Elizabeth Gurley Flynn

Elizabeth Gurley Flynn (August 7, 1890 – September 5, 1964) was an American labor leader and feminist. In the early years of her activist career, she was an organizer for the Industrial Workers of the World (known also as the IWW or the Wobblies). During World War I she founded the Workers Defense Union (WDU), to advocate for anyone arrested and imprisoned for violating the Espionage Act while championing the cause of labor. In 1920, Flynn helped found the American Civil Liberties Union. She joined the Communist Party USA in 1936 during the Popular Front period and became one of its most recognized and beloved leaders.

In 1940, in a highly controversial move, the ACLU expelled her from its executive committee because she was a Communist, despite her reputation as a longtime advocate of free speech. She was elected the first woman chair of the Party in 1961. After her passport was revoked because of her Party membership, she appealed successfully for its reinstatement. She died during a visit to the Soviet Union, where she was accorded a state funeral with processions in Red Square attended by more than 25,000 people.

Background

Elizabeth Gurley Flynn was born on August 7, 1890, in Concord, New Hampshire, the daughter of Annie (Gurley) and Thomas Flynn. The family moved in 1900 to the Bronx, New York, where she was educated at the local public schools. She was a bright student and a talented debater, winning a silver medal for her argumentative prowess. Her parents inspired her with stories about the Irish freedom struggle and introduced her to socialism. When she was only 15 years old, she gave her first public speech, "What Socialism Will Do for Women", at the Harlem Socialist Club. After this, she felt compelled to speak out for social change. She left Morris High School before graduation, a decision she later regretted. However, other sources state that she was expelled from high school due to her political involvement.

Career

Industrial Workers of the World

Flynn delivered her first soapbox speech for socialism in New York City in the summer of 1906. She was immediately arrested. Not long after that incident, she joined the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW; also known as the "Wobblies").

In 1907, Flynn became a full-time IWW organizer. She attended her first IWW convention in September of that year. Over the next few years, she organized campaigns among garment workers in Pennsylvania, silk weavers in New Jersey, restaurant workers in New York, miners in Minnesota, Missoula, Montana, and Spokane, Washington; and textile workers in Massachusetts. During this period, author Theodore Dreiser described her as the "East Side Joan of Arc". She was widely recognized for her youth, beauty, speaking ability, intelligence, and wit.

During one of her IWW speaking engagements Flynn met James Connolly, fellow Wobbly and revolutionary leader of the movement for Irish independence from England. She and Connolly became good friends and she worked with him, Patrick Quinlan, and other Irish Americans to establish the Irish Socialist Federation of New York. The federation aimed to assist working-class Irish in their revolutionary struggles, to educate Irish Americans about socialism, and to encourage working-class solidarity across racial, ethnic, and national lines for the emancipation of workers everywhere. Flynn championed Connolly's idea of a free and independent workers republic in Ireland throughout her life. She also befriended and worked with other Irish freedom fighters, including James Larkin and Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington.

In 1909, Flynn played a leading role in free speech fights in Missoula, MT, and Spokane, WA. The Missoula free speech fight ended in victory for Flynn and the IWW in October 1909. During the Spokane free speech fight, Flynn was arrested and imprisoned. She accused the police of using the jail as a brothel, which resulted in the city hiring a female prison matron. Flynn's allegation prompted Spokane city officials to try to confiscate all copies of the Industrial Worker reporting the charge. On March 4, 1910, Spokane relented, giving the IWW the right to hold speech meetings and letting all IWW protestors free.

During a cross-country speaking tour in spring of 1915, Flynn met with songwriter Joe Hill in the Salt Lake City County Jail, where he was awaiting the Utah Supreme Court to hear his case. Her account of the meeting, published in the May 22, 1915 issue of the Solidarity newspaper, was considered "a significant milestone in the IWW's support of Hill". Over the next several months, she and Hill had an active correspondence. He wrote and dedicated "The Rebel Girl" to her. On November 11, 1915, she managed to meet with President Woodrow Wilson in the White House to plead for clemency on Hill's behalf, but it was to no avail and he was executed eight days later.

Throughout her years of IWW activism, Flynn was arrested on ten occasions, but was never convicted of a crime. Disagreement with William D. Haywood over the structure of the IWW, and over the plea bargain that she and Joseph Ettor had arranged to secure the release of fellow Wobbly organizer Carlo Tresca (who was jailed during the Mesabi Range strike), led Flynn to break with the Wobblies in 1916. After she left the IWW, she continued to exhort workers, especially Black workers, to join the union.

Workers' Defense Union

Flynn organized the Workers' Defense Union in November 1918. An umbrella organization comprising trade unionists, socialists, syndicalists, anarchists, and communists, the WDU was not sectarian and did not discriminate on the basis of race or gender. It provided assistance with legal defense and publicity for labor activists arrested under the Espionage Act and advocated (unsuccessfully) for political prisoner status for those imprisoned for their labor activism. The WDU also provided material aid to immigrant radicals facing deportation and supported anticolonial movements in India, Mexico, and Ireland.

American Civil Liberties Union

Flynn was among those who founded the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in 1920. She played a leading role in the campaign against the conviction of Sacco and Vanzetti. Although her primary loyalty was to the labor movement, Flynn was also concerned with women's rights, supporting birth control. Flynn also criticized the leadership of trade unions for being male-dominated and not reflecting the needs of women.

In 1926, while she was actively involved in the defense campaign for Sacco and Vanzetti, Flynn was taken seriously ill while on a speaking trip on the West Coast. Between 1926 and 1936, she took a leave of absence from public life and recuperated in southwest Portland, Oregon, with birth control activist and suffragette Marie Equi. Despite her poor health, Flynn was a vocal supporter of the 1934 West Coast Longshore Strike.

International Labor Defense

From 1927 to 1930, Flynn chaired the International Labor Defense (ILD), a legal advocacy organization (like the Workers Defense Union), founded by the Communist Party. She resigned from the chair position because of ill health.