Early years Paul Grottkau was born in
Cottbus in 1846 and raised in
Berlin,
Prussia (now part of
Germany), the son of a relatively prosperous
noble family. Grottkau was trained as an
architect. Part of this training process involved Grottkau's learning the crafts of stonemasonry and building, activities which brought him into contract with members of the
working class and first introduced him to
socialist ideas. This political activism placed Grottkau in the sights of the German police. Faced with arrest by the authorities under the
Anti-Socialist Laws, Grottkau emigrated to the United States of America in 1878. During this interval the socialist movement of Chicago, centered around branches of the
Socialist Labor Party of America (SLP), began to turn towards the ideas of
armed insurrection and
anarchism. Membership in the SLP plummeted, hitting a low water mark of just 1500 members in 1883, while the number of semi-independent anarchist "groups" multiplied and their membership rolls proliferated. Grottkau, like many others, was briefly swept up in this tide, and the
Arbeiter-Zeitung was made a leading voice of American anarchism. In the view of historian Howard H. Quint the reason for Grottkau's willingness to cast his lot with the so-called Social Revolutionaries (i.e. the Anarchists) in the early 1880s was related not to his affinity for their
paramilitary auxiliary, units of the
Lehr und Wehr Verein (Educational and Defensive Society), but rather due to a desire to change the personnel and tepid policy of the SLP, exemplified by the group's National Secretary,
Philip Van Patten. While the meddling of Van Patten and the Detroit-based National Executive Committee of the SLP may have been Grottkau's primary objection, he nevertheless went all the way with the anarchist wing for a time, going so far as to himself briefly join the
Lehr und Wehr Verein. Grottkau ultimately broke with Spies, Parsons, and the Social Revolutionaries following the
1883 Pittsburgh Convention of the Revolutionary Socialist Party, which formally rejected socialist
collectivism in favor of
communist anarchism. In the aftermath the Socialist Revolutionaries went over to full-fledged anarchism, while the more moderate and electorally oriented elements such as Grottkau returned to the ranks of the SLP. This new fissure was made eminently clear on the evening of May 24, 1884, when Grottkau appeared before a Chicago audience to debate the "Communist" position against
Johann Most, a leading voice of the Anarchist movement.
Morris Hillquit, one of the earliest historians of American socialism, recalled the affair: It was a well-matched contest, the opponents being equally well-versed in the subject of discussion and both being fluent speakers and ready debaters. The discussion was very thoroughgoing and dealt with almost every phase of the subject. It was reported stenographically, published in book form, and widely circulated. Another pioneer historian of American socialism,
Frederic Heath, recalls the
Most–Grottkau debate as pivotal in Grottkau's own personal story. According to his account: Grottkau was now thoroughly enlisted against the Anarchists, realizing that they were inimical to the true interests of the proletarian movement. He fought valiantly for his view of the matter and wrote and spoke ardently, but the ground he had himself prepared was against him. He had a notable debate with Most in which he had decidedly the best of the argument and achieved an intellectual and argumentative victory; but not so thought the crowd, which was still filled with his previous teachings. A few weeks later he was forced to retire from the
Arbeiter-Zeitung and to turn over the editorial pen to August Spies, the former business manager, a man more to Most's liking.
Milwaukee years Forced out of his editorial position in Chicago, Grottkau left the city to establish a paper of his own in
Milwaukee,
Wisconsin — the ''Milwaukee'r Arbeiter-Zeitung'' (Milwaukee Workers' News), issued three times a week. The paper commenced publication in 1886. Grottkau became one of the leaders of the militant
Milwaukee Central Labor Union, a group which, together with the
Knights of Labor, coordinated a march in that city on
May Day 1886 as a means of agitating for establishment of the
8-hour day. This gathering and march proceeded without incident, but the groundwork seems to have been laid for further activity. On Monday, May 3, 1886, a general strike was called on Milwaukee's breweries, with as many as 1,000 men marching on Falk's Brewery in an effort to close the facility. Most refused to quit work and law enforcement authorities were called upon to break up the group of strike agitators. Governor
Jeremiah Rusk was notified by
telegraph and several units of the
National Guard were dispatched to Milwaukee from their station in
Madison, arriving on the scene the next morning. The same historian noted that despite the firing of shots, "not one person was wounded in the volley," noting: Many of the mob, as they saw the rifles aimed, threw themselves flat upon the ground, others sought shelter behind woodpiles and telegraph posts and fences. Notwithstanding, it seemed providential that the ground was not strewn with dead and dying. Many buildings in range of the rifles were perforated with bullets ... In the afternoon of Wednesday, May 5, 1886, strikers again assembled to march on the
company town of Bay View. This time, new orders had been issued to the members of the National Guard by Governor Rusk — that, in the event of the repeat of mob tactics, the guardsmen should this time shoot to kill. The number wounded will never be known, having been carried away by the fleeing crowd, but eight people died in what is today remembered as the
Bay View Massacre. This would be the first of several publication's in Berger's portfolio, which would ultimately prove to be the stepping-stone to the socialist publisher's election to
United States Congress in the fall of 1910. During his final year of life Grottkau joined the
Social Democracy of America, a political forerunner of the
Socialist Party of America.
Death and legacy In the spring of 1898, Grottkau made a speaking tour on behalf of the Social Democracy, visiting the cities of
Buffalo,
Cleveland, and
Detroit. ==Footnotes==