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Student Activism in the 1930s
Bunny Bitters
How and when I became interested in the progressive movement is rather hard to explain. As far back as I can remember I've always had a conscious knowledge that some people were poor or subjected while others were rich and had power over the workers. This was due mostly, I think, to my father who had come from Russia at the time of the revolution and who had always been interested in international affairs. His stories of how he used to live in poverty over there and their fear of Jewish pogroms are very familiar in our home. However, when I was about 10 year's old or younger, I went around with a group of very religious, gentile kids. They couldn't convince me that there was a God or a heaven, or any such thing, although at time I had a very vivid picture of how I would burn in a big bonfire or something to that effect. They finally gave up and said that it couldn't be helped because that's the way I was brought up by my parents and I didn't have any mind of my own. I didn't like this very much and although I didn't change my ideas about religion and its consequences, this idea definitely meant a change in my thoughts. I wanted to be an individual in my home and every where else so I wouldn't get those taunting replies whenever I expressed my opinion. Things became very complicated at this point. My father would talk to me about International affairs, about social, racial, and economic problems. In the bottom of my heart I could see and understand many of these things and even agree with them, but my friends never spoke or thought-about these things, and again I began to feel that I was thinking through my parent's mind. After this I refused to even listen to things of this kind at home. I didn't want to bother. Marion and Tommy got along pretty well and they didn't worry about such things. They were fun. They liked hot Jazz and movies and nothing else. This state of mind continued until about Junior high school when anti-semitic propaganda reached the minds of my friends and was immediately felt. We sort of separated then into groups and it hurt me a little to think that after all these years of friendship they left us because we didn't go to the same church. Just about this time too, my parents managed to drag me to several meetings and demonstrations held by the League for Peace and Democracy and other similar organizations. I noticed young people there just like me but they weren't hanging on to their mother's apron strings. In the midst of all the excitement it was always they who sang and cheered the loudest and yet had about them the air of seriousness, sincerity and knowledge of what was going on. I began to feel small and very unimportant. A little later, while attending high school, I was asked to help organize a chapter of the American Student Union. They were to meet for the first time on Friday. It happened that Friday night was movie night for me and my friends. I wan terribly annoyed at this interruption in my plans, but there was a feeling of being guilty if I didn't go. About ten kids showed up and a few of them really sounded as if they knew their stuff. We elected our officers and had a few very interesting meetings, but still it wasn't a vital thing in my life. Shortly we got a college sponsor who spoke to us on the peace position of the ASU. The fire works started. A very hot argument ensued between the Chairman and his friend and our college sponsor. Instantly we all sat up, startled. Here was our own chairman arguing against the position of the whole ASU. The rest of us didn't know much about it at that time but we all felt instinctively that Irv, our sponsor, was correct. From that time on things were different for me and for our chapter. I wanted to know what really was going on and so I began to read. Irv talked to me and a few others and we finally began to realize the situation as it existed. Slowly but surely our talkative chairman and one of his friends came through in their true colors. To make a long story short they turned out to be Trotskyites or members of the Lovestonite group. Life really became miserable and never before or since have I acquired such a deep hatred for a group of people. After reading, discussing, and learning about the ASU and what it stood for, I began to see what a fool I had been. This was where I belonged for all of the reasons the organization gave for existing. It wasn't long before I was in the midst of the arguments and nothing has ever quite measured up to the thrill I received when I felt that I had really beaten them on one point or another. One of the AF of T teachers from our school talked to us and helped us and after a term of fighting, quarreling, and bickering we finally got rid of these vicious students. I took a few courses in the Worker's School in Philadelphia and after that the ASU and their progressive movement was my life and always will be. The District High School Training School also helped show me how to build and organize, and tell others the reasons for and why an American Student Union. After I graduated from High School I went to Business School and in the afternoon worked for the District Staff as secretary. This coming fall I intend to work there again and also help our District High School Secretary, for every day and every hour it becomes more important to me that these high school students organize and stand firm for a progressive program such as the ASU offers. Home | Historical Essay | Documents | Credits |
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