionment of the movement after the political events of the late 1930s, particularly the
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Nazi-Soviet Pact of 1939. The “after-born” was the term used by Bell to describe the new
generation of historians active in the 1960s and 1970s, who were not involved in the old
Communist Party, and sought to reexamine American Communist History through the lens of
the New Left paradigm. The earliest histories of the American Communist movement were
written by the “first-born,” members of that movement and contemporaries associated with it.
These come from a variety of sources: Party functionaries, disgraced or repentant former Party
members, United States Government reports and enquiries, and witnesses from outside the
Party but on the periphery of the radical Left. The first truly scholarly works emerged in the
1950s and 1960s, most notably the influential series of studies commissioned by the Fund for
the Republic, entitled “Communism in American Life.” The “Communism in American Life”
series, which more than any other represented the “twice-born” perspective, established the
dominant narrative of American Communist history for several decades, and was not
challenged until a new generation of scholars emerged from the New Left and Student
Movement of the 1960s. The new generation argued for a reevaluation of American Communist
history focusing on grass-roots and local political efforts of the Communist Party membership.
Beginning in the 1990s, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, a new shift occurred in which
scholars once more returned to the old dynamic established in the 1950s and 1960s, which
focuses the history of the Party as one completely interwoven with the political history of the
Soviet Union.
The earliest attempt to establish a timeline of events of the American Communist
movement came from political opponents of that movement during a period of labor unrest
that was perceived to be influenced by Russian Bolshevism and its proponents in the United
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States. The Lusk Committee, a New York State Senate investigative committee headed by New
York State Senator Clayton Lusk, was established in 1920 in the midst of the first red scare to
investigate seditious activities in New York State, due to the large number “radicals” residing in
New York City. A 4,000 page report entitled Revolutionary Radicalism: Its History, Purpose and
Tactics with an Exposition and Discussion of the Steps being Taken and Required to Curb It was
the result of this enquiry. The massive report included brief summations of the Socialist
movements in nearly every European nation, the role of the corresponding Socialist parties
during the War and the Berne conference, the formation of the Third (Communist)
International, and an analysis of the Soviet government and Soviet foreign relations. The report
also included a surprisingly detailed account of the 1919 split in the American Socialist
movement and the formation of the American Communist parties, including entire documents
from the founding of those parties. The investigative committee made little distinction between
the Communists and Socialists in the United States despite the manifestos and constitutions of
those parties being printed verbatim.2
James Oneal chronicled the early history of the American Communist movement in his
1927 book American Communism: A Critical Analysis of its Origin, Development, and Programs.
Although an outsider in that he was not a member of either Communist Party, Oneal did have
firsthand knowledge of the early American Communist period by virtue of his role in the
Socialist Party of America (SPA). Oneal witnessed the growing divide between the revolutionary
Left Wing of the SPA and the conservative Center and Right Wing of the Party. This divide
2 New York (State), Revolutionary Radicalism: Its History, Purpose, and Tactics, with an Exposition and Discussion of
the Steps Being Taken To Curb It, Report of the Joint Legislative Committee Investigating Seditious Activities, Filed April 24, 1920, in the Senate of the State of New York, Part I: Revolutionary Subversive Movements Abroad and at Home, Volume I (Albany, NY: J.B. Lyon Company, 1920), 634. Available in its entirety at http://darrow.law.umn.edu/trials.php?tid=14.
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widened after American entrance into the First World War and quickly accelerated after the
Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, resulting in a divide that he regarded as irreparable. As a result,
Oneal favored the expulsion of the Left Wing in 1919. Oneal was far from a neutral or unbiased
witness as he was not a member of either Communist Party and a staunch supporter of the
Socialist Party. He ultimately concluded that the factionalism and in-fighting between the two
parties, and between the Communists and the remnants of the SPA, undermined both the
revolutionary and reformist aims of the Communists and Socialists, respectively. He further
argued that the Communist Party’s largely foreign-born membership’s preoccupation with the
Bolsheviks and the situation in Soviet Russia divorced the early movement from the large
majority of the American working class. Written in 1927, Oneal’s work regarded the Communist
movement as a failed exercise in revolutionary agitation, and one that was in the process of
decline into total obscurity, a correct analysis of the movement at the time, although the
movement achieved its largest membership in the following decade.
Strangely, the Communist Party of America published no official history of the Party
until the 1930s. Even then, the first histories published were primarily autobiographies of the
leadership. The often changing nature of Communist doctrine and policy issuing forth from
Moscow in the 1920s may have made it difficult to publish an accurate account of the early
years of the Party without highlighting sudden and dramatic reversals of tactics and theory
inconsistent with contemporary dogma.3 Eventually two major works emerged, both written by
high ranking members of the Party. Benjamin Gitlow’s I Confess: The Truth About American
3 This opinion is shared by noted scholar of American Communism Maurice Isserman, who suggested that constant
shifts in Party line in the 1920s made any study of the Party’s early history “embarrassing.” See Maurice Isserman, “Three Generations: Historians View American Communism,” Labor History 26, no. 4 (Fall, 1985), 517.
6
Communism, published in 1940, was a Party history from a once-powerful Party leader. Gitlow,
who along with John Reed was one of the most influential founders of the Communist Labor
Party, fell out of favor with both the American Communist membership and the Soviet
leadership in Moscow. Although Gitlow ran on the ticket of the Workers Party for Governor of
New York in 1926, and was William Z. Fosters running mate as vice presidential candidate in
1928, he was ejected from the Party in 1929 following the Cominterns purge of “Right
Oppositionists.” By the late 1930s Gitlow had renounced all radicalism and become an
outspoken critic of Communism. His account of the Party history was one that painted him in a
favorable light as a champion of the working class who endeavored to create an American
Communist Party for the native-born American workers, but who was opposed at every
juncture by the foreign-born Party leadership in the CPA and by the Soviet leadership after
Lenin’s death. Gitlow’s account was thus far from unbiased; however at the time of its
publication it was by far the most detailed history of the American Communist movement in
existence.
William Z. Foster’s 1952 insider account of Party history was a work equally biased,
although written by an influential Party member whose fortunes were decidedly greater.
Entitled History of the Communist Party of the United States, Foster’s work was as equally
detailed as Gitlow’s but perhaps less concerned with historical accuracy. History of the
Communist Party of the United States was in many ways a revisionist work. Foster attempted to
downplay the role of foreign-born leadership and emphasized the contributions of native-born
American workers, such as Foster himself, to the establishment and development of American
Communism. Foster further sought to establish American Communism as a movement largely
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American in origin, rooted in American radical tradition, as opposed to an alien ideology
imported by foreign radicals and controlled by Moscow. Published in the 1950s, Foster’s work
was thus an attempt to create a legacy of the American Communist Party that was in contrast
to allegations by political opponents that the American Communist movement was something
imported to and controlled by a foreign state, and not a legitimate creation of American
citizens.
Daniel Bell’s Marxian Socialism in the United States was also published in 1952. Bell’s
work was the first lengthy history of American Communism to emerge from academia. His work
was primarily an attempt to understand why Marxism largely failed to take root amongst the
American working class. In it, the author argued that the conservative elements that remained
in the Socialist Party in 1919 were as caught up in the glory of the Bolshevik successes as the
revolutionary Left Wing which created the American Communist Parties. As evidence, Bell cited
the SPA’s application to the Third International, and reapplications that followed until 1921
when the Party all but “turned its back on communism.”4 Bell maintained that the fundamental
differences between the SPA and the CPs were not all that great; rather, the dividing issue was
the amount of faith placed by the parties in when revolution in the United States would be
realistic, and the whole-cloth adoption of Bolshevism to American realities. He concluded that
the SPA, like the American Communist parties, alienated itself from the American working class
by embarking in revolutionary “adventurism.” The foreign-born leadership within the
Communist Party of America, by claiming to be the representatives of Bolshevism in the United
States and the only people capable of replicating Bolshevik success in very different political
4 Daniel Bell, Marxian Socialism in the United States (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1996), 115.
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circumstances, similarly led the Party away from mainstream American politics and thus from
the majority of the American working class.
Bell’s work was the first in a line of Communist Party histories written by serious
academics. In 1953, Robert Hutchins, the former president of the University of Chicago and
head of the liberal group The Fund for the Republic, financed and organized a new series titled
Communism in American Life. The group published ten volumes written by several academics in
the ensuing years. The first two volumes, written by former Communist Party member
Theodore Draper, entitled The Roots of American Communism (1957) and American
Communism and Soviet Russia: The Formative Period (1960) were the most detailed and well-
researched. Draper drew on a variety of Communist Party archival sources, interviews with
former Communists, and published Communist Party documents and newspapers to detail the
genesis of American Communism. The Roots of American Communism addressed the rise of the
Left Wing of the SPA from the beginning of the First World War through the factional disputes
that culminated in two Communist Parties, ending in the final unification of American
Communists into one cohesive organization in 1923. Draper’s narrative was a history from the
top down; he focused almost entirely on the most influential persons in the Party and their
quest to foster revolution in the United States along the Bolshevik model. He further chronicled
the ensuing internal debates over questions such as the underground versus legal Party, the
Party’s stance on parliamentary politics, trade union policy, and autonomy of Party units within
the larger organization. Draper argued that the American Communist Party was born of
revolutionary American Socialists and Syndicalists, both native-born and foreign-born, who
became disillusioned with the international Socialist movement and instead looked to the
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Soviets for inspiration and guidance. By doing so, any chance at creating a truly American
revolutionary movement was lost in favor of a willing subordination to Moscow and the Third
International. In his own words, the American Communist Party “was transformed from a new
expression of American radicalism to the American appendage of a Russian revolutionary
power. Nothing else so important ever happened to it again.”5 His second volume, American
Communism and Soviet Russia: The Formative Period traced the twists and turns of Communist
Party doctrine and tactics according to corresponding shifts in Soviet policy, through the end of
the 1920s. Draper returned to focusing on key figures in the American Party, and their changing
fortunes as they were forced to adapt quickly to shifts in Soviet ideological theory and strategy
during the post-Lenin and Stalinist years, and to curry favor with the ruling cadre in Moscow,
lest they face political irrelevance or expulsion.
Through the course of these two volumes, the only such to delve into the early Party
history at length, Draper established the leading paradigm of American Communist history,
which portrayed the American movement as wholly submissive to the Communist Party of the
Soviet Union and its instrument, the Communist International. This narrative of the American
Communist experience remained dominant for over a decade, and was echoed by the other
historians of the Communism in American Life series. Later volumes carried the same
framework through different periods. David A. Shannon’s The Decline of American Communism:
A History of the Communist Party of the United States since 1945 (1959) focused on the early
Cold War period. Others in the series focused on specific aspects of Communist activity in the
United States, such as Daniel Aaron’s Writers on the Left: Episodes in American Literary
5 Theodore Draper, The Roots of American Communism (New York: Octagon Books, 1957), 395.
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Communism (1959), Ralph Roy’s Communism and the Churches (1960), and Frank Meyer’s The
Molding of Communists: The Training of the Communist Cadre (1961), while others like Nathan
Glazer’s The Social Basis of American Communism (1961) analyzed changes in Communist Party
membership along class and ethnic lines over the course of the 1920s and 1930s. However, all
ultimately maintained that the American Communist Party was totalitarian in nature,
subordinate to the Soviet Union, and thus effectively outside of mainstream American politics
of the time.
Irving Howe and Lewis Coser’s 1962 study The American Communist Party: A Critical
History was the first to attempt a total history of the Party from its inception in 1919 to its
“virtual demise” in 1957.6 Coser and Howe, anti-Stalinist but not anti-Communist, were as the
title suggests critical of the American Communist movement. They supported but did not
wholly agree with the views of Draper and the other Fund for the Republic historians. Howe
and Coser utilized “public” sources almost exclusively; they eschewed eyewitness accounts and
internal Party memos (although scarcely available until the opening of the Soviet archives,
Draper had access to a few) and instead drew primarily from published materials such as
leaflets and fliers, Party newspapers and magazines, and the published memoirs and
biographical histories of Party leaders. The authors began with a history of the Communist split
with the Socialist Party in 1919, through the factionalism of the early years and eventual unity
of the Party, to the “Stalinization” of the Party in the later 1920s, the vacillations of the 1930s
from hard-line Leftism to the united front period and support of New Deal initiatives, the
Party’s efforts during the Second World War, and finally its repression and further
6 Irving Howe and Lewis Coser, The American Communist Party: A Critical History (New York: Da Capo Press, 1974),
ix.
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marginalization in the post-war and early Cold War eras. For Howe and Coser, the defining shift
in American Communism, that which ultimately led to its irrelevancy in American politics, was
the transition into a totalitarian, Stalinist Party in the late 1920s, essentially terminating any
factionalism or deviation from Party line, forcing members to recant previous ideological
positions and adopt radically different ones, and cementing the American Communist Party as
an appendage of Soviet foreign policy.
A reassessment of American Communist history developed in the late 1960s and 1970s,
emerging from the New Left and by members of Students for a Democratic Society, several of
whom founded the journal Radical America in 1967. The historians of Radical America initially
ignored Communist Party history, preferring to fill their pages with historical studies on the
Industrial Workers of the World, and largely dismissed the academic works of Draper, Howe
and Coser, Bell, and the rest as biased and unreliable sources. Gradually, however, the new
generation of academics began to reexamine American Communism. Looking upon their own
experiences in the 1960s, many sought to understand the experiences of the non-elite Party
membership, and how they came to become Communists or radicals. The new generation of
historians also revisited the existing historiography. Draper and others received their due for
situating the American Communist Party within the context of Soviet foreign policy needs, and
the new historians remained critical of the old Party structure. But, increasingly the new
generation of historians sought to determine and identify the positive contributions made by
the Party in the decades past, regardless of the “totalitarian” Party structure. The focus shifted
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to grass roots efforts, the experiences of the common or rank and file member, and the role of
the Communists within specific industries or unions.7
The new “revisionist” historical paradigm dominated the historiography of the 1970s
and 1980s. Many of the studies focused on Communist Party policies towards African
Americans, working class women, unions, and subgroups within the larger Party.8 New works
paid particular attention to the 1930s and 1940s, when the Communist Party had achieved its
zenith of influence and relevance within American politics, and reached its largest membership.
The revisionist historians paid little attention to the upper echelons of the Party and what they
thought about the work taking place at the lower levels. The new generation of historians
turned the historiography of American Communism completely on its head, and so scholars
such as James Weinstein in Ambiguous Legacy: The Left in American Politics (1975) and Maurice
Isserman in Which Side Were You On? The American Communist Party during the Second World
War (1982) sought to understand how the working class membership acted within the confines
of Party policy, and how the Party elite could be so far removed from those they were
ostensibly representing.
The historians of the older generation were not content to let the revisionist history of
the American Communist Party become the dominant model. In the 1980s historians Harvey
7 Isserman, “Three Generations,” 539.
8 See for example: Paul Buhle, “Jews and American Communism: The Cultural Question,” Radical History Review,
23 (Dec. 1980): 9-33; Mark Naison, “Historical Notes on Blacks and American Communism: The Harlem Experience,” Science and Society, 42 (Fall 1978): 324-343, and “Harlem Communists and the Politics of Black Protest,” Marxist Perspectives 1 (Fall 1978): 20-50; Robert Schaffer, ”Women and the Communist Party, USA, 1930-1940,” Socialist Review 9 (May-June 1979): 73-118; Bruce Nelson, “’Pentecost’ on the Pacific: Maritime Workers and Working-Class Consciousness in the 1930s,” in Zeitlin and Kimeldorf, eds., Political Power and Social Theory, 141-182; Ron Schatz, “The End of Corporate Liberalism: Class Struggle in the Electrical Manufacturing Industry,” Radical America 9 (July-August 1975): 197-201; Harvey Levenstein, Communism, Anticommunism, and the CIO (London: Greenwood Press, 1981).
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Klehr and John Earl Haynes revisited the traditionalist school of American Communist history.
For over two decades the two historians published works separately and have collaborated on
others. Klehr and Haynes’ accounts of the history of American Communism resemble those
published in the 1950s and 1960s by the authors of the Communism in American Life series.
Klehr and Haynes placed emphasis on the top-down history of the Party, Party hierarchy,
important and influential figures within the Party leadership, and ties between the American
movement and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. “To understand Communist actions in
America it is not enough to study the CPUSA…it was abroad, in Moscow, that the decisive
formulations were made,” contended Klehr in the introduction to his 1984 study The Heyday of
American Communism: The Depression Decade.9 The Heyday of American Communism traced
the Party history through the 1930s, and according to Klehr was intended to be the
continuation of Draper’s work for the “Communism in American Life” series. Indeed, Draper
had begun work on a third volume covering the same period of time, but abandoned the
project after several years. Utilizing Draper’s accumulated notes and research materials for his
own study, Klehr’s resulting work was far removed from the social history which had dominated
scholarly discourse on American Communism since the late 1970s. However, by ignoring the
social historical contributions of scholars in the 1970s, Klehr imposed Draper’s model, which
perhaps was better suited to an understanding of the small and marginal American Communist
movement of the 1920s, onto the 1930s Party, which was a major and influential political
movement. Klehr and Haynes’ subsequent work The American Communist Movement: Storming
Heaven Itself (1992) covered the entirety of American Communist Party history from its birth
9 Harvey Klehr, The Heyday of American Communism: The Depression Decade (New York: Basic Books, 1984), pg.
11.
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through the 1950s. The authors reached the conclusion that the Party was inextricably linked
with the Soviet government and should be examined through the lens of Soviet foreign policy
needs.
New material became accessible to historians of American Communism for the first time
after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the opening of the Soviet archives in the 1990s.
The new wealth of evidence resulted in several more works from the “traditionalist” historians
Klehr and Haynes. In The Secret World of American Communism (1995) and The Soviet World of
American Communism (1998), the authors utilized the files of the Communist Party of the
United States in the Comintern archives, available in the Soviet Archives in Moscow and
containing both English and Russian language documents, to illuminate the clandestine and
espionage activities of the CPUSA (The Secret World) and to support the argument established
in preceding works that the Party was never an independent actor in American politics (The
Soviet World). More recently, the two authors collaborated on In Denial: Historians,
Communism, & Espionage (2005), a largely polemical work that argued that the revisionist
history of the Party popularized in the 1970s and 1980s, which they believe remains the
dominant paradigm of American Communist history, has largely failed to reassess Party history
in light of the new materials available after the opening of the Soviet archives.
Before his passing in 2006, Draper returned to the debate surrounding the history of the
American Communist Party. Draper championed the work of Klehr and Haynes and chastised
the revisionist historians, whom he erroneously identified as almost anyone who had criticized
Klehr and Haynes’ traditionalist history. In a series of essays for the New York Review of Books,
Draper attacked the “left-wing intellectual yuppies” who had established the revisionist history
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of the Party, arguing that the historians who emerged from the New Left undertook (and
subsequently politicized) the study of American Communism to find what he called “a usable
past.”10 Draper asserted that the new historiography reflected a trend in historical research
that was hostile to political history and instead focused on “mushy and sentimental social
history.”11 However, revisionist historians such as Maurice Isserman and James Weinstein
acknowledged that the contributions of authors such as Draper, Howe, Coser, and even Klehr
and Haynes have indeed demonstrated the importance of the interconnectedness of the
American Communist Party and that of the Soviet Union. However, they have advanced beyond
the political or structural narrative and continue to study other facets of American Communism,
in an effort to understand how and why many Americans decided to join the Party, and their
contributions to the movement in the United States.
The history of American Communism, as we have seen, remains a contentious topic.
Although the field has been tilled many times, there is still much to be said about the history of
the American Communist Party. Historians of the old persuasion addressed subgroups within
the Party at times, however they largely focused on the more influential members and the
relationship of the Party to the Soviet Union. The revisionist historians such as Paul Buhle, Mark
Naison, Robert Schaffer, and Bruce Nelson that emerged from the New Left of the 1960s have
done much to contribute to the understanding of how American Communism reflected
uniquely American conditions, and the work done within the Party to appeal to various
marginalized groups in American society, particularly in the 1930s and the decade following the
Second World War.
10
Theodore Draper, “American Communism Revisited.” New York Review of Books, May 9, 1985, 32-37. 11
Isserman, “Three Generations,” 543.
16
In spite of all this work, there has been relatively little research in regards to the
American Communist Party during its first decade of existence. The present work is situated
within the traditionalist historiographical approach described above. This work examines the
role of influential individuals within the Language Federations affiliated with the Socialist Party
of America and the Communist Party of America, and their contributions to the shaping of the
American Communist movement. As has been documented above, traditionalist works detailing
the political and personal lives of influential figures within the American Communist Party are
many. However, to date no historian has properly addressed the contributions of the lesser
known but highly influential figures who led the non-English speaking Socialist immigrants
within the Foreign Language Federations of the American Socialist movement.
The total membership of the Socialist Party of America was 80,379 members at the time
of the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia in 1917. Dramatic increases in the enrollment of foreign-
born Socialists in the Foreign Language Federations after the Bolshevik Revolution grew the
total Party membership to 108,504 in 1919.12 Foreign-born immigrant Socialists residing in
major urban centers in the north east and Midwest, many of whom had relatively recently
relocated to the United States from the lands of the former Russian Empire made up the
majority of the new members. The organized Left Wing of the Party emerged largely from these
Language Federations, and shortly thereafter split from the SPA to found the first American
Communist parties. They would remain dominant within the new parties for several years and
do much to shape the early American Communist movement, for better or worse.
12
Klehr, The American Communist Movement, 18.
17
Although the history books are full of references to influential native-born Communists
like Charles Ruthenberg, Benjamin Gitlow, John Reed, Jay Lovestone, William Foster, James
Cannon, and Earl Browder, the contributions of Russian-American and Eastern European
immigrants to the development of American Communism remains to be examined. Names like
Nicholas Hourwich, Alexander Stoklitsky, Oscar Tyverovsky, and George Ashkenuzi appear less
often than their influence merits; the contributions of prominent Russian political exiles on the
American Socialist scene are also largely ignored. What few references are made to Russian
Americans in the histories of the Left Wing of the American Socialist movement and the
American Communist movement are typically negative. These figures are remembered as the
wreckers of the early movement responsible for the split in the Left Wing which resulted in two
Communist parties, and their role in the inability of these two Communist entities to unite and
remain cohesive. In this thesis, it will be demonstrated that Russian Americans were
instrumental in the splits of the Communist movement. Although Russian-born Socialists
greatly contributed to the divisive character of the Communist Party of America, owing to their
understanding of Bolshevism that they retained through a period of International Communist
reform and restructuring, without their presence in the American Socialist movement and
contributions to that movement’s understanding of Bolshevism, there would have been no
coherent, organized Left Wing in the United States such as developed and from which was born
the American Communist movement.
Through an analysis of the intersection of Russian-born leadership and foreign-born
rank-and-file membership situated within the Foreign Language Federations of the Socialist and
Communist parties, this thesis will contribute to a greater understanding of American
18
Communist history often neglected in the historiography detailed above. Little is known about
the contributions of influential Russians, both infamous and largely forgotten, such as
Alexandra Kollontai, Nikolai Bukharin, Leon Trotsky, Nicholas Hourwich, Alexander Stoklitsky,
Oscar Tyverovsky, and George Ashkenuzi, to the development of American Communism. Their
respective roles in the dissemination of Bolshevik theory and ideology in the American Socialist
movement and the applications of these ideas to the American Socialist and Communist
political scene, and the challenges posed by native-born Americans who sought to build an
American Communist organization led by native-born American Socialists will be assessed here.
In doing so, it is the author’s hope that this largely unexplored area of early American
Communist history will be properly understood and integrated into the larger historical
narrative of the Communist Party of America.
19
II. FOREIGN LANGUAGE FEDERATIONS AND THE SOCIALIST PARTY
Prior to the outbreak of the First World War, the Socialist Party of America was
composed primarily of native-born Americans. Founded in 1900, the SPA reflected American
working class attitudes. Although tied to the great Socialist parties of Europe through its
membership in the Second International, the SPA differed in many respects from European
social-democracy. The SPA, like the German or Russian Social Democrats, encompassed both
reformist social democrats and revolutionary Marxist Socialists. Unlike the European parties,
however, the SPA also included a variety of elements more uniquely American. The members of
the American Federation of Labor (AFL), the Agrarian Utopianists, the DeLeonites of the
Socialist Labor Party, and the Syndicalists represented by the Industrial Workers of the World
were all under the umbrella of or otherwise affiliated with the SPA. From its founding until the
First World War, the SPA was a reflection of the multitude of American Leftist currents, foreign-
born and native-born, and what one author referred to as “a surprising native interlude” of
American Leftism between the foreign-born led parties that preceded and succeeded it.13
This is not to say there was no recent immigrant presence in the pre-war SPA. However,
the leadership of the Party, from its founding until the eve of the U.S. entrance into the war,
was overwhelmingly composed of native-born Americans. Outside of the leadership, within the
general membership and particularly within the working class segment of the Party
13
Nathan Glazer, The Social Basis of American Communism (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1961), 14. Glazer here is referring to the Socialist Labor Party and the American Communist Party. The Socialist Labor Party was established in 1876 as the Workingmen’s Party. It was largely composed of German immigrants in the United States, and conducted work almost entirely in the German language. Daniel DeLeon joined the organization in 1890. Multilingual and fluent in English, as well as a devout Marxist, DeLeon was instrumental in incorporating more native-born American workers into the Party. A following-out between DeLeon and the German-born leadership led to a split of the Party in 1899. The dissenting German group merged with Victor Berger and Eugene Debs’ Social Democratic Party to form the Socialist Party of America in 1901.
20
membership, foreign-born and recent immigrants made up a large part of the Party by 1914
and definitely were in the majority by war’s end.14 However, their integration into the SPA was
not easy. A census by the U.S. Immigration Commission in 1909 found that 60 percent of men
and 47 percent of women in the nation’s mining and manufacturing industries were immigrants
from throughout Europe.15 In this same year, SPA membership numbered approximately
40,000, of whom 71 percent were native-born Americans and an additional 17 percent were
“old” (and thus relatively acculturated) immigrants from Northern and Western Europe.16 At a
time when the majority of the industrial proletariat of the United States was composed of
recent immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe, the SPA represented relatively few.
The absence of Southern and Eastern European immigrants in the pre-war SPA can be
attributed to several factors. One such factor was increasing nativism within American politics
at the turn of the century. The American Federation of Labor favored restrictions on
immigration from Eastern and Southern European states, arguing that immigrants from these
regions were willing to work for less pay than native-born American workers, were accustomed
to a lower standard of living, were resistant to unionization and more likely to scab for capital
during strikes, and thus driving native-born Americans out of jobs and undercutting the labor
movement.17 AFL leaders also objected to increasing immigration for racist reasons. Samuel
Gompers argued that “the maintenance of the nation depended upon the maintenance of
racial purity” and viewed the new immigrants as stereotypically anarchists prone to militancy
14
Glazer, The Social Basis, 14. 15
William M. Leiserson, Adjusting Immigrant and Industry (New York, 1924), 12-13, as cited in Charles Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party and ‘New’ Immigrants,” Science & Society 32, no. 1 (Winter, 1968): 1. 16
Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 1. 17
Ibid., 3.
21
and radicalism.18 The SPA, although not fearing the radicalism of newly arrived immigrants, was
less than accepting none the less. Elements within the SPA echoed the AFL objections to
Southern and Eastern European immigration along nativist and racist lines. These were
countered by others within the Party who argued for international working class solidarity.
Barney Berlyn, an internationalist, took the position that to append disclaimers upon the slogan
“Workingmen of all countries, unite” would necessitate appending a similar disclaimer to the
end of the Party name- “Socialist Party of America, A Damn Lie.”19 Ernest Untermann, a nativist
and racist, responded “I believe in the international solidarity of the working class…but I do not
believe in international solidarity to the point of cutting my own throat,” an expression of his
concern that an influx of immigrant workers would undermine the labor movement in the
United States.20
At a 1910 meeting of the SPA’s Committee on Immigration, Morris Hillquit, founding
member, International Delegate and leader of the SPA, submitted a resolution stating the SPA
would support all legislation preventing the importation of large numbers of immigrants by
capital for the purposes of weakening organized labor in the United States, but that the Party
was also opposed to exclusion of immigrants based on race or nationality, and that the United
States should “be at all times maintained as a free asylum for all persecuted…for their politics,
religion, or race.”21 This resolution confused the committee members, but drew support from
18
Samuel Gompers, as quoted in Marc Karson, American Labor Unions and Politics 1900-1918 (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1958), 136, cited in Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 3. 19
Barney Berlyn, Proceedings of the National Congress of the Socialist Party 1908 (Chicago: Socialist Party, 1908), 114, as quoted in Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 7. 20
Ernest Untermann, Proceedings of the National Congress of the Socialist Party 1908 (Chicago: Socialist Party, 1908), 110, as quoted in Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 7. 21
Morris Hillquit, as quoted in David A. Shannon, The Socialist Party of America: A History (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1955), 50.
22
the nativists and racists in regards to the first portion as well as support from the
internationalists for the second. However, the Party was no closer to resolving the debate. For
the leaders of the AFL, almost all immigration was fostered for the purposes of weakening
organized labor. Hillquit’s resolution, when seen through the lens of the AFL, was thus in favor
of supporting legislation aimed at restricting immigration. Eugene V. Debs was outraged with
the results, labeling the resolution and its acceptance reactionary and not at all in line with
orthodox Marxism. The Party thus faced a divisive issue: adhere to the orthodox Marxist tenet
that held class lines were stronger than national lines, or protect the organized and established
American proletariat from the troubles that new sources of cheap labor would provide.
Ultimately, neither side triumphed, and the Party adopted Hillquit’s compromising resolution.
Although contradictory and pleasing no one fully, the resolution remained the official position
of the Party on immigration for decades to come.22
Historian Charles Leinenweber argues the divide between nativist and racist Party
members and internationalist Party members was a reflection of the growing split between the
Left, or revolutionary Marxist, wing of the SPA and the Right, reformist social democratic wing
of the SPA. The reformist element, allied with the craft union AFL and municipal in scope, was
interested in limiting immigration and retaining the support of the skilled workers of the
American “labor aristocracy.” The Left, international in scope, and more sympathetic to the
Industrial Workers of the World, which itself was more accepting of new immigrants and having
greater success organizing them, sought to break down barriers and unite the whole of the
22
Shannon, The Socialist Party of America, 50.
23
American working class.23 This championing of the disorganized new immigrant masses, as we
shall see, greatly increased the strength of the Left Wing of the SPA in the years to come.
The systemic objection to Eastern and Southern European immigrants within the SPA
was but one obstacle to their integration into the Party. The language barrier was a more
tangible impediment to immigrant integration. Many immigrants arrived on American shores
with little to no knowledge of the English language. Residing within ethnic enclaves in major
urban centers, immigrants could continue to live by speaking their mother tongues. What
English was learned was often insufficient to participate in SPA meetings or comprehend Party
sponsored lectures and speeches. The Party leadership, too, was hindered by the language
barrier in its inability to reach out to and make contact with the large numbers of sympathetic
progressive immigrants that arrived daily in the United States due to the language barrier.
