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Writings of Eugene V. Debs; A Collection of Essays by America's Most Famous Socialist
s/t: A Collection of Essays by America's Most Famous Socialist
A collection of speeches, pamphlets and writings from Eugene V Debs, from 1888 to 1925. Beginning his career as an organizer for the American Railway Union, Debs ran for President on the Socialist Party ticket five times, polling up to 6 percent of the total vote in 1912. Jailed in 1919 for an antiwar speech in Ohio, Debs ran for President from his jail cell in 1920, polling almost a million votes, 3.4 percent of the total votes cast.
A collection of speeches, pamphlets and writings from Eugene V Debs, from 1888 to 1925. Beginning his career as an organizer for the American Railway Union, Debs ran for President on the Socialist Party ticket five times, polling up to 6 percent of the total vote in 1912. Jailed in 1919 for an antiwar speech in Ohio, Debs ran for President from his jail cell in 1920, polling almost a million votes, 3.4 percent of the total votes cast.
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First published January 2, 2009
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About the author
Eugene V. Debs
78 books129 followersEugene Victor Debs was an American union leader, a founding member of the International Labor Union & the Industrial Workers of the World, as well as candidate for President as a member of the Social Democratic Party in 1900.
In 1855, labor leader, reformer and socialist Eugene V. Debs was born in Terre Haute, Ind. He was not baptized by his formerly Catholic mother. The family living room contained busts of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. When a teacher gave Debs a bible as an academic award, inscribing it, "Read and obey," Debs later called, "I never did either." (New York Call interviews with David Karsner). He dropped out of high school at age 14 to work. By 1870 he had become a fireman on the railroad, attending evening classes at a business college. His labor activism began in 1875. As president of the Occidental Literary Club of Terre Haute, Debs brought "the Great Agnostic" Col. Robert Ingersoll, whom he always revered despite political differences, Susan B. Anthony and other famous speakers to town. He was elected state representative to the Indiana General Assembly as a Democrat in 1884, while continuing his labor activities. As editor of the Locomotive Firemen's journal for many years, Debs routinely attacked the church, promoted women's and racial equality, and promoted justice for the poor. "If I were hungry and friendless today, I would rather take my chances with a saloon-keeper than with the average preacher," Debs once said (cited in Eugene V. Debs: A Man Unafraid, 1930, by McAlister Coleman). He saved his strongest denunciations for the Roman Catholic Church, for being an anti-democratic, anti-family, authoritarian "political machine."
In June 1893, Debs organized the first industrial union in the United States, the American Railway Union in Chicago, which held a successful 18-day strike against Great Northern Railway the next year. Debs and leaders of the union were arrested during the Pullman Boycott and Strike of 1894, and were sent to jail for contempt of court for 6 months in 1895. An inspired campaigner, Debs ran for president as a candidate of the Socialist Party in 1900, 1904, 1908, 1912 and 1920, employing the "Red Special" train to visit America during his 1908 campaign. The irreligious Debs was beloved by many. He was associate editor from 1907-1912 of the Appeal to Reason, a popular weekly published by freethinker E. Haldeman-Julius in Girard, Kansas. In 1918, Debs delivered his famed anti-war speech in Canton, Ohio, in protest of WWI, and was arrested and convicted in federal court under the wartime espionage law. His appeals to the jury and to the court before sentencing went into legal history. Debs was sentenced to 10 years in prison and was disenfranchised for life, losing citizenship. While in prison, he was nominated to run for president and conducted his last campaign, winning nearly a million votes. His opponent, Warren G. Harding, commuted Debs' sentence and released him on Dec. 25, 1921. Debs was welcomed by 1,000 fellow Terre Hauteans upon his return. His health broken by his imprisonment, he died at a sanitarium. The Terre Haute home he built with his wife in 1890 is today a National Historic Landmark of the National Parks Department and a museum. D. 1926.
More: http://debsfoundation.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_V...
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/t...
http://www.biography.com/people/eugen...
http://www.marxists.org/archive/debs/
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/wilson/p...
http://www.ushistory.org/us/37e.asp
http://www.history.com/topics/eugene-...
