Benjamin J. Davis, born on this day in 1903, was American lawyer and communist who was elected in 1943 to the New York City Council, representing Harlem. Davis was persecuted by the state via the anti-communist Smith and McCarran Acts.

Davis became radicalized through his role as defense attorney in the 1933 trial of Angelo Herndon, a 19-year-old black communist who had been charged "attempting to incite insurrection" because he tried to organize a farm workers' union.

In 1949, Davis was among a number of communist leaders prosecuted for violating the Smith Act. He was convicted and sentenced to five years in prison. In 1962 Davis was charged with violating the Internal Security Act (also known as the McCarran Act), but died before the case could come to trial.

"Whether one agrees with the Communist Party or not, one must at least know the truth about it. One must not permit his ideas to be shaped by the hysteria which now passes as a 'crusade against Communism'... For example, the canard that every Communist has his pockets lined with 'Moscow gold.' If that were true, one could be sure that there would scarcely be any room in our party for workers. The capitalists, to whom gold is god of the universe, would crowd them out."

  • Benjamin J. Davis

Ben Davis: The Communist Councilman from Harlem cpusa

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  • quartz242 [she/her]
    ·
    10 months ago

    #Tradle #551 2/6

    🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜

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    https://oec.world/en/tradle

    spoiler

    guessed France first, Québécois in shambles

    • milistanaccount09 [she/her]
      ·
      10 months ago

      #Tradle #550 2/6 🟩🟩🟩🟨⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 https://oec.world/en/tradle

      spoiler

      Lol I did norway

    • MF_COOM [he/him]
      ·
      10 months ago

      #Tradle #550 1/6 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 https://oec.world/en/tradle

    • thelastaxolotl [he/him]
      hexagon
      M
      ·
      10 months ago

      #Tradle #550 2/6

      🟩🟩🟩🟩⬜

      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      https://oec.world/en/tradle

      spoiler

      Guessed mexico first, after that it was really easy

    • SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him]
      ·
      10 months ago

      #Tradle #551 4/6
      🟩🟩🟨⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩⬜
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      https://oec.world/en/tradle

      spoiler

      I got that it was a Western country pretty quickly, but this was actually one of the toughest tradles for me so far as, for some reason, I repeatedly discounted Canada entirely - I guess I just thought it had an entirely different export economy than it actually does. My second-to-last guess was actually America, not because I actually thought it was America (export total was WAY too low) but because I couldn't understand what other country it could possibly be. Then when I saw it pointing still north, it was the only option remaining.

      • TerminalEncounter [she/her]
        ·
        10 months ago
        spoiler

        I saw rapeseed and knew it could only be canola, also I know we produce tons of oil and make a bunch of cars.

    • Ho_Chi_Chungus [she/her]
      ·
      10 months ago

      #Tradle #550 1/6

      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      https://oec.world/en/tradle

      spoiler

      I didn't know Canada made that many cars but I saw their second largest crop export as rapeseed and it all fell together. Finally got Canada after several times having it be a Baltic/Scandinavian country and incorrectly guessing Canada

    • soy_disantra [he/him]
      ·
      10 months ago

      #Tradle #550 1/6 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      https://oec.world/en/tradle

      spoiler

      shoutout to matt ranting about Canadian timber