WfJ/iNE/iS ,,IN'IJ,IR'No. 248 ~~'IIit", ..... ~. X-523

25¢25 January 1980

lid Army.MopJJlA Afghan Reactio!,

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Let 'em Go to Moscow

The Georgia mafia discovered thatthe ayatollah was a good target, but hebelieves in religion. Brezhnev is a betterpunching bag to run against for U.S.president-and for that they're ready toblow up the world! These guys aresitting on more hydrogen bombs thanwe care to think about. New Yorkentrepreneur Crazy Eddie would bebetter in the White House than JimmyCarter.

Mad Dogs on the Loose

In the space of less than a month'analysts from Pravda to the Wall StreetJournal, officials from the Kremlin tothe Pentagon have announced theadvent of a new Cold War. Even beforethe first Red Army soldier's boot hit therunway at Kabul airport, Washingtonwas proclaiming the death of detente.Recalling the "rollback" threats of coldwarrior John Foster Dulles, Carter'smaniacally anti-Russian "national secu­rity adviser" Zbigniew Brzezinski de­mands that the U.S. "contain Moscow'sexpansive drives." American officialsmake it clear that this is no passingphase: the Washington Post (6 January)headlined, "U .S. Moves Against SovietsCalled the Start ofa Global Drive." AndBusiness Week (21 January) has pub­lished a special report on "The NewCold War Economy: A Strategy toAnswer the Soviets":

"From the Pentagon to corporate board

continued on page 10

Sovietgymnast

Nelly Kim

Som~body had to cl.ean up There's an old saying that any foolAfghamstan and try to drag It toward can rule in a state of siege. Carter's~llJ.h·ce%}I;f}:Q~ountin~h.sl~f~L ~_~that~ut over Ir~p ~B t~~~' Wit-­hautt:ur, Alcxz,ncler Cor.kburn. wntmg" get TIm re-4eCiea. PiC r n; nsfin the Village Voice (21 January), "Marxist"(!) Teheran embassy kidnap-caught the flavor of the place: pers are modern-day Barbary pirates

"We all have to go one day. but pray and dispatches the USS Kitty Hawk andGod let it not be over Afghanistan. An a flotilla from the Seventh Fleet tounspeakable country filled with un- rescue the hostages. Then he keeps thespeakable people, sheeps.haggers and Navy circling around in the Indiansmugglers, who have furnIshed In their .leisure hours some of the worst arts and Ocean for two months, And now hecrafts ever to penetrate the occidental declares he has nothing againstworld. Iranians-if they would onlv let the"I yield to none in my sympathy to those embassy staff go and unit~ againstprostrate beneath the RusslanJackboot. h'" C . . Kh m .n' canbut if ever a country deserved rape it's at elst~c, ommunJsm, a el I

Afghanistan. Nothing but mountains have bIlltons.filled with barbarous ethnics with viewsas medieval as their muskets. andunspeakably cruel. too,"

threatens to pick up his marbles andleave the Olympics.

Carter's sore because he is stymiedover the Teheran embassy crisis and cando nothing to stop Red Army successesin Afghanistan. An American boycottof the Moscow games, however, will donext to nothing to directly hurt theUSSR. Beyond being a gesture ofimperialist frustration, Carter's pro­posal to set up a "Free World Olympics"is an attempt to see how far he can pushthe American people into an anti­Russian frenzy. But if American farmers

continued on page 11

the "Great Game" with imperial Russiaover the Khyber Pass, Afghanistan wasdeemed to be the key toSouth A,.sia.~.

in the age of the jet plane and L.~~lsti(;

missile. When Kabul signed a treaty offriendship and military cooperationwith the USSR a couple of years ago,level heads cautioned against alarmismabout the "Russian menace":

"Instead of being a strategic highway toIndia. as the Victorians feared. Afghan­istan looks more like a footpath tonowhere."

-NeH' York Times. 8 December1978

This is the view held by all relativelyintelligent politicians and statesmentoday. But not by Jimmy Carter. Hispolitics are insane.

So Jimmy Carter says he will pullAmerican athletes out of the Olympics!And for what? To "punish" the Sovietsfor coming to the aid of an Afghangovernment beset by bands of Islamictribalist reactionaries armed and backedby the CIA. In his Cold War frenzyCarter is liable to pull any crazy stunt­remember when he kidnapped a Sovietjetliner at JFK airport last August?! TheNational Gallery in Washington evencanceled an exhibition of paintings fromLeningrad's famous Hermitage artmuseum. And to really sock it to theRusskies, the U.S. president now

The people running this country arecrazy. The American government istalking as if it's about to start WorIdWar II lover Afghanistan-or at least avicarious form of it around the Olympicgames. Why? The Soviet Union comesto the aid of its allies in Kabul andsuddenly Washington has visions ofRussian "empire-builders" swarmingdown the Indus to Karachi. the PersianGulf, Aden, Suez.... The staid Brezhnevsuddenly fomenting revolution amongthe Kurds. Turkomans, and above allBaluchis. ... It's positively demented.Trouble is, Jimmy Carter not only saysbut really believes this stuff.

In the nineteenth century, whenBritish expeditionary forces engaged in

Break Carter'sOlympic Boyc"

Mobilize Bay Area Labor AgainstKlan/Nazi Attacks

WORKERSVANGIJARDMarxist Working-Class Biweeklyof the Spartacist League of the U.S.EDITOR Jan Norden

ASSOCIATE EDITOR Charles Burroughs

PRODUCTION Darlene Kamiura (Manager)Noah Wilner

CIRCULATION MANAGER: Karen Wyatt

EDITORIAL BOARD Jon Brule. GeorgeFoster. liz Gordon. James Robertson, JosephSeymour. Marjorie Stamberg

Workers Vanguard (USPS 098-770) publishedbiweekly. skipping an issue in August and aweek In December. by the SpartacistPublishing Co . 260 West Broadway. NewYorK. NY 10013 Telephone: 732-7862(Editorial). 732-2910 (Business). Address allcorrespondence to: Box 1377. G.P.O, NewYork. NY 10001 Domestic subscriptions:5300/24 Issues Second-class postage paid atNew York, NY

Opinions expressed In signed articles orletters do not necessaflly express theedllonal viewpoInt.

OAKLAND-Bay Area trade unionistsare demanding a vigorous mobilizationof the labor movement to combat Klanand Nazi attacks. On January 7 dele­gates from several union locals alongwith representatives of socialist organi­zations attended a conference cal1ed byLocal 6 of the International Longshore­men's and Warehousemen's Union(ILWU) to organize a Bay Area-wideral1y protesting the Greensboro massa­cre and demanding that al1 charges bedropped against the anti-Klan protes­ters in North Carolina. Unfortunately,the ILWU officials who chaired theJanuary 7 planning meeting fritteredaway the opportunity by unsuccessfullyattempting to exclude socialist organi­zations from delegate status and endedup adjourning the meeting withouttaking a single concrete step to organizea rally.

In recent weeks Bay Area Nazis held apublic rally under massive policeprotection in Walnut Creek, and evenmore ominously on December 8 some15 Ku Klux Klan thugs equipped withrifles, shotguns, pistols, knives and riothelmets staged a racist show of force atthe Federal Building. The Klansmen,exploiting extensive TV coverage, de­nounced a federal hearing which wasconsidering awarding grants to "im­prove relations" between the police andthe black community. The K«l:n actionwas obviously arranged with the conniv­ance of the cops with whom the fascistschecked their guns upon entering,picking them up on the way out.

The appearance of Klan hoodlumsopenly flaunting their weapons on thestreets of San Francisco only posesmore urgently the need for an effectivelabor counterattack. The Local 6initiative was undertaken as a result of aresolution by the Militant Caucus oftheILWU for a mass labor/black/Latinomobilization in November following theGreensboro massacre. But in the severalweeks following passage of this motionthe ILWU tops sat on their hands,leaving it to the Militant Caucus andsupporters of the "Longshore Militant"newsletter in Local 10 to press the fight.These militants and other anti-racistscirculated a petition which received 500signatures from union members de­manding that the anti-Klan rally beheld.

However, the ILWU bureaucracydoes not want a militant demonstrationof thousands of working people. Pres­sured by strong anti-Klan sentiment intheir own membership, the union tops

Eddie Holland, president of ILWULocal 18 in Sacramento, whose local,with the urging so far of the Internation­al, continued to load grain bound for theSoviet Union. We call on the Interna­tional, which has indicated that ifdirected by the government the ILWUmay embargo Soviet grain, to stand firmand actually uphold the tradition of theILWU: this union for decades resistedpressure to boycott trade with theUSSR brought by right-wing andgovernment forces when it suited theiranti-communist militarist purposes." •

Soviet army against the Islamic coun­terrevolutionaries in Afghanistan. Hepointed out the similarities betweenKhomeini's policies and those of theAfghan Muslim feudalists, who havebragged about killing people for the"crime" of teaching school! Americanworkers, he said, have no interest insupporting a war in Iran ~r a waragainst the USSR. After 20 minutes ofdebate, the International bureaucracy'smotion for a shipping boycott of Iranwas put to a vote. It carried, but only byabout 35 to 20, with some 70abstentions.•

members from unions representinganother 30,000 workers. If these unionsdid not have official status, it was thefault of the Local 6 leaders. who did notnotify them of the meeting! Many of thetrade unionists present heard about themeeting only through word of mouth;the broad attendance testified to thewidespread desire of Bay Area labor tostop the Klan and Nazis.

Acting as a transparent left cover forthe ILWU chiefs were supporters of theCommunist Party (CP) such as JoeFigueiredo. In the planning meetingFigueiredo backed LeRoy King at everycrucial juncture, including the attemptto exclude socialist organizations. Andcertainly the CP has at no time distin­guished itself from the Local 6 bureauc­racy's policy of relying on the capitalistpoliticians. Thus it sought unsuccessful­ly to stop the Nazis in Walnut Creek bybegging the city council to ban thefascist demonstration. Similarly, Fi­gueiredo favored the proposal to inviteLionel Wilson as guest speaker.

Despite the disruptive tactics pursuedby the ILWU leaders and their Stalinistlackeys, union militants have vowed tocontinue the fight to organize againstthe Klan threat. At an East Bay divisionmeeting of Local 6 on January 17, afterthe bureaucracy abruptly adjourned themeeting, the Militant Caucus urgedmembers to remain in their seats anddiscuss the Klan issue. Of the 100members who stayed, a majority votedoverwhelmingly for a motion demand­ing that ILWV officers reconvene thepublic planning meeting for the anti­KKK/Nazi rally within a week, and thatlabor-socialist organizations agreeingwith the demands adopted by Local 6 beseated with voice and vote. The resolu­tion also recommended that the rally beheld February 2 to coincide with thescheduled march in Greensboro.

Klan and Nazi provocations must notgo unredressed! Implement the Local 6motion without further delay! Noreliance on the racist cops and tapitalistparties! Only a militant labor/black/Latino mobilization can drive the fascistvermin out of the Bay Area! •

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and Joe Figueiredo who presided overthe planning meeting directed their fireat leftist militants. A Spartaci~;t League(SL) spokesman intervened, correctlypointing out the absurdity of denyingrepresentation to the left, including theCommunist Workers Party (CWP),whose comrades were shot down inNorth Carolina. The SL pointed outthat Local 6 bureaucrats were simply

IL WU Militants Say:

Load the Grain!A January 16 issue ofthe Longshore­

Warehouse Militant, entitled "Local 6Leadership Wrecks Anti-KKK/NaziPlanning Meeting," pointed to theprobable connection between the KuKlux Klan and Nazis and terroristproponents of the anti-Soviet grainboycott:

"In fact they [KKK and Nazis] areprobably behind the ·death threats to

lah regime for its oppression of nationalminorities, women, the labor movementand all those who drink liquor or engagein sexual practices not to its taste.Opposing American intervention inIran, he asserted that Carter wouldintervene militarily in Iran, not todefend the workers movement and theoppressed, but to protect U.S. oilinterests and for strategic anti-Sovietreasons. Mandel said unionists shouldfeel no concern for the hostages, manyof whom were undoubtedly linked to theCIA and military intelligence.

Mandel forthrightly defended the

caving in to the lies broadcast by the big­business press, which claimed that"violence on the left" was equallyresponsible for the Greensboro massa­cre. Finally, Jane Margolis, an officialdelegate from the CWA (phone work­ers), put forward an amendment that alllabor-socialist organizations shouldhave voice and vote. The delegates votedthis up, 10 to 6.

Once they discovered that they didnot have control over the meeting, King,Figueiredo & Co. did everything in theirpower to disrupt it. They then claimedthat there was not sufficient representa­tion from the labor movement. This wassimply a lie. At the meeting were officialdelegates from unions including twolocals each of the ILWU, CWA andSEIU, as well as locals of the RetailClerks and of the Letter Carriers,representing 20,000 workers. Alsopresent were officers, stewards and

~..............

have been forced to at least make a showof opposing the fascists. but their realstrategy is to rely on the bourgeoisgovernment. Not only have theydragged their feet in calling the rally butthey opposed the petition's call for theright to armed self-defense and the needto build workers defense guards.

