James Graham Phelps Stokes
Encyclopedia
James Graham Phelps Stokes (1872–1960), known to his friends as "Graham," was an American millionaire
socialist writer, political activist, and philanthropist
. He is best remembered as a founding member and key figure in the Intercollegiate Socialist Society
and as the husband of Rose Pastor Stokes
, a radical
union organizer
and activist in the Communist Party of America. Graham Phelps Stokes split with the Socialist Party of America
over the question of American participation in World War I
, objecting to the party's staunchly antimilitarist stance. He separated from his wife and left radical politics during this period.
on March 18, 1872 to one of the city's most prosperous families. He was one of 9 children. His great-grandfather, Thomas Stokes, came to New York City
from London
at the end of the 18th Century and became a merchant, founding the establishment Phelps, Dodge & Co., the source of the family's wealth. His father, Anson Phelps Stokes
(1838–1913), a banker and real estate developer, was patriarch of a large house on Madison Avenue in Manhattan
. His mother, Helen Louisa Phelps, was the descendant of a man who emigrated to Dorchester, Massachusetts
from England
in about 1630.
Two boys of the Stokes household were given four names, the first of which was decoration. Graham's brother, the architect Isaac Newton Phelps Stokes (1867–1944), was known merely as "Newton," and throughout his life James Graham Phelps Stokes, named after his paternal grandfather, was known to all as "Graham." Another brother, Anson
(1874–1958), later a famous philanthropist, was named after his father and did not receive an "extra" name like his siblings.
The Stokes household, despite its venerability, was not without its concerns about broader society. Graham's father was active in the causes of civil service
reform, currency reform, and the replacement of protectionism
with free trade
. He was also a collector of art and books and a founder of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
.
Graham Stokes benefited from a first rate education. He attended the Sheffield Scientific School
of Yale University
, receiving his Ph.B. degree there in 1892, before going on to obtain a M.D. degree from Columbia University
in 1896 — although he never practiced medicine. Following the reception of his doctor's degree, Stokes continued with a year of graduate study of political science
, also at Columbia.
Stokes served in the New York National Guard from 1899 to 1901. During the Spanish-American War
of 1898-1899 he was a private in the U.S. Army cavalry, but he did not deploy overseas. At this same time, Graham's father was active in the Anti-Imperialist League, described by one historian as "a group of substantial citizens" opposed to American intervention in The Philippines.
While at university, Stokes became concerned with the plight of the American underclass and poverty. He served on the board of the University Settlement while at Columbia.
In November 1902 Graham Stokes left his father's comfortable household to take up living himself in a settlement house on the Lower East Side
of Manhattan — one of the poorest areas of New York City
.
Historians Arthur Zipser and Pearl Zipser describe well the scene:
Love flourished among the young, socially-concerned settlement workers. Stokes' sister Caroline Phelps Stokes fell in love with settlement house manager Robert Hunter
, later a widely-known socialist journalist and author, and the pair married in 1903. And it was in connection with the settlement house that Graham Stokes met an attractive young news reporter who interviewed him for the Yiddish Daily News, Rose Pastor
. The pair fell in love and married on July 18, 1905.
While Stokes did participate in commercial affairs throughout his life, serving variously as an officer of such concerns as the Phelps Stokes Corporation, the Austin Mining Company, the Nevada Central Railroad, and the State Bank of Nevada, Stokes' primary interests and concerns lay in the realm of public affairs. Stokes was a frequent author of articles on current social problems and letters of opinion to various journals and newspapers. He also served as a member of the Board of Directors of the Tuskegee Institute.
for President of the New York Board of Aldermen
. Stokes was the second name on a ticket which featured William Randolph Hearst
for Mayor, causing contemporaries to refer to the Municipal Ownership League as "Hearst's League." The decision to run downticket with the multimillionaire publisher was not a popular one with Stokes' radical new wife, who wished for defeat of Hearst and his associates. She later recalled:
Graham Phelps Stokes seems to have joined the Socialist Party of America
in 1906. Even before that, Stokes was enlisted in the Socialist cause by author Upton Sinclair
, who sought to establish a new group fostering the dispassionate study of socialist ideas on college campuses around America, an organization to be called the Intercollegiate Socialist Society
(ISS). Stokes was one of ten signatories of the published call for the new organization which appeared in the spring of 1905, joining Sinclair, author Jack London
, attorney Clarence Darrow
, sociologist and author Charlotte Perkins Gilman
, and others. The first formal meeting of the organization, held at a restaurant in New York City late in the summer of 1905, elected Stokes second vice president of the ISS, serving with London as president and Sinclair as first vice president.
