Ohio History Journal

SOCIALIST PARTY                                                   105

called the war a struggle between two capitalist camps, fought at the ex-

pense of the working class. Even before the outbreak of war in Europe,

William D. "Big Bill" Haywood, an organizer of the Industrial Workers of

the World, had proposed a general strike against war: "War is Hell--let the

capitalists go to war to protect their own property."⁴ The third element

consisted of German-Americans who desired to see the United States up-

hold neutrality. The vast majority of American Socialists, also, wanted the

country to remain neutral and work for a rapid peace. Therefore, between

1914 and the declaration of war by Congress in April 1917, Socialist efforts

were directed toward keeping America neutral. It was this neutrality cam-

paign that stimulated Ohio Socialists to participate in activities that were

destined to alter their political existence.

Early writings of Ohio Socialists indicate they feared war with Mexico

more than America's involvement in the European conflict. The state con-

vention of the Ohio party in 1914 passed a resolution opposing the war in

general and war with Mexico in particular.⁵ No other mention of the party's

stand on war is found in the constitution or by-laws. The Socialist News

(Cleveland) attacked the interventionist trend of United States policy to-

ward Mexico as intending not to protect the United States but to protect

"the property of the millionaires.^"6

Robert Minor, Socialist cartoonist and war correspondent, toured the

battlefields of Europe in 1915-16 and reported to Socialist locals a vivid

picture of death and suffering endured by members of the working class as

a result of modern warfare.⁷ His purpose was to rob war of its glamor and

to present a realistic picture of the agonies involved. He was one of the first

"lost generation" writers to feel and express disillusionment over the pur-

poses of World War I.

At the state convention held in Columbus on June 2, 3, and 4, 1916, the

delegates overwhelmingly endorsed a resolution calling for a "national refer-

endum to recall Victor L. Berger [co-founder of the Socialist party] from

the National Executive Committee for his advocacy of preparedness."⁸ A

flood of anti-preparedness speakers hit Ohio during the ensuing ten months.

That summer Local Cleveland stationed two to five speakers daily at various

strategic spots in the city. In September Allen L. Benson, Socialist candidate

for President, spoke in Cleveland's Gray Armory. There were the numerous

picnics, social meetings, lecture courses, bands, and other recreational get-

togethers that comprised Socialist campaigns.

By February 1917 the movement had reached its peak. Bold headlines ap-

peared in Socialist papers: "With All Our Force We Demand Peace," "A

Great Peace Meeting," "Americans Want No War."⁹ In the drive to keep

America out of war, Cleveland's local sponsored an international peace

meeting. The Engineers Auditorium was filled with people representing

practically every nationality involved in the European war. Charles E. Ruth-

enberg addressed the gathering in English, followed by Paul Madaski speak-

ing in Slovak, Leo Frankl in Hungarian, and Joseph Jodlbauer in German.

One Socialist publication observed that "the many Germans present were of

varied opinions, some supporting peace propaganda because they loved the

106                                                OHIO HISTORY

Kaiser, while others supported it because they considered the lives of work-

ers too dear to be sacrificed for capitalist profits."¹⁰

Two thousand people in Cleveland heard Eugene Debs, the most noted

Socialist in America, urge his party to organize politically and industrially to

"checkmate . . . the master class and eventually make wars impossible by in-

augurating the Co-operative Commonwealth."11 While Debs spoke, C. E.

Ruthenberg, Arthur Wagenknecht, and Tom Clifford addressed an over-

flow crowd of five hundred. During this last effort before the declaration of

war was passed by Congress, anti-war meetings were sponsored by Socialists

in Akron, Dayton, Hamilton, Cincinnati, Toledo, Canton, and in numerous

smaller cities with strong locals. But the Congressional action of April 6,

1917, marked the end of efforts to keep the United States out of war, and

so the Socialist party lost its campaign for neutrality.

