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PUL as a mass membership organization would have been almost inconceivable.
There is irony in the PULfs relationship to the social liberal community
though, for, if many of PUL's important supporters were drawn from among the
social liberals, so were many of its most direct opponents. During the Great
Depression, the Family Welfare Society (the organization that earlier confirmed
both Oilman and Mitchell in their social activism), for example, became, at various
times and in various ways, a quasi-governmental dispenser of relief and a prime
target for PUL protests and pickets. Furthermore, as the New Deal stimulated the
growth of local and state welfare bureaucracies, these were often staffed by those
firmly in the tradition of the old Progressivism, and they in turn became the object
of PUL pressure. In some cases, though, new welfare officials retained their close
ties social reformism and even to their PUL compatriots. Arthur Hungerford was
friendly with PUL leaders before he became Maryland director of the National
Emergency Council, and afterwards continued to attend PUL meetings until he was
told by his superiors to stop. '
In all cases, PUL attempted to turn their relationship to and knowledge of
the milieu of social liberalism to their advantage when they dealt with liberals in
power. They prepared their cases carefully, used tactical persuasion, and applied
protest in measured amounts. As Frank Trager recalled:
When we protested, we had facts. When we would face up social agencies,
we could talk in terms of facts that they couldn't disprove. On the whole, we
were, you know - we could talk the language of the governments"
The Socialists of PUL were, in effect, partial insiders at the same time they, as
advocates of the unemployed, were outsiders. Rather than denying their partial
insider status, they exploited it with some skill.
The third major area of Socialist Party contacts that was crucial to the
building of PUL was in Baltimore's African American community. Two points
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