WflliltEliS ,,1N(;',1,, 25¢ No. 421 '"'~.)('523 6 February 1987 Reagan Off the Deep End? There he goes again-as soon as The very next day the Pentagon Reagan gets into a political jam at canceled port leaves for the Nimitz, home he reaches for the.red phone and sending the nuclear aircraft carrier U.S. naval task forces are sent prowl­ into the eastern Mediterranean; the ing for a military "crisis." For weeks, Kennedy's battle group was ordered to the Reaganauts have been looking to remain in the region "indefinitely"; a divert attention from the Iran/Contra 1,600-man Marine amphibious unit is scandal with some "bang bang" for the on station while another is due there TV evening news. So you could almost shortly; six U.S. warships are heading hear the shouts of joy from the White north in the Persian Gulf, and a third House basement when news came carrier, the Kitty Hawk, is racing from from Lebanon that three more Ameri­ the Philippines to the Arabian Sea. cans had been kidnapped in Beirut. In addition, the State Department AP The London Guardian (29 December) banned all travel to Lebanon and gave perceptively. noted that, this "intensi­ American passport holders 30 days to fied the political pressure on President get out of the country. And while Reagan's Reagan just as the lacklustre State of they're rattling sabers in the Med, an "diplomacy": the Union address to Congress and the FBI dragnet arbitrarily seizedPales­ Bibles and guns nation on Tuesday night conspicuous­ tinian Arabs in Los Angeles (see page for Iranian ly failed to achieve its goal of re­ 2) in a transparent effort to whip up mullahs. U.S. establishing the prestige of the presi­ war hysteria at home. battleship Iowa dency after Irangate." Since it didn't The "State of the Union" speech, off Honduras play in Peoria, they bring up the supposed to be the rallying cry for the coast. Sixth Fleet. continued on page 11 Anger Over Racist Attacks Derailed in Georgia ATLANTA-They came from around the wrist with nothing more than the country to participate in what was misdemeanors. After being subjected dubbed the biggest civil rights march to racist invective and intimidation since the '60s: But the "Brotherhood Il" throughout the day the marchers gave march in Georgia's all-white Forsyth a final display of suicidal pacifism, County January 24 was more like a chanting at their would-be murderers:" walking prison than a freedom march. It "We love, you, we love you, we love was designed and tightly controlled by you." The white lynchers retorted: "We its Democratic Party organizers as a hate you, we hate you, we hate you." show of faith in racist American "de­ This march against "intimidation" mocracy," rather than a militant pro­ did nothing to intimidate the KKK kill­ test against Ku Klux Klan terror. Many ers. In its wake, one Klan group an­ of the more than 20,000 undoubtedly nounced plans to march through For­ came out of a felt desire to oppose KKK syth County on February 7, another to lynch mob attacks of the sort met by a hold a cross-burning in Barrow County few score Martin Luther King Day two weeks later. Yet a third Klan marchers the previous Saturday. Pro­ provocation is scheduled to go ahead in testers eagerly bought Workers Van­ suburban College Park near Atlanta. guard and other Spartacist literature And in the aftermath, Forsyth County calling for a perspective of labor/black passed' an ordinance to stymie any mobilization to smash racist terror. But future anti-racist march, demanding when they arrived in the Forsyth county that march organizers pay all "security" seat of Cumming, they found them­ costs. Yet the black Democratic politi­ selves hemmed in on all sides by an army cians and preachers like Atlanta city of National Guardsmen and local and councilman Hosea Williams who organ­ state cops, and were ordered to refrain ized "Brotherhood II" join in hosannas even from singing old civil rights songs. for the "New South." They agree with While Georgia politicians bemoaned the Atlanta Constitution (26 January) the bad press being given Forsyth editorial claim that "the events of the County, more than 1,000 rabid racists last two weekends dramatized just how turned out. The night before, every gun much it has changed." Does someone shop in Cumming sold out of ammuni- " , Dennis Brae have to remind them that they are' all tion and weapons. A black TV reporter National Guard, cops, Democratic Party bigWigscorral anti-Klan protesters, sworn into office under the Confederate who got too close to the racist mob was Forsyth County, Georgia, Januar·y 24. slaveholders' banner, which happens to attacked even as she was televising a march, several hundred demonstrators attack, while waiting for buses to pick be the Georgia state flag and the banner report. One marcher hit by a brick had were forced to cower in a shopping them up. Yet the more than 50 racist waved by the Klan lynchers! to have brain surgery. And after the center after sundown, fearful of a Klan terrorists arrested are being slapped on continued on page 13 Unleash Labor/ Black Power! Finish the Civil War! I Tragically dead at 29 years of age death all the more bitter; by his own hand. A member of our In a note which he intended as his ALDEN BURR CAVANAGH organization for more than eight will, written a few months before and years. found by his side at the time of his The shock of his death is com­ death, he wrote among other things pounded by the evident fact that of his regard for the Spartacist 1AUGUST 1957 - 20 JANUARY 1987 none of his friends, roommates, League as mankind's last best hope. comrades, lovers or others who were But he noted that, like his grandfa­ close to him at the time had any ther, he was taking the reasons for inkling of such an impending act. this will to the grave with him. Thus he was deprived of any support Alden is free now from his .tor­ in what must have been his agony. ments and ourworld is a poorer place To the extent that others knew for it. him, and especially his comrades, they felt affection and personal re­ -Bay Area District of the SL/U.S. spect for him, which feelings only -Central Committee of the SL/U.S. grew with time, thus making his 25 January 1987

Alden with Spartacist contingent at anti-Klan rally in Boston, 1982.

MEMORIAL MEETING Sunday, February 15 Hyatt Regency Oakland, 5:00 p.m. California Room, 1001 Broadway For more information: (415) 839-0851 OAKLAND

