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A Communist Campaign for the Minneapolis Public Library Board

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A Communist Campaign for the Minneapolis Public Library Board %22.6 NOT %8//(76 $&20081,67&$03$,*1)257+(0,11($32/,638%/,&/,%5$5<%2$5' :$<1($:,(*$1' attention. Among four people run- thousand Minneapolis people voted ning for two spots on the Minneapo- to put an avowed and active Com- n June 12, 1941, Minneapolis lis Public Library’s board of directors, munist into public office. It is 2voters went to the polls to elect Communist Party candidate Helen unbelievable that any such number candidates for municipal offices. This Allison Winter placed third with of Minneapolis voters want a Com- was not a routine election. In previ- 35,108 votes. Her total, an FBI agent munist on any city board, especially ous months, the contest for a nor- later reported, “staggered the popu- in times like these.” 1 mally obscure and uncontroversial lation of Minneapolis.” The Minne- The hardships experienced by office had drawn local and national apolis Times agonized: “Thirty-five millions in the Great Depression had Busy circulation desk at the Minneapolis Public Library, 1942 148 Minnesota History led many Americans to question the Their common interests included Earl Haynes. In the 1940 gubernato- viability of capitalism. Among the an active anti-Fascist foreign policy rial race, Republican Harold Stassen groups that benefited most from this and support for much of Franklin resoundingly defeated the Farmer- unease was the Communist Party D. Roosevelt’s New Deal legislation. Labor candidate, Hjalmar Petersen, of the United States of America By the late 1930s, Communists had and Communist Party power and (CPUSA), born in September 1919. integrated into mainstream state influence in state politics waned sub- To gain recognition in 1933, the politics through the Farmer-Labor stantially.5 Soviet Union promised the United Party. Minnesota had one of the larg- Despite these reverses, the Min- States that it would not agitate est state CPUSA units in the coun- nesota CPUSA consistently parroted against the American government or try (2,100 members in 1938), with Moscow’s opposition to U.S. involve- engage in propaganda campaigns. particular strength among Finnish ment in the European war. When It kept neither promise but only immigrants in the north and CIO the Minnesota Young Communist chose its moments to increase or workers in Minneapolis and St. Paul. League issued a leaflet in late 1939 decrease the intensity of its efforts. Between 1936 and 1938, argues his- announcing a St. Paul rally support- Although recognition added political torian Harvey Klehr, “In no other ing the nonaggression pact and So- legitimacy to the CPUSA, on foreign state in the Union did the Commu- viet invasion of Finland (“Prolonged policy it followed Moscow dictates nists have so intimate a relationship fascist Finnish provocations on the precisely.2 with the executive branch and the Soviet frontier . compelled the During the depression, the political party that controlled it.” 4 Soviet government to take protective CPUSA portrayed itself with some success and sincerity as defender of the unemployed, champion of the racially oppressed, and opponent of &20081,6760$'($6,*1,),&$17,035(66,21 Fascism. In 1935 Moscow directed Communist parties around the world 210,11(627$32/,7,&6'85,1*7+(6 to adopt a “Popular Front” policy and cooperate more with other left-wing politicians. In the United States, this On August 23, 1939, however, measures against the war schemes meant establishing alliances with the Moscow’s foreign policy became of Finland’s imperialist masters”), newly formed Congress of Industrial paramount for American Commu- the Republican-leaning, pro-Stassen Organizations (CIO) and infiltrating nists. On that day, the Soviet Union Minneapolis Times criticized this existing left-leaning groups or orga- and Nazi Germany signed a nonag- “generously distributed colored nizing new ones.3 gression pact, promising not to at- handbill” for its hypocrisy. Such spin, Communists made a significant tack each other. In its wake, Hitler the Times concluded, only recon- impression on Minnesota politics invaded Poland, and within weeks firmed what many Minnesotans per- during the 1930s. In mid-decade, France and England joined the war ceived as the party’s basic dishonesty: the Popular Front connected Com- against Germany while Russia at- “It’s all clear now.” 6 munists to union movements and tacked Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Still, the CPUSA’s position on the the Farmer-Labor Party, the state’s and Finland. Events in Europe forced war resonated with many in a state leading liberal political institution. Americans of all political persuasions having a strong tradition of isolation- to respond. For U.S. conservatives, ism. From 1906 to 1946, according to Wayne A. Wiegand, F. William Stalin’s willingness to ally with Hitler historian