Bay State "Blue" Laws and Bimba; a Documentary Study of the Anthony

Bay State

"Blue" Laws and Bimba

By Wiinam Wolfcovich

FORUM PRESS OF BROCKTON and 1 VILLAGE OFFSET OF SANDWICH, MASS. $5.95

(Plus 35c postage and mailing unless prepaid. Mass. residents 18c sales tax in addition.)

"... a book of extraordinary interest."

"His (Anthony Bimba's)

trial. . . created a sensation."

"It is about . . . two counts of blasphemy and sedition. Both counts have a common element of freedom of speech which makes the trial, and this book relevant today."

"Facts are of prime interest in the Sacco- Vanzetti case, principles are of prime interest in the Bimba case."

"... the book is well researched and doc-

umented, and is eminently readable."

(Excerpts from the Foreward by Rev. William J. Kenealy,

S. J., Professor and Dean Emeritus of Boston College Law School.) BOSTOISI PUBLIC LIBRARY

BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA Note About the Title: The word "blue" is used here to mean "seldom or rarely invoked" as applied to many statutes. The author's intention is to prescind from the inherent merits of the laws themselves. Bay State 'Blue Laws and Bimba

A Documentary Study of the ANTHONY BIMBA TRIAL for Blasphemy and Sedition in Brockton, Massachusetts, 1926

by William Wolkovich

Jacket by JULIAN S. ALEXANDER,

Director of Art, Milton Schools, Milton, Massachusetts

Library of Congress Catalogue Card No. 73-87571

Copies of this book available from WOL-PEL DISTRIBUTORS P.O. Box 2022 BROCKTON, MA 02403

Copy—$5.95; postage free if prepaid; otherwise, please add 35

dents kindly add 18

Printed by The Colonial Press Inc. Clinton, Massachusetts

30STnM PHRI in LIBRARY DEDICATION

This book is happily dedicated to Attorney Paul F. Shaughnessy in remembrance of his many kindnesses to my family.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many thanks to Rev. William J. Kenealy, S J., former dean of Boston College Law School for his careful inspection of this text and for the contribution of the Foreword.

In the compilation of material, it was a joyful experience of mine to profit from the splendid and venerable library tradition of helpfulness to researchers. Prompt cooperation was shown to me in my travels to the Firestone Library, Princeton University; the libraries of Boston, Worcester, and the Brockton Library where

Melvina O'Connor was most eager to assist. I am indebted also to Patricia Farina at the Clerk's Office in Plymouth Superior Court, and especially to David E. Stevens, Clerk of the Plymouth District Court in Brockton. Further thanks are due to Rt. Rev. Francis P. Juras for the unlimited use of his ALKA archives at Putnam, Connecticut; to Jackus Sonda of Keleivis for his welcome help, and to Mrs. John H. Quebman (Adelaide King) for her comments and for the loan of invaluable newspaper clippings.

Especially I value the interviews granted by the survivors of the trial, the principals themselves: defendant Anthony Bimba, defense counsel Harry Hoffman, and prosecuting attorney L Manuel Rubin. Mr. Bimba's memoirs were especially useful as background material. My gratitude likewise must be expressed to historians Simas

Suziedelis and Nancy Carrigg whom I consulted freely. Also thanks to Denise Brouthers for typing this manuscript.

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

This documentary account of the Bimba trial is from the pen of William Wolkovich, a free-lance writer born in Hudson, Massachu- setts in 1929, ordained a Roman Catholic priest in 1953. He has written some thirty articles for various Catholic and secular publications on a variety of topics including medical-moral questions. In addition, he has given intermittent attention to topics relating to his Lithuanian background especially as a contributor to the Encyclopedia

Lituanica. Father Wolkovich 's more important books and articles are:

1 Norms of Conduct for Pharmacists, Norms for Pharmacists, Hudson, Mass., 1962, pp. 160. 2. From the Nemunas to the Assabet, Hudson, Mass., 1966, pp. 96 (a history of the Lithuanians and Lithuanian-Americans of Hudson). 3. "Professional Ethics in Focus," Proceedings of Annual Meeting, 1961, National Association of Boards of Pharmacy and American Associa- tion of Colleges of Pharmacy, District One.

4. "Gimimu Kontrole: Naujienos, Pastabos, Isvados" (Birth Control: News Events, Observations, Reflections) Laiskai Lietuviams, March, 1966.

5. "Lithuania and Lithuanians in the New Catholic Encyclopedia,"

Lituanus, fall, 1970. 6. "Medininkai (Varniai), Lithuania—The Rare Instance of a Diocese Established by an Ecumenical Council— 1417," to be published in The Jurist.

FOREWORD

Father William Wolkovich has written a book of extraordinary interest. It is about the trial of Anthony Bimba in Brockton, Massachusetts in 1926. The native Lithuanian, a socialist turned communist, was charged in two counts of blasphemy and sedition. Both counts have a common element of freedom of speech which makes the trial, and this book, relevant today.

Massachusetts disestablished its State Religion in 1833. But in

1 838 Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw upheld the conviction of Abner Kneeland for violating the blasphemy law of 1697. Kneeland was a deist and the founder of the Boston Investigator. His was the only conviction under the 1697 statute in history. Then came Bimba. Anthony Bimba made a speech to an assembly of Lithuanians, chiefly Catholics by tradition, which was allegedly blasphemous and seditious. His trial, coming soon after the celebrated Sacco-Van- zetti case, created a sensation. It was reported in the national news media, including the newspapers of New England, New York, Philadelphia and major cities elsewhere. Facts are of primary interest in the Sacco-Vanzetti case, principles are of prime interest in the Bimba case. Here is a sad tale of a Lithuanian community torn asunder by religious and political strife. The author, a priest of the

Archdiocese of Boston, is expert in the Lithuanian language. As a result, the book is well researched and documented, and is eminently readable. Only a few people linked with this trial have survived, namely: defense counsel Harry Hoffman of Boston, prosecutor

Manuel Rubin of Brockton (both octogenarians still practicing law at this writing), and the defendant himself—Anthony Bimba of Brooklyn, N.Y., all of whom were interviewed by the author. 12 FOREWORD

It is a pleasure to recommend this volume, especially to anyone who wishes to refresh himself on the principles of free speech and free assembly as they were curiously tested and interpreted a half century ago in the district court of Brockton, Massachusetts.

Rev. William J. Kenealy, S.J. Professor and Dean Emeritus, Boston College Law School INTRODUCTION

The third decade of the twentieth century in the United States spawned several legal altercations which provoked national and even international attention. Two such episodes were: the so-called "monkey" trial of John Thomas Stokes in the court of Dayton, Tennessee and the Sacco-Vanzetti case tried in Dedham, Massachu- setts. The first dispute was a deliberate test of a 1925 state ban on teaching the theory of evolution. The other proceeding was the outcome of a robbery and slayings of a paymaster and guard on April 20, 1920.1 Both juridical wrangles were highly charged with emotion, encompassing a cluster of religious, political, ethnic, and social aspects. The two trials with their abundant human-interest fare provoked many fertile pens at the time. Since then, attention has intermittently surfaced in the public eye resulting in several quite lengthy studies of recent date.^

Hitherto unreported in any major study is a companion trial of that same era. National notoriety, too, surrounded the prosecution of Anthony Bimba^ in Plymouth County District Court of Brockton, Massachusetts for the double charge of blasphemy and sedition. The case became a crucible for the issues of free speech, liberty of assembly, the socialist-communist fracture at the national and local level, and a furious dispute of two boisterous ethnic factions in the New England industrial city. Even a touch of European politics was injected into the litigation, namely the contemporary power struggle abroad in Lithuania, Bimba's native land. The Brockton affair was a curious instance in the history of Massachusetts law, exposing a rare, criminal statute dating back to the seventeenth century colonial days, forbidding expression of anti-religious sentiment. The court case against Bimba was also the 14 INTRODUCTION

first application of a contemporary Bay State law of 1919 outlawing seditious utterances.

Knowledge of this trial first came to me about 1950 when I was thumbing through an apologetic handbook of Catholic teaching by David Goldstein. In his chapter on atheism, the author of the manual has a scant one-line remark about the 1926 Bimba trial in Brockton. The name had already been familiar to me from my own ethnic background since Bimba was known as a leading Lithuanian communist in America. One of my assignments as a priest was to the parish of Saint Casimir in Brockton (1955-1957), the community where the Bimba episode occurred. Curious, fleeting thoughts darted across my mind about investigating the subject of this book. Ten years later, on reassignment to the same church (1967-1970), my intention crystal- lized.

One day I was jolted when I picked up a copy of a communist tabloid. The little newspaper described Bimba, now in his twilight years, giving a talk at Laisve (i.e. Liberty) Hall in New York on the topic of the 1969 fall elections of that city.* This zealot was still active, not only by writing, but even by continuing to mount the lecture platform. Apart from his communistic goals and despite them, such energetic devotion in this man provoked my curiosity all the more and pressed me into my inquiry.

In the winter of 1970, I began assembling material for what was meant to be an article. After several months of investigation two things became self-evident. The trial could scarcely be narrated adequately in a mere magazine-length story; also, the legal tale was more than just a candidate as an entry in the "miscellany" section of a law journal. The Bimba trial was layered with legal questions that are quite alive today. Perennial issues of freedom were at stake. What happened in 1926 in the city of Brockton has much to say to the nation a half century later.

Some acquaintances of mine have inquired why I, a Catholic priest, have written the story of a communist's trial. Is this not somehow a strange or inappropriate thing to do? Others have wondered if this book would not be an attack on the defendant, or perhaps the opposite—a vindication of Bimba or an encomium of sorts? Will this endeavor not lend itself as propaganda in opposition to communists or in favor of them? INTRODUCTION 15

The truth is that I am writing neither "for" nor "against"

Anthony Bimba. I deem this presentation as an important segment of American history, more particularly America's history of law. It is erroneous, therefore, to regard this work in the language of hyphenated labels, namely: priest-writer and communist-defendant.

It is no such thing. As a free-lance practitioner, I have dabbled in a variety of topics. The Bimba trial merely happens to be one of these selections. Reviewers and critics are respectfully invited to assess the quality of this monograph as a historical effort, nothing more, nothing less. This story hinges heavily on newspaper accounts and court records. Because of the ethnic and bi-lingual aspects of the case, pertinent sources in the Lithuanian language were consulted to complete the picture. Interviews were conducted with the few survivors connected with the trial, as well as close friends and relatives. It is my hope that I have treated this material objectively, sensitive to the complex of questions enfolded in this courtroom drama.

NOTES

1. Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were accused (and later executed) of killing paymaster F. A. Parmenter and his attendant, Alessandro Berardelli, on Main Street in South Braintree, Massachusetts. 2. Lyon Sprague DeCamp, The Great Monkey Trial, Doubleday, Garden City, N.Y., 1968; Herbert Brutus Ehrmann, The Case That Will Never Die, Little Brown, Boston, 1969; Francis Russell, Tragedy in Dedham, McGraw- Hill, New York, 1971. 3. A pre-World War I immigrant who became a communist writer and lecturer, particularly among his fellow-Lithuanians.

4. Gimtasis Krastas, Nr. 1 (153), Jan. 1, 1970 (a publication intended for nationals outside Lithuania itself).

931

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgments 7 Biographical Note 9 Foreword 1 Introduction 1 Chapter 1 The Bimba Explosion in Brockton 19 Chapter 2 "The" Speech 23 Chapter 3 Bimba's Youth 29 Chapter 4 Bimba: Socialist and Communist 33 Chapter 5 Lively National Hall and Its Adversaries 40 Chapter 6 Protracted Five-Year Sequel 45 Chapter 7 Double Counter-Attack on Eudaco and the Citizens Club 47 Chapter 8 Bimba's Arrest; Protest and Support 51 Chapter 9 The Trial Postponement 58 Chapter 10 Pro-Bimba Assemblies Blocked 62 Chapter 11 Bimba's Interim Pursuits; Eve of the Trial 66 Chapter 12 The Trial Begins 72 Chapter 13 Opening Day Witnesses 79 Chapter 14 Death Threats 86 Chapter 15 Second Day of the Trial 90 Chapter 16 Trial Sidelights 97 Chapter 17 Third Day of the Trial 102 Chapter 18 Final Arguments of Defense and Prosecution 108 Chapter 19 Guilty and Not Guilty; An Appeal 1 14 Chapter 20 Public Response 1 1 Chapter 21 The Bimba Bubble Bursts 126 Epilogue 133 Sources 137

Chapter One

THE BIMBA EXPLOSION IN BROCKTON

Montello, Mass.'

Sausio 5, 1926

Gerb. Pirmininkas ir Nariai L.T.N. Dr-ves,

Amerikos Lietuviy Darbininky Literatures Draugijos 6 kuopa kvecia jumis (sic), kad L.T.N. Draugove prisidetu prie surengimo protesto

pries Lietuvos valdzi^ uz ziauriai terozavim^ ir vartojim^ inkvizicijos irankius kankinimui Lietuvos darbininkus. Protestas yra rengiamas

didelis ir yra uzkvietimai issiusti visoms draugijoms bei kuopams.

Prisiuskite savo tris atstovus. Protesto atstovy susirinkimas [vyks Sausio 26 d. 1926 m. L.T. Name 7 val, vakare. Am. Liet. Darb. Lit. Dr-jos 6-tos kuopos komisija:

K. Venslauskas

J. Kukaitis

J. Zemaitis

Montello, Mass.

January 5, 1926 Dear President and L.T.N. Society Members,

Chapter 6 of the American Lithuanian Workers' Literary Society invites you to join in the preparation of a protest against the Lithuanian

government for its cruel terrorism and use of methods of inquisition

aimed at torturing Lithuanian workers. The protest being arranged is a

large one, and invitations have been sent to all societies and chapters. 20 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Send three of your own delegates. A meeting of the protest delegates will take place January 26, 1926 at the L.T. Hall at 7 p.m. The Amer. Lith. Workers' Literary Society, Chapter 6 committee:

K. Venslauskas

J. Kukaitis

J. Zemaitis

January 26, 1926 was the start of a series of events which infelicitously hurtled Brockton, Massachusetts, the famous *'shoe" city, into the limelight of the nation. The above letter marked "Montello", the northern section of the community, was penned to members of the Lithuanian National Hall (L.T.N,—Lietuviy Tau- tiskas Namas) and its affiliated organizations. The invitation was from a communist-oriented literary group. Alleged blasphemous and seditious remarks were expressed at the planned gathering spoken about in the letter. Itinerant lecturer, Anthony Bimba, on the speakers' platform that winter evening in the hall at North Main and Vine Streets, triggered one of the most colorful episodes in United States history. Brockton swiftly became the target for uncomplimentary barbs from prickly pens of east-coast newsmen. An editor in Worcester

(Massachusetts) lamented that his state "would not relish it if the Bimba affair gave her some of the kind of notoriety achieved by Tennessee through young Mr. Scopes." ^ A reporter for the Interna- tional News Service began his story of the trial with strokes of satire. "The shades of New England's Puritan ancestors rose here today to defend their God against the onslaught of atheism." ^ The New York

H^or/df charged that the moral sense of Brockton required the trial. In one of its few editorial observations, the local Brockton Enterprise defended the city, inviting Gotham newsmen to read the details of the trial and accordingly revise their intimations.'* Later, another New York publication in a post-trial commentary scoldingly shook a finger at its New England neighbors with this lament: "Brockton ^ cannot be particularly proud of what it has done." In the face of such publicity, residents of the community were wishing that a spell of amnesia would settle over the rest of the country to black out this unwanted attention. By the end of the season, the aftermath of this melodrama was recorded dryly and without comment in the "Report of the City Marshall" {i.e. Police Chief) as follows:^ THE BIMBA EXPLOSION IN BROCKTON 21

Adult Cases in Police Court

Male Female Total

Blasphemy 1 1

Inciting, Government, To Overthrow 1 1

Mayor Harold D. Bent in his inaugural address of 1927, w^hile describing the police and their wôrk, remained wôrdless about the trial. It was an incident to be consigned to oblivion. The defendant represented by the numeral one in the city report vâs avârded an honorary degree in history by the University of Vilnius, Lithuania (under Soviet occupation) on December 25, 1962. As a 69-year-old activist of a decade ago, Bimba received the prize for his long career as w^riter, journalist, and lecturer in behalf of communism. As late as the fall of 1969, he was still making appearances for his cause.' In a junket around the country in 1950, the editor predictably managed to stir up demonstrations along the way. He was "almost killed" by a "lynch mob" in Cleveland in mid-March, provoking ire also in Chicago, Brooklyn, Newark, and Los Angeles. In Worcester, he was booked as guest speaker for the thirty-fifth anniversary of the American Lithuanian Workers' Literary Society. There he was met with placards reading: "To Siberia, Bimba, Opposer of Freedom." He needed the arrival of police cruisers to quell the vocal demonstra- tors estimated at 1500.^ A vain attempt was made in 1963 in Brooklyn Federal Court to revoke Bimba's status as a citizen. The action arose from recommen- dations of the 1957 hearings of the House Unamerican Activities Committee. Under questioning of this congressional body, the communist invoked the Fifth Amendment. At the 1963 proceeding, the defendant was accused of concealing information about his Brockton arrest, when being naturalized as a citizen in 1927. Apart from his prolonged stint in Lithuanian circles, Bimba's role on the American scene was unfolded by the government at the Brooklyn investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Peter H. Ruvolo, Jr. disclosed the following about the Brooklyn editor:

1. elected to Central Executive Committee 2. ran for superior court judgeship on communist ticket, 1933 3. was communist party candidate for state senate in 1938.^ 22 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

It was this visiting journalist in the bloom of youth who temporarily soared into the realm of national attention.

NOTES

1. Exhibit 13, case no. 16499, Anthony W. Eudaco, et al. vs. Klement

Navickis et al., Plymouth County Superior Court records. (This writer's translation follows.) 2. Worcester Evening Gazette, County Edition, Feb. 20, 1926, henceforth, simply Gazette; C.E. = County Edition; F.E. = Final Edition. 3. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 24, 1926.

4. Brockton Enterprise, March 2, 1926, henceforth, simply Enterprise.

5. New York Times, March 3, 1926. 6. Extract from City of Brockton Annual Reports, J926, p. 139. 7. See Introduction, note 4. 8. Worcester Telegram, March 27, 1950.

9. ibid., Dec. 18, 1963. Chapter Two

"THE" SPEECH

The protest meeting spoken about in the letter at the head of chapter one was to be enhanced by the presence of the pubhcized journaHst, Anthony Bimba. The sponsors were members of a society founded in

1915 for the publication of socialist writings. In 1919 the society fell under communist direction as did the majority of socialist chapters around the country.' As indicated in the letter, all Lithuanian organizations were welcome to send representatives, placing the rally under multiple auspices. Many of these Baltic immigrants belonged to several groups, and so participated under different titles. Besides the medium of written notices, news of Bimba's coming circulated freely and thoroughly by word of mouth in all the little independent stores of north Brockton. Besides offering products and services, the proprietors played the role of newscasters. Whatever bulletins one missed from the shopkeepers, one was sure to pick up at the shoe factories, many of which dotted the neighborhood. Mention of lecturer Bimba's name would promptly divide any gathering into two camps. To the listener of socialist leanings who had gone over to the communists, Bimba the anti-religionist, was a pro-labor hero. To the opponents who were of socialist stripe remaining loyal to their homeland, and to the churchgoers of the community, he was an enemy. The socialist newspaper of South Boston called Bimba an Apostle of Moscow ("Maskvos Apastalas") and of all the bolsheviks the biggest unwashed mouth ("didziausias nepraustaburnis").^ The publication of Catholic workers characterized him as filthy-mouthed ("slyksciaburnis"), a brainless screamer ("besmeginis reksnelis"), and labelled his utterances as nonsense- sayings ("pliauskalai").^ Through counsel, Bimba described himself as a self-appointed apostle of the downtrodden people of Lithuania.* §

> •So i I

V a a, ^ r o

t <^

8 S

•5 ^

fc .s

O Oi

Qk4 CM "THE" SPEECH 25

In any case, he was already a man of certain reputation, favorable or unfavorable among his ethnic peers, frequently touring their colonies in those pre-television days when an air of novelty attached to his appearance. Wherever he moved about, he managed to attract supporters, the uncommitted (though there were few of these), and the curious from among his adversaries. This particular evening of January 26, 1926 there awaited the unsuspecting speaker a kind of ambush of which Bimba had no knowledge whatsoever.^ It isn't that he necessarily deviated from his customary pattern of topics namely, pro-bolshevik and anti-capitalist pleadings, criticism of the contemporary regime in Lithuania, and ridicule of religion, especially the Roman Catholic Faith to which the majority of Lithuanians adhered. This sort of talk was the common denominator of the fare offered in his visits to Lithuanian communities. But on this occasion, the setting was quite different. Knowing with reasonable accuracy what kind of speech could be expected, and being prepared to ask some provocative questions, an anti-National Hall vanguard found Bimba a somewhat welcome figure for a change. The text of Bimba's address was published that same year in pamphlet form entitled, Lietuvos Respublika ir Jos Ateitis, Laisve, Brooklyn, 1926, pp. 59, with an introduction by R. Mizara. Opponents of Bimba no doubt are skeptical about how accurately this brochure reproduces the actual speech as it was delivered in Brockton. At least some 30 of the approximately 150 listeners in the Hall were out of sympathy with the guest lecturer. In the course of the evening, his every word was well scrutinized. An activist named Anthony Eudaco and his allies in attendance made mental notes, and possibly some written ones as well. The next day, Wednesday, January 27, 1926 Eudaco and a certain Joseph Treinavich went to the Clerk of Court and swore out charges against Bimba. Eudaco authored the sedition charge, while Treinavich pressed the blasphemy issue. Accordingly the clerk, Charles F. King formulated Complaint #78314 for the Common- wealth of Massachusetts against Anthony Bimba. The Brooklyn writer was accused of violating state laws on two counts: Chapter 272, #36 forbidding blasphemous speech, and Chapter 264, #11 interdicting the promotion of anarchy. The blasphemy ban originated in 1641 in the Massachusetts Bay 26 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Colony which decreed that a person "Whether Christian or pagan" "shall be put to death" based on the Old Testament book of Leviticus, 24:15,16. The law was renewed in 1658 under the same severe penalty. By 1697 the punishment was considerably softened to fine and imprisonment.^

Bimba had allegedly breached the law as it had come down from

the end of the seventeenth century. The precise wording is thus:

Whoever wilfully blasphemes the holy name of God by denying, cursing or contumeliously reproaching God, his creation, government or final judgment of the world, or by cursing or contumeliously reproaching Jesus Christ or the Holy Ghost, or by cursing or contumeliously reproaching or exposing to contempt and ridicule, the holy word of God contained in the holy scriptures shall be punished by imprisonment in jail for not more than one year or by a fine of not more than three hundred dollars, and may also be bound to good behavior.'

The sedition matter was a contemporary issue. In 1919 amidst a post-war atmosphere of patriotism and sensitivity to any foreign encroachment from a subversive source, the following statute was produced by the Massachusetts Legislature.

Whoever by speech or by exhibition, distribution or promulgation or any written or printed document, paper or pictorial representation advocates, advises, counsels or incites assault upon any public official, or the killing of any person, or the unlawful destruction of real or personal property, or the overthrow of the commonwealth or of the United States, shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for not more than three years, or in jail for not more than two and a half years, or by a fine of not more than one thousand dollars: provided, that this section shall not be construed as reducing the penalty now imposed

for the violation of any law. It shall be unlawful for any person who shall have been convicted of a violation of this section, whether or not any sentence shall have been imposed, to perform the duties of a teacher or of an officer of administration in any public or private educational institution, and the superior court, in a suit by the commonwealth, shall have jurisdiction in equity to restrain and enjoin any such person from performing such duties thereafter; provided, that any such restraining order or injunction shall be forthwith vacated if such conviction shall be set aside.^ "THE" SPEECH 27

Bimba was the first to be tried under this law of 1919, and the first to be brought to court under the blasphemy ordinance during the twentieth century, while only the second defendant on the blasphemy count ever to appear in the entire history of the Bay State.

The two Brockton dailies were the first to inform the public of the controversy at the National Hall the previous Tuesday night. "Bimba Speech Called Radical" barked the Enterprise.^ "Charge Bimba Denied Existence of Deity" hawked the Brockton Times, quoting the fighting Eudaco as saying, "I am going to take steps to see if this sort of poison being poured into the minds of citizens and candidates for citizenship cannot be stopped." '° The battle trumpets had sounded. The drama was to unfold rapidly.

But first, a thorough inspection of the background so pertinent to grasping the dimensions of this celebrated trial. Precisely, who was this man who momentarily became a folk hero because of his nationally-publicized court appearance in Brockton? What preceded his thirty one years of age when he stood in the defendant's box in

District Court? What is the biography of Anthony Bimba regarded by the United States authorities as one of the 120 "Important National & District Leaders of the Communist Party"? '' And what turmoil was there in Brockton which provided the legal quicksand in which Bimba became engulfed?

NOTES

1. Antanas Petrika, LLD ir Pazangieji Amerikos Lietuviai, {i.e. LLD and Progressive Lithuanians of America) (no place of publication given), 1965, pp. 9-34. Publication Nr. 74 of the American Lithuanian Workers' Literary Society, reviewing 50 years of existence; Lietuvii^ Enciklopedia, Vol. XII, p. 302.

