Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T18:49:17.519Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Christianity and Socialism in America, 1900–1920

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Robert T. Handy
Robert T. Handy
Affiliation:
Union Theological Seminary
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

American Christian churches in the first three quarters of the nineteenth century were in general strongly conservative in social and economic outlook, and solidly supported the individualism of the time. But after the Civil War the swiftly and often painfully changing social scene stimulated widespread interest in economic and social matters and contributed to extensive rethinking of traditional views on the part of many Christians. Important reformist, progressive, and radical Christian social movements rose and agitated the churches. Hence, when socialism grew with startling rapidity in the first decade and a half of the twentieth century, the attention of Christians was powerfully drawn to the new development. In that period when awareness of the social problem throbbed in the atmosphere of the time, that period of muckraking and trustbusting, progressivism and the sociological novel, the Socialist Party found rich soil in which to grow. The socialist vote grew from slightly over 400,000 in 1904 to some 900,000 in 1912, while party membership increased from 25,000 to 120,000 in the same period. By the latter date there were over one thousand socialists in elective positions across the land, most of them in minor posts, but with fifty mayors and twenty legislators included in the total. This rapid growth raised in a new and urgent way the problem of the relationship that should exist between Christianity and socialism.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 21 , Issue 1 , March 1952 , pp. 39 - 54
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1952

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 May, Henry F., Protestant Churches and Industrial America (New York: Harper & Bros., 1949)Google Scholar; Hopkins, Charles Howard, The Rise of the Social Gospel in American Protestantism, 1865–1915 (“Yale Studies in Religious Education,” Vol. XIV [New Haven: Yale University Press, 1940]).Google Scholar

2 Hughan, Jessie Wallace, The Facts of Socialism (New York: John Lane Co.. 1913), pp. 47–49.Google Scholar

3 Socialism in Theory and Practice (New York: The Macmillan Co.. 1913), p. v.Google Scholar

4 Thompson, Carl D., The Christian Socialist, February 1, 1910, p. 2.Google Scholar

5 The Church and the Social Problem (Cinciunati: Jennings & Graham, 1906), pp. 113 f.Google Scholar

6 Christ's Social Remedies (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1911), pp. 77, 89, 107.Google Scholar

7 The Church and the Wage Earners (New York: Charles Seribner's Sons, 1916), pp. 125 f.Google Scholar

8 Social Christianity: The Gospel for an Age of Social Strain (Nashville: The Advance Publishing Co., 1911), p. 81.Google Scholar

9 Socialism from the Christian Standpoint: Ten Coinferences (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1912), p. 41Google Scholar. Cf. also Ming, John J.. The Characteristics and the Religion of Modern Socialism (New York: Beuziger Bros., 1908)Google Scholar, and The Morality of Modern Socialism (NewYork: Benziger Bros., 1909)Google Scholar.

10 “May a Catholic Be a Socialist?” The Christian Socialist, February 15, 1909, p. 2.Google Scholar

11 E.g., The New York Call of March 2, 1911, declared that “the theory of economic determinism alone, if thoroughly gǵrasped, leaves no room for a belief in the supernatural.” Quoted by Spargo, John, Marxian Socialism and Religion (New York: B. W. Huebsch, 1915), p. 85 n.Google Scholar

12 Socialism in America (Garden City: Doubleday, Page & Co., 1916). p. 115.Google Scholar

13 Spiritual Significance of Modern Socialism (New York: B. W. Huebsch, 1908), p. 20.Google Scholar

14 Marxian Socialism and Religion, p. 171.

15 Hopkins, , The Rise of the Social Gospel in American Protestantism, pp. 182 fGoogle Scholar. Cf. also Dombrowski, J., The Early Days of Christian Socialism in America (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936)Google Scholar, and Laubenstein, Paul F., “A History of Christian Socialism in America” (Unpublished S.T.M. thesis, Union Theological Seminary, 1925).Google Scholar

16 The Christian Socialist, March 15, 1914, p. 5.Google Scholar

17 Socialism and Character (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1912), p. 73.Google Scholar

18 The Christian Socialist, June 15, 1905, quoted in Laubenstein, “A History of Christian Socialism,” p. 55.

19 Socicdism and Character, p. 133.

20 Jacobs, Leo, Three Types of Practical Ethical Movements of the Past Half Century (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1922), p. 33.Google Scholar

21 The christian Socialist, May 15, 1909, p. 1.Google Scholar

22 Ibid., February 1, 1910, p. 5.

23 The Social Preparation for the Kiagdam of God, January, 1918, p. 11.Google Scholar

24 Letters from Prison: Socialism a Spiritual Sunrise (Boston: Richard A. Badger, 1915).Google Scholar

25 A Christian View of Socialism (Girard, Kansas: Appeal to Reason, 1917), p. 5.Google Scholar

26 The Co-operative Commonwealth (Boston; Lee & Shepard, 1903), p. viii.Google Scholar

27 Our Destiny: The Influsnce of Nationalism on Morals and Religion (Boston: Lee & Shepard, 1901), p. 177.Google Scholar

28 Cf. Handy, Robert T., “George D. Herron and the Kingdom Movement,” Church History: Studies in Christianity and Culture, XIX (June, 1950), 97–115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

