·IN THIS ISSUE CLEVELAND CITY AT WAR SUNFLOWER COUNTY LOWNDES COUNTY SNCC STAFF MEETING TEATRO CAMPESINO JUNE 1967 WE ARE GOING MOVEMENT-SNCC TO BUILD OFFICE RAIDED I

SAN FRANCISCO - The joint offices of by several middle-aged businessmen driv­ THE MOVEMENT and Bay Area SNCC ing late model cars. MOVEMENT staff were raided by unknown persons in the people took down the license plate num­ early morning hours of May 22. bers and are now checking out who owns The raiders entered by an unlocked the cars. outside window and broke the 'lock of an inside door to enter the office. They stole FBI NOT INTERESTED the entire MOVEMENT subscription list, Terence Cannon, MOVEMENT Editorial and confidential files containing SNCC Board member, called the FBI, told them reports and correspondence. During the about the raid, and asked whether they raid they strewed the aclclress stencils of would investigate. "ls there ,any reason the newspaper over the floor. Also taken why we should?" said the local FE! chief. was a list of international contacts andthe "This seems to be part of a general names and addresses of persons working pattern of raids on SNCC and movement­ for SNCC and THE MOVEMENT. related offices around the country," Can­ non said. "Is that so?" said the FBI man. SUSPECT SEEN "Besides, I thought you'd be interested, The building is shared with a church considering the remarks your Director has and two church-related groups. On the made recently," said Cannon. previous Friday at 4:30 A.M., ttvo volun­ , "What do you mean, my Director?" teers for the Night Ministry, seated in an said the FBI, with the slightest trace of office in the front of the buildiI;lg, saw hostility beginning to creep into his voice. a man trying to enter the building. They "I mean J. Edgar Hoover, who just described him as "micldle-aged." Their accused SNCC of' being in contact with screams drove him off•. All-Negro, Red' Chinese, Marxist - Len­ Gtmerally speaking, middle-aged men inist, revolutionary groups dedicated to don't enter buildings late at night through the overthrow of the UnitedStates govern­ the .....indow to rob the poor box. THE ment." MOVEMENT staff assumes that this was "The only grounds under which we would the same person who raided our office investigate would be if you were govern­ two days later. ment property," concluded the FBI chief. During the week after the raid, THE Government property THE MOVEMENT MOVEMENT office was under surveillance is not...

RAP BROWN, new chairman of SNCC.

ATLANTA, GEORGIA -- "SNCC is country," Brown said when asked about moving from rhetoric to prograin," Rap working with white organizations. "We Brown told THE MOVEMENT shortly will cooperate with any group strug­ after his election as Chairman of the gling against a common oppressor." Student Nonviolent Coordinating Commit­ SNCC does not see its work as com­ tee. "We are going to build Freedom peting with any already existing peo­ Organizations across the country." ple's groups. It will organize in unor­ The role of SNCC will be to create ganized areas. A major push will be to independent power groups and "instill create a nation-wide anti-draft move­ in them political know-how and political ment of black high-school students. . ' power," B1'own explained. The freedom Organizations will be multi-issue groups, CARMICHAEL including such things as maids' unions, Stokely Carmichael did not run for welfare groups, mothers against the war. any office in SNCC in this election. They will not be Freedom Parties, He declined a seat on SNCC's Central Brown said. They will be independent Committee. "rm just an organizer," He forces, i,ndependent of both parties. "We said joyfully. He is planning to go to don't want to be put in the bag of being Washington, D.C. to organize a Freedom just a political party," he said. "The Organization. Freedom Organizations must be looked to by Black people as a source of jobs, SAN FRANCISCO power and freedom." The Bay Area is being considered by "The prob I e m with Lown des (the SNCC for a projectbeginningthis summer. Lowndes County Freedom Organization, If this happens, a SNCC Field Secre~ organi~ed with the help of SNCC) was tary ",ill be assigned to this area, with that we had no economic philosophy. We several volunteers. The purpose of the built a political machine. But how do program will be to organize a black­ you sustain that without an economic anti draft movement and Freedom Or­ structure? The Poverty Program will ganization. come in there and try to buy them off. It will undermine and drain the move­ ment. Had we been successful in the NEW SNCC OFFICERS election we would have controlled the Elected with Rap Brown were Stanley tax assessing. We could have forced Wise, Executive Secretary and Ralph Fea­ the whites to sell their land cheaply. therstone, ProgramSecretary. Brownfor­ As it is one family owns 70% of the merly worked in Alabama BUilding Free­ land in the -county. You can't have free­ dom Organizations similar to the Lowndes dom under a system like that. Freedom County Freedom Organization. Wise has Organizations must have power in order worked in Mississippi and Alabama and. to stay independent. Black folks can't was formerly one of SNCC's three Or­ do that now." ganizational Secretaries. Featherstone al­ so worked in Mississippi and' Alabamll, COOPERATION then in Washington, D.C. His interest lies particularly in economic projects and he "We will cooperate with any other is expected to guide SNCC's program in group that is fighting the draft in this related directions. .. Address stencils litter floor of Movement office after raid, PAGE 2 THE MOVEMENT JUNE 1967 THINGS 'ARE ··..·..·..··..ED ITOR IALS . MOVEMENT HEATING' UP DRAFTEE Someone used the term •'vandalism" WHAT THEY SAY WHAT WE SAY in connection with the raid on our office ARRESTED last month. It was not vandalism. It was ABOUT US AND ABOUT THEM a professional raid, carried off in a business-like way by people who knew Students for a Democratic Society 'New Left' Newspaper On May 17, Brooks Penney, a member what they wanted. They ransacked our have, at least unoffici,alIy, disassociated of THE MOVEMENT's editorialgroup, was To the Editor: files, taking only certain ones. They from Snick. A San Francisco "New arrested at the Oakland Induction Center. maga~ine, We see that out of the dingy, clearly wanted to find out who we are, Left" "The Movement," has He was charged with disturbing the peace announced official disassociation from cluttered offices of The New who we know, and who is in contact with York Times, where white editor,; of the military flunkies who were pro­ Snick. us. , sit and jUdge the movements of 'cessing men to go out and kill or get The government and the press are the world, has come an "al'ticle" killed. Ralph McGill in the Atlanta Constitution on the New Left. [Page 1. trying hard to cut SNCC off from its sup­ Penney had been ordered to become a May 7.J port. SNCC has come under extreme You mention The Movement professional killer that day and was pass­ attack from the FBI and the House Armed POllters of (he Guevara and newspaper and claim that it has ing out leaflets inside the center stating Services Committee for its opposition of Ma.Icdlm X. the black na.­ "disaffiliated" with the Student that he would go to jail before anybody tionallst sla.l.n here two years to the Vietnam War. Rep. Mendel Rivers Nonviolent Coordinating Com­ was going to make him a: killer. ago, are advertised for sale "at mittee. It has not. wants to do away with .the First Amend­ special buUc rates" in a san THE MOVEMENT fully supports any ment in order to put Stokely Carmichael FranciSc() monthly, The Move­ The Movement supports fully and all actions along thiS line. Perhaps, ment. The publication the Black Power philosophy of in jail. J. Edgar Hoover is trying to link racUcal disaffiliated recently from the S.N.C.C. It is one of the few as Sartre says, "The only real freedom us with so-called insurrectionary groups. Student Nonviolent Coordinat-, newspapers in the llountry that that we have is the freedom to say NO." This c limate of official repression ing Committee, the militant, gives without distortion the We must say NO to this crime in Vietnam. Southem-oriented movement views of the Black Liberation leads directly to raids such as ours. that used to be one of the pU­ We must say NO to the arrogant auto­ There have been three raids against lars ot the New Left but has movement. It is one of the few crats who are killing black people in this SNCC and movement-related offices and lately veered toward black pow­ that S.N.C.C. respects enough country and yellow people in Vietnam. er Coals and away from stu· to give information that it can­ homes in San Jose in the last few months. dent. for .. Democratic Society. not trust ,with tthe American Only in this way will it be even remotely Official and unofficial raids have recently Tm No Paclfl.t· press. possible to move this country toward jus­ taken place against SNCC offices in Chi­ Unlike The New York Times. tice and sanity.• cago and Philadelphia. Che Guevara's bearded like­ TERENCE CANNON ness was encountered on the Editorial Board lf these forces can isolate us they will waIls of the littered offices of destroy the movement. We need your sup­ .z'a.dtcal newspapers and left· The Movement wing groupa. His name croPJ)ed STOKELY CARMICHAEL port more than ever. We urge you to send Field Hand, S.N.C.C. contributions to SNCC and THE MOVE­ Paul Hofmann in the New York Times Atlanta, May 13, 1967 WELFARE MENT and to find subscribers for the newspaper. The more repressive the government and police become the more important it is that we exist.... PRESSURE ..•• ·~~ •..L ETTERS·· FORCES REAGAN Brother Stokely, Later we, with the student mass, moved Representatives of some six welfare Hawaiian Gardens Mothers Group and During the past week there occured toward the Athletic Field, where they rights organizations threatened to sit-in others. a series of events at the University of were beginning their parade. The stu­ at the office of Ralph Goff, Gov. Reagan's The representatives appeared at the Puerto Rico, for which around 30 students dents staged a sit-in in front of the welfare man in Los Angeles. The de­ offices of the State Department of Social ••• have been suspended. cadets, thus not allowing the parade to monstration occurred May 22, 1967 after Welfare to protest the racism and in­ FUPI (Feder'aeion Universitarios Pro commence. The stage from which the a statement from Spencer Williams to humanity of Williams' statement. Williams Indepencia: student liberation movement parade was being led was turned over. the effect that there would be no June tried very hard to make it sound like with which SNCC is allied, ED.) has They had to call off the parade. The welfare checks unless the federalgovern­ it was the responsibility of the federal been carrying on an intense campaign' Air Force generals, American Legion­ ment acted to advance the appropriation of government to rush the appropriation against ROTC and for the right to picket naires, and the local colonial politicians some $38 'million. The groups', from through and the state would simply sit on campus. bad to leave the field. They were pushed Long Beach, Pueblo del Rio Housing, back and watch people starve if the Last Thursday, May 4th, the Air Force off the field, covered with dirt, and deeply Project and other areas, included Citi­ money didn't come. Charles Eure, spokes­ ROTC -- which is in apparant decadence humiliated. zens for Creative Welfare, S.O.S., Car­ man for the groups put it this way, "We here, due to student repudiation -- held The slogans of these acts were: Soli­ melitas Welfare Rig h t S Organization, hold Gov. Reagan personally responsible an "Open House" with the intention of darity with Vietnam, Out with the ROTC, for the 1,300,000 welfare recipients in recruiting followers. They planned to and Against Imperialism in Puerto Rico.­ the state of California. The state has been have a parade on campus honoring San The students remained in possession of coming up with money to cover that Juan Mayoress, Felisa Rincon deGautier, the field; the military had to run away. ANTI' - WAR annual federal deficit for 15 years and and the officers of the 10th Nr.val District Now) the Chancellor is about to expell have always been repaid. lf they can of the Antilles Military Command, of the FUPI leaders and some of our most appropriate $7,000,000 for a new Northern the Air Force, and of the American militant members from the University••• STUDENTS California Disneyland then they hadbetter Legion. They also had a conference in Please let these events be known as try and find this money fast.',' the University Theater -- where you Widely as possible. We need your soli­ MEET Three days later, on May 25, a letter spoke when you were here. This was darity. Black Power! Independence for was sent to Gov. Reagan which stated in an evident provocation. We picketed in Puerto Rico! Two resolutions on the draft were part: front of the Theater. While we were adopted at the first national conference "It is apparently the position of the picketing, facist students and Cuban exiles Revolucionariarnente, of the Student Mobilization Committee, State of California that checks scheduled tried to co un t e r-picket. There were Alberto Perez held May 12-14 at the University of for issuance June 1st must be delayed several violent incidents with them, but President, FUPI Chibago. Some 500 liberal and radical at least ten days, because federal reim­ we made them nee. students from universities around the bursement has not yet been authorized by Friends, country plus a delegation of civil rights Congress. We are further informedthatin activists attended. the past on each occasion of delay in The first resolution called for an end supplemental appropriations to finish out llfE MOVEM'ENT We have had to take precautions our­ selves against the "vandalism" bit. It to student (2-S) deferments and was the fiscal year, the State has advanced is published monthly by must be hell to get the stencil cards carried 225 to 88. The second resolu­ the money to the counties and no delay The Movement Press thrown around, not even considering the tion, a proposal for black and white draft was occasioned. 449 14th Street other damage. We will reprint your press resistance unions which originated in the "We content ,that, by California law -­ San Francisco, California 94103 release and send it out to our member­ "Black Sfudents" workshop was approved irrespective of any rights available under 626-4577 ship in our next mailing. almost unanimously. federal statutory, or constitutiona(law -­ A strong statement from the "Black our clients and those similarly situated EDITORIAL GROUP Brotherhood-Revolution Students" workshop stated, in part: have a right to their full welfare checks. ference Cannon Joe Blum Bi'ian Heggen ". •• one of the main problems facing Welfare and Institutions Code Sections Bobbi Cieciorka William Mandel New South Student Black activists ••• is the lack of defini­ 11011 and 11450 establish one and only Mike Sharon Ellen Estnn Nashville, Tenn. tion relating the merger of the peace one criterion for the dimunition of welfare Brooks Penney Dave Wellman and civil rights movements. Thur far, aid under AFDC, AID, AB, or OAS pro­ Hardy Frye Karen Koonan the relationship has been seen as civil grams -- decrease of the federal share, Dear Movement, rights forces supplementing peace efforts Congress has not only not decreased, LOS ANGELES STAFF rather than the formation of coalition of it has in fact promised full payment of I understand your files were rifled two equally important facets of revolu­ Bob Neimann the federal share," and •Movement' subscription lists were tionary activity. lf the civil rights move­ 1720 Butler, 6 The letter was signed by James D. stolen. Under the circumstances, I'd like ment is expected to expend time and Lorenz, Jr., Carol Ruth Silver, and Don Los Angeles, CA 90008 to take this opportunity to renew my sub­ 478-9509 energy developing creative ,alternatives B. Kates, Jr. of California Rural Legal scription. Enclosed is a check for $20. to the racist war in Vietnam; the peace Assistance, who had prepared a class Keep the change to pay the phone bilL movement must be expected to spend action (a lawsuit of individuals on behalf CHICAGO STAFF equal time seeking creative alternatives of all welfare recipients) in case the Mike James Will Simard to racist wars here at home." Governor did nbt come up with the money. 4533 N. Sheridan Rd. Berkeley. Calif. The' conference adopted a national These independent actions, plus a well Chicago, Ill. program including a campus referendum publicized presentation by Welfare Rights on the war, a recommendation to the Groups at the Los Angeles County Boardof SUBSCRIPTIONS (adult) Spring Mobilization Committee for Supervisors, did the trick, as on May 26, $2 per year, individual copies, IWW (labor) SONGBOOKS a March on Washington this fall, plus 1967 Gov. Reagan signed a proclamation $7 per hundred per month, non­ 40¢ each 5/ $1.85 C. Ooehrer, P,O, Box 592 continuation of anti-war programs and to the effect that the state would make cQmmerci,a.l pplk, ~l,Iqsc;ripti9ns '~!WQse ctikago: Illinois ,60 6.9 0 ',_ ,ii- .- .' ...~ caravans ,afi.d. attempts \to ,.md,,@p.,. "the' neeessa-l:"y· advarrees:'·lfhe"J]iune' lst Advertising: $4 per column inch P

