‘A Statement of the Problems Confronting the Socialist Movement Today and a Call to Action’ was written by Louis Fraina, Ludwig Lore, and Louis B. Boudin in May, 1917 this important declaration acted as the Statement of Principles of the Class Struggle magazine and its organization, the Socialist Propaganda League of America. A catalyst for the internationalist and revolutionary Left Wing of the Socialist Party, forerunner to the US Communist movement.

The Task Before Us: The Class Struggle and Socialism by Louis Fraina, Ludwig Lore, and Louis B. Boudin. The Socialist Publication Society, New York City. May, 1917.

The Class Struggle is considered the first pro-Bolshevik journal in the United States and began in the aftermath of Russia’s February Revolution. A bi-monthly published between May 1917 and November 1919 in New York City by the Socialist Publication Society, its original editors were Ludwig Lore, Louis B. Boudin, and Louis C. Fraina. The Class Struggle became the primary English-language paper of the Socialist Party’s left wing and emerging Communist movement. Its aim was also to document the tremendous debates happening within the world Socialist movement and its pages are a veritable archive of important works. A major journal in the history of the US left. Its last issue was published by the Communist Labor Party of America.

PDF of full pamphlet: http://cfss.indstate.edu/debspams/c614c6_1917.pdf