WV Photo

Down with the McCarran-Walter Act! Karl Liebknecht: "The Main Enemy Is At Home!" The great German revolutionary Karl Stop the FBI/INS Liebknecht issued the following interna­ tionalist manifesto calling for an interna­ tionalist demonstration against the imperi­ Witchhunt of Palestinians! alists and their world war on May Day 1916. Addressing 10,000 workingpeople in To boost his plummeting polls and witchhunt are well-established busi- Berlin, Liebknecht was arrested by the whip up Americans for new war moves .nessmen, students and working people. TROTSKy Kaiser's troops whose uniform he wore. LENIN in the Near East, Reagan and his top cop For example, the alleged Southern Poverty and misery, need and starvation, are ruling in Germany, Belgium, Poland Meese are rounding up Palestinians in California "PFLP leader" Khadar and Serbia, whose blood the vampire of imperialism is sucking and which resemble Los Angeles, treating them as though Musa Harnide is a 32-year-old business­ vast cemeteries. The entire world, the much-praised European civilization, is falling they lived under the Zionistjackboot in man who studied marketing in college, into ruins through the anarchy which has been let loose by the world war. the West Bank. On January 26, in-a has lived in the U.S. since 1971 and was Those who profit from the war want war with the United States. To-morrow, Gestapo-like dragnet federal agents expecting final approval of his U.S. perhaps, they may order us to aim lethal weapons against new groups of brethren, burst into the homes of eight Palestini­ citizenship application January 27. He against our fellow-workers in the United States, and fight America, too. Consider ans and a Kenyan,'arrested them andare is active in Democratic Party politics as well this fact: As long as the German people does not arise and use force directed by holding them for deportation. a Jesse Jackson supporter, and an its own will, the assassination of the people will continue. Let thousands of voices Six of the Palestinians were charged outspoken opponent of U.S. aid to the shout "Down with 'the shameless extermination of nations! Down with those under the 1952 McCarthyite "thought contras. Hamide's wife, Kenyan-born responsible for these crimes!" Our enemy is not the English, French, nor Russian crimes" McCarran-Walter Act for Julie Nyangugi, is an accountant. people, but the great German landed proprietors, the German capitalists and their allegedly "advocating communism," Anti-Arab repression is an aspect of executive committee. i.e., the views of the radical-nationalist racist American capitalism that is Forward, let us fight the government; let us fight these mortal enemies of all Popular Front for the Liberation of compounded by Washington's support freedom. Let us fight for everything which means the future triumph of the working­ Palestine. They and the Kenyan wife of - for Israel as its gendarme in the Near classes, the future of humanity and civilization. one of the six were shackled hand-to­ East. A wave of FBI persecution and Workers, comrades, and you, women of the people, let not this festival ofMay, the foot and dragged before U.S. immigra­ Zionist terror bombing targeting Arabs second during the war, pass withoutprotestagainst the Imperialist Slaughter. On the tion judge Ingrid Hrysenko, Declaring and Arab Americans has swept this first of May let millions of voices cry, "Down with the shameful crime of the them a "national security risk," she country, including the hideous October extermination of peoples! Down with those responsible for the War!" denied them bail and confined them to 1985 murder in Los Angeles of Alex solitary where they are being held Odeh, a leader of the American Arab -Karl Liebknecht, "May Day Manifesto" (1916) without access to sanitary or medical Anti-Discrimination Committee. Need­ - facilities. Deportation hearings are less to say, the FBI has made no arrests scheduled for later this month. Two in this terrorist crime. And the anti­ other Palestinians also arrested were communist McCarran-Wal~er Act is expected to be released on bail. used not only to ban distinguished This case is a racist and politically scholars, artists and politicians from the !!w!~!.'!!!4!!J!!~!!! ~ motivated frame-up from start to finish. "land of the free," but to witchhunt and All of the accused deny membership in throw out of the country an American­ DIRECTOR OF PARTY PUBLICATIONS: Liz Gordon the PFLP or participation in any of its born author and critic of U.S. imperial­ EDITOR: Jan Norden PRODUCTION MANAGER: Noah Wilner activities here or abroad. The "Justice" ism, Margaret Randall. CIRCULATION MANAGER: Jon Lawrence Department spokesmen admitted they This witchhunt targets all ofus and EDITORIAL BOARD: Bonnie Brodie, Jon Brule, George Foster, Liz Gordon, were compelled to use the witchhunt­ the rights we hold dear. Stop the Jan Norden, James Robertson, Reuben Samuels, Joseph Seymour, Marjorie Stamberg, ing McCarran-Walter Act because "a deportation proceedings and release Noah Wilner (Closing editor) lengthy FBI investigation failed to turn these nine victims of the FBI/INS Workers Vanguard (USPS 098-770) published biweekly, except 2nd issue August and with 3-week interval December, up evidence of plans to commit criminal terror campaign! Give .them financial by the Spartacist Publishing Co., 41 Warren Street, New York, NY 10007.Telephone: 732-7862 (Editorial), 732-7861 (Business). Address all correspondence to: Box 1377, GPO, New York, NY 10116. Domestic subscriptions: $5.00/24 or terrorist acts" (Washington Post, 29 restitution' for this racist persecution. issues. Second-class postage paid at New York, NY. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Workers Vanguard, January). It is the FBI and INS who are .Citizenship for Khadar Musa Hamide! Box 1377, GPO, New York, NY 10116. Opinions expressed in signed articles or letters do no1 necessarily express the editorial viewpoint. America's state terrorists, and the most Full citizenship rights for all foreign­ dangerous terrorist nuts presently lurk born workers and students! Down No. 421 6 February 1987 in the White House. with the 'McCarran-Walter "thought ~ ------,..------=-----~ Indeed, the nine victims of this vicious control" Act!. 2 WORKERS VANCUARD Spartacist Protest in S.F. .. 20 M N...... ,MtUTARY UUEtlJt !,/~WEN51 --OEfOID 1\ " . . oflhe USSR . SMASHING Illlll f'1ORoE.~u/\ Spy Shcharansky AGAINST THIRD RflLH ! 'JANU" , \\ \MPERIALlSM! -SPAlTACJt7

1'"\ ... \>\. l]\ .. ;\ SAN FRANCISCO, January 30­ stood up for the defense of the Nicara­ Spartacist protesters confronted imperi­ guan -Revolution. It was B'nai B'rith alist spy and Soviet traitor Anatoly who offered their services to the San Shcharansky today at a breakfast meet­ Francisco cops, these same cops who ing of the bourgeois establishment find it amusing to display Nazi posters Commonwealth Club.:While Shcha­ in their San Francisco van.... We ransky addressed the capitalist "opinion Spartacists are the ones who stopped the makers" at the posh Fairmont Hotel, Nazis from marching in San Francisco Spartacist pickets outside carried signs in 1980, when they wanted to obscenely denouncing him: "Imperialist Spy celebrate Hitler's birthday right down­ Shcharansky Is Guilty as Hell!" and town in front of SF Civic Center, in "Shcharansky Witting Tool of U.S. front of City Hall." Imperialism!" Until he was swapped Today, while his wife Avital works for a group of Soviet bloc intelli­ with the fascistic anti-Arab Gush Emu­ gence agents a year ago, Shcharan­ nim movement in Israel, Shcharansky is sky was imprisoned in the USSR on doing the anti-Soviet banquet circuit, proven charges of passing military WV Ph~tos calling for imperialist blackmail of the secrets to Western "news sources," a Spartacist League protests imperialist spy Shcharansky, demands freedom USSR. But it is a sign of changing times frequent conduit for the imperialist spy for Mordechai Vanunu. that his major plea in the Bay Area was agencies. those U.S./Israeli "first strike" advo­ Military Defense of the USSR Against for American public opinion not to be The Spartacist protesters also carried cates who have their fingers very near Imperialism!" "taken in" by Soviet leader Gorbachev. signs demanding "Defend Mordechai the nuclear trigger and who pose the real Other SL signs declared: "Anti-Soviet Reagan must have been doubly galled Vanunu!"-the Israeli nuclear techni­ threat of a nuclear Armageddon. War Drive Breeds Fascist/KKK Anti­ when his former "favorite dissident" and cian who faces the death penalty on es­ In a speech at the demonstration, Semites!" and "Shcharansky Support­ father of the Soviet H-bomb Andrei Sa­ pionage charges in Israel for revealing Spartacist spokesman Martha Phillips ers Favor Repression of American Dis­ kharov was released from internal exile that the Zionist madmen have amassed declared, "We stand for the uncondi­ sidents by U.S. Police!" Martha Phillips and came out against the LJ .S. presi­ a nuclear arsenal of up to 200 bombs. In tional military defense of the USSR explained: "Shcharansky is supported dent's "Star Wars" scheme. And the contrast to Shcharansky's crime against against imperialist attack and internal by organizations like B'nai B'rith and Zionists' Shcharansky charade, por­ the defense of the Soviet workers state, counterrevolution. We Trotskyists say supposedly he stands for dissidents. trayinga willful and witting anti-Soviet Vanunu has done the international that the land of the October Revolution' Well, B'nai B'rith has come out against spy as a "human rights" martyr, just working class a service by his spectacu­ is in danger." Interviews with Phillips Spartacist activist Guillermo Bermu­ doesn't cut it in these days of Reagan­ lar revelations. Such an extensive Israeli were aired on the two Bay Area radio dez, providing information to the San gate. For our part, we intend to do our nuclear buildup necessarily threatens a news stations and an NBC-TV story on Francisco cops and the San Francisco best to see that Shcharansky's real nuclear attack against the Soviet Union. the demonstration focused in on the State administration to try to prosecute crimes against the international work­ And Shcharansky is a mouthpiece for Spartacist placard: "For Unconditional this youth because he courageously ing class are not forgotten.•

