Clarence Miller (born 1906) was a 20th-century American labor activist who, as a member of the

Young Communist League USA The Young Communist League USA (YCLUSA) is a communist youth organization in the United States. The stated aim of the League is the development of its members into Communists, through studying Marxism–Leninism and through active participation ...

, participated in the 1926 Passaic textile strike (January 25, 1926 – March 1, 1927) and the 1929

Loray Mill strike The Loray Mill strike of 1929 in Gastonia, North Carolina, was a notable strike action in the labor history of the United States. Though largely unsuccessful in attaining its goals of better working conditions and wages, the strike was considere ...

(AKA Gastonia Strike) (March 30, 1929 – June 7, 1929), in which he and six other labor leaders were found guilty of murder.

Background

Clarence Miller was born in 1906 to "middle-class parents." He joined the Young People's Socialist League "while still in school."

Career

Miller was a leader of the Young Communist League.

1926 Passaic Strike

In 1926, Clarence Miller was a strike leader during the Passaic strike, along with Kate Gitlow (mother of

Benjamin Gitlow Benjamin Gitlow (December 22, 1891 – July 19, 1965) was a prominent American socialist politician of the early 20th century and a founding member of the Communist Party USA. During the end of the 1930s, Gitlow turned to conservatism and wrote t ...

Elizabeth Gurley Flynn Elizabeth Gurley Flynn (August 7, 1890 – September 5, 1964) was a labor leader, activist, and feminist who played a leading role in the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). Flynn was a founding member of the American Civil Liberties Union ...

. On February 2, 1926, Miller met with

Albert Weisbord Albert Weisbord (1900–1977) was an American political activist and union organizer. He is best remembered, along his wife Vera Buch, as one of the primary union organizers of the seminal 1926 Passaic Textile Strike and as the founder of a s ...

William Weinstone William Wolf Weinstone (1897–1985) was an American Communist politician and labor leader. Weinstone served as Executive Secretary of the unified Communist Party of America, the forerunner of today's Communist Party USA, from October 15, 1921, to ...

, Joseph Zack, and others named Kovetz, Blumkin, Baylin, and Dyaik.

International Labor Defense The International Labor Defense (ILD) (1925–1947) was a legal advocacy organization established in 1925 in the United States as the American section of the Comintern's International Red Aid network. The ILD defended Sacco and Vanzetti, was activ ...

mentioned Miller ("another of the young militants") faced probably prison term. Jack Rubinstein and Miller was held on $10,000 bail. On May 17, 1926, the case against Rubinstein and Miller was dismissed. On June 18, 1926, Miller spoke to a YCL Youth Conference in New York City.

1929 Gastonia Strike

On March 30, 1929, Fred Erwin Beal of the National Textile Workers Union led the Loray Mill strike, better known as the 1929 Gastonia Strike. In late April 1929, Miller and his wife arrived in Gastonia with CPUSA representative Jack Johnstone. On June 7, 1929, Miller was one of 16 workers arrested during the strike. Other "communists among the prisoners" included: Fred Beal, Vera Bush, Amy Schechter, and "19-year old Sophie Melvin of the Young Communist League." All 16 faced threat of the

electric chair An electric chair is a device used to execute an individual by electrocution. When used, the condemned person is strapped to a specially built wooden chair and electrocuted through electrodes fastened on the head and leg. This execution method, ...

. On October 6, 1929, Miller testified about dynamiting of strike headquarters. Edith Saunders Miller, Miller's wife, testified that "she had taught the children in the strikers' tent colony to strive for a Soviet-style government of workers and farmers." She "avowed almost all of the Communist principles that Beal had carefully avoided." (In 1949, Beal wrote, "Comrade Edith Miller was addressing the Court, but she was anticipating the commendation of Stalin's lackeys in New York and Moscow.") On October 21, 1929, seven of the Gastonia strike leaders and union members were found guilty of the murder of O.F. Aderholt, chief of police: Fred Beal, Clarence Miller, George Carter, Joseph Harrison, W.M. McGinnis, and Louis McLaughlin. Beal later noted, "It was characteristic of Southern justice that the four Yankee 'foreigners'–George Carter, Joseph Harrison, Clarence Miller, and I–were given the more severe sentences... from seventeen to twenty years of hard labor in the State prison at

Raleigh Raleigh (; ) is the capital city of the state of North Carolina and the seat of Wake County in the United States. It is the second-most populous city in North Carolina, after Charlotte. Raleigh is the tenth-most populous city in the Southeas ...

." On October 31, 1929, Miller wrote a letter to Max Bedacht, who was acting Party leader at the time, following the expulsion of

Jay Lovestone Jay Lovestone (15 December 1897 – 7 March 1990) was an American activist. He was at various times a member of the Socialist Party of America, a leader of the Communist Party USA, leader of a small oppositionist party, an anti-Communist and Centr ...

