I’m a nurse . . . (2006)

From Issue 20 of the World Socialist Review

. . . and one of the things I do for a living is facilitate groups for mothers of babies from two to twelve weeks old. The goal is to empower the mothers to trust their own judgment, as well as to teach them about infant development and the needs of new babies.

When I’m working with this group, I wear a somewhat different hat than the one I wear doing my socialist work.

The other day, one of the new moms wondered if it was safe to put baby sunblock on her two-month- old, because the tube was marked “Warning: not for infants under six months.” Another mom responded that her pediatrician had told her it was OK, as long as you didn’t put any on the face or hands. Someone else said her doctor insisted it was absolutely contraindicated to put sunblock on a baby under six months of age.

It became clear that there was no consensus among the different providers these women were using, although all the tubes and jars of sunblock stated clearly not to use them on very young babies. One of the mothers (who is a doctor herself, though not a pediatrician) offered that when there is so much difference of opinion among health professionals, it generally means there isn’t enough science to make a definite judgment.

I listened to all of this, and then I said, “Two generations ago, children played at the beach all day and no one worried much if they got sunburn. One generation ago, parents were urged to put sunblock on children, but not on young babies. Now in this present generation, we see the beginning of a tendency for even parents of very young babies to be advised to apply sunblock.

“Two things are happening here: they’re trying to make sunblock less toxic, and exposure to UY rays is getting riskier because our current system of society has been making holes in the ozone layer. In other words, the risk of exposure to our own sun is becoming (or maybe has already become) greater than the

risk of exposure to the chemicals in sunblock.

“The reality is that the UY rays are more dangerous now than they were 50 years ago, because of lack of concern about protecting our environment.”

Later, I was chastised by my boss for “not maintaining an upbeat atmosphere.” Some of the mothers had been disturbed by what I said. But I couldn’t help it — my RN hat hat had fallen off and been replaced by my Socialist hat!

I wish it was possible to connect the desire of mothers to protect their babies to the desire to protect humanity itself. What good does it do to maintain an upbeat attitude, feeling good as we apply the toxic sunblock, ignoring the relationship between skin cancer risk and capitalist disregard for the environment? I wish I could help these new moms recognize that the best way to protect their babies is by working for socialism.

— RN

Branch News (1964)

Party News from the July 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

Lewisham Branch is continuing its propaganda activity in Bromley and the Branch has especially asked that as many comrades as possible would be welcome to support their Thursday evening meetings at the Market Place, Bromley (outside Dunn's). These meetings commence at 7.30 p.m.

Glasgow Branch held a Seven Days for Socialism (June 6th-June 14th). Comrade Gilmac went up for the week to assist the Branch and we will have a review of the events in next month's issue.

Three weeks in America. Comrade McClatchie (Gilmac) reports: “I recently spent three weeks in America, most of the time in Boston, but I spent three days in New York. In Boston some members occupy Monday nights at their Head Office doing the routine work—dealing with correspondence, sending out literature, attending to subscriptions, etc. On Friday evenings there is an economic class and on Sundays they hold their fortnightly Executive Committee meetings. In between times Rab, Morrison and Fenton (the latter is also General Secretary) are engaged in writing and going through articles for the “W.S.” As far as I remember, the meetings on Boston Common had not recommenced. They have had very bad weather.

I attended an N.A.C. meeting and the Economics Class the first week I was there. At the second meeting of the Economics Class I spoke on the Materialist Conception of History. There was no time for advertising this meeting but about 80 letters were sent out to possible attenders. As a result about 30 turned up, and there were a number of questions.

I noticed one welcome change from my previous visit. A number of young people are interested and some have joined the Party.

Whilst in Boston I stayed, very pleasantly, at the Rabs. One evening they had a party which enabled me to meet some of the young people who have joined, and some who are interested. I also spent some pleasant evenings in the homes of Comrades Morrison, Ellenborgen, Blake and Gloss. One lovely evening Com. Gloss took me to dinner at a restaurant by the sea. Although his bookshop was burnt down he is carrying on quite well. I stayed with Comrade Orner and met the New York comrades. One of these (Charley David) was mentioned in a paper on account of his weekly discussions in a Square there. Another (Jack Kilgore) I was told, drives over one hundred miles to attend their Branch meetings in New York! In New York I had some lengthy discussions with Comrades Davis and Coombs. Another Comrade was there part of the time. Sam Orner is as full of beans as ever and proposes attending our next Conference. Charley Davis expressed the same intention. Comrade Fenton of Boston also proposes making a visit and Rab has it in mind.

In conclusion, I must record my appreciation for the comradely welcome I received everywhere. In particular, the warm and friendly atmosphere in the two places where I stayed; the Rab’s home in Boston and the Orner’s home in New Jersey. They could not do too much for me and for my comfort. I must add that Comrade Rab took me for a delightful three day trip through the New England States, which, to me, had an advantage historically as well as the appreciation of beautiful scenery and houses, villages and towns containing shadows of time gone by."

West London Branch have planned a visit to Brighton on Sunday, July 5th. This visit has been arranged in conjunction with the Brighton Group. All are welcome—meeting place—West Pier, Brighton, noon, Sunday, July 5th.

Wood Green & Hornsey Branch will meet in future at 17, Dorset Road, N.22, on Fridays at 8.30, All enquiries and correspondence to E. L. McKone at that address.

Phyllis Howard

Obituary: Ron Elbert (2024)

Ron and Karla Rab.

Obituary from the February 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are saddened to have to report the death in November of our comrade Ron Elbert of the World Socialist Party of the United States. He joined the WSP in the 1980s and became a regular writer for their journal The Western Socialist and its successors as well as contributing to the Socialist Standard. For a period he served as the party’s Secretary General, an administrative post in our parties. Our condolences go to his family and friends.

Sara Ellenbogen writes:

As Ron Elbert’s stepdaughter, I am deeply saddened to report his passing last July. Besides being a wonderful stepfather, Ron was a long-time dedicated member of the World Socialist Party and became one of its vital organizers along with my mother, the late Karla Rab, whom he met through the Party.

