Industrial Socialism: Big Bill Haywood and the I.W.W.

Summary

William Dudley Haywood, nicknamed “Big Bill,” was an American labor organizer as well as founding member and leader of the Industrial Workers of the World (commonly referred to as the “Wobblies”). He was also a member of the executive committee of the Socialist Party of America.

During the first two decades of the 20th century, Haywood was involved in several important labor battles, including the Colorado Labor Wars, the Lawrence Textile Strike and other textile strikes in Massachusetts and New Jersey.

Haywood was often targeted by state and federal prosecutors. In 1918 he was one of 101 IWW members jailed for anti-war activity during the First Red Scare. He was sentenced to twenty years in prison. In 1921, while out of prison during an appeal of his conviction, Haywood fled to the Soviet Union, where he spent the remaining years of his life, and where he died in 1928.  Haywood is one of the five Americans buried at the Kremlin.

The analysis of the United States economy put forth by Haywood in this polemic, and his advocacy of the principles of Socialism are now over 110 years old. Many of his criticisms of capitalism still contain enough kernels of truth to make listening and understanding worthwhile. His explanation of Socialism—as understood in 1911—is passionate and easy to understand.