¹ Holmes, John Haynes, Debs – Lover of Men (New York: Community Church, “The Community Pulpit” Series 1926–1927, No. V)Google Scholar; Holmes to Theodore Debs, October 22, 1926, in Letters of Eugene V. Debs, 3 vols., ed., J. Robert Constantine (Urbana, 1990), 3: 606–07 (hereafter cited as Letters). The poem also appeared in Unity, November 15, 1926. Holmes included Debs in a chapter, “Great Men,” in I Speak for Myself: The Autobiography of John Haynes Holmes (New York, 1959), 245–48.

² Pauline Rauschenbusch to Eugene V. Debs, May 3, 1926, and Debs to Rauschen-busch, May 22,1926, Letters, 3: 567–69, 579–80. For Rauschenbusch's views of socialism, see Dorn, Jacob H., “The Social Gospel and Socialism: A Comparison of the Thought of Francis Greenwood Peabody, Washington Gladden, and Walter Rauschenbusch,” Church History 62 (March 1993): 91–100.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³ Lewis J. Duncan to Theodore Debs, October 19, 1926, and Robert Whitaker to Theodore Debs, [October 1926], Papers of Eugene V. Debs, 1834–1945 (microfilm ed., 1983), reel 4, Indiana State University, Terre Haute, Indiana (hereafter cited as Papers).

⁴ Salvatore, Nick, Eugene V. Debs: Citizen and Socialist (Urbana, 1982), 310–11.Google Scholar The best previous biography of Debs gives relatively little attention to religious analogies but also argues that journalists, ministers, poets, and others created a “Debs Legend” of self-sacrifice and greatness of soul. Ginger, Ray, Eugene V. Debs: A Biography (New York, 1962), 284–85Google Scholar; originally published as The Bending Cross: A Biography of Eugene Victor Debs (New Brunswick, NJ, 1949).

⁵ Holmes, John Haynes to Debs, Eugene V., November 1, 1920Google Scholar, and August 18, 1926, Letters, 3: 149–50, 594–95.

⁶ Debs, Eugene V., “Bigelow and the Blacksnake Brutes,” Social Revolution, December 1917Google Scholar, in Papers, reel 8; Herbert S. Bigelow to Debs, January 12, 1921, ibid., reel 3.

⁷ Rev. G.W. Woodbey to Eugene V. Debs, March 31, 1921, in Papers, reel 3.

⁸ Coleman, McAlister, Eugene V. Debs: A Man Unafraid (New York, 1930), 319.Google Scholar Citations to two other postwar poems that linked Debs and Christ appear in Letters, 2: 453, 522; Prade, Ruth Le, “Eugene V. Debs,” Protest (May 1919)Google Scholar and Kunitz, Joshua, “Debs – America's Soul,” New York Call, May 4, 1919.Google Scholar

⁹ “First Annual Convention Social Democratic Party,” Social Democratic Herald, March 17, 1900.

¹⁰ Byron-Curtiss, A.L. to Debs, Eugene V., November 12, 1912Google Scholar, and November 22, 1921, in Papers, reel 4.

¹¹ Eastman, Max, “Greek Drama in Cleveland – The Trial of Eugene Debs,” Heroes I Have Known, Twelve Who Lived Great Lives (New York, 1942), 133–38Google Scholar, in Debs, ed., Radosh, Ronald (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1971), 135Google Scholar; Ameringer, Oscar, If You Don't Weaken: The Autobiography of Oscar Ameringer (New York, 1940), 268Google Scholar; Broun, Heywood, It Seems to Me, 1925–1935 (New York, 1935), 35–39Google Scholar, in Radosh, , Debs, 141.Google Scholar

¹² Coleman, , Debs, 10–12Google Scholar; Brommel, Bernard J., Eugene V. Debs: Spokesman for Labor and Socialism (Chicago, 1978), 13–15Google Scholar; Ginger, , Debs, 20Google Scholar, 23–24, 82–83; Salvatore, , Debs, 9–11.Google Scholar These authors use Debs' interviews with David Karsner of the New York Call, published as Debs: His Authorized Life and Letters (New York, 1919) and Talks with Debs in Terre Haute (New York, 1922).

¹³ Ginger, , Debs, 39Google Scholar; Debs, Eugene V. to Haldeman-Julius, Emanuel, October 4, 1924, Letters, 3: 440–42Google Scholar; Currie, Harold W., “The Religious Views of Eugene V. Debs,” Mid-America: An Historical Review 54 (July 1972): 147–56Google Scholar and Eugene V. Debs (Boston, 1976), 111–21.

