Max Bedacht Manuscript
Collection Number: 6224
Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation and Archives, Cornell University Library
Title:
Max Bedacht Manuscript, 1967
Collection Number:
6224
Creator:
Bedacht, Max
Quantity:
0.5 linear ft.
Forms of Material:
Typescripts.
Repository:
Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation and Archives, Cornell University Library
Abstract:
This typescript autobiography, "On the path of life," deals with Bedacht's reflections on American and international communist
leaders and the workings of the Comintern. He describes the factional feuds within the
Communist Party, refutes Whittaker Chambers' charges against him in Witness! and recounts the circumstances around his
expulsion from the party in 1948, and his reinstatement in 1960. His work establishing and leading the International Workers
Order is also traced. Throughout the memoir he comments on world events and their implications for socialism. Photocopies
of photographs and of important documents are included.
Language:
Collection material in English
Max Bedacht was a communist activist and theoretician. After an impoverished childhood and career as a journeyman barber and
trade union leader in Germany and Switzerland, he immigrated to the United States in 1908 where he supported himself as
a barber and German language newspaper editor. Bedacht became an early leader of the German Federation of the Socialist
Party in California, while continuing to edit German language and labor mewspapers in Detroit, San Francisco and South
Dakota. From World War I onward his sympathies were increasingly with the left wing of the Socialist Party and at the
1919 convention he joined the Communist Labor Party. Caught up in the Palmer Raids in California and Chicago, he was arrested
and tried for conspiracy. He was convicted but never imprisoned and was soon travelling to Europe and Russia as an international
delegate for the American Communist Party.
This typescript autobiography, "On the path of life," deals with Bedacht's reflections on American and international communist
leaders and the workings of the Comintern. He describes the factional feuds within the Communist Party, refutes
Whittaker Chambers' charges against him in Witness! and recounts the circumstances around his expulsion from the party
in 1948, and his reinstatement in 1960. His work establishing and leading the International Workers Order is also traced.
Throughout the memoir he comments on world events and their implications for socialism. Photocopies of photographs and
of important documents are included.
Names:
Browder, Earl, 1891-1973.
Chambers, Whittaker.
Ruthenberg, Charles E. (Charles Emil), 1882-1927.
Communist International.
Communist Party of the United States of America.
International Workers Order.
Socialist Party (U.S.)
Subjects:
Socialism--United States.
Communism--United States.
Communists--United States
Form and Genre Terms:
Typescripts.
Access Restrictions:
Access to the collections in the Kheel Center is restricted. Please contact a reference archivist for access to these materials.
Restrictions on Use:
This collection must be used in keeping with the Kheel Center Information Sheet and Procedures for Document Use.
Cite As:
Max Bedacht Manuscript #6224. Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation and Archives, Cornell University Library.
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| Box 1 | Folder 2 | 1967 | |
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