He was a gifted and passionate advocate for socialism. He lectured in public forums such as Community Church of Boston and when I taught a course on business ethics and asked him to present an evaluation of a passage in the textbook to the effect that capitalism was the most rational system, his analysis was brilliant. As a Masters student in history at the University of Massachusetts/Boston, he wrote a thesis on the history of the Socialist Party of Canada which he planned to publish, traveling to British Columbia to interview members. He could always be found at local progressive gatherings, such as the Bread and Roses festival, sitting behind a table laden with World Socialist Party literature, engaging passers-by in conversation about the movement.

Ron cared as much he did about social justice because he cared so much about people. Social change was what he wanted to dedicate his life to. I remember one time I asked him to look at a cover letter I’d written for a job in a homeless center. He added one sentence to it. He wrote ‘The poor are often only able to get services at the expense of their dignity. Our community is greatly in need of people to provide them services in a way that respects their dignity’. That was the way he treated people.

Ron always ended his email messages with a quote from the socialist writer William Morris below his signature. I think he might have liked me to conclude with that quote.

‘We who were once fools and dreamers then shall be the brave and wise

There amidst the world new builded shall our earthly deeds abide

Though our names be all forgotten and the tale of how we died.’

The Life and Letters of Isaac Rab (2011)

Book Review from issue 22 of the World Socialist Review

Role Modeling Socialist Behavior: The Life and Letters of Isaac Rab by Karla Doris Rab,  504 pages. Lulu Press. $23.16.

For most of the twentieth century, Isaac Rab (1893 – 1986) was well known in the Boston area as a socialist soap-box orator, lecturer, and teacher. He was a founding member of the World Socialist Party of the United States and a central figure in the Boston Local for many years.

In this book, our comrade Karla Rab, who is the granddaughter of Isaac Rab, tells the story of his life and presents a large selection of his surviving correspondence as well as many photographs. She draws on her own reminiscences and on those of many others who knew her grandfather.

Isaac Rab was born into an immigrant socialist family on December 22, 1893. He devoted his whole life to the cause until his death on New Year’s Eve 1986. In 1916 he helped form the WSP from the left wing of the Michigan Socialist Party in Detroit. Later he settled in Boston, where he organized the Boston Local of the WSPUS in 1932. He also taught classes on Marxian economics for other organizations, including the Communist Party, the Proletarian Party, and various Trotskyist groupings.

Karla Rab’s book is, of course, about much more than her grandfather as an individual. It is the first history of the World Socialist Movement in the United States. Its importance is great but subtle. It is often said that history is written by the winners. Even the obscure history of North American left politics has its hierarchy. Credibility is given only to “winners” such as the Industrial Workers of the World, the Communist Party, and the Congress of Industrial Organizations – even though many of the problems that plague the workers' movement are the logical outcomes of their policies.



Social democrats and Leninists like to portray smaller groups like the WSPUS as “isolated sects.” And as the history of the working class movement has been written mainly by them, who is to challenge what they say? However, with the collapse of the left in the United States there has been a reassessment of what various political organizations actually accomplished. For example, in their study of the Auto Workers Union [1] the 1930s era Trotskyists Genora and Sol Dollinger conclude that the Communist “leaders” of the Flint sit-down strikes only succeeded thanks to assistance from the Proletarian Party, which has usually been derided as an isolated sect.

The book under review proves that the WSPUS, while small, was hardly isolated. Rab’s letters demonstrate involvement in the United Auto Workers and the Typographers' Union (a model of democratic unionism) as well as discussions and debates among a wide range of left groups. Among the members of the WSPUS there were highly experienced class warriors. William Pritchard and Jack McDonald had helped lead the Western Labour Rebellion in Canada. Sam Orner had been an IWW organizer in the hard metal mines of the American Rockies as well as the leader of a famous strike of New York City taxi cab drivers in 1934. (He was the model for the character Lefty in Clifford Odet’s famous play, Waiting for Lefty.) The Detroit Local of the WSPUS had members who had helped form the United Auto Workers and played roles in the educational services of the most militant UAW locals (Irving Canter, Joe Brown, David Davenport, Frank Marquart). [2]

Another important thing about Karla Rab’s book is that it shows how Rab organized his political activity. His letters are a lesson of lasting value in how to approach the personal as well as the intellectual and educational aspects of building a movement for socialism. I have forty years of experience in organizing community groups and labor unions as well as political groups. I have found this book a first-class resource and have dipped into it repeatedly since first reading it in draft form.

FN Brill 

Notes

[1] Soll Dollinger and Genora Johnson Dollinger, Not Automatic: Women and the Left in the Forging of the Auto Workers Union (New York: Monthly Review Press, 2000).

[2] See: Frank Marquart, An Auto Worker’s Journal: The UAW from Crusade to One-Party Union (Pennsylvania State University Press, 1976).

Letters: His Excellency (2017)

Letters to the Editors from the February 2017 issue of the Socialist Standard

His Excellency

Dear Comrades

I was shocked a few weeks ago when I read the utterances by a Mr. Steve Franke (said to work for a global group) in a local daily. He attributes President Mugabe’s socio-economic catastrophe to his Marxism. I wonder if anyone on Earth could be farther from Marxism than Mr. Mugabe: Mr. Trump is much better because he acquired his wealth outside of government office. Our own Mr. Excellency abused Marxism (equality/fairness) to win public support.

If you have access to the likes of Mr. Franke kindly put the following questions: Did not Marx say (if socialism is implemented) the state will wither away? While 99 percent of us (Zimbabweans) are literally starving is not His Excellency building a too large army and police force? Marxism? Add state-of-the-art military academies (and we are not under threat from anyone), new parliament, new capital city etc.

While we starve Mr. Mugabe was among the poor before going into public office, but his cabinet are Christian, did not Marx criticize religion? In fact, what I can say is that Marx overrated influential people’s morals and compassion. And while Christ and other religionists were dreamers, mysticists (selfish and arrogant) Marx was the best in terms of ethics, they (gullibly) believe they will join their god in the (imaginary) paradise. Although they now disown each other, law, politics, religion originate together, in a bid to make order to society; tragically the cunning and powerful abused power selfishly. Hence proponents of just, fair and ethical ideals like Marx were condemned while proponents of bigotry/dictatorship like Christ (read, e.g. Matthew 10:34-42 and Luke 9:59-60) are eulogised. An Almighty Dad (if he has the power; love and mercy he is said to have) would never subjected his son to barbaric torture.

