The book “The Molly Maguires” by Anthony Bimba, a communist who is sympathetic to Socialism is a short history of the militant coal miners dubbed the “Molly Maguires”. Mine owners paid low wages for work, framed, and just plain murdered militant miners in order to crush strikes. The chief agent of the mine operators is Pinkertons number one labor spy McParland. Famous for his quickly obtained and case clinching confessions. He pops up from time to time in labor history. Most notably he shows up in 1908 to help kidnap, imprison, and frame Haywood and Moyer leaders of the Western Federation of Miners. Unlike the “Mollies” these men had the support of workers across the globe and they we’re vindicated. Yes Bimba was was a member of the Communist Party (this was written in the 1930’s heyday of the commies) so he leans towards labor and mass-action and detests managers and especially owners who employ people threrfore his conclusions are socialist based. He analyzes newspaper accounts and examines court documents and procedures to come to a conclusion that favors labor. Bimba was born in Lithuania. He was an active member of the Lithuanian Socialist Federation of the Socialist Party of America from his college days and wrote for several Lithuanian-language socialist publications published in America. More info about Bimba is HERE.
Antanas “Anthony” Bimba Jr. (1894–1982) was a Lithuanian-born American newspaper editor, historian, and radical political activist. An editor of a number of Lithuanian-language Marxist periodicals published in the United States, Bimba is best remembered as the defendant in a sensational 1926 legal case in which he was charged with sedition and violation of a 229-year-old law against blasphemy in the state of Massachusetts.
Bimba was once again in the news in 1963 when the United States Department of Justice began deportation proceedings against him, charging that he committed perjury during the course of his 1927 naturalization as an American citizen. The effort was contested and ultimately dropped by the government in the summer of 1967.
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