Benjamin Gitlow

Benjamin Gitlow (December 22, 1891 – July 19, 1965) was a prominent American socialist politician of the early 20th century and a founding member of the Communist Party USA. At the end of the 1930s, Gitlow turned to conservatism and wrote two sensational exposés of American communism, books which were very influential during the McCarthy period. Gitlow remained a leading anti-communist up to the time of his death.

Benjamin Gitlow was born on December 22, 1891, in Elizabethport, New Jersey. His parents were Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire; his father, Lewis Albert Gitlow, moved to the United States in 1888, followed by his mother, Katherine, in 1889. In the United States, his father worked part-time for insufficient hours in various factories, while his mother helped the impoverished family to make ends meet by stitching piecework at home for garment factories.

Radicalism seems to have run deeply in the family. Guests to the family home told stories about their personal and political experiences in Tsarist Russia. Gitlow later recalled this experience as formative to his own political development:

I would listen intently to the adventures of the Russian revolutionary leaders, of their experiences with the police, the days and years spent in prisons and their exile to the wastes of Siberia. I would grow indignant hearing how the Tsar mistreated the people. I thrilled at the stories of the underground movement, of the conspiring activities, how deeds of violence against the Tsarist oppressors were planned... The stories of personal experiences when raids were made by the secret police upon revolutionists' homes held me spellbound. I anticipated every incident that would be related. I also listened to discussions, very idealistic in their essence, in which the participants showed how Socialism would transform the world, and to arguments over methods of how Socialism would be achieved.

In later years, his mother achieved some notice as an important communist women's leader, serving as Secretary of the Women's Committee of the Workers Party of America in 1924. However, she resigned from the party in 1930 and became a bitter opponent of the Stalin regime until her death in 1940.

Gitlow studied law while working as a retail clerk in a department store in Newark, New Jersey. He helped to organize the Retail Clerks Union, political activity for which he was discharged from his job and blacklisted by the Merchants' Association. In June 1914, Gitlow testified before the US Commission on Industrial Relations on conditions prevalent in US department stores. His testimony included descriptions of mandatory overtime, spying on workers, and quid pro quo sexual harassment.

Following his blacklisting from the retail sales industry, Gitlow worked briefly as a cutter in the garment industry before entering the world of radical journalism in 1919.

As soon as he turned 18 and became eligible for membership, Ben Gitlow joined the Socialist Party of America. Gitlow was a committed and active member of the party and he was elected a delegate to the New York state convention of the SPA in 1910, the year after his joining. In the fall of 1917, Gitlow was elected on the Socialist ticket to the New York State Assembly (Bronx Co., 3rd D.), and sat in the 141st New York State Legislature. He was one of 10 Socialists elected to the Assembly of 1918, all of them from New York City.