Instead of facing reality (like Marx), mysticists waste time and resources wrestling an imaginary monster. Thus the very real monsters abusing power (the bully bigots exploiting and torturing 99 percent of the population) are ignored. Really, some churches are very well organised, help their members in need but, pathetically, if you are going in the wrong direction, you will never get to your destination, however graceful your pace may be.

Bigots wishfully think they can lock reality out of the front door. I am one of the many made destitute when our cruel and selfish leaders forfeited our savings (now I am unemployable due to age). Ironically, His Excellency wants to work beyond 2020, even if he is 25 years older than me, old enough to be my father. But ever since robbing us in 2008/9 they are bombarding us with propaganda ‘Empowerment! Zim asset’ instead of doing some good to us. They defrauded/robbed in 2008/9, once more they are squandering millions of US dollars telling us how good His Excellency is and how much good is in store for us come 2018.

A week ago: people were tortured and chased by armed police from demonstrating against the bond notes, but the Herald newspaper came out with ‘people ignore the planned demo…’ Yes, locking reality out of the front door, but they forget we live in the situation, although we have no access to the internet and we cannot afford phones, which can access Facebook, Google etc. Yes, religious propagandists are safer with their acumen to articulate and encourage the suspension of logic, hallucinate and infatuate congregants.

Godwin Hatitye

Harare, Zimbabwe

Gig economy

Dear Editors

I read the article ‘Gigs and Umbrellas’ in the December Socialist Standard. It was a very good article and made some excellent points about changing workplace conditions for us working folks, but it left out one relevant point that shouldn’t be missed.

The last 15 years of my own career as an RN was spent as an independent practitioner for a nursing agency. In this situation, I met only my client(s), not my fellow-independent practitioners working for the same agency. Although independent practitioners generally get less pay and are taxed at a higher rate than other workers, there is little opportunity for them to share complaints about the work, the pay, the treatment received from management, etc.

In addition to all the problems cited by in the article, think of the effect this has on potential union activity: there is neither incentive nor opportunity for independent practitioners to form a union. Each one is an isolated individual. ‘Solidarity forever’ is becoming passé in this new world order.

Karla Rab, 

WSP(US)

Reply: 

Actually there have been attempts in Britain to organise workers who are the ‘self-employed’ such as motorbike couriers and Uber drivers. See: https://iwgb.org.uk/

Obituary: Karla Rab, 1940-2017 (2018)

Obituary from the March 2018 issue of the Socialist Standard

Karla Rab died on September 15th at age 77 in her Somerville, Massachusetts home.

A fifth-generation socialist, she learned ‘by osmosis’ that the most worthwhile cause to struggle for is to wake up the working class to its enlightened self-interest — the immediate abolition of capital’s anachronistic employment system.

She imbibed the influence of a socialist family upbringing from her earliest years, and went on to make it her vocation on joining the World Socialist Party founded in 1916 by her grandfather Isaac Rab and others. She was a practical visionary who took an active organizing role in party activities; after some re-organization c. 2000, she performed her role as Postal Corresponding Secretary with gusto. In 2010, fulfilling a promise she had given Rab to 'do something' with his voluminous correspondence, she published Role-Modeling Socialist Behavior: The Life and Letters of Isaac Rab, a multi-faceted undertaking at once a biography, a history and a memoir. Her natural editorial talents were appreciated by all her collaborators.

Everything of any value, she knew, starts with the human imagination, independently of reality, as long as you plug it back into the real world. Karla grew up immersed in a culture of optimism. She knew she really could make the world a better place, not just in a moral sense but as an actual historical reality.

And there was a way to achieve this goal. All you had to do was get everyone to understand that the world humans have evolved, the terrible mess we have made of human society, has a tangible and specific cause. While we have improved some aspects of our existence, we have done so at the expense of our better nature, and the 'progress' we imagine is inherent in our civilization is a process of tying society in knots. Humans have gotten themselves into a progressively knottier condition, and the end results are beginning to look pretty grim.

Karla learned as a child that the way to cut the Gordian knot is to re-imagine a society that once again returned to a need-oriented model of human nature in which people everywhere understand the stake they have in each other’s well-being. This is something we all know how to do, but which ever since agriculture was introduced we have been educating each other to forget. But it takes only a little self-enlightenment to break this momentum.

Since there can be no limits to how this reawakening takes place, our destiny as humans is to do this re-thinking of ourselves on a global scale. We all have it in us to retrace our steps and 'get back to the garden.' It is emotionally and intuitively easy, if you just listen to yourself and keep the courage of your convictions.

Like her grandfather, she was an incurable optimist who believed humanity still has a future. Pessimism is merely the long shadow of ignorance. The choice is clear.

R. E.

The World Socialist Party of the U.S. Turns 100 (2016)

From the July 2016 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is now just a century since the WSP established itself in the USA. Other such organizations arose at about the same time in Australia, New Zealand, and elsewhere, from similar circumstances: SPGB comrades became world travelers to escape conscription in The Great War, spreading knowledge and understanding of the case for socialism as they went. In the Twenties and Thirties these early parties took steps to form what we now call the World Socialist Movement.

In Detroit, Michigan, British 'slackers' Moses Baritz, Adolph Kohn and others conducted a series of classes on Marxian theory at Duffield Hall. Out of these classes, some 43 individuals, 19 of them belonging to the Michigan section of the “Socialist” Party of America (SP of A), held a conference on 7 July 1916 at which they voted to form a revolutionary socialist party based on the SPGB’s object and principles. They chose to name the organization The Workers’ Socialist Party, since the SP of A objected to 'Socialist Party of the U.S.'

Among these original founders of the WSP(US) were Bill Davenport, its first Secretary; Bill Gribble, a Canadian, its first Organizer; Isaac Rabinowich, usually called simply 'Rab,' around whom Boston Local was to form; and Walter Green, influential in establishing a Local in New York.

