50 years ago Trotskyists were put on trial by Roosevelt gov't

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Minneapolis defendants on their way to prison on New Years Eve-Dec. 31, 1943.

From left: Felix Morrow, Albert Goldman, and James P. Cannon.

SOCIALIST ACTION DECEMBER 1991 9 Fifty years ago, on Dec. 8, 1941, the day after Pearl Harbor, 17 men and one woman were sentenced to terms in the federal penitentiary. They were convicted of conspiring to "advise, counsel, urge," and of distributing "written and printed material to cause insubordination in the armed forces" and of advocating "the duty, the necessity, desirability, and propriety of overthrowing the goverment by force and violence."

They hadn't assassinated anyone or robbed or swindled people. Such crimes-if of sufficient magnitude-often go unpunished. No, these 18 revolutionary socialists, Trotskyists, had committed even greater crimes:

1) They advocated the replacement of the decaying, humanity-destroying capitalist system by a workers and farmers government, by socialism;

2) They opposed imperialist war. This brought them into conflict with the federal government and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

3) They were very active in building the power of the trade-union movement.

Under Trotskyist leadership, Teamsters Local 544 in Minneapolis-after a series of battles, including the nationally famous 1934 general strike-grew from 200 to 6500 members and organized 200,000 overthe-road truckdrivers throughout the Midwest. The growing influence and prestige of these militant leaders earned the enmity of the bosses, of course, but also that of International Teamster president, Daniel Tobin.

Who were "The Eighteen?" James P. Cannon, National Secretary of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP); Grace Carlson, SWP candidate for U.S. Senate; Felix Morrow, editor of The Militant, Farrell Dobbs, SWP National Labor Secretary; and Albert Goldman, a labor attomey who had represented Leon Trotsky in Mexico City before the Dewey Commission's hearings into the Moscow Frame-up trials three years before Trotsky was assassinated in 1940.

All the otber prisoners were activists and leaders in the union movement in Minneapolis. Among them were SWP members Vincent R. Dunne, Carl Skogland, Harry DeBoer, Max Geldman and Jake Cooper.

Why put them on trial?

Before 1934, the average wage of the Minneapolis truckdrivers was 18 cents an hour. By 1939, the average was 70 cents an hour (at that time, a living wage). From 1934 on there had been constant friction between Local 544's leadership and Tobin, who had red-baited the local leaders during the 1934 strikes.

Things came to a head in June 1941 when Tobin tried to appoint a dictatorreceiver over the union who would have absolute powers, including the power to expel anyone.

At a Local 544 membership meeting on June 9, the 4000 members present voted almost unanimously to reject Tobin's scheme and to disaffiliate from the AFL and join the CIO. The CIO welcomed them.

Tobin, a personal friend of President Roosevelt and head of the Democratic Labor Committee in the 1940 presidential election, immediately wired Roosevelt for help. Roosevelt's secretary, Steve Early, told the press: "When I advised the president of Mr. Tobin's representations, he asked me immediately to have the government departments and agencies interested in this matter notified."

Within a few days after this pronouncement, FBI agents raided the SWP headquarters in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minn., and carted off a carload of books, pamphlets, leatlets, and ottice recoras— including photographs of Marx, Lenin, Trotsky, etc.

Only five days had elapsed since Local 544 had voted to disaffiliate. Why the haste?

The United States was poised to enter World War II. These anti-imperialist-war Trotskyists—although not yet a major obstacle—were in the way. So, put their leaders, especially their influential tradeunion leaders, in prison! This would solve Tobin's problem and at the same time help the war effort. Thinking became a "crime.' The trial began on Oct. 27, in the Federal District Court in Minneapolis just six weeks before Pearl Harbor. Twenty-eight defendants faced the court.

One defendant was absent; Grant Dunne, union organizer, a shell-shocked and crippled World War I veteran, committed suicide a few days before the trial began.

The indictment contained two counts, each charging a conspiracy.

Count One was based on a statute enacted in 1861 which makes it a federal crime to commit overt acts against the government. This law was passed during the Civil War for use against the armed rebellion of the Confederacy.

The prosecution charged that the Union Defense Guard of Truckdrivers Local 544 had concealed arms and ammunition with which to overthrow the government by force and violence. The Union Defense Guards had been formed in September 1938 to defend the union's picket lines, beadquarters, and members against threatened anti-labor violence from fascist gangs known as Silver Shirts.

But the trials proved that no arms or ammunition were concealed. This count was thrown out by the jury.

