tss )posicion de Izquier· liegan que el tedtlr " ' 1lducto de Octubre 0 , La oposicion dirije 'a el fenomeno de la )cratica y considera .mieuto de plenas aticas para todos los MNERS· nos.hll.jo la constitu· B meta centrBl. de su ­ '0 es para los nuevos ncipalmente la vio· ~ad... STRKE OR MAYOR iticos al por mayor rafos. Enumeramos' ' "1 ,. &5 grotescos: , . m supuesi4mente es 'D,",.. ,'0'fMS'" ' ',' ,sidera que la van· !J 7~ ~- ne de los miembros . d~' una mezcolanza BY BRENT DAVIS . UMWA President Arnold Mill~r presents the union's contract demands to the coal barons. Tomorrow Miller will retreat y no del liderato •On Noyimlber 12, 125,000 mblers will square off on the most ifuJllSitant demands. .' . proletariado orga· ,in""a battle that has the potential to ch~ge the 1" , partido centralista relations of class fOJ:ces from coast to coaSt. When The"min~' struggle has this potential, but many twenty million ton shortage is expected this year tista. the U~ Mine Workers' con With~flie~co81 roadWa'c!ks'Illust be smashed if that p'oterltiiLIis to not counting the effects of the strike. a sin dar argumen· OwDerS tripi,reli, , ' 'es of: ,~~~isle be"realized. The Miller leadership will try to shackle The coal industry is caught between the capital que el "movimiento and all clds\d)' w" beiiV~ ~n· the"'!{iLilks, throwing away many' of the most shortage affecting the entire economy and the ~ en la Constituci6n the coal fieldS. The fighting' spirit of the ~ners is' important union demands. The government, strength oftheUMW.Coal Age, an industry journal, ~en de ley" es una among tl:te highest in the labor movement, and they nervous about the shaky economy, will try to head estimates that $12.5 million is required for a one ·alidad el programa know the power,that the energy crisis giveS thein. off a lengthy strike. Ifsuch a strike does occur, the million ton per year underground mine, and that democratico". Sin The miners are determined to take long strides gover-.ment may be forced to attack it head on. The such mines take several years to become evidencia que nos towards Winning dignity, safety and a decent wage. . entire labor bureaucracy will rally to prevent a operational. ; prueban 10 contra- The effects of sizeable settlement for the miners . class·wide explosion. This capital outlay and time lag is just the could spread throughout the labor movement:The beginning of the coal industry's problems. Many a a entender que el biggest unions have accepted pitiful wage gains UMW BARGAINING POSITION key materials are in very short supply. The y la Constituci6n de without a strike. Many smaller unions and isolated provisions of the 1969 mine safety act requiring la misma cosa. locals are fighting heroically, but matched against The bargaining position of the is very good. explosion·proof machinery in all mines have mder que los Iogros . stronger enemies. The example of the miners' The energy crisis has greatly increased the demand recently come into effect, and this equipment is uivalentes al conte­ victory could inspire the central divisions of labor's for coal, with the government now encouraging a back ordered for years. Transportation facilities tuci6n. Pero "se Ie army, paving the way ,for a class·wide wage shift away from oil use. The coal industry has been including railroad cars are insufficient to meet lector que esto esta offensive. incapable of meeting this increased demand, and a increased production. , a 10 dicho por ,-----=------,------­ The mine safety act of 1969, passed by Congress 'olucion traicionada to head off the upsurge in the coal fields, has la Constituci6n de increased production costs. The average miner .1idaci6n juri~ca de '[-Ecrlforial"I,l) , misses 31 days"a year due to "absenteeism" and roletar~ia"d,c.:;o~":-._~,__"_,.._,, strike activity. The combinat~on of these. factors cer un and bringing less efficient mines into operation, has iento democratico" lowered coal productivity from 16 tons per man per un refrito que sOlo -BaSTOI: Cont'd. p. 5 lementos son "mas otros. :e todo los puntos 2 10 que sucede aqui: e acuerdo con el DEFEND·THE BLACK STUDENTS ormas y trata de INSIDE :ho calificandolo de" The lynch-mob atmosphere "in Bosto.p is a ·vivid President Ford mouthing "quality education" as an e tactica trotskista. preview of what decaying capitalism interlds for its alternative to busing when he has called for slashing Pabloism in Argentina wage-slaves. Unwilling and unable to grant a decent Federal aid· to education shows him fully as filthy a LUCIONARIO life for all, capitalism's ouly alternative is to set the hypocrite as Richard Nixon. exploited and oppressed at each other's throats. The Equally despicable is the liberal alternative, The p:2 3 revolucionarios es racist violence of the white mob that nearly killed a racist violence in Boston is the inevitable result of a Reconociendo que passing black driver, the racist insults chalked and program-busing-which has pitted two sections of nocraticas son Iegi· painted on walls, the stoning of school buses the exploited against each other. The Irish-Catholic Spartacist Economics ucionarios dan BU carrying blacks, the attack on a city transit bus working class· neighborhoods of South Boston­ , por lograrlas. Al driven by a black driver-these brutal events are now famous as "Southie"-are a depressed, p.9 lalan que el capitaI­ the result of the strategy of ruling class liberalism high-unemployment area. The white working class puede ser reformado to divide and conquer the working class. youth of "Southie" are among the victims of U.S. .a clase gobernante The Boston crisis demonstrates the criminal ·capitalism. 'In their desperation, they have become Class Struggle in the )S obreros al ir en intentions of both liberal and conservative mince-meat for demagogues whipping up their hate ara' gariar tiem~e bourgeois "sides," We denounc~ ~he vile ~ypocrisy and fear of blacks. They have become the Sigue en la p. 14 .of the bourgeois opponents of busmg. Then- call for capitalists' racist tools in their attacks on these South p.16 "quality education" is a transparent mask for race even more exploited and oppressed-the most ,,~, privilege and segregation. The spectacle of Cont'd. p. 13 Page 2/The Torch / November, 1974 II ida Socialista de los ajadores"

Jegitima.j,e ISM certain bo suhlltantw oULsid(! of their own ranks, through "!JiIl,'le,-" lh" class e - -;~1t;. lQUIliGWaterfal1s "paLriotic" sections of the bourgeoisie. underdeve ) ARGENTINA The PST vacillates between exposing Lhese "socialist" collaborationist schemes and draping itself their real c C6rdOba. URUGUAY Mendoza~ 0 Rosa.rlo bourgeois nationalist tradition. The PST's the ruling, BYSHELLEY KRAMER 1969 Cordoba general B,,,,..AI,,, Lion is extremely dangerous given the own "jmB. which Peronism has exerted over the working class In the The Argentine Partido Socialista de los ·Trabaja· strike, shifted the CHILElN",;':~~;~""'d""'" attention"of Moreno YllaBtencn dores is the largest self-conceived Trotskyist party for the last thirty years. In the 1950's Moreno and his supporters in Latin America. It has attracted hundreds of and his followers a- 'fico"" way from petty- ( swallowed Peronism whole, liquidating their own working-class militants over the last few years. bourgeois guerrilla- J "Trotskyist" party to enter the Peronist Partido Not surprisingly, therefore, the policies of the ism. These labor RloG,I""", J Socialista de 10 Revoiucion Nael"",,,1 (PSRN), and PST are the subject of heated debate throughout struggles, closely fol- '-___~""'±::C.,::::oo::::H=o'''_'' -­ the Trotskyist movement. Its successes and failures serving on the leading committee of the "62 Union lowing the defeat of Organizations," the legal wing of the Peron­ in the Argentine class struggle will be viewed by many workers who have been burned by the Che Guevara's "model" guerrilla experiment in' dominated trade unions. The PST not only has betrayalf·of reformism and Stalinism-and who are Bolivia, formed one link in a worldwide chain of never repudiated Moreno's past workers' and students' upheavals and seemed to continues to peddle an ambiguous own rev{ now see~g a revolutionary alternative-as a test Lory) line on Peron and his relationsh;,'J question ~ of the revolutionary claims of aU self-proclaimed restore some of Moreno's lost faith in the working power hy Trotskyists. . class. working class. In response to the workers' upsurge, Moreno As rcccnLly as the August 20 issue of The PST's The leadership crisis produced by Peron's death class obligl piaces the PST in an unusually advantageous (along with other one-time guerrillas like Hugo "'"'C'CllWU'. for example, the PST was still _I " ...... ,,-,.. position for a Trotskyist party at this time. The Blanco in Peru and under the tutelage of the U.S. Per6n's in 1946 as a "",riven moment.~ in current political chaos is marked by ahout one Socialist Workers Party) began to champion a "a hourgeois nationalist movement woul.d "classical model" for the Latin American revolu­ stand at the side of the workers against politi~al assassination a day, intense in-fighting The PST within the Peronist government, and a wave of tion. Isolated guerrillaism was now to be replaced imperialism." The truth is that Peron never stood, strikes in major industries challenging Peron's by "mass mobilizations of workers and students." 'not even for a moment, "at the side of the workers infamous Gran Acuerdo Nacional (Great National Underground guerrilla armies were now declared to against imperialism." He used the working class as Agreement). be diversions from the main task of constructing a lever, even granting it certain concessions, to gain A~ this has left the left wing of the Peronist mass workers' parties. The guerrilla adventures of a better deal for himself i.n his dealings with movement beheaded and confused. The "emperor" the '60's were still defended-but considered imperialists abroad and capitalists at home. Peron is dead, and his successors have no clothes' obsolete now that the working class had "risen from The PST's tendency to find "momentary" democratic, they openly fight among themselves over the best the grave." The new line was trumpeted as the adherence to the proletarian cause among bourgeois less obviou~ means of damming up the working-dass upsurge. continuity of the Bolshevik tradition. nationalists leads the PST to gross errors today. The PST' And while they deliberate, pandemonium reigns In reality, the PST's tum to the working class The errors, while not yet as explicit w; Moreno's outlines a c, in the country. The fascist Argentine Anti-Commu­ was but another kind. of adaptation to petty-bour­ of the '50's, nonetheless serve to Uon, capiLu nist Alliance (AAA) has published a list of left-wing geois leaderships-this time calTied out within the and illistrain those advanced workers who "ritical qUE political figures whom it plans to assassinate, and it labor movement proper. In order to win favor are only now hreaking from the grip of internationa has proceeded unhindered to murder one victim among the militant workers who led the rebellions That, while of the late '6C's, the PST muted its differences with after another. BOURGEOIS NATIONALIZATION "either or tI The Old Guard of Peronism, led by Lopes Rega their left-Wing PeronisL leaders. yield that u: and right-wing labor bure2.ucrats, has emerged the A revolutionary party would have attacked the Another recent example of the PST's adaptation tactics to "" victor of government-level feuds over who can bourgeois program of these misleaders while to bourgeois nationalism was its line on the Peronist engaging them in united fronts within the labor government's "oil nationalization" legislation. The Press, ]\ legitimately claim to be Peron's rightful heirs. Its This, whilE victory has been celebrated by Isabel Peron's Jatest movement. The PST sought unity with the petty­ bill was limited to providing the government's the United ~ piece of legislation, which raises penalties for bourgeois leaders first-leaving criticisms until corporation a monopoly of gas sold at service later, when everyone would presumably be on stations. Hailed as a blow against imperialism, the could not st strikers and union oppositionists who rebel against invading th, the bureaucracy's brutal policing of the union rank friendlier terms. To win its own base in the working law affected only 13.3 per cent of Shell and Esso class the PST adjusted its politics to fit the sales. toward the and file. reveals just T;,e Montoneros, the largest left-wing Peronist petty-bourgeois prejudices and illusions among Not surprisingly, this kind of "nationalization" workers which the centrists and reformists ride measure, and even more "radical" measures along would like to has declared war on the government. Yet the the MQntoneros' "generals" are themselves only liberal upon and reinforce. w:,," IIIIll" ena Peronist politicians (like Peron's one-time stand·in national bour Hector Campara) who will never lead a war whid; friends who risks upsetting capitalist class relations. The NATIONALISM keeping off 0 Communist Party's response to the growing prole­ The specific errors tarian upsurge and the Peronist repression and and betravals of the violence is to redouble its efforts to find bourgeois PST all f~llow from supporters for its popular:lrorit 'proposaIs~ and to this general adapta­ Much of th safeguard Buenos Aires's various trade deals with tion to left-sounding electoral activ the U.S.S.R. bourgeois currents. both the Man Considering the extreme isolaLion of petty­ Many advanced brought the P bou,-geois guerrilla armies like the People's Revolu­ worke'rs look to the did not use i tionary Army (ERP), the field is wide for the PST for leadership, popularize a re PST to'appeal to leftward-moving workers the PST adapts to its efforts on c and students with a program which defends the petty-bourgeois re­ sociologically, interests and independence of the class. formists, and the re­ election campi The PST is directing its attent.ion to workers formists complete the revolutionary and students, but not the way a revoiutionary party chain by capitulating PST's apolitic should. The PST's performance bears the worst directly to the Argen­ 'fhe PST Cl trademarks of opportunism and adaptation. tine ruling class and allegiance to th the imperialists. of his seat.s t, OPPORTUNISM The Left Peronists possibility of The PST, under the leadership of Nahuel Moreno appeal to the anti­ political and Juan Carlos Coral, has followed a thoroughly imperialist senti­ opportunist course since its birth as a party. ments of the working Moreno, a long-time Pabloite, left the Revolution­ class in order to draw ary Workers Party (PRT) with a group of his workers into bour­ his bureauerat~ supporters in the late sixties. An enthusiastic geois popular-front This opport! advocate of guerrilla warfare in the early sixties, movements. Workers Peron's hands. Moreno split with the PRT over its continued are encouraged to was the u nwillir reliance on guerrilla methods. major working- seek the strength to class struggles of the late climaxing in the expel imperialism November, 1974/ The Torch / Page :1 -' ------.~.'<------.-.----~- ".­ these lines, are popular in bourgeois circles. The the very excusePer6n has always employed when After kneeling'· at the.altar of bOl)rgt,,,is demo" PST again found itself "in agreement" with certain he has assigned those henchmen to their dirtiest cracy, Coral swore on th~ reformistB'bible-l,he bourgeois politicians on this issue: "We agree with work. At the same time, the PST's opposition to utopian "peaceful road to socialism." Coral called '1 Oscar Alende (a favorite popular-front partner of Per6n was largely focused upon the sociological "-for cOJistitutional reforms to pave that road: the CP) that our oil should be exploited by Argen­ composition 0c\ his slate rather than the capitalist We think that in order to extelld democratic b,.,ed"'n~ tines and not by imperialists." .(Intercontinental program he has stood for all along-whether his ehaogcsmu.t b.. made in the cODlititution ....d PIr"s'" July 22.) candidates have been workers or not. sanctioned by the sovereign will of the people, Iha. ihe The PST crosses the line which separa-tes the ""nstitution must be mad" into .... adequate legitimate tactic of temporary· agreements with UNITED FRONT Iramewo'-!< for the period of the transition to ""dal,oND, certain bourgeois forces on specific actions from (Intercontinental Pres., June 18, 1973) Following this maneuver, the PST formulated a How disgusting Coral's performance looks when substantial political, programmatic alliances with 19h alliances with the class enemy. When bourgeois nationalists in the new strategy, a step to the left of the first, but still compared to ~~\;way revolutionaries have greeted 5'eoisie. underdeveloped world take up democratic and even based on a workerist, not a revolutionary socialist emp.ty promis~ke Per6n's in the pas;" During thn )osing these class­ "socialist" slogaris, revolutionaries must expose Iping itself in _the their real ciass motives and use the divisions within 'he PST's vacilla­ the ruling class to tactically further the proletariat's n the hammerlock own aims. the wo!'\ring class In the Transitional Program, Trotsky specifically warns against blurring the difference between a his supporters revolutionary program for the expropriation of .dating their own industry and the "muddle-headed reformist slogan PeroIDst Partido of 'nationalization.'" Trotsky spells out the ''''Ill (PSRN), and differences: of the "62 Union 1.1 We