ADL Conspires with Cops,.Defames Spartacists Here's proof: the Anti-Defamation League of c,..".,..... B'nai B'rith is working hand in glove with the police _~..."t'..." ••e..-.ar... in spying on the left. The letter reproduced here, 1IIIt, ... ,a."tr.ro..W addressed to the San Francisco State University ..~- -tIL,..,.."".... cops, was turned over to us recently during pre-trial ~,~t.", ... ,.,. ... I. 1·.f'Id ...... discovery proceedings in the case of Spartacist ~-"HH ': "(C'n... ll:J:"I:"H activist Guillermo Bermudez. (In a gratifying '-:9'-""'''. $,x'"!frUl'"iowt victory, charges against Bermudez have been ~!4." dropped-see page ,5.) The police "experiences" '~"""J", .l..\b:...... \''':'w''I' ",rft,"'r February 12, 1985 during the winter of 1984-85, which Frankel finds .. ;.,.an..... so "enhancing" to the ADL's work, consisted of a ... "'ff Lieutenant Wibel .~ .l...._•• ~... torrent of arrests; South Africa-style campus Department of Public Safety .lw·.. ,,.·:-,,·,ta bannings, seizure of our Marxist literature, hand­ .' .~ .. .!c '''ll'~ 1600 Holloway :e: .<1 ·.f(~r·I~," """", ...... ,,, San Francisco, CA 94132 cuffing and generally harassing our members and -:•.,01·"":'1 ....,. "'l·-"'''-oti supporters on campus. . ~.···r W So the ADL joins with the forces of racist Io'···..'·!h:.•,· Dear Lieutenant Wibel: repression against those like us who are committed '.1'. c.," ....: Enclosed is the ADL's S .' ~~u~~t~.M~nual t~at to smashing fascist terror, and not just in the Bay "•. ~ • '~':" .:1 I hope we will be able we discussed. ··..··rl" ..·• o~ 7n~e work~ngon Area. When the Spartacist League was mobilizing ...... :", . Sparticus Youth Lea ue' the ...... " t~"':-'I" State university's g s act~v~t~es on. San Francisco to stop a threatened Ku Klux Klan provocation in ~ ._0: ,'1 ••;. ". '~ ~. 4' t~:m~u~. Yo~r exper~ences ~ certainly enhance would Washington, D.C. in November 1982,we called the ••••. .." (: r '':1-t, • ':4\"0 collected. ~n ormat~on we have already '1 ·"~~n ADL in New York to get their report on fascist ."-"" ~; • ..:~ .o:,r""" groups in the U.S. A spokesman quoted the ).1.1'"e ~....~;;J ~' ,.~::~ ~."' If I can be of assistance again Workers Vanguar.d headline "Reagan, Begin and .'...,•....:,....•...... r'II contact me. at any time, please Hitler," and hung up. Recently the ADL came to the ., ,',.- t·:·, ••.• ". " ·v;.~.• defense of the "World Anti-Communist League," a , , ..-.. ., . Sincexely, 4 ••••• ;••' .."r sinister collection of leftover Nazis and death squad • ',:. ~.'';' ~t~v killers, claiming "substantial progress" in "ridding .,.M'IIIft04~1 ~!dizfJ~ ":=ecr.....n. ~'".....xtlI. the organization of the racists and anti-Semites" ~.;..ar. "'olb ~ .... h",U'U Bobbi Frankel (New York Times, 14 October 1986).The WACL is ...."i...... 't:"':'I. ,"to11 Community ConSUltant one of Reagan's conduits for blood money to the •.•~'L"'"b" ··,.-:etleYW contra terrorists. ·).·"

6 FEBRUARY 1987 3 than one year, the Aquino regime has outdone its fascist predecessor in the !quino Regime Unravels scale of violence against the people.... The Aquino government cannot wash its hands of its responsibility for this bloody incident" (San Francisco Exam­ iner, 23 January). But the Stalinist­ nationalist CPP and its allies, in their commitment to "popular-front" class collaboration, soon' started apologizing Massacre in Manila for Aquino. Two days later Sayan leader Leandro Alejandro said the FEBR VARY I-Thousands of desper­ group was withdrawing its criticism of ate peasants march on the presidential the president because "we do not believe palace demanding land. Hundreds of .she was directly responsible" for the riot police and heavily armed troops killings (New York Times, 26 January). block their way. As the marchers ap­ The January 26 protest march to Mala­ proach, troops and cops open fire point­ cafiang demanded the "resignations of blank on the defenseless crowd. March­ Ramos and Beto but not Aquino. ers flee in terror, bodies litter the bloody In fact, Aquino and Ramos differ, if pavement, tear gas fillsthe air as soldiers at all, only in how best to crush the pursue fleeing demonstrators through working people. Since squelching the the streets. Pinochet's Chile? EI Salva­ January 22: coup plots of Emile last November, Peasants dor under the junta? Ramos has increasingly been calling the . It could have been the work of the demanding land are shots anyway. Aquino accuses both murderous despots backed by Washing­ Emile and the left of trying to "destabi­ ton from Central America to South . massacred by AqUino lize" her regime. It couldn't get much Korea. But this time it was the work of government's more unstable than it is, and it sits atop a the regime headed by Corazon Aquino, troops. mass of social TNT. In the countryside president ofthe Philippines and "demo­ nothing has. changed since Marcos, cratic" darling of V.S. imperialism. uriless for the worse. Rapacious land­ Only three weeks previously Time (5 lords starve peasants and kill their January) named. Aquino ."Woman of organizers. On the sugar island of the Year," lauding her in nauseating Negros plantation workers get 40cents a terms as leader of a "fairy-tale revolu­ day for backbreaking labor when it is tion" standing on a "platform-of faith, available. When there isno work, in the hope and charity," "the happiest symbol cocked and aimed their M-16s. The that the gear was apparently not for her, "dead season," the peasants eat roots, or in a year of symbols [and] the most supposedly unarmed police produced since the boots were riot her size. nothing at all. human." Cory's massacre on January22 guns from behind riot shields stenciled Especially after the January 22 The CPP is committed to a class­ . tore off the mask. with the words "Maximum Tolerance." massacre, Aquino's "people power" collaborationist alliance with' the . Under the slogan of "people power," Most of the dead-landless tenant regime is foundering as Philippine "national" bourgeoisie, a "national­ Aquino was installed a year ago when farmers and migrant agricultural society.is increasingly polarized. Aqui­ democratic coalition government," Washington told her predecessor, the workers-were shot in the head or the no is pinning her hopes to restore which means betrayal of the masses for butcher Ferdinand Marcos, he was back. stability on a new constitution, written the sake of a "share of the power" within finished and put him on a plane to Cory's imperialist patrons obscenely by her hand-picked commission, to be a capitalist framework. The Stalinist-led Hawaii. Two of Marcos' chief lieuten- blamed the victims for provoking the voted on in a plebiscite February 2. The peasant movement's demand for "gen­ idea that a' new constitution will uine land reform" is a will 0' the wisp. restabilize bourgeois rule is, of course, The bloodsucking landlords, with their absurd. But Aquino needs to win big to private armies, will not be reformed undercut ambitious rightists like Emile, away. Aquino's own family estate, reassure her imperialist backers in Hacienda Luisita, isone of the country's Washington and gain a cloak of "demo­ largest sugar plantations. One of the cratic legitimacy" in dealing with the demands of the marchers on January 22 left. was that Aquino show her "commit­ Cold-blooded A 60-day cease-fire with the New mass murder by ment" to land reform by starting with Aquino's cops People's Army, guerrilla arm of the Hacienda Luisita. The answer was and marines Communist Party, ends on February 7. bullets. exceeded even "Peace talks" in the interim have gone The only way to deal with. such Marcos' nowhere and weresuspended indefinite­ exploiters is an agrarian revolution, in butchery. lythe day of the massacre. Meanwhile, it which the poor peasants and agricul­ has been revealed how Aquino inter­ tural workers seize the land. This can be vened during her American tourlast fall carried out only by a revolution in which to ensure that the V.S.' giant Clark Air the urban proletariat places itself at the Force Base and Subic Bay Naval Base head of the insurgent peasant masses ants, armed forces chief Fidel Ramos massacre. "On the left, zealots thirst for will remain open as staging points for to smash the whole framework of and defense minister Juan Ponce Emile, martyrs and shootings, the stuff of nuclear war. A "mandate" for the new capitalist/landlord rule. jumped ship in what amounted to a revolution," ranthe editorial apologia constitution is part of the preparation Following Aquino's victory last Feb­ military coup backed by the,U.S. for Aquino in the 28January New York for renewed bloody suppression of the ruary, in the wave of enthusiasm for the embassy, Roman Catholic Cardinal Sin Times. Aquino professed "shock" and guerrilla insurgency and for further new regime, the reformist left was and hundreds of thousands of people in appointed the usual commission to neocolonial subjugation by the Yankee scrambling to climb aboard the Cory the streets. But the carnage in Manila on "irrvestigate"-i.e., to whitewash the imperialists. bandwagon. The CPP, which wields mass influence in the Philippines, called January 22 surpassed that of any similar government and perhaps come up with a Stalinists Still Tail Aquino outrage in the capital in Marcos' bloody scapegoat. (Such a commission on the its electoral boycott "a major political 20-year reign. Behind the facade of military death-squad murder of leftist At first the Philippine left-domi­ blunder" and advocated "critically par­ "democratic" talk and "progressive" KMV union leader Rolando Olalia last nated by the Communist Party of the ticipating in the snap election." In the ministers, this is a regime that does not November took months to come up with Philippines (CPP)-denounced Aquino V.S., inveterate tailists such as the SWP shrink from cold-blooded mass murder, a single low-ranking fall guy.) Ramos for the January 22 massacre, reflecting hailed the Aquino "revolution," while butchering workers and peasants in and the current defense minister, Rafael the felt outrage of their ranks. The leftist the dubious Workers League published defense of the ill-gotten gains of the Ileto, cynically said the troops "over­ umbrella group Bayan

