use both this parameter and , birth_date to display the person's date of birth, date of death, and age at death) --> , death_place = , death_cause = , nationality = American , other_names = , citizenship = , education = , alma_mater = , occupation = , years_active = , era = , employer = , organization = , agent = , known_for = co-founding

United Federal Workers of America The United Federal Workers of America (UFWA) was an American labor union representing federal government employees which existed from 1937 to 1946. It was the first union with this jurisdiction established by the Congress of Industrial Organizati ...

(UFWA) , notable_works = , party =

Communist Party USA The Communist Party USA (CPUSA), officially the Communist Party of the United States of America, also referred to as the American Communist Party mainly during the 20th century, is a communist party in the United States. It was established ...

, movement = , opponents = , boards = , criminal_charge = , criminal_penalty = , criminal_status = , spouse = , partner = , children =

Eleanor Raskin Eleanor E. Raskin (née Stein; born March 16, 1946) was a member of the Weathermen. She is currently an adjunct instructor at Albany Law School. She was an administrative law judge at the New York State Public Service Commission. Background ...

, parents = , relatives = Thai Jones , family = Arthur Stein was an American union leader, co-founder of the

(UFWA), and some-time member of the

who led communist cells within the US federal government during the later 1930s and into the 1940s.

Background

Arthur Stein's father Charles came from the

shtetl or ( ; , ; Grammatical number#Overview, pl. ''shtetelekh'') is a Yiddish term for small towns with predominantly Ashkenazi Jews, Ashkenazi Jewish populations which Eastern European Jewry, existed in Eastern Europe before the Holocaust. The t ...

of Mazritch (

Międzyrzec Podlaski Międzyrzec Podlaski () is a town in Biała Podlaska County, Lublin Voivodeship, Poland, with a population of 17,102 inhabitants . The total area of the town is . Międzyrzec is located in the historic region of Podlachia, near the Krzna river, n ...

?) in Poland. He studied at the

Evander Childs High School Evander is a masculine Masculinity (also called manhood or manliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles generally associated with men and boys. Masculinity can be theoretically understood as socially constructed, and there is al ...

The Bronx The Bronx ( ) is the northernmost of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. It shares a land border with Westchester County, New York, West ...

Career

Stein joined the Communist Party some time in the late 1920s or early 1930s, and co-organized the 1932 Chicago Counter-Olympics (also known as the International Workers Athletic Meet, the first Olympic counter-protest). He later was an employee at the Works Progress Administration and then the

War Production Board The War Production Board (WPB) was an agency of the United States government that supervised war production during World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt established it in January 1942, with Executive Order 9024. The WPB replaced the Su ...

. Arthur Stein had helped co-found the

or UFWA (one of the two predecessor unions of the

United Public Workers of America The United Public Workers of America (1946–1952) was an American labor union representing federal, state, county, and local government employees. The union challenged the constitutionality of the Hatch Act of 1939, which prohibited federal exec ...

or UPWA), was elected president of its

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; from 1935 to 1939, then known as the Work Projects Administration from 1939 to 1943) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to car ...

local, and later worked as a full-time organizer for the UPWA. In 1937, he helped organize a secret cell of the Party within a subcommittee of the

Senate Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce The United States Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation is a standing committee of the United States Senate. Besides having broad jurisdiction over all matters concerning interstate commerce, science and technology policy, a ...

, and later at the

National Labor Relations Board The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is an Independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States that enforces United States labor law, U.S. labor law in relation to collect ...

. On February 23, 1943, Stein testified before a subcommittee of the

House A house is a single-unit residential building. It may range in complexity from a rudimentary hut to a complex structure of wood, masonry, concrete or other material, outfitted with plumbing, electrical, and heating, ventilation, and air c ...

Committee on the Civil Service as assistant to secretary-treasurer, United Federal Workers of America,

Congress of Industrial Organizations The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) was a federation of Labor unions in the United States, unions that organized workers in industrial unionism, industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. Originally created in ...

(now part of the

United States House Committee on Oversight and Reform The Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is the main investigative United States congressional committee, committee of the United States House of Representatives. The committee's broad jurisdiction and legislative authority make it one o ...

) regarding additional compensation for civilian employees. In January–February 1944, Stein testified before a subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Education and Labor (now

United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions The United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) generally considers matters relating to these issues. Its jurisdiction also extends beyond these issues to include several more specific areas, as defined by Sena ...

) regarding salaries of government employees. In December 1944, a House ''Miscellaneous'' report listed names and union affiliations of "110 leaders of the work in which the C.I.O Political Action Committee" engaged with the National Federal for Constitutional Liberties. It listed Stein as "assistant to secretary-treasurer, United Federal Workers of America."

Espionage

In December 1955, Herbert Fuchs testified under subpoena before

House Committee on Un-American Activities The House Committee on Un-American Activities (HCUA), popularly the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives, created in 1938 to investigate alleged disloyalty an ...

(HUAC) and described Arthur Stein as a recurring leader in underground networks in the federal government. In 1936, when Fuchs moved to Washington, DC, and joined the Wheeler Committee. Arthur Stein led the committee's communist members. They included: James Gorham, Samuel Koenigsberg, Ellis Olim, and Margaret Bennett Porter (wife of John W. Porter). When Fuchs moved to the

, his comrades were: again Arthur Stein, Allan Rosenberg, Martin Kurasch, Joseph Robison, Eleanor Nelson, Henry Rhine, Philip Reno, Sidney Katz, Julia Katz, and Bernard Stern. Fuchs named

Victor Perlo Victor Perlo (May 15, 1912December 1, 1999) was an American Marxist economist, government functionary, and a longtime member of the governing National Committee of the Communist Party USA. Biography Early years Victor Perlo was born May 15, 19 ...

as Party dues collector at the NLRB; Arthur Stein succeeded him.

Personal life and death

On August 12, 1933, Stein married

Annie Steckler Annie Stein was a civil rights activist who focused on desegregating Washington, D.C. theaters, restaurants and department stores. Background Annie Steckler was born in Brooklyn, New York. Her parents were Ukrainian immigrants; her father's n ...

. Their daughter

joined the

Students for a Democratic Society Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) was a national student activist organization in the United States during the 1960s and was one of the principal representations of the New Left. Disdaining permanent leaders, hierarchical relationships a ...

and become a leader in the

Weather Underground The Weather Underground was a far-left Marxist militant organization first active in 1969, founded on the Ann Arbor campus of the University of Michigan. Originally known as the Weathermen, or simply Weatherman, the group was organized as a f ...

domestic terrorist group. (Eleanor would marry fellow Weatherman Jeff Jones in 1981; their son Thai Jones is a nationally known journalist.)

Works

References

* Jones, Thai: ''A Radical Line: From the Labor Movement to the Weather Underground, One Family's Century of Conscience''. SUNY Press, New York 2007, ISBN 9781416591290

External links

Investigation of Communist Infiltration of Government: Hearing, Parts 1-2

Thai Jones official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Stein, Arthur American civil rights activists American people of Polish-Jewish descent 1900s births Year of birth uncertain Year of death missing Activists from the Bronx Members of the Communist Party USA Jewish American activists Jewish socialists