¹⁴ Karsner, , Talks with Debs in Terre Haute, 99.Google Scholar Repeated in Coleman, , Debs, 11Google Scholar; Brommel, , Debs, 15Google Scholar; Morais, Herbert M. and Cahn, William, Gene Debs: The Story of a Fighting American (New York, 1948), 21Google Scholar; Ginger, , Debs, 24Google Scholar; and Currie, , “Religious Views,” 147–48.Google Scholar Debs' marriage occurred in an Episcopal church.

¹⁵ Coleman, , Debs, 31–33Google Scholar; Brommel, , Debs, 75Google Scholar; Ginger, , Debs, 40–41, 222Google Scholar; Ingersoll, Robert G. to Debs, Eugene V., [February?] 2, 1881Google Scholar, Letters, 1: 13.

¹⁶ Currie, , “Religious Views,” 148–49Google Scholar; Salvatore, , Debs, 103–04.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Morais, and Cahn, , Debs, 75Google Scholar; Coleman, , Debs, 175.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Debs, Eugene V., “Prostitution of Religion,” Appeal to Reason, April 23, 1910.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Debs, Eugene V., “Jehovah and God,” Melting Pot (February 1916): 11.Google Scholar

²⁰ On Sunday, see Morais, and Calm, , Debs, 121–22Google Scholar; Debs, Eugene V. to Debs, Theodore, March 3, 1917, Letters, 2: 289–90.Google Scholar For a Christian Socialist critique, Prosser, William A., “Billy Sunday – Symptom of Decay,” Christian Socialist 11 (March 1, 1914): 12–13Google Scholar, and “What Do You Think of Billy Sunday,” ibid. 12 (August 1915): 3. On Abbott, see Debs, Eugene V. to Sinclair, Upton, October 28, 1918, Letters, 2: 459.Google Scholar Ginger quotes Abbott, in Debs, 161.Google Scholar

²¹ For Catholic-Socialist conflict, see Dorn, Jacob H., “‘The Oldest and Youngest of the Idealistic Forces at Work in Our Civilization’: Encounters Between Christianity and Socialism,” in Socialism and Christianity in Early 20th Century America, ed., Dorn, (Westport, CT, 1998): 16–23.Google Scholar

²² Debs, Eugene V., “Tichenor's ‘Creed of Constantine,’” National Rip-Saw, January 1917.Google Scholar

²³ Debs, Eugene V. to Bowers, Claude G., April 22, 1914, Letters, 2: 97–98.Google Scholar

²⁴ Debs, Eugene V. to Warren, Fred D., December 13, 1912, Letters, 1: 560.Google Scholar

²⁵ Debs, Eugene V., “A Bishop's Bewilderment,” Social Democratic Herald, February 20, 1904Google Scholar; Debs, Eugene V. to Warren, Fred D., January 3, 1910, in Letters, 1: 315–16.Google Scholar

²⁶ Hillquit, Morris to Debs, Eugene V., November 15, 1913Google Scholar, and Debs, to Hillquit, , December 20, 1913, Letters, 2: 81Google Scholar, 85–86. The debates were published as Hillquit, Morris and Ryan, John A., Socialism: Promise or Menace? (New York, 1914).Google Scholar

²⁷ Debs, Eugene V., “The Knights of Columbus,” International Socialist Review 14 (April 1915): 600–02.Google Scholar

²⁸ Debs, Eugene V. to O'Neill, John M., November 24, 1911, Letters, 1: 436–38Google Scholar; Theodore Debs to John F. Noll, June 27, 1913, ibid., 2: 67–69. For a more polite version of Kluser's attack, see his “Socialism a Menace to Religion and the Family,” New York Call, January 19, 1913.

²⁹ Salvatore, , Debs, 64Google Scholar, 103–04, 165. For similar comments, see Ginger, , Debs, 305Google Scholar, and Craig, Robert H., Religion and Radical Politics: An Alternative Christian Tradition in the United States (Philadelphia, 1992), 112–14.Google Scholar

³⁰ Debs' emphasis on the humanity of Jesus extended to speculation that Jesus may have had a romantic relationship with Mary Magdalene. Ginger, , Debs, 448.Google Scholar

³¹ Debs, “Prostitution of Religion,” and Debs, Eugene V., “The Pious Pharisees,” New York Call, July 13, 1919.Google Scholar

³² White, Bouck, The Call of the Carpenter (New York, 1912).Google Scholar White wrote a sequel, The Carpenter and the Rich Man (New York, 1914).