In May 1907, Jack London resigned the presidency of the ISS and Graham Stokes assumed the position. He continued to play a leading role in the organization for the next decade, sitting on the organization's executive committee and speaking far and wide on topics on topics of contemporary concern under ISS auspices. In the spring of 1909, for example, Graham and Rose Stokes went on the road for a full month, speaking at colleges throughout New England, where they distributed ISS literature for free or at nominal charge to interested undergraduates.
Stokes' papers are housed at Columbia University
in New York City. The collection includes more than 1600 cataloged letters.
The Hartley House records, which include extensive correspondence with Graham Phelps Stokes, are housed at the University of Minnesota
at Minneapolis
.
Millionaire
A millionaire is an individual whose net worth or wealth is equal to or exceeds one million units of currency. It can also be a person who owns one million units of currency in a bank account or savings account...
socialist writer, political activist, and philanthropist
Philanthropist
A philanthropist is someone who engages in philanthropy; that is, someone who donates his or her time, money, and/or reputation to charitable causes...
. He is best remembered as a founding member and key figure in the Intercollegiate Socialist Society
Intercollegiate Socialist Society
The Intercollegiate Socialist Society was the a Socialist student organization from 1905-1921. It attracted many prominent intellectuals and writers and acted as the unofficial Socialist Party of America student wing...
and as the husband of Rose Pastor Stokes
Rose Pastor Stokes
Rose Harriet Pastor Stokes was a Jewish-American socialist activist, writer, birth control advocate, and feminist. She was active in labor politics and women's issues, and was a founding member of the Communist Party of America in 1919. She was a figure of some public notoriety for having married...
, a radical
Left-wing politics
In politics, Left, left-wing and leftist generally refer to support for social change to create a more egalitarian society...
union organizer
Union organizer
A union organizer is a specific type of trade union member or an appointed union official. A majority of unions appoint rather than elect their organizers....
and activist in the Communist Party of America. Graham Phelps Stokes split with 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...
over the question of American participation in 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...
, objecting to the party's staunchly antimilitarist stance. He separated from his wife and left radical politics during this period.
Early years
James Graham Phelps Stokes was born in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
on March 18, 1872 to one of the city's most prosperous families. He was one of 9 children. His great-grandfather, Thomas Stokes, came to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
from London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
at the end of the 18th Century and became a merchant, founding the establishment Phelps, Dodge & Co., the source of the family's wealth. His father, Anson Phelps Stokes
Anson Phelps Stokes
For other men with the same name, see Anson Phelps Stokes Anson Phelps Stokes was a merchant, banker, publicist, philanthropist, and became a multimillionaire. Born in New York City, he was the son of James Boulter and Caroline Stokes; brother of William Earl Dodge Stokes and Olivia Eggleston...
(1838–1913), a banker and real estate developer, was patriarch of a large house on Madison Avenue in Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
. His mother, Helen Louisa Phelps, was the descendant of a man who emigrated to Dorchester, Massachusetts
Dorchester, Massachusetts
Dorchester is a dissolved municipality and current neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It is named after the town of Dorchester in the English county of Dorset, from which Puritans emigrated and is today endearingly nicknamed "Dot" by its residents. Dorchester, including a large...
from England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
in about 1630.
Two boys of the Stokes household were given four names, the first of which was decoration. Graham's brother, the architect Isaac Newton Phelps Stokes (1867–1944), was known merely as "Newton," and throughout his life James Graham Phelps Stokes, named after his paternal grandfather, was known to all as "Graham." Another brother, Anson
Anson Phelps Stokes (philanthropist)
Anson Phelps Stokes , was an American educator, clergyman, author, philanthropist and civil rights activist.Stokes was one of three men of the same name; his father was multimillionaire banker Anson Phelps Stokes, and his son was the Bishop Anson Phelps Stokes, III, an Episcopal bishop.He was born...
(1874–1958), later a famous philanthropist, was named after his father and did not receive an "extra" name like his siblings.
