In the winter of 1903, ten thousand Chicago socialists attend a two hour oration by Eugene V. Debs at the city’s Coliseum, with a program of music, marching, a banquet and dancing.

‘Ten Thousand Pack Coliseum to Hear Debs’ from The Chicago Socialist. Vol. 5 No. 249. December 12, 1903.

STUPENDOUS SOCIALIST SUCCESS

Enthusiasm Knows No Bounds–Debs Makes Effort of His Life–Thirty Unions March to the Strains of Revolutionary Music–Thousands Dance Till Midnight–On to Washington the Watchword.

Drawn together by the class struggle between wage workers and capitalists and fired with the enthusiasm of labor’s solidarity, ten thousand people met, mingled and cheered for the triumph of Socialism last Sunday at the great demonstration at the Coliseum. The trade unions of Chicago had been invited to participate in the demonstration and to send their banners in charge of committees. As these committees arrived they were escorted by the reception committee to places on the east gallery above the speaker’s rostrum, and the banners were displayed over the railing. Twenty-four of these trade union banners were present, eloquent with the fact that the rank and file of the various labor organizations are beginning to think for themselves.

Good order, good cheer and good fellowship, such as only Socialists know how to create, were the undercurrents which served to make the demonstration an occasion of continuous enjoyment. The enthusiasm, born of hopes fulfilled, with which the old-timers viewed the assemblage was perhaps the most characteristic feature of the day.

The event of the day was the oration by Eugene V. Debs, who spoke for two hours to the largest throng which ever listened to a political speech in the Coliseum. The effort made by Comrade Debs was a masterpiece and was punctuated with frequent outbursts of enthusiasm from the vast crowd which crowded toward the rostrum where he spoke. Although his voice was far-reaching and his endurance marvelous, the speaker could not make himself heard by all of the people who were so eager to listen to the matchless appeal for Socialism by one of the movement’s foremost orators.

The purpose of the big demonstration was two-fold: First, for the purpose of gathering together the Socialists of Chicago and their sympathizers under one roof: second, for the purpose of raising funds with which to more actively push the work of agitation throughout the State, which has been so well begun by the State organizers. Considered with a view to both of these purposes, the meeting was grand success and exceeded the expectations of the most sanguine of its promoters.

The spectacle of ten thousand per- sons drawn together through their interest in Socialism was productive of untold good to the movement in Chicago. It fired every party member present with a new enthusiasm and sent them forth to work for the cause with a new determination and a new hope. It was the means of raising a large sum of money which is placed at the disposal of the State and Cook County committees, to be used in the work of organization and propaganda.

Long before the hour for the beginning of the program the masses of Socialist humanity began pouring into the doors of the Coliseum. At 1:15 all the seats in front of the speakers rostrum on the east side of the vast floor space were filled. Then the refreshment tables began filling up, and others, more desirous of getting nearer the speaker, crowded into the aisles. Next the galleries began to fill, and before 2:30 o’clock, when Thomas orchestra began the first number on the musical program, every seat in the vast enclosure was occupied. Nothing was left for those who came afterward but to stand. They came and they stood, thousands of them.

As the crowd continued to increase, the enthusiasm of the men who have been working for Socialism in Chicago for years, who have battled when the movement was not nearly so popular as it is now, increased to such a pitch that it could brook no bounds. Each number on the musical program profited by this supply of pent-up feeling, so much so in fact that the musicians remarked to themselves that it was the most appreciative and demonstrative audience to which they had ever played.

When Comrade Debs made his appearance, it was the signal for a demonstration by the whole vast throng which packed the Coliseum. To a man the audience rose to its feet, hats were tossed into the air, and a great shout rose and echoed among the girders of the great edifice. It was such a greeting as only the class-conscious workers can give to those who are loyal to labor and useful in the true propaganda.

Shortly after Comrade Debs was seated on the platform the orchestra struck up the Marseillaise. This was the signal for another outburst of enthusiasm. The music of the most inspiring revolutionary air that was ever written was lost in the mighty roar of applause from the throats of those who are destined to usher in a new order.

John Collins, one of the State organizers of the Socialist party of Illinois, advanced to the edge of the platform and introduced the chairman of the day, Comrade James H. Brower, of Elgin, who in a few words presented Comrade Debs.

When America’s leading Socialist orator arose, with his long, awkward limbs, and walked to the front of the rostrum another mighty outburst of applause arise. The upturned, eager faces of the earnest thousands stretched out in billows of humanity, formed an inspiring sight. The orator was fired with the importance and possibilities of the occasion. As a result he made a speech which for two hours held the close attention of everyone within the compass of his voice.

As Comrade Debs told off the points in his impassioned arraignment of the capitalist order of society, round after round of applause gave evidence that he touched the spots in the right place. The endurance of the speaker was marvelous. For two hours he spoke, trying to make his voice reach the farthest edges of the crowd. The effort was one without the reach of a man of less than Debs rugged physique. The sweat poured from his features, and his collar was soon melted into a rag, but he kept on until finally, in a superb peroration, he closed his speech and received the congratulations of the Socialists of Chicago.

After the speech-making supper was served in the Coliseum annex. Plenty of the best of cheer was provided. It was an informal banquet, where every man was hale fellow well met, and where the motto was eat, drink and be merry. A crowd of 1,500 persons sat at this Socialist banquet.

After the supper took place the most inspiring number on the program–a march of the different trade union organizations which participated in the demonstration. Twenty-four local unions had sent their banners in charge of committees of ten. These committees with banners lined up at the head of the men of the various crafts represented. Then the orchestra struck up the Marseillaise, and the grand march of labor began.

It was an inspiring sign to the grizzled old veterans of the Socialist movement to see these trade union banners marching around to revolutionary music, eloquent with the solidarity of the oppressed, and prophetic of the coming change.

When the trade union parade was concluded the orchestra struck up dance music, and from then until midnight young and old participated in the merry closing feature of the greatest demonstration the Socialists of Chicago ever held.

The Chicago Socialist, sometimes daily sometimes weekly, was published from 1902 until 1912 as the paper of the Chicago Socialist Party. The roots of the paper lie with Workers Call, published from 1899 as a Socialist Labor Party publication, becoming a voice of the Springfield Social Democratic Party after splitting with De Leon in July, 1901. It became the Chicago Socialist Party paper with the SDP’s adherence and changed its name to the Chicago Socialist in March, 1902. In 1906 it became a daily and published until 1912 by Local Cook County of the Socialist Party and was edited by A.M. Simons if the International Socialist Review. A cornucopia of historical information on the Chicago workers movements lies within its pages.

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