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Socialism before Sanders pp 121–135Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

Their Party, Their Power: Socialist Women in the 1930s

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Abstract

“Their Party, Their Power” examines the role that women played in the socialist revival of the 1930s. A view of the Socialist Party that incorporates women’s contributions to American socialism allows for a complicated and more complete analysis of women’s role in a revived SP. Explicating the roles that women took on in the SP, as well as socialist women’s daily interactions with men, also demarcates the limits of women’s achievements within the SP.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Bernard K. Johnpoll, Pacifist’s Progress: Norman Thomas and the Decline of American Socialism (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1970), 52–53.

  2. 2.

    “Socialists Favor,” The Lewiston Daily Sun, 24 May 1932.

  3. 3.

    Socialist Party, “The March of Socialism, 1928–1932,” Journal of the Seventeenth National Convention (Chicago: Italian Labor Publishing Co., 1932), 33.

  4. 4.

    See Sally M. Miller, Flawed Liberation: Socialism and Feminism (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1981); Mari Jo Buhle, Women and American Socialism, 1870–1920 (University of Illinois Press, 1983); Sally M. Miller, “Socialism and Women,” in Laslett and Lipset, Failure of a Dream?: Essays in the History of American Socialism (University of California Press, 1984), 244–268. There are a number of works that focus on social-democratic and progressive women’s organizing efforts during the 1930s, as well as biographical studies of important female labor leaders. See Landon Storrs’s work on the social-democratic coalition (though communist women, too, participated in social-democratic coalitions during the Popular Front) that coalesced in support of the New Deal and included socialists and former socialists. Landon Storrs’s Civilizing Capitalism: The National Consumers’ League, Women’s Activism, and Labor Standards in the New Deal Era (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000) has examined a broader group of women in the 1930s, including socialist women, most notably Florence Kelley. Annelise Orleck’s Common Sense and a Little Fire: Women and Working-Class Politics in the United States, 1900–1965 (The University of North Carolina Press, 1995) explores the organizing work and achievements of Rose Schneiderman, Pauline Newman, and Clara Lemlich.

  5. 5.

    Sally M. Miller, “Women in the Party Bureaucracy: Subservient Functionaries,” in Flawed Liberation, 28.

  6. 6.

    Mari Jo Buhle, Women and American Socialism, 1870–1920 (University of Illinois Press, 1983), 323.

  7. 7.

    Gretchen J. Garrison, “Help Wanted—Female,” May 1934, Box 5, PECSP. It may sound strange to hear socialists lauding marketers, but the SPA was by no means anti-market in the 1930s. The SP promoted cooperatives during this period. These cooperatives were designed to function within a market structure. They would, so the argument went, help to democratize both production and consumption and help to control prices and make the economy use driven rather than profit driven.

  8. 8.

    “Norman Thomas’ Wife Dies in New York City,” Reading Eagle (Reading, PA), 1 August 1947; “Here’s One Husband Who Dictates to His Wife,” Herald-Journal (Spartanburg, SC), 6 September 1936.

  9. 9.

    “Mrs. Norman Thomas Running a Tearoom,” The Norwalk Hour (Norwalk, CT), 28 July 1932.

  10. 10.

    “Here’s One Husband Who Dictates to His Wife,” Herald-Journal (Spartanburg, SC), 6 September 1936; “Mrs. Norman Thomas Running a Tearoom,” The Norwalk Hour (Norwalk, CT), 28 July 1932.

  11. 11.

    “Socialist Rift: Norman Thomas Named for President as the Old Guard Bolts,” [1936], The Literary Digest, Box 3, PECSP.

  12. 12.

    Willis Thornton, “Norman Thomas Answers Questions Put to Candidates of Republicans,” Herald-Journal (Spartanburg, SC), 6 June 1936.

  13. 13.

    “Mrs. Thomas Minds Her Knitting,” The Milwaukee Journal (Milwaukee, WI), 15 July 1935.

  14. 14.

    Ethel M. Davis to Mrs. G. Duff, October 19, 1932, SPAP, Reel 25; Ethel M. Davis to Louise Wiener, October 19, 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Martha Croushore, October 19, 1932, SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Mrs. Henry Wiegel, October 19, 1932, SPAP; and Ethel M. Davis to Caroline Goodman, October 18, 1932, SPAP.

  15. 15.

    “Fix Machine Age, Women Urged by Socialist Leader,” The Milwaukee Journal (Milwaukee, WI), 12 October 1932.

  16. 16.

    “PA. Socialists Open Sessions Here Tonight: Young Men and Women to Hold State Conference Over the Weekend,” Reading Eagle (Reading, PA), 1 July 1932.

  17. 17.

