I’m not sure if it’s officially called that or not, but it’s as good a day as any to celebrate the life of Eugene v Debs. On June 16, 1918, Eugene v Debs gave a vibrant anti-war speech at Canton, Ohio. This speech would end up with his arrest and imprisonment. As he later explained in his book Walls and Bars:
The world war was in progress and the excitement was intense. I had my own views in regard to the war, and I knew in advance that an expression of what was in my heart would invite a prison sentence under the Espionage Law. I took my stand in accordance with the dictates of my conscience, and was prepared to accept the consequences without complaint. The choice was deliberately made, and there has never since been a moment of regret. It was not because I yearned for imprisonment that I took the position that human beings had a higher call and a nobler purpose in life than slaughtering each other and hating those they could not kill, but simply because I could take no other, although realizing fully that the choice led through prison gates.
The Espionage Act that led to Debs’ imprisonment remains today and has been recently used against John Kiriakou, Edward Snowden, Reality Winner, Julian Assange, and Daniel Hale.
I recommend reading the entire Canton Speech, but here are a few of my favorite excerpts:
But Socialists were not born yesterday. They know how to read capitalist newspapers ; and to believe exactly the opposite of what they read.
Who appoints our federal judges? The people? In all the history of the country, the working class have never named a federal judge. There are 121 of these judges and every solitary one holds his position, his tenure, through the influence and power of corporate capital. The corporations and trusts dictate their appointment. And when they go to the bench, they go, not to serve, the people, but to serve the interests that place them and keep them where they are.
John at once provided himself with Socialist literature and began his study of the red menace, with the result that after he had read and digested a few volumes he was a full-fledged Socialist and has been fighting for socialism ever since.
The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and all to lose—especially their lives.
It is the minorities who have made the history of this world. It is the few who have had the courage to take their places at the front; who have been true enough to themselves to speak the truth that was in them; who have dared oppose the established order of things; who have espoused the cause of the suffering, struggling poor; who have upheld without regard to personal consequences the cause of freedom and righteousness.
To turn your back on the corrupt Republican Party and the still more corrupt Democratic Party—the gold-dust lackeys of the ruling class counts for still more after you have stepped out of those popular and corrupt capitalist parties to join a minority party that has an ideal, that stands for a principle, and fights for a cause. This will be the most important change you have ever made and the time will come when you will thank me for having made the suggestion.
Political action and industrial action must supplement and sustain each other. You will never vote the Socialist republic into existence.
The sun of capitalism is setting; the sun of socialism is rising. It is our duty to build the new nation and the free republic. We need industrial and social builders. We Socialists are the builders of the beautiful world that is to be. We are all pledged to do our part. We are inviting—aye challenging you this afternoon in the name of your own manhood and womanhood to join us and do your part.
In due time the hour will strike and this great cause triumphant—the greatest in history—will proclaim the emancipation of the working class and the brotherhood of all mankind.
These words of Debs remain as valid today as when he spoke them over 100 years ago.