Moreover, many immigrants arrived in the United States with little or no understanding
of Marxist theory. This was particularly true of the immigrants, mostly from Western or
Northern Europe, who arrived in the mid-nineteenth century, and who were more typically
from agrarian and rural backgrounds and largely influenced by tradition and religion. However,
as European states became increasingly industrialized in the latter part of the nineteenth
century, larger numbers of immigrants from European urban centers came to the United States.
These people were more likely to have come from industrial backgrounds and came seeking
work in U.S. industry, and were also more likely to have been knowledgeable of, or members
of, radical working-class movements in Europe.24 Unable to engage fully in American Socialist
politics, non-English speaking immigrants often turned their attention to Socialist activities in
23
Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 13-14. 24
Glazer, The Social Basis, 20-21.
24
the countries of their origin. The result was the creation of unaffiliated Socialist language
groups, often accompanied by corresponding foreign language Socialist newspapers, in many
major cities throughout the Midwest and Northeast.
Newly arrived immigrants found an outlet for political expression in their own language,
encouraging Socialist meetings where debates and lectures were held, and Marxist theory
could be studied within these Socialist language groups. The newspapers published by such
groups kept immigrant communities abreast of political and social developments in their
homelands, as well as in the United States as it pertained to them. They also served a more
basic social function, where immigrants with a shared history and culture could congregate for
recreation. Some federations established club rooms and community social centers, accepting
of Socialists and non-Socialists, which generated revenue for the federation and served as a
fertile ground for federation recruitment. In the first decade of the 1900s, the language groups
scattered throughout the industrial centers of the Northeast and Midwest grew and came to
affiliate with one another into national Language Federations. However, they remained outside
the SPA, and so largely outside of American politics.
One of the largest Language Federations in the pre-war United States was the
Organization of Finnish Socialists. The federation of previously independent Finnish language
groups, which represented Finnish immigrants largely concentrated in Boston and the upper
Midwest, was established at an organizational convention in August, 1906. The delegates at the
convention agreed that the Organization of Finnish Socialists would affiliate with the SPA. The
National Executive Committee of the SPA accepted the organization into the ranks of the Party
under conditions that the federation would collect membership dues owed to the SPA, a
25
portion of which was sent to the SPA central offices, and would in turn receive no voting rights
at Party affairs. The Finnish Federation shrewdly instructed the leadership of the locals to
affiliate with their respective state Socialist parties to gain the voting rights indirectly, a plan
which would be emulated by affiliating language groups in the years to follow.25
The Lettish Federation affiliated with the SPA in 1910. The next year, the South Slavic,
Scandinavian, and Italian Federations followed the path to affiliation established by the Finns.
The Hungarian and Bohemian Federations affiliated in 1912, the German, Polish, Jewish, and
Slovak in 1913, and finally the Ukrainian, Lithuanian, and Russian Federations affiliated in
1915.26 The process was not painless, however. Immigrant members of the SPA, who had joined
the Party independently of their Language Federation, found it difficult to integrate into the
Party. Many immigrants were unable to participate in local Party votes, due to the issuing of
referenda ballots being printed exclusively in English. Some, such as a Polish immigrant and
Party member at the 1910 SPA convention, argued that the only means of integrating Socialist
immigrants into the SPA was to encourage the affiliation of language groups and federations:
“*the federations+ don’t want to be separate…they want to join the Party. When you go to one
of the Italians or Poles and talk to him in English about the Party, he does not understand. The
privilege we ask is to conduct our work in our own tongue.”27 To this the Party leadership
responded that the immigrants were in America now, and should join the American movement,
presumably becoming fluent in English as a prerequisite to participation. “There are foreigners
who come to this country and are here thirty to fifty years and never learn to speak the English
25
Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 17. 26
Glazer, The Social Basis, 24-25. The Jewish Federation conducted work in Yiddish but was referred to as the “Jewish Federation” within Party records and literature. 27
Unidentified Polish representative, as quoted in Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 18.
26
language,” countered delegate Novak, a Bohemian immigrant. “That man will never be a
member of an English speaking branch…the only thing to do is to organize *the immigrants+ in
affiliation with the Socialist Party in their own language,” he concluded.28
The Language Federations represented large numbers of working class immigrants, and
were recognized by the National Executive Committee of the SPA as a potential source of
growth for the Party as a whole. “The foreign-speaking Socialists want to see the Socialist Party
of America grow and get into power…we ought to reach these foreigners as soon as they come
to this country and keep them in our organizations,” argued delegate Skala.29 Another delegate
argued that something must be done to support the Language Federations, in order to aid the
Socialist movement in the United States: “if you want to reach the foreign-speaking
workingmen of this country, to reach the eleven million workers toiling in industry, you must
give them some official standing…a right to organize on National lines.”30 As a result of the
debate at the 1910 SPA convention, the Party resolved that all state organizations of the SPA
grant charters to all locals and branches of foreign speaking organizations that wished to
affiliate, under several conditions. In order to affiliate, a language group had to possess at least
500 members, all accepting of the SPA Party platform and constitution; collect dues from the
membership and send five cents per capita to the National Office (equal to those paid by the
English speaking branches); and have all political activity subject to the supervision and
approval of the state SPA organization. Finally, no federation would receive a vote in Party
28
Delegate Novak, Proceedings of the National Congress of the Socialist Party, May 15 to May 21, 1910 (Chicago: Socialist Party, 1910), 262. Available online at http://www.archive.org/stream/NationalCongressOfTheSocialistPartyHeldInMasonicTempleChicagoIll._777/1910socialist2a#page/n45/mode/2up/search/language (accessed February 23, 2012). 29
Delegate Skala, Proceedings 1910, 265. 30
Delegate Valimakli, Proceedings 1910, 261.
27
national referendums or in the elections of national officers. They would be allowed to send
one fraternal delegate to national conventions or congresses of the Party, who would “have a
voice but no vote,” and would be permitted to vote in local and state organization affairs.31
In order to overcome the language barrier, a Translator-Secretary was to be elected by
the federation and based at the national office of the SPA, whose duty it was to translate Party
documents, acts, minutes of meetings, memos, and literature for the non-English speaking
membership, and to serve as a medium between the federation and the national organization.
However, this attempt to counteract the language barrier had unforeseen consequences.
Although the national office was able to utilize the federation secretaries to reach non-English
speaking immigrant populations, they were often left in the dark as to the activities of these
federations. As a result, the affiliated Language Federations, granted charters to bring
immigrant communities closer to the Party as a whole, were effectively as independent from
the national organization as federation leadership, or individual Translator-Secretaries, wished
them to be. As the only intermediary between federation and Party, the Translator-Secretaries
wielded considerably more power than was anticipated. Indeed, they often took on roles in
addition to translation of Party documents, becoming responsible for issuing dues stamps to
federation locals, going on organizing tours, and handling federation correspondence and
postage.32
The Foreign Language Federations rapidly grew in membership following the decision to
allow affiliation to the SPA. Two new foreign-language daily newspapers and 16 new foreign-
language weeklies were established between the 1910 Party congress and the 1912 Party
31
Proceedings 1910, 259-260. 32
Shannon, The Socialist Party of America, 45.
28
convention.33 In that same period, the Finnish Federation grew from 7,767 dues paying
members to 11,483; the Italian Federation nearly doubled from 660 to 1,200. The Polish
Federation grew from 1,450 to 2,130 during 1911 alone; the Scandinavian Federation grew
from 216 to over 1,000 between the beginning of 1911 and May, 1912; and the South Slavic
Federation grew from 1,320 to 1,800, an addition of nearly 500 members, from January 1, 1912
to December 31 of the same year.34 By the end of 1912, the Foreign Language Federations
collectively accounted for 16,000 of the approximately 118,000 total members of the SPA, or
about fourteen percent.
The 1912 Party convention report noted the “substantial progress in carrying on
Socialist propaganda” among immigrant communities done by the seven Foreign Language
Federations affiliated with the Party.35 The 16,000 new Socialist Party members, largely
concentrated in bigger cities, were nothing to scoff at, and the increase in membership was
surely welcomed by the SPA leadership. However, there were signs that members of the native-
born majority of the Party were unenthusiastic about the progress of the federations, arguing
that although the ranks of the federations were swelling, there was little indication that the
immigrants now being organized were integrating into the Party. Rather, the federations overly
33
Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 19. 34
Figures can be found in John Spargo, ed., Proceedings of the National Convention of the Socialist Party, 1912 (Chicago: The Socialist Party, 1912), Appendix O, 237-245. Available online at: http://www.archive.org/stream/ProceedingsOfTheNationalConventionOfTheSocialistPartyPart3/1912SPcon3#page/n5/mode/2up (accessed February 24, 2012). 35
Spargo, Proceedings 1912, 221. http://www.archive.org/stream/ProceedingsOfTheNationalConventionOfTheSocialistLaborParty/1912conv2a#page/n53/mode/1up/search/foreign (accessed February 24, 2012).
29
focused attention on events in their respective homelands, to the detriment of American
movement.36
Several Language Federations demonstrated this preoccupation with events in the old
country in their reports to the 1912 Party convention. The Bohemian Federation voted to
establish closer ties with the Social Democratic Party in Bohemia. The Federation further
appropriated funds for the establishment of an information bureau in Prague, whose purpose
was to dissuade potential Czech immigrants from coming to the United States by American
steamship companies, which, it was alleged, lied about the conditions and quality of life in the
United States to increase their own profits.37 The Lettish Federation collected $1,093 from its
membership in subscriptions to a publication entitled “Lettish Social Democracy in Russia,” held
large annual meetings in memoriam of the 1905 Revolution in Russia, and sponsored lecture
tours that specifically addressed Russian politics in addition to American political
developments.38 The South Slavic Federation report was largely concerned with the effects of
the First Balkan War, which was expected to disrupt the Federation, composed of Serbs, Croats,
Slovenes, and Bulgarians. It is understandable that much of the attention of the Federation
membership would be focused on their homelands; the First Balkan War was being fought to
“abolish the rotten rule of feudalism and open the road for capitalism,” necessary steps in the
transition to Socialism for orthodox Marxists.39 Finally, the Finnish Federation addressed the
36
Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 20. 37
Joseph Novak, “Report of the Bohemian Section to the Socialist Party National Convention,” published in Spargo, Proceedings 1912, 242. 38
C. Karklin, “Report by the Executive Committee, National Lettish Organization, S.P.” to the Socialist Party National Convention,” published in Spargo, Proceedings 1912, 244-246. 39
Alex Susnar, “Report of South Slavic Socialist Federation to the National Committee of the Socialist Party of America,” in Tim Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism: A Repository of Source Material, 1864-1946, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/lfed/southslavic/1913/0500-susnar-reporttonc.pdf (accessed
30
issue head on. Tactfully articulating its defense of energy directed toward Finnish politics, the
Federation representative stated that the emphasis on events in Finland had nothing to do
with “love of the ‘fatherland’” or for otherwise nationalistic reasons, but because so many
Finnish-American Socialists retained an intense interest in Social-Democratic developments in
their homeland, and further aimed to help Socialists in an area under one of the most
autocratic governments in the world: “only in the victory of the Socialists of Russia lies the
victory of the Socialists in Finland.” 40 The interests of internationalism, it argued, trumped any
sense of nationalism within the membership.
It is apparent, then, that the Language Federations directed at least some energy away
from domestic American political activity and toward Socialist activity in European states. This
situation suggests that the federations acted rather autonomously within the larger Party, and
often undertook initiatives completely unknown to the National Office of the SPA. Although the
1910 Party congress established that Language Federations were to act in concert with state
SPA branches, the language barrier and role of Translator-Secretaries prevented this close
cooperation. Furthermore, the establishment of Language Federations drew some foreign-
speaking members out of integrated English-speaking branches and into the federations,
furthering the gulf between immigrant Socialists and native-born Socialists. Although the
federations contributed to the growth of total Party membership prior to the war, the newly
acquired members stood largely outside of mainstream SPA activity.
February 24, 2012). First published as a typeset leaflet by the Socialist Party, undated. Specimen in Tim Davenport collection. 40
J.W. Sarlund, “Report of the Finnish Translator-Secretary to the Socialist Party National Convention, 1912,” published in Spargo, Proceedings 1912, 238-239.
31
Another factor contributing to this isolation was the rights granted to the federation
membership at the 1910 Party congress. Allowed to vote in local and state Party affairs, but
barred from voting in national referenda as members of federations, it is little wonder that
federation members were less concerned with American Socialist Party politics. This suited the
largely Right Wing, reformist leadership of the Party. The Language Federations’ membership,
many of whom arrived with experience in European Socialist movements, stood to the left of
the Party leadership. The Right, which had argued for restrictions on immigration and found its
base of support among native-born workingmen and the “aristocracy of labor,” were weary of
the rapidly growing numbers of immigrants in the Language Federations, which Morris Hillquit,
writing years later, would remember as “Bolshevik to the core.”41 The influence of the Left
Wing of the Party was held in check, for a time, through restricting the rights of federations.
Several more federations applied for affiliation following the 1912 Party convention. By
1915 the Ukrainian, Lithuanian, Russian, Slovak, German, and Hungarian Federations joined the
Finnish, Lettish, Italian, Scandinavian, South Slavic, Jewish, and Polish Federations represented
at the 1912 convention. Meanwhile, total Party membership had dropped from 118,045 at the
time of the 1912 Party convention to approximately 80,000 total in 1915, perhaps due to the
exodus of IWW members following Bill Haywood’s removal from the National Executive
Committee (NEC) of the SPA in February, 1913, as well as Eugene Deb’s decision not to run for
the presidency in 1916. Of these, between 25,000 and 30,000 were members of Foreign
Language Federations, up from a mere 16,000 in 1912. The SPA thus lost nearly 40,000
members, almost entirely from the native-born, English-speaking membership. The Foreign
41
Morris Hillquit, quoted in Leinenweber, “The American Socialist Party,” 22.
32
Language Federations, in contrast, were increasing in size, although still constitutionally
prevented from wielding the power their numbers would suggest.
The Language Federations within the SPA were both a blessing and a problem for the
Party. The federations were supposed to act as organizing bodies for the recruitment of
foreign-born immigrants in the U.S. to the SPA. Their task was to organize and propagandize
among immigrant communities to this end. In that regard, they were quite successful, bringing
in almost 30,000 sympathetic non-English speaking Socialists into the Party by 1916, at a time
when English-speaking membership rates were dropping. Although they faced hostility from
some nativists within the SPA, the federations were able to join the larger Party and commence
Party work among foreign-born workers in the U.S. However, their organizational structure and
the language barrier that separated the membership from the English-speaking portion of the
Party meant that the federations became autonomous units within the Party. This autonomy
and separation allowed the federations to focus their energies and attention to Socialist
movements in their respective homelands, to the detriment of work in the U.S. For these
reasons, it is difficult to say categorically whether the development of the Foreign Language
Federations was a positive or a negative for the American Socialist movement. Their existence
was a positive in that they brought many immigrants into the Party who otherwise would not
have joined due to the language barrier. However, although ostensibly advocates of the SPA
and for Socialism in the United States, the federation members remained largely outside of the
larger Party, isolated and independent from the English-speaking contingent of the SPA.
Although a large number of immigrants now identified with the SPA through the federation
33
system, their inability to directly contribute to the mainstream discourse of the Party resulted
in a weaker, more fractured organization.
34
III. INTERNATIONAL SOCIALISM, THE ZIMMERWALD LEFT, AND THE SOCIALIST PARTY OF
AMERICA
The United States’ policy of neutrality during the first years of the war, and the
geographic distance of the nation from the belligerent nations of Europe, provided American
Socialists with the luxury of time, a luxury the European Social Democratic parties lacked. As
European states mobilized for war in the last days of summer, 1914, European Social Democrats
were all faced with a question that precipitated splits within their parties: to support the war
effort or to oppose it in total. The Second International’s 1912 conference in Basel concluded
that in the event of war among the European nations it was the duty of the European working
class, and its representatives in the various Socialist parties, to mobilize economically and
politically, to prevent the war by general strike or any other means necessary.42 Instead, in the
Western nations where Socialists had achieved some margin of power within representational
governments, Socialists abandoned the doctrine of the Second International. The French
Socialists backed the war effort after conceiving of it as a struggle against imperialism, making
distinction between the imperialism of the Central Powers and that of the French Republic.43
The Socialists of Britain split on the issue like all others, however ultimately rallying behind
Henry Hyndman and the “defencists,” who believed it was necessary for British workers to
support the war effort in defense of the nation. The Social Democratic Party of Germany, by far
the most influential of European Socialist parties, fearing repression by the German state and
the destruction of the Socialist movement, resolved “not to leave the Fatherland in the lurch” in
42
Manifesto of the Second International Socialist Congress at Basel, in Marxists Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/international/social-democracy/1912/basel-manifesto.htm (accessed February 27, 2012). Originally published in Extraordinary International Socialist Congress at Basel, November 24-25, 1912. (Berlin: Vorwärts Publishers), 23-27. 43
Robert Wohl, French Communism in the Making, 1914-1924 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1966), 54.
35
the moment of crisis.44 When the moment finally came in the weeks following the Austrian
ultimatum to Serbia, the Social Democratic representatives in the parliaments of Europe voted
for war credits to the states, allowing for funding of the war effort and tacitly choosing
nationalism over internationalism as the policy of the Social Democratic Party.
The SPA published a proclamation following the outbreak of hostilities in Europe,
reiterating its opposition to all war in accordance with the declarations of international
Socialism, and reminding their working class brethren in Europe that they have “no quarrel with
each other,” since their suffering is not the cause of workers of other nationalities but of their
own ruling classes. The SPA encouraged foreign-born workers in the United States to rally for
peace and hold mass meetings “for the purpose of emphasizing the fraternity and solidarity of
all working people.” Finally, the SPA pledged support to the European Socialist parties in any
measures necessary to maintain peace among nations and advance goodwill among men.45
“Workingmen of the world, the land of your birth has done nothing for you…you have no
country! There is only one flag worth fighting for…the red flag” proclaimed American Socialist
Mary Marcy. The war was brought about for the profit of the ruling classes of Europe; American
Socialists had faith that the internationalism of the proletariat would bring it to a swift end.
The SPA was officially against the war in Europe, issuing statements that denounced the
European governments and blaming capitalism and imperialism for its outbreak. However,
some American Socialists took sides in the European conflict. Alan Benson, 1916 SPA
44
Carl Schorske, German Social Democracy, 1905-1917: The Development of the Great Schism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1955), 285. 45
Walter Lanferseik, “Proclamation of the Socialist Party of America on the Outbreak of War in Europe, August 8, 1914,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1914/0808-spa-proclamation.pdf (accessed February 28, 2012). Published in The American Socialist [Chicago], v. 1, no. 4, whole no. 92 (Aug. 8, 1914), 1.
36
presidential candidate was publicly anti-German, and wished for a German defeat “to give the
German people an opportunity to throw off the medieval institutions under which they live.”46
John Spargo hoped for a Russian victory, as did George Herron. Max Eastman supported the
French against German occupation. Jack London, William English Walling, and Edward Russell
all expressed pro-Allied sentiments. Charles Steinmetz, Robert Loqie, Victor Berger, and at
times Hillquit all sympathized with Germany and the Central Powers.47 Support for belligerents
does not appear to be linked to Left-Right political alignment; Eastman, London, and Walling
were, at the time, all members of the pre-war American Left Wing of the SPA, while the others
cited above represented the reformist or Right Wing SPA lines. What is interesting to note,
however, is the nation of origin of these Socialists sampled and where their sympathies lay.
Benson, Eastman, Herron, London, Walling, and Russell all were native-born and backed the
Allied nations of Britain, France, and Russia. Spargo, born in Britain, also was sympathetic to the
Allied cause. Steinmetz, Lowie, and Berger, all of whom demonstrated at least some measure of
support for the Central Powers, were all foreign-born immigrants to the United States.48
Despite the faith placed in internationalism by the SPA, it is clear that some of the leading
membership were unable or unwilling to suppress sympathies to certain belligerent states
along nationalistic or ethnic lines.
Regardless of the personal opinions of these few prominent American Socialists, the
vast majority of the membership and top echelon of Party leaders remained staunchly anti-war.
Eugene V. Debs exhorted American Socialists to “let us show the people the true cause of war.
46
Allen L. Benson, as quoted in Nathan Fine, Labor and Farmer Parties in the United States, 1828-1928 (New York: Russell & Russell, 1961), 303. 47
Draper, The Roots, 56. 48
Charles Steinmetz was born and raised in Germany, Robert Lowie in Austria, Victor Berger to German-Jewish parentage in the Austrio-Hungarian Empire, and Morris Hillquit to German-Jewish parentage in Latvia.
37
Let us arouse a sentiment against war. Let us teach the children to abhor war.”49 Hillquit,
responded to Allied sympathizers within the Party: “The ghastly carnage in Europe has no
redeeming features. It is not a war for democracy, culture, or progress…it is cold-blooded
butchery for advantages and power for the ruling classes of the warring nations.”50 In an article
published in The American Socialist, Hillquit articulated his rationale for Socialist neutrality. The
Allied nations, he maintained, were not fighting to free the German people from Prussian
militarism; such a development could only come from the German people themselves. Likewise,
support for the Western democracies against reactionary Germany would lend tacit support to
the most reactionary and oppressive government in Europe, the autocratic Russian Empire.
Support for the German war effort was equally improper, as any notion that Germany fought to
protect and spread her “culture” to the nations of Europe was, to him, but more “hollow
patriotic German pretenses.” No, argued Hillquit, the correct stance of the American Socialists
was absolute and complete neutrality, in the hopes that the war would end in a draw due to
the exhaustion of the warring states. “Only then,” he concluded, “will this war remain forever
accursed in the memory of men, only then will it lead the people of all nations…to revolt
against the capitalist system which leads to such paroxysms of human madness.”51
But what could American Socialists actually do to contribute to a cessation of hostilities
in Europe? Walter Lanferseik, national executive secretary of the SPA, went over the head of
SPA leader Morris Hillquit in September, 1914 and cabled the leaders of ten Socialist parties in
49
Eugene V. Debs, “Peace on Earth,” in Marxists Internet Archive, http://marxists.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1915/0109-debs-peaceonearth.pdf (accessed February 29, 2012). Published in The American Socialist [Chicago], v. 1, no. 26, whole no. 114 (Jan. 9, 1915), 1. 50
Morris Hillquit, as quoted in Shannon, The Socialist Party of America, 85. 51
Morris Hillquit, “Socialist Neutrality,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1915/0109-hillquit-socneutrality.pdf (accessed February 29, 2012). Published in The American Socialist [Chicago], v. 1, no. 26, whole no. 114 (Jan. 9, 1915),. 1.
38
Europe to encourage their support for a proposed mediation by the United States. Although
Hillquit and Victor Berger were dismayed by Lanferseik’s unilateral action, they joined the
National Executive Committee of the SPA in drafting an official proposal to the Socialists of
Europe for an international conference held in the U.S., the purpose of which was the discuss
possibilities for ending the war. Alexander Trachtenberg and the N.E.C of the SPA drafted a
program for consideration by the International Bureau which proposed lofty measures to end
the conflict and prevent future wars. Cessation of hostilities was to be predicated upon a peace
plan without indemnities or annexations of territory. The program also proposed a post-war
restructuring of governance: an international congress, an international court of mediation, and
an international police force. Peace would be maintained through mass disarmament of states,
the internationalization of “strategic waterways” such as the Dardanelles, the Suez and Panama
canals, and the Straight of Gibraltar, and the neutralization of the seas.52 Finally, the program
encouraged an “extension of democracy,” political and economic, towards the dismantling of
the Capitalist state. The authors encouraged Socialists around the world to make efforts to
“secure the official adoption the program by the governing bodies at the earliest date,” an
unrealistic goal given the political circumstances in the warring states of the time.53 The
Socialist parties of the belligerent nations rejected the proposal for the international
conference, and so never seriously considered the peace program. The conference was well-
received by Socialists in neutral European states, however, under the condition that the
conference be held in Europe. Unfortunately American Socialists lost enthusiasm for the
52
Fine, Labor and Farmer Parties, 303-304. 53
NEC of the SPA, “Disarmament and World Peace: Proposed Manifesto and Program of the Socialist Party of America, December 26, 1914,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1914/1226-spa-draftmanifesto.pdf (accessed March 5, 2012). Published in The American Socialist [Chicago], v. 1, no. 24, whole no. 112 (Dec. 26, 1914), 1.
39
proposed conference when it became clear that the Socialists of the warring states would not
participate. Irritated by the disinterest of SPA members, and the contention of International
Bureau secretary Camille Huysmans that mediation was “a hopeless cause,” Hillquit, the only
delegate from the SPA, did not depart for the January 15th, 1915 conference in Copenhagen and
the Party abandoned the proposal altogether. 54
European Socialists were not unified in their support of their respective countries’ war
efforts. The differing opinions reflected the split between the Right and Left Wings in the
parties, with the Right or reformist Social Democrats favoring defense of the homeland and the
revolutionaries of the Left favoring international working class cooperation in opposition to the
war. Anti-war Center and Left Wing members of the European Social Democratic parties
continued to appeal to internationalism to bring the war to an end. These elements met from
September 5 through September 8, 1915, at the International Socialist Conference at
Zimmerwald, Switzerland. The conference majority condemned the Socialist representatives
who backed the War, who asked the proletariat to put aside the class struggle, voted for war
credits, and in some instances entered government ministerial positions. These men, argued
the Zimmerwald manifesto, were responsible for the War and the deaths of working people on
the battlefields of Europe. The Zimmerwaldians called for international solidarity of the working
class, which should rally behind the Left and Center Socialists to oppose the war by economic
54
Shannon, The Socialist Party of America, 85-86.
40
and political action, and support the Zimmerwald Manifesto’s call for a peace without
annexations.55
However, the more radical attendees of the conference, chiefly the Russian Bolsheviks
Vladimir Lenin and Grigorii Zinoviev, found the proposed manifesto to be unsatisfactory, due to
the lack of any real program to oppose the war and any mention of the “opportunism” of
reformist Social Democrats, which Lenin believed was the deciding factor in the collapse of the
Second International at the outbreak of war.56 The Left Wing delegates submitted a resolution,
heavily influenced by Lenin, that was voted down nineteen to twelve. Within it, the Left Wing
bloc at Zimmerwald offered a definite program of resistance: refusal of war credits, resignation
of appointments in government cabinets by Socialists, public denunciation of the war by
elected representatives, street demonstrations, propaganda of international working class
solidarity amongst soldiers in the trenches, and the use of economic weapons such as the
general strike. “Civil war, not civil peace,” was to be the aim of revolutionary Socialists. An end
to the war was not enough; rather, the war should be transformed into a civil war across
Europe between proletariat and bourgeoisie. The Left Wing resolution further indicted the
“social patriots,” or Right Wings of the European Social Democratic parties, as a greater threat
to the proletariat than the imperialist bourgeoisie, and stated that the fight against social-
patriotism was the first step in the “revolutionary mobilization of the proletariat and the
55
International Socialist Conference at Zimmerwald: Manifesto, in Marxists Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/international/social-democracy/zimmerwald/manifesto-1915.htm (accessed February 27, 2012). 56
International Socialist Conference at Zimmerwald: Two Declarations, in Marxists Internet Archive, http://marxists.org/history/international/social-democracy/zimmerwald/two-declarations.htm (accessed February 28, 2012).
41
reconstruction of the international.”57 The Left claimed that to rouse the working class and
transform the world war into a Europe-wide revolution, the Socialist parties would have to split.
The Centrist majority argued this was unacceptable. The conference adopted the more Centrist
Manifesto instead. It called for international solidarity of Socialists to oppose the war and
support peace without annexations or indemnities, and the right to self-determination for all
states. Any mention of the parliamentary tactics such as refusing approval of war credits and
resigning governmental posts was excised from the final draft. Beaten, the Left bloc signed the
Manifesto, considering even a tempered call for struggle, and a proposal for peace without
annexations or reparations, preferable to isolation from the international Socialist movement.
The Zimmerwald Manifesto was published by the Socialist press in Italy, Britain, and the
neutral countries, and clandestinely distributed amongst Socialists in Germany, France and
Russia. The majorities of the Socialist parties and the Bureau of the International rejected the
manifesto. Party leaders across Europe regarded the conference as illegitimate, a gathering of
“Party sharpshooters without troops,” in the words of secretary of the Second International
Camille Huysmans.58 The Zimmerwald committee reconvened from April 24 to the 30, 1916, in
Kienthal, Switzerland. Again Lenin attempted to gain the support of the Left Wing delegates and
called for a program of revolutionary propaganda with the aim of transforming the War, and for
the Center and Left Socialists of Europe to break with the Second International and form the
nucleus of a Third. Again, his proposals were defeated. The Centrists again carried the day. The
new Manifesto again called for peace without annexations, and took one step further in calling
57
International Socialist Conference at Zimmerwald: Draft Resolution of the Leftwing Delegates, in Marxists Internet Archive, http://marxists.org/history/international/social-democracy/zimmerwald/draft-resolution.htm (accessed February 28, 2012). 58
Camille Huysmans, as quoted by Julius Braunthal, History of the International Volume II: 1914-1943, trans. John Clark (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, Inc., 1967), 49.
42
upon Socialists in the European parliaments to refuse support for war policies and war credits.
The new Manifesto further condemned the “social-chauvinists” whom Lenin and the
Zimmerwald Left had indicted at the 1915 conference.59 A shift to the left was evident, and
tensions between the Left and Center-Right Wings of the European Socialist parties were
growing over the Socialist response to the War, yet the Second International remained intact,
and inert. However, first at Zimmerwald, and then at Kienthal, Lenin had made public his visions
for a new International, a radical end to the war, and the ruptures of Socialist parties the world
over.
The Zimmerwald Manifesto, which articulated a position unmistakably to the Left of the
European Socialist and Social-Democratic parties, did not prove divisive to the American
Socialist movement. American Socialists had time to consider the SPA position in the context of
the larger world conflict. Not facing the threat of invasion by foreign armies, and thus not
pressed to decide for national interests over international solidarity, American Socialists were
able to remain antiwar without opposing the government, and to stand resolutely by the
decisions of the Second International laid out in the Basel manifesto. However, American
Socialists were dismayed by the actions of their comrades in Europe at the outbreak of war.
How could the resolutions of the Second International have been so quickly discarded by
Socialists in the belligerent countries? Why did European Socialists vote in large numbers for
war credits? U.S. Socialist Mary Marcy could see no justification: “We do not imagine for a
moment that a single German Socialist wanted war…any more than the English, French, and
Belgian comrades did…in spite of the anti-military sentiment of the French Socialists, the anti-
59
Merle Fainsod, International Socialism and the World War (New York: Octagon Books, 1973), 95.
