William Bross Lloyd (February 24, 1875 – June 30, 1946) was an American attorney and political activist. The oldest son of the
muckraking
The muckrakers were reform-minded journalists, writers, and photographers in the Progressive Era in the United States (1890s–1920s) who claimed to expose corruption and wrongdoing in established institutions, often through sensationalist publ ...
journalist
Henry Demarest Lloyd
Henry Demarest Lloyd (May 1, 1847 – September 28, 1903) was a 19th-century American progressive political activist and pioneer muckraking journalist. He is best remembered for his exposés of the Standard Oil Company, which were written before ...
and
Jessie Bross, daughter of ''
Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television a ...
'' founder
William Bross, William Bross Lloyd is best remembered as a founding member and financial angel of the fledgling
Communist Labor Party of America
The Communist Labor Party of America (CLPA) was one of the organizational predecessors of the Communist Party USA.
The group was established at the end of August 1919 following a three-way split of the Socialist Party of America. Although a legal ...
, forerunner of the
Communist Party USA.
Biography
Early years
William Bross Lloyd Sr. was born February 24, 1875, in
Chicago, Illinois
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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. He was the oldest son of
muckraking
The muckrakers were reform-minded journalists, writers, and photographers in the Progressive Era in the United States (1890s–1920s) who claimed to expose corruption and wrongdoing in established institutions, often through sensationalist publ ...
progressive journalist
Henry Demarest Lloyd
Henry Demarest Lloyd (May 1, 1847 – September 28, 1903) was a 19th-century American progressive political activist and pioneer muckraking journalist. He is best remembered for his exposés of the Standard Oil Company, which were written before ...
and Jessie Bross, daughter of ''
Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television a ...
'' founder
William Bross, through whom he ultimately inherited a valuable one-quarter share of the newspaper.
[Theodore Draper, ''The Roots of American Communism.'' New York: The Viking Press, 1957; pg. 138.]
Lloyd attended
Harvard College
Harvard College is the undergraduate college of Harvard University, an Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636, Harvard College is the original school of Harvard University, the oldest institution of higher lea ...
from which he graduated in 1898.
[Stephan Weatherly (ed.)]
"Biographical/Historical Information,"
William Bross Lloyd papers online finding aid. New York: New York Public Library, 2014. Thereafter he enrolled at
Harvard Law School, completing his studies there in 1902 and continuing to practice law in the states of
Massachusetts
Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...
and
Illinois
Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rockf ...
.
While at Harvard Lloyd met his fellow student
Lola Maverick and the couple married in November 1902.
The couple traveled briefly following their marriage before setting up house in Chicago, where William intended to begin practicing law.
[William Bross Lloyd, "William Bross Lloyd," i]
''Harvard College Class of 1898 Quindecennial Report.''
n.c.: n.p., June 1913; pp. 199-200. The couple would have four children, three girls and a son, before a bitter divorce in 1916.
Lloyd would remarry to Madge Bird following the divorce and fathered one more son in 1918 by his second wife.
Political activism
![The Wayside](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/98/The_Wayside.JPG)
Following his father's death in September 1903, William decided to enter politics himself, giving up plans on practicing law to instead become an activist in the movement for public ownership of the municipal railway system — the primary mode of civic transportation in the pre-automotive era.
While Lloyd's father, Henry Demarest Lloyd, had long been a member of the socialist movement,
as a youth William Bross Lloyd was not a member of the
Socialist Party of America or its youth section, joining the organization only in 1906.
Lloyd would remain a political activist for the better part of the next two decades.
In 1918, William Bross Lloyd entered the world of practical politics for himself, running for
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States.
The composition and pow ...
on the Socialist Party ticket.
Lloyd was a member of one of the earliest explicitly Bolshevik political organizations in the United States, the
Communist Propaganda League, established in Chicago in 1918.
Lloyd's personal secretary, attorney
Isaac Edward Ferguson, was the founding secretary of that same organization.
Lloyd was elected to the 15-member National Executive Committee which governed the Socialist Party in early 1919, but the results of the election — which would have turned control of the party and its assets to an insurgent left wing — were overturned and ignored by the outgoing NEC in June and he never assumed office.