In viewing the history of the Socialist party in America three conferences

stand as milestones in the movement. The Indianapolis convention of 1901

marked the party's birth and the Chicago convention of 1919, for all practi-

cal purposes, marked its death. Between these two historical meetings oc-

curred the equally important St. Louis Emergency National Convention of

the Socialist Party, April 7 to 14, 1917. It was this convention's task to decide

what the party policy would be in the event America entered the war. The

day after war was declared, nearly two hundred delegates assembled at the

Planters Hotel in St. Louis. The policy created at this convention and later

adopted through referendum was to change the course of the party's history.

One recent historian maintains that the delegates to the St. Louis con-

vention were a good cross section of the Socialist party. He also discredits

earlier charges that the delegates were wild-eyed aliens or Irish Nationalists

who were interested in England's defeat.¹² It is reasonable to say that the

Socialists constructing the anti-war policy were neither pro-German nor

foreign-born radicals. They were American Socialists, each voting for a peace

policy based upon what he thought best for the Socialist movement.

Two Ohioans, Frank Midney and Charles E. Ruthenberg, served on the

eleven-member "War Committee" and drafted the party's declaration upon

the questions of war and militarism. Marguerite Prevey of Akron and Tom

Clifford of Cleveland worked on the resolutions committee; Charles Baker

of Hamilton was a member of the ways and means committee; and William

Patterson of Toledo and state secretary Alfred Wagenknecht served on the

platform committee and committee on organization, respectively. The Ohio

delegation took an active part in the convention and voted with the majority

on every issue.13

The St. Louis Declaration said, in part, that "The working class of the

United States has no quarrel with the working class of Germany or any

other country. [The American people] have been plunged into this war by

the trickery and treachery of the ruling class . . . ."¹⁴ Morris Hillquit and

Charles Ruthenberg wrote the majority report pledging the party to the

following course of action for the duration of the war: 1) 'Continuous, ac-

tive, and public opposition to the war . . .'; 2) "opposition to military con-

scription, sale of war bonds, and taxes on the necessities of life . . ."; 3)

SOCIALIST PARTY                                                   107

"'vigorous resistance' to all measures curtailing freedom"; 4) 'Consistent

propaganda against military training and militaristic teaching in the public

schools'; 5) "extension of the Socialist program of education for the workers

in an effort to shorten the war and establish a lasting peace . . ."; 6) 'Wide-

spread educational propaganda to enlighten the masses as to the true rela-

tion between capitalism and war . . .'; and 7) "a demand for the restriction

of food exports . . . to protect the 'American masses from starvation.'"15

Two other plans were also presented to the convention. Louis B. Boudin,

of New York City, representing the middle ground position, drew up a re-

port similar to the majority report except that it omitted a plan of action.

John Spargo, of Vermont, submitted his own report stating that "the war

is an accomplished fact, . . . we hold that it is our Socialist duty to make

whatever sacrifice may be necessary to enable our nation and its allies to win

the war as speedily as possible." These were submitted to the delegates

along with the Hillquit-Ruthenberg report. The majority report received

136 votes to Boudin's 32 and Spargo's 5.16

The Hillquit-Ruthenberg report and the Boudin report were combined

and presented to the party membership, with Spargo's report submitted as

an alternate proposal. In a national party referendum each section of the

reports was voted upon separately. All sections but one of the majority

report received over 21,000 votes, while no section of the Spargo report re-

ceived over 8,000 votes, clearly evidencing the membership's anti-war senti-

ments.¹⁷

Scott Nearing, the Socialist economics professor at the University of To-

ledo prior to America's entrance into World War I, recently stated: "The

anti-war stand destroyed the party as a political force in the United States."18

If Dr. Nearing is correct, it is necessary to answer the question, "How?"

