B. The War Years
“You Will Pay in Blood and Suffering” read the leaflet distributed by the Socialists of Cleveland on April 1, 1917. It was one of many warnings delivered at a series of anti-war rallies organized by Charles Ruthenberg to protest America’s impending entry into World War I. When Congress declared war on Germany five days later, he composed a “Manifesto Against War,” which the Socialist News published. “In all history,” Ruthenberg wrote, “there has been no more unjustified war than that which this nation is about to engage in. . . . No greater dishonor has been forced upon a people than that which the capitalist class is forcing upon this nation against its will.”[24] The Manifesto urged workers to engage in a general strike that would trammel the war economy and force the government to remain neutral.[25]
Ruthenberg had long anticipated public counter-offensives to suppress socialist demonstrations against American war policy. “We are being tested by fire,” he notified the readers of the Socialist News.[26] Still, the heat had not yet been cranked up and directed against him personally. That was to change in June of 1917. Under the pressure of local businesses and newspapers, the Printz-Biederman Company forced Ruthenberg to choose between his political activities or his purchasing-agent job; he chose socialism, and was fired. Even worse, a Cleveland federal grand jury indicted him, along with two of his colleagues, for obstructing the Conscription Act. The prosecution’s star witness was a young man unknown to him, Alphons J. Schue, who had pled guilty for refusing to register after having been induced by Ruthenberg’s speeches not to comply with the law. With an unsympathetic jury, a guilty verdict was no surprise. Before his sentencing, Ruthenberg addressed the court: “I am not conscious of having committed any crime. The thing I am conscious of is having endeavored to inspire higher ideals and nobler lives. If to do that is a crime in the eyes of the Government, I am proud to have committed that crime.”[27] He was sentenced to one year in the workhouse at Canton, Ohio.[28]
Out of jail on bail pending the appeal of his conviction, Ruthenberg mounted a vigorous mayoral campaign under the slogan: “For Socialism, Peace and Democracy.” His stirring address to an audience of 10,000 sympathetic listeners at the Cleveland Federation of Labor’s picnic on Labor Day was meant to be one of the campaign’s highlights. As Ruthenberg spoke, however, a cluster of rowdy soldiers pushed their way to the front of the crowd and demanded that he step down; they climbed onto the stage, shoving and punching anyone who tried to stop them. They succeeded in breaking up the assembly as thousands fled into the streets. Ultimately, Ruthenberg was not elected mayor, although he ran in third place with 27,865 votes, more than double his tally for the prior mayoral election. Two months later, in January of 1918, he entered prison after his anti-recruitment conviction was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, with Justice Brandeis joining a unanimous judgment that rejected a host of alleged criminal procedural errors.[29] He was released in December of that year, after serving ten months on good behavior as a clerk-typist in the prison office.[30]
