Hale moved to Greenwich Village in New York City, where he came to know many writers and artists while practicing as a lawyer.[2] By 1912, he was already an outspoken advocate for women's suffrage.[4]
Hale was a member of the law firm of Hale, Nelles, and Shorr, which "defended radicals." His partners were Isaac Shorr and Walter Nelles. Carlo Tresca, a prominent Italian anarchist, was well acquainted with them.[5]
After World War I, Hale "became more closely identified with Socialist activities," although his partner Walter Nelles described him as "not a Socialist but interested in socialism."[2]
He joined Alfred Bettman, former Special Assistant United States Attorney General in charge of sedition, in testifying before the Rules Committee of the United States House of Representatives.[1]
In July, he was active during a convention of the Committee of 48.[2]
In the fall, he served as publicist for the newly formed Farmer-Labor Party (FLP). In his efforts on behalf of the FLP, Hale was careful to delineate the differences between his fledgling organization and the rival Socialist Party of America (SPA), noting that while the SPA included only "simon-pure socialists," the FLP made a broader appeal, targeting not only wage-workers but also farmers, small business proprietors, and professionals.[6]
He wrote to Tom Mooney, "We are in a hot bed of repression here, with only a very few lawyers who are willing and able to handle the situation, and who are hopelessly overworked."[7]
Hale married twice.[1] In 1910, he married Beatrice Forbes-Robertson; they divorced in 1920.[1][2][3] They had three daughters.[2] In 1921, he married Marie Tudor Garland Green, a disinherited heiress.[1][8] Between 1922 and 1924 while living mostly in Taos, New Mexico, Hale had an affair with artist Greta R. Hercz.[1]
In 1925, Hale bought a coal yard in Westport, Connecticut, to remake into a studio with apartments as an artists and writers colony.[9] Also in 1925, Hale suffered a nervous breakdown.[2][1]
Swinburne Hale died age 53 on July 3, 1937, in a sanitarium in Westport, Connecticut.[2][1]
His papers are housed at the New York Public Library in New York City, where they occupy 8 archival boxes and 1 oversized folder. The papers cover 1908-1924 with "primarily of personal correspondence" and "do not reflect his activities as a lawyer or his socialist sympathies."[1]
The Demon's Notebook: Verse and Perverse. New York: N.L. Brown, 1923[1]
Law-Politics:
Do We Need More Sedition Laws? : Testimony of Alfred Bettman and Swinburne Hale before the Committee on Rules of the House of Representatives. New York: American Civil Liberties Union, n.d. [1920].
"Reds, Deportations, and Palmerism," in Alexander Trachtenberg and Benjamin Glassberg (eds.), The American Labor Year Book, 1921-1922. New York: Rand School of Social Science, n.d. [1921]; pp. 34–39.