A key proposal made earlier by theILWU leadership was to invite Oakland"ii'. ·;.. ........-r..c;.4L"J~

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OAKLAND-Some 125 warehouse­men attending the January 17 member­ship meeting of the East Bay division ofInternational Longshoremen's andWarehousemen's Union (ILWU) Local6 heard a debate over the ILWUInternational-sponsored boycott of allshipments to and from Iran. The unionmembers, many of whom had come todemand strike sanction against an Em­eryville plant, received the debate withintense interest, reflecting the concernaroused by threats of war in the NearEast and against the Soviet Union.

Supporters of the reformist Com­munist Party spoke against the pro­posed boycott and came out in supportof the Iranian Khomeini regime, at thesame time expressing "concern for thehostages" being held in Teheran. Theyaccused Carter of warlike moves againstIran and the USSR, but completelyskirted the issue of Afghanistan and theneed for socialists to raise the call todefend the USSR. Bob Mandel, Mili­tant Caucus spokesman and Local 6general executive board member, alsoopposed the boycott, but his speechstood in sharp contrast to thereformists.

Mandel denounced the Iranian mul-

WV Photo

November 10 Detroit labor/black rally against Greensboro massacre showshow to fight Klan terror.

California Warehousemen Debate Iran Boycott

mayor Lionel Wilson as a centralspeaker for the anti-Klan rally. But theDemocratic Party politicians who haveregularly been breaking the strikes ofBay Area workers since 1974 are notabout to protect them from fascistviolence. Lionel Wilson's cops are thesame racist, trigger-happy thugs thathave declared open season on blacks inOakland! And the leniency and com­plicity of the San Francisco cops towardthe armed KKKers who marched downthe city streets stand in stark contrast tothe years-long campaign of frame-ups,arrests and cold-blooded murdermounted against the Black Panthersafter that group marched to the Sacra­mento state capitol carrying rifles andshotguns to protest against proposedgun-control legislation,

Instead of hammering out an effectivestrategy to rid the Bay Area of the Klanmenace, ILWU officers LeRoy King

25 January 1980 II

No. 248

2 WORKERS VANGUARD

Police Shoot Down Nine Blacks in '79

Protest Oakland Killer Cops!

Oakland cops' racist brutality: standard operating procedure.

UCASSH Launches Fund Drive

It Takes Money to Fight Carter'sSecret Police!

OAKLAND-More than 2,500 angry,predominantly black residents packedinto a special meeting of the Oaklandcity council January 9 to demand actionagainst escalating cop terror in the city'sblack community. Active opposition tothe trigger-happy brutality of localpolice has been mounting since lastsummer. Significantly, the protestsagainst cop killings have includedhundreds of Oakland unionists, posingthe opportunity to mobilize the powerof the Bay Area labor movement againstthis gang of kill-crazy thugs in uniform.

In the past twelve months aloneOakland's 66-percent-white police forcehas gunned down nine blacks in thestreets of the city's ghetto. The latest,James Bell, 38, was shot to death infront of his own apartment just threedays before the January 9 meeting.Other victims whose killing generatedprotest include:• 15-year-old Melvin Black, shot todeath by three white undercover cops inMarch. One of his killers, officer GlennTomak, shot to death another youngblack, Talmage Curtis, in December.• Charles Briscoe, 37, a shop steward inthe International Association of Ma­chinists (lAM) at Alameda Naval AirStation, shot to death September 5 byofficer Robert Fredericks.

Fredericks is a notorious racist thugwho has been personally involved infiveother shootings, three of them fatal.One of the notches on Fredericks' .357magnum is for Black Panther Partymember Bobby Hutton. Not sur­prisingly, Fredericks has always beencleared by internal police investigations.This time Fredericks' incredible storywas that Briscoe threatened him with a

Jane Margolis vs. The United StatesSecret Service-a lawsuit which square­ly challenges the government's right tointerfere in the labor movement-gainsmore support as the Union CommitteeAgainst Secret Service Harassment(UCASSH) embarks on an urgent effortto raise funds for the case. Through herattorney, Charles Garry, Margolis hasfiled suit against the Secret Service forviolation of her constitutional rights.The suit seeks damages in excess of $1

poe Solidarity Letter

Union Committee Against SecretService Harassment

PO Box 12324San Francisco, CA 94112

Dear Brothers and Sisters:

The case of Jane Margolis vs.United States Secret Service is anunparalleled and important defenseof the independence of the labormovement from state interferenceand control. That Secret Serviceagents can, with impunity, forciblyseize an elected union delegate andremove her from the proceedings ofher own convention to gag criticism

25 JANUARY 1980

rifle, forcing him to fire four shotgunblasts into the black unionist's body.Still feelin~ "threatened," Fredericksreturned to his squad car to fetch histrusty .357 and emptied all six roundsinto Briscoe. Two days later the Oak-

land Police cleared Fredericks of anywrongdoing.

The killing of Briscoe and the white­wash of his killer were so blatant thateven the usually staid NAACP urged amore thorough investigation. More-

million. As a brochure recently releasedby UCASSH states: "It challenges inprinciple the government's interferencein and attempt to politically control thetrade-union movement."

Jane Margolis, a member of theexecutive board of CommunicationsWorkers of America (CWA) Local 9410in San Francisco, was an electeddelegate to the union's national conven­tion last summer in Detroit. On the daythat Jimmy Carter was to preach his

of governmental policy is an outrageto all who stand in defense of theinterests of working people.

As an expression of our solidaritywith UCASSH efforts on behalf ofthis suit, a donation is enclosed. ThePDC also pledges to contact thoseorganizations and individuals whichhave assisted us with our pastcampaigns to solicit support andfinancial aid for your efforts. This,indeed, is no ordinary lawsuit-JaneMargolis' only "crime" is the defenseof the CWA against the anti-laborpolicies of the government.

Partisan Defense CommitteeBox 99, Canal St. Sta.N.Y., N.Y. 10013

over, 500 members of the lAM jammeda city council meeting to protest the

. brutal slaying of their union brother.Black mayor Lionel Wilson, attemptingto retain credibility among the city'sblack electorate, appointed a "task

force" to come up with a plan of action.The task-force proposal was for a five­member "review board" appointed bythe mayor and city council to hearcomplaints and make "recommenda­tions" to the city manager and the chief

anti-labor policies to the CWA conven­tion, Secret Service agents suddenlyseized Margolis before stunned dele­gates and hauled her off the conventionfloor. Margolis has been a leadingmember of the Militant Action Caucus(MAC) for over seven years and is oneof the foremost class-struggle opposi­tionists in the CWA. This Secret Servicemugging was a blatant attempt tomuzzle a voice of opposition to Carter'sausterity.

But Jane Margolis will not besilenced. Her lawsuit is a militantresponse to an outrageous provocationagainst the left and labor movements.The provocation must not go unan­swered. Only last month the SecretService admitted it had engaged in acampaign to disrupt InternationalAssociation of Machinists demon­strations along the course of Carter'ssummertime Mississippi riverboatcruise. The Margolis lawsuit can be­come the focal point of an effort torepulse Carter's vicious assault on labor.

The expenses of suing the federalgovernment, however, are enormous.According to UCASSH, legal fees alonein the Margolis case are expected toexceed $20,000 this year. It is a fact ofcapitalist class justice that individuals inthe working class cannot afford the cost

of police. But the Oakland PoliceOfficers Association (OPOA), deter­mined to remain a law unto itself andopposed to any review board no matterhow impotent, staged a demonstrationof several hundred· "off-duty" copsDecember 4. The OPOA show of forceat city hall was a demonstration thateven the black mayor is being threat­ened by these killer cops.

The frustrated anger of Oakland'sblack population was clearly apparentat the January 9 meeting. When whitecouncil member John Sutter presentedthe findings of the mayor's task forceand concluded that the "consensus ofour group is that we have a very goodpolice department," the audience an­swered him with a chorus ofcatcalls andboos. Wilson was forced to declare aten-minute recess to restore order. Butwhen the meeting resumed the explosiveatmosphere was not dispelled. The copsmanaged to find a black policewoman,Lynda Drummer, who testified thatcriticism of cop killings had caused herto hesitate rather than pull her pistol ona suspect. As a result, she claimed, shehad been severely beaten. The moral ofDrummer's story was that to "bejudgedby other than our peers"-i.e., othercops-was a threat to police lives. Thecrowd was not impressed with the cops'attempt to put on a black face andDrummer was loudly booed as she leftthe microphone.

Leaving aside the pro-cop speeches,the political debate during the four-and­a-half-hour meeting was between theadvocates of two impotent liberalreforms-a fact that reflects the 'We!I'r--

continued on page 9

WVPholo

Jane Margolis at Detroit anti-Klanrally.

of legally defending democratic rights.As the UCASSH brochure states: "Thegovernment has almost unlimited re­sources. We are depending on yoursupport to raise the thousands ofdollarsneeded to wage this fight."

The Partisan Defense Committee willcampaign to raise the urgently neededfunds, and to publicize this case ofpressing interest to all working people.Readers of Workers Vanguard areencouraged to send donations toUCASSH. Support the Margolis suit­Secret Service hands off the unions!Donations should be sent to: UnionCommittee Against Secret Service Har­assment, P.O. Box 12324, San Francis­co, CA 94112.•

3

~~artheid Reforms": ANew Shackle for Black Labor

The Struggle for IndependentBlack Unions in South Africa

1973 black workers strike paralyzes Durban; first mass resistance since 1960 Sharpeville Massacre.

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For some time now the imperialistpress has been making much of thesupposed self-reform or even self­abolition of South Africa's racist apart­heid system. This "quiet death ofapartheid" propaganda is encouragedby incredible, obscene statements fromthe butchers of Sharpeville and Soweto.Last summer Pieter Koornhof, Ministerof Cooperation and Development (theman in charge of keeping the blacksdown), vowed in the New York Times(4 August 1979): "We will not rest untilracial discrimination has disappearedfrom our statute books and everyday lifein South Africa." A few months later hisboss, Prime Minister P. W. Botha, toldTime magazine (3 December 1979) that"the apartheid our enemies presented tothe world is dead." This is like AdolfHitler in the late 1930s proclaiming thefull equality of Jews in Germany!

Apartheid is, of course, as alive asever. It will meet its death only when theatrocious white racist regime is rippeddown by a victorious revolution liberat­ing the oppressed non-white masses.However, all the talk about reformingapartheid is more than simply propa­ganda for foreign consumption de­signed to soothe consciences in SouthAfrica's "democratic" imperialist allies.The Botha regime is attempting a majoroverhaul of the mechanisms of apart­heid rule as constructed in the 1950s,specifically to better control andexploitblack labor. In May of last year thePretoria government approved a com­mission report providing for "registra­tion" of segregated black unions. Thatthis won't ensure labor peace, however,was shown by a series ofstrikes in PortElizabeth culminating in a mass firing ofblack workers in late November.

Black labor is the Achilles' heel ofapartheid. It is the one area whereblacks have a social power the whiterulers cannot suppress purely andsimply through police-state terror. Inthe fall of 1977, following the torture­murder of black nationalist leader SteveBiko, the regime outlawed all anti­apartheid political organizations, in­cluding white liberal and church-basedones. That same year it set up theWiehahn and Riekert commissions, onerecommending legal status for blackunions, the other the ending of certainresidency restrictions for part of theblack urban population.

These measures (which have nowbeen implemented) do not arise fromany benevolent attitude by white rulerstoward the ordinary black worker.Rather the black labor force is too large,too strategically vital to be suppressed!ike the anti-apartheid political groups.If every black worker who went onstrike or took part in a job action werebeaten and imprisoned, the damage tothe economy would be severe. Blackworkers would increasingly resort toindustrial sabotage (even now quitecommon), in many cases more expen­sive for employers than granting a wageincrease or settling a grievance. Smallstrikes could easily turn into majorconfrontations between the white policestate and the black masses.

The Wiehahn/Riekert measures arealso designed to increase the rate ofcapitalist exploitation by using cheapblack labor for jobs formerly monopo­lized by skilled and scarce whites. TheSouth African Chamber of Minesprojected that by 1982 there would be a

4

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i!

shortage of 50,000 skilled artisans,traditionally and legally restricted towhites, throughout the economy ([Lon­don] Financial Times, 11 May 1979).