With the infamous Palmer 'Red raids' of 1919, the group felt it prudent to reincarnate themselves as the Socialist Education Society. Not till 1931 did the SES Locals in Detroit, New York and Boston reconstitute the Workers’ Socialist Party.

Two good sources for early WSP history are Bill Jerome’s in the Western Socialist (No 4, 1966) and more comprehensive account, Role-modeling Socialist Behavior: The Life and Letters of Isaac Rab, by his grand-daughter Karla Rab (November 2010 (Lulu.com); available on Amazon.com from which much of this present article is drawn.

Isaac Rab speaking from the WSPUS platform.

The Thirties, Forties and to some extent the Fifties were the years of greatest sustained activity for the WSP(US). During WWII, many comrades were drafted, and Party Rules prevented members of the Armed Services from being in the organization; but when draftees returned, they usually rejoined. It was a time of 'keeping the ‘social’ in ‘socialism’' as some comrades put it: party socials at Headquarters and in comrades’ homes were almost weekly events.

In 1947 the Workers’ Socialist Party became the World Socialist Party, thanks to a push from the Trotskyite 'Socialist' Workers Party. The postwar 'anti-communist' hysteria brought a McCarthyist makeover of the Palmer period; it was, if possible, still more artificially contrived — but with the same chilling effect. The WSP’s activities drew fewer newcomers as a result. There were enough comrades to keep things going, although membership was declining.

SPGB Comrade Gilbert McClatchie (Gilmac) paid his first of many visits to the USA in 1954. He got to meet East Coast comrades in Boston, and also visited California on that trip.

Out West, Jack MacDonald was propagating socialist ideas from his bookstore in San Francisco; other Canadian expatriates, like Bill Hewitson (Winnipeg) also turned up in California over the years.

In Los Angeles, W.Z. Miller, Frank Neale, Fred Evans, Walter Henderson and others had formed a Local, sometimes meeting in MacArthur Park. Bill Pritchard, one-time editor of the Western Clarion and a famous co-defendant at the Winnipeg General Strike trial who tied up the proceedings with an epic filibuster, was to become involved with Local Los Angeles as well. A member of the old Socialist Party of Canada (but who left the socialist movement when that SPC expired in 1926), Pritchard found his reputation had preceded him; he was allowed to stay in the U.S. after 1938 on a promise not to 'join any organizations.' And he kept a low profile until the Sixties, when he officially joined the WSP and began writing articles for the Western Socialist. (In 1939 the 'new' SPC had moved the WS to Boston to evade the wartime censorship.)

During Gilmac’s later visits and those of other British comrades following his example, comrades in Boston and elsewhere were always able to arrange speaking opportunities for them, often on the radio where there was good exposure. Cyril May, Jim D’Arcy, Adam Buick (who spent ten weeks with the Boston members in 1964, including an excursion up to the SPC’s Toronto and Montreal Locals) and many others came and took advantage of American propaganda opportunities during the 1950s, 60s and 70s. Tony Turner also visited, following his resignation from the SPGB.

By 1966, Johnson’s escalation in Vietnam was reaping the whirlwind in the form of a vociferous and growing anti-war movement, adding to the Civil Rights struggle already engulfing the Establishment. An ongoing debate arose within the party around how to respond to the Civil Rights movement: of course, the right of African Americans to vote was a cause that socialists must support — but was the fight for civil liberties ultimately just an attempt to make capitalism work better? Broadly speaking, Rab argued, it was not, but the drive to establish equal rights for all before the law was essentially a reform, because it did nothing for establishing real equality among all people. It was an illusion to think Black capitalists had common interests with Black workers.

Internally, the party was having a hard time finding members to carry out basic administrative tasks, but it was forging ahead again: a minor renaissance was taking place, with membership growing during the late Sixties in both numbers and enthusiasm. Promising new members like Bill Jerome and Steve Butterfield (who wrote as Stan Blake) joined the party. Both wrote for theWestern Socialist.

Enough new members joined in the Boston area to revive the LAC, or Local Administrative Committee, which consisted of five younger members (Steve Butterfield and his wife, Connie; George and Karla [Rab] Ellenbogen, and Bill Jerome) and oversaw all activities within the Boston Local, mainly indoor meetings, outdoor meetings held on Boston Common, covering protest meetings, and so on.

The older members like Rab, Harry Morrison and George Gloss, all of whom spoke often on the Common, tended to concentrate at the NAC level, but younger members like George Ellenbogen and Bill Jerome, for instance, might also find their way onto the National Committee. Jerome, elected to the NAC, was quickly co-opted onto the Editorial Committee as well to replace Len Fenton. This was symptomatic of a party in which too few members were having to wear too many hats.

Aware of this problem, the WSP(US) back in 1950 had moved its National Office from Boston to Detroit in an attempt to free up the Boston comrades to do more propaganda work by reducing their administrative tasks. For five years Detroit comrade Irving Canter served ably as National Secretary, but to no avail, and the National Office returned to Boston.

Annual conferences were sometimes rowdy; one comrade from Glasgow returned home with the alarming impression that the WSP(US) was about to implode from infighting. But these fireworks really only registered a predictable frustration among comrades who perceived that very important tasks were not yielding expected results.

By the late Sixties, most party activity was occurring in Boston. New York Local, which in the early years had been the center of activity, had lost its fire. Years went by when no new members joined. Even Sam Orner, an old Wobbly who had led the 1934 taxi drivers’ strike, could no longer inspire anyone apart from his family to join the struggle for a better world. Orner argued that New York Local was not adequately publicizing its existence, but his was a voice in the wilderness.

The mid-Seventies brought one golden moment: PBS Channel 44 offered a half-hour of prime time free on 'Catch 44' to any community group requesting it. The party jumped at the chance, producing three videotaped segments. The first two used a “talking heads” format; the third was a dramatization.

By the end of the 70s, Local New York was defunct. Local activity in Boston was dwindling, too. The World Socialist Party (US) now found itself a party of members at large, placing its organization on a tenuous national basis for the first time in its history. In fact, it was a member at large who did arguably more work for socialism than any other other American comrade during that period. Starting in 1976, Sam Leight, a real estate broker in Tucson, Arizona ran a series of radio broadcasts from which he generated two books: World Without Wages (Money, Poverty and War!) and The Futility of Reformism. (Earlier, Leight had also participated in the NAC as a member at large.)