43
war propaganda of the English movement…the 4,500,000 voting Social Democrats in Germany,
we find the working classes of Europe flying at each other’s throats.”60 Irrespective of Left-Right
orientation, some American Socialists did find means to justify supporting the war efforts of
belligerent nations, often justifying the war effort of their own nationalist or ethnic homeland;
even amongst outspoken internationalists, nationalist sympathies were difficult to renounce
completely. However, the vast majority of the membership and top echelon of Party leaders
remained staunchly anti-war. Eugene V. Debs exhorted American Socialists “let us show the
people the true cause of war. Let us arouse a sentiment against war. Let us teach the children
to abhor war.”61 Hillquit responded to Allied sympathizers within the Party: “The ghastly
carnage in Europe has no redeeming features. It is not a war for democracy, culture, or
progress…it is cold-blooded butchery for advantages and power for the ruling classes of the
warring nations.”62 Only complete neutrality, he concluded, was the correct stance of American
Socialists.
In the first months of 1915, the Second International asked the SPA to pay its back dues
for 1914 and current dues for 1915. The NEC of the SPA, having witnessed the ineffectuality of
the International as a peacekeeping institution after the outbreak of war in Europe, was less
than enthusiastic about paying the money owed. The NEC voted unanimously to pay no dues to
the International Bureau for 1915, effectively severing ties with the Second International and
reneging on efforts to mediate peace between the warring states. American Socialists instead
60
Mary Marcy, as quoted by Shannon, The Socialist Party of America, 83. 61
Eugene V. Debs, “Peace on Earth,” in Marxist Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1915/0109-debs-peaceonearth.pdf (accessed May 23, 2012). Published in The American Socialist [Chicago], v. 1, no. 26, whole no. 114 (January 9, 1915), 1. 62
Morris Hillquit, “Socialist Neutrality,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://www.marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1915/0109-hillquit-socneutrality.pdf (accessed May 23, 2012). Published in The American Socialist [Chicago], v. 1, no. 26, whole no. 114 (January. 9, 1915), 1.
44
turned their attention towards ensuring the neutrality of the United States in the larger war. In
November, 1915, the NEC of the SPA endorsed the Manifesto of the Zimmerwald conference,
which one executive council member argued reasonably articulated a definite plan of action to
guide Socialists in the current crisis, and thus deserved the support of any who sincerely
ascribed to the theory of class struggle and international solidarity of labor.63 Clearly, then,
when the Party withdrew from the Second International internationalist sentiment did not
evaporate.
The moderate program of the Zimmerwald conference appealed to the moderate
leadership of the SPA. The more extreme position of the Zimmerwald Left was equally as
influential, but found proponents not in the top echelon of the Party leadership but among Left
Wing Socialists and the Party membership base, particularly within the Language Federations.
Lenin, himself, attempted to contact elements within the American Left Wing directly. In
November, 1915, he obtained a copy of the manifesto of the Boston-based Socialist
Propaganda League (SPL), home to several prominent Left Wingers within the Party and heavily
populated by Lettish émigrés residing in New England.64 The SPL was comprised primarily of
Latvian-American immigrants residing in Massachusetts. According to Theodore Draper, many
were former members of the Lettish Social Democratic Labor Party, a national branch of the
Russian Social Democratic Labor Party. The SPL was founded in November, 1916 by C.W.
Fitzgerald, who was not of Latvian origin. The organization was composed of Left Wing SPA
63
Arthur LeSueur, “The Zimmerwald Conference and its Endorsement by the Party NEC,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1915/1127-lesueur-zimmerwald.pdf (accessed March 5, 2012). Published in The American Socialist [Chicago], v. 2, no. 20, whole no. 160 (November 27, 1915), 3. 64
See Draper, The Roots, 73-74. It is speculated by Draper that it is through this connection that Lenin was able to obtain the manifesto.
45
members. The SPL thus was an independent group existing within the SPA but not officially
recognized by the larger Party. The SPL was small and isolated; most of its members resided in
Massachusetts with a few residing in New York City. The SPL published its own organ, the Left
Wing journal The Internationalist. Although small in number, the SPL represented the first semi-
organized Left Wing faction dedicated to Revolutionary Marxist Socialism in the SPA.
In the manifesto, the SPL argued for industrial unionism, recognition of parliamentary
action as an adjunct to the mass action of the working class, the advancement of revolutionary
principles through education and organization, opposition to militarism, and the use of mass
action by the working class on both the economic and political fields.65 The SPL also endorsed
the position of the “Left Wing Socialists of Europe” and so called for the SPA to endeavor in the
creation of a new international based entirely on revolutionary Marxist theory and tactics.66
Lenin approved of the SPL position, stating it “corresponds fully with the position of our Party
(Social-Democratic Labor Party of Russia, Central Committee).”67 Lenin proceeded to clarify
some points on the position of the SDLP of Russia, Central Committee, stating that the Party
was not wholly opposed to immediate demands of the working class, so long as it was made
clear that such reforms amounted to little if not “seconded by revolutionary methods of
struggle.”68 Additionally, Lenin noted that his Party was for democratic centralism, as the
German Social Democratic Party was organized, stating that in moments of crisis a small group
65
“Manifesto of the Socialist Propaganda League of America, Adopted at a Meeting Held in the City of Boston, Nov. 26, 1916,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spla/1916/1126-spla-manifesto.pdf (accessed May 23, 2012). Published in The Internationalist: Weekly of the Left Wing Socialists [Boston], v. 1, no. 1, Second Edition (January 6, 1917), 2. 66
Ibid. 67
V.I. Lenin, “Letter to the Secretary of the Socialist Propaganda League,” August 1914-December 1915, Vol. 21 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1972), 423. 68
Ibid., 424.
46
can direct the masses in “a revolutionary direction.”69 Most importantly, Lenin articulated his
Party’s position on the European Social Democratic parties, arguing for secession of the Left
Wing from these parties dominated by opportunistic agents of the middle class and capitalists.
Lenin additionally sent a German language copy of the Left Wing manifesto drafted at the
Zimmerwald conference, and implored SPL secretary C.W. Fitzgerald to seek out a German-
speaking comrade to translate and distribute the document throughout the American Left Wing
press.
Had fate not intervened, perhaps the American Left Wing would have connected with
Lenin more directly during the war. There is no evidence that the SPL ever took note of Lenin’s
letter. One possible explanation is that Lenin was so little known in American circles that his
letter was disregarded and simply thrown away, although Theodore Draper speculates that the
Latvian immigrants, no strangers to Russian Social Democracy, would have had to be aware of
Lenin’s position within the Russian movement. It is more likely that French authorities
confiscated the letter and it never reached American shores, a common occurrence throughout
Lenin’s attempts to correspond with friends and comrades abroad during the war.70 Although
Lenin’s attempt at contact with more radical elements of the American Left came to nothing,
the SPL manifesto nonetheless demonstrated that there were elements within the American
Socialist movement sympathetic to the Zimmerwald Left position. The Left Wing of the
American Party would come into contact with Lenin and his Bolshevik Party soon after,
69
Ibid. 70
Draper, The Roots, 74. Benjamin Gitlow contends that the Latvians “threw *Lenin’s+ letter into the waste basket” in his autobiographical history of the CPA, I Confess: The Truth About American Communism (New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., 1940), 23.
47
however. Shortly after the letter was sent, several prominent Russian political exiles familiar
with Lenin journeyed to the United States.
49
IV. RUSSIAN EXILES AND ÉMIGRÉS IN THE UNITED STATES
In early August, 1915, Alexandra Kollontai received an invitation from Ludwig Lore,
Translator-Secretary of the German Federation of the SPA, to travel across the United States on
a three month speaking tour, sponsored by the German Federation. Kollontai was working for
Lenin, helping to agitate on behalf of the Zimmerwald Left in the Scandinavian countries, when
she received the invitation. Kollontai was born in St. Petersburg to a family of some means. Her
father was a military officer, and a liberal who wished to see Russia transformed into a
constitutional monarchy. She inherited a curiosity of the world around her, and a passion for
studying history and politics, from her father. Her mother, the daughter of a Finnish peasant
who struck it rich in lumber sales, bestowed upon her a respect for people of lesser wealth and
privilege. She spoke fluent Russian, learned Finnish from the peasants of her grandfather’s
estate in Finland, spoke French with her mother, learned English from her English nanny, and
studied German in school. Kollontai took to Socialism, and studied in Zurich under Professor
Heinrich Herkner, who, she later recalled, increasingly took to the revisionist positions of
Eduard Bernstein.
In 1899, after returning to Russia, she joined the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party,
where she met Vladimir Lenin for the first time. When the RSDLP split between the Mensheviks
and Bolsheviks in 1903, she opted to stay neutral, although contemporaries remembered her as
a Menshevik prior to the First World War. Kollontai was an eye witness to the January 22, 1905
massacre in St. Petersburg remembered as “Bloody Sunday.” She was sent into exile in 1908
after publishing revolutionary propaganda. She traveled to Germany, where she came to know
and be influenced by German Marxists Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg. After the outbreak
50
of war and the voting of war credits by German Social Democrats, Kollontai departed for
Scandinavia. Dismayed by both the German Social Democrats and the Mensheviks for
supporting their respective nations’ war efforts, she finally threw her lot in with Lenin, and
officially joined the Bolshevik Party.71
Prior to the war she disagreed with Lenin on several issues; she doubted the validity of
his vanguard theory, disagreed with his dismissal of the spontaneous revolution, his belief in
the necessity of a highly centralized Party structure, and his theory of imperialism. When the
War began, she publicly supported Lenin and his call to transform the conflict into a civil war
between classes; in private, she held to her pacifist beliefs, which Lenin regarded as silly and
misguided.72 In their personal communications, Lenin made it known that her positions were
incorrect; he chastised Kollontai for her use of “the watchword of peace” which was “pacifist,
petty-bourgeois, helping the governments and obstructing the revolutionary struggle.”73 In
another Lenin derided her for espousing disarmament, asking “how can an oppressed class in
general be against the armament of the people? To reject this means to fall into a semi-
anarchist attitude to imperialism.”74 In still another, Lenin again attacked Kollontai’s pacifist
agitation amongst the Scandinavians, stating “I think it mistaken in theory and harmful in
practice not to distinguish between types of wars…repudiating “war” in general, that is not
Marxist.”75 Clearly, Kollontai was not completely in line with the Bolsheviks; what she desired
most was peace. Despite her earlier doubts about Lenin’s theories, when war broke out, she
71
Isabel De Palencia, Alexandra Kollontai: Ambassadress from Russia (New York: Van Rees Press, 1947), 69. 72
Barbara Evans Clements, Bolshevik Feminist: The Life of Aleksandra Kollontai (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1979), 91-92. 73
V.I. Lenin, Letter to Alexandra Kollontai, Letters: February 1912-December 1922, Vol. 35 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1972), 193. 74
Ibid., 198. 75
Ibid., 200-201.
51
placed her reservations aside, and decided his program held merit.76 Kollontai embraced the
Bolshevik program entirely, and publicly agitated for the Zimmerwald Left and Bolshevik
program in first Sweden, and then Norway. Kollontai’s fluency in English, Russian, German,
French, and Finnish and her reputation as a first class public speaker and lecturer made her an
invaluable asset to Lenin. She served Lenin well in the Scandinavian countries. When she was
invited to tour the United States, Lenin realized she could serve him there, as well.
Alexandra Kollontai received the invitation from Ludwig Lore, Translator-Secretary of
the German Federation of the SPA and Left Wing Socialist, on August 10, 1915. Lore had heard
of her reputation as a public speaker and anti-war activist, and arranged for the German
Federation to sponsor a speaking tour of the United States. After reading the letter, Kollontai
recorded in her diary “this is so incredibly good that I am gasping with joy and am afraid to
believe it.”77 She accepted the invitation by return mail, and sent a letter to Lenin informing him
of this development. Lenin responded enthusiastically, saying he pinned “many hopes on this
visit.”78 Lenin requested that Kollontai attempt to find an American publisher who would print
the booklet Socialism and War in English, and suggested Charles Kerr, Chicago publisher and
editor of the International Socialist Review, one of the primary organs of the SPA’s Left Wing.
Finally, he asked that she “mobilize the internationalists,” although he did not indicate who
exactly they were.79 The two corresponded by mail for the duration of Kollontai’s stay in the
U.S., although several letters did not reach her, perhaps again due to the diligence of the
76
Clements, Bolshevik Feminist, 91. 77
Quoted in Clements, Bolshevik Feminist, 94. 78
V.I. Lenin, Letter to Alexandra Kollontai, Letters: February 1912-December 1922, Vol. 35 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works, 201. 79
V.I. Lenin, Letter to Alexandra Kollontai, 1900-1923, Vol. 36 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works, 346.
52
French post office. Lenin provided Kollontai with a copy of Socialism and War to translate,
which she began as she set out across the Atlantic on September 26, 1915.
Her friends worried about her crossing the Atlantic during the period of unrestricted
submarine warfare. Her passage was safe, although by her own accounts rather uncomfortable.
She shared a third class cabin with several other Russians, and the accommodations of the
cramped cabin made her translation work difficult. She was able to complete the task,
however, by the time the ship docked in New York City on October 8.
Upon disembarking Kollontai was greeted by Lore and several other German Federation
members, as well as several Russian editors and contributors to the Russian Federation journal
Novy Mir. She was taken to her hotel on Union Square where her itinerary for the next three
months was made known to her: she would be speaking at events in New York City for several
weeks, then travel by train to Racine, Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Chicago, St. Louis, Denver, San
Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Philadelphia before returning to New York. At each stop she
was to address crowds at several meetings, speaking in English, German, French, and Russian as
the situation demanded. Her American sponsors asked her to speak on European
developments, the War, and Zimmerwald; she suggested talks on national defense and
international solidarity of the working class, and war and women’s tasks in addition, all with an
eye to, as she wrote to Lenin, “spread as widely as possible the ideas you’ve so clearly
formulated, the basis of revolutionary internationalism.”80 She spoke that very night to a small
group of German Federation members. The topic was the Zimmerwald convention, and by the
end of her talk and ensuing debate, all came out in favor of the Zimmerwald Left program. A
80
Alexandra Kollontai, as quoted in Cathy Porter, Alexandra Kollontai: The Lonely Struggle of the Woman Who Defied Lenin (New York: The Dial Press, 1980), 227.
53
lecture to Russian Americans several days later ended with similar results; Nokolai Nakoryakov,
an editor of Novy Mir and Bolshevik himself, recalled the meeting was “unfailingly
successful…even the Menshevik leaders, who initially greeted her agitation coolly, had to
confess that that she destroyed a great deal of their influence, like magic.”81 She spent several
more busy days in New York, then departed on her tour of the U.S. She spoke to Russians and
Germans in Milwaukee, then traveled to Chicago where she addressed ten crowds in half as
many days. There she connected with Charles Kerr, whom Lenin had suggested as a publisher
for Socialism and War. He showed little interest in publishing the work.82
She went then to St. Louis, and from there west through the great plains and Rocky
Mountains, to California, Washington, and back. The pace of her journey took a great toll;
Kollontai was often exhausted, tired of the repetitiveness of her lectures, and had few
moments to herself. She wrote letters in what little spare time she had. She wrote to Lenin “the
German comrades have enlisted my services for a very good reason…someone from Europe has
immense authority here.”83 Lenin replied “if there are people in America who are afraid even of
the Zimmerwald Manifesto, you can brush them aside…bring in only those who are more Left
than the Zimmerwald Manifesto” and in a post-script “Try everywhere to see (if only for five
minutes) the local Bolsheviks, to ‘refresh’ them and get them in touch with us.”84 Although she
grew weary, Kollontai fought not to lose sight of her mission in America. This was difficult,
however. Although she fell in love with the natural beauty of the United States, the west of
which reminded her of the Russian steppes, she found the people she encountered out west
81
Nikolai Nakoryakov, as quoted in Porter, Alexandra Kollontai: The Lonely Struggle, 228. 82
Porter, Alexandra Kollontai: The Lonely Struggle, 229. 83
Alexandra Kollontai, as quoted in Porter, Alexandra Kollontai: The Lonely Struggle, 229. 84
V.I. Lenin, Letter to Alexandra Kollontai, Letters: February 1912-December 1922, Vol. 35 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works, 221.
54
complacent, insular, and ignorant of the war in Europe. She returned east through Minneapolis,
Chicago again, then Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Finally, on December 22, she arrived back
in New York City. She rested for twelve days, before embarking on a more leisurely speaking
tour that took her to Boston, Pittsburgh, and New Jersey. In Boston she made contact with the
Socialist Propaganda League, at Lenin’s behest: “I hope you will make every effort to find out
everything you can about them, and will try to build up out of them one of the rallying-points
for the Zimmerwald Left in America.”85 In Philadelphia she connected with two young
Bolsheviks, V. Volodarsky, a Russian political exile who had fled to the U.S. in 1913 and worked
in a Philadelphia garment factory, and another named Gurvich, perhaps Nicholas Gurvich, who
later adopted the Anglicized last name Hourwich, and was soon to come into prominence
within the Russian Federation of the SPA.86 In a little over four months, Kollontai had traveled
the length of the U.S. and back, and addressed 123 meetings in four different languages. She
agitated on behalf of the Zimmerwald Left, spoke to foreign and native-born American
Socialists, endeavored, but failed, to get Lenin’s Socialism and War published, and made
contact with Bolsheviks residing in the United States. She departed New York City at the end of
December, to return to Norway. Personal matters would bring her back to the United States
only half a year later.
In the late summer of 1916, Alexandra Kollontai again Left Norway for the United States.
This time, her trip was not centered around political agitation for the Zimmerwald Left or
Bolshevik Party. Although she did intend to reconnect with American Left Wing Socialists and
Russian émigrés in New York City, she ventured to the United States at the request of her son,
85
V.I. Lenin, Letter to Alexandra Kollontai, 1900-1923, Vol. 36 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works, 360. 86
Porter, Alexandra Kollontai: The Lonely Struggle, 233.
55
who had himself recently emigrated to Paterson, New Jersey, perhaps to avoid being drafted
into the Russian army. In New Jersey he continued his engineering studies, but found that he
needed the support of his mother in this strange new land. Alexandra wrote to Lenin that she
was suspending her work in Sweden and Norway, asked that he send a replacement, and
crossed the Atlantic a second time. She stayed in New Jersey for several months. Kollontai
found herself very unhappy in Paterson. “We’re living in the latitude of Naples, but it doesn’t
feel at all like the South,” she complained to a friend. She found the town a dreary place, where
“monotonously dull rows of little wooden houses” were occupied by equally monotonously dull
American housewives who would spend the evenings sitting on porches and gossiping about
trivialities.87 To alleviate her boredom, Kollontai read American literature and works and what
she termed “psychological studies.” Her time was not spent completely free of Socialist activity;
she contributed the occasional article to American Socialist newspapers, however these were
few and far between. Towards the end of her stay, in October, 1916, she reconnected with the
New York Left Wing. She began to venture into the city for meetings of the Society for the
Protection of Child and Mother, and contacted the Bolsheviks Chudnovsky and Nakoryakov at
Novy Mir.88 It was here, in November, that Kollontai discovered that the Russian émigré
community in New York was now host to another notorious Bolshevik: Nikolai Bukharin.
Like Kollontai, Bukharin came to the United States from Scandinavia, where he had
wound up after a series of exiles and deportations for radical activity. In September, 1916, he
decided to leave Copenhagen for the United States. His reasons for doing so remain a mystery;
Bukharin may have relished the opportunity to agitate for revolutionary Socialism in the
87
Alexandra Kollontai, quoted in Clements, Bolshevik Feminist, 99. 88
Porter, Alexandra Kollontai: The Lonely Struggle, 237.
56
stronghold of Capitalism that was the United States in the early twentieth century.89 Perhaps he
left for the United States because his ego was wounded; in another similarity to Kollontai,
Bukharin had found himself on the wrong side of Lenin’s pen. He had endured months of
criticism in Russian Left Wing publications and speeches. Lenin derided Bukharin for his “very
large error,” that of “semi-anarchism,” of wishing to “explode” the old state machinery and
forego a post-revolutionary state, the dictatorship of the proletariat.90 The two made some
effort at rapprochement shortly before Bukharin boarded his vessel to America. Lenin, upon
hearing that Bukharin was leaving for the United States, wrote to Aleksandr Shliapnikov, the
head Bolshevik organizer in the Scandinavian countries: “write frankly, in what mood is
Bukharin leaving? Will he write to us or not? Will he fulfill requests?”91 Shortly thereafter Lenin
received a letter from Bukharin himself. Bukharin’s letter was intended as a goodbye to his old
Bolshevik comrade, although it was not entirely conciliatory. Bukharin rejected Lenin’s
accusations, and defended his own views on the nature of the post-revolutionary state as
“correct and Marxist.”92 He ended, however, with a touching reaffirmation of his commitment
to Lenin and the Party: “I ask one thing of you: if you must polemicize, preserve such a tone
that it will not lead to a split. It would be very painful for me, painful beyond endurance, if joint
work, even in the future, should become impossible.” Bukharin’s last sentence left little doubt
that although he was wounded by the differences between the two men, he felt no lingering
hostility: “I have the greatest respect for you; I look upon you as my revolutionary teacher and I
89
Stephen F. Cohen, Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution: A Political Biography 1888-1938 (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974), 40. 90
V.I. Lenin, quoted in Cohen, Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution, 40. 91
V.I. Lenin, quoted in Cohen, Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution, 40. 92
Nikolai Bukharin, quoted in Cohen, Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution, 40.
57
love you.”93 Lenin responded with a softer tone. Although he remained firm in his insistence
that his charges against Bukharin were valid and the disagreement “fully” the fault of Bukharin,
he nonetheless sought a mending of relations when he stated “we all value you highly.”94
Thus Bukharin was prepared to depart for America having mended the bridge with
Lenin, ready and willing to propagandize the Bolshevik position amongst the American Left.
Before Bukharin sailed, Lenin sent a list of requests he wished him to fulfill in the United States.
Lenin instructed Bukharin to have the manifesto of the Zimmerwald Left as well as the
Bolshevik “pamphlet on the war” published in English in the American Left Wing press, and that
copies of American Left Wing newspapers and journals be sent to the Central Committee of the
Bolshevik Party. Lenin also asked that Bukharin orchestrate “a small group of Russian and
Lettish Bolsheviks capable of following interesting literature, sending it, writing about it,
translating and printing what we send from here” and otherwise foster interest in a Third
International and the program of the Left international Socialist movement among the
American Socialists. “If a couple of Bolsheviks were actively linked with a couple of Letts
possessing a good knowledge of English, then the thing might work,” he suggested, and to this
end Lenin suggested that Bukharin track down a Lett named Berzin, residing in the U.S. Finally,
Lenin recounted the program of the Socialist Propaganda League he had received and the
response letter he had sent, and asked Bukharin to establish contact with the group.95 With this
list of tasks, Bukharin departed for the United States, ready to bring revolutionary international
Socialism to American Socialists.
93
Nikolai Bukharin, quoted in Cohen, Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution, 40. 94
V.I. Lenin, quoted in Cohen, Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution, 41. 95
V.I. Lenin, Letter to N.I. Bukharin, December 1893-October 1917, Vol. 43 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works, 578.
58
Bukharin arrived in the United States in early November, 1916. He quickly made his way
into the ranks of Novy Mir, perhaps through a connection to Nakoryakov. For two months he
split his time between writing for the paper and undertaking his own research in the New York
Public Library, and mingled with and ingratiated himself into the Russian immigrant community
of New York City. In early January, 1917, he became Novy Mir’s de facto chief editor, a position
he achieved after some struggle with the then-Menshevik editorial board.96 Under his tutelage,
Novy Mir turned quickly to the Left, as Bukharin wrote and promoted articles espousing the
Bolshevik-Zimmerwald Left attitude toward the war, and endeavored to transform the paper
into one of the leading anti-war publications in the U.S.97 Novy Mir, as official organ of the
Russian Federation of the Socialist Party, undoubtedly brought Lenin’s position to many Russian
immigrants within the American Socialist movement. Novy MIr, however, was published only in
Russian and so its audience was limited. However, Bukharins position at the paper gained him
some measure of fame amongst the American Left, and he occasionally left New York City to
undertake speaking tours similar to those of Kollontai.98 His place in the sun as perhaps the
leading figure of the American Left was usurped, however, by the arrival of a Socialist of greater
notoriety: Leon Trotsky. Although he was only present in the American scene for a brief two
months, his contributions to American Socialist developments cannot be overstated.
96
In a letter to Kollontai dated February 17, 1917 Lenin writes that he is pleased of the “victory” of N. Iv., Bukharin’s initials, in Novy Mir. In a letter two days later sent to Inessa Armand, he again writes that “N. Iv. and Pavlov (the Lett who was in Brussels: Pavel Vasilyevich) have won Novy Mir.” These statements suggest that prior to Bukharin’s editorship, the paper was run by Menshevik Russian émigrés. Lenin notes that he received copies of the paper but “devilishly irregularly.” See V.I. Lenin, Letter to Alexandra Kollontai, Letters: February 1912-December 1922, Vol. 35 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works, 285; V.I. Lenin, Letter to Inessa Armand, Letters: February 1912-December 1922, Vol. 35 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works, 288. 97
Cohen, Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution, 43. 98
Ibid.
59
Historians and biographers have made much about Trotsky’s brief stay in the United
States. By his own account, Trotsky’s time in America had little impact on his own life. Trotsky
came to the United States out of necessity; deported from France in September, 1916 for anti-
war activities, he was refused reentrance to Switzerland, and so he sought refuge in Spain, only
to be told on November 9, 1916 that he could not remain in that nation. Spanish authorities
attempted to ship him to Havana. Trotsky protested as he felt that location to be too remote
from events in Europe owing to the slow rate of communication via post.99 He appealed to the
United States, which granted him asylum. On Christmas day, 1916, Trotsky and his family
departed Barcelona for New York City aboard the steamer Montserrat. At 3:00 in the morning
of January 13, 1917, Trotsky disembarked in New York City. American journalists, not just of the
Socialist publications, who wished the interview this famous revolutionary greeted him at the
docks. “Never under the strictest interrogation by gendarmes did I sweat as now under the
cross-fire of these professional specialists,” Trotsky later recalled of these interviewers.100 In
addition to the journalists was a large crowd of immigrant Socialists, mostly hailing from the
lands of the Russian Empire.
Grigory Chudnovsky and Nikolai Bukharin were among them. They whisked Trotsky
away, and Chudnovsky set him up with an apartment in the Bronx, for which Trotsky paid
eighteen dollars a month and which included novel conveniences unfamiliar to the Trotsky
family: electric lights, a gas stove, telephone, bathtub, service elevator and garbage chute.
American journalists variously reported that the renowned radical Leon Trotsky worked as a
dishwasher, a tailor, even a film extra for Brooklyn studios, all out of necessity, as he struggled
99
Robert Service, Trotsky: A Biography (Cambridge: The Belknap Press, 2009), 152. 100
Leon Trotsky, as quoted in Service, Trotsky, 154.
60
to make ends meet and provide for his family while in exile.101 In reality, as Trotsky recalled,
while in the United States his only profession was that of revolutionary Socialist. 102 Ludwig Lore
paid Trotsky for speaking engagements and lectures to Socialists and labor meetings; his English
was very poor, and he stuck to lecturing amongst Russian and German émigrés.103 Although he
ventured out of New York City, he stuck to lecturing in the cities of the Northeast. Trotsky
supplemented his income through writing and editing, first for the Jewish Socialist daily
Forverts, which he found too moderate, and then for Novy Mir, where he joined the Bolsheviks
Chudnovsky and Bukharin on the editorial board.104
At Novy Mir, Trotsky found a platform to reach German, Russian, and Jewish
immigrants. Here, he proselytized Left Wing immigrants, joining Bukharin in arguing for an
organized Left Wing adhering to the Zimmerwald Left position on the war. He railed against the
reformist SPA leadership, with their material wealth, haughty sense of superiority over
European Socialists, and smug indifference to Marxist ideas; “immigrants who had played some
role in Europe in their youth, they very quickly lost the theoretical premise they had brought
with them in the confusion of their struggle for success,” he later wrote.105 He attacked the
pacifists in the United States, who, in the period of the American preparedness campaign gave
“vulgar speeches about the advantages of peace as opposed to war” which “invariably ended in
a promise to support war if it became ‘necessary.’”106 When the U.S. government broke
diplomatic relations with Germany on February 3, 1917, he warned the readers of Novy Mir
101
Ronald Segal, Leon Trotsky: A Biography (New York: Pantheon Books, 1979), 118. 102
Leon Trotsky, My Life (Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith, 1970), 270. 103
Trotsky, My Life, 271. 104
Service, Trotsky, 154-155. 105
Trotsky, My Life, 274. 106
Ibid., 272.
61
that the rapidly growing “chauvinistic music…the tenor of the pacifists and the falsetto of the
Socialists” was a tune he had heard before in Europe, in the summer of 1914. “The mobilization
of the American patriotism was simply a repetition of what I had seen before. I noted the stages
of the process in my Russian paper, and meditated on the stupidity of men who were so slow to
learn their lessons,” he recalled.107 In the pages of that newspaper, Trotsky reproduced his
work in Europe, and gave the American immigrant communities the Left Zimmerwaldian
program: revolutionary transformation of the war as the only genuine solution to the current
and future conflict. According to Trotsky, it was through this organ, and the Russian-speakers
within “all of the national federations of the Socialist Party,” including those for whom Russian
was not their primary language, that the ideas espoused in Novy Mir found their way into the
larger American Socialist movement.108
Everything was not entirely agreeable at the offices of Novy Mir, however. The
conflicting personalities and ideologies of the leading Russian émigrés, Trotsky on the one hand
and Bukharin and Kollontai on the other, disturbed the harmony within the budding organized
Left Wing centered in New York City. Trotsky recalled Bukharin welcoming him to New York
with “the childish exuberance characteristic of him” which was “the beginning of a close
association that warmed- on Bukharin’s part- into an attachment for me that grew steadily
more intense.”109 This was, for Trotsky, not a desirable quality, for as Trotsky later wrote
“Bukharin’s nature is such that he must always attach himself to someone. He
becomes…nothing more than a medium for someone else’s actions and speeches…I never took
107
Trotsky, My Life, 272. 108
Ibid., 275. “National Federations” refers to the Foreign Language Federations of the SPA. 109
Ibid., 273.
62
Bukharin too seriously, and I left him to himself, which really means, to others.”110 Alexandra
Kollontai, at this time reintegrating into the New York Russian community after her stay in
Paterson, left little impression on Trotsky: “her knowledge of foreign languages and her
temperament made her a valuable agitator. Her theoretical views have always been somewhat
confused, however…She was in correspondence with Lenin and kept him informed of what was
happening in America, my own activities included.”111 Kollontai did keep tabs on Trotsky; in one
letter to Lenin she reported his arrival, and expressed her amazement that Trotsky, ostensibly a
Menshevik, had not obstructed Bukharin in cleansing Novy Mir of remaining Menshevik
contributors: “Trotsky clearly disassociated himself from them and probably will carry on his
own line, which is by no means clear,” she wrote.112 The message may have been confused,
however, for Lenin records in a letter to Inessa Armand that “Trotsky arrived, and this scoundrel
at once ganged up with the Right Wing of Novy Mir against the Left Zimmerwaldists! That’s it!