Ie knows that Per6n Cont'd.from· p. 1 The reason for the today is the direct 'day in '1964 to 11 toruiin 1973. lally leading to the The coal shortage gives miners a great deal of leverage against the entire oureaucracy into the capitalistcmss. The two,,biggest coal consumers are the utility companies, which 's response to the take 60 per cent of coal.production for electrical power generation, and the steel lOt armed workers' companies,.which-take 20 per cent of production. Coal stockpiles for both are nt int~vention! By very low, The normal stockpile for utilities nationally is a' 90 day supply. In te to 'l:Iiscipline the September it had fallento 75 days, Since converting their furnaces from coal to :es illusions in the oil takes several months and a lot or money, the utilities would be crippled by a benevolence at pre­ lengthy strike, The effects would be felt long before 75 days, as rationing would ndependence of the be used to try to stretch out coal supplies. and its armed self· T fought for and STEEL IN WORSE POSITION The steel industry is in even more desperate straits, averaging reserves of only two to three weeks. The steel industry uses coal to make coke and there is ARIAT no substit:lte. The steel furnaces must be gradually banked, so steel cutbacks ,T, a sympathizing would begin almost immediately once the strike starts. Steel itself is in very t, has become a hot short supply, and the steel mills running at full steam are a major prop for the economy. Significant cutbacks in steel production threaten to knock the bottom British miners demonstrate in }<'"brura,y. 1ltek struggle co"tains valuable I,,"sons 10, raging w~thin that U.s. m;',eTS today. . it's "International out of the economy, . Ernest Mandel) is The production shortfall has not damaged the coal operator's profits. Coal ans_ of exposing its prices are sailing ahead at the same tempo as oil government's wage controls. producers will be driven ouL of busirK'Ss. Advances Tendency"l,ed prices. In August of 1973~, the-Utiiities were paying oy Their militancy proved too great for the for the miners on safeLy will have this effect up as a model. $9 per ton for steam coal on the. market. This :'1' conservative National Miner's Union bureaucracy exactly the most FebrualY the price had risen to $35, and the increase particulady sharply, to head off, and the miners struck. The militancy of neys. Their own in .the price of metallurgical coal was almost as 'I'he larger producers tend to have safer mines the miners and the of the entire English . ex·proteges in the outrageous. Profits in the coal industry were up than the smaller companies. With the shortage of working class threw back the ruling class. The then mining machinery and its growing costs, the large the same methods before the price skyrocketed. From the first quarter Prime Ministt->r Heath went down to defeat in the n. In fact, most of of '72 to the first quarter of '73, Pesbody Coal, the companies are somewhat more willing to invest in elections he called as part of his campaign againsl as mthin. the bounds largest producer, saw its profits rise 83 per cent. preventing accidents that destroy machinery well the miners, Wilson's new Labour government was ice. Moreno's policy . The profits on coal production are just the as miners. Mining disasters can shut down mines forced to meet the miners' demands. beginning"'Of the story, however. For 40'years the for months or forever, and the major producers, 'orust movement or---~ The UMW leadership, the coal industry and the when forced hy miner militancy, will be willing to mt with the Pablo­ UMW has pursued .a policy of encouraging the U.S. government are all very conscious of the make slight concessions to limit such disasters. centralization of capital in the coal industry (a atior' i;}to Stalinist British example, From it they have learned two Much of the cost of increased safety provisions policy discussed in Torch No, 151, and .the union rategy Mandel and lessons. The fitst is that it is extremely difficult to will be much cheap(!r on a per ton basis for the leadership and the coal giants have been ·successful. take the miners head on and beat them. Tlw second larger mines. For example, the union is demanding Instead of an industry dominated by hordes of ~ent of continental is that if they can keep the miners isolated, they can a full-time, company-paid safety inspector for every leadership and his small producers, today the coal industry is prevent a partial victory from spreading. mine. Any safety improvements and many other general theory and dominated by some of the largest corporations in advances for the miners, will greatly increase the America. 1e correct specific THE COAL OPERATORS STRATEGY low(~st amount of cnpital necessary to TUn lninf? ~ Cas:roism"-SWP, The top 15 producers mine over 50 per cent of the Already the business press is ialking about a The .major coal operators appear resigned to ,tin, Discussion on . nation's coaL Of the top 15, only four are wave of mergers and acquisitions following the giving the miners a relatively big package. They see 'essed the corr::non independent coal producers. The other 11 are owned contract. This is a most important henefit to the the militancy of the miners, the picture of England StaG'1ist gllerrilla by giant corporations. Kennecott Copper, Continen­ major producers. Many of the steel companies, comes to mind, and they don't want a fight they are ;he reunification of tai Oil, Occidental Petroleum, U.S. Steel, General Republic for one, are having difficulty getting going to lose. The sting of a relatively large [t is only Mo:-eno's Dynamics and Bethlehem Steel all own major coal enough coal. Further centralization of the industry settlement will be lessened by several factors. With lieh angers Mandel producers. The profits of these corporapi0ns are will make it easier for them to buy the coal mines ;-ther t!le forces of the price of coal rising, they are looking for. If the economy declines, the the higher costs can be demand for coal declines with it. The further passed through to the centralization of the industry may allow the major consumers. Even for the producers to limit production and keep prices steel companies, who jacked up when this occurs. SWp·?ST s~b')rd· buy the coal they mine, ) the bourgeoisie in higher coal prices allows TH); SMALL PRODUCERS hip. Their common shifting their profits to te- vvTorld ViCVi. their coal divisions, The strategy of the major producers to give it accepts Eastern which gives them a tax relatively big concessions in return for aid in )rth Vietnam, and break. The cost of the quelling wildcats, increased centralization of the impelled to accept miners settlement is industry and for a short strike, represents a mortal '·bourgeois leader· only a small part of total threat to the small producers. 'ograms are able to costs for these firms who This has created tension mthin the Bituminous =they accept this, .. are primarily based in Coal Operators Association, the major bargaining lat "the e-mancipa-­ o other industries. vehidc for the coal operators. The BCOA's t be conquered by membership already screens out many of the For the major pro· - becomes just an smallest producers, many of whom are non-union_ ducers, especially those ions ·:Jf Lenin and Of the union mines, the BCOA tends to represent who consume their coal, evolutionary party the larger companies. Only 50 per ceni of the union such as steel, the utilities ideal instruments mines are in the BCOA, but they account for 80 per and General Dynamics, 1t certainly not the cent of the union coal. The steel companies, the continuing production uments. "Blunted biggest in the industry until the oil companies came and increasing produc­ parties and· pro­ in during the '60's, have traditionally carried most Wredtrike special anti-strike legislation or even seizing the the chances that Boyle would lose. Amold with its ruinous consequences for the economy. In mines. one of the leaders of the Black Lung strike, light of the energy crisis, he is concerned with The government would much prefer avoiding himself at the head of the miners upsurge. increasing coal production as much as the operators this, even at the expense of a big settlement. A backing of the liberal-reform Miners for Democracy, are. Consequently, as Business Week reported, direct strike-breaking attack by the government which broug·hl together forces from the "There are indications that government efforts to here could have a powerful effect. Militant forces in struggle, the Yablonski campaign and the avert a nationwide strike in November include a many unions would demand demonstrations and against the payboard, Miller was swept to victory warning to the coal operators not to be 'stingy' in strikes to aid the miners and the, effect of a big the 1972 election, gaining 70,000 votes. control ovm· their wage offer." . settlement then would be even more electric. In the work. Mille. This advice to the operators, aimed in part to U.S., auto, steel, rubber and the other large labor UMW HANKS CONFInENT strengthen the large producers against the smaller, battalions have not struck recently. An attack on The string of victories won by the miners against is very different than the advice Ford gives in most the miners might be the signal for these workers to join battle. the operators and against the Hoyle· bureaucracy contract situations. Ford is developing an austerity has built up the confident'e and combativeness of program and a costly settlement in coal will hurt his the miners. The results were made clear in last efforts. But Ford remembers Britain, and he sees no THE FORCES IN THE UMW victory add, Decemher's tiM W convention. Forced answering tI alternative. U.S. miners have ripped to shreds The combativeness of the miners has not concessions to the ranks'demands for' numerous attempts to hold their wages down in the developed overnight. The militant tradition of the Harlan could Miller saw the convention pass forces who d past and are ·not likely to be cowed this time. 1930's and 1940's sagged during the '50's and early demanding a host of essential improvements Ford wants to avoid a head-to,head battle with '60's as coal production and profits declined, and Ford's invitiJ provemcnts he had no intention of fighting· summits an the miners. As U.S. News and World Report puts it, the size of the work force plummeted. As coal addition to straight economic demands a Taft-Hartley injunction "is regarded as useless by Bargaining ( production began to rise in thE! mid-'60's, the class increase, cost of living protection and many observers in the coal industry." But Ford convince the struggle heated up in the coal fields. payments into the welfare and retirement !Ilay not be able to avoid such a confrontation. If Miller is A wave of wildcats forced Tony Boyle, successor convention demanded much that would cut Miller is not able to sell a package to the UMW capitalism a productivity. A six hour day at eight hours pay, membership and a lengthy strike occurs, Ford will to John L. Lewis as head of the union, to negotiate a quadruple time for holiday work, and end to -be·untieT tremendous pressure to break the strike. new contrac~ in 1964. The same year an oppositionist, Steve Kochis, won 20,000 votes compulsory overtime and numerous safety demands The government has a number ofdifferent carrots running against Boyle., The 1964 contract won no -all these are essential to the miners. All are and sticks it can throw at the miners.. Besides a serious threat to coal-hungry capitalism. ' pressure on the companies to raise their offer, the improvements on safely, and next few years saw government has control over enforcement of mine waves of wildcats on this issue. The recent victory in organizing the Brookside 1\;10r<: impo safety laws, air pollution ;egulations, import and Wildcat activity forced improvements in the mine and the coal shortage have raised the miner's would do to I export policies for coal and strip-mine legislation. contract of 1966, and the upsurge forced Boyle to morale to new heights. As one miner put it, "We'll the industry. Ford can offer a deal to the Miller leadership, call a national strike in 1961l. The miners revolt never get another chance like this in my lifctimc. If of the ranks, threaten retaliation, or do both. The press has reached new heighLs in 1969, when a three-week we don't gpL it this year, ~e'll never gd prestige will already reported plans by the Federal Energy Office wildcat shut down ali West Virginia coal production Within Llw union leadership, the old Boyle forces extremely gO( to wke charge of coal allocation if a strike develops. u.ntil th~ legislatu[(~ made Black Lung a compensa· ;-dain control over many locals, districts· '''!II Miller in the This control could be a strike-breaking tool, tIonal dIsease. occupy seats on the International Exeeutivp Board. Miller·s feE although not a very effective one. But the In an attempt to himself at the head of this Tl](' rdired miners, disenfranchised for mos!' UMW government could use it in an openly provocative upsurge, Joseph long-time UMW e1edions at the last convention, were a SOUl"CP [­ manner. Troops could be sent to proted and convoy bureaucrat, ran for president, gaining 43,000 votes of support for Llwse right-wing elements. lowcver, noted that scab coal that otherwise would not make it out of in a blatantly rigged election. Yablonski's murder the biggest reason they have the strengUl they do io dcmands-- lik Appalachia during a strike. While scab coal (25 per did not quell the uprising in the mine pits. During that Miller abandoned the fight against them. Linn: for OVP cent of production) production cannot be increased the '70's, strikes resulted in 4.1 per cent of all Shortly after getting elected, Miller dissolved the quadruple tim MFD. Claiming that he wauLI'd to the lisL.·· Til( end factionalism in the union, Miller Miller is iryin actually was afraid that MFD ;-;UC11 necc~~;] might provide a basis for iJnemploymen organized militant opposition. Miller overtime and refused to campaign for the When the bt candidates in the district elections, "far down on t preferring to mend fences with the right-wing forces. The strong right wing acts as a balance against militants to the left of Miller. Miller's "anti-factional­ use a second ism" allows him to stand between provision thai the contending factions, acting inde­ for pendently to consolidate his own forces. "Anti-factionalism" serves another purpose for Miller. ~ The militant opposition But Miller h, he unorganized at this time, Despite theiI bulk of these miners even the bigge Miller, but with criticisms_ important dem, eh" MFD militants did not want to resigned to a s( s('e the MFD dissolved. Miller's they will try to campaign against wildcats has hc­ therefore have 1o'1m to raise questions among has a chance of militant miners, particularly in West settlement WOe Virginia. The conservative organiz­ clause, a sign ing policies and the belated aid to the a wa Brookside miners has also encour­ with tJ aged militant opposition. However, settlement thal the bulk of the militant miners stilI "henefits" .issu( helieve that 'VI iller can lead them to any product.ivit: "victory. bloc with the n Jarger settJemer MILLER'S STRATIcGY continue his ca possibility that. Miller's hold over the union HB~oo-dy Harlan"-Coa1 operator violence h.as been a way of life in Harlan County, Kentuckv fOlf more than penalties agair precarious. The operatoT1l and the years. Beret Duke Power "r::;clCurity guardfi" use force to break up a pk'~"H't Une ~t UH~ Highsplint mine. soaring, Miller's !{()vcrnment know that Miller·,; _0___••• ~~_o______~_~ o~ __~~.o_ .o__~ __00. 0 __