Late in the Seventies, the Western Socialist dropped to two issues a year, ceasing publication entirely in 1980. The West Coast’s already sporadic activity grew faint. Boston was now the only active center left, yet this was precisely when things took a turn for the worse. From 1973 on, Rab suffered from Alzheimer’s Disease; on New Year’s Eve, 1986, he finally succumbed to pneumonia. The party, doubting its ability to make good use of a bequest from a member, voted to send the money to the SPGB. And in 1982 developers chased the WSP out of its fourth headquarters at 295 Huntington Avenue.

It was a bleak moment for the entire party; the NAC’s administrative functions ceased to be carried out, and the meetings (now held in a comrade’s home) became those of a correspondence committee, its Minutes an occasional 'Report to the Membership.'

Then in 1986, a young recently-joined Michigan member, collaborating with an SPC member from the Toronto area, brought out a new party publication, the World Socialist Review — a shoestring successor to the defunct Western Socialist produced on an office photocopier. After the second issue, Aaron Feldman, the new National Secretary, asked the present writer (a desktop publishing enthusiast) to see what he could do with it, and so a morphed WSR revived the SES tradition of an 'occasional' journal. Boston-area members (Fenton, Mike Philips, Ken Stewart, Karla Rab and myself) did stage a minor rally toward the end of the 80s, in tandem with a speaking tour by SPGB comrades Steve Coleman and Richard Montague; but not until nearly a decade later, in 1997, did a group of us set about re-establishing a functional NAC as a first step toward bringing the party back to life.

The new NAC has had its ups and downs, to be sure, although the continuous revolutionizing of communications and computer technologies has opened up once unimaginable opportunities. The WSM has embraced the Internet, with all the companion parties having linked Websites, blogs, social media and so on. The WSR, thanks to the good offices of Comrade Morgan Miller on the West Coast, was transformed by referendum into a 'print-on-demand' yearbook — a very workable concept that bridges the gap between print and electronic publishing. This should soon allow the WSP to make better use of its resources — although at this writing, only the first such yearbook has been produced, and a second is planned.

And so, after a century, even if the World Socialist Party is not as active as we have been, we are still working to make socialists. Still lacking, unfortunately, is a conscious, political majority of socialists eager to move society on to the next phase of social evolution.

Ron Elbert (World Socialist Party of the United States)

A socialist life (2010)

Book Review from the December 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Role-modeling Socialist Behavior: The Life and Letters of Isaac Rab, Karla Doris Rab..Lulu.com. 490 pages.

This book is a worthy account of the life and works of one of America’s unsung working class heroes, Isaac Rabinowich, commonly known as Rab. Through the medium of his granddaughter’s personal account of Rab’s family life, it is particularly valuable to be able to view a Socialist such as Rab as a real person, tolerant and enlightened, not just a faceless propagandist. Well illustrated, this is a useful and thought-provoking book, carried out in a charmingly eccentric style.

The story of Rab is, in a sense, the story of real Socialism in America. Rab was born on 22 December 1893 in Boston, the old home of American ‘freedom’. His parents, Sheppie and Sarah, had recently arrived from the shetetls of eastern Europe but were literate and engaging, attributes which Rab inherited in spades. Rab also inherited his father’s socialist background, joining the Socialist Party of America at the age of sixteen. Despite his humble origins, Rab excelled academically and was accepted for Harvard. However, wanting to be a real worker rather than an academic drone, he headed instead to an agricultural college in Ohio. A chance flood destroyed his practical project and exhausted his financial resources, so, in the summer of 1915, he headed to Detroit, where a well-placed class mate acquired him a job at the Ford’s factory. Via the Detroit local of the SPA, he soon came into contact with Adolph Kohn and Moses Baritz, two SPGBers fleeing the effects of the First World War. The encounter was to change his life. Kohn and Baritz won Rab over to Marxism, to which he would dedicate the rest of his life.

On 7 July 1916, Rab and 42 other attendees of Kohn-Baritz classes established the Workers’ Socialist Party of the United States, along the lines of the Socialist Party of Great Britain. Faced with political repression, the group was to be short-lived and in 1919 was reconstituted as a social club known as the Detroit Socialist Education Society. Shortly after Rab was sacked by Ford for his political activities and moved with his wife and young family back to Boston.

The 1920s were difficult both politically and personally for Rab and it was not until the end of the decade that things began to move again. On a national level, comrades in New York began to issue a journal, The Socialist, Rab being one of the foremost contributors. Shortly thereafter, on 12 September 1930, the Workers’ Socialist Party was re-formed, with Rab a member of first Executive Committee. In Boston, Rab helped form a Socialist Education Society which in 1931 became the Boston local. It was around this time that Rab became friends with Anton Pannekoek, astronomer and Marxist theoretician, who stayed with Rab during trips to America. Rab was also on good personal terms with the council communist Paul Mattick.

In 1939, editorship of The Western Socialist, previously a journal of the Socialist Party of Canada, was moved to Boston because of fears that the paper might be suppressed due to the outbreak of the Second World War, it becoming a joint publication with the WSPUS. The following year, national headquarters was moved to Boston too. Boston remained the centre of WSPUS activity in North America for the next forty years.

Boston local continued its extensive social and political programme into the ‘40s, which were, perhaps, the golden age of the WSPUS. In 1947, confusion with the Socialist Workers’ Party, a Trotskyist organisation, caused the WSPUS to be renamed the World Socialist Party, a significant development which has spread throughout what is now known as the World Socialist Movement.

The 1950s, as in this country, were a period of rapid and steep decline for real Socialism. The WSPUS was dogged at this time by controversies over the ballot and violence. Rab and the Socialist stalwarts, however, carried on with same enthusiasm.

Better times came in the 1960s, with the revival of radical politics with the Civil Rights and anti-Vietnam War movements and the opening up of new media for propaganda activities. The US Party was particularly enthusiastic in its use of radio programmes.

