DIALECTICAL MATERIALISM. A CRITIQUE OF MAX EASTMAN.

(Chicago, IL): Revolutionary Workers League of the U.S., (1941)., (1941).. Fair. - Octavo, 10 inches high by 6-7/8 inches wide. Softcover, bound in printed white wraps. Lacking the rear cover, the front cover is creased with a short tear to the right of the title. A number and a date are stamped to the right and left of the title at the top of the front cover. 14 pages. The corners of the pages are creased and there are some tiny tears to the bottom edges of 2 leaves. A longer diagonal tear along the top of page 10 was repaired with clear tape in the distant past. A good working copy.

RARE.

The Trade Unionist and Kansas district organizer for the Communist Party USA in the early days, Hugo Oehler (1903-1983) organized workers in Southern textile mills and miners in Colorado. In 1930, Oehler demanded that the Trotskyists be permitted to rejoin the party, a move which ended his career with the Communist Party USA. He went on to join James P. Cannon and others who formed the nation's first Trotskyist group, the Communist League of America. The League merged with the American Worker's Party in 1934, becoming known as the American Worker's Party of the United States. Oehler moved on to form the Revolutionary Workers League with Tom Stamm and Sidney Lens. He eventually broke with Trotsky and disavowed him, criticizing Trostky's call for an independent Ukraine.

The radical left Revolutionary Worker's League lasted from 1935 through 1946. Led by Hugo Oehler, the league published The Fighting Worker newspaper. The RWL sent Russell Blackwell to Spain in the early days of the Spanish Civil War and later sent Oehler who witnessed the May 1937 suppression of the Anti-Stalinist Left. Both Oehler and Blackwell were captured and imprisoned by the Franco regime, and only returned to the USA after the US embassy intervened.