Winfield R. Gaylord was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 minister

Minister

Minister can mean several things:* Minister , a Christian who ministers in some way* Minister , the rank of diplomat directly below ambassador* Minister , a politician who heads a ministry...

 and Socialist politician from Milwaukee, who served one term (1909–1912) as a member of the Wisconsin State Senate

Wisconsin State Senate

The Wisconsin Senate, the powers of which are modeled after those of the U.S. Senate, is the upper house of the Wisconsin State Legislature, smaller than the Wisconsin State Assembly...

 representing the Milwaukee-based 6th Senate District

Wisconsin Senate, District 6

The 6th District of the Wisconsin Senate is located in Southern Wisconsin, and is composed of parts of Milwaukee County.-Current elected officials:...

. He was the Socialist Party nominee for United States House of Representatives

United States House of Representatives

The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...

 in 1904, 1910, 1912, 1914 and 1916, coming within about 400 votes of victory in both 1910 and 1914; and the 1906 nominee for Governor of Wisconsin.

Background

Gaylord was born June 14, 1870, in Verona, Mississippi

Verona, Mississippi

Verona is a city in Lee County, Mississippi, United States. The population was 3,334 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Verona is located at ....

. He attended public school in Cleveland, Ohio

Cleveland, Ohio

Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...

; studied at Ohio Wesleyan University

Ohio Wesleyan University

Ohio Wesleyan University is a private liberal arts college in Delaware, Ohio, United States. It was founded in 1842 by Methodist leaders and Central Ohio residents as a nonsectarian institution, and is a member of the Ohio Five — a consortium of Ohio liberal arts colleges...

, Hamline University

Hamline University

-Red Wing location :Hamline was named in honor of Leonidas Lent Hamline, a bishop of the Methodist Church whose interest in the frontier led him to donate $25,000 toward the building of an institution of higher learning in what was then the territory of Minnesota. Today, a statue of Bishop Hamline...

; Northwestern University

Northwestern University

Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....

, and Chicago Theological Seminary

Chicago Theological Seminary

The Chicago Theological Seminary is a seminary of the United Church of Christ. It prepares women and men for leadership in the church and society through Master of Divinity , Master of Arts in Religious Studies , Master of Sacred Theology , Doctor of Ministry , and Doctor of Philosophy programs...

, (graduating from the latter school in 1908), while serving as a pastor

Pastor

The word pastor usually refers to an ordained leader of a Christian congregation. When used as an ecclesiastical styling or title, this role may be abbreviated to "Pr." or often "Ps"....

 in various Methodist

Methodism

Methodism is a movement of Protestant Christianity represented by a number of denominations and organizations, claiming a total of approximately seventy million adherents worldwide. The movement traces its roots to John Wesley's evangelistic revival movement within Anglicanism. His younger brother...

 and Congregational churches in Minnesota

Minnesota

Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...

, Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

 and Wisconsin from 1889 to 1902. From 1902 he worked as a lecturer

Lecturer

Lecturer is an academic rank. In the United Kingdom, lecturer is a position at a university or similar institution, often held by academics in their early career stages, who lead research groups and supervise research students, as well as teach...

 on popular and economic subjects.

Political activity

He served as National Lecturer for the Socialist Party and as a member of the state executive board. In 1904, he was nominated for Congress from the Fourth District

Wisconsin's 4th congressional district

Wisconsin's 4th congressional district is a congressional district of the United States House of Representatives in Wisconsin, encompassing a part of Milwaukee County and including all of the city of Milwaukee and its working-class suburbs of Cudahy, St. Francis, South Milwaukee, West Milwaukee,...

, losing to Republican

Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

incumbent Theobald Otjen

Theobald Otjen

Theobald Otjen was a U.S. Representative from Wisconsin.Theobald was born to German immigrants John Conrad and Dorothea Otjen, in west China township in St. Clair County, Michigan and attended the Marine City Academy and a private school in Detroit.He was employed as foreman in the rolling mill...

. In 1906, he was the Socialist nominee for Governor of Wisconsin, losing to Republican acting Governor James O. Davidson

James O. Davidson

James Ole Davidson was the 21st Governor of the U.S. state of Wisconsin.-Background:Jens Ole Davidson was born in Årdal, Sogn og Fjordane County, Norway. He immigrated in 1872 to the United States when he was 18 years old...

, coming in third in a five-way race.