·mpared to 1.1 per cent in .------··--mmGllsFOlUHEiii4IiMWI:7iihnilftNEfitiiiAll_ atiolfllli colltract strike in tits until the payboard re hike. The Big Operators Arnold Miller , phe miners in the pits Meet .ome wage ""d safety demtmda in retur.. II"" ending Contr,,1 the ..anks, H"lp th" I'r"dUe"~fj centrdlzu, l""!&t,, ""Y reoisie that he had to go. wildcat. and increasing productivity. Ceotralize'othe industry strike a.,tivity and keep it .hort. WID "" muclt in w"Ires ",,01 invalidated the 1969 a. much 9S POBBibl4!_ Keep any strike short. . safety as possible, Jd a new election, and the UMW to ma:ximize mid lose. Arnold Miller, The Government lack Lung strike, placed The Revolutionaries :liners upsurge. With the Urge operators to meet some UMW demands to prevent~ a long strike: .Build Miller's prestige so· he can contl'.ol the Pose united action by miners, getting "J'l,,". If I],;overnlflle"t tI"·,,..tens to breoili "trike, ampaign and the fight build a general stRike. ,r was swept to victory in 70,000 votes. control over the ranks is a must for their strategy to the miners' wages in the years to come. This achieve the same end. These deal.s wcukened "the work.. Miller has to be able to sell the' miners a retreat will be a waste of the tremendous union by creating divisions within the membership ~O:NYmENT settlement, and he has to be able to control the opportunity the miners have this year. and a hatred of th" union on tlw pado of m,my miners, m by the miners against wildcats. One possible deal Miller could cook up, depending The government has tried to strengthen Miller's on the depth of the split among the operators, is to the Boyle bureaucracy hands, Government Mediator Usery pressured sign a contract with the major producers, If the e and. combativeness of Duke Power into settling the Brookside strike, This smaller producers will not sign, Miller would strike THE REVOLUTIONARY STUNl'IWY 'ere made clear in last victory added· enormously. to Miller's prestige, them, Such a strike would not cripple steel A miners' victory can have' an explosive effect Oll ltion. Forced to make answering the right-wing forces who swore that production, With some union coal moving, militants the entire working dass. With til" ex"mple of Ihe ,ema:1ds for· democracy, Harlan could never be organized, and the militant would be discouraged from stopping the movement miners before them, auto, sLeel, transportation ann tion pass resolutivns forces who demaIl,ded more support to the strike. of scab coal. With steel production continuing, the other workers are mueh more likely to press their tial Luprovements-im­ Ford's inviting Miller to the White House economic economy would not be threatened until the utiiiLies' own wage claims. If these unions do rip up their Jtion of fighting for. In summits and placing him on the Collective supplies ran low, contraeLs and fight for immediate wage reopeners, 10miC demands -{wage Bargaining Commission is ~a~·fur.ther attempt to Miller would have a strike to show the ranks that they will join the many smaller unions and locals tectio:1 ana tripling the convince the miners that Miller has clout for them. he actually fought the companies, Moreover, a already in tlw fight. The result would be a shift in nd retirement fund), the Miller is caught between his dedication to selpf't.ive ~t.rik", on top of an expensive agreement, the relation of class forces to the proletariat's uch that would cut capitalism and the militancy of the ranks. He advantage, ay at eight hours pay, desperately wants to avoid a long strike. His This process will not occur lY work, and end to , general outlook is to nurture the coal industryinto a spont.aneously. Oth(,1' unions have Imerous safety demands sustained prosperity, an impossible dream, and he been in an excI'nent hargaining ;0 the miners. All are knows what a long strike would do to the industry pOBi Lion, only to have the \lllion ngry capitalism. and the entire economy. hureaucracy rescue the companies ganizing the Brookside 'VIore importantly, he knows what a long strike with a sC'l\-()ut contract. have ,aised the miner's would do to his relations with the government and The revolutionaries must. con­ me miner put it, "We'll the industry. If Miller cannot control °the militancy sciously intervene to affect the :e this in my lifetime. If of the ranks. the capitalists' efforts to build his results of the UMW contract. The we'll :1ever get it." prestige will disappear. If he does not produce fight against. the coni operators, lip, the old Boyle forces ~xtremely good results for the miners,opposition to against. tbe government. strike­ )eals, districts and still Miller in the union would mushroom, breaking, against a Miller sell-ouL tiOI:2.1 Executive Board. Miller's fear of a long strike has led him to and against Uw Jaho)" bureall­ nchised for most UMW puhlicly retreat on a whole host of the demands the cracy's att.empts to keep the convent.ion passed, A Scripps-Howard reporter ion, 177~re a rr:ajor source I1 minf'rs isolated it is nil the sallle ing 21ements. However, r.oted that'"Some of the most publiciz('d fight. , the strength they do is demands-like the six-hour work day and doubJt, Central t.o thi" strategy is e figr:t against them. time for overtime. triple t.ime for Sunday and uncompromising exposure of Mil­ d, =,Eller dissolV2d the "uadrupJe time for holidays-are fairlv ja,. down on ler's class collahorationist role. ~l-je list:" The Wall Street Journal ~eport('d that. ing that re wanted to Thr politically ndvanced min('rs ism in the union, Miller Miller is trying to geL only"a fOOL in the door" on retain their faith in Miller. This such necessities as sick leave, dental care, afra;d that the MFD gives Miller tremendous leverage ,~nempIDyment and severance benefit.s, voluntary .de a basis for an to enrry Ollt. his plans for [l sell-ollt. overtime and union-approved °safety programs, :itant opposition. Miller He will be able to signifieanUy When the business press knows that something is npaig:J. for the militant control the militancy of the ranks "far down on the list" or is a "foot in the door," l he in fighting govrmnwllt strike-­ I the district coal operators know that Miller does not wish to mend fences with breaking. H" will fight hard to press them. Miller's militant talk of a six month rees. prevent militant solidarity actions ~trike is heing replaced with frequent references to a by the rest of th" working e1m;s to ; righ::. wing acts 28 a settlement without any strike. And his refusal to If 1St militants to the left aid the miners, miner use a second five-day memorial period, a contract. filler's "anti-factional­ militants and advanced workers provision that allows the union to sh~t down him t:'J stand between throughout the J"bor movenH'nt production for a week, is further proof of h;8 regard Miller di.cusses with reactionary labor-bater Gerald Ford how to avoid a co,lI ,g factions, acting inde­ keep their illusions in fo!" the operators and the level of stockpiles. stril<~. coTLsolida te his own Miller, the labor bureaucracy, pointing t.o Miller's opposition, ;i.factionalism" serves MILLER'S RETRBAT oie for Miller, . wotildhasten the centrahzation of the industry by will have a ready-made excuse to cover their it oPDositiO:1 appears to But Miller has to come back with something big. further weakening the smaller produeers. The major own hetrayals in refusing aid to the miners. ,d at'this time, with the Despite their growing profits, the coal operators, producers might give a somewhat better settlement. se miners supporting even the biggest, cannot afford to meet. the m~st in return for this favor. If the split in the operators CENTRISTS PROVIDE LEFT COVEll ith criticisms. Many of important demands passed at the convenbon. Whlle is not deep enough for this strat.egy, Miller will In the 1972 UMW (,Iection, the present members :itants did not want to resigned to a settlement larger than prevlO~s one.s, probably be forced to call a short strike to prove his of the Revolutionary Socialist Leah'lle advocated a D dissolved, Miller's they will try to hold the package down. M~ller wlll toughness to the ranks, policy of critical support to Miller'. This policy w.as ainst wildcats has be­ therefore have to push hard to get anythmg that Miller's strategy poses grave dangers to the designed to open up the situation in the UMW, (,0 se questions among has a chance of passing the ranks, At a minim~n:, a miners. The retreat on essential demands passed at express our support for the militant aspirations of rs, particularly in West settlement would have to include a cost-of-hvmg the convention is bad enough. But the threat of a the pro-Miller miners and to place Miller in the ~ -conservative organiz­ clause, a significant increase in welfare fund selective strike opens the door to molding the position where he would either be foreed to carry out ld the helated aid to the payments, a wage hike and some pro~ess o?, safety. contract to fit the individual operator's ability to his promises to the miners or be exposed in practice iners has also encour­ Faced with this situation, Miller WIll drIve for a pay, rather than a uniform contract for the entire in the eyes of the miners. Such a policy was : ODDosition. HO";;,-ever, settlement that comes across heaviest on wage and industry. Miller has indicated the beginnings of this designed to prove in action the substance of onr he ;;'ilitant miners still "benefits" issues, retreating as much as :le can on strategy by raising the scheme of giving the charges that Miller represents an agent of the vliller caTL lead them to any productivity related questions. He WIll make a western strip mines a lower per-ton payment to the bourgeoisie. This policy has been vindicated by bloc with the major producers, who can afford a retirement fund. subsequent events. The task is ]low to complete the larger settlement, In return, Mille~ will pled~e to exposure of Miller, to expose his sell-out tactics and IfMiller implements this, and follows it up with a continue his campaign against wIldcats, With a pave the way for the construction of a revolutionary :R'S STRATEGY selective strike in the East, the stage is set for possibility tha~ the c?ntract will ,in~lude: further leadership in the UMW, ability-lo-pay type contracts. John Lewis and Tony lId over the union is penalties agamst wlldc~tters. N Ith .nflatlOn Cont'd. next, page 'he operators and the soaring, Miller's contract wIll not even truly protect Boyle used sweetheart contracts extensively to kno\~ that lvliller's '.."".p'~ '·.t(11' ,~,"y '('\ 1 h,~.' <,A Page 8/The 'Torch/November, 1974 strike-caused Iay-offs for: more backward workers. point out this danger and begin educating the most Many self-proclaimed revolutionary tendencies In the context of both defending the miners and advanced workers to the need for a ~ep.eral strike. will attack the R.S.L. for its exposure of'MilIer. In .building towards a class-wide upsurge, the R.S.L. This education requires an across the board attack the name of a false unity during the struggle, calls for militant solidarity actions with the miners. on the labor bureaucracy, who will do all they ca.Q to groups like the. Intefhationa~ Socialists, ~he The labor movement must "hot cargo" all coal prevent it. They are well aware that a g~eral stnke Communist Party, October League and the ·during the strike~If :railroad, barge and dock to defend the UMW is very likely to spill o,!:eriPto a SocialistWorkers Party will strive to provide Miller workers refused to touch the strike-breaking coal, general strike against inflation and unemploYment, with a left cover, preventing militants from ·the miners' strike would be immediately effective. smashing Ford's austerity program before it gets breaking with their reformist leadership. This Other energy workers should carry out sympathy o~ the ground. A congress of Labor and Oppressed People, an emergency convention of specially I, centrist strategy is not only. a betrayal of the strikes which would strengthen the miners. The oil revolution-it is an immediate betrayal of the workers contract expires in January. They need the elected delegates from all working class organiza­ miners' struggle' today:- -"'Unity" under. Miller's strength of the miners even more than the miners tions, is necessary' to build and co-ordinate these' [Note: These Q.TE thumb really means division, dividing the miners in need .their aid. Oil workers :and power workers . solidarity aCtions. made by Walt, large mines from the small mines and dividing the striking With the miners in November would give Today, many of the best miners maintain their SocialIst League miners from the rest of the class. .these workers much added l~verage in their own pay illusions in types like Miller, as do most militants League held in , The government propaganda campaign agains.t demands. Steel workers should refuse to touch coal throughout the working class. The largest so-called the miners will be a concerted bourgeois attack to during the strike, making the miners' strike more socialist organizations feed these illusions. The prevent that unity. With inflation and unemploy­ powerful and turning a potential lay-off into a strike chances that the revolutionary forces will be able to ment growing, only a revolutionary program can for a wage re-opener. bring about a thorough miners' victory and a successfully Iillswer ·the bourgeoisie's propaganda The sharpest need for a class-wide defense of the class-wide upsurge are very small. Th~rldecon campaign. UMW will be posed if the government attempts to But in carrying out the revolutionary strategy, to Marxists. No Revolutionaries must explain concretely and openly break the strike. The threat of anti-strike the R.S.L. will maximize the possibilities of this solution to the , specifically how the miners' struggle is in the legislation is real, and the labor movement's occuring. Just as important, the R.S.L. will further unemployment, p interests of the entire working class-emphasizing response must the general strike. the education of the most advanced workers so that ages of vital mate the potential for a class-wide wage offensive. A If the government can successfully break the the revolutionary forces and the working class will been able to el vague sympathy with the miners will pale in miners' strike, the right to strike will have received he in a strengthened position as further opportun­ unraveling of wo importance compared to rising utility rates and a severe blow. Revolutionaries must begin now to Ities present themselves. "~ .post·World War I fact, most left-VI Marxists failed t therefore have nOI r dangers and opp< Apologists for: Counter-revolution facade of stabilit: .. During the pos' relative prosperit countries ofthe W Revolutionary Union on Russia conviction. It was the '30's, during , collapse of capitali .Robert Avakian, spokesman for the Bolshevik party and the state appara­ iat. With the smashing of the prole- rationalize state-capitalist planning, far more difficult Revolutionary Union, one of the tus, for which Joseph Stalin was the tariat's class power this property with the capitalist nature of the plan­ during the '50's , prominent US Maoist organizations, spokesman. In the party struggles of became alien class property-capital. ning itself. MA spoke on the Soviet Union at an RU the 1920's this layer was triumphant. This process is in no way under­ forum in Detroit on September 18. Then"from 1928 to 1938, the proletar­ stood by the Revolutionary Union_ RU AND STALIN Self-avowed Avakian began his