That’s Trotsky for you! Always true to himself.”113
Trotsky helped to oust the Mensheviks from Novy Mir, and his contributions to the
paper were certainly in line with the Zimmerwald Left position. However, he and the Bolshevik
Bukharin took opposing sides on one very important question facing the American Left Wing: to
split immediately from the SPA, as Bukharin advocated, or to remain within the larger Party and
“capture” it for revolutionary Socialism, as Trotsky advised. This key difference was illuminated
to American Socialists just a day after Trotsky’s arrival in New York. Ludwig Lore invited
Bukharin and Kollontai, who had been agitating for an organized Left Wing of the SPA capable
110
Trotsky, My Life, 273. 111
Ibid., 273. 112
Alexandra Kollontai, as quoted in Clements, Bolshevik Feminist, 100. 113
V.I. Lenin, Letter to Inessa Armand, Letters: February 1912-December 1922, Vol. 35 of V.I. Lenin: Collected Works, 288.
63
of mounting a campaign of opposition to preparedness and American entry into the war, to a
“unity meeting” of Left Wing elements at his Brooklyn home. Lore also invited Trotsky, despite
his very recent arrival. According to Lore, the meeting was called to “discuss a program of
action for Socialists of the Left, for the purpose of organizing the radical forces in the American
Socialist movement.”114 On the evening of January 14, the Russians Bukharin, Kollontai, Trotsky,
Chudnovsky, and Volodarsky joined American Left Wingers Louis Boudin, Louis Fraina, S.J.
Rutgers, Sen Katayama, and Lore at a meeting ostensibly called to organize the Left Wing of the
SPA; the Russians were invited as advisors.115 John D. Williams, editor of The Internationalist,
official publication of the Socialist Propaganda League, was perhaps the only native-born
American Socialist at the meeting.116 Trotsky and Bukharin, the two greatest theoreticians
present, dominated the meeting. Despite Trotsky’s unfamiliarity with American Socialism, he
nevertheless weighed in passionately, arguing against the position taken by Kollontai, Bukharin,
and the other Bolsheviks. Bukharin advocated an immediate split of the American Left from the
larger Socialist Party, citing Lenin’s tactic of refusing to work with reformist “compromisers.”117
Trotsky, meanwhile, took the position that he himself had taken with regards to the Russian
Social Democratic Party: avoid a clean break with the Right Wing of the Party for now, and
establish an independent Left Wing organ for propaganda purposes to win over the masses of
the Party to the Left. The Americans began the meeting amid an air of pessimism and the belief
that the Left was too weak and disorganized to effect any real change. “At first it seemed that
114
Ludwig Lore, quoted in Draper, The Roots, 81. 115
It should be noted that all of the attendees of this “unity meeting” were, in fact, immigrants; Boudin from Russia, Fraina from Italy, Lore from Germany, Rutgers from the Netherlands, and Katayama from Japan. However, these figures had spent some time within the U.S. radical political milieu, better understood American political conditions and the SPA, and were regarded as the leading figures of the Left Wing, such as it was, at the time. 116
Draper, The Roots, 80. 117
Clements, Bolshevik Feminist, 100.
64
this conference which was rapidly followed by a number of others would achieve no tangible
result. The Russians were in their element and long drawn-out but intensely interesting
theoretical discussions were always in order. We others felt that for the time being it was
hopeless to think of organizing the Left within the Party for anything like effective action,”
recalled Ludwig Lore a year later.118 Believing their chances of uniting the Left under a coherent
program a remote possibility, and perhaps under the spell of Trotsky’s notoriety (“Had Trotsky
remained a year in the United States, our movement would have found in him a great and
splendid leader,” lamented Lore), the Americans backed Trotsky’s position. Doing as the
Bolsheviks suggested, and splitting from the SPA and establishing an independent organization,
they felt, would doom the Left Wing to complete irrelevancy within the American Socialist
movement. An elected subcommittee, which included Trotsky, proposed a bimonthly periodical
issued by the Left Wing. John D. William’s The Internationalist was chosen as the official organ
of the Left Wing. However, the Socialists present ousted him as the editor and chose Fraina as
his successor. The title was changed to The New International, and the offices of the paper
moved from Boston to New York; so, too, did the gravitational center of Left Wing activism.
Trotsky carried the day, but the Bolsheviks present, Kollontai, Chudnovsky, and
Volodarsky, led by Bukharin, did not relent, and called a different conference a month later.
“The International Conference of Socialist Organizations and Groups,” as the February 17, 1917
conference was titled, was an attempt to organize Left Wing Socialist groups and elicit a
commitment to the Zimmerwald movement as “the embryo of the Third International.” Present
118
Ludwig Lore, “Leon Trotsky,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://www.marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1918/1107-lore-trotsky.pdf (accessed April 24, 2012). Originally published in One Year of Revolution: Celebrating the First Anniversary of the Founding of the Russian Soviet Republic: November 7, 1918 (Brooklyn, NY: The Class Struggle, 1918), 7-10.
65
were representatives of Novy Mir, the Russian Branch of the Socialist Party, Lettish branch no. 1
of the SPA, the Ukrainian Branch of the Socialist Party, the Manhattan Lithuanian branch, the
Brooklyn Lithuanian branch, the Bolshevik section of the Russian Social Democratic Workers’
Party (represented by Bukharin), the Socialist Propaganda League, and a group of Social
Revolutionaries.119 Émigrés from regions within the Russian Empire comprised eight of the nine
groups in attendance. Only one, the Socialist Propaganda League, contained any native-born
Americans at all. The attending groups pledged support to the Zimmerwald Left and a proposed
Third International. Here, in the Foreign Language Federations, was a nucleus through which
Bukharin could position himself for a leading role in the American Left, while Trotsky did
likewise through the non-Federationist Left Wing which had backed his plan to propagandize
within the SPA. However, the Russian Revolution intervened, and the Bolsheviks in America
made hasty plans to return to Russia.
The Left suddenly lost two potential leaders. However, their relatively short stays had
made a significant impact. During their time in the United States, Trotsky and Bukharin
gathered the scattered elements of the Left Wing and impressed upon them the importance of
organizing and unifying. Through their work at Novy Mir, and Alexandra Kollontai’s lengthy and
rigorous speaking tours, the Russian exiles brought to the American Left Wing the
Zimmerwaldian and Bolshevik views of the war, and proposed these programs as the means by
which American Socialists might oppose American entrance into the greater conflict, a
development Trotsky considered an inevitability, or utilize such a conflict to bring about
dramatic changes in the American political and economic systems. The Russians imbued their
119
Draper, The Roots, 83.
66
countrymen and fellow Language Federationists with a revolutionary spirit. They proposed, and
helped organize, an independent publication of the Left Wing, which could be used to sway
American radicals to revolutionary Socialism. Perhaps most importantly, the two factions,
represented by Trotsky on the one hand and Bukharin, Kollontai, and the Bolsheviks on the
other, had proposed two conflicting plans of action for the American Left Wing. The established
Left Wing leaders adopted Trotsky’s plan to remain in the SPA and take control of the Party for
revolutionary Socialism. Meanwhile, the Language Federation membership, particularly those
representing the nationalities of Eastern Europe, disseminated Bukharin’s proposal to split as
soon as possible and establish an independent organization. These two strains of thought
would reemerge in 1919, following the first Comintern Congress. In the meantime, the Left
remained united, not only among its own factions but with the Center and Right of the SPA, in
opposition to the crisis of American entrance into the War.
67
V. THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTIONS, BOLSHEVISM, AND THE CONSOLIDATION OF THE AMERICAN
LEFT WING
The March, 1917 Russian Revolution shocked the world. American Socialists rejoiced at
the fall of the repressive, autocratic regime. On the evening of March 20, 15,000 Socialists,
many of them Russian émigrés, flooded Madison Square Garden to demonstrate support for
the Russian Revolution and the new Provisional Government.120 Socialist Joseph Cohen
applauded the actions of the revolutionaries, contrasting their relatively bloodless
achievements with the “reign of terror” that was the American Revolution, and suggested that
the Russian model was one to be emulated by Socialists the world over.121 Hillquit rejoiced in an
editorial, writing “Russia is free!...The Russian Revolution is the first bright ray of light that has
come to us from Europe since the dark days of August, 1914…The fall of Russian absolutism is
the doom of political oppression all over the world.”122 The sudden revolution in Russia, Hillquit
concluded, signaled the beginning of the end of the Great War, with peace forced upon the
governments of Europe by the war weary working class masses. Despite such hopes, American
Socialists did not believe that Russia was yet ripe for a Socialist restructuring of society. Rather,
the Revolution, despite originating from the proletariat and not the “liberal middle classes in
the Duma,” in Hillquit’s words, was but the orthodox Marxist prerequisite in the development
of the nation from feudalism to capitalism, from autocracy to bourgeois-democracy. “Russia, in
spite of the recent revolution, will be a capitalist nation; in fact, the Revolution made possible
the free development of the capitalist system of production, as the French Revolution did in
120
“15,000 at Russian Revolution Meeting,” The New York Call, March 21, 1917. Microfilm. 121
Joseph E. Cohen, “Revolution,” The New York Call, March 24, 1917. Microfilm. 122
Morris Hillquit, “Russia is Free!,” The New York Call, March 25, 1917. Microfilm.
68
France,” wrote George Halonen, editor of the Finnish Federation monthly Sakenia.123 Socialist
leaders asked Alexander Trachtenberg, a Russian émigré who relocated to the U.S. following his
involvement in the 1905 Russian Revolution, to educate American Socialists on the
developments in Russia. Although himself a Left Winger in the American movement,
Trachtenberg came out in support of Russian Social-Revolutionary Alexander Kerensky, and
argued that the goal of the Revolution should be the establishment of a democratic republic.124
Hillquit, contrary to his initial enthusiasm, agreed: “With the exception of a small group of
extremists, the Socialists are free from the illusion that...Russia offers an opportunity for the
establishment of a Socialist regime. Neither industrially nor politically is Russia ripe for the
‘cooperative commonwealth.’”125
The Left Wing of the SPA was equally enthusiastic. The Left quickly pointed to the “mass
action” of the Russian people in forcing the abdication of the Tsar as proof of the efficacy of
that revolutionary weapon. Fraina, editor of the Left Wing publication The New International,
saw the Russian Revolution as a display of “the meaning and power of Mass Action.”126 Rutgers,
the Dutch Leftist then residing in the United States, recognized that the Russian Revolution as
mass action demonstrated the needed alternative to the American Party focus on the “rigid,
123
George Halonen, “The Russian Revolution and Finland,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/lfed/finnish/1917/0427-halonen-rusrevfinland.pdf (accessed March 14, 2012). Published in the New York Call, v. 10, no. 117 (April 27, 1917), 6. 124
Draper, The Roots, 99. 125
Morris Hillquit, “The Provisional Government of Russia and Separate Peace: As Viewed by Socialists,” The New York Call Magazine, May 13, 1917. Microfilm. 126
Louis Fraina, as quoted in Draper, The Roots, 90.
69
centralized, boss-ruled unions” of the American Federation of Labor; “the new methods have to
develop from the bottom up and against the stubborn resistance of the old ‘leaders.’”127
Although the March Revolution energized and invigorated the American Left Wing of
the SPA, it also precipitated the departure of some of its greatest minds. The Revolution
opened the way for the repatriation of prominent Russian exiles in the United States, most
notably Alexandra Kollontai, Nikolai Bukharin, and Leon Trotsky, the last having written only a
short time prior that he did not expect to remain in New York long for “a revolution is bound to
break out in Russia in a short time.”128 Although only in the U.S. for a short period, the three
made immediate preparations to return to Russia upon hearing the news of the Revolution. The
Left Wing thus lost three of its greatest ideological theorists, whom Socialist Sen Katayama had
envisioned as the natural leaders of the American Left Wing, until “the Revolution called them
back.”129
American Socialism was profoundly affected by the November, 1917 Bolshevik
Revolution which overthrew the Russian Provisional Government. Whereas Socialists of all
types reacted positively to the fall of autocratic rule in favor of parliamentary democracy,
opinions were split over the developments in Russia toward the end of 1917. News was slow to
travel, and there were initially many misconceptions about the aims of the Bolsheviks; Socialist
newspaper The New York Call admitted “the Russian Revolution has got clean away from
127
S.J. Rutgers, “Fighting Big Capital: Letter to the Editor of the New York Call, April 8, 1917,” in Davenport, ed., http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1917/0408-rutgers-fightingbigcap.pdf (accessed March 14, 2012). Published in the New York Call Magazine, April 8, 1917, 10. 128
Leon Trotsky, “A Revolutionist’s Career,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1917/0300-trotsky-revcareer.pdf (accessed March 14, 2012). Although not published until February, 1918, in St. Louis Labor, Trotsky wrote this biographical piece in March, 1917, “only a week before leaving New York to return to Russia,” according to the editor. Published in St. Louis Labor, whole no. 889 (Feb. 16, 1918), 2. 129
Sen Katayama, quoted in Bell, Marxian Socialism, 108.
70
us...we can make nothing of it at present, nor predict anything for its future.”130 Very few
American Socialists reacted with anything but enthusiasm to the Bolshevik seizure of power.
One exception was Louis Boudin. Perhaps the premiere American Marxist theoretician, Boudin
argued in an article published in The Class Struggle that the Russian Revolution was a tragedy in
the old Greek sense, “a fatal situation from which there is no escape.”131 Boudin believed that
the moderate Mensheviks within the Kerensky government had failed in their quest to utilize
their connections to the Allied governments to broker a peace with Germany; this endeavor
was doomed to failure, as the governments of the Western powers could not accept a peace
without indemnities. Rejected as a result by the Russian working class, the Mensheviks fell to
the Bolsheviks had taken the initiative, gained the support of the masses, and sought peace
through means equally unrealistic to Boudin: directly appealing to the German working class
and encouraging a similar revolution in that state. The end result, then, was a splitting of the
Social Democratic movement in Russia that could only strengthen reactionary forces and bring
about a counter-revolution which “will rob the Russian people of the best fruits of the
revolution.”132 His fellow editors Lore and Fraina forced him out of his editorial role for taking
this stance. There was no room for criticism of the Bolshevik Revolution in a Left Wing
publication.
130
The New York Call editorial, December 24th
, as quoted in Draper, The Roots, 112. 131
Louis Boudin, “The Tragedy of the Russian Revolution,” in The Class Struggle, Vol. 1, no. 4 (November-December, 1917), 85-90. Available online at Marxists Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/class-struggle/v1n4nov-dec1917.pdf (accessed March 19, 2012). 131
“Proclamation to the People of the United States from the NEC of the Socialist Party of America, February 1918,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, 132
Louis Boudin, “The Tragedy of the Russian Revolution,” in The Class Struggle, Vol. 1, no. 4 (November-December, 1917), 85-90. Available online at Marxists Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/class-struggle/v1n4nov-dec1917.pdf (accessed March 19, 2012).
71
For the most part, conservative elements of the SPA reacted favorably to the November
Revolution. The reformist Right Wing dominated NEC of the SPA publicly supported the
achievements of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, stating their revolution “threatens the thrones of
Europe and makes the whole capitalist structure tremble,” and that it reveled in the proletarian
Russian Revolution and its “inevitable triumph.”133 The SPA also pledged its support to
revolutionary movements of the class conscious workers the world over.134 Hillquit saw in the
Bolshevik Revolution a new Russia to be a model for all: “Russia…which as heretofore been the
strongest resort of the darkest reaction, is today the vanguard of democracy and social
progress. It is from top to bottom in the hands of the people, the working class, the
peasants…autocracy, capitalism, and oppression are dead in Russia.”135 The “extremely Right
Wing” Socialist Louis Waldman similarly regarded the Revolution as “an awakening to freedom
and self-government.”136 Debs regarded himself as a “Bolshevik and proud of it” from his head
to his feet, while gradualist, reformist James Oneal publicly defended revolutionary violence in
Russia.137
Nowhere was the joyous celebration as raucous in the American movement as amongst
Left Wing Socialists. To the Left, the Bolsheviks seemed to have found a definite solution to a
problem that had plagued revolutionary Socialists throughout Europe and America: how to win
133
“Proclamation to the People of the United States from the NEC of the Socialist Party of America, February 1918,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1918/0216-spanec-proclamation. (accessed March 19, 2012). Published in The Eye Opener (Chicago), v. 9, no. 30, whole no. 276 (Feb. 16, 1918), 4. 134
Ibid. 135
Morris Hillquit, “Labor and the War,” in Marxists Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1918/0706-hillquit-laborandwar.pdf (accessed March 29,2012). Published in The New Age [Buffalo], v. 6, no. 318 (July 6, 1918), 3. 136
Louis Waldman as quoted in Shannon, The Socialist Party of America, 119. 137
Draper, The Roots, 110.
72
over the working class. The success of Lenin’s Party demonstrated that this was not necessary.
The Bolsheviks seized power in the largest nation on the globe with only a relatively tiny, yet
fanatically dedicated, membership, and only after did it win over the masses. The Left argued
that if it could be done in Russia, the model of reaction and backwardness, it could be
replicated in any industrialized nation. The American Left Wing took the lesson to heart: what
was important was not numbers, but revolutionary ardor and dogmatic purity. The Bolshevik
tactics also proved to the Left Wing the intellectual and moral insolvency of reformist Socialist
tactics. A February, 1918 article in The New International proclaimed that the Bolsheviks had
illuminated the failures of moderate Socialism, and as a Party were not unique to the present
situation in Russia but instead simply one among many revolutionary Left Wing Socialist groups
the world over espousing similar doctrine.138 The Bolsheviks orchestrated the Revolution, but it
belonged to the international revolutionary Socialists. This was certainly the feeling of Fraina,
the most vocal supporter of the Zimmerwald Left in the U.S. and rising star of the revolutionary
wing of the American Party, who published multiple articles as editor of the Left Wing
publications The New International and The Class Struggle, in which he sought to defend the
actions of the Bolsheviks against American critics. In “The Proletarian Revolution in Russia” he
argued against those orthodox Marxists who believed Russia to be unripe for anything but a
bourgeois revolution.139 In “Bolsheviki Power Comes from the Masses,” he defended the
Bolshevik dissolution of the Russian Constituent Assembly in January, 1918, arguing that the
institution would necessarily become an instrument of bourgeois reaction and was inherited as
138
“The Bolshevik Policy,” The New International, February, 1918, as cited in Draper, The Roots, 106. 139
Louis Fraina, “The Proletarian Revolution in Russia,” in The Class Struggle, Vol. 2, no. 1 (January-February, 1918), 29-67. Available online at Marxists Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/class-struggle/v2n1jan-feb1918.pdf (accessed March 20, 2012).
73
“a legacy bequeathed to the Bolsheviki by a revolution not their own.”140 In “The Bolsheviki-
Socialism in Action!,” he drew parallels between the Russian Bolshevik and Menshevik parties,
and reformist and revolutionary Socialists elsewhere. Fraina concluded that the Bolshevik
Revolution was the signal for “the Social Revolution of the European proletariat,” as Marx and
Engels suggested it might be. Thus Fraina articulated to the American Left Wing Lenin’s belief
that the November Revolution would inspire similar revolutions in the “more developed
nations” of Europe; indeed, at the time Lenin believed this was the only way his revolution
could succeed.141 The Zimmerwaldian Left desire to transform the imperialistic world war into a
civil war between classes had manifested in Russia, and, so believed the Left, was bound to
spread throughout the other belligerent states.
The Socialist Propaganda League, whose leaders had been so supportive of and affected
by the visiting Russians, were so inspired by the Bolshevik successes that they drafted a new,
updated manifesto. The previous manifesto, written in 1916 was decidedly Zimmerwaldian in
tone. It called for industrial unionism, parliamentary activity as a means of propagandizing and
agitating, revolutionary mass action tactics, and working with European Left Wing Socialists in
the establishment of a new Socialist international.142 The new 1918 manifesto drew heavily
from the Bolshevik model, demonstrating an evolution of Left Wing thought in the American
140
Louis Fraina, “Bolsheviki Power Comes from the Masses,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1918/0209-fraina-powerfrommasses.pdf (accessed March 20, 2012). Published in The Evening Call [New York], v. 11, no. 35 (Feb. 9, 1918), 7. 141
Louis Fraina, “The Bolsheviki- Socialism in Action!,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1917/1230-fraina-socinaction.pdf (accessed March 20, 2012). Letter to the editor of The Evening Call [New York], v. 11, no. 4 (Jan. 5, 1918), 7. 142
“Manifesto of the Socialist Propaganda League of America: Adopted at a Meeting Held in the City of Boston, November 26, 1916,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spla/1916/1126-spla-manifesto.pdf (accessed March 20, 2012). Published in The Internationalist: Weekly of the Left Wing Socialists [Boston], v. 1, no. 1, Second Edition (Jan. 6, 1917), 2.
74
movement similar to that of European revolutionary Socialists, and perhaps in no small part to
the efforts at educating American Socialists undertaken by the Russian exiles Kollontai,
Bukharin, and Trotsky. The SPL now invoked the Leninist theory of imperialism as the highest
stage of capitalism, opposed parliamentary activity and called for the destruction of bourgeois
democracy, refused any compromise with Right Wing Socialist “social-patriots” and
“opportunists,” urged the formation of workers’ and soldiers’ councils as developed in Russia,
and reaffirmed the SPL’s support for a proposed Third International.143 Through its Left Wing
organ The New International, edited by Fraina, the SPL agitated for the adoption of the
Bolshevik program by Left Wing American Socialists. What remained necessary, however, was
the formal organization of the Left Wing as a “Party within a Party,” a semi-autonomous unit
within the SPA, to usurp the Party machinery, a step taken by the Russian exiles Trotsky and
Bukharin before the Revolution put such aspirations on hiatus.
The Letts in the SPL, with other Left Wing foreign-born Socialists like Fraina, Rutgers,
and Lore, took the reins after the departure of Bukharin and Trotsky, and disseminated
Bolshevism as they understood it to the American Left Wing. In January, 1918, these elements
combined with Russian American groups and established a pro-Soviet organization, the
American Bolshevik Bureau of Information. Representatives from the SPL, the Russian Socialist
Federation, the Russian Branch of the Socialist Party, the New York Section of the Russian
Bolsheviki, the New York group of Social Revolutionists, and Novy Mir, the Russian Federation
newspaper, were present. The Bureau elected Fraina the director. Its purpose was to “aid the
143
“Manifesto of the Socialist Propaganda League of America,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spla/1918/0100-spla-manifesto.pdf (accessed March 20, 2012). Published as “A Program of Revolutionary Socialism” in The Revolutionary Age [Boston], v. 1, no. 21 (March 8, 1919), 8.
75
Russian revolutionaries” and spread “the spirit of revolt in the United States.” According to the
Lusk Committee report on the Socialist movement in the U.S., in March, 1918 the Russian
Federation sent a cable to the Council of People’s Commissars in Petrograd that stated “you
have our unqualified faith and support. The whole colony is with you. [We] Are ready to
organize Red Guard for Russia. Americans will help.”144 A similar cable from Fraina on behalf of
the American Bolshevik Bureau echoed this sentiment, and Fraina also stated that Red Guards
were being organized in the United States. Red Guard units, composed of volunteers willing to
go to Russia to fight on behalf of the Soviets, were in fact organized; some 500 “Guards for the
Revolution” stood ready to sail for Russia. The Bureau sent a delegate to the get the approval of
the War Department in Washington, which of course refused to permit the volunteers to go
abroad and fight for a government it did not officially recognize.145
The leadership of the Russian language groups within the American Socialist movement
was not the only proponent of Bolshevism; the rank and file of the Russian language groups
were every bit as supportive. The membership of the Russian Federation had been only about
500 members at the start of 1917. By the end of 1918, that number had increased nearly six
times, to just short of 3,000 members, or nearly fifteen percent of all foreign-born members
within the SPA.146 The rapid rise in the Russian Federation ranks have been attributed to several
factors, including the fall of the Tsar and the November, 1917 Revolution, and the prestige of
Bolshevik triumphs within Russian national groups. Communist Labor Party founder Benjamin
144
New York (State), Revolutionary Radicalism, 634. 145
Draper, The Roots, 108-109. 146
“Membership Series by Language Federation for the Socialist Party of America: Dues Stamps Sold by Month, January 1917 to March 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0400-spa-membersbyfed.pdf (accessed March 20, 2012). Adapted from original in Socialist Party Papers, Duke University, unspecified film reel. Copy in Theodore Draper Papers, Hoover Institution Archives, Stanford U.
76
Gitlow surmised that the growth was due to Russian immigrants wishing to return to Russia
after the abdication of the Tsar. He recalled that “as many as could left for Russia
immediately.”147 It was believed by some Russian immigrants that membership to the Russian
Federation provided a means of doing so; Socialist Russian Americans, enthusiastic about
returning to their once-repressive but now Socialist homeland would need to demonstrate
some support for the Revolution to garner favor with the new regime there.148
Were this the case, one might suspect that membership rates would have grown very
rapidly in the period following the heady days of the November, 1917 Revolution; however,
Russian Federation membership rates held steady through 1917, and did not begin a rapid
increase until February, 1918, months after the November, 1917 Revolution, when it became
clear that the Bolsheviks had defied the odds and were not to be immediately crushed by
reactionary White forces. This suggests that the rise in membership rates that occurred in 1918
was, as historian Daniel Bell contends, a reflection of nationalistic enthusiasm for the success of
the Bolshevik revolution: “The Russian Federation of the Socialist Party became the idol of the
Left Wing…its members looked upon as the only ones who understood Bolshevism, apparently
through some mysterious osmosis of the language.”149 This process is less than “mysterious,”
however, if one takes into account the Bolshevization of Novy Mir, undertaken by Bukharin at
the beginning of 1917; Russian Americans had access to Bolshevik literature, written in their
own language, in the pages of Novy Mir. For this reason, Russian Americans within the SPA had
147
Gitlow, I Confess, 22. 148
Draper, The Roots, 137. 149
Bell, Marxian Socialism, 109.
77
in Novy Mir a resource which more accurately presented Bolshevik ideas than English language
publications.
Gitlow recalled a similar sentiment among English-speaking Socialists, who regarded the
Russian Americans within the Federation as “the Bolshevik kernel in the Party…Many Socialists
believed that only the Russians understood Bolshevism and were fitted to speak on its
behalf.”150 Writing many years after the fact, and having been ousted from the Party, it is with
much bitterness that Gitlow recalled that the Russian leadership did little to dispel these
notions, instead “wallowing in the esteem accorded them…and insisting that they alone should
be recognized as leaders of the Left Wing.”151 Russian immigrants in the American Left Wing
had reason to be proud. After all, it was their countrymen and former comrades in the Russian
Social Democratic Party which had brought about the first worker’s democracy in history, and in
a country deemed not yet ripe for such developments according to traditional Marxist theory.
However, the Russian Federation was not the only federation to see such rapid growth
in membership numbers. There was a similar influx of new members across several of the
Eastern European Language Federations for the same period of October, 1917 to the end of
1918. The Latvian Federation increased from 800 members to over 1,300; the Estonian
Federation doubled in size, from 400 to 800; the Polish Federation added nearly 1,000
members for a total of approximately 1,400; and the Ukrainian Federation grew from 1,800
members to 2,400. The remaining federations within the SPA remained at steady membership
levels or decreased in membership numbers only slightly. Out of a total of approximately
82,300 dues paying members of the SPA, around 37,700, or forty-five percent, were non-
150
Gitlow, I Confess, 25. 151
Ibid.
78
English speaking federation members.152 The rapid growth in membership of the non-Russian
federations suggests that the Russian Federation did not grow solely because of enthusiastic
nationalist sentiments. That same enthusiasm was found within the federations corresponding
to nationalities from elsewhere in the Russian Empire, as well.
Not content with supporting the Russian revolutionary effort through organizations such
as the American Bolshevik Bureau of Information, the Left Wing, now heavily composed of
Russian-American and Eastern-European immigrant membership, sought to reorient the culture
of the SPA away from parliamentary politics, opportunism and reformism in favor of
revolutionary mass action. Left Wing Socialists in Chicago, where the Slavic Federations were
particularly strong, assembled on December 6, 1918 and formed the Communist Propaganda
League. The plans for this meeting were formalized during the Fourth Convention of the
Russian Socialist Federation, which met in New York City over the period September 28 to
October 2, 1918. The convention decided to call a conference of all the Russian Federations
within the SPA which promoted the “realization of our Bolshevik program” within the Party,
with the end goal of organizing the geographically separate Russian Federations under one
“united center.”153 Members of the Chicago branch of the Russian Federation, representatives
of the Bolshevist Federation of the American Socialist Party, and several “important and active
members of the local Socialist movement who thoroughly agree to the program and principles
152
“Membership Series by Language Federation for the Socialist Party of America: Dues Stamps Sold by Month, January 1917 to March 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0400-spa-membersbyfed.pdf (accessed March 20, 2012). Adapted from original in Socialist Party Papers, Duke University, unspecified film reel. Copy in Theodore Draper Papers, Hoover Institution Archives, Stanford U. 153
“Minutes of the Fourth Convention of the Russian Socialist Federation: New York City, September 28 to October 2, 1918,” http://ia600609.us.archive.org/0/items/MinutesOfThe4thConventionOfTheRussianSocialistFederation/1002-rsf-convminutes.pdf (accessed April 2, 2012).
79
of the Russian Bolsheviks” were present at the conference.154 They named the resulting
organization the Communist Propaganda League. Like the Socialist Propaganda League in
Boston, the Communist Propaganda League held little influence outside of Chicago. Like the SPL
it also limited its work largely to propagandizing within the Left Wing press, seeing itself as a
“unit of propaganda with the purpose of serving the Socialist Party by affecting its policies,
platforms, form of organization, and personnel of management and representation along the
lines of clear revolutionary proletarian action.”155 The new league did not envision itself a
faction seeking to take control of the SPA, but rather to educate and influence its membership
and bring them into the Left Wing fold, imploring every “thinking Socialist” to “criticize the
principles and tactics” of the SPA and to encourage a new program for the Party founded on
“the revolutionary class struggle of the proletariat” and an organizational structure democratic
in nature, ensuring membership control over Party officials and press.156 The Communist
Propaganda League, like the SPL before it, emanated from American-born Left Wing leadership,
but expanded upon foreign-born immigrant membership, in this instance primarily Russian
154
Alexander Stoklitsky, “Declaration to the Members of the Socialist Party of America of the Communist Propaganda League,” in Marxist Internet Archives, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0206-stoklitsky-compropleag.pdf (accessed March 21, 2012). Document in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 931, file 202600-779. 155
“Organizational Preamble of the Communist Propaganda League of Chicago, Adopted December 6, 1918,” in Marxist Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1918/1206-compropleaguechicago.pdf (accessed March 21, 2012). As published in The Class Struggle (Brooklyn, NY), February 1919, 114-115. 156
“Organizational Preamble of the Communist Propaganda League of Chicago, Adopted December 6, 1918,” in Marxist Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1918/1206-compropleaguechicago.pdf (accessed March 21, 2012); “Declaration to the Members of the Socialist Party of America of the Communist Propaganda League : With Comments by Alexander Stoklitsky, February 6, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0206-stoklitsky-compropleag.pdf (accessed March 28, 2012). Document in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 931, file 202600-779.