    1930 United States Census, s.v. “Sarah Limbach,” Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania; 1920 United States Census, s.v. “Sarah Limbach,” Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania; Obituary of Sarah Limbach, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 4 October 1989.

  18. 18.

    1930 United States Census, s.v. “Sarah Limbach,” Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania; 1920 United States Census, s.v. “Sarah Limbach,” Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.

  19. 19.

    “Roberts and Pinola Named,” Reading Eagle, 28 April 1936; Obituary of Sarah Limbach, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 4 October 1989.

  20. 20.

    “Socialist Hits Suffrage Bars,” The Pittsburgh Press, 8 October 1930.

  21. 21.

    1930 United States Census, s.v. “Jane W. Tait,” Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.

  22. 22.

    1900 United States Census, s.v. “John Tait,” Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.

  23. 23.

    Ibid.

  24. 24.

    1920 United States Census, s.v. “Jane Tait,” Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.

  25. 25.

    “Refuse to Endorse Industrial Workers: State Socialists Stand by Trade Unions,” Reading Eagle, 21 April 1912.

  26. 26.

    ”Minutes of the National Convention, Socialist Party,” in The Socialist World [Chicago], v. 2, no. 6/7 (June–July 1921), 24.

  27. 27.

    Ethel M. Davis to Mrs. Dorothy Thompson, 18 October 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Ella Griffin, 18 October 1932, SPAP.

  28. 28.

    Kristi Andersen calls into question Davis’s assumption that women were not going to polls along with their husbands, though Andersen generally agrees that women’s voter turnout was lower than men’s during the 1920s. See Kristi Andersen, After Suffrage: Women in Partisan and Electoral Politics Before the New Deal (University of Chicago Press, 1996), 51–53; Margret Mary Finnegan agrees that women were not voting in large numbers during the 1930s. See footnote 74 in Margaret Mary Finnegan, Selling Suffrage: Consumer Culture & Votes for Women (Columbia University Press, 1999), 202.

  29. 29.

    Ethel M. Davis to Louise Wiener, 19 October 1932, SPAP.

  30. 30.

    Ethel M. Davis to Louise Wiener, 19 October 1932, SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Pansy Waldron, 19 October 1932, SPAP; Maud McCreery to Ethel M. Davis, 20 October 1932, SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Frances Atkinson, 20 October 1932, SPAP; Ethel Davis to Mrs. John Thompson, 18 October 1932, SPAP.

  31. 31.

    Seymour Martin Lipset and Gary Marks, It Didn’t Happen Here: Why Socialism Failed in the United States (New York: W. W. Norton, 2000), 205.

  32. 32.

    Ibid. Lipset and Marks do not mention the role that women played in organizing for this victory.

  33. 33.

    Ethel Davis to Mrs. John Thompson, 18 October 1932, SPAP.

  34. 34.

    Maud McCreery to Ethel M. Davis, 20 October 1932, SPAP.

  35. 35.

    Ibid.

  36. 36.

    Ibid.

  37. 37.

    Ibid.

  38. 38.

    Ibid.

  39. 39.

    Buhle, Women and American Socialism, 318–320, 323.

  40. 40.

    Ethel M. Davis to Mrs. G. Duff, 19 October 1932, SPAP.

  41. 41.

    “Labor Classes for Trades Union Women Open,” The Milwaukee Journal (Milwaukee, WI), 29 September 1936.

  42. 42.

    Ibid.

  43. 43.

    Dorothy Sue Cobble, The Other Women’s Movement: Workplace Justice and Social Rights in Modern America (Princeton University Press, 2011), 23.

  44. 44.

    For more information on the heyday of American socialism see Richard W. Judd’s Socialist Cities: Municipal Politics and the Grass Roots of American Socialism, Irving Howe’s Socialism and America, any one of James Weinstein’s The Decline of Socialism in America: 1912–1925, and Paul Buhle’s Marxism in America.

  45. 45.

    William C. Pratt, “Women Socialists, Male Comrades: The Reading Experience,” in Flawed Liberation: Socialism and Feminism, ed. Sally M. Miller (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1981), 146; Cecelia Bucki, Bridgeport’s Socialist New Deal, 1915–36 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2001), 199. In addition to all of the major centers of socialism in the United States, there were many Socialists and sympathizers scattered throughout states that had only a dozen or so years earlier had relatively significant Socialist movements. Tennessee was one such state. Memphis had core of members and other committed Socialists were scattered across rural Tennessee.

  46. 46.

    Gretchen J. Garrison, “Help Wanted—Female,” May 1934, Box 5, PECSP.

  47. 47.

    Meta Riseman to the Literature Technicians, 18 October 1932, SPAP.

  48. 48.

    National Headquarters to Anna Steese Richardson, 24 October 1932, SPAP.

  49. 49.