Two facts are pertinent. First, the party's anti-war declaration and its cam-

paign to oppose the war created antagonism against Socialists. This is clear-

ly evidenced in reviewing the numerous arrests and trials between 1917 and

the 1919 free speech drive. Second, is the inner-party split that occurred after

the St. Louis meeting. Carl D. Thompson, writing to the Cleveland Citizen

in May 1918, expressed many Socialists' sentiments by calling for the repeal

of the St. Louis platform on the grounds that it "violates the principle of

majority rule."¹⁹ Thompson and others maintained that after the nation

had declared war through its legally constituted authorities, the principle of

majority rule required submission. For this reason, many prominent leaders

in the national movement left the party, including the writers Jack London

and Upton Sinclair; George Herron, the Christian Socialist leader; Robert

Hunter, the social worker; J. C. Phelps Stokes, the party's millionaire; and

Allen Benson, the party's 1916 Presidential candidate. Among the Ohioans

who left were the editor of the Cleveland Citizen, Max Hayes and the prom-

inent Akron Socialist, Jim McCartan. McCartan felt that it was "his duty to

back up the boys in the trenches. It was like a strike; he might think it un-

wise, but if the majority voted for it he would be on the picket line with

his fellow workers."²⁰

These losses were more than balanced by those persons who joined the

108                                                 OHIO HISTORY

Socialist party because of its war stand. The foreign language federations had

grown in strength and influence from 1912 to 1919. By the later year, over

57,000 members belonged to the federations out of a national total of 108,000

card-carrying members. In part, the Russian revolution stimulated this

growth, but a substantial percent joined to protest America's entrance into

the war.²¹ Local Cleveland membership increased from 1,362 in September

1916 to 1,460 in May 1917, and this gain was made in spite of the fact that

a branch of nearly one hundred members withdrew from the party to af-

filiate with the Industrial Workers of the World.²² This change in party

composition resulted in the formation of a new left wing that was eventually

to solidify opposition to the Berger-Hillquit controlled right wing. If the

St. Louis declaration destroyed the Socialist party's political force, it was not

apparent until 1919, and even then other elements must receive equal con-

sideration.

In accordance with the St. Louis Resolution, Ohio Socialists launched

their anti-war campaign. Four thousand persons assembled in Cleveland's

Public Square on May 20, 1917, to "listen to denunciation of the govern-

ment which got [them] into war.^"23 Socialists in Columbus circulated leaf-

lets opposing conscription. Public meetings were held in Cincinnati, Hamil-

ton, Dayton, Toledo, Canton, Akron, Lorain, and Marietta denouncing the

war and American intervention. The Socialist plea for peace was sent out

from all parts of the state. Ohio's Socialist press, the Ohio Socialist, Miami

Valley Socialist, and Socialist News, joined in propagandizing the party's

stand.

The party's efforts were limited, however, by its radical nature and by the

deficiency of its press. Work by local organizations and individual action

constituted the bulk of anti-war endeavors. The initial form of Socialist

protest was the simple failure or refusal to register for the draft. For exam-

ple, the Youngstown Vindicator, October 22, 1917, reported that many men

registering to vote were found to be "shy of serial numbers."²⁴ Many men

failed to appear for their pre-induction physical examinations. Pamphlets

and street speakers urged young men to oppose conscription. Such agitation

against Federal policy was certain to foster grave repercussions as a wave of

super patriotism took hold of the American public.

It was not long after the St. Louis Resolution was adopted that Ohio

newspaper headlines signified the reaction:

Anti-war meet here rouses U.S. Jail Socialists for "No Draft" Tirade [in

Cleveland].

Nation-wide conspiracy is unearthed in Columbus.

Eleven men charged with treason in Cincinnati.

Three Ohioans face death for treason.

W. O. McClory imprisoned in Tiffin for having Socialist literature in his

pockets.

Arrested while crowd riots. A. Wagenknecht, state secretary of the Socialist

party jailed.²⁵

Throughout the country anti-Socialist and anti-pacifist groups organized to

SOCIALIST PARTY                                                 109

suppress opposition to the war.²⁶ When meeting such organized resistance,

the Socialist party was helpless since it could look for neither police pro-

tection nor public support. Its own organization was not prepared to protect

either the locals or individual members.

The Socialists, Charles Ruthenberg, candidate for mayor, Alfred Wagen-

knecht, state secretary, and Charles Baker, the state organizer, conducted

an anti-war meeting in Cleveland's Public Square which was broken up

by city police. The three leaders were arrested on June 27 and 28 and

charged with persuading a certain Alphonse Schue not to register for the

draft. In reporting the resulting trial a Socialist newspaper described the

jury as "a dozen Rip Van Winkles." The basis for the charge was Schue's

testimony that he had attended several meetings held on the Public Square

where Baker, Wagenknecht, and Ruthenberg had spoken. The young man

maintained that these speeches had caused him not to register.²⁷

The Socialist paper questioned the prosecution's case, contending that

"there was no evidence other than his unsupported statement that the

speeches had caused him not to register.^"28 District Attorney Edwin S.