80
instead of Lettish. It was also one step forward in a Left Wing split from the SPA predicated
upon relentless criticism of the Party leadership.
European events influenced the American Left Wing. Historically a loose smattering of
anarchists, Syndicalists, and revolutionary Marxist Socialists, the Left Wing was brought closer
together first by the Zimmerwald Left program, advocated for and disseminated in large part by
the efforts of Russian exiles in the United States and their Left Wing supporters, and then
further cemented by the influence of the Bolshevik Revolution. A program and plan to rally
around now existed, the revolutionary model of the Bolsheviks, and the Europeans in the U.S.
encouraged the shift of the SPA to the left. Throughout late 1918 and early 1919, Lenin’s
prediction of a European-wide proletarian revolt appeared to be coming briefly to fruition;
Finland established a Socialist Worker’s Republic which was crushed by reactionary White
forces in 1918, the German Revolution, which in some aspects mirrored that of the Russian
Revolution, stopped short of proclaiming “all power to the Soviets,” but did result in a short
lived Bavarian Soviet Republic and the abortive Spartacist uprising. Hungary, too, experienced a
revolution by the masses which resulted in a Soviet Republic for several months. Ignoring
American conditions that greatly contrasted with the turbulent effects of the war on European
states, American Left Wingers believed they saw the signs of impending proletarian revolution
in their own country. A strike wave in early 1919, which resulted in violent clashes between
workers and management in Seattle, Portland, Lawrence, Massachusetts, and Butte, Montana,
heralded the arrival of the revolutionary moment in the United States. Believing a revolution
imminent, and believing in the duplicability of the Bolshevik model of proletarian revolution,
Left Wing leaders such as John Reed and Louis Fraina maintained that the application of
81
Leninist tactics to American situations would result in a dictatorship of the proletariat in the
United States. The time to organize the Left on a national scale had come. But how to do it? The
question of whether to capture the SPA for revolutionary Socialism, or to immediately forge a
Communist Party, as had occurred in several European states, would preoccupy the Left Wing
for much of 1919.
82
VI. THE 1919 SPLIT AND THE TWO COMMUNIST PARTIES
The American Socialist movement was torn asunder in 1919. Towards the end of 1918,
the Left Wing increased the attack upon the reformist Old Guard of the SPA, primarily through
the organ of the SPL, The Revolutionary Age, and through the publications of the Communist
Propaganda League.157 The Left charged the leadership of the Party with showing only half-
hearted support for the Bolsheviks in Russia and the Russian Soviets, and with failing to adopt a
more revolutionary stance as the leading political organization of the American working class.
“The coming year or two will bring the mightiest strikes and industrial struggles in the history of
this country…but the Party, as expressed through its national administration, is not, it must
bitterly be confessed, measuring to the opportunity,” wrote Fraina, editor of The Revolutionary
Age.158 The Left argued that what was needed was a unity of the Party, staunchly anti-capitalist
with revolution and the radicalization of the American workers as the goal.
To that end, the Left Wing began to organize in earnest to capture control of the SPA for
revolutionary socialism in early 1919. Left Wing organizations existed in Boston and Chicago,
represented by the Socialist Propaganda League and newly formed Communist Propaganda
League, the latter of which was composed primarily of Russian immigrant groups such as the
Chicago Branch of the Russian Federation under the direction of its leader Alexander Stoklitsky.
However, no organized Left Wing group existed in New York City. This is not because there was
no Left Wing sentiment among Socialists in New York; the boroughs of Queens, Brooklyn, and
the Bronx were home to several prominent Left Wing Socialists such as Lore, Boudin, Rutgers,
157
Shannon, The Socialist Party of America, 130. 158
Louis Fraina, “The Crisis and the Socialist Party,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1918/1130-fraina-crisisandspa.pdf (accessed March 26, 2012). Published in The Revolutionary Age [Boston], v. 1, no. 5 (Nov. 30, 1918), 1.
83
and Gitlow. Manhattan, however, was a stronghold of the conservative Old Guard of the Party,
owing largely to the personal influence of Party founder Hillquit and New York State Executive
Secretary Julius Gerber.159 A January, 1919 joint meeting of the central committees of the locals
of Greater New York ended in disarray when Left Wing members walked out after Gerber
refused to give them an opportunity to speak. The Left Wing members who exited demanded
their own meeting room in the hall and therein elected a City Committee of Fourteen, drafted a
manifesto, and styled itself as a Party within the Party aiming to win over the rank and file to
revolutionary socialism.160 Edward Lindgren, a New York City Left Winger, explained the
necessary creation of this new faction, stating “the ‘Left Wing’ group is the logical outcome of a
dissatisfied membership…that has been taught by the revolutionary activities of the European
movements ‘to compromise is to lose.’…The ‘Left Wing’ group therefore believes that ‘the time
has come for the Socialist Party of America to throw off its parliamentary shackles and stand
squarely behind the Soviet Republic of Russia and the revolutionary movements of Europe” and
to guide the American workingman in the coming revolutionary struggle between the
proletariat and the capitalist classes.161 The American Left Wing saw the old Socialist parties of
Europe split, between Bolsheviks and Mensheviks or Social Democrats and Spartacists. It did
not seek to follow suit, but spoke instead of taking over the American Party leadership and
transforming the Party into a revolutionary organization. This would have to be done on a
national scale, and the New York Left Wing was prepared to do so.
159
Draper, The Roots, 129-140. 160
Ibid., 145. 161
Edward Lindgren, “What is the ‘Left Wing’ Movement and Its Purpose?,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0200-lindgren-whatisleft.pdf (accessed March 26, 2012). Published in The Class Struggle [Brooklyn, NY], v. 3, no. 1 (Feb. 1919), 111-114.
84
The Left Wing Section of the Greater New York Locals of the Socialist Party, as it was
officially titled, drafted a lengthy manifesto in January, 1919. The Left Wing Section of the
Greater New York Locals was an inclusive organization, containing both Left Wing sympathizers
within the federations as well as Left Wing native-born and English-speaking immigrant
Socialists. Although the federations contributed most of the rank and file members from within
their own ranks, the leadership of the Left Wing Section of the Greater New York Locals was
composed of both Federation members such as Lore, Nicholas Hourwich, and J. Wilenkin, as
well as English-speaking Left Wingers such as Fraina, Reed, and Jay Lovestone. The manifesto of
the Left Wing Section of New York summarized, and dismissed, the moderate “sausage
Socialism” that had dominated the Socialist movements of Europe and the Americas since
Eduard Bernstein’s critique of Marxist theory. The program outlined within the manifesto was
essentially the Bolshevik model of 1917: the organization of workmen’s councils, workmen’s
control of all industry, repudiation of all national debts, expropriation of the banks, railroads,
and “large trust organizations of capital,” and the socialization of foreign trade. It further
advocated that the SPA repudiate all reformist tactics. It agitated for the overthrow of
capitalism and the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The program included
support for industrial unionism, argued that the Party should control all Party press and
educational institutions, and repudiated the Berne Congress and elect delegates to attend the
proposed inaugural meeting of the Third International in Moscow, to be held in March, 1919.162
The New York Left Wing became the organizing nucleus for the Left Wing membership around
162
“Manifesto and Program of the Left Wing Section Socialist Party, Local Greater New York,” in Marxists Internet Archive, http://www.marxists.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0500-lw-manifesto.pdf (accessed March 26, 2012). Published as a pamphlet, circa May 1919. Copy in Comintern Archive f. 515, op. 1, d. 4, l. 55-63.
85
the country, and gained control of several New York locals, which provided membership dues
sufficient to found a new organ. This publication, The New York Communist, with John Reed as
the editor, provided a platform with which to attack the Old Guard of the Party leadership, and
provided a means of reaching Left Wing Socialists in the goal of organizing to win the upcoming
spring elections to the National Executive Committee of the SPA for the Left Wing.163 The Left
Wing now had a unity of purpose: transforming the SPA’s Party platform from reformist
gradualist tactics to a revolutionary organization along Bolshevik lines. The Left set upon the
task of winning control of the Party through the established democratic channels.
A month after the first meeting of the New York Left Wing Section, the founding
Congress of the Third (Communist) International opened in Moscow, on March 2, 1919. The
Socialist Labor Party, the Workers’ International Industrial Union, the Industrial Workers of the
World, and the “Left Elements” in the SPA, “as represented by Debs” and the Socialist
Propaganda League, were invited to attend the first congress. No delegates went, however, as
the distance between Moscow and the United States, coupled with the Allied blockade of the
Soviet state, made communications difficult. This is also a probable reason for the failure to
invite the two most radical Left Wing organizations in the United States which would have been
eager to attend: the Communist Propaganda League and the Left Wing Section of New York.
Having been organized relatively recently, the organizers of the founding congress in Moscow
were most likely unaware of their existence, and so no invitations were given. The SPA held a
referendum on attendance to the congress in Moscow, and the membership overwhelming
voted to send delegates; however, the leadership of the Party intentionally delayed the results,
163
Shannon, The Socialist Party of America, 132-133.
86
announcing the returns two months after the end of the founding congress.164 Only two
representatives of the American organizations invited were able to attend, and that was only
due to their fortuitous presence in Russia prior to the calling of the founding congress. Boris
Reinstein, a Russian-American immigrant who had repatriated to Russia two years earlier,
represented his former Party, the Socialist Labor Party, albeit without the authorization from
the Party itself. S.J. Rutgers, who had been in Russia since the end of 1918, sat as a non-voting
member representing the Socialist Propaganda League.165 Lenin’s theses presented at the
founding congress of the Third International reiterated his belief that a pan-European
proletarian revolution was imminent, would dismantle capitalism, and would thus ensure a
lasting European peace. To encourage the proletariat to revolutionary action, a unity of
purpose was necessary, and so the Third International would act as a unifying force among
revolutionary Socialists. To further propel the workers of Europe and America, the “yellow,” or
Right and Center Socialists needed to be exposed as agents of the bourgeoisie. To this end,
Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Third International Grigory Zinoviev declared it
“absolutely essential” for the Left Wing Socialists to split from the Center and Right, and to win
over the revolutionary elements of the Party through “ruthless criticism and exposure” of the
Party leadership.166 This “absolute historical necessity,” the break from the Party, heavily
influenced the actions of the American Left Wing in the coming months.
The American Left Wing Socialist press published the manifesto and writings from the
founding convention of the Communist International. The Comintern urged a “merciless fight”
164
Howe and Coser, The American Communist Party, 35. 165
Draper, The Roots, 154-155. 166
“Extracts from the Resolution of the First Comintern Congress on the Berne Conference of the Parties of the Second International,” in Jane Degras, ed., The Communist International, 1919-1943: Documents, vol. 1 (London: Oxford University Press, 1956), 26.
87
against the “social-patriots,” or Right Wing Socialists who had supported the war. Such a fight
was already underway within the American Party, as the Left began to label the Right “social-
patriots,” and criticized the “petty bourgeois pacifism” that had dominated the SPA’s attitude
toward the American war effort, stating “there is no place for pacifists in the Social
Revolution.”167 However, the Comintern also instructed Left Wingers to engage in unrelenting
criticism of the Socialist centrists. The Center was less identifiable; few American Socialists
attempted to bridge the gap between the Left and Right Wings. However, there were some
Socialists who brought upon the ire of the Left by assuming something of a centrist stance:
adhering to the Left Wing program, but opposed to the Left Wing tactics that might tear the
SPA apart.168 The Left Wing had no intention of splitting the Party, provided the membership
could be won over overwhelmingly for the Left, the Old Guard leadership replaced, and the
Party transformed into a Revolutionary Socialist Party adhering to the Left Wing manifesto and
program. The Left, boasting of the “almost unanimous acclaim with which the rank and
file…have accepted the manifesto of the Left Wing,” and bolstered by the ever-growing number
of sympathetic foreign-born Socialists in the federation ranks, was attempting to do exactly
these things, and the upcoming Spring elections of 1919 would be the start of the coup.169 The
Right Wing did not sit idly by and allow the Party to be taken for the Left, however.
167
Scott Nearing, as quoted in Draper, The Roots, 144. 168
Morris Zucker, “Party Tactics: A Letter to the Editor of the New York Call, March 31, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0331-zucker-Partytactics.pdf (accessed March 27, 2012). Published in The New York Call, March 31, 1919, 6. 169
Morris Zucker, “Party Tactics.” See James Oneal, American Communism: A Critical Analysis of its Origin, Development, and Programs (New York: The Rand Book Store, 1927), 53-54. Oneal cites figures stating that federation membership for the Russian, Ukrainian, South Slavic, Lithuanian, and Lettish Federations had grown from a combined total of 12,591 in December, 1918 to 22,430 by April, 1919. He further states that 57,248 members belonged to Language Federations, out of a total of 108,504, meaning 53% of the total membership of the SPA were federation members by April, 1919.
88
Although the Left Wing in New York City had captured many of the locals, the New York
State organization of the SPA remained within the firm grasp of the reformist Right. On April 13,
1919, the New York State Committee of the Socialist Party met at Albany, New York and drafted
a resolution on the Left Wing Section. Citing Article 1, Section 3 of the Constitution of the
Socialist Party of the State of New York, which stated that members and locals of the Party
“must adhere and conform to the National and State platforms and constitutions,” and
charging that the Left Wing Section had gone outside the established channels provided by the
Party for the “fullest and freest discussion of ideas, opinions, and sentiments,” the Committee
resolved that the Executive Committee of the New York State Party revoke the charters of the
locals that had affiliated with the Left Wing Section.170 Shortly thereafter, the State Party
commenced “reorganizing” the Party locals which supported the Left Wing Section. John Reed
documented the effort in a series of articles entitled “The Pink Terror” published in the New
York Communist, organ of the New York Left Wing Section. The Seventeenth Assembly District
Branch, the largest in New York City with over 400 members, was subjected to a questioning
panel stylized as the “committee to register.” The newly reorganized branch denied Left Wing
members the right to register, and so were excluded from voting during meetings. The branch
asked those who were readmitted to attend a meeting on Sunday, April 20, “for the purpose of
reorganizing the branch, and to put a working Party branch in the district free from factionalism
170
“New York State Committee, Socialist Party Resolution on the Left Wing Section, Adopted April 13, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0413-spny-resolution.pdf (accessed March 27, 2012). A document in the Socialist Party of America papers, Duke University, microfilm reel 101.
89
and cliques.”171 When they arrived, they found police guarding the entrance to the meeting
hall, for the purpose of forcibly removing Left Wing members who attempted entry. Two days
later, the state organization liquidated the entire branch and removed the records and
furniture. Other branches were soon reorganized. The Eighteenth-Twentieth Assembly District
Branch was padlocked from the outside, while Right Wing sympathizers flooded the Second and
Sixth Assembly District Branch meetings and the actual membership suspended.172 Twenty-four
Right Wing Socialists of the State Committee, under the guidance of State Secretary Julius
Gerber, unwilling to let the Left organize their “Party within a Party” for the purpose of taking
control of the SPA, had undemocratically ousted the Left from the New York Party. The event
set a dangerous precedent that was replicated on a national scale one month later.
The Left Wing won an overwhelming victory in the spring Party elections. The Boston,
Cleveland, Toledo, Akron, Buffalo, San Francisco, Oakland, Portland, Philadelphia, Detroit,
Seattle, Queens, Bronx, and Brooklyn branches of the Party publicly endorsed the Left Wing
program prior to the election.173 They were joined by several of the Eastern-European Language
Federations: the Russian, Lithuanian, Ukrainian, Polish, Hungarian, South Slavic, and Lettish,
representing 22,430 members of the total 104,656.174 Left Wing Socialist Kate Richards O’Hare
defeated Hillquit for the position of International Secretary of the Party by 13,262 to 4,775.
Reed beat Victor Berger by a similarly large margin for the post of delegate to the Socialist
171
John Reed, “The Pink Terror, Part 1: The Rape of the 17th
Assembly District Branch,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0426-reed-pinkterror1.pdf (accessed March 27, 2012). Published in the New York Communist, v. 1, no. 2 (April 26, 1919), 8. 172
John Reed, “The Pink Terror, Part 3: Frightfulness in the 2nd
and 6th
AD Branches,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0508-reed-pinkterror3.pdf (accessed March 27, 2012). Published in the New York Communist, v. 1, no. 4 (May 8, 1919), 8. 173
Draper, The Roots, 156. 174
Oneal, American Communism, 53.
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International.175 The elections to the National Executive Committee of the Party were also a
decisive victory for the Left, with Left Wing candidates capturing twelve of fifteen seats.176 The
Left Wing, which saw its program as the one most representative of the majority of Party
members’ Socialist convictions, was poised to fulfill its goal of transforming the SPA into what
the Left envisioned a Leninist revolutionary Party to be. The Old Guard which had dominated
the NEC of the SPA for so long could not abide this. Having heard rumors of vote fraud, Hillquit
and Germer declared the results void pending an investigation. They alleged that the results
were invalid, as only approximately one-fifth of the entire Party membership had voted in the
referendum.177 Additionally, they charged that the Language Federations voted as a bloc,
awarding all member votes to the majority-backed candidate, as well as encouraging Party
members to vote multiple times for Left Wing candidates.178 Executive Secretary Germer asked
the Federation leaders to provide the election ballots, however only a few actually complied
with his request.179 The members of the NEC consequently voted to hold an emergency
convention set for August 30, 1919, at which a new election to the NEC would take place.
With this action, the conservative leadership of the SPA bought some time to determine
how best to counter the Left Wing in its effort to take the Party. In an article published on May
21, 1919 in The New York Call, Hillquit announced his intentions to “clear the decks.” Hillquit
attacked the Left Wing as “a purely emotional reflex of the situation in Russia,” totally out of
sync with American conditions and American workers’ desires, and harmful to the continued
175
Howe and Coser, The American Communist Party, 35. 176
Bell, Marxian Socialism, 111. 177
Draper, The Roots, 157. 178
Oneal, American Communism, 53. 179
Shannon, The Socialist Party of America, 138.
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existence of a single Socialist Party dedicated to the “concrete class struggle.”180 Hillquit
concluded by arguing the two wings of the Party go their separate ways, stating “better a
hundred times to have two numerically small Socialist organizations, each homogenous and
harmonious within itself, than to have one big Party torn by dissensions and squabbles, an
impotent colossus on feet of clay.”181 Hillquit soon acted to make this vision a reality. Hillquit
and Germer decided to expel the seven Left Wing affiliated Language Federations, plus the
Michigan State organization, which although not officially affiliated had voted to remove any
mention of reformist tactics from its platform. On May 24, the NEC met and by a vote of eight
to two (the two being the only Left Wing members on the old NEC, Alfred Wagenknecht and
Ludwig Katterfeld,) expelled the Left Wing affiliated Language Federations and the entire
Socialist Party of Michigan. Other expulsions followed. At the start of 1919, the SPA could lay
claim to over 109,000 members. Following the expulsions of the Left Wing elements within the
Party, the SPA membership stood at a total of 39,750 dues paying members.182 Now the
elections to the NEC could proceed without interference by the Left and the Old Guard of the
SPA could retain its hold on the Party. The Left Wing was not content to let this happen,
however; one faction believed it the better that they should split the Party. Another held out
for one last effort to take the SPA, an organization to which they no longer officially belonged.
On May 1, 1919, John Reed stated that the intention of the Left Wing was not to split
the Party, although by his own words it was “better to split and keep on splitting than to
compromise with reaction.” Instead, Reed argued for capturing the SPA Party machinery to
180
Morris Hillquit, “The Socialist Task and Outlook,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0521-hillquit-socialisttask.pdf (accessed March 28, 2012). Originally published in the New York Call, May 21, 1919, 8. 181
Ibid. 182
Draper, The Roots, 158.
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“mold the American movement into an effective weapon with which to fight the battles of the
working class,” and to transform the SPA into a revolutionary Socialist vanguard Party. Although
the Left was able to mobilize the support of the majority of the membership in electing Left
Wing Socialists to the NEC of the SPA, or at least fraudulently produce enough votes to claim
that this was the case, the unilateral and undemocratic expulsions of Left Wing oriented
subunits within the Party resulted in a status quo of Party leadership and a much smaller, more
conservative membership. The Left Wing now had to decide the next course of action. They had
almost 70,000 former SPA members sympathetic to their program and manifesto. Nearly half
were members of the expelled Foreign Language Federations, with the majority of those hailing
from the federations representing the nationalities of the former Russian Empire and
congregated in Boston, New York City, and Chicago. The remainder were native-born, English
speaking Left Wingers, belonging to the expelled State branches and locals of Massachusetts,
Illinois, Ohio, Minnesota, and Michigan, all states containing relatively large enclaves of Eastern
European immigrants but also home to American-born Left Wingers such as C.E. Ruthenberg of
Ohio.183 The two sides made odd bedfellows, and the issue of leadership ultimately threatened
unity of action among the Left Wing.
Reed, Fraina, and the other leaders of the Left Wing called for a national conference, to
be held in New York City on June 21, 1919. The purpose of the conference was to determine the
next step in the capturing of the SPA for revolutionary Socialism. It began on the twenty-first
with unity between the factions. The attendees endorsed a statement submitted by Reed that
declared the purpose of the Left Wing to be the establishment of a revolutionary working-class
183
Draper, The Roots, 159.
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movement in the United States, to establish workers’ control of industry and the state through
the actions of the working masses themselves, by use of “extra-parliamentary action.”184 All
agreed this was the ultimate goal. The two factions disputed the means of achieving this,
however. The old dispute that separated Bukharin and Trotsky at the first meetings of the then
disorganized Left Wing in 1917 resurfaced: to capture the SPA for revolutionary Socialism, the
position Trotsky endorsed, or to split the Left Wing from the SPA and form an independent
organization, as Bukharin advocated. The Language Federations, and the Michigan state branch,
having both been expelled from the larger SPA, agitated for the immediate creation of a
Communist Party, separate from the SPA. Reed and Fraina, representing the English-speaking
membership, maintained that the correct course of action was to wait until the SPA emergency
convention on August 30, and attempt to win control of the Party at that time. Reed and Fraina
argued that capturing the SPA would provide the movement with the financial assets at the
disposal of the SPA, the Party press machinery, and would also win over sympathetic Socialists
who, although in disagreement with the SPA leadership, wished to see the SPA remain unified.
Should this attempt fail, Fraina and Reed said, then the only option remaining would be the
establishment of a separate Communist Party. The Language Federations and Michigan group
remained obstinate, however, and moved to create a Communist Party now. The conference
defeated the motion, fifty-five to thirty-eight.185 Thirty-one delegates representing the
Language Federations and Michigan group thus withdrew from the conference and decided to
reconvene on September 1, 1919 in Chicago to found a Communist Party in the United States.
The remaining delegates decided to hold another conference to meet on the 30th of August, in
184
John Reed, as quoted in Shannon, The American Socialist Party, 140. 185
Shannon, The American Socialist Party, 141.
94
Chicago, where the Emergency Convention of the SPA was to be held. The plan was to hold the
Left Wing conference in the same city on the same night, in the hopes that the official SPA
convention might dissolve and the Left Wing “fall heir to delegates that came to Chicago.”186
Should the SPA emergency convention be held as planned, the Left Wing would attempt to
forcibly seat delegates at the meeting hall.
The impetus for the immediate creation of a Communist Party by the Michigan-
Federation bloc came from two directions. The Michigan leaders, Dennis Batt and John
Keracher, had proposed the creation of a new Socialist Party in the United States affiliated with
the Third International. An emergency state convention in Michigan in early June, 1919,
resulted in the call for the establishment of such a Party in Chicago on September 1. The whole
of the Left Wing found this unsatisfactory, as the goal was to attend the official SPA emergency
convention on August 30 and capture the Party. The Left Wing would not be taken seriously
had it already decided to forge a new Party the next day.187 However, the Michigan group found
allies in the Russian Federation leadership. Thus the Federation-Michigan bloc, having
determined in early June that a Communist Party must be formed as soon as possible, attended
the June 21, 1919 Left Wing conference with the intention of winning the rest of the Left to
their position, and failing that to announce its withdrawal from the greater Left Wing and
intention to form a Communist organization in the United States.
Relatively little information survives about the leaders of the Russian Federation of the
Socialist Party. Although their influence was great, it was only so for a short period of time.
Their names are recorded in the documents and voting results of the Federation, and their
186
Oneal, American Communism, 57. 187
Draper, The Roots, 165.
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political screeds are preserved within the microfilmed volumes of Novy Mir, although many of
these remain to be translated. However, little personal information is available; what
knowledge survives largely comes from the memoirs and accounts of English-speaking
comrades and rivals, which often portrayed these individuals in a negative light. However, they
do deserve some examination, as a handful of Russian émigrés within the American Socialist
movement wielded large amounts of power, through the membership of their Federation, in
the early Communist movement in the United States, and undoubtedly played a key role in the
disharmony and discord of that same movement in its earliest years.
It should be noted that none of the following Russian Federation leaders were born in
the United States. All immigrated to the U.S., although when exactly remains a mystery. It is
likely that Nicholas Hourwich resided within the United States in the 1890s. We can only
speculate that others such as Alexander Stoklitsky and Oscar Tyverovsky arrived on American
shores at a later date than Hourwich, perhaps as political exiles following the 1905 Russian
Revolution. These Russian immigrants kept abreast of events in Russia after their departure
through Novy Mir. Through this medium, Russian Americans were able to remain informed on
developments within Russian politics, and within both the Bolshevik and Menshevik factions of
the Russian Social Democratic Party. Russian immigrants who did not depart from Europe until
after the 1905 revolution would undoubtedly have been familiar with Lenin’s 1902 work What
is to Be Done?, in which Lenin argued that common workers would never develop class political
consciousness solely through economic struggles for immediate workplace reforms. Such
consciousness, he argued, could only be brought from without the economic sphere, by a
vanguard Party composed of professional revolutionary Socialists, who would endeavor to
96
educate and convert the working class to Marxism. Through Novy Mir it is likely that Russians
who immigrated to the U.S. prior to 1902, such as Nicholas Hourwich, would have had the
opportunity to read Russian Socialist literature such as What is to Be Done?
The Russians in the United States were thus exposed to the Bolshevik position despite
being an ocean removed from events in Russia. What is to Be Done? Influenced Russian
immigrant leaders such as Hourwich and Stoklitsky to such a degree that they sought to build a
Communist Party that was the vanguard Party described by Lenin; certainly, they saw in the
U.S. a labor movement characterized by the trade unionism of the AFL, the ignorance of Marxist
principles by the average workingman, and a reluctance to accept revolution as a necessity in
political reform. The success of the Bolsheviks in the November Revolution of 1917 only further
reinforced the belief among Russian immigrants that Lenin’s model of a revolutionary Party was
the correct blueprint to overthrow the existing social order. This unyielding belief in the
Bolshevik model of 1902 remained the at the core of the Russian Federation leadership’s
aspirations for what the Left Wing of the SPA, and later the Communist Party of America,
should be, for almost two decades. When Lenin authored “Left Wing” Communism: An Infantile
Disorder in 1920, the Russian immigrants of the CPA remained steadfast in their devotion to the
1902 conception of Bolshevism. In his 1920 work Lenin chastised “Left Wing” Communists who
remained anti-trade unionist, anti-parliamentarism, and refused to compromise and rigidly
clung to theory as dogma, all familiar characteristics of the Russian immigrant leaders in the
CPA. The leaders of the Russian Federation, then, remained “Bolsheviks,” as they understood
the program outlined in What is to be Done?, well past the expiration date. Removed from the
events in Russia after the November, 1917 Revolution, they failed to appreciate the changes
97
and fluctuations in Bolshevik doctrine that occurred out of necessity in the succeeding years.
Their refusal to adapt to the changing times would have far reaching consequences for their
organization and roles within the American movement, as we shall see.
At the head of the local New York Russian Federation was Nicholas Hourwich. Hourwich,
(originally Gurvich) was the son of Russian Social Democrat Isaac Hourwich, an economist and
lawyer, who immigrated to the United States sometime in the 1890s.188 His father was involved
in Russian politics in the Tsarist Empire, knew Lenin personally, and was appointed to the
Russian Soviet Government Bureau, an informal embassy of Soviet Russia established in 1919 in
New York City and headed by Ludwig Martens, whose mission was to establish commercial links
with American businesses. Nicholas, perhaps because of his father’s acquaintance with Lenin,
regarded himself as “an outstanding exponent of Bolshevism in America.”189 He certainly
attempted to portray himself as such; as Benjamin Gitlow recalls, “his egotism knew no bounds.
When he spoke, his small reddish beard bristled with excitement…short of stature and
impressed with his own importance, he was a ludicrous-looking individual dressed in black,
pockets crammed full of papers and documents, a bundle of newspapers and magazines always
under his arm.”190 The young man was one of the three chief editors at Novy Mir as early as
1918, making him the inheritor of the legacy established by the true Bolsheviks who had run
the paper in 1916-1917. Influenced by the declarations of the first Comintern Congress,
Hourwich led the charge of the federation secession from the greater Left Wing in 1919,
agitating for the immediate establishment of a Communist Party rather than following the Left
188
The exact date of Hourwich’s emigration is unknown, although it is known that he served as a lawyer in Russia as late as 1887 but passed the Illinois bar exam in 1893. See section “Isaac Hourwich” at http://www.marxists.org/history/usa/eam/other/rsgb/rsgbofficials.html (accessed April 25, 2012). 189
Gitlow, I Confess, 27. 190
Ibid.
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Wing Council plan to capture the SPA.191 Hourwich disappeared from the American political
scene shortly after the formation of the Communist Party of America. Perhaps to avoid arrest
during the first Red Scare of 1920, he was “bundled off to Russia,” posing as a coal stoker on a
ship headed East. He felt his exodus to be a temporary one, but “the Communist International
willed otherwise. He never returned.”192
Less is known about Hourwich’s counterpart in those early days of the American
Communist Party: Alexander Stoklitsky. A stocky man with jet black hair and a Stalin-esque
mustache, Stoklitsky was a fiery orator and passionate polemicist whose works appeared often
in Novy Mir. Stoklitsky headed the Russian Federation Chicago locals. He, too, was a proponent
of splitting from the Left Wing. Stoklitsky served as Translator-Secretary of the Russian
Federation within the Communist Party of America, and thus weld a large amount of power, as
the Russian Federation made up almost one-third of total Communist Party of America
membership.193 Stoklitsky, too, was arrested in the Red Scare dragnets. Deported to Russia, he
attended the Second Comintern Congress as an international delegate of the Communist Party
of America in 1920. His name does not appear again within Party election results or documents,
save for one editorial appearing in The Socialist World in 1923, three years after his
disappearance from the American Communist movement, by Bertha Hale White. In the
editorial, White accused Stoklitsky of being an agent provocateur of the U.S. government, sent
191
Draper, The Roots, 166-167. 192
Gitlow, I Confess, 27. 193
Glazer, The Social Basis of American Communism, 41. Glazer cites statistics that the Russian Federation claimed 8,000 members in May, 1919, out of “more than 20,000, perhaps as many as 30,000” total federation members. This is out of the estimated total membership of 27,341 dues-paying members cited in Draper, The Roots, 189.