CHICAGO - On sunday, May 21st, a and bottles and physically threatening Dedication to rename Washington Park in members of the hugepol1ce force who had fOR ROCHESTER? Chicago for s 1a i n leader- Malcolm X drawn their pistols and aimed them at Shabazz was turned to Violence, complete members of the huge police force who with ,billy clubs and riot guns by the city had drawn their pistols and aimed them at by: Richard Fried and Alfred Price During the following week, Louis Eilers, police. members .of the crowd. As more police president of Kodak, offered in place of The occasion, which started out on a reinforcements arrived, blockingtraffic at Over 1,000 supporters and members of the disowned FIGHT-Kod'ak agreement a joyous note, with speeches, Afro-American the intersection, the crowd was forced FIGHT, a community union of poor people vague pledge of general help for all music and dance, was disrupted when two back into the park, where, according to in the central black ghetto of Rochester, minority groups; he termed this as "the white women attempted to join the crowd of eye witnesses, police fi red indiscrim­ New York, marched on Eastman Kodak's white hope for the poor of Rochester." between 250 and 300 black people. When inately upon men, women and children. A annual stockholders' meeting held at At a FIGHT meeting, Florence rejected the women were askedtoleave and refused, thirteen year old girl was allegedly ar­ Flemington; New Jersey on April 25. the offer, saying: "We're not interested they were set upon by two black women rested after being clubbed by police. Wal- FIGHT (I;reedom, Integration,God, Honor, in white hope for the poor of Rochester. Today) was protesting Kodak's abrupt FIGHT asks Kodak where is the black repudiation of a mutually negotiated con­ hope for the underprivileged and unem­ tract which agreed to provide jobs for ployed in Rochester." 600 hard-core unemployed persons. At the demonstration, Minister Franklin D. R. Florence, president of FIGHT, THE SYSTEM gave a one-hour ultimatum to comply The causes of the conflict are more with the agreement or face a "war against than just a commun~cation gap in the Eastman Kodak and the power structure Kodak corporate hierarchy. They pri­ of Rochester." At the end of the hour, marily stem'from the paternalistic manner Kodak board chairman WilliamS.Vaughan by which Kodak controls Rochester, a explained again that the contract was not city of 600,000 people. While unemploy­ legitimate because the company officers ment is currently 2% in the metropolitan who signed it were not authorizedto do so. area.. for blacks it is estimated at 20% Florence then announced: "Racial war higher. At this same time, Kodak has has been declare_dupon the black people of just had a record first quarter net earn­ the United States by' Eastman Kodak," ings of $60,759,000. Rochester has a paradoxical job situa­ tion with about 10,000 openings for highly ~ORPORATE POWER skUled workers (due to the character of The dispute between FIGHT .and Kodak two of the city's larger employers, Kodak began last December 22 when Kodak and Xerox) and many unemployed who do abrogated an agreement which had been not have the necessary skills to enter the negotiated only 48 hours earlier. The labor market. contract, signed on December 20 by The training programs of nonunion Minister Florence for FIGHT and by John Kodak have always been inadequate to MUlder, an assistant vice-president of reach those at the bottom of the skill Kodak, called for "the recruitment and ladder. ThOUgh Kodak says it has 1,200 referral (to include screening and selec­ to 1,400 blacks· working for it out of a tion) of 600 unemployed people over a labor force of 40,000, the number is not 24 - month period, barring unforeseen commensurate with the central importance economic changes affecting the Rochester of Kodak in Rochester. Blacks comprise community." Mulder, head of a special 35% of the unemployed work force even bargaining committee appointed by Ko­ though only 13% of the population is dak's president, was two days later black. rebuffed by the company's executive com­ But Kodak's role in the city is more mittee, and with "his eyes ••• full of important than the salient fact that it tears" apologized to FIGHT officers for employs one of every three industrial the double-cross. Five months later, he workers in Rochester. It sets the town's was purged from the company's board of dominant tone and style: that ofbenevolent JIM LEWIS, President of Afro-American Student Association, addresses crowd in directors for his role in signing the front of sign renaming park, agreement. CONTINUED ON PAGE 9 who pushed and shoved them away from the lace sustained several broken ribs. Of the area. Within minutes, the meeting was sur­ more than thirty arrested, several were rounded by uniformed and plainclothes injured either during·the arrest or after. policemen with guns drawn. Heated argu­ ments ensued as police attempted to dis­ COMMUNITY APPROVAL purse the crowd. But the group, which The idea for renaming the park, which remained generally calm', refused toleave is located in the heart.of the city's vast and continued their meeting. South Side black community, originated As the program ended, an annouBcem~nt with the Afro-American Student Associa­ was made that a black and gold sign tion, headed by 23 year old Jim Harvey. bearing the name, "Malcolm X Shabazz The dedication commemorated the May Park" would be posted at the northern 19th birthday of Malcolm X Shabazz. entrance to the park (about two blocks For over thirty years, the small hill away from the meeting place) and the where the meeting was held has been people were asked to re-convene at that known as "The Forum," a public place point. Unaware that the police were wait­ where people of many persuasions have ing for them, the crowd walked toward gathered to debate the issues of the day. the old Washington Park sign, intending Speakers at the May 21st meeting were to replace it. in complete agreementthat members ofthe surrounding black community had every VIOLENCE ERUPTS right to rename the park for one of their Violence eruptedwhen photographer Bill own heroes with or without the consent of Wallace was beaten to 'the street by, a City H a 11. Two comments heard were: police sergeant as Wallace attempted to "They didn't ask anybody permission to photograph the old sign being taken down. name it Washington Park; why should we, Angered by this act, members of the who live here ask permission." And, crowd retaliated by throwingsticks, stones "Washington had slaves." .. FIGHT DEMONSTRATION at Kodak stockholders' meeting. ST AFF MEETING REPORT NEW SNCC DIRECTIONS ATLANTA, GA. - In our staff meet­ a fight for independence and liberation ing of national freedom organizations which obtaining these objectives, we will work ing held during the past week, the organ­ there. will deal with all aspects of the problems with all other black groups who are fight­ ization voted that the Student Nonviolent facing black people in America. The poli­ ing for the same goals. Coordinating Committee is a Human Rights ANTI DRAFT tical objective will manifest itself in the organization, interested not only in Human We shall seek to build a strong nation­ creation of a viable, independent political ANY MEANS NECESSARY Rights in the United States,.but throughout wide Black Anti - Draft program and move­ force. The economic objective will be (1) The events around the student rebellion the world; that, in the field of Inter­ ment to include high school stUdents, along to expel the exploite;rs who presently con­ of the last few days in Jackson, Mississippi national Relations, we assert that we en­ with college students and other black men trol our community, (2) to gain economic is a clear example of the continued vio­ courage and support the liberation strug­ of draft age. We see no reason for black control of our communities, and (3) to lence, racism and exploitation of white gles of all people against racism, ex­ men, who are daily murdered physically create an economic. system which will Americans against black humanity in this ploitation, and oppression. We see our' and mentally in this country to go and kill be responsible to and benefit the black country. It is, furthermore, a clear indi­ struggle here in America as an integral yellow people abroad, who have done no­ community, rather than a few individuals. cation of the need for all black people 1(.1 part of the world-wide movement of all thing to us, and are, in fact, victims of Our cultural objective will be (1) to destroy unite for Black Power, to create national oppressed people, such as in Vietnam, the same oppression that our brothers in the myths and lies propogated by white freedom organizations, and to struggle ­ Angola, Mozambique, South Africa, Zim­ Vietnam suffer. America concerning our history in Africa by any means necessary - to end our op­ babwe, and Latin America. Furthermore, and in this country and (2) to develop an pression and to end the noose that White we support the efforts of our brothers in FREEDOM ORGANIZATIONS awareness and appreciation of our thick America has around our necks. .. Puerto Ri~o who are presently ~ngaged in .' Our major thrust will be'in the build- lips, broad noses; kinky hair and soul. In PAGE 4 THE MOVEMENT JUNE 1967