In 1855, labor leader, reformer and socialist Eugene V. Debs was born in Terre Haute, Ind. He was not baptized by his formerly Catholic mother. The family living room contained busts of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. When a teacher gave Debs a bible as an academic award, inscribing it, "Read and obey," Debs later called, "I never did either." (New York Call interviews with David Karsner). He dropped out of high school at age 14 to work. By 1870 he had become a fireman on the railroad, attending evening classes at a business college. His labor activism began in 1875. As president of the Occidental Literary Club of Terre Haute, Debs brought "the Great Agnostic" Col. Robert Ingersoll, whom he always revered despite political differences, Susan B. Anthony and other famous speakers to town. He was elected state representative to the Indiana General Assembly as a Democrat in 1884, while continuing his labor activities. As editor of the Locomotive Firemen's journal for many years, Debs routinely attacked the church, promoted women's and racial equality, and promoted justice for the poor. "If I were hungry and friendless today, I would rather take my chances with a saloon-keeper than with the average preacher," Debs once said (cited in Eugene V. Debs: A Man Unafraid, 1930, by McAlister Coleman). He saved his strongest denunciations for the Roman Catholic Church, for being an anti-democratic, anti-family, authoritarian "political machine."
In June 1893, Debs organized the first industrial union in the United States, the American Railway Union in Chicago, which held a successful 18-day strike against Great Northern Railway the next year. Debs and leaders of the union were arrested during the Pullman Boycott and Strike of 1894, and were sent to jail for contempt of court for 6 months in 1895. An inspired campaigner, Debs ran for president as a candidate of the Socialist Party in 1900, 1904, 1908, 1912 and 1920, employing the "Red Special" train to visit America during his 1908 campaign. The irreligious Debs was beloved by many. He was associate editor from 1907-1912 of the Appeal to Reason, a popular weekly published by freethinker E. Haldeman-Julius in Girard, Kansas. In 1918, Debs delivered his famed anti-war speech in Canton, Ohio, in protest of WWI, and was arrested and convicted in federal court under the wartime espionage law. His appeals to the jury and to the court before sentencing went into legal history. Debs was sentenced to 10 years in prison and was disenfranchised for life, losing citizenship. While in prison, he was nominated to run for president and conducted his last campaign, winning nearly a million votes. His opponent, Warren G. Harding, commuted Debs' sentence and released him on Dec. 25, 1921. Debs was welcomed by 1,000 fellow Terre Hauteans upon his return. His health broken by his imprisonment, he died at a sanitarium. The Terre Haute home he built with his wife in 1890 is today a National Historic Landmark of the National Parks Department and a museum. D. 1926.
More: http://debsfoundation.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_V...
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/t...
http://www.biography.com/people/eugen...
http://www.marxists.org/archive/debs/
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/wilson/p...
http://www.ushistory.org/us/37e.asp
http://www.history.com/topics/eugene-...
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 25, 2016
I am a union man. I support unions whole-heartedly and unashamedly. I have been, in my many years of bouncing from job to job (mostly out of the boredom and confusion that comes from not knowing what the hell to do with my life), a member of several unions.
I have not always been supportive of unions, but this was mostly due to ignorance and a tendency to accept the opinions and advice of people whom I trusted and admired without question. Over the years, having read more about the history of unions, seeing how important unions were, appreciating what unions have accomplished, and realizing that unions are as vital and necessary today as ever before, it has simply bolstered my belief in unions.
Bernie Sanders, in his autobiography, “Outsider in the White House”, repeatedly quotes someone named Eugene V. Debs, an important figure, apparently, in the Socialist movement of the 1920s and a hero among workers’ unions.
I’m ashamed that I had never known much about Debs prior to my interest in Sanders. The name was one of many that I recalled, briefly, from history textbooks about whom I had simply forgotten or never had much interest in to begin with. History textbooks, unfortunately, tend to do that with important and fascinating historical figures.
Debs was born in 1855 in Terre Haute, Indiana, the son of French immigrants. A high school drop-out, Debs went to work at a rail-yard. He was paid fifty cents a day for back-breaking labor. It was while working on the rail-yard that Debs fell into firefighting. He worked as a firefighter for years, loving everything about the job, even the high pay---one dollar a day.
Debs became heavily involved in the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen. He also became editor of the popular BLF newsletter, Firemen’s Magazine, which nearly tripled in circulation under his editorship.
In 1884, Debs was elected to the Indiana General Assembly on the Democratic ticket, serving one term. At this point in his life and career, socialism was not a major part of his life.