99
to infiltrate the Socialist Left Wing, and who spent his time in the Party sowing discord and
weakening the movement.194
Oscar Tyverovsky’s origins remain a mystery. He was actively involved in the Russian
Federation within the SPA, and was elected Federation Secretary in January, 1919, a post he
retained after the expulsion from the SPA and within the Russian Federation of the Communist
Party of America. Tyverovsky further served on the Central Executive Committee of the
Communist Party. A proponent of a split from the Left Wing, Tyverovsky also opposed unity
negotiations between the Communist Party and the Communist Labor Party throughout
1919.195 Tyverovsky was also arrested in the Red Scare raids of 1920.196 However, he avoided
deportment and sat on the Unity Committee of the Communist Party of America in February,
1921.197
George Ashkenuzi was elected to the Central Executive Committee of the Russian
Federation of the SPA in January, 1919. After the expulsion of the Federation and the founding
of the Communist Party of America, Ashkenuzi became Communist Party of America District
Organizer of New York City, a post he retained until rejoining the Central Executive Committee,
194
Bertha Hale White, “The Enemy Within,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://www.marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1923/0300-white-enemywithin.pdf (accessed April 25, 2012). Originally published in The Socialist World [Chicago], vol. 4, no. 3 (March 1923), 5-8. 195
See Oscar Tyverovsky, “Circular to All Branches of the Russian Federation of the Communist Party of America from Oscar Tyverovsky, Secretary, circa September 15, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/lfed/russian/1919/0915-tyverov-torussianfed.pdf (accessed April 25, 2012). Russian document and translation in the DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA collection M-1085, reel 938, file 202600-1172. 196
“To All Sections of the Russian Communist Federation: A leaflet from the Executive Committee of the Russian Communist Federation of the CPA *mailed February 24, 1920+” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/lfed/russian/1920/0224-cecrfcpa-toallsections.pdf (accessed April 25, 2012). Photostatic original of leaflet “Ko vsem otdelam Russkoi Kommunisticheskoi Federatsii” and unsigned translation in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 931, file 313846. 197
See “The Communist Party of America (1919-1946)” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/subject/usa/eam/index.html (accessed April 25, 2012).
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this time of the unified Communist Party of America following the Joint Unity Convention held
in Woodstock, New York in May, 1921. Ashkenuzi is notable for being one of the three CEC
members of the so-called “Central Caucus” faction of the Party, which split from the larger
unified Communist Party over objections to forming an above-ground, “Legal Political Party,” in
1922.
Hourwich, Stoklitsky, Tyverovsky and Ashkenuzi were all prominent figures within the
Russian Federation of the SPA, and later the Russian Federation of the Communist Party. Their
personal histories are largely lost or remain to be examined, however it is known that, owing to
their membership within the Russian Federation, all spoke primarily Russian instead of English,
and hailed from the Russian Empire, emigrating to the United States prior to 1917. Their
personal political histories, too, are lost to time; it is possible that these men came to the
United States well versed in Russian Social Democracy but not ardent Bolsheviks. However, by
1918, all were avowedly self-professed Bolsheviks. Through their leadership positions within
the Russian Federation and Communist Party, these men were highly influential in the
development of American Communism and took center stage, at various times, in the factional
battles that resulted in disunity and splits within the early American Communist movement.
Nicholas Hourwich, of New York City, and Alexander Stoklitsky, of Chicago, were two of
the more prominent Russian Federation members. Initially they backed the proposed takeover
of the SPA as outlined in the Left Wing manifesto and program; this is evident in the minutes of
the Fourth Convention of the Russian Socialist Federation, held in New York City from
September 28 to October 2, 1918. A section within the minutes, wherein the convention
addressed the Federation’s relationship to the SPA, acknowledged a coming split as had
101
happened between revolutionary and non-revolutionary factions in the European Socialist
movements. There is no indication that the Russian Federation sought to split the Party, only to
follow the Left Wing program of transforming the reformist SPA into a revolutionary, Bolshevik
Party, through agitation and education among the membership.198 However, Stoklitsky,
Tyverovsky, and Hourwich, as they became familiar with the documents and theses issued forth
at the founding congress of the Third International, decided capturing the Party was contrary to
Bolshevik tradition; the first congress of the Third International called for such splits in the
Socialist parties of Europe and the Americas. An undated letter from Bukharin to American Left
Wing “Comrades,” written on behalf of the Comintern, argued that “the time had come” for the
Left to split from the SPA following the expulsion of the Language Federations, and form a
Communist organization affiliated with the Third International and working to encourage the
organization of Soviets amongst American workers, soldiers, and sailors.199 Had Lenin, they
asked, attempted to unify the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks of the Russian Social Democratic
Party, or take the name of that fractured Party for his own? No, they realized, he had made a
clean break. So, too, must the American Left Wing. They, and the Russian Federation, thus
backed the Michigan group in their effort to form a Communist Party and leave the SPA to its
own destiny. Thus on June 5, 1919, a meeting of the Russian Branches of the SPA in Chicago
resolved that the Russian Federation press begin propagandizing for the establishment of a
198
“Minutes of the Fourth Convention of the Russian Socialist Federation,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/lfed/russian/1918/1002-rsf-convminutes.pdf (accessed May 8, 2012). Document in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA collection M-1085, reel 938, document 341853. 199
Untitled Letter from N. Bukharin to American Left Wing, in Communist Party of the United States of America, and John Earl Haynes. Files of the Communist Party of the USA in the Comintern Archives. [Moscow, Russia]: Rossiiskii tsentr khraneniia i izucheniia dokumentov noveishei istorii, 1999., Reel 1, Folio 1, 4-6. Microfilm.
102
Communist Party in the United States.200 Two weeks prior to the National Conference of the
Left Wing, the Russian Federation leaders had already determined to walk out of the meeting
and begin preparations for a founding convention of a Communist Party, with or without the
rest of the Left Wing of the SPA.
The Russian Federation leadership dove wholly into organizing work in preparation for
the proposed September 1st founding convention of the Communist Party of America. On July
15th, Federation Translator-Secretary Alexander Stoklitsky sent a circular letter to all members
of the Russian Federation, which called on the membership to create Communist locals or
conferences for the purpose of electing delegates to the General Communist Convention to
meet on September first.201 The Left Wing press published the call for the founding convention
of the Communist Party, and included a program nearly identical to that of the Left Wing
Section of the SPA, although with the role of parliamentary activity reduced to of “secondary
importance.”202 Stoklitsky contributed a long article to first issue of The Communist, a short-
lived publication of the “Federation-Michigan Alliance.” Entitled “On The Party Horizon,”
Stoklitsky articulated the federation position, arguing why the time had come to sever ties with
200
Jacob Spolansky, “The Conference of Russian Branches of the American Socialist Party in Chicago: Organization, Representation, and Activities, [events of March 24 to August 9, 1919+,” 3. In Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/1919/0809-spol-confrussbranches.pdf (accessed April 2, 2012). Document in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 931, file 313846. Spolansky was a Russian Immigrant in New York City. He was employed by the Bureau of Investigation as an undercover agent. He attended many Left Wing Socialist, Communist, and Russian Federation meetings, providing meticulous notes and copies of minutes to the Bureau. Spolansky’s involvement in the American Communist movement is detailed in his book The Communist Trail in America (New York: Macmillan, 1951). 201
Alexander Stoklitsky, “Circular Letter to All Members of the Russian Socialist Federation from Alexander Stoklitsky, Translator-Secretary, in Chicago, circa July 15, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/lfed/russian/1919/0715-stoklitsky-circularletter.pdf, (accessed April 2, 2012). Russian document and a translation in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 925. 202
“Call for a National Convention for the Purpose of Organizing a Communist Party in America,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0719-fedsmichigan-convcall.pdf, (accessed April 2, 2012). Published in The Communist [Chicago, Left Wing Section], v. 1, no. 1 (July 19, 1919), 1-2.
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the SPA and create a new Party of revolutionary Marxist character. He referred to the split in
the SPA as “the echo of the death rattle of the Second International,” a “direct result” of what
he asserted was the increasingly revolutionary attitude of the American working man. He
lambasted the Left Wing Socialists who remained resolute on capturing the SPA at the
upcoming August Party convention, calling their plan to capture the Party for revolutionary
Socialism a “declaration of war upon windmills by the Don Quixotes of the Center,” and
justified this position by appealing to the authority of the Bolsheviks and the Third
International, which never “adopted the slogan ‘capture the Second International for
revolutionary Socialism.’”203 Stoklitsky likened the American Left Wing to the European
Zimmerwaldian “Centrists” maligned by Lenin, whom he quoted: “’The fatal weakness of the
Zimmerwald International…was its hesitancy, its lack of decision when it came to the…question
of breaking with the social-patriots and social-patriot international.’ These very defects we
found in the Majority Delegates. As the Zimmerwaldites, their American prototypes hesitate
and are irresolute in the question…to break away from the traitorous Socialist Party, the Party
which sent delegates to the Bern Conference.”204 To the argument of the Left Wing that
capture of the SPA would “attract the Socialist masses away from the social traitors” of the
Right Wing, Stoklitsky again argued from a position as authority on Bolshevik practice: “Must
we stoop so low as to…capture the masses? Bolsheviki never run after the masses; Communists
are not satisfied to be the tail. They are ever in the lead…we do not care for a Communist Party
203
Alexander Stoklitsky, “On the Party Horizon,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0719-stoklitsky-onhorizon.pdf (accessed May 24, 2012). Published in The Communist [Chicago: Federation-Michigan Alliance], v. 1, no. 1 (July 19, 1919), 3, 8. 204
Alexander Stoklitsky, “Zimmerwaldites and their American Prototypes,” The Communist, August 2, 1919. Available online at http://marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/thecommunist/thecommunist2/v1n03-aug-02-1919.pdf (accessed April 9, 2012).
104
minus the Communist principles. Only consistent and principled supporters of the Third
International can build a new and militant Party.”205 For Stoklitsky, the split was already fact,
and had begun with the expulsion of the seven Language Federations and Michigan State
branch two months earlier. Capturing the Party was a fool’s errand, a course decided upon by a
wavering and irresolute “Center” of the SPA. The time had come to found a Communist Party
dedicated to revolutionary socialism, built on the Bolshevik model. And who best to lead such a
Party than the representatives of Russian revolutionary Socialism in the United States, the
“Russian Communistic Federations.”206 Indeed, the call for the convention to organize a
Communist Party made it obvious that the federation leaders had every intention of controlling
the formation: one delegate for every organization attending, and an additional delegate for
every 500 members within an organization. The federations, home to the majority of Left Wing
American Socialists, would thus easily claim a majority of the delegates.
Stoklitsky, Hourwich, and the leadership of the expelled federations attacked the
majority Left Wing during the period leading up to the SPA emergency convention of August
31st. Although they had walked out of the National Conference of the Left Wing, they had not
broken all ties with that organization, and the federations were still officially affiliated with the
Left Wing Section of the SPA. However, the Federation-Michigan group refused to support the
resolution of the National Council of the Left Wing, denied them the financial support from
membership dues, and, as Benjamin Gitlow recalls, even ordered large quantities of the Left
205
Alexander Stoklitsky, “On the Party Horizon,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0719-stoklitsky-onhorizon.pdf (accessed April 2, 2012). Published in The Communist [Chicago: Federation-Michigan Alliance], v. 1, no. 1 (July 19, 1919), 3, 8. 206
Gitlow, I Confess, 37. Benjamin Gitlow contends that the Russian Federation leaders emphasized to their members that their American comrades “could not be trusted because they don’t understand Bolshevism” and that “only those born in the territory that formerly comprised the Russian Empire had the attributes that went to make Bolsheviks.”
105
Wing publication The Revolutionary Age which they “destroyed and refused to pay for.”207 The
Left Wing majority remained resolute in their stance, however, and continued to plan for
forcing entrance to the SPA emergency convention. Should the Left Wing delegates be denied
entrance at the convention, which they felt they were entitled to owing to the victory of the
Left Wing in the spring Party elections, only then would the Left found “an American Party of
Communism.”208 Alfred Wagenknecht, Edward Katterfeld, and Edward Lindgren, three of the
representatives elected to the National Executive Committee of the SPA in the spring elections,
the results of which were declared null and void by the official NEC of the Party, convened
regardless, and stylized themselves the “new” NEC of the SPA. They regarded themselves as the
legitimate executive body of the SPA, citing a “mandate” of the Party membership, and
convened from July 26 to July 27, 1919. The new NEC issued a declaration to the Party, stating
its intent to oust Germer from the post of National Executive Secretary, reinstate the expelled
Language Federations and State branches, reorganize the SPA as a Communist Party, and to
assume full control of the Emergency National Convention scheduled for August 30, 1919, in
Chicago.209 The majority Left Wing appealed to the democratic wishes of the Party membership
for legitimacy, justifying their plan to take the SPA convention upon these grounds. Ironically,
the majority of the membership that elected the Left Wing NEC members resided within the
ousted Language Federations, and so was opposed to the plan to usurp the Emergency
207
Gitlow, I Confess, 35. 208
I.E. Ferguson, “The National Left Wing,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0725-ferguson-nationallw.pdf (accessed April 2, 2012). Originally published in The Truth [Duluth, MN], vol. 3, no. 29, (July 25, 1919), 3. 209
“NEC Declaration to the Party: Issued by the *new+ National Executive Committee of the Socialist Party,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1919/0727-newnec-declaration.pdf, (accessed April 2, 2012). Originally published in The Revolutionary Age [New York], vol. 2, no. 5, (August 2, 1919), 3-4.
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Convention and instead favored the immediate creation of a Communist Party. Regardless, the
majority Left Wing continued on course, resolute in its belief that they represented the majority
of American Socialists, and secure in its belief that this majority wanted a Socialist Party based
upon a revolutionary, not reformist, program.
When the day came, however, the Left was again foiled by the Right Wing old NEC.
When the Emergency Convention of the SPA opened on August 30th, 1919 at Machinists’ Hall in
Chicago, the old leadership of the SPA was prepared to deal with any disruptions caused by the
Left Wing. The SPA credential committee was informed not to seat delegates who arrived to
the convention without the specially issued white cards, to ensure Left Wing delegates could
not slip into the meeting. Only those examined by the credentials committee and found in line
with the SPA program were issued such cards. Two missteps by the Left Wing further
complicated its plans: Left Wing delegates met on the evening before the convention opened in
the billiard and bar room of Machinists’ Hall, and carelessly left at least one copy of the minutes
of the meeting on a table. The janitor at Machinists’ Hall, who was a good friend of SPA
Executive Secretary Germer, discovered the document and informed Germer of the Left Wing
plans. Additionally, Left Wing Socialist Alfred Wagenknecht had bragged to a reporter from the
Chicago Tribune that the Left Wing would take seats at the convention by force if necessary.
The reporter informed the Chicago Police Department, which made sure to post uniformed
policemen at the hall on the day of the convention to keep the peace between the factions.210
The conference opened as planned, and the Left Wing attempted to take seats at the hall.
Germer arrived late, and ordered the Left Wingers to leave the hall. They refused, and a scuffle
210
Draper, The Roots, 176-177.
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ensued between Germer and Reed, although it is unclear who threw the first punch.211 The
police were called in, and they forcibly removed the Left Wing Socialists. The Left Wing plan had
failed. A contingency plan had been agreed upon beforehand, however: the Left Wing would
forge ahead and create a Communist Party, separate from that planned by the Michigan-
Federation bloc.
The Left Wing did not have far to go. The delegates adjourned to the billiard and bar
room on the first floor to protest the actions of the SPA leadership. One day later, at 6:00 p.m.,
they reconvened and opened the founding convention of a Communist Party. One of the first
actions of the convention was a vote on a proposal by Charles Ruthenberg, who suggested the
convention delay the organization of a Party and seek unity with the Federation-Michigan led
Communist Party convention scheduled to begin the next day. The delegates voted down the
motion thirty-seven to thirty-one, after which Ruthenberg withdrew from the convention. Unity
was not possible. Reed dismissed the motion, saying that the federation leaders could come to
the CLP if they wanted unity.212 Left Winger Max Eastman later wrote that to have supported
Ruthenberg’s measure would have been to “submission to the control of the Slavic
Federation.”213 Two days later, after the proceedings had been moved to the I.W.W. hall in
Chicago, they agreed on the title Communist Labor Party (CLP). Reed and the delegates drafted
a constitution, and established an organizational framework similar to that of the SPA,
complete with provisions for CLP members elected to Congress as well as guidelines for the
211
Howe and Coser, The American Communist Party, 37. 212
Draper, The Roots, 179. 213
Max Eastman, as cited in Howe and Coser, The American Communist Party, 39.
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establishment of Foreign Language Federations within the Party.214 They also created a
platform and program. The CLP platform stated the Party was “in full harmony with the
revolutionary working class parties of all countries,” was in complete harmony with the
principles of the Third International, and appealed to the workers of the United States to stand
with the CLP in conquering political power and “the abolition of the present system of
production.”215 The organization of the Party differed little from the SPA, and the program,
based upon the principles of the Third International, was not much different from that drafted
by the Communist Party of America. What is clear, however, is that the CLP did not wish to
incorporate the federation leadership into the American Party. Immediate unity would only be
achieved on the CLP’s terms.
Meanwhile, the Federation-Michigan bloc, with some English-speaking members of the
Left Wing such as Ruthenberg and Fraina who had initially supported the Left Wing plan to
capture the SPA and later decided to give their support to the Federation-Michigan group, met
on September 1 at the headquarters of the Russian Federation in Chicago for the purpose of
establishing a Communist Party. Fraina, in the opening address of the convention, proclaimed
an end “once and for all to factional disputes. We are at an end with bickering. We are at an
end with controversy. We are here to build a Party of action.”216 He was premature in his
optimism. The founding convention of the Communist Party of America was characterized by
conflict. The makeup of the convention was one of three power blocs. The federations were the
strongest numerically, claiming the largest membership of the three. The English speaking Left
214
“Constitution-Program-Platform, Communist Labor Party,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 1, Folio 5, 15. Microfilm. 215
Ibid. 216
Louis Fraina, as quoted in Draper, The Roots, 182.
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Wing Council remnants that bolted from the SPA emergency convention, and the CLP founding
convention, and headed by Fraina and Ruthenberg claimed slightly fewer members. The final
group was the Michigan State organization, which could claim only half as many members as
either of the other two, and thus was proportionally weaker with fewer representative
delegates.
The Fraina-Ruthenberg Council Group suggested the CPA convention consider
approaching the CLP convention with a proposal of unity. The Federation-Michigan alliance
staunchly opposed any such measure, voting down a motion to appoint five delegates to a
committee toward this end 75 to 31.217 The delegates agreed, however, that any CLP delegates
acceptable to the CPA credentials committee were welcome to join as “special guests.”218 The
Michigan group fell out with the Federation bloc on the sixth day of the convention. The
Michigan group objected to the Party program and manifesto, with Michigan leader Batt
deriding the federation leadership for putting forth a program not sufficiently Marxist in
character, stating “You so-called ‘100% Bolsheviks’ will not deny the facts as they are…50% of
you have not read Marx’s Value, Price, and Profit. Your program does not deal at all with the
delicate question of the High Cost of Living *sic+…I have no hope of competing with the Russian
Dictatorship of this convention…you have endeavored to capture the masses as you have
captured this convention, but you will find it vastly different.”219 The Michigan group also
objected to the use of the term “mass action” in the manifesto, and stated opposition to armed
217
Draper, The Roots, 183. 218
Ibid. 219
Batt, quoted in James Peyronnin, “First Convention of the Communist Party of America, Day 6, September 6, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/1919/0906-peyronnin-cpaconvday6.pdf (accessed May 24, 2012). Document in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 931, file 313846.
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revolt as a tactic of the Party and arguing for a commitment to “political action.”220 Batt then
read the Manifesto as proposed by the Minority, making it clear that each statement was
backed by the writings of Marx, Engels, and Lenin. With that, Batt left the convention, and the
Michigan group resolved not to vote for the Manifesto and Program and to refuse nomination
for any future post in the Party.221 The remainder of the convention did not heed their threats,
and the Michigan bloc remained isolated and did not contribute seriously for the remainder of
the convention.222
Batt was not alone in his belief that the Federation bloc, under the leadership of the
Russian-Americans Hourwich and Stoklitsky, dominated the proceedings of the convention.
James Peyronnin, an agent of the Bureau of Investigation, infiltrated the CPA convention. His
report of the fourth day of the convention indicates that Edward I. Lindgren and Morris Zucker
of the Kings County, New York local, Henry Tichenor of the St. Louis, Missouri local, and Irene
Smith of California left the convention “on account of their opposition to the Russian
Federations’ control.”223 They defected to the CLP convention instead. Jacob Spolansky,
another Bureau of Investigation agent, similarly recorded the departure of a delegate on the
third day. Upon leaving, the man stated that the Russians dominated the convention due to
their “well organized machine” and that he “did not see any difference between this
220
Bell, Marxian Socialism, 123. 221
James Peyronnin, “First Convention of the Communist Party of America, Day 6, September 6, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/1919/0906-peyronnin-cpaconvday6.pdf (accessed April 4, 2012). Document in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 931, file 313846. 222
Draper, The Roots, 184. 223
James Peyronnin, “First Convention of the Communist Party of America, Day 4, September 4, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/1919/0904-peyronnin-cpaconvday4.pdf (accessed April 4, 2012). Document in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 931, file 313846.
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convention and the Emergency Socialist Convention…and that a few leaders were trying to
dominate the Communist Party of America for their own selfish purposes.”224
The Russian Federation knew it commanded a large contingent of the new CPA
membership, and perhaps felt that they were entitled to greater authority as a result. Perhaps
they regarded themselves as the only authentic representatives of Bolshevism in the United
States, and the only ones capable of establishing a “true” Communist Party. Despite their
dominance of the convention, which drove some delegates away in disgust, the remaining
English-speaking Left Wing bloc did not abandon the convention. Indeed, when the convention
elected individuals to the important posts in the nascent Party, almost all went to non-Slavic
federation, English speaking members. The delegates elected Ruthenberg National Secretary,
and Fraina International Secretary and editor of Party publications. Ruthenberg, Fraina, Charles
Dirba, I.E. Ferguson, Harry Wicks, John Ballam, Max Cohen, and Jay Lovestone, all English-
speaking, non-federation members, won seats on the Central Executive Committee of the
Party. The remaining seven posts went to federation members, with only Nicholas Hourwich
and Oscar Tyverovsky hailing from the Russian Federation. The leadership, then, was anything
but reflective of Russian dominance within the early CPA. However, the federation leaders
wielded significant influence within their respective federations, and thus could influence Party
elections. To retain their positions of influence, the English-speaking CPA leaders would have to
keep the federation leadership placated.
224
Jacob Spolansky, “Communist Party of America Convention, Day 3, September 3, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/1919/0903-spolansky-cpaconvday3.pdf (accessed April 4,2012). Document in DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 931, file 313846.
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The CPA was the product of the Michigan-Federation group. Elements of the English
speaking Left Wing which withdrew from the SPA emergency convention and the CLP founding
convention joined them. These English speaking Left Wingers stayed with the CPA to keep the
nascent movement unified, a sentiment which would in 1920 lead many, such as Ruthenberg,
to abandon the CPA for amalgamation with the English speaking dominated CLP. For their part,
the Russian and other Federationist leaders tolerated the English speaking comrades in the
Party hierarchy out of necessity. Although they believed themselves the only ones truly capable
of understanding Leninism and Bolshevism, and believed their English speaking comrades
largely ignorant of Leninist principles and theory, they realized the necessity of having some
native English speakers able to fully reach the English speaking American working class.
The Michigan group found the CPA program and manifesto unsatisfying, and their
attempts to influence the convention were ineffective. They quickly realized the limitations of
their involvement within the new Party, and remained non-players. The Council Group headed
by Ruthenberg and Fraina, wielding numbers less than that of the Federation bloc, remained
within a power-sharing arrangement with the federation leadership, and, indeed, held the most
influential positions within the Party hierarchy. The CPA, then, was a Party characterized by a
large non-English speaking federation membership with native-born, or at least English-
speaking and assimilated, American leadership. The CLP, which had the support of few
federation members and a smaller total membership base, was more native-born American or
English-speaking in character. The CLP was formed as a response to the inability of the Left
Wing to participate in, and “capture,” the SPA Emergency Convention. The Left Wing Section
113
and the Federation-Michigan group initially split over the issue of whether or not to attempt
this taking of the SPA political machinery. This maneuver failed.
Why did the CLP exist at all then? After all, the CLP and CPA both espoused the same
goals with little difference in tactics and theory. Their constitutions were likewise similar. The
two parties existed separately not because of ideological reasons, but due to the political
aspirations of their respective leaders. The Russian Federation leadership desired to be the
architects of an American Communist Party based on the Bolshevik model. The CLP leaders did
not want the American movement coopted by what they perceived as Russian born elitists with
aspirations of dominance over the Party. John Reed referred to the CPA as “an artificial
grouping of foreign-born workers…trying to create a foreign working-class movement in the
U.S. expressed in terms of the European movement (without any attempt to adapt it to the
psychology of the American working-class.)225 This is a puzzling sentiment given Reed’s
idolization of Lenin and his Bolshevik Party. Clearly, Reed did not equate Russian immigrants in
the United States with their countryman Lenin in Russia. Reed preferred a Bolshevik-style
revolution in the United States led by native-born U.S. Leftists. The question that divided the
two Communist parties was, then, who will control the American movement: foreigners or
native-born Americans?
This question was not an easy one to resolve and was the basis for the inability of the
two parties to unify during the early 1920s. The question presented itself in various forms.
Through 1919 and 1920, the divide between the Party was a question of ideological purity,
tactics, and theory. Thereafter, the divide manifested through a question of organization:
225
John Reed, Untitled Editorial, in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 1, Folio 6, 7. Microfilm.
114
whether to establish a legal “above ground” Communist Party, and then whether to liquidate or
retain the underground Communist organization. These debates kept the two parties disunited,
and following the eventual unity of the two organizations, precipitated further splits. Russian-
American Foreign Language Federation leaders, who had contributed to the rise of the
American Left Wing of the Socialist Party and agitated so passionately for a break with that
Party, were a constant through these divides.
115
VII. RUSSIAN AMERICANS, THE FEDERATIONS, AND FACTIONAL WARFARE IN THE EARLY
COMMUNIST MOVEMENT
The early period of Communist Party activity in the United States is characterized by
factional strife and disunity. The movement began with two separate entities, the Communist
Party of America and the Communist Labor Party, under rival leaderships. The CLP at times
attempted to bridge the gap and unite the two bodies, while the CPA often refused and stymied
overtures of peace and unification. This situation endured throughout 1919. In 1920, a minority
group departed the obstinate CPA and joined the CLP in an act of unity. The remaining
contingent of the old CPA stayed the course of isolation from the other Communist
organization, until intervention by executives of the Third International demanded working
unity between the two bodies in 1921. This unity was short-lived, however, as the remaining
leadership of the old CPA again split from the larger Party, this time over the issue of the
establishment of a parallel above-ground “Legal Political Party,” as the public wing of the
Communist movement. The dissenters reentered the fold, again at the insistence of Comintern
representatives, in September, 1922. At the center of these disputes in the first three years of
Communist Party existence in the United States was the nucleus of CPA leadership: the Russian
Americans of the Russian Federation. 1919 marked the height of Russian-American influence
within the Communist Party. The unifying events and subsequent splits resulted, over the
course of the next three years, in the gradual decline of this influence in the Party, from an apex
at the birth of the movement to almost complete marginalization by the end of 1922.
There has been a tendency in the literature of the early American Communist
movement to dismiss the discord between the two Communist parties as unimportant, simply
116
the result of two distinct groups of ambitious leaders, both vying for the control of the Left
Wing American Socialist membership, and both seeking to be at the head of American
Communism. Contemporaries of these ambitious individuals echoed this sentiment; Henry
Kuhn of the Socialist Labor Party in a letter to Boris Reinstein, stated that the two parties
emerged from the ruins of the SPA emergency convention “largely because of rival leadership;
there is little else to divide them.”226 Although the issue of who would lead the American
Communist movement was at the root of the divide between the two parties, it is not entirely
accurate to state that is all that divided the two parties. The CLP, which initially backed all unity
proposals in order to gain the moral high ground in the factional dispute, objected to the
organizational structure of the CPA, and could not accept a unity which would accept the CPA
organizational scheme. The CPA, meanwhile, argued that the CLP did not truly represent the
Left Wing Americans, and was furthermore tainted by centrism in the upper echelons of the
CLP leadership. These were the justifications given by both factions to oppose unity in the
closing months of 1919.
The CLP expressed an interest in unity between the two parties during its founding
convention, while the CPA convention was simultaneously underway in another part of
Chicago. The CPA invited CLP delegates to attend the CPA convention as “special guests,” who
would sit in on the proceedings but have no vote or voice. The CLP wrote to the CPA leaders,
saying that although they considered the CPA convention host to some “inconsistent
elements,” they nonetheless wished to forge “one solid phalanx” of all American Communist
forces. However, they rejected the offer to spectate at the CPA convention, and instead
226
Henry Kuhn, Letter to Boris Reinstein in Russia, December 9, 1919, in CPUSA and Haynes. Files of the Communist Party, Reel 1, Folio 4, 31. Microfilm.
117
reiterated that they felt their organization to be the legitimate Communist Party and legal
successors to the Left Wing of the SPA. They claimed this legitimacy through their assertion that
the CLP “obeyed all agreements of the Left Wing conferences…and mandates of the
revolutionary faction of the Party membership” as demonstrated through the 1919 SPA
referendum, and was as decisive in the “crystallization of the revolutionary elements” of the
SPA membership as “the volatile and bolting groups” which composed the CPA convention.227
Claiming an “advantageous position” as a result, the CLP was willing to discuss unity with the
CPA leadership on an equal basis, and suggested that the two organizations form a joint
credentials committee toward vetting the delegates at both conventions for admittance to a
future unified convention.
Stoklitsky, Hourwich, and Ruthenberg penned the CPA response toward the end of
December, 1919. They did not explicitly reject the CLP proposal. They did, however, restate the
CPA offer to accept CLP delegates to the convention on a special basis. The CPA furthermore
took umbrage with the claim to legitimacy of the CLP, stating that it could take “no account” of
the actions and decisions of the Left Wing bodies that predated the CPA convention. The CPA
reply also argued that legitimacy belonged to itself, claiming that an examination of the
referendum ballots of the SPA membership would demonstrate that it was the CPA
membership "which cast the overwhelming bulk of these votes,” and that some delegates
present at the CLP convention really belonged at the CPA convention "by mandate of their
227
“Question of Unity,” published in The Voice of Labor, in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party. Microfilm.
