Communist Appeal
The MOWM had a peculiar relationship with communist organizations in the U.S. While the idea of proletariat uprising was attractive to some Communists, “they constantly drew a line between the ‘job-march’ and its ‘war-mongering leadership.’” Randolph used various tactics to avoid Communist membership in the March on Washington Movement. One of the most effective was restricting membership to African Americans. Although this didn’t exclude black Communists, only a small percentage of the disciplined Communist party members were black.
Read more about this topic: March On Washington Movement
Famous quotes containing the words communist and/or appeal:
“In communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticize after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, shepherd or critic.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)
“... life is moral responsibility. Life is several other things, we do not deny. It is beauty, it is joy, it is tragedy, it is comedy, it is psychical and physical pleasure, it is the interplay of a thousand rude or delicate motions and emotions, it is the grimmest and the merriest motley of phantasmagoria that could appeal to the gravest or the maddest brush ever put to palette; but it is steadily and sturdily and always moral responsibility.”
—Elizabeth Stuart Phelps (1844–1911)