It wouldn’t be until after the major role he played in the famous Pullman Strike that Debs became a Socialist. The Pullman company, which made the train cars responsible for transporting important freight across the country, as well as the U.S. mail, feeling the economic crunch of the time, cut employee wages by 28%. The workers---against the initial advice of Debs, who knew that the company, along with the federal government, would strike back with force---went on strike.
The American Railway Union, country-wide, shut down train transport with its strike. President Grover Cleveland ordered the U.S. Army to intervene in busting the strike. Thirty strikers lost their lives, and countless more were injured. Debs was sent to federal prison for violating the initial injunction by the U.S. government, which claimed that the strike was obstructing the delivery of mail---a federal crime.
It was during his six-month stay in prison that Debs voraciously read and studied Socialism. When he was finally released, Debs was a full-fledged Socialist.
Debs was a gifted orator who earned respect and admiration from workers across the country as well as hatred from the rich company owners and the federal government. He was imprisoned several times, most notably after giving an anti-war speech during the early years of World War I.
Red and Black Publishers, in 2009, published a small book compiling some of Debs more famous speeches, essays, and articles.
Reading his articles today, I am struck by how some of the language could just as easily apply to today’s situations, especially in regards to what Debs called “wage slavery”, the tendency of big companies to work their workers to death with little monetary compensation. He wrote about the importance of a living wage. He also frighteningly predicted the disastrous effects of policies like NAFTA, nearly sixty years before it existed, and the massive job losses and industry devastation due to globalization.
Sadly, Socialism received a bad name after Germany and Russia usurped some basic (albeit extremely perverted) premises of socialism, twisted and molded to fit a dictatorial mold. Germany’s National Socialist Party (dubbed Naziism) and Russia’s Communist Party gave the American general public a distorted and, sadly, horrific view of socialism’s good-idea-turned-very-bad.
Parts of Debs’s writings are, admittedly, cringe-worthy, given the history of the world shortly after his death in 1926. He writes about the “coming revolution” and the “death of capitalism”: strong rhetoric which, for him, simply meant an inevitable and optimistic shift toward more wealth equality and better working conditions. I doubt he could have ever foreseen the horrors of Europe in the 1940s, the McCarthy Era, and the disastrous anti-communist debacles in Korea, Vietnam and Southeast Asia.
Still, there is much to admire and appreciate in the nearly-centuries old political writings of Debs.
I have not always been supportive of unions, but this was mostly due to ignorance and a tendency to accept the opinions and advice of people whom I trusted and admired without question. Over the years, having read more about the history of unions, seeing how important unions were, appreciating what unions have accomplished, and realizing that unions are as vital and necessary today as ever before, it has simply bolstered my belief in unions.
Bernie Sanders, in his autobiography, “Outsider in the White House”, repeatedly quotes someone named Eugene V. Debs, an important figure, apparently, in the Socialist movement of the 1920s and a hero among workers’ unions.
I’m ashamed that I had never known much about Debs prior to my interest in Sanders. The name was one of many that I recalled, briefly, from history textbooks about whom I had simply forgotten or never had much interest in to begin with. History textbooks, unfortunately, tend to do that with important and fascinating historical figures.
Debs was born in 1855 in Terre Haute, Indiana, the son of French immigrants. A high school drop-out, Debs went to work at a rail-yard. He was paid fifty cents a day for back-breaking labor. It was while working on the rail-yard that Debs fell into firefighting. He worked as a firefighter for years, loving everything about the job, even the high pay---one dollar a day.
Debs became heavily involved in the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen. He also became editor of the popular BLF newsletter, Firemen’s Magazine, which nearly tripled in circulation under his editorship.
In 1884, Debs was elected to the Indiana General Assembly on the Democratic ticket, serving one term. At this point in his life and career, socialism was not a major part of his life.
It wouldn’t be until after the major role he played in the famous Pullman Strike that Debs became a Socialist. The Pullman company, which made the train cars responsible for transporting important freight across the country, as well as the U.S. mail, feeling the economic crunch of the time, cut employee wages by 28%. The workers---against the initial advice of Debs, who knew that the company, along with the federal government, would strike back with force---went on strike.
The American Railway Union, country-wide, shut down train transport with its strike. President Grover Cleveland ordered the U.S. Army to intervene in busting the strike. Thirty strikers lost their lives, and countless more were injured. Debs was sent to federal prison for violating the initial injunction by the U.S. government, which claimed that the strike was obstructing the delivery of mail---a federal crime.