anti-Spartacist witchhunt at SF .State. Women's Center director Judy Moore (aka "Baby HUAC") led this cabal in a rapidly escalating series of attacks from the banning of Marxist literature to the Guillermo Beals banning of Marxist people. The "Red Avengers of the Underground SYL" were born to fight this onslaught. Scorning the would-be campus McCar­ thyites, Red Avengers dorined "Miss Piggy" masks and witches' hats and 5.1.510le Ban performed guerrilla theater skits across the campus. A series of "underground communiques" were distributed, spoof­ ing the redbaiters. The cops and the courts were deter­ A hard-fought victory for free speech! mined to prosecute Guillermo, an Guillermo Bermudez (left) fights "ban" avowed Marxist, to set an "example" against Marxists at SFSU. • that wouldintimidate other student pro­ testers. But just as we defeated UC Berkeley's attempt to jail our comrade The two-year vendetta by the San :J on false charges that he assaulted the '"U Francisco State University administra­ os cop who held him in a choke hold and tion, campus cops and the SF district eni broke his arm for leading a protest attorney's office to enforce a South 0> c: against Marine recruiters (see "Guiller­ Africa-style "ban" on Spartacist youth o:J mo Bermudez Wins!", WVNo. 404, 23 . activist Guillermo Bermudez has been >- May 1986), the Spartacist League and defeated! On January 25, the D.A.'s the Partisan Defense Committee fought office moved to dismiss all charges this case with every legal and political against Guillermo for the "crime" of November 1984­ means at our disposal. Guillermo's passing out a Marxist leaflet on campus. Red Avengers attorneys, noted civil rights lawyer The ban was imposed in November 1984 mock campus Howard Moore and Partisan Defense when Bermudez and other Spartacist '~hought police." Committee staff counsel Valerie West, "Red Avengers" held a rally to raise Red Avengers took this case all the way to the money for Nicaragua's defense against returned to SFSU on January 30 to California Supreme Court, which re­ U.S. imperialism. The next day, he announce victory fused to review their appeal for a defied the ban by coming to campus to over wltchhunters. dismissal. In pre-trial discovery, the give out leaflets and was arrested. defense uncovered a lash-up with the Support for Guillermo's case rolled in Cold War Zionists of the B'nai B'rith from professors, student organizations Anti-Defamation League, who pro­ and unionists who endorsed the defense vided the campus cops with a "security protest the criminal policies of this youth what they can think, read, ingest case, wrote letters to publicize this manual" and cooperation in setting up government. and do under the covers, but the violation of free speech and invited the credibility of this gang is none too high, ­ Spartacists (see page 3). "banned" Marxist to speak at their As our Bay Area comrades noted in as they are daily exposed as gross Finally the D.A.'s office threw in the classes. As SFSU faculty member Sam their victory statement distributed at SF incompetents and fumbling liars." towel, offering the lame excuse that they Wellbaum wrote in the Golden Gater, State: Two years ago, we enraged the craven couldn't find their witnesses-SFSU "If a little group of radical Trotskyists "At a time when the Reagan administra­ campus "left" when we exposed their lie administrators and campus cops, every can be squelched today, more 'respecta­ tion is reelingfrom the Iran-Contragate that the way for the workers and scandal and the always marginal sup­ one of whom had been served subpoe­ ble' protesters will be tomorrow. That's port for Reagan's Central America oppressed to fight Reagan was by back­ nas by Guillermo's attorneys! We won! one of those lessons of history we forget / policies is plummeting, perhaps the ing loser "Quarantine Nicaragua" Mon­ But funds are still needed to defray the at our peril." We extend our thanks and D.A. was not so eager to try to con­ dale. An unholy alliance spanning the costs of fighting the two-year prosecu­ appreciation to everyone who took a vince a jury 'of the danger of a young university administration .and cops, tion. Send checks payable to the Parti­ Marxist handing out flyers on a uni­ . stand to defend Guillermo and in so versity campus defending the Nicara­ student government bureaucrats, Dem­ san Defense Committee, Box 99, Canal doing helped set an important precedent guan Revoluticn., .. Meese and Co.'s ocratic Party careerists and their fake­ Street Station, New York, NY 10013. A in defenseofthe rights of all who would 'thought police' want to tell American left camp followers launched a frenzied victory for one is a victory for all!. "Finish the Civil War-Fight lor a Socialist futurel" The statement printed below, writ­ woman token clerk at the Broad ten by a member of the New York Channel station on the "A" train line. I Spartacus Youth Club, recounts the knew these kids were sick, as were their author's experiences growing up in Growing Up in Howard Beach educators-the parents and teachers Howard Beach, Queens, the neighbor­ who taught them race-hatred. I also hood where Michael Griffith, a 23­ There's a one-sided race war, and cident of racist terror that occurred thought it was probably the same everywhere. ' year-old black man, was killed by a blacks are the target. when I was sevenor eight while I was at mob of white racists on the night of As I came of age to go to school, Charles Park. The QII bus route came Escaping from the Howard Beach December 20. there was a national movement of by there, and the bus would often stop, Torture Chamber changed my entire By Mary_nn Murphy which I was hardly aware. Thousands for a few minutes to get back on life. I got a street education in I was born in Howard Beach in 1963 of people were in the streets-fighting schedule. Well, that day there was a integration and some book knowledge and lived there almost 15 years. The for busing,' against racism.' We black bus driver. That invisible line on the Civil War arid labor/black cumulative experiences of that racist watched the TV news. The sick fight was crossed. These teenage boys from defense. I know about the first workers hellhole, and the (lack of) conscious­ against busing inflamed the minds of the park went tearing over to the bus, revolution in history-that led by the ness of its inhabitants, were incentive Howard Beach residents. screaming racistepithets, and dragged .Bolsheviksin 19I7-which put an end enough for me to run away at 14. I went to Our Lady of Grace, an all­ the driver out of the bus, kicking ami" to racist pogromist terror and capital­ Contrary to the protests of the white Catholic school, for eight years. punching him. Then they took the ist oppression. people who live there today, Howard P.S. 146was a few blocks away. When bus and ran it up a hill. I don't know We need flatbed trucks of labor/ Beach has always been a white, racist busing came to that small town, all the what ever happened to that unfortu­ black defense guards to patrol the mini-apartheid. They have this para­ "good Catholics" and "neighborly nate victim. streets of places like Howard Beach, noid, backward, intellectually defi­ Christians" put up one hell of a fight to At the same park four or five years Gravesend and Broad Channel. We cient mindset, wherein their own little stop black kids and white kids from later, a kid we hung out with.was must build' a workers party to finish world reigns supreme. An invisible line attending the same school. So much proudly breaking the' news that his the Civil War and fight for a socialist is drawn. If you're not white, and you ~ for "God created everybody equal"! . cousin was in jail. He'd participated future. That is how to avenge the cross that line, you'd better have a gun. I clearly remember a horrifying in- in the Klan-style murder of a black victims of racist terror! '

6 FEBRUARY 1987 5 Racist Llnching in Howard Beach For Labor/Black Defense to Smash Racist Attacks! controllers union was his message to labor. Black History The racist terror comes straight from the top, from. Reagan, and from Koch. Lately they got this thing, about how Month Koch has supposedly changed his stripes. You know, he went out and said

