Bert Cochran: Difference between revisions
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'''Bert Cochran''' (December 25, 1913 |
'''Bert Cochran''', born '''Alexander Goldfarb''' (December 25, 1913 – June 6, 1984) was an American [[Communist]] politician and writer. A [[Trotskyist]], he was a member of the [[Socialist Workers Party (U.S.)|Socialist Workers Party]] from the 1930s to the 1950s. |
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==Biography== |
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Cochran was born in Poland in 1913 and |
Cochran was born in Poland in 1913 and moved to the US at an early age. In the 1930s, Cochran attended the [[University of Wisconsin–Madison]] where he was recruited to the [[Trotskyist]] movement by [[Max Shachtman]]. In 1938 when a group of American Trotskyists under the leadership of [[James P. Cannon]] formed the [[Socialist Workers Party (United States)|Socialist Workers Party]], Bert Cochran was one of them. For a number of years, Cochran was part of the ''National Committee'', the leading body of the SWP and became the party's main leader in [[Detroit]]. Under the pen-name E.R. Frank he was a regular contributor to the magazine of the [[Fourth International]], which the SWP supported. |
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In the 1930s and 1940s, Cochran was a district organizer for the [[Mechanics Educational Society of America]] (MESA), a radical independent union which drew the ire of the federal government for refusing to not strike during World War II. Cochran also organized with the [[United Autoworkers]] (UAW).<ref name="biosketch">{{cite web |title=Biographical Sketch |url=https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/cochran/bio-bibl_cochran.pdf |website=[[Marxists Internet Archive]] |accessdate=6 April 2020}}</ref> |
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⚫ | In the beginning of the 1950s, Bert Cochran became the leader of a faction inside the Socialist Workers Party that opposed the leadership of Cannon and instead favoured the approach of [[Michel Pablo]], a leader of the [[Fourth International]]. The faction, known to their opponents as the ''Cochranites'', argued that the SWP was abstaining in a sectarian manner from the opportunity to intervene into the radical layers around the Communist Party. The SWP's leadership interpreted this as meaning that the current around Cochran no longer believed a revolution in the United States was possible, and that they had recoiled from revolutionary activity under the dual pressures of relative post-World War II capitalist prosperity and the accompanying [[McCarthyism|McCarthy]]-era anti-communist witch-hunt. Cochran was also criticised for proposing to remove the image of [[Trotsky]] from the [[ |
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⚫ | In the beginning of the 1950s, Bert Cochran became the leader of a faction inside the Socialist Workers Party that opposed the leadership of Cannon and instead favoured the approach of [[Michel Pablo]], a leader of the [[Fourth International]]. The faction, known to their opponents as the ''Cochranites'', argued that the SWP was abstaining in a sectarian manner from the opportunity to intervene into the radical layers around the Communist Party. The SWP's leadership interpreted this as meaning that the current around Cochran no longer believed a revolution in the United States was possible, and that they had recoiled from revolutionary activity under the dual pressures of relative post-World War II capitalist prosperity and the accompanying [[McCarthyism|McCarthy]]-era anti-communist witch-hunt. Cochran was also criticised for proposing to remove the image of [[Trotsky]] from the [[Masthead (British publishing)|masthead]] of the SWP's newspaper, ''[[The Militant]]''. |
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⚫ | Eventually, Bert Cochran and the |
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⚫ | |||
Bert Cochran, with [[Harry Braverman]] and about one hundred of his supporters founded the [[Socialist Union of America]], which existed from 1954 to approx. 1959. After a short period out of regular political activity, he became a sponsor of the [[Third Camp]] journal, ''[[New Politics (magazine)]]'', and remained so until the journal's demise in 1976. Cochran taught labor relations at the [[New School for Social Research]] and [[Empire State College]] and was a senior fellow at the Research Institute on International Change at [[Columbia University]]. He wrote six books, one of which, ''Labor and Communism: The Conflict that Shaped American Unions'' (1977), was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. He died from [[cancer]] the summer of 1984 before the re-launch of ''New Politics'' in the mid-1980s. |
Bert Cochran, with [[Harry Braverman]] and about one hundred of his supporters founded the [[Socialist Union of America]], which existed from 1954 to approx. 1959. After a short period out of regular political activity, he became a sponsor of the [[Third Camp]] journal, ''[[New Politics (magazine)]]'', and remained so until the journal's demise in 1976. Cochran taught labor relations at the [[New School for Social Research]] and [[Empire State College]] and was a senior fellow at the Research Institute on International Change at [[Columbia University]]. He wrote six books, one of which, ''Labor and Communism: The Conflict that Shaped American Unions'' (1977), was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. He died from [[cancer]] the summer of 1984 before the re-launch of ''New Politics'' in the mid-1980s. |
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==References== |
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{{reflist}} |
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==Notable works== |
==Notable works== |
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* [https://archive.org/details/ProspectsOfAmericanRadicalism ''Prospects of American radicalism''] New York, N.Y. : American Socialist Publications, 1954 |
* [https://archive.org/details/ProspectsOfAmericanRadicalism ''Prospects of American radicalism''] New York, N.Y. : American Socialist Publications, 1954 |