Count Two was based on a new law, the 1940 Alien Registration Act, popularly known as the Smith "Gag" Act. This law was the first since the Alien and Sedition Laws of 1798 to make thinking and the expression of opinion a federal crime.

In his opening statement to the jury, Prosecutor Anderson explicitly declared that even if it could not be proven that the defendants had taken up arms against the government, they could nonetheless be found guilty.

The government took three weeks to present its case. The evidence against the defendants consisted only of certain statements alleged to have been made before witnesses—the majority of whom were on the payroll of Daniel Tobin.

Also introduced were over 150 exhibits, consisting of official documents and articles published by the SWP, together with many of the best known works of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Trotsky. All these publications could be found in reputable libraries and had been openly distributed and sold for decades.

The defense strategy The defense took only four days. Cannon, in his pamphlet, "Defense Policy in the Minneapolis Trial," outlined the carefully worked-out courtroom strategy: "The prosecution was designed to outlaw the party and deprive it, perhaps for a long time, of the active services of its most experienced leaders. At the same time, it was obvious that the mass trial, properly handled on our part, could give us our first real opportunity to make the party and its principles known to wide circles of workers them.o gain a sympathetic hearing from "We decided to use to the fullest extent every legal protection, technicality, and resource available to us. ... On the other hand, we planned to conduct our defense in court not as a 'criminal' defense but as a propaganda offensive ... to popularize the principles of our movement."

And this was done through the testimony of the defendants, especially that of Cannon (to be found in the pamphlet "Socialism on Trial," published by Pathfinder Press) and the masterly application of the defense tactics by the defense lawyer, Albert Goldman, himself a defendant.

James P. Cannon was the chief witness for the defense. In his testimony he explained carefully what the socialist society of the future would look like, and that it could only come about if the majority of the people wanted it.He pointed out that violence would be initiated by the deposed capitalist minority. In that case, the new Workers and Farmers Government would take action against the rebels.

Question by the prosecution: "Well, how would you resist this uprising, this uprising against you?"

Cannon: "The same way 1861."

Goldman, statement ...as I heard Mr. Anderson deliver his argument, my thoughts drifted far afield. What are we on trial for, I asked myself. Certain men wrote books many years ago and we are on trial because these men had ideas and wrote about them ... books that have been read by tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands. ... My mind wandered back into the Middle Ages, and I saw before me inquisitors, prosecutors ... with a heretic standing before them, and these inquisitors were ster and merciless. Lifting a finger of accusation, the prosecutor said "He does not believe our doctrine ... I accuse him of heresy."

A very peculiar conspiracy On the question of conspiracy, Goldman said, "What kind of a conspiracy is it when we publish a weekly newspaper and a monthly magazine, when we ask people to come to our meetings, to listen to us, and to join our party! Our conspiracy is indeed peculiar; it is a conspiracy that attempts to get the vast majority of the people of the U.S. to become members of it. Political propagandists, yes, but don't call us conspirators. Tell the truth, Mr. Anderson, and say that our ideas are distasteful to you."

The trial concluded on Nov. 28. Five of the defendants were dismissed for lack of evidence. After two and a half days of deliberation, the jury acquitted all the defendants on the first charge and cleared five of all charges. Eighteen of the defendants were found guilty on the second count alone. But the jury recommended leniency. Twelve were given 16-month prison terms and six were given 12-month terms. All were released on bail.

A two-year fight to free the 18 was launched by the Civil Rights Defense Committee (CRDC), an organization of prominent liberals and labor leaders. More than 600 labor, civil liberties, and Black organizations backed the Minneapolis Case victims.

The "War For the Four Freedoms" had created an intolerant attitude towards dissenters in the United States. But the CRDC, assisted by the American Civil Liberties Union, persisted. It took the case to the "liberal" Supreme Court, a majority of whose members had been appointed by Roosevelt. Three times the court refused to hear the case, although basic constitutional rights were involved.

On New Years Eve-Dec. 31, 1943—the 18 entered federal penitentiaries. At the farewell banquet, Cannon said, "Our party didn't sell out, didn't lie. We told the truth That is why we are being railroaded to prison."

Afterword: Jake Cooper, who was the youngest of the 18, died on Sept. 8, 1990. Jake, a founding member of the Socialist Workers Party, was expelled from the SWP by the clique around National Secretary Jack Bames. Jake became a founding member of Socialist Action in 1983. Socialist Action lives proudly in the traditions of the Minneapolis defendants.

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