J. Louis Engdahl reports on the S.P.’s Italian Socialist Federation’s building plans, particularly expanding to California. An Italian-Language Socialist Federation was formed 1902, with G.M. Serrati the principal organizer and initially affiliated with the Socialist Labor Party. It withdrew in 1903, became an independent organization and began publishing lI Proletario with Carlo Tresca as editor in Philadelphia and as a daily paper. In 1906 it became a weekly publication and moved to Chicago . In 1906, the ISF claimed over 40 branches and 1200 members in good-standing and remained independent of both the SLP and SP. After suffering a split in which some members would joined the Socialist Party, others the SLP, the bulk joined the Industrial Workers of the World. Tresca quit as editor to publish his own paper and lI Proletario became the Italian-language paper of the I.W.W. While the S.P. had many Italian branches, a formal Italian Federation of the Socialist Party was not constituted in December 1910 at a Congress in West Hoboken, New Jersey. The following year the Italian Federation had 28 branches with less than 660 members. The vast majority of Italian speaking radicals and Socialists were active outside the structure of the S.P., which was considered somewhat hostile to immigrants, and Italian immigrants in particular. The Translator-Secretary was Joseph Corti with offices in in Chicago. The early Federation had three papers; La Parola Del Socialisti, the official published in Chicago with a circulation of 3,000; La Fiaccola published in Buffalo, NY, with a circulation of 1,500; and La Flamma, published in Camden, NJ, with a circulation of 2,000. L’Avanti! would become the Federation’s official paper in the fall of 1918. Most of the Italian Federation, unlike many of the other language federations, remained loyal to the S.P. following the 1919 split, though the New York City Italian branch joined the Communist Labor Party. The Socialist Party continued to have an Italian Federation affiliated with it throughout the decade the 1920s, holding about 3% of the party’s membership. L’Avanti! was edited by G. Valenti and Giuseppe Bertelli with the name returning to La Parola del Popolo in 1922.

‘Italian Socialists Plan Hot Campaign’ by J. Louis Engdahl from The New York Call. Vol. 5 No. 92. April 1, 1912.

Activity Noted in All Sections of That Branch of the Party.

CHICAGO, March 29. With the approach of the National Socialist Convention several fraternal delegates from the Socialist parties of Europe are beginning to make their preparations to cross the Atlantic to attend the “Red Congress” of the United Slates.

Joseph Corti, national translator-secretary of the Italian section of the Socialist party, announces that Angelica Balabanof, who has been living Terni, Italy, since her exile from Russia fifteen years ago, will arrive New York City May 15, and that she will proceed to the National Socialist Convention at the earliest opportunity.

She will there greet the American Socialists on behalf of the Socialists Italy. It has already been definitely settled that Karl Legien, prominent Socialist and secretary of the German trade unions, will be in this country next month and that he will attend the Socialist convention.

It is expected that fraternal delegates from several of the other countries of Europe. where the Socialist. movement is strong, will also be represented at the convention by fraternal delegates.

Dora B. Montefiore, representing the Social Democratic party of Great Britain, was the only fraternal delegate in attendance at the 1910 Socialist Congress, held in Chicago.

The Italian section of the Socialist party is planning to take advantage Angelica Balabanof’s stay in this country. National Translator-Secretary Corti is planning a four months’ tour for her which will include all of the big industrial centers. She speaks Russian, Italian, French, German and English fluently, so that she will be perfectly at home among the cosmopolitan cities of America.

The Eastern States convention of the Italian Socialists will be held at Schenectady, N.Y. April 7 and 8. It is expected that delegates will be present from New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania and Vermont.

There are twenty-two Italian branches in these States with about 400 members. The convention will be welcomed to the city by Socialist Mayor George R. Lunn. New York State Secretary U. Solomon will attend the convention, and an effort will be made to settle the question of how the dues are to be paid by the Italians In New York.

The New York State organization is willing to grant the Italian section a 50 per cent rebate on the rates dues, but takes the stand that the Italian branches should buy their dues stamps from the State organization, which in turn would turn the rebate in bulk over to the Italian section.

Translator Secretary Corti is willing that this should be done because it would greatly decrease his work, but he takes the position that he can keep in closer touch with the branches if they buy the stamps from him. This is the case in Illinois and Wisconsin, and he will try to bring about this state of affairs in New York State.

Joseph Bertelli, formerly editor of La Parola de Socialista, the Italian Socialist weekly issued in Chicago, has left for Los Angeles, where he will immediately start a two months’ tour of the Golden State to bring the French and Italian inhabitants of that part of the West to Socialism.

The tour will be under the direction of California State Secretary F.B. Merlam. It is estimated that there are 150,000 Italians in that State, most of them being from the Northern districts of Italy, where the people are more susceptible to the Socialist propaganda. They now live on California farms.

There is now not one Italian Socialist branch in California, but large numbers of names of those interested in Socialism have been secured through the National Socialist Lyceum Bureau, Italians having sent in their subscriptions through this medium.

It has been a noticeable fact that the foreign Socialist publications have been the heavy gainers by the Lyceum Bureau, names of those interested in Socialism being ferreted out in this way, where they would probably have never been otherwise reached by the Socialist message.

When his California tour has been completed, Joseph Bertelli will spend some time in other States, especially Kansas, where it is believed that he can do good work. Bertelli speaks French, as well as Italian, and will hold many meetings open to French Socialists and sympathizers.

The New York Call was the first English-language Socialist daily paper in New York City and the second in the US after the Chicago Daily Socialist. The paper was the center of the Socialist Party and under the influence of Morris Hillquit, Charles Ervin, Julius Gerber, and William Butscher. The paper was opposed to World War One, and, unsurprising given the era’s fluidity, ambivalent on the Russian Revolution even after the expulsion of the SP’s Left Wing. The paper is an invaluable resource for information on the city’s workers movement and history and one of the most important papers in the history of US socialism. The paper ran from 1908 until 1923.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/chicago-daily-socialist/1912/120401-newyorkcall-v05n092.pdf