It was during his six-month stay in prison that Debs voraciously read and studied Socialism. When he was finally released, Debs was a full-fledged Socialist.
Debs was a gifted orator who earned respect and admiration from workers across the country as well as hatred from the rich company owners and the federal government. He was imprisoned several times, most notably after giving an anti-war speech during the early years of World War I.
Red and Black Publishers, in 2009, published a small book compiling some of Debs more famous speeches, essays, and articles.
Reading his articles today, I am struck by how some of the language could just as easily apply to today’s situations, especially in regards to what Debs called “wage slavery”, the tendency of big companies to work their workers to death with little monetary compensation. He wrote about the importance of a living wage. He also frighteningly predicted the disastrous effects of policies like NAFTA, nearly sixty years before it existed, and the massive job losses and industry devastation due to globalization.
Sadly, Socialism received a bad name after Germany and Russia usurped some basic (albeit extremely perverted) premises of socialism, twisted and molded to fit a dictatorial mold. Germany’s National Socialist Party (dubbed Naziism) and Russia’s Communist Party gave the American general public a distorted and, sadly, horrific view of socialism’s good-idea-turned-very-bad.
Parts of Debs’s writings are, admittedly, cringe-worthy, given the history of the world shortly after his death in 1926. He writes about the “coming revolution” and the “death of capitalism”: strong rhetoric which, for him, simply meant an inevitable and optimistic shift toward more wealth equality and better working conditions. I doubt he could have ever foreseen the horrors of Europe in the 1940s, the McCarthy Era, and the disastrous anti-communist debacles in Korea, Vietnam and Southeast Asia.
Still, there is much to admire and appreciate in the nearly-centuries old political writings of Debs.
May 20, 2019
A hero to working people everywhere, Eugene Debs fought tirelessly on their behalf and in advocacy for a fairer world in which work is not something to be subjected to and controlled by but a dignified sense of purpose and fraternal solidarity. Never cowed by industry powers or the political structures of his day, he rallied, organized, and inspired millions to believe in the power and value of workers. It’s difficult to overstate his contributions to the Labor Movement and to workers around the world.
His words are timeless and, of course, I could never capture them better than he himself:
“Society has always been and is now built upon exploitation—the exploitation of a class—the working class, whether slaves, serfs or wage-laborers, and the exploited working class in subjection have always been, instinctively or consciously, in revolt against their oppressors.”
“If I have the slightest capacity for leadership I can only give evidence of it by leading you to rely upon yourselves. As long as you can be led by an individual you will be betrayed by an individual.”
“thank God, in every age and in every nation there have been the brave and self-reliant few, and they have been sufficient to their historic task; and we, who are here today, are under infinite obligations to them because they suffered, they sacrificed, they went to jail, they had their bones broken upon the wheel, they were burned at the stake and their ashes scattered to the winds by the hands of hate and revenge in their struggle to leave the world better for us than they found it for themselves. We are under eternal obligations to them because of what they did and what they suffered for us and the only way we can discharge that obligation is by doing the best we can for those who are to come after us.”
“You need to know that as long as you are ignorant, as long as you are indifferent, as long as you are apathetic, unorganized and content, you will remain exactly where you are. You will be exploited; you will be degraded, and you will have to beg for a job.”
His words are timeless and, of course, I could never capture them better than he himself:
“Society has always been and is now built upon exploitation—the exploitation of a class—the working class, whether slaves, serfs or wage-laborers, and the exploited working class in subjection have always been, instinctively or consciously, in revolt against their oppressors.”
“If I have the slightest capacity for leadership I can only give evidence of it by leading you to rely upon yourselves. As long as you can be led by an individual you will be betrayed by an individual.”
“thank God, in every age and in every nation there have been the brave and self-reliant few, and they have been sufficient to their historic task; and we, who are here today, are under infinite obligations to them because they suffered, they sacrificed, they went to jail, they had their bones broken upon the wheel, they were burned at the stake and their ashes scattered to the winds by the hands of hate and revenge in their struggle to leave the world better for us than they found it for themselves. We are under eternal obligations to them because of what they did and what they suffered for us and the only way we can discharge that obligation is by doing the best we can for those who are to come after us.”
“You need to know that as long as you are ignorant, as long as you are indifferent, as long as you are apathetic, unorganized and content, you will remain exactly where you are. You will be exploited; you will be degraded, and you will have to beg for a job.”
