The Communist (National Organizing Committee). Vol. 1 No. 6. August 23, 1919.

Contents: Nationalizing the Railroads, Communist Organization by Alexander Stoklitsky, Call for a National Convention for the Purpose of Organizing the Communist Party of America, An Open Letter to Comrades by H.M. Wicks, Russian War Prisoners in Germany, It Can Be Done, Editorials, Communiques, Capitalizing Debs’ Imprisonment, Is the Syndicalist Movement Revolutionary?, That Menshevik “Call,” The League of Nations by U. Stetklov.

This ‘The Communist’ was published in Chicago by the Communist Party National Organization Committee starting in July 1919 by the made up largely of Michigan and Illinois activists and was edited by Socialist Party of Michigan activist Dennis E. Batt and Harry Wicks. Many of those associated with this trend would become the Proletarian Party established on June 27, 1920 and disagreed with the vast majority of the pro-Bolshevik US socialists of the time by rejecting the possibility of an imminent US revolution. They became the first ‘split’ in the movement when they were expelled from the Communist Party of America in 1920. Emulating the Bolsheviks who in 1918 changed the name of their party to the Communist Party, there were up to a dozen papers in the US named ‘The Communist’ in the splintered landscape of the US Left between 1919 and 1923. All them claimed adherence to the new Third International and sought that body’s endorsement. They were often published at the same time and in the same format, making it somewhat confusing to untangle their relationships.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/thecommunist/thecommunist2/v1n06-aug-23-1919.pdf