Communist Party USA
The Communist Party of the United States of America (CPUSA) is one of several Marxist-Leninist groups in the United States. For many years (1959-2000) it was led by Gus Hall. Perhaps the most famous member of the CPUSA is Angela Davis.It was formed in 1919 as a splinter group of the left-wing of the Socialist Party over the issue of the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia. The left wing socialists supported Lenin and Trotsky, and broke off the SP to form two rival parties: the Communist Party of America and Communist Labor Party. Under pressure from the Communist International, these two communist parties officially merged in Chicago in 1919. From its inception, the Communist Party, USA came under attack from the FBI and Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer for defying the Sedition Act of 1918. Consequently, the Communist Party went underground and went through name changes to evade the authorities.
Since its inception, the CPUSA was known for closely following the orders of the Communist International (“Comintern”). This was evident in 1926 when, upon the orders of Stalin, the CPUSA expelled James Cannon and all other Trotskyists from the organization.
During the 1950s, the Communist Party was decimated by Senator Joe McCarthy and his anti-Communist campaign. However, during the New Left Movement of the 1960s. In the 1970s, the CPUSA managed to grow in membership to about 25,000 members, despite the exodus of numerous Anti-Revisionist and Maoist groups from its ranks. However, in 1984, seeing the onslaught of Ronald Reagan's anti-Communist administration and decreased CPUSA membership, Gus Hall chose to end the CPUSA's nation-wide electoral campaigns, and the CPUSA has endorsed the Democratic Party in every national election ever since. The CPUSA still runs candidates for local office.
Throughout most of its history the Communist Party has been under pressure from the United States government, especially the FBI and was heavily infiltrated. Following the McCarthy years, membership and activities of the Communist Party were kept secret with very few visible members, although the Party claims that many community leaders thoughout the United States were affiliated with the Party.
From 1959 until 1989 when Gus Hall attacked the initiatives taken by Gorbachev in the Soviet Union the Party received a substantial subsidy from the Soviet Union. Starting with $75,000 in 1959 this was increased gradually to $3 million in 1987. This substantial amount reflected the Party's subservience to the Moscow line in contrast to the French and Italian Parties whose Eurocommunism deviated from the orthodox line. The cutoff of funds in 1989 resulted in a financial crisis resulting in cutting back publication in 1990 of the Party newspaper, the People's Daily World to weekly publication.
Communist party members consider Party membership an honor and often work very hard toward realization of the idealistic goals of communism. Generally the life of a Communist is organized around Party activities with the expectation that they will in a disciplined way advance the goals of the Party.
Communists have often participated in the organization of quasi-independent organizations (front groups) which support some aspect of their platform or serve organizing goals. In addition, Communist Party members, working together within an organization such as a labor union proceeding skillfully, were often able, together with others who supported them (or at least did not actively oppose them), to rise to leadership positions and in some cases to dominate the organization. In some cases, especially in labor organizations such as the Screen Actors Guild this practice resulted in a backlash as more conservative members such as Ronald Reagan [1] competed for control of the organization.
The current National Chair is Sam Webb. The newspaper is the People's Weekly World.
See also: McCarthyism, List of political parties in the United States
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