) in which he complained that "Beal had lost faith in the Party" and was blaming

for losing them the case. He suggested that the Party send Beal on a national tour to help him recover his faith. After the trial,

William F. Dunne William Francis Dunne (October 15, 1887September 23, 1953) was an American Marxist political activist, newspaper editor and trade unionist. He is best remembered as the editor of the radical ''Butte Bulletin'' around the turn of the 1920s and a ...

, editor of the ''

Daily Worker The ''Daily Worker'' was a newspaper published in New York City by the Communist Party USA, a formerly Comintern-affiliated organization. Publication began in 1924. While it generally reflected the prevailing views of the party, attempts were ...

'', offered to help the condemned escape to the Soviet Union. Clarence Miller, his wife, Beal, and three other co-defendants secretly raised funds and secured fake passports and left the States. "Miller was personally all for skipping" bail and fleeing to Russia. Miller and Harrison traveled first. Beal traveled second. (In September 1931, when Beal made a second trip to Russia, he did so in the company of

Myra Page Dorothy Markey (born Dorothy Page Gary, 1897–1993), known by the pen name Myra Page, was a 20th-century American communist writer, journalist, union activist, and teacher. Background Page was born Dorothy Page Gary on October 1, 1897, ...

and her husband, John Mackey.) In a 1937 article, Beal wrote, "I could not, like Clarence Miller and so many other complaisant dream-walkers, convince myself that the suffering and futility which I saw everywhere in Stalin-land were but figments of the Capitalist imagination."In September 1931, In his 1949 memoir, he wrote:

Only Clarence Miller, who was never a worker and whose connection with the Gastonia strike was accidental, blossomed out in Soviet Russia as a "Red professor" and occupied a comfortable apartment, enjoying the prosperity of Soviet bureaucracy.

He worked for the Comintern, as did his wife when she traveled to Russia to live with him. On June 27, 1931, the

Lovestoneite The Lovestoneites, led by former General Secretary of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) Jay Lovestone, were a small American oppositionist communist movement of the 1930s. The organization emerged from a factional fight in the CPUSA in 1929 and unsu ...

newspaper '' Revolutionary Age'' mentioned an article on the Young Communist League that "Clarence Miller was district organizer back in 1928." On August 9, 1949, Joseph Zack Kornfeder testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) regarding Communist infiltration of American labor unions: In response to the question "Did many Americans attend the Academy of Red Professors?" he said:

There were two that I know of... Sam Don, D-O-N, who later became editor of the ''Daily Worker'', and another one was Miller, I believe Clarence Miller. After his graduation he was utilized in the apparatus of the
Communist International The Communist International (Comintern), also known as the Third International, was a Soviet-controlled international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism. The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress to "struggle by ...
. I don't know to what extent he became active in the American Communist Party, however. I haven't seen his name in any public activity.

Personal life and death

Miller married Edith Saunders. In 1926, Miller changed from Socialist to Communist Party allegiance during the Passaic Strike. Beal stressed that Miller was "not of proletarian origin" and "never a proletarian." According to Vera Buch Weisbord, Miller had supported

but left the

Lovestoneites The Lovestoneites, led by former General Secretary of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) Jay Lovestone, were a small American oppositionist Communism, communist movement of the 1930s. The organization emerged from a factional fight in the CPUSA in 19 ...

for the main

CPUSA The Communist Party USA, officially the Communist Party of the United States of America (CPUSA), is a communist party in the United States which was established in 1919 after a split in the Socialist Party of America following the Russian Revo ...

. Weisbord (wife of the best known Passaic strike leader,

–a Lovestoneite) said that the Party played up the roles of Clarence Miller and his wife; in fact, their roles in the Gastonia strike were minimal. Beal described Miller's role similarly.

Legacy

In 1926,

Sam Krieger Samuel Krieger (1902-1981) was an American union organizer, IWW member, Teamsters member, and communist. Life Background Samuel Krieger was born in Russia on August 20, 1902. He came with his family to the United States at age two. He grew u ...

took "Clarence Miller" as his Party name, which he used for his chapter in the 1926 book ''The Law of Social Revolution,'' published under the lead of

Scott Nearing Scott Nearing (August 6, 1883 – August 24, 1983) was an American radical economist, educator, writer, political activist, pacifist, vegetarian and advocate of simple living. Biography Early years Nearing was born in Morris Run, Tioga Coun ...

. Miller appeared in the documentary ''The Passaic Film Strike'' (1926).

References

Sources

* * * * * * * * * * * *
Alt URL

* * * * *

External sources

*
American Film Institute - Clarence Miller
* ''Red Fraud: An Expose of Stalinism'' (introduced by Ferdinand Lundberg, prefaced by

James T. Farrell James Thomas Farrell (February 27, 1904 – August 22, 1979) was an American novelist, short-story writer and poet. He is most remembered for the ''Studs Lonigan'' trilogy, which was made into a film in 1960 and a television series in 1979. B ...

) (1949)
Register of the William T. Poole collection
Correspondence with Clarence Miller 1928-1929 {{DEFAULTSORT:Miller, Clarence Trade unionists from North Carolina 1906 births Year of death missing Members of the Communist Party USA Members of the Socialist Party of America