The following speech by Marjorie I the Howard Beach murder was a Stamberg, Spartacist League Central lynching, akin to something in the Deep Committee memberand1985 Spartacist South, which it was. But all of a sudden, candidate for NYC mayor, wasgiven at Koch is not supposed to be a racist pig a January 23 SL forum in New York. anymore? This is the man who treats blacks and Latins like he's the Israeli I want to start off with some basics. military commander and they're Pales­ We're talking abouta fundamental right tinians on the occupied West Bank; the here-the right of a black person inNew man who paraded through the streets of York City to .go into a -deli and buy a Queens with Israeli general Sharon, the bagel; the right of a black man to walk butcher of Sabra/Shatilal This is the down any damnstreet he wants to in this 0.0 man whose cops gunned down Michael Spartaclst League forom: A class-conscious labor movement must cham- city and buy a slice of pizza. Or of a pion the cause of black freedom. . Stewart, whose cops blew away black black family to buy a house in any grandmother Eleanor Bumpurs. neighborhood in this country and live patrol Howard Beach to ensure thatthis Chicago, the Howard Beach types put The. Bumpurs trial is on right now. without the threat of the burning cross neighborhood is safe for all working on Klan hoods and swastikas and That's right, supposedly Sullivan the and the KuKlux Klan. Or the right to people." And with 37,000 members in spewed their racist filth in Marquette Cop is on trial; but really the murdered drive a silver Mercedes through the this powerhouse of New York labor­ Park last summer. In Amherst, Mass. a victim is on trial, as also in the case of streets of Tampa-that's right, they beat black, Latin, Irish-you better believe, mob of a thousand stampeding white Michael Griffith. Because up in the up and busted Dr. K., Dwight Gooden, they've got the muscle to get some racists set upon a dozen black people Bronx they are obscenely trying to pin because the idea of a black man making respect. But you can't bankit, you've got after the World Series..And just last the blame on the Bumpurs family for the a million bucks and driving an expen­ to use it. weekend in lily-white Forsyth County, fact that a SWAT team broke down the sive car just stuck in the cops' craw. - We're talking about a red -army­ Georgia, the KKK terrorized black door and blasted an infirm black Well, we communists of the Sparta­ that's what workers defense guards are marchers and then had a so-called grandmother because she was $387.40 cist League call on all working men and about-it's an embryo of workers pow­ women in this city, black and white, er, of a workers state where these race­ Hispanics, Asians; we call on all de­ terrorists would be gone for good. And fenders ofdemocratic rights to mobilize that's what it's going to take. In the to defend those rights and crush the Russian Revolution, workers defense racist scum that are wreaking their guards went out and smashed the murderous terror against minorities. KKKers of the day-the so-called Black There's been a lynching, right here in Hundreds, who used to terrorize the New York City. And now the people Jewish ghettos with their pogroms, their who run this city are trying to lynch the lynch mobs. survivors and dig up the corpse to lynch We've got Black History Month com­ January 12: SL and Michael Griffith all over again. This ing up, so let me read from something Labor Black League double lynching has brought this city to written by Claude McKay-the black protest at Bronx the point of explosion, and people are American writer who was one of the first courthouse. Racist searching for answers, for a program to to rally behind the Bolshevik Revolu­ courts cover up fOr stop this racist terror. And that's what tion. He wrote -this in a letter to the killer cop Sullivan, we want to talk about tonight. editor of the magazine called The Crisis, put murdered The Spartacist League and our sup­ which was published by W.E.B. Du black grandmother Eleanor Bumpurs porters in the city labor movement have Bois: and family on trial. been calling for a massive show of "I am surprised and sorry that in your force-it's the only language these racist editorial. .. you sneer at the Russian vermin understand. We call 'for the Revolution, the greatest event in the history of humanity; much greater than formation of integrated armed workers the French Revolution, which is held up defense guards drawn from responsible as a wonderful achievement to Negro "white power" rally of 1,000 racists at behind' on her rent. Who here hasn't union men and women to patrol the children and students in white and black been $387.40 behind on their rent, right? streets where Michael Griffith was schools. For Ametican Negroes the. the county courthouse. These people are So now we have eviction-by-murder in attacked and killed. Militant transit indisputable and outstanding fact of the killers. Where do you think all these Russian Revolution is that a mere guns are going that have been stolen this city. workers in the Committee for a Fighting handful of Jews, much less in ratio to from U.S. army warehouses? We ran an election campaign here in TWU in Local 100put out a call to form the number of Negroes in the American Make no mistake, the Howard Beach the fall of 1985, a campaign like the a "caravan of flatbed trucks filled with population, have attained through the mob is not just a bunch of racist yahoos. Bolsheviks did-as a platform to rally integrated union defense squads to Revolution, all the political and social rights that were denied to them under They and people like them are doing the the working people and oppressed in the regime of the Czar." work of sinister forces that are driving struggle. We held a forum at a church in Workers defense guards, mass labor/ this country to the brink of imperialist Harlem with the slogan "Harlem to black defense, an integrated fight to war and pushing this city to the brink of Soweto-Smash Racist Terror!" and it smash the racist terrorists-that's what race war. Trade war and imperialist war Wl:'.S a very moving event when Eleanor it will take to deal with the lynchers, the mean racist terror at home. You can Bumpurs' daughter Mary, and Veronica cross-burners, the fascists who are hear the beat of war drums-whipping Perry, the mother of Edmund Perry acting like they've got a license to kill in this country into a war frenzy against who was killed by the cops in Harlem, Reagan's America and Koch's New the Soviet "evil empire" and its "surro­ came and spoke-of their pain and their York. We of the Spartacist League gates" from Nicaragua to Libya. And anger. And wedemonstrated against the believe the black question is thekey to how do they mobilize for war? With cops' coroner, Dr. Gross the Ghoul­ the American revolution-the fight for racism, with Rambomania. They keep you remember, he's the one who gouged revolutionary integration, for black pushing this protectionist poison about out Michael Stewart's eyes and hid 'liberation through socialist revolution, Japanese workers supposedly taking them, so the evidence that Stewart was We put all faith in the power of the American jobs, and pretty soon a choke-holded by the cops wouldn't independent mobilization of the work­ Vincent Chin is bludgeoned to death by show. It's really like we said, it's a system ing class and minorities under the a white Chrysler foreman. They get of racist terror, from the cops to Koch to leadership of the revolutionary party those white medical students kissing the D.1\. Morgenthau to Gross. and no reliance on the f06th Precinct­ ground over Reagan's rape of black Shortly after that was the struggle to in the cops, the courts, the capitalist Grenada. And anybody who steps out defend Brother James Grimes, the black Marc Asnin state. of line-they're to be obliterated, like transit worker who did have a gun to For Integrated trade-union defense ~ This racist atrocity in New York City the firebombing of MOVE. That was defend himself, unlike Brother Michael squads to clean out these racist is part of the overall social climate in this Reagan's message to black people, just Griffith or Willie Turks-s-so James scuml country. It's Racist Terror U.S.A. In like the destruction of the PATCO air Grimes is alive to talk about it today. 6 WORKERS VANGUARD • "Gun Control Is Killing Blacks!"

Comrade, Ed Kartsen, a Spartacist gun laws, which are advocated by electoral candidate in 1985, is a member Democratic Party liberals, have to be ofthe SL Central Committee. We print abolished. below condensed excerpts from his The "Johnny Reb" types who killed remarks at the January 23 SLforum in Michael Griffith should share the same New York. fate as the Confederate soldiers who 'were destroyed in order to overthrow In Howard Beach what we had was a slavery. Our demands are that venge­ putrid leftover of something that has to ance be gotten for Michael Stewart, for be eradicated from this country, the Willie Turks, for Eleanor Bumpurs, for putrid leftovers of slavery. This time it July 1983: Dennis Groce, for all the victims of was the family of Michael Griffith who Ed Kartsen racist terror;' our strategy is the mobili­ suffered a deep loss. We share in their at rally of zation of the working class and minori­ grief. And we regard with contempt, transit workers ties under revolutionary leadership to disgust and outrage the media campaign demanding finish the Civil War. And we know that to turn the victims into the criminals. TWU action to this struggle is not exclusively a struggle The surfacing of mob terror in New avenge racist of the offensive. We know that there is York City just adds a note to the fact murder of a need to defend many of the class­ that the civil rights movement is not union brother Willie Turks. struggle prisoners who have already only far from complete, but those gains become the targets of the racist justice are being driven back at breakneck system in order to enforce Jim Crow. speed. And these racist murderers know I'm speaking in particular of Ramona it-that's what has emboldened them. Africa, the sole survivor of the grisly They're in Reagan's America, which is MOVE bombing, and of Geronimo characterized by the massacre of the which the Civil War opened up. And in mobilized strength of the working class Pratt, the framed-up ex-Black Panther. members of the MOVE organization in this city, as the cops and mob terror is the only way that black freedom, and Reagan wants to make the Cold War Philadelphia, cruelly burned to death, in enforce the racist status quo, gun the cause of all working-class people, hot, and the Ku Klux Klan and Nazis a city with a black Democratic Party control is killing blacks. Gun control can be ensured. and the racist terrorists like the ones out mayor, who worked hand in hand with has to be abolished. One of the most important examples in Howard Beach want to help them by the federal agents. Labor has to mooiiize in abig way to of a movement within the civil rights maintaining the racist status quo. The In New York City, Koch is Reagan's reverse the influence of the racist lynch movement to break out of the pacifism agents of race-hate in the working class man. And because the civil rights mobs in this country and this city, but that MartinLuther King preached was want to set black, white, Hispanic and movement isincomplete, the tasks of the workers are deeply divided along race Robert Williams, head of the Monroe, Asian workers at each other's throats. Civil Warare incomplete. They have to lines. In order to successfully break North Carolina NAACP. He answered Well, we think that all workers in this be finished. The rule of Jim Crow in this through that barrier, conscious workers - KKK terror by organizing armed de­ country, united'with workers world­ city is manifested by cop' terror, by have to take a granite-hard stand in fense squads to protect black neighbor­ wide, should defend the remaining gains unemployment, by conditions of the opposition to the passivity and, back­ hoods and protests. against Ku Klux of the October Revolution of 1917. And homeless, by massive hunger. It's also wardness which is manifest in the labor Klan terror. Robert Williams' tactics, the gains of the first and second manifested by anti-gun laws. Anti-gun movement. That's why TWU militants which the Spartacist League supported, American Revolutions, which are under laws in this city are analogous to the have demanded, along with the Sparta­ tied to the social power of the working attack, must also be defended. What we disarming of black soldiers who occu­ cist League, that flatbed trucks be class could reforge a movement that need is a workers party to do that, pied the Confederate States of America. mobilized by the thousands into areas would move beyond the limitations that and replace that strutting cowboy in It's analogous to the pulling out of the like Howard Beach. Racist terror must Martin Luther King ran into. It was the White House and the Democrats Union Army from the occupied Confed­ be answered swiftly and decisively; Malcolm X as well as the Deacons for with a workers government. Our fight eracy. Well, after that pullout the Klan otherwise the lives of black people are Defense who fought for the right of is to finish the Civil War with a did its work of pushing back many of the cheapened, inequality is reinforced. The armed self-defense. And in order to third American revolution, a workers gains and many of the potential gains crushing of the race-hating killers by the continue the fight for that right, anti- revolution.•