And so for white people to be allowed 249 million persons. He who holds or to define us by calling us Negroes, which has influence in Vietnam can affect the means apathetic, lazy, stupid andallthose future of the Philippines and Formosa other things, is for us to accept those to the east, Thailand and Burma with definitions. their huge rice surpluses to the west, YOU BETTER We must define what we are and move and Malaysia and Indonesia with their from our definitions and tell them to rubber, ore and tin to the south. recognize what w~ say we are. "Vietnam, thUS, does not exist inageo­ You ever listen to t,he news? Every graphical vacuum from its largest day now, Viet Cong terrorists today storehouses of wealth and population can COME ON bombed and killed 50 women andchildren, be influenced and undermined." what a shame. In the meantime, our jet He is absolutely right. Because that's bombers have been flying heavily. over what that war is all about. And that's Hanoi, dropping bombs. why we are not going. And the power to define is the most Those, then, are the words of the important power that we have. He is ambassador to Saigon. They are not my HOME master who can define. That was made words. And he outlines very clearly what ciear in the McCarthy period. IfMcCarthy ~the war is being fought for. From a speech by Stokely Carmichael beings -- they were subhuman, they were said you were a Communist, you had to to the students df Morgan State inhuman, they were inferior, or we were get up and say, no I am not a Communist. NECESSITY OF WAR/ ~ol1ege, Baltimore, Md. just following law and order. He had the power to define. It is the If you understood ,anything about this nood afternoon. It is good to be back Does that soundfamiliar? So itis crystal same thing. My fellow Americans, the country, you would kn,ow that 75 percent here at Morgan. I used to party here clear thatselfcondemnationis impossible. -, Communists, the slanted eye Viet Cong of this budget is spent: on war materials. when I was at school -- after we sat in And so it is with white America as a are our enemy. You must go kill them. That means that fqr this country to sur­ in Baltimore on Route 40. whole community. White America is in­ You don't have the righttodefine whether 'vive it must always be at war. I would think that at a black univer­ capable of condemning that which it has or not that cat is your enemy. The master You will not get a victory for this sity it would be absUrd for me to talk done to black people as, a total community has defined it for you. And when he says country if you win in'Vietnam. That's about Black Power, but rather to talk inside this' country. TherefoFe we must jump, you say, how high, boss? no victory. The country must keep fight­ to black students -about what their role do it, we must condemn. So then we must begin to define our ing. You do not invent things that have is to be in the coming struggle. And so And after having condemned we do not own terms and certainly our own concept no use. You invent them so that they have my remarks today would be addressed try to imitate, but begin to create. And of ourselves and let those who are not a use. And every time you invent a better to you, black students of Morgan. you must understand that very, very , capable of following us fall bythe wayside. ',bomb you must drop it. ' To give you a chance to hear some of clearly in your mind. the things that you never hear about, your need to stop being ashamed of being DEFINITIONS black and come on home. Now then we come to the question of Now we ought to then outline the points definitions. We will talk about that for we want to discuss. We want to talk a While. I(is very, veryimportantbecause about what this country has been able to I believe that people who can define are do to black 'people. What it has been able masters. to do is to make' us ashamed of being I want to read a quote. It is one of my black. favorite quotes. It corries from " Alice And thal Is one of the>first recognitions in Wonderland," Lewis Carroll. You ought of a free people. That we recognize that to read him. Just like you ought to read we must be united as a people; that we Winnie the Pooh and Huckleberry Finn. understand the concept of peoplehood and The quote:"'When I use a word,' Hump­ not be ashamed of ourselves. ty Dumpty said in a rather scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to STOP IMITATING WHITES mean, neither more nor less~IThe ques­ That means that we must stop imi­ tion is,'said Alice,'whether you can make tating white society and begin to create V{ords mean so many different things: for ourselves and our own and begin to iThe question is/ said Humpty Dumpty, 2mbody our own cultural patterns so that 'who is to be master.'" we will be holding dear to those things That is all. That is all. Understand , whiCh we have created. that. You remember a couple of years For example: It is nonsensical for ago when our black leaders would talk black people to have debutante balls. It about integration. They would say we want is nonsensical because you are imitating to integrate. They would be talking about that which white society has given to you good houses, good schools, goodneighbor­ (5 hoods. White people would say, you want ..0 and which you know nothing about. Wouldn't o it be better to take that $500 and give' to' marry my daughter. III it to Morgan so that you could begin to Now you have got to understand this ao concept very, very clearly, because what .c develop a good black institution? 0.. Now imitation runs deep in the black they were doing was defining integration, community in this country. It runs very for these black leaders, and these black So you invent another bomb. That is deep. You know when we first got people leaders allowed them to. VIETNAM correct and that is why this countrykeeps to go to college and they went to the first You see, I used to see these black Now we want to talk a little about Viet- goingatthebreakneck speed it is going in White university in this countrythere were leaders say, we want to integrate. The nam. We think it is drastically important. terms of its military might. And we have things called fraternities and s'ororities. white man , would say, you want to marry You must begin to understandthe nature to understand that. Because we are told We are going to talk about it.; my daughter. They would say, no, I of this country called America, which lnthIs :country that we are civilized -­ Now what happened was that our black don't want to marry your daughter. We exploits all other nonwhite countries. Now anOther word to define. ,brothers and sisters could not get into just want to be your brother, we don't you know we are fighting for freedom, Indeed what is civilization? To be able these fraternities. They kept them out want to' be your brother-in-law. Or we democracy, for peace. Nobody questions to drop:bombs on Hiroshima? ,because of the color of their skin. So want to live next door to you, we don't it. Yes, we are going to kill for freedom, Is that civilization? To be able to drop what did our brothers do -- they turned want to live in your bedroom. By the 'democracy and peace. Those little bombs on Hanoi? Is that civilization? Is ,around and formed something called time this cat finished reacting to a defini­ Chinese, Vietnamese yellow people ain't it? : Do we want to be civilized tOO? Kappas, ,and only light-skinned Negroes tion by a white man, he was out the got sense enough to know they want their This, country, has said that civilization =ould get in. window. ' democracy; we are going to fight for is at stake and there is no other solution Our black sisters, not' to be outdone, And by the time he came back to be them, give it to them because Santa Claus except that of war. rormed AKA for only bluebloods. a g g res s i v e the black community said is still alive. So' what they do is, they train us in So the other dark-skinned, ~rothers, "later" for that cat. He allowed white I want to read a quote made August ROTC. You dig it? All they do in ROTC lot to be outdone, set up Omega and people to define his reaction at his own 4, 1954, before the U.S. State governors is teach you how to kUl. You may try Alpha. And then, of course, we had the terms. in Seat tl e. Incidentally, I highly recom­ 'to justify it all you want, but your job =ounterparts, the Deltas. ' Now when we get asked that question mend this book. It is called "Vietnam, is to kill. The job of the Army is to kill. Now, wouldn't it have been far. better in SNCC you know what we say. The Vietnam," by Felix Green. That is the reason why it is there. Not if those people, instead of imitating a white woman is not the queen of the "Now let us assume," the quote says, to teach you how to become anything. If 30ciety which had been built on excluding world, she is not the Virgin Mary, she "that we lost Indo-China." Now that is you want to be taught something, build :hem, 'had turned around and built a can be made like any other woman. Let's in 1.953; we were not fighting the war, a school in my neighborhood and let me lraternity which would have included move on, let's move on. the French were fighting it for us. We go there. Don't tell me about going to everybody? were just giving them the money. Vietnam to learn nothing. Perhaps that is the greatest problem WHAT BLACK POWER MEANS "Now let us assume we lost Indo­ Nhich you as black students face. You Now then, that is very, very important China. The tin and other items we so INSTITUTIONALIZED VIOLENCE rre never asked to create, only to imitate. because the same things happen. Now, I greatly value (from that area) would Now then I have to be appalled at the say black po}Ver and someone says you cease coming." So that when the United president of the university who stands up SELF CONDEMNATION mean violence. And they expect me tosay, States votes four hundred million dollars and saysthat Black Power is about violence The philosophers (Albert) Camus and no, no. I don't mean violence, I don't to help that war we are not voting a while at this very campus he encourages :Jean Paul)Sartre raised the question of mean that. give-away program. institutionalized violence by compulsory i,elf condemnation in most of their Later, for you, I am master of my own "We are after tne,eheapest way, to pre­ ROTC and does not speak about that. ",ritings. Camus, you know, is an exis­ term. If black power means violence to vent the oc<:urre~cii:of so~etniilg terrible Who does he thing he is kidding? There ,entialist., He wrote "The Rebel," "The you, that is your problem, as is marrying - the loss of 0ur;'ability to 'get what we , '~ is nothing wrong with violence. It is just aranger." You ought to read them. What your daughter. want from the ri~hes of the Indo-Chinese ",;who, is able to control it. That's what :::amus says is that self condemnation is I know what it means in my mind. I territory'and frdiiJ,Southeast Asia." 'counts. Everybody knows that. You have ,mpossible. will stand clear. And you must understand That ,quote:,:'was made by President institutionalized violence on your campus. There are examples of that. For ex­ that, because the first need of a free Dwight D.Eis~nho~er. You have to dress up in':,monkey suit unple, there were Nazi prisoners during people is to be able to define their own I want)6:~read you a statement now, a.'ld train how to kill once' ~ week. And iVorld War II. Those who were captured. terms and have those terms recognized by Henry'C:!ihOt Lodge. He's the good­ what is your response to that as black i they admitted that they had killed six by their oppressors. It is also the first 100king'0I)'~.,:~You know, tall, blond hair, students coming to a university where nillion Jews they had to commit suicide. need that all oppressors must suspend. blue eyes/iJis:quote a year ago: they are supposed to teach you civiliza­ They must commit suicide. The ones Camus says ~hat when a slave says "Geographically, Vietnam stands at the tion? Is that civilization too? That one vho were able to live were the ones who NOhe begins to exist. You see you define hub ofa,:':vast area of the world, South­ lad sacid we did not kill six million human to contain. That's all you do. east As,ia../:~. JUNE 1967 THE MOVEMENT PAGE 5 CLEVELAND CITY AT WAR By Tim Hall CLEVELAND, Ohio - Cleveland' is at war. It is a guerilla war of the black poor against the police, andthe blacks have the initiative. And just as in Vietnam, the police are answering people with tech­ nology.