analysis by iat was kicked out of power com­ The RU's spokesman, Avakian, under In sum, it was Stalin who was the Keynesian analysi pointing out the centrality of Marx's pletely, its living standards cut in half, the guise of focusing on the right British socialist, analysis of capital to the question of gravedigger of the proletarian power questions- the party and the economy in Russia. The RU, however, accepts insufficiently und~ state-capitalism. Marx, Avakian cor­ in eliminating depI rectly said, traced capitalism to' the -examined only the aftermath of the Stalin's political betrayal of Leninism above-mentioned coun terrevolu tion­ Review and his f( capital-labor relationship, i.e., the - "socialism in one country," the ary process; i.e., the 1940's and '50's. monopolization th relationship between classes. The class-collaborationist Popular Front, Avakian found a formal statement the liquidation of the Third Inter­ Marx's law of the bourgeoisie holds its position as fall, and abandon exploiting class based on its control of of the capitalist restoration in Khru­ national. They support Stalin's gang­ shchev's thesis of the "Two Wholes" theory of value. the means of production. The prole­ ster methods. As a result, they (the party was no longer a workers' Ernest Mandel tariatisdefined as a class by its total support Slalin's strangling of the party, but a party of the whole people; tional proclaimed separation from control of the means October Revolution. the state was no longer a workers' .To give up Stalin, they would have the era of neo-capi of 'production. The worker possesses, lously had recovel nothing but his ability to labor, which state, but a state of the whole people). to give up Mao-since Mao carripd out But it was Stalin himself who pro­ Stalin's program in China. The prole­ Strachey, Swel he must sell to the capitalist for a "Marxist" econo] wage. claimed the "two wholes" during the tariat played no role in the 1949 revo­ last years of the Stalinist counter­ facade of stability All the laws of the capitalist lution and remains an exploited class revolution-not Khrushchev in 1956. under Chinese state-capitalism today. economy derive from this basic class THE) relation. The U.S.S.H. is state-capital­ The 1936 constitution proclaimed For the RU to give up Maoism would ist because the proletariat is divorced the end of the dictatorship of the prole­ be to repudiate themselves. This was in dire from the means of production. The wa;sth:-;;:;:;;;;;;ij;;;~ tariat. In effect, the state was pro­ The RU is thus tied hand and foot to analysis that we I form of capitalist property as state ,of the Bolshevik Party. The claimed a state of the whole people. Stalin. Incapable of breaking with decay. This is the, property in no way alters the basic arv Union" however considers Stalin Within the Bolshevik party, the tech­ Stalinism, they are incapable of under­ turn of the century class relation. [aiong with his pupil, Mao Jthe continuator nocrats, intellectuals and state bureau­ standing the destruction of the work­ of capitalist society Avakian recognized that the anal- of Bolshevism! crats were welcomed into full member­ ers's state in Russia. The RU's anal­ dominant capitalif __ . ysis of Russian state-capitalism can­ the democratic gains of women and ship_ The party, too, was now a party ysis of Russia is only a cover for their Marx foresaw, the { not remain purely a-mathir '. of -national--minorities, destroyed. of "the whole people," that is, of the own capitulation to bourgeois forces. become a fetter hol( definitions. The process d Russian Most important of all, the Bolshevik state-capitalist ruling class. The direct corollary of the RU's productive forces. Party-the sole carrier of the revolu­ counter-revolution must be explained. Avakian placed the decay of the vacillation and centrism is their Unlike the condil tionary banner after the Soviets atro-_ But it is here that the RU's false Bolshevik party in the 1940's. Accor­ political COWARDICE. The physical capitalism succeed« political position, their commitment to phied-was completely destroyed. In ding to him, the party was weakened exclusion of RSL members from the forces to an exten Stalinism-Maoism, turns their theoret­ 1936-1938 Stalin executed almost the by the masses of uneducated cadre forum by Avakian, and the refusal to societies, today CI ical analysis into an apology for entire surviving leadership of the drawn into it in World War II, while allow RSL members to sell The Torch transform producti counter-revolution. party of the October Revolution, as the influence of these cadres was in­ .even outside the forum, is only the. Itcannot raise th well as the general staff of the Red creased by the loss of the most most concrete example of this political level of the advanCE . Army. By 1938 the proletarian char­ COUNTERREVOLUTION advanced workers at the front lines. cowardice. acter of the Bolsh evik Party was ir­ A Wikian made no mention, however, Like Stalin, the RU resorts to As The Torch has previously revocably destroyed. of the destruction of the.entire leader· political gangsterism in order to explained, Russia in 1917 underwent a Stalin's program was "Socialism in ship-of October by Stalin in the '30's. protect themselves and their centrist The Sparta< workers' revolution. The isolation, One Country." Basically this meant inally, Avakian charged Khru­ politics which they cannot defend poverty and cultural backwardness of "industrialization in one country." In ev with placing planning ort a cap­ politically. The proletariat requires an workers' Russia after World War I place of the Left Opposition's program itahs bas . To Avakian, planning open debate in order to choose its necessity 01 and the liquidation of thousands of the -the development of industry under under Stalin was socialist because leadership. It requites a revolutionary most class-conscious proletarians in control of the proletariat combined sectoral needs were subordinated to' regroupment around the pt.ogram of the civil war, however, led to with an international revolutionary the national plan; under his succes­ Lenin. The Leninist program today is with stable bureaucratic deformations in the policy-Stalin attempted to make sors, profit accounting at the factory the program of Trotskyism. For this workers' state. peace with the capitalist world and level took the place of national reason the RU is terrified to confront _fails to pre, Bureaucratization meant primarily build up industry ruthlessly as alien planning. But this is confusing the Trotskyism in an open political the rise of a privileged layer in the property out.of control of the proletar- post-Stalin bureaucracy's attempts to debate. --.--~-.------.------­ ---'."~ U('ating the most a general strike. the board attack s ISTS'PETTY- EORIES' ::10 !ill! they can to u t a general s t,rike ) spill OYer into" I unemployment, m before it gets r and Oppressed , ';f;' , :m of specially ARISM ND : class organiza­ o-ordinate these' [Note: These are excerpts from the .presentation two sectors grows ever-wider. It can no longer pull we are debating her~. It is our contention that the made by Walter, Dahl of the Revolutionary out of depressions without gross destruction of the Spartacist League has abandoned the heritage of ; maintain their Socialist League in a debate with the· Spartacist productive forces (as witness World War II). Trotskyism. It hasdenied the method of M andllIn , most militants League held in New York on October 26. J Likewise, it must utilize the brutal methods of' in analyzing the world economy; it has denied largest so-called fascism to beat back the organized proletariat in theory of the permanent revolution and imperialism illusions. The times of crisis. It must escalate its looting of raw in dealing with the oppressed; it has ripped the gulli '5 wiil be able to .materials from the underdeveloped nations. out of the Transitional Program. I t therefore stands victory and a The growth that does occur in this epoch tends to before the working class as a centrist tendency, an The world economic crisis is comprehensible only be partial, sectoral and at the expense of the obstacle on the road to the proletarian revolution. ouary strategy, to Marxists, No capitalist politician can find a system's future ability to grow. Growth in the In particular, the Spartacist League denies the ,ibilities of this solution to the unprecedented inflation, growing advanced countries occurs at the expense of the pre·revoiutionary character of the present period. '.L. will funher unemployment, production shutdowns, and sh.Ol:"t· underdeveloped countries, Growth in one period is denies the necessity of a depression for capitaUsllJ. workers so that ages of vital materials. No bomgeois economist has destroyed by wars and depressions in the next. The It downplays the tendency towards strongman 'rking class will been able to explain, much less predict, the drive is towards ever-more destructive wars; it is Bonapartism, and fascism. I t therefore fails to rther oppor:u:o· um1'aveling of world capitalism that followed the towards the decimation of the proletariat through prepare the working dass for the revolutionary role post·World War n period of economic stability. In fascism; it is towards creating huge raw matl;'rials it must play in the world today-if the fact, most left·wing thi!'l'lrists who claim to be shortages (as Lenin foresaw in his Imperialism). It revolutionary character of the epoch is not to take Marxists failed to foresee the current crisis, and is towards disruption of the world market through on, once again, its counter-revolutionary aspect. therefore have not warned the working class of the In short, the Spartacist League-like Mandel, dangers and opportunities it faces as capitalism's Sweezy and Strachey·has heen completely disor· facade of stability shatters. iented by the post-war recovery of capitalism. While During the post·war boom, the 20·year period of clinging to the phrase "epoch of decay," they have :relative prosperity and stability in the advanced gutted it of all content. To the Spartacists, as we . countries of the West, Marxism appeared to lose its shall see, the epoch of decay is synonymous conviction. It was relatively easy to be a Marxist in stable capitalism. They, like the other epigones, the '30's, during the Great Depression, when the have been overwhelmed by their empirical collapse of capitalism was plain for all to see. It was observations of the post-war world. .list planring, far more difficult to retain the Marxist program So before going any further, I will outline the re of the plan­ during the '50's and early '60's. analysis that the Revolutionary Socialist League has developed of the post-war boom-and its \'.. MARX AND KEYNES unraveling in recent years (a full explanation has .LIN Self-ayowed "Marxists" rallied round the been presented in Torch No. 15 .... 5ee Jack Gcegory, ! 1 who was IDe Keynesian analysis at this time. John Strachey, a "On th" Brink of Deprcssion") , letarian power British socialist, discovered that Marxists had Ne-...~er, accepts insufficiently understood the benefits of democracy POST,WARBOOM i al of Leninism in eliminating depressions. Paul Sweezy of Monthly This analysis is based on Lenin's theory of :ountr.y," the Review and his followers decided that because of imperialism. Under the conditions resulting from oDular Front, monopolization there was no longer any sense to World War n, the U.S. bourgeoisie was able to Third Inter· Marx's lav,; of the tendency of the rate of profit to Lenin and Trotsky [c"nter], the leaders ,,~ the Russian break out of the pre-war impenalist deadlock and Stalin's gang· fall, and abandoned both this law and the labor Uevolution, celebrate the 3rd anniversary of the creation of appropriate to itself a vasL share of the world's i result, the',­ theory of value. the world's firet workers' state. Both leade.·" emphasized PTO.duction of surplus-value. The Soviet Union did jl ;gli:og: of the I Ernest Mandel of the so-called Fourth Interna­ the criBis of leadership in the epoch of imperiali§t decay, likewise in its imperialist sphere. tional proclaimed the third industrial revolution, capitalism'. last stage. The defeat of the European and Japanese the era of neo-capitalism, when capitalism miracu· working classes-as a consequence of the Great ~ 'v would h"Ye autarchy and reducing sectors of the world lously had recovered its progressive capabilities. Depression, the World War, and the betrayal of the r-;'o carripd (South Asia, Africa) to the Ievel where I Sweezy, Mandel-the best-known Stalinist and Social Democratic leaderships-estab- ! na. The prole· investment is increasingly less profitable. the 1949 r8"0' economists-all caoitulated to the Iished a high rate of exploitation in these areas. This , facade of stability during the post.war boom. In this epoch, the bourgeoisie is not capable of tremendous exploitation of the workers, together class completing the democratic tasks in any countr.y­ with the destruction of industry during the war, today. underdeveloped or advanced. Over time, it must THE EPOCH OF DECAY made possible profitable investments and the IIaoism would attempt to roil them back-that is what fascism reconstruction of Western Europe and Japan on the ~yes, This was in direct contradiction to the Marxist represents. The world proletariat is the only basis of new technology. The American bourgeoisie, end and foot to analysis that we live in the epoch of imperialist fundamentally revolutionary force in this epoch­ because of its overpowering military and industrial ) .reaking with decay. This is the epoch (beginning roughly at Lhe and therefore this is the epoch of proletarian position after the war, its imperialist apparatus, ,able of undC'"· turr~ of the centur.y) in which the productive forces revolution and the transition to socialism. organized around the international monctar.y 1 of the wo,k· of capitalist society have come into conflict wi.th the But the proletariat must rise to its revoJ.utionar.y system established at Bretton Woods, was able to he RU's anal- I dominant capitalist relations of production. As tasks. If not, this epoch will see famine, depressions :over for their Marx foresaw, the capitalist mode of production has of devastating scope, and nuclear war. This is the siphon surplus-value from both the rebuil!' j advanced countries and the semi-colonial countries. Irgeois fm,p",.~j····-- .... become a ·fetter holding-back-·thedevelopment of the heart of Leninism and Trotskyism: the theory of of the RU's productive forces. imperialism as the highest and last stage of HEGEMONY sm is their Unlike the conditions of the 19th centur.y, when capitalism, the theory of the permanent revolution, U.s_ The physical capitalism succeeded in developing the productive the Transitional Program, and the Fourth Interna· This represented the international concentration " Jers from the forces to an extent unimaginable to all previous tional. The objective conditions are ripe for the and centmlization of capital in the hands of the the refusal to societies, today capitalism cannot qualitatively socialist revolution; what is lacking is the United States bourgeoisie. It was mirrored by the Jell The Torch transform production. . revolutionar.y leadership_ The crisis of the epoch can state·induced capital centralization within the '1 is only the It cannot raise the underdeveloped nations to the thus be reduced to the crisis of leadership. countr.y in favor of the leading corporations. f this political· level of the advanced-rather, the gap between the These fundamental questions underlie the issues Cont'd, next page

J resorts to in order to their centrist The Spartacist League. ~ies the pre-revolutionary character of this period. It denies the mnot defeCld at requires aI: of a deroress;on capitalism. To the f'he epoch decay is synonymous to choose ,j revolutionary . e program of' .strongman and gram today is with stable capitalism. downplays the tendency towards rule therefore "ism. For this ,d to confront .fails to prepare -the working class the revolutionary role· it must play today. pen political Page 10/The Torch / November, 197"­