The Stokes household, despite its venerability, was not without its concerns about broader society. Graham's father was active in the causes of civil service
Civil service
The term civil service has two distinct meanings:* A branch of governmental service in which individuals are employed on the basis of professional merit as proven by competitive examinations....
reform, currency reform, and the replacement of protectionism
Protectionism
Protectionism is the economic policy of restraining trade between states through methods such as tariffs on imported goods, restrictive quotas, and a variety of other government regulations designed to allow "fair competition" between imports and goods and services produced domestically.This...
with free trade
Free trade
Under a free trade policy, prices emerge from supply and demand, and are the sole determinant of resource allocation. 'Free' trade differs from other forms of trade policy where the allocation of goods and services among trading countries are determined by price strategies that may differ from...
. He was also a collector of art and books and a founder of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art is a renowned art museum in New York City. Its permanent collection contains more than two million works, divided into nineteen curatorial departments. The main building, located on the eastern edge of Central Park along Manhattan's Museum Mile, is one of the...
.
Graham Stokes benefited from a first rate education. He attended the Sheffield Scientific School
Sheffield Scientific School
Sheffield Scientific School was founded in 1847 as a school of Yale College in New Haven, Connecticut for instruction in science and engineering. Originally named the Yale Scientific School, it was renamed in 1861 in honor of Joseph E. Sheffield, the railroad executive. The school was...
of Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
, receiving his Ph.B. degree there in 1892, before going on to obtain a M.D. degree from Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
in 1896 — although he never practiced medicine. Following the reception of his doctor's degree, Stokes continued with a year of graduate study of political science
Political science
Political Science is a social science discipline concerned with the study of the state, government and politics. Aristotle defined it as the study of the state. It deals extensively with the theory and practice of politics, and the analysis of political systems and political behavior...
, also at Columbia.
Stokes served in the New York National Guard from 1899 to 1901. During the Spanish-American War
Spanish-American War
The Spanish–American War was a conflict in 1898 between Spain and the United States, effectively the result of American intervention in the ongoing Cuban War of Independence...
of 1898-1899 he was a private in the U.S. Army cavalry, but he did not deploy overseas. At this same time, Graham's father was active in the Anti-Imperialist League, described by one historian as "a group of substantial citizens" opposed to American intervention in The Philippines.
While at university, Stokes became concerned with the plight of the American underclass and poverty. He served on the board of the University Settlement while at Columbia.
In November 1902 Graham Stokes left his father's comfortable household to take up living himself in a settlement house on the Lower East Side
Lower East Side
The Lower East Side, LES, is a neighborhood in the southeastern part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is roughly bounded by Allen Street, East Houston Street, Essex Street, Canal Street, Eldridge Street, East Broadway, and Grand Street....
of Manhattan — one of the poorest areas of New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
.
Historians Arthur Zipser and Pearl Zipser describe well the scene:
"There was a lively intellectual atmosphere on the top floor of the University Settlement house, where the highly educated, mostly rich, young social workers had their residence, dining, and club rooms. It was a world apart from the lower floors of the building, where the regular settlement house functions were carried out among the denizens of the surrounding ghettoized slum. This separation between leaders and led was not the goal they were aiming for, which was the outreach of the privileged to the downtrodden. But the separation was real."
Love flourished among the young, socially-concerned settlement workers. Stokes' sister Caroline Phelps Stokes fell in love with settlement house manager Robert Hunter
Robert Hunter (author)
Robert Hunter was an American sociologist and progressive author.-Early life:Robert Hunter was born on April 10, 1874 at Terre Haute, Indiana the middle of five children born over thirteen years to William Robert and Caroline “Callie” Hunter...
, later a widely-known socialist journalist and author, and the pair married in 1903. And it was in connection with the settlement house that Graham Stokes met an attractive young news reporter who interviewed him for the Yiddish Daily News, Rose Pastor
Rose Pastor Stokes
Rose Harriet Pastor Stokes was a Jewish-American socialist activist, writer, birth control advocate, and feminist. She was active in labor politics and women's issues, and was a founding member of the Communist Party of America in 1919. She was a figure of some public notoriety for having married...
. The pair fell in love and married on July 18, 1905.
While Stokes did participate in commercial affairs throughout his life, serving variously as an officer of such concerns as the Phelps Stokes Corporation, the Austin Mining Company, the Nevada Central Railroad, and the State Bank of Nevada, Stokes' primary interests and concerns lay in the realm of public affairs. Stokes was a frequent author of articles on current social problems and letters of opinion to various journals and newspapers. He also served as a member of the Board of Directors of the Tuskegee Institute.