Wertz was unable to prove that Schue had been on the Public Square on

the days in question, but he secured a verdict of guilty from the jury and a

sentence of one year in the Canton, Ohio jail for the three Socialists. Be-

fore receiving sentence, Ruthenberg told the court: "I am not conscious of

having committed any crime. The thing that I am conscious of is having

endeavored to inspire higher ideals and nobler lives. If to do that is a crime

in the eyes of the government, I am proud to have committed that crime."

While the case was being appealed to the Supreme Court of the United

States, the three men were released on a $5,000 bond.²⁹

In Columbus, Ammon A. Henacy, Harry E. Townsley, and Cecil Baily,

members of Local Columbus Socialist party were arrested for circulating

an anti-conscription pamphlet which urged men not to register for the

draft.³⁰ The three were charged first with treason, but later convicted on a

lesser charge and sent to prison. Thirteen Socialists were arrested in Cin-

cinnati on June 1, 1917, for printing and distributing handbills "which de-

nounced conscription, quoted the first and fifth amendments of the federal

constitution and a portion of Daniel Webster's anti-draft speech of 1814,

and boldly urged all to refuse to register."³1 Their trial was delayed for

several years, eventually ending in conviction.

In Toledo Eugene Debs, who was also under indictment, was scheduled

to deliver a farewell address on Sunday, March 30, 1919. The Socialists ar-

ranged with the Metal Workers' Council to use Memorial Hall which the

council had rented for that date. City authorities took the position that if

the Metal Workers' Council did not use the hall, then some "patriotic or-

ganization" should have first chance. The council replied that they would

keep the date and offer their full support for a Debs meeting. One Socialist

newspaper reported that Toledo Mayor Cornell Schreiber then gave orders

to the police department that "No meeting will be permitted to be held

anywhere in this city where it is suspected a man of radical tendencies is

to speak."³²

110                                                OHIO HISTORY

By two-thirty that afternoon a crowd of over five hundred had assembled

at the depot to greet Debs. Suffering from an attack of lumbago, the cham-

pion of Socialism was unable to make the Toledo meeting but the state

headquarters had sent Charles Baker, Socialist organizer just out of prison

on bail, to fill the engagement. Baker entered a car and the crowd formed

a line behind him to march to the hall. The police arrested the driver of

the car; another man took his place, and the procession continued. Upon

reaching Memorial Hall, it was found to be locked by city authorities, who

had refused even the Metal Workers use of the building for a Debs meeting.

An estimated 10,000 persons were in the streets around the hall. M. H.

Toohey, secretary of Local Toledo, mounted a speakers platform and began:

"We will hold a meeting here this afternoon, and enjoy Democracy, if we

must wade through blood to do it!"33 Toohey was then arrested by one of

the three hundred policemen detailed to keep peace and was rushed to jail

in a patrol wagon. William Harris, also of Local Toledo, was next to mount

the platform. After a short speech consisting of "Ladies and Gentlemen," he,

too, was taken to jail. A soldier just back from France and a member of the

same local was next to be arrested. They were followed by fourteen others,

including Thomas Devine, Toledo's Socialist councilman.³⁴

State organizer Baker then called Socialist leaders to meet in their head-

quarters where the battle plan was outlined. The Socialists proposed to fill

the jail, and over two hundred people pledged to take their turns speaking.

