The West Coast strikes of 1934 came as the Executive Committee of the Comintern was moving away from the Third Period analysis and toward what in France was called the Front populaire, the People’s Front, and was usually called the Popular Front in the United States. Georgi Dimitrov, head of the Comintern, formally announced the change of direction in mid-1935, due largely to Hitler’s rise to power and his evisceration of the German CP. By then, events in California and France were already moving toward a Popular Front.

Though national party leaders had quashed Darcy’s efforts in the 1934 state election, detailed analysis of the West Coast strikes led the party further away from the millenarian thinking and Third Period sectarianism of the 1920s and early 1930s and toward the mainstream of organized labor. By the mid-1930s, many CP members in California were actively involved in unions and some had been elected to union office. Instead of preparing to lead the supposedly imminent uprising of the workers, they found themselves immersed in collective bargaining and contract enforcement.

Throughout 1935 the Western Worker continued to attack Roosevelt and the New Deal, condemning the work-relief programs of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) as “a wage-cutting, anti-strike club held over the heads of every worker.” The Western Worker also condemned “the strike-breaking activities of Roosevelt’s Labor Relation Boards, and the strike-breaking, company union Wagner Labor Disputes Bill.” The party also continued to decry “social fascists,” especially Upton Sinclair and his EPIC organization. In April 1935 the WW saw the defeat of EPIC candidates in Los Angeles elections as evidence of “the fallacy of its program of ‘reformism’ and ‘liberalism.’”

Though the CPUSA moved toward the Front populaire slowly and uncertainly in 1935 and 1936, the party was fully committed to working with New Deal Democrats by mid-1937. During 1937–1939 the California CP moved very close to the political mainstream—partly through circumstances over which the party had no influence, partly due to the presence of party members or supporters in CIO unions, and partly because of the People’s Front line of the Comintern. The closer the CP moved to embrace Roosevelt and the New Deal, the greater grew their potential to influence local and state politics. Circumstances in California came together briefly during 1937–1939 to put the CP into a position where its leaders could meet with Democratic candidates for state and legislative office to discuss campaign tactics and legislative initiatives. Issues that the party had pressed for years became part of mainstream politics, if only for a short while.

The party soon completed its transition from persistent and vitriolic critic of Roosevelt and the New Deal to staunch supporter. On January 1, 1938, District 13 launched a new newspaper, People’s World (PW), a daily paper replacing the semiweekly WW. Al Richmond, the new managing editor, twenty-three years old, brought three years of experience at the Daily Worker. Harrison George became executive editor, his duties limited to writing editorials and a personal column. Like the party, the new paper moved toward the mainstream, featuring some news stories with little or no political commentary. The final page became a sports page, and columns dealt with movies, radio programs, art, and helpful hints for women. Typical of most daily papers at the time, photos of attractive young women in skimpy outfits appeared regularly. Saturday’s paper included a magazine with articles by prominent liberals as well as CP members, a woman’s page (including Comrade Kitty’s tips on how to be fashionable on a budget), a page for children, and a page of comics—though the comics were definitely political. Glowing accounts about the Soviet Union and Stalin’s speeches still appeared but were fewer in number. Articles by non-Communist liberals began to appear, including Upton Sinclair, no longer a fascist or social fascist. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, and, especially, Abraham Lincoln all received positive stories. Along with the new format came a full-blown embrace of FDR and the New Deal. On January 5, 1938, an editorial announced, “Mr. President, We’re Behind You!”

In the 1938 general election, a coalition of business and conservative groups tried to constrain the state’s robust union movement through a ballot initiative. Proposition 1 originated with the Industrial Association of San Francisco (which a U.S. Senate investigating committee chaired by Robert La Follette Jr. had recently called “an example par excellence of . . . success in denying labor its collective-bargaining rights”), the Associated Farmers (which Carey McWilliams labeled “farm fascism” and which the La Follette Committee accused of “flagrant and violent infringement of civil liberties”), the Merchants and Manufacturers Association of Los Angeles (the state’s oldest, and highly successful, advocate of the open shop; the La Follette Committee claimed it “arrogated to itself the determination of what constituted law and order”), the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, and Southern Californians Inc. (an arch-conservative group dedicated to “preservation of industrial freedom”).

Proposition 1 proposed to restrict picketing, prohibit secondary boycotts, make unions liable for damages caused by members, and more. Its supporters launched the state’s most expensive campaign for a proposition up to that time. Those efforts were closely tied to leading Republican candidates, Frank Merriam, the incumbent governor who was seeking a third term, and Philip Bancroft, candidate for U.S. Senate, who had connections to the Associated Farmers.