Biography
Paul Kettunen, whose full name was Pauli Olavi Kettunen, was a Finnish immigrant detained for deportation over alleged Communist Party affiliation. He entered the United States with his mother on July 26, 1925, at age fifteen, later working as a painter and Great Lakes sailor. Immigration officers arrested him in Duluth, Minnesota, on February 21, 1934. He was subsequently taken to Ellis Island, where he was held in solitary confinement. The Second Circuit reversed the denial of his habeas corpus petition on August 5, 1935. The court found that he had withdrawn his party application without becoming a member and that his club attendance and newspaper sales did not establish the affiliation required for deportation.
Daily Worker, February 4, 1935: Pages 2 and 6 individually name him among five labor activists held for deportation whose freedom was to be demanded by a delegation representing more than 225 organizations. The announced meetings with immigration officials and Congressman Dickstein were proposed advocacy, not a release or completed removal. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n030-Nat-sect-1-feb-04-1935-DW-LOC.pdf
The February 22, 1935 account of an Ellis Island interview with Otto Richter named him among fellow political deportees held there in segregation. The interview day was not printed, so the issue date is not an intake or transfer date. This corroborates the existing immigration episode without supplying a completed duration or overriding later established bail release. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n046-Nat-feb-22-1935-DW-LOC.pdf#page=5
The March 29, 1935 Daily Worker named him among the political deportees accompanying John Ujich on the guarded eastbound deportation-train journey to Ellis Island. The report described a filthy, overcrowded barred car and public solidarity greetings at Spokane and Chicago. It gives no release endpoint. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n076-NAT-mar-29-1935-DW-Q.pdf#page=5
Page 2 reports the Monday appellate reversal, consistent with the established August 5, 1935 decision. It explains that newspaper sales at a Duluth Finnish picnic and refusal to answer political-belief questions did not establish deportable Communist affiliation; Judge Harris B. Chase wrote the unanimous opinion. It retrospectively dates a writ halting removal from the President Harding, with Oscar Mannisto, to October 29, 1934, fifteen minutes before sailing. That vessel/date claim is retained as a contemporary account rather than substituted for physical discharge or silently reconciled with other transport accounts. The appellate victory is not itself the exact day Kettunen left custody. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n190-NAT-aug-09-1935-DW-Q.pdf
Page 6's editorial, printing the second man's surname Kettinen, announces a Federal District Court hearing in two days concerning deportation. This is a future hearing in the existing immigration-defense campaign, not proof of an accomplished removal or a new physical custody interval. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n302-Nat-dec-19-DW-LOC.pdf
Labor Defender, February 1935, PDF page 5: John Howard Lawson names him among five foreign-born workers physically held on Ellis Island when a delegation visited January 11, 1935. The account alleges segregation, confiscation of reading material, lack of exercise and efforts to prevent bail, with guards’ threat to shoot after paper was lighted to read mail in a dark room. Ujich was taken to hospital an hour before the visit; Lawson interviewed the other four. The continuation on PDF 24 identifies Popoff’s wife and three children in Syracuse and Mannisto’s typographical-union membership in Astoria, Oregon. These are attributed prison conditions and intermediate custody, not a fresh detention or executed deportation. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1935/v11n02-feb-1935-orig-LD.pdf#page=5
Contemporary report of release after the deportation challenge
The same brochure, page 5, recounts that Kettunen was placed aboard the S.S. President Harding for Finland, that a writ served on the captain halted deportation, and that he was released after an appellate reversal. It places the court victory in 1935, consistent with the separately documented August 5 decision. It does not give the physical-discharge day, so the decision date is not substituted for a release date and no precise custody total is calculated.
Daily Worker, August 9, 1935; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Page 6’s editorial note reports Oscar Mannisto and Paul Kettunin taken off the S.S. President Harding on October 31, 1934 under habeas corpus writs secured by the Committee for Protection of Foreign Born. This establishes interruption of the planned deportation, not physical discharge from immigration custody or permanent asylum.
The front-page report says a habeas corpus writ obtained by Fanny Horwitz removed Mannisto and Paul Kattunen from the President Harding fifteen minutes before sailing. It separately dates their Ellis Island train arrival to Monday, October 29, and announces a Friday hearing before Judge Knox. This is interrupted removal, not release from detention or a completed deportation; the issue does not explicitly give the ship intervention day. Later retrospective accounts differ on that day and are not silently reconciled.
Daily Worker, December 19, 1934; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
The March25,1935 Daily Worker reports that Paul Kettunen, John Ujich, Ray Carlson and Oscar Mannisto had been released on bail and would address a meeting that evening. This is a completed bail-release observation by publication, not an exact discharge day or a final end to deportation litigation. Kettunen's later appellate outcome does not establish that he remained continuously jailed until that ruling; no new admission, release date or measured total is inferred.
The page 3 defense review says a writ served on the S.S. President Harding’s captain stopped the proposed deportation of Paul Kettunen and Oscar Mannisto fifteen minutes before sailing. It prints Wednesday, October 30 without a year; the day/date combination and other sources’ October 29 or October 31 accounts remain discrepant. The article describes continued Ellis Island detention and appeals. This retrospective account is not a new admission, a discharge to freedom, or proof of accomplished foreign deportation. Existing individually supported dates remain unchanged.