Within half an hour after their return to the crowd, sixty speakers had been

arrested. Baker then mounted a car and called upon the vast crowd to go

to the jail. The crowd--by this time a mob--marched on the city jail. Coun-

cilman Devine convinced Chief of Police Herbert to release all prisoners and

allow the Socialists to make their speeches in order to avoid bloodshed. A

police car was pulled into the street and Thomas Devine, Charles Baker,

and M. H. Toohey delivered their speeches in front of the jail. Shortly

thereafter, the crowd dispersed and violence was avoided.³5

Socialist battles against pro-war elements in Ohio generally followed the

four examples herein presented. All Socialist meetings, whether originally

organized as anti-war meetings, anti-conscription programs, free speech as-

semblies, or merely municipal election campaigns, were constantly harrassed

by well-meaning citizens, who, through mass hysteria and fear, denied both

natural and civil rights in order "to preserve democracy." Dedicated to the

preservation of those rights without which Socialists maintained there was

no democracy, one by one the leaders of the movement martyred themselves

to the cause. Eugene Debs could not stand by and watch others pay for the

cause he had championed without entering into the fray. After Kate

Richards O'Hare of St. Louis, Rose Pastor Stokes of Kansas, Ruthenberg,

Wagenknecht, and Baker of Ohio, and numerous other Socialists had been

indicted and sentenced under the Espionage Act, Debs left his home and

wife in Terre Haute for another campaign, not for office, but for the ideal

of free speech.

It may have been a confused feeling of guilt as well as a sincere desire

to help those who were paying the price for opposing war that motivated

SOCIALIST PARTY                                                 111

Debs to crusade for free speech. When the Socialist leader was asked to ad-

dress the Ohio Socialist convention at Canton, he decided to make his stand.

He had written to Kate Richards O'Hare in December 1918: "I cannot yet

believe that they will ever dare to send you to prison for exercising your

constitutional rights of free speech but if they do ... I shall feel guilty to be

at large."³⁶ In the weeks preceding the Canton speech, Debs orally attacked

the President, criticized the war, and denounced the Federal war policies

without being arrested.

Early in the afternoon of June 16, 1918, a reception committee of local

Canton Socialists met Debs at the Courtland Hote1 to drive him to

Nimisilla Park to address the convention. A reporter for the Cleveland

Plain Dealer, Clyde R. Miller, intercepted the famous radical and Debs

agreed to be interviewed. When asked if he still supported the St. Louis

Manifesto, Debs answered: "I approved of the adoption of the platform

in form and substance at the time it was created but in the light of the

Russian situation I think we should put forth a restatement of the aims

of the Socialist Party."³⁷ Miller then asked Debs about the United States

involvement in the war. Debs said the war was "a contest, between power-

ful imperial forces in Germany and precisely the same kind of ruthless,

rich and greedy men in England .... The pawns in the contest were

the millions of young men in the various armies--young men who had

not the faintest understanding of the real issue of war."³⁸ Miller, believ-

ing Debs had violated the Espionage Act of 1917, placed a telephone call

to the District Attorney's office.

Upon leaving Miller, Debs went directly to the Stark County Work-

house to visit Wagenknecht, Baker, and Ruthenberg. Debs was told that

the three Socialists had been assigned to work in the laundry. Refusing

this work as a judgment against their political views, they were punished

by hanging by their wrists for two days. Filled with anger, Debs left the

workhouse and proceeded to Nimisilla Park where he delivered the famous

Canton speech.

