Communist International And U.s. Communism, 1919-1929

Jacob A. Zumoff, PhD (2003) in history, University of London, has lectured at several universities, including as a visiting professor at the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey and, most recently, New Jersey City University. He has published on the labour movement and racial oppression in the Americas.

"[...] this fine book stands as a major contribution to the history of Communism in the United States."Paul Le Blanc, Labour/Le Travail (2015)Jacob Zumoff’s book is a major contribution to the history of the CPUSA and of the Communist International itself in its first decade. Based on meticulous scholarship and rigorous analysis, it will become the standard text on the party’s first decade. But, more importantly, the book also serves as a vital tool for those who today view the history of the early Communist International and the successes and failures of the CPUSA not merely as a topic of historical enquiry but as a crucial programmatic component for today’s struggles to build a party that can lead a successful workers’ revolution.”Tony Colins, Marx and Philosophy Review of Books"The Communist International and US Communism, 1919-1929 is a detailed, nuanced book that analyses a very important period in U.S. communist history. It is a book worth reading. And reading again."Tony Pecinovsky, People's WorldJacob A. Zumoff has written an impressive scholarly tome [that] belongs in all research libraries and in big city public libraries”Dan La Botz, New Politics"This book deserves a much more detailed examination and review than we are able to bring in this last issue of NWF labor scholars will find it interesting."Gerry Henkel, New World FinnIn many ways Jacob Zumoff’s recent in-depth look at the earliest years of the Communist movement in the U.S. affirms Theodore Draper’s earlier work, but it has much to offer on its own, especially in today’s political climate Using Soviet archives unavailable to Draper, Zumoff presents a nuanced story of change, both in the U.S. party and in the Comintern itself. Along the way he offers insight into the importance of tempering ideology with reality while avoiding factional pettiness.”Beverly Tomek, WorkingUSA

• AbbreviationsAcknowledgementsIntroduction: History and Historiography of American Communism in the 1920s1: The Formation of the Communist Party, 1912–212: The Fight for Legality3: Communists and the Labour Movement4: William Z. Foster and the Turn towards the Labour Movement5: The Farmer-Labor Party6: The La Follette Fiasco, 1923–247: The Double-Edged Sword of ‘Bolshevisation’, 1924–268: The Foreign-Language Federations and ‘Bolshevisation’9: Factionalism and Mass Work, 1925–2710: The death of Ruthenberg and the Ascension of Lovestone, 1926–2711: Lovestone between Bukharin and Stalin, 1927–2812: The ‘Third Period’, the Sixth Congress and the Elimination of Opposition, 1928–2913: Lovestone becomes a Lovestoneite, 1928–192914: The ‘Negro Question’ to the Fourth Comintern Congress15: The ‘Negro Question’ from the Fourth to the Sixth Congress16: The Sixth Congress and the ‘Negro Question’17: ‘Self-Determination’ and Comintern InterventionConclusionBibliographyIndex