Emil Herman
Encyclopedia
Emil M. Herman was a German-American socialist
and anti-war activist. A three-time candidate for Congress on the ticket of the Socialist Party of America
, Herman is best remembered for his imprisonment by the Wilson administration
due to his political activity in the outspokenly anti-war Socialist Party of America
during World War I
.
town of Kamnitz
(now part of the Czech Republic
), the son of a farmer of ethnic German extraction. The family emigrated to the United States in 1882, settling first in Alexander, Arkansas
before moving to Kansas City, Missouri
, where Emil attended grammar school. Herman's education came to an abrupt end at an early age, however, as he was forced by economic circumstances to drop out of school to go to work to help support the family at age 11.
Herman moved to Washington state
in 1890, setting near Lyman, Washington
. He worked variously as a lumberman, a farmer, and a baker. In 1922 he became a member of the Bakers Union
.
(SLP) in 1897 and was a member of Section Woolley, Washington
. He remained with the SLP until 1899, when he exited to join instead the Social Democratic Party of America (SDP) headed by Eugene V. Debs
and Victor L. Berger
. Herman served as the local secretary of Local Lyman] on behalf of his new organization.
When the SDP united with Slobodin and Hillquit's East Coast-based group of former SLP members in 1901 to form the Socialist Party of America
(SPA), Herman continued his political activity in that new organization as well. First serving as a local secretary, Herman was first elected as a delegate to the Socialist Party's national convention in 1908. He was also chosen in that capacity to attend the party's conventions of 1917, 1923, and 1924.
Herman's first run for political office came in the spring of 1904, when he ran for Seattle City Council
on the Socialist Party ticket. He later ran as a Socialist candidate for U.S. Congress in 1906, 1908, and 1909.
Herman was elected State Secretary of the Socialist Party of Washington
in 1916, continuing in that role until 1918. In this capacity, he served as editor of the state SP's official newspaper, Party Builder. He was also elected to the governing 15 member National Executive Committee of the Socialist Party of America in 1917, with his term expiring in 1919.
Herman was a dual member of the International Workers of the World from 1910 through the early 1920s.
On April 30, 1918, Herman was arrested at the Everett, Washington
office of the state Socialist Party under the Espionage Act of 1917
. He was held pending $20,000 bond, which was eventually provided. While out on bond, Herman was rearrested and his bond was revoked for traveling to Chicago to attend an organizational conference of the IWW.
At trial the prosecution produced its evidence against Herman seized in the raid on his office, including the pamphlets The Great Madness, Mental Dynamite, and The Menace of Militarism. Also shown to the jury were "disloyal" stickers with a quotation falsely attributed to Jack London
reading:
In the wartime climate of superheated nationalism
and anti-German sentiment
, the German-American socialist organizer Herman was convicted under the Espionage Act of 1917
for possession of these "seditious" materials and sentenced to 10 years in prison.
While serving time at McNeil Island Federal Penitentiary
in Washington state, Herman remained a member of the Socialist Party's governing National Executive Committee. He was sharply critical of the decision of the members of the NEC still at liberty to expel the Michigan
state Socialist Party and to suspend various foreign language federations
supportive of the organized faction known as the Left Wing Section
, charging in a letter published in the party press that the NEC had acted without maintaining a quorum
and engaged in "petty, political trickery" by invalidating the 1919 party election and making a major section of the party ineligible for participation in the forthcoming 1919 Emergency National Convention
of the party.
Herman was pardoned and released on December 24, 1921, after having spent over 3 years and 4 months behind bars. He was unbowed by his prison experience, delivering a speech immediately after his release in which he declared:
Despite being courted by communists through the newly-formed Workers Party of America
amid his wartime imprisonment, upon his release Herman rejoined the Socialist Party. At the time of his reaffiliation to the SPA, Herman declared in a published article that the Communists had "swallowed hook, bait, and line of the programs imposed upon them" by "agents of the Department of Justice," and thus been driven underground.
Herman again opened up an office in Everett, where he served as the secretary for the Northwest District for the now-atrophied Socialist Party in the years after his release.
Emil Herman's wife, Ruby Herman (1885-?), was an activist in the Socialist Party and continued her husband's work as the party's secretary for the Pacific Northwest region for some time after her husband's death. A native of Arkansas
, she ran for Congress as a Socialist in 1924 and 1928.
