James H. Maurer
Encyclopedia
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
trade unionist
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
who twice ran for the office of Vice President of the United States
Vice President of the United States
The Vice President of the United States is the holder of a public office created by the United States Constitution. The Vice President, together with the President of the United States, is indirectly elected by the people, through the Electoral College, to a four-year term...
on the ticket of 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...
.
Early years
James H. Maurer was born in ReadingReading, Pennsylvania
Reading is a city in southeastern Pennsylvania, USA, and seat of Berks County. Reading is the principal city of the Greater Reading Area and had a population of 88,082 as of the 2010 census, making it the fifth most populated city in the state after Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Allentown and Erie,...
, Berks County, Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...
on April 15, 1864, the son of a shoemaker. Maurer first went to work at age 9 and became a machinist's apprentice at age 16.
Political career
Maurer joined the Knights of LaborKnights of Labor
The Knights of Labor was the largest and one of the most important American labor organizations of the 1880s. Its most important leader was Terence Powderly...
in April 1880 and was active in the Single Tax movement. In the early 1890s, he joined the People's Party
Populist Party (United States)
The People's Party, also known as the "Populists", was a short-lived political party in the United States established in 1891. It was most important in 1892-96, then rapidly faded away...
, a populist
Populism
Populism can be defined as an ideology, political philosophy, or type of discourse. Generally, a common theme compares "the people" against "the elite", and urges social and political system changes. It can also be defined as a rhetorical style employed by members of various political or social...
political organization which attempted in particular to advance the cause of the nation's farmers. He was introduced to socialist ideas near the end of the decade, spending nearly a year to read Karl Marx
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His ideas played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement...
's Capital before joining the Socialist Labor Party of America (SLP) in 1899. Maurer helped to organize Section Hamburg, Pennsylvania SLP in February of that year.
From 1901 he was a member of the Plumbers and Steamfitters Union. Throughout his later life Maurer was strongly supportive of the American Federation of Labor
American Federation of Labor
The American Federation of Labor was one of the first federations of labor unions in the United States. It was founded in 1886 by an alliance of craft unions disaffected from the Knights of Labor, a national labor association. Samuel Gompers was elected president of the Federation at its...
and he came to strongly disapprove of the SLP's efforts to establish a competing socialist trade union to the AF of L, the Socialist Trade and Labor Alliance
Socialist Trade and Labor Alliance
The Socialist Trade and Labor Alliance - commonly abbreviated STLA or ST&LA - was a revolutionary socialist labor union in the United States closely linked to the Socialist Labor Party , which existed from 1895 until becoming a part of the Industrial Workers of the World at its founding in 1905.The...
and left the SLP to join 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...
(SPA) in 1901 over this issue. He ran for Governor of Pennsylvania on the Socialist Party ticket in 1906, garnering nearly 26,000 votes.
In November 1910, Maurer was elected as a Socialist to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives
Pennsylvania House of Representatives
The Pennsylvania House of Representatives is the lower house of the bicameral Pennsylvania General Assembly, the legislature of the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. There are 203 members, elected for two year terms from single member districts....
, serving through 1912. That same year he was elected as President of the Pennsylvania Federation of Labor, a post which he held until 1930. Defeated in his bid for reelection to the Pennsylvania House in 1913, Maurer came back from the loss to win election to two more terms, in 1915 and 1917. Maurer was instrumental in working for the passage of child labor and workmen's compensation legislation in the state.
In January of 1916, Maurer was part of a three person delegation to President Wilson
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...
to advocate part of the Socialist Party's peace program, proposing that "the President of the United States convoke a congress of neutral nations, which shall offer mediation to the belligerents and remain in permanent session until the termination of the war." A resolution to this effect had been offered in the House of Representatives by the SPA's lone Congressman, Meyer London
Meyer London
Meyer London was an American politician from New York City. He was one of only two members of the Socialist Party of America elected to the United States Congress.-Early years:...
of New York, and President Wilson received London, Maurer, and party leader Morris Hillquit
Morris Hillquit
Morris Hillquit was a founder and leader of the Socialist Party of America and prominent labor lawyer in New York City's Lower East Side during the early 20th century.-Early years:...
at the White House
White House
The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...
, along with various other delegations. Hillquit later recalled that Wilson was at first "inclined to give us a short and perfunctory hearing" but as the Socialists made their case to him, the session "developed into a serious and confidential conversation." Wilson told the group that he had already considered a similar plan but chose not to put it into effect because he was not sure of its reception by other neutral nations. "The fact is," Wilson claimed, "that the United States is the only important country that may be said to be neutral and disinterested. Practically all other neutral countries are in one way or another tied up with some belligerent power and dependent on it."
