Minneapolis labor emerges from the Red Scare in 1921 with thousands marching on May Day.

‘May Day Spirit Mounts High in Minneapolis’ from The Toiler (Cleveland). No. 171. May 14, 1921.

Minneapolis, May 2nd. Demonstrating their solidarity with revolutionary labor the world over, between ten and fifteen thousand workers marched in the May Day parade here Sunday. For twenty-four hours there had been a steady downpour of rain which only stopped about half an hour before the time set for the parade to start. But in spite of the unfavorable weather crowds of workingmen began to form in line. long before the designated hour, two o’clock.

Revolutionary banners were unfurled to the silent gaze of thousands of spectators who lined the sidewalks of Nicollet Ave., down which the parade proceeded to the parade grounds. “We want the working class to be the ruling class,” “He shall not eat who does not work,” “Workers of the world unite,” “All power to the workers, down with parasites,” “We hail the Workers’ Soviet Republic of Russia” and Long live the Third International” were some of the slogans which carried a message of hope to the oppressed workers who witnessed the parade, but uttered a menacing threat to the members of the exploiting class.

At the parade ground the vast throng was addressed by W.F. Dunn, editor of the Butte Daily Bulletin, J.O. Bentall, editor of Truth, Duluth and by Andrew LaFin of Chicago. W.F. Dunn pointed out that the working class had never yet secured anything by waiting for the capitalist class to fulfill its promises, but that only by organizing their potential power and going after what they wanted could the workers improve their condition, and free themselves from wage slavery.

J.O. Bentall declared that the instinct to produce, to create, dominates the entire universe and that when workingmen are locked out of factories and away from their tools, they are being denied the opportunity to give expression to the universal creative impulse. In order that men may be free to work, to create and to enjoy the fruits of their labor, they must themselves possess the means of creating and not allow these to be owned, as at present, by a small minority who are thereby enabled to dictate how, when, where, and under what conditions a man may work.

Amid vociferous cheers the following resolution was unanimously adopted:

“The first Congress of the Second Socialist International held in Paris in 1889 decided that the first day of May should henceforth be set aside as a day for the mobilization of proletarian forces and for international brotherhood.

“For thirty years the May Day festival has been a symbol of proletarian solidarity and fraternal unity between the workingmen of all nations. On that day workingmen of all lands have demonstrated their hope and aspiration for the day when labor will be free from the exploitation of capitalism and master of its own destiny.

“May Day 1921 finds these hopes on the eve of fulfillment. When the bourgeoisie masters of Europe criminally hurled workingmen at each others throats, they sounded the knell of their own doom. Thirty million killed or wounded, milliards of fresh war debts, countries ravaged, starvation rampant, industry paralysed, unemployment mounting, these are the results of the misrule of the capitalist class.

“But out of the chaos in which the old order is tottering to its ruin, a new world is arising. The universal misery and despair which the war has inflicted on the workers of all lands, victors as well as vanquished, has fanned the flame of revolution. A new day is breaking. Already we see the red dawn in the east. The workers of Russia by force of arms, have overthrown their bourgeoisie government, they have erected a Workers’ Republic and are defending it from the assaults of a capitalist world with their invincible. red army.

“This bold act has acted like a clarion call to the workers in all countries. Everywhere workers’ organizations are gathering together their forces to put an end to the misery and misrule of the capitalist class. Millions today throughout the world are demonstrating their desire for a new order of society.

“The workers of Minneapolis mass meeting assembled this first of May, 1921, pledge our loyal support to the struggling Russian Republic and declare our solidarity with all efforts of the working people everywhere to free themselves from the exploitation of capitalism.

“We demand the resumption of trade with Russia which will open our factories and give work to the millions of unemployed.

“We pledge ourselves to work unceasingly for the release of our fellow workers who are rotting in the masters’ prisons because they upheld the principles of industrial democracy and opposed the butchery of workers in an imperialist war.

“We pledge ourselves to support all efforts at International co-operation between working class organizations that will be proposed in the coming Congress of Red Industrial and Trade Unions at Moscow, Russia.

“We pledge ourselves to resist the efforts of the capitalist class to destroy existing working class organizations; we are determined to strengthen our organizations until we are able to take all power into our own hands.

“DOWN WITH CAPITALISM! “UP WITH THE WORKERS’ RULE!
“LONG LIVE THE INTERNATIONAL SOVIET REPUBLIC!
“LONG LIVE THE THIRD INTERNATIONAL!”

The parade was held under the auspices of the International Labor Day Committee, composed of representatives from practically all of the working class organizations in the city, who forgot their minor differences in order to celebrate together the international holiday of Labor.

Early in the week preceding May Day thousands of leaflets were mysteriously distributed in Minneapolis and St. Paul urging the necessity of erecting a Workers’ government in this country. “We, American Workers, will no more stand the tyranny of the bosses and of their government,” declared the circular. “We have had enough. The United States government stands for the bosses against the workers! It uses the law-making bodies, the courts and the troops against the workers.”

All newspapers in the Twin cities printed extracts from the circular and every one of them interpreted it to be a call for an uprising on May Day. Authorities declared the circular to be one of the most incendiary and treasonable documents ever circulated against the United States government. The circular was signed by the United Communist Party of America, but all efforts of federal agents to discover who were responsible for its distribution were unavailing.

The city government must have accepted the interpretation of the newspapers seriously for about an hour before the May Day parade, about twenty-five policemen entered the I.W.W. hall and made a thorough search for firearms! Also large numbers of policemen were detailed to guard the line of March and the parade grounds–doubtless from the expected uprising!

The Toiler was a significant regional, later national, newspaper of the early Communist movement published weekly between 1919 and 1921. It grew out of the Socialist Party’s ‘The Ohio Socialist’, leading paper of the Party’s left wing and northern Ohio’s militant IWW base and became the national voice of the forces that would become The Communist Labor Party. The Toiler was first published in Cleveland, Ohio, its volume number continuing on from The Ohio Socialist, in the fall of 1919 as the paper of the Communist Labor Party of Ohio. The Toiler moved to New York City in early 1920 and with its union focus served as the labor paper of the CLP and the legal Workers Party of America. Editors included Elmer Allison and James P Cannon. The original English language and/or US publication of key texts of the international revolutionary movement are prominent features of the Toiler. In January 1922, The Toiler merged with The Workers Council to form The Worker, becoming the Communist Party’s main paper continuing as The Daily Worker in January, 1924.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/thetoiler/n171-may-14-1921-Toil-nyplmf.pdf