In short, the regime is seeking tocontrol black labor militancy, co-opt ablack labor bureaucracy and create ablack labor aristocracy. A few years agoliberal capitalist Anton Rupert, acolleague of diamond magnate HarryOppenheimer, declared: "We cannotsurvive unless we have a free marketeconomy, a stable black middle class"(quoted in African Communist, FourthQuarter 1979). But the Ruperts andOppenheimers will not survive, nomatter what new strategems of apart­heid they come up with. Their gravedig­gers will be the black masses who slavein South Africa's factories, mines andfields.

The 1973 Durban Strikes:A Turning Point

When on 9 January 1973,2,000 blackworkers at the Coronation Brick andTile Co. in Durban walked out demand­ing a wage increase from 9 to 20 rands aweek, they presaged a new era in SouthAfrican political life. Within two weekstens of thousands of black (and alsoIndian) workers, including most munic­ipal employees, were on strike. Garbagewent uncollected and produce rottedin the market. South Africa's third larg­est city and major port was paralyzed.Hundreds and at times thousands ofstrikers armed with sticks patrolleddowntown Durban looking for scabs,clashing with police on severaloccasions.

Yet the year before the Durban massstrike a large anti-apartheid demon­stration by white liberal students wasbrutally broken up by police. And three

IIt

years later Soweto would enter theworld's political vocabulary as a newterm for racist atrocity, when the policefired round after round into defenselessblack student protesters. Why then werethe Durban strikes not drowned inblood?

Mainly because their very scope andsuddenness caught the regime off guard.Small acts of repression, beating up orimprisoning a few strikers, would onlystiffen the workers' resistance. In fact,that's just what happened. To suppressthe Durban mass strike would haverequired a level of violence close to civilwar. And for that white South Africancapitalism would have paid a very highprice, far higher than for Soweto.

The Durban strikers won significantwage gains. But much more important,this was the first victory of any kind forblacks in over two decades. Themassive repression following the 1960Sharpeville massacre crushed thenationalist/liberal-democratic opposi­tion and the left. For more than a decadethe black masses, demoralized andapathetic, faced a seemingly all­powerful white police state. But whenthe garbage piled ever higher in down­town Durban and ships were leftunloaded in its harbor, everyone senseda new era of black resistance had begun.And so it had.

In the 18 months following January1973 black workers engaged in morethan 300 strikes (all illegal) costingemployers over 1.5 million man-hoursin lost production. Black trade-unionmembership, only 20,000 in 1969,quadrupled to 60,000 by 1975. Todayit's about 70,000. Though this remains aminute fraction of a black industriallabor force of some 5 million, the impactof black labor militancy is far greater

'\

than the relatively meager figure forunion membership would suggest.Between 1972 and 1975 the averagewage of a black laborer in the engineer­ing industry, for example, increased by75 percent (Official Yearbook of theRepublic of South Africa, 1978). Evi­dently many employers met the workers'demands before they resorted to indus­trial action.

The regime recognizes that the 70,000black trade unionists are but the firstwave of a potential flood tide. TheWiehahn Commission warns that blackunions "can unite with other unionsthrough affiliation (as is happeningnow) without government approval andthus embrace strategic industries whichcan be paralysed at any given moment"(Wiehahn Commission Report, 1 May1979). Above all, South Africa's whiteruling class fears another Durban 1973,this time better organized and morepolitical.

A New Kind of Shackle

Since 1973 the basic law dealing withblack labor has been changed threetimes. Clearly the white ruling class canno longer govern the black proletariat inthe old way. In 1953 any participationby black workers in strikes, job actions,slowdowns, etc. was made a criminaloffense. Black unions as such were notoutlawed, but were deprived of any legalstatus. By contrast, the so~called "regis­tered" unions, composed of whites,coloureds (mulattos) and Indians weregranted the legal right to negotiate theterms of employment for all workers,including the black majority. This legalprivilege of the largely white registeredunions has been the main mechanismfor imposing the industrial color bar­Le., the exclusion of blacks from skilled.

WORKERS VANGUARD

November after an eight-month con­sumer boycott organized by the blackFood and Canning Workers Union. Thecompany was forced to rehire 50workers it had fired for union activity.An even more significant victory tookplace at Dura Construction, a Dutchsubsidiary in the Cape. Here thecompany at first refused to talk to theblack Western Province General Work­ers Union at all. But under the pressureof Dura workers in Holland, the SouthAfrican management fully met theworkers' wage demands plus two years'interest and legal costs.

But these trade-union gains,important though they are, should notinvite illusions that black workers nowhave the same rights as whites. Ameasure of how "liberal" the new laborpolicy of "enlightened" apartheid iscame with the mass firing last Novemberof 1,300 black workers at the PortElizabeth plants of FQrd Motor andGeneral Tire. The confrontation at Fordbegan when blacks struck to defend ablack foreman, who had been victimizedfor participating in a local politicalgroup. Not only did he get his job back,but the strikers secured full back pay forthe three days they were out, an unusualconcession.

These gains for the blacks provoked awhite blacklash. When the blacks stagedanother series of walkouts directed atracist abuses, Ford answered with thewholesale firing of 700 workers. GeneralTire followed suit by firing 600 of itsworkers to stop a unionizing drive at anearby plant, which had been triggeredby the Ford worke-FS' struggles. At thispoint the South African security policestepped in and arrested 21 of the workermilitants involved. These black union­ists could certainly tell the editors of theNew York Times and Time somethingabout the "new liberal" South Africa.

All the lying publicity aboutreforming apartheid is designed to takethe heat off the Pretoria regime and theimperialist corporations which invest inSouth Africa. An openly racist societyruled by police terror, South Africa isthe target of universal moral outrage.This is felt especially strongly in theU.S., where the descendants of Africanslaves naturally solidarize with SouthAfrica's blacks, who face an even moresavage form of racism. However, for thepast several years international revul­sion at apartheid has mainly taken theform of empty save-one's-soul consum­er boycotts (from sardines to Kruger­rands) and university divestmentschemes. Even worse are appeals to the"liberal conscience" of the Americanimperialist ruling class, specifically toJimmy Carter's' anti-Soviet "humanrights" campaign.

Instead of prettifying U.S.imperialism, popular hatred for racistterror in South Africa must be chan­neled into strengthening the one forcecapable of smashing apartheid rule, theorganized black proletariat. The victoryat Dura Construction and the defeat atFord point to the urgent and desperatene~d for international labor solidarity.We're not talking about token financialcontributions or the diplomatic gesturesthat American and West Europeanlabor bureaucrats occasionally make.Active international labor support canmean life or death for South Africa'sblack unions, and sometimes for theirmembers as well. Had the AmericanUnited Auto Workers used its muscle onFord, very likely the 700 Port Elizabethworkers would not have been fired andthe 21 union activists would not havebeen arrested. And everyone knowswhat happens to black militants inSouth Africa's prisons.

Rehind their police terror and lies. theBothas, the Oppenheimers, the Fordmanagers know they are on a rumblingvolcano. Under the leadership of arevolutionary vanguard party, a massblack labor movement will be thegravedigger of apartheid. And on thatgrave will arise a black-centered work­ers and peasants government. •

The past months have seen anupsurge in black labor militancy inSouth Africa, leading to some notablevictories. For example, Monis andFattis, a bread and flour processor in theCape, surrendered completely last

would automatically dominate thesituation if Blacks would agree to mergewith them" (quoted in David Davis,African Workers and Apartheid[1978]). BAWU also rejected anyconfrontation with the apartheid statein favor of the "self-help" doctrines ofthe Black Consciousness movement. Itdeclared that it \\(9uld seek:

"_ . . to win the respect of theemployers, the public and the govern­ment; to create a climate of opinion inwhich the laws about Bantu tradeunions ... could be reformed for thesake of the country's rickety economy."

As against the Africanist nationalists,proletarian revolutionaries in SouthAfrica stand in principle for multiracialunions. But the minimum condition forsuch unions is that they be internallydemocratic-i.e., one man, one vote onall questions. Some white (and colouredand Indian) union leaders, those whoaren't openly racist, will say: "That's afine ideal, but we can't do it. It's illegal."No respect for apartheid legality! InSouth Africa any serious working-classand democratic struggle requires thecombination of legal and illegal activity.

To be sure, in the present situationvery few white workers will participatein illegal labor organization with blacks.Indian and coloured participation ismore promising (thousands of Indianswere involved in the 1973 Durbanstrikes). But even in South Africa classsolidarity can at times overcome thedeep racial division. In this senseproletarian socialists can look back atthe Garment Workers Union of the1930s-40s, a militant organization com­posed mainly of black and Boer womenled by the Communist E. S. Sachs.

product of the bloc between theMoscow-Stalinist Communist Partyand the liberal nationalist AfricanNational Congress (ANC). It waseffectively broken up in the 1960s alongwith its parent bodies. The basicstrategy of the Stalinist/ANC bloc has.been and still is a deal with the whiteliberal bourgeoisie. To that end in the1950s the CP advocated electoralsupport to the opposition United Party(despite its backing of the Suppressionof Communism Act) and later switchedto Harry Oppenheimer's ProgressiveParty, which stood for extending thefranchise only to "educated" blacks.

Pure black nationalist tradeunionism, unsullied by Stalinist refor­mism, is to be found in Drake Koka'sBlack Allied Workers Union (BAWU).This was set up in 1972 as an appendageof the student-based Black Conscious­ness movement. Probably always prettymuch a paper organization, with Kokaand his colleagues now in exile BAWUcan have at most a marginal existence inSouth Africa. Needless to say, BAWUrejected multiracialism on principlewith the usual argument that "whites

Newsweek

Black South African gold miners earn only one-eighth of white workers'wages.

more than willing to obey the masters ofver/igte ("enlightened") apartheid. Theleader of the largest black union, LucyMvubelo of the National Union ofClothing Workers, is a rabidly anti­communist right-winger, who would fitright in on the AFL-CIO executivecouncil (except that she's a blackwoman). Mvubelo's main activity (nodoubt financed by some CIA front)seems to be attending internationalconferences in order to oppose econom­ic sanctions against South Africa.

The immediate task for proletarianrevolutionaries in South Africa is tobreak the black unions from a narroweconomism conditioned by two decadesof effective police-state repression. Theunions must use their economic powerand relative freedom of organization tooverthrow racist apartheid rule. Theymust fight, for example, to destroy thebantustan system, to end the hated passlaws and all residency restrictions andfor a revolutionary constituent assem­bly based on one man, one vote.

In a longer historic term, apoliticalbread-and-butter unionism cannotprevail in South Africa. The white racistoppression of the black masses is toodeep, too brutal, too all-sided, tooobvious. That most black workers havetheir famiiies and relatives on thebantustans in itself goes against anarrow trade-unionist consciousness. Inany major class upheaval the Uncle Tomunion bureaucrats like Mvubelo will beswept aside by leaders who promisecomplete liberation of the black people.In a revolutionary crisis the proletarianvanguard party will find itself pittedagainst one or another variety ofnationalist demagogue, the aspiringNkrumahs, Kenyattas and Machels of For. Int~rnational LaborSouth Africa. Solidarity!

Today those trade unions tied tobroader nationalist movements arereduced to an exile existence, of whichthe most active is the South AfricanCongress uf Trade Unions (SACTU).SACTU was formed in the 1950s as a

"We don't care about governmentrecognition. What is important to us isto build strong and independent unions.That will force the employers to dealwith us."

-quoted in IntercontinentalPress, 28 May 1979

For class-struggle militants, registrationis strictly a tactical security question.Some unions may be forced into it as alegal cover to avoid victimization. But itmust be just that-a legal cover, nothingmore. Any black union leader whoactually adheres to apartheid legality,who accepts umpteen stages of govern­ment arbitration without taking indus­trial action, who refuses to support anti­apartheid struggles, is betraying notonly his own membership but the entireblack people.

Given the total suppression of thenationalist opposition and left in the1960s, the now-existing black unions aregenerally narrow and economistic. Inthe main this reflects the still primitivelevel of organization and struggleavailable to South Africa's black prole­tariat. But black unionists are alsosaddled with a thin layer of bureaucrats

The Fight Against Economismand Nationalism

To register or not to register, that'sthe burning issue facing South Africa'sblack trade unionists. One militant putit bluntly:

well-paying jobs.Full legal rights for black unions

sound like a good thing. But this isSouth Africa. In order to totallysubjugate the black masses, bourgeoisdemocracy even for the whites is andmust be highly restricted. This is,naturally, particularly true for the labormovement. While enjoying enormouseconomic privileges, white workers inSouth Africa do not have the democrat­ic trade-union rights available in theU.S. or West Europe. Compulsoryarbitration and government wage-fixingis pervasive throughout South Africanindustry. The right of white workers tostrike is highly restricted. All unions arebanned from any participation inpolitical activity and the governmentintervenes heavily in internal union lifethrough the monitoring of finances.