Rab remained throughout his life an active trade unionist, latterly as a member of the International Typographical Workers Union. He died in 1986.

Details on how to obtain a copy, write: WSPUS, P.O. Box  440247, Boston, MA  02144, USA or email spgb@worldsocialism.org

Kaz.

Build It Now? (2007)

Book Review from Issue 21 of the World Socialist Review

Build It Now: Socialism For The Twenty-First Century by Michael A. Lebowitz

Marx wrote: “Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by them- selves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past.”[1]

The circumstances encountered by those of us striving to build a socialist majority in the North today include a population made up almost entirely of people who have never known any form of society except for capitalism. Arguably, this is the greatest obstacle to building a socialist majority here in the United States, and has been so for many generations.

But in Venezuela, this obstacle does not loom quite so large. In a speech made on Dec. 15, 2006, Hugo Chávez claimed that the indigenous peoples in Venezuela had “lived in socialism for centuries,” and called them “the bearers of socialist seed in our land.”[2] (According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, about two-thirds of Venezuelans have some Indian ancestry.) In other words, the constituency who voted overwhelmingly for Hugo Chávez in 2006 is made up, in part, of people who can still remember another way of life. A case can certainly be made that the “circumstances directly encountered” by people striving to build a socialist majority in Venezuela are more propitious than what we Americans are used to.

Build It Now: Socialism for the Twenty-First Century gives us a fascinating look at contemporary Venezuela. Its author paints a picture of “a country which at the time of this writing embodies the hopes of many for a real alternative to capitalism.” (Introduction, p 10). Since most readers of this journal understand that the only two possible “real alternatives” to capitalism are socialism or barbarism, in this review I would like to address the question: “Is Venezuela under Hugo Chávez actually on the road to socialism?”

Lebowitz is a Marxist writer based in Caracas, and in Build It Now he makes many worthwhile points. One is that, once you understand the nature of capitalism, “you can no longer look at capital as this wondrous god providing us with sustenance in return for our periodic sacrifces. Rather, you understand capital as the product of working people, our own power turned against us.” He makes the case that we must “go beyond capitalism” if we want to end the exploitation of the working class; and states (p. 30):

The society to which Marx looked as an alternative to capitalism was one in which the relation of production would be that of an association of free producers. Freely associated individuals would treat ‘their communal, social productivity as their social wealth,’ producing for the needs of all.

The chapter entitled “The Knowledge of a Better World” contains some of the key points in the book. Lebowitz tells us:

Knowing where we want to go is a necessity if we want to build an alternative. But, it is not the same as being there. We live in a world dominated by global capital, a world in which capital divides us, setting the people of each country against each other to see who can produce more cheaply by driving wages, working conditions, and environmental standards down to the lowest level in order to survive in the war of all against all. We know, too, that any country that would challenge neoliberalism faces the assorted weapons of international capital — foremost among them the IMF, the World Bank, and imperialist power… We need to recognize the possibility of a world in which the products of the social brain and the social hand are common property… For this reason, the battle of ideas is essential.

It is easy to find inspiration in the following words, that Lebowitz addressed, in 2005, to a National Conference of Revolutionary Students for the Construction of Socialism in the Twenty-first Century, in Mérida, Venezuela:

We need to remember the goal. If you don’t know where you want to go, then no road will take you there. The world that socialists have always wanted to build is one in which people relate to each other as members of a human family, a society in which we recognize that the welfare of others concerns us; it is a world of human solidarity and love where, in place of classes and class antagonisms, we have “an association, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all.” (pp. 64-65)
…We see that our productivity is the result of combining our different capabilities and that our unity and the common ownership of the means of production make us all the beneficiaries of our common efforts… (p. 66)
All of these characteristics and relations coexist simultaneously and support one another in the world we want to build. Democratic decision making within the workplace (instead of capitalist direction and supervision). Democratic direction by the community of the goals of activity (in place of direction by capitalists), production for the purpose of satisfying needs (rather than for the purpose of exchange), common ownership of the means of production (rather than private or group ownership), a democratic, participatory, and protagonistic form of governance (rather than a state over and above society)… (p. 66-67)

So, how can we build this world?

He suggests (in Chapter 2 and elsewhere) that this world can be built in Venezuela with the support of Chávez’s government. Lebowitz asserts (pp. 98 –99) that if the Venezuelan government under Hugo Chávez encourages “radical endogenous development,” e.g., “preparing people for new productive relations through courses in cooperation and self-management,” (which would be possible only for a government “prepared to break ideologically and politically with capital”), that can be seen as a step towards socialism.

Socialists have sometimes called government “the executive committee of the capitalist class.” For that reason, the World Socialist Movement does not envision any role in socialist society for government per se, but anticipates that the men and women living in socialism will devise some method of managing affairs, with the necessary administrative authority but no coercive power.

One must ask, can a government “prepared to break ideologically and politically with capital” exist in the present world? Can a socialist nation exist, surrounded by capitalist nations on all sides? Certainly, it must be pointed out, contemporary Venezuela is not an example of a socialist society. Although Lebowitz may have asserted, “We see that… our unity and the common ownership of the means of production make us all the beneficiaries of our common efforts,” there is really not, at this moment, common ownership of the means of production anywhere. (If there were, there would also be common ownership of the goods and services produced, which would imply free right of access to these things — but, as of this writing in 2007, Venezuelan citizens do not enjoy free access. It remains a goal to be achieved.)

On the other hand, this is not to say that they have not taken a step in that direction. “Radical endogenous development” could include building a socialist majority. Chávez has stated that as his intention. If that should happen, then a global Socialist Revolution would have a real chance of beginning in Venezuela.

“Socialism” with a qualifier
I want to take a moment here to talk about words. When Lebowitz speaks of “Socialism for the Twenty-First Century,” does he mean the same thing by “socialism” that Hugo Chávez does? Does either of them mean the same thing that we do? Over time, words change their meanings. When I was a child, for example, all wristwatches had faces, and when you said “watch” the concept called up was a circle of numbers with 12 at the top and 6 at the bottom. Since the advent of digital technology, “watch” no longer has that meaning. Now, if you want to refer to that kind of watch, you have to add a qualifier: “analog watch.”

