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Portrait of Morris Hillquit.

When Socialists Run for NYC Mayor, Good Things Can Happen

Socialist legislator Zohran Mamdani is running for New York City mayor against a corrupt, unpopular mayor. Morris Hillquit did the same thing a century ago.
Governor Philip La Follette signing the old-age pension bill in Madison, Wisconsin in 1931.

The Golden Age of Wisconsin Socialism

At its peak in the 1920s and early ’30s, the Socialist Party in Wisconsin used confrontational tactics and nonsocialists alliances to make legislative advances.
Storefront of Nazi-owned "Aryan Book Store" called "Silver Shirt Literature."

Bigoted Bookselling: When the Nazis Opened a Propaganda Bookstore in Los Angeles

On Hitler’s attempt to win Americans over to his cause.
Barack Obama speaking in front of a museum exhibit titled "Writing the Constitution."

The Constitution and the American Left

A culture of reverence for the U.S. Constitution shields the founding document from criticism, despite its many shortcomings.
Broken hammer and sickle illustration.

The Cause That Turned Idealists Into Authoritarian Zealots

The history of American Communism shows that dogma and fervor are no substitute for popular support.
partner

No Place to Make a Vote of Thanks

On the long tradition of Black third-party activism.
Eugene V Debs speaking at a rally, c1912-18. Photo courtesy the Library of Congress.

For Socialism and Freedom: The Life of Eugene Debs

How Eugene V. Debs turned American republicanism against the chiefs of capitalism – and became a true crusader for freedom.
Recently freed African Americans receive rations.

The Origins of the Socialist Slur

Reconstruction-era opponents of racial equality popularized the charge that protecting civil rights would amount to the end of capitalism.
A researcher holds a magnifying glass to an archival photograph.

Looking for a Lineage in the Lusk Archive

The records of a New York surveillance committee from the time of the First Red Scare document a radical world—and its demise.
Big Bill Haywood, Adolph Lessing, and Carlo Tresca, Paterson, New Jersey, 1913.

The Wobblies and the Dream of One Big Union

A new history examines the lost promise and fierce persecution of the IWW.
Eugene Debs mug shots at the US Penitentiary in Atlanta.

War Fever

The crusade against civil liberties during World War I.
Black-and-white grainy photograph of Eugene Debs speaking and gesturing with his hands

In The Debs Archive

The papers of American labor activist and socialist Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) offer a snapshot of early twentieth-century politics.
Illustration of Hubert Harrison by Joe Ciardiello.

Hubert Harrison, Giant of Harlem Radicalism

A two-volume biography tracks the life and times of one of Harlem’s leading socialists.
Workers working on ruins after the US Civil War, circa 1865.

The Abolitionist Legacy of the Civil War Belongs to the Left

The US Civil War was a revolutionary upheaval that crushed slavery and stoked hopes of a broader emancipation against the rule of property.
FDR with eyes crossed out with red line

Is It Time to Cancel FDR?

Today’s progressives are children of the old Republican Party, not the New Deal Democrats. Roosevelt and his followers stood for nearly everything they oppose.
A man sitting on a table.

A More Perfect Union

On the Black labor organizers who fought for civil rights after Reconstruction and through the twentieth century.
Soldiers in a trench during the First World War.

What We Should Remember on Armistice Day

World War I was a catastrophic, barbaric conflict that left tens of millions of people dead and set the stage for anti-democratic rollbacks for years to come.

Hearts and Stomachs

Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle has come to symbolize an era of muckraking and reform. But its author sought revolution, not regulation.
A rent strike in Harlem, New York City, September 1919.

The Fight for Rent Control

In the early twentieth century, immigrant tenant organizers made rent control laws a reality. Today, working-class New Yorkers still fight for housing justice.
Political cartoon of people reaching toward a woman symbolizing Milwaukee who herself is reaching toward socialism.

When Socialists Swept Milwaukee

Democratic socialists attending the 2020 Democratic Convention won’t be out of place in a city with a long history of socialist governance.

America’s Missing Labor Party

The history of labor strikes shows that, in order to achieve lasting success, workers need to capture political power.

How (or How Not) to Build a Labor Movement

Looking at the Pullman Strike and the political forces it stirred.

Socialism and the Liberal Imagination

How do socialist demands become liberal common sense? The history of the New Deal offers a useful lesson.
New York City skyscrapers

Capital of the World

The radical and reactionary currents of New York at the turn of the 20th century.
Eugene V. Debs campaigning to crowd

When America's Most Prominent Socialist Was Jailed for Speaking Out Against World War I

After winning 6 percent of the vote in the 1912 presidential election, Eugene Debs ran afoul of the nation's new anti-sedition laws.

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