Socialist years
In 1905, Stokes became a candidate for public office for the first time, running as the candidate of the Municipal Ownership LeagueMunicipal Ownership League
The Municipal Ownership League was an American third party formed in 1904 by controversial newspaper magnate and Congressman William Randolph Hearst for the purpose of contesting elections in New York City....
for President of the New York Board of Aldermen
New York City Council
The New York City Council is the lawmaking body of the City of New York. It has 51 members from 51 council districts throughout the five boroughs. The Council serves as a check against the mayor in a "strong" mayor-council government model. The council monitors performance of city agencies and...
. Stokes was the second name on a ticket which featured William Randolph Hearst
William Randolph Hearst
William Randolph Hearst was an American business magnate and leading newspaper publisher. Hearst entered the publishing business in 1887, after taking control of The San Francisco Examiner from his father...
for Mayor, causing contemporaries to refer to the Municipal Ownership League as "Hearst's League." The decision to run downticket with the multimillionaire publisher was not a popular one with Stokes' radical new wife, who wished for defeat of Hearst and his associates. She later recalled:
"One evening, passing my living-room window, I heard Graham's name flung upward from the street below. I leaned out to see. A very fiery young man was making a speech from a soapboxSoapboxA soapbox is a raised platform on which one stands to make an impromptu speech, often about a political subject. The term originates from the days when speakers would elevate themselves by standing on a wooden crate originally used for shipment of soap or other dry goods from a manufacturer to a...
on the corner. A little knot of men, women, and children had collected about him. He was pointing up at my window — at me. He was saying things about us. I strained to hear... 'Municipal Ownership is no solution,' he cried, 'so long as the propertied classes own the municipalities. J.G. Phelps Stokes is a rich man — a man of property; he belongs to the capitalist classBourgeoisieIn sociology and political science, bourgeoisie describes a range of groups across history. In the Western world, between the late 18th century and the present day, the bourgeoisie is a social class "characterized by their ownership of capital and their related culture." A member of the...
. The Municipal Ownership League is a rich man's creation. W.R. Hearst belongs in the millionaire class. This is his government. He doesn't want to change the government. The Socialist Party, the workers' party, and what we want is a government of, for, and by the people who work.' 'Hear, hear!' I called down, leaning far out of the window and clapping my hands.
Graham Phelps Stokes seems to have joined 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...
in 1906. Even before that, Stokes was enlisted in the Socialist cause by author Upton Sinclair
Upton Sinclair
Upton Beall Sinclair Jr. , was an American author who wrote close to one hundred books in many genres. He achieved popularity in the first half of the twentieth century, acquiring particular fame for his classic muckraking novel, The Jungle . It exposed conditions in the U.S...
, who sought to establish a new group fostering the dispassionate study of socialist ideas on college campuses around America, an organization to be called the Intercollegiate Socialist Society
Intercollegiate Socialist Society
The Intercollegiate Socialist Society was the a Socialist student organization from 1905-1921. It attracted many prominent intellectuals and writers and acted as the unofficial Socialist Party of America student wing...
(ISS). Stokes was one of ten signatories of the published call for the new organization which appeared in the spring of 1905, joining Sinclair, author 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...
, attorney Clarence Darrow
Clarence Darrow
Clarence Seward Darrow was an American lawyer and leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union, best known for defending teenage thrill killers Leopold and Loeb in their trial for murdering 14-year-old Robert "Bobby" Franks and defending John T...
, sociologist and author Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Charlotte Perkins Gilman was a prominent American sociologist, novelist, writer of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction, and a lecturer for social reform...
, and others. The first formal meeting of the organization, held at a restaurant in New York City late in the summer of 1905, elected Stokes second vice president of the ISS, serving with London as president and Sinclair as first vice president.
In May 1907, Jack London resigned the presidency of the ISS and Graham Stokes assumed the position. He continued to play a leading role in the organization for the next decade, sitting on the organization's executive committee and speaking far and wide on topics on topics of contemporary concern under ISS auspices. In the spring of 1909, for example, Graham and Rose Stokes went on the road for a full month, speaking at colleges throughout New England, where they distributed ISS literature for free or at nominal charge to interested undergraduates.
