Biography
John Ballam was arrested on November 6, 1931.
The November 6 Lawrence dispatch on page 1 names TUUL national-board representative and United Front Rank and File Committee organization secretary John Ballam as arrested that morning on the Wood mill picket line. Charged with vagrancy, he was actually released on $500 bail. The prosecutor obtained a continuance and threatened a more serious accusation, without establishing that such a charge was filed. This adult union organizer is distinct from City College student Joseph Ballam. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1931/v08-n268-NY-nov-07-1931-DW-LOC.pdf
Contemporary original newspaper source; individual page evidence retained in review audit 884. Exact individual custody dates and duration are not inferred from relative dates or collective claims.
The portrait on page 4 of the July 2, 1932 Daily Worker is captioned John Ballam, Communist candidate for governor of Massachusetts, and identifies him with the struggle in the state of the Lawrence strike. That named Massachusetts labor-organizing context supports identification of the Lawrence organizer recorded here.
In the December 1931 Labor Defender, Vern Smith identifies Chandler as the judge handling Lawrence municipal-court prosecutions during the textile strike. He names John Ballam among the people whose cases Immigration Inspector Chase investigated in that setting. This identification concerns the local strike proceedings, not a federal immigration adjudicator. The account does not establish a new personal conviction, sentence, physical custody endpoint or duration.
Source: Vern Smith, Labor Defender, December 1931, printed page 242, Uncle Sam—Official Strikebreaker.