RIOT- CAUSES UNCHANGED- The city has done nothing for thecauses of the 1966 Hough Riots. The Job Corps and the Neighborhood Youth Corps are training janitors and maids. Concerned businessmen set up a job center; hardly anybody got and kept jobs. Unemploy­ ment in Cleveland as a whole is 2.4%, in the slums it is 15.6%. Blacks are 38% of the city popUlation, 17% of the work force, 13% of the journeymen in the building trades (most are laborers -which requires no apprenticeship) 'and 2% of the apprentices. The black schools are miserable, with few exceptions. Welfare continues at 76% of a dollar standard set in 1959.The infant mortality rate is 50% higher amongblacks than among whites. Th~ housing code is enforced only against hippy and nationalist storefronts. Cleveland is one of the most heavily rat-infested cities in the nation. Even Urban Renewal --known as" Com­ munity Development" to give it a Peace Corps image -- is at a halt, with federal funds denied. It has removed a lot of people and condemned a lot of property, LOOTERS GO TO WORK on firebombed store, Note fireman and cop. but has built nowhere for themto go. Hough is filled with empty houses and flattened large gatherings of people. Night patrols 'also between Red China and the U.S. pilot, he said: "Don't call it riot control. blocks with signs speaking of your tax stopped after the Riots, but started again Publicity in local papers and in the Wall Call it crime control." dollars. The people are being shunted in November after the rape-murder of a Street Journal (March 14) had the Greater to otlier ghetto areas, while the city white woman in the University Circlearea Cleveland Metropolitan Areashook up. The 'BLACK BEASTS OF PREY' trie.;; to get private industry to finance adjoining Hough. The patrols continued Loran County Sheriff, next door, an­ On the 24th the United Pastors As­ renewal and rehabilitation. through the winter, helping in several nounced that he would deputize and arm sociation (formed after the riots to pre­ reported arrests, but the main push was 500 (white) men, a plan made popular by serve "law and order") released a state­ RENEWAL FUNDS DENIED for the sumlJler. Jim Clark of Selma. ment calling black, gangs "beasts ofprey" When Mayor Locher went to Washington At the April 18 City Council meetingthe and the city began its attempt to divide to get funds to carry out Urban Renewal, TROUBLE BEGINS reaction began in earnest. The Mayor had the Negro middle classes from the black , HUD's Robert Weaver wouldn't even see March and the beginning of April were told the police that day to "fill every poor and the older black poor from the him, and funds were refused, pending warm. The trouble began with a series of jail we have." And the Safety Director young who were doing the firebombing. some. indication of progress back here. robberies and shootings that killed two had apded: "This city is not going to be The city sees a few small gangs as the The appearance of the mayor of a major white ghetto grocers and one black bus run by hoodlums." whole problem. American city being refused an appoint­ driver in the first weeks of March. Council That set the tone for a chorus of white On the same day the New York Times ment with a Cabinet member -- and a bought the motorsl;ooters, and was asked councilmen. Councilman Latkovic: "Shoot reported that Negro Community Relationl? black one at that -- was comical. It was for funds to buy two copters. (They are 'em dead. The only good hoodlum is adead Director for the city, Bertram E. Gard­ also a neat way for the federal govern­ now leased with privatefunds.) Six officers hoodlum." Garofoli of Murray Hill, a ner, was passing the word down to black ment to cut domestic expenses during a were training for helicopter licenses. racist Italian ghetto where a Negro' was groups to "forget this police brutality war and get off the hook by scapegoating OD March 13 the largest Sears Roebuck killed during last summer's riots, said business, and if the cops have to use a an incompetent administrator. Later this store in the city, located in the ghetto, his people were ready to take action if little force, look up at the stars, look spring the city failed to complete its was firebombed, along with an Ohio state the police didn't. Councilman Katalinas: away." Safety Director John N. McCor­ , application for model city grants -- the Employment Service Vocational Planning "The best way to leave a hoodlum is on mick, a past FBI agent, appeared- on TV only large city to do so. Center which had been hit last summer. the street to be picked up by an am­ to say that he expected char:ges of police The next night a condemned house went up bulance." brutality but "I don't care." Also tha.t day POLICE PREPARE FOR WAR and the firemen were stoned by black Councilman Banko threw down the glove: the Cleveland Transit System threatened Meanwhile the city added to, its arma­ crowds. "If the police have to break some ~kulls, to stop night service in the ghetto. ments with urgent calls for recruits to _On the ,night, o~ March 3Q, a warm night, what will be the reaction of the people in take the police exams, the'creation of crowds heckled the police making an this area? Riots? Or will they ,rise to KING TO SEND ORGANIZERS the 120-man Task Force to cover the arrest in Hough, then rescuedthe arrested the occasion and support the police? Let's On April 25, Martin LutherKing arrived ghetto, and the addition of, such new man from the police, shouting, "You ain't find out." And Negro COllncilman Leo and was "sad" that Mayor Locher had equipment as a squad of 20 extremely taking our friends!" The police reinforced, Jackson called for the national Guard, no called him an "extremist" along with mobile, radio-equippped motor scooters, but did nothing. doubt to protect his flock. McKissick and George Wallace, and had and the night-patrolling helicopter. The night of April 2 there was a fire The weather turned cold, and a publicity refused to meet with him. The next day By the end of March police totaled2130. at the ,Call & post, a bourge9isNegro campaign began which was meant to cool he spoke in two high schools, one junior_ Each scooter covers as much territory as newspaper edited by, William O. Walker, things off for May 9 and also to push the high and before the United Pastors, saying: five foot patrolmen, and can pursue up the only Negro at the 1964 RepUblican income tax - two contradictory aims, since "Our power does not lie in molotov ont,Q. sidewalks and down alleyways. High­ Convention to vote for Barry Goldwater. the tax, everyone,knew, was to arm the cocktails. Put a black m~n in city hall." powered mercury streetlights had been Police said the fire was caused by Wiring, police. And: "Build, baby, build! Organize, baby, installed in, much of the ghetto. The city but nationalists expressed private doubts. organize! Vote, baby, vote!". He said he had asked the federal government' for There were two other firebombings that SUBMACHINE GUN FIRE will send organizers into Cleveland to $137,000 for a closed circuit TV stakeout night, one of them at a recreation center. On the night of April 20, the helicopter carry out Operation Breadbasket, aselec­ in "high-crime areas." And the Cleveland sighted some young blacks firebombing an tive buying program to get jobs for black Transit System was thinking of installing FIRE BOMBINGS abandoned house in Hough, spotlighted people in ghetto stores and businesses two-way radios in city buses. On the night Of April 4, some 50 fires them and pinned them down with sUb­ and promote black products. ' But the scariest new weapon waS the were set in the Central Area, the oldest machinegun fire until the' :Task Force On April 30, Bayard Rustin spokebefore helicopter. The police began testing its black ghetto. Most were, firebombings. (Green Berets) arrived. Both papers com­ the NAACP and called for a political, counter-insurgency potential in May 1964, Nearly all were in abandoned houses in pared the action to helicopter operations movement to get millions from Congress. before any of the major ghetto riots has 'urban renewal areas. At one, burning in Vietnam, implying that the guys had Negroes, he said, "must fight the Black occurred. A copter was then being used super'market, reporters took pictures of acted like Viet Cong., ~ Power Movement ,and join with our white for traffic control, and the Department looters and people cheering them while a The helicopter can be heard allover friends to build an accumulatedstrength." began taking targE't practice with auto­ few police and firemen stood by. 'fwo the East Side at night. It sounds like a His crowning comment was on King and matic weapons at moving targets out over Negro deputy sheriffs arrived and when one mosquito when far away, and it can't be Vietnam: "The civil rights movement has Lake Erie. Police Chief Richard Wagner of them was hit with a canned ham they seen until it's extremely close, and then no mandate to deal with peace questions" was quoted at the time as saying that waded into the crowd, slugging people with only if the watcher is not standing under no more than the Girl Scouts should be the helicopter was extremely useful in shotgun butts. PeoplE" yelled, "I hate you, a streetlight. Mothers tell of their children involved with anyting but Girl Scout prob­ "riot work:' (Cleve. Pressi M-ay 21,1964) Uncle Tom!" but t.he crowd broke up. g')~ting nightmar~s and o,f the helicopter lems," Numbers had been painted on the roofs On April 5, Polire Chief Wagner pro­ coming down so close to their houses at of all patrol cars, and a three-way radio posed that firemen carry shotguns to pro­ night they can see the pilot. One young BLOODY REVOLUTION system had been installed, ,linking the tect themselves from the crowds, but the guy told me how the helicopter broke The cold spell continued into May ana copter with the squad cars and the central Fire Chief said they would let the city up a football game after school at Glen­ there were few reported incidents in th" station. burn first. Firebombings continued for the ville High. About 50 black students were ghetto. On May 2, Sgt. John Ungvary of next several nights. playing or watching when the copter spQtted the policeSubversive Squad testifiedbefore POLICE HELICOPTER the group and radioed for the Task Force. the Senate Internal SecuritySubcommittee, The first major riot use of the copter TENSION BUILDS Three squad cars cam~screaming,and one which is rumored coming to Clevelandthis came during the Hough Uprisings, when Tension was building toward May 9, of them drove up onto the grass and moved summer. Ungvary asked for a federal law it droned over the ghetto nightly and called the date set by a nationalist astrologer slowly through the group, sirens going, to arrest all adult nationalists for con- police cruisers to the scene offire-bomb­ named Ahmed for a racial apocalypse in and broke it up. When I later spoke on ings, incidents of any kind, and even to Cleveland and other American cities and the phone to Sgt. Lemieux, the copter CONTINUED ON PAGE• 8 PAGE 6 THE MOVEMENT JUNE 1967 SUNFLOWER COUNTY WE'RE GONNA RULE By Bob Fletcher for the Freedom Democratic Party. As your city officials, we want to take this SUNFLOWER CITY, MISS. - For over opportunity to assure our citizens that we eight month~, a small, militant and de­ will take any and all means to protect termined force of local residents have the citizens of this community; therefore, canvassed the black community of Sun­ your city officials have contacted the flower City (population 662). They have proper authorities who have assured us built a slate, campaigned for it, set uI: that the highway patrol will ass.ist our black captains and held meetings. They local law enforcement in protecting all have explained the action of the Fifth citizens against their goal. This protection Circuit Federal Court in setting aside the will be guaranteed on election day, after 1966 municipal elections ,- bl,ack people election day and at all other times. We haj not been allowed sufficient time to urge all citizens to report any violation exercise their voting rights, recently or threat to the city officials, county offic­ clarified by the 1965 Voting Rights Bill, ials, or to the highway patrol so the offend­ by registering, in time for that election. ers can be prosecuted to the full extent PREPARING sample ballot. The town's 55% registered black voters of the law." (signed, "the mayor andboard (uut of a potential voting age' majority of of Alderman.") , 75%) were urged'to select their own can­ didates. They nominated a slate of six: 20 year old Otis Brown for Mayor, andfor NO, ONE CAN MAKE YOU VOTE the five aldermanic pOSitions, Elvin Gip­ The second letter was from the chief of" son, Mrs. Annie Mae King, Mrs. Willie police: Mae Smith and the fiery Mr,s. Lela Mae "We have had many reports of lies, Brooks. threats and intimidation directed against the citizens of Sunflower. Threats and in­ NO BLACKaELECTION OFFICIAL timidation againstoOur citizens will not be A group of northern liberals 'called the tolerated and any such reports a~e prompt-. national Committee for Free Elections in ly pas,sed on to the proper authorities. As , ,Sunflower (headed by William Fitz Ryan for the lies and falsehoods told our citi­ and Bayard Rustin) formed and began to zens this is the truth and that's the way, apply pressure on the Justice Department it is: to send in federal officials. In an apparent *No' one, including the United'States effort to discourage such a likelihood, the Government, can MAKE you vote in any local election commission agreed to let election •.• Joseph Harris, one of the leadtng local *If you CHOOSE to vote in any elec­ black organizers, serve as an election tion, NO ONE, including the UNITED official. This meant he would be available STATES GOVERNMENT, can tell you who to go behind the curtain with any illiter­ you HAVE to vote for. ates who requested his help. *If you are a dUly registered citizen On May I, the day before the election, and CHOOSE, to vote NO ONE can tell the JD announced that it would be sending HOW you voted. THE VOTE IS 'COM­ LAWRENCE GUYOT, state-MFDP Chairman, r~views'sample balklt with voters on their way to polls. federal observers to Sunflower. That eve­ PLETELY SECRET. You use your own ning, less than twelve hours before the election, the election commission held a special meeting and decided not to let Joe Harris give help after all. This news was brought to the pre-election mass meeting just as the lawyers were confidently ex­ plaining that all people had to do was to "ask for Joe." "Oh well," said the law­ yers, "you still don't have to worry about a thing; just demand that you and whoever helps you be accompanied by a federal observer." But many poor black people in the Delta are not yet used to demanding anything, and besides, the federal observer was just another white man. There was no longer any guarantee, for illiterates, of a secret ballot, free of reprisals. Lawyer Morry Stavis explainedwhat had happened. There was a difference of 49 votes between the highest vote for a black candidate (Ill) and the lowest for a white (160). "Now, there were 38 'spoiled bal­ lots' - THEY said defectively marked. There were 13 challenged ballots. And MRS. HAMER: "We doin this cause our lives are at stake." FIRST IN LINE to vote that morning. there were somewhere between 27 and 32 ballots in which people were helped - but only by whites." Stavis argued that there best judgment and pick the candidate you would have been at least 65 more uncon­ ALONE think is the best person for the testable votes, more than enough to re­ job, best qualified, best experienced, and verse the difference of 49, if the election you vote for that person and' not even officials had not reneged on their agree­ your own wife or husband will know how ment to let Joe Harris act as helper. If you voted unless you tell. Joe Harris had been a helper, there could *No 'person, organization, nor even the be no challenge of the 27-32 votes where United States Government can tell a free people who asked for help and could only citizen how to vote or who to vote for. get white help waived all possibility for a "THAT'S JUST THE WAY IT IS. Any­ secret ballet. If Harris had been a helper, one tries to tell you different or makes the 38 ballots would not have been improp­ threats against you or your property is erly marked by people too afraidof whites wrong and should be reported to the au­ to ask fol' help. thorities at once." "So," said Stavis, "we're going backto Obviously designed for the nervous federal court. We're going to ask the fed­ fringe of the black community, the let­ eral court to set aside this election ex­ ters were apparently intendedamong other actly the same way that we asked the fed­ things to 1) implicate the FDP as an un­ eral court to set aside the last election." lawful, questionable group in league with Confusion was further served with the ever-insidious "outside agitators", 2) following two letters, both sent out to the bring to mind the head-beating SS troops black citizens of Sunflower the day before of the Delta, the Highway Patrol, 3) fur­ the election. The first one was headed: ther shake what little faith there might "Important Notice to Sunflower Citizens': have been in the protective presence of .,In the face of the election of officers to the United States G 0 vel' n men t," serve the next two years in the depart­ "THAT'S JUST THE WAY IT IS," SUNFLO~,IER POLICE CHIEF as baliff. ment of city government, we want to thank On May 2, election day, the polls were you for the fine support you have given scheduled to open at 7:00, At least 50 this administration in the past. people were up at five for a final prayer , 'We have had complaints from some of meeting, urging the Lord not to forsake the our local citizens that they have bee n side of righteousness, Students from North threatened and harassed by people working Carolina College, a couple of Free Elec- JUNE 1967 THE MOVEMENT PAGE 7

tion Committee volunteers, local people vote. As it turned out, the bailiff was TIRED OF BEING NICE and a handful of other outside agitators also the chief of police, who, throughout canvassed their assigned streets for the the day, did not hesita,te to utilize his The pain and anger in the room began final time~ working with localSNCC people position at the polls' entr~nceto do consid­ to surface -as people who could contain in arranging transportation for all who erable electioneering, while intimidating it no longer began to speak. These were needed it. Women prepared food for those Negroes. And so the day began. the people who drew cheers and shouts. who had gotten up too early to think about Outside and across the street from the Mrs. Hamer, with tears in her eyes, said eating. The townspeople came for a final Town Hall, Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer was "I'm tired of folks comin' and tellin' briefing, reviewing the names of the black circulating through the gathering crowd, us to be nice. That we got a symbolic candidates on their sample ballots. Mrs. generating that spirit of determination with victory. We ain't doin' nothin' symbolic; Lela Mae Brooks began her final round­ which she infects people wherever she we doin' this cause our lives are at up among the community's faint of heart, travels. This particular day, she and her stakel" She called for a campaign di­ the not quite confirmed Un-cle Toms:" Just husband had only to travel20minutesfrom rected at pressuring Negro school teach­ want to see if you need-a ride down to the her home in Ruleville, just north of Sen­ ers (who traditionally in the Deep South headquarters ... OK, I'll be looking for ator Eastland's 6,000 acre Doddsville have been intimidated by all white school you now; you know, we can't all live to­ Plantation. Mrs. Hamer was the MFDP boards) to register and vote in the Novem­ gether in Sunflower if we don't get down plaintiff in the court action responsible ber elections, by organizing for a boycott there and vote, now canwe?" "NoMa'm " for this special election. of their schools in September. was the usual ner'vous reply. ' Kitty-corn7red to this group was a ser­ ". think it's time," said Guyot, for peo­ ple who are fighting to survive in the Del­ FIRST VOTES vice station where about 15-20 crackers had gathered, one with a Brownie camera ta to establish HOW w.e're going to fight At 6:55, the first wave of people began with which he tried to intimidate blacks and WHEN we're going to fight, for the MRS. 8 ROO KS: "we're the to move down to the Town Hall polling on their way to vote. Although reporters first time in our lives. And I'm going to .majority and we're gonna rule." place to line up for the long-awaited and photographers were warned to stay ask that tlree people from each Delta at least 30 feet away from the polling county come to a meeting ... so we can place, nothing was s.aid to the heckling talk about lining up a complete black whites, sitting on a pickup truck, less than slate, to run as independents throughout fifteen feet from the exit door, nor to the this Delta and to STAY THE HELL OUT mayor's wife, sitting in a parked car just OF THE GODDAMN DEMOCRATIC outside the door, very visibly "takin PARTY ... down names." Inside, things were re­ "I would certainly hope- that if we're ported to be very tense, with officials going to fight for the right of black people . discourteous and' uncooperative. to eat and sweat and to live in the Delta, it shouldn't make much difference to us WHICH hunky becomes governor of Miss­ JUST THE WAY IT IS issippi. I just hope that we can under­ Around 10:00, a group of about 10whites stan~ that what we've got to do now ... arrived. A cracker in a pickup truck with is REGISTER BLACK PEO PLE 10 a .scoped rifle andpolice dog began circling VOTE." around the block. Some of the young people began singing rather defiantly. Joe NOT LOST, STOLEN Harris came out andaskedthem to stopthe singing, which he was worried might pro­ "Now I want y'all to understand some­ voke violence. He told them that they were thing," said Mrs. Lela Mae Brooks. "We there to win an election, and nothing more. did not LOSE the election, the white folks The 10 whites formed a separate line STOLE it; like they stole our land/ like M parallel to blacks who had been patiently they steal our commodities every month, .<:" 2 waiting their turn. The police chief came. like they stealin' our young men eVf:!ry r;:" out and let the whites in right away. day to go and fight their war in Viet .a Nam, like they stole our great, great o "THAT'S JUST THE WAY IT IS." 10 By 10:30, only 68 of the eligible black grandparents from Africa a long, long time ago ... Now they got nothin' to take "'o voters had not yet come to the polls. in­ "0 from us cept our lives •.• .<: cluded among these was the small mi­ 0. nority of residents who have someform of "They think they can scare us with them MAN IN WHEELCHAIR identified by bystanders as living "out in the rurals". employment. They would not be in from guns in their cars; we not scared of them work until the afternoon. For the next damn guns, and we want them to know it. five hours things went pretty uneventfully lt we were scared of them guns, we in Sunflower City. wouldn't even register to vote ..• Around 4:00 p.m., the whites of Sun­ "We been running around here talkin' flower City began to arrive in large num­ that non-violent stuff and this violent stuff. bers to do their voting. White teenagers, Now, dammit, when THEY get ready to on their way home from school, joinedthe get violent, let's ALL get violent ... growing numbers of crackers at the ser­ we ain't 'swore to nobody we wasn't gonna vice station. White housewives, on their fight •.• way home from shopping or picking up "Now, talk about Viet Nam, it can be their grade-school children, got out of Viet Nam right here; in Sunflower; in their big cars to take snapshots. During Mississippi •.. They better believe that, this time, more than 10 whites were just the same as we can fight over there, spoted by local young people as liVing we can fight right here... outside the legal boundaries. "N ext, "They think it's over, but it's just they'll be hauling them in from the grave­ startin'. It's time out for sufferin'; we're yard sure enough," said one girl, when a not afraid of Mississippi anymore ... cripple, whom she identified as living "out We're the majority, and we're gonna in the rurals," was unloaded and wheeled rule." ...