The transit brothers and sisters mobi­ Michael Griffith] they tried to lynch the ocrats, you're voting for the Dixiecrats. just like he hustled votes for Fritz lized, repeatedly, at the courthouse, at lawyers, because Maddox and Vernon So they just formed a political alliance ("Quarantine Nicaragua") Mondale and the T.A. to defend Brother Grimes. And Mason didn't want to go along with the with Cuomo here over Michael Grif­ Geraldine ("No to forced busing") out of that successful struggle to defend standard cover-up that, was being fith's dead body. And if they don't get Ferraro last time around. And when he the right of armed self-defense, the New cooked up in the D.A.'s office. Maddox justice from this special prosecutor, glad-handed Mr. Segregation, George York Labor Black League was formed. said, look, the Willie Turks case shows don't be surprised. We. say break with Wallace, don't forget that. Because And earlier, after black transit worker that this city is not going to prosecute a the racist Democrats-s-forge a multi­ there's a symbiosis between Jackson and WillieTurks was killed on Avenue X,in . . white mob that killed a black. man. racial class-struggle workers party! Wallace, they go together, just like Gravesend, by a racist mob, the militant Which is the simple truth. So they threw - Now, along .with the 'deal with Louis Farrakhan and the likes of Tom transit workers also fought for union the book at the lawyers-s-Koch even Cuomo, they have this "boycott white Metzger, the San Diego KKK leader patrols in Gravesend. That struggle that said the refusal to go along with businesses" and "boycott white media" and fellow Democrat. There's a reason was sabotaged by the so-called union Santucci was worse than the lynching campaign. Partly, it's absurd-someone why Farrakhan took money from "dissidents" and by Local 100president itself! But unfortunately; behind the actually raised the slogan "Pizza kills." Metzger, why Metzger came out to at that time, John Lawe, who said such a lawyers' whole legal strategy is the And supposedly not watching the Farrakhan's speech in the Forum in Los mobilization would "disturb good rela­ . politics of pressuring the state or federal Superbowl is going to strike a blow Angeles last year. Metzger and Farra­ tions with management." You bet it .government.to take over the case. against racism? But it's much more khan both think "Hitler was a great would. And we are bitter about this They went looking for a deal with sinister than that. Look, the racists are man," and both of them want to keep because, if labor had mobilized then, as Governor Cuomo, who wants to run for mobilizing to keep blacks out of "white black people locked into the ghettos. it should have done, Michael Griffith president. But who is Cuomo? He's a neighborhoods," right? That's what they Well, here in New York we've seen, might be alive today. productofthe same Democratic Queens were using those "stun guns" for in the this kind of dangerous, race-baiting machine that brought you Donald 106th Precinct, to drive black youth out demagoguery before. I'm thinking back Defeat of the Manes, Geraldine Ferraro and John of Ozone Park. Howard Beach even has to 1978,when Herbert Daughtry divert­ Civil Rights. Movement Santucci. Cuomo even dumped on Pinkertons to keep out black people. ed protests over the police murder of Koch for mentioning the word lynching. So, along come black misleaders like Al black businessman Arthur Miller into a So what happened in the Howard Well, as Malcolm X used to say, just Sharpton or Roger Green, and they're march on a Hassidic synagogue in Beach case? Well, after the lynching [of remember, if you're voting for the Dem- saying don't buy white, stay with your Crown Heights. He had a couple own. That plays right into the racists' thousand people massed, whipping up hands. That's what the racists want. the crowd with anti-Semitism, remarks Furthermore, this is poisonous anti­ about people in "strange clothing." Italian demagogy. Just like Sharpton Today Daughtry is oh-so-respectable, last summer tried to stage a little . he's in tight with Koch, he gets his pogrom against Arab candy store picture taken with Cuomo, he wants to owners in the supposed "Crack-down" be Jesse Jackson's main man in New Racist state in Harlem. York. But it's just two sides of the same terror in Reagan's As always, Jesse Jackson's on hand coin of bourgeois ethnic politics, and it's America: black when somebody's brokering a deal with deadly dangerous. They're toying with Democratic the Democrats, and Louis Farrakhan is race war to get a little "clout" within the mayor Goode, in the wings there as well. Farrakhan's Democratic Party, a little influence they Philadelphia people have been whipping up the worst can peddle. And race war in this country cops, FBI of the anti-Italian race-baiting that has is necessarily one-sided, against black incinerated been going on, and the speeches at people. eleven people the January 21 rally were laced with Now in part, they're trying to do a in hideous anti-Semitism. What Jesse had to say replay of the '60s. Take the protest firebombing of MOVE. about Howard Beach was that the focus march they had into Howard Beach ought to be on the White House-by right after the murder of Michael which he means vote Democratic in '88, continued on page 10 6 FEBRUARY 1987 7 ------HONOR------BOLSHEVIK LE ERS

Dietz Verlag Berlin Oietz Verlag Berlin LENIN, LIEBKNECHT, LUXEMBURG

On January 18,the Spartacist League held a public meeting in the San fran­ cisco Bay Area to pay tribute to the "three L's" of Bolshevism: V.I. Lenin, Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, all of whom died in the month of January. Lenin, whose Bolshevik Party led the Russian working class to power in October 1917, died in January 1924; Liebknecht and Luxemburg, the Ger­ man Communist leaders, were mur­ dered in January 1919. In the meeting hall were displayed historical photographs and artists' scenes of the German Spartacus upris­ ing, enlarged quotes by Luxemburg, Liebknecht, Leon Trotsky and Lenin, and a literature display. The main speaker, James Robertson of the SL Central Committee, noted that "back WV when the Communist Party had a Oakland, January 18: Fighting in the tradition of the "three memory, some 50-plus years ago," L's"-Spartaclst League pays tribute to historic leaders of the meetings in January in honor of the proletarian fight for socialism. "three L's" were a regular event. The meeting heard quotes from the writings capacity to take power. In Germany, the Militarism, the appeal to proletarian dence in the bourgeois regime (see and speeches of Lenin, Liebknecht, .revolutionists' hard split from the youth for which he was convicted of facing page). Luxemburg and others. Following the capitulators came much later, after the treason, and Luxemburg's last defiant The main speaker concluded: "Our discussion, the Internationale was sung November 19J8 overthrow of· the article, "Order Reigns in Berlin." A task ...is to do two things,in intimate and Chopin's funeral march was played. Hohenzollern monarchy. In the revolu­ passage from John Reed's Ten Days conjuncture. One is to struggle to retain The main presentation emphasized tionary confrontations of 1918-19 the That Shook the World described Lenin the understanding of the practices and that there are no "great leaders" in crucial left-wing leaders Luxemburg as "a strange popular leader-a leader traditions of the international commu­ isolation; that for success in situations and Liebknecht were murdered. And purely by virtue of intellect ... but with nist movement in the spirit and program of urgent revolutionary opportunity, with the proletarian leadership be­ the power of explaining profound ideas of the Bolsheviks." In addition, he there must be a tested leadership that headed, the 1923 revolutionary confron­ in simple terms, of analysing a concrete noted, "we have to live it to the extent has an evolved authority among the tation in Germany miscarried, leading situation." Other readings included that we can....-And part of living as masses of working people. Lenin's directly to the rise of Hitler and the sections of Leon Trotsky's speech to the communists is to act like the commu­ struggle for disciplined communist second imperialist world war. Petrograd Soviet three days after the nists who evolved under the ...unusual organization, in the 1903 split with the Among the quotations read to the death of Luxemburg and Liebknecht conditions of the tsarist empire, and Mensheviks and onward, forged a meeting were a passage from Lieb­ and Lenin's famous telegram of March managed to crack the power of the Bolshevik Party with the will and knecht's work Militarism and Anti- 1917 demanding a policy of no confi- rulers and the enslavers.".