So long as concentration and centralization of capital are possible on a large enoughscale, as Marx The 'Spanacist s ina ... to account for .the post-war 600m set th explained, recovery and a new boom·are possible. ' And this is what occurred: real wages increased. unemployment was reduced sharply. and physical thepe was no boom and therefore cant be any crisis. production increased internationally. A period of - . . relative stability ensued. This constitutes a boom in the epoch of decay. We will never again look upon a world capitalism capable of growing at the rate that it did in the progressive epQ5:h._ We have already indicated that limitations of growth in the epoch of decay. But the fact that capitalism was able to stabilize and grow in the post-war period demonstrate that this was a period of boom. . But the boom had clear limitations. In the U.S. the increased state intervention into the- economy _concentrated in building up war .industries and other unproductive ventures, whose massive costs l drained capital away from the productive sectors of the economy. At the same time, the build-up of industry abroad allowed dome.stic investment to fall behind. setting into motion a long process of '~ obsolescence and deterioration of the U.S.·s ~ productive equipment. 25 years after its post-war hegemony, the U.§. is no longer unchallenged in I economic strengtlf. The world situation internation­ _2ily is now heading toward one of old-style .; imperialist rivalry and impending conflict. Furthermore. the falling rate_of profit has meant that growth rates in Europe and Japan have slowed. IThis plus the intensification of the class struggle ! :nade it increasingly difficult for these countries to ' absorb the inflationary. paper values exported from p; fascist rally in Haly, August, 1974. As capitalism's co"tradiction" sharpen, the U.S. Inflation. the sharpest evidence of the arises again to smash the working class down. fpresent crisis, grew out of the roots planted in the : post-war period; the steady expansion of credit and ;, government deficits created vast amounts of \ fictitious capital that the stock market has. no:w In this epoch, and especially during times of crisis, Some :W.OOO New Jersey construction workers converged 0111 UH' Statchous(' I. begun to discount. . l;apitalism can only reduce the underdeveloped nations to Trenton July 29 demanding jobs. The deepening economi~ crisis ""iii ~ revoiutionarim; a wider hearing in the proletariat tlum the-y have had !H decal starvaUon, epid.em~1C and ruin.. t, EXPORT OF INFLATION . the analysis upon which lhe Transitional Program "\. These irulationary tendencies were exported classes of many countries arc not demoralized and the winter fuel shortagE throughout the world because of tbe privileged are willing to fight-- they have not suffered a is hased. Congress was eager to . position of the U.S. dollar. As a result, inflation has decisive defeat in 25 years. Workers' Vangnard of July, 1~)73 sums up the powers to the discredit ,aJready undermined the international monetary SL's approach: Now, the roiing ell CAHlIlI:mUl[lIists do not need to p!'oject the imr.lL'tincnce '0] discip'ine the wm-king cl system-it was this linchpin of the imperialist INTERNATIONAL CRISIS network that was the first component to break a if:atastrophic economic crisis and fascist ru.le to of the economy. Whet Idown. justify the need for "odali"t revnluOon. The highest Ford-Rockefeller regim' inflation in twenty ye....s. a 5% rate of officially ! Today, the lack of sufficient capital for 1976 remains to he seen, aekHlowledged I,",cmployme"t and l>. "enal .mi! linvestment (despite inflated profits), the decline of The Portuguese events Blrc not an isolated it nl(~8.J,! that Dower incident. There Blre crises in Italy, Britain and morillnmd union bu.reaucracy actively ooUaborating greatly reduced.'/ · real wages due to inflation, the destruction of the with II reactionary government to hold down !environment under the pressure of business to reap Argentina. Combined with events in Chile, Greece, the energy crisis and world famine, it is w8{~eH--theBe conontioDs aTe a quite sufficient 11 profits without paying costs, the rotting away of precondition for building H,e vanguard communist , clear .that the development of working class public services- all these are the visible signs of party cI"ss-strugg!e opposition in the unin,,". Elsewhere in the SIU insurgency will continue, producing major class and decay previously hidden under a veneer of The Spartacists use this analysis to justify their appear to realize that j imperialist prosperity. . confrontations in which the question of who is to necessity. "The U.S.' have state power is posed_ passive, complacent, anti-Marxist notion that there I The erosi~n of the post-war boom determines ~he is no need to recognize the inexorable drive of imperiaIist pOV,r~T requi -character or the present perIOd. The world-wIde Under these circumstances, as capitalist decay capitalism toward depression, fascism and war. But this wisdom doesn 1shortage of capital for investment is the major grows even more rotten. as one countrv after They dismiss every type of economic crisis. The continues, "Italy can mil , manifestation of the tendency for the rate of profit another turns to military dictatorship" when tasks of revolutionaries in Lhe epocb of decay cab;net hecause the nml i fall, made plain as a shortage of surplus-value hourgeois democracy becomes inadequate-and as thus reduced to the struggle against inflation carried out hy tI", perm .relative 1;0 the massive claims upon it. Today, World War III looms as the outcome of intensifying unemployment; apparently, the present conditions for U.S.. ." Ono Icapital must once more be ~oncentrated and imperialist rivalries- the socialist revolution be­ will he maintained forever. severe prohlems Clln hr centralized; weak capitals must be eliminated, the comes a necessity for survival. The necessity of Spartacists, within the , working class standard of living attacked, and the revolution and the material conditions for working WATERGATE dernocrncy. the i mountains of fictitious capital leveled. This requires class power exisL-- what is missing is the military coup, eoun t de~pression, war, or both. revolutionary leadership of the proletariat- that is This repUdiation of the Marxist understanding of has heen (lxcused from o the-necessit-Yc"of a ~full-scale_depression what Trotsky referred to as the crisis of proletarian the epoch necessarily has implications in the SJ/s world crisis" ~confronts the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie will be leadership. practice" Workers Vanguard's coverage-of Water­ forced to increase the burden on the working gate illust.rates the Spartacists' faith in the stability "NO] i classes, using the treacherous Stalinist and Social of hourgeois democracy_"There are those who Democratic parties where possible-and the TRANSITIONAL PROGRAM the Watergate affair as a sign of impending fascism The key to ..he SP!lrU capitalist crisis of today methods of strongman rule will once more come to or full-scale Bonapartism," said the October 26, I The Transitional Program was formulated (although perhaps the w( · the fore. Economic nationalism and the drive 1973 issue. "In fact, it is just the opposite-Con­ precisely to guide the proletariat in its struggle, to gress is restoring the norms of U.S. bourgeois their theory th"!. there towards inter-imperialist war will accelerate. arm it against the bourgeoisie's drive to destroy I all democracy, and the power of the government bas Under this theory, they h In the epoch of imperialist decay, the capitalist organizations of the working class through state must tend to assume ever greater powers heen greatly reduced." the prolonged economic E I Bonapartism and fascism. It is the program of the Here the Spartacists are opposing the two sides relatively low level of da because of the need for econoinic and political proletariat in the epoch of decay-and first of all it of a dialectical relationship to one another. Nixon in unemployment, the w( I c8ntralization. During periods of crisis, or of is based upon the understanding that the I working class resistance, this centralization takes was not a Bonapartist leader-in that the production, the increasinJ bourgeoisie cannot eliminate depression and war, the advanced countries, on a Bonapartist, or military form. In other words, Spartacists are correct. But in the epoch of decay, " and must savagely attack the proletariat through the capitalist state must tend to assume ever for a quarter of a centm the need for state control in this epoch makes a I the most brutal forms of bourgeois rule. greater powers because of the need for economic and change in the charnd · rapid transtion to strongman rule possible-the The Spartacists' program and analysis has !weapons are already there. political centralization. predominant intcrnlltiol18 nothing in common with this, despite their Before the Watergate scandal broke, Nixon was sion. Nor do they need to superficial adoption of the form of the Transitional PRE·REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD steadily enlarging the powers of the executive hoom has eroded, how tn( Program. Since they do not understand that branch and following a strong-government policy. post-war period masked i I What makes the current period pre-revolutionary capitalism cannot maintain stability indefinitely, Watergate represented a detoll!' from that road, but why till' decay is now b , is that the end1l!'a::,ce of th~ proletariat is be~ng they fail to warn the working class of the dangers of not the shift into reverse gear that the Spartacists even empiricists prrccive Istretchoo to ':he limIt-at a tlme when the vrorkmg Bonapartism and fascism, hence make a mockery of see. Despite Watergate, in critical periods such as By dcnying thc mdsten \ \ -----.--- • ., ---.~ ---_t'-;-­

same either way, By calling the post-war b'J.I)m a :ount for Post-W;l1' the stage for their cU~Y'8ntattitude that· myth, the Spartacists surrender to thebourgooie the boom set myth that renewed prosperity is around the corner, ~ can't be any crisis. SL'S "'fHEORY" How do the Spartacists back up their denial of the post-war boom? It iB WOl"th exaIninirw their theoretical justification, as put forward by Joseph Seymour in an article written in early 1972, 'I'lit, article was writtenasa polemic against the "three principle currents of Marxist revisionism" ,·epre­ sented by Paul Sweezy, Ernest Mandel and Michael Kidron of the British International Socialists. .Seymour points· out that the three share the notion that post-war capitalism has fundamentally changed, and has become what Mandel calls "neo-capitalism." This Seymour believe,; is a necessary consequence of the idea of post-war boom, for he thinks that them is no way to account for such a boom except by assuming that capitalism underwent major structural changes that -could, guarantee permanent prosperity and stability. Seymour argues that boom equals new "porch: Ali theoric" ,,{ fundam<",tal post-w.... c~!'itali.t cbange """"me that post·w"r capital's", ha. performed extraordinlU'i1y well. 'l'hi. exceptio"..1 performlUlce can only be explained if maior struct..ml reforms have taken place. Bourgeois ....d revisionist theo.ists then se..rcb for the structural changes hehind this otherwise inexplicable boom-i{cy"".i'm­ type stabilizatiml policy, Cal)italist pl:lI1miilIl\g~ in­ 1'" of WATERGATE reports: military coup, the country that invented fascism, the Communist Intern"tional, Vol. I, p. 200) Idiation of the Marxist understanding of In order to leave the impression that Trotsky shares The 'American Century', tbe longest continuous boom has been excused from the consequences of the in the reactionary period or capitalism, ha. rome to an lecessariiy has implications in the SL's world crisis. the Spartacis~'1' conception that economic oscilla­ 'otters V/illguard's- coverage-of-Wa ter­ tions are all that .Marxists have to say about the e"d. This phase w"s based 0" a permlUlent C"I

the 'permanent arms economy,'. etc." scores a direct the Transitional Program! The world economic The British Labour government i. formally cOlllDlit­ on the unfortunate Spartacist writer of 1971, crisis has been reduced to a "period of sharp ted to lI11ationalizatioDS and an antu"d(~n&- ti,,"ary policy. The ItalillJl Christian I)c",<>cu' who managed to compress all these theories into one economic downturn" -and 80 .has the Great tic/Socialist <",clition has promised to wjll'imize small paragraph. Depression of the 1930's. The Spartacists ignorej~ ;",Jqwb'iw layoUs, providing the unions will Trotsky's estimate of the period when the il1le".,,,"mll t""e.. Tbus the political conditiol1l" SL'S-KEYNESIANISM Transitional Program was written as something ikitoi" ""d Italy are such that a wave of This 1971 version of the post-war boom was not more than an economic .downturn: "a pre-revolu­ senzuJ['etsl oltgsHlIized by the unions would not Cont'd. from. p. 1 an isolated occurrence; it occurred in various tionary period of agitation, propaganda and ""ailelil by tile armed forces of the state. Th,," Spartacist statements on economics up to 1971. In organization," whose strategic task "consists in tl>"<,,fo .. e, '''' udve..turistic tactic. oppressed wage·"l, overcoming the contradiction between the maturity Such trust. in Lhc promises and commilmcnt.s of hlades. that period the Spartacists also had an explanation bourgeois governments is a gift that the ruling class for the end of the boom, which they called "the Of the objective revolutionary conditions and the immaturit~, of the proletariat and its van­ does not deserve from "Trotskyists." Do the deepening economic and political crisisin the U.S., Spartacists acutally believe that the capitalists who , part of the world capitalist crisis"-an assessment guard.... That is, the task of revolutionaries is not simply factories are seized by the workers will not call in forthright enough to be denounced by today's the police, and the army if necessary'! That the Spartacists as crisis-mongering. Their explanation to raise demands to defend the workers' standard of J living, but to demonstrate that the only alternative British and Italian governments, whatever their was the government's "delicately balanced econ­ economic promises, will refuse to use force? And omic policy" had been disrupted by the Vietnam to depression, military takeovers, fascism and war is the socialist revolution. that the bourgeoisie will not have its privately­ whjl,()s who t'l.n~ h war when the war "mushroomed into unmanageable owned supply of thugs to bring into acLion as well? proportions." So the Spartacists swallowed the The demands that the Spartacists raise "aJiising are hused oul. The Spartacists' treacherolls Keynesian theory whole. Neither liberalG on the soft words of the bourgeoisies' Keynesian policy fliiled, according to them, not education for all because it was fundamentally an illusion covering Social Democratic servants comes education will imp up the world-wide plundering of U.S. imperialism, the same article that reports that share it assumes I but because war spending caused too great a "mInors of a military coup needed to system hut. capi. distortion in the federal budget for the economy to impose 'austerity' flourish" in scrviceH, an overh( }tumors like this are not mere gossip be successfully managed. Lots of bourgeois being slashed to k theorists objected to that too. the Spartacists' columns, but a warnin/,: to the workiog dass. NO BOOM, NO CRISIS Trotsky's Transitional Program calls To the morali for the slogans of workers' self-defense For.most of its history, therefore, the Spartacist "socialist" hanger::: and a workers' militia precisely in the League accepted both the post-war boom and the suffer ( context from which thc Spartacists Keynesian explanations for it. Their inability to remove them- Lhe hourgeoisie's at­ account for the boom, except by means of the socialists to SUppOJ tacks on sit-down strikers. The exper­ bourgeois theories that Seymour so righteously i.errible crime, an charges to others, set the stage for their current ience of the 1930's, repeated today in capitalism, a capi!.1 attitude that there hadn't been a boom at all and Chile, proves that the hourgeoisie reacts Unfortunately, i with violence when thwarted