118
membership.”228 The CLP, then, regarded its legitimacy as deriving from inheritance of the old
SPA Left Wing legal procedure. The CPA responded by claiming legitimacy through the will of
the membership. The CLP, believing that “a self-seeking leadership” within the CPA was
obstructing any unity process, tasked several of its rank and file members to appeal to the CPA
for unity. They delivered to the CPA convention a “cordial invitation” to meet at an informal
session to discuss unity between the two conventions. The CPA rejected this as well, and only
replied with its original invitation to sit CLP delegates as “special guests” some of whom “may
qualify as delegates or fraternal delegates.”229 The CLP, exasperated by what they considered
obstructionist methods of the CPA leadership, proclaimed a standing invitation to meet on the
basis of equality at a future Unity Conference: “the organization of two Communist Parties is a
crime…but our repeated attempts to unite all the revolutionary Communist hosts seem to have
been thwarted by certain elements in your convention…we are ready at any time to meet your
representatives to consider the question of unity.”230 The two conventions concluded
separately with the issue of unity undecided. The question remained, however, and attempts to
bring about a Unity Conference continued thereafter.
Although the CLP appealed to the CPA for unity measures, it certainly did not wish unity
on just any grounds. The CLP reiterated that unity talks would have to proceed “on the basis of
equality.” The reason for this is simple: the CPA had in its ranks the great majority of the Left
Wing membership contained within the Language Federations. The CLP estimated its
membership figures to be about 30,000 members at its founding, with the CPA representing
228
“Question of Unity,” published in The Voice of Labor, in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party. Microfilm. 229
Ibid. 230
Ibid.
119
some 27,000. The CPA figured 58,000 members for itself, and only 10,000 for the CPL, and
regarded the CLP as a “Party of leaders without a following.”231 Records of the CPA dues paying
membership counted 27,341 for the month following the CPA founding convention, of which
26,680 belonged to the Language Federations, 7,000 hailing from the Russian Federation
alone.232 If a unity conference were to occur with proportional representation, the CPA would
claim the right to far more delegates than the CLP, and thus the CLP leadership would be
outvoted at every step. The CLP also objected to the organizational form of the CPA. Despite
making provisions for Foreign Language Federations within its own constitution, the CLP
objected to the greater autonomy given to Language Federations within the CPA constitution;
an article published in Communist Labor Party News entitled “The Three Parties- Which One Is
Yours?” stated that the CPA agreed with the CLP on fundamental principles, but differed in
“form of organization and policy.”233 Specifically mentioned was the “practically autonomous
federations, each a complete Party within itself,” and the lack of a centralized organizations
“capable of meeting the revolutionary situation” containing “two heads, an Executive Council
and a Central Executive Committee…already at loggerheads with each other.”234 For these
reasons the CLP would not accept the wholesale adoption of the CPA constitution demanded by
the CPA leaders. The CLP continued to offer unity on a basis of equal representation, and every
offer was countered by a CPA offer to accept any CLP branches wishing to affiliate with the CPA
231
Oscar Tyverovsky, “Circular to All Branches of the Russian Federation of the Communist Party of America from Oscar Tyverovsky, Secretary, circa September 15, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/lfed/russian/1919/0915-tyverov-torussianfed.pdf (accessed April 10, 2012). Russian document and translation in the DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA collection M-1085, reel 938, file 202600-1172. 232
Figures cited in Draper, The Roots, 189. 233
“The Three Parties- Which One Is Yours?,” published in Communist Labor Party News, November, 1919, in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 1, Folio 6, 10. Microfilm. 234
Ibid.
120
into its ranks, with one reply even offering to send a CPA special committee to meet with a
similar CLP committee “to arrange for the liquidation of the national organization of the
Communist Labor Party…to take over its work, liabilities, and assets” to “absolve the
Communist Labor Party membership from any responsibility incurred by having joined a third
Party.”235
The CPA, then, adamantly opposed unity measures except total incorporation of the CPL
into its own organization, and perhaps was obstructionist in its methods. The CPA leadership
had since before the founding convention of the Party regarded the Left Wing leadership which
now led the CLP as “Kautskyist” Centrists: “That there are Communist elements in the
Communist Labor Party is a fact, and particularly the comrades of the Pacific Coast. But it is
equally a fact that these comrades have the opportunity of affiliating with the Communist
Party. They are now being misled by the Lore-Katterfeld-Wagenknecht Centrists and by the
Reed-Carney emotionalists” read one editorial in the CPA press.236 Having painted the CLP
leadership as wavering centrists and themselves as true Communists, they could not agree with
CLP assertions that the two parties programs did not differ greatly. But what was truly different
about the two parties’ programs and platforms? The CPA Russian leadership railed against
parliamentarism in the CLP program, which allowed CLP elected officials “the right of
introducing reforms.”237 Thus, argued the CPA, the CLP “must accept thereby the responsibility
for all laws promulgated against the workingmen…and leading the American proletariat into
235
“Statement to the National Executive Committee of the Communist Labor Party in Cleveland from the Central Executive Committee of the Communist Party of America in Chicago, October 23, 1919,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/1919/1023-ceccpa-tonecclp.pdf (accessed April 10, 2012). A document in the DoJ/BoI Investigative Files, NARA M-1085, reel 940, doc. 185. 236
Quoted in Gitlow, I Confess, 50. 237
Oscar Tyverovsky, “Circular to All Branches of the Russian Federation.”
121
delusion.”238 In contrast, the CPA made only limited provisions in its Party program for
parliamentary tactics, barring any elected Communist from introducing or supporting reform
measures, and limiting his action to propagandizing through the legislature.239 The CPA
reiterated its policy of boycotting elections and public offices, an easy measure to adopt when
there was no realistic chance of any Communist being elected to any public office. The two
parties had similar takes on dual unionism. The CLP program officially supported the IWW
model of revolutionary industrial unionism. The CPA differed only slightly in its call for a
“general industrial union organization” which would bring together the IWW, the Workers
International Industrial Union, independent unions, militant AFL unions, and unorganized
workers “on the basis of revolutionary class struggle.”240
Both parties utilized the revolutionary phrases that had entered Socialist vocabulary
since the Bolshevik revolution; both pointed to the Leninist conception of Imperialism as the
genesis of the First World War and the resulting revolutionary tumult throughout the Western
world, as well as liberal use of the phrase “Dictatorship of the Proletariat.” However, both also
contained phrases soon to be out of vogue. The CPA program made specific mention of the use
of “Mass Action” in the revolutionary moment, while the CLP opted for “Action of the Masses,”
a phrase used by the CPA to accuse the CLP leadership of taming that Party’s revolutionary
rhetoric.241 Both parties also adhered to the program and policies of the Third International.
However, as the CLP had stated its desire to create a Communist Party largely free of the
influence of Language Federations, its internationalism was called into question by the CPA:
238
Oscar Tyverovsky, “Circular to All Branches of the Russian Federation.” 239
Draper, The Roots, 185-186. 240
Ibid., 186. 241
Louis Fraina, “To the Bureau of the Communist International, November 24, 1919” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 1, Folio 9, 11. Microfilm.
122
“The SPA and the CLP agree on one thing: an ‘American movement, not a ‘foreign’
movement.”242 The CPA program, on the other hand, stated that “the problems of the
American workers are identical with the problems of the workers of the world.”243 The CPA
could thus claim a truly internationalist program against the CPL’s exclusionary one, an ironic
claim given the CPA leaders willingness to exclude native-born Americans under the assumption
that they were unable to fully grasp Bolshevik theory. Minor doctrinal differences within the
Party programs separated the two organizations for the first four months of their respective
existences; however, these doctrinal differences were not so great as to prevent the two
organizations from working in harmony, or coalescing into one. There was also the much more
important issue of the role of Language Federations within the larger Party organizational
structure. It was the Language Federations that provided the base of support for the CPA
leadership, and the Russians on the CEC in particular. Thus the CLP leadership could not accept
the CPA offers to incorporate the CLP into their Party. To do so meant relinquishing all control
in the movement to foreign-born leadership. However, the CPA remained obstinate in its
refusal to work seriously toward unity. Nothing could be done to rectify the situation, until the
beginning of 1920, when the English-speaking minority of the CPA acted independently toward
Communist unity.
In the last months of 1919, the minority English-speaking bloc within the CPA, the
Ruthenberg-Fraina faction, increasingly grew weary of the federation dominance over the
Party. In January 1920, Ruthenberg and other English-speaking CPA leaders began to agitate for
242
Quoted in Draper, The Roots, 187. 243
“Constitution of the Communist Party of America,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://www.marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/1919/0907-cpa-constitution.pdf (accessed May 24, 2012). Published in Manifesto and Program. Constitution. Report to the Communist International. (Chicago, IL: Communist Party of America, n.d. [1919]), 18-25.
123
unity with the predominately English-speaking CLP. External pressures made it possible for the
Ruthenberg-Fraina group seriously to consider mending ties with their former comrades in the
CLP. This pressure came from the Palmer Raids of late 1919 and 1920, which suppressed Left
Wing radical activity, including both Communist parties, and sent the organizations
“underground.” On the night of January 2, 1920, Attorney General Palmer and the U.S.
Department of Justice agents descended upon the meeting halls and headquarters of both
Communist parties. The Department of Justice agents apprehended more than 4000 radicals in
thirty-three cities. The raids affected almost every Communist local and many of the leaders
were arrested.244 The Department of Justice agents seized documents and literature. Touting
the 1918 Alien Act as justification, the U.S. government deported over 240 foreign-born
American Communists. The Secretary of Labor ruled that under the Immigration Act of October,
1918, also known as the Dillingham-Hardwick Act, mere membership in a Communist
organization was grounds for deportation. The raids had their intended effect: both Communist
parties suffered a dramatic loss in membership, both foreign-born and native-born American.
The CPA, which in December, 1919 claimed 23,624 dues paying members could claim only
1,714 in January, 1920.245 The CLP suffered similar losses. Although these figures represent only
dues-paying members, it is possible that many more continued to identify with the Party.
Regardless, the figures demonstrate the catastrophic disruption of the Communist
organizations as a result of the raid. Communication between leaders and rank and file
244
Robert K. Murray, Red Scare: A Study of National Hysteria, 1919-1920 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1955), 213. 245
See “The Communist Party of America Membership Figures: 1919 Communist Party of America,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/subject/usa/eam/index.html (accessed April 10, 2012). The author notes that “dues collections were disrupted in January 1920” due to the Palmer Raids and “do not reflect the actual size of the Party membership.”
124
members also became difficult. To combat Department of Justice surveillance, the leaders of
both parties adopted pseudonyms that changed constantly. In inter-Party communications, the
Communists employed the language of business. For example, Communists referred to the
central office of the CPA in New York City as the “home office,” a Party convention might be a
“shareholders’ conference,” International Delegates were “salesmen” returning home “with full
instructions from the Board of Directors,” the last a code name for the E.C. of the Comintern.246
The raids shook up the organizational structures of the two parties as well. The CLP changed
from the strictly state-based Party organizational model inherited from the SPA to one based on
larger regions encompassing multiple states. The Raids sent both parties underground.
Members were lost, documents destroyed, and organizational structures destroyed. The parties
remained, however weakened, and adapted to the circumstances. An underground existence
made the work of the Communist parties more difficult, certainly. However, American
Communists took a certain pride in emulating the conspiratorial, underground existence of the
Russian Bolsheviks in the months and years prior to November, 1917.
On January 12, 1920, the central committees of the CPA and CLP received
correspondence from Zinoviev and the Comintern. Zinoviev stated that the issue of two
American Communist parties was carefully considered by the CEC of the Third International,
with the input of one delegate from both the CLP and the CPA. The Comintern leaders
concluded that the split between the Communists had “rendered a heavy blow” to the
American Communist movement as a result of the “dispersion of revolutionary force,” “harmful
parallelism,” the “absurd” division of practical work of organizing and educating the American
246
Draper, The Roots, 357-358.
125
proletariat, and the loss of energy to factional squabbles in lieu of practical Party work. To the
Comintern, the split had no justification, as the two parties had no differences in program and
only slight differences in regards to the question of tactics, as well as organization questions, in
particular the differing rights of Language Federations within the two organizations. Towards
this question, Zinoviev stated that the federations should exist within the Party with limited
autonomy and subordinate to the CEC, and should focus on propaganda work within their
respective language communities. As regards the Party makeup, Zinoviev noted that the two
Communist entities represented two different, but ultimately complementary, sides of the
American movement: the CPA “more developed theoretically” and more closely connected with
revolutionary tradition of the Russian working class, was nonetheless out of touch with the
American working class, while the CLP needed “certain intellectual guidance” in regards to
Marxist theory, but by virtue of its English-speaking leadership was better placed to reach
American workers. Because unity would provide the movement with a mixed leadership
properly schooled in Marxist theory and able to propagandize among American workers,
Zinoviev and the Executive Committee of the Third International concluded that unity was “not
only possible but absolutely necessary…the E.C. categorically insists on this being immediately
brought about.”247 Thus Zinoviev and the Comintern stated their desire for “a mass
organization, and not a narrow, closed circle.”248 The Comintern suggested a joint conference to
discuss unity, composed of an equal number of representatives of both organizations. The
247
Grigory Zinoviev, “To the Central Committees of the American Communist Party and the American Communist Labor Party,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 1, Folio 17, 1. Microfilm. 248
Grigory Zinoviev, quoted in Draper, The Roots, 244.
126
Comintern had ruled that unity must be achieved, and done so as quickly as possible, on the
basis of equal representation.
With the leadership of the Comintern demanding Communist cohesion, and the
federations weakened by the Palmer raid arrests and deportations, as well as the exodus of
“Centrists” in the CLP scared off by the prospect of legal prosecution in the Palmer Raids, the
Ruthenberg-Fraina group within the CPA realized the time was ripe to pursue unity between
the two organizations seriously. In late January, 1920, Ruthenberg and the English-speaking
minority leaders of the CPA began a campaign for unity with the CLP within their Party. Their
efforts resulted in a half-hearted gesture to the CLP to hold a joint convention to discuss unity,
but only on the condition that a united Party adopt wholesale the CPA program and
constitution. This was, of course, not acceptable to the CLP leadership, who countered with an
offer of “immediate working unity” coordinated by a merged executive committee composed
of leaders from both parties. In response, the CPA proposed a joint convention to be held six
months in the future, but would retain the CPA’s “privileged status” of Language Federations
within the Party structure.249 The CLP reiterated that it preferred immediate unity talks, but
when this proposition was considered within the CEC of the CPA, Ruthenberg’s pro-unity
faction lost the vote, nine to four. The CPA again refused unity talks with the CLP. The issue of
unity with the CLP was not the only one separating the Ruthenberg group from the
Federationist majority within the CEC of the CPA. The two factions also came to loggerheads
over the organizational form of the Party, with Ruthenberg spearheading a drive to centralize
the Party and lessen the autonomy of the federations, as well as over the principle of the use of
249
Draper, The Roots, 212.
127
force, wherein the Ruthenberg faction argued against espousing violence at a time that such
rhetoric could be used by the government to further suppress the Communist movement. For
their efforts, the English-speaking minority of the Party were labeled Mensheviks by the
majority.250 Ruthenberg and his allies could take no more, and on April 20, 1920, split from the
CPA.
Ruthenberg took with him two other members of the CEC of the CPA: I.E. Ferguson and
Jay Lovestone. Additionally, the few English-speaking CPA members followed Ruthenberg out of
the Party. To claim legitimacy as the official Communist Party, the Ruthenberg faction retained
the named “Communist Party of America” and continued to exist, briefly, as an independent
Party. This organization even published its own organ, The Communist, which was titled the
same as that produced by the majority CPA, to the confusion of many. Finally, he left with the
financial records of the Party and a large portion of the Party treasury. Ruthenberg fired a
parting shot that helps elucidate the disconnect between the Federationist CEC members and
the English-speaking CEC members: “Since the beginning of the Party there have been two
viewpoints represented in the CEC. The majority members…considered themselves ‘great
theorists.’ They constantly talked about the word ‘principle’ but never about how to relate…to
the working class movement of this country…The minority group, on the other hand, stood for
a policy which would make the CPA…the ‘Party of action’…not the Party of closet philosophers
but a Party which participates in the everyday struggles of the workers.”251 The majority
responded by claiming Ruthenberg and the minority sought “contact with the masses,” and
would sacrifice “principles and tactics” in order to get it. “Contact with the masses” was
250
Draper, The Roots, 212-214. 251
C.E. Ruthenberg, quoted in Draper, The Roots, 215-216.
128
undesirable to the majority, which believed the masses would “clog and hamper the
revolutionary effectiveness” of the Party, refuse to accept the use of force as necessary in the
revolutionary moment, and through “sheer weight of numbers” gradually water down the
Communist program, and transform the Party into nothing more than another social-patriotic
Socialist Party.252 Here is the great disconnect between the English-speaking minority of the
CPA and the federation majority: one desired a Party of broad-based support, the other desired
uniform principles and sectarian isolation to ensure dogmatic purity. The Ruthenberg group
saw in wide appeal to the masses a Party that could reach the American working class, and
guide the masses at the revolutionary moment. The majority, on the other hand, strove to
create a conspiratorial revolutionary vanguard, along the Bolshevik model, and had little use for
the ideologically ignorant American masses. The two could no longer coexist.
The next day, on January 21, Ruthenberg made unity overtures to the CLP, which
responded by stating “our subcommittee stands ready to meet a like committee from your
faction to begin negotiation.” 253 John Reed sent terms to the Ruthenberg group. Both parties
were to designate three delegates each to sit on the Bureau of Unity, whose job it was to
organize a unity convention. The basis of representation was similar for both parties, and the
total number of delegates decided upon by basis of each parties’ membership figures as of
January 1, 1920. The name of the Party created at the convention was to be the United
Communist Party (UCP). A significant portion of the terms of unity dealt with a restructuring of
the federation system within the larger organizational framework, along a model similar to that
252
Author Unknown, quoted in Draper, The Roots, 216. 253
“Letter to C.E. Ruthenberg, January 26, 1920,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 1, Folio 23, 18. Microfilm.
129
of the CLP. Restructuring barred the federations from “any independent legislative or
administrative functions,” expelling or suspending federation branches, or issuing literature or
propaganda without the approval of the Central Executive Committee. Additionally,
membership dues were paid into the Party treasury through local and state Party organizations,
as opposed to being paid to federation branches directly. Finally, any federation member
deemed “capable of taking part in the English-speaking movement” could be drafted into
English-speaking branches by the CEC.254 The new UCP made it known from the beginning: the
combined organization sought a centralized Party structure under the control of the English-
speaking leadership in the CEC, and wished to limit the autonomy of the Language Federations
that proved to be a considerable obstacle in the unity of the Communist Party of America, and
in large part the reason for the Ruthenberg group defection from that Party. The Party retained
the federations, however they would be limited to only propaganda work among non-English-
speaking Party members and their communities.255 Ruthenberg and his allies, having never had
the widespread support of the Language Federations in the CPA, found these terms agreeable.
The majority of the foreign-born Communists, meanwhile, remained in the old CPA. These new
terms thus had no impact on their federations, which remained affiliated in the remnants of the
CPA. However, the terms made it known that any future CPA amalgamation with the new UCP
would mean a drastic curtailing of federation autonomy.
On May 25, 1920, thirty-two delegates representing the Ruthenberg Minority faction
and twenty-five delegates representing the CLP met in Bridgman, Michigan. Following seven
254
“Agreement for the Unification of the American Communist Party and the American Communist Labor Party,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 1, Folio 22, 1-2. Microfilm. 255
“Protocol: Unity Communist Labor Party with Communist Party,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 1, Folio 22, 8. Microfilm.
130
days of debate and discussion, the two groups left the convention as one, consolidated into the
United Communist Party. Unity was not achieved easily, however. There were disputes
regarding the new Party’s program, specifically on the points regarding the use of force, dual
unionism, political action, and the organization of the Central Executive Committee. Both
factions reached compromises satisfactory to all; they agreed upon the use of force as a
necessary tactic, upheld dual unionism, and encouraged Communists within the “reactionary”
AFL to pronounce hostility to the organization at every opportunity. They agreed that the IWW
was “the obvious medium for giving the advocacy of industrial unionism affirmative
character.”256 The factions found political action acceptable within only legislative, not
executive, political offices, and only then as a means of propagandizing within the system. The
greatest point of contention centered around the makeup of the CEC; the Ruthenberg faction,
with 32 delegates to the CLP’s 25, would carry the elections to the Executive Committee
handily. The factions decided upon a compromise of five CEC members from each faction on a
committee of ten. Unity was achieved, but only barely.
The CPA, which after the departure of Ruthenberg, Ferguson, and Lovestone had a CEC
composed primarily of Language Federationists, including Hourwich and Tyverovsky, remained
an independent organization until May, 1921. For almost a year exactly, the CPA leadership
maligned and disparaged the leadership of the UCP. The CPA leadership characterized the UCP
as “pink,” “bourgeois,” and “centrist,” and claimed that the Party was led by “adventurers and
charlatans.”257 Its platform and program were completely unacceptable. It contained the
phrase “soviet rule under a working-class dictatorship,” which demonstrated to the CPA leaders
256
Draper, The Roots, 219-220. 257
Unknown, quoted in Oneal, American Communism, 91-92.
131
the lack of understanding of Bolshevism within the upper ranks of the UCP, since, as any true
Communist would have known, and the CPA leaders certainly believed, however erroneously,
the Soviet system of government is itself a form of proletarian dictatorship. They found the
UCP’s commitment to force inadequate. One CPA critic wrote “the UCP considers the use of
force a purely defensive measure- not as an offensive measure for which the Communists must
consciously prepare.”258 The CPA leaders found the UCP suspect in not addressing the question
of an underground organization, an omission which to the same critic “confirms the suspicion
that the UCP may eventually give up any pretension of being an illegal underground Party. How
can any real Communist organization unite with an organization guilty of such evasions?”259 The
CPA used these doctrinal issues as justification to reject any notion of uniting with the UCP; as a
resolution at the Second Convention of the CPA in July, 1920, stated “Communist Unity is based
upon the organic unity of principles and tactics. Communist unity means unity with the rank
and file…not with leaders.”260 In defiance of the Comintern instructions, the leadership of the
CPA did not seek unity with the UCP, which it regarded as centrist. The CPA encouraged its
membership, however, to join the CPA on the basis of its program, tactics, and principles. The
CPA aimed to separate the rank and file membership from the UCP leadership through its
slanderous campaign.
The Comintern intervened again, at the Second Congress of the Third International, in
July, 1920. Louis Fraina and Alexander Stoklitsky represented the CPA as international
258
Unknown, quoted in Oneal, American Communism, 91-92. 259
Ibid. 260
“Motions and Resolutions Adopted at the 2nd
Convention of the Communist Party of America: New York, July 13-18, 1920,” in Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/1920/0718-cpa-convresolutions.pdf (accessed May 1, 2012). Typescripts in Comintern Archives, RGASPI, f. 515, op. 1, d. 30, ll. 12-15.
132
delegates. John Reed and Alexander Bilan, who had been en route to Russia during the run up
to the Unity Convention which resulted in the UCP, believed themselves to be representing the
CLP; in actuality, that Party no longer existed. In order to appease the Comintern in its demand
for Communist unity in America, the delegates decided to work in conjunction as one
delegation. However, when the Congress opened on July 17, a fifth delegate, Edward Lindgren,
arrived claiming to represent the UCP. He demanded that Fraina and Stoklitsky be barred from
participating in the congress, claiming that the majority of the CPA had gone into the UCP at the
unity convention. Lindgren stated that 30,000 CPA members had gone with the Rutheberg
minority into UCP, an inaccurate figure that was far too large; however, no one at the Congress
was in a position to challenge the number, owing to ignorance of events in the United States
and the slow rate of correspondence.261 The Comintern refused his demands. However, the
event demonstrated to the Comintern officials that Communist unity in America was far from
achieved. Zinoviev and the EC of the Communist International set a deadline of October 10,
1920, by which time the two parties would have to be united as one. Failure would result in the
expulsion of both parties from the Comintern. Fortuitously, Nicholas Hourwich arrived in
Moscow, and he requested a delay. The Comintern thus took additional time to set out a
definite program for unity between the UCP and the CPA.
The proposed plan presented a problem. Both parties found a new program agreeable,
as the new program was based upon the twenty-one conditions of admission to the Communist
International put forth during the Second Congress. The issue arose over the basis of
representation at the future unity congress. The Comintern dictated that representation was to
261
Draper, The Roots, 267.
133
be decided upon based on dues payments for the months of July through October, 1920. This
was problematical to the UCP, as the CPA claimed 9000 dues paying members for that period of
time to the UCP’s 4000. The UCP accused the CPA of embellishing its membership numbers;
one internal memo of the UCP to its membership notes that the CPA membership figures for
the Lithuanian Federation showed 1400 dues paying members during the July to October time
period, a figure which “suddenly jumped” to 2700 for the same period after the unity program
presented to the parties by the Comintern at the Second Congress. The UCP noted a similar rise
in the Russian Federation, from a membership of 1400 t0 2500.262 The CPA suggested that the
dues stamps collected for each month did not accurately reflect the total number of members,
and in fact there were more members within the Party for the July to October time period than
the dues stamps collected would indicate, as “in a membership composed almost exclusively of
workers, dues are not always promptly paid for the current months. Some comrades are behind
one, two, or three months as the state of their finances and conditions of their particular
industry permit.”263 The UCP accused the CPA of manipulating membership numbers, while
suggesting their own figures were entirely accurate, and put forth a program of equal
representation at the unity convention. The CPA responded with similar accusations and
assurances, and demanded a majority of delegates by Right. The issue was of the utmost
importance as representatives at the coming unity conference, which by Comintern deadline
had to occur before January 1, 1921, were to be allotted based on total membership. At stake
was the control of the unity convention, and which side would wield the majority of delegates
262
“Unity Bulletin No. 2 to the Members of the UCP,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 2, Folio 28, 23. Microfilm. 263
“Third Statement on the Unity Proceedings” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 2, Folio 33, 72. Microfilm.
134
and thus control the proceedings. The same two groups, English-speaking leaders of the UCP
and Language Federation leaders of CPA, were still at odds, and the old question of which
faction would lead the Communist movement left the two parties divided still.
The January 1, 1921 deadline came and went. The two parties did not reach an
agreement. Unity negotiations had only intensified adversarial feelings between the two Party
leaderships. Again, the Comintern intervened. The Comintern established a special committee
of three, the “American Agency,” composed of Charles E. Scott representing the UCP, Fraina
representing the CPA, and Sen Katayama, chairman and Comintern representative.264 The
Comintern tasked the American Agency with imposing unity on the two warring American
Communist organizations. On April 2, 1921 the agency sent instructions to the UCP and CPA:
unite by June 1, 1921, or “the whole movement will be reorganized without regard to the
existing parties.”265
With little choice, the two Communist parties in the United States begrudgingly worked
toward a new unity convention. The new Party would be named The Communist Party of
America, Section of the Communist International.266 The terms permitted both the UCP and the
CPA thirty delegates each. Both sides continued to antagonize one another up to the final days
before the Joint Unity Convention, which began on May 15, 1921, near Woodstock, New
York.267 The two parties easily agreed upon the new program. Consent was unanimous on this
issue; after all, the program necessarily needed to reflect the provisions of affiliation to the
Comintern laid down at the Second Congress of the Third International. For two weeks, the two
264
Draper, The Roots, 269. 265
Quoted in Howe and Coser, The American Communist Party, 72. 266
This Party is sometimes referred to by historians as the unified CPA and will hereafter be referred to likewise for the sake of clarity. 267
Howe and Coser, The American Communist Party, 72.
135
parties’ representatives debated over the constitution and the organizational structure of the
new combined Party. Again, the struggle for control manifested itself, split evenly along Party
lines, and was reflected in the debates over how many members should constitute the CEC and
what role the Language Federations should play.268 These issues deadlocked the proceedings,
and without resolution no constitution could be adopted. Finally, fearing that negotiations
would break down completely and end the convention with no unity achieved, cooler heads
prevailed, led by an “unidentified” Comintern representative sent to overseer the unity
convention.269 The Comintern delegate suggested the delegates from both parties form two
separate caucuses which could more effectively negotiate through smaller committees. These
small committees representing both factions reached two compromises. The Language
Federations would continue to exist and operate for the purpose of organizing foreign-born
workers. However, their autonomy was severely limited; they were now “knitted…together
inseparably with the regular English-speaking organization.” The federations would no longer
“discipline and tax” their membership, and membership dues went directly to the central
organization rather than channeled through the federation branch offices. The result was one
centralized structure for the entire Party, with “full power resting in the hands of the Central
Executive Committee.”270
The issue of federation autonomy was the primary stumbling block to Communist unity
from the inception of both Communist organizations in 1919. The federations were the bulwark
of the Foreign-born leadership, and the source of their power and influence. Why, then, did the
268
Draper, The Roots, 271. 269
Ibid. 270
J. Carr, “Report of the Communist Party of America to the Executive Committee of the Comintern,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 2, Folio 39, 239. Microfilm.
136
federation leaders at the Woodstock Unity Convention of 1921 surrender this autonomy, and
with it their source of authority within the American movement? One possibility is that the
leaders recognized the absolute necessity of achieving unity at any cost; after all, the Comintern
Executive Committee had demanded unity or else. Had unity not been achieved, the Comintern
may have made good on its threat to “reorganize the whole movement without regard to
existing parties.” Faced with a forced exile from the American Communist movement that they
had helped create, they perhaps decided to retreat from the issue of autonomy and retain at
least some measure of authority within the new Party. They indeed retained some authority.
The other issue that prevented adoption of a constitution was the makeup of the new
CEC of the unified Party. Nine members were supposed to be elected to this body. The CEC
member elections split along Party lines as well. Four were elected by the thirty delegates of
the CPA, another four by the thirty delegates of the UCP. The decisive ninth member, who
would break the deadlock in any tie vote and give control of the united Party to one of the
former factions, could not be decided on. Both parties nominated “impartial” comrades to the
post, and again both delegations voted on Party lines, thirty to thirty.271 The convention
reached a compromise here, as well. Since the election of a ninth CEC member proved difficult,
both ostensibly impartial nominees would be elected, and the CEC enlarged to ten total
members. Charles Dirba, John Ballam (both English-speaking native-born Americans), Joseph
Stilson, J. Wilenkin, and George Ashkenuzi were the five CEC members from the CPA. Stilson
was a prominent member of the Lithuanian Federation, while Wilenkin and Ashkenuzi were
both rising stars in the Russian Federation. Oscar Tyverovsky, meanwhile, represented the CPA
271
Draper, The Roots, 271-272.
137
faction as one of two international delegates.272 Though abdicating federation autonomy, the
federation leaders had managed to secure important positions in the top echelon of the unified
Party. Their influence was perhaps reduced, but they were not entirely marginalized from the
American movement. And, after more than two years, that movement was finally unified in one
Communist organization.