The Wiehahn "reform" is designed tobring black unions into this corporatiststraitjacket. Seeking to counter hard-­line apartheid opposition, the commis­sion actually makes the -incredibleargument that "the present statutorysituation thus discriminates againstwhites, Coloureds and Asians whereasthe black trade unions enjoy completefreedom"! As these "free" black tradeunionists are constantly fired, expelledto the bantustans (glorified tribalreserves), imprisoned and tortured, thisstatement is an atrocious falsehood andits authors know it. But it does expressthe intent of this apartheid "reform." Inparticular the regime wants to stamp outonce and for all any ties between theblack trade unions and anti-apartheidpolitical groups.

The Botha regime also loudlyproclaims it is doing away with theindustrial color bar. Another lie! Thenew legislation continues to prohibitmultiracial unions, while reinforcing theclosed shop. Thus, the white laboraristocracy still can legally restrict theentry of blacks into the skilled trades. Asthe conservative London Economist (6October 1979), which is sympathetic tothe apartheid reformers, reports:

"Conservative white unionists, whowere at first suspicious of the govern­ment's intentions, are now saying thatthe veto system will afford their mem­bers better protection against blackencroachment into their jobs than didthe old system."

Tied to the new trade-unionlegislation are the Riekert Commissionmeasures, designed to increase geo­graphical labor mobility. The 20 percentof the black urban population who arelegal residents of the townships (likeSoweto) surrounding South Africa'scities will now be allowed to move toother townships without governmentapproval. This relatively privilegedgroup gets another legal privilege, onegiving them access to a far broader labormarket. But for the 80 percent of urbanblacks who are classified as "citizens" ofthe bantustans, Riekert makes thingsworse, for some much worse. Penaltiesfor iliegal residency are now moresevere. Many "migrant" workers willlose their jobs (as employers will refuseto pay stiff fines) and be sent to starve inthe arid hellholes. And this c'ruellaw istrumpeted a great liberalizing reform!

These new measures are an attempt tocreate an economically and legallyprivileged caste among urban blackssomewhat analagous to the bantustanbureaucracy. This was clearly perceivedby two white South African liberals,Steve Friedman and John Kane­Berman, writing in the London Guardi­an (21 May 1979):

"Probably the single most importantelement common to Riekert and Wie­hahn is the desire to win selected blackallies to the side of the white minority­not all blacks, but those whose labourgives them a passport to the centraleconomy."

25 JANUARY 1980 5

Minneapolis general strike of 1934, led by Trotskyist Communist League of America, posed possibility of directgrowth of mass revolutionary party.

through the whole course ofdevelopment." ... while the Social Democrats, Love­stoneites, etc. advocate a labor orfarmer-labor party with a purely refor­mist program and more or less confinethemselves to unprincipled top combi­nations under cover of this slogan-theSocialist Workers Party advances itsprogram of transitional demands inorder to fructify the mass movement infavor of a labor party and lead it in arevolutionary direction ...."

-[SWP] Internal Bulletin, No.2In 1938

In light of subsequent efforts to gutthe revolutionary position on the laborparty, certain points in the Shachtman/Burnham essay deserve special com­ment. In answer to those comrades whosaw a labor party as necessarily refor­mist, modeled on its British namesake,the article states clearly that Trotskyistscall for a party based on the TransitionalProgram. However, the authors do notexplicitly project the possibility oftransforming (or splitting) an amor­phous labor party movement to form arevolutionary party under communistleadership. On the Farmer-Labor Party,the article falsely equates this petty­bourgeois formation with a labor party,thereby forgetting'the lesson drawn bythe Trotskyist movement from the 1923­24 FLP adventure. Centering on theneed to throw out/break with bourgeoispoliticians of the LaFollette/Olsonstripe, communist tactics toward such"two-class" parties are qualitativelydifferent than toward parties of theworking class.

In 1938 the SWP recognized that theagitational demand on the union bu­reaucracy (or a section of it) to form alabor party was conjunctural, to beraised when there was an actual impulseto break with the bourgeois parties. TheTrotskyist tactic thus has nothing incommon with the labor party cretinismof the Healyite Workers League (before

rhe6or· r1uesflonIn •merlca

"At the time of our national convention,we took insufficient account of the newdevelopments in the labor movement,especially in their political aspects, andfell into the error of repeating abstractformulas on the question of the laborparty which, in the light of great newdevelopments, had become obsolete ...."The Socialist Workers Party, sectionof the Fourth International, clearlyrealizes the fact that in virtue of theunfavorable historical reasons its owndevelopment lagged behind the radicali­zation of wide layers of the Americanproletariat and precisely because of thisthe problem of creating a labor party isplaced upon the order of the day

downturn shook workers' confidence inRoosevelt's New Deal reforms. Equallyimportant, the cutback in productionstalled the CIO organizing drive. TheLittle Steel strikes were bloodily defeat­ed while Ford stopped the UAW effortby firing entire factory shifts. Defeatedat the economic level, the union bu­reaucracy turned to political action,setting up Labor Non-Partisan Leaguesand Political Action Committees, inmany cases with broad rank-and-fileparticipation. Meanwhile, feeling be­trayed by Roosevelt's "curse on bothyour houses" attitude during the LittleSteel strikes, demagogic CIO leaderJohn L. Lewis sharply attacked theDemocratic president. With a riftopening up between an importantsection of the labor bureaucracy and theDemocrats in power, the idea of a laborparty became a real issue in Americanpolitical life.

The new situation caused Trotsky topropose that the SWP come out for alabor party. Recently obtained SWPPolitical Committee minutes for theApril 1938 plenum reveal that the shiftin line initially met with vehementopposition among even many of theleading cadre of the SWP. The changewas summed up in the majority resolu­tion to the plenum:

labor party" movement in 1923-24. AsTrotsky pointed out, behind rhetoric ofa bogus "two-class" party, the Commu­nists were being towed in the wake ofbourgeois populist politicians like La­Follette. Also, to call on WilliamGreen's AFL, a deeply corrupt pro­capitalist bureaucracy based on labor­aristocratic craft unions, to form a laborparty was to define it in advance asreformist. The Trotskyists understand­ably did not want to create a newreformist obstacle to proletarianrevolution.

By 1938, however, a number of devel­opments converged to give the idea ofa labor party wide support amongAmerican workers. The rise of masstrade unions in 1936-38 and the forma­tion of the Congress of IndustrialOrganizations embraced strategic sec­tions of the industrial proletariat for thefirst time. The CIO emerged, however,with a pro-capitalist bureaucracy whichwas qualitatively stronger than the left­wing political organizations. Prior tothe rise of the CIO it was certainlypossible for a mass revolutionary partyto develop as a result of direct commu­nist leadership of working-classstruggles. General strikes in Minneapo­lis, Toledo and San Francisco during1934 were all led by socialist groupswhich outflanked the hidebound AFL.But by 1938 the trade-union bureaucra­cy was becoming one of the main basesof support for the Rooseveltadministration.

At the same time a significant sectionof the new CIO leadership professedbelief in socialism and an independentworking-class party. Homer Martin,first president of the key United AutoWorkers, was associated with theLovestoneites as the Reuther brotherswere with the Socialist Party. SidneyHillman's Amalgamated ClothingWorkers set up the American LaborParty in New York, primarily becauseits ranks would not vote for Roosevelton the Democratic Party ticket. Inshort, the left wing of the CIO bureauc­racy paid lip service to a labor partywhile in practice forming the Americanversion of the popular front by support­ing FDR.

The economic and politicalconjuncture gave the labor party de­mand a particular agitational signifi­cance. In 1937-38 a sharp economic

Editor's note: Labor opposition toJimmy Carter's administration with theonset of a severe economic crisis raisesin a more immediate way the issue of aworkers party, a party based on thetrade unions and organized in opposi­tion to the twin parties of capital.Already the Communist Party (CP) ishailing "people's coalitions" with pro­Kennedy labor fakers such as the lAM'sWinpisinger, while the equally reformistSocialist Workers Party (SWP) calls onother Democratic Party stalwarts(UAW chief Fraser or Wurf/Gotbaumof AFSCME) to form a labor party on aminimalist, economist program. Inorder to clarify the revolutionaryposition on the labor party demand, weare reprinting below an article by MaxShachtman and James Burnham fromthe August 1938 New International,theoretical journal of the then­Trotskyist SWP.

In 1940 the two authors broke withthe Trotskyist movem<;nt in rejectingunconditional defense of the USSR, aquestion of principle for Marxistsdespite the bureaucratic degeneration ofthe Soviet workers state. However, in1938 Shachtman and Burnham weretwo of the SWP's leading spokesmen,and this article represented the views ofthe party majority as it first took up thelabor party demand. Written as theDemocrats consolidated their alliancewith the bureaucracy of the newlyestablished CIO industrial unions, theessay retains its significance today as astatement of revolutionary tactics.

As noted in a 1972 speech bySpartacist League national chairmanJames Robertson, to be published in asubsequent issue of WV, the labor partyis the particular American version of theunited front, a tactic for communists togain authority through the struggle forproletarian unity against the capitalistclass. The need for the labor party tacticderives from the vast disproportion instrength between the revolutionaryvanguard and the bureaucratically ledtrade-union movement. Even whereable to field its candidates in bourgeoiselections, a small communist propagan­da group cannot credibly present itselfas the practical alternative for the massof the working class against the Demo­crats and Republicans. Revolutionariesin this period therefore address the needfor working-class political indepen­dence by calling on the unions to form aparty of labor on a program of abolish­ing capitalist rule-i.e., the TransitionalProgram.

For authentic Marxists, the laborparty tactic is not an alternative tobuilding a communist vanguard party,but is a means of facilitating that task.The slogan is not valid under allhistorical circumstances and could evenbe an impediment to revolutionaryorganizing. If, for example, communistsshould succeed in building a massrevolutionary workers party, theywould then oppose the efforts of trade­union bureaucrats to establish a laborparty, whose only function would bethat of a reformist competitor to thecommunist-led organization.

In fact, until 1938 the AmericanTrotskyists rejected the labor partydemand and on this issue stood opposedto the Socialist Party reformists and the.former right opposition to the Stalinists,headed in the U.S. by Jay Lovestone.One factor which motivated the Trot­skyist position was the fiasco around theearly CP's flirtation with the "farmer-

•6 WORKERS VANGUARD

,2

The position on the question of aLabor party held up to now by theSocialist Workers Party and the move­ment out of which it developed, may besummarized as follows: The "revolu­tionary party [cannot] properly take theinitiative in advocating the formation ofLabor or Farmer-Labor parties" whichour Declaration of Principles character­izes as reformist by virtue of "their falseprogram and perspective"; further, "farfrom constituting independent classpolitics, the present labor party develop­ment is, from the point of view of thebureaucrats and the bourgeoisie, themethod for preventing the growth ofindependent class politics"; however,"the labor party movement, from thepoint of the workers themselves, doesreveal a progressive development ingeneral towards class consciousness";therefore, "where the labor party devel­ops as a genuine mass movementseparate from the capitalist parties, therevolutionists must remain in the midstof the workers ... [and] stand at eachstage for those concrete policies andactions which sum up a progressive andclass perspective" (our emphasis­l.B.-M.S.).

A study of the development of ourposition indicates that we based our­selves on two alternatives. If there is nomass reformist party, or movement forit, we do not initiate or form one as a

the whole process, especially the trendtoward a Labor party, and at all eventsimpel it to find new channels and formsof expression.

substitute for the revolutionary party,but build the latter directly as a massDarty. Where a mass Labor party doesexist, we, to whom sectarianism is alien,are flexible in our tactics and, generally,give critical support to such a party;and, as is known, we followed thiscourse in Minnesota where there is anestablished Farmer-Labor Party,6 sup­ported by the mass of the unions.

But our analysis was incomplete, andin some respects. not sufficiently clear.It did not allow for the present stage ofdevelopment, in which an undevelopedand only partly conscious mass move­ment exists and is torn by warringtendencies of progress and reaction, butis not yet crystallized. A contributorycause preventing us from supplement-

1947 pamphlet issued byUAW Local 659, Flint, Michigan.

a party. Those who believe that a Laborparty in the U.S. would play the sameprogressive role, and for the sameperiod of time, as the British LabourParty, are guilty of flagrant dogmati­cism and of blindness to those verynational peculiarities which they accusetheir critics of ignoring. While localLabor party movements are alreadycrystallizing and others will undoubt­edly develop, there are few outstandingleaders of the trade unions consciouslyand firmly working toward a Laborparty. On the other hand, other move­ments, now more powerful and havingmore conscious and determined leaders,are at work absorbing the incipientLabor party trends.

A "third party" is not unlikely todevelop. On a small (state) scale, atleast, its establishment is even certain.But its class instability, especially underthe brutal blows of the crisis, gives it nogreat future and indicates that it willsplit in two extreme directions before iteven grows to full stature. A long-livedindependent middle-class party, espe­cially in our times, is a chimera;politically, the middle class must flyapart, one section following the leader­ship of the workers, the other-underfascism-the leadership of big capital.

