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Socialist Party of America

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Election poster for Eugene V. Debs, Socialist Party of America candidate for President, 1904

The Socialist Party of America (SPA) was a socialist political party in the United States and one of the most influential socialist parties in U.S. history. It was formed in 1901 by a merger between the Social Democratic Party, formed three years earlier by veterans of the Pullman Strike of the American Railway Union, and a wing of the older Socialist Labor Party of America.

History

Early history

File:Eugene v debs 1912.jpg
Eugene V. Debs

From 1901 to the onset of World War I, the Socialist Party had numerous elected officials. There were two Socialist members of Congress, Meyer London of New York and Victor Berger of Wisconsin; over 70 mayors, and many state legislators and city councilors. Socialist electoral victories were most likely in the Midwest and plains states, particularly Oklahoma and Wisconsin.

Early participants' perspectives ranged from radical socialism to social democracy, with New York party leader Morris Hillquit and Congressman Berger on the more social democratic or right wing of the party and radical socialists and syndicalists, including members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and the party's frequent candidate, Eugene V. Debs, on the left wing of the party. As well there were old line agrarian utopian-leaning radicals, such as Julius Wayland of Kansas, who edited the party's leading national newspaper, Appeal To Reason.

The party had a hostile relationship with the American Federation of Labor (AFL). The AFL leadership was strongly opposed to the SPA, but moderate Socialists like Berger and Hillquit urged cooperation with the AFL in hopes of eventually forming a broader Labor Party. Their leading ally in the AFL was Max Hayes, president of the International Typographical Union. These efforts were bitterly spurned, however, by the majority of the Socialist Party, who held to either the IWW view or the Wayland view.

On June 16, 1918 the Party's most well-known leader, Eugene Victor Debs made an anti-war speech in Canton, Ohio, calling for draft resistance to World War I, and was arrested under the Sedition Act of 1918 passed under the presidency of Woodrow Wilson. He was convicted and sentenced to serve ten years in prison; he served three years until pardoned by President Warren G. Harding.

Expulsion of Bolshevists

In January 1919 Vladimir Lenin invited the communist wing of the Socialist Party to join in the founding of the Communist Third International, the Comintern.

The Bolshevists held a conference in June 1919 to plan to regain control of the party by bringing delegations from the sections of the party that had been expelled to demand that they be seated. However, the language federations, eventually joined by Charles Ruthenberg and Louis Fraina broke away from that effort and formed their own party, the Communist Party of America, at a separate convention in Chicago on September 2, 1919.

Meanwhile plans led by John Reed and Benjamin Gitlow to crash the Socialist Party convention went ahead. Tipped off, the incumbents called the police, who obligingly expelled the Bolshevists from the hall. The remaining Bolshevist delegates walked out and, meeting with the expelled delegates, formed the Communist Labor Party on September 1, 1919. The two parties eventually merged in 1921 to form the predecessor of the Communist Party USA.

Electoral campaigns

From 1904 to 1912, the Socialist Party ran Eugene Debs for President at each election. The best showing ever for a Socialist ticket was in 1912, when Debs gained 901,551 total votes, or 6% of the popular vote. In 1920 Debs ran again, this time from prison, where he was serving time for opposing American involvement in World War I, and received a vote on par with his 1912 showing. Debs was pardoned by President Warren Harding on Christmas Day 1921.

The Socialist Party did not run a presidential candidate in 1924, but joined the AFL and railroad brotherhoods in support of the Progressive Party's candidate, Senator Robert M. La Follette, Sr. of Wisconsin. Under the guidance of Debs and Morris Hillquit, the Socialists were following the example of the Socialists of the United Kingdom, who had just in the past few years successfully brought about the formation of the Labour Party. It was against the heartfelt pleadings of Debs and Hillquit that the new party disbanded in 1925.

In 1928, the Socialist Party returned as an independent electoral entity under the leadership of Norman Thomas, a Presbyterian minister in Harlem and a founder of the American Civil Liberties Union. Thomas would remain the party's presidential candidate and leader until after World War II.

A turn to the left

The party experienced a major growth spurt during the Great Depression, primarily among youth. These youth leaders, however, were quickly won over to the proposition of reconciliation and reunification with the Communist Party, in keeping with new United Front policy of the Comintern. Leaders of the United Front faction included Reinhold Niebuhr, Andrew Biemiller, Daniel Hoan, and Gus Tyler. Most of these figures went on to become the founders of Americans for Democratic Action (ADA), a key Cold War liberal organization.

The "militants", as they were called, were triumphant at the Socialist Party's national convention in Detroit in June 1934, which precipitated the exodus of the opposing "old guard"—led by Louis Waldman and David Dubinsky—which favored the formation of a national Farmer-Labor Party that would have been likely led by Huey Long. [citation needed] After this fell through, in 1936 the old guard leaders formed the Social Democratic Federation and reluctantly endorsed Franklin Roosevelt.

By this time, however, the militants as well were on the Roosevelt bandwagon, in keeping with the dictates of the Popular Front. The party was then buttressed by the mass entry of the American followers of Leon Trotsky in keeping with the so-called French Turn, by which Trotsky posited the belief in social democracy as a Leninist vanguard. The Trotskyists caused enough havoc, however, that they were expelled by 1938.

Waning years

By 1940, only a small committed core remained in the party, which swam mightily against the tide of the New Deal and the increasing power and prominence of the Communists with whom they were at that time allied. Thus in 1940 Norman Thomas was the only presidential candidate opposed to a pro-Soviet foreign policy. This also led Thomas to serve as an active spokesman for the America First Committee during 1941.

Thomas led his last presidential campaign in 1948, after which he became a critical supporter of the postwar liberal consensus. The party retained some pockets of local success, in cities such as Milwaukee, Bridgeport, Connecticut, and Reading, Pennsylvania. In New York, they often ran their own candidates on the Liberal Party line. In 1956, the party reconciled and reunified with the Social Democratic Federation.

In 1958 the party admitted to its ranks the members of the Independent Socialist League led by Max Shachtman. Shachtman's young followers were able to bring new vigor into the party and helped propel it to play an active role in the civil rights movement as well as the early events of the New Left.

Split

By the late 1960s the Socialist Party of America had fallen under the control of the Shachtmanites, who had divorced themselves from the new left with their support for the Vietnam War and for the right wing of the Democratic Party led by Scoop Jackson. After much attrition, they won unopposed control of the party in 1973 and renamed it the Social Democrats USA.

Meanwhile, a faction led by Michael Harrington became the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (later the Democratic Socialists of America), which also worked within the Democratic Party but in support of its left wing as led by George McGovern. They enjoyed some successes in the 1970s, but were marginalized by their dependence on Harrington's personality and later support for Jesse Jackson.

A third faction of democratic socialists, led by David McReynolds, broke away to form the Socialist Party USA. The Socialist Party USA developed into a small third party in U.S. politics with now roughly 1,500 members. The party regularly runs candidates for public office.

Presidential tickets

Prominent members

(*) Left with founding of Communist Party USA

Further reading

Archives

  • Socialist Party of America Papers, 1897-1963, Duke University Library, Manuscript Department.

Socialist Party of America websites

Articles

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