Today in Labor History December 9, 1935: Walter Liggett, American newspaper editor and muckraker, was murdered in a drive-by shooting with a Thompson submachine gun, as he stepped out of his car, groceries in his hand. His wife and daughter were in the car and witnessed his death. Liggett was a card-carrying member of the American Socialist Party, but he was more of a Mid-Western Populist-Socialist than a Marxist. In the 1920's he participated in efforts to free Sacco and Vanzetti and Thomas Mooney. In a series of articles, he accused Farmer-Labor politicians of collusion with the organized crime family of Isadore Blumenfield. He accused Minnesota Governor Floyd Olson of corruption and said that he should be impeached and prosecuted. In response, Blumenfield tried to bribe him to stop his exposés, but Liggett refused. Blumenfield and his gang savagely beat Liggett up. Liggett escalated his attacks and began printing a list of reasons for Olson's impeachment on the front page of the Midwest-American. Soon after, he was murdered.
Today in Labor History October18, 1927: The trial of Sholom Schwartzbard began for killing Ukrainian nationalist Symon Petliura, for slaughtering15 members of his family in Pogroms. Schwartzbard was a Russian-born French Yiddish poet and an anarchist. He served in the French and Soviet militaries.