its own ~herefore there can't be any post-war crisis. socialism whieh I svstem's contradictions and rising So they changed their analysis without admowl­ "socialist" b'TOUP~ ,il'mands of the workers. edging the change; and just recently they have program-the Soci. been talking Hcrisis" and even Ucatastrophe"­ 'l'he organization of the workers for ers League, the S again, without acknowledging that their theory of self-defense against scabs, police and tional Socialists. ( last year ruled out the possibility of crisis. gangst.ers cannot be replaced hy naive proletariat and esp' The Spartacist League's failure to present a trust in the government's good will. If leadership they so Marxist analysis of the world economy is the working class is to defend itself and Instead of characteristic of centrist groupings. The SL's fight to maintain its deteriorating panded successive theories have tailed events without standard of living, workers' cynidsm back a cynical far pointing out the direction of the economy and passivity must be uprooted. capitalism at ead beforehand. Despite their claims to Bolshevism, The slogans of workers' defense are programs are pos. they have failed to prepare the working class for the needed today in order that the capitulate to liberal dangers it faces and the revolutionary tasks it must proletariat train itself, learn self-confi­ democratic rights of 2,ccomplish. Promising to provide revolutionary dence, and find the road to power. lile program of lib, leadcership, they have instead relied on bourgeois Otherwise, the revolutionary character The most disgust methods which have proved to be bankrupt in the of the epoch-the epoch of capitalist I.he Spartacisl. Lea; hands of all their practitioners, both bourgeois and decay for which the program was miliLant left win,.; 0 pseUdo-socialist. created-will take on its counter-revo­ result. its Since the Spartacist League has an economic lutionary aspect. "Ext.end analysis which in reality denies that this is the In short, the Spartacist League quot.ed in epoch of decay, their practice must follow suit. We understands neither the objective con­ have already seen how they fail to prepare the ditions, nor the method of the Transi­ working class of the danger of strongman rule, tional Program, and therefore cannot Bonapartism and fascism in their analysis of Nix"" before bis fall. The Spartacist League-hopeless empiricists-de­ possibily provide a revolutionary lead­ NATIONAL OFFICI Wagergate and their optimistic faith in the stability nies the conneoetion between capitalism's economic and social crisis WId ership. This empiricist outfit, recogniz­ of Italy's "permanent civil service." These are not the leadership ~JI"'isi9 within the nniulfIlg class. ing neither boom nor depression, fails to isolated examples, since by not understanding warn of the danger of fascism; it objective conditions the Spartacist League mangles the Transitional Program. out of the concrete conjuncture" are limited to guts the call for workers' self-defense; it three. None of them shows how to fight inflation working dass to ignore the danger CHICAGO TRANSITIONAL PROGRAM GUTTED (although the article refers to "unprecedented bourgeoisie its armed might against them. massive inflation" which "cannot drop significantly These are just" of the many incredible errors ];'OT example, here is how the Spartacists lay and may well rise"). which must flow from a grouping that postures as . claim to the Trotskyist tradition: revolutionary while standing on empiricism. It is dear that .. deep economic crisis coming in a WORKERS' DEFENSE? NO NEED Promising to provide revolutionary leadership, period of generally rising class struggle, particularly the Spartacist League has instead relied on in Europe, can lead to revolutionary situations. The Worse, the Spartacists' truncated program has hourgeois methods which have proved to be Transitional Program of the , nothing to say about the need for workers' defense, completely bankrupt in the hands of all their DETROIT: written in 1938, is .. strategic document which is valid although Workers Vanguard has indignantly denied practitioners, both bourgeois and pseUdo-socialist. for the epoch af imperiallsm, i_eo, of capitalist decUne. our accusation in Torch No.9 that they capitulate in Th~ir program, mimicking their complacent Many af its particular demands. formulated in 0Jll earlier period of _harp economic downturn. are of just this way to pacifism. Not only do the theOrIes, IS a watered-down and passive rendition of Spartacists overlook the danger of armed repression special relevance today. The following demands, the Transitional Program. The Sparta':ists' diSarm­ LOS ANGELES; II arising out of the concrete conjuncture in the major by the bourgeoisie and its agents who run the ing of the working class, 'done in the name of capitalist countries, must be mised tine labor state-they take great pains to deny that the Trotsky and revolutionary internationalism, makes movement if the worker. ru-e lJ.'" to a sharp danger exists! Here is how they justify one of their them an ohstacle on the road to socialist revolution 'I reduct;"n of their living standard•. three demands. "Occupation of Closed-Down that revolutionaries have to expose and politically R What a passive and reformist interpretation of Plants-:-Nation"lize them under Vlforkers Control": defeat. NEW YORK· I 4J N _____~~_~__~______Ni~Q.:vem::.:b::e~r.:.,~1974 / Th£ 0iTorck/Page 13 of direction the The immediate quesUOli of approach'is.'fully applicabl~ to ,~~,"demOQ'litic Editorial posed in Boston is the demands of specially exploited and oppre88ed defense of the basic demo­ groups. cratic rights of blacks. At Because this is the only method of solving the the same eime, the crisis terrible problem of racism, revolutionarys0ci8li,ts government is formally commit­ poses the question of how know that democratic rights can only be gaiwld ationalizations IlDd an IlDti-defia­ these· rights are to be. through the transitional demands contained in the The Italian Christian Democra­ ~~NDIHE. . ,n bas promised to millimize defended- through the socialist revolutionary program. Capitalism cannot roviding the unions will accept .' ...... I'·.~'U· " .. program of the bour~isie implement the democratic demands, even "partial­ 108 tbe politlea1 conditions in ·~ArK S'IIII'~·DE-·NT·'5' to create a race war within ly" or '''incompletely''- it can only destroy BL '/' ,. , re such that a wave of plllDt . the working class; or democracy as its death agony increases. , the unions would not simply be through. the program of We support the rights of blacks to attend school ~ forces of the state. That is not, Cont'd. from p.l the proletariat. anywhere. We support this through the program of ;Bristie tactic. oppressed wage-slaves of American capitalism, the improved, expanded' education for all, at the promises and commitments of blacks. expense of the capitalists. To make these demands lts is a gift that the ruling class This explosion of racist violence is not only the DEMOCRATIC RIGHTS meaningful, they must be coupled with the program from "Trotskyists." Do the inevitable result, but even the aim of the liberal For revolutionary socialists, the starting point is of full employment through the sliding scale of believe that the capitalists who program. As The Torch has previously explained, wages and hours, and the rebuilding of the cities at )y the workers will not call in that only the socialist revolution can secure and busing is a to""I hoax. It proposes to spread white capitalist expense, central demands of the Transi­ army if necessary? That the guarantee the democratic rights of the oppressed. and black students a little more evenly through The various bourgeois programs which talk about tional Program. We defend blacks and support their governments. whatever their rotting schools. The slight and mainly illusory gains rig-hts in today's specific situation while calling for will refuse to use force? And democratic rights are actually designed to smash it offers to some blacks come at the expense of them. We support the rights of blacks to equality, this program to win these rights by revolutionary , will not have its privately­ whites-who are bused into the schools the blacks means. is to bring into action as well? access to any schools and neighborhoods, safety are bused BUt of. Finally, we call for workers' defense guards to ,artacists' treacherous reliance from racist violence. We support blacks today Neither liberals nor conservatives can expand against the racist violence in Boston. We support defend black rights and the black community 1ft words of the bourgeoisies' education for all.. The argument that black against racist violence. We call on black workers to emocratic servants comes in their right today to attend school in South' Boston education will 'i1hprove when whites are forced to and anywhere else. We support these rights without form armed defense organizations and to demand in e article that reports that share it assumes that capitalism is an expanding the trade unions the official formation of workers' its devisive strategy. question-unknown to those centrists who call oppressed slaves of American capitalism to defend res that the bourgeoisie reacts Unfortunately, it is precisely this betrayal of themselves "Trotskyists"- was stated as long ago themselves through their own class power, not the lce when thwarted bv its own socialism which has been committed by the as 1927 in the P)atform of the Left Opposition: "It. bourgeois poliee and army. Socialists must call ;ontradictions and the rising "socialist" groups that support the busing is necessary to achieve an increasing equalization in upon them (,0 defend themselves through their own of the workers. program-the Socialist Workers Party, the Work­ the wages of different groups of workers, by way of class program, not the bourgeois program. anization of the workers for ers League, the 'Spartacist League, the Interna­ a systematic raising of the lower-paid groups; in no Anything else is a hetrayal of socialism, the e against scabs, police and tional Socialists, etc. These groups deprive the case by a lowering of the higher-paid." This method working class and all oppressed people. cannot be replaced by naive proletariat and especially the black workers of the e government's good will. If leadership they so desperately nped. g class is to defend itself and Instead of posing the socialist alternative-ex­ Los Allgeles~~ Forum maintain its deteriorating panded education for all at capitalist expense- they )f living. workers' cynicism back a cynical farce which hurls the victims of COAL AND THE CLASS STRUGGLE. -ity must be uprooted. capitalism at each other's throats. Their owil The UMW and the Tasks of the Labor Movement :ans of workers' defense are programs are posed for "later." The~,e groups may in order that the capitUlate to liberalism; they are unable to pose the Speaker: Fred Larson train itself, learn self-confi­ democratic rights of the oppressed independently of 1 find the road to power. the program of liberal capitalism. 1910 S. Vermont Avenue, Los Angeles the revolutionary .' character The most disgusting such capitulation is that of Tuesday, November 1!J IU)O P.M. Ich-the epoch bfC~pitalist the Spartacist League, which offers itself as the which the progr& was militant left wing of the bourgeois program. As a ,ill take on its counter-revo­ result. its slogans-"Implement Busing Program," tspect. "Extend Busing to the Suburbs"-are approvingly League Mounts $10,000 Fall Fund Drive ·t, the Spartacist League quoted in the New York Times. is neither the objective con­ The Revolutionary Socialist League was born of States and abroad. We have undertaken this work ,r the method of the Transi­ the contradiction between the sharply accelerating in a struggle for the reconstruction of the Fourth gram, and therefore cannot LEAGUE DIRECTORY crisis of world capitalism and the lack of a International as the world party of socialist ,rovide a revoiutionary lead­ NATIONAL OFFICE: revolutionary proletarian leadership. The so-called revolution. revolutionary organizations-including self-pro­ is empiricist outfit, recogniz­ R.S.L. In the League's second year, its need for funds boom nor depression, fails to claimed "Trotksyists'" such as the United Secretar­ from its friends is as sharp as ever. The tasks are 13755 Woodward Ave., Room 200 iat, the International Committee, International the danger of fascism; it Highland Park, Mich. 48203 enormous-the improvement and professionaliza­ ,rs' self-defense; it urges the Socialists and the Spartacist League and its tion of The Torch, the dissemination of theoretical international grouplets-provide only misleader­ Plore the danger of the CHICAGO R.S.L. and programmatic writings internationally, the armed might against them. ship. In place of the revolutionary analysis of' expansion of international discussions and inter­ 160 Nortb Halsted St. capitalism and the fighting proletarian progrl'm to f the many incredible errors Chicago, lliinois 60606 vention, the development of a systematic presence a grouping that postures as meet the crisis, they offer capitulation to the petty in the trade unions 'and movements of the anding on empiricism. bourgeoisie or a sterile sectarianism that gravitates oppressed, including a network of lahor bulletins CLEVELAND: R.S.L. toward opportunism at the first "opportunity." Ie revolutionary leadership. supplementing The Torch in the day-to-day life of P.O. Box :;162 Born in a fight against centrist leadership, the lle has instead relied on Cleveland, Ohio 44101 the working class, the expansion and professional­ vhich have proved to be RSL has elaborated the Leninist-Trotskyist pro­ iza tion of our staff. in the hands of all their gram, strategy and tactics for the approaching DETROIT: R.S.L. The League's two previous fund drives, in Irgeois and pseudo-socialist. revolutionarv crisis. We have shown the road to 13755 Woodward Ave_, Room 200 revolution iiI the United States, Britain, South autumn 1973 and spring 1974, both raised imicking their complacent Highland Park, Mich. 48203 substantially more than expected. In view of this own and passive rendition of America and elsewhere. We have elaborated the application of Leninist revolutionary tactics in the the goal of this autumn's fund drive has been raised 1m. The Sparta':ists' disarm­ LOS ANGELES: R.S.L. lass, 'done in the name of Middle East war, and the understanding of the to $10,000. Once again our members and 1910 S. Vermont sympathizers are making great sacrifices to meet Lary internationalism, makes Stalinist states as state-capitalist societies, born of Los Angeles, Calif. 90007 counterrevolution and the maintenance of capital­ this goal and finance the League. Our readers and e road to socialist revolution ism in its epoch of decay. We have cohered and friends can do nQ less. We appeal to you to make the Lve to expose and politically NEW YORK: R.S.L. trained our own organization and launched The greatest possible contribution before the end of the 41 Union Square W., Room 925 Torch as the propaganda organ to bring our drive on November 25. Make checks payable to New York, N.Y. 10003 I program to the advanced workers in tl?e United Revolutionary Socialist League, RSL Of Sy Landy. ,Page J.4/,I'hf;.To1:f:/u:NQvember, 1974 ---­ --,--_.