    Ethel M. Davis to Pansy Waldron, 19 October 1932. SPAP; J.H. Bangs to the National Office of the Socialist Party, 20 October 1932, SPAP.

  50. 50.

    Betty Naysmith to Clarence Senior, 15 October 1932, SPAP.

  51. 51.

    Dorothy Anderson to Heywood Broun, 18 October 1932, SPAP.

  52. 52.

    Ethel Davis to P.K. Reinholt, 18 October 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Mary Donovan, 18 October 1932, SPAP.

  53. 53.

    “PA. Socialists Open Sessions Here Tonight: Young Men and Women to Hold State Conference Over the Weekend,” Reading Eagle, 1 July 1932.

  54. 54.

    “Death Takes Lilith Wilson: First Women Legislator From Berks Country Dies at Home,” Reading Eagle, 8 July 1937; “PA. Socialists Open Sessions Here Tonight: Young Men and Women to Hold State Conference Over the Weekend,” Reading Eagle, 1 July 1932.

  55. 55.

    “Which Can Will You Throw Your Vote In?,” October 1932, SPAP.

  56. 56.

    Executive Secretary of the SP to Marguerite Thomas, 25 October 1932, SPAP.

  57. 57.

    Unknown to Helen Biemiller, 25 October 1932, SPAP.

  58. 58.

    Ethel Davis to Miss Grace Johnson, 24 October 1932, SPAP.

  59. 59.

    Walter P. Reuther to Paul H. Ritterskamp, 20 October 1932, SPAP.

  60. 60.

    Alice Dodge to Paul Ritterskamp, October 1932, SPAP.

  61. 61.

    Ethel M. Davis to Neils Nielsen, 24 October 1932, SPAP.

  62. 62.

    Ethel M. Davis to Joel Seidman, 24 October 24 1932, SPAP.

  63. 63.

    Albert H. Lenkau to Paul H. Ritterskamp, 26 October 1932, SPAP.

  64. 64.

    Fern Babcock to Paul H. Ritterskemp, 23 October 1932, SPAP.

  65. 65.

    Paul Ritterskamp to Miss Leonora Lane, 25 October 1932, SPAP.

  66. 66.

    Paul Ritterskamp to Miss Elinor Coleman, 25 October 1932, SPAP.

  67. 67.

    Ethel Davis to Greta Mather, 25 October 1932, SPAP.

  68. 68.

    See Wendell W. Cultice, Youth’s Battle for the Ballot: A History of Voting Age in America (New York: Greenwood Press, 1992).

  69. 69.

    Eleanor B. Semple to Paul H. Ritterskemp, 24 October 1932, SPAP.

  70. 70.

    Ethel M. Davis to Eleanor B. Semple, 24 October 1932, SPAP.

  71. 71.

    Ethel M. Davis to Dorothy Alday, 24 October 1932, SPAP.

  72. 72.

    Ibid.

  73. 73.

    See the high volume of correspondence from September to October 1932 in the SPAP, Reels 24–25.

  74. 74.

    Secretary of the Labor Committee for Thomas and Maurer to Irene Blaine, 25 October 1932, SPAP; Secretary of the Labor Committee for Thomas and Maurer to Emma Shantz, 25 October 1932, SPAP.

  75. 75.

    “85 Women Seeking Office This Year,” Reading Eagle, 21 October 1936.

  76. 76.

    Ethel M. Davis to Louise Wiener, 19 October 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Pansy Waldron, 19 October 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Martha Croushore, 19 October 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Mrs. Agatha Nagle, 19 October 1932. SPAP; Dorothy Halvorsen to Ethel M. Davis, 20 October 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Frances Atkinson, 20 October 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Ella Griffin, 18 October 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Gretchen J. Garrison, 18 October 1932. SPAP; Ethel M. Davis to Caroline Goodman, 18 October 1932; Ethel M. Davis to Sarah Volovick, 18 October 1932, SPAP.

  77. 77.

    Eleanor B. Semple to Paul H. Ritterskamp, 24 October 1932, SPAP.

  78. 78.

    Garrison, “Help Wanted—Female,” May 1934, Box 5, PECSP.

  79. 79.

    This echoes Buhle’s arguments about women and the SP in the time of Debs. See Buhle, Women and Socialism, 313.

  80. 80.

    Miller, Flawed Liberation, xvii.

  81. 81.

    Zilla Hawes Daniel, “The Plant, A little Café, and Lots of Coffee,” in Refuse to Stand Silently by, ed. Eliot Wigginton (New York: Doubleday, 1991), 94.

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    Jake Altman

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Altman, J. (2019). Their Party, Their Power: Socialist Women in the 1930s. In: Socialism before Sanders. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-17176-6_6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-17176-6_6

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