Radical Political Newsletters

The American Bulletin was a American pro-Nazi newsletter, which echoed the foreign and domestic policy of the Third Reich. From bitter denunciations on the Jews to calls for a stronger national government in line with the traditions of the "Nordic race," the newsletter focused on paranoid accusations, charging that the government was under the direct control of Jews. Combining this rhetoric with attacks upon Communists, the American Bulletin claimed itself to be the true representative of the working class--but only the white working class, of course.

The opening salvo of the paper rails against the trial of Raymond J. Healey by a Jewish Judge. Healey, who had a colorful, though short, career as a right-wing demagogue, was arrested in Camden, NJ in August, 1933 for inciting a riot and again in June of 1935. A member of both the Khaki Shirts of America and the Nationalist Socialist Workers' Party, Healey also appeared as a witness to the murder of Antonio Fierro in December, 1934. During his testimony, he boasted that he was a "Hitler," causing an uproar. The New York Times referred to him as the "Brooklyn 'Hitler,'" no doubt stoking what already appears to have been an oversized ego.

The collection of American Bulletin begins after his conviction on July 16, 1935, and continues through July 14, 1936. The collection is sporadic, containing ten individual weekly editions. Each individual newsletter averages about ten pages and contains a range of articles providing news through the eyes of Nazi ideology.

The Marxist Policy Committee was a splinter group of Marxists which criticized ultra-leftists. The group was based in Chicago by a man known as Beckett, who demanded that his criticism in the Bulletin of the Marxist Policy Committee be published to all members of The Appeal, presumably a pro-Trotskyist group. Max Schachtman, one of the leading American Trotskyist theorists, mocked the MPC, criticizing it as an "Oehlerite stooge group" as well as its propensity to switch sides. The MPC was short-lived and soon joined the Oehlerite group.

The Bulletin of the Marxist Policy Committee material consists of a mix of a few newsletters and a few independent reports. The newsletters come from October 1937 through January 1938, while the reports are undated. The ideological orientation of the group is, as the title suggests, communist, claiming to represent true Marxism against the ultra-leftism of Trotsky. From the reporting, they seem to have arisen as a dissident group from a paper known as the Appeal, which refused to advertise their ideas. Originally, the purpose was to disperse the views of the MPC to a larger audience in preparation for the upcoming convention.

The group was poorly funded from the beginning, forcing their spokesmen to hitchhike around to their speaking locations. Important goals included the establishment of a revolutionary Fourth International. The group also denounces accommodation with reformism, which is declared an agency of the bourgeoisie. However, rather than taking up an unconditional support of the Soviet Union, the group says that it is a worker's state, but is in the grip of bureaucracy. In this, the Marxist Policy Committee prefigures later arguments made by libertarian socialists. Overall, the main thrust of the arguments are not directed at the bourgeois system, but rather at opposing ideologies of the left, such as the positions of Communists, such as Cannon and Schachtman.

The common complaints of the MPC with the rest of the Socialist movement were those who leaned towards "Trotsky-Cannon" positions, such as Schachtman. The issues are addressed to Appeal subscribers, who they wished to win over to their position.

One of the most influential of the publications in the group was Counterattack, which sought to provide the average American with "facts to combat communism." Founded by former FBI agents and published by American Business Consultants, Counterattack attempted to elucidate examples of communist activity within the United States, failures of the government to protect against communists, and to rally troops against communism. Even Time magazine reported on the resignation of "Mr. Counterattack" and spokesman for the publication, Ted C. Kirkpatrick. Time recognizes the most significant action of Counterattack as the publication of the Red Channels, a report on purported communist control in the media.

By arousing popular awareness, Counterattack attempted to influence politics by uniting anticommunists in letter-writing campaigns, counter-protests against communists, and supporting legislation, such as the Nixon-Mundt Bill. Throughout its storied career, Counterattack was itself constantly on the defense against accusations of libel after the publication of Red Channel. As former FBI agents, the staff of Counterattack had access to FBI files on potential subversive activity and the files of the House Un-American Activities Committee. With this material, they published the names of members of the media who appeared and the number of times that they appeared, without accusations. Through such tactics, the publication gained attention and notoriety.

The bulletin was published by the Young Socialist League's (YSL) Left Wing Caucus, which represented the more leftist tendencies of the YSL. Their slogan, "Unity to Left," invited controversy among the less radical members of the YSL, who believed that they wished to unite with the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party. Instead, the group urged the development of a coalition of those who are closest to their ideology already and are moving to the left.

They also criticize Michael Harrington's depiction of their caucus as a group of Trotskyists while at the same time urging the avoidance of working with reformist groups and parties, such as the Socialist Party and the support of Communists for the Democratic Party.

Negro Labor News Service was a publication which sought to present news from a socialistic and racial point of view. While not revolutionary, the paper advocated social and economic restructuring that would seem extreme to contemporaries. One of the main luminaries behind the paper was Frank Crosswaith, a political activist and also a major African-American voice. A Caribbean immigrant, Crosswaith eagerly took to the politics of his adopted land as an advocate for greater equality and democracy. His political outlook favored a fusion of labor and socialist parties. However, he was opposed to communism, which he considered to be "a stumbling block in [the socialists'] campaign to organize the Negro population of the United States."

Crosswaith, besides acting as an advocate on social issues, also sough to act within politics. He for several positions in government, including Secretary of State with Norman Thomas, Congressman, Lieutenant Governor, New York City Council, and the President of the Board of Aldermen. Additionally, he authored The Negro and Socialism. Other important contributors were Earl Lawson Sydnor, a Black Bostonian poet and James Oneal, an historian and author who wrote The Next Emancipation.

Socialist Monthly was a publication of the Libertarian Socialist League, which posited an ideology which saw itself engaged in struggle against both the Soviet Union and the United States. Maintaining that the USSR represented a bureaucratic state hostile to the interests of the working class, the Socialist Monthly attacked "both war camps." The ideology of libertarian socialism resembles that of the Spanish Anarchists during the Spanish Civil War and is also similar to the thought of Bakunin.

Libertarian socialism is a left-libertarian ideology, which emphasizes the autonomy of the individual, yet seeks to bring him into a communal life, without private property. Both the state and capitalism are regarded as tools of oppression in the hands of the ruling class. This radically differs from right-libertarianism, which is most common in the United States, and holds private property in high regard.

The Socialist Youth Review was a publication of the Workers Party, which was a Trotskyist political party which was formed by Max Shachtman after he was expelled from the Socialist Workers Party in 1940. After 1949, the group was called the Independent Socialist League and later merged with the Socialist Party.

The collection consists of the publications, with each being about 30 pages long. They cover a range of contemporary political issues, both domestically and internationally.

The Network was a review of the moves of the Soviet Union that sought to unmask it as a threat to the Western democracies. Ruth Fischer was an Austrian radical who immigrated to the United States from Berlin, where she had become disenchanted with Stalinist attempts to control the German Communist Party. This fact distinguishes The Network from the other anticommunist journal examined, which criticized Communism from a much different perspective.

The journal also differs from Counterattack in that it judges fascism and communism to be variations on the same general theme. This was a common criticism during the 1930s, when Germany and the Soviet Union were often categorized together as totalitarian states. While she gives no evidence of having lost her faith in true communism, Fischer attempts to throw light on the moves of Stalin and his potential post-World War II aims with regard to Germany.