{{Short description|British Trotskyist}} {{similar names|James Deane (disambiguation){{!}}James Deane}} {{Use dmy dates|date=October 2023}} '''Jimmy Deane''' (31 January 1921 – 21 August 2002) was a British Trotskyist who played a significant role in building the Revolutionary Socialist League. Along with Jock Haston and Ted Grant, he played a role during the Second World War in the Revolutionary Communist Party, the British section of the Fourth International.
==Early years==
Jimmy Deane was born in Liverpool to a blacksmith, Gus Deane, and his wife, Gertie, a trained nurse.<ref name="revhist">[http://revolutionaryhistory.co.uk/allobits/jimmy-deane.html Jimmy Deane (1921-2002)] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110810031208/http://www.revolutionaryhistory.co.uk/allobits/jimmy-deane.html |date=10 August 2011 }} – Accessed 7/7/2010</ref> Deane came from a long line of trade unionists in the Labour movement in Merseyside – Deane's maternal grandfather Charles Carrick was elected president of the Liverpool Trades Council in 1905, served for fourteen years as one of Labour's first councillors, and was an organiser for the Marxist Social Democratic Federation.<ref>Crick, Michael, ''The March of Militant'', p36</ref> Carrick, like many trade unionists at that time, remained active within the Labour Party when the Social Democratic Federation left. Deane's mother and brothers were all in the Trotskyist movement<ref>Taaffe, Peter, ''Liverpool: A city that dared to fight'', p33, p36, p41</ref> and were members of the Walton Constituency Labour Party in the 1950s and 1960s. The origins of Trotskyism to which the Deanes were attracted can be traced to Albert Houghton, a founding member of the Communist Party in Merseyside who had drawn Trotskyist conclusions and fought the Stalinists in Merseyside who later became leading Labour figures.<ref>'The War and the International', Bornstein and Richardson, p5. Bessie Braddock was a former Communist Party member who became president of the Liverpool Trades Council and Labour Party in 1945 and was MP for Liverpool Exchange. Liverpool Echo special edition 17 November 1987</ref>
Joining the Labour Party in 1937, he was later that year won over to Trotskyism and joined the Militant Group.<ref name="revhist" /> Through him his mother Gertie was recruited, and then his brothers Arthur and Brian, who also played an important role in the Trotskyist movement.
In 1939, with growing fragmentation within the Militant Group, Gerry Healy a member of an earlier breakaway from that group, the Workers International League (WIL) formed in 1937, was able to recruit the Deanes, along with Eric Brewer, Tommy Birchall and Harry Matthews to the new group.<ref name="revhist" />
==During the Second World War==
Due to serving an apprenticeship at the Cammell Laird shipyard as an electrical engineer, he was not called up during the Second World War, and became a shop steward.<ref name="revhist" /><ref name="sewell">[http://www.marxist.com/jimmy-deane-proletarian-revolutionary.htm Jimmy Deane: Proletarian revolutionary, heart and soul]- Accessed 7/7/2010</ref> In January 1944 he was trained as a miner, due to wartime legislation, and worked at Nook Pit, Tyldesley before he was invalided out of work at the end of the year.<ref name="revhist" />
For most of 1945, Jimmy Deane became a full-time worker for the newly formed Revolutionary Communist Party as its London Industrial Organiser and joined the party's central committee and editorial board of the ''Socialist Appeal'', the party's journal.<ref name="revhist" />
In 1946 Deane was the British delegate to the International Conference of the Fourth International alongside Jock Haston.<ref>[http://www.marxist.com/the-theoretical-origins-of-the-degeneration-of-the-fourth-interview-with-ted-grant.htm The theoretical origins of the degeneration of the Fourth – Interview with Ted Grant] – Accessed 7/7/2010</ref> He stayed in Paris for a further 18 months as the British representative on the International Executive Committee.<ref name="revhist" />
==Revolutionary Socialist League==
Deane was one of the founders of the Revolutionary Socialist League in 1956 and was appointed as its first General Secretary.<ref name ="revhist" />
Deane was to go on several international missions of behalf of the International during this period including going to Morocco to help the Algerian FLN break through the electrified Algerian/Moroccan border as well as attempting to unite Indian Trotskyists in Calcutta, Bombay and Madras into a single all-India organisation.<ref name="revhist" /><ref name="dickinson" />
After attempting to bring about an unsuccessful fusion between the RSL and the International Group as well as joint work with the International Socialists in the magazine ''Young Guard'', Jimmy Deane suggested Peter Taaffe as his successor as General Secretary and editor of the soon to be launched ''Militant'' newspaper.<ref name="dickinson" /> He left Britain for India in 1965 and subsequently spent a few years in Fiji.<ref name="revhist"/>
Although he returned to Britain he did not resume his active role in the Trotskyist movement: he remained loyal to his political beliefs, speaking at a meeting in Wigan against the witch-hunt of Militant in the Labour Party.<ref name="dickinson">[http://socialistworld.net/doc/333 Obituary: Jimmy Deane – pioneer of Trotskyism] – Accessed 7//7/2010</ref> At the end of his life he declared his support for the Socialist Appeal tendency,<ref>[http://www.marxist.com/letter-from-jimmy-deane.htm ''Socialist Appeal'']</ref> and emphasised that "A Marxist tendency must combat any traces of ultra-leftism that arise out of impatience". Jimmy Deane died of pneumonia alone on 21 August 2002 at the Rosebank Nursing Home in Liverpool.<ref name="revhist" />
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== *Obituary by Keith Dickinson {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091028050012/http://www.geocities.com/socialistparty/LabHist/deaneobit.htm |date=28 October 2009 |title=Obituary for Jimmy Deane – pioneer UK Trotskyist }} *{{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091028050011/http://www.geocities.com/socialistparty/LabHist/Deaneinterview.htm |date=28 October 2009 |title=A short interview with Jimmy Deane }} * Obituary by Rob Sewell [http://www.marxist.com/jimmy-deane-proletarian-revolutionary.htm Jimmy Deane: Proletarian revolutionary, heart and soul] *Obituary by John McIlroy [https://web.archive.org/web/20110810031208/http://www.revolutionaryhistory.co.uk/allobits/jimmy-deane.html Jimmy Deane (1921-2002)] *[https://mrc.epexio.com/records/DEA Catalogue of Deane's papers], held at the Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Deane, Jimmy}} Category:1921 births Category:2002 deaths Category:Deaths from pneumonia in England Category:English Trotskyists Category:Militant tendency supporters Category:Revolutionary Communist Party (UK, 1944) members Category:Politicians from Liverpool