into the polls. Some of the crackers Advertisement . moved from the service station and sta­ tioned themselves right outside of the exit . door, and of course, nobody ordered them back to the other side of the 30 feet limit. WHY PAY At 6:00, when the polls closed, Guyot and Mrs. Breoks began to move people MEEKl Y off the corner and back to the community center, for fear that the tension of wait­ ing might cause violence to erupt. At FOR WAR? that 'time, everyone involved thought it was touch and go as to who had ·actually won. Legally demand inc.orne tax WE LEAR NED A LOT \¥hen it was announced that the racist incumbents had taken the election right refund. Write: down the slate, people quieted down intu mournful headshaking, groans of sad­ ness or general dull disbelief. In a kind TAXPAYERS of trance, people "amen'd" Joe Harris as he assured them that "we might not see anybody sitting in the City Hall, but AGAINST WAR we still won. This is the first time in the history of the city of Sunflower that 97% P.O. Box 15394 of the vote turned out in this small town ... We learned a lot from these elections here in Sunflower.... and we've got other San Francisco elections coming up ... We made a lot of mistakes, but we won't make those • mistakes in November." California To this there was polite hand clapping from people who were no longer very opti­ 94115 mistic. MRS. BROOKS helping get out the vote. ~~------

PAGE 8 THE MOVEMENT JUNE 1967

the audience, made up of strikers; and they were "acting'" to achiev~ so<;jaL ,_" POVERTY WAR -HITS LOWNDES change. Their acts onstage were political CONTINUED FROM PAGE 10 TEATRO acts within the'broad reality of the Huelga. The skill and craft of the actor thus At a mass meeting a few weeks ago, my housel" yelled the owner of the ~ -CAMPESINO shared a practical value with the skill and Smith was argUing for, his deal with land. -eraft of a union organizer, secretary Coleman over t!i.e poverty building. When "I'm not a Black Panther," saidHulett. or strike kitchen cook. he fini,shed, the people politely applauded. "I'm a MAN." Cont. from P. 12 lf farm workers are to have their Then a SNCC Field Secretary stood up He left the house and went over to the political, popular theater, the skills and and attacked the plan for, "helping out plantation owner's car. In the car were crafts of the theater must be taught to the same white man who's been keeping three black tenants the owner had to trucks and in run-down labor camps). them. We need to teach the basics in you down." The people applauded him. drive back to work on the plantation. Starting out as a neutral backdrop, the the Theater Arts, justas farm workers are "I can't understand it," Smith said Hulett went over to the owner's car, screens end up a character in the acto. being taught the basics about nursing care afterward. •'They applauded me and then leaned in the right-handwindow and started. When Perro-Minetti resists a consumer in our clinic, secretarial skills in the they applauded that SNCC guy. I don't to talk to the workers about registering. boycott, Don Sotaco and Mrs. American offices, organizing skills in the fields, want SNCC people 'around any more." The owner, behind the steering wheel, Consumer aided by Purity and Thrifty mechanical skills in our cooperative gas "If he tries to keep SNCC people out was turning bright red. "He didn't want Markets close the screens around him; station and garage. Theater workshops of the county, the whole place will blow to drive away first and leave me there," the two end panels of the screens have must be organized with weekend volun­ uP." Frank Miles said. said Hulett. two signs on the back reading BOY and teers coming from the cities to teach COTTo When the screens are totally playwrighting, directing, acting, mime, closed, P-M is cut off from his market music, etc. to farm workers who will in a tight, red and black box marked, then teach other farm workers. This is of course, BOYCOTT. already happening in at least one con­ ACTION, NOT WORDS crete way. During the last six mO:1ths or so, Tim Kelly - an old, retired radical ,"- '" These actos are hardly the last word in effective, political theater. They are longshoreman from the San Francisco described to illustrate our deliberate use docks - has been holding sighting-read­ of visual dramatic images. Our points ing and recorder music classes in our Teatro. He has children and adults, be­ must be absolutely clear to our farm ginners and advanced students participat­ worker audience. Vagueness and poetic ing. They meet four times a week, and obscurantism are out. 'We are seriously some of the guys in the Teatro are devoted to the task of organizing our now introducing soprano, alto and bass people, not to proving how clever, subtle recorder music into our more lyrical or radical we can be. The dialogue in the ballads on the farm worker. Two gUitars, actos is at a minimum, haVing been an accordian, a guitarron and three re­ improvised from the action to provide only the necessary information to keep corders. A new sound in our work. BOB MANTS, SNCC Field Secretary at LCFO headquarters. the acto going. We are not a theater Delano is the base of our farm worker movement. It will be the base of our pop­ that bombards its audience with talk. Shortly after that Stokely Carmichael Then the owner jumped out of the ular theater. Cesar Chavez and the United paid a surprise visit to the Poverty car and stood a few feet behind Hulett, Farm Workers recognize the tremendous office. The secretaries hugged and kissed getting redder and redder. Mrs.Strick­ power of the arts in human communica­ him when he entered. Mr. Smith was land got out of Hulett's car and stood tion; and human communication is at the unusually qUiet. a few feet behind the plantation owner. basis of our non-Violent effort to organ­ •'SNCC people don't come round much Hulett continued talking to the blackwork­ ize and win strikes by winning people more," Frank Miles' told us. "Stokely ers in 'the car for 45 minutes• . over to the Cause. So the Teatro Campe­ came down and told us how to do good. Finally the owner couldn't stand it sino is now one of the departments of He didn't want to take over or run us. any more, got back in his car and squealed the union. The union pays our rent, util­ We're independent. He told us to take out. ities, gas, etc., but we more than pay what we could use from what he gave "Then," said Hulett with a satisfied our own way by fund-raising ten to fif­ us, and leave the rest. , smile, "I turned around and registered teen times a month what the union pays for "We don't hate whites. Neither does EVERYONE on that plantation:' the building that houses our work. Stokely. But you defend yourself.lfevery­ The other story is from Frank Miles. SPIRITUAL TRANSFUSION one, black and white, carries guns, that Miles was driving on the highway to The Cause that will motivate farm equalizes things. - Nobody wants,. to go' Montgomery; The, speed limit was 50 workers to build their political, popular .down, to kill people. But in Lowndes and a Highway Patrol car ahead of Miles .-,-- Away from Delano, it is necessary to theater already exists. Given the prac­ County no one will protect Negroes. We was going 45. Miles passed him. The supplement the actos with a few historic­ tical skills, the people themselves will have to defend ourselves." cop pulled him over. al facts about the Huelga and union, but develop their own art, their own artists. Two stories tell the way things have "Boy, where y'all going?" that is presented in the form of a narra­ The American Theater could well do with changed in Lowndes County, o'nce one "To work:' tion which does not pretend to be drama. a spiritual transfusion from a mass of of the most oppressed counties in the "Don't you know you were speeding?" 1'11.18-'actors 'themselves are' freeOfffie over two million farm workers eager South. •'I. wasn't speeding. I've got a speed- tiresome expositions and conversations so to use their newly found voice; it could It was the intimidation of black people meter in my car, same as you:' often used by those playwrights who put well do with new actors, playwrights and living on the plan~tationsthat cost the "Don't get smart, boy," said the cop. everything into their works except drama­ directors sprung from a people only LCFO the last election. A major thrust "Where you from?" tic action. The same is true of our scenery, heretofore included, as in society, in now is to register the tenants and share­ "Lowndes." costumes and props: we use them only the periphery of American "drama. .. croppers and to fight the fear under "Where they're stirring up all that as necessary to make our point clear. Our which they live. trouble?" askedthe cop, suddenly nervous. "What trouble?" . main theatrical device is the human body CLEVELAND .. John Hulett and Mrs. Strickland went itself; there is more power in the human out on one of the big plantations to "You know," said the cop. "Themblack face and body, than in all the theatrical CON'T FROM PAGE 5 .convince people to register. Hulett went cats .,. black panthers...." "You mean ,the Lowndes County Fr-ee- claptrap of a new, million-dollar theater spiracy because they were planning a up to the home of one of the 'share..;' dom Organization," said Miles. . in New York. This belief is an inheri­ "black and bloody revolution." "Wouldn't' croppers. The man who lived there was "Well, look here, MR. Miles, uh, you tance from Ron Davis and the San Fran­ this be far better than to wait for an not home and Hulett asked his' wife if better watch your driving all the same, cisco Mime Troupe. overt act?" he aske~ He also said that he . could come in and talk to her about and uh, be careful." 300· black "youths" were 'being trained registering. He was sitting there when GUERILLA THEATER. Things have changed in Lowndes County. in guerilla warfare, and that Communists the plantation owner came in. A socially-oriented theater must belong "I don't want no Black Panthers in' Black people are organized. .. to the people it is trying to reach, if it were exploiting the movement. The para­ is to become a serious politicalweapon. It llel with Vietnam, with the black youths must do more than educate and delight; ~ as Viet Cong, grew stronger. the rest with a housing violqtion. The girl the last year and a hali, and each time it must stimulate and agitate its audience On'May 3 the income tax was approved lives in New York. "It was a normal he has visited with Stokes. It would look by a 2-1 margin; after a campaign that to act - in the theater and in reality. So police procedure, " said Lt. Malik. good for LBJ to have a black but control­ it is with the Teatro Campesino. Thefarm stressed its importance for police pro­ "There's. nothing more to it than that." lable mayor in a major northern city worker actors are •'acting" in a reality tection. The tax' had lost in all white Two firebombings were reported that before 1968. that far exceeds the artificial limits of wards in the city in June 1966, when it night, at a junior high and a high school, In the stage. Often enough, there is no stage last appeared on the .ballot. November but they were controlled. Then early in the morning May 11, a as such but only a flat bed truck or a CoUncil passed it, and a referendum was young black guy shot and killed a white union hall cluttered with artifacts belong­ called. This time all the white wards went police "GreenBeret" after a burglary. The ing to the same reality the performance for the tax. MARTIAL LAW BilL black guy had been a member of JFK (Jomo seeks to synthesize through the theater Armed with the mandate, the city ner­ The real bomb carne the next day. Papers Freedom Kenyatta) House, a nationalist art. 'Sometimes the Teatro is forced to vously awaited the predicted May 9 riots. reported that Stokes had authored a bill center, last year before it was blamed for share its narrow stage in Filipino Hall Everybody had some inside word on what in the Ohio House that would allow the the Hough Riots. It has since been torn with boxes of donated food and clothing: would happen. Rumors were that black kids governor to declare martial law in the down. before that, when the NFWA used to meet were being let out of school, that they case of riots and suspend civil penalties This event, the continuing helicopter in Negrito Hall (public buildings, like labor stayed at home, that no one was going to against guardsmen on duty•. Ttle governor operations and other police tactics have had work, that suburban shopping centers would camps, are distingUished by their. racial w 0 u I d be commander - in - chief and the a strong effect on the mood of the ghetto. names in Delano; the Mexican Hall in be firebombed. troops would be responsi!?le only to mili­ Many blacks say that the poor are uniting LUwn was turn duwfi some year:> ago to tary court. At present the governor behind the firebombers and the gang:>, make room for the freeway) we literally QUIET MAY 9 must wait until the mayor calls for the despite the city's "divide and conquer" performed our acts in between, around and Nothing happened on that liay, and the Gu-ard. campaign. If this is so, then Ungvary's on top of the children and adults sitting poliCe couldn't take it. Early in the even­ It appears that Stokes wants to pick testimony before t1)e Eastland Committee on the floor up front. The intimacy of aud­ ing, several officers and detectives came up white votes before the reaction against may take on a new meaning. ience with cast provided a perfect atmos­ up to the Plain Dealer city room and asked black power grows too strong, and also It may indicate that the Police Depart­ phere for the sharing of social truths that for the NBC cameraman. They said that to use the threat of riots to str,ike a ment tactics will lead them to identify reach into our most private lives; the NBC knew where the riots were. Next the political blow against the mayor. He sees the whole population of the ghetto as the actors were not strangers or professional police went to Ahmed's book store and that the ghetto has no other choice than enemy, just as the American forces have entertainers .or stage stars (who are alien­ arresteri him (for the thirdtime ina month) him, so he can show hjmself as a law­ been led to identify the entire rural pop­ ated from tht: common mass, anyway, by and 20 others, among them Lincoln Lynch and-order Negro. It is said that he 's ulation of Vietnam as the enemy. Then the the i r reputatio'1); the actors were of CORE and a girl researcher for NBC. Lyndon's man for mayor this fall. Hubert helicopter will begin to"search-and-de­ strikers -- a blood and bone extension of Lynch was charged with drunkenness an.j Humphrey has peen in town three times in 'stroy" in earnest. .. -. ; ': L: i ~ic.".~, ~ '" . :.!r .: JUNE 1967 THE MOVEMENT PAGE 9