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* [ |
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210121125504/https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000956349 ''American Labor in Midpassage''], Monthly Review Press, 1959 (editor and contributor). |
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* ''The Cross of the Moment'', Macmillan, 1961. |
* ''The Cross of the Moment'', Macmillan, 1961. |
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* ''The War System: An Analysis of the Necessity for Political Reason'', Macmillan, 1965. |
* ''The War System: An Analysis of the Necessity for Political Reason'', Macmillan, 1965. |
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* ''Adlai Stevenson, Patrician Among the Politicians'', Funk & Wagnalls, 1969. |
* ''Adlai Stevenson, Patrician Among the Politicians'', Funk & Wagnalls, 1969. |
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* ''Harry Truman and the Crisis Presidency'', Funk & Wagnalls, 1973, ISBN |
* ''Harry Truman and the Crisis Presidency'', Funk & Wagnalls, 1973, {{ISBN|0-308-10044-1}}. |
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* ''Labor and Communism: The Conflict that Shaped American Unions'', Princeton University Press, 1977, ISBN |
* ''Labor and Communism: The Conflict that Shaped American Unions'', Princeton University Press, 1977, {{ISBN|0-691-04644-1}}. |
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* ''Welfare Capitalism — and After'', Schocken Books, 1984, ISBN |
* ''Welfare Capitalism — and After'', Schocken Books, 1984, {{ISBN|0-8052-3868-9}}. |
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* [http://www.thebertcochranlegacy.com/throughtherearviewmirror.htm ''Through the Rearview Mirror: Past Book Reviews on Still Present Social Issues''], Times Two Publishing, 2005, ISBN |
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20090805080151/http://www.thebertcochranlegacy.com/throughtherearviewmirror.htm ''Through the Rearview Mirror: Past Book Reviews on Still Present Social Issues''], Times Two Publishing, 2005, {{ISBN|1-930077-75-0}}. (A collection of book reviews, published posthumously.) |
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==External links== |
==External links== |
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* [http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/cochran/ Bert Cochran (E.R. Frank) Internet Archive] |
* [http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/cochran/ Bert Cochran (E.R. Frank) Internet Archive] |
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* [http://www.trotskyana.net/Trotskyists/Bio-Bibliographies/bio-bibl_cochran.pdf The Lubitz TrotskyanaNet] provides a biographical sketch and a selective bibliography on Bert Cochran |
* [http://www.trotskyana.net/Trotskyists/Bio-Bibliographies/bio-bibl_cochran.pdf The Lubitz TrotskyanaNet] provides a biographical sketch and a selective bibliography on Bert Cochran |
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* [http://www. |
* [http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/amersocialist/index.htm The American Socialist] |
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* [http://www.columbia.edu/~lnp3/mydocs/american_left/reflections_on_the_cochranites.htm Reflections on the Cochranites] |
* [http://www.columbia.edu/~lnp3/mydocs/american_left/reflections_on_the_cochranites.htm Reflections on the Cochranites] |
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* [ |
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110202103246/http://thebertcochranlegacy.com/ The Bert Cochran Legacy] |
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{{Authority control}} |
{{Authority control}} |
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{{Persondata |
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| NAME = Cochran, Bert |
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| ALTERNATIVE NAMES = |
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| SHORT DESCRIPTION = American politician, author |
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| DATE OF BIRTH = 1913 |
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| PLACE OF BIRTH = |
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| DATE OF DEATH = June 6, 1984 |
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| PLACE OF DEATH = |
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}} |
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Cochran, Bert}} |
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cochran, Bert}} |
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[[Category:1913 births]] |
[[Category:1913 births]] |
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[[Category:1984 deaths]] |
[[Category:1984 deaths]] |
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[[Category:American communists]] |
[[Category:American communists]] |
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[[Category:American Marxists]] |
[[Category:American Marxists]] |
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[[Category:American male writers]] |
[[Category:American male writers]] |
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[[Category:Polish emigrants to the United States]] |
[[Category:Polish emigrants to the United States]] |
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[[Category:Members of the |
[[Category:Members of the Socialist Union of America]] |
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[[Category: |
[[Category:Socialist Workers Party (United States) politicians from Michigan]] |
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[[Category:Trade unionists from Michigan]] |
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[[Category:Empire State University faculty]] |
Latest revision as of 05:28, 28 June 2024
This article needs additional citations for verification. (April 2020) |
Bert Cochran, born Alexander Goldfarb (December 25, 1913 – June 6, 1984) was an American Communist politician and writer. A Trotskyist, he was a member of the Socialist Workers Party from the 1930s to the 1950s.