The Hermans had two children, Donald R. Herman (born about 1915) and Edwin A. Herman (born about 1922).
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...
and anti-war activist. A three-time candidate for Congress on the ticket of the Socialist Party of America
Socialist Party of America
The Socialist Party of America was a multi-tendency democratic-socialist political party in the United States, formed in 1901 by a merger between the three-year-old Social Democratic Party of America and disaffected elements of the Socialist Labor Party which had split from the main organization...
, Herman is best remembered for his imprisonment by the Wilson administration
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...
due to his political activity in the outspokenly anti-war Socialist Party of America
Socialist Party of America
The Socialist Party of America was a multi-tendency democratic-socialist political party in the United States, formed in 1901 by a merger between the three-year-old Social Democratic Party of America and disaffected elements of the Socialist Labor Party which had split from the main organization...
during World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
.
Early years
Emil M. Herman was born August 22, 1879, in the Imperial GermanGerman Empire
The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...
town of Kamnitz
Ceská Kamenice
Česká Kamenice is a town in Ústí nad Labem Region of the Czech Republic. It has cca 5,500 inhabitants.Following villages are administrative parts of Česká Kamenice: Pekelský Důl, Dolní Kamenice, Filipov, Huníkov, Horní Kamenice, Kamenická Nová Víska, Kerhartice and Líska.Česká Kamenice became the...
(now part of the Czech Republic
Czech Republic
The Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....
), the son of a farmer of ethnic German extraction. The family emigrated to the United States in 1882, settling first in Alexander, Arkansas
Alexander, Arkansas
Alexander is a town in Pulaski and Saline counties in the U.S. state of Arkansas. The population was 614 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Little Rock-North Little Rock-AR Metropolitan Statistical Area.-Geography:...
before moving to Kansas City, Missouri
Kansas City, Missouri
Kansas City, Missouri is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri and is the anchor city of the Kansas City Metropolitan Area, the second largest metropolitan area in Missouri. It encompasses in parts of Jackson, Clay, Cass, and Platte counties...
, where Emil attended grammar school. Herman's education came to an abrupt end at an early age, however, as he was forced by economic circumstances to drop out of school to go to work to help support the family at age 11.
Herman moved to Washington state
Washington State
Washington State may refer to:* Washington , often referred to as "Washington state" to differentiate it from Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States* Washington State University, a land-grant college in that state- See also :...
in 1890, setting near Lyman, Washington
Lyman, Washington
Lyman is a town in Skagit County, Washington, United States. The population was 438 at the 2010 census. It is included in the Mount Vernon–Anacortes, Washington Metropolitan Statistical Area.-History:...
. He worked variously as a lumberman, a farmer, and a baker. In 1922 he became a member of the Bakers Union
Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers' International Union
The Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers' International Union is a labor union in the United States and Canada. It has a membership of 100,000...
.
Political career
Herman joined the Socialist Labor PartySocialist Labor Party of America
The Socialist Labor Party of America , established in 1876 as the Workingmen's Party, is the oldest socialist political party in the United States and the second oldest socialist party in the world. Originally known as the Workingmen's Party of America, the party changed its name in 1877 and has...
(SLP) in 1897 and was a member of Section Woolley, Washington
Sedro-Woolley, Washington
Sedro-Woolley is a city in Skagit County, Washington, United States. The population was 10,540 at the 2010 census. It is included in the Mount Vernon–Anacortes, Washington Metropolitan Statistical Area.-History:...
. He remained with the SLP until 1899, when he exited to join instead the Social Democratic Party of America (SDP) headed by Eugene V. Debs
Eugene V. Debs
Eugene Victor Debs was an American union leader, one of the founding members of the International Labor Union and the Industrial Workers of the World , and several times the candidate of the Socialist Party of America for President of the United States...
and Victor L. Berger
Victor L. Berger
Victor Luitpold Berger was a founding member of the Socialist Party of America and an important and influential Socialist journalist who helped establish the so-called Sewer Socialist movement. The first Socialist elected to the U.S...
. Herman served as the local secretary of Local Lyman] on behalf of his new organization.
When the SDP united with Slobodin and Hillquit's East Coast-based group of former SLP members in 1901 to form the Socialist Party of America
Socialist Party of America
The Socialist Party of America was a multi-tendency democratic-socialist political party in the United States, formed in 1901 by a merger between the three-year-old Social Democratic Party of America and disaffected elements of the Socialist Labor Party which had split from the main organization...
