Born in Minsk on the 18th of November, 1882. In 1907 he settled down in Kraków. In that period he involved himself in the works of the Management Board of Adam Mickiewicz Folk High School. He was also the chairman of the Workmen’s Tourist Club. He knew Vladimir Lenin, with whom he both carried on ideological disputes and made hikes in the Tatra Mountains (including the one to the summit of Rysy in 1913). He remembered the future leader of the revolution as an ascetic, hopeful fanatic devoted to the cause in the name of which he carried on his struggle. This picture, however, did not prevent Czapiński from criticizing the results of Lenin’s regime severely at a later period. In the Second Polish Republic he held a Sejm seat on behalf of the Polish Socialist Party (PPS) in 1919-1935. He was famous for his anti-clerical and anti-Soviet pronouncements, as well as for his work on the Constitutional Committee. He was considered one of the best-educated activists of the PPS, and his private library was far-famed for the richness of its collections. Czapiński was also counted among the most important contributors to “Robotnik”; he was the deputy editor-in-chief of the “Naprzód” magazine. In 1924-1939 he was first the deputy chairman, and then chairman of the Association of Workers’ Universities (TUR). During the Second World War he collaborated with the Barricade of Freedom, an underground organization of Socialists associated with the PPS. Arrested by the Gestapo, he was sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp, where he lost his life. His works include Bankructwo bolszewizmu (1921), Co dał komunizm robotnikom, chłopom i krajowi (1928), Dokąd kler prowadzi Polskę (1921), Faszyzm współczesny (1932), Kler a robotnicy (1911), Partia wrogów ludu pracującego (endecja) (1928), Socjalizm czy komunizm (1924), and Moja znajomość z Leninem. Wspomnienia z dawnych lat (1931).