³³ Debs, Eugene V., “Bouck White's Great Book,” Coming Nation, May 10, 1913.Google Scholar

³⁴ Debs, Eugene V., “Jesus, the Supreme Leader,” Coming Nation, March 1914.Google Scholar Debs so liked a sketch of Jesus by radical cartoonist Art Young when this article reappeared in the Call on December 22, 1917, that he urged its use in all socialist discussion of Jesus. Debs, Theodore to Karsner, David, December 19, 1917, Letters, 2: 352–53.Google Scholar

³⁵ Debs, Eugene V., “Jehovah and God,” Melting Pot (February 1916): 11Google Scholar; Debs, Eugene V., “Jesus,” in The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest, ed., Sinclair, Upton (Philadelphia, 1915): 345.Google Scholar Debs' statement opens Sinclair's section on Jesus.

³⁶ Steffens, Lincoln, “Eugene V. Debs on What the Matter Is in America and What To Do About It,” Everybody's (October 1908): 455–69Google Scholar, in Radosh, , Debs, 129–30.Google Scholar

³⁷ Debs, Eugene V., “Socialist Ideals,” Arena (November 1908): 432–34.Google Scholar See also Debs, , “The Socialist Party's Appeal,” Independent 65 (October 15, 1908): 875–80Google Scholar, quoted in Nelson, Phyllis A., “George D. Herron and the Socialist Clergy, 1890–1914” (Ph.D. diss., State University of Iowa, 1953): 304.Google Scholar

³⁸ Ginger, , Debs, 411.Google Scholar

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⁴⁰ Karsner, , Debs: His Authorized Life and Letters, 10–11.Google Scholar For some of Debs' reflections on religion while in prison, see his Walls and Bars (Chicago, [1927], 1973), 97, 157, 265–66, 269.

⁴¹ One notable exception is John Spargo, a Methodist preacher in England who became an agnostic and then an Episcopalian. Associated with the Right on trade-union policy, Spargo was part of an effort to deny Debs the presidential nomination in 1908. In interviews years later, he accused Debs of hypocrisy and pseudo-martyrdom and played up the embarrassments his drinking caused the party. He appealed to President Wilson, however, for a pardon for Debs. “The Reminiscences of John Spargo” (Oral History Research Office, Columbia University, 1957), 208–15.

⁴² Hollingsworth, J.H., Eugene V. Debs: What His Neighbors Say of Him (n.p., [1912]), 17.Google Scholar

⁴³ Lee, Matthew C., “‘Onward Christian Soldiers’: The Social Gospel and the Pullman Strike,” Chicago History 20 (Spring and Summer 1991): 4–21.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Denton, James A., Rocky Mountain Radical: Myron W. Reed, Christian Socialist (Albuquerque, NM, 1997), 120Google Scholar, 138–39,148; Debs, Eugene V., “Reminiscences of Myron W. Reed,” Comrade 3 (November 1903): 34–35.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ “Notes and Comments,” Christian Socialist 8 (April 13, 1911): 8.

⁴⁶ Nelson, , “Herron and the Socialist Clergy,” 209Google Scholar; “Vail Nominated for Governor,” Social Democratic Herald, January 12, 1901.

⁴⁷ “National Campaign Opened,” Social Democratic Herald, October 6, 1900; “The Voice of the Prophet,” Social Crusader 2 (October 1900): 8–9. The speech was reprinted as “Why I Am a Socialist,” Kerr's, Charles H. “Pocket Library of Socialism” No. 20 (Chicago, 1900).Google Scholar Never one to underdramatize his life, Herron said that he skipped a meeting with Leo Tolsoy to appear with Debs.

⁴⁸ Herron, George D., “A Plea for the Unity of American Socialists,” International Socialist Review 1 (December 1, 1900): 321–28.Google Scholar This address in Chicago appeared as the lead article in the ISR.

