International Labor Defense

INTERNATIONAL LABOR DEFENSE. Founded in 1925, the International Labor Defense (ILD) was a radical legal-action group that specialized in representing jailed union members, immigrants, political activists, and members of minority groups. In the early 1930s it attracted special notoriety through its militant defense campaigns on behalf of Black prisoners, which exposed widespread racism in the American South. Less active during World War II, the organization unsuccessfully attempted a comeback at the war’s end. In 1946 it merged into the Civil Rights Congress, which continued many of the ILD’s original policies.

The individual most responsible for the establishment of the ILD was James P. Cannon, an influential leader in the Communist Party, USA (CPUSA). During a visit to the Soviet Union in 1925, Cannon discussed the need for a comprehensive legal-defense organization with William D. “Big Bill” Haywood, the exiled American labor leader. Upon his return, he helped initiate the drive that led to the formation of the ILD at a Chicago convention in June of that year. Elected as national secretary, Cannon remained the dominant influence in the group until 1928, when he was replaced by J. Louis Engdahl after being expelled from the CPUSA. The stated purpose of the new organization was “to defend all persecuted for their activity in the labor movement,” including minorities, and to provide aid for their families. The ILD’s guiding philosophy was its concept of “mass defense” or “mass protest.” This concept taught that since working-class defendants inevitably faced a hostile court system, legal maneuvers alone could not win an acquittal. Instead, legal strategy had to be complemented by a mass protest movement that would mobilize the general public on behalf of the accused. Only through this dual struggle could justice ultimately prevail.

Although there were always several non-Communists on the national executive board, the Party openly dominated the ILD until 1937. Yet the organization’s membership not only included Communists but also numerous liberals and radicals of various ideologies. With the exception of Trotskyists, its legal assistance was consistently made available to prisoners on a nonpartisan basis. Soon after its inception, the ILD became quite active in the unsuccessful campaign to save the lives of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti. During the late 1920s and 1930s, the ILD mounted major campaigns over such famous political prisoners as Tom Mooney and Warren Billings, James B. McNamara, and the Centralia, Washington, defendants. In 1930, strongly influenced by the CPUSA’s new emphasis on Afro-American affairs, the ILD aggressively began to seek out Black cases. The promotion of attorney William L. Patterson, an outspoken Black Communist, to the national secretary’s post in 1932 further underscored this new commitment.

Among the most important Black cases handled by the ILD were those of Angelo Herndon in Georgia, Euel Lee in Maryland, Willie Peterson in Alabama, and Jess Hollins in Oklahoma. But by far the most significant such affair was the famous Scottsboro case, in which nine young Black men were accused of raping two white women on a freight train in north Alabama in 1931. The ILD vigorously defended the nine in court while its aggressive protest campaign, aided by the CPUSA and many others, developed the case into an internationally known cause célèbre symbolizing southern racism. Through its aggressive tactics and militant ideology, the ILD added a radical dimension to civil rights struggles and exposed many blacks for the first time to Marxist teachings and Communist Party activities.

In 1937 the ILD was reorganized in response to the rise of the Popular Front. Vito Marcantonio, the East Harlem politician, became president and a major force in the group, while Anna Damon, a CPUSA member, was named national secretary. Under their leadership the ILD became even more heavily involved in defending trade union members and officials, especially during organizing drives of the Congress of Industrial Organizations. In addition, the group expanded its legal assistance to immigrants and resident aliens and conducted an important national campaign against the ubiquitous practice of debt peonage on southern plantations.

With the outbreak of World War II, the ILD went into a slow decline, increasingly relying on volunteer workers rather than paid employees. The group strongly protested wartime violence against blacks and racial discrimination in the war effort. Yet it never formally endorsed the “Double V” campaign of the African American press and was criticized by some Blacks for failing to repeat its dramatic campaigns of the 1930s. At the war’s end, ILD supporters tried to revitalize the organization, but with limited success. After extended discussions in 1946, the group’s leaders, probably with the encouragement of top Communist Party officials, decided to disband. Officially the ILD was merged into the Civil Rights Congress, a new organization that continued the ILD’s traditions of “mass defense” and prisoner relief into another era.

Carter, Dan T. Scottsboro: A Tragedy of the American South. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1969.

Goodman, James. Stories of Scottsboro. New York: Pantheon Books, 1994.

Martin, Charles H. “The International Labor Defense and Black America.” Labor History 26 (1985).

Papers of the International Labor Defense. Frederick, Md.: University Publications of America, 1988.

Stanton, Mary. Red, Black, White: The Alabama Communist Party, 1930-1950. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2019.