Now what happens then isthat the people that has come out in the country from will be brought before a wider justice who have power in our ghettos are the black men. than they recognize and a more profound CARMICHAEL property owners. So that when their stores Do you know of him? ijave you read condemnation than they are equipped to CON'T FROM PAGE 4 are touched they call the National Guard. his stuff? Why haven't you read his understand.', But analyze that one step further, every­ stuff? Is it because you are too busy. That is a profound statement. was kllled? body in our ghettos knows that we are trying to find out where the Kappas are Is that what you are imitating? Is it charged higher prices for rotten meat. partying Friday night? for you not to reason why at a Univer­ Everybody knows that, but nobody says Why is .it that you haven't read his IT NOT YOU, WHO? sity, but to do and die? Do you not have we deplore the high prices they charge stuff? Is it that you are spit-shining ., Now the last statement that I want to the guts to say, hell no? the Negro for rotten meat. your shoes so that you can become a leave you with is by John Donne. You Do you not have the guts to say I wlll They don't say that. Nobody moves to lieutenant colonel to"" go to Vietnam when know John Donne is my favorite philo­ not allow anyone to make me a hired readjust the problems black people are you graduate? Why is it that you haven't sophical poet of the 17th centruy. He klller? facing in the ghetto -:---the slumlord, read his stUff? Is it that you don't want said "the death of any man diminishes When I decide to kill, since it is the machinery set up. to read anything about being black be- me because I am involved in mankind." greatest crime that man can make. I And if they try to, they find out that the >cause you, too, are ashamed of it and are Now what this generation has allowed will make that decision. And I will not people who own the property arethe people running from it? to happen is that we are not involved in only decide to kill, I will decide whom who make the laws. So you want to run ,to your debutante mankind. Now when we began to crawl to kill. ball with your light-skinned girlfriend they sent six million people to an oven So that you are now at a vast black to be white. So.you want to run to your and we blinked our eyes. And when we university where they have already in­ PRIVATE PROPERTY Kappa fraternity ball and forget all else. walked they sent our uncles to Korea. corporated in your thinking violence. When the ghettos rebel you are going And we grew up in a cold war to continue And here you are marching around every Property rights, property rights iswhat to be the buffer, and you are the ones their head-wrecking period so that we are -" Friday, or Thursday, or Wednesday or the United States Consitution is based on. who are going to be caught in the middle. immune to humanity and we, this genera­ Whatever it is, with your shoes spit You should know that. The gate is swinging open. Brothers and tion, must save the world. We must be­ shined 'til three o'clock in the morning People ·who didn't own property could sisters, you had better come home. You come involved 'in mankind. h~d, marching with a gun in your learn­ not vote when this country was first had better come home early this summer.· We must not alloW them to stage the ing all about how to shoot. founded. Not ·until years afterwards were You had better take what knowledge you killing of every and anything that gets in Over in Vietnam they put you on a front suchpeople able to vote. So the analysis have and use it to benefit black people their way. line and you are shooting. But that is not is -the- question of property vs. property­ in the ghetto. We must not become part of that violence because you can't define for your- . less people. That's what it's all about. machinery. Now I want toread my favorite self. Y()U ought to tell the school that if That's what thoserebellions are about. quote: you. wanted to learn how to kill ,you would Nothing else, nothing less. And what ap- WHAT MUST BE DONE 'IIf I am not for myself, who will be? go to West Point. •palls me about the black leaders is they If I am for myself alone, who am I? They ,turn them out there. You came do not have the guts to condemn the You had better recognize that in­ ,If not now, when? And if not you, who?" here to learn'how to help your people of grocery store owner. Now I will say any­ dividualism is a luxury that black stu­ I want to thank you. .. Baltimore in the ghettos upon whom you time a man has been charging us all that dents can no longerafiord. You hadbetter turn your baCks as soon as you get a money for 15 years, his store should understand that. You had better begin to chance. have been bombed five years ago. See yourself as a people, and as a group If the money the Americans are planning' And what can you tell a black man in Should have been out of the neighbor­ and, therefore, you need to helpto advance to spend on the war next year. were Baltimore who lives in the ghettos about hood five years ago. And if nobody wants that group. simply divided up and. given to the 16 kUling? Hasn't he been subjected to it all to do it, then you can't blame people Can you b~ aggressive? Can you say million inhabitontsof South Vietnam, of his life? What is your analysis about when they move to do'it for themselves. that Baltimore is almost 52 percent black every man, woman and child -';"'ould get the rebellions that have 1>een occurring If you want to stop rebellion, then eradi­ and black people should own, run it, lock, a 'sum of nearly $1,960 each, which all around the state? cate the cause. stock and barrel? They do it every place would give them ane of the highest per Are you like everybody else? Are you You are college stUdents, you should capita incomes in the world. else. Or, are you afraid? ,- The New Statesman against violence? Do you analyze? Do you think. Now then we want to talk finally Can you not go out and organize those recognize what it means? Let me explaiIi. about the responsibility of youth. That's people to take the political power which The reason why they say we expound black students. they have been denied? Can you not help? violence isn't becausewe expound violence Or are you too busy trying to be a doctor but because we refuse to condemn black RESPONSIBILITY and lawyer so that you can get a big car people who throw rocks and bottles at ,OF BLACK STUDENTS and a big house and talk about your house policemen. in the suburbs and r m the only one out That is why, and I'say that is the only What is your responsibility to your fel­ there? reason why. Because I' look at all the low black brothers? Why are you here? . Can you begin to say that James Brown FIGHT other Negroleaders -- so calledleaders __ So that you can become a social worker is us, that he is a musical genius as CONIT FROM PAGE 3 everytime there is a riot. "We deplore so that you can kick down a door in the much as Bach or Beethoven? Can you say violence, we avoid use of violence, it is middle of the night to look for a pair it? of shoes? very, very bad, there is only a small Can you understand your culture? Can paternalism. The black ghetto is split Is that what you come to college for? group of vagabonds, they don't represent you make them teach it to you here in between a few appointed leaders, accept­ SO that you can keep the kid in the ghetto our community, and violence never college, rather than to teach you Bach and able to the dominant institutions, and the accomplishes anything. Yes, we aretrain­ school, so that you can ride up in a big Beethoven which is only one-sided? Why mass of the poor. Bonneville with AKA sign stuck on the ~o ing our boys to go to Vietnam. We think can't you also have James Brown that The two traditional P9litlcal parties have it is a good thing to send them to Vietnam baCk? Is that your responsibility? Is that you can begin to know what culture is ignored the black community, and until your responsibility? What is your re­ but violence never accomplishes anything all about? two years ago, only 25% of the blacks at all." sponsibUitY? What is your responsibUity I want to finish with two quotes. The were registered to vote. The entireopera­ to black people of Baltimore who are first is by Bertrand Russell. You know­ tion of Rochester indicates that it Is GHETTO VIOLENCE .hungry for the knowledge you are sup­ about the war tr1bun:i.I•. You should. closed to any leadership which does'not posed to have? Bertram Russell is calling :the war tri­ represent a segment of the business Now you have got to.understand this Is it so that you can .just get over? bunals to judge people ,of,this country. community. Do you forget that· it is your sweat that very;clearly. If you know anything about I want to read from what ·he calls , FIGHT the ghetto, you wouldJrnow that on any put you where you are? Do you not know "An Appeal to My Conscience." You ought s~utJ1ern given Friday or Saturday·night there.is that your blackmothers scrubbedfloors so to try to understand it very·clearly be­ "They run this town like a more yiolence inside the ghetto than any . you can get here, and the minute you get cause what you ought to .IBlderstand about plantation," exclaimed"professionalrad­ place ..else.in any given city. out, you turn. your back on them? What the war in Vietnam is that ithas interest lcal" Saul Alinsky,whoseorganizationithe You know that we cut and butcher and is your responsibUity, black students? to you not only personally,that is·during Industrial Areas Foundation,was imported ' shoot each other. And do you also know What is it? Is it to become a teacher so your student days, but iUs very political by the Rochester Council of Churches to that in any given ghetto there is more you can be programmed into a ghetto for black people. When McNamarasayshe .gve theblack communitya vo4;e, following police power, that is, in terms of num­ school? So that you can get up and say, is going to draft 30 percent black people the 1964 uprising. . bers, there are more police per block, "It's a shame how ourchUdren are out· of the ghettos, baby that,is nothing After a year and one-halfofwork, FIGHT per square inch than in any other area 'culturally deprived?" but urban removal, that's all it is. And if emerged as an organization of organiza­ of the city? What do you know about culturally de­ you don't begin to understand that,you are tions representing some "105 churches,' What 'does that mean to yoU? It means prived? What is your definition ofculture. going to be the fellows leadingthe charges fraternities, block clubs, civil rights that on Friday night while there are Isn't it anything man-made? Is it not any­ of your 30 percent black people. You don't groups, small businesses, poolhalls, bar­ more police there is moreviolence among thing man-made? How the helt can I be understand that. Do you have the guts to bershops and youth groups."Nevertheless, . black people. So obviously they don't· give culturally deprived? You deny my very stand up now and say I will not follow the degree of real cohesion within the a damn about the violence among black existence, to use that term. law and order, I will follow my own black community andthe amount ofsupport people ••• Do ·you question what they tell you at conscience? . for FIGHT is largely indeterminate. Let one black boy throw one rock at school? Or do you only accept, carry it That's what they sent Eichman to jail In spite of the fact that local Protes­ some filthy grocery store and the whole back, get over; andgo outtofurther stymie for, you know, because he followed law tant ministers, selected by Alinsky and damned National' Guard comes into our black people in the ghetto? and order. And they said that there is the Council of Churches, provide the ghetto. Why is that? I blam~ you· for the rebellions across a higher law than the law of government. primary leadership for FIGHT, the or­ Because property rights means more the country last summer, 'And Iwill blame There is the law of each of us and they ganization does project an image of than human rights and ,in the ghetto we you again when they increase more this are absolutely right. And that is my law, mtUtancy. Minister Florence, FIGHT's 110 not own the property. If we get robbed, summer. and I will not go to Vietnam, I will not dynamic and aggressive leader, working you can call the policemen. 'tu you It is your obligation to be back in the serve in the army. I will say hell no. closely with Alinsky and the two fUll­ turn white: He ain't coming. But just hit ghetto helping out black people whO are The choices are very clear. They are time professional IAF organizers, has a grocery store. Just throw a molotov looking, who are acting, begging and think­ crystal clear. You either suffer or you openly proclaimed his support for black cocktail through a window and see how ing a way to solve their problems. And inflict suffering. Eiijl.er you go toLeaven­ power. Florence and Alinsky intend to qUick they come in. you are running out of'the ghetto as worth or you become a killer. I will not make the confrontation between community They deplore violence. They can't stand fast as your sports cars and Mustangs become a killer. I will choose to suffer. unions and business corporations the new the violence that goes on in the street. can carry yOU? I will go to jail. To hell with this country. focal point for a revived civil rights Itsallright on Friday and Saturday night What is your responsibUity, black stu­ Now then the quote by Mr. Russell: movement and thus transformblackpower when we cut each other in the street dents of Morgan? Do you know about Du "Just as in the' case of Spain, Viet­ from a slogan to a strategy for social and no one black man ever talks about Bois? Have you read Douglass? Do you nam is a barbarous rehearsal. It is our action. it. We need nonviolence in the black com­ know Richard Wright? Can you quote A. J. ' intention that neither, the bona fides nor Supporting Florence, Stokely Carmi­ munity. That's where we need it. Rogers? Do you know Claude MCKay? the authenticity of this tribunal will be chael, who visited FIGHT in February, We have to learn to love and respect Can you understand, can you understand susc~ptible to challenge from those who remarked: "When we're through with ourselves. That's where it should begin. LeRoi Jones? There is a young man with have so much to hide. them, Minister Florence will say 'jump' That's where it must begin. Because if me now. His name Eldridge Cleaver. He "President Johnson, Dean Rusk, Robert and they'll ask, 'How High?' " So far, the we don't love us, ain't nobody going to just spent eight years in jail, he is writ­ McNamara, Henry Cabot Lodge, General corporate business leadership has, not love us. ing some of the most profound writing Westmoreland and their fellow criminals responded with that question. .. PAGE 10 THE MOVEMENT JUNE 1967

