Ruthenberg

In capitalistic Washington, State Department officials stuck to the story of the ogre that is Bolshevism, refused passports to Socialists, rebuked far-away Mexico for communistic tendencies. In Chicago their archenemy, Comrade Charles E. Ruthenberg, master-Bolshevik, eyes hope-haunted with a thousand failures, lay still, died. Throughout the U. S. tiny bands of comrades mourned. "He was," said the Daily Worker, communist newssheet, "the sole outstanding figure who carried over into our party the very best traditions of the pre-War socialist movement.... We expected to write soon that he had gone to prison because of his loyalty to the cause of the workers. . . . But death does not release its prisoners." Editor Linson of the Chinese Nationalist Daily, news organ of the Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party), wrote: "We are very sorry that such an able man as C. E. Ruthenberg leaves us so soon." Editor Olgin of the Hammer eulogized: "He looked like a rock. ... Of iron was his logic. Of iron was his will."

Born of a Cleveland longshoreman, Comrade Ruthenberg found in elementary school and business college education enough to climb in rapid strides from factory worker and clerk to newspaper correspondent and editor. In 1909 he took to his heart the pink flag of socialism; held it there while it turned perceptibly red.

Nine times he waged unsuccessful compaigns for political offices (State treasurer, Mayor, Governor, U. S. Senator). His political creed: Gain office in the legislatures of capitalism to carry on the war for a peaceful revolution within their very walls.

In 1917, jail, the "capitalistic bastille," threatened. The great War broke out; on a soap box in the Public Square, Cleveland, Comrade Ruthenberg shouted, "War is mass murder." He was indicted, sentenced to one year in jail.

Comrade Ruthenberg was ever in the toils of the law. At the time of his death an appeal was pending in the U. S. Supreme Court from an indeterminate five to ten year sentence in the Michigan state penitentiary.

Bitter, humorless, antagonizing more than he converted, Charles Ruthenberg split the Socialist party in 1919, became leader of the small Communist wing, while the late Eugene Victor Debs remained leader of the Socialists. Comrade Ruthenberg's ultimate purpose was "revolution without violence"; he advocated strikes "because they are a dress rehearsal for the revolution" which he hoped would free the workers from capitalism.

He died alone, at 44, shadowed by broken hopes, crying, "Let's fight on!" His comrades, echoing his cry, shouted of new vigor, new conquests to Communism. They saw one more hope, one more strong leader gone from a cause which, in the U. S., is, at least for the present, hopeless, leaderless.

In Cleveland, Comrade Ruthenberg's wife and son heard the news, prepared to go to Chicago for the cremation and burial. From comrades in Moscow came despatches. Russians were grieved, said : "His ashes will rest beneath the Kremlin wall, together with other revolutionary leaders." In New York, Communists were expelled from the International Fur Workers Union, lost their last hold on the furriers' trade. One more blow came in Cleveland. The Soviet propagandist film Breaking Chains was banned by state authorities, its permit to show revoked after one performance.*

*Not only in the U. S., but in the Americas generally were Communists disheartened. In Chile, last week, the government continued its campaign against Bolshevism, suppressed the Communist newspaper El Pueblo of Taena-