He was a delegate to the Milwaukee city charter convention of 1908, and his translation of Changes in the theory and tactics of the (German) social-democracy by Paul Kampffmeyer was published by Charles H Kerr Company Publishers

Charles H Kerr Company Publishers

Charles H. Kerr Publishing Company was established in Chicago, Illinois in 1886 by Charles Hope Kerr, originally to promote his Unitarian and vegetarian views. As Kerr's personal interests moved from religion to Marxism and he became interested in the labor movement, the company's publications took...

 that same year.

Legislative service

Gaylord was elected in November 1908 to the State Senate from the Sixth district (9th, 10th, 19th, 20th and 22nd wards

Wards of the United States

In the United States, a ward is an optional division of a city or town, especially an electoral district, for administrative and representative purposes...

 of the City of Milwaukee) for a four-year term to succeed fellow Socialist Jacob Rummel

Jacob Rummel

Jacob Rummel was an American cigarmaker and Socialist from Milwaukee who served one term as a member of the Wisconsin State Senate representing the 6th Senate district .- Background :Rummel was born on April 17, 1857 in Washington County, Wisconsin where he attended public schools...

, receiving 6,236 votes against 5,820 for Republican August Langhoff. He was appointed to the standing committee

Standing Committee

In the United States Congress, standing committees are permanent legislative panels established by the United States House of Representatives and United States Senate rules. . Because they have legislative jurisdiction, standing committees consider bills and issues and recommend measures for...

s on manufactures

Manufacturing

Manufacturing is the use of machines, tools and labor to produce goods for use or sale. The term may refer to a range of human activity, from handicraft to high tech, but is most commonly applied to industrial production, in which raw materials are transformed into finished goods on a large scale...

 and labor, and on public health

Public health

Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals" . It is concerned with threats to health based on population health...

.
In 1910, he was again the Socialist nominee for the Fourth Congressional District, coming in second to Democratic incumbent William Joseph Cary, and in that banner election year for the Socialist Party of Milwaukee came with 447 votes of unseating the incumbent.

By 1911, he was the statewide Organizer

Organizing

Organizing is the act of rearranging elements following one or more rules.Anything is commonly considered organized when it looks like everything has a correct order or placement. But it's only ultimately organized if any element has no difference on time taken to find it...

 for the Socialist Party. In 1912, with his Senate district had been redistricted

Redistricting

Redistricting is the process of drawing United States electoral district boundaries, often in response to population changes determined by the results of the decennial census. In 36 states, the state legislature has primary responsibility for creating a redistricting plan, in many cases subject to...

 out of existence (it had been split between new Fifth and Sixth districts, which were taken by Republican George Weigel

George Weigel

George Weigel is an American author, and political and social activist. He currently serves as a Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Weigel was the Founding President of the James Madison Foundation...

 and Democrat George Weissleder respectively), he was again the Socialist nominee for the Fourth Congressional District, coming in second again to William Joseph Cary. He was also serving as Chairman of the Socialist Party's statewide executive committee. In 1914 he was the Congressional candidate, and came within 365 votes of unseating Cary. In 1916, he still came in second and received almost one-third of the vote, but Cary extended his winning margin over Gaylord to almost one thousand votes.

Influence and controversy

Gaylord was credited by Carl Sandburg

Carl Sandburg

Carl Sandburg was an American writer and editor, best known for his poetry. He won three Pulitzer Prizes, two for his poetry and another for a biography of Abraham Lincoln. H. L. Mencken called Carl Sandburg "indubitably an American in every pulse-beat."-Biography:Sandburg was born in Galesburg,...

 with introducing him to the ideas of the Wisconsin wing

Sewer Socialism

Sewer Socialism was a term, originally more or less pejorative, for the American socialist movement that centered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and existed from around 1892 to 1960...

 of the Socialist Party, and with persuading him to move to Wisconsin.

Gaylord was expelled from the Socialist Party in May 1917 after his and A. M. Simons' letter to Senate of the United States Paul Husting denouncing as treason

Treason

In law, treason is the crime that covers some of the more extreme acts against one's sovereign or nation. Historically, treason also covered the murder of specific social superiors, such as the murder of a husband by his wife. Treason against the king was known as high treason and treason against a...

able the anti-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...

 majority report of the Socialist convention in April 1917 and recommending its suppression by the government was printed in the Congressional Record

Congressional Record

The Congressional Record is the official record of the proceedings and debates of the United States Congress. It is published by the United States Government Printing Office, and is issued daily when the United States Congress is in session. Indexes are issued approximately every two weeks...

. Husting used this letter and communications from Gaylord to the Milwaukee Journal in support of 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 became a leading member of the pro-war element within the labor movement in the United States, speaking on platforms with such conservative icons as Nicholas Murray Butler. He was among those who were present at the September, 1917 organizing meeting of the Wisconsin Loyalty Legion