A reorganized Democratic Party,embracing in one coalition all the classiccomponents of the People's Front, haspowerful forces working for its develop­ment. They include not only the Roose­velt wing, but virtually all the prominentleaders of the unions, especially of theCIa, and the powerful machinery oftheStalinist party, which is now firmlymobilized against the organization of aLabor party or any other form _ofindependent working-class politicalaction. The almost certain reorganiza­tion of the Democratic Party, while itdoes not necessarily exclude the otherpossibilities mentioned, could, for ashort but indeterminate period, swallowup the other movements. In the worstcase, which is not at all excluded, itsrealization might conclusively preventthe Amerisan working class fromdeveloping a Labor party on any impor­tant scale. It would, instead, cpen uptwo direct roads, one leading straight torevolutionary politics, the other tofascism.

Finally, it should be borne in mindthat a new world war-no small orremote factor!-might well interrupt

Amalgamated Meat Cutters

1937 Memorial Day Massacre of Chicago-area steelworkers. With the rise ofmass industrial unions under pro-capitalist leadership, Trotskyists adoptedthe tactic of the labor party.

accidental. Under the impulsion of thesocial crisis it will grow and find clearerexpression. Who can challenge this savethose who expect an early stabilizationof U.S. capitalism, an easy surmountingof the crisis?

Side by side with this movement,however, exists and develops the move­ment for a "third party." Its mostconcrete form to date is the organizationof the National Progressives.4 This toois not the product of an individualcaprice or aberration, but is basedobjectively upon the discontent and thedilemma of the middle classes sufferingintensely from the crisis, which havebeen deliberately exploited by dema­gogues like LaFollette.5 While its veryclass basis deprives it of an enduringcharacter, at least with its present formand program, it :s an important sign ofthe times.

More important is the simultaneousmovement to develop the "Americanform" of coalition in one party-areconstituted Democratic Party, freedof the "conservatives," and composed ofRoosevelt's "liberals," plus the Republi­can "progressives" and supported by theLN-PL, the ALP, and the two trade­union movements. The division in theDemocratic camp in 1936, the violentinner-Democratic fights in Congress,the present primary campaign, all ofwhich are based on social conflictswithin the party itself, indicate the linesof the schism which the crisis will onlydeepen and toward which many right­wing and left-wing Democrats areconsciously working. Both camps real­ize that the old alignments no longercorrespond to the needs of the newsituation.

What, then, are the actual possibili­ties of development for working-classpolitical action on a mass scale in thenext period? There appear to us to bethree.

A national Labor party, similar inscope and position to the British LabourParty, would be far the most probabledevelopment if one could arbitrarilytransfer the present forces back to theperiod of America's expansion and rise,approximating the present period ofcapitalist decline, so forcefully evidentin the United States as well, such adevelopment is distinctly less likely. Thesocial limitations imposed upon areformist party by desperate, decayingcapitalism, set the political limits of such

it left the workers movement to becomethe mouthpiece of Islamic dictatorQaddafi), which endlessly campaignedfor the ultra-chauvinist, anti­Communist Meanyite AFL-CIO bu­reaucracy to found a reformist laborparty. We likewise oppose the call by thenow thoroughly reformist SWP on theliberal bureaucrats to form a "laborparty": all wings of the American laborbureaucracy are today bound hand­and-foot to the capitalist parties.

Accordingly the Spartacist Leaguetoday raises the labor party demand inthe same spirit as did the SWP in the late1930s, as part of a program of revolu­tionary opposition to the "labor lieu­tenants of capital." We demand: Oustthe bureaucrats! For a workers party,based on the unions, to fight for aworkers government! In present condi­tions of American political life, thelabor party demand is essentially apropagandistic expression of working­class political independence. As such itis a subordinate, tactical element in thestruggle for a workers government,popular expression for the dictatorshipof the proletariat.

THEQUESTIONOFAL-AB-OR BY JAMES

BURNHAM

PARTYsHA&T~~~-,Political formations in the United

States are undergoing a radical realign­ment, and in addition to the oldformations, new ones are appearing on

. the scene. The changes in the situationare of such a nature as to dictate achange in or amplification of the tacticspursued by the revolutionary Marxistsin this country.

Two unprecedented economic crises,the second following the first before itreached the stage of boom; the increas­ingly deep social crisis in which thebourgeoisie finds it impossible to solvethe problems of its social order in any ofthe traditional ways; and the organiza­tion of the workers in the basic, mass­production industries under the bannerof the CIa, numbering more than3,000,000 genuine proletarians, havenot only brought into existence anunmistakable movement for working­class political action, but have devel­oped it-for all its backwardness-on avast scale, one never known in the USA.

The Labor Non-Partisan League(LN-PL),1 the direct intervention of theunions in the Detroit and Seattleelections and in the Pennsylvaniaprimaries-these are only superficiallysimilar to the ancient Gompers'2 policyof "reward your friends and punish yourenemies"; the formation of the Ameri­can Labor Party (ALP)3 in New York isan even sharper break from the tradi­tional position of the labor movement.The advance consists in the fact that forthe first time the American unionists arebeing mobilized as a class to participatein politics. The leaders of labor, how­ever, strive to confine this movement tothe old capitalist parties, that is, toprevent this class movement fromex<;eeding the bounds of bourgeoispolitics, and taking the form of inde­pendent working-class political action.The movement is Qot temporary or

From the Archives of the Revolution25 JANUARY 1980 7

WV Photo

Washington, D.C. 1975 AFL-CIO rally against unemployment. Class­struggle militants fight bureaucracy's tactic of pressuring government,reliance on bosses' parties.

Labor Party...(continued from page 7)ing our analysis was the need ofconcentrating our attention and attackupon the reformist Labor party concep­tions of the right wingers and centrists inthe old Socialist Party, in connection,particularly, with the problem of theALP which originated not as a break­away from the old parties, but as amachine to break the advanced andtraditional socialist influence upon theNew York workers and to corral thelabor vote for an old capitalist party andticket.

In brief, our old position cannot anddoes not effectively answer the problemsraised by the present stage of develop­ment. It cannot even in theory, for thereason that the new situation was notclearly allowed for. More decisive is thefact that practice has also demonstratedits inadequacy, and consequently, thefact that it does not permit us to giveconcrete answers, not only such as areunderstandable and acceptable to tnemasses, but as will develop morespeedily their class consciousness, theirbreak with the bourgeoisie and itsparties, and also with their petty­bourgeois leaders.

In Pennsylvania, after Kennedy's7defeat in the primaries, if we do not urgethe workers to put up their ownindependent ticket on a militant pro­gram (which, in view of the electionmachinery alone that is required, meansthe decisive step towards a Labor partyformation), and break with the Demo­cratic Party-we can only urge them tosupport in the elections the SWP(which, alas, is yet too weak to put aticket in the field); in effect, therefore,we leave the CIO bureaucracy and theStalinists associated with them a freehand in keeping the masses tied to theDemocratic Party. In New Jersey, ourparticipation in the conferences of theLN-PL is sterilized because we do notcounterpose in. the most concrete formindependent political action to theHolderman-Stalinist policy of paralyz­ing the· movement, disorienting it,rendering it passive and delivering it toone gang or another in the capitalistparties. In the ALP, similar indecisiondeprives us in advance of the possibilityof playing any role whatsoever.

Our old position, irrespective ofwhether it was right or wrong, or ofwhat specific position we adopt now,must be brought up to date. Weadvocate a positive policy, one that isbased upon the present reality, as well asthe objective needs of the working class.

3Our attitude toward the present

movement for workers' political actionmust give concrete and unambiguousanswer to these questions:

Are we indifferent to it? We are notindifferent, and cannot be, toward anymass movement of the workers.

Is the movement, in so far as itrepresents and expresses a break withthe tradition of supporting the oldcapitalist parties, progressive or reac­tionary? On the part of the workers, aswe have declared in the past, it isobviously progressive.

Will the trend towards independentworking-class political action, towardsincreased political consciousness of theworking class, grow weaker or strongerin the coming period? One cannotseriously hold to the belief that thesocial crisis in the United States isdeepening, that sharper class conflictsare ahead, that the bourgeoisie mustseek to burden the masses increasinglywith the cost of the crisis, that mereeconomic action wilI prove increasinglydifficult and insufficient and thereforegive greater point to the urgency ofpolitical action-without concludingthat the American workers are certain tomove at a faster and clearer pace to­wards independent political class actionin the period ahead, whatever organiza-

8

tional forms it may at any given momenttake.

Will this movement, in any decisiverespect, take the form of a massrevolutionary Marxian party during thenext period? At most, one can say that itis not theoretically excluded; but allpractical and realistic considerationsindicate that this will not be the case.

The actual alternatives, therefore, arethe development of a mass Labor party,or the immersion and sterilization of themovement into a reorganized Demo­cratic or third party. Powerful politicalforces are working in the latter direc­tion: the bourgeois and social refor­mists, the trade-union bureaucracy, theStalinists, the pressure of the pettybourgeoisie, etc. They are all deliberate­ly impeding the development of anindependent Labor party.

In this concrete dispute, we have, andmust have, an active preference. Asagainst the last-named elements andtheir strategy, we are positively in favorof the political organization of theAmerican workers as a class, that is, of aLabor party. This alone makes itpossible for us to intervene in the labormovement in such a way as to heightenthe class consciousness of the workers inthe given circumstances, to sharpentheir antagonism to the bourgeoisparties, to widen the breach betweenthem and their class~collaborationist,

bureaucratic misleadership.In Pennsylvania, we counterpose to

the capitulatory policy of the CIOchiefs, the proposal that labor shouldenter its own ticket, and set up thepolitical-organizational machinery torun this ticket; we conduct a vigorouscampaign for this policy which will berealistic and acceptable to thousands ofworkers, perhaps only a handful ofwhom will be interested in an SWPticket. And the policy will be correct notonly because it is "realistic and accept­able," but because it will impel thou­sands of workers to break from theDemocratic Party, to break with bour­geois politics and also its sponsors in theCIO and AF of L, and to seek the roadto independent class action. When thebosses of a Labor Non-Partisan Leagueconference propose the endorsement ofDemocratic Smith or RepublicanJones, we cannot seriously counterposeTrotskyist Robinson; it is entirelycorrect, however, and fruitful for ourmovement, to fight at the conference fora candidate put forward by labor itself,for a Labor party organized andcontrolled by the workers. In theensuing fight, the militant, advanced,comparatively conscious workers willrally to our side and, in time, swell theranks of the revolutionary party;

Do we then become a "Labor-partyparty," which, like the Lovestoneitesand Thomasites,8 will carry on anabstract, general, universal and perpetu­al campaign for a Labor party? Nothingof the kind. We need a position that

enables us to give the concrete revolu­tionary answer to the specific situationsthat arise (Pennsylvania, New Jersey,Michigan, the ALP, Workers Alliance,9etc.) But more important than this is thefundamental point of difference be­tween our revolutionary position andthe opportunist position of the Love­stone and Thomas groups. They are theadvocates and defenders of a reformistLabor party, a "good" reformist party.Our Declaration of Principles properlydefines the present Labor party move­ment as reformist on the basis of its"false program and perspective." TheSocialist Workers Party does not andcannot advocate or support this pro­gram and perspective.

Let us put it more concretely. We arenot the advocates of a Labor party "ingeneral," in the abstract, or even of the

Labor party as it stands now. We say tothe workers: You want to break fromthe capitalist parties, to form a party ofyour own? Excellent! That is a stepforward, it is progressive. Such a step wewill support; we will urge all workers todo likewise. A political party is formedto take control of the affairs of thenation, and we are for the workerstaking such control. But-you cannottake control and impose your will andinterests by means of a reformistprogram and tactics or under a refor­mist leadership. That is demonstratedby the experiences in England; rightnow in the United States; in fact,throughout the world. We of the SWPare a revolutionary party. We thereforepropose to you, not a program of pettyreforms which the deepening crisisprevents from really impro'v'ing yourconditions; not a program of reformsfor reconciling you with your hatefulclass enemy and its bankrupt socialorder; but a program of revolutionarytransitional demands which correspondat once to your needs and desires and tothe objective situation. We propose, inorder to advance the Labor partymovement toward class struggle and notclass collaboration, that you adopt aprogram calling for workers' control ofproduction, for militant Labor DefenseGuards to protect our democratic rightsand combat fascism, for the expropria­tion of the industrial and financialdictators of the country, etc., etc.

