American Worker's Councils

A topic that is mostly forgotten or unknown to communist militants and leftists in general is that of the proletarian organs of power created during the mass & great strikes in the United States after 1917- including strike committee's, mass assemblies with worker-delegates and worker's councils/soviets. Combined with the history of militant and violent struggle carried on by immigrant and native workers in America in the 19th and early 20th century, I believe that this heritage is important for all communist militants to know of, particularly American militants who often ignore the historical struggles of our native proletariat because of its history of passivity and low level of class consciousness in much of the 20th century.

Awhile back I read the recently published Wobbly book, "The Industrial Workers of the World: Its First 100 Years," by Fred W. Thompson & Jon Bekken, and found details (like names, dates and locations) concerning the existence of numerous soviets/worker's councils in the United States in the immediate post-October Revolution period. I no longer have a copy of the book otherwise I would type up and post the relevant passages (if anyone reading this does have a copy, it'd be great if you could take the time to type and post those portions ).

I did some research online and came across a website for the 'Seattle General Strike Project,' which states:

While people may have exaggerated the involvement of the IWW in the Seattle General Strike, the history of the Wobblies in the months and years leading up to the strike did provide their opponents with ammunition and evidence to support their claims. IWW members never shied away from confrontations with their opponents, and made their radical ideas well known. In August 1918 the IWW was reported to be plotting a general strike of miners and lumber workers throughout the West. 32 Wobblies were arrested in Spokane in connection with the plot. Scores of Wobblies were arrested following the passing of anti-sedition laws by the government. The same month that the plot was broken up in Spokane, 70 IWW members were jailed in Seattle for "government investigation as suspected seditionists."
There were also reports of a mass meeting in Tacoma of the Tacoma Soldiers’, Sailors’, and Workmens’ Council where the speakers, including I.W.W. representatives, urged "a peaceful overthrow of the present form of government in the United States and the taking over of government industries by the working class..."
An article in the Oregonian on January 13, 1919 reported on a meeting of "Bolsheviks" in Seattle at 4th and Virginia at which speakers were urging a general strike in large part to prevent the shipping of supplies to Siberia for use by armies who were resisting the Bolsheviks there. These articles all reflect the fact that there was an abundance of activity by the IWW and other radicals in the years prior to the strike. The activities that found their way onto the pages of the newspapers made much of the public resentful, distrustful, and afraid of the Wobblies and their intentions.

I posted this information on Libcom.org, where other posters made the following suggestions for relevant information about the time period and embryonic soviets:

-"Strike!" by Jeremy Brecher; "Dynamite" by Louis Adamic; "Labor's Untold Story" by Richard Boyer and Herbert Morais

-More information on the 1919 Seattle General Strike at prole.info/texts/seattle1919.html.

-Draper's, "Roots Of American Communism" mentions American worker's councils in Butte, Montana and Portland, Oregan.

-

Toledo Ohio also had a major Workers' council. Most of these were centered (as far as I can tell) around the left-Socialist "Proletarian University" based in Detroit. The Seattle council was also tied into the One Big Union based in Canada, which the Washington State AFL came near to joining in 1919. The Proletarians were close to both the Socialist Party of Canada and SPGB, joined the Communist Party of America as a dissident group. Most left the CPA to form the Proletarian Party of America.

-Links to the ICC website articles on the Winnipeg General Strike & 1919 Seattle General Strike (I can't post links yet, these can be found by doing a search on the ICC site internationalism[dot]org )

-Information on the short-lived Workers’, Soldiers’, Sailors’, and Farmer’s Council of Buffalo and Erie County in March 1919, with links to its Manifesto at the Marxists[dot]org website, search by year, 1919 to find it.

-Information on the 1877 Saint Louis General Strike and link to the wikipedia article on it:

The St. Louis strike was marked by a bloodless, efficient and quick take-over by dissatisfied workers of commerce and transportation in the area. By July 22, the St. Louis Commune began to take shape as representatives from almost all the railroad lines met in East St. Louis. They soon elected an executive committee to command the strike and issued General Order No. 1, halting all railroad traffic other than passenger and mail trains. John Bowman, the mayor of East St. Louis, was appointed arbitrator of the committee. He helped the committee select special police to guard the property of the railroads from damage.

The wiki article has a great anecdote about reactionary workers becoming progressive in times of proletarian struggle:

At another large rally a black man spoke for those who worked on the steamboats and levees. He asked, "Will you stand to us regardless of color?" The crowd shouted back, "We will!"

-Soldiers’, Sailors’, Workers’ and Farmers’ Council Denied Right of Assemblage
[events of March 6-10, 1919]

Article at the above mentioned Marxists[dot]org portal, search by year 1919. Includes memorable quote "Chamber Of Commerce In Deadly Fear Of Bolshevism."

Included in that list of articles is one dealing with the meeting of A link about a meeting of the Union of Russian Workers ('Soviet of Workingmen's Deputies of the US and Canada') in 1919:

From the 6th to the 9th of January, 1919, the
2nd Convention of the Russian Colonies was held in
New York City. One hundred twenty-three delegates
participated in the convention and they represented
33,975 Russians, according to the Soviet of Workingmen’s
Deputies of the US and Canada Weekly. The independent
element was represented by 60 delegates;
Union of Russian Workers, 49; Socialists, 9; Industrial
Workers of the World, 2; and Anarchists, 3. During
the convention, Peter Bianki, who represented the
Union of Russian Workers of the United States and
Canada and the Anarchists, declared from the convention
floor: “The Union of Russian Workers deny any
form of power and Government because where Government
begins, Revolution ends and where there is Revolution
there is no place for Government.” Bianki further
declared that the Union of Russian Workers has found
it possible to support the Bolsheviki in its struggle
against the counterrevolution because the Bolsheviki
undoubtedly are the most Revolutionary part of the
Russian Social Democratic Party.