Death and legacy
Graham Phelps Stokes died in 1960.Stokes' papers are housed at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
in New York City. The collection includes more than 1600 cataloged letters.
The Hartley House records, which include extensive correspondence with Graham Phelps Stokes, are housed at the University of Minnesota
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...
at Minneapolis
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis , nicknamed "City of Lakes" and the "Mill City," is the county seat of Hennepin County, the largest city in the U.S. state of Minnesota, and the 48th largest in the United States...
.
Books and pamphlets
- Hartley House: And Its Relations to the Social Reform Movement. New York: Hartley House, 1897.
- Public schools as social centres. Philadelphia: American Academy of Political and Social ScienceAmerican Academy of Political and Social ScienceThe American Academy of Political and Social Science was founded in 1889 to promote progress in the social sciences. Sparked by Professor Edmund J. James and drawing from members of the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania, Swarthmore College, and Bryn Mawr College, the Academy sought to...
, 1904. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science,; v. 23, no. 3; - The Socialism of To-day: A Source-Book of the Present Position and Recent Developmet of the Socialist and Labor Parties in All Countries, Consisting Mainly of Original Documents. Editor, with William English WallingWilliam English WallingWilliam English Walling was an American labor reformer and socialist born in Louisville, Kentucky. He was the grandson of William Hayden English, the Democratic candidate for vice president in 1880, and was born into wealth. He was educated at the University of Chicago and at Harvard Law School...
, Jessie Wallace HughanJessie Wallace HughanJessie Wallace Hughan was an American educator, a socialist activist, and a radical pacifist. During her college days she was one of four co-founders of Alpha Omicron Pi, a national sorority for university women. She also was a founder and the first Secretary of the War Resisters League,...
, and Harry W. LaidlerHarry W. LaidlerHarry Wellington Laidler was an American socialist functionary, writer, magazine editor, and politician. He is best remembered as Executive Director of the League for Industrial Democracy, successor to the Intercollegiate Socialist Society, and for his close political association with perennial...
. New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1916. - Down with Democracy! Down with Authority! : Lenine. New York : National Security LeagueNational Security LeagueThe National Security League was a nationalistic, militaristic, and eventually quasi-fascist nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that supported the naturalization and Americanization of immigrants, Americanism, a strong military, universal conscription, meritocracy and government regulation of the...
, n.d. [c. 1919]. - Industrial Paralysis under the Bolsheviki: An Examination of Falling Off of Productivity of Manufacturing Centers under 'Dictatorship of Proletariat'. New York: American Alliance for Labor and DemocracyAmerican Alliance for Labor and DemocracyThe American Alliance for Labor and Democracy was an American political organization established in September 1917 through the initiative of the American Federation of Labor and making use of the resources of the United States government's Committee on Public Information...
, 1919. - The One Lord of East and West. (Introduction by Swami SivanandaSwami SivanandaSwami Sivananda Saraswati was a Hindu spiritual teacher and a proponent of Yoga and Vedanta. Sivananda was born Kuppuswami in Pattamadai, in the Tirunelveli district of Tamil Nadu. He studied medicine and served in Malaya as a physician for several years before taking up monasticism...
) India: Yoga-Vedanta Forest AcademyYoga-Vedanta Forest AcademyThe Yoga-Vedanta Forest Academy is a school of the Divine Life Society located within Sivananda Ashram, near Rishikesh. Its aim is to train seekers in the practice of yoga as a general discipline for personal integration as well as human welfare...
, 1956. - The Ever-Returning Christ: And Other Writings. Sivanada Nagar, Rishikesh, India: Yoga Vedanta Forest University, 1958.
Articles
- "On the Relation of Settlement Work to the Evils of Poverty," International Journal of Ethics, vol. 11, no. 3, (April 1901) pp. 340–345.
- "Public Schools as Social Centres," The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, vol. 23 (May 1904), pp. 49–55.
External links
- Finding Aid for the James Graham Phelps Stokes Papers, Columbia University. Retrieved February 26, 2010.
- http://www.meherbabatravels.com/personalities/graham-phelps-stokes/Descriptions of Stokes's interactions with the spiritual teacher Meher BabaMeher BabaMeher Baba , , born Merwan Sheriar Irani, was an Indian mystic and spiritual master who declared publicly in 1954 that he was the Avatar of the age....
]