Barbara Stuhler, “isolation- Summers Professor of library and proved that the Soviet Union was ism was a dominant strain in Minne- information studies at Florida State as totalitarian as Germany. In Min- sota foreign policy thought.” Until the University, is also director of the nesota, Popular Front alliances were U.S. entered World War II, this stance Florida Book Awards and president of the Friends of Florida State Uni- tested. Most held, although Finns was pontificated most effectively in versity Libraries. abandoned the Communist Party “in Minnesota by Charles Lindbergh Sr. droves,” according to historian John and Jr., both of whom believed only Winter 2010–11 149 eastern bankers and munitions mak- during World War I for resisting Winter was named the Communist ers had anything to gain from waging conscription, Helen was expelled Party candidate for one of the two war outside U.S. borders.7 from school for wearing a Eugene open positions on the Minneapolis Debs campaign button. She married Public Library board. The primary Carl in 1927, and by the middle of the election would narrow the field to n Minneapolis, these forces 1930s both were active in Cleveland, four candidates. That primary would ,played out in ways unique to city where Helen ran on the party ticket also witness a fierce battle between politics during the spring and sum- for secretary of state in 1937. A year Popular Front and anti-Communist mer of 1941. At the time, Communist later they moved to Minneapolis forces within the Farmer-Labor Party headquarters was at 10 Tenth to open the bookstore. For a while Party. The battle, which effectively Street South, across from the Min- they resided at 3803 Fourth Avenue ended party unity and eventually neapolis Public Library and one floor South—“the colored district,” noted drove many Farmer-Laborites to above the party-run Library Book an FBI agent monitoring their activi- the Democrats, was most obvious Shop. Like other CPUSA-sponsored ties. Helen Winter became the party’s in the mayoral race. On the left, the bookstores in the 1930s, the Min- secretary for both Hennepin County Hennepin Farmer-Labor Associa- neapolis shop sold leftist books and and the Young Communist League. tion (a Popular Front organization) pamphlets not likely to be found in FBI files describe her as a “plain” endorsed Al Hansen, while the Min- public libraries. And tacked up inside dressing, “large boned” woman with neapolis Central Labor Union (an the front window for passersby to “big features”; she stood five-and-a- American Federation of Labor affili- read was the front page of the party’s half feet tall, weighed 140 pounds, ate strongly influenced by the Team- New York-based Daily Worker.8 and had “mouse colored, stringy” sters Local 544, host to a cadre of The secretary of the Communist hair. In the summer of 1940 she and virulently anti-Communist Trotsky- Party of Minnesota was Carl Winter, her husband worked the streets of ites), backed Torauf Eide. In the a Pittsburgh native who spent his Minneapolis-St. Paul, the towns of campaign, Hansen largely ignored youth in Cleveland and there joined the Iron Range, and many places in municipal issues, attacked Eide and the party in 1925. His wife, Helen, between to secure more than 20,000 the Central Labor Union as capitalist was born in Seattle in 1908, daughter signatures on a petition naming stooges, and spun the election as a of Alfred Wagenknecht and Hortense jailed CPUSA leader Earl Browder as “Vote Against the War.” 10 Allison, both activist party function- candidate for U.S. president.9 In accepting the nomination for aries. While her father was in prison Then, on March 26, 1941, Helen the library board, Winter immedi- ately accused Hansen’s mayoral op- ponents of bringing war industries to Minneapolis, a tactic she described as an attempt to “sell the war to the citizens.” The war, she said, “is the main issue in the election, since it endangers economic security, civil liberties, and right to free speech and press.” Exactly how a library board position would play into this scenario she did not say, and the local press did not ask. Her opponents gener- ally ignored the war as an issue for a library post. But the FBI imme- diately took notice and filed a sum- mary report of her life gathered from Left: Carl Winter, pictured in the Communist Party’s newspaper The Campaigner, information agents had been docu- October 1940. Right: Helen Allison Winter, from her leaflet “For Peace and Progress.” menting for more than a decade.11 150 Minnesota History Several pressing matters made for fought back, but to no avail. “We re- obvious campaign issues. In 1941 the ally are indignant at the thought of library was still suffering the vicis- losing something which rightfully situdes of the depression, when bud- should be ours,” Sheridan School gets were greatly reduced at the same Parent-Teachers Association officers time that demand for books and wrote Vitz in March 1941.
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