Betty Gannett, Marxist theoretician, writer, and teacher, was active in the Communist Party, USA (CPUSA) for more than forty-five years. At the time of her death in 1970, she was editor of Political Affairs, the theoretical journal of the CPUSA, and a member of the Party's national and political committees. Born in 1906 in Poland, Gannett immigrated to the United States in 1914 and, with six brothers and sisters, was reared in poverty in New York City by her widowed mother who worked as a cook and maid. Terminating her public school education at age thirteen, Gannett then completed a two-year commercial course and became a secretary in the office of the AFL-United Garment Workers. Two of her sisters, who worked in the sweatshops of the garment district, were members of the union. Her next employment was in the office that produced the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers Journal, then edited by Albert F. Coyle.
Drawing upon her working-class experience and a detailed study of Marxist literature, Gannett joined the Young Communist League (YCL) and the CP in 1923. From that time, her work for the Party dominated her life. In 1927 she accompanied the first rank-and-file delegation of American trade unionists to the Soviet Union and soon thereafter entered the Lenin School in Moscow. Subsequently many of her experiences and activities were international and included her active participation in debate within both Marxist and non-Marxist circles. This work outside the United States drew her into a wide range of activities including participation in the anti-Nazi German underground and in the foundation of the Young Communist League of Canada. Returning to the United States in 1928, the YCL sent her to Cleveland as an organizer which resulted in her being charged with criminal syndicalism. Although sentenced to ten years in prison, her conviction was reversed on appeal. During this period she also was taking an active part in the coal mine disputes in Western Pennsylvania. In 1929 Gannett became the national educational director of the YCL.
Early in the 1930's Gannett returned to New York to serve as an editor of The Communist, a forerunner of Political Affairs, and of another CP publication, Party Organizer. She was also organizing secretary of the Party in Pennsylvania, again involving her in strike activities in Pennsylvania and Ohio in 1933. Two years later she was transferred to the west coast where she served as the first educational director of the California Party until 1941 and was a leader in the struggle to organize agricultural workers. While in California, she was one of the Founders of the Western Worker, a local CP publication, which became the People's World. In 1938 she married James J. (Jim) Tormey, then a leading figure in the California CP, who formerly had helped to rally support for the defense in the Scottsboro trials (1932) which had focused world-wide attention upon the arbitrary trial procedures frequently used in criminal cases involving Blacks in the South.
From 1941 to 1944 Gannett served as Midwest regional coordinator of the Party. Headquartered in Chicago, she administered a territory that included most Midwestern states and all the Rocky Mountain states. Shortly before the end of World War II she returned to New York to be the assistant national organizational secretary of the CP, and in 1950 she became the Party's national educational director. In 1963 she was named executive editor of Political Affairs, then associate editor, and finally editor in 1966. Her death on March 4, 1970 followed a long illness.
In addition to Gannett's functions in the CP, her career was filled with a variety of legal problems arising solely from her Party affiliation and activities. The government unsuccessfully attempted to deport her in 1949, as she never acquired American citizenship. In 1951, during the McCarthy period, she, together with 16 other second-level CP leaders, was convicted under the Smith Act. Charged with conspiring to overthrow the government by force and violence, Gannett and her fellow defendants vigorously denied that they planned to initiate any violence, arguing that they would use force only to defend the decisions of a majority. Failing with this defense, she spent two years, 1955 and 1956, at the women's federal prison in Alderson, West Virginia. After her release, she was harassed for the rest of her life. Another attempt was made to deport her, and when it failed, the Immigration Bureau sought to have her report once a week to Ellis Island and to remain within a fifty-mile radius of Times Square. Through litigation, she overcame the government's requirements, thus setting a precedent against its indiscriminate denial of civil liberties to aliens.
