Alecu Constantinescu

Alexandru Constantinescu
Constantinescu shortly before World War I
Born	(1872-03-10)March 10, 1872 Bucharest
Died	March 28, 1949(1949-03-28) (aged 76) Bucharest
Nationality	Romanian

Alexandru "Alecu" Constantinescu (March 10, 1872 - March 28, 1949) was Romanian trade unionist, journalist and socialist and pacifist militant, one of the major advocates of the transformation of the Romanian socialist movement into a communist one.

Constantinescu was born in Bucharest, Romania's capital, in the family of tailor Ion Constantinescu. He enrolled in highschool, however due to financial problems he was forced to abandon it and work as an apprentice in an upholstery workshops. During this period he became acquainted with socialist ideas through the works of the early Romanian socialists Constantin Dobrogeanu Gherea, Anton Bacalbaşa and Constantin Mille. In the 1890s he became a founder of one of the earliest Romanian trade unions, the Professional Association of Upholsterers, and later joined the Romanian Social Democratic Workers' Party (PSDMR). However he soon grew disillusioned with the party leadership, and began attacking it for what he considered to be political and ideological inconsistency. The party itself was dissolved in 1899, when a large part of the leadership joined the National Liberal Party.

Alecu Constantinescu continued to collaborate with some former PSDMR members who remained dedicated to the workers' cause, such as I. C. Frimu, Alexandru Ionescu, Ştefan Gheorghiu, and Mihail Gheorghiu Bujor. At the end 1902 he departed for Paris, France, however he kept contacts with Romanian workers' movement, occasionally sending articles for the socialist newspaper 1 Mai ("May Day"). Returning to Romania in 1904, he worked along Frimu and Bujor towards the reorganisation of the Romanian trade unionism. In August 1906, the Conference of trade unions and socialist circles elected Constantinescu secretary of the General commission of the trade unions, the first Romanian general labour organisation. In the same period he joined the editorial board of România Muncitoare, becoming its executive editor. The newspaper was the main socialist venue of the time, and helped organise several strikes. Alecu Constantinescu himself began in 1906 a tour of Romanian cities, helping organise the local workers, in the hope of creating an unified national trade union. In 1907, during the Romanian Peasants' Revolt he was in Paşcani, in Moldavia, one of the centres of the rebellion. Due to his activism among the local workers in support of the peasants he was imprisoned for lèse majesté, however the Fălticeni court cleared him of charges few weeks later.