(SPA), Herman continued his political activity in that new organization as well. First serving as a local secretary, Herman was first elected as a delegate to the Socialist Party's national convention in 1908. He was also chosen in that capacity to attend the party's conventions of 1917, 1923, and 1924.
Herman's first run for political office came in the spring of 1904, when he ran for Seattle City Council
Seattle City Council
The Seattle City Council is committed to ensuring that Seattle, Washington, is safe, livable and sustainable. Nine Councilmembers are elected to four-year terms in nonpartisan elections and represent the entire city, elected by all Seattle voters....
on the Socialist Party ticket. He later ran as a Socialist candidate for U.S. Congress in 1906, 1908, and 1909.
Herman was elected State Secretary of the Socialist Party of Washington
Socialist Party of Washington
The Socialist Party of Washington was the Washington state section of the Socialist Party of America , an organization originally established as a federation of semi-autonomous state organizations...
in 1916, continuing in that role until 1918. In this capacity, he served as editor of the state SP's official newspaper, Party Builder. He was also elected to the governing 15 member National Executive Committee of the Socialist Party of America in 1917, with his term expiring in 1919.
Herman was a dual member of the International Workers of the World from 1910 through the early 1920s.
On April 30, 1918, Herman was arrested at the Everett, Washington
Everett, Washington
Everett is the county seat of and the largest city in Snohomish County, Washington, United States. Named for Everett Colby, son of founder Charles L. Colby, it lies north of Seattle. The city had a total population of 103,019 at the 2010 census, making it the 6th largest in the state and...
office of the state Socialist Party under the Espionage Act of 1917
Espionage Act of 1917
The Espionage Act of 1917 is a United States federal law passed on June 15, 1917, shortly after the U.S. entry into World War I. It has been amended numerous times over the years. It was originally found in Title 50 of the U.S. Code but is now found under Title 18, Crime...
. He was held pending $20,000 bond, which was eventually provided. While out on bond, Herman was rearrested and his bond was revoked for traveling to Chicago to attend an organizational conference of the IWW.
At trial the prosecution produced its evidence against Herman seized in the raid on his office, including the pamphlets The Great Madness, Mental Dynamite, and The Menace of Militarism. Also shown to the jury were "disloyal" stickers with a quotation falsely attributed to Jack London
Jack London
John Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...
reading:
"Young Man! The lowest aim in your life is to be a good soldier. The 'good soldier' never tries to distinguish right from wrong. He never thinks, never reasons; he only obeys.... A good soldier is a blind, heartless, murderous machine.... No man can fall lower than a soldier — it is a depth beneath which we cannot go. Young Man, Don't Be a Soldier, Be a Man.
In the wartime climate of superheated nationalism
Nationalism
Nationalism is a political ideology that involves a strong identification of a group of individuals with a political entity defined in national terms, i.e. a nation. In the 'modernist' image of the nation, it is nationalism that creates national identity. There are various definitions for what...
and anti-German sentiment
Anti-German sentiment
Anti-German sentiment is defined as an opposition to or fear of Germany, its inhabitants, and the German language. Its opposite is Germanophilia.-Russia:...
, the German-American socialist organizer Herman was convicted under the Espionage Act of 1917
Espionage Act of 1917
The Espionage Act of 1917 is a United States federal law passed on June 15, 1917, shortly after the U.S. entry into World War I. It has been amended numerous times over the years. It was originally found in Title 50 of the U.S. Code but is now found under Title 18, Crime...
for possession of these "seditious" materials and sentenced to 10 years in prison.
While serving time at McNeil Island Federal Penitentiary
McNeil Island
McNeil Island is an island in western Puget Sound, located just west of Steilacoom, Washington, with a land area of 17.177 km² . It lies just north of Anderson Island. Fox Island is to the north, across Carr Inlet. To the west McNeil Island is separated from Key Peninsula by Pitt Passage. The...
in Washington state, Herman remained a member of the Socialist Party's governing National Executive Committee. He was sharply critical of the decision of the members of the NEC still at liberty to expel the Michigan
Michigan
Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....
state Socialist Party and to suspend various foreign language federations
Language federation
Language Federations were formed in the late 19th and early 20th century by immigrants to the United States, primarily from Eastern and Southern Europe, who shared a commitment to some form of socialist politics...
supportive of the organized faction known as the Left Wing Section
Left Wing Section of the Socialist Party
The Left Wing Section of the Socialist Party was an organized faction within the Socialist Party of America in 1919 which served as the core of the dual communist parties which emerged in the fall of that year — the Communist Party of America and the Communist Labor Party of America.-Precusors:A...
