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H-Labor Early American Marxism (14-08) Discussion published by Tim Davenport on Sunday, February 23, 2014 Early American Marxism website • www.marxisthistory.org/ Weekly Update no. 14-08 • February 23, 2014. A bountiful bouquet of 21 new files, the big majority dealing with various aspects of the understudied 1934-38 party crisis of the Socialist Party of America. Synopsis: The radical Declaration of Principles adopted by the 1934 National Convention marked a shift in power from the "Old Guard" faction that had ruled the SPA throughout the 1920s to a new more radical younger generation. In December 1935 the factional growling between the Old Guard and the Militant/Thomasite alliance through their rival newspapers, the New York Leader and the Socialist Call, erupted into a formal split of the New York organization. This battle was ultimately decided by the National Executive Committee of the SPA in favor of the insurgent alliance against the Old Guard. Excluded from the SPA, the Old Guard of New York briefly called themselves the "People's Party" before moving to formal membership and active participation in the American Labor Party. During the first half of 1937 the Old Guard also joined forces with the state Socialist Parties of Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Maryland, the Jewish Socialist Verband, and other disgruntedled elements around the country in forming a rival national organization to the SPA called the Social Democratic Federation. Meanwhile within the SPA the departure of the Old Guard did not end the faction fight but rather started another round of political warfare. The New York Militants, led by Jack Altman and Max Delson, and the bloc of university- and pacifism-oriented individuals around Norman Thomas and Harry Laidler moved to oust the organized Trotskyist faction of Jim Cannon and Max Shachtman, who had entered earlier as part of the SPA's move towards an "all-inclusive party." This communist faction was ultimately expelled over the objections of the left social democratic "Clarity" faction of Herbert Zam and Gus Tyler in Aug. 1937. The now-more-conservative SPA then attempted to themselves follow the rival SDF into the New York ALP in 1938, a plan actually supported by the SDF but opposed by the CPUSA, who successfully thwarted this effort. Despite a basic commonality of ideological perspectives between the Old Guard SDF and the Thomasite SPA, reunification efforts failed until 1957, when the remaining remnants of the two organizations finally again joined forces. All of these files are available for free download and non-commercial reproduction at the following URL: http://www.marxisthistory.org/subject/usa/eam/14-08.html Thanks for your interest, Tim Davenport [email protected] Corvallis, OR ================= NEW FILES ON EAM ================= (1) "Which Party for the American Worker? Letter to a Worker-Correspondent," by A.J. Muste [April 1935] Published appeal of pacifist and labor leader A.J. Muste for American workers to join the new Workers Party of Citation: Tim Davenport. Early American Marxism (14-08). H-Labor. 02-25-2014. https://networks.h-net.org/node/7753/discussions/11715/early-american-marxism-14-08 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 1 H-Labor the United States, formed through a merger of Muste's American Workers Party and the Trotskyist Communist League of America headed by James P. Cannon and Max Shachtman. Muste outlines the history of the WPUS, launched on Dec. 1, 1934, noting that the CLA was comprised of "revolutionists who were expelled from the Communist Party and the Communist International" who had "differed with the line taken by the CP and CI in certain matters of principle and tactics." His own American Workers Party had had roots in the Conference for Progressive Labor Action (CPLA), which had likewise emerged in 1928-29, Muste notes. * * * (2) "Facts About New York and About the Nation," by David P. Berenberg [June 22, 1935] David Berenberg, publisher of the anti-Left Wing weekly New York Socialist during the party controversy of 1919, found himself on the other side of the factional barricades during the battle between the Militant and Old Guard factions for control of the Socialist Party during the middle 1930s. This article from the weekly newspaper of the allied Militants and Norman Thomas loyalists details the disruptive behavior of the Old Guard-dominated New York organization during the year after the 1934 convention. The March 1935 session of the governing National Executive Committee of the SPA had presented the Old Guard New York organization with 9 demands, Berenberg notes, aimed at ending the Old Guard's factional antics and adverting a split. The Old Guard organization had refused to comply, sending an inadequate answer in May. * * * (3) "The Thomas-Browder Debate," by Haim Kantorovitch [event of Nov. 27. 