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Sewer socialism was an originally pejorative term for the American socialist movement that centered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from around 1892 to 1960. [1] The term was coined by Morris Hillquit at the 1932 Milwaukee convention of the Socialist Party of America as a commentary on the Milwaukee socialists and their perpetual boasting about the excellent public sewer system in the city. [2]
With the creation of the Socialist Party of America, this group formed the core of an element that favored reformism rather than revolution, de-emphasizing social theory and revolutionary rhetoric in favor of honest government and efforts to improve public health. The sewer socialists fought to clean up what they saw as "the dirty and polluted legacy of the Industrial Revolution", [3] cleaning up neighborhoods and factories with new sanitation systems, city-owned water and power systems and improved education. This approach is sometimes called "constructive socialism". [4] The movement has its origins in the organization of the Social Democratic Party, a precursor to the Socialist Party of America. Even before the creation of the Social Democratic Party, Milwaukee had elected socialist millwright Henry Smith (who had been elected to the legislature under the "Socialist" label) to Congress on the Union Labor ticket in 1886.
Victor L. Berger was one of the prime movers of sewer socialism, [3] often compared to Robert La Follette and his representation of progressivism. He was an Austrian Jewish immigrant who published English and German daily newspapers, distributing free copies to every household in Milwaukee before elections. He was the best-known local leader of this tendency. His wife, Meta Berger, was also a prominent socialist activist. In 1910, he became the first of two 20th-century Socialists elected to the House of Representatives, representing Wisconsin's 5th congressional district (the second was Meyer London of New York). Berger was reelected in 1918, but he was barred from his seat in the House because of his trial and conviction under the 1917 Espionage Act for his public remarks opposing intervention in World War I. A special election was called in which Berger again emerged victorious, but he was denied the seat and it was declared vacant. Berger served the 5th district again from 1923 until 1929 and during his tenure introduced proposals for numerous programs that were subsequently adopted, such as old age pensions, unemployment insurance and public housing. Positions advanced by Meta Berger which proved successful included "penny lunches", medical exams for children, and improved working conditions and wages for teachers.
In 1910, the Socialists won most of the seats in the Milwaukee city council and county board. This included the first Socialist mayor in the United States, Emil Seidel, who also received the nomination for Vice President on the Socialist Party of America ticket in the 1912 election when the Socialists netted 6% of the vote, their highest-ever percentage. Seidel and Berger both lost their campaigns in 1912, but in 1916 a new socialist mayor was elected, Daniel Hoan, who remained in office until 1940. Socialists never regained total control over the local government as they did in 1910, but they continued to show major influence until the defeat of Daniel Hoan in 1940. The sewer socialists elected one more mayor in Milwaukee, Frank Zeidler, who served for three terms (1948–1960). A member of a socialist party has not been elected mayor of a major American city since the end of Zeidler's tenure, although independent democratic socialist Bernie Sanders was elected mayor of Burlington, Vermont in 1981. In the Democratic Party primary for the 2021 Buffalo mayoral election, self-identified socialist India Walton scored an upset victory over incumbent Byron Brown. [5] However, Brown went on to defeat Walton in the general election as a write-in candidate. [6] Had Walton won, she would have been the first socialist to serve as mayor of a major American city since Zeidler. [5]
In 2022, Milwaukee elected two democratic socialists to the Wisconsin State Assembly, Darrin Madison and Ryan Clancy. Madison and Clancy, who are both members of the Democratic Party, announced they would form an informal Socialist Caucus, the first of its kind in Wisconsin since 1931. [7]
Although the Socialists had many ideas and policies similar to those of the Wisconsin Progressives, tensions still existed between the two groups because of their differing ideologies. Socialist Assemblyman George L. Tews, during a 1932 debate on unemployment compensation and how to fund it, argued for the Socialist bill and against the Progressive substitute, stating that a Progressive was "a Socialist with the brains knocked out". [8] Although, as a rule, the Progressives and Socialists did not run candidates against each other in Milwaukee, they rarely co-operated on elections. One notable exception was the 1924 presidential campaign of Robert La Follette, who was endorsed by the Socialist Party of America. A factor that affected this lack of collaboration was the relationship of each party to the Republican Party. Socialists were outright opposed to the party, while the Progressives sometimes worked with their parent party.
In 1961, Progressive editor William Evjue wrote of the Wisconsin Socialist legislators he had known by saying: "They never were approached by the lobbyists, because the lobbyists knew it was not possible to influence these men. They were incorruptible." [9]
In 2022, when union organizer Juan Miguel Martinez was elected to join incumbent Ryan Clancy as the second self-proclaimed socialist member of the eighteen-member Milwaukee County board of supervisors (both had been endorsed by the Milwaukee chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America), Martinez and Clancy both cited the sewer socialists as part of the heritage on which they seek to build. [10]
The Socialist Party of America (SPA) was a socialist political party in the United States formed in 1901 by a merger between the three-year-old Social Democratic Party of America and disaffected elements of the Socialist Labor Party of America who had split from the main organization in 1899.
Emil Seidel was a prominent German-American politician. Seidel was the mayor of Milwaukee from 1910 to 1912. The first Socialist mayor of a major city in the United States, Seidel became the vice presidential candidate for the Socialist Party of America in the 1912 presidential election.