Following the split of the left wing from the Socialist Party in the summer of 1919, Lloyd became a founding member of the
Communist Labor Party of America
The Communist Labor Party of America (CLPA) was one of the organizational predecessors of the Communist Party USA.
The group was established at the end of August 1919 following a three-way split of the Socialist Party of America. Although a legal ...
.
[Dennis Rodkin]
"The 1855 Home of a Legendary Chicago Journalist Sold in Winnetka for Almost $2 Million,"
''Chicago Magazine,'' July 29, 2013. After just three months of public existence this organization was subjected to government repression as one of the targets of the
Palmer Raids of January 2/3, 1920, and was driven underground.
Lloyd would be one of 20 Communists tried for conspiring to overthrow the US government in a major Chicago trial, which was prosecuted by future Chicago judge
Frank D. Comerford and defended by celebrated attorney
Clarence Darrow
Clarence Seward Darrow (; April 18, 1857 – March 13, 1938) was an American lawyer who became famous in the early 20th century for his involvement in the Leopold and Loeb murder trial and the Scopes "Monkey" Trial. He was a leading member of t ...
. The trial, which ran from May 10 to August 2, 1920, resulted in convictions for all of the defendants. Lloyd received a sentence of from 1 to 5 years in prison
[Lawrence Kestenbaum (ed.)]
"Politicians Who Died of Cancer: William Bross Lloyd (1875-1946),"
The Political Graveyard, www.politicalgraveyard.com/ but remained free on bail pending resolution of the appeal process. Though the appeals process was exhausted in 1922, Lloyd was no longer seen as a threatening advocate of communism by that date and his sentence was accordingly commuted.
Lloyd posted bail for
Big Bill Haywood
William Dudley "Big Bill" Haywood (February 4, 1869 – May 18, 1928) was an American labor organizer and founding member and leader of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and a member of the executive committee of the Socialist Party of ...
for his 1921 trial. Haywood skipped bail while out on appeal and fled to the Russian SFSR. The $15,000 bail was forfeited as a result of Haywood's flight.
Death and legacy
William Bross Lloyd died of cancer on June 30, 1946, at the
Ritz-Carlton Hotel
The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, LLC is an American multinational company that operates the luxury hotel chain known as The Ritz-Carlton. The company has 108 luxury hotels and resorts in 30 countries and territories with 29,158 rooms, in addi ...
in
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
.
He was 71 years old at the time of his death. Lloyd's body was cremated and his ashes cast into the Atlantic Ocean by his surviving family.
Lloyd's papers, combined into one collection with those of his eldest son, prominent
pacifist William Bross Lloyd Jr. (1908-1995), reside at the
New York Public Library in New York City.
["William Bross Lloyd Papers, 1912-1986."]
OCLC WorldCat no. 122466592. The collection, totaling 24 linear feet of material, is housed in 41 archival boxes and includes writings, publications, photographs, and family correspondence.
Footnotes
Works
* ''Peace: Now You See It and Now You Don't; or, That's All — The Prestidigitator.'' n.c.
hicago? n.p.,
. 1917
* ''The Socialist Party and Its Purposes.'' With Isaac Edward Ferguson. Chicago: Goodspeed Press, 1918.
* "Silence — And the Resurrection: A Letter from William Bross Lloyd" with "In Reply" by Max Eastman, ''The Liberator,'
vol. 1, no. 6(Aug. 1918), pp. 30–32.
Further reading
* Clarence Darrow
''Argument of Clarence Darrow in the Case of the Communist Labor Party in the Criminal Court, Chicago.''Chicago: Charles H. Kerr and Co., 1920.
External links
* Weatherly Stephan (ed.)
William Bross Lloyd papers online finding aid, New York Public Library, 2014.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lloyd, William Bross
1875 births
1946 deaths
Politicians from Chicago
Harvard Law School alumni
Lawyers from Chicago
Massachusetts lawyers
Members of the Socialist Party of America
American Marxists
Harvard College alumni