1935] Marxist theoretician and American Socialist Quarterly co-editor Haim Kantorovitch -- best conceptualized as "the Morris Hillquit of the Militant faction" -- offers his appraisal on the united front, the main issue of the widely publicized and controversial public debate between CPUSA General Secretary Earl Browder and three time SPA Presidential nominee Norman Thomas. * * * (4) "Socialists Reject NY Old Guard; Map Party Drive." (Socialist Call) [events of Dec. 4-8, 1935] On the evening of Dec. 4. 1935 the long-threatened split of the Socialist Party in New York state finally occurred when the City Central Committee by a 48-44 vote passed a resolution prohibiting party members from associating with the Socialist Call (a paper established as an alternative to the Old Guard-dominated New York Leader) or its affiliated institutions. The move was seen as a clear effort to provoke a split as it would have lead either the the closure of the Call or the expulsion of factional leaders Jack Altman and Norman Thomas, and when the decision was not reconsidered the minority walked out and reconvened at the Call's offices where they reconstituted themselves a new City Central Committee and called a reorganizational convention for Dec. 28-29, 1935 in Utica. Rival mass meetings of the parallel organizations were held the night of Sunday, Dec. 8, with the Militant-Thomasite insurgents drawing 1500 and the Old Guard, 650, according to this Call report. (5) "The Old Guard: An Analysis of Its History and of Its Principles," by Haim Kantorovitch [Dec. 14, 1935] With a split of the Socialist Party an accomplished fact, leading theoretician of the Militant faction Haim Kantorovitch attempts an analysis of the composition and ideas of the rival Old Guard faction. Kantorovitch notes that an attempt to examine the dispute on the basis of the Old Guard's program would be fruitless, since "it has none. While the Old Guard constantly ridicules and misquotes the program of the Left Wing, it has never attempted to formulate a program of its own." Kantorovitch instead tries to understand the faction from their composition, which he characterizes as "old and tired in body and mind," filled with a "kind of paternalistic cynicism" about the "folly of their youth" when revolutionary ardor burned bright. The battle with the left wing fought by some of the Old Guard leaders for nearly 20 years had been a fight for control of our institutions rather than a committed struggle for hegemony of principles, Kantorovitch indicates. * * * (6) "A Letter to the Membership," by Charles Garfinkel and Jack Altman [Dec. 14, 1935] Threatened for two years, a split of the Socialist Party of New York was now a reality, writes Charles Garfinkel and Jack Altman, temporary executives of a new parallel City Committee established in opposition to that of the Old Guard faction. The previous "gerrymandered" City Central Committee by a vote of 48 to 44 had decided to Citation: Tim Davenport. Early American Marxism (14-08). H-Labor. 02-25-2014. https://networks.h-net.org/node/7753/discussions/11715/early-american-marxism-14-08 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 2 H-Labor reorganize the party, expelling all who participated or worked in connection with The Socialist Call, rival paper of the dissidents of the Militant faction and their close allies surrounding party leader Norman Thomas. Old Guard leaders Louis Waldman, Julius Gerber, James Oneal, and Algernon Lee are called "party wreckers" and "breeders of disunity" and likened to Daniel DeLeon by the two alternative leaders. * * * (7) "New York Locals Vote 29-15 for Party Loyalty." (Socialist Call) [Dec. 28, 1935] Although the constitutional mechanism is unclear, it seems that in the aftermath of the Dec. 4 split of the New York City Central Committee into dual Old Guard and Militant-Thomasite bodies, a referendum vote of the branches of Local New York took place to resolve the dispute. According to this report from the organ of the insurgents, by a vote of 29 to 15 these branches decided in favor of the Militant faction's new rival body. A branch-by-branch listing of allegiances is included in the report. Various factional shenanigans of the opposition are specified, including the Old Guard's expulsion of 9 branches, its refusal to allow qualified Young People's Socialist League members from gaining their party cards, as had been called for in a July agreement, the allowance of the voted of members of a rival Old Guard "Young Socialist Alliance," and the stacking of membership roles by strategic transfer of Old Guard memberships from one branch to another. (8) "Socialist NEC Lifts Charter in New York State." (Socialist Call) [Events of Jan. 4-5, 1936] In January 1936 the governing National Executive Committee of the Socialist Party, controlled by an alliance of party radicals and Norman Thomas loyalists, decided the matter of competing Socialist Party administrations in New York in the favor of the insurgents by voting to suspend the charter and reorganize the Socialist Party of New York.
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