Frank Paul Zeidler was an American socialist politician and mayor of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, serving three terms from April 20, 1948, to April 18, 1960. Zeidler, a member of the Socialist Party of America, is the last Socialist Party candidate to be elected mayor of a large American city.
Victor Luitpold Berger was an Austrian–American socialist politician and journalist who was a founding member of the Social Democratic Party of America and its successor, the Socialist Party of America. Born in the Austrian Empire and present-day Romania, Berger immigrated to the United States as a young man and became an important and influential socialist journalist in Wisconsin. He helped establish the so-called Sewer Socialist movement. Also a politician, in 1910, he was elected as the first Socialist to the U.S. House of Representatives, representing a district in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Daniel Webster Hoan was an American politician who served as the 32nd Mayor of Milwaukee, Wisconsin from 1916 to 1940. A lawyer who had served as Milwaukee City Attorney from 1910 to 1916, Hoan was a prominent figure in Socialist politics and Milwaukee's second Socialist mayor. His 24-year administration remains the longest continuous Socialist administration in United States history. A panel of 69 scholars in 1993 ranked him among the ten best mayors in American history.
Morris Hillquit was a founder and leader of the Socialist Party of America and prominent labor lawyer in New York City's Lower East Side. Together with Eugene V. Debs and Congressman Victor L. Berger, Hillquit was one of the leading public faces of American socialism during the first two decades of the 20th century.
The municipal government of the U.S. city of Milwaukee, located in the state of Wisconsin, consists of a mayor and common council. Traditionally supporting liberal politicians and movements, this community has consistently proved to be a stronghold of the Democratic Party. As the largest city in Wisconsin, Milwaukee receives a significant amount of attention during elections.
Frederic Faries Heath (1864–1954) was an American socialist politician and journalist who was a founding member of the Social Democratic Party of America in 1897 and the Socialist Party of America in 1901. He was an elected official in Wisconsin for nearly half a century.
Wisconsin's political history encompasses, on the one hand, Robert La Follette and the Progressive movement, and on the other, the Republican and anti-Communist Joe McCarthy. From the early 20th century, the Socialist Party of America had a base in Milwaukee. The phenomenon was referred to as "sewer socialism" because the elected officials were more concerned with public works and reform than with revolution. Its influence faded in the late 1950s largely because of the red scare and racial tensions. The first Socialist mayor of a large city in the United States was Emil Seidel, elected mayor of Milwaukee in 1910; another Socialist, Daniel Hoan, was mayor of Milwaukee from 1916 to 1940; and a third, Frank P. Zeidler, from 1948 to 1960. Succeeding Frank Zeidler, the last of Milwaukee's Socialist mayors, Henry Maier, a former Wisconsin State Senator and member of the Democratic Party was elected mayor of Milwaukee in 1960. Maier remained in office for 28 years, the longest-serving mayor in Milwaukee history. Socialist newspaper editor Victor Berger was repeatedly elected as a U.S. Representative, although he was prevented from serving for some time because of his opposition to the First World War.
The Wisconsin Progressive Party (1934–1946) was a political party that briefly held a dominant role in Wisconsin politics.
Louis A. Arnold was an American schoolteacher, HVAC worker and Socialist politician from Milwaukee who served two terms (1915–1922) as a member of the Wisconsin State Senate representing the Milwaukee-based 7th Senate district.
Thomas McEwing Duncan was an American clerical worker from Milwaukee who served three terms as a Socialist member of the Wisconsin State Assembly (1923–1928) and one term (1929–1932) as a member of the Wisconsin State Senate representing the Milwaukee-based 6th Senate district.
The Socialist Party of Wisconsin (SPWI) is the state chapter of the Socialist Party USA in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. The Socialist Party had two locals, the Milwaukee County Local and the South Central Wisconsin Local.
John McClelland Work (1869–1961) was an American socialist writer, lecturer, activist, and political functionary. Work is best remembered as a founding member of the Socialist Party of America and as the author of one of its best-selling propaganda tracts of the first decade of the 20th century. He was also the executive secretary of the Socialist Party of America from 1911 to 1913 and a frequent candidate for public office on its ticket.
The Social-Democratic Party of Wisconsin (SDPW) was established in 1897 as the Wisconsin state affiliate of the Chicago faction of the Social Democratic Party of America. When that organization merged in 1901 to form a political party known as the Socialist Party of America, the Social-Democratic Party of Wisconsin became the state affiliate of that organization, retaining its original name.
Paul Grottkau (1846–1898) was a German-American socialist political activist and newspaper publisher. Grottkau is best remembered as an editor alongside Haymarket affair victim August Spies of the Chicagoer Arbeiter-Zeitung, one of the leading American radical newspapers of the decade of the 1880s. Later moving to Milwaukee, Grottkau became one of the leading luminaries of the socialist movement in Wisconsin.
The 1942 Wisconsin gubernatorial election was held on November 3, 1942.
The 1910 Wisconsin gubernatorial election was held on November 8, 1910.
The 1921 New York City mayoral election took place on November 8, 1921, resulting in a victory for Democratic Party candidate John Francis Hylan.