29 Bader, William, “The Oakland Institute of Applied Christianity,” The Kingdom, VIII (1895–1890), 454.Google Scholar

30 “How I Became a Socialist,” The Christian Socialist, Septembe 15, 1910, p. 1.Google Scholar

31 “An Appeal to the Working Classes,” The Social Crusader, September 15, 1899 pp. 12, 14.Google Scholar

32 E.g., Herron late in 1900 spoke to a mass meeting of Chicago socialists on “A Plea for the Unity of American Socialists,” The International Socialist Review, I (1900–1901), 327.Google Scholar

33 Loose Leaves from a Busy Life (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1934), p. 48.Google Scholar

34 Laidler, Harry W., Social-Economic Movements (New York: T. Y. Crowell. 1948), p. 583 n.Google Scholar

35 Sidelights on Contemporary Socialism (New York: B. W. Huebseli. 1911), p. 154.Google Scholar

36 E.g., cf. Wilson, J. Stitt, “George D. Herron, D. D., A Biographical Sketch,” The Social Crusader, February, 1901, pp. 8–12Google Scholar, in which the decisive influence of Herron on his development was stressed, with his “How I Became a Socialist,” The Christian Socialist, September 15, 1910, pp. 1 f.Google Scholar, in which Herron is noteven mentioned.

37 Social Preparation for the Kingdom of God, October, 1918, pp. 12 f.Google Scholar

38 A Christian View of Socialism, p. 11.

39 “Has the Church Failed?” The Christian Socialist, October 1, 1910. p. 4.Google Scholar

40 “The Relation of Socialism to Christianity,” The Christian Socialist, August 1, 1909, p. 1.Google Scholar

41 Ibid, September 1, 1909, p. 3.

42 They Must: or God and the Social Democracy, A Frank Word to Christian Men and Women (Chicago: Co-operative Printing Co., 1908), p. 8.Google Scholar

43 The Christian Socialist, April 1, 1909, p. 4Google Scholar. Jacob's estimate of the Fellowship as “… a counter move of Socialists to capture the Church for Socialism” (Three Types of Practical Ethical Movements, p. 32) is not strictly correct.

44 A Christian View of Socialism, p. 11.

45 “Shall We Abolish Institutions,” The Congregationalist, LXXIX (January– July, 1894), 791.Google Scholar

46 “Human Limitations of the Church,” The Social Preparation for the Kingdom of God, January, 1918, pp. 12–15.Google Scholar

47 Seudder, , On Journey (New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1937), pp. 191 f.Google Scholar

48 Hughan, , Facts of Socialism, pp. 145, 148Google Scholar. Cf. Kelley, Edmond, Twentieth Century, Socialismn: What It Is Not, What It Is, How It May Come, (New York: Longmans, Green & Co., 1913), p. xiv.Google Scholar

49 Quoted from The New York Herald, June 1, 1908, by Laubenstein, “A History of Christian Socialism,” p. 31.

50 The Christian Socialist, December 15, 1913, p. 1.Google Scholar

51 Laidler, , Social -Economic Movements, pp. 588 f., n.Google Scholar

52 The Social Preparation for the Kingdom of God, October, 1918, p. 13.Google Scholar

53 Social Christianity, pp. 81–120.

54 Cf. Rausehenbusch, Walter, Christianizing the Social Order (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1912), p. 397Google Scholar. Rausehenbusch, was called “A Prophet of the Great Identification” in The Social Preparation for the Kingdom of God, October, 1918, pp. 12–15Google Scholar, but this is incorrect, for it was his inabilty to make the “identification” that kept him from Socialist Party membership.

55 Cf. Spargo, John, Americanism and Social Democracy (New York: Harper & Bros., 1918).Google Scholar

56 The Christian Socialist, September, 1918 p. 1.Google Scholar

57 Real Democracy, December, 1919, p. 1.Google Scholar

58 E.g., ef. the contrasting opinions of Rev. Byron-Curtiss, A. L. (“The Church and Reconstruction After the War,” The Social Preparation for the Kingdom of God, October, 1918, pp. 9–11Google Scholar) and Vida Scudder (“Prophecy Coming True,” Ibid., January, 1919, p. 12), the one representing a positive and the other a more negative attitude toward the Russian Revolution.

59 Shailer, Mathews & Smith, G. B. (eds.). A Dictionary uf Religion and Ethics (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1921), p. 90.Google Scholar

60 Scudder, Vida P., The Church and the Hour (New York: E. P. Dutton & Co.. 1917). p. x.Google Scholar