Maurer was elected multiple times to the governing National Executive Committee of the SPA. He was also President of the Workers' Education Bureau of America and Brookwood Labor College from 1921. He was on the governing National Committee of the Conference for Progressive Political Action
Conference for Progressive Political Action
The Conference for Progressive Political Action was officially established by the convention call of the 16 major railway labor unions in the United States, represented by a committee of six: William H. Johnston of the Machinists' Union, Martin F. Ryan of the Railway Carmen, Warren S. Stone of the...
(CPPA) from 1922. He was strongly supportive of Robert LaFollette's
Robert M. La Follette, Sr.
Robert Marion "Fighting Bob" La Follette, Sr. , was an American Republican politician. He served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, was the Governor of Wisconsin, and was also a U.S. Senator from Wisconsin...
1924 campaign for President.
In 1928, Maurer was selected by party convention to join Norman Thomas
Norman Thomas
Norman Mattoon Thomas was a leading American socialist, pacifist, and six-time presidential candidate for the Socialist Party of America.-Early years:...
on the Socialist Party's presidential ticket. He ran a second time for Governor of Pennsylvania in 1930. In 1932 he was selected once again as Norman Thomas' number two in the SPA's presidential campaign. In 1934, Maurer made his final electoral run as a candidate for US Senate from Pennsylvania.
In 1938 the Socialist Party-affiliated Rand School Press
Rand School of Social Science
The Rand School of Social Science was formed in New York City by adherents of the Socialist Party of America in 1906. The school aimed to provide a broad education to workers, imparting a politicizing class-consciousness, and additionally served as a research bureau, a publisher, and the operator...
published Maurer's autobiography, It Can Be Done.
Jim Maurer retained his faith in socialism
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...
into the New Deal
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...
of President Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...
, writing in 1938:
"There can be no doubt that if the cards were dealt honestly and the game played on the level without marked cards, the New Deal would be a vast improvement over the Old. But if President Roosevelt believes that those who profited under the old deal and never played the game square in their lives will now play fair with him, he is due for a rude awakening. I believe President Roosevelt is sincere and that he really hopes to lift the suffering masses out of their desperate poverty and yet save capitalism....
"Just how President Roosevelt and his advisers hope to lift the exploited and oppressed out of the mire by increasing profits and raising the cost of living is too deep for me. If they believe employers will increase wages as their profits increase, then they believe the leopard can change his spots. They should know that increased profits only increase the appetite for profits. The desire for the accumulation of great wealth seems like a disease, and disease has never been cured by increasing its virulence. ...[T]he one lasting solution is the end of the profit system."
Works
- Unemployment and the Mechanical Man Our strike-breaking governments n.d.
- The Far East, Reading, Pa., Press of Sentinel Print. Co., 1912.
- The Constabulary of Pennsylvania (with Charles Maurer) [Reading, Pa.? : C.A. Maurer?,
- A reply to "The American Cossack." (with John Groome) n.p., 1915.
- Things We Care About. (with others) [New York : People's Council of America for Democracy and PeacePeople's Council of America for Democracy and PeaceThe People's Council of America for Democracy and Peace, commonly known as the "People's Council," was an American pacifist political organization established in New York City in May 1917...
, 1917. - Report of the Pennsylvania Commission on Old Age Pensions, March, 1919. Harrisburg, Penna., J.L.L. Kuhn, Printer to the Commonwealth, 1919.
- A Heart to Heart Talk with Trade Unionists Chicago: Socialist Party National Office, 1920.
- Report on the Workers' Educational Classes in Pennsylvania during 1920-1921 Reading, PA: Peoples Printing Company, 1921.
- The Open Shop? Harrisburg, Pa., Pennsylvania Fderation of Labor 1921.
- Report of the Pennsylvania commission on old age pensions. February, 1921 Harrisburg, Penna., J.L.L. Kuhn, Printer to the commonwealth, 1921.
- Report of the Pennsylvania Commission on Old Age Pensions, January, 1927. Harrisburg, PA: 1927.
- Unemployment and the mechanical man Chicago: Socialist Party of America, 1930.
- Socialism vs. capitalism Brooklyn: Socialist Party, Kings County, 1932.
- It Can Be Done: The Autobiography of James Hudson Maurer'.' New York, Rand School Press, 1938.