July 8, 2019
This collection of Debs' writings gets 5 stars from me as a result of it being my first true introduction to the history of the American Socialist movement. Having never been taught about the Socialist movement in the US, I found the need to learn more develop out of a response to how flippantly the term is thrown around these days.
Debs' ability to write and, I would have to imagine, speak persuasively is very inspiring, and he lays out the nature of US politics and economics very clearly here. His words have inspired me to continue in my pursuit of understanding the history of this movement and ability to think outside of the capitalist confines of my upbringing and education.
Up next on my list:
> 10 Days That Shook the World - Reed
> Understanding Marx - Wolff
> The Socialist Manifesto - Sunkara
> Marxism and Politics - Miliband
> The State in Capitalist Society - Miliband
(Suggestions encouraged. Cheers!)
Debs' ability to write and, I would have to imagine, speak persuasively is very inspiring, and he lays out the nature of US politics and economics very clearly here. His words have inspired me to continue in my pursuit of understanding the history of this movement and ability to think outside of the capitalist confines of my upbringing and education.
Up next on my list:
> 10 Days That Shook the World - Reed
> Understanding Marx - Wolff
> The Socialist Manifesto - Sunkara
> Marxism and Politics - Miliband
> The State in Capitalist Society - Miliband
(Suggestions encouraged. Cheers!)
February 21, 2025
I found the final speech in this book tremendously sad. I think that Debs himself realised that despite his efforts to open the eyes of the proletariat to their plight it was all to no avail. For some reason we always seem to be grateful for the few crumbs thrown to us from the top table. Unfortunately we have now fell into the capitalists trick of getting ourselves into a never ending cycle of debt in order to buy luxuries that we have been convinced we can't live without, like a £20,000 car so we can drive 5 miles to work only to leave it rusting in a factory car park for 8 hours, the annual fortnight abroad, and most damaging of all the huge mortgage that takes most of one's working life to pay. Once in this trap we dare not go on strike or behave in a manner that may cost us our jobs for fear the we will lose everything. Unlike America, we do have a Labour Party, unfortunately they are an absolute disgrace and do not deserve to be associated with working class heroes such as Debs. It is time for the unions to stop funding the Labour Party and to put candidates up against them. Saying that the unions need to take a hard look at themselves over the way they meekly accepted Thatcher's anti union laws. Will we ever have a socialist government?, I don't think so, one only has to remember how the Labour Party along with the British working class treated Jeremy Corbyn.
Keep the red flag flying high.
Keep the red flag flying high.
February 29, 2024
This book is exactly what it purports to be. It is a collection of writings/speeches of Eugene V. Debs. As I read this book, I realized it is not enough. I am broadly ignorant of the early 20th century socialist movement; I lack the historical context around Debs specifically to understand the details in his writing. I need these essays mixed in with history and annotations.
The big points still land: Democrats and Republicans are capitalist parties that will not support the workers; Laborers/Workers should unite in one party rather than separate specialist unions; not explicitly covered, but its clear the first past the post 2-party system does them no favors in gaining traction (It's still a problem, unadressed).
My own context: I was interested in reading more on Debs as I found that he was from Terre Haute, IN; where I lived for 4 years and heard nothing about him. Also, the fact that he was tied to the early 20th century's socialist movement was interesting to be because it broadly gets erased from the history we covered in school (at least my own experience in IN, years ago). I vaguely know many others tied to the socialist movement such as Mark Twain and Helen Keller that do get covered for unrelated narratives - but not their political activism.
The big points still land: Democrats and Republicans are capitalist parties that will not support the workers; Laborers/Workers should unite in one party rather than separate specialist unions; not explicitly covered, but its clear the first past the post 2-party system does them no favors in gaining traction (It's still a problem, unadressed).
My own context: I was interested in reading more on Debs as I found that he was from Terre Haute, IN; where I lived for 4 years and heard nothing about him. Also, the fact that he was tied to the early 20th century's socialist movement was interesting to be because it broadly gets erased from the history we covered in school (at least my own experience in IN, years ago). I vaguely know many others tied to the socialist movement such as Mark Twain and Helen Keller that do get covered for unrelated narratives - but not their political activism.
September 20, 2020
Debs is exquisite.
June 23, 2025
Some of the writings feel repetitive or without real gravity, but there is a wealth of great thought and knowledge about socialism and the American labor movement.
August 22, 2014
No other person quite like him.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews