We discussed Eugene V. Debs and his arrest because of his opposition to WWI in class, so I thought I'd give some background as well as the details of his arrest.
Eugene V. Debs was born in Terre Haute, Indiana in 1855, the son of poor immigrants. He left school early to work on the railroads, where he joined the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and later co-founded the Industrial Workers of the World. He would lead the American Railway Union to challenge the federal troops sent to end the Pullman Strike of 1864, and was subsequently jailed for six months. After his release, Debs rose to become a key speaker for the socialist party, and ran for president in 1900. He reached the peak of popularity in the election of 1912, in which he ran against Democrat Woodrow Wilson, president-at-the-time William Howard Taft, and former president Theodore Roosevelt. Debs received nearly one million votes in this election. In 1916, Debs ran for an Indiana Congressional Seat; his campaign was composed of pacifist beliefs and a strong conviction in American Neutrality. Debs was elected into the seat in 1916, however was arrested under the Espionage Act of 1917 in 1918 when he made an “anti war speech;” in fact he only mentioned the war once in this speech. Debs' was accused by the district attorney of Canton, Ohio.Throughout the trial, Debs did not call any witnesses, however addressed the court at length; he did not deny the speech he made, nor his socialist beliefs, but he argued that his right to free speech was protected under the First Amendment. He even sarcastically quoted President Woodrow Wilson’s campaign speeches in 1912 which strongly supported free speech. Debs was found guilty by a jury on six counts of sedition on September 12, 1918. He was sentenced to ten to fifteen years. Debs’ continual popularity in the Socialist party was demonstrated by the fact that he was nominated as the Socialist Party presidential candidate in 1920, and despite running his campaign from a jail cell, Debs’ was able to win over a million votes in the election of 1920. Throughout his time in jail, Debs never renounced his belief that capitalism had caused World War I. He was released under presidential pardon on Christmas, in 1921, by President Harding. President Woodrow Wilson refused to grant Debs his freedom, despite the pleas of over one million of his followers, as Wilson saw Debs as a security threat.
Do you think Wilson had basis to believe that Debs was a threat? Or was his arrest simply a result of war fever?
“I am opposing a social order in which it is possible for one man who does absolutely nothing that is useful to amass a fortune of hundreds of millions of dollars, while millions of men and women who work all the days of their lives secure barely enough for a wretched existence.”
-Debs' Statement to the Court Upon Being Convicted of Violation of The Espionage Act in 1918
Sources:
"Democracy's Prisoner: Eugene V. Debs, the Great War, and the Right to Dissent." Publishers Weekly 3 Mar. 2008: 39. Student Resources in Context. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
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<http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/wilson/peopleevents/p_debs.html>
This is an interesting and well written post, Mehr! I'm glad you detailed Debs' arrest because I was wondering about it in class. To me, it's pretty infuriating that the federal government stripped the people of their right to freedom of speech during wartime. Regardless of what one thinks about Debs' beliefs, it's clear that his arrest was unfounded. So to address your question, I believe that his arrest was simply a result of war fever.
ReplyDeleteWhile I agree that Debs' arrest seems unjustified, I think that perhaps Wilson has some basis for his actions, even if it doesn't really make up for what he did. The war appears to have been opposed by many Americans before the country got involved, and I can see how he would be afraid that very reasonable arguments against the war would hurt the war effort. The whole country needed to be mobilized for war.
ReplyDeleteI most definitely believe with Maya and Rebecca in that Debs' arrest was was unjust. Maya, your comment about how unjust it is for the government to pass acts that strip people of their constitutional rights is what I want to talk more about. Rebecca said that Wilson's conviction of Debs can be justified, and I agree that in certain circumstances arrest may be necessary in order to ensure the authority of the President. But that does not mean I agree with such acts as the Sedition Act that apply to the entire population. This is because more often than not, the acts result in the conviction of relatively innocent people.
ReplyDeleteAn example today of such a constitutional right violating Act is the Patriot Act. One thing this at does is allow the government to invade into people's homes to conduct searches without a search warrant. Anothing thing the act does is allow people to be taken to Guantanamo Bay where they are torchered and denied their rights under U.S. law. Prisoners are denied their miranda rights, such as the right to remain silent, the right to a fair trial, and the right to remain silent.
I don't know about all you guys, but to me this is unjust, especially considering the fact that so many innocent people have been convicted as a result of this act.
Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Act
I think that it was unjust for Wilson to put Debs in jail essentially because he was a political opponent, but it does make a lot of sense from Wilson's point of view. If everyone wasn't supporting the war then the war really couldn't be fought. And he thought that he was fighting a war to end all wars and create world peace; from that standpoint it's probably worth it to strip a few people of their rights in order to eliminate war from the wolrd.
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