Lewis Corey

The Decline of American Capitalism Lewis Corey

Louis Corey was born Louis C. Fraina (1892?1953) and was a founding member of the American Communist Party in 1919. After running afoul of the Communist International in 1921 over the alleged misappropriation of funds, Fraina left the organized radical movement, emerging in 1926 as a left wing public intellectual by the name of Lewis Corey. During the McCarthy period, deportation proceedings were initiated against him. Fraina came to socialism as a youth, later stating that he had joined (and quickly departed) the Socialist Party of America in 1909. Fraina seems to have been greatly influenced by the writings of Daniel DeLeon, editor of the newspaper of the rival Socialist Labor Party of America, a party which Fraina joined shortly after his departure from the SPA. Fraina was an enthusiastic convert to the SLP, making public speeches on revolutionary socialism and the SLP's ideas about revolutionary industrial unionism. He made streetcorner speeches in New York City every weekend in good weather, learning the art of public oratory in the trenches and mastering the loud and dramatic form of presentation needed to captivate strangers when speaking from a soapbox. After a protracted legal battle, Corey died of a cerebral hemorrhage before the action against him was formally abandoned. Corey's papers are housed in the Rare Book & Manuscript section of Butler Library at Columbia University in New York City. The collection includes 10 linear feet of material housed in 24 archival boxes. This is a reproduction of an out-of-print manuscript. All pages are intact and it has been carefully reviewed.