This is our program. If the workers donot adopt it as a whole, or at all, wecontinue to give support to the Laborparty, but critical support. We are notsectarians or ultimatists. We give thelabor movement no ultimatum: Accept

. our program, join our party or we willhave nothing to do with you. On theother hand, we accept no ultimatums,even from the labor movement. We haveour views, and if labor does not acceptthem in full, we continue with ourcomradely criticism and do not makeour own the inadequacies or mistakes ofthe working class; but support unmis­takably every progressive step, even

small ones. In this way, we help torevolutionize the mass movement, andto make a mass movement out of therevolutionary party. There is no otherway.

Our main aim is to build the revolu­tionary party, and all tactics mustsubserve this aim. The Labor partytactic is not, ofcourse, given for all time.It is imperative for the period ahead. Ifthe trend toward a Labor party isswallowed up in the coming period by athird party or "Democratic Front," theLabor party slogan may lose its effec­tiveness, and the struggle will take theform of combat for direct leadership ofthe masses between the revolutionaryparty and the reformist-patriotic move­ment. The coming war, after a shortperiod, would, for example, enormouslysharpen all relations and problems. Itwill be recalled that the big reformistmovements after the last war broke intwo, with such large sections comingover to revolutionary Marxism that thesmall communist sects in many coun­tries became mass parties almost over­night. Such a perspective is far fromexcluded in the United States. But it isstill not on the immediate horizon.

While the next period does notindicate the likelihood of the revolution­ary party directly becoming a massparty, there is no reason at all for lack ofconfidence. The adoption of the Laborparty slogan, as elucidated by us, doesnot mean giving up the revolutionaryparty; it means the best way, under theconcrete circumstances, of rooting theparty in the living mass movement andof building it into a stronger force.Given a correct policy on our part, thevery same forces pushing the workersnow toward a Labor party will, as theydeepen and as experience is accumulat­ed, push the workers even more firmlytowards the revolutionary party. Theterrific social crisis, and the impendingwar, open out directly revolutionaryperspectives, with a concomitant tumul­tuous growth of our party which willbring the United States to the veryforefront of this old world. We needonly know how to exploit the vastpossibilities in a realistic, practical,effective, i.e., Marxist manner. Anarena in which our ideas are brought tothe masses and our party is built-it is inthis sense, above all, that our tacticstoward the Labor party must beunderstood.

James BurnhamMax Shachtman

FOOTNOTESI Labor Non-Partisan League: Political armof the CIO, organized in 1936 to supportRoosevelt.

2Samuel Gompers founded the AFL in 1886.3American Labor Party: Formed in 1936 by

David Dubinsky and Sidney Hillman,social-democratic leaders of the garmenttrades unions, to mobilize New York laborsupport for Roosevelt. Split in 1944 intoALP and Liberal Party.

4 National Progressives: A liberal bourgeoisthird party, founded by Philip LaFollette in1938.

5 Philip LaFollette: Wisconsin governor andson of populist Robert M. LaFollette.

6 Farmer-Labor Party: Reformist third partyof trade-union and farmer organizationsformed in the wake of World War I.Maintained popular support in Minnesota,where the F-LP's Floyd Olson was electedgovernor in 1930and 1932. F-LP leadershipsupported Roosevelt, but the trade unioncaucus of F-LP ran an independent slate inthe 1937 primaries. .

7Thomas Kennedy, secretary-treasurer ofthe United Mine Workers, ran in the 1938Pennsylvania Democratic primary for thegubernatorial nomination (and wasdefeated).~Thomasites: Followers of NormanThomas, leader of the American SocialistParty.

9 Workers Alliance: Coalition againstunemployment formed in April 1936between the SP-Ied Workers Alliance, CP­led Unemployed Councils and AmericanWorkers Party's National UnemployedLeague in which the Trotskyists worked.

WORKERS VANGUARD

Klan ...(continuedfrom page 12)article on page 2). For mass black/laboraction to smash the Klan!

1960-1980: Which Road fromGreensboro?

The organizers of the February 2march remind us that 20 years agoGreensboro was the site of the first sit­ins. The wave of sit-ins that started atWoolworth's lunch counter developedinto the militant student wing of the civilrights movement. Now we are told bythe "National Anti-Klan Network" thatthis movement can be repeated in the1980s, presumably along the same oldroad in the same old way, perhaps evensinging the same songs.

Of course the civil rights movementcannot be repeated today. And if itcould, who would want it? The old civilrights hierarchy with the reformist left intow would certainly like to repeat thepolitical methods of the liberal-led civilrights movement-the methods ofbetrayal and defeat. The idealism andself-sacrifice ofcountless young activistswho embodied the hopes of miIlionswere squandered in the name of "work­ing within the system."

No one can now deny that despitesome token gains and important formalstatements of legal equality, the mass ofblacks face under capitalism ever­decaying conditions. Schools and hous­ing are worse and more segregated thanever. Black unemployment is at itshighest in history. Practically an entiregeneration of black youth is being

tossed on the garbage heap.Harry Truman observed from a

position of privilege that a recession iswhen "the other guy lost his job" and adepression is when "you lost your job."Blacks are "the other guy" who sufferpermanent depression conditions. Andthe industries being hit hardest today­auto and steel-are those in whichblacks have historicaIly been hired intothe proletariat in waves of migrationfrom the rural South. In every way thatmatters the capitalists have not onlypushed black people to the back of thebus, they have made it too expensive toride at all. And now in the name ofCarter's escalating anti-Soviet "HumanRights" crusade to restore capitalism tothe Russian deformed workers state,blacks and the poor are getting anoverdose of grinding austerity in adangerous atmosphere of increasingimperialist militarization.

The civil rights movement showedonce more the courage and dedicationof black people in their struggle forequality and liberation. But that move­ment was led down the liberal road ofreliance on the federal government andloyalty to capitalism's DemocraticParty. As a result the establishmentpreachers have been joined by a newlyformed secular club of Black ElectedOfficials whose job it is to keep thestruggle within the bounds ofcapitalism.

It is this same Democratic Partywhich is leading the' onslaught againstblack people's democratic rights andtheir very livelihoods. It is the party thatdumped school busing when it became ahot issue for the racists on the streets of

Boston and LouisviIle. It is the party ofJimmy Carter and the Dixiecrats. Thatparty, preferred by the CommunistParty and phony "progressives" ofeverysort, has never been nor can it ever be aparty in the interests of black people.Now the organizers of defeat offer thesame bankrupt strategy to "lay claim tothe 1980s."

Many of the young militants inspiredby the early sit-ins got fed up with theliberal pacifism of the Martin LutherKings. They saw it was necessary tostruggle for po\,ver. But in the absence ofa strong proletarian movement fightingfor black freedom, multi-racialism wasfalsely identified with subservience towhite liberals. Thus some of the bestfighters against racial oppression, likeSNCC, saw no class-struggle road toliberation and were squandered in therhetoric of black-separatist utopiasborn of despair. Or like the Panthersthey were burned out and hunted downby capitalism's police until they too weretamed in the political cage of theDemocratic Party.

But there was another road out ofGreensboro, 1960. Not liberal integra­tionism nor black separatism butrevolutionary integrationism-the fightfor assimilation of black people into anegalitarian socialist society. That road isthe road of the class struggle-thenecessary fusion of the struggle forblack freedom with the fight for prole­tarian revolution.

It is this class-struggle road that blackactivists must take today. In the wake ofa demoralized, defeated civil rightsmovement and the horror of theGreensboro massacre, there are a few

hard facts and conclusions that mustbe faced.

• There is no future for black peopleunder capitalism.

• Black people in the U.S. constitutenot a separate "nation" but a speciallyoppressed race/color caste segregated atthe bottom of capitalist society, inte­grated into the economic life of theproletariat.

• Therefore the question of revolu­tion in America is the race question:there can be no social revolution in thiscountry without united struggle of blackand white workers led by a multi-racialvanguard party, and there is nothingother than a workers revolution whichcan at last open the road to freedom forblack people.

The Trotskyists of the SpartacistLeague have staked out this road ofclass struggle. We are dedicated to theconstruction of the multi-racial van­guard of the working people. We takeaction to harness the power of the labormovement in the fight for black equali­ty, fighting within the unions against thepoisonous racism which cripples unitedstruggle and for a new class-consciousleadership to oust the pro-capitalistbureaucrats and unleash the power ofthe workers' organizations. We know wehave chosen the road of long, hardstruggle. But it is the only one which canliberate us all.

For labor/black mobilizationsagainst the Klan! Break with theDemocrats, black and white-Build aworkers party to fight for a workersgovernment! For black liberationthrough socialist revolution! •

Guest speaker: FRANK HICKS, member UAW Local 600;Detroit

>:~:;::;:....., ..

§.Q.artacist League Public Forum

Killer COpS...(continued from page 3)

ness of the u.s. left and the de­cay of the radical black movement ofthe 1960s. (The decline of black na­tionalism after more than a decade ofgovernment repression and politicaldisintegration was underlined in earlyJanuary by Eldridge Cleaver. Theformer Panther leader, now a "born­again" Moonie, spoke out against anycivilian review board as a judge wasreleasing him on probation.) MayorWilson's proposal for a five-person"advisory" review board was "opposed"by the NAACP's caIl for a nine-personboard with power to review police"policies" as well as individual atroci­ties. Splitting the difference, the councilon January 17 approved a seven-personboard along the lines of the mayor's taskforce recommendation.

These mild liberal-utopian schemes tocurb capitalism's kiIler cops have beenseconded by Oakland's phony "leftists."The Communist Party U.S.A. Marxist­Leninist, a bunch of Albania cultists,latched onto the Briscoe case, launchinga "Charles Briscoe Committee forJustice." They called for a "disciplinaryboard" which could only "recommendcriminal charges" and "would not beable to put killer cops in jail" as "theonly proposal worth fighting for." Thecrazed pro-"Gang of Four" Maoists ofthe Revolutionary Communist Partyturned up at the January 9 meeting witha pig's head on a stake and some flashybanners with rhyming slogans-butwith no concrete proposal. The attempt

,)

WinnipegBox 3952, Station BWinnipeg, Man.(204) 589-7214

San FranciscoBox 5712San FranCISco. CA 94101(415) 863-6963

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"

power to defend oppressed minoritiesfrom unbridled police violence. If thetrade unions flexed their muscles indefense of the black population it wouldbe far more effective than a thousandspeeches by black politicians or phony"review boards." If, for instance. t\le _Alameda Central Labor Council, whoseleader Richard Groulx made a token"labor" speech at the January 9 meeting,called a one-day general protest strike ofits 65,000 members, the reins wouldcertainly be tightened on the Oaklandcops. But such labor fakers would rathermake liberal speeches than launch thenecessary class struggle. Indeed, Groulxhas shown more sympathy for cops thanworkers: in 1979 he let Bay Area RapidTransit workers go down to defeat in alockout while in 1977 he sanctioned aBART strike on behalf of the transitcops' "union."

The case of Charles Briscoe, the slainshop steward, could potentially serve tolaunch a labor struggle against racistcop killings. Briscoe's lAM brotherscould take a real step forward byinitiating a movement for a laborprotest strike against cop terror. Amongthe demands militant unionists mustraise in such a strike would be: Jail killercops, starting with four-time killerRobert Fredericks! Cops out of thelabor movement! Disarm the police! •

VancouverBox 26, Station AVancouver, B.C.(604) 224-0805

Los AngelesBox 26282. Edendale StationLos Angeles, CA 90026(213) 662-1564

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DetroitPO Box 32717DetrOit. M: 48232(313) 868-9095

HoustonBox 26474Houston. TX 77207

TROTSKYIST LEAGUE OF CANADATorontoBox 7198. Statoon AToronto, Ont.(416) 593-4138

National OfficeBox 1377. GPONew York. NY 10001(212) 732-7860

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\.

SPARTACIST LEAGUE LOCAL DIRECTORY

pression under capitalism and must bestrongly opposed.

Racist police repression is an oldstory in Oakland. In her 1977 book AFine Old Conflict, ex-Communist Partymember Jessica Mitford wrote a wholechapter about how the CP built an EastBay branch around battles againstpolice brutality in Oakland in the late1940s. Oakland cops, reinforced byrecruiting in the South, have notmellowed with the passing decades.From the police vendetta against thePanthers to the cases of Tyrone Guyton,a black 14-year-old shot dead by cops in1973, and 23-year-old Floyd Calhoun,cut down by Oakland police in 1975, thewanton killings by these gunmen in blueare notorious. But what has always beenmissing in recent protests against copbrutality in the Bay Area is the massiveintervention of organized labor. In theGuyton case the Militant Caucus, aclass-struggle opposition group in thewarehouse division of the InternationalLongshoremen's and WarehGusemen'sUnion, obtained union endorsement fora protest demonstration. But as wenoted at the time, "The union leadershipfailed to push for a heavy mobilizationamong its several thousand members inthe East Bay" (WV No. 99, 5 March1976).