Both are very interesting. It would be so beneficial if a complete written account (in chronological order) of every soviet and proto-soviet formed after 1917 in North America, along with the activities of RSFSR-linked groups in North America, were available. From intially stumbling upon that quote and little bits and pieces in a couple books, to the information provided by everyone here, there seems to be an incredible historical movement to draw lessons and inspiration from.
In the book 'Wobblies & Zapatistas', Staughton Lynd writes that in his youth he tried to find a period of American history that he could 'relate to', regarding his feelings for revolution, 'progress', etc and was unable to do so. I think a lot of American communists, anarchists, syndicalists, etc feel the same way. Aside from individual groups recording & carrying on their own legacy (IWW, SLP, etc) and archived material for historical value (marxists.org and various books) there isn't a well grounded revolutionary history of the revolutionary American workers. A lot of us just don't know about these events, the people involved, the groups involved, etc.


Does anyone here have any other links or know of any printed sources (books, etc) concerning these and/or other American worker's councils, the activity of Bolsheviks/Comintern representatives here in the US, the internal position of groups like the IWW and SLP etc in these American soviets, etc?

I think it would be highly beneficial if a group like the ICC wrote a comprehensive account of these American worker's councils and embryonic organs of proletarian political power in the context of the mass and general strikes, and the unions/political groups involved, and an analysis of them- what they accomplished, where they fell short, the material situation of the US during the years just after the October Revolution, etc. What do you guys think?

I'd like to add an article that contains a critique of the IWW of this time period (1919). While certain branches and individual members of the IWW were participating in the organs of proletarian political power or helping organize them (including soviets/worker's councils), in the same year this critique was written, IWW HQ was officially against Communism and the Soviet system (even while their members were participating in them, such as the Tacoma Soldier's, Sailor's And Workermen's Council).

This article was written in 1919, and was published in anissue of the Chicago branch of the Communist Party of America (CPA) newspaper, The Communist:

EDIT: Unfortunately, I don't have enough posts to post links, and for whatever reason my browser crashes every time I try to copy-paste this article from the Marxists.org PDF file.

The article is, "The Soviets And The I.W.W." by I.E. Ferguson

The Communist, New Series Volume 1, Number 7, Nov.15.1919

-Also, an interesting line from Zinoviev in a letter dated September 1, 1919, titled, "Circular Letter to Comintern-Affiliated Parties on Parliamentarism and the Soviets":

In France the syndicalist group of Comrade Pericat forms the heart of the Communist Party; in America, and also to some extent in England, the fight for the Soviets is led by such organizations as the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World). These groups and tendencies have always actively opposed the parliamentary methods of fighting.

I think it would be highly beneficial if a group like the ICC wrote a comprehensive account of these American worker's councils and embryonic organs of proletarian political power in the context of the mass and general strikes, and the unions/political groups involved, and an analysis of them- what they accomplished, where they fell short, the material situation of the US during the years just after the October Revolution, etc. What do you guys think?

Seems to me like you just researched yourself into a job....why don't you make a start?

Heh, fair enough. I think that is a good idea- it may take some time to acquire a few of the books needed for source material, I would like to hear any ideas anyone has though (and any additional books, articles, etc that contain references to the topic).

I imagine it would be organized like this:

1) Opening paragraph with description of the general idea/topic, brief outline of the article.

2) History of well developed mass & general strikes in the US in the years after the Paris Commune to WWI- where politicised and militant workers spread their struggle across union and industry lines, showed impressive solidarity with foreign, immigrant, non-white workers, established mature organs of workers political power (strike committee's that took on administration of a town or city, mass assemblies with electable and revocable delegates, etc).

3) Brief description of the political landscape at the time of the October Revolution, the union and domestic political situation, attempts to form an American section of the Third International.

4) Chronological narrative of the lead up, formation and dissolution of the worker's councils in the US, if other proletarian organs were established (factory committees, red guards/worker militias, etc), what political elements were involved and to what extent. RSFSR / Bolshevik reaction to American communists and embryonic soviets.

5) Lessons to draw from these experiences, analysis of the balance of class forces in each soviet, strengths and weaknesses of tactics, strategy, etc, and the legacy of these experiments in revolution in continental America and what it should mean to modern communist militants.

How does that sound as a broad outline? Reading over it again I get the feeling this will take a pretty significant amount of time to complete

EDIT: A note on the Autonomous Industrial Colony Kuzbas would be appropriate as well. It seems that the failure of the embryonic organs of proletarian power to spread significantly in the United States led some revolutionaries to flee to the 'socialist fatherland' and participate in an experiment in communism in Siberia, the realization that the revolutionary wave was going to begin receding seemed to weigh heavily on them to try and protect the most significant gains of the world revolutionary wave in the early 1920's.

sounds excellent - in the intro it would be worth saying something about why these experiences have been 'buried' and argue that they counter the myth of the 'middle class working class' in the USA. Worth contacting the Inter comrades about this but I am sure they will welcome the proposal.