of contacts. Ruthenberg was associated with the far left so-called "Impossibilist" wing of the SPA, which had little hope for the efficacy of ameliorative reform, seeking instead revolutionary socialist transformation. Ruthenberg was a frequent candidate on the ticket of the Socialist Party. His first electoral failure came in 1910, when he ran for Ohio's state treasurer on the Socialist ticket. In 1911 he ran for mayor of Cleveland, in 1912 for Governor of Ohio, for U.S. Senate in 1914. In 1915 he ran again for mayor of Cleveland and in 1916 he ran for United States Congressman. In 1917 he made his third run for mayor of Cleveland (receiving 27,000 votes of 100,000 cast), followed by his second run for Congress in 1918. His final fourth and final run for mayor of Cleveland came in 1919. Ruthenberg was a delegate to the seminal 1917 Emergency National Convention of the SPA. There he was elected to the Committee on War and Militarism and was one of three primary authors of the aggressively antimilitarist St. Louis program, along with Morris Hillquit and Algernon Lee. After American entry into World War I, Ruthenberg continued to publicly attack the imperialist conflict and America's participation in it. He was charged with violating the Espionage Act, accused of obstructing the draft in connection with a speech given at a rally on May 17, 1917. Also charged at the same time were Alfred Wagenknecht and Charles Baker. They were tried together in July 1917 and sentenced to one year in the Ohio State Penitentiary, a decision upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court on January 15, 1918. Informed of this decision, issued a statement declaring The Supreme Court has decided we must spend a year in jail. The crime for which we are convicted is truth telling. We believe in certain principles; we fought for those principles, and we go to jail ostensibly for inducing a certain Alphones Schue not to register. The charge is merely an excuse.... The important fact is that the ruling class feared our message to the workers and tried to silence that message. That fact should make a hundred willing workers take up the work we lay down.... Ruthenberg, Wagenknecht, and Baker served almost 11 months of their sentence and were released on December 8, 1918. 1919 Cleveland May Day Riot Freed from prison in December 1918, Ruthenberg dove in with both feet