It is the labor movement that has the

Mon. Feb. 412 noonStudent Union Can!. Rm. A-ES.F. State

San Francisco(415)863-6963

835-1535

of this group which only a few years agowas in a de facto anti-busing alliancewith the KKK in Boston to pose now asdefenders of black people is outrageousin any case. Downright pernicious,however, was the proposal put forwardby the Communist Party's NationalAlliance Against Racist and PoliticalRepression (NAARPR) for "com­munity control of the police."

Civilian review boards are largelyimpotent mechanisms which encourageillusions in the "reformability" of thecapitalist state. There are times when thequestion of a civilian review boardbecomes a referendum on police bona­partism. For example, in 1966 NewYork City police in alliance with anassortment of racist, right-wing groupslaunched a heavily bankrolled referen­dum campaign to eliminate MayorLindsay's powerless Civilian ReviewBoard. New York cops wanted tocontinue to terrorize racial minorities,striking workers and leftists withouteven this token impediment. In re­sponse, the Spartacist League issued aleaflet: "Vote No to Cop Brutality andRacism." While placing no confidencein the review board, we warned then: "Ifthe cops actually get the vote ofconfidence they're after, it will strength­en the hand of the ruling class and thecops against all working people andtheir organizations." The CP /NAARPR call for "community control"of the cops, however, means administer­ing the cops, including "hiring, trainingand promotion of police employees."This is a dangerous proposal forminorities and working people totake responsibility for their own op-

Sun .. Feb. 37'30 pmOakes 105U.C. Santa Cruz

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25 JANUARY 1980 9

"Dividends Rising-Proletarians falling."

Fred ElliS

248

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WORNERS"NO11'"

first since World War II to raise realarms expenditures three years running.And in December Carter announced afurther hike in military spending (al­ready scheduled to rise 4.5 percent) by 5percent annually. Taking inflation intoaccount, this amounts to over $1 trillionto be added to the war budget in the nextfive years. Most of this is to pay for a"rapid deployment force" and newships which the Pentagon has had on itsshopping list for years.

Compared to 20 years ago, however,the United States' world position isgreatly weakened and the role of itsimperialist allies is much greater. Theend of unquestioned U.S. imperialisthegemony was marked by Nixon's 15August 1971 action breaking the dollar'slink to gold-the basis for the post-warBreton Woods monetary system. NowCarter meets indifference to his calls foreconomic boycotts of Iran and theSoviet Union. The French turned downU.S. requests to curb advanced compu­ter exports to Moscow, and the Japan­ese are continuing with their multi­billion projects to develop Siberiannatural gas. The most Carter couldcome up with was German diplomaticsupport and an agreement by majorgrain exporters not to increase theirsales to the USSR. On Iran, they arewilling to vote with the U.S. in theUnited Nations, but no one is willing tojeopardize vital crude oil supplies for thesake of the hostages. Even Pakistan'sZia is queasy, terming Carter's $400million aid offer "peanuts."

The Chinese alone pledged to go allthe way, for what that's worth. DuringU.S. "Defense" Secretary Brown'srecent trip to Peking he called for

0JV Photo

PresidentSlashing Jobless Benefits

It would have taken a Bertolt Brecht tocapture this ruling class myopia. But RosaLuxemburg said it long ago in her JuniusPamphlet on how capitalist economicirrationality leads to imperialist war:

Justice Dept. to Oust Nazi Hunter

NYT January 6. 8

Militant longshoremen and ware­housemen from the ILWU came out tothe demonstration under the placard,"Down with the Reactionary ILA GrainBoycott." But there was no response tounited-front demonstration requestsmade to several Bay Area fake-leftgroups.

in Afghanistan," and "From Moscow toPeking-For International CommunistUnity Against Imperialism" were thechants of the 45-man demonstrationoutside the Federal Building here lastFriday, January 18. Called by theSpartacist League, an SL/SYL bannerproclaimed "For Red Army AgainstIslamic Reaction-Extend Gains ofOctober Revolution to AfghanPeoples!"

Defense Stocks Lead Market Upward

Soviet axis was already foreshadowedby Washington's complicity in lastyear's Chinese invasion of Vietnam.Whether in the "Human Rights" rhetor­ic of Vance or the McCarthyite demon­ology of Brzezinski, the target ofCarter's onslaught is the Soviet Union.And the threat of the new realignment isimperialist war to obliterate theconquests of the October Revolution.

"Born Again" Cold War

As we have repeatedly pointed out,ever since taking office Jimmy Carterhas sought to morally and militarily re­arm American imperialism and pull theU.S. out of what the Pentagon sees as itspost-Vietnam paralysis. His claims tohave recently changed his opinion of theRussians to the contrary, Carter issimply milking the Iran and faked-upAfghanistan crises for all they are worthin building jingoist support for his wardrive against the USSR. The adminis­tration defends itself against Republi­can criticism by pointing out it is the

San Francisco, January 18Spart2cist Britain

SAN FRANCISCO-"Ship Grain tothe USSR, For International Working­Class Solidarity," "Stop ShootingTeachers, Down with Islamic Reaction

recently resuscitated mouthpiece ofBritish imperialism, the London Times(10 January), was able to crow gleefully,"British Left Condemns Intervention byMoscow."

"This picket proves that the Times'blanket statement is not true," declaredSL/B spokesman Alastair Green at therally. "We have nothing in commonwith Thatcher and Carrington, Carterand Brzezinski, the butchers of Viet­nam, of Ireland, today of Rhodesiaagain. These are the bitter enemies oftheworld working class."

matter rather accurately: "As a result ofthe Carter Administration's actions, theimpression is increasingly forming in theworld of the United States as anabsolutely unreliable partner in inter­state ties, as a state whose leadership,prompted by some whim, caprice, oremotional outbursts, or by considera­tions of narrowly understood immedi­ate advantage, is capable at any momentof violating its international obligationsand cancelling treaties and agreementssigned by it" (quoted in the New YorkTimes, 13 January). Of course, Stalincould have said the same of Hitler afterJune 1941-in both cases the nationalistbureaucrats relied on treacherous agree­ments with the imperialists rather thanrevolutionary action by the internation­al proletariat.

If Dr. Strangelove is running Ameri­can foreign policy, domestic U.S. affairslook as if they are under the thumb ofDaddy Warbucks. Carter's answer tothe looming economic crisis is a classic"guns, not butter" armaments program.With weapons expenditures soaring,"defense" stocks are naturally booming;but as factory layoffs mount, unemploy­ment benefits and social security pay­ments are cut back; meanwhile the CIAis demanding an end to curbs on covertaction and the "Justice" Departmentdrops efforts to prosecute Nazi warcriminals. Recent developments in theU.S. almost caricature the reactionarynature of capitalism in this epoch: asRosa Luxemburg wrote in her pamphletagainst the first imperialist world war,"dividends are rising, proletarians faIl­ing." And that indeed is the prospectfacing the working people in the absenceof socialist revolution-it is not just"cold" war that the capitalists willinstigate.

We are presently experiencing amajor shift of the international order asit was shaped in the aftermath of WorldWar II. Such changes do not occurovernight, and to place the turning pointat I January 1980 would be dangerouslymisleading. In 1946 Churchill sought toblame the end of the wartime coalitionon the Soviets by accusing Stalin oflowering an "Iron Curtain" over EastEurope. So today American imperial­ism tries to pin its war drive on "Sovietaggression" in Afghanistan. Yet eversince Potsdam, Truman's policieshave sought an imperialist allianceagainst the USSR; and the new anti-

London, January 12 .

LONDON-The chant "Red Army inAction Against Islamic Reaction" rangout repeatedly January 12 as 40 Sparta­cist League/Britain supporters andothers demonstrated in front ofthe U.S.embassy in Grosvenor Square. SL/Bplacards included "For Military De­fence of the Soviet Union," "SmashCarter/Thatcher/NATO Anti-SovietWar Drive" and "Extend Social Gainsof October Revolution to AfghanPeoples."

The protest occurred amidst the bitternationwide steel strike here as the pro­capitalist labour fakers were excoriating"Soviet aggression," working overtimeto line up the working class in Toryprime minister Margaret Thatcher'scamp. So flagrant has been the capitula­tion of much of the British left that the

rooms and the trading rooms offinancial and commodity markets, fore­casts for the 1980s are being hastilyrewritten to accommodate the end ofdetente and the beginnings of a new coldwar."

Afghanistan ...(continued from page 1)

The images all spring quickly to mind.There is the jut-jawed crewcut admiraldispatching cutters to "interdict" Sovietfishing trawlers off Alaska. The presi­dent's Stateof the Union speech is slatedto announce a new Carter Doctrine,paralleling the Truman, Eisenhowerand Nixon "doctrines"-which broughtforth NATO, CENTO and thedeepening anti-Soviet alliance withMaoist China. Former Nixon stafferWilliam Safire gloats that all theDemocratic "doves" have been routed,or have at least changed the coloring oftheir feathers. In a column on "TheSecond Cold War" (New York Times,10 January) he ironically notes thatCarter's new ally Pakistan is hardly asterling example of "Human Rights":"General Zia, who executed formerPrime Minister Ali Bhutto, is somewhatmore repressive than was PresidentThieu of South Korea."

Faced with a CIA-backed andChinese-armed Islamic reactionaryinsurgency against its Afghan allies,Moscow did the natural thing. But in hisJanuary 3 telecast announcing the grainboycott and other measures to coercethe Soviet Union, Carter justified theseacts of economic and diplomatic war­fare by claiming that Brezhnev lied tohim. Appealing to the old J. EdgarHoover maxim-"never trust a Com­munist to keep a treaty"-he has provedthat if anything the exact opposite is thecase. In his 1976 presidential campaignCarter pledged: "The singling out offood as a bargaining weapon is some­thing I would not do." Now he is tryingto blackmail the Russian people byattacking their food supply.

And food is hardly the ultimateweapon. Carter's pious lies about SALTare a thing of the past as the U.S.embarks on a mammoth arms drive.

Dispassionately considered, theUnited States is acting like a mad dogthat slipped the leash. Brezhnev, whohas good reason to be peeved, put the

10 WORKERS VANGUARD

when pro-imperialist "dissidents" likethe physicist Andrei Sakharov called forSoviet withdrawal, they were brandedfor what they are-traitors to theproletarian cause. In the face of theimperialist uproar over Soviet militaryintervention against the mullah-ledreactionaries in Afghanistan, Trotsky­ists proclaimed: "Hail Red Army!"

Despite wishful thinking in the Westthat Afghanistan will become "theUSSR's Vietnam," Soviet forces areclearly capable of suppressing thedisorganized, poorly armed tribalistrebels. What will then become of thecountry? In the absence of any but themost rudimentary proletariat the essen­tial ingredients for the liberation of theAfghan peoples must come from outsidethis overwhelmingly tribalist region. Ifthe country is effectively incorporatedinto the Soviet bloc this can today beonly as a bureaucratically deformedworkers state. Compared to presentconditions in Afghanistan this wouldrepresent a giant step forward. Thesharp contrast between the condition ofwomen in Soviet Central Asia and thatin any Islamic state provides an index.But the road to a socialist future ofewnomic plenty and internationalistequality lies in a proletarian politicalrevolution to oust the parasitic Stalinistbureaucracy. This in turn must be linkedwith socialist revolutions from SouthAsia to the imperialist centers.

The Kremlin and its flunkies of thepro-Moscow CPs will predictablylaunch a "peace offensive" to "isolatethe warmongers" and "revive detente,"To these shibboleths we respond asCannon did to the Stalinists in the1950s: "The class struggle of the work­ers, merging with the colonial revolu­tions in a common struggle againstimperialism, is the only genuine fightagainst war. The Stalinists who preachotherwise are liars and deceivers. Theworkers and colonial peoples will havepeace when they have the power and usetheir power to take it and make it forthemselves. That is the road of Lenin.There is no other road to peace.".

principle for Marxists-is directlyposed.

Brezhnev & Co. continue their treach­erous policies of seeking "peacefulcoexistence" with the "democrat­ic" imperialists and "national"bourgeoisie-policies that have led tobloodbaths from Djakarta to Santiago,and which needlessly prolonged theheroic struggle of the Indochineseworkers and peasants for decades. Butat least when they felt the hot breath ofcounterrevolution next door, the Krem­lin was not seized by rotten liberalism.At Kabul airport the Antonov trans­ports landed every two minutes. And

terms of the conflict. Frequently-inEgypt, the Sudan, Sri Lanka, Syria,Iraq and elsewhere-the Russian bu­reaucracy aids regimes which are in noway more progressive than their neigh­bors or internal opponents-and whichno less frequently turn on their Sovietallies. Communist revolutionists,Trotskyists, do not support thesereactionary ploys of Kremlin foreignpolicy. But in Afghanistan, faced withimperialist pressure and Islamic revolt,the Stalinists have found themselvesforced, for purely defensive reasons, totake up a genuinely red cause. Anddefense of the USSR itself-a matter of

"plucky little Afghanistan," especially indefense of the mullahs.