The unified CPA constitution resulted in the centralized Party that the CLP and UCP had
desired. The program was reflective of the guidelines issued from Moscow at the Second
Congress of the Comintern. Dual-unionism was cast aside: the program stated that “the
Communist Party condemns the policy of the most advanced revolutionary elements leaving
the existing unions. On the contrary, they must remain within the large mass of organized
workers. The Communist must take an active and leading part in the everyday struggles of the
unions” and “against the social-patriotic and reactionary leaders.”273 The program also provided
for parliamentary action by the Party. It stated that the unified CPA “recognizes that the
revolutionary proletariat must use all means of propaganda and agitation to win over the
exploited masses…one of these means is the bourgeois parliament.”274 The Party no longer
shied away from participation within the U.S. government, although limited activity to using
“the parliament as a platform,” through the proposal of “demonstrative measures, not for the
purpose of having them passed by the bourgeois majority but for the purpose of propaganda,
272
See Davenport, ed., Early American Marxism, http://marxisthistory.org/subject/usa/eam/cpaofficials.html for listing of Communist officials and their posts in the various iterations of the Communist Parties. 273
“Program of the Communist Party of America,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 3, Folio 49, 10. Microfilm. 274
Ibid.
138
agitation, and organization.”275 However, as the political climate of the United States had
forced the Communists underground, the unified CPA existed as an illegal organization. The
unified CPA was thus prevented from participating in elections under its own name. The
program notes that the Party “must organize the necessary legal machinery” to participate in
local, state, and national elections. The creation of a legal Party parallel to the underground
unified CPA was precisely what the Comintern was preparing to demand of the American
Communists.
The edict came at the Third Congress of the Third International, which opened two
months after the conclusion of the unity convention. Four international delegates of the unified
CPA, Max Bedacht and Robert Minor, both former UCP members, and Nicholas Hourwich and
Oscar Tyverovsky, both Russian Federation leaders and former members of the old CPA,
attended the Third Congress, held from June 22 to July 12, 1921. This congress, in contrast to
the first and second, was framed against the assumption that general European revolution was
indefinitely delayed, due to what Trotsky regarded as the “undeniable consolidation” of the
European bourgeoisie and “its state apparatus.”276 No incident further demonstrated this in the
minds of the Soviet leaders than abortive Ruhr uprising in March 1921 by German Communists.
Revolution could not be expected in the immediate future. Comintern guidelines to the
Communist Parties of the world were therefore situated in terms of more practical work: put
aside aspirations of immediate revolution and go to work winning over the working class.277 The
275
“Program of the Communist Party of America,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 3, Folio 49, 8-9. Microfilm. 276
Leon Trotsky, quoted in Howe and Coser, The American Communist Party, 88. 277
“At the present moment the most important task of the Communist International is to win a dominant influence over the majority of the working class and involve the more active workers in direct struggle.” See
139
Russian leaders Lenin, Radek, Bukharin, Trotsky, and Zinoviev directed similar instructions to
the Americans directly: they stated that the American Communists “are still before the first and
simplest task of creating a Communist nucleus and connecting it with the working masses.”278
To do so, they were told to “try by all ways and means to get out of their illegalized condition
into the open among the wide masses.”279 Robert Minor, in a speech to the Congress, accepted
the chastisement, although he vocalized his reservations and stated that any legal organization
would need to remain subordinate to the underground unified CPA. Hourwich and Tyverovsky,
too, had reservations.280 Lenin decided to intervene directly, and toward the end of the third
congress he met with the American delegates in his office in the Kremlin.
In the meeting, Lenin reiterated the need for the American movement to build a mass
Communist Party. Tyverovsky and Hourwich brought to bear their old argument against a mass
Party, which they had leveled at the CLP just two years earlier: the workers of the United
States, they argued, were too backward politically. Bringing the masses into the Party would
corrupt the ideological purity of the organization, and dilute the program and platform of the
Party, more easily than the Communists could convert the masses.281 Lenin swiftly dismissed
this argument. He remarked that it was “very foolish.” He produced an American printing of
Bukharin’s The Communist Program, and asked if it had been printed illegally. The delegates
responded that it had been printed legally, by a regular printer, to which Lenin replied that if
Marxist Internet Archive, http://marxists.org/history/international/comintern/3rd-congress/tactics.htm (accessed May 2, 2012). 278
“Make it a Party of Action: A Declaration of the Central Executive Committee to the Membership,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 3, Folio 55, 18. Microfilm. 279
Quoted in Draper, The Roots, 277. 280
“To the Central Executive Committee of the CPA,” in CPUSA and Haynes, Files of the Communist Party, Reel 3, Folio 56, 8. Microfilm. 281
Draper, The Roots, 279. Draper cites an interview of Max Bedacht by the author, dated June 1, 1954, wherein Bedacht recalled the specifics of the meeting.
140
such literature could be printed and sold legally in the United States, an underground Party was
not necessary. The Americans departed with the understanding that they would have to create
a legal political Party to reach the masses of American workers. Hourwich, who was unwilling to
budge, and who according to Bedacht had irritated Lenin by constantly interrupting throughout
the meeting, was not permitted to return to the United States. The Third Congress of the
Comintern marks the end of his involvement in the American Communist movement.
Nicholas Hourwich made a stand against a legal Party in Moscow, at the Third Congress
of the Comintern. For his actions, he was severely reprimanded and removed from the
American Communist movement by decree. The position he articulated, however, had
adherents within the unified CPA, and particularly amongst the old Federationists who had
integrated into the Party following the Woodstock unity convention. These die-hards did not
relent on their position, and argued against the creation of a legal Party for the reasons given
by Hourwich. Three men, Charles Dirba, John Ballam, and George Ashkenuzi, all members of the
CEC of the unified CPA and the last an important figure in the Russian Federation, rejected any
legal Party, preferring to remain an underground organization.
The majority of the CEC, which supported the establishment of a legal Party, did not
want to do away with the underground organization; they envisioned a legal Party manipulated
behind the scenes by the underground organization, enabling the Communists to make contact
with the masses as requested without entering fully into the public eye. This was little
consolation to the minority. They believed the masses would only serve to weaken the purity of
the Party. The minority was backed, confusingly enough, by the majority of the membership,
141
some 4,000 members, most of which were foreign-born and within the Language
Federations.282
As preparations for the establishment of the legal Party went forward in the fall of 1921,
the minority acted. Knowing they had the majority of the rank and file behind them, they
demanded a convention of the underground unified CPA to allow the membership to weigh in
on the decision. The majority countered that this was unnecessary; the Comintern had provided
explicit instruction to go ahead with the effort at the Third Congress. Both factions appealed
directly to the EC of the Comintern. On November 2, 1921, the majority of the CEC of the
unified CPA suspended the three dissenters, before an answer was received from the
Comintern. That answer came on November 14, which reiterated that Zinoviev was for the
establishment of a legal Party. Another communique on December 8 addressed the suspension
of Ballam, Dirba, and Ashkenuzi. The EC of the Comintern found the suspended members guilty
of “a serious and intolerable breach of discipline” and conceded that the majority had acted
correctly in ejecting the minority of three from the CEC. The Comintern further provided for
their reinstatement, should they renounce their position and agree to abide by the decision to
form a legal Party.283 The minority, remembered by history as the “Central Caucus,” declared
the decision unsatisfactory, and threatened to split the Party, yet again.
The unified CPA continued ahead. The unified CPA leaders created a legal Party over the
course of December 23 to the 26, 1921. Although the new organization, dubbed The Workers
Party of America (WPA), incorporated several affiliated non-Communist organizations, such as
the Jewish Socialist Federation, the Worker’s Educational Association, and the Workers’
282
Draper, The Roots, 335. 283
Ibid., 340.
142
Council, which had recently split from the SPA, the proceedings were largely controlled by
Communists within an ostensibly independent group, the American Labor Alliance. The
American Labor Alliance accounted for 47 of the delegates at the founding, the Workers’
Council only 13, and the remaining 34 from the other two organizations. Thus, the Communists
from the outset had a majority of the delegates and so directed the founding of the WPA. The
founders tempered the language of the program and constitution of the WPA, as the Party was
to be a legitimate organization with aspirations of electoral political activity, to better reach a
wider audience. Gone was any mention of armed revolution, civil war, or the terminology of the
Bolsheviks such as “soviet” or “dictatorship of the proletariat.” Instead, the WPA program
stated the Party’s purpose was “to educate and organize the working class for the abolition of
capitalism” through “the establishment of the Workers’ Republic.”284 Furthermore, the WPA
was not itself affiliated with the Third International, although its parent organization
underground remained so.285 In November the Comintern had issued a document entitled
“Concerning the Next Tasks of the Communist Party of America.” The language used made it
clear that the WPA was to be a puppet organization of the underground Party: it stated that the
Communists should make certain to “control all the leading organs of the legal Party,” retain “at
least the majority on all important committees,” and that the entire membership of the Party
should join the WPA and therein be “its most active element.”286 In the WPA, the American
Communists created the legal Party requested as a bridge to the American working class. It was,
284
“Program and Constitution of the Workers’ Party of America,” http://ia600202.us.archive.org/16/items/ProgramAndConstitutionWorkersPartyOfAmericaAdoptedAtNational/202300.pdf (accessed May 2, 2012). 12. 285
Bell, Marxian Socialism, 126. 286
“Concerning the Next Tasks of the Communist Party of America,” quoted in Oneal, American Communism, 140.
143
as Alexander Bittelman recalled, a “transmission apparatus between the revolutionary
vanguard of the proletariat and its less conscious and as yet non-revolutionary masses.”287
Party unity was once again threatened when the formation of the WPA went ahead
without the requested underground convention proposed by the Central Caucus. In December,
1921, the total number of members in the unified CPA was estimated at approximately 10,000.
The Central Caucus organized an emergency convention independently in early January, 1922.
Thirty-eight delegates were present, claiming to represent 4,400 unified CPA members. Of
these, ninety percent were also members of the Language Federations, mostly Russians,
Ukrainians, and Lithuanians.288 The emergency convention opted to split from the unified CPA,
but refused to relinquish the title “Communist Party of America.” Once more, there were two
underground Communist parties, both with the same name, and both publishing official organs
titled The Communist. The Central Caucus CPA leveled charges against the WPA reminiscent of
the 1919 factional battles; “compromisers,” “opportunists,” “centrists,” “Mensheviki.”289 They
attacked the WPA program, with its omissions of Bolshevik terminology and lack of violent
rhetoric. The Central Caucus CPA could attack the WPA as a fallacious attempt by the
Americans in the unified CPA to fulfill the Comintern’s wishes; they did not dare to criticize the
demand for a legal Party, only this specific iteration of a legal Party, a perhaps hypocritical
position since it was the establishment of a legal Party that provoked the Central Caucus to bolt
in the first place. Because the Central Caucus faction claimed the majority of the membership,
and thus legitimacy, Ballam was dispatched to Moscow to argue their case before the EC of the
287
Alexander Bittelman, quoted in Draper, The Roots, 343. 288
Benjamin Gitlow, I Confess, 133. 289
Quoted in Draper, The Roots, 354.
144
Comintern. To placate the Russian officials, the Central Caucus then established its own legal
political Party, the United Toilers of America.
The issue of the legal Party was the impetus for the Central Caucus defection from the
unified CPA. In February, 1922, the Central Caucus faction formed just such a legal Party. It is
curious that the Central Caucus faction would orchestrate a split from the unified CPA, taking
with them nearly half the total membership, because they opposed the creation of a legal
political Party and then almost immediately create that which they had found a grievous
offense to the Communist movement. The Central Caucus, led by Ashkenuzi, Ballam, and Dirba,
split from the unified CPA must be seen as one last attempt by the leaders of the old CPA, that
which originated within the Language Federations and for so long was at odds with the native-
born American leadership in the CLP and later UCP, to retain some measure of authority within
the American Communist movement. By splitting the Party, the Central Caucus again rebelled
against the authority of the native-born Americans in the movement, after only eight months of
unity, and attempted to portray themselves as the only authentic Communists remaining in a
Party of “centrists,” adventurers,” and “American Mensheviks.”
Their attempt was doomed to failure. The Comintern did not abide this latest factional
strife within the American movement, and soon after extinguished not only the rebellion of the
Central Caucus, but the entire underground Party itself. The Comintern addressed the latest
split in March, 1922. L.E. Katterfeld and Max Bedacht were present in Moscow to represent the
unified CPA position. John Ballam, one of the original three CEC members suspended, pleaded
the case of the Central Caucus. A Comintern commission of Heinrich Brandler, Matyas Rakosi,
Ottomar Kuusinen, Boris Souvarine, and Boris Reinstein arbitrated the dispute. None of the
145
commission members were sympathetic to Ballam’s argument, despite his claim that the
Central Caucus represented the majority of American Communists. Ballam later recorded “they
care nothing for majorities. They will support a minority who will carry out their policies against
a majority that is opposed to them…They say, ‘You report 5,000 comrades in America, whose
comrades are they? Dirba’s, Ballam’s, and Ashkenuzi’s? Or are they Lenin’s, Trotsky’s and
Bukharin’s? You must obey the discipline first.’”290 Here, in no uncertain terms, the commission
ruled that conformity to the wishes of the International took precedence over the democratic
whims of the Party membership. The ruling was an early demonstration, but by no means the
last, that the Comintern would dictate to the American Party. The Central Caucus, inheritors of
the old CPA legacy of “true Bolshevism” within the American Party, were operating under an
outdated model. The Comintern demanded unity, contact with the masses, and a legal political
Party, not the small, isolated, ideologically pure revolutionary vanguard Party that the
federations had always believed themselves to be. The “American Bolsheviks” of the
federations were now “too Bolshevik,” too sectarian and conspiratorial, for the original
Bolsheviks. The commission ruled in favor of the unified CPA and WPA. The Comintern
instructed the Central Caucus to reintegrate into the unified CPA within two months, and for
doing so would recover full membership rights. Any who did not comply within the two months
allotted would “stand outside of the CPA and therefore also out of the Comintern.”291 Ballam
relented, and signed a document promising to carry out the decisions of the Comintern
committee. Upon his return to the United States he toured extensively, agitating amongst the
290
John Ballam, quoted in Draper, The Roots, 356. Dirba, Ballam, and Ashkenuzi are referred to by the pseudonyms Dobin, Moore, and Henry in the original. 291
Quoted in Draper, The Roots, 357.
146
membership of the Central Caucus CPA to rejoin the unified CPA. Some did, including Ballam
and Dirba, and the remaining leaders formally liquidated the Central Caucus CPA on September
30, 1922. It is unknown if Ashkenuzi returned to the unified CPA. What is certain, however, is
that he did not regain his position among the CEC of the Party. The last Federationist of the old
CPA bent was politically irrelevant.
So, too, became the federations themselves. Although the CPA membership continued
to remain primarily foreign-born throughout the 1920s, the federations as subunits of the Party
had finally and irrevocably been wrangled into line, no longer autonomous in action but
subjugated to the centralized structure of the Party. The CPA leaders liquidated the
underground Party, itself, and its components merged with the WPA, following yet another
intense and protracted factional battle. This last dispute was only solved by Comintern
intervention at the Fourth Congress of the Third International in November, 1922, when Trotsky
ruled in favor of the liquidation of the underground apparatus. American Communists turned a
page at that congress: the Comintern instructed them to throw all of their support into the legal
WPA, to work in conjunction with other organizations in the establishment of a Labor Party, an
early attempt at implementation of united front tactics. The Party adopted these measures so
that the American Communists would finally make progress toward reaching the American
masses. Comintern instructions to the American delegates acknowledged the foreign-born in
the American Communist movement and their contributions, stating “the immigrants, including
Communists, who have migrated to America from Europe, play an important part in the
American Labor movement…the Communist immigrants have brought many virtues with them
to America, self-sacrifice, revolutionary courage, etc…however, their greatest weakness lies in
147
the fact that they desire to apply the experience they have acquired in the various countries of
Europe, mechanically to American conditions.”292 The congress laid out a new strategy for the
WPA, for which “the most important task is to arouse the American-born workers out of their
lethargy.”293 The American movement, which had now eradicated the influence of the
Language Federations within the Party power hierarchy, and whose top leadership now
consisted almost entirely of native-born Americans and English-speaking, integrated European
immigrants, now sought to finally create an American Party led by Americans that represented
the American working class.
At the Fourth congress of the Communist International, the Comintern leaders
reinforced the need for united front tactics among the Communist parties of the world. The
revolutionary wave that followed the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia by 1922 had faded. Where
Communist revolts were successful, it was only temporary. German Communists attempted
several revolutions, but were unsuccessful in their endeavors. On December 5, 1922, the
Comintern issued new theses on Comintern tactics. The Comintern noted that the proletariat
had failed to “deal capitalism a decisive blow” in the period of economic turmoil caused by the
First World War. The bourgeoisie, in conjunction with Social Democrats, successfully repressed
the revolutionary elements of the working class in that period, shored their economic and
political power, and launched “a new offensive against the proletariat.” In their offensive,
capital in all nations was “mercilessly lowering the wages of the worker,” “lengthening the work
day,” and “curtailing the modest rights of the working class.” In light of these developments,
the Comintern instructed Communists of the world to implement united front tactics, and to
292
Quoted in Draper, The Roots, 386. 293
Ibid.
148
join in a common struggle with all workers, regardless of political affiliation, to defend the
immediate, basic interests of the working class against capital. American Communists would
have to build bridges to the average American worker to fully implement this strategy. To do so,
the American Communist movement needed native-born, English-speaking leadership, and a
legal political Party from which to work. Having rid the Party of the last of the old foreign-born
Federationist leaders, and realized a legal Party in the WPA, American Communists were poised
to fulfill the Comintern directives issued at the Fourth congress.
The federations remained within the Party structure until 1925, when the Comintern
instructed the CPA to engage in a “Bolshevization” campaign. This undertaking transformed the
structure of the Party from a federated organization based on geographical or national-ethnic
subunits into one based around “shop nuclei” at the lowest level. This meant that the Party was
no longer composed of affiliated language federations or locals, as was the organizational
model inherited from the pre-war SPA. After 1925, members belonged to the shop nucleus of
their respective workplaces, which responded to their “section” of their respective cities.
Sections reported to “subdistricts” which represented multiple cities, and which answered to
district organizations covering one or more states. District organizations were firmly under the
control of the central offices of the Party, and thus the Party leadership. After the
Bolshevization campaign of 1925, the CPA’s organizational structure was radically different,
resulting in both a more rigidly centralized Party hierarchy and marking the end of semi-
autonomous Language Federations.
Free of foreign-born influence on the Party membership, the American Communist
movement reached a zenith of influence in the 1930s. The Bolshevization campaign of 1925
149
resulted in a loss of membership for the CPA from approximately 16,325 in early 1925 (before
the campaign began) to a mere 7,213 in October, 1925, after the restructuring process was well
underway.294 Historian Harvey KIehr surmises that the vast majority of membership losses
came from the federations. Klehr suggests that federation members had little incentive to
rejoin the CPA as individual members after the dissolution of the federations, which put an end
to the “social and fraternal functions” of those organizations. Instead of rejoining the CPA, they
remained “hall socialists,” congregating on the weekends but essentially no longer actively
involved in the Communist Movement.295
In 1930, the Party again reached 10,000 members. In 1938 the CPA recorded almost
55,000 members. The onset of the depression in 1929 provided the CPA the opportunity to
reach large numbers of unemployed native-born Americans. The Communists found a receptive
audience. Changes in Comintern policy in the 1930s, such as the implementation of popular
front tactics, also allowed the CPA to present a more amenable image to native-born American
workers. Finally, restrictions on immigration enacted in the 1920s meant fewer foreign-born
immigrants were available to enter into the CPA. Thus over the course of the 1930s, the
proportion of foreign-born to native-born Communists in the CPA changed. Whereas in 1930
foreign-born membership accounted for over seventy percent of CPA, by 1935 foreign-born
Communists made up only fifty percent of total Party membership. In 1936, the CPA for the first
time in its seventeen year history claimed more native-born Americans within its ranks than
foreign-born. The Comintern decree laid down a decade previously at the Fourth Congress of
294
Klehr and John Earl Haynes, The American Communist Movement, 54. 295
Klehr, Communist Cadre, 22.
150
the Third International was realized: the CPA in 1936 could claim to be a legitimate
representative of the American working class and a credible force in American politics.
151
VIII. CONCLUSION
At the Fourth Congress of the Communist International in November, 1922, the Soviet
leaders assessed the role of immigrants in the American Communist movement. They stated
that the foreign-born members of the Party had demonstrated “self-sacrifice” and
“revolutionary courage” in their contributions to the movement. However, the assessment
concluded that their failings lay in endeavoring to apply their revolutionary experience
garnered in the countries of their origin to their new home, where conditions were entirely
different, and thus required entirely different tactics and strategies.
This assessment is accurate; however, it is also unfair to some extent. Russian
immigrants in the United States, as we have seen, attempted to transpose their conception of
Bolshevik methods, which had achieved such astounding success in an autocratic state ravaged
by war, with a tradition of revolutionary Marxist activity, to a democratic republic, economically
bolstered by war, with little tradition of revolutionary Marxist activity and a largely reform-
minded American working class. When examined from this angle, the belief that Bolshevism
was applicable to the post-war United States seems ludicrous. However, the Russians in the Left
Wing of the United States Socialist movement of 1918 and 1919 did not appraise the political
situation of the United States through that lens. Rather, they believed, as did their native-born
comrades and Lenin, himself, at the time, that worldwide revolution was imminent; the spark
had come from their homeland, but would soon spread through Germany, Western Europe,
and eventually across the Atlantic to the United States. For these men who so fervently
believed in this inevitability, they only had to organize themselves as the Bolshevik Party had
done. Their relative weakness and small membership, and isolation from mainstream American
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politics were not disadvantages, they were virtues. By organizing as a rigid, small, ideologically
pure sect, they only need await the swelling of the revolutionary tide. When it came, they
would be poised to lead it as the vanguard Party they envisioned themselves to be. Native-born
Americans in the Left Wing believed the Russian immigrants pompous for this stance, and
accused men such as Hourwich, Stoklitsky, and Tyverovsky of stylizing themselves
revolutionaries merely because they happened to hail from the same country that Lenin and his
cadre transformed. This, too, is unfair. Their experience in the Russian Labor movement prior to
emigrating, their familiarity with revolutionary Marxism and European Socialist developments,
their direct access, for a brief period of time, to Bolsheviks and Russian Socialists like Alexandra
Kollontai, Nikolai Bukharin, and Leon Trotsky, and the propagation of these Russian émigrés’
writings and theories in Novy Mir, an organ only they could understand, all of these things
provided Russian immigrants in the American Left Wing with an understanding of Bolshevism
that was partially inaccessible to native-born American Socialists. Complete devotion to the
abstract principles that these resources and experiences imbued them with was, to the Russian
American Left, the blueprint to proletarian revolution.
The Russian Americans in the Left Wing learned the lesson that dogmatic purity in a
small revolutionary organization would ensure success when the revolution came. The Russian
American Left did not abandon this lesson, and did not change with the times. This reluctance
to change, even when those Bolshevik leaders who provided the model demanded it, ultimately
resulted in the marginalization and elimination of Russian Americans from positions of
influence within the American movement. Content to await the revolutionary moment, the
Russians and other foreign-born in the American Left differentiated themselves from the
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native-born Americans in the movement, by labeling them centrists, or Mensheviks, and in so
doing reinforced their own notions of superiority as “true Bolsheviks.” The Left Wing Council
plan to take the SPA for revolutionary Socialism was deemed “incorrect,” as Lenin had not
sought to take over the Russian Social Democratic Party but instead struck out on his own. So,
too, did the federation leaders, who split from the SPA and immediately formed their own
Communist entity. Amalgamation with the CLP in 1919 was unthinkable; doing so would mean
an alliance with such pretenders, and would corrupt the purity of their faction within the
movement. This would also threaten their own positions of power. The UCP further threatened
their positions of power, as integration into that organization would mean a tightened control
over the Language Federations. The two parties achieved unity only because refusal to unite
meant expulsion from the Comintern and exile from the international Communist community.
Even after unifying with the native-born Americans of the UCP, the Russians split again, this
time over the issue of a mass Party, again demonstrating a preference for a small and
ideologically pure revolutionary nucleus.
In their reluctance to alter their position, the Russian Americans in the American
Communist movement were left behind by the changing times. Nowhere is this more evident
than in the changing demands of the Communist International. The Comintern intervened in
the American movement at crucial junctures, always to further its aims. The Comintern desired
a united Party, then a mass Party, with which the American movement could endeavor to
achieve success in propagandizing to and organizing the American working class. The
Comintern’s instructions always reflected the changes in policy that accompanied new analyses
of the worldwide political situation. The Comintern desired unity of purpose among affiliated
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parties at the Second Congress. The Comintern announced the twenty-one conditions of
affiliation, and American Communists adopted these as the guidelines of their program. The
Comintern demanded unity between the two parties, who, with their backs against the wall,
begrudgingly abided, although even then only barely. When hopes of immediate revolution
throughout Europe dwindled, the Comintern at the Third Congress announced a step back, and
asked that Communists work to win over the masses. Comintern leaders instructed the
American Party to create a legal Party that would provide an organization capable of
participating in parliamentary politics. At the Fourth Congress, Comintern officials reinforced
this notion, and again asked the American Party to increase its work amongst the average
American worker. The Comintern leaders deemed the underground Party no longer necessary,
and tasked the American Communists with liquidating the organization in favor of devoting
themselves to the legal WPA. At every step, the Russian immigrant leaders in the American
Communist movement opposed or argued against the changes in Comintern policies. They only
accepted unity with the UCP by threat of expulsion. At the Third Congress, they opposed “going
to the masses,” arguing that doing so would only result in the tempering of the movement they
had worked to create. Shortly before the Fourth Congress, the Comintern instructed the
Russian leaders in the American movement to renounce their sectarian position and rejoin the
unified Party. By the time the Fourth Congress commenced, the few Russian Federation leaders
who remained were politically irrelevant, and the American movement was something quite
different from that which they had helped build, and looked to a future without their
leadership. At every turn, the Russian American leaders remained obstinately stuck in the past,
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refusing to adapt, while the international, and domestic, Communist movement evolved
around them.
It is fair to say that the Russian Federation leaders were instrumental in the early
factional strife which encompassed so much of early Communist activity in the United States;
indeed, at every factional dispute between 1919 and 1921, the Russian American leadership of
the CPA precipitated or propagated a split. However, it is also fair to say that without the
involvement of Russian Americans such as Nicholas Hourwich, Alexander Stoklitsky, Oscar
Tyverovsky, and George Ashkenuzi, men who were so often vilified by contemporaries and
historians of American Communism for their roles in Communist disharmony in that early
period, there would perhaps have been no American Communist movement, or at least one
very different from that which developed historically.
Russian American Socialists were instrumental in the creation of the organized American
Left Wing which birthed the earliest Communist Parties in the United States. Prior to the rapid
growth of Foreign Language Federations within the SPA from the period 1912 to 1917, the Left
Wing of the American Socialist movement was fractured, scattered, numerically small, and
composed of adherents to a variety of Left Wing ideologies: the Syndicalists of the IWW,
DeLeonists of the Socialist Labor Party, anarchists, and a smattering of Revolutionary Marxists
within the SPA. These disparate ideas and approaches comingled and coexisted within the
greater Left Wing milieu, and at times worked either directly within or simply with the SPA.
Although all agreed in principle on the dismantling of capitalism and restructuring of the United
States’ political system, the individuals within these distinct groups ascribed to different
methods, outlooks, and programs. There was thus no cohesive, organized Left Wing Socialist
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group within the SPA, and so the moderate majority of the Party defeated the Left at every
turn. An increase in Language Federation membership prior to and during the First World War
strengthened the Left Wing numerically. Exposure to first the Zimmerwald Left program, and
later Bolshevism, helped solidify the Left Wing ideologically. This exposure came from a variety
of sources. Two very important such sources were Russian in origin: the speaking tours and
lectures of prominent Russian Socialists such as Alexandra Kollontai, Nikolai Bukharin, and Leon
Trotsky, architects and signatories of the Zimmerwald Left manifesto, who physically crossed
vast distances across the nation to speak to common workers and active Socialists, urban and
rural, European-born and native-born. These Russian émigrés informed the American
movement of the Zimmerwald and Bolshevik programs and principles, and the Russian
Federation organ Novy Mir, which was profoundly influenced and reoriented to the extreme
Left by their editorship and written contributions. Their brief interludes in the U.S. ended in
March, 1917; the Russians within the Russian Federation carried on their work, however. The
articles and editorials of Novy Mir exposed American Socialists to the European Left Wing
tradition and educated them about developments within International Socialism, most
importantly the Bolshevik quest to create a new International Socialist organization. With a
more definite, universal program provided in part by Russians in the United States to rally
around, and a larger membership base to draw upon, the American Left Wing coalesced for the
first time into an organized force within the SPA.
The Russian-Americans within the Language Federations assumed a position of
leadership first amongst the federations, and then within the Communist Party. The growth of
membership within the federations affiliated to the SPA in the second decade of the twentieth
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century turned the tables somewhat. By 1917, immigrants in the Language Federations made
up the majority of the Party, and the vast majority retained a dedication to the Left Wing
Socialist ideas of their respective homelands. Although the moderates within the Party
attempted to curb their influence, by 1917 the federations had successfully achieved voting
rights for federation members, and thus became highly influential within the Party hierarchy.
The Party rank and file attempted to shift the Party program to the left in the intraParty
elections of 1919, resulting in the unconstitutional expulsion of the more radical Language
Federations from the Party in that same year. Expelled, the federations, led by the Russian
Federation leaders who were so thoroughly converted to Bolshevism after the November, 1917
Russian Revolution, then made up the bulk of rank and file membership in the early period of
the Communist movement. Using this influence over the majority of the membership, the
Russian Federation leaders agitated for the creation of a Communist Party in the late summer
of 1919.
Simultaneously, the native-born American Left Wing, in conjunction with more
acculturated immigrant members, founded another Communist Party. Historians and
contemporaries have often pointed to the Russian Federation as the instigator of that first split
of the Left Wing which occurred in the summer of 1919; certainly, the prominent figures of that
federation factored heavily into the succeeding divisions of the American Communist
movement. There is no doubt that Russian dominance among the federations resulted in
animosity between the two Communist entities and their succeeding iterations, which
weakened the greater movement through misallocation of time and resources away from
agitation, propagandizing, and organization. The animosity arose from the differing programs
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and platforms of the two parties, and only increased as the Russian-dominated CPA remained
obstinate in its beliefs even as the E.C. of the Third International demanded program and
constitution reform, which the native-born and English-speaking comrades obeyed.
History remembers the disunity and disharmony that resulted from Russian-American
dominance in the Language Federations of the SPA and CPA. However, there would have been
no organized Left Wing, or at least none so large, to split had it not been for the efforts of
Russian Americans to educate and organize American Socialists according to the Left Wing
programs of the Zimmerwaldists and Bolsheviks. Contemporaries and the historians who have
since cited them write of the arrogance of Hourwich, Stoklitsky, and others, and assign blame to
them for the strife that characterized the first years of the American Communist movement.
This reputation is perhaps undeserved; historians have given little recognition to these men in
their efforts to organize and shape the American Socialist movement into an active component
of an international Communist movement that, to them, would also better American society.
Although Russians in the American Left Wing did much to divide the American Communist
movement in the first years of its existence, their positive contributions to the growth and
development of an organized Left Wing during the First World War must be better documented
and understood in the history of American Communism.
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