After being introduced to the convention, the tall, gaunt figure stepped

to the front of the stage and observed that it was "extremely dangerous

to exercise the constitutional right of free speech in a country fighting

to make democracy safe in the world." He then spoke of Ruthenberg,

Wagenknecht, and Baker as symbols of the Socialist movement, stating

that the authorities could put individuals into jail "but they cannot put

the Socialist movement in jail."³⁹

The Socialist leader attacked capitalism and its war as the evil exploita-

tion of working class youth. Debs spoke of war in general saying: "The

master class has always declared the war; the subject class has always

fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to

lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and all to lose--especial-

ly their lives.^"40 In repudiating the propaganda linking the party with

"pro-Kaiserism," he declared that Socialists had "been fighting it [Prussian

militarism] since the day the Socialist movement was born .... I hate,

I loathe, I despise junkers and junkerdom. I have no earthly use for the

112                                                OHIO HISTORY

junkers of Germany, and not one particle more use for the junkers of

the United States."⁴¹ Also in this vein, Debs challenged them "to find

any Socialist who was ever the guest of the Kaiser [as Theodore Roosevelt

had been] except as one of his prison wards."⁴² Not content with attack-

ing capitalism in general terms, he aimed at the "cowardly" institutions

upholding that system. Debs cried that "when Wall Street says war, the

press says war and the pulpit promptly follows with its Amen."⁴³

Department of Justice agents went through the crowd demanding to

see the draft registration cards of young men present as Debs spoke. A

government stenographer, Virgil Steiner, was sent to Nimisilla Park to

record Deb's speech. Steiner could not keep up with the speaker, catch-

ing only sentences here and there. The Socialist party had hired Edward

R. Sterling, a Canton attorney, as a stenographic reporter for the Debs

meeting. Steiner's copy of the speech was turned over to the United States

Attorney's office for the Northern District of Ohio.

After underlining passages which he thought were in violation of the

Espionage Act, Edwin S. Wertz, United States Attorney for the Northern

District of Ohio, sent the copy to the Attorney General in Washington.

The Attorney General and his advisors did not forbid prosecution but

found that "In the opinion of the Department, most of the passages marked

by you, in and of themselves, do not violate the law."⁴⁴

Wertz decided to prosecute, however, and on June 29, 1918, a Federal

grand jury in Cleveland indicted Eugene V. Debs. Arrested and taken

to the Federal Building in Cleveland, Debs again met Clyde R. Miller, the

Plain Dealer reporter. Miller asked Debs if he wanted to repudiate the

St. Louis Manifesto and the Socialist replied: "I do not and, if necessary,

I shall die for those principles."⁴⁵ Two Socialist party members, Marguerite

Prevey and A. W. Moshowitz of Cleveland posted a $10,000 bond and

Debs was released.

Clarence Darrow offered his service as defense attorney but Debs refused

to be represented by the great lawyer because of his pro-war views. There-

fore, four Socialists (Seymour Stedman and William A. Gunnea of Chicago,

Joseph W. Sharts of Dayton, and Morris H. Wolfe of Cleveland) prepared

Debs' defense. The defendant was prepared to admit that he had delivered

the Canton speech but he denied that the speech or any part of it was

criminal. The Socialists' only argument was that the Sedition Act, an

amendment to the Espionage Act, violated the First Amendment which

meant that their battle must be fought in a higher court.

The government first entered the two versions of Debs' speech as

evidence for the prosecution. Charles Ruthenberg was called into court

to identify the St. Louis Manifesto. For three days the prosecution read

its evidence into the records, with Clyde R. Miller as chief witness against

Debs. As the trial drew to a close, Debs and his legal advisors were

certain the verdict would be guilty.

The defense called no witnesses, but attorney Morris H. Wolfe secured

for Debs the right to address the court in his own behalf. He told the

jury:

SOCIALIST PARTY                                                113

I have been accused of obstructing the war. I admit it. Gentlemen,

I abhor war. I would oppose the war if I stood alone . . . . I wish to

admit everything that has been charged against me except what is em-

braced in the indictment . . . . I can not take back a word. I can't

repudiate a sentence. I stand before you guilty of having made this

speech . . . prepared to take the consequences of what there is to em-

brace.⁴⁶

After the jury "of retired farmers and merchants" had found him guilty,

Debs was offered the opportunity to make a statement before sentencing.

He faced the court and said:

Your honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living be-

ings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the

meanest of earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower

class I am in it; while there is a soul in prison, I am not free . . . . I

look upon it [the Espionage Law] as a despotic enactment in flagrant

conflict with democratic principles and with the spirit of free institu-

tions . . . .47

Judge D. C. Westenhaver sentenced Debs to ten years imprisonment.

When Debs' case was appealed to the Supreme Court, Gilbert E. Roe,

a New York attorney, filed a brief attacking the constitutionality of the

Espionage Act. Justice Oliver Wendell Homes delivered the unanimous

opinion of the court which accepted Westenhaver's original decision on

the ground that Debs had intended to interfere with the war and that

interference was the effect of his words.⁴⁸ So far as the Supreme Court

was concerned, Eugene V. Debs would have to pay for his right to speak

against American policy by serving ten years behind bars.