-­------­ of Christians and Jews.) South Africa is itself an imperialist state, a junior imperialist. It exploits workers drawn from Ii 01 the African continent, FOl' economy, the South African ists import easily exploitable wm'kerr; byWIl~ n for stay:; of 18 months. Fo! 60 per cent of aU black miners in South Africa come from outside by William Jackson country. The Republic ofBouth Africa is widely known for its oppression of black Some are imported from the three Africans under the system of apartheid (sllper-segregation), This racist 'puppet African governments tOli':hing SouLh Air-iea---- Botswana, SW2/.iland society, however, can only be understood when seen as a key part of the and l,{'sotho. These have Gxploitation of all Africa by the western imperialist powers. Thal is, South Africa can only be understood in a world context. seats in the Organization African Africa probably has the largest supply of minerals of any continent, yet Unity, hut they are puppet Africa is also the least industrialized of all the continents. In the late '60's regimes. Their economy is wholly the breakdown of the "prosperity" which had followed World War II made based on exporting the labor power of these African raw materials more sought-after than ever before. The t.heir populatioll. OUlI'r workers come capitalists discovered that they had neglected to invest enough in the from the "ind!'pendent" nation of production of oil, copper and other minerals. ' Malawi, whose ruler, Hasting~ Randa, was nHn' a fiery "f(''Voh]tionary'' - Today, the capitalist system is facing severe shortages of minerals, and nationalisL After indep'''ld('T)c(' he the nrices have been increasing. The monopolists and speculators are decid('(j Lo turn his countr\' into a to Africa: UNITE a~tr~cted client siaL<' of South Africa' sell ... Africa is the world's principal producer of gold, manganese, radium, his people's lahor power. Till' task of r(',· scandium, caesium, c,rundum, and graphite. It also dominates the market in The Portuguese colony of Mozmn­ is to convince the certain strategic minerals such as cobolt, chrome, lithium, beryllium, tantalum, hique also sells African workers for lasting unity ca and germanium. Iron ore, coal, ni.~kel, vandium, copper, zinc, lead, bau":ite, 18-mon"thstret.ches, The Portuguese around the silver, platinum, ~Jumbite,' cadmium, phosphate, tin, uranium, etc. [are also imperialists get a big financial bonus the Trotskyist Tr, f01ffidJ in varying quantities. (African Progress, July-Auguest, 1972) for r(,IlLing their workers South this purpose, Best of all, for the capitalists, is that they do not have to pay the Africa. til(' South AfricilllS cheap (1", ,,;.ratcgy of t1 (reiatively) high wage;! of American or European workers to get these labor and the black workers get wages d"malld of the un mineral resources, The ores can be mined by cheap-starvation which arc a little bit. j,pttcr chan n'fOfm=sts and of Che2.D- black African labor. ' starving in the> Mozambique country­ Uwl they unite So' the imperailists have really been rushing into Africa. In the period side. actions, I n order from 1960 to 1968, investments in Latin America grew by 30 per cent and followers to our I in Asia by 100 per cent, but imperialist investments in Africa grew by 300 IMPERIALIST POLICE ship, we denoun pe,. cent' In this period, profits from such investments increased 70 per limitation pi cent in Latin America. per cent in Asia. but leaped 400 per cent in Africa! In "v"ry colonial ("Third World") Whil.e stilI tl region, Lll(' imperialists try to ;-wt up Communist Int" OF SOUTH AFRICA imp"ri"iisi junior-partlwrs t.o police d"ciared: till: "indep('ndent" coloni"s, Brazil in ""tIived gro .. ~ great deal of this foreign investment has gone into extracting mineral Rlacks in South Africa arc ~Hrccd to carry pass-bonl{s which ~h.ow where Uw h4~'\H'e,' ~lIlay livt" SOlIL!\ J\nH"'ica, Israel and Lrail in the [~]teh~~~gted in prt wealth from the Hepuhlic of South Africa, AfLer all, South Africa has 70 work. or for how long he on- SjH~ may remain Rn nny Middle l~ast a;e slIch imperialist immutable "II the per cent of the world's known gold deposits, 70 per cent of the known parti('ular area. policemen. So is South Africa in blilck working dagB into j platinum, 60 per cent of the diamonds, Africa (and so isPortugai with its other tn&nd. have a 75 per cent of the chrome, 30 per cen t African colonies), down the hSl"riierH in te..d,ing the "Of the uranium and various amounts of South Africa has tlw larg-est arm"d lo!!nw our examp minerals (such il" ('opper and forc('s per inhabitant in 11](' world_ Its :--::laganese). meaning 0 military is ('quipped witl the latest ameaDing V1 "" ),:th is African gold especially weal''';'s, ,j('1 planes and iwlicopters; it the social revi i;r.. po[~ant. South /\.hican IDlners ilnports weapons fronl Franee and our party. (Tile Fi oroduce H) per cent of all g-old mined clsf'wlwr(' and runs its own large Commun.ist InternE - :1on·Stalinis: worlel, The inter­ annanwn!.s industrv, (Vi il.h its mod­ "gold ,tandard" The Workers Le ern Lt'chnolngy and'uraniuTll depo:-3its, which dai! that the monetarv til(' SO" til i\Irican ruling cia,;s already and prop was supporLed hv l he swedt hRS nnciear power plants could T'"otsky. It clai] and muscle' and hlood of black South probably build an atom bomb.) rcvisionisn1 of the African slaves. After South African forces are, of course, 1971, the oS, said that it Party and offers llsed to hold down l.heir black working being TrotskyisL longer e:xchange dollars for g-old dass, but they are also llsed to aid the other countries" show, it is one of f'ortug11eSC imperialists and th" Rho­ f(rnupiTlgs and fa( S:nce then the value: of the dollar desian s('til('r-state. now, there has drastically declined a:ld that of ill pr(-'~;{'rving intac are thousands of South troops 1,)1(' hnrriers divij he.s even more sharplv increased. in Ithod('sia (Zimbahwe) fightillg the each country's curr,;n'cy becomes f:,ruerri lIa rnovement. i::J.iiatcd and is worth less and less, the There has been constant speculatioll THEWLC banks and investors demand the one that South Africa would support the commodity which seems sure to stay white settlers of Angola and Mozam," The New Yo valuable: gold" From $35 an ounce in Guerrilla fighter. in Rhodesia [Zimbabwe]. The fight against imp,,,'ialism and a.;;;;a.em~~lique (both on the borders of South Socialist S< 1971, the price of gold has shot up to requires an international proletarian leadership. Africa) if they broke away from New York $132 an ounce-and may not yet have . Portugal, Tn July, 1973, the fonner d<:clnrin::; our supp reached its ceiling. During the "gold South African Interior Minister told a carrqwigns of He exchange standard," South Africa had and nine other U.S. banks have South puhlic meeting in Rhodesia that "The T"ITV Delgado in a halance-of-payments deficit every Yd American capitalism can be African branches. critical to the South African economy, Zambesi (a river on the Rhodesian COllgr('s.sional ~)i~t year, Since 1971, the South African f'unnJJl[j on the W( Altogether 300 American firms have For example, in 1960, after the northern border and also north of ~apitalists have had a payments Delgado rUHnill investments here. In 1970, these U.S. infamous Sharpeville massacre, for­ Mozambique) will from now on be and surplus and a really booming econ­ Chisholm, th" Dem Investments reaped over $100 milJion eign investors pulled out of South remain South Africa's northern bor­ omy. HbJack WOITlaB rnill in profits. In 1969, U.S. companies Alfrica in droves, fearing a revolution, der." The present Interior Minister sold $518 million worth of goods to the has said, "We know what to do if our The WL's "E U.S. INVESTMENTS An American businessman, Charles South African economy and bought Engelhard, arranged a $,lO-million neighhor's house is, on firc," iBuH0tin, June 21. Amcng those tapping South Afri­ 3]51 million worth of South African loan to the South African mining, can wealth have been the American products, This gave the U.S. a industry from American sources. This THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL capitalists-and not small ones, natiqn-to-nation trade surplus of $367 was important in ending the flight of The South African system is rooted either, Of the U.S. 's 20 Jargest firms, million, South Afrka is good for capital, (Engelhard was a big backer in the internationaieapitaiist system. 12 have South African investments. you-if you are a white U.S. capitalist. of the liberal wing of the Democratic Therefore, the struggle against South The Bi&: Three auto corporations, plus It is true that the U.S. imperialists Party and a friend of President African apartheid cannot be separated U.S. Steel, Union Carbide and Gulf Oil only own 15 per cent of the foreign Johnson. For his support of liberal from the struggle for an international are a few of ~he imperialist investors. investments in South Africa causes, he won an Annual Brother­ First "iationaJ City, Chase Manhattan (British imperialists own two·thirds). hood Award from the National Council Cont!d. p, 17 md Jews.) . is itself an imperialist mHm imperialist. It exploits from a third of the ent. For its booming Workersl.eague Opposes United";'i outh African imperial­ by Wayne Gordon :Jy exploitable workers references are to the WL'sQuUeth.) refused to allow members of other need for a labor party. Oldy 5 to joIIl .... months; Forexample, party•• _ • Then we must Introd_ oar . T~e~ stren~h .of ~he working class warns, .. workers Cif the deepening organizations to attend the WL I black miners working hes m Its solidanty, Its weakness in its economic crisis and of the tendency demonstrations, even keeping the transitional IIIogans. • •• [Leon' Trotsky come from outside the It on the Labor Party in the United State.I disunity. The divisions are' deep towards political dictatorship. places and times secret from everyone The entirety of the Workers League between white workers and black and correctly demands that but its supporters! Whefl a big ported from the three practice shows they do not understand brown, between men· and women ... the trade UDions· Call for a Congress de~<;,nstration, to defend the rights of governments touching the key Leninist tactic of the united workers,.between.unionized and unor­ of Labor•.• for the buDding of a labor HaItIan refugees, was held in May front. Their labor party line, unlike Botswana, Swaziland party.pledged to a socialist program to ganized, between skilled crafts and right i?- the middle of their. Brooklyn Trotsky's, is not part of the united rhese countries have production line workers. meet tbe crisis.• ; [inclnding) national· campaIgn area, the WL did not show front approach at all. Thus the rganization of African ization of industry••• without compen­ up. Even the urge to overcome class Workers League can jump from an ey are just puppet disunity is used to weaken the sation... by a workers government. economy is wholly The campaign is supportable. Its WALL OFF POLITICS opportunist line on the question to a proletariat. Union hacks use-"unity" formally correct call for a labor party ing the labor power of a.s a. defense against militant opposi­ program is far superior to that of the The WL does all it can to wall its . Other workers come Socialist Workers Party candidate in members and supporters off from based on a socialist program and still tlOmsts. They sell out thejnterests of not get any nearer to Trotskyism. To ependent'" nation of blacks and other specially\oppressed the 12th CD, Maxine Williams. Her other political tendencies. It excludes uler, Hastings Banda, program calls for, among other things, political opponents from public forums the Workers League the labor party workers to maintain the facade of slogan is something they inherited iery "revolutionary" racist "unity." "community control" of education and,meetings. Its members are under :er independence he (electing local bourgeois governments strict orders not to talk to outside from Trotsky which they carry around like so much baggage. l his country into a UNITED FRONT to boss school workers) and hiring groups. The WL does not dare to drop ;outh Africa and sell "local residents" to be police. its anti-Trotskyist sectarianism. The character of the WL's line on )r power. The task of revolutionary Marxists Regardless of the merits of its the labor party was expressed quite se colony of Mozam- is to convince the workers that a real OUR DIFFERENCES positions, the Young Socialist mem­ clearly in 1972. When the AFL-CIO lasting unity can only"be reached refused to endorse McGovern, the African workers for We have important objections to bers could not defend the WL·YS hes. The Portuguese around the revolutionary program, program. They are attracted to the YS Bulletin headlined: "AFL-CIO Tops the Trotskyist Transitional Program.· the Workers Party program. For Threaten Labor Party at Miami." aoig financial bonus example, the Platform declares: "Rac· on a very low level. Young adults are For this purpose, Marxists developed (July 17, 1972) An article explained: r workers to South ism. is openly encouraged by the offered barbecues, summer camps, the strategy of the united front. We What dominates this convention in fact h Africans get cheap government which uses the busing hasketball games and dances as demand of the union bureaucrats and is the complete break-up of the ck workers get wages issue to divide the working. class." come-ons to a very little Marxism. reformists and of other left groupings, relationship between the labor mo"e' ,tIe bit better than This statement, correct as far as it People attracted in such a non·politi· that they unite in specific class ment and the Democratic Party. The I-fozambique country­ goes, hides the fact that the Workers cal fashion had better be kept away Democratic Convention opened this .actions. In order for us to win their League has repeatedly stated that itis. from other tendencies. week with the leadership of the followers to our program and leader­ for busing. ("Opposition to busing can The WL has another good reason to AFL-CIO desperately seeking to hold ship, we denounce them for every .LIST POLICE have only one meaning, and that is be sectarian. The sectarianism is a back the movement of the working class limitation they put on the s.truggle. conceding to racists and reactionary barrier against the WL's persistent f"r its own 1..I>or partv.... 1ial /"Third World") While still in the leadership of the tendency toward opportunism. Of course, the "labor tops" had not rialists try to set up I fascist forces." March 27, 1972) Communist International, Trotsky This dynamic can be clearly see~n completely broken with the Democra­ If-partners to police .While the RSL supports the right of declared: blacks to go to any school they want, the WL line on the labor party. 'JiIl,e tic Party and they certainly did not t" colonies. Brazil in The outlived groupings and factions are threaten a lallor party, as their we oppose the strategy of busing, of Workers League has continually lsrae! and Iran in the interested in preserving intact and "neutral·for-Nixon" stance' was to forcing the children of any workers to raised the call for a labor party. ;e such imperialist immutable all the barriers dividing the Today, it calls for such a party on the show. Meany broke with McGovern working class into segtr,.mts. We, on the attend rotten, slum schools. Not only South Africa in black basis of a socialist program: But for hecause McGovern was "against the is Portugal with its other hand, have a vib:.1ttake in pulling the anti-busing conservatives, but also war," not because' he was more down the barriers of conservatism and the pro·busing liberals use "the busing years it called for such a party to be formed on a refonnist progralll. anti-labor than any otner Democrat. as the largest armed in teaching the working class to issue to divide the working class." follow our example. Herein lies the The Platform also predicts repres­ What it did not and still does not FAIL TO WARN WORKERS tant in the world. Its whole meaning of tbe united front understand is why Trotsky first lped with the latest sion of the workers and even goes so In any case, it was the job of the policy, a meaning which derives directly far as to say that " ... the prepara­ advocated raising the labor party les and helicopters; it from the social revolutionary essence of slogan in 1938. Trotsky's call for a WL to warn workers that if the s from France and our party. (The First Five Years of the tions for civil war against the entire present labor bureaucracy ever formed working class are far advanced." labor party in the U.S. was based on rlUts~~ own large Communist International, Vol. 2, p. 168) its own labor party, it would be a However, neithevthe Platform nor the the method of the united front. He ,trv. /With its mod· The Workers League is one of the started frorn the objective need for a sell-out, pro-capitalist labor party­ nd'uranium deposits, Bulletin ever.tail on the trade unions not whal. the workers need, "a labor groups which claims to stand on the to build workers' defense guards to re"oIutionary party and the actual :l ruling class already party on a socialist program." Not a methods and program of Lenin and defend workers and minorities from smallness of the revolutionary party er plants and could Trotsky. It claims to reject the /then the SWP) and its isolation from word of this appears in the article. n atom bomb.) fascist thugg~r violent govern· The WL can "get away" with its revisionism of the Socialist Workers ment atLacks. the masses. forces are, of courst., Party and offers the appearance of Despite, these and other differences, The labor party slogan was tlms a opposit.ion to the united front only n their black working heing Trotskyist. In fact, as we will we were sincerely willing to aid Lhe tactic which the vanguard could use La because of the relatively low level of e also used to aid the show. it is one of " ... the outlived Workers League campaign in any struggle for a revolu tionary party in a the class struggle in the U.S. today. rialists and the Rho­ groupings and factions... interested way, such as helping the petition drive ,yay which placed them in a united When the AFL-CIO failed to organize teo Right now, there in preserving intact and immutable all necessary for getting on the ballot. As front relationship with the mass of a workers' movement to impeach South African troops the barriers dividing the working in any principled united front, we workers. In joint struggle for an Nixon, then the WL's little marches lbabwe) fighting the dass." woulCl have insisted upon our right to independent party of the working could be sold to its followers as the mt. sell The Torch, raise our differences class, the vanguard would fight for a "mass movement.