International Workers Order

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Original logo of the International Workers Order (IWO), 1930-39. Taken from an IWO membership certificate, as reproduced in the book Red Scare in Court by Arthur J. Sabin. The openly Communist imagery of this seal was used as evidence against the Order in court. The organization's post-1940 logo was a lithograph by Rockwell Kent.

The International Workers Order (IWO) was a Communist-affiliated insurance and fraternal organization (landsmanshaftn) founded in 1930 following a split from the The Workmen's Circle/Arbeter Ring, a still-extant Jewish fraternal organization.[1] After its separation from the Workmen's Circle, the IWO opened itself to Communists of all ethnicities, although its Jewish section, the Jewish Peoples Fraternal Order remained the largest group in the Order, and played a dominant role throughout its existence.

At its height, after World War II, the IWO had almost 200,000 members and provided low-cost health and life insurance, medical and dental clinics, and supported foreign-language newspapers, cultural and educational activities. The IWO also ran a Jewish summer camp, Camp Kinderland. Additionally the IWO owned and operated cemeteries throughout the US and Canada, a common practice among left wing Jewish mutual-aid organizations like the Farband and the Workmen's Circle.

The United States Attorney General placed the IWO on its list of subversive organizations in 1947. Though financially solvent and conservatively managed, the New York State Insurance Department contended that, since the IWO was engaged in political activity, which was prohibited to insurance organizations, it placed its members' interests in jeopardy, leading ultimately to its liquidation in 1954. [2]