The earliest statement from the Socialist Party directed to Black workers is this resolution adopted at its founding Indianapolis convention in July, 1901.

‘Socialism and the Negro’ (1901) from St. Louis Labor. Vol. 4 No. 144. November 7, 1903.

WHEREAS, The negroes of the United States, because of their long training in slavery and. but recent emancipation therefrom occupy a peculiar position in the working class and in society at large;

WHEREAS, The capitalist class seeks to preserve this peculiar condition, and to foster and increase color prejudice and race hat ed between the white worker and the black, so as to make their social and economic interests to appear to be separate and antagonistic, in order that the workers of both races may thereby be more easily and completely exploited;

WHEREAS, Both the old political parties and educational and religious institutions alike betray the negro in his present helpless struggle against disfranchisement and violence, in order to receive the economic favors of the capitalist class; be it therefore

RESOLVED, That we, the Socialists of America, in National Convention assembled, do hereby assure our negro fellow worker of our sympathy with him in his subjection to lawlessness and oppression, and also assure him of the fellowship of the workers who suffer from the lawlessness and exploitation of capital in every nation or tribe of the world; be it further

RESOLVED, That we declare to the negro worker the identity of his interests and struggles with the interests and struggles of the workers of all lands, without regard to race or color or sectional lines; that the causes which have made him the victim of social and political inequality are the effects of the long exploitation of his labor-power; that all social and race prejudices spring from the ancient economic causes which still endure, to the misery of the whole human family, that the only line of division which exists in fact is that between the producers and the owners of the world–between capitalism and labor; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we, the American Socialist Party, invite the negro to membership and fellowship with us in the world movement for economic emancipation by which equal liberty and opportunity shall be secured to every man and fraternity become the order of the world.

A long-running socialist paper begun in 1901 as the Missouri Socialist published by the Labor Publishing Company, this was the paper of the Social Democratic Party of St. Louis and the region’s labor movement. The paper became St. Louis Labor, and the official record of the St. Louis Socialist Party, then simply Labor, running until 1925. The SP in St. Louis was particularly strong, with the socialist and working class radical tradition in the city dating to before the Civil War. The paper holds a wealth of information on the St Louis workers movement, particularly its German working class.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/missouri-socialist/031107-stlouislabor-v04n144.pdf