By James P. Cannon (1944)
This history will be of great interest to readers who want to learn more about the Trotskyist movement, which is playing an increasingly prominent role in the mass social protest movements in American politics today.
In a series of twelve informal talks, Cannon recounts the early history of the revolutionary movement in the United States. A veteran revolutionary, Cannon traces the roots of the Trotskyist movement back to the influence of the Russian Revolution on the radicals in the IWW and the Socialist Party. He describes the origins and early years of the Communist Party and explains how the Trotskyist movement was born out of a split in the Communist Party in 1928. Focusing on the years 1928-38, Cannon describes how the experiences of earlier revolutionary movements were assimulated by the American Trotskyists and how this process led to the formation of the Socialist Workers Party.