2. Kelewis, Feb. 10, 1926.

3. Darbimnkas, Feb. 5, 12, 23, 1926. 4. Gazette, F.E., Feb. 19, 1926. 5. This writer's interview with Bimba, July 26, 1971. 6. Colonial Laws of Massachusetts, 1672-1686, Boston, 1887, p. 14. 7. Annotated Laws of Massachusetts, C. 272, #36, Vol. 9-A, 1968, p. 191. For a description of several rare blasphemy cases in Australia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, see Peter Coleman, Obscenity, Blasphemy, Tradition, Brisbane, 1963. For selected material on instances in 28 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

England during the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries, see article by Reginald C. S. Ellison Month, Oct., 1931, pp. 308-314; for fuller treatment, see G. D. Noakes, A History of the Crime of Blasphemy, 1928. 8. Annotated Laws of Massachusetts, C. 264, #11, Vol. 9, 1968, p. 512. 9. Enterprise, J2in. 27, 1926. 10. Brockton Times, Jan. 27, 1926. 11. Communist Activities Among Aliens & National Groups, 1950, p. 160, U.S. Government Printing Office. Chapter Three

BIMBA'S YOUTH

Anthony Bimba was born on January 22, 1894, the same year that

Lenin's first major work was published. Bimba's birthplace was the village of Uzusieniai in the region of Rokiskis, Lithuania, about twenty miles from the Latvian border in the north. The head of the household was a blacksmith-farmer, also Anthony, and the mother was Victoria Sukyte (Sukis). The elder Bimba's first wife and their daughter had died earlier. The surviving children of the second marriage were: Joseph, John, Anthony, and Stanley, in that order. There were also two girls: Ursula and Veronica. The subject of this book was baptized with the name of a younger brother who had died in infancy.

Bimba's recollection of his youth in general is a pleasant one. He pens a sensitive, picturesque scene of his beautiful homestead where he was born and reared. Both his parents are described with filial reverence. The father is remembered as having been quite clever in manual skills such that "he had no equal in all the surrounding area." ^ Among his dexterous habits, the senior Bimba had the skill of a "dievdirbis", i.e. wood-carver of sacred images. Among the examples of his father's handicraft, Bimba recalls a beautifully adorned crucifix surrounded by winged angels along with the Blessed Virgin Mary. The mother of the Bimba family was genuinely patriotic, attending the "secret" school on Sunday mornings conducted by Rev. John Katele in the town of Panemunelis at a time when such a venture was risky business under czarist Russia. The woman met an untimely death the year after Anthony went away to America. In a fall in which her tresses caught on to a projection, she was severely bruised. Unhappily, she was given inferior first-aid, 30 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

which allowed her sores to fester and deteriorate, leading to her death.

Young Anthony was prematurely tall and physically precocious. This led to shepherd duty earlier than usual and awkwardness in class. He attended elementary school for three years at Panemunelis. Here he experienced his first adverse meeting with a priest. A fellow classmate was quizzed in the final examination about the Prophets. The lad remained silent unable to recall the names. As a result, he

was kept back a year. Bimba was next, but he got off' lightly with the mere recitation of the Lord's Prayer. A generation later in reviewing this happening, he remembers the scolding the speechless colleague received from the cleric. "Perhaps no other experience in my youthful soul more deeply implanted the seed of anti-clericalism than the priest's behavior during those examinations," remarks the

autobiographer.^ Bimba didn't know the list of Prophets either. The same question would have stumped him, too, meaning the repetition of a school year. It was all "just because of a priest." "From then on,

I never had any good will towards priests, and I always feared them." * Another quotation in Bimba's memoirs refers to a bad memory of clergy in regard to their collections of funds. A common occurrence among young males in the small Baltic nation was their emigration to America because of a fear of military conscription into the Russian army, and on account of the lure of that fabled land across the water. The Bimba family was no exception. Brothers John and Joseph were the first to leave their homeland. Anthony followed in 1913. Using the ticket sent by John for the ocean voyage, Bimba arrived on the eve of the fourth of July at Burlington, New Jersey. Within a few days, the newcomer was working in the same steel mill as his brother, earning about $7.00 a week for six ten-hour days in conditions he recalls as a hell on earth. Finding the factory surroundings unbearable, Anthony wrote to his brother Joseph in Rumford, Maine inquiring about work opportuni- ties. Soon Bimba was in the "Pine Tree" state laboring at the Oxford paper mill. Circumstances there were somewhat less repulsive. One could earn $9. weekly for working the day shift of thirteen hours, or gain a higher figure of $11. on the eleven-hour nocturnal round of duty. Nevertheless, Bimba developed chest pains from the fumes of the chemicals used to dissolve the wood into pulp. Meanwhile, a new opportunity arose. There was a sole Lithuanian baker in the BIMBA'S YOUTH 31 community providing the favored rye bread of these immigrants. In the absence of competition, he was free to charge what he wished without putting his best effort into bread-making. Bimba took part in forming a co-operative bakery, and found himself driving the deHvery truck.

It was there in Rumford, Maine^ that Bimba's mentaUty took a distinctive change of direction. According to his own testimony, he frequented the gatherings of local socialists, taking part in their debates, listening to itinerant speakers under socialist auspices, and struggling to defend his Catholic faith. He became fascinated by the visiting speakers, and was prone to read heavily the socialist publications coming by mail into the isolated community. Thus, "I became a freethinker and a Socialist." ^ Bimba's somewhat restless and inquiring spirit next set him off on a junket west to Muskegan, Michigan where he knew there was a small colony of Lithuanians. After a brief stop there, he headed back east to famed Niagara Falls, New York.^ There he met a socialist named Kuliacka with whom he struck up a friendship. As far as the Lithuanians in that settlement were concerned, "the church and saloon held them firmly in hand," in Bimba's view.® To enlighten these ignorant folks, the pair decided to sponsor a lecture and invited from Chicago an atheist named Thaddeus Kucinskas.^ The meeting backfired. When the lecturer began touching on subjects of religion dear to the listeners, they rose up in arms over the irreverence they were hearing. Bimba, Kuliacka, and Kucinskas all fled out the back door. It was Bimba's recently acquired confidant, Kuliacka, who urged the energetic, inquisitive youth to further his education. By that time, Valparaiso University had achieved a reputation as a haven for Lithuanian students. To this institution of learning Bimba was urged to go, and so he did.

NOTES

1. Biographical data in this chapter is based on the following: Bimba,

"Autobiografijos Bruozai" {i.e. "Autobiographical Outlines"), 1957 (unpublished); interview with Bimba, July 26, 1971. See also Lietuviskoji Enciklopediay 32 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Vol. Ill, p. 1031, Kaunas, 1935; Mazoji Lietuviskoji Tarybin'e Enciklopedia, Vol. I, p. 230, Vilnius, 1966. For geographical and historical data about the region of Bimba's birth, see Bronius Kviklys, Musii Lietuva, Vol. II, pp. 155 ff., Lithuanian Encyclopedia Press, South Boston, Mass., 1965.

2. "Autobiografijos Bruozai".

3. ibid.

4. ibid. 5. An estimated 800 Lithuanians were living there at the time. Data in this chapter on cities and towns linked to Bimba is taken from Lietuviy. Enciklopedia, South Boston, Mass., 36 volumes, 1953-1969. 6. "Autobiografijos Bruozai".

7. Lithuanians here date from the end of the nineteenth century. In 1914 a Catholic parish of St. George was established. 8. "Autobiografijos Bruozai".

9. See Lietuviii Enciklopedia, Vol. XIII, p. 269, where a biographical notice describes him as "Theodore" rather than "Thaddeus". Chapter Four

BIMBA: SOCIALIST AND COMMUNIST

Bimba appeared on campus at Valparaiso' in the spring of 1916. He

had come to this midwest community the previous August with % 1 50 in his pocket.^ At the university, he found a fraternity library of Lithuanian material, and also a chapter of the Socialist Party—both of which played a role in his formation. He began classes on May 30, 1916 totalling eleven terms in the years 1916, 1916-17, 1917-18, and 1918-19.3 The new student approached his studies vigorously and with dedication. He found English quite difficult, but was not discour- aged. In addition, he took mostly history and sociology courses. Meanwhile, he practiced writing, read extensively, and engaged in debates within the socialist circle. After the 1917 revolution in

Russia, new combinations of combatants emerged: Socialists vs.

Clericalists, and Bolsheviks vs. Mensheviks. In all this "give-and- take" of university polemics, Bimba was being exposed to various shades of Marxist thought, and was in turn molding his own mentality according to his own sensitive insights. He managed to get by financially, choosing the least expensive meals in the school cafeteria, and by caring for the Lithuanian

library in return for a free room adjacent to it. For two summers he found work in Cleveland at a wire factory and a machine shop.* By now, Bimba was writing for Lithuanian publications of a socialist vein, and was receiving invitations to give talks in the many Lithuanian settlements nearby, such as Gary and Chicago. His talk before the steel workers of Gary^ in the summer of 1918 provoked an arrest, his first scrape with law-enforcement officials. The reason for this police action was Bimba's "pro-labor" activity according to a sympathetic encyclopedia produced in 1966 under Soviet supervi- i ^

34 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA sion. A different encyclopedia published in free Lithuania in 1935 attributes the arrest to "anti-war" agitation. Oddly enough, an unofficial informant of this writer indicates that Bimba was picked up for failure to carry his draft card. This no doubt was a pretext for taking him into custody. He was seized for both his labor activity and for his protest against the war. He spent a week in jail and was then released. In his recollections, Bimba speaks bitterly of this detention and its circumstances, all of which appeared so unjust to him. An attorney named Tilton came along and arranged to have the case dropped. But it was an indelible experience in Bimba's life.^ Another setback was in the offing, this time from the university. A medical student, John T. Vitkus who had given the Lithuanian language course was going elsewhere, and needed a replacement. Bimba was the choice of his fellow students, and expected to gain this post. Instead, to his surprise a certain Mr. McKinsey called Bimba for a conference. In the conversation, Bimba was told that the university didn't need troublemakers such as he, and it would be better if he left the institution.' One other adverse experience ran through Bimba's mind as he penned his autobiographical outlines. A history professor by the name of Hamilton one day in class gave a stirring patriotic address. Hitting at those who opposed the war, he compared the nation to a boat that was in danger and needed the help of all hands. After an outburst of applause for the teacher, Bimba asked to be heard. With rapier thrust of logic, he questioned the professor as follows. Suppose the boat is beyond repair, and the inhabitants choose to abandon it for something better, what then? Bimba tells that he never returned to that class again. But now his fortune took a favorable turn. He was invited by mail to come to New York to take over the editorship of Darbas {i.e. Labor), the publication of the Lithuanian chapter 54 of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America. With little regret, he left Valparaiso and came to Brooklyn in the summer of 1919. In his new surroundings, he mingled with president Sidney Hillman of the ACWA and secretary-treasurer Joseph Schlossberg. From both of them he observed and learned more about the thrust of the labor movement. Bimba also had occasion to mix with William Foster during the 1919 steel strike.^ Bimba's stroke of good luck was short-lived. He succeeded in BIMBA: SOCIALIST AND COMMUNIST 35 turning out copies of Darbas beginning with the September season of 1919. He was told to copy the purpose of Advance (the union's

English-language paper) and to imitate its material. Soon differences of opinion arose. Bimba did not wish to be fettered down to a rigid format. He wanted to publish original articles on a variety of topics which seemed pertinent in his judgment. As a result, he quit the editor's post by the end of August in 1920. His next assignments were '° in his life's field of work, namely in the domain of communism. By 1919 there were 226 local chapters of Lithuanian socialists around the country. Along came the first national convention of the newly-formed Communist Party of America in Chicago on Septem- ber 1, 1919. The Lithuanian socialists sent their national secretary, Joseph V. Stilson (Stasiulevicius) to this gathering where he promised to link up the existing 226 lodges to the Communist Party. The promise was kept within a short time. In several weeks the tenth national meeting of the Lithuanian socialists transpired in Brooklyn. The next day an overwhelming majority of delegates voted in favor of affiliation. Bimba was one of the five members of the Resolutions Committee urging this alliance. At this same assembly, the newspaper Laisv'e {i.e. Liberty), up to that time a strongly socialist publication, passed into the hands of the communists.'^ Bimba was now a committed communist. He assumed the duties of national secretary for the Lithuanian communists, and took on the role of editor for Kova {i.e. Struggle) which later was called Komunistas. In 1924, he affiliated with Laisve and has remained there to this date, except for a few brief absences. Bimba showed signs of being an independent thinker, and on occasion his zeal trapped him in a lapse of prudence. Though welcome to the U.S. Commiinist Party, he proved somewhat troublesome at least one instance. Writing about the 1922 national convention, an ex-comrade recalls that "another grave situation was caused by Bimba's indiscretions." '^ It seems that the enthusiast was representing a group of Lithuani- ans linked with the United Toilers. Contrary to convention rules, Bimba was mailing reports of the proceedings to the press of the Toilers. Convention guards apprehended their nonconforming comrade, searching his person and his quarters. There they uncovered reports and letters readied for mailing. A special meeting was summoned to pass judgment of the recalcitrant Bimba. As a penalty, 36 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA he was stripped of convention rights, placed on probation as to future membership, and put under strict surveillance.'^ The communist's practice-writing sessions of Valparaiso days resulted in a prolific pen. In addition to countless newspaper and magazine articles, Bimba has credited to him over twenty titles of books and pamphlets during his lifetime. Some of his more important works are:

Istonja Klasit^ Kovos Amerikoje (History of Class Struggle in America), 1925

History of the American Working Class, 1927 (in Russian, 1930)

The Molly Maguires, 1932 (in Russian, 1950; in Lithuanian, 1962; the original English reprinted in 1970)

Kelias [ Naujq Gyvenimq (Way to a New Life), 1937

Naujoji Lietuva Faktq ir Dokumentii Sviesoje (The New Lithuania in the Light of Facts and Documents), 1940

Other topics embrace the Sacco-Vanzetti case, a resurrected Lithua- nia, and America's presidents. Bimba also wrote a few plainly anti-religious pieces in his earlier days with quaint names such as:

Moteris ir Ispazintis (Woman and Confession), 1925; Religija ir Piktadaryste (Religion and Crime), 1925; Klebonijos Paslaptys (Secrets of a Rectory), 1930. One suspects that he regrets these lapses into yellow journalism, and would have preferred to invest his efforts into more positive and productive literary expressions. Bimba's proclivity to original thinking was displayed in his essay on the American laborers, a writing which plunged him into a dark moment in the eyes of Moscow. When the History of the American Working Class appeared in a Russian translation, a certain N.

Majorski wrote a devastating review in the September 9, 1930 issue of Pravda, official organ of the Communist Party in Russia. This review showed up in English in the Daily Worker on October 15, 1930 and was carried in Lithuanian in Laisv'e two days later. In an editor's note, a vain attempt was made to tell the reader that despite the critical review, the work still had some value. The review itself, however, had not a single favorable sentence in its two full columns. The book was full of errors and omissions according to Majorski. Bimba wasn't following the line of Marx and Lenin; he wasn't picturing the work of the U.S. Communist Party in a true light; he BIMBA: SOCIALIST AND COMMUNIST 37 was identifying labor too closely with the Communist Party. Perhaps the most humiliating point of all centered around Bimba's mention of Marx's greeting to President Lincoln. Of Bimba's interpretation of the exchange, the reviewer says that the writer completely misunder- stood Marx.''* The manual is nevertheless considered the "standard Red" text on the U.S. Labor Movement by one commentator who says the writing "in effect denounced Abraham Lincoln as an enemy of mankind and taught subversion and scorn for all our national heroes." '^ For his writing on the Molly Maguires, Bimba once received at least a left-handed compliment by an author of the same topic. "His is the typical 'left-wing' viewpoint substantiated by authentic documents, but failing to present the entire case." '^

At the time of the Brockton trial, Bimba was already associated with Laisv'e, voice of the communists in eastern United States (as Vilnis has been in the Chicago area). In addition to his journalistic pursuits, he traveled about intermittently through colonies of fellow nationals as a lecturer. This was a common practice for such newspapermen, with speaking engagements easily booked under sponsorship of local chapters of one or another partisan group. On such a tour of New England communities there came in the winter of 1926 one Anthony A. Bimba, 46 Ten Eyck St., Brooklyn, N.Y., occupation—bookkeeper, age 31, ht. 5' 11", wght. 185, born in Lithuania—as inscribed on the criminal file card in the Plymouth County District Court of Brockton, Massachusetts. To discern the climate in Brockton, more specifically of the

Montello section, it is essential to inspect the district and superior court dockets for the years previous to Bimba's entrance. In these files, one finds a wealth of information providing the necessary background to this legal encounter of Blasphemy and Sedition in the famous "shoe city" twenty five miles south of Boston.

NOTES

1. In 1905 Valparaiso University in Valparaiso, Indiana received its first Lithuanian student in the person of an A. Ramanauskas. Within five years, the place of learning was tagged as a "Mecca" for Lithuanian students by Joseph O. Sirvydas, a socialist newspaperman. In 1906 at the request of the incoming Baltic immigrants, a Lithuanian language course was inaugu- 38 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA rated. A literary society was formed, and by 1913 it had a library of 1,781 books. Also, in 1905 the Lithuanian socialists banded together into a national organization beginning with eighteen local chapters including a seven-member group in Brockton, Massachusetts, the scene of the future Bimba trial. By 1914 there were 168 such chapters around the country, one of which Bimba found at Valparaiso.

(Juozas 0. Sirvydas, Biografijos Bruozai (i.e. Biographical Outlines) ed. Vyt.

Sirvydas, Dirva Press, Cleveland, 1941, pp. 237 ff.; also, pp. 218 ff.) 2. This writer's interview with Bimba, July 26, 1971 Ozone Park, New York. 3. Letter, Aug. 13, 1970, to this writer from Paul E. Thune, Registrar, Valparaiso University. 4. "Autobiografijos Bruozai". 5. A huge steel mill was built there in 1906 drawing many foreign workers. A Catholic parish for Lithuanians was inaugurated there in 1916 under the name of St. Casimir. 6. "Autobiografijos Bruozai".

7. ibid.

8. ibid.

9. ibid.

10. ibid.

11. Leituvii^ Enciklopedia, Vol. XII, p. 301 (article on "Lithuanian Communist Alliance in America"); also. Vol. XIV, pp. 81, 82 (articles on "Laisve"); also, Vol. XXVIII, pp. 224-226. See also Juozas 0. Sirvydas, Biografijos Bruozai passim; Aleksas Ambrose, Chicagos Lietuviq Istorija, Lithua- nian American Historical Society, Chicago, 1967, p. 180. This last-named source gives the affirmative vote for affiliation at 92 with four abstentions. The encyclopedia article offers the figure of 97.

A translation of the resolutions as found in Ambrose is as follows:

"WHEREAS on September 1, 1919 the Communist Party in America was formed;

WHEREAS the Lithuanian Socialist Alliance is a part of that strong, clearly discernible, proletarian, revolutionary movement; THEREFORE: 1) The tenth (in truth it should be the eleventh, since the tenth meeting occurred in Chicago) LSA convention on September 28, 1919 resolves to unite with the Communist Party in America and with the rights such as are guaranteed in said Party's convention to foreign-language affiliates. 2) The Lithuanian S.A. having united with the Communist Party now calls itself the Lithuanian Communist Alliance of America."

According to Ambrose, 168 local chapters did not send delegates. It is quite possible that the majority approval of affiliation with the communists did not in reality reflect the majority of the entire membership. BIMBA: SOCIALIST AND COMMUNIST 39

12. Benjamin Gitlow, / Confess, New York, 1939, pp. 142 ff. 13. ibid.

14. Laisv'e, October 17, 1930. 15. Louis Francis Budenz, This Is My Story, McGraw-Hill, New York: London, 1947, pp. 101, 102.

16. J. Walter Coleman, The Molly Magutre Riots, 1936, p. 178. Chapter Five

LIVELY NATIONAL HALL AND ITS ADVERSARIES •

At the turn of the century, fraternal societies were springing up throughout the east coast of America in cosmopoHtan centers attracting foreign-born immigrants. Brockton received its share of such arrivals among whom was an increasing number of Lithuani- ans. The vast majority settled in northern Brockton, winning for the Montello section of the city the popular name, "Lithuanian Village", sometimes mentioned simply as "the village". Among the activities of these new residents was a meeting at Saint

Rocco (later Saint Casimir) Church located on a little side street named Webster near a swampy field. The purpose of this October 4, 1910 gathering was the founding of an association. The goal of this fraternity was broad, namely "promoting the educational and social welfare of its members." ^ Legal blessing on this venture was granted on October 21 of that year by decree of William M. Olin, Secretary of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. By 1913 the association was able to obtain a mortgage from the Brockton Savings Bank for the erection of a building at 664 North Main Street, corner of Vine Street, scene of the controversial Bimba speech of thirteen years later. Officially known as "Brockton Lithuanian National Hall Association", the membership was open to any Lithuanian on a non-partisan basis. The roster climbed as high as 1,000, listing several well-known Catholic priests: Rev.

Casimir Urbanavicius, Rev. Francis Juskaitis, Rev. J. Vaiciunas, and Rev. Francis Virmauskis.

In the flow of time religious and political rifts disrupted unity among the brethren. The clergy and some of the more active LIVELY NATIONAL HALL AND ITS ADVERSARIES 41

churchgoers withdrew.^ When the communist-socialist split crackled at the national level in 1919, this break was echoed at the local chapter level around the nation. Here, too, the communists gained control. The litmus test for distinguishing one group from the other

was principally its view toward the homeland. Socialists remained fiercely loyal to Lithuania. The communists did not share this patriotism. Rather they were Moscow-oriented. Their mentality displayed itself in Brockton through a number of incidents.

For instance on January 7, 1920, delegate John Vileisis of the Lithuanian Mission,"* then touring the United States, was discour- teously received at the National Hall by a denial to unfurl the Lithuanian flag. The next year the Lithuanian minister in Washing- ton D.C., Valdemaras Carneckis, on a similar visitation was even refused admission at the door of the Hall. The association once came to the attention of Brockton city officials through complaints about a play scheduled for the winter of 1923. The drama in question "Macocha" was painfully distasteful to the Catholics of "the village", depicting as it did a priest as drunkard, adulterer, and murderer. Despite protests to the contrary, Mayor Frank B. Manning banned the performance of this pro- duction at the National Hall.^ The Hall was a common platform for talks by the best known freethinkers and atheists among these Baltic emigres, such as

Fortunatus J. Bagocius, Stanley Michaelsonas, John Sliupas, and Michael X. Mockus. Their coming would often provoke some pulpit comments from the local pastor of St. Rocco (Lithuanian) Church, a half mile down the street from the Hall. Writing letters of protest to newspapers, to disorderly members, and to dues-paying laggers among the affiliated societies—these were rather common items on the agenda of business meetings. Members were quite outspoken, frequently disputing among themselves and going to court. The majority did not even hesitate to expel from the

Association the local chapter # 1 7 of the Lithuanian communists in a 1920 row, reported at the February 3 meeting.^

In the two years prior to Bimba's trial, the kettle of animosity was bubbling and gurgling between leaders of the Hall and some divergent voices within the Association—men who were also members of the Lithuanian Citizens Club of 1903 vintage. The "Catholics are engaging in attacks" on the Association according to the 42 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA president in a 1924 remark.' At least a trio of civil suits decorated the docket of Plymouth Superior Court at this time. These conflicts were partly matters of political differences, but perhaps for the most part instances of personality disagreements. It would be difficult to untangle with accuracy and fairness the communists, socialists, nationalists ("tautininkai"), and catholics. Although the Hall has been known in Brockton as "little Moscow", it would not be just to assume that anyone connected with the organization was necessarily a communist, although the majority were such at least by sympathy if not intellectual conviction. One of the most colorful, aggressive and interesting inhabitants of the community was Anthony W, Eudaco (Juodeika). It was he who was to file charges of sedition against Bimba. A resident of nearby Randolph, the shoeworker persuaded Michael Abraczinsky (Abra- cinskas), prominent and respected church member, to join in a civil action against the National Hall, its executive officers, and a trio of trustees. The accusation was made in Plymouth County Superior Court on August 28, 1924 and was to result in an abortive three-week skirmish. In the Bill of Complaint^ were a variety of intriguing allegations extending to 31 points. The plaintiffs objected that the defendants were usurping "wrongfully and fraudulently, and are exercising, fraudulently and without right, powers not conferred upon them or any of them by the constitution of said association," ^ When the Hall was built, any group donating $50. or more was to have a three-man voice on the Directing Committee to rule the Hall affairs jointly with the Executive Committee. Eudaco claimed that these provisions were being ignored. The Bill contended further that the membership roles and financial status of the Association were being withheld from inquiring members among whom were Eudaco and Abraczinsky. These accusers maintained that the Hall officers were not conducting publicly announced meetings, but were merely notifying select members of the same political sympathies. Additional charges embraced misconduct such as: fraudulent elections, misuse of funds, failure to keep proper records, forgery and falsification of books, and improper attempts to alter the constitution.

