Biography
Corliss Lamont was an author and civil libertarian who refused on First Amendment grounds to answer questions before Senator Joseph McCarthy’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations in 1953. The Senate cited him for contempt and he was indicted, but a federal district court dismissed the indictment. The Court of Appeals upheld the dismissal in 1956 because the subcommittee lacked authority for the inquiry, and the government abandoned the prosecution. Lamont served no jail time in the case.
The Daily Worker of March 2, 1935, page 2, identifies Corliss Lamont, son of Thomas W. Lamont, and Alfred Bingham among sympathizers arrested on the Miller furniture strike picket line in Jersey City during the previous year. This establishes an earlier labor-solidarity arrest, separate from his later McCarthy contempt prosecution; exact custody dates and duration are not given. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n053-NAT-mar-02-1935-DW-Q.pdf
The June 28, 1934 report dates Lamont’s Miller Parlor Furniture picket arrest to June 27 and says $1,500 bail was fixed for a July 5 trial. The amount being fixed does not prove payment or physical release. This fills the existing 1934 labor-solidarity case, without creating a second arrest or altering the separate McCarthy proceeding. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n154-jun-28-1934-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
Daily Worker, July 16, 1934, page 2: National Furniture Workers Industrial Union secretary Joe Kiss reports that Corliss Lamont, Alfred Bingham and Justine Tulin Wise, Rabbi Wise's daughter, were arrested with about fifteen union members during the Jersey City frame-shop dispute. The union resisted employers moving four Brooklyn shops under Mayor Hague's promise of protection from picketing. Kiss reports a July 2 National Labor Board decision directing reinstatement of former employees without discrimination. That labor-board order is not a criminal acquittal or physical jail release, and the earlier solidarity arrest is not duplicated. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n169-sect-one-jul-16-1934-DW-LOC.pdf
New Leader, July 28, 1934, page 4: The Newark Court Order Vacated item reports Federal Judge Avis vacating a previous Chancery Court order restraining furniture-union picketing at the Miller plant in Jersey City. It identifies Alfred Bingham and Corliss Lamont as having picketed and submitted to arrest, and expects them to testify at another hearing July 31. The vacated picketing restraint is not a criminal acquittal or jail-release order; the announced hearing and expected witness appearances are prospective in this issue. This adds legal-defense context to the existing Jersey City arrest. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/new-leader/1934/v17n30-jul-28-1934-NL.pdf
Page 2's July 5 New Jersey report recalls his arrest the previous week while supporting the Jersey City Miller Parlor Frame Company furniture strike. It reports a National Labor Board direction to rehire pre-strike workers and stop anti-union intimidation. This is labor-dispute context for the existing arrest, not a criminal acquittal or physical jail-release order. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n161-jul-06-1934-DW-LOC.pdf
The weekly chronology notes postponement of the JerseyCity picketing prosecution. It supplies no new physical custody or final disposition. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/new-masses/1934/v12n03-jul-17-1934-NM.pdf#page=8