, charging in a letter published in the party press that the NEC had acted without maintaining a quorum
Quorum
A quorum is the minimum number of members of a deliberative assembly necessary to conduct the business of that group...
and engaged in "petty, political trickery" by invalidating the 1919 party election and making a major section of the party ineligible for participation in the forthcoming 1919 Emergency National Convention
1919 Emergency National Convention
The 1919 Emergency National Convention of the Socialist Party of America was held in Chicago from August 30 to September 5, 1919. It was a seminal gathering in the history of American radicalism, marked by the bolting of the party's organized left wing to establish the Communist Labor Party of...
of the party.
Herman was pardoned and released on December 24, 1921, after having spent over 3 years and 4 months behind bars. He was unbowed by his prison experience, delivering a speech immediately after his release in which he declared:
"I am opposed to war. I object to bloodshed. I would not take the life of a human being to save my own. I regard human life as infinitely sacred. I am opposed, therefore to the system that ruthlessly sacrifices human life in the most barbarous manner possible.
"Sixty thousand of our boys lie beneath the Flanders poppies. For what? Did not Lloyd George just the other day make the assertion that Europe was worse off than ever? That there were more men under arms than before the war?
"The disarmament conference was a farce. To be true, they limit battleshipBattleshipA battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...
s, but laboratories in every country are occupied by those who work feverishly to perfect deadly and secret gas. The next war will be of airplanes and poison gas, and no one will be a non-combatantNon-combatantNon-combatant is a term in the law of war describing civilians not taking a direct part in hostilities, as well as persons such as medical personnel and military chaplains who are regular soldiers but are protected because of their function as well as soldiers who are hors de combat ; that is, sick,...
, not even the smallest infant."
Despite being courted by communists through the newly-formed Workers Party of America
Workers Party of America
The Workers Party of America was the name of the legal party organization used by the Communist Party USA from the last days of 1921 until the middle of 1929. As a legal political party the Workers Party accepted affiliation from independent socialist groups such as the African Blood Brotherhood,...
amid his wartime imprisonment, upon his release Herman rejoined the Socialist Party. At the time of his reaffiliation to the SPA, Herman declared in a published article that the Communists had "swallowed hook, bait, and line of the programs imposed upon them" by "agents of the Department of Justice," and thus been driven underground.
Herman again opened up an office in Everett, where he served as the secretary for the Northwest District for the now-atrophied Socialist Party in the years after his release.
Death and legacy
Emil Herman died October 10, 1928.Emil Herman's wife, Ruby Herman (1885-?), was an activist in the Socialist Party and continued her husband's work as the party's secretary for the Pacific Northwest region for some time after her husband's death. A native of Arkansas
Arkansas
Arkansas is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. Arkansas shares borders with six states , and its eastern border is largely defined by the Mississippi River...
, she ran for Congress as a Socialist in 1924 and 1928.
The Hermans had two children, Donald R. Herman (born about 1915) and Edwin A. Herman (born about 1922).
Works
- "Imprisoned Member Protests NEC Action," The New Age [Buffalo, NY], v. 7, no. 369 (June 26, 1919), pg. 7.
- "Where I Stand — And Why," Miami Valley Socialist [Dayton, OH], vol. 10, no. 526 (April 7, 1922), pg. 3.
- "Forward to Independent Political Action," The Socialist World [Chicago], vol. 4, no. 1 (January 1923), pp. 10–11.
- "An Unconsidered Phase of the Amnesty Question," The Socialist World [Chicago], vol. 4, no. 4 (April 1923), pp. 3–4.
- "Free Speech in Montana," The Socialist World [Chicago], vol. 4, no. 8 (August 1923), pp. 6–8.
- "Political Situation in the Northwest," The Socialist World [Chicago], vol. 4, no. 10 (October 1923), pp. 4–6.
- "Communist Party Pays Farmer-Labor Convention Expenses," The Socialist World [Chicago], vol. 4, no. 12 (December 1923), pp. 6–7.
External links
- "Party Builder (Everett, WA, 1914-1919)," The Labor Press Project website. Retrieved March 23, 2010. —Online images of publication edited by Herman.