The Bill elaborated on this last accusation. On August 5, 1924 a meeting was held at which, supposedly, a change of policy was LIVELY NATIONAL HALL AND ITS ADVERSARIES 43

introduced regarding membership applicants. By use of a black ball system, Hall authorities could arbitrarily control the influx of new faces. The petitioners in this suit decried this technique of black and white balls as alien to the by-laws of the fraternity and in opposition to the majority sentiment of the membership. The strongest paragraph was #16 in the Bill of Complaint. Here

the respondents were attacked for using the Hall and its finances "for purposes which are subversive ... to the organized and established government of the United States of America." '^ Equally vigorous was a companion complaint, paragraph #21 protesting the use of

the Hall for "reds, bolsheviks, radicals, and communists . . . whose avowed intent is the destruction of the organized government of the United States of America." '' As a result of these charges, the court did issue a temporary injunction against the Association banning any changes in membership procedures or record-keeping, and holding up the use of funds. But before the defendants could compose their reply to the complainants, the case was suddenly dropped. On September 15 an Agreement to Dismiss the Bill was properly recorded at the courthouse. Did the plaintiffs have a change of heart? Word of the outcome quickly spread around in the village barbershops, butchershops, bakeries, and barrooms. An apparent calm settled over Montello. Yet the quiet was merely a temporary "cease-fire". Time showed that this court action was just a dress rehearsal. Case # 16399 was hardly filed away when something of a multiple-alarm blaze shot flames in all directions. The Eudaco-Hall Association civil suit was to have a successor in less than a month.

NOTES

1. Information in this chapter is gleaned partly from the following: S. Suziedelis, Kunigas Jonas Nuo Kryziaus, Brooklyn, 1956 (biography of Rev. John Svagzdys, pastor of the local Lithuanian church from 1918 to 1948; Lietuvii^ Enciklopedia, Vol. Ill, pp. 267-68 (article on "Brocktonas"); Encyclope- dia Lithuamca, Boston, 1970, Vol. I, pp. 415-16 (article on "Brockton").

2. Exhibit 2, case no. 16499, Eudaco vs. Navickis, Plymouth Superior Court records. Twelve signatures are inscribed on the original document of incorporation, namely: Joseph Dragun, Peter J. Grigas, Michael Abraczin- 44 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA sky, Thaddeus M. Kubilsky, Boleslaws A. Zurausky, Joseph Woychuns, Justin Mickiewic, John Ustupas, John Balianis, Anthony Yakavonis, Ysidor Dounis, George Rindzevich. 3. The vast majority of Lithuanians are Roman CathoHcs, although a sizeable segment of these immigrants became inactive on arrival in the United States, and some became hostile. 4. Such good-will tours were not uncommon soon after the little sovereignty regained its independence in 1918. 5. Darbininkas, Jan. 23, 1923. 6. Minutes, National Hall Association, volume covering Dec. 17, 1917 to Oct. 21, 1930, graciously loaned to this writer by George Shimaitis who presided at the January 26, 1926 meeting at which Bimba spoke. 7. Minutes, National Hall Association, August 5, 1924 meeting.

8. Case no. 16399, Anthony W. Eudaco et al., vs. Brockton Lithuanian

National Hall Association, et al., Plymouth County Superior Court records.

9. ibid.

10. ibid.

11. ibid. Chapter Six

PROTRACTED FIVE-YEAR SEQUEL

As soon as the first duel was called off, the principal complainant huddled with his attorney James W. Murdoch, a local barrister, to map out strategy for more effective combat. This sequel was to be as long as its predecessor was brief After an interval of only three weeks, Eudaco came back roaring into court with a freshly compounded Bill of Complaint. The script had been rewritten with a slight change in cast. Abraczinsky, who perhaps found the whole muddle distasteful, stepped out of the picture, and was replaced by Anton (Anthony) Tautkus, also an active church member, as co-plaintiff. The original 31 -point complaint was streamlined to an even dozen paragraphs. Most of the rephrased charges were confined primarily to the issue of membership. The Hall defendants were said to control admissions on their own whim, having dishonestly amended the Association statutes. Again mentioned were the black ball maneuver, the concealment of records, and the failure to notify members of meetings. Paragraph twelve injected a fresh charge: "That the defendants have used and are about to use large sums of money belonging to the said society for the defence of their acts committed against the interest of the said society and its members and in the defence of suits brought and to be brought in connection therewith for breach of ."2 duty . . The Bill asked for an injunction against the defendants, and for a hearing of the issues. Eudaco emerged momentarily as winner in a contest that was just beginning. On October 15, Suffolk County Superior Court allowed an Interlocutory Injunction, and two days later. Justice Philip J. O'Connell handed down a Temporary Restraining Order against 46 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA the Hall Association. The litigation shifted around from Brockton to Plymouth to Boston, depending on the case load and the need to transfer elsewhere, all within the superior court system. The Boston law firm of Roewer & Bearak for the defense gave answer to the charges, admitting the obvious preliminary statements, while denying the rest of the Bill. There followed a lengthy chain of legal zigzags—motions, counter-motions, the impounding of the Association's books, and a companion motion for their return. Interspersed in all this were predictable delays, the appointment of a "Master" for a hearing, plaintiffs request for a substitute Master, his withdrawal within a short time, and the selection of a third Master!

The lengthy bout ofjuridical fisticuffs endured from October 9, 1924 with the first Bill of Complaint until July 31, 1929 when the court sitting in Boston issued a Final Decree dismissing the whole litany of accusations. In the midst of this legal tug-of-war, the Bimba case was to erupt, deepening rivalries, intensifying bitterness. Yet while the Brooklyn speaker was on route to New England, there were still more concoctions brewing in the legal kettle—still more lawsuits whose principals were all to figure in the Bimba trial. This parallel litigation must also be scrutinized as part of the background to the Bimba affair.

NOTES

1. Case no. 16499, Eudaco vs. Navickis (the Association was listed as 'nominal" defendant), Plymouth County Superior Court records.

2. ibid. Chapter Seven DOUBLE COUNTER-ATTACK ON EUDACO AND THE CITIZENS' CLUB '

Among the numerous societies spawned in the heyday of the immigrant influx to Brockton was the group popularly called the "Citizens Club", legally molded together on September 18, 1903. Its aim was similar to the wide purposes of other such combinations, namely the welfare of its members. Over the years a variety of temporary quarters were utilized by the Club, assembling in private homes and rented facilities. Eventually, the Citizens ensemble settled at 1 28 Ames Street in the heart of Montello where the organization still functions at this writing. The ubiquitous Eudaco himself now became the center of a separate juridical procedure. While he was taking on the chieftains of the National Hall, his enemies shot back with a counter-complaint against him and the "Brockton Lithuanian Citizens Associa- tion" as the Club was legally known. This dispute was to drag out to a six and a half year span, even longer than the Eudaco-Navickis encounter! Many of the young, vibrant immigrants were members of both the National Hall and the Citizens Club. In the December elections of 1923, the glib Eudaco won himself the presidency of the Club. Thirteen months later, he found himself pondering replies to a Bill of Complaint filed January 24, 1925. Who were his accusers? The plaintiffs turned out to be a sextet of individuals, members of the Club including spokesman Stanley K. Krauchunskas (Kriauciunas) and Leon Simutis who happened to be Recording Secretary of the Hall Association as well. 48 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

The complainants unleashed a barrage of their own in 22 paragraphs of allegations, asking injunctions to provide them relief in their distress. Eudaco supposedly refused the counting of ballots in the December, 1924 election of executive officers. The rest of the charges were a carbon copy of the shots Eudaco was firing at the Hall Association in his own suit begun just a few months earlier. The colorful gentleman was accused of misuse of funds, malfea- sance of office, neglect of paying sick members their due benefits, improper alteration of the constitution and arbitrary exclusion from discussion of members inimical to him. A novel and intriguing sally

is found in paragraph twelve of the Bill. There it contends that Eudaco "has coerced members and dissolved meetings by unlawful use of the police force, and has caused the arrest of members who

." ^ were conducting themselves in a lawful manner . . Here is an apparent reference to a pair of participants who were fined $25. each in district court for disturbing the peace, thanks to Eudaco's vigilance in conducting orderly meetings. Plaintiffs attorney Her- bert C. Thorndike of Boston was in the midst of a legal whirlwind without knowing the forecast of continued turbulence for another half decade. The complainants against Eudaco seem to have plunged into the fray with undue haste. Krauchunskas and his cohort quickly refueled and rushed back into court only five days after the original Bill of Complaint. On January 29, 1925 they proffered a reworded Bill expanded from 22 to 28 points. Great stress was put on a meeting of January 15, 1925 at which the defendant allegedly engaged in a series of self-benefitting manipulations. In the next eight weeks a flurry of motions and petitions was exchanged surrounding a restraining order against the plaintiff who was forbidden from interfering with the business of the Club.

Eudaco's lawyer filed a Defendant's Demurrer on March 1 7 of that year, along with a Brief (undated in the court records). The thirteen-point Demurrer stressed the vagueness of the charges, and asked for more specific information. Paragraph eleven labelled the Bill as "multifarious" and questioned the very right of the accusers to prosecute. Defense attorney James W. Murdoch pointed out in the Brief that the plaintiffs say they represent the majority of stockhold- ers. Thus they ought to find it possible to obtain remedy within the organization itself. DOUBLE COUNTER-ATTACK ON EUDACO 49

The luckless plaintiffs came back with their own Brief on April 10 but in vain. The court upheld the Defendant's Demurrer in a decision of May 2, a temporary setback for the accusers. A three-month uneasy calm set in while the anti-Eudaco forces reassembled their case. In the midst of this proceeding, still a third case^ made its debut on the docket of superior court, providing a double-barrel blast against the Club officials.

But first here is a continuation of the sequence of events in this

Krauchunskas-Eudaco tilt. The plaintiffs reentered the arena on August 12 with an Amended Bill in Equity—the third and longest version of their grievances encompassing 31 paragraphs of a legal dirge. This latest text was substantially the same as the two earlier lamentations, but with notable tightening up of unclear charges. Several exhibits were introduced as evidence this time. Chapters and sections of the by-laws and constitution pertinent to the court action were spelled out plainly. Tacked on the end of the Bill was the outcry that the defendant was illegally using Club funds "for counsel fees and expenses of litigation" ^—the same protest Eudaco was voicing in his plaintiffs role against the National Hall crowd. This Krauchunskas-Eudaco dispute lay dormant for the next five years during which the plaintiffs lawyer pulled out of the case, probably wearied by the seeming insolubility of the quarrel. Herbert C. Thorndike's shoes were filled for the moment by the law partnership of Katzman & Vahey from Plymouth. Coming into the melee but a few weeks prior to Bimba's appearance on the scene, these practitioners from the colonial town filed a Motion to Substitute the Bill of Complaint. But then the case bogged down again, with the Bimba trial side-tracking everyone's attention. After a year of calendar gazing, Messieurs Katzman & Vahey headed for the "exit" sign in the footsteps of their colleague, Thorndike. "Please withdraw our appearance for the complainants" they petitioned in a letter to Superior Court Clerk, Edward E. Hobart.^ The suit eventually died a natural death. It was dismissed on September 6, 1932 under the three-year rule covering inactive litigation. Meanwhile, the previous summer (1925) the Simutis-Samson encounter surfaced. There were five signatures of plaintiffs against twelve members of the Club. Samson was now president in Eudaco's place. The complaint was very similar to the Krauchunskas-Eudaco one. Apparently what precipitated this third suit was the threat of 50 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Samson to expel at a June 4 meeting a handful of members he had already suspended. This case too, came to a halt when the Bimba episode erupted. As in the other suit, Katzman & Vahey withdrew. Similarly this Simutis-Samson squabble ended up as an inactive case. It was dismissed on September 5, 1931 by court decree.^ Thus, as Bimba was wending his way over a two-hundred-mile expanse from Brooklyn to Brockton, there were three relevant court proceedings going on. Eudaco, Samson, and their nationalist associates were at one end of the field of combat, while Krauchunskas, Simutis and colleagues were deployed at the opposite end. Thus, the

Eudaco-Navickis, Krauchunskas-Eudaco, and Simutis-Samson civil suits were the battle terrain on which the New York journalist Bimba was about to set foot in January of 1926. It was a treacherous and ominous field where he was about to be caught in the crossfire. In simplest terms, members of two clubs were quarrelling, a fact of utter insignificance to the general populace of the nation. Yet, like children playing with matches, the antagonists quite accidentally and unintentionally ignited a mighty bonfire which enveloped the major movements and issues of the day: radicalism, communism, free speech, free assembly, capitalism, and atheism. Bimba was thrust into the public arena, and along with him were brought all these sensitive questions and causes.

NOTES

1. Case no. 16720, Stanley K. Krauchunskas et aL, vs. Anthony Eudaco et al., Plymouth Superior Court records; also, case no. 16982, Leon Simutis vs.

George Samson et ai, Plymouth Superior Court records.

2. ibid.

3. Case no. 16982, Louis Simutis vs. George Samson et aL, Plymouth County Superior Court records.

4. Case no. 16720, Krauchunskas vs. Eudaco.

5. ibid.

6. Case no. 16982, Simutis vs. Samson. Chapter Eight

BIMBA'S ARREST: PROTEST AND SUPPORT

The two-pronged stab of blasphemy and sedition against Bimba stirred up a mixture of both anger and apprehension among the sponsors of his talk, especially the National Hall folks themselves. In an era prior to sensitivity and caution over pre-trial statements, the participants on all sides freely handed out comments to the press. Eudaco hurled darts at Bimba and the five patron societies responsible for the evening program.^ In reply the Hall officers and Board of Directors met Friday after the speech to piece together a protest against Eudaco and to threaten that any future statements from him "will lead to court action." ^ In Worcester, Massachusetts, Bimba antagonists also publicized names of groups, six in number, alleged to be favorable to the accused.^ Meanwhile, an arrest warrant was out for the missing defendant. He was supposed to speak in nearby Bridgewater the night after the Brockton engagement, but failed to show up. A week later as he was about to address a Worcester audience in the Lithuanian Hall at 29 Endicott Street, the arrest took place. Detective Sergeants Sharry and Stonequist, and Sergeant Flanagan of the local police department seized Bimba as a fugitive from justice on a tip from their Brockton colleagues relaying an anonymous informant's call. The presence of the visiting Bimba stirred up the large, east central Massachusetts community. That he did not represent Lithuanians was the murmur of Anthony Kriaucialis, president of the Worcester Lithuanian Social Council, headquartered at 96 Green Street. On his part, Bimba defended himself as being on tour to stop the flow of U.S. money to Lithuania because of alleged misuse by the government there.'* 52 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

On Tuesday, February 2 at 9:15 p.m. Sergeant Arthur S. Leary of the Brockton PoHce Department received word from Worcester of

Bimba's detention. Sergeant Stephen J. Bryan and Officer Ray Hemenway were dispatched to retrieve the prisoner, returning to the station at 3:00 a.m. When searched, Bimba was found with just SI 3.79 in his pockets. He was wearing what appeared to be a World War army coat. In the face of questioning, he remained almost completely silent, making but a few vague answers. Later in comments to the press, he charged that his arrest was part of a nationwide conspiracy, and that he would have been seized anyway no matter where he happened to be speaking. At first he refused bail, but promptly reversed himself A sympathizer Casimir Benulis stepped forward with the required $1,500 surety to furnish Bimba's freedom.^ Within a fortnight of the provocative speech, Brockton began a reluctant, goldfish bowl existence. Associated Press, United Press, and International News Service each began transmitting copy to their subscribers, fixing the eyes and ears of the nation on the New England manufacturing city. The novelty of an arrest for blasphemy so captured the attention and imagination of newsmen and their readers as to over-shadow the companion allegation of sedition, at least in the first steps of reporting the case. At the start, the original wire news agency to take notice was United Press with an article by Henry Minott. The UP story carried comments of Massachusetts Attorney General, Jay R. Benton. He was quoted as observing with dismay that even men of the stature of famed attorney Clarence Darrow and horticulturalist Luther Burbank apparently could be prosecuted under the anti- quated "blue" law for voicing disbelief in a Supreme Being. However, the state official personally was disinclined ever to press such a charge.^ This UP article went on to narrate the only instance of enforcement under the 1697 law against an Abner Kneeland.^ Writing in the Boston Investigator in 1833, he penned a series of denials in several basic Christian truths of faith.^ He was convicted in a lower court which judged his column to be offensive within the meaning of the law. Kneeland appealed to the Massachusetts Supreme Court where a majority opinion upheld the finding against him. As a result, he was given 60 days in jail.^ Almost a century was BIMBA'S ARREST: PROTEST AND SUPPORT 53 to pass before anyone thought of dusting off the pages of this law to resurrect it. Voices rang out in support of Bimba now catapulted into national acclaim. For instance, Dr. A. Wakefield Slatten of the fashionable West Side Unitarian Church in New York City tagged the trial as an "absurdity".'^ A suffragist and member of the International Labor Defense Council, Alice Stone Blackwell issued a statement decrying the prosecution as "preposterous and indefensible." *' Among offers of legal aid was a telegram to the Enterprise from Robert Zelius, New England head of the International Association for the Advancement of Atheism. '^ Most eager to participate in Bimba's defense was the American Civil Liberties Union whose director Foster Bailey painted the charge of blasphemy as "an outrageous thing." '^ The defendant's own communist publication acknowledged the willingness of ACLU to help, even though it was a bourgeois organization ("nors . . . burzauazine organizacia").'* Bimba engaged in a brief correspondence with the national headquarters of ACLU. The Union first wrote to him because of a news clipping describing his case. The Field Secretary pointed out that the Union was equipped to handle such cases and was anxious to help. The office would carefully follow the proceedings and hoped that Bimba would keep the ACLU informed. ^^ In reply the accused notified ACLU that the defense was being undertaken by the International Labor Defense Council '^ centered in Chicago. This committee had been formed in June of 1925, to help especially "class-war" prisoners anywhere in the world. Brockton had a local chapter. Bimba referred ACLU to both the national office and the New York branch of the Defense Council.^' In a later mailing, Director Foster Bailey informed Bimba that an ACLU attorney in Boston was conferring with the defendant's local lawyer. Pending approval of Bimba's counsel, the ACLU had requested Harvard's Professor Zechariah Chafee to associate himself with the case. A few more letters were exchanged at the end of the trial. Back in Brockton, Stanley Smith, vice-president of the National Hall was busy making disavowals in behalf of his confreres and himself They had no quarrel with the authorities of the United States government, he explained. Rather, they were opposing the existing regime in Lithuania contending that it was distasteful to 54 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

fellow nationals throughout the world. Smith denied any condemna- ble remarks on the lips of Bimba.'^ On the Sunday between the arrest and trial date a phalanx of some 400 anti-Bimba protesters mobbed the local Catholic Church of St. Rocco for a rally with the approval and encouragement of Rev. John Svagzdys, pastor. John Dikinis, editor of the Darbininkas, was the guest speaker at this February 7 gathering. A sum of S67 was collected on the scene to fight Bimba and his followers, while a fund drive for that purpose was announced under the chairmanship of one Joseph Daugelevicius.'^ There were rumors of big-name attorneys being ushered into the ranks of the Bimba defense, names such as Clarence Darrow, well-known champion of the underdog and exponent of agnosticism, and his assistant Dudley Field Malone, an international divorce lawyer, the two of whom had handled the spectacular Scopes

"monkey" trial of the previous summer in Dayton, Tennessee. As it turned out, the Defense Council provided legal services in the persons of Hoffman, Hoffman (Harry and Irving) & Katzoff from Boston.^^ To pay the legal fees, funds and promises of funds streamed in from a variety of sources including the Defense Council itself, the ACLU, and local chapters of groups and individuals sympathetic to Bimba and his cause. ^' Eudaco heightened the tension with some melodramatic revela- tions to the press. He said his enemies were considering a plea to a New York gunman to come to Brockton to exterminate this star witness. Even so, Eudaco was not afraid to die for American principles if need be. He obtained a gun permit and was ready to use ". it. . . if they had man enough in their makeup to stand up like ^^ men and face me man-to-man, I would shoot it out with them." The trial date was set for a week after the arrest. At the arraignment, Bimba had asked Judge Herbert C. Thorndike^^ for a continuance to Feb. 27, but was turned down because of the prosecutor's objection. ^^ Thus, Wednesday, February 10 was to be the big day. The previous evening a rally of several hundred supporters was held in the same site of the controversial lecture.

Brockton Mayor Harold D. Bent^^ was ambivalent about it. He did not attempt to block the gathering, but did send police saying, 'T am opposed to any such meetings, and will do all in my power to destroy them." 2^ On his part, National Hall president Klement Navickis BIMBA'S ARREST: PROTEST AND SUPPORT 55 was apologizing nervously that the space was merely rented for the night, disclaiming any tie between the Hall and Bimba.

Both the list of speakers and the makeup of the listeners were a potpourri. Clearly only the avid fans among his fellow country-men ventured out in the winter snow to boost Bimba. A handful of curious residents of Brockton, and a sprinkling of outsiders blended in with the Baltic faces. The defendant spoke in English apparently to allow the police in the audience to know what he was saying. In an emotional plea in broken tongue, he insisted that he was the victim of a "frameup'V a claim which he frequently repeated during the ordeal. Seated on the stage to display their backing of a brother in trouble were John McCarthy of Boston from the Carpenter's Union, Harry Canter of New York from the Typographical Union, Bert Miller of New York, communist editor and member of the Defense Council, and Albert Oddie, a local official of the Defense Council who hired the Hall for :$ 12.50. In his delivery, McCarthy likened Bimba to Tom Mooney and the Sacco-Vanzetti duo, radicals who were victims of class war. Miller in turn denounced the deceitful conditions under which some of the listeners had come to the United States, probably a reference to questionable techniques sometimes used by factory owners in recruiting immigrant laborers. To add to the defense coffers, a collection was taken up resulting in $293.33 ^® with seven women filling the role of usherettes.^^ Elsewhere in the city, police were reviewing their assignments at the courthouse on Belmont Street for the next day, anticipating possible trouble. In addition to a recent snowfall, another storm was forecast by the weatherman. An air of strangeness and a measure of tension were detectable in the atmosphere. Bimba and Brockton were unwittingly coupled for the time being in an unwilling partnership as curiosity-stricken readers awaited further news bulletins.

NOTES

1. Enterprise, Jan. 27, 1926. 2. Enterprise, Jan. 30, 1926. 3. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 19, 1926; Kelewis, Feb. 10, 1926. 3 56 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

4. Gazette, F.E., Feb. 3, 1926; Enterprise, Feb. 3, 1926.

5. Brockton Times, Feb. 3, 1926; Gazette, ibid; Enterprise, ibid. 6. Enterprise, Feb. 6, 1926; Gazette, C.E., Feb. 6, 1926. 7. An American deist, Kneeland was born in Gardner, Massachusetts in April of 1774 and died in Farmington, Iowa on August 27, 1884. He founded the Boston Investigator in 1831. 8. Boston Investigator, Dec. 20, 1833. Kneeland began by offering a statement of general disbelief, and then gave four examples as follows:

"1. Universalists believe in a god which I do not; but believe that their

god, with all his moral attributes, (aside from nature itself) is nothing more than a chimera of their own imagination. 2. Universalists believe in Christ, which I do not; but believe that the

whole story concerning him is as much a fable and fiction, as that of the

god Prometheus, the tragedy of whose death is said to have been acted on the stage in the theatre at Athens, 500 years before the christian era.

3. Universalists believe in miracles, which I do not but believe that every pretension to them can either be accounted for on natural principles

or else is to be attributed to mere trick or imposture. 4. Universalists believe in the resurrection of the dead, in immortality

and external life, which I do not; but believe that all life is mortal, that

death is an eternal extinction of life to the individual who possesses it, and

that no individual life, is, ever was, or ever will be eternal." 9. Massachusetts Reports, Com. vs. Kneeland (Vol. 20 Pickering), pp. 206-246 gives the text of the court decision. The verdict was handed down by Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw in the March term of 1838. 10. New York Times, Feb. 22, 1926. 11. ibid 12. Enterprise, Feb. 23, 1926. 13. ibid. Feb. 9, 1926. 14. Laisv'e, Feb. 9, 1926. 15. Feb. 4, 1926 letter of ACLU to Bimba, Civil Liberties Cases, Corresp., Vol. 2, 1926, Mass.-N.Y. This writer consulted the original material at the Firestone Library, Princeton University. A microfilm collection is to be found at the New York Public Library. 16. Eight Questions And Seven Answers About the Michigan "Red Raid" Cases, (no date or place of publication), Labor Defense Council, Chicago. An eight page brochure posing the following queries:

1. What is This Case? 2. When Did These Raids Occur? 3. Who Are the Men Involved? 4. Why Were These Men Arrested? 5. What do These Raids Mean to the Labor Movement? 6. What is the Labor Defense Council? 7. What Can You Do? 8. What Will You Do? This promotional booklet describes the purpose of the Defense Council as threefold: 1) the defense of the Michigan Criminal syndicalist defendants BIMBA'S ARREST: PROTEST AND SUPPORT 57 prosecuted by the government in its drive against organized labor, 2) to defend free speech, free press, and free assembly for workers, 3) to organize local units of the Defense Council of individuals and organizations sympathetic to the Council. This publication is part of the collection at the Chicago Historical Society which kindly supplied this writer with a duplicate. 17. Feb. 6, 1926 letter of Bimba to ACLU, Civil Liberties Cases, Corresp.,

Vol. 2, 1926, Mass.-N.Y. 18. Enterprise, Feb. 9, 1926.

19. ibid., Feb. 8, 1926; Keleivis, Feb. 10, 1926.

20. At this writing the sole survivor of the defense team is the chief counsel, Harry Hoffman, born in Boston on March 29, 1897 of Louis and Eva Buxbaum. He was a member of the Harvard Law School class of 1920. Earlier he had exonerated three defendants charged with armed robbery in a case arising out of the Checker Taxi Cab strike. He had a penchant for taking cases of unpopular figures. 21. Enterprise, Feb. 8, 1926; New York Times, Feb. 18, 1926 mentions "considerable sums".

22. Brockton Times, Feb. 3, 1926. 23. A native of Newport, Rhode Island, born on December 17, 1879 of Henry and Elizabeth Cahoone (Gorton), Thorndike was a graduate of Harvard Law School, class of 1904. He was counsel for Krauchunskas in his suit against Eudaco.

24. Brockton Times, Feb. 3, 1926. 25. Harold Dexter Bent was the son of shoe manufacturer Frank and Anna L. King, born in Providence, Rhode Island on December 21, 1881, In his mayoralty post, he had succeeded William A. Bullivant. 26. Enterprise, Feb. 9, 1926.

27. ibid., Feb. 10, 1926. 28. Probably the correct amount. The antagonistic Keleivis puts the figure at $43 in its Feb. 17, 1926 issue. 29. For more detailed accounts of this pre-trial rally see Enterprise, Feb. 9, 10, 1926; Brockton Times, Feb. 10, 1926; Boston Evening Transcript, Feb. 10, 1926, henceforth, simply Transcript. Boston Post, Feb. 10, 1926, henceforth, simply Post. Chapter Nine

THE TRIAL POSTPONEMENT

Charles Carroll King was scheduled to handle the Bimba case. This Chief Justice of the Plymouth District Court of Brockton was born on June 11, 1863 in Montpelier, Vermont. The son of a wholesale

produce merchant, he received his law degree from Harvard in 1 888, and settled permanently in Brockton the following year. King was a descendant of Charles Carroll of CarroUton. At the time of the trial, he was a member of the law firm of Nutter, King & Keith. His religious affiliation was Unitarian.' The press spoke of the seasoned jurist's "quiet manner of speaking,

his dry wit and deliberate thought and action . . . true to the type of the Green Mountain State." ^ "He was most certainly known among

his friends for his dry wit . . . but sometimes surprised them by his sternness in the courtroom," according to Judge King's daughter.^ Now in his fifty third year, the official was facing the most unusual case ever to come before his bench. King took a clear, no-nonsense stand. He gave advance notice against any "standing room" spectators in the chambers of the courthouse, directed that the corridors be kept unobstructed, and warned that there would be no catering to the public as in the Scopes trial of the prior summer. "No Vaudeville Aspect to Mark Bimba Trial" cautioned one of the local dailies on the eve of the legal fray.*

The predicted storm did come with such a heavy fall of snow as nearly to isolate the city. Bimba attorneys left Boston by train at 7:20 a.m., but were only halfway along the 25-mile journey at Braintree Highlands by 10 a.m., so severe were the swirling gusts. On arrival soon after 1 1 a.m., the Hoffmans asked for a two-week delay to allow more time for mounting their defense. A postponement would permit some time for agitation and fund-raising in behalf of the defendant. THE TRIAL POSTPONEMENT 59

There was also some concern about the local witnesses being snowbound in the court building, since some of them no doubt had arrived on foot, the courthouse being only a mile and a half from "the village" where almost all the trial participants lived. Despite the intense snowstorm, a large crowd showed up so that the overflow had to be checked at the door by Court Officer Joseph Nathan. Bimba appeared as a "tall, stooped young man" with a "winning personality" but whose life was "somewhat of a mystery." ^ He took a seat between the windows so as to make a time-exposure impossible, ducking photographers and refusing to pose. In an attempt to establish the defendant's patriotism, his friends told the press that Bimba had fought in France during the World War, but they didn't seem to have much more information about his career.^ The defense lawyers were willing to waive examination and have the case sent immediately to the higher court, but the defendant balked at this maneuver. Bimba wanted the money raised for his protection to be spent in trying the case at the district court level, since a large share of funds had been solicited locally. Stanley Smith of 71 Vine Street, where Bimba had lodged the previous night, volunteered the figure of nearly S2,000 obtained for Bimba's defense.' Eudaco who was to be the star government witness was also in the forefront. He was collecting funds for the Citizens Club to be used at its discretion to fight Bimba. He showed the press a list of donors which included: Douglas Shoe, Atherton Furniture, Brockton Public Market; also individual gifts from: Mayor Harold D. Bent, Superin- tendent of Schools John F. Scully, efficiency expert William F. Brady of Douglas Shoe (also a past faithful navigator of the Knights of Columbus), Henry Rubin, superintendent of Diamond Shoe (uncle of the prosecutor of Bimba), J. F. Long, Americanization secretary at the YMCA, and prominent Brocktonians Harold C. Keith, head of his father's shoe business—the George E. Keith Company, and Rev. Thomas F. Brannon, pastor of St. Edward Church (just yards away from the National Hall). Interestingly, the mayor and the school head took exception to the use of this list as an anti-Bimba device. Both of them had made free-will contributions to the Citizens Club prior to the Bimba incident to promote citizenship efforts.^ The postponement having been granted, the following Tuesday on

February 1 6, the defense counsel formally petitioned ^ the govern- —

60 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA ment for a Bill of Particulars. Two days later, the chief prosecutor filed his reply as follows:

The commonwealth alleges that the defendant did violate G.L. Chapter

264, section 11 , by saying in substance in (the) Lithuanian language, a

translation of which in English is as follows:

Here we are organizing Lithuanians among Lithuanians, the Poles among the Polish, and the Jews among the Jewish, etc., to overthrow the American Capitalistic Government by a revolution in the same kind of Government that they now have in Russia. Workers are out of

employment. They are persecuted here in America and now is the time to organize.

We don't believe in the ballot. We don't believe in any form of Government here. The red flag shall fly on the capitol in Washington and there will also be one on the Lithuanian Hall in Brockton. '^

Neither district nor superior court records contain a Bill of Particulars on the blasphemy charge. Apparently the document was destroyed at the local level since the charge was settled there. The Associated Press did print the text described as the prosecutor's translation. One of the local newspapers also carried a copy as follows:

People have built churches for the last 2,000 years, and we have sweated under Christian rule for 2,000 years, and what have we got?

The government is in control of the priests and bishops, clerics, and

capitalists. They tell us there is a God. Where is he? There is no such

thing. Who can prove it? There are still fools enough who believe in

God. The priests tell us there is a soul. Why, I have a sole, but that sole

is on my shoe. Referring to Christ, the' priests also tell us he is God.

Why, he is no more a God than you or I. He was just a plain man.''

While the public focused on the rare theological question, the defense tackled the sedition allegation in an opening thrust. In a press retort, Harry HoflPman complained that "not more than 10% of '^ the bills are true" and "about one sentence in each bill is correct." A sentimental note was scored into the melodrama with the advent of Eva Bimba,'^ spouse of the accused. Speaking in percentages, too, she pointed out that "90% of the statements" in the Bill of Particulars were misquotes or misinterpretations in the translation, THE TRIAL POSTPONEMENT 61 as she affirmed her loyalty to her husband. She scorned the state's "blue" laws with the quip that she would be afraid to kiss her marital partner in public lest she be arrested. The defendant's wife remained throughout the trial, acting part of the time as stenogra- pher for counsel.**

NOTES

1. Elroy S. Thompson, History of Plymouth, Norfolk & Barnstable Counties, Mass., New York, 1928, p. 38; Boston Herald, Feb. 24, 1926, henceforth, simply Herald.

2. Rutland Daily Herald, Feb. 24, 1926; Thompson, ibid. Like so many newspapers around the country, the Rutland publication of King's native state gave front-page attention for the duration of the trial. 3. Letter of Mrs. John H. Quebman (Adelaide King) to this writer, July 12, 1971. 4. Enterprise, Feb. 9, 1926. 5. ibid Also, Feb. 10, ibid 6. Brockton Times, Feb. 9, 10, 1926. This wartime military service attributed to Bimba was incorrect. His memoirs account in detail for his whereabouts in America during the World War, but say nothing of his being a soldier. 7. Transcript, Feb. 10, 1926.

8. Brockton Times, Feb. 8, 1926; Bimba mentions this list of donors in a typewritten speech dated March 6, 1926, Civil Liberties Cases, Corresp., Vol. 2, 1926, Mass.-N.Y. 9. Case no. 78314, Plymouth County District Court records. 10. Case no. 11730, Plymouth Superior Court records (scene of the later appeal). 11. New York Times, Feb. 19, 1926; Brockton Times, Feb. 18, 1926; Gazette, F.E., Feb. 18, 1926. 12. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 19, 1926.

13. Now and long since the trial, Eva Mizaras, a widow, she is a secretary at Laisv'e alongside her former husband. 14. Enterprise, Feb. 23, 24, 1926. —

Chapter Ten

PRO-BIMBA ASSEMBLIES BLOCKED

One Brockton newspaper perceptively foresaw what was ahead.

"Massachusetts must bear as best it can the jibes directed at her ..." observed an editorial,^ disavowing any parallel between the Bimba case and the Scopes trial. Boston and Worcester now became embroiled as the two-week postponement allowed tensions to enkindle and blaze forth at meetings and attempted meetings rallies sparkling with charges and countercharges. In Worcester,^ Superintendent Charles H. Briggs of the Worcester County Mechanics Association cancelled a lease for the use of their hall when apprised that Bimba was to speak. Elsewhere in the city, rental of Washburn Hall was momentarily denied for a Bimba assembly. Then the chairman of the Worcester branch of the Labor Council intervened and persuaded Washburn Hall authorities to rescind their ban. Chairman H. Sidney Bloomfield recalled the reluctant Mayor Sullivan of a few years earlier who only hesitatingly gave approval for a similar controversial meeting. Voicing an outcry ". of that time, the committee spokesman retorted that . . bringing out the police and even the militia will not prevent our meeting. There may be a smashing of heads, but what will that accomplish? It doesn't deny us the right to meet." "We will appeal to Mayor O'Hara." ^ Bloomfield was keeping in mind the possibility of securing Clarence Darrow for the defense of Bimba, but only if the case went to higher court. Meanwhile in Worcester, a group of sympathizers were coming together at their regular meeting place the local A.O.H. (Ancient Order of Hibernians) Hall.* Despite Bloomfield's oratory, the Washburn Hall was refused at the last minute for the second time. Robert Zelms, New England district organizer of the Defense Council protested that when the PRO-BIMBA ASSEMBLIES BLOCKED 63

KKK (Ku Klux Klan) wanted to meet in Worcester at a time when public sentiment was adverse, at least Mechanics Hall officials argued for free speech. But now the atmosphere was strangely different. There is a "hysteria and a blot on the democracy and fairmindedness of such a large cosmopolitan center as Worcester." ^ Zelms accused labor enemies of using this case as a weapon. Boston, the "Cradle of Liberty" was no more generous or tolerant. Refusals occurred at these halls: Faneuil, Ford, Lorimer and Tremont, After some delay, Paine Memorial Hall was hired, but not for long. Boston City Censor, John M. Casey advised Paine officials against the rental. Acting Mayor Charles K. Keene also lashed out against the permission, an action which contributed to the withdrawal of the hall for the Bimba rally. Away in New York at the time. Mayor Malcolm E. Nichols telephoned his approval of stopping such meetings "aimed at our institutions." ^ Zelms of the Defense Council was beside himself over these misfortunes. "So much confusion has been caused through the high-handed action of the officials in blocking free speech ... it would now be futile to hold a meeting as proposed." ' A comedy of errors transpired on Sunday, February 21 when self-proclaimed extremist and revolutionary Scott Nearing arrived in Boston. Barred from speaking at Paine Hall,^ he began a street speech from a "pile of snow" ^ when Sergeant Charles W. Miller and a patrolman McNally drove up from Station 5 of Dedham Street. The duo escorted the speaker to a police box at Berkeley and Tremont Streets. From there an inquiry with district headquarters about the "prisoner" proved embarrassing. Sergeants Gale and

Miller on desk duty told their colleagues that it was permissible to let

Nearing speak in the street provided he didn't block traffic. Red-faced, the policemen released their captive. The orator promptly returned to the steps of Paine Hall to complete his talk.'° The Nearing episode fully frustrated Zelms. Incensed over the incident, the Defense Council organizer professed that "this is the last time that free speech will be abridged in the cradle of American ". ^' liberty if we can help it." . . We intend to force the issue."

A voice from a New Hampshire campus added its disgust over the Nearing fiasco. "We now understand what revered Bostonians me^n by that figure. Their town is the cradle in which liberty is being ." ^^ slowly rocked to sleep." "A gentle snore was heard . . accord- 64 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

ing to the Dartmouth College newspaper. Rabbi Dr. Harry Levi of Boston, in a talk before the Brockton YMHA (Young Men's Hebrew Association), urged "free air" *^ for all radical ideas which he compared to boiling water ready to expand explosively. In incidental remarks, support for Bimba came from Edwin D. Meade and George W. Coleman on the platform of the Ford Forum at an eighteenth anniversary lecture on Palestinian problems.*'^ Ironically enough, a rally did take place in behalf of Bimba in

Brockton itself, although here too there was a number of previous failures to obtain facilities. Vasa Hall was denied. The Damocles

Lodge gave approval for the use of its Pythian Temple, but right afterwards cancelled out when the exact purpose of the rental became evident. The same thing happened with Canton Hall. First

it was "yes" according to custodian, Charles C. Hurd,*^ but then it was "no" when the trustees met under chairman Zenas Lewis and associate William Cox. A five-dollar check paid in advance to the janitor for his service was returned to Henry L. Freeman of the Defense Council. Another affirmative-negative sequence of replies was heard from authorities of Massasoit Hall. Bimba adherents did finally succeed in obtaining space at the Labor Lyceum headquarters (see next chapter).'^ The wire services and local reporters continued to focus on Bimba, thus letting the nation sleuth the details of the contest. The interim period had an amphetamine effect on the populace. Public opinion hardened against Bimba, while a minority of zealots firmly displayed their allegiance to him.

NOTES

1. Brockton Times, Feb. 11, 1926. 2. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 20, 1926. 3. ibid. C.E., Feb. 20, 1926. 4. ibid. C.E., & F.E., Feb. 19, 1926. 5. ibid Feb. 22, 1926. 6. Post, Feb. 20, 1926; Gazette, C.E. Feb. 20, 1926; Feb. 22, C.E., 1926; New York Times, ¥^h. 21, 1926. 7. Herald, Feb. 23, 1926. 8. A speech arranged by the Committee for the Recognition and Defense of Soviet Russia, New York Times, Feb. 22, 1926. PRO-BIMBA ASSEMBLIES BLOCKED 65

9. Boston Globe, morning ed., Feb. 22, 1926.

10. ibid., morning ed., Feb. 22, 1926. Post, Feb. 22, 1926; New York Times, Feb. 22, 1926. 11. New York Times, Feb. 22, 1926. 12. Quotes from Herald, Feb. 23, 1926. 13. Globe, morning ed., Feb. 22, 1926. 14. ibid. Permission to use Ford Hall for the Bimba rally had been rescinded by trustee chairman, William E. Blodgett.

15. Brockton Times, Feb. 18, 1926. Hurd's apology was, "It is not that we are in opposition. It is merely because we don't want to get mixed up in this thing." 16. Enterprise, Feb. 18, 19, 20, 1926; Brockton Times, Feb. 18, 19, 20, 1926. ^

Chapter Eleven

BIMBA'S INTERIM PURSUITS; EVE OF THE TRIAL

A man of uncommon zeal and singular purpose, Bimba was apparently unshaken by his impending court appearance as he continued his trek about centers of Lithuanians in Massachusetts. He found time to travel 100 miles to the city of Pittsfield on the western border of Massachusetts where he attempted to give a talk before a handful of listerners.' When word spread to the local police head about Bimba's presence within the city limits, Chief John L. Sullivan and Captain John H. Hines broke up the gathering and ordered the speaker to leave on the next train. In mid-February Bimba managed to get himself embroiled in a so-called bolshevik scare in the small factory town of Hudson, Massachusetts, 30 miles west of Boston. " 'Red' Accusations Fanned By Sensational Rumors" screamed the headlines of the weekly newspaper, countered by another headline a week later which announced that the "Bottom Drops Out of 'Red' Scare". ^ Bimba's connection in Hudson with a "red" schoolhouse on Houghton Street and a controversial burial case aroused the entire town, especially the fiery Irish pastor of the local Catholic Church, Rev. John D. Mullen. As a result of the turmoil, the priest supposedly was planning to attend the Brockton trial. Meanwhile, literature and other evidence to be presented to the court was turned over to Brockton authorities who came to Hudson.'^ Even Bimba's lawyers couldn't keep track of their client. The Hoffmans were unaware of his trip to Hudson, but admitted that since the arrest, he had made showings in Lowell, Lawrence, and Boston.^ Worcester and Norwood were also scenes of other talks.^ In Worcester, Lithuanians for the most part were anxious to BIMBA'S INTERIM PURSUITS; EVE OF THE TRIAL 67

unhinge in the mind of the community any link between them and Bimba. A city gathering was held a day before the trial at the Rialto Theater. The fruit of a lengthy three-hour session was a disavowal of Bimba by 87 delegates from 29 organizations. The participants asserted their loyalty to the United States by recalling that 450 Lithuanians of the city had served in the Army and Navy during the World War. Spokesman Nicodemus Kudarauskas denied any truth in an earlier publicized statement that Bimba supporters in the city numbered up to 1,500.' The pastor of the Lithuanian church in Brockton spoke out. Rev. John Svagzdys petitioned the mayor to prevent future meetings of the kind at which Bimba spoke on that fateful January 26. The priest characterized Brockton as a "red" stronghold of New England, and for good measure attacked the neighboring town of Stoughton as a nest of bolsheviks, too.® In Brockton, Mayor Bent again wisely refrained, although with reluctance, from impeding any rally, this time on recommendation of District Attorney Winfield D. Wilbar (who figured in the outcome of the case) and City Solicitor Stewart B. McLeod.

. . . acting on their advice, I am going to throw the city wide open to these radicals for this evening. However, should there be further

attempts to hold such meetings in Brockton, I will bar the speakers and punish the hall managers by revoking their licenses. The only logical procedure for the programme this evening would be

.^ to railroad Bimba out of the city, but he must appear in court . .

Two meetings were scheduled: one at the Labor Lyceum, corner of Crescent and Otis Streets and one at the National Hall, scene of the original controverted speech. By a peculiar twist of fate, the latter assembly fell through because of an intramural rift among the Hall officials over the authority to rent.'*' Scott Nearing was expected to speak, along with New York writer Bertrand Wolfe. Dudley Field Malone was repeatedly mentioned in the press as a speaker, too. Likewise, anticipated was Henry Wordsworth Longfellow Dana, grandson of the poet, who had been dismissed from Columbia University for his so-called "advanced ideas." But none of these four appeared on the rostrum. Instead, there was another trio at the Lyceum forum which transpired without any overt incident. Chaired by Harry Canter, a secretary in the Defense Council 68 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA setup, the speakers' program consisted of Dr. Howard A. Gibbs of

Middleboro, Mass., J. Louis Engdahl of Chicago, editor of the Daily Worker, and Bimba himself Gibbs was introduced as a "true American" who could trace his ancestry back to 1640, and as one who had come to apologize for his Puritan forefathers' blasphemy statute. The speaker linked religion with suppression of work- ingmen's rights. Concerning the defendant Bimba, the blueblood New Englander opined that the Brooklyn writer "was helping expose the religious superstition and 'bunk' by which the workers are kept in ignorance and subjection." ^' Gibbs was willing to be jailed along with Bimba if necessary. As to the laboring class,

You workers must emancipate yourselves. But how? I know I am on

thin ice now. I won't tell you to throw bombs. I'll leave it to you to do things your own way. But you must take control, and the only way to

take it is to take it. This thing is coming faster than you or I think; it is sweeping toward us '^

Engdahl in his own polished style of oratory likened Bimba to Demosthenes compelled to drink hemlock. This second speaker scorned the fear of new ideas, rallying the listeners to "make them put us in jail" and to "shake off your chains and rise to power,"

". ." '^ . . until we crush this thing called private property . . Both Gibbs and Engdahl called for the abolition of the "capitalistic social system" which they interpreted as using religion for a tool. As they spoke, cautious listeners included Brockton police officials: Inspec- tors Chase, Hill, Brouillard, and Regan, hearing at first hand some radical notions, perhaps for the first time in their lives. Bimba on his part struck out against Cardinal O'Connell '* and his "agents", a term of derision for priests. Of them the defendant said, "they would establish an inquisition and hang those opposed to them" ^^ if they had the power to do so. As to a Supreme Being, "no scientifically-minded man believes in God," declared Bimba. '^ He asked in bitter rhetoric if the church were not the support of Mussolini, the Czar, and the Kaisers? "I further claim that religion is not necessary for people in order to be good and moral." ^^ As to the blasphemy restriction, Bimba complained.

It is a disgrace to the commonwealth of Massachusetts and to the

country itself that such a law still exists. If these blue laws of Puritan BIMBA'S INTERIM PURSUITS; EVE OF THE TRIAL 69

times are re-enforced and made valid, then nobody is safe in this State. If the shoe manufacturers of Brockton and the agents of Cardinal O'Connell will succeed in convicting a person for denying the existence of a certain God, then tomorrovs^ they will convict you for eating mince pie or kissing your wife on Sundays.'^

No doubt this oratory held the audience. But w^hen Bimba sw^itched to talk about conditions in Lithuania, the listeners for the most part from the eastside of Brockton, became bored since many of them were not Lithuanians. "Bimba Speaks but Audience Fails to Stay" '^ was a caption in the following day's Enterprise^ explaining that "whispered conversations broke out all over the hall and many ^^ persons left their seats." Chairman Canter overestimated the generosity of his listeners. His successive appeals for gifts of SIO, $5, $2 brought no response. Finally, he admitted that dollar bills would be acceptable. S48.01 were collected for the defense fund. Among the well-wishers in the ". hall was Eva,^^ spouse of the accused, described as . . petite, attractive, brunette, with boyish-bobbed hair, rosy cheeks, and pale blue eyes." ^^ The pre-trial booster session ended quietly, and the crowd dispersed marked with curiosity as to what would come of the next day and its legal proceedings.

Reporting the climate at the outset of the trial, the communist daily published in Chicago attacked the New England of strike- breaker, president Calvin Coolidge, 77?^ Boston Telegram and its owner Doheny, the authorities of Hudson, Massachusetts, the Brockton police, and wealthy manufacturers of the area—all ridiculed with a variety of charges. "Capitalist Press In Boston Is Wildly Whipping Up Lynching Frenzy Against Anthony Bimba" blared one of two front-page stories. Only the student publication of Dartmouth

College won words of praise for its stand. ^^ An editorial meanwhile summed up the stance of the communist paper. The column charged that the opposition to Bimba was plotting to harass foreign-born laborers into meek submission to their bosses, and to force them back to their churches "under the deadening spell of the clergy".^* At the Belmont Street courthouse in Brockton, a teletype was being set up in an anteroom of the building. Paul Courteau, court correspondent for the Brockton Times, was instrumental in arranging for this wire service through his personal acquaintance. District Attorney Winfield Wilbar.^^ 70 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

On the eve of the Bimba trial, another trial was still on minds of the populace. The celebrated accused murderers—Sacco and Van- zetti—were still alive pending one appeal after another in their behalf These Italian immigrants had been captured in Brockton itself Their trial had taken place in nearby Dedham, only fifteen miles away. Something of the fear, wonderment, and high emotion attached to the Sacco-Vanzetti proceedings was hanging over Brockton like an ominous cloud.

NOTES

1. Keleivis, Feb. 24, 1926 gives the number of eleven. Other sources mention twelve and thirteen. 2. Enterprise, Feb. 20, 1926; Brockton Times, Feb. 20, 1926. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 20, 1926; New York Times, Feb. 21, 1926. 3. (Hudson) News-Enterprise, Feb. 19, 26, 1926. 4. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 16, 17, 22, 1926; William Wolkovich, From the

Nemunas to the Assabet, Hudson, Mass., 1966, Part I, #33.

5. ibid., Feb. F.E. 18, 1926. 6. Keleivis, Feb. 10, 1926; Laisv'e, Feb. 15, 1926. These addresses of Bimba were evidently confined to foreign-language audiences since there is hardly any mention of them in the English-language press. 7. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 23, 1926, F.E., Feb. 24, 1926. 8. Brockton Times, Feb. 8, 20, 1926; Globe, morning ed., Feb. 20, 1926. 9. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926.

10. ibid.

11. ibid.

12. ibid.

13. ibid. 14. Ordinary of the archdiocese of Boston which included in its territory the city of Brockton. 15. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926. 16. ibid 17. Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 24, 1926. For some reason the Boston and Worcester newspapers said little about this Tuesday evening assembly. See Post, Globe, morning ed. and Transcript, Feb. 24, 1926. 18. Chronicle Telegraph, Quebec, Feb. 24, 1926 (unsigned article, probably from a wire service). Thus Canadians, too, were being informed about Bimba. 19. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926. 20. ibid 21. Herald, Feb. 24, 1926. BIMBA'S INTERIM PURSUITS; EVE OF THE TRIAL 71

22. Enterprise, Feb. 23, 1926. 23. The Daily Worker, Feb. 24, 1926. 24. ibid. Feb. 24, 1926. 25. Interview between this writer and Paul Courteau, Jan. 7, 1972, Brockton, Mass. Chapter Twelve

THE TRIAL BEGINS

Colorful, uncommon, jumbo-size headlines flashed in readers' eyes that Wednesday and Thursday in February, blaring out a journalistic fanfare for the start of the trial. "Bimba Motion Fails; Blasphemy Trial On" {Enterprise, Feb. 24); "Blue Law Poor One But Valid" {Post, Feb. 25); "Digs Out Old Law to Try Bimba" {Gazette, C.E., Feb. 24, caption with photo of assistant prosecutor); "Bimba Trial Starts Under Puritan Law" {New York Times, Feb. 25); "Bimba 'Blasphemy' Trial Begins" {The Daily Worker, Feb. 24, 1926). The mood of the Brocktonians was one of apprehension mixed with curiosity and indignation. Their community* was a typical east coast cosmopolitan center of French, Greeks, Irish, Italians, Jews, Lebanese, Lithuanians, and Poles, plus a segment of the oldtime residents—the "Yankees" of English background. The vast majority of 69,179 residents were at least nominally churchgoers affiliated with the 47 churches and synagogues of the city. As the world's largest manufacturing center for men's shoes, Brockton experienced a measure of unrest among the poorly paid workers, some of whom were attracted to so-called radical causes despite the violence that sometimes accompanied agitation to organize unions, of which there were 25 already established. Alongside this kind of sentiment, there was a certain spirit of demonstrative patriotism in the air. Long and spectacular parades were a big drawing card on civil, festive days. The people had not so quickly forgotten the 97 men of Brockton who had perished in the World War.^ The police department prosecutes cases in district court according to contemporary practice. In 1926 the custom was for the city to employ its own attorney to speak for the government. The task of pursuing Bimba became the novel burden of one I. Manuel Rubin, City Prosecutor for some eight years under appointment of Mayor

74 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Harold D. Bent. Graduated from Boston University Law School, class of 1915, Rubin found himself opposing a law-school classmate in the person of Irving Hoffman. The city lawyer was born in Russia in 1891. His parents were Harris and Mary Lachmanov who had four children of whom L Manuel was the oldest. The attorney's entire law practice has been confined to Brockton where he still observes office hours at 231 Main Street, despite his eighty plus years. In reminiscing about the trial forty five years later, Rubin tells that he was quite surprised when assigned to the blasphemy case.

The novelty stunned him, and at first he thought the clerk of court was being facetious.^ Because of the bi-lingual aspects (all the witnesses were immigrants) of the proceedings, an interpreter was available at the outset. Also, a young Lithuanian-speaking lawyer, Joseph M. Veracka,* was permitted to act as assistant prosecutor. He was out of law school but a few years at the time. Veracka was born in Lithuania in 1901, but was brought to America as an infant by his parents. The son of a tailor, the trial participant received his law degree from Suffolk Law School in 1923. The Clerk of Court was Charles F. King, former professional baseball player in the New England league and an American League umpire in 1904, credited with unearthing the blasphemy law. At 9:20 a.m. his booming, resonant voice called out the name of Anthony Bimba. Newsmen observed that the defendant's wife Eva caressed him as he entered the dock. He stood there, a strong- looking, dark-haired man with a winning smile and striking appearance. He listened as the judge began to speak. Immediately, Justice King voiced regret over having this case ^ before him. "The entire Lithuanian situation is repulsive to me," he lamented, inasmuch as these rival groups were frequently resorting to the machinery of courts to settle their grievances, sometimes serious, more often not. No doubt the judge was adverting to the Eudaco-Navickis, Krauchunskas-Eudaco, and Simutis-Sam- son litigation in progress at that very moment. In a paternal aside. King remarked, "These people should learn to live in peace." ^ Harry Hoffman, who was spokesman for his law firm throughout the trial, opened up for the defense with Motions for Dismissal of both complaints. First he concentrated on the blasphemy matter.

I assume that we've got to discuss the validity of a law with reference to conditions existing at the present time. When this act was passed we THE TRIAL BEGINS 75

were living in a different age, when we had not even seen a separation

of Church and State . . J

Hoffman continued, putting the case in historical perspective.

"Massachusetts didn't have the cosmopolitan population then that it has now. It was a Congregationalist State and any offense against the

Church was per se against the State." ® Counsel drew the court's attention to the antiquity of the blasphemy law, antedating the constitution with its guaranteed freedoms and rights. He asked religionists to recognize the rights of an atheist, calling atheism itself a kind of religion. "Man has a right to deny the existence of God."

"This is a constitutional right and the courts should protect his belief" Also, "Atheism is as much a religious problem as any religion. The drafters of our constitution assumed that everyone believed in God and a government." ^ Hoffman pleaded for a realistic appraisal of present-day conditions warning against retro- gression. "Unless we wipe out the Kneeland decision we step back ." ^° 150 years . . From the angle of rights, the lawyer questioned whether or not the blasphemy law was not itself a violation of the first, second, and third amendments. The defense moved on to the sedition issue, flatly denying any act of incitement in Bimba's speech. The Hoffmans' client, if indeed he did say the things attributed to him, was merely making pronounce- ments of fact. "It is not a crime to say one believes only in the Soviet form of government," '^ Hoffman asserted. Next, the prosecutor arose to offer his rebuttal to the Motion for Dismissal. As an officer of the court, Rubin's task was to present the darkest side of the picture possible, in harmony with the facts as they would be developed in testimony. Hoffman too as an officer of the court had a similar role, but in reverse, namely, to offer the most favorable construction possible in behalf of his defendant. The judge would have to determine which combination of views most closely approximated the truth, such as is the role of every jurist. Manuel Rubin had already anticipated his line of attack in an earlier press statement. "The type of men represented by Bimba and the radical statements accredited to him are a menace to American liberty and the American public." ^^ The prosecutor continued, "I am confident that laws . . . will show their teeth, much to the disadvantage of Mr. Bimba." "We are ready to fight to the limit." '^ 76 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Quite correctly, he lectured his opponent to the effect that it was not for the court to decide the constitutional issue. Then he linked together the two alleged crimes by contending that the U.S. government stands on a foundation of religion and must be protected in its roots. "This man is not here on a charge of heresy, but because he has attacked the existence of God and attempted to destroy and disrupt men's veneration for a religion." '"^ The legislature in 1921 had considered the blasphemy statute for possible revision, but chose to leave it intact. Rubin put emphasis on the notion of a "willful" denial in the sense of being malicious, in accord with the 1838 ". Kneeland decision. . . he (Bimba) did willfully offend the rights of others," '^ the prosecutor maintained. Blending in the sedition charge, Rubin went on to admit, "I can readily see that a more violent tirade might have been used by Mr. Bimba," but in the mind of the government's attorney there was enough matter involved for "judicial notice of the court." '^ Thus, he urged the court to move ahead, citing relevant cases against Benjamin Gitlow in New York and William Bross Lloyd in Illinois. At one point in the morning pleadings, Hoffman asked the judge to allow separate hearings on the two charges. The request provided an opening for a flash of wit on the part of King, the first such quip of many to come during the trial hours. Anxious to get on with the case in its entirety. Judge King replied, "I can't see any use in taking two bites at a cherry." •' "I would be pleased to grant both motions of the defense," '^ started the justice. But he realized he was bound by the 1838 Kneeland verdict, although he sided with the minority opinion. He confessed he had no competence to do what the higher court might do. Should Bimba be found guilty before the district court, the judge foresaw an automatic appeal, hoping that in such an instance, the court would "apply the sponge to it (i.e. the law) with considerably '^ more vigor than it did in 1838." Taking up the companion charge of sedition. King commented: "As to incitement, there perhaps was an occasion during war times to invoke this law with unstinted severity and possibly there is no need of it now." ^^ Continuing his language of moderation and perceptiveness, the judge concluded, "In reference to the sedition charge, its alleged statement of the defense sounds more like a prophecy than an inciting, but the evidence will decide the .

THE TRIAL BEGINS 77 question," 2' The motions were overruled. The way was now unblocked for the prosecution to usher in its witnesses. Meanwhile, in the streets below, there was momentary excitement over the arrival of Bimba's devotees. Paul Courteau, newsman for the Brockton Times vividly relates the scene as he observed it from a second floor window of the courthouse.

Local and state police were in evidence, some on foot, some on motorcycles, with another four or five on horses. The local police guarded the courthouse doors, while the state police were deployed at strategic posts outdoors. Bimba's followers came marching around the corner at Main Street, up along Belmont Street to Clinton Avenue. They were spread out abreast filling the sidewalks as well as the streets. At the juncture of Belmont Street and Clinton Avenue, they came to a halt and formed a semi-circle. But there was no trouble. Only two or

three tried to bolt through the police, but were held off.^^

NOTES

1 Brockton & Bridgewater Directory, 1926. 2. In Memoriam, issued by Brockton World War Victory Association, 1919; Brockton and Its Centennial, 1821-1921, ed. Warren P. Landers, Brockton, 1921. 3. Interview with this writer, August 21, 1970. 4. Elroy S. Thompson, History of Plymouth, Norfolk & Barnstable Counties, Mass., Vol. II, New York, 1928, p. 207. Veracka died in 1952. His widow Anna lives in Brockton. 5. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926. 6. Transcript, Feb. 25, 1926. 7. ibid, Feb. 24, 1926. 8. ibid 9. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 24, 1926. 10. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926. 11. Transcript, Feb. 24, 1926.

12. Brockton Times, Feb. 8, 1926. 13. Enterprise, Feb. 23, 1926. 14. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 24, 1926. 15. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926. 16. ibid 17. Globe, afternoon ed., Feb. 24, 1926. 18. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926. 78 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

19. Post, Feb. 25, 1926. 20. Brockton Times, Feb. 24, 1926. 21. Gazette, C.E. & F.E., Feb. 25, 1926. 22. Interview between this writer and Paul Courteau, Jan. 7, 1972, Brockton, Mass. Chapter Thirteen

OPENING DAY WITNESSES

There was a traffic jam in the courthouse as more than two score pohcemen were on duty overseeing several hundred newsmen, lawyers, witnesses, and spectators trying to squeeze into a trial room with a capacity of about 70. The previous day, court officials laid down the exact order of entry into the chambers, i.e. first the defense lawyers, then counsel for the government, followed by government witnesses, reporters, and finally—if any room were left over—the public.^ Back in "the village", plans for the baseball season were being put together, with assurance of funds for new uniforms to clothe Saint Rocco's nine. The lineup for the warm weather sport read: John Chestnut, Joe Kvaraceus, Don Bartkus, Mike Podzun, Joe West, Philly O'Gonnell, Anthony Chestnut, Bronie West, Joe Svirsky, Peter Couble, Frank Couble.^ Meanwhile, another lineup of acquaintances and colleagues was forming in the local halls of justice. Thirteen witnesses for the prosecution were sworn in, and seventeen for the defense were called and admitted to the courtroom.^ In the defendant's box there sat a "melancholy martyr", "a man of sour and horn-rim spectacled countenance," as one observer noted.'* District court procedure did not encompass official stenographic recording of testimony. The quotations and sequence offered here and in chapters fifteen and seventeen represent a selection of news accounts which this writer has blended together as the most accurate and substantially correct version. One must bear in mind that translations of testimony were being made on the spot, and that a variety of reporters were jotting down notes in their own style and with their own selection of details. Newsmen came from all directions. At least three wire services 80 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA were covering the story namely, United Press, Associated Press, and International News Service. Reporters came from the New York Times and the Worcester Evening Gazette. Among the representatives of the Boston press were: Frank P. Sibley for the Boston Globe, Charles Drury of the Boston Herald, David P. Shea from the Boston Post, Fred C. Green for the Boston Evening Transcript. Chicago's communist

paper, The Daily Worker was on hand via its editor, J. Louis Engdahl. The two Brockton dailies as well as other newspapers were also on the scene. It was now overture time for Manuel Rubin, prosecutor. He had the backing of considerable public opinion, as well as opposition from a vociferous minority. The day before the trial, he received a telegram from Charles Smith, president of the American Association for the Advancement of Atheism.

The AAAA protests against persecution of Atheists camouflaged as prosecution for blasphemy. We have members in Massachusetts where we shall most certainly propagate Atheism. Can you not dig up ancient Bible-supported laws providing that witches be hanged and disobedient children be killed? ^

No doubt however, between the two attorneys, Rubin must have been notably more comfortable pressing his side of the case than Hoffman with his unpopular defendant to protect. The lead witness was called, and the no-jury trial was under way.

He was identified as Anthony J. Eudaco of Randolph, a nearby town. A rather slight man of 140 pounds measuring five feet four inches, he was employed at W. L. Douglas Shoe as a vamper. Preliminary answers revealed that Eudaco had been in the United States for 26 years, and was a citizen for 18 years. He accounted for his presence at the disputed speech by explaining that he and his friends responded to invitations and circulars. Assistant prosecutor Joseph Veracka translated pertinent exhibits for the benefit of the court. According to the witness, about 150 listeners showed up for the Bimba talk including some children. The lecture was in two parts split by an intermission for the sale of books, including Russia Today, the report of the British Trade Delegation to Soviet Russia, most likely in a Lithuanian version aimed at an all-Lithuanian audience. Concluding the presentation was the customary question-answer period. OPENING DAY WITNESSES 81

First Rubin strove to establish the blasphemy as an essential background to the seditious remarks. Eudaco spoke with nervous voice, gripping the sides of the chair.

RUBIN: "What did Bimba say about God at the meeting?"

EUDACO: "Ministers and priests tell us there is a God in the clouds

somewhere, which there is not and who can prove it? Bimba

tells us there is no such thing as God. He said Christ was a coward and was afraid to die and that communists were braver

than Christ. He said there were still fools around for 2,000 years

and the workers got nothing out of it."

From there the prosecutor made a transition to the sedition issue.

RUBIN: "Did he say anything about prayers and swords?" EUDACO: "Yes. Bimba said the workers don't expect to get

anything through prayers. The only way to get government is by the sword." RUBIN: "Did he say anything about organizing?" EUDACO: "He said now was the time for workers to organize for the revolution. He said American workers were suffering as much as European workers." RUBIN: "What else?" EUDACO: "Bimba answered a question by saying communists did not believe in the ballot, but in revolution. We are organizing American workmen to overthrow the capitalistic government,

and to establish a Soviet Republic as in Russia. There is only

one red flag and it will fly in Washington, Lithuania, and over this Hall." 6

Eudaco also testified about Bimba ridiculing the notion of a human spirit, i.e. the soul, by saying he had such a thing, but it was the sole on his shoe. In the Lithuanian tongue, there is no such parallel synonym. It appears the prosecutor was misled by the witnesses on this point. The "soul-sole" debate cropped up repeatedly during the three days of testimony. But it was nothing more than an aggravating exercise in semantic futility.

The first witness described several questions put to Bimba. It seems another member of the audience (also a witness for the 82 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA government), George Sampson had asked the lecturer why he had advocated socialism for six years but now had switched to communism. The reply was: "Socialism believes in the ballot, but we don't. We believe in revolution." ' The lead witness had also posed a pair of queries to Bimba. Why, for instance, didn't the Lithuanian bolsheviks recognize the new Lithuanian regime when even Russia did so? And why, if the Lithuanian flag flew in Moscow, was it not unfurled at the National Hall? Eudaco testified that Bimba answered by saying he recognized Lithuanian workers but not their government, and he foretold that the red flag would fly in Kaunas

{i.e. the Lithuanian capitol), Washington, and the National Hall.

The second question was: how long would Bimba last in Russia if he spoke about its government as he had spoken here about the U.S. authorities? Supposedly, the defendant admitted that he would not last long. The starting prosecution witness also told how an official of the National Hall, Stanley Smith, warned Bimba at one point not to answer any more inquiries because of the "kind of people here tonight." 8 Hoffman now took up the cudgels for the defense. Under rigid cross-examination, Eudaco stuck to his story about the sayings on the night of January 26, 1926 at the National Hall. Then the defendant's attorney began to probe the circumstances of the sedition complaint.

HOFFMAN: "Did you ever tell anybody before Bimba came to Brockton that he would be arrested?" EUDACO: "No, Sir." HOFFMAN: "When did you decide to swear out a criminal complaint?" EUDACO: "The next morning." ^

With skillful scrutiny, the defense counsel returned to this same question on the third and final day of the trial, unnerving the witness and forcing him to revise his reply above. The questioner then tried to ascertain what directly preceded and immediately followed Bimba's allegedly inflammatory statements. Hoflman hoped to show no natural setting for such remarks, and to suggest that Bimba was provoked, if indeed he did say anything bordering on the nature of OPENING DAY WITNESSES 83

the complaint. But Eudaco couldn't remember! The defense pressed onward.

HOFFMAN: "Didn't Bimba say the Lithuanians were organizing to overthrow the government of Lithuania?" EUDACO: "No, Sir." '^

Now Bimba's counsel struck out plainly to discredit the reliability of the man on the witness stand.

HOFFMAN: "You are more interested in fighting the men who brought Bimba here, than you are in fighting Bimba, aren't you?" EUDACO: "I am fighting Bimba and Americans who believe in

radical principles. I am fighting for American principles." HOFFMAN: "Are you a member of any church?" EUDACO: "Not now." HOFFMAN: "When did you last attend church?" ^^

Here Judge King cut in with a ruling against the question. Hoffman rejoined that he was merely aiming to show that an atheist's talk could not shock another atheist. Court was then recessed for a lunch hour. Recalled briefly in the afternoon, Eudaco and Hoffman had an exchange over the soul-sole matter. The defense extracted an admission from this government witness that he did have a civil suit pending at the moment against the National Hall. Also, he admitted having been a treasurer though very briefly for the local William Foster fund (for the defense of radical Foster). Court reconvened at 11:30 p.m. with the second witness, George Sampson, president of the Citizens Club, ascending the witness chair. He was further described as a cutter for Diamond Shoe. Sampson corroborated Eudaco's testimony, adding that Bimba scoffed at the Catholic clergy labelling "... priests, pope, bishops,

." '^ (as) nothing but monarchs . . Relating to the sedition charge, Sampson quoted Bimba as saying, "... workers here are killing ." ". themselves day by day at the bench . . . . Alliance with the

Communists Party is the only remedy." "Now is our chance to join." ^3 84 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Sampson's use of written notes attracted Hoffman's eye. The defense lawyer approached the witness and asked about the time this material was written. Sampson replied that he had prepared these cues after being summoned to appear in court, and also after a meeting of witnesses with Jospeh Veracka in Prosecutor Rubin's office. Apparently little came of the cross-examination inasmuch as the press scarcely gives any quotations of the Hoffman-Sampson conversation. The third and last witness of the day was John Balionis (spelled in a variety of ways in the press accounts). His English was obviously limited as was the case with most of the witnesses. In his excitement, he lapsed several times into Lithuanian. Rubin called for the intervention of the interpreter, but Judge King objected that the witness had been in America eighteen years and ought to be able to go a long way. "Well, let's see how far we can get without an interpreter," sighed Rubin.^* Several times the witness ran ahead of the interpreter and had to be restrained from rushing on, but only with difficulty was he slowed down. Justice King was taking copious notes, especially writing out key words used in Lithuanian. 'T have somehow got to get to the Lithuanian words. Say them one at a time. Say them slowly," he urged during the testimony of the day.^^ By now, counsel for the defense had missed his train back to Boston, so he agreed to begin cross-examining Balionis. Court ended at 4:30 p.m. The need for translations caused taxing delays throughout the proceedings. "Trial of Bimba Drags Slowly in Brockton Court," observed one writer.'^ "Trial Drags in Babel of Speech", was another caption for the day's events.^' No wonder. Only three witnesses were heard the first day. "Too bad we have no functionary who could squelch such things," quipped an editorial '^ in the Worcester paper.

It categorized the defendant as a "harmless sort of creature if there ever was one," "A poor, ill-informed highly emotional young man." A practical joker serving as an informant gave the Globe reporter a false bit of information. Newsman Frank P. Sibley described the prosecutor's attempt to call on the court interpreter by writing of him—"Ivan Ivanovitch Romanouski, a straight Russian".*^ The truth was that the court language man was really John Romanas, a Lithuanian!

It was a tedious, wearing, slow-motion day in court. "Few of the OPENING DAY WITNESSES 85 government witnesses had any command of English, and with all but three, an interpreter was freely used," observed the AP reporter later in the trial. ^° Despite the adverse aspects of the case. Judge King carried on admirably. "Judge C. Carroll King is to be praised and the city of Brockton may well congratulate itself for his calm and judicial handling of the Bimba case," ^^ wrote the editorialist of the local Times, no doubt having in mind the circus-like atmosphere of Dayton, Tennessee in the previous summertime. Thus ended the first, hectic day on Belmont Street at district court.

NOTES

1. Brockton Times, Feb. 23, 1926. 2. Enterprise, Feb. 23, 1926. 3. ibid., Feb. 24, 1926. 4. Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 25, 1926. 5. Brockton Times, Feb. 23, 1926. 6. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926; Gazette, C.E. & F.E., Feb. 24, 1926. 7. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926; Gazette, C.E. & F.E., Feb. 24, 1926. 8. Enterprise, Feb. 24, 1926.

9. ibid.

10. ibid,

11. ibid.

12. ibid.

13. ibid. 14. Globe, Feb. 25, 1926. 15. Globe, afternoon ed., Feb. 25, 1926. 16. Transcript, Feb. 25, 1926. 17. Globe, morning ed., Feb. 25, 1926. 18. Gazette, C.E. & F.E., Feb. 25, 1926. 19. Globe, Feb. 25, 1926. 20. Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 26, 1926. 21. Brockton Times, Feb. 25, 1926. Chapter Fourteen DEATH THREATS

While Manuel Rubin was molding his case for the government, his young Lithuanian-born assistant snatched a share of the spotlight. At least three of six death notes which spiced up the atmosphere were directed to Veracka. The first two letters came postmarked from Worcester. One was sent on the opening day of the trial and was mailed at 1 :00 p.m., while the second dark message came a day later. The death warning was in crude, misspelled Lithuanian in favor of Bimba as follows:

"Parsergejimas—Atmink Advokate ej (sic) Bimba bus nuteistas, atsaky- mas trumpas. Musu Raudona Ranka pasieks tava (sic) givaste (sic). Atmink. R.R." '

An accurate translation was printed in the famous New York newspaper in this fashion:

"Remember, Advocate, if Bimba will be sentenced, the answer is short.

Our Red Hand will reach your life. Remember, R.H. {i.e. Red Hand)" 2

"Bimba Enemies Also Send Death Threat to Veracka" ^ was the balancing headline in the Worcester paper, accompanied by a photo of the note and its envelope. The initials of the sender were marked L.R.C. probably meaning: Lithuanian Roman Catholic. Not en- tirely coherent, this second threat was as nervous-sounding and fanatical as its predecessor. This new caution read:

Remember, Attorney, if Bimba is not sentenced, we can shoot. Don't be

a coward. There is a God. What about the rain? What about the snow? DEATH THREATS 87

What about the air? What about the sun? And many other things. He

is a fool that hates others to Hve. Put Hoffman with him. Let's have

On Thursday, the second day of the trial, a special delivery letter came from Portland, Maine inscribed 1 1 :00 a.m. This English-language mailing was in pencil on a scrap of paper torn from the automotive section of the Portland Press-Herald for February 21 of that year. This third gruesome note to Veracka had a resemblance in its hysterical quality to the first warning, both of which had a bolshevik flavor.

Damn you. Let Bimba alone. He will burn your house some night and get you. The time comes soon for us workers to strike. Then we will burn all churches and all flags and Trotsky will come to us. Signed: The Cheka, G.P.U.

{i.e. Russian secret police)^

Russian spokesmen in New York ridiculed the threat as a piece of

"fraud" since the Cheka had been discontinued as a title, the new one being G.P.U. As a result of these death missives, Veracka's insurance company solicited him for more business, and likewise a nationally known detective agency offered protective services to the lawyer. Mayor Harold D. Bent of Brockton did not escape being a target for a pair of death warnings. One of the texts was printed in the press. This second note postmarked from Boston the previous Monday at 2:00 p.m. read:

You narrow-minded tool of haters of the right of free speech. You

contemptible descendant of the witch burners. Beware. I am going to get you. So straighten out your account with your 'sweet' Jesus. (Signed) "Truth" ^

This scare piece was illustrated with arrows surrounding the word "You", accompanied by the sketch of a bomb and a burning fuse. Nor did Bimba escape the postman's call. A death threat came labelling him a liar for his denial of God, urging him to go to Russia if he didn't like the United States. What was the origin of this postal card message? It was cancelled "Philadelphia", the city of brotherly love.' 88 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

With grim humor, the principals in the case who were receiving this kind of mail would come into court on a given morning and compare death letters. But not all the anonymous letters were meant to terrify. The key figures were also beneficiaries of unrequested advice and comfort. Veracka was a recipient of such an "uplifting" communication. This somewhat erratic piece of mail came from Providence, Rhode Island inscribed by "An American". The rather jumbled note ran:

Bimba should be deported back where he belongs. The law reads—we cannot legislate morals into the hearts of men, and that (is) what he has been doing right along. The old law of Massachusetts should be punished (sic) otherwise, we will have all Bolsheviks preaching and legislating morals into the hearts of us Americans. Have courage, Mr. Veracka. The threat letter that came from Worcester signed R.H. doesn't mean a thing. There are a bunch of fools like Bimba in that city and they are his own nationality.^

In view of Veracka's own Lithuanian birth, this quaint attempt to console proved more amusing to the attorney than a source of solace. As to the semantics apropos of the "dusia" (soul-sole) flareup, Hoffman was recipient of an instruction in spelling from an anonymous West Bridgewater Lithuanian. Though one may be inclined to dismiss these bizarre letters, they do serve to reflect the climate of the times, showing the irrational fringes of some unthinking people of the day. Post Office authorities did attempt an investigation of these mailings, but nothing came of their efforts, despite the endeavor of the New England district.^ In any case, Worcester, Providence, Portland, and Philadelphia added a little color to the scenario in Brockton.

On its part, the communists' daily publication interpreted these death threats as a "stunt" pulled off" by the prosecution or someone closely linked with the trial for the sake of creating a sensation. "... reds never resort to such foolishness as sending a half-baked lawyer a threat of any kind. We do not advocate their personal death—we intend to kill them politically." *° DEATH THREATS 89

NOTES

1. Darbininkas, Feb. 26, 1926.

2. New York Times, Feb. 25, 1926. 3. Gazette, C.E. & F.E., Feb. 25, 1926. 4. New York Times, Feb. 26, 1926. 5. Gazette, Feb. 26, Mar. 2, 1926; Keleivis, March 3, 1926. 6. Enterprise, Mar. 3, 1926.

7. ibid., Feb. 25, 1926.

8. ibid,, Feb. 27, 1926. 9. Transcript, Feb. 25, 1926. 10. The Daily Worker, Feb. 27, 1926. Chapter Fifteen

SECOND DAY OF THE TRIAL

In the colorful language of reporter Sibley of the Boston Globe, "The morning grist of drunks, hooch sellers, and disturbers of the peace had been ground out by 9:30 a.m. . . .'V as the Bimba trial entered its second day. John Balionis was recalled to the stand. He was in the strange position of being both a defense witness and a speaker for the state. In the hands of Rubin, Balionis duplicated previous testimony but in a milder vein. He admitted Bimba's anti-religious remarks, but added, "I took Bimba's speech as a joke and only as child's talk." 2 Hoffman now embarked on an effort to dislodge the pair of charges against his client. Since the witness was of mixed views regarding Bimba, defense counsel took advantage of this unique combination, grilling the man in the witness box at length.

HOFFMAN: "Did Bimba at the meeting on January 26, say that the American government was to be overthrown by force and violence?"

BALIONIS: "He said it was to be overthrown. But he did not say by what means." HOFFMAN: "Do you remember Bimba mentioning anything about the overuse of moonshine among the workers?" BALIONIS: "No."

HOFFMAN: "Is it true that he urged membership in the LDLD?" (initials for the Lithuanian Workers' Literary Society) BALIONIS: "No. Because he well knew that organization was a nest for communists."

Prosecutor Rubin objected that the answer was not responsive. SECOND DAY OF THE TRIAL 91

Hoffman then shifted his Hne of questioning to the witness' own views.

HOFFMAN: "Is it true that you did not agree with what Bimba said?" BALIONIS: "Yes, because what he said about Russia was wrong. They are forcing communist membership now." HOFFMAN: "Did you finally understand Bimba to say that there was no God and that the workers should join the communist ranks?" BALIONIS: "No." HOFFMAN: "What was your understanding?" BALIONIS: "I understood him to say that there was no God and he

gave no proofs of it. He was only exploiting the people as the priests exploit them." HOFFMAN: "Then you believe the priests exploit them?" BALIONIS: "Sure."

Now the defendant's attorney bore down hard on the witness, continuing his tactic of striving to show up the government witnesses as having neither penchant nor sensitivity for religion. Indeed, counsel moved to demonstrate that most of these men were themselves radicals by the opinion of the day.

HOFFMAN: "Did you ever publicly speak against God?" BALIONIS: "No." HOFFMAN: "Didn't you speak at a meeting in a hall at 195 Ames Street at one time?" BALIONIS: "Yes, we held a discussion of God and religion there." HOFFMAN: "Didn't you then question the existence of God?" BALIONIS: "No." HOFFMAN: "Did you ever speak at the Lithuanian National Hall against God and the Church?" BALIONIS: "Yes, we held another discussion of God and the

Church. I contended people misconstrued the meaning of the Deity and the Church."

Continuing his essay to undermine the credibility of the witness the defense lawyer asked: 92 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

HOFFMAN: "Weren't you an LW.W. {i.e., Industrial Workers of the World) leader during the strike at the W.W, Cross tack factory in this city?"

BALIONIS: "That's a pure lie." HOFFMAN: "Were you ever a member of the Socialist Party?" BALIONIS: "I was a member of the Lithuanian branch here for three years." HOFFMAN: "Didn't you carry a red banner in a May Day parade here in 1916?" BALIONIS: "That's a lie." HOFFMAN: "Are you a Socialist?" BALIONIS: "No."

Rubin clarified a point interjecting a question. "How did Bimba

say communism was to win its new regime?" "Revolution," retorted Balionis. As to when this was to come, the reply was—the near future.

Early in the trial, Hoffman questioned the accuracy of the interpreter, John Romanas. The defense raised this objection prompted by whispered expressions of irritation from his client and wife, Eva, alleging errors in the translations. Judge King responded

by saying he had heard about 1 ,000 cases using the same interpreter, without any grave problems. Hoffman then sat down immediately. Nevertheless, counsel renewed his dissatisfaction with the court's language expert, and succeeded in achieving a replacement. A law student from Suffolk Law School in Boston, Vincent B. Ambrose, happened to be within reaching distance, and was promptly

retained.^ It is his name alone which appears in the district court

files as the paid interpreter. The fourth government witness stepped into the box. It was Joseph Treinavich, the man who had sworn out the blasphemy complaint. Prosecutor Rubin drew out a lengthy corroboration of all that Eudaco had offered. In fact, Treinavich spoke so confidently and unhesitatingly as to arouse Hoffman's curiosity. The defense counsel drew near the witness to observe if he, like Sampson of the day before, were not using some sort of notebook. Hoffman searched for traces of a conspiracy, namely, collusion among the witnesses to stick to the "overthrow of the government" story lest the entire case be dismissed by the court. This Treinavich denied flatly. SECOND DAY OF THE TRIAL 93

HOFFMAN: "Do you know what 'contumeliously reproaching God' means?" TREINAVICH: "Contumeliously means 'degrading', and 'reproaching' means 'to swear'." HOFFMAN: "Did the lawyers explain what had got to be proven in this case?" TREINAVICH: "Yes." HOFFMAN: "When was the first time you heard the word contumeliously?" TREINAVICH: "In the clerk of court's office." ^

When asked if he had read the complaint before signing it, Treinavich confessed he hadn't done so, but insisted he knew the meaning of the contents. As to hostility to the members of the National Hall, the witness declared that everyone was his friend, including Bimba! Witness number five against Bimba was Frank Alusow. But he added nothing of merit, monotonously repeating testimony of previous witnesses. When the matter of soul-sole (in Lithuanian the words used were: "dusia-padas") popped up again. Judge King moaned in jest, "Our old friend—dushe (sic)".^ After the witness stepped down, a recess was declared until 2:00 p.m. Following intermission, Charles (Karolas) Pigaga mounted the stand. He was a simple, unsophisticated gentleman. Like his predecessors he reiterated the theme Eudaco had described. When asked to relate in English precisely what Bimba had said of an objectionable nature, Pigaga declined saying, "No. I can't say it in English. He said some bad words." ^ Numbed by the elusiveness of the bi-lingual proceedings, Hoffman deviated momentarily to relieve the strain and tension of the day by indulging in a bit of levity with Pigaga.

HOFFMAN: "Do you think St. Peter is going to let you into Heaven for coming here to testify in this case?"

PIGAGA: "Yes, because I am Catholic and am sworn to tell the truth." HOFFMAN: "I hope you get there." '

Apparently, Judge King himself was tiring, and did not interrupt 94 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA this "theological" question. He had been earnestly trying to jot down notes of the translations, demanding from time to time that the speaker "slow down". He finally gave up. The jurist's humor was evident throughout the trial. His discreet, intermittent jibes were a refreshing breath in a stuffy, jammed courtroom. At one stage of Rubin's interrogation, a witness was asked a short and simple question. When the response was a protracted outpouring of Lithuanian, Judge King turned to the prosecutor and quipped: "Do you want a 'yes' or 'no' answer? Your question seems to have opened the sluice gates." ^ When Hoffman inadvertently made use of sesquipedalian words in quizzing the same witness, King broke in with a fatherly caution, "You'll ffoor him completely." ^ The seventh witness approached the enclosure. It was John David (Dovidaitis), inspected aggressively but fruitlessly by Hoffman, following a few brief replies to Prosecutor Rubin.

HOFFMAN: "Do you go to church?" DAVID: "No." HOFFMAN: "Do you know how the revolution in Russia was brought about?"

DAVID: "I wasn't there, but they tell me there were lots of lives lost."

Hoffman was irked by David's inability to say anything of a positive nature from Bimba's talk.

HOFFMAN: "Did your conference with Rubin help you to remember?" DAVID: "No." HOFFMAN: "Has anything happened since the night of the speech to make you remember only those three things: 'over throw', 'priests' and 'soul and God'?" '° DAVID: "No. I have a vague memory only of other things."

This was enough for Harry Hoffman. He gave up, and the next witness was summoned. It was a William Sharkus, an even more short-lived speaker. He couldn't seem to remember much of anything either and was quickly dismissed, although Rubin sought to cross-examine him as a hostile witness. SECOND DAY OF THE TRIAL 95

The ninth and last member of the witness' team made his way to the wooden rostrum. Michael Uzdavinys was his name, an employee of W. L. Douglas Shoe. He related how Bimba's second half of the lecture was devoted to exposing the terrible working conditions of laborers in America. Bimba told of visiting shoe plants in Haverhill, textile mills in Lawrence, and factories in Wilmington. As to Haverhill conditions, "his hair stood on end'V* Uzdavinys commented relaying Bimba's observations. In Lawrence, the defendant found workers being forced to make 1000 yards of cloth for the price they used to get for 300 yards. The women in Wilmington complained to Bimba about being beaten up. Uzdavinys, whose memories differed from all other witnesses, also quoted Bimba as mentioning organization among ethnic groups, i.e. Lithuanians among Lithuanians, Poles among Poles, Irish among Irish, Yankees among Yankees, and finally Chinese among Chinese. The translator omitted the third group in his version for the court, but not without Hoffman adverting to this lapse. "What about the Irish, Mr. Interpreter?", challenged the defense. Ambrose shot back smilingly, "The Irish, the Irish!" '^ Here the prosecution terminated abruptly, much to everyone's delight. Rubin tiringly had gone through nine spokesmen: Eudaco, Sampson, Balionis, Treinavich, Alusow, Pigaga, David, Sharkus, and Uzdavinys, with court closing up about 3:30 p.m. when Hoffman asked for a fresh start on the morrow.

It was a tired entourage that found its way out of the Belmont Street courthouse that wintery Thursday afternoon, faced with the need to return for at least another day or two before the final verdict. Reporters scurried off to arrange transmission of their voluminous notes for the consumption of curious readers around the nation. A strong editorial from Worcester complained that "The good old Commonwealth of Massachusetts, proud—and rightly—of its degree of civilization, is now the scene of an entertainment sillier even than that which made Dayton the laugh-center of the universe. It is too bad." '^

NOTES

1. Globe, afternoon ed., Feb. 25, 1926. 2. Enterprise, Feb. 25, 1926; all quotations from the Hoffman-Balionis 96 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA verbal volley from this same issue. See also, Post, Feb. 25, 1926. 3. Brockton Times, Feb. 25, 1926. Vincent Bernard Ambrose was born on Dec. 25, 1894. He attended Suffolk Law School from Jan. 26, 1926 to Jan. 30, 1930 according to school records.

4. ibid.

5. ibid. 6. Herald, Feb. 26, 1926. 7. ibid., Feb. 26, 1926; Enterprise, Feb. 25, 1926. 8. Brockton Times, Feb. 25, 1926. 9. Globe, morning ed., Feb. 26, 1926.

10. ibid., Enterprise, Feb. 26, 1926. 11. Gazette, F.E., Feb. 25, 1926. 12. Enterprise, Feb. 26, 1926; Globe, morning ed., Feb. 26, 1926. 13. Gazette, C.E. & F.E., Feb. 25, 1926. Chapter Sixteen

TRIAL SIDELIGHTS

An emotion-packed drama like the Bimba case was bound to generate some human-interest tales. This was inevitable in view of the subject matter of the trial and the scope and caliber of the witnesses. On the second day of the court maneuvers, Bimba was greeted at noon with a verbal challenge in the corridor. Joseph Green, an elderly former slave and a member of the Holy Christian Church (Holy Rollers, also called the "Foot Washers") had given the crowd of onlookers a revival talk, promising that he could in five minutes convert Bimba to believe in God. "The hand of friendship to you, brother," ^ cried the Negro preacher as he approached a stunned defendant. "What do you mean," Green pleaded questioningly, "by

." ^ saying there is no God . . This color bearer for the Hancock firemen went on speaking of the wonders of nature which cried out for a Supreme Being as their creator. Bimba "stood dumbfounded" ^ as the literally colorful gentleman confronted him. Green was appraised as one "whose enormous feet and flamboyant uniform

." * have been a familiar sight in Brockton for many years . . Too busy to talk, the somewhat startled Bimba pulled away on his trip to lunch. The Daily Worker, in its issue of Feb. 27, 1926, accused the Boston press of artificially perpetrating this Green incident for the sake of providing copy for curious readers. The paper claimed that Bimba and Green quickly became friends and enjoyed their conversation on the way to lunch. A pre-trial statement in the press indicated that Rubin would cite a Maine case of 1921 in the course of the prosecution because of the similarity with the Bimba matter.^ Subsequently, the notion was abandoned. But in the meanwhile, the Bimba case in turn drew 98 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA notice from U.S. Attorney, Frederick R. Dyer of Oxford County, Maine. In a letter^ to the Brockton District Court, he inquired about the exact identity of the defendant on the suspicion that he might be the same as a Michael X. Mockus,^ another intinerant Lithuanian lecturer. Mockus had suffered a conviction of a lower court sustained by the Supreme Court of Maine^ for his blatantly sacrilegious presentations to an audience in the fall of 1919 in Rumford, Maine where Bimba had lived a short time earlier. Dyer thought perhaps Bimba was an alias for Mockus because of a superficial likeness in the two cases. The courtroom deliberations drew a motley crowd of spectators. Among those present who were noticed by the press were: State Representative M. Sylvia Donaldson, Edith F. Blanchard, a secretary to several past mayors, a sprinkling of clergy including Dr. Rev. Horace F. Holton, pastor of the local Porter Congregational Church, several prominent communists, and agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation who were "silently viewing the proceedings." ^ A bit of "cloak and dagger" flavor came out in one press story. "Another mystery element was added to the Bimba case in the appearance at the trial of a beautiful woman in black. Both sides ^^ state she is unknown to them." The witnesses themselves were an amalgamation of the foibles of human nature. Most of them were familiar to the local police on at least the humble charge of too close acquaintance with alcoholic beverages. One government witness had an arrest card showing twelve entries dated prior to the Bimba affair. Another witness, sworn in but never called to the stand, had seven arrests preceding the Bimba trial for a variety of charges such as: assault and battery, disturbing the peace, and motor vehicle violations. This government witness had been fired on by police at a dance disturbance the weekend before the February 24 trial opening, and was arraigned that very morning for carrying a concealed weapon. Rubin's sources of evidence in behalf of the state were indeed a mischievous crowd. Defense witness Stanley Smith claimed that all but one of the opposing witnesses had criminal records. One of them denied that any of his team had such a record. Neither statement was quite in accord with the facts. Several witnesses had been expelled from one or another club, and many of these gentlemen who appeared in the witness chair were involved in civil suits against each other before, TRIAL SIDELIGHTS 99 during and after the brief appearance of Mr. Bimba in Brockton. The bi-Hngual aspect of the trial, while impeding the rapid flow of business, did frequently harvest smiles from the audience. One man was asked, "Do you understand English?" The inquiring lawyer was told, "No," stirring up ripples of laughter. "Spasms of laughter," ^^ were reported over the unfamiliar sounding tongue of these Baltic immigrants. After one prolonged outburst of Lithuanian from the witness box, Hoffman slipped in before the interpreter could act by smilingly responding, "I agree with you." ^^ Another witness, after giving his name was asked by Rubin, "How do you spell it?" "I don't know," was the reply. '^ Then there was stern Judge King providing comic relief at appropriate openings, some of whose humor has already been recorded in previous chapters. One witness, to give another example of King's sabre wit, was talking about conditions in Lithuania where a convicted man named Boris was to be shot. To stress the condemned man's heroism, the one testifying explained that this Boris refused a drink at the moment of death, while cursing "Schloopers and Vititus" ^^ (the reporter's corruptions for two figures from Lithuanian history, namely the socialist, Sliupas, and the fifteenth century Grand Prince, Vytautas). At the sound of these new names. King tossed out another fragment of levity saying, "We're getting in some new members." '^ During the legal unfolding of events, the jurist pleasantly suggested for her comfort that Mrs. Bimba surrender her fur coat to the clerk "if you feel you can trust him." ^^ Ironically, she was attired in a status symbol of the enemy capitalist class. Eva Bimba, spouse of the accused, was present throughout the trial, taking notes in both languages. She was invited to take a seat at the clerk of court's table. On one occasion, she had left her box of pencils at the bench of the defense counsel. From time to time, her husband would walk over and hand her a fresh writing instrument. From her slightly elevated position she was able to look out at the spectators and smile. Press accounts described her as being fashion- ably dressed, a habit she is known to have continued throughout her life.

Hoffman wisely moved to stay clear of theological niceties, as one amusing exchange reveals. In introducing four of his defense people to the witness' oath, the lawyer for Bimba asked if they believed in —

100 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

God. Three agreed that they did. The fourth hesitatingly questioned: "What kind of a God do you mean?" Hoffman instantly snapped back, "Never mind." And barking to the four of them, he ordered, "Hold up your right hands." •' One other implication of the trial was in effect in intensifying public awareness of ethnic minorities in the Bay State. One publication, for instance, devoted an editorial *^ to the "Lithuani- ans" with commentary on their history and ancient tongue, ^^ plus some remarks about their contemporary problems. Concerning an alleged mass meeting of communists, another newspaper told that "the authorities intervened after reading circulars which had been disseminated by the Circlo Marion

Rhapsodi, an alleged Italian radical association . . . announced the meeting." "^ "Bimba Case Excuse for Attack On Finnish And Other Language Papers By Minions Of Reaction" complained the headline of March 2, 1926 in The Daily Worker. The article pointed out the apprehension in Worcester, home of the powerful Finnish daily Eteenpain (Forward) labelled a "challenging influence throughout the entire East".^*

NOTES

1. Brockton Times, Feb. 25, 1926. 2. Enterprise, Feb. 25, 1926.

3. ibid. 4. Brockton Times, Feb. 25, 1926. 5. Enterprise, Feb. 9, 1926. 6. Undated letter, Brockton District Court records. 7. He was not unknown as a visitor to Brockton. See Minutes, Lithuanian Hall Association, Dec. 22, 1919, Meeting. 8. Maine Reports, Vol. 120, pp. 84-98, State vs. Mockus. 9. Enterprise, Feb. 26, 27, 1926. 10. New Bedford Times, Feb. 26, 1926. The spectator was probably merely a Bimba sympathizer from Montello. 11. Herald, Feb. 25, 1926. 12. Brockton Times, Feb. 25, 1926.

13. ibid., Feb. 26, 1926. 14. ibid 15. ibid 16. ibid TRIAL SIDELIGHTS 101

17. Enterprise, Feb. 26, 1926.

18. Manchester Union, March 1, 1926. 19. Regarded by many philologists as the oldest spoken language in the world. 20. Fall River Herald, Feb. 26, 1926.

21. The Daily Worker, March 2, 1926. Chapter Seventeen

THIRD DAY OF THE TRIAL

Now that the defense was to have its moment of initiative, there was wonderment about Bimba himself taking the stand. Hoffman had said that his chent was ready at any time. But there was yet no sign of the defendant being called to the witness box.

It was now Friday, January 26, the third day of the trial. Promptly that morning Hoffman took up his cause. He began by recalling

Eudaco. From the cross-examination, it emerged clearly that counsel for the defense had done some footwork since Wednesday. Bimba's lawyer set out fully to discredit the star government witness.

HOFFMAN: "Did I understand you to say you made up your mind to get a complaint against Bimba on the morning after the speech in Montello?" EUDACO: "Yes." HOFFMAN: "Were you in the office of the city marshall on the eve of Tuesday, January 26?" EUDACO: "Yes." HOFFMAN: "Did you go there into matters relating to Bimba's speech that evening?" EUDACO: "Yes." HOFFMAN: "You didn't know Bimba before that time, did you?"

EUDACO: "Yes. I had heard him speak before. I knew his character all right." HOFFMAN: "Did you want Bimba arrested on the platform?"

EUDACO: "No. I wanted to prevent his speech." HOFFMAN: "Did you ask the police to come to the meeting?" EUDACO: "No." THIRD DAY OF THE TRIAL 103

HOFFMAN: "Didn't the marshall tell you that until a crime had actually been committed that he could not act?" EUDACO: "No." HOFFMAN: "He told you to go to the lecture and then come back with evidence for a complaint, didn't he?" EUDACO: "No." HOFFMAN: "Then when you said that the first idea of making a complaint against Bimba came to your mind on the following morning, that wasn't true?" EUDACO: "Yes, for the warrant." '

By now, Eudaco was being boxed into a corner by the persistent quizzing of the defense. The witness admitted getting out of work a few hours earlier that day to go to Boyden's office around 4:30—5:00 p.m. A final blow was struck by Hoffman with a brief line of inquiry about Eudaco's link with former Mayor Frank A. Manning. It developed in testimony that the witness knew the ex-mayor, and had worked with him in some minor capacity. In this regard, Hoffman asked about the mayor's ban of a play at the National Hall in 1923, a drama which depicted a priest as a killer, adulterer, and inebriate. Mayor Manning did in fact deny permission for the performance in response to protests from Catholics in Montello. Hoffman wanted to

know if Eudaco was not one of these objecting to the ban. "No, it was my society," was the witness' nervous distinction.^ At 10:00 a.m. several defense witnesses were sworn in, and the

defense began its own line of endeavor. Leadoff" man was a Stanley Krauchunas, already familiar to the reader from the Krauchunas- Eudaco civil action described in chapter seven. Also called to testify were: August Baronas, Stanley Smith, Joseph Vasil (Vasilauskas), and John Balionis again. In general, Bimba's witnesses predictably denied completely the objectionable statements attributed to the defendant. Rather, those on the stand spoke of the positive flavor of the lecturer's sayings: encouragement of education, temperance as to alcoholic beverages, and the need to promote publication of Lithuanian literature.

The first witness told of Bimba reading a letter from Lithuania, showing pictures relating to horrible conditions there allegedly 104 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

caused by the clergy. Defense counsel sought to clear the air of the two charges.

HOFFMAN: "Did Bimba say anything about Jesus Christ?" KRAUCHUNAS: ''No." HOFFMAN: "Did he say anything about the overthrow of the U.S. government?" KRAUCHUNAS: "No. Only the Lithuanian government." ^

The witness further denied both Bimba's talk of government by revolution rather than by ballot, and his supposed prophecy about the red flag flying over Washington, Lithuania, and the National Hall, Brockton.

Now for the first time, Rubin assumed the post of cross-examiner in regard to Hoffman's lineup. His strategy was kindred to that of Hoffman. Using a common device of courtroom swordsmanship, Rubin set out to discredit the witnesses, unmasking them as unbelievers in religion and therefore not particularly worthy of credence themselves.

RUBIN: "Are you a communist?" KRAUCHUNAS: "No." RUBIN: "Is the LDLD a branch of the Communist Party?" KRAUCHUNAS: "No." RUBIN: "Are you conversant with the platform and constitution of the literary society?" KRAUCHUNAS: "Yes." RUBIN: "Do you believe in God?" ^

Hoffman sprang to his feet with an objection. A momentary pause occurred while the statute books were consulted. As a result, the judge ruled to allow this one question but no further pursuit in this

^ KRAUCHUNAS: "No. I believe in heaven."

A fruitless wrangle then erupted about the significance of an oath taken by one who has some measure of religious belief, but not THIRD DAY OF THE TRIAL 105

seemingly in the accepted sense required for calling on God in an oath. After some vain hair-splitting, the questioning resumed.

RUBIN: "Was the Lithuanian Citizens Club the cause of the arrest?" KRAUCHUNAS: "No." ^

Rubin failed to provoke the witness w^ho wisely held off saying

anything adverse about his court opponents in the civil suit pending in superior court.

RUBIN: "Are you the same Krauchunas who on January 25, 1925 was arrested (and found guilty in Superior Court) for disturbance of the peace?" KRAUCHUNAS: "Yes."'

Both he and Joseph Vasil were fined $25. each on the occasion, Krauchunas denied that Bimba advocated membership in the Communist Party. Rather, he contended the lecturer was urging education among these immigrant listeners in the audience. The rest

of the defense was brief There was little variation of testimony that Hoffman could draw from his speakers. Meanwhile, Rubin had a chance to get in some shots of his own. The following comical conversation took place between Rubin and an afternoon witness, Joseph Vasil (Vasilauskas), who proved to be utterly cooperative.

RUBIN: "Are you—?" VASIL: "Yes." RUBIN: "—the same—?" VASIL: "Yes." RUBIN: "—who was arrested—?" VASIL: "Yes." RUBIN: "—and fined $25?" VASIL: "Yes."

RUBIN: "That is all." HOFFMAN (with a smile): "You paid the $25?" VASIL: "Oh, yes." 8 106 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Both Vasil and another witness, August Baronas, who had been the second speaker, told of letters Bimba read from Lithuania in which atrocities were described. The defendant also showed a picture of a young girl who went insane because of the punishments inflicted on her. Vasil testified that he was in tears listening to Bimba. Baronas said the same of the audience. The third witness, Stanley Smith, did not escape Rubin's probing.

