Able to Lead: Disablement, Radicalism, and the Political Life of E.T. Kingsley

A life of socialist activist Eugene Kingsley, now in paperback.

After an accident made him both a double amputee and a political radical, Eugene T. Kingsley dedicated his life to socialist reform. Able to Lead retraces the radical’s inspiring political journey from San Francisco soapboxes to prominence in Canadian politics. In organizing the Socialist Party of Canada, Kingsley shaped a generation of leftists during a time when the country’s laws prohibited immigration by people with disabilities. This book explores the life and work of this fascinating thinker, who left a rich inheritance to the modern left.
 

Ravi Malhotra is professor of law and rehabilitation sciences at the University of Ottawa and coauthor of Exploring Disability Identity and Disability Rights through Narratives: Finding a Voice of Their Own.

Benjamin Isitt is a lawyer, historian, and legal scholar based in Lekwungen territory (Victoria, British Columbia). He is the author of From Victoria to Vladivostok: Canada's Siberian Expedition, 1917–19 and Militant Minority: British Columbia Workers and the Rise of a New Left, 1948–72; co-author, with Ravi Malotra, of Able to Lead: Disablement, Radicalism, and the Political Life of E.T. Kingsley; and coauthor, with Bob Williams and Thomas Bevan, of Using Power Well: Bob Williams and the Making of British Columbia.