ABSTRACT
The Yiddish-speaking communist movement in the United States emerged in the early 1920s from a welter of factional struggles in the Jewish labour movement and the Socialist Party. This chapter examines the origins of the Yiddish-speaking immigrant communist movement. It argues that this movement should be understood within the context of deep-seated conflicts within the immigrant Jewish community. At the heart of these conflicts was a fundamental tension in modern Jewish politics between particularistic and universalistic goals and political strategies. The Yiddish-speaking communist movement had its origins in a relatively small, but nonetheless important organization called the Jewish Socialist Federation. Jewish socialists made their first step in 1907 by forming the Jewish Socialist Agitation Bureau. The Yiddish-speaking communist movement as a significant organized force began in early 1922 with the founding of the daily Frayhayt. Frayhayt demonstrated its commitment to Yiddish culture in several ways, beginning with language.