RUBIN: "Do you recall federal men seizing books at your home?" SMITH: "Yes."

RUBIN: "Were you shown your name in a book . . . (with) names of the Communist Party?" SMITH: "No." 9

The only woman to testify was an Antonia Kazender of Ran- dolph. "We must give the ladies a chance," explained Hoflman as he called on this witness.

HOFFMAN: "How long have you lived in this country?"

KAZENDER: "Since I was ten years old." HOFFMAN: "I won't ask you how long that is." '«

Speaking in excellent English, the lady expressed grave misgivings about the truthfulness of Eudaco who had lived in her home at one time. After her unflattering testimony about the government leadoff" witness, there came Vincent Zuroski, a special police officer and expelled member of the Citizens Club. He was the final occupant of the witness box. Hoffman wound up his defense at 3:25 p.m. Where was Bimba? Would he not take the stand in his behalf? Up to the last moment, it appeared he might do so. Nevertheless, Harry Hoflman decided to refrain from making a target of his client. In addition, he had misgivings about Bimba's suitability to enter the witness enclosure in view of the oath to be taken. An endless quarrel might break out over the concept of an avowed atheist giving testimony. Shrewdly, counsel for the defense kept the accused man out of the witness box. The case was weak, contended Hoffman. There was no need to submit Bimba to possible harassment. Thus ended the third day at 3:25 p.m. in what was proving to be a sluggishly-moving tempo of happenings. THIRD DAY OF THE TRIAL 107

NOTES

1. Enterprise, Feb. 26, 1926. 2. ibid.; Darbininkas, Jan. 23, 1923. 3. Enterprise, Feb. 26, 1926.

4. ibid.

5. ibid 6. ibid

7. i6i^. 8. Brockton Times, Feb. 27, 1926. 9. Enterprise, Feb. 27, 1926. 10. Brockton Times, Feb. 27, 1926. Chapter Eighteen

FINAL ARGUMENTS OF DEFENSE AND PROSECUTION

Hoffman had an unpopular figure to defend and an unpopular cause interwoven into this courtroom extravaganza. Public opinion was almost wholly against Bimba, and by vicarious extension opposed to his lawyer. To appear to be against religion and against the U.S. government is a heavy burden to bear. Hoffman argued persuasively and meticulously in the face of weighted odds. The case was being heard before a national audience, an arena seldom accorded to a community attorney. The Bimba trial would be examined and studied with searching eyes by counsel's peers. This was probably the biggest courtroom challenge the member of the bar from Boston would ever face, and he knew it. But he had already dabbled in causes of disfavored defendants, and so brought some experience with him to Brockton in his role of mediator for Bimba.

It is a shame that this case ever came into court. It has engendered

hard feeling in small communities, and it has made things uncomforta-

ble for certain foreign elements. But if it brings before the people the

realization that our constitution gives us a right to talk, then I say our time has not been wasted,' lamented Hoffman, while expressing hope for some good to grow out of the Bimba affair. Defense counsel hammered away at the suspect motives of the prosecution's witnesses. Wasn't it peculiar that they were all members of the Citizens Club which just happened to have a suit in progress at that very moment in superior court against the National Hall? Hoffman blasted Eudaco for doing somersaults as to the FINAL ARGUMENTS OF DEFENSE & PROSECUTION 109

Catholic Faith. Was this witness a devout believer, or did he share the unbelief common to socialists, and if so, why was he so concerned about the rare and practically unknown legal action against blasphemy? "I don't think he is clever enough to put it over on this

." ^ court . . remarked Hoffman about Eudaco. As for Balionis, counsel was puzzled as to whether or not the witness were a brainless, high-class moron. Referring to Uzdavinys, Hoffman perceived that the witness "... didn't get his signals straight. He was at the rehearsal, but didn't learn the part," ^ a reference to the witnesses' meeting with Rubin and Veracka. As for Sharkus, he "had paralysis of the memory." * Again, talking about Eudaco, Hoffman described him ironically as being the "champion of the people, of the country, of the church, and of God." ^ Bimba's attorney accused all these giving testimony for the state as guilty of perjury. "Their ^ hypocrisy is revolting." The defense also had some stinging things to say about Treina- vich.

I have always thought that God was all-powerful. Then why should a man like Treinavich try to carry the burden of the Supreme Being on

his shoulders? Is that not blasphemy? ^

Hoffman welcomed a guilty verdict on the religious issue.

I am perfectly ready to go to a higher court on the blasphemy charge

because I am convinced that a man has a constitutional right to deny his belief in the existence of God.^

The defense saw the sedition matter as an interpolation meant to enhance the blasphemy, a companion charge manufactured out of Bimba's talk about a regime overseas in Lithuania.

Mr. Bimba did deny the existence of God. The government has attempted to insert such other facts and circumstances as to take the case beyond the law as shown in the dissenting opinion in the Commonwealth versus Kneeland. Hence came the injection of that

punless pun. I have dwelt upon that not because it is of consequence to the blasphemy charge.^

The issue of the existence of a soul has been a perennial matter for •

no BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA discussion. "It was injected into this case by the government solely to lend color,'^ insisted Hoffman. Turning to the sedition complaint, counsel continued:

I am more interested in the other charge. It is peculiar that all of the government witnesses are members of the Lithuanian American Citizens Club and that they were the only ones who asked questions at the meeting. The government had dragged the Communist Labor Party into this case. (But) the courts have held that the Communist

Labor Party never was an illegal party in the United States. I am glad

to say I had a hand in defending certain aliens in obtaining that decision.'

Hoffman recalled that complainant Treinavich admitted on the stand that he didn't know what the Communist Party stood for. "We

'^ are trying this case on facts, not on atmosphere. The war is over," urged counsellor Hoffman.

They say the Department of Justice seized books belonging to

Stanley Smith, one of the witnesses. I don't want to have to explain the actions of the Department of Justice; anyway, does that prove that Bimba committed a crime? '^

Only witness Sampson won a few words of praise from Hoffman. At least he—Sampson—was truthful on the "overthrow" question admitting that Bimba meant the foreign power in Europe, and not the U.S. authorities. Hoffman denounced the accusers as being more un-American than Bimba in anything he might have said. On Friday evening, the defense lawyer visited the Brockton Public Library to check on the use of a book by Harvard Professor Zechariah Chafee, called Freedom of Speech. The Chafee writing on free speech had been taken out only three times, Hoffman disturb- ingly noted. This publication he recommended to the people of Brockton and to all those present in court as a means of self-education. Judge King replied skeptically, "Well, I wonder." ** At 11:00 a.m. Hoffman closed his plea.

It was now Rubin's turn to deliver his final verbal blows. He assessed Bimba as a troublemaker coming from outside the community to stir up discontent. Rubin depicted the defendant as a schemer who went about "arousing Lithuanians in this country with a FINAL ARGUMENTS OF DEFENSE & PROSECUTION 111

harangue about conditions in Lithuania, showing them pictures of torture and of the alleged victims." '^ Bimba coupled this wedge with attacks on religion, intending "to lessen regard of his listeners for God, to impair their trust and confidence in Him." '^ Having undermined respect for the Deity, and having aroused his hearers with talk against the Lithuanian regime, Bimba then, in Rubin's view, "approached the main purpose of the evening—sowing the seed of hate—not love, destruction—not construction." '^ The prosecutor called on the court to decide which set of witnesses were speaking the truth, so mutually contradictory was their testimony.

Bimba either told his audience that night the workers were oppressed in the United States, that one half of the people were working and the other half loafing; that the only solution of the workers' problems was to organize and overthrow the government by revolution; that no hope lay in the prayers or the ballot; or he did not say those things.'^

Since Hoffman had stressed Bimba's rights, Rubin had a few

W thingst to say about rights, likewise.

Let each man so advocate his own doctrines as not to interrupt the

fullest enjoyment of those same rights by others. It cannot be necessary that a man in inculcation of his own notions shall abuse and insult others. To recite with malicious and blasphemous contempt the religion

professed by almost the whole community is an abuse of rights.'^

Did Bimba come to share only positive ideas and promptings to

good works? Rubin's answer to Judge King was, "Your Honor is over seven, and you know what other men know." ^^ "If Bimba wasn't there to sow discontent, what was he doing in town?" ^' asked Rubin rhetorically. Answering Hoffman's direct attack on the government witnesses, Rubin insisted there was no evidence of a plot. "The men themselves are not the sort who would agree to such a plan." ^^ The men came

only because they were subpoenaed to appear in court. "There is no hostility between factions," ^^ Rubin professed, resting his case at 12:30 p.m. Hoffman had ended his defense with references to the writer

Wendell Phillips' pieces on "Truth vs. Virtue", "Blessing of Free 112 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Speech", and a recitation of "Ungagged Lips" by the same author.

Rubin made quotations from the Kneeland case of 1838 with its refinement of the blasphemy law, and the "Lloyd" case of Illinois on "advocacy". Both lawyers did their work faithfully and with admirable decorum, despite their hard-hitting style of oratory. Judge King who had accumulated a thick pile of notes announced he would study them over the weekend, and make his decision in the beginning of the following week.

It was a nervous wait those few intervening days. Bimba stayed out of sight accepting the hospitality of his sympathizer, Stanley Smith at his Vine Street home. The defendant, meanwhile, became the topic of several sermons in Brockton pulpits. With his daughter, Adelaide, away in college in Connecticut at the time, Judge King had the weekend to himself where he could meditate and wrestle with the myriad memories and insights of the past few days since Wednesday morning. Somehow he had to harmonize the two laws on the criminal ledger with the rights of the defendant, and at the same time reflect in some way the consensus of public opinion which itself is at least a minor determinant of interpreting civil statutes. Perhaps the biggest chore was to correlate and synchronize the testimony, so conflicting at times, and to distill from all this melange, if at all humanly possible, the clear water of truth.

NOTES

1. Gazette, F.E., Feb. 27, 1926. 2. Globe, afternoon ed., Feb. 27, 1926.

3. ibid.

4. ibid. 5. Transcript, Feb. 27, 1926. 6. ibid 7. Enterprise, Feb. 27, 1926. 8. Gazette, C.E. & F.E., Feb. 27, 1926. 9. ibid 10. ibid 11. ibid 12. Enterprise, Feb. 27, 1926. 13. ibid FINAL ARGUMENTS OF DEFENSE & PROSECUTION

14. Globe, afternoon ed., Feb. 27, 1926. 15. Gazette, C.E. & F.E., Feb. 27, 1926. 16. ibid.

17. ibid. 18. ibid 19. ibid 20. Transcript, Feb. 27, 1926. 21. Herald, Feb. 28, 1926. 22. Transcript, Feb. 27, 1926. 23. Enterprise, Feb. 27, 1926. Chapter Nineteen

GUILTY AND NOT GUILTY; AN APPEAL

"Bimba Decision to Attract Large Numbers, Police Think" ' was the headline for reader's consumption in Brockton on Monday afternoon. Marshall Boyden, head of the city police department, had a large detail of men prepared to cope with a possible outburst when announcement of the decision would come. The verdict was made public after lunch on March 1, the sixth day after the trial began, and, seven weeks after the speech at the National Hall. Headlines for

Tuesday, March 2, instructed readers as to the outcome. "Bimba Escapes Blasphemy Conviction; Appeals Sedition Charge of $100." {Enterprise)] "Bimba Guilty of Sedition; Not Guilty of Blasphemy" {Gazette).

After having consistently dodged photographers during the trial, Bimba did permit flash pictures after the finding was revealed. He and his wife had arrived about 8:50 a.m. destined for a long, exasperating wait. Hoffman appeared at 9:22 a.m., while Rubin walked in at 9:50 a.m. The pileup of cases over the weekend consumed the morning session. Veracka marched in with a look of confidence, waving a fistful of letters offering encouragement. The accused's response was curt. He repeated the "frameup" charge, nodded a "very fair" salute to Judge King for acting according to his lights, and in a partially relieved mood departed quickly from the courthouse. He announced he was all through lecturing, and was returning to Brooklyn to resume his writing. It was very much a hasty, premature statement since Bimba soon afterwards appeared in talks in Brooklyn, neighboring New Jersey, and more engagements in Massachusetts. Bimba's man-to-the-res- GUILTY AND NOT GUILTY; AN APPEAL 115 cue, Casimir Benulis again supplied the bond money, this time in the sum of S500. Semi-victorious Rubin spoke out harshly, stating that the government had to "exterminate the sources" ^ of such seditious talk. Furthermore, "every effort will be made on the District Attorney to bring about the stoutest kind of prosecution." ^ The Hoffmans were more subdued, omitting any further conten- tions, as they promptly and predictably appealed the finding to the higher Court in Plymouth, Massachusetts, the county seat. "We are very disappointed at the outcome of the trial," * sadly commented the defense. Mrs. Bimba echoed this refrain, saying, "I thought Anthony would surely be found "Not Guilty" of the sedition complaint." ^ Over the weekend. Judge King had endeavored to untangle the web of bi-lingual confusion and bickering which had transpired in his presence. The attention of the nation was plainly fixed on him. The press was there in goodly numbers, emissaries of the wire services and major newspapers of all nearby cities. King could hardly forget for a moment this national viewing. He felt obliged to back his verdict with a lengthy commentary. As to witnesses King remarked:

The epithets and characterizations which ran through this case are

the same as have run through others I have handled. One side will contend that all of the other side are communists, socialists, and

atheists, and the other side will contend that there is unfair discrimina- tion and too strict religious belief.^

I suggest that our Lithuanian friends are perhaps over-contentious

and zealous. Even at that, I give them a lot more credit than is sometimes accorded them.'

The jurist was satisfied that while Bimba did indeed deny the existence of God,

it is not certain that he said more. It seems apparent to most of us that there was no sense in his bringing this statement into a protest against

the Lithuanian government, but apparently it resulted from the fact as

alleged in testimony that the Lithuanian government is clerical.^

While making note of Bimba's anti-religious utterings. King found 116 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA that they were irrelevant to the court entanglement. "I do not hold that his statements as to personal religion played any part in this case. I am content to leave it that the defendant's declaration of personal belief was permissible under the Kneeland decision." ^ The verdict of King went on to account for the borderline seditious sayings of Bimba as a result of provocation in the question-answer period. "The seditious charge was noteworthy in that the audience contained men apparently ready to 'get' Mr. Bimba." '^ Since the speech itself failed to provide the hostile listeners with enough basis for court action, "they put 'fighting questions' to some extent at least designed to stir him up and get a fuller declaration." '^ The judge recalled and reviewed the four troublesome queries which in his mind were unrelated to the main address.

1) Why do you now favor communism over socialism which you previously espoused?

2) Why is not the Lithuanian flag flown over the National Hall in Brockton? 3) How can Lithuanians in America best improve their conditions? 4) Why don't you go to Russia if conditions are so good there?

In view of what the court accepted as the actual statements of Bimba, the defendant was found guilty within the sedition statute of counselling anti-government action, but not to the extent of "inciting" to an immediate overthrow of the authorities. Thus, "His principal advice was to join the A.L.D.L.D. I think to many in the audience, this meant to organize, to eventually overthrow the ." ^^ American system, and I shall find him guilty . . King found a basis slender though it was, for imposing the fine of $100 without adding any jail term. The penalty was "meagre" admitted King, "but we are now at peace with the world," he explained. ^^ The court official also took time out to give a paternal scolding to the ethnic group represented in the legal meanderings of the previous week.

"I want to say a bit about the situation among our Lithuanian friends in Brockton. They resort too much to court for religious and factional

disputes. ... I think that it is a rather overzealousness rather than intent to use the court eternally as a weapon that brings these cases here." »* GUILTY AND NOT GUILTY; AN APPEAL 117

King also indulged in some armchair political commentary on the picture of Europe in his prefatory remarks.

"At the end of the World War, various buffer states were created between Russia and Germany. Among them were Estonia, Livonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Czechoslovakia carved out of the Russian empire for the most part." '^

Here he lapsed historically, since these sovereignties were reasserting their independence of previous generations, and not appearing for the first time as synthetically concocted states. The judge saw these small nations as buffers being used by the allies to block the spread of the Red throughout Europe.

The Lithuanian government was perhaps used as a means of spreading bolshevism over Europe and the government responded by arresting people believed to be emissaries of the soviet government. We have heard in the case of the orator's references to these arrests.'^

He suggested that these happenings in Europe were the cause of the Bimba speech, acknowledging the effort of some Montello residents to prevent the defendant's lecture. In King's view, these folks were the ones out to 'get' the sponsors of the Bimba appearance. Despite the arduous sequence of events in the court, both attorneys won praise from the judge for their "eminently fair" conduct.^' Communist readers were given news of the trial decision with an attack on the "puppet judge" who had to find at least some slight guilt in Bimba. The authorities were further assailed for "red-bait- ing" and for their antipathy to the foreign-born, while priests were described as "white guard foreign clergy of New England in the pay .".^^ of textile and shoe manufacturers . . An editorial rebuked the "petty judge" and the "mental vacuums" of the prosecuting attorneys, insisting that the absence of a Supreme Being was scientifically proven on the basis of "incontrovertible facts." '^

NOTES

1. Enterprise, March 1, 1926. 2. ibid., March 2, 1926. 118 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

3. ibid.

4. Transcript, March 2, 1926.

5. ibid. 6. ibid

7. Enterprise, March 2, 1926. 8. Gazette, C.E., March 2, 1926. 9. ibid

10. /*irf.

11. i^i^.

12. Pasadena Star, March 2, 1926.

13. Enterprise, March 2, 1926. 14. Gazette, March 3, 1926.

15. ibid.

16. Pasadena Star, March 2, 1926. 17. Gazette, March 3, 1926.

18. The Daily Worker, March 3, 1926. 19. ibid —

Chapter Twenty

PUBLIC RESPONSE

Not surprisingly many shades of opinions were prompted by the Bimba affair, ranging from permissive, liberal views to plainly fundamentalist ones. Rather accurately, press commentaries reflected the thoughts of the populace. The New Bedford Times twice committed editorial ink to a biblical slant in self-explanatory columns entitled: "The Fool Hath Said in his Heart", "A Good Thing Keeps Going" (on the decalogue), and "Atheist No Witness". The newspaper struck at opponents of the blasphemy law as "shallow thinkers", while approving of the "stern values of the Massachusetts law". The editorial writer rejoiced ". unrealistically because . . that salutary ordinance has been

vested with new weight and importance after its 200 years of life." * A similar strict stance was adopted by the Fall River Globe? "Imported Destructionists" was the caption of the sole editorial notice found in the paper expressing clear, anti-Bimba sentiments. A competing publication was less rigid in a lengthy editorial, "Check- mating the Reds". Espousing a positive thrust, the journalist urged more use of Americanization classes to inform newly-arrived immigrants of our American institutions to counterbalance radical speeches in foreign tongues.^ Across the state line in Rhode Island a friendly, tolerant voice was sounded. Dipping into its own history for the obvious comparison "Bimba and Roger Williams"—an editorialist wrote of the blasphemy item as a "misty statute", ending with a veiled invitation to Bimba,

If he is not allowed to say it in Massachusetts, he may feel inclined to turn his face, as Roger Williams did long ago, in the direction of a 120 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

generous-minded community where soul liberty has been a cherished

doctrine from the first.*

The other Providence newspaper was equally sympathetic. Referring to a good-will New York dinner of the three major faiths, the paper ^ fraternally counselled "Brockton papers please copy . . ." Another liberal posture was taken by the leading New Hampshire publication. Reaching for a contemporary figure, the writer mused that

. , . one would think a country which listened, from a thousand platforms, to Robert IngersoU, with never a thought of throwing him into jail, would overlook a similar offense, on the part of an obscure Lithuanian editor.^

One Boston daily gave the defendant a brotherly pat on the back observing,

Bimba says he is going back to Brooklyn. Good luck to him, and may he accumulate wisdom with the years.

. . . his ideas have been shown up as more half-baked than vicious. He

is merely the dupe of more adroit plotters.

. . . Godless Bimba fared better at the hand of a Brockton judge, a man noted for his common sense and tolerance, than many who followed the trial closely had expected.'

An evening newspaper of Boston optimistically hoped Bimba's brush with American juridical procedure would leave a salutary mark. "His opinion of American government may well have softened rather than sharpened by his dealings with the Brockton court." ^ Sarcastic was the Brockton weekly which advised Mr. Bimba "to pay his fine, go home, and tend to his business in Brooklyn, if he has

." ^ any business to attend . . At the same time, star government witness Eudaco provoked a Shakespearian buff on the staff of this same newspaper. The front-page story went on to ask

Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed that he has grown so great? Does the great Anthony wish to set himself up as a Caesar or czar over his fellow countrymen in Montello, so that he might be able not only to shape their political opinions but also act as their religious censor, guide and philosopher? '^ PUBLIC RESPONSE 121

The Brockton Democrat finished its commentary with some fi-iendly advice to the "juggo" (colloquial term peculiar to this one settlement) dwellers of "the village".

To our fellow workers and citizens of Montello who are of Lithuanian nationality we would say: Get out of the ruts of Anarchy and

Communism; pay no attention to those blatherskites who tell you you

can establish a Soviet form of government in this country. It can't be

done, mates, because if all the descendants of the good old Yankee stock were dead and gone forever, the red-blooded citizens of their races, in the land would stand no such nonsensical form of government, so be

wise in time. . . . raise your children to be good Americans. Study Trades Unionism rather than Communism. Join a union of your craft,

and when you do join it be true to it and pay your dues promptly. Join with your fellow citizens of other races and nationalities in making

Brockton . . . one of the most law-abiding cities ..."

The prosecution made Bimba important, as the leading New York publication saw the picture, pointing out an irony in the conviction. Bimba was acquitted for what he admitted, and found guilty of that which he denied. As a result, there was a "thrusting of an insignificant young Lithuanian into a notoriety which makes him ." ". something like a national figure . . . . whatever of evil there

." '^ may be in his opinions will spread through far wider circles . . A journalist in Vermont partly defended Bimba by invoking a comparison apropos of a famous gathering place in England.

Bimba could have talked in Hyde Park, London, and said things much more subversive, theoretically, than anything he said in Brockton, and unless he actually caused a riot the chances are that he would not have been disturbed. '^

Still, the writer harshly and incorrectly dismissed Bimba as a "wild-eyed crank" who should have been admonished by the

Brockton police to "move on"; for "Religion is too big a thing for

•'* such two-penny stuff'." Unlike the Manchester Union, the major southwestern New Hamp- shire newspaper'^ kept silent in its editorial columns, while com- menting freely on happenings in Europe, including the Soviet land.

The New Hampshire Sentinel, the Keene weekly copied its mother 122 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA journal with regular page one insertions while keeping voiceless on the editorial sheet. The same policy was pursued by others such as the Taunton Daily Gazette and Quincy Patriot Ledger, despite their being only fifteen miles away from the scene of the trial. Among his fellow countrymen, Bimba's rivals of Socialist bent'^ were expectedly pleased with the blasphemy verdict for reasons of their own, and were equally jubilant about the punishment at least by way of a fine. The press of Catholic persuasion predictably voiced a satisfied "I-told-you-so" attitude.'^ Even so, the fact of the trial ever having taken place was not a welcome event. Like the New York Times and other English-language papers, the Lithuanian Darbininkas and Keieivis regretted the bur- geoning sensation into which the Bimba affair had developed, giving the people of his nationality a bad name. The two organs complained that the press was artificially manufacturing another Scopes sensation.'® A former member of the U.S. communists suggests that Bimba's associates took the matter lightly. "The Bimba headline later became a laughing matter among the comrades, because it had exposed their views so crudely. Their concern was not the insult to all believers, but the gross giveaway of the atheistic views they really held." 19 The two major religious voices of Boston were somehow strangely silent throughout the entire case. Despite Bimba's attacks on

Cardinal O'Connell and the clergy. The Pilot, official archdiocesan newspaper, was journalistically tongue-tied, finding nothing of consequence to say. Apparently, Bimba's verbal assaults on the

Cardinal himself made no lasting impression either. There is no mention of either the trial or the defendant in the prelate's memoirs. ^° Even the Christian Science Monitor, well known for its lively concern about social problems, was voiceless. While reporting extensively on crime legislation, prohibition ills, and the League of Nations, the closest the Monitor came to adverting to Bimba was an editorial on the desirability of deporting troublesome aliens. ^* Most puzzling of all was the complete failure to report or comment about Bimba on the part of the New Republic, the liberal journal of unpopular causes. Neither before, during or after the trial was there a single word printed in the magazine.

The Daily Worker, meanwhile, vigorously aired its thoughts about the trial and its meaning. The Bimba affair was assessed as part of a —

PUBLIC RESPONSE 123 national campaign to control immigrant workers, a design of the capitalist, republican Goolidge regime in Washington.^^ The prosecutor, viewed as a capitalist tool, fared poorly at the hands of a Chicago editorialist writing in the same issue. The communist's pen sparkled with color as he tagged Rubin with phrases such as "forlorn nincompoop" and "petty creature" attributing to him a "somewhat disordered brain", placing him among "nonentities".^^ While the defendant received the bulk of newspaper space as the subject of the trial. Judge C. Carroll King was cheered quite universally for his astute, noiseless manner in guiding the courtroom activities. He was commended for mining the evidence from beneath all the ore, and applying the fragile law to an equally fragile situation. In faraway California, one publication editorialized that "Excep-

." 2'* tion can scarcely be taken to the fairness of the decision . . The nearby New Bedford newspaper expressed praise even before the trial was completed. "Whatever points of resemblance there may be between the Bimba case and the Scopes case at Dayton, they do not include the procedure. Judge King of the Brockton District Court is ^^ trying a case in law, not conducting a forum . . ."