In order to call up the concept of “socialism” as Marx used it in the 19th Century, it is also now necessary to add a qualifier. The qualifier is “non-market.” Without that qualifier, the word “socialism” means many different things to different speakers. Because I want to be crystal clear about what I mean by “socialism” in this writing, I will make a distinction between “non-market socialism” and “market socialism” (although I am aware that most people do not add "market" any more than people who wear a digital wristwatch add "digital").

Socialism is not a market economy. It is (as developed in Engels's Socialism, Utopian & Scientific) a society where money has become superfluous because the means of production are completely under social control. All labor is voluntary, everyone has free access to whatever goods and services are available.

Without importing goods from other nations, the people of Venezuela could never maintain an acceptable standard of living. No country in the world has all the raw materials necessary to do that, within its own national boundaries. Therefore, even if a socialist majority were to be created in Venezuela under Chávez, as long as there is a global capitalist economy, it could not establish non-market socialism. It could not become either moneyless or classless.

Perhaps Lebowitz has lost sight of this — or perhaps he believes that this aspect of Marxian socialism is not to be present in the Twenty-First Century version. He emphasizes, “I am convinced that worker management is the only real ultimate alternative to capitalism,” (p. 74), which implies he has forgotten that when the means of production are under social control, there is no more class of workers, and no more class of capitalists either. There are just people, all equal members of society.

Venezuela needs a money economy now to trade even with neighboring Latin American countries, let alone with giant imperialist states like the US; so, when one refers to “socialism” in Venezuela under Chávez — or in Cuba under Castro — what is really meant is “market socialism,” in which money is still used to regulate the exchange of goods and there is no common right of access. Moreover, the government of a “market socialist” economy (think: Cuba) is forced to exert coercive authority over people from time to time.

Will a conscious, political socialist majority in Venezuela put up with this? Or, freed from the logic of capital, will they take the next step and demand free access to what they produce?

Hope for a real alternative
I think there is reason for optimism, and I applaud Lebowitz for his careful and insightful development of the situation in Venezuela. Certainly, there is hope for a real alternative to global capitalism resulting from the circumstances described in Build It Now.

Hugo Chávez himself, shortly after his election last year, called on his followers to dissolve their existing parties and to form a new “United Socialist Party of Venezuela,” which would provide a forum for discussing how to “construct socialism from below.”[3] The material conditions in the world are ripe today for a global Socialist Revolution, except for the lack of a majority of people who understand that non-market socialism represents a viable alternative to capitalism and are willing to commit themselves to making it work. Capitalism has wrought so much havoc on the ecology of Earth that the welfare of all human beings — capitalists as well as workers — is threatened. Not just the working class, but all of humanity, need to stop the engine of capital, if we are to survive.
The revolution has to start somewhere, and the indigenous Venezuelans who elected Chávez may yet set an example for the rest of the planet.

Karla Rab

Footnotes

[1] The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte.
[2] “Chávez Calls or United Socialist Party of Venezuela" by John Riddle< Socialist Voice, December 2006.
[3] “Chavez Calls for United Socialist Party of Venezuela,” by Gregory Wilpert; retrieved from Dec 18, 2006

Issac Rabinowich and the World Socialist Party of the United States (2006)

This year marks the ninetieth anniversary of the formation of the World Socialist Party of the United States, companion party of the World Socialist Movement in the United States. Printed below is a biographical article on one of its founding members, Issac Rab, which I've reproduced because I think it provides an interesting commentary on the history of radical politics in the United States in the first half of the twentieth century, and also because I hope it goes some way in shedding light on the marxian socialist tradition in the United States.

90 Years On

The Party now known as the World Socialist Party of the United States was formed, in Detroit, in July 1916. Probably its most enthusiastic founder-member was Isaac Rabinowich, generally called Rab for short. His granddaughter and long time member of the WSP, Karla Rab Ellenbogen, has just written and published Role-Modeling Socialist Behavior: A Biography of Isaac Rab, which also contains a selection of Rab's letters and articles, as well as a report on his visit to Britain in 1954 and a tape-recorded address to the SPGB. annual conference in 1959.

Rab's parents, Sheppie and Sara Rabinowich, came from Navaradok in Minsk-Gobernia, on the Russian-Polish border. Sheppie's father and grandfathers for many generations had been rabbis; and Sheppie also studied to be a rabbi, but then decided that it was irrational to believe in a god. He gave up being a rabbi, and became a lay teacher. In August 1893, Sheppie and Sara, who was already pregnant, arrived in Boston in the United States, and on December 22 had a son whom they named Isaac.

Sara was, even before emigrating to America, the pioneer revolutionary socialist in the family. Almost immediately after arriving in the United States, Sheppie joined the Socialist Labor Party, and then with its formation, the reformist Socialist Party of America. He later became a charter member of the Communist Party, although neither Sara nor their son fell for Bolshevism. In 1909 at the age of 16, Isaac Rab joined the Socialist Party of America, and served as the Boston Locals secretary until he left in 1912.

In 1915, Rab moved to Detroit, Michigan, and as soon as he arrived joined the Detroit Local of the SPA. Detroit was a boom town with auto plants attracting workers not only from other areas of the USA, but also from Canada and Great Britain. Among them at that time were members of the Socialist Party of Canada and of Great Britain, including Tom Bolt, Bill Davenport, Adolph Kohn and Moses Baritz. As elsewhere, the reformers in the Detroit Local of the SPA predominated, but the revolutionary minority drew encouragement from the new reinforcements and socialist literature, as well as the International Socialist Review published by Charles H. Kerr & Co.

Rab soon heard about a Marxist study class conducted by Moses Baritz and Adolph Kohn in Duffield Hall. He immediately joined. And soon after rejected the majority reformism of the SPA. Rab also met, and became friendly with John Keracher, the Michigan State Secretary of the SPA, who originally came from Scotland. Karla Rab Ellenbogen relates that, in April 1916, at a lecture in Duffield Hall with a friend, Bob Reynolds, Rab "couldn't pull his eyes away" from the girl taking the collection a little way down the aisle from them. It was love at first sight. Her name was Ella Riebe. Rab was introduced to her.. "I'm going to marry that girl," Rab told Reynolds. And on September 27, 1916, Ella and Isaac were married.

