Did you know that the ACLU was founded by Communists?

Question

Roger Nash Baldwin : the founder, and director of ACLU. At the time of the founding, he was deeply involved in the communist movement. In late 1935, he gave a speech that said his political goal was communism. Baldwin wrote the following in his college yearbook:

“I have been to Europe several times, mostly in connection with international radical activities…and have traveled in the United States to areas of conflict over workers rights to strike and organize. My chief aversion is the system of greed, private profit, privilege and violence which makes up the control of the world today, and which has brought it to the tragic crisis of unprecedented hunger and unemployment…Therefore, I am for Socialism, disarmament and ultimately, for the abolishing of the State itself…I seek the social ownership of property, the abolition of the propertied class and sole control of those who produce wealth. Communism is the goal”.”

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=41751

Answer 1

llitrix and tribecab, you guys aren't telling the whole story:

Baldwin was against the Soviets opression of its citizens through police force, and he felt that there was no stopping communism from going down this road. Therefore, he tried to remove all communists from the ACLU in the 1940's.

But he never reneged on his words from 1935. He still believed in a communist economy and a communist culture of no religion, just like the ACLU does today.

Baldwin didn't directly turn on communism, he turned on the Soviets policy of opressing their people.

Karl Marx himself never believed in opression!

Answer 2

It would really be nice if you were honest for a change. Roger Nash Baldwin developed a sympathy for the Soviet Union and for Communism that lasted until 1939 when he was disillusioned by the Nazi-Soviet Pact and broke off all radical ties. In 1927, he had visited the Soviet Union and wrote a book, Liberty Under the Soviets, which contained extensive praise for the Soviet Union. However, he later denounced communism in his book, A New Slavery, which condemned "the inhuman communist police state tyranny". In the 1940s, Baldwin led the campaign to purge the ACLU of Communist Party members.
He also helped found the Japanese version of the Civil Rights Union in Japan.
I am all for the ACLU. Who else would stand up to our government for our civil rights if they weren't around?

Answer 3

This is the same Roger Baldwin who, in 1940, ousted all communists from the ACLU board. He also drafted the resolution that required all ACLU officials to aver that they were not adherents of communism. Baldwin stated that “No movement in which Communists participate can successfully resist their manipulations for control.” Apparently, he had a change of heart.

Answer 4

There was a small, but vocal movement in this country in the 30's started by socialists and, or, communists. Many of the early unionizers were socialists, as an example. Many intellectuals of this time had sympathies for socialists, and even the USSR, of course, without knowing Stalin was murdering his own people by the millions at the time!

Answer 5

Communists? I thought the ACLU was founded by idiots!

The ACLU defended KKK members for free speech rights, yet goes on an all-out campaign on the County of Los Angeles for having a small cross which symbolized the influence of the California missions on the Countys seal.

Answer 6

That's funny. Most people credit the Jews with the founding of the ACLU.....Maybe some of them were communists?

In any event, certainly none of the Muslim nations have anything as good as that.

Answer 7

Do you know that the United States was founded by agents of the British government? After all, some of the people who were the Founders of this country had previously worked for the British govt.

Baldwin was one of many individuals who founded the ACLU, and one of only two out of a dozen that had any affiliations with the Communist party. And both of those people dropped their support of the Communist party when the party started advocating violence. And all of this was long before WW2, and long before Communism was viewed as a Cold War threat.

This blanket statement is both massively inaccurate and grossly misleading. But maybe that's your point.

If your only goal is to trigger emotional buttons, with no regard for the actual facts, then congratulations. You have succeeded at distracting people from looking at the facts.

Answer 8

both together combined search threw both seperate bad from the good and let the human race in whole decide not any ruler or king or president as to what we as many like the sands of the sea should have say .

Answer 9

The Communists have had all of the above: greed, private profit, privilege and violence. The USSR would still be around if they could have made Marx's dream work.

The US has three of the four right now except for systematic violence against its own people.

Answer 10

OK, so one of the founders of the ACLU was for socialism back when he was in college in the 1930s.

Therefore this organization which defends the Constitution against all attackers is bad.

Typical rightwing "logic".

Rightwingers attack people, because they can't argue issues on the facts.