After his arrest the party had arranged many meetings in Ohio seek-

ing money to be used as a Debs Defense Fund.⁴⁹ Among the corps of

speakers who rushed into Ohio offering aid were Ross D. Brown (Ohio

Negro organizer), Lotta Burke (Cincinnatian who faced prison herself),

Kate Richards O'Hare (the pretty midwestern radical), and Thomas

"Proletarian Tom" Lewis (organizer of party locals in several states). In

December Charles Ruthenberg, Alfred Wagenknecht, and Charles Baker

were released from the Stark County Workhouse and joined the crusade.

Socialist speakers from Akron, Bellaire, Dayton, Columbus, Fostoria,

Canton, Conneaut, Coshocton, East Liverpool, Hamilton, Lorain, Martins

Ferry, St. Marys, and several smaller towns raised funds by holding free

speech meetings. Although the Ohio party made an admirable effort to

defend those facing prison, achievements in this campaign were limited

by a lack of organization, outside harrassment, and the unwillingness to

foster cooperation between the state and national Socialist campaigns.⁵⁰

During the summer of 1918 the National Executive Committee launched

a Million Dollar Campaign and Defense Fund drive for the "Free Speech

Struggle." Cleveland organizer and acting state secretary (while her husband

was in jail), Hortense Wagenknecht, in an open letter to Ohio Socialist

party members attacked the national office for sending five different men

114                                                OHIO HISTORY

into the Cleveland area to collect funds. She implied that local state control

of this operation would cost less and issure the rank and file that proper

records of money collected would be kept. She also questioned the wisdom

of sending representatives from local, state, and national organizations to

the same people for money. Such demands would surely place a financial

burden on members. Speaking for the state office, she called on all Ohio

Socialists to protest against this "undemocratic" practice.⁵¹

At the Socialist Party Chicago Conference of August 10, 1918, the Ohio

delegation brought the matter to the floor to be considered by all delegates:

The Socialist Party of Ohio through the state office and the state

executive committee, opposed the plan from the very beginning. We

saw it as another attempt on the part of the national office to centralize

party activities in the national office and we saw in the centralization

of party activities the greatest enemy to organization.⁵²

The Ohio delegation proposed two plans to establish better relationships

between national and state organization fund-raising attempts. Under

plan "A" the national office would divide all state organizations into

three categories: well organized, fairly well organized, and poorly organized.

The national office would then seek to aid groups two and three with the

help of group one. Under the alternate proposal, plan "B," a "good" state

and a "poor" state, geographically close, would share organizers and

speakers.⁵³ In this way the state office in Ohio hoped to preserve local

control of organizational and fund drives.

Ohio delegates at Chicago were unable to muster a majority vote in

support of either of their plans. When Eugene V. Debs sent out a plea

for support of the Million Dollar Campaign and Defense Fund, Ohio

Socialists answered only half-heartedly. Keeping in mind the Ohio party's

left-wing position, another motive entered the picture. A majority of the

National Executive Committee were conservatives. The Ohio delegates and

other left-wing state organizations formed a coalition seeking to oppose

conservative "reformism." The issue of local autonomy became a factor

in the battle for power and control of the whole party on a nationwide

basis. This conflict between the party's left and right wings was a revival

of the factionalism that had remained dormant since 1906. Radicals believed

that the attempt to build a strong, dominant national office was a right-

wing plot to retain control of the party. At the next Chicago convention

in 1919 this conflict was to develop into an intra-party civil war, ultimately

destroying it as a political force.

The story of Ohio Socialist struggles in behalf of peace and free speech

ends in defeat. Opposition to war and the defense of free speech in normal

times are noble positions shared by most Americans. Unfortunately for

the Socialists, the trying years of 1917 and 1918 were beyond the realm

of normality. From its conception in 1901 the Socialist party had failed

to realize that in the United States political parties succeed only through

compromise and practical politics. Philosophically consistent, Ohio So-

cialists refused to alter the basic ideas presented in George R. Kirkpatrick's