Socialist Party Scores Heavy Increases New York and Reading Lead the March
Socialist Party Scores Heavy Increases New York and Reading Lead the March THE most ambitious campaign the Socialist Party has waged in many years is over, and the results do not precisely confirm...
...The vote for members of Assembly, the State Senate and Congressmen was between 10,000 and 15,000 higher...
...The principal result of the Communist campaign was, not to make votes for that party BUT TO DISGUST COUNTLESS PEOPLE WITH RADICAL PARTIES AND THUS TO KEEP THE SOCIALIST VOTE EROM GROWING AS IT SHOULD...
...Obviously the mass protest vote went with a great rush to Mr...
...Roosevelt, who may find it more of a boon in getting him elected than in helping him to face the years that lie ahead...
...that not a man or a party has failed in these tragic years through which we have passed, and which still lie ahead, but the capitalist system...
...In states like Maryland, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Ohio, California and New Jersey the party quite definitely came back...
...Socialist Party Scores Heavy Increases New York and Reading Lead the March THE most ambitious campaign the Socialist Party has waged in many years is over, and the results do not precisely confirm the hopes of those who visualized a vote of from three to eight millions and the election of Congressmen and large blocs of state legislators...
...Between now and the next national election we must bend all our energies on organizing the country for Socialism...
...This was by no means an anti-Tammany protest vote, since those who felt disgruntled at Tammany's ditching of Acting Msyor McKee and who were outraged by the Walker administration expressed their protest by writing in the nam* of McKee, to the tuns of some 150,000 votes THAT WERE COUNTED...
...By Norman Thomas The Future Is Our si J AM grateful that with our exceedingly limited funds and our encouraging but still young" organization, in state after state the Socialist vote in this year of an overwhelming anti-Hoover stampede is as good as it now seems likely to be...
...The party failed to make gains sny where near commensurate with the rosy hopes of enthusiasts where the appeal was mainly sentimental, or largely "good government...
...With only fragmentary reports at hand, however, it is clear that the party of Socialism scored ¦olid gains in most parts of the country, and dug itself in with heavy votes and big increases wherever it had long maintained an organization, and where its appeal was principally to the working class...
...The most striking vote was that cast for Morris Hillquit, who polled a quarter of a million votes for Mayor of New York...
...During the heat of the campaign our enthusiasm carried us away, and aided by the press which gave a great deal of publicity to our candidates, and the splendid campalgn made by our national, state and local candidates many of us built castles in the air and expected a vote out of all proportion to our organization...
...The educational value and ultimate practical effect of our work are incalculable...
...We have undoubtedly stirred up a process of critical political thinking and created a sympathetic feeling towards the Socialist philosophy which will bear fruit in the years to come...
...By Morris Hillquit Renew Efforts to Reach Workers ly^T the time of this writing the published returns of the Socialist presidential vote are too fragmentary to allow of a reasoned analysis...
...and in the state it will run over 175,000 and possibly reach 200,000—a result directly attributable to organization and a strict working class appeal...
...The success of the Socialist propaganda must be measured in terms of qualitative as well as quantitative progress...
...The straight Socialist vote In New York City, meager as present reports are, indicate an Increase over that of 1028 and 1080, and a considerable increase up-state...
...The indications are that our vote will fall somewhat short of the sanguine expectations we entertained in the heat and enthusiasm of the campaign, but that it will mark a very substantial progress compared with our last record...
...In many respects it is a blessing to the cause of Socialism that the Democratic Party is as completely in power...
...We did not have the landslide some of...
...The vote we polled on the 8th of November is not the sole or even principal measure of our progress...
...We have reached millions of the American people with our message...
...VOTE IS COMMENSURATE WITH ORGANIZATION 1*0 the Socialists of New York * City in general and the Socialist Party members of the City of New York in particular: The battle is over...
...There are two features in this election that should be borne in mind above all others, one in the nature of a cheering reflection, the other by way of a practical conclusion...
...Its inevitable failure to deal with any fundamental problems will help to educate the masses of the people to the one essential lesson that there is no hope in either old party...
...A sympathetic middle-class support is a substantial help to our movement, but this election has once more' demonstrated that we cannot build up a powerful Socialist party in America without working-class support as its backbone...
...It is certain, however, that it will far more than double—even treble —the Thomas-Maurer vote of 1928, and it may possibly reach 800,000 to 900,000...
...It has no unifying principles, hope or program...
...In Maryland the Socialist Party scored the largest vote ever polled it in any year...
...The total vote for the ThomasMaurer ticket has not been tabulated, and it will be some weeks before it can be accurately known...
...We Socialists will carry on with energy and determination, for there is no hope save in our purpose and program...
...There are no figures at this time for Governor, United States Senator or Chief Justice of the Court of Appeals...
...They were not and in the nature of things could not be fully translated into votes cast for Norman Thomas and James Maurcr...
...I want to thank the loyal comrades who have stood by us in this fight, and who will be ready to begin again tomorrow...
...In New York The greatest gains, however, were in New York: The Thomas vote in the city was in excess of 120,000, as compared to the 50,000 of 1928...
...It is evident that what we got was the convinced Socialist vote...
...We have had an attractive and sympaJ thetic hearing...
...We must have a wellorganized, disciplined and harmonious party in every state of the union and...
...We forget that we cannot xpect resales where we hart no organisation...
...The practical conclusion is the crying need of organization...
...The quarter of a million votes for Hillquit were vote* of Social* ists and those who sympathize with the Socialist municipal platform, as so brilliantly expounded by the party's notable spokesman...
...above all, tut must renew and increase our efforts to reach the American workers...
...The Socialist party was utterly unprepared and unequipped to take full advantage of our exceptional opportunities in this campaign and to crystallize the sympathetic sentiment of the people, particularly the working masses...
...We have made a good campaign...
...It is interesting to note that the widespread and widely publicised campaign of the Communist Party resulted in an increase over any vote ever cast for that party in the past BUT NOT A HEAVY INCREASE...
...We emerge from this campaign stronger and more respected than we entered it...
...But the results are gratifying, even if not wholly satisfactory...
...Sweep Reading Socialism swept the City of Reading, Pa., where the party has long carried on Socialist propaganda based upon the working class movement...
...nothing, in fact, to hold it together save passion for office and a general acceptance of the status quo as against constructive change...
...Gradually the smoke is clearing and we begin to see clearly...
Vol. 14 • November 1932 • No. 20