WV Photos Bay Area comrades assembled moving display on revolutionary work of Lenin, Liebknecht, Luxemburg. "The main enemy is at homel" 8 WORKERS VANGUARD Our tactics: no trust in and no support of the new government; Kerensky is especially suspect; arming of the proletariat is the only guarantee; immediate elections to the Petrograd City Council; no rapprochement with other parties. Telegraph this to Petrograd. Ulyanov - V./. Lenin, "Telegram to the Bolsheviks Leaving for Russia," /9 March /917

State Fine Arts PUblisher~ Petrograd, 1917: Lenin defends his ARrll Theses. Red soldiers in 1917 Moscow demonstration. Banner says "Communism."

militarismus und, flntimilitarismus

.Ill" bd_" _KIolit.ng da ...... ­ 1...... "'-·118

The toiling masses are the prime movers of , Or. Karl Ciebknedtt social revolution. Clear class consciousness, clear recognition of their historic tasks, a clear will to achieve them, and unerring effectiveness-these are the attributes without which they will not be able to (,ipzit 1107 complete their work. Today more than ever ---- the task is to clear away the unity Liebknecht's famous smokescreen, expose half measures and pamphlet directed halfheartedness, and unmask all false friends against capitalist militarism. of the working class. Clarity can arise only out of pitiless criticism, unity only out of clarity, and the' strength to create the new socialist world only out of unity in spirit, goals, and purpose. -Karl Liebknecht, "The New 'Civil-Peace', " /9 November /9/8'

Dietz Verlag Berlin 5 January 1919: Liebknecht addresses Berlin .workers, shortly before he and Luxemburg wer~ murdered at Instigation of German Social Democrats.

·l:e fight for socialism is the most gigantic civil war in history, and the proletarian revolution must prepare the necessary defense for this war. It must Iearn to use it, to fight and to conquer. This defense of the compact masses of the workers, this arming of them with the full political power for the accomplishment of the revolution, is what is known as the dictatorship of the proletariat...... - This, and only this, is the --SPA~TACUS true democracy. -Rosa Luxemburg, ..What Does The Spartacus League Want," 14 December /9/8; adopted as the founding program of the Communist Party of Germ.my, 30 December /9/8-1 January 1919.

