Publications Index | Encyclopedia of Trotskyism | Marxists’ Internet Archive
In Defense of Bolshevism and its successor, the Bulletin of the Workers League for a Revolutionary Party, was the journal of the Leninist League.
The Leninist League was the result of a series of splits that originated within Socialist Workers Party of the U.S. in 1936. The first split resulted in a group calling itself the Revolutionary Workers League and lead by Hugo Oehler and Thomas Stamm.In 1937 a split occurred in the RWL that resulted in two organizations both claiming the name “Revolutionary Workers League”, both published in Chicago. At the same time, George Spiro left the RWL to form the “Leninist League” with about half a dozen members at the most. Spiro frequently wrote under the pen-name of “George Marlen”, having created “Marlen” from the first three letters of Marx’s and Lenin’s names.
The Leninist League created for itself a space to polemicize with both wings of the RWL, the SWP and the Trotskyist movement as a whole, something Marlen and his comrades came to reject formally. Marlen’s nom-de-plume was George Spiro. In October of 1939 the name of the publication changed to The Bulletin of the Leninist League, U.S.A. The publication and group seems to have finally folded around 1950. We only have a limited number of the publication but most of the issues bewteen 1937 and 1945. Additionally there is a supplemental bulletin titled Political Correspondence of the Workers League for a Revolutionary Party. Lastly, we have added one book and one pamphlet of Spiro’s writings.
Regarding the pamphlet Paris on the Barricades: The copy we scanned was published by the Spartacus Youth, youth group of the Workers Party of the U.S. the U.S. section of the Movement for the Fourth International and precursor to the SWP, in 1935. However, we are told the pamphlet was originally published by the Communist Party in 1929, with an introduction by Mossaye Olgin. And that it is part of the novel The Road , written by Spiro/Marlen and published in 1932. The Road is frequently noted as “The worst proletarian novel ever written”. We elected to spare visitors to this site access to a copy here (and spare ourselves the time and trouble required to scan the long book). Hard copies of it are at this time available for as little as $25 from various sources via Bookfinder.com. Major left libraries also have copies.
Digital scans provided by Marty Goodman of the Riazanov Library Project
Volume 1, No. 1, no month, 1937
Volume 1, No. 2, December, 1937
Volume 1, No. 8, September, 1938
Volume 1, No. 9, November, 1938
Volume 2, No. 1, January, 1939
Volume 2, No. 2, February, 1939
Volume 2, No. 3, April-June, 1939
Volume 2, No. 4, July-September, 1939
Volume 2, No. 5, October-November, 1939
Volume 3, No. 1, January, 1940
Volume 3, No. 2, February, 1940
Volume 3, No. 4, April-May, 1940
Volume 3, No. 5, June-August, 1940
Volume 3, No. 6, September-November, 1940
Volume 3, No. 7, December, 1940
Volume 3, No. 8, January-March, 1941
Volume 4, No. 4, September, 1941
Volume 4, No. 5, November, 1941
Volume 5, No. 1, January-February, 1942
Volume 5, No. 5, September, 1942
Volume 5, No. 6, December, 1942
Volume 6, No. 2, September, 1943
Volume 6, No. 3, December, 1943
Volume 7, No. 3, November-December, 1944
Volume 8, No. 1, January-February, 1945
Volume 8, No. 2, March-April, 1945
Volume 8, No. 3, May-June, 1945
Volume 8, No. 4, July-August, 1945
Volume 8, No. 5, November-December, 1945
Volume 9, No. 1, January-February, 1946
Volume 9, No. 2, March-April, 1946
Volume 9, No. 3, June-July, 1946
Volume 9, No. 4, September-October, 1946
Volume 9, No. 5, November-December, 1946
Volume 10, No. 1, January-February, 1947
Volume 10, No. 2, April-May, 1947
Volume 10, No. 3, September-October, 1947
Volume 11, No. 1, February-March, 1948
Volume 11, No. 2, November-December, 1948
Volume 12, No. 1, May-June, 1949
Volume 12, No. 2, November-December, 1949
Volume 123, No. 1, July-August, 1950
Paris on the Barricades [1935]
Earl Browder: Communist or Tool of Wall St.? Stalin, Trotsky or Lenin? [1937]
Last updated on 8 August 2014