Better CrazyEddie thanCrazy Jimmy.

capitalists, landlords; usurers and colo­nial exploiters everywhere."

- The Road to Peace (1951)So today U.S. imperialism finds itself inleague with the mullahs and khans, thedefenders of bride price and the veil,usury and serfdom, and perpetualmisery. The victory of the Islamicinsurgents in Afghanistan means theperpetuati.on of feudal and pre-feudalenslavement well into the last quarter ofthe 20th century. For that reason wehave called for the military victory oftheKabul regime.

The direct deployment of Soviettroops and confirmation of the reaction­ary rebels' imperialist ties change the

For the Red Army AgainstIslamic Reaction!

Writing almost 30 years ago, Ameri­can Trotskyist leader James P. Cannonsaid of the first "Cold War":

"Diplomatic double-talk aside, what isreally involved in the cold war is aconflict of class interests and social andeconomic systems, which cannot bereconciled. Aml:rican imperialism, themain representative of a decayed social

.. system, whose fate is inextricably tied tothe fate of capitalism on a world scale, isof necessity the ally of reactionary-----

"complementary actions" against sup­posed Russian expansionism; to whichChinese Vice-Premier Deng Xiaoping(Teng Hsiao-p'ing) replied saying,"China and the U.S. should do some­thing in a down-to-earth way" against"Soviet hegemonism." In the case ofAfghanistan, however, this meant whata Washington official described as "arational division of labor" in whichChina continues to supply small arms tothe Afghan Islamic reactionaries whilethe U.S. provides heavier weaponry toPakistan. Revising its earlier (public)verdict on Deng's attack on Hanoi lastye.ar, the U.S. now concludes that "theChinese ... were bloodied by the moreexperienced Vietnamese armed withmodern Soviet weapons" (New YorkTimes, 17 January). And Pentagonofficials estimate conservatively that tobring Peking forces to the point thatthey could threaten anyone would costat least $35 billion.

Domestically Carter has succeeded inrallying key sectors of the Americanbourgeoisie for his Cold War policies. Inthe recent Democratic caucus politick­ing in Iowa, the only attacks were fromthe right-Republican Reagan calledfor arming the Afghan rebels withsurface-to-air missiles (!) and Kennedytried to attack his primary rival forfailing to "understand the Sovietthreat." Carter's new budget, heavilyexpanding arms expenditures, has metgeneral approval in business circles.Where the government is weakest isclearly at the level of popular support.Riding the current wave of patrioticsolidarity, the administration makesmuch of polls showing for the first timein a generation a plurality in favor ofgreater "defense" spending. But whilethere is a real chauvinist backlash overthe Iran hostage seiz.ure, Soviet militarysupport to the Kabul regime hasawakened little or no passion. For mostAmericans the country is a long wayaway and already in the Soviet sphere ofinfluence; the Russians, faced with athreat to their clients, did the normalthing and nobody is ready to die for

Olympics...(continued from page 1)

have been none-too-enthusiastic aboutthe Starve Russia grain boycott, so farAmerican athletes and sports fans arenot buying Carter's Hate Russia ("Hu­man Rights") boycott.

Col. F. Don Miller, executive directorof the U.S. Olympic Committee,denounced the administration's cal­lousness toward the sacrifices ofamateur athletes and called for resisting"political, religious and racial intrusionsinto the games." One of the two U.S.representatives to the InternationalOlympic Committee (l0C), DouglasRoby, predicted the only way Cartercould stop contestants from going toMoscow is to lift their passports. AndIOC president Lord Killanin, whounlike Carter appears to live up to hisagreements, has repeatedly declaredthat the Olympics will be held asscheduled in Moscow and nowhere else.

For revolutionaries, current opposi­tion to boycotting the Moscow Olym­pics is heartening. It shows that there isnot now the kind of rabid anti-Sovietchauvinism that Carter wants to fuel hiswar drive against the Russian degener­ated workers state. Public opinionseems to be that, whatever is happeningin Afghanistan, it's not worth pullingout of the Olympics. Of course, giventhe government and press campaign towhip up fear of a "Communist menace,"this popular mood could change.

Whether or not Carter can pull theU.S. team out of the Moscow games, hiscounter-Olympics is strictly a losers'bowl. Japan, West Germany and Franceare all sending their teams to the USSRin August. To date, only Saudi Arabiahas pulled qut. Perhaps the Saudis will

25 JANUARY 1980

inaugurate a new sport at Carter's "FreeWorld Olympics": stoning to death of"adulteresses." Khomeini's disciplescould have the self-flagellation mara­thon. And Afghani "freedom fighters"can introduce their own event: shootingin the back ( ommunist school teachersbringing literacy to enslaved Muslimwomen.

• Despite the Olympic Committee'shigh-flown rhetoric, the site of thegames has always been a highly politicalact. Attending the 1936 Olympics inMunich/Berlin was part of the British/French policy of "appeasement" towardGermany. And since 1956 every Olym­pics has been held in one of America'simperialist allies, except for 1968 whenit was held in neighboring Mexico. Thusthe decision to hold the 1980 games inMoscow was considered to be a majordiplomatic breakthrough for the USSR.Tens of millions in the West could seeMoscow not as the sinister site of theKretnlin but as a great city hosting theworld's most prestigious athletic event.It was part and parcel of "detente."

The Russian bureaucracy's obsessionwith the Olympics assumes absurdproportions. The peoples of the "thirdworld" do not really choose their socialsystems on the basis of great-powerprestige as measured by the number ofgold medals. And the notion thatinternational athletic competition"brings people together" over the headsof their governments is popular-frontiststupidity; in the epoch of imperialist warthere is no "people's unity" short of theinternational proletarian revolutionuniting the workers of the world:'-

Perhaps the OlympiCS mania isintended for internal consumption. TheGerman revolutionist Karl Liebknechtonce observed that the Kaiser's govern-

ment institudonalized sports to getworking-class German youth out of thecafes where they were sitting aroundtalking about communism. The enor­mous sports apparatus of the USSR issimilarly a "wholesome" outlet forenergies which might otherwise findtheir way into other youthful pursuits:drinking, sex, politics.

Even before Afghanistan there wasmuch talk in right-wing imperialistcircles of boycotting the MoscowOlympics, using the bureaucratic re­pression of Soviet dissidents as apretext. We should note that thisreactionary proposal came not onlyfrom the Ronald Reagans and Franz­Josef Strausses but even from fake­Trotskyists. Both the British IMG andFrench LCR, members of Ernest Man­del's "United Secretariat," uncriticallypublished Soviet-bloc dissidents' ap­peals for a boycott of the MoscowOlympics. Tamara Deutscher rightlytook the Mandelites to task for endors­ing such anti-Soviet boycotts.

It is obscene for the men who A­bombed Hiroshima, who murderedmillions of defenseless Vietnamese, tocall for boycotting the Moscow Olym­pics in the name of internationalpolitical morality. In reality, U.S.imperialism's terror in Vietnam ex­tended to the Olympic games them­selves. Ten days before the 1968Olympics, when thousands of studentsprotesting (among other things) r\meri­can atrocities in Indochina held a rallyat the University of Mexico's Tlatelolcohousing project they were mowed downby machine guns of government troopsand police, leaving hundreds dead. Noone in Washington, including bourgeoisliberal "doves," proposed boycottingthese games. On the contrary, theTlatelolco massacre was carried out in

good part to make the Olympics safe forAmerican imperialism.

Those who are against the Moscowgames boycott because they believe thatthe Olympics must be "above politics"are living in a fantasy world of sportspurism. They argue that the Olympictorch must burn bright above the nastybusiness of the politics of nations. In thisrespect liberals point to Vietnam andfalsely equate the U.S. imperialist waragainst the workers and peasants of thecountry with the Soviet invasion ofAfghanistan. Such a position wasreflected in the statement of longdistance runner Don Kardung: "A fewyears ago most of the world thought wewere on the wrong side in Vietnam.Nobody boycotted because of that"(Washington Post, 6 January). Unlikethe liberal athletes opposing Carter,communists are not sports purists.Rather we oppose Carter's Olympicboycott because it is a diplomatic attackby U.S. imperialism on the Sovietdegenerated workers state, one mo­mentarily important in mobilizingpopular support for Washington's wardrive. Oppose Carter's Cold War ironcurtain! Let the U.S. Olympic team goto Moscow!.

Spartacist League/Spartacus Youth League

Public Offices

-MARXIST LlTERATURE-

Bay AreaFriday 3:00-600 pm Saturday 300-600 p.'111634 Telegraph. 3rd floor (near 17th Street)Oakland. California Phone (415: 8~5-1535

ChicagoTuesday 5:30-900 p m Saturday' 200-530 p m523 S Plymouth Court. 3;d floorChicago illinOIS Phone (312) 427-0003

11

WfJliNEliS VIINfitJllli1J500 Black Workers and Leftists in Detroit Show the Way

Labor/BlackAction toSmash Klan!

WV PhotoDetroit, November 10: auto workers answer Greensboro massacre.

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JTHEHN~K ARMED

I)EFENSE

the answer was swift and effective: "TheKlan Won't Ride in the Motor City" (seeWV Supplement, 16 November 1979).

While the old-line civil rights groups,the labor bureaucrats and the reformistleft sat on their hands, the SpartacistLeague and union militants (includingworkers from Ford's giant River Rougecomplex who had recently driven outtwo foremen who paraded in KKKhoods) organized an important anti­Klan demonstration. On November 10,for the first time in decades the fascists'provocations were met neither withhand-wringing middle-class protest norwith the pointless adventures of littlebands of leftists. Despite the threats ofDetroit's liberal black mayor, ColemanYoung, that anti-Klan protesters wouldbe arrested, 500 black and whiteworkers and leftists rallied to demand:"Down with Klan terror! For the rightof Southern black armed self-defense!For factory seizures against layoffs!Oust the bosses' tools in the labormovement! For independent black andlabor candidates against the Democrat­iC'~'arty! Build a workers party!"

This was the demonstration thatshowed the way to fight Klan terror­neither the nutty adventurism of theWorkers Viewpoint Organization/Communist Workers Party (WVO/CWP), nor the cringing pacifist legalismof the SCLC preachers. This demon­stration pointed toward an anti-Klanstrategy based on mobilizing the enor­mous power of the labor movement.And it will take this power to smash theKla:l. We must reject the dangerouscivil-libertarianism aped by the refor­mist Socialist Workers Party, whichcalls for "free speech" for fascists. Wemust do more than simply "say no" toracist terrorists who "say no" to blacks,Jews, leftists. and unionists with bullets,arson and the lynch rope. Those whowould fight the Klan must reject relianceon the capitalist state, the bankruptstrategy pushed by everyone from theSCLC's Joseph Lowery to the Commu­nist Party with its calls to "ban theKlan."

Militant unionists and the SpartacistLeague call for other labor-basedactions against the Klan and Nazis tofollow up the start made in Detroit (see

continued on page 9

On February 2 outrage will march inthe streets of Greensboro, North Caroli­na where only three months ago theKKK and Nazis in the name of "WhitePower" and anti-communism gunneddown five anti-Klan demonstrators,martyred members of the Maoist CWP.The marchers' will chant, "Rememberthe Greensboro Massacre!" But whocan forget? Who can fail to grasp theominous message? The killers struck inbroad daylight announcing open hunt­ing season on blacks, union organizersand those who call themselves leftists.And the Greensboro cops facilitated thekill. The burning question is: how tofight the Klan?

Those who have come to Greensborofrom all over Jimmy Carter's "NewSouth" have heard the Klan's murder­ous message before: in Decatur, Ala­bama where last May black demonstra­tors were shot by hooded assassins; inAtlanta where a union organizer wassavagdy beaten by known Klansmen; inMemphis where nightriders·:rrorized ablack mayoral candidate wilh their fierycross.

There is no mistaking the growth ofthese race-hate terror groups in the U.S.and the passive acceptance they arereceiving in a rightward-drifting Ameri­ca. The Anti-Defamation League esti­mates Klan/Nazi membership at 10,000with a threefold jump in sympathizers to100,000 (New York Times, II Novem­ber 1979). And there is no mistaking themenace of the media's reporting theGreensboro massacre as a "shootout"between two more or less equallyrepulsive violent fringe groups.

Many who have come to Greensboroknow that the massacre demands morethan remembrance. They know thebloody message sent by the race­terrorists last November 3 must beanswered-and answered with massaction. That means bringing out thepower of blacks and labor to smash theKlan!

Some who have been battling theKKK in the South may not be awarethat there was such an answer to theKlan organized in· Detroit one weekafter the killings. When the Klanannounced it intended to march in thatlargely black and working-class city incelebration of the Greensboro massacre,

No More reenSDoros!12 25 JANUARY 1980