ABSTRACT
After the split with Fitzpatrick, the miscarriage of the Federated XTL Farmer-Labor party, and the tailspin of the Trade Union Educational League, the Communists were down but not out. The "Third Party alliance" gave them the rare opportunity of playing the same game twice. The concept of this alliance arose out of Communist doctrine as it was understood and practiced in this period. According to this doctrine, the LaFollette movement represented a third party of the petty bourgeoisie as distinguished from the two parties of the big bourgeoisie, the Republican and the Democratic. After Fitzpatrick's disillusionment, Chicago rapidly receded in importance as the Communists' center of operations in the Farmer-Labor movement. But wherever the Communists turned within the Farmer-Labor movement, the shadow of LaFollette fell across their path. The new Communist allies were even more fervently pro-LaFollette than the old.