"Whitney Young is a great man," he they would all quit if the money was not said. "He operates out of New York paid in full. The money was given to them and Washington. He works behind the that day. scenes with businessmen andpoliticians." "People in Lowndes County are well­ "But," he said sadly, "nobody knows informed," says Hulett. "And we keep about what Whitney Young does:' them informed. They told Smith things Menge is doing his best to let the about the stipends that he didn't know Lowndes County people know what a great about." man Whitney Young is. He purchased The people in the county can control 18 copies of a NEWSWEEK article on the program because the staff 'cannot the Negro Movement and was giving it keep information away from them. They out to his trainees. This article is one meet with one another and discuss what is of the most vicious anti-Carmichael at­ happening. When Smith paid a friend of tacks ever written. his $175 to take some photos ofthe burned office, the people learned about it fast. "SENSITIVITY TRAINING" "Poor people don't have that kind of money," says Frank Miles, LCFO candi­ Menge was using the NEWSWEEK article date for Tax Collector. "Smith could in one of his classes. It was a "sensi­ have bought himself a camera and trained tivity training" class of which he was people to use it for less than that:' very proud. An LCFO leader told us, "Smith wants "These people have a natural sense a good reputation with the whites. Negroes of body contact," he said. "So I divided can't talk with him: he's too busy. But them up in pairs and had them put their if a white from the courthouse comes PART OF TENT CITY in Lowndes County. fingertips to the fingertips of the other down, he'll talk with him for half the person. Then I asked one of them to day. And he holds unauthorized meetings. pretend that he was one of the Negro I think he's the worst enemy of Negroes ·leaders in NEWSWEEK and to try and in Lowndes County." let the other person know who he was through his fingertips. And it workedI They were able to tell who the other ACT LIKE WHITES person was pretending to beI" It is obviouS that the Program staff WAR ON POVERTY "Who did. most of the people choose have no traction when it comes to bra1n­ to be?" we asked. washing. When Smith told Hulett that he "Stokely Carmichael," Menge said~ thought that Negroes in Lowndes should HITS LOWNDES puzzled. . learn to act like whites, Hulett let it by Terence Cannon Smith proposed the contract at a meet­ ing when Hulett was out Of the county. HA YNEVILLE, ALABAMA -- Lowndes Since then the people have learned the County is the heartland of Black Power. full story. Hulett says he doesn't think A year ago the black residents, with the they will let the Poverty Program build aid of SNCC, organized the Lowndes the new headquarters there. County Freedom Organization (LCFO), "The OEO is for poor people to help the powerful political party that is chang­ poor people help themselves," says Hulett. ing life in the county. Since January "We take what is good from the Poverty there has been a quiet war between the Program, the literacy and the medical LCFO and the federal county poverty services. The other part, brainwashing porgram. It looks like Black Power is to get people to compromise with the winning. power structure -- we don't buy that. The Poverty Program is teaching local "Poor people don't have to be grateful people how to read and how to teach to the government. It's your money and reading. A medical program is being we are the government. planned. These are good and important "Mr. Smith says he thinks poor people programs. People must be able to read don't know what they want. He writes in order to run their own lives. The proposals and then shows them to the water in Lowndes is contaminated and Board." medical services are poor. In order to change this, the people of the county THE MAN FROM BOSTON applied for a federal poverty program. (;: ..a The "Educational Consultant" for the o Program is Dr. Carleton Menge from ro o MR, D. ROBERT SMITH Boston, a white man. When we asked o .c Mr. D. Robert Smith is the Director him about the church burnings, he said, 0. of the county poverty program. His salary "The burning of the church has aroused is $800 a month; he lives in Tuskeegee, a lot of sympathy in the white com­ JOHN HU LETT, head of the Lowndes County Freedom Organization. 75 miles from Hayneville. He commutes munity for the Poverty Program." every day. Mr. Smith reminded me of a "You mean the white community IN THE $200 DESK pass without comment. A few weeks later, football coach, friendly, cagey, and full LOWNDES COUNTY?" "Yes :' We met Dr. Menge later in the Poverty the white bank that handles the poverty of energy. A lot of that energy, I think, "How do you mean?" we asked. Office. He, was lamenting that there had account completely screwed up the Pro­ is nervousness. For good reason. "Oh, they've given money:' not been enough money asked for in the gram's cancelled checks. Smith was "Who has?" original poverty grant. furious. "Those people at the bank are "Why, Mr. Coleman, who owns the build­ THE BUILDING DEAL "The people who drew up the original stupid and incompetent," he fumed. ing and land, put up $1000:' proposal were very unsophisticated," he " Are those the white people we're sup- "Did any other whites in the county said -- meaning John Hulett andthe mem­ posed to act like?" said Hulett. . The people in Lowndes County tell give money?" we asked. bers of the Lowndes County Christian There is no way that the Program can many stories about Mr'. Smith. One is No answer. Movement. !'They only requested $1000 control Hulett. He refused to take a about the Poverty Headquarters. The main Later we asked Hulett about Coleman's for office supplies." job with them and refuses to run for office was located in a church in the "gift"• "Why, anybody knows that a desk like office. Smith needs Hulett's support and white district of Hayneville, the county "Wouldn't YOU give $10007" he said, this costs $200," he said, rapping his knows it. seat. The church and the property were "if the building was yours after 10years?" owned by a Mr. Coleman, first cousin knuckles on a modern metal desk. "Now "Smith is employedby the poor people," of the Coleman who murdered J onathen when Mr. Smith draws up HIS proposal says Hulett. "WE decide. We elected Daniels. THE 70 YEAR OLD BOY for -next year, we'll have plenty of money professional people to the Board, but we Two months ago the church was burned Our first impression of Dr. Menge· to run an office:' made it clear that the poor controlled down. A trailer now houses the Program was at a mass meeting of trainees in "That's right," John Hulett told us. them. They've done very good:' office on the same property. Smith drew the Program. "You people are simply "Smith wants to draw up a lot of pro­ How did Smith come to be chosen up a contract with Coleman which said wonderful," he told the audience of 200 grams under his control, so all the Poverty Director? According to local a new building would cost the Program black people. "Why it's amazing how money goes through his. hands. Smith leaders it came about this way: The OEO between $5,000 - $10,000. The building fast you've learned to read.l~ told us he wants to have an expensive in Washington Wanted a person with a must be completed within 90 days from "Now take Mr. ," he said, office to impress Governor Wallace:' Masters Degree to head the program. It appointed a Consultant from Tuskeegee, the beginning of construction and must pointing to a blac";"k-m-an-s""i'-tting against THE REVOLT have $10,000 worth of insurance for 10 the wall. "He's 70 years old, but he's C' a guy making $50 a day working for years. just a BOY:' Hulett and the people of Lowndes are Humphrey and Johnson to tell poor people The contract also said that at the end Later John Hulett said to us quietly, not letting Smith get off lightly. They are what they need" Frank Miles described of 10 years, ownership of the bUilding "We don't go for that in Lowndes County." not giving up their control over the him). goes back to Mr. Colemanl "I'm simply amazed," Dr. Menge told program. "You can't brainwash Lowndes The Consultant had to recommend a When Smith brought the contract to the the audience, "that you people don't know County people," Hulett told us. person with an MA, and recommended Poverty Board, made up mostly of Lowndes who Senator Brooke of Massachusetts A while ago the stipends paid to the Smith. However, he made it clear to County black people, for approval, he is. He should be an example to your trainees were held up for several weeks, the Poverty Board that they did not did not tell them they would lose the race. He's successful. He's a Negro because of an accounting error. Many had HA VE to take him. Then there was a bUilding in 10 years. He did not tell who has reached the very top." a large sum coming to them. Smith ob­ big rush and the people were told that them about the 90 'day limit. Later in the churchyard, Menge told jected to paying them the full amount, if they did not have the program set up John Hulett, head of the LCFO, told us, "It's amazing -- these people admire saying" You can't give that much money in a week they would lose the money. THE MOVEMENT, "We don't need the Stokely Carmichael so much. And they to poor people at one time." The Board felt pushed to ilppoint Smith. Hulett went to the trainees and ex­ headquarters there. What is it doing don't seem to know anything about the ! in the white community anyway? The more successful Negro leaders." plained what had happened. The group CONT INU ED ON PAGE B Lowndes County Christian Movement owns What t\egro leaders does Mr. Menge -went over all the rules about the stipends its own land. If the bUilding was built admire? ".nd then called in Smith and told him )n our land, we'd own it forever." JUNE 1967 THE MOVEMENT PAGE 11 WELFARE BLUES IN CHICAGO

by Marilyn Katz

CHICAGO -- On April 28, 1967, the Welfare Recipient Unions in Chicago met at the West Side Organization. The ques­ tion before them was whether to support the strike of the Independent Union of Public Aid Employees and if so, how. The request of the IUPAE for support brought up once again the dilemmafacing "radical organizer~ who consider working with two constituencies which, by their position in the system, are in conflict. Can recipient unions work with a union of casework-ers? Can they unite to im­ prove an immoral, repressive system while it exists? Or are their goals mutu­ ally exclusive?