⁴⁹ Minutes of the Unity Convention, typescript, 3–8, 166–71, 182, National Office Papers, General Records, July 1901, Socialist Party of America Papers, Duke University. Herron's articles in the ISR appeared from January through May 1901. They originated as lectures in Chicago and were also covered by the Social Democratic Herald. For Herron's role in the new party, see, Dieterich, Herbert R., “Patterns of Dissent: The Reform Ideas and Activities of GeorgeD. Herron” (Ph.D. diss., University of New Mexico, 1957): 132–36Google Scholar; Handy, Robert T., “George D. Herron and the Social Gospel in American Protestantism, 1890–1901” (Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, 1949): 146–47Google Scholar, 167–69, 172; Nelson, , “Herron and the Socialist Clergy,” 205–06Google Scholar, 236–38; Quint, Howard H., The Forging of American Socialism: Origins of the Modern Movement (Indianapolis, 1953), 134–36Google Scholar, 374, 377, 383–84.

⁵⁰ “Proceedings of the Convention” and “National Platform,” International Socialist Review 4 (May 1904): 697–705, 668–72. On the Rand School, see Hillquit, Morris, Loose Leaves From A Busy Life (New York, 1934), 62Google Scholar, 64–65, and Cornell, Frederic, “A History of the Rand School of Social Science, 1906 to 1956” (Ed.D. diss., Teachers' College, Columbia University, 1976): 16–27.Google Scholar

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⁵² Frederick G. Strickland to Eugene V. Debs and Theodore Debs, May 3, 1906, in Papers, reel 1, and to Eugene V. Debs, n.d., reel 3; Frederick G. and May Strickland to Theodore Debs and Family, October 23, 1926, reel 4; Theodore Debs to Frederick G. and May Strickland, March 12, 1941, reel 5.

⁵³ For this group's activities and their rationales for socialism, see the Social Crusader (1898–1901) and the Socialist Spirit (1901–1903). Spargo, , “Reminiscences,” 162.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ Salvatore, , Debs, 212.Google Scholar

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⁵⁷ Dorn, , “The Oldest and Youngest of the Idealistic Forces,” 2.Google Scholar

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⁶² The magazine appeared under the first name from August 1921 to February 1922; under the second, until April 1923. Jacob H. Dorn, “‘Not a Substitute for Religion, but a Means of Fulfilling It’: The Sacramental Socialism of Irwin St. John Tucker,” in Dorn, , Socialism and Christianity, 139–51.Google Scholar When David Karsner wrote that Debs was displeased about articles attributed to him, Debs sharply rebuked him, refused for this and other reasons to endorse his Talks with Debs in Terre Haute, and tried to stop the spread of the rumor. Debs Magazine 2 (September 1922): 3; Eugene V. Debs to David Karsner, July 28, [1922], in Papers, reel 4; Debs, to Karsner, , December 8, 1922, Letters, 3: 355–58.Google Scholar

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⁶⁵ “Catholic Special Edition,” Christian Socialist 6 (January 15, 1909); “A Foolish Priest,” ibid. 9 (May 16, 1912): 5; Edgar Franklin Blanchard, “The Roman Catholic Church and Socialism,” ibid. 10 (November 1, 1913): 1–3.

⁶⁶ Charles H. Vail, “The Attitude of the Church Toward Social Reform” and “Abolition of Social Evils,” Coming Nation, June 18, 1898 and March 11, 1899; “Sevenoaks,” “Queries From a Minister,” ibid., November 27, 1897; Brown, William Thurston, “The Beginnings of a New Religion,” Social Gospel 2 (October 1899): 10Google Scholar; Herron, George D., “The Recovery of Jesus from Christianity,” Arena 26 (September 1901): 225–43Google Scholar; J.G. Phelps Stokes to Rev. Joseph H. Odell, November 6, 1908, James Graham Phelps Stokes Papers, Butler Library, Columbia University, Box 77; “Professor Fagnani Speaks for Labor,” Christian Socialist 4 (January 15, 1907): 1–2; Sinclair, Upton, The Profits of Religion: An Essay in Economic Interpretation (Pasadena, CA, 1918), 18Google Scholar; Sawyer, Roland D., “The Social Science of Jesus,” Christian Socialist 9 (September 1, 1912): 9–14.Google Scholar

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⁶⁹ J.O.B., “Christian Socialist Fellowship Center,” Christian Socialist 4 (January 1, 1907): 5Google Scholar; E.E.C., “The Chicago Christian Socialist Center,” ibid. (January 15, 1907): 1; “Progress of the Center,” ibid. (February 1, 1907): 8.

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