~· constant speculation THE WL CAMPAIGN with the Workers League and to revolutionary program for this party. But what will happen when the a would support the working class really goes into mass The New York Revolutionary expose the latter's inconsistency and Angola and..Mozam­ vacillations.-­ TROTSKYON THE LABOR PARTY aetion? PerI1I1P_s_the WL·YS will stay he borders of South Socialist League sent a--letter to the on the sidelines, with their isolated \; ew York City- Workers League, In any case, the WL informed us broke away from ... We cannot say to the trade unions, "mass actions." The young members declaring our support far the election that "we aren't interested" in any iy, 1973, the former united front work. you should adhere to the SWP. It would would no doubt be disillusioned and terior Minister told a campaigns of Helen Halyard and he a joke.... Whyi' Because the decline demand that the WL jt;lin the real Terry Delgado in the 14th and 12th Such a reaction is typical of the WL, l Rhodesia that "The which has frequently refused to join of capitalism develops ten-8 hundred mas.s movement. r on the Rhodesian Congressional Districts in Brooklyn, times faster than the speed of our party. But then they will have to stand up running on the "Workers Party" slate. with other groups in common activi· It is a new discrepancy. The necessity of and also north of ties. The WL had been re<;enUy in large union meetings or strike Delgado is running against Shirley a political party is given by the objective committees and defend their positions 1 from now on be and running an "Oust Nixon" campaign. conditions, but our party is too small, Chisholm, the Democratic Party's pet against, the attacks of the union frica's northern bor­ Not only did the WL refuse to go to with too little authority to organize the nt Interior Minister "black woman militant." bureaucracies and of other left groups. The WL's "Election Platform" any of the anti-Nixon demonstrations workers into its own ranks.... In a lOW what to do if our held by other organizations, but it mass meeting 500 would agree on the They will have to try to respond to the is on fire." (Bulletin, June 21, 1974-all further reformism of the bureaucrats and the I I would like to suboi:ribe to THE TORCH. I Communist Party, the centrism of r--·------.---·------most of the other left tendencies and INTERNATIONAL I ' CHECK ONE. I the Trotskyism of the Revolutionary ican system is rooted I ) 6 issues for 50 cents. : I ) 12 is~"es f.... $1.00. NAME • Socialist League. It won't be eaSy. lal capitalist system. Despite the centrist character of the ruggle against South BE ) 26 issues for $3.00. '. SUBS ) Supporting sub-.,cr;ption: #5.00. ADDRESS m' Workers League and the limitations of I cannot be separated the program 'of its current campaign, e for an international Send to: III NOW! I Revolutionary SociaUst Leape CITI' II we urge a vote for the 'Workers Party Cont'd. p. 17 13766 WoodtNl'd "ven"" I candidates in the 12th and 14th CD's I IfiPIaad Par... .M1 ~ II'I'.M'E. #.W. ODOR iii .. _...~-_- ... _-""--iiifilllO--ilili_--~-., ..... in Brooklyn on Election Day. Pa.qe 16/The Torcl./November, 1974

But 1\ surv"'y of tJ I thos{c traditional ~ndl impOlLanc(;;, 697,000 275,000 in f £tnd fuYn.ij Jun,);er indwltrieb 8lnpi ea<:h. A>l ~/)l.Ith Too!!y Three: "Undcniai.Ay, "he " encouraged primarily indwlt;ry in wLic;h eve] often eXUlts on the ! Today, Mlly-Jun~, 19~ Fuither, fiY'anei. largely from outside Northeast, with AUll way-station. To noip whistling Dixie, I!~ III I But

BY DAVID FRANKLIN We have noted that the South historically "PROSPRltl1.'," functioned as a super-oppressed region within the Tn agriculture, 'II> 11 United States with similar characteristics to the exploitatioJi of the "third world." But despite the sy~lem is a of tl l;(ls dramllLicallv similarities, there are fundamental differences. Du~ :0 a complex of reasons-the-geographical !,I'e end of prohlems proximity, the close commercial, communicative, the farm. As Sm,!h 'I [mnsportative, and general cultural ties, etc.-the mechanization and South was never economically subordinated to the capital-intensive farm same degree, or in the same form, as the more Southerners off th' lam "ackward areas of the world. migrating to the city t, _ And, politically, the differences are even sharper. staying in a rural settir In the third world, completAi'political went along winter, 5easonal jobs il with economic subjugation. One of the chief effects adds that "Fl,>

But Ii survey of the work-force indicates that super-oPPfElssion·.of southern workers and rural poor incapal::>le of eliminating the super-oppression of those traditional industries have not lost their has direct effects which affect more than those southern workers. It will be even less able now, the importance: 697,000 textile workers; 421,900 in people presently living in the region. Many blacks' post-war boom being transformed into II appa~els; 275,000 in .food processing; 212,800 in and poor .w,hite "hillbillies," faced with poverty in decline. Perhaps God can think of an answer, chemIcals; and furmture, pulpw60d, paper and the South, fled to such urban centers as Detroit Imd shouldn't count on that either (he has a lumber industries employ less than 200,000 workers Chicago to find themselves in the "lower classes" of working through the channels of the each. As South Today, a bourgeois journal, admits:­ these areas. "Undeniably, the South has attracted and Conversely, the "higher positions" in southern encouraged primarily low-wage, labor-intensive society t~at have been created by the post-war industry in which even the fully employed worker prosperity are largely filled by modern-day versions often exists on the .margin of poverty." (South of "carpetbaggers." "You can go to any gathering Today, May-June, 1973, p. 7) of businessmen in Atlanta,"says Edward D. Smith, Further, the financing of production still comes chairman of the First National Bank of Atlanta, largely from outside the South, notably the "and I'll bet you $5 to a ginger cake that at least 50 Northeast, with Atlanta serving as the major per cent of them will not be natives." (Business way-station. To note this is hardly a matter of Week, Sept. 2, 1972, p. 36) . whistling Dixie, as later examination will show. I t is not a particularly malicious regional But most importantly, this "progress" cannot be southern bourgeoisie-great-grandl?ons of slave detached from class relations, and it is here where overseers or- anything like that-that is the prime the "New South" is very much the "Old South." "fause for the oppression of southern workers, but a typcialJy malicious bourgeoisie that will screw "PROSPERITY" IN CLASS TERMS workers anywhere, for as much as it can. Workers outside the South are not immune to these In agriculture, as mentioned, the old one·crop proceedings; many are thrown out of their jobs as system is a thing of the past, and tenant farming their former employers head for the cheaper has dramatically dropped. But this has not meant southern labor. A recent example of the old-fash· the end of problems for .th~ "little people".down on' ioned runaway shop is the move of Federal-Mogul the farm. As South Today further notes: "Farm from Detroit to Alabama. mechanization and the trend ~toward large, capital-intensive farms has pushed milliOlls of THE."NEW" (OLD) POLITICS Southerners off the land. They must choose between The 1920'8: f"rm worl,,,r. 11',,11 their plow by "",,,I. migrating to the city to live on ghetto incomes, or Like the economy, the southern political staying in a rural setting to work at odd jobs in the structure has changed in form, but has maintained winter. seasonal jobs in the summer." (The article an exceptionally repressive content. One of the social relations anywayl_ adds that "Federal policies have supported .large ways this is manifested is in the tax structures; the It is left for the 80";"Ii§t .'evolution to fulfill this incomes for large farmers, making almost no chief source of tax revenue in all the southern states task, in the process of abolishing the exploitation of provision for the small farmer and the landless farm is the general and selective sales tax, the most the working class altogether. This demands a workers.") retrogressive of all taxes. Another example is the mobilization not only of southern workers, but of And for the workers? The "southern differential" right-to-work laws existing throughout the South. the international proletariat, in an all-out fight i, very much a thing of the· present. Industrial Ostensibly aimed at giving a worker the "right" to against capitalism. wages average only 80 per cent of the nation's (up not join a union, their main intent is to re-inforee the This is 's theory of the Permanent only three per cent from the 1960 level-during ;­ dominance of open shops. Nor is this extremely Revolution, as applied to the ordeal of southern !:loom period). The "cheap living" in the South is reactionary character limited to internal southern labor and the general political conclusions that flow Gssentially a myth that by no means offsets this politics. If the "Solid South" is changing in party from it. fact; further, the abysmal lack of "public services" labels, its congressmen in Washington can be ------~------in southern cities merely intensifies the distinction. counted on to be the staunchest supporters of Pabloism in Argentina But even in industries where unionization exists, military spending, Vietnam-type wars, "law and the :'southern differential" is preserved. In 1971, for order," and Richard Nixons, even when most of the rest of the capitalist class has already deserted him. Cont'd. from p. 4 example. a local transit worker in Atlanta was paid of the Bolivian RevolutionAry Workers Party (POR) '>3.66·an hour while his New York counterpart was PERMANENT REVOLUTION --another one-time affiliate of the SWP- -am Daid $4.90; a building lahorer in Jackson, :Ilississippi was paid $3.09 an hour while a Peoria, The South, t.hen, still remains a super.oppressed ominous. These self-styled Trotskyists, through Illinois laborer got $6.44. Overall, the differential region of the U.S., but the forms of this oppression their constant capitulation to left-bourgeois cur­ 16.9 per cent of the total for workers under union contract has been have changed. The region no longer bears the exact rents, left the proletariat politically and physically only 14.3 pex cent. estimated at between 20 and 30 per cent. same relation to U.S. capital as it once did, but the unarmed before a right-wing coup d'etat. The me-crop lie:: syste:n has primary way that historical continuity has been result.: four years of Banzer's military dictatorship. h,mization and d:versifi­ EXTRA.REGIONAL EFFECTS maintained is of ut.most importance to the working The Argentine working_class, however, is far from nd the appiisation of we look back to per'capita income figures, we class, the special exploitation of southern labor. dcf"ated. The recent strike wave clearly focused on s in sharp contrast..,the see that it hides class distinctions. It also hides It boils down to this: capitalism, even in the the question of who will lead the labor movement :nethods of workmg"~the something else: the fact that the historical period of the post.war boom, has shown itself to be forward. The leftward motion of the working class, ~ economic substructure r-I ______-;;;;::;:=====:;:;;;;;;;;:;;;;;:;:;:;;;:;;:;:;;;:::;:;;;;;;;;==:::::::;;:::=::;;;:;::::::;;::::::===:::=~::=::;_IcombinedPeronist government,with the rightward has sent direction shock ofwaves the :cations within southern through the mass Peronist movement and shaken Health, tra'·lsportation, its best elements into opposition. :: been rapidly advanced. These developments allow for the creation of al ;, then, the South r.:lore revoluUonary leadership in the midst of the chaos of ltion as a wtole. (And it capitalist crisis-a leadership which can restore at large in some of the order ou the proletariat's terms. s of capitalism. Witness If the PST pursues its present course, it will no ,rnmercialism and gaudy only prove incapable of providing this leadership­ ok Aaron's record-break­ it will represent a major obstacle to the creation 0 :tadium. Perhaps a more such a leadership. worthy and measurable ~o~th Revolutionaries within the PST's ranks mus f the militaTY in southern IAfrica fight to prevent this outcome. They.must cnaaen,f!;ClI the PST's hardened centrist leadership with a revolutionary Trotskyist program-a program "PROSPERJITY" which Moreno and Coral claim to stand 011 hut only ons to this "prosperity." World use to deceive and disarm the workers who believe ita income (a measure of these claims. , we Imd that the South's The Transitional Program must be taken off the nly 80 per cent of the Revolution bookshelves and brought into combat-most rom the past, no doubt, U.S. miners protest importation of coal mined by slave I"bor in South Arrka. urgently, today, the demand for armed workers' Cont'd. from p. 14 b.e American norm. 40 per is necessary for the liberation of the South African militias to defend the working class. The lives socialist revolution. Faced with totalitarian dicta· in rural sett:ngs/' workers and peasants. revolutionary program must be counte,poscd a cent nationally. torship, the South African liberation forces have a every turn to the fake democratic program of the special need for p.. utside, international aid. The workers of South Africa desperately need an )€en broken with the past international vanguard party composed of the left·Peronists and their admirers. of southern industry. The exiled meIJ\lbers of the Pan African Congress and the African' Congress (two major libera~ion. revolutionary workers of all nations, with a socialist Only such a decisive tllrn--a turn .Which reqU,~ires' ~try has moved into the program of uncompromising opposition to all forms the removal of the PST's present leadership- ly related to traditional organizations of ~he past) get aid from !nd.i:vidual prevent the PST from repeating the fate of th African governm nts, from the OrganIZatIon of of capitalist rule. The struggle to rebuild the textile machinery, for Trotskyist Fourth International on a revolutionary Bolivian POR. African Unity and from China or Russia. But these Only such a struggle can contribute to a are all capitalist ~tates. They cannot support a basis is a matter of life or death for the South African revolution. Ivictory of the working class in Latin AmeriCA']. L-~==~~~movement against______intemational capitalism-which ~ ______~ ______~.----.~ ...... ~---.J