Difference is, Debs was actually persecuted by the government for his beliefs. Oh, and not a repugnant fleshsack excuse of a human being.
I knew this comparison would materialize…and I fucking hated the idea of it, let alone an actual article.
In short, Trump is no Debs, not by any stretch of the imagination, even the imaginations of his deranged supporters.
And frankly, even separate from the very disparate ethics surrounding the crimes they were convicted of, this comparison is completely irrelevant. Debs was a minor candidate with no shot at winning. This trivia article is mostly just going to be an excuse for why an actual criminal who could actually win the presidency is no big deal. Putting this out now is just a single tiny step down from deciding now is the right time to recount Nelson Mandela’s time in prison.
It’s like reporters are just blank slates primed with random contemporary keywords without context and incapable of contemplating what the effect of their work will be in reality.
Yup, I absolutely fucking hate that people are comparing someone who was unfairly persecuted to fucking Trump. It is such a deeply bad faith argument.
In case anyone wanted to know a bit more. He was the founder of the American Railway Union, one of America’s first industrial unions. As leader, he organized a stike against the Pullman factory that resulted in its own factory workers, who were not ARU members, to strike. The strike was because factory workers had their wages reduced but their rents (which they paid to the company they worked for) were not. Engineers and conductors for the company continued to work, so Debs had the striking factory workers block railways. That caused the government to send in the army to break up the union and jail Debs along with other union and strike leaders.
While in jail, Debs read socialist political literature and founded several socialist political parties on his release. Debs gave many political speeches that upset the government, but one where he urged listeners to dodge the WWI military draft, because the proletariat shouldn’t fight the battles of the rulling class, caused him to be jailed once again for sedition. It was this time in jail that he ran for office.
And more about him being in prison for speaking out against the war.
“I know of no reason why the workers should fight for what the capitalists own,” Debs wrote to novelist Upton Sinclair, “or slaughter one another for countries that belong to their masters.”
Illness slowed Debs for several months after war was declared; he mostly stayed home in Terre Haute, resting under doctor’s orders, sick with back pain, digestion problems, and a weak heart. But in December, his friend Kate O’Hare, the nation’s most prominent female socialist, was convicted under the Espionage Act for a July 1917 anti-war speech and sentenced to five years in prison. “I shall feel guilty to be at large,” Debs wrote her in solidarity. In May 1918, Congress passed the Sedition Act, further tightening restrictions on dissent.
Enraged, Debs set out in June on a new speaking tour of the Midwest. He knew he was courting prosecution, and maybe even welcomed it. “I’ll take about two jumps and they’ll nail me, but that’s all right,” he told a friend.
Two weeks later, Debs was walking into a Socialist picnic in Cleveland when U.S. marshals arrested him.
“I have been accused of having obstructed the war,” Debs told the jury. “I admit it. I abhor war. I would oppose the war if I stood alone.” He defended socialism as a moral movement, like the abolition of slavery decades before. “I believe in free speech, in war as well as in peace,” Debs declared. “If the Espionage Law stands, then the Constitution of the United States is dead.”
The jury found Debs guilty on three counts, and the judge sentenced him to ten years in prison.
The Wilson administration, unmoved, rejected a recommendation to commute Debs’ sentence in February 1921. “While the flower of American youth was pouring out its blood to vindicate the cause of civilization, this man, Debs, stood behind the lines, sniping, attacking, and denouncing them,” Wilson complained to his secretary. “This man was a traitor to his country."
In December 1921, Harding commuted Debs’ sentence, set his release for Christmas Day, and invited Debs to the White House. “I have heard so damned much about you, Mr. Debs, that I am now very glad to meet you personally,” Harding greeted him on Dec. 26. Leaving the meeting, Debs called Harding “a kind gentleman” with “humane impulses,” but declared that he’d told the president he would continue the fight for his “principles, conviction, and ideals.” He took the train to home to Terre Haute and his wife, Kate, the next day.
Debs died in 1926 at age 70.
Pretty much the same thing as raw-dogging a porn star just after your wife gave birth and then committing felony business fraud and campaign finance violations to cover it up, I guess.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee in November’s election, has joined an unusual club: presidential contenders who are also convicted criminals.
Before Trump was found guilty on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in a historic verdict on Thursday, the most well-known convict seeking the Oval Office had been Eugene Debs, a socialist who conducted his presidential campaign behind bars in 1920.
While Republican Warren Harding won that year’s election by a landslide, defeating Democrat James Cox, Debs managed to secure nearly 1 million votes from his Atlanta prison cell — which Allison Duerk, director of the Eugene V. Debs Museum in Terre Haute, Indiana, called “remarkable.”
“He couldn’t even use his most powerful tool, which was his voice,” she said, adding that he was permitted to put out a short weekly press release during the campaign season but otherwise relied on others in the Socialist Party to get the word out for him.
Trump pleaded not guilty to his charges, which were related to a hush money payment that his former lawyer made to adult film star Stormy Daniels as the 2016 presidential election approached.
After a couple of months imprisoned in West Virginia, Debs was transferred to a federal prison in Atlanta to serve the rest of his sentence.
The original article contains 764 words, the summary contains 212 words. Saved 72%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
