Socialist Party USA

From RationalWiki
Jump to: navigation, search
Guide to:

U.S. Politics

Icon politics USA.svg
Hail to the Chief?
Persons of interest

The Socialist Party USA (SP USA) is a political party in the United States that holds as its primary position the realization of democratic socialism. It is a multi-tendency party, and since its birth has been formed of a right wing and left wing, the right wing being made up of reformists and social democrats, and the left wing being made up of socialists. They are equally opposed to totalitarianism, where an oligarchy of superior powers determine what is the best for the people. SP USA holds that only the people can decide what is best for them, and that even the most benevolent autocrat is a tyrant. They have been accused of being "bourgeois socialists" and "reformists" by other socialists due to the strength of their right wing, and the reformist tendencies displayed in their platforms. It was originally formed as the Socialist Party of America by the reformist 'kangaroos' of the De Leonist Socialist Labor Party, who were forced to leave after attempting a violent coup of the party, and then formed the right wing of the Socialist Party USA by merging with Eugene V. Debs' Social Democratic Party.[1] Debs, while starting out as a reformist, turned into a socialist after reading Marx's works, somewhere, ironically, along the lines of De Leonism.

The party is one of the largest socialist organizations in the United States, although that really isn't saying much. With approximately 1,500 members, it's in a distant third behind the approximately 2,000 in Communist Party USA and the 6,000 in Democratic Socialists of America. For comparison, the incredibly marginal Constitution Party, an organization for people too right-wing for the Tea Party or the Libertarian Party, has almost 78,000 members as of 2013. Workers of the world unite!

Contents

[edit] History

Historically the Socialist Party of America was a notable third party with its heyday from the 1900s-1910s and again briefly in the 1930s, and had sporadic success electing politicans on its ballot line such as two U.S. Congressmen (Victor Berger and Meyer London), and the mayors of Milwaukee and Schenectady. Its strongest showings in U.S. presidential elections were Eugene Debs in 1912 and 1920, and Norman Thomas in 1932. As with many other left groups at the time it faced domestic repression due to its opposition to U.S. entry into World War I. Victor Berger was prosecuted under the Espionage Act and denied being seated for a second term in the U.S. Congress, and Eugene Debs was prosecuted for "sedition" for speaking at an anti-draft protest and imprisoned (for the second time; his first time being imprisoned was for his role in instigating a railroad workers strike in 1894.)

Writers Upton Sinclair and Jack London were notable members. Upton Sinclair would later win the Democratic Party nomination for governor of California in 1934, sending the state's business establishment into headless chicken mode trying to stop him out of fear his E.P.I.C. (End Poverty In California) platform would turn California into a big socialist commune. Sinclair was defeated in the general election, and many analysts date the origin of today's sophisticated media smear tactics to that election.

The SP's decline can be attributed to many reasons: domestic repression during World War I, losing some members to Communism following the success of the Bolshevik Revolution, the SP throwing its support behind the Progressive Party presidential candidacy of Robert LaFollette in 1924 rather than run their own candidate, and finally the emergence after the New Deal, World War II, and the second Red Scare of a social-democratic, anti-Communist, and pro-labor union and civil rights tendency aligned with the Democratic Party. Notable among the latter were writer Michael Harrington and former Trotskyist Max Schactman, who, while remaining within the SP, argued that Socialists should work within the Democratic Party instead of run their own candidates. Disputes over this issue and over the Vietnam War caused the SP to split into Social Democrats USA, the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (today known as Democratic Socialists of America), and the Socialist Party USA after its 1972 convention. The first two groups supported working within the Democratic Party, and divided over their response to the Vietnam War (SDUSA, the most conservative of the three and the most closely aligned with AFL-CIO leadership, endorsing the status quo and a negotiated settlement in Vietnam, putting it to the right of Democratic nominee George McGovern on that issue; DSOC supporting an immediate cease fire and U.S. withdrawal). SPUSA, the furthest left of the three, split from DSOC in 1973 and sought to organize as Socialists instead of working with the Democrats. The current name Socialist Party USA dates from that time.

[edit] Recent candidates

Their presidential candidate for the 2012 U.S. Presidential Election was Stewart Alexander.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

[edit] Footnotes

  1. Record of the 'Battle of June 10'
United States political parties
Alaskan Independence Party - American Independent Party - Christian Liberty Party - Communist Party USA - Constitution Party - DINO - Democratic-Republican Party - Democratic Party - Federalist Party - Green Party - Know Nothing - Libertarian Party - Modern Whig party - National Atheist Party - Progressive Labor Party - Prohibition Party - RINO - Radical Republicans - Reform Party - Republican Party - Revolutionary Communist Party (US) - Socialist Workers Party (US) - States' Rights Democratic Party - Workers World Party - World Socialist Party of the United States - Yippie -
Personal tools
Namespaces

Variants
Actions
Navigation
Community
Tools
support