Biography
[edit]Cochran was born in Poland in 1913 and moved to the US at an early age. In the 1930s, Cochran attended the University of Wisconsin–Madison where he was recruited to the Trotskyist movement by Max Shachtman. In 1938 when a group of American Trotskyists under the leadership of James P. Cannon formed the Socialist Workers Party, Bert Cochran was one of them. For a number of years, Cochran was part of the National Committee, the leading body of the SWP and became the party's main leader in Detroit. Under the pen-name E.R. Frank he was a regular contributor to the magazine of the Fourth International, which the SWP supported.
In the 1930s and 1940s, Cochran was a district organizer for the Mechanics Educational Society of America (MESA), a radical independent union which drew the ire of the federal government for refusing to not strike during World War II. Cochran also organized with the United Autoworkers (UAW).[1]
In the beginning of the 1950s, Bert Cochran became the leader of a faction inside the Socialist Workers Party that opposed the leadership of Cannon and instead favoured the approach of Michel Pablo, a leader of the Fourth International. The faction, known to their opponents as the Cochranites, argued that the SWP was abstaining in a sectarian manner from the opportunity to intervene into the radical layers around the Communist Party. The SWP's leadership interpreted this as meaning that the current around Cochran no longer believed a revolution in the United States was possible, and that they had recoiled from revolutionary activity under the dual pressures of relative post-World War II capitalist prosperity and the accompanying McCarthy-era anti-communist witch-hunt. Cochran was also criticised for proposing to remove the image of Trotsky from the masthead of the SWP's newspaper, The Militant.
Eventually, Bert Cochran and the Cochranites were expelled from the SWP in 1954, which meant that the party lost a great deal of its members in Detroit and the Cleveland area. James P. Cannon sent Ed Shaw to lead the reconstruction of the party's branch in Detroit.
Bert Cochran, with Harry Braverman and about one hundred of his supporters founded the Socialist Union of America, which existed from 1954 to approx. 1959. After a short period out of regular political activity, he became a sponsor of the Third Camp journal, New Politics (magazine), and remained so until the journal's demise in 1976. Cochran taught labor relations at the New School for Social Research and Empire State College and was a senior fellow at the Research Institute on International Change at Columbia University. He wrote six books, one of which, Labor and Communism: The Conflict that Shaped American Unions (1977), was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. He died from cancer the summer of 1984 before the re-launch of New Politics in the mid-1980s.
References
[edit]- ^ "Biographical Sketch" (PDF). Marxists Internet Archive. Retrieved 6 April 2020.
Notable works
[edit]- Prospects of American radicalism New York, N.Y. : American Socialist Publications, 1954
- American Labor in Midpassage, Monthly Review Press, 1959 (editor and contributor).
- The Cross of the Moment, Macmillan, 1961.
- The War System: An Analysis of the Necessity for Political Reason, Macmillan, 1965.
- Adlai Stevenson, Patrician Among the Politicians, Funk & Wagnalls, 1969.
- Harry Truman and the Crisis Presidency, Funk & Wagnalls, 1973, ISBN 0-308-10044-1.
- Labor and Communism: The Conflict that Shaped American Unions, Princeton University Press, 1977, ISBN 0-691-04644-1.
- Welfare Capitalism — and After, Schocken Books, 1984, ISBN 0-8052-3868-9.
- Through the Rearview Mirror: Past Book Reviews on Still Present Social Issues, Times Two Publishing, 2005, ISBN 1-930077-75-0. (A collection of book reviews, published posthumously.)
External links
[edit]- Bert Cochran (E.R. Frank) Internet Archive
- The Lubitz TrotskyanaNet provides a biographical sketch and a selective bibliography on Bert Cochran
- The American Socialist
- Reflections on the Cochranites
- The Bert Cochran Legacy
- 1913 births
- 1984 deaths
- American communists
- American Marxists
- American male writers
- Polish emigrants to the United States
- Members of the Socialist Union of America
- Socialist Workers Party (United States) politicians from Michigan
- 20th-century American writers
- Trade unionists from Michigan
- The New School faculty
- Empire State University faculty