If the Bimba case were a complete parallel with the Scopes case, we

should expect to see the Brockton court filled not with honest Lithuanian shoeworkers who heard Bimba's speech, but with experts sociological, theological, philosophical, economic, political experts

.^^ making learned speeches . .

The New Bedford paper also swung some incense in favor of the Hoffman brothers, pointing out that "The counsel in the case at Brockton are not headliners like Mr. Darrow and the late Mr. Bryan. They are not airing their private views of the stat- ." 2' utes . . There was no danger of the Bimba case becoming a circus, according to the New Bedford editorial writer.

"The way in which the judge and the counsel under his direction are confining themselves to that issue in a case that has aroused considerable public interest and that might so easily get out of hand, makes one rather proud of the judicial procedure of Massachusetts as Judge King's

court exemplifies it." ^^ 124 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Another New Bedford voice coincided asserting that "The trial was neatly and promptly expedited." 'Tt has served to improve people's opinion about such court proceedings," "^ From the other end of the state, there came commendation in a Springfield paper telling of the trial conduct and judgment as something "to be applauded for their manifestation of common sense." ^ The Boston Traveler was happy with "the evenness of temper displayed by Judge King," which "conveniently let Massachusetts out of a somewhat embarrassing situation." ^' "A wise opinion," ^^ was the observation of an Ohio publication. A local weekly set forth that "it was the general impression throughout the city and especially among those who attended the hearing that Judge King dealt with the case in a fair and impartial manner and lost no time ^^ in getting rid of it." One of the Brockton dailies tagged the conduct of the trial as "admirable." "It has been conducted with dignity and celerity There has been no delay, no declamation of counsel seeking to win the plaudits of the crowd." The newspaper trusted that the world now realized that there was "no heresy hunting here in Brockton." The Enterprise went on to chide colleagues of the press by insisting that "newspaper reporters and photographers have been here in numbers, making the most they could of the meagre material the case afforded, but even the most imaginative of them could find nothing on which to base a sensational story." ^'^

NOTES

1. New Bedford Times, Feb. 25, 26; March 3, 1926. 2. ibid., Feb. 23, 1926. 3. Fall River Herald, Feb. 27, 1926. 4. Providence Journal, Feb. 27, 1926. 5. The Evening Bulletin, Feb. 25, 1926. 6. Manchester Union, Feb. 27, 1926. 7. Boston Telegram, March 3, 1926. 8. Boston Taveler, March 3, 1926. 9. Brockton Democrat, March 6, 1926.

10. ibid. U.ibid 12. New York Times, March 3, 1926. For a like view, see also The (Providence) Evening Bulletin, Feb. 24, 1926. PUBLIC RESPONSE 125

13. Rutland Daily Herald, March 4, 1926. 14. ibid 15. Keene Evening Sentinel, Feb. 23 to March 2, 1926.

16. Keleivis, March 3, 1926.

17. Darbininkas, March 5, 1926; Garsas, March 4, 1926; Draugas, March 3, 1926.

18. Darbininkas, Feb. 23, March 3, 1926; Keleivis, Feb. 10, 17, 24, March 3, 1926. 19. Louis Francis Budenz, This Is My Story, McGraw-Hill, New York: London, 1947, p. 102. 20. Recollections of Seventy Years, Boston, 1934.

21. Christian Science Monitor, March 1, 1926, editorial, "Deporting Deporta- ble Aliens". 22. The Daily Worker, Feb. 26, 1926. 23. ibid

24. Pasadena Star, March 2, 1926. 25. New Bedford (Massachusetts) Standard, Feb. 27, 1926. 26. ibid 27. ibid 28. ibid 29. New Bedford Times, March 3, 1926. 30. Springfield Republican, March 3, 1926. 31. Boston Traveler, March 3, 1926. 32. The Ohio State Journal, March 5, 1926. 33. Brockton Democrat, March 6, 1926. 34. Enterprise, March 3, 1926. Chapter Twenty One

THE BIMBA BUBBLE BURSTS

Despite press notice that the appeal would be heard in June, a full year was to elapse before a final decision was given in Plymouth Superior Court. The traditionally heavy docket and an apparent lack of haste by the defense to press the case seem to account for the twelve-month delay. Seasoned somewhat by his unpleasant experience, but in no way daunted, Bimba instantly renewed his lectures as well as his schedule of writing, editing, and corresponding. In fact, Laisv'e advertised a rally for Friday, February 26 (the third day of the trial) at Millers Grand Assembly in the Brooklyn area, a meeting at which Bimba himself was booked to appear! • A few weeks after the Brockton verdict, Bimba was to speak on March 24 in Newark, New Jersey. As soon as local police discovered his coming to lecture on the trial, they barred potential listeners from the hall, and the talk never took place. This twist of events was reported by Bimba to the New York headquarters of the ACLU in a letter to Director Foster Bailey. In reply, the official cautioned Bimba that some hitherto unidentified fellow nationals were moni- toring his activities and movements, reporting them to the police and to postal authorities.^ Especially through the Labor Defense Council which had paid his legal fees, Bimba received a handful of requests to appear before English-speaking audiences, now that he was a national personage of sorts. In May of 1926 he was reported as the speaker for a mass meeting in Union Square, New York. There he denounced conditions in Lithuania, calling for a resolution directed to the president of that nation demanding the release of alleged political prisoners.^ Before the year was up, Bimba ventured back to Boston. Harvard i 128 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA intellectuals had been engaged in a duel over free speech and free assembly with Malcolm Nichols, mayor of Boston. After a lengthy series of letters together with a signed protest against the chief official of the city, a session was held on June 24 at the Old South Meeting House to strike out against the mayor's hostile policies. Speakers at the gathering included: Dean Roscoe Pound, Dr. Samuel M. Crothers, and James P. Monroe. The battle stretched into the summer months when Nichols finally but reluctantly consented to a Bimba speech in Faneuil Hall to be sponsored by the ACLU and the Labor Defense Council.'* The partially acquitted defendant did give his talk on November 22 despite intemperate protests. For example, Boston Councilman,

Michael J. Ward, communicating from a sickbed with vigorous objection to the mayor's permit, averred that Bimba would "contam- inate" Faneuil Hall.^ A few months later, as the winter snow began to thaw on the ground that the Pilgrims trod three centuries ago, the Bimba appeal was taken up in Plymouth. District Attorney Winfield Mason Wilbar held the decision-making power in his hands. He was born on October 21, 1880 of Dexter E. and Ella Allen. The prosecutor's father was a shoe manufacturer and Brockton city official. Wilbar was a graduate of Boston University Law School, class of 1901. For four years he had held the post of City Solicitor in his home city of Brockton. In 1925, he ascended to the position of chief law-enforcement agent for the county.^ After his investigation and examination of the court records, and following appropriate consultation with other officials, he reached a nolle prosequi finding. The court document containing the hand-written statement of assistant District Attorney Dudley P. Ramney read tersely: "Evidence very conflicting. Very serious question of law whether statute violated. Interests of public justice do not require further prosecution of this case." ^ This nol pros decision under the approval of Judge Nelson Pierce was elaborated by District Attorney Wilbar in his press commentary. He repeated the notion that the background of the case was little more than a factional rumpus.

The interests of public justice do not require further prosecution of this

case. This issue is dead now and the offense is so trivial that I do not THE BIMBA BUBBLE BURSTS 129

think it worth the time and heavy expense to prosecute. Even at its best, the affair in which Bimba figured was little more than a factional

"Bimba Sedition Charge Dropped" the Enterprise reported quietly on page sixteen in giving readers the outcome.^ Despite attempts in the press to compare the Bimba proceedings with the Scopes case of the summer of 1925, there was scant resemblance between the two trials until the finale was reached. Ironically, at last there was indeed a likeness. The cases were parallel in that they both landed in the nol pros file. The Tennessee Supreme Court fingered the "monkey" trial appeal by finding an escape hatch in the lower court's behavior, and on a technicality squelched the entire embarrassing venture. Wilbar used the same escape route provided by the labyrinthine ways of law. This maneuver of quashing the sedition matter amounted to consigning the case to a legal limbo. The meaning of the Latin phrase ("nolle prosequi") is that the prosecutor is unwilling to continue the proceedings, and therefore abandons the case. Thus, the court is relieved of making any clearcut decision "for" or "against" the defendant. This legal dodge, though permissible, proved irksome to many observers of the trial and its perennial issues of freedom. One editorial summed up this dissatisfaction by regretting that "We won't find out whether Mr. Bimba was seditious or merely exercised legitimate freedom of speech." *° No one will ever know. In the meantime, "Who remembers Anthony Bimba?" "And while this is

'' not a national disaster, it does seem slightly regrettable." Somewhat surprisingly, the Bimba case was indeed quickly forgotten. Despite the grave issues of law, rights, and freedom which surfaced in the trial, it seems commentators found the whole incident embarrassing and worthy only of being swept under the rug of oblivion. His own hometown paper, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle^ ignored him almost completely, carrying but a few excerpts from AP releases. An inspection of leading journals published in Lithuania turns up nothing. One trace alone is found in Tiesos Kelias^"^ in an article by Rev. Stanley Kiskis. After a tour of the U.S. Lithuanian colonies, he described the type of disharmony he found in these communities. He mentions no names, but his description fits the type of conflict in 130 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Brockton. Perhaps the writer had this situation in mind. Two vigorously Catholic magazines, both house organs for their organizations— Vytis (publication of the Knights of Lithuania) and Moterij, Dirva (a publication of Catholic women) were also silent about the

Bimba affair. The Guide to Periodical Literature for the years 1926, 1927, 1928 has no listings whatsoever pertaining to Bimba. A reference work in social science published in 1930 gives a fleeting mention of the case.'^ In law journals, one finds only brief, scattered references.

The single article in English which this investigator could find is a chapter of Zechariah Chafee's book, The Inquiring Mind, which appeared in 1928. Pages 108 to 116 offer a short contemporary account of the trial with brief observations by the author. The

Harvard professor thought very little of the sedition matter. In mock rhetoric he shuddered asking, "And if these words were dangerous when fleetingly spoken in a little-known language in a small hall in Brockton, what must have been the public peril created by the Boston

Herald, which reprinted them in full in English on its front page, where they incited a hundred thousand readers to the overthrow of the government of the Commonwealth!" ''^ As to blasphemy, Chafee held that the reasons backing the Kneeland decision as ruled on by Chief Justice Shaw were not valid. Opting for maximum freedom of speech, the professor of law maintained that public nuisance statutes were sufficient to guard against utterances distasteful and disrupting to the majority. Chafee also attacked the reluctance of the community to allow open discussions as expressed in the bans on halls for pro-Bimba rallies. The only ones who have been faithful in remembering Bimba over the years are the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Immigra- tion Department. At the time of the trial, immigration officials were mentioned in press notices as carrying on their separate investigation. Bimba was not then a citizen, and understandably avoided inquiries about his manner of entry into the country and concerning his status. In the evening of the first trial day, a Bostonian journeyed to Worcester to stir up interest in the deportation of Bimba. The visitor, Anthony J. Jokubaitis, was a patriotic gentleman, Lithua- nian-born actor, writer, and one-time police official in Riga, Latvia.*^ After the finding of Judge King, a Boston paper ran a caption: "Deportation of Bimba in Offing". John P. Johnson, THE BIMBA BUBBLE BURSTS 131 immigration commissioner at Boston, opined that such action was '^ likely if the higher court were to uphold the guilty decision. Bimba did obtain his citizenship in 1927, but at the time did not go out of his way to give Brooklyn immigration officials a disclosure of his Brockton arrest. At the 1963 hearings conducted by the government (see chapter one), this omission was used as a wedge to attempt deportation. A pro-Bimba, sympathetic view of this federal effort is given in a brochure called "No End to Persecution" (undated) published by the American Committee for Protection of

Foreign Born, whose center is in New York on Forty Ninth Street.

The pamphleteer is a Methodist minister, Reverend Lee. H. Ball of the ACPFB, looked upon by former Attorney General Brownell as a "Communists Front" organization. Looking back over a span of forty six years, Paul Courteau, court reporter for the Brockton Times^ concisely characterized the Bimba affair.

When the litigation was first made public, we newsmen were baffled. We had no knowledge of any trouble up in Montello. Never in my 30

years of court reporting did I see a case flare up and mushroom

seemingly out of nowhere, stir up a sensation, and then just as quickly fade into oblivion."

NOTES

1. Laisv'e, Feb. 26, 1926.

2. March 27, 1926 letter of Bimba to Bailey; April 2, 1926 letter of Bailey to Bimba, Civil Liberties Cases, Corresp., Vol. 2, 1926, Mass.—N.Y. 3. New York Times, May 22, 1926. 4. Free Speech: The Work of the American Civil Liberties Union, annual report, 1927 (no page numbering). 5. New York Times, Nov. 21, 1926. 6. Elroy S. Thompson, History of Plymouth, Norfolk, & Barnstable Counties, Mass. New York, 1928, pp. 264-5. 7. Case no, 11730, Plymouth County Superior Court records.

8. Enterprise, March 3, 4, 1927.

9. ibid., March 4, 1927. 10. Gazette, C.E., March 4, 1927.

11. ibid.

12. Tiesos Kelias, March 20, 1926, p. 176. 132 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

13. Encyclopedia of Social Sciences, Vol. II, Macmillan, 1930, p. 586. 14. Zechariah, Chafee, The Inquiring Mind, New York, 1928, p. 110. 15. Gazette, C.E., Feb. 19, 1926; Lietuviu Enciklopedia, Vol. IX, p. 439. 16. Enterprise, Feb. 25, 1926; Post, March 4, 1926. 17. Interview between this writer and Paul Courteau, Jan. 7, 1972, Brockton, Mass. EPILOGUE

These 21 chapters have been an endeavor to reconstruct with impartiahty and precision the Bimba affair as it actually transpired.

An effort was made to fill out the account of the trial with flesh and blood dimensions, and to provide an adequate prelude and postlude for the sake of historical context. From the vantage point of a near half-century interval, one is strongly moved to indulge in some retrospective observations and assessments arising from the investigation, collection and correlation of facts which make up this documentary.

1. The trial was precipitated by a local band of mischievous gentlemen seeking vengeance on the National Hall folks. Plainly, it was not a plot of shoe manufacturers in collusion with the clergy of the neighborhood, as Engdahl charged in The Daily Worker. Once the episode occurred, it is true that many religious-minded people found an occasion for rallying and rejoicing that an atheist was being brought to trial. Still, admitting this much is not the same as establishing a cause-effect link between a pairing of New England shoe company owners with the local priests and ministers, and the bringing of Anthony Bimba to trial. The emotional explosion of the day, nevertheless, accounts for some of the paranoid and hysterical utterings heard from all camps.

2. Nor was the court action a campaign against Bimba devised by the Catholic segment of the "village". This was the opinion expressed in some articles of a pro- Bimba flavor; and even the defendant himself apparently has held this belief at least up to the time of his reading through of this text. Such an attack by Catholics would have been fully in the realm of probability in those times of frequent appeal to courts. But this was simply not so in regard to 134 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

Bimba. The defense attorney quite deftly disarmed the government witnesses, showing that but for a few exceptions, they themselves were atheists or at best non-churchgoers, or "laisvamaniai" (freethinkers) as the Montello residents knew them.

3. In view of Bimba's life as summarily presented in these pages, one notes a spirit of independent thinking which surfaces evidently from time to time. One recalls the Brooklyn's editor's style of behavior at the 1922 U.S. communists' convention; his differences with socialist colleagues at Valparaiso; his unwillingness to transfer blindly the imposed newspaper policy of Advance on to the Lithuanian publication under his editorship; and the stinging review he suffered at the hands of a Moscow writer in 1930 relating to Bimba's history of the

American laboring class. By way of conjecture, it appears that he was never allowed to go higher in the Communist Party because he might not be trusted to obey unthinkingly every arbitrary edict from above (see chapter four).

4. The trial thrust the ever-enigmatic question of free speech into the public forum. While it is desirable for everyone to have his say, where, if anywhere indeed, should the state attempt to draw the line of limitation? Does the advocacy of every shade of opinion and idea enjoy the right of freedom of expression? The courts have permitted simple disavowal of a belief in God. Contemporary practice goes further, and tolerates even violent outbursts against a Supreme Being, and the advancement of atheism by organized groups. Beyond this liberty, how permissive can society be? A reasonable man agrees with the classic denial of a right to cry "fire" in a crowded theater, when there is no fire at all. The exact dimensions of free speech remain a somewhat elusive prey, always subject to reflecting the temper of the times and the power of public opinion.

5. The blasphemy statute is still on the pages of Massachusetts law books, as is the ban on seditious talk. One finds it difficult to imagine any circumstances today in which the blasphemy restriction could or would be invoked. It is literally broken not uncommonly, even in the mass media such as television. From the legal aspect, Harry Hoffman wisely observed as did Zechariah Chafee that ordinances against disturbing the peace are adequate civil protection for those EPILOGUE 135 whose sensibilities might be inflamed through atheistic sayings in their presence. Scarcely a lawyer today would deny that the blasphemy paragraph should be quietly dropped. It is just possible that a prankster could create a modern-day version of the Bimba trial, to plague the courts, and bring derision to both Religion and Law. Yet who will take the initiative? As one Boston newspaper shrewdly spoke back in 1926: "The old law against blasphemy, or the contumelious denial of the Deity, remains on the books, ready to be invoked again. It is the sort of law which most citizens do not care to move to repeal, lest their tolerance be construed as irreverence." '

Thus, the almost fifty-year-old advice of the Providence Journal is still unheeded. "Massachusetts, by the way, would do well to make it impossible for anyone else to be baled into court for a like reason in the future." ^ Perhaps in a housecleaning maneuver of outdated laws, the blasphemy ban will someday be detached and noiselessly laid to rest.

All but a few of the principals connected with the trial, mortal as they are, have died.^ The issues at stake in the Brockton courthouse in 1926 remain immortal.

NOTES

1. Boston Traveler, March 3, 1926.

2. Providence Journal, March 3, 1926.

3. As late as July 1, 1973, survivors of the trial included: Anthony Bimba, Harry Hoffman, I. Manuel Rubin, Eva Bimba Mizara, and George Shimaitis (who presided at the controversial meeting at which Bimba spoke).

SOURCES IN ENGLISH

UNPUBLISHED

Civil Liberties Cases, Corresp., Vol. 2, 1926, Mass.—N.Y. (files of the American Civil Liberties Union) Plymouth County District Court records:

#78314 (criminal case), January 28, 1926 to March 1, 1926 Plymouth County Superior Court records:

#16399 (civil case), August 28, 1924 to September 15, 1924

#16499 (civil case), October 9, 1924 to July 31, 1929

# 16720 (civil case), January 24, 1925 to September 6, 1932

# 16982 (civil case), June 3, 1925 to September 5, 1931

#11730 (criminal case), March 3, 1927 Letter: U.S. Attorney Frederick R. Dyer, Oxford County, Maine to Plymouth County District Court at Brockton, 1926, no date. Letter: Paul E. Thune, Registrar, Valparaiso University, Valparaiso,

Indiana to this writer, August 13, 1970. Letters: Mrs. John H. Quebman (Adelaide King) to this writer, March 22, 1971 and July 12, 1971.

PUBLISHED

NEWSPAPERS (Jan. 27, 1926 to March 4, 1926;

March 1, 1927 to March 4, 1927)

Boston Evening Transcript Boston Globe (morning and afternoon editions) Boston Herald Boston Post Brockton Enterprise Brockton Times Brooklyn Daily Eagle Christian Science Monitor New York Times Philadelphia Inquirer Worcester Evening Gazette (county and final editions) 138 BAY STATE "BLUE" LAWS AND BIMBA

(Feb. 23, 1926 to March 4, 1926)

The Daily Worker

The (Providence) Evening Bulletin Fall River (Massachusetts) Globe Fall River (Massachusetts) Herald

Keene (New Hampshire) Evening Sentinel Manchester (New Hampshire) Union New Bedford (Massachusetts) Times New Hampshire Sentinel (Keene) Providence Journal Quincy (Massachusetts) Patriot Ledger Rutland (Vermont) Daily Herald Taunton (Massachusetts) Daily Gazette

Also:

Boston Investigator (Dec. 20, 1833)

Boston Telegram (March 3, 1926)

Boston Traveler (March 3, 1926)

Brockton Democrat (March 6, 1926) Chronicle Telegraph, Quebec (Feb. 24, 1926) New Bedford Standard (Feb. 27, 1926) News-Enterprise, Hudson (Feb. 19 and 26, 1926)

Ohio State Journal (Mar. 5, 1926)

Pasadena Star (Mar. 2, 1926)

Springfield Republican, Massachusetts (Mar. 3, 1926) Worcester Telegram (Mar. 27, 1950 and Dec. 18, 1963)

PAMPHLETS

Eight Questions and Seven Answers About the Michigan "Red Raid" Cases (no date

or place of publication; c. 1925-26)

No End to Persecution? (no date or place of publication), American Committee for the Protection of Foreign Born.

BOOKS

Frederick Lewis Allen, Only Yesterday, An Informal History of the Nineteen Twenties, New York and London, 1931. Louis Francis Budenz, This Is My Story, McGraw-Hill, New York: London, 1947.

Zechariah Chafee, Jr., The Inquiring Mind, New York, 1928. Benjamin Gitlow, / Confess, New York, 1939. SOURCES IN ENGLISH 139

Peter Coleman, Obscenity, Blasphemy, Tradition, The Jacaranda Press, Bris- bane, Australia, 1963. Elroy S. Thompson, History of Plymouth, Norfolk, & Barnstable Counties, Mass., New York, 1928.

William Wolkovich, From the Nemunas to the Assabet, Hudson, Mass., 1966. Annotated Laws of Massachusetts, Vols. 9 and 9A, 1968. Brockton and Its Centennial, 1821-1921, ed. Warren P. Landers, Brockton, 1921. City of Brockton Reports, 1926. Colonial Laws of Massachusetts, 1672-1686, Boston, 1887. Communist Activities Among Aliens & National Groups, 1950, U.S. Government Printing Office. Free Speech: The Work of the American Civil Liberties Union, annual report, 1927. In Memoriam, Brockton World War Victory Association, 1919. Maine Reports, Vol. 120. Massachusetts Reports, Vol. 20, Pickering.

ENCYCLOPEDIAS

Encyclopedia Lituanica, South Boston, Mass., 1970. Encyclopedia of Social Sciences, Vol. II, Macmillan, 1930.

INTERVIEWS

Aug. 21, 1970, between this writer and Manuel Rubin at Brockton, Mass. July 26, 1971, between this writer and Anthony Bimba at Ozone Park, New York.

Nov. 1, 1971, between this writer and Harry Hoffinan by telephone.

Jan. 7, 1972, between this writer and Paul Courteau at Brockton, Mass. SOURCES IN LITHUANIAN

UNPUBLISHED

"Autobiografijos Bruozai" ("Autobiographical Outlines" of Anthony Bimba) Minutes, Brockton Lithuanian National Hall Association, volume containing Dec. 17, 1919 to Oct. 21, 1930.

PUBLISHED

NEWSPAPERS (Jan. 27, 1926 to March 4, 1926;

Mar. 1, 1927 to Mar. 4, 1927)

Darbininkas (also, Jan. 23, 1923) Draugas Garsas

Keleivis

Laisv'e {also, Oct. 17, 1930)

Also:

Gimtasis Krastas (Jan. 1, 1970)

PAMPHLET

Lietuvos Respublika ir Jos Ateitis, Laisve, Brooklyn, 1926, pp. 59.

BOOKS

Bronius Kviklys, Musy, Lietuva, Vol. II, Lithuanian Encyclopedia Press, South Boston, 1965.

Antanas Petrika, LLD ir Pazangieji Amerikos Lietuviai (no place of publication), 1965. Simas Suziedelis, Kunigas Jonas Nuo Kryziaus, Brooklyn, 1956. Juozas 0. Sirvydas, Biograjijos Bruozai, ed. Vyt. Sirvydas, Dirva Press, Cleveland, 1941.

Chicagos Lietuviy, Istorija, Lithuanian American Historical Society, Chicago, 1967. SOURCES IN LITHUANIAN 141 ENCYCLOPEDIAS

Lietuviskoji Enciklopedia, Kaunas, 1935.

Lietuviii Enciklopedia, South Boston, Mass., 1953-1969. Mazqji Lietuviskoji Tarybine Enciklopedia, Vilnius, 1966.

Boston Pua^iw lii^rary. Sale of thts material benefftsil the Library.

Boston PubKc Library

Copley Square

General Library

Kf224 • 65N6

^^^^^^^^^^^

The Date Due Card in the pocket indicates the date on or before which this book should be returned to the Library. Please do not remove cards from this pocket »ti>

"Father Wolkovich's

book is a very fine and timely documentary providing us with much in- sight as to the unrest and uneasiness prevalent nearly a half century ago.

Much history is recorded in this extraordinary trial of Anthony Bimba for sedition and blasphemy; history which has been repeated on many occasions since. Only the dates and names " have changed. . .

(David E. Stevens, Clerk, Plymouth District Court of Brockton) Author: Rev. William Wolkovich

A VAILABLE EXCLUSIVEL Y FROM: WOL-PEL DISTRIBUTORS P.O. Box 2022 Brockton, Ma 02403