The revolutionists within the Michigan SPA felt that a new political party was needed, in the words of the SPGB declaration of principles, "determined to wage war against all other political parties, whether alleged labour or avowedly capitalist...". Keracher largely agreed, but with Dennis Batt decided to remain in the 5PA for the time being. On July 7, 1916, however, 43 members of the Duffield Hall study group, including Rab and 18 other members of the Detroit Local, formed the Socialist Party of the United States. They included Bill Davenport, who became the first secretary, Lawrence Beardsley, George Ramsay, Walter Green and Bill Gribble, the first organizer (although not mentioned by Karla, Gribble had been an active member of the Socialist Party of Canada). Ella joined later. Shortly after, the Socialist Party of America challenged the new partys right to use the name, and Workers Socialist Party was substituted. The WSP adopted the object and declaration of principles of the SPGB. On August 11, 1917, Ella gave birth to a boy who was named Willie.

Following the Bolshevik coup d'état in Russia, writes Karla Rab Ellenbogen, "the socialists in the new Workers Socialist Party were sneered at for their failure to recognize a socialist revolution when it took place". And she adds: "To their credit, the WSP comrades saw that there was no conscious, political majority of convinced socialists in Russia; any revolution there could only lead to the establishment of a capitalist government."

Faced with a hostile political climate, of government repression against "reds", anarchists, radicals and socialists, the WSP membership had to make a hard decision. Without changing its principles, it decided in 1919 to abandon the structure of a political party, and re-group as the Detroit Socialist Education Society, generally referred to as the SES. In 1921 it changed its name again to the Marxian Club. In April, 1920, Ella Rab gave birth to another baby, whom they named Anna Hope. Rab, who was working for Ford, was warned that he was not to propagate socialist ideas in the factory, and was then blacklisted. In the same year, the family moved back to Boston.

In Boston, there were no members of the socialist movement. So, in the words of Karla, "Rab had resumed the task begun in Detroit, his lifelong work of spreading knowledge and understanding of the case for socialism, almost as soon as he got back to Boston." He was a charismatic speaker and soon drew large audiences wherever he spoke. Meanwhile, an active socialist group, the Socialist Educational Society, had been formed in New York, comprising former members of the SPGB and SPC, as well as others such as Sam Orner, the taxi driver immortalised by Clifford Odets in the play Waiting for Lefty.

In 1927, Rab and Ella, and their two children, marched in the funeral parade for Sacco and Vanzetti, the two anarchists executed by the state "for a murder of which they were patently innocent", writes Karla Rab Ellenbogen in her biography of her grandfather. (Charlie Lestor was also there - PEN).

Shortly after, Rab took charge of the Vagabonds, an athletic club which, in the words of Karla, "played a role in the growth of the socialist movement in Boston that no one could have anticipated". The Vagabonds was not just an athletics club, but encouraged discussions of science, history, anthropology and, under Rab's influence, socialism. Some members of the Vagabonds formed a Science Club, a number of whom became active in the socialist movement in Boston. In 1929, Rab and a number of his comrades were able to form a Socialist Study Class which moved into International Hall, which, incidentally, was also the headquarters of the local Communist Party. With increasing activities in Boston, New York and Detroit, the members of the various classes, clubs and groups voted to once again become the Workers' Socialist Party of the United States. Rab continued to soapbox at various locations in Boston. And by 1931, he was joined by a well-known, top-notch local tennis player by the name of George Gloss. As Karla notes, George Gloss was to play a major role in the history and development of the WSP.

In November, 1933, the Boston Local of the WSP had just 12 members. By 1939, it had around a 100. The Local moved into the WSP headquarters at 12 Hayward Place; and members spoke regularly on Boston Common. In 1940, Karla was born to Rab's daughter Anna and a young socialist, Lenny Feinzig. At the beginning of the Second World War, the WSP issued its anti-war manifesto, calling on the workers to establish socialism, and "put a speedy end to the profit system that breeds wars...". Unfortunately they did not.

In 1946, the Boston Local was forced to move to another headquarters at 27 Dock Square. This put quite a strain on the membership. Karla's grandmother, Ella, was the Locals secretary at the time. Rab was the National Organizer. In 1946-1947, there were at least a 100 active socialists in Boston. It was at this time that the Workers Socialist Party decided that it must change its name, largely because of the confusion caused by a Trotskyist group calling itself the Socialist Workers Party. Although many members of the WSP were reluctant to give up the old name, a majority, in a referendum voted for the party to be called the World Socialist Party of the United States. Rab said in later years that it had been a fortuitous choice, as it emphasized the international nature of the socialist movement.

By the 1950s, the WSP began to lose some of its often most active members. There were a number of controversies. Karla comments: "The material conditions were simply not conducive to a general desire for social change as they had been during the Depression. The American working-class were disinterested in socialism during the post-war years. McCarthyism was on the rise. It was a discouraging time for socialists." The National Office was moved from Boston to Detroit in 1950. The McCarthy witch hunts made it particularly difficult for not just "Communists", but also socialists and the WSP. Nevertheless, a much smaller party carried on. In September, 1954, Rab and George Gloss visited the United Kingdom. Indeed, this writer met Rab and heard him and George Gloss speak to a large and attentive audience one sunny Sunday afternoon in Hyde Park.

By the early 1970s, Isaac Rab began to age, although he continued to be active in the party. In December, 1975, there was, writes Karla, a huge celebration for Rab's 80th birthday. Hundreds of people came. Ella Rab died in 1979. And Rab began to suffer from Alzheimers disease. He died on December 31, 1986. The World Socialist Party, of course, carried on. In fact, "Eventually, members in other parts of the country who had thought the WSP was no more, found the party again", notes Karla Rab Ellenbogen. The World Socialist Party continues the struggle, 90 years on.

Peter E. Newell

Further information on the WSPUS and its history are available at the following links:
World Socialist Party of the United States MySpace Page
A Brief History of the WSPUS (dating from 1966 on its 50th anniversary)