Child of the Sit-Downs_ The Revolutionary Life of Genora Dollinger - Carlton Jackson [65]
Such thoughts, however, did not deter Genora and Sol and their SUA colleagues in their socialist endeavors. They did begin to wonder—as it turned out, most rightly so—if their organization reflected ivory-tower philosophical musings rather than realistic concerns in an industrial world. While sincere in their beliefs of a proletarian-dominated society in the United States at least, the ingredients and motivation for the revolution for which they hoped and expected did not exist. The SUA membership expressed the futility of its proclamations, bulletins, and appeals in its official journal, The American Socialist, and at a Chicago conference in the summer of 1957 the SUA dissolved itself and was replaced by the newly created New York–based American Socialist Club (ASC). Its members dropped the appeal for a proletarian revolution and worked toward the “education and organization of new socialist forces in order to prepare the way for the building of a new movement of democratic socialism in the United States.”49 The ASC was reformist, intending to work within the system, rather than revolutionary, proposing to destroy the system.
In the late 1950s the cause of Socialism as it related to unions in the United States had fallen on hard times. For one thing, industries steadily moved into the American South, where unionism had never been as pervasive as in the North. Second, economic conditions dictated against a workers’ uprising, and third, American workers were loath to support a system they had always viewed with suspicion. Nevertheless, the SWA, SUA, and ASC had validity. They constantly petitioned national, state, and local lawmakers for improvements in worker compensation laws and, in particular, for increased worker safety. In one speech after another, Genora hammered away at the inequities suffered by many workers. She and hundreds of others with a Socialist bent helped ultimately to set laws in place, such as the Occupational Safety and Health Organization (OSHA—a federal organization for monitoring factory safety), which have been beneficial to both industrial and agricultural workers around the country. These Socialist groups had an intense concern for the environment, and Genora, later in life, joined forces with nationally active environmentalist Barry Commoner to protect generations not yet born from the impact of industrial and automotive pollution.
These groups condemned U.S. military involvement in Korea and, later, in Vietnam. These were capitalist ventures, they argued, against people too weak to fight back and ultimately win. These initiatives and others justify some of the Socialist activities in post–World War II America. These Socialist groups were stronger and more effective as reformers than as revolutionaries. Most workers in the United States belonged to the reform-minded Democratic Party. One Socialist, Harry Braverman, wanted his followers to be ready to fill the breach in the future when it became clear that the Democrats were not really helping the working classes. If the Socialists have done their jobs, Braverman asserted, the Democratic Party “will turn to us to lead them in a fight against the imperialist wars, depressions and recurrent crises in the capitalistic government.”50 In the long run, however, workers continued to shy away from Socialist programs.
Genora and Sol grew aloof from the Trotskyist splinter groups that developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s. If any of these Trotsky sects asked for help, Genora contributed her thoughts. The Trotskyist organizations, however, remained isolated from the broad working-class movement, causing members to behave “like the Christian sects of old Rome. They all sought salvation