REASONS FOR SUPPORT Last. year at this time we faced the same dilemma. At that time the case­ workers were on strike for the right to organize and unionize and wanted sup­ port from the various organizations doing welfare and civil rights work. Last May we decided to support the union in their LADO ORGANIZERS demonstrate-at Wicker Park Public Aid office. demands although each organization did so separately. We supported the,m be­ at any Cook County Department of Public recipients and caseworkers alike. On the such overt hostility in their district of­ cause: Aid location. other hand the IUPAE had dropped mOst fices, but all realized the battle lines _ 1. We felt that they had the right Through this contract,on all matters of of the agency-improvement section of being drawn at Wicker Park to organize, unionize and strike. major policy and legislative change the its contract, and it became ever more Today is Monday and it appears that 2. It was a chance to use disruptive IUPAE would be obligated to support clear that the majority of the IUPAE was the caseworkers will be going back to tactics which pointed to the inadequacies Union actions. If the IUPAE purports to oriented toward the development of a their jobs this week. The picket lines are of the welfare system. "be about the same thing we are", then professional trade union. still being manned but a contract has been it is only logical that they agree to this negotiated and only needs ratificationfrom 3. The administration was arguingthat INDEPENDENT ORGANIZING the unionization and striking of Public clause. the county board. We have not seen a At this point we decided to go into copy.of the contract but rumor has it Aid Employees injured recipients. We CONTRACT VOTED DOWN wanted to dispell that myth and make the district offices independently. We that it does not include an al?;ency im­ it clear that the real enemy was not the However, this contract was voted down would do heavy organizing and grievance provement section nor does it insure any union but those same administrators. by the delegate assembly of the IUPAE work to make sure Jhat the department kind of IUPAE security within the de­ Since that time the dilemma has been 38-4 on the following Monday night be­ was not screwing recipients any more partment. cause of Article 1. The' assembly felt than usual. We felt that 'it was an ex­ intensified and has grown more com­ SOME LESSONS LEARNED plex: they could not ask their membership cellent time to recruit members for the 1. Weare no longer dealing with an to go out on strike in support of WRU union, as the department's inefficiency The dilemma which faced us last month administration equally ,oppressive in_ demands when it w~uld mean _breaking was at its highest. has not been resolved, but the past month rhetoric and deed, but one which has their contract which specified no strike Also, some of the more active IUPAE of striking has been extremely educa­ assumed a liberal rhetroic and is head­ action during the duration of the con­ merrbers were going out in the com­ tional for all parties involved, though ed by a man (William Robinson, a Negro) tract. Furthermore, they felt they could munities encouraging recipients to go to not particularly productive in actual gains. who was nominated and supported by the not ask their membership to give up a Recipient Unions if they had problems The liberal administration's rhetoric Welfare Recipient Unions. day's pay for support of issues which and not to stay away from the offices has been completely stripped away and 2. The IUPAE has done littletofurther would not benefit them. Finally they because of the strike. although Robinson claims to be a soul working relationships with the recipient brought up the point that there was no _ The most active union in this inde­ brother, his"goodness" can only be seen unio~s in the past year. way they could enforce this clause even pendent organization was LADO. They as irrelevant in an immoral and oppres­ if they did agree to it as they had no had taken a softer line with the IUPAE sive system. NEW PRIORITIES effective control over thebehavior oftheir and were willing to work with them at The IUPAE, although the contract they members. Thus negotiations broke down their district office (Wicker Park) which won was weak, may have learned a lesson When the Welfare Unions met thisyear, and we tookan essentially neutral posi­ has the well-earned reputation of being in power as evidenced by their growing we acted upon a new set of priorities. tion on the strike. one of the worst offices in the city. militancy and increased out-reaChing to Our primary commitment was to the uni­ The next Friday the IUPAE presented LADO organizing and grievance work recipient groups as the strikeprogressed. fication and strengthening of recipient the ~elfare Recipients Unions with a four was met with police state tactics. On The contradictions are still there but groups, and all our decisions proceedfrom point proposal similar to the one the their third day of organizing LADO or­ the IUPAE can be worked with while the that. The West Side Organization, JOIN, City-Wide Union had presented to them. ganizers found recipients enclosed in an contradictions between the Recipient East Garfield Park Community Organiza­ However, they had emasculated the whole office where they could not get to them. Unions and the Administration are irrES­ tion, the Latin American Defense Organi­ thing by changing the first point so that When they attempted to enter this office olvable. zation and the Englewood Civic Organiza­ instead of mutual support for picket lines to distribute their literature andtake care However, no matter who the Recipient tion, uniting as the City-wide Welfare there would be a committee set up to of the grievances of the recipients they Unions decide to work with in the future, Union, decided that we would have to discuss whether or not either groupwould met with resistance from office officials it is essential that we be unified. If we demand certain legally binding commit­ support the actions of the other and to aided by a goon squad of cops. Obed allow the department or the IUPAE to ments from IUPAE if we were to sup­ what extent. Lopez was carried out by one of the thug­ divide us on issues we will never be able port-them. Consequently a five point con­ cops who had attacked him without warn­ to gain the power or gain control of tract was submitted to the Community NEED FOR ACTION ing. The next day the LADO organizers the system. Organizations Committee of the IUPAE. The proposal was voted doWn by the were promised safe conduct by the Ad­ We must not be forced to keep reacting The contract called for mutual coopera­ CWWU although there were differing ministration of the Welfare Department to situations as individual groups who come tion between IUPAE and the Welfare opinions among the merrbers about the but Obed and a fellow organizer, Olga together only at the moment of crisis. Unions including a joint grievance board present strike. No one had expected it Pedroza, were arrested on a charge of Instead we must act as a unified group and mutual efforts to change the Ulinois to last as long as it did and people criminal trespassing and whisked out the that knows where it is going and has a Public Aid policy and administration. The felt that some action had to be taken. back door before anyone could protest. strategy which will enable it to direct most important and controyersial point On the one hand, recipients were being None of the other Recipient Unions met action so that it &an get there. '+ was #1 which read: turned away from the distriCt offices Welfare Union and IUPAE will show and the administration's liberal rhetoric mutual respect for picket lines, refusing was .increasingly being worn thin by the GOOD FELLOWS' FIND PLACE to cross a line set up by either union repressive nature of its actions toward by Junebug Boykin young guys to hang out. A place wherE CHICAGO -- The Chicago Goodfellows we could talk to guys andtryto get througt started last summer when a couple of to them and be friends with them. hillbilly guys had an idea and got to­ We just opened the place. We know that gether. Arid the idea was that something it will be a slow hard task, but it wi!: had to be done about police brutality. be worth it in the end. Not only on polic( The only way we though: of to stop police brutality, but bad housing and food CO-Ol ,brutality was getting guys together and and everything that is wrong with thi~ march on the police. (200 Guys marched. damn society. See Movement, Cd '66) So the march on All we have in the place is a ping­ the police was done, but something hap­ pong table and a juke box. But we will pened and it wasn't for the good. get more machines to put in the place, What happened was that after the march It's not so hot inside the place, but it's guys went their separate ways and the started and we're fixing it up. cops really let them have it. Then before There is something that I want to say, you knew it there was no more Good­ and that- is when guys like myself keel fellows. popping up with ideas they might just fit Wirter came and things moved sJowly, together and be the answer to our prob­ but it gave a few guys time to think lems though it might take a lifetime. This and think hard. And then another idea is my life now and what I just wrote gives popped up. That was to open a p1'alle:for W3,enp,.p"eOI?~~!~~~ ~~}a1th.; ~ ,':", "

t .~.(~/ )";I:,l_~I !";.." b' ]."/ .. b/I~-)~llJ') • PAGE 12 THE MOVEMENT JUNE 1967

TEATRO CAMPESINO LUIS VALDEZ. DIRECTOR --POLITICAL ART-FORM

For the past 18 months, a "theatre event from the Huelga, The very first representing all farm workers. The pa­ of the farm worker" has been evolving situation that developed was a Hueiguista troncito became SCHENLEY, then DI­ in Delano. It works toward the organiza­ on the picket ijne talking to a scab in the GIORGIO, then PERELLI - MINETTI tion of farm workers into a national fields, trying to convince him to join changing names as soon as we won a ne';' union, through the United Farm Workers the strike. It was a scene straight out of contract, but always there just the same. Organizing Committee, AFL-CIO, it is a reality, and its impact on the little aud­ The PA'IRONCITO represents all grow­ "poor people's" theatre realized in an ience gathered there that night was con­ ers. We needed no curtains, no lights, art-idiom intended to express their re­ siderable. no make up; we used costumes and props ality. It is known as EI Teatro Campesino only sparingly (who had time to make (Farm Workers Theatre). EARLY DEVELOPMENT them anyway?) - a cigar, a hat, an old pair of pants (taken from donated cloth­ "Are you REALLY farm workers?" A scene, 'however, does not make a asks a well-i~tentlOned union supporter. ing), a pair of pruning shears, a wine theatre. For about five months, we put "Who taught you how to act? Who writes bottle. The union hall was our stage, and our actos (skits) together, quite unob­ your material?" These are questions the living presence of the Huelga was our trusively, in the late hours of the night ofte:l asked of us after a performance in set. after picketing, after organizing, after one of the big cities. They imply, I suppose, " all the immediately necessary work had that farm workers would not be duing , '§ been done. If there was time, the actos REFLECTING THE STRIKE theatre if someone hadn't put them up to .:! were rehearsed and presented to the We began. to see that our little Teatro it. True, but by the same token, there strikers at the weekly meetings. Strike had a real function. Done well, it could wouldn't be a United Farm Workers Union J ,,, songs were composed in much the same articulate our collective experience, re­ if Cesar Chavez and his staff hadn't put ~ way. Nothing was ever written down, flecting the strike back to the strikers farm workers up to it. Even so, all •'out­ c3 no scripts were used, actors constant­ in clear images. The actos became little side agitators" must eventually leave a ly changed, and much of a performance morality plays expressing the morality the organization in the hands of its own ~ _was improvised. The group was never of the Huelga. As the strike grew more people. So it must be in the Teatro. 0.. officially launched and baptised as a complex, the actos - in order to re­ main simple - began to depend on the POLITICAL ART FORM FELIPE CANTU as Con Sotaco, fl,ugie Lira as union theatre. In those early months of his conscience strike, nobody was even sure the union synthetic' power of symbolism. Poetic What we mean by ..theatre" here is images emerged from our broad comic not a group but a political artform used farm workers cheer and applaud him. itself would survive. style. In "La Quinta Temporada" (The by farm workers to organize. A theatre:' His "Don Sotaco" is TIlE farm worker. From the very beginning, the measure Fifth Season), the four seasons are per-' aimed at the popular mind, where the Without any real precedents to confuse of a good acto became how well we zeroed sonified. Don Sotaco is hired by Don audience is encouraged to participate as us, the Teatro developed by working with in on the practical issues of our struggle: Coyote to pick the Patroncito's summer boisterously as the· actors themselves. A what was available, It would have been the need for union recognition, the tac- crop. When the time comes, •'Summer" ' theatre with groups across Californiafrom impossible !O try to present a play'in the . tical workings of a consumer boycott,' enters dressed in farm working clothes, Brawley to ;Yuba:City, ,and even in Oregon, beginning. Much less, find a stage, lights the protection of a union contract. We but with dollar bills hanging like green Washington, Arizona and Texas. Perhaps and a rehearsal hall, etc. We began in began to learn how to dramatize the leaves all over his worn, khaki work even in Colorado, and on east to Wisconsin November '65, in the second month of the reality we were all living in. It was a shirt and hat. The green dollar-leaves and New York. Except for the last three collective reality, so what emerged was Delano Grape Strike, with little morethan are the crop Don Sotaco picks. states mentioned, the Teatro Campesino the willingness of a few farm workers an "unnaturalistic" (as opposedto unreal­ istic) form of theater. Organizations, in­ Another acto on P-M is called •'EI has performed in allof these places. Farm to Itact out" what they were experienciilg' Boyceteo del Perro-Minetti" (The Boy­ workers have seen the simplicity with in the struggle. We had some small signs animate objects, seasons, and ideas be­ cott of Dog-Minetti). The action takes which the Teatro works, and they' have saying in plain black letters on whitepost­ came living characters - all by the place in front of our two, four-paneled asked many times:. "How do we start er board: ESQUlROL (scab), HUELGUlSTA simple act of hanging signs on actors, folding screens. (The black and red o~ own Teatro?" The people are ready (striker), PATRON ITO (gr'Ower), and reading WINTER, BOYCOTT, CON'IRACT, paneled cloth screens serve as our all­ for 'their theatre. It is we who are not CONTRATISTA (contractor). I put string SOCIAL Jl,JSTICE. Our human characters purpose backdrop, wings" and dressing otganized to give them one. ·on them, and then at a small meeting in became the archetypes of our struggle: room during performances on flat-bed Part of the problem is that we didn't a kitchen, hUI.1g them on some willing the farm labor contractor became DON COYOTE, representing all contractOrs; what a Farm Worker~ Theatre "actors," askiilg them to act OUt some cQNTINUED ON pXGE: 8 know _~eUlguista was when we started the Teatro. There oUr r became "-[:)qN"SbTACO; was no blueprint (as far as we know) provided for such a project in American Theatre history, and so we had to start from scratch. In the genre of workers' theatre there was Brecht, Odets, the Fed­ eral Theatre Project in New York during GIAnT POSTERSI the 30's, etc. -all distant and academic. Then there was the Free Southern 11:e­ atre, but they made no pretenses to being MAL~OLM Xand 'HE GUEVARA a workers' theatre and never seriously tackled the problem of teaching South­ ern sharecroppers and farm workers $1.00 EACH. how to produce plays oftheir owri. •'Wait­ ing for Godot"· is, after all, a bit way out even for the well-fed white audiences ONLY 75¢ in the North. There was the Mexican popular theater of the 20's when the to Movement Mexican Revolution was still young and S"bSc.ibe~ radical, but that too was distant: only the popular caricatures of Pozada, Oroz­ co and Rivera inspired by the bawdy, satirical characters of the Teatro Te­ pache and Teatro Lirico remained to in­ spire us. Orozco's savage, satiricalscet­ ches shOWing drunken hags andpoliticians; (22 X 28 inches) Rivera's murals showing gor~lla generals and capitalists hogging bags of money .SPECIAL BULK'RATES whilt. stepping on the starving poor; Po­ zada's CALAVERAS (skeleton carica­ tures) and his gift for capturing the ex­ pressions of the Mexican peasant - these did more for us than all the plays of the radical 30's. (7====*SUBSCRIBE TO THE MOVEMENT!'

MEXICAN SPIRIT NAME More o'f the spirit of the Mexican popu­ lar theater came into the Teatro through specific individuals. Not all Mexican farm ADDRESS laborers in the United States are illi- "" t~rate. Many in fact are surprisinglyedu­ CITY STATE ZIP cated IN SPANISH. Felipe Cantu is a _ case in point. He is 45, has seven chil­ Please send me: dren, and has worked in the fields during Next 12 issues of THE MOVEMENT ($2) I the last 20 years he has been in the U.S. Malcolm X posters In MeXico, however, he was everything from "a cop to a clown," and used to Che Guevara posters act in provincial theaters. From time to check if time, he quotes us long passages of Mex­ I enclose $----- ican poetry, and bis fund of folk songs M~~~ ~ in fantastic. Cantinflas is lis hero, but \= _,:=. subscriber he has a comic style all his own. He has ~-===== been building a character during the last ------' year or so, based onAndy Zermeno's MAIL TO THE MOVEMENT 449 14th STREET , comic hero in EL MALCRIADO cartoons. SEND ONE TO A fRIEND' SAN _FRANCISCO, CALIF. 94103 When Felipe comes on as "Don Sotaco,"