Proletarian internationalist paper of German . ....1 Spartakusbund, founded by Dietz Verlag Berlin Rosa Luxemburg denounces war preparations In 1907. Llebknecht and Luxemburg. 6 FEBRUARY 1987 9 passed that law aboutcarrying shotguns Labor/ Black and carbines in public because Malcolm had one in his car, since there had already been one attempt on his life. Defense ... They passed that law, and within (continued from page 7) months Malcolm was shot dead, in the Audubon Ballroom. Who did it? We Griffith. It was a very bad scene there, don't know, but we do know there were because the black marchers were sur­ two forces who wanted Malcolm dead. rounded by the racists, who weren't just One, the government: as later revealed, screaming, they had their baseball bats the COINTEL program called for with them. And when what's standing "neutralization" of black leaders; and between you and the racists is the 106th another was Louis Farrakhan. . Precinct, you are in trouble. On WLI~, But it was the events of 1968 "that. people called in and commented that It really cut off the prospects of united reminded them of Chicago, ofCicero in black/labor struggle in this city. The arl rant mid-'60s was also a period of rapid 1966 when the civil rights marchers SNCC leader John Lewis (fourth from left) addresses Harlem rent ~tri~~ ~ally, werestoned in the streets by the racists. 1964 .Posters mock Republicans, Democrats. As Malcolm X said: Either growth by the municipal unions in New That march was defeated militarily, but party that you align yourself with is suicide." York. Remember the '66 transit strike, it also marked the political defeat of the when old Mike Quill said the judge liberal civil rights movement when it SNCC and later the Panthers, broke raining ridicule down ..on the black could drop dead in his black robes, and ~alhng tried to go north. . with the black ministers and .black Democrats; he was for armed the union tore up the back-to-work Because, you see, the pacifism of the Democrats unfortunately the "black self-defense. Progressive Labor was up injunction? . So the city rulers were preachers and the politicians was not power" movement never found the road there, in partic';llar Bill Epton. There worried, and together with the Ford just because they liked Gandhi or to workers power, never linked the was, a. ~ery radical tenants m0.vement Foundation and the federal govern­ T~e something, it was based on a strategy of ghettos to the factories, where the social orgamzmg black tenants c?unclls. ment, they came up with a scheme to try relying on the federal government to power is. Instead, they got locked i~to ~ind of wo~k the ,Com~umst Party did to break the teachers union, which had overturn Jim Crow segregation: the . the dead end of nationalism-s-which m Harlem m the 30s, like mass defense also been expanding at that time. They know~ right to vote, integrate the bus stations is really a pseudo-nationalism, since against evictions: you, the cops got a new black administrator in Ocean and lunch counters ana so forth. (These blacks in America are not a nation, but would put somebody s !urmture onto Hill-Brownsville, Rhody McCoy. And 50~ gains are still under attack, and now an oppressed race-color caste. And the. street, except there s people. his first act was to dismiss without due ~n the'~treet, being reversed, not only under Reagan, many of the most courageous fighters waning and.they Just bring process a number of teachers, including but when the Democrats abandoned for black liberation were gunned down the furmture nght back in, . the shop stewards; and when 250 busing back in the mid-1970s.) When in cold blood by the cops. Others were So the ruli?g ~lass. was getnng wor- teachers walked out in protest, they King launched a campaign for "open framed up and jailed, for years, like ried about this situation, because they were "transferred," and replacements housing" in Chicago, they were up former Panther leader Geronimo Pratt saw the spectre of red and black hired. r~member, against the economic realities that are who is still behind bars in San Quentin. 'together. Some people may This was straight out union-busting, how after the Cuban Revolution, when but the city created a smokescreen to the bedrock of racist American capital­ 1964-68: Northern Ghettos Erupt ism where black people are last hired, Fidel Castro came on his first visit to cover it: "community control." Black first fired, ghettoized.. terrorized, in But before that, as the civil rights this country,he stayed at the Hotel leaders, and almost the entire left, lined inner cities that have been lumpenized, movement was first spreading to the Teresa in Harlem. And I remember up against the strike. Now the Shanker and are today worse than any time since North, there were some real opportuni- these'scenes from television-people leadership of the UFT [United Federa­ were sitting outside on the stoop and tion of Teachers]-that sounds like a cheering every time Fideland those guys disease, but it's a person, Al Shanker. in guerrilla uniforms came out. They Shanker played right into Lindsay's were cheering revolution: And the-rul- hands, by total indifference to the ing classjust went bananas. . concerns and needs of the ghetto, and In the summer of 1964, our orgamza­ even demanding the famous "rowdy tion, the Spartacists, had just gone child clause." And the card that was public, having been expelled from the played to split blacks from the unions Socialist Workers Party, among other was anti-Semitism, because the teachers reasons because we were fighting to union is heavily Jewish. Really ugly intervene in the black struggle, North stuff. Just to name one flagrant exam­ and South, on a communist program, ple, there was the repulsive poem read while the SWP just wanted to tail along. over WBAI by one Les Campbell, And in the very second issue of our Rhody McCoy's right-hand man, that's paper, we warned that the bourgeois the man we know as Jitu Weusi today. state was preparing to use the cops to He went on the air and he attacked crush the black struggle in Harlem. Just Shanker as a yarmulke-wearing "Jew a few days later the police killed a 15­ boy," and saying, "I wish you were year-old black youth,. James ~owell. dead." Harlem mobilized to protest this out­ 1968 split blacks and labor, and that rage, and the cops went in gun~ blazing, brought in its wake the Big MAC AP Wide World nightsticks swinging. Well, 'big events cutbacks of the '70s, which ripped up Chicago, 1966: Martin Luther King was defeated when he went North. Liberal are the test for a revolutionary party. union contracts and destroyed social civil rights.movement had no answer to ghetto misery rooted In capitalism. And Spartacist came out hard in defense services for the ghettos. It gave us labor­ of the people of Harlem, at a time when the Depression, where an entire genera- ties pointing toward a revolutionary, hater race-baiter Ed Koch, who, accord­ virtually all the left and the black tion of black youth are condemned t() a class-struggle road to black freedom. So ing to his own autobiography really got reformist leaders had abandoned them. future of despair. And no civil rights I want to talk about the Harlem police off on busting the 1980transit strike and .The Harlem Defense Council had bill, no liberal Democrat is going to riot of 1964, where the question of shutting down Sydenham Hospital. So change this. For that, you need socialist labor/black defense was posed "Con- been formed by Bill Epton and other our job is to reforge a fighting unity in revolution and the expropriation ofthe cretely on a mass scale, from 125th and militants and they were calling for this city between blacks and the labor organizing block-by-block, apartment­ capitalist class. 'Lenox to the garment district. Because' movement. And that means a fight in So the ghetto explosions in the late in that period Harlem was seething, and by-apartment, house-by-house defense the unions to oust the Shankers and '60s were really due to the failure of the the political ferment was quickly mov- against the cops. They tried to hold a their ilk, the pro-capitalist Russia­ civil rights movement to make a ing beyond the capitalist framework. mass demonstration in Harlem, but hating labor bureaucracy that plays ball liberal mayor Wagner banned it and the difference in the lives of the mass of There were a number of factors: Mal- with the bosses. (I mean that literally. black people in the North. And while t~e co1m X was there; he had split from the cops arrested the organizers as soon as Victor Gotbaum bragged that he and they stepped off the curb. The Sparta­ left wing of that movement, located m Black Muslim organization and was Big MAC banker Felix Rohatyn regu­ cists took the lead in forming a Harlem larly •play tennis together out in the Solidarity Committee that attempted to Hamptons.) We say: Labor's Gotta Play take the pressure off the ghetto by. Hardball to Win! And that means a rallying mass working-class support. It fight to break the unions and the black held a '1,OOO-strong rally in the garment masses from the Democratic Party. center calling for the cops outof Harlem Marxist Working-Class Biweekly of the Spartacist League and "Support Right of Citizens to Defend Themselves." Spartacist editor Imperialist War and James Robertson-addressed the rally, Socialist Revolution \ o $5/24 issues of Workers Vanguard o $2/4 issues of denouncing the cops and commenting So here we are, deep into the Reagan (includes S"partacist) International rates: . Women and Revolution $20/24 issues-Airmail on the attempts to blame the riots on years. Blacks and labor have been o New 0 Renewal $5/24 issues-Seamail 0$2/10 introductory issues of communists. He said, "Unfortunately taking it on the chin. It's been a lousy 0$2/4 issues of Spartacist . Workers Vanguard there aren't many reds in Harlem now­ period, of rightist reaction. But early on, (ediclon en espanol) (includes Spartacist) but there will be." in our party conference in 1981, we had Well, they cut it off with the cop riot taken up the question of "Facing the Name ~__---''--- _ and with the witch hunt that would Reagan Years," and steeled our com­ Address _ come, and not just in Harlem. They rades to fight routinism, to be prepared ______.-:- ---Phone (__) _ destroyed the ghetto organizations by to seize toe opportunities which would arresting the leaders; Bill Epton was come. And we've gone out looking for City_.-:- State > Zip ="' jailed for "criminal anarchism." And the them. Notably, the Labor/Black Mobi­ 421 next year Malcolm was killed. You want lization on November 27, 1982, which Make checks payable/mall to: Spartaclst PUblishing Co., Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10116 to know why we say. gun control kills we built in one week, that brought out blacks? In New York the city council 5,000 black youth and unionists who 10 WORKERS VANGUARD of a supposed Qaddafi "link" to the Reagan ... disco bombing. Who gets bombed next? Only Reagan (continued from page 1) and his new National Security Adviser Operation Turnaround, to show that Frank Carlucci know for sure, or maybe "Reagan's back" and "in charge," was ~ only the latter. Perhaps they'll go after miserable flop. Though he made It the "usual suspects" in the Bekaa region through the upbeat script (selected by of Lebanon, a favorite Israeli target. Nancy), with Republicans jumping ~p The last time Reagan tried anything and down for standing ovations while serious in Lebanon he got 241 Marines Democrats sat stonily in their seats, the blown to bits in October 1983. (That New York Times (28 January) reported December, the New Jersey was ordered a "consensus tonight among politicians to come to the aid of the Marine in both parties ...that the President had compound in Beirut, but only managed not regained the initiative," presaging to shell civilian areas because the "an even more rapid ebbing of the . 30-year-old powder charges for the Administration's power" than custom­ 40-year-old battleship's guns caused ary. In other words, not a "lame duck" shellsto go astray.) But Reagan was able o ert . aggms " . . New York T~mes but a dead duck administration, blown to cover up this disaster by fabricating 1964:Outrage over cop killing of 15-year-old Harlem youth (left). Spar~acl.st­ out of the water by the Iran/Contragate another military "crisis"-the U.S. rape Initiated rally in garment district to defend Har,lem masses against pollee affair. The Times put the knife in, of black Grenada. Former Democratic riot (right). ostentatiously giving top billing to House speaker Tip O'Neill, who went stopped the Ku Klux Klan cold when Vietnamese did their job with their Communist Party chief Mikhail Gorba­ along with Reagan's ploys when the they tried to march in Washington for historic victory that sent the (J.S. and its chev's state of the Soviet Union address chips were down, admitted the game the first time since 1925. And most puppets packing, but the. American over Ronald Reagan's sorry state of the after he retired: recently, the ILA strike this past workers haven't done their job yet. Yet if presidency. "When [KAL Flight] 007 went down, October, where we rushed into action the' American ruling class tries it again, There is a deep-going crisis of the re­ that's the day we met and decided to gime in Washington today. The Ameri­ send our Marines to Beirut. When the with our special supplement. Unfortu­ in Nicaragua, they'll have one hell of a 241 Marines were killed, three days later nately the strike only lasted three days; social explosion here at home. can ruling class is kind of panicked that [they] get it off the front page and go because the raw power of that integrated I want to end on this note. In the their commander-in-chief has lost his into Grenada." grip. When White House aides refused -CNN News, 14November 1986 hardball union, with its heavily black California Bay Area last weekend, we Southern locals, scared the bureaucrats commemorated three revolutionaries to let investigators question Reagan on Whatever the administration decides and the bourgeoisie. who all died in January-Lenin, the the Iran arms affair, on the grounds that to do in the Near East, it's likely to be a "the President might become confused," November 27th by the way, was the leader of the Bolshevik Party, who cheap shot-a quick bombing raid, for Maine Republican Senator Cohen re­ culmination of a series of labor/black together with Leon Trotsky led the instance-which they can sellas "Amer­ actions that were instrumental in keep­ Russian workers to power in 1917;and marked, "I have the sensation we've ica standing tan again." Where they ing the Klan off the streets of the Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, slipped through a rabbit. hole into intend to commit theU.S. militarily is something of a fantasy land." Asked if Northern cities. It was one of the most the Spartacists in Germany, who in Nicaragua, in the name of a global war important victories in decades in the World War I said "The main enemy isat the president remembered signing the on Communism. Reagan vowed in the fight against racist terror in this country. home!" and refused to support "their" Bible sent to Teheran, departing White "State of the Union"address to stand by House spokesman Larry Speakes re­ But thereare people who can't stomach bourgeois government in the imperialist his contra "freedom fighters," pro­ that-even some on the left, like'the so­ slaughter. At the beginning of World plied, "I don't know thathe knew that he claiming "There must be no Soviet called Workers League, which called War I, only four leaders of the German knew." On Friday, Reagan actually beachhead in Central America." And as vetoed a "clean water" bill that had that action a "provocation." That's the social democrats had the courage to Congress gears up for another contra same thing they've recently come out take this internationalist stand-they passed the House 408..-6 and the Senate aid fight, a series of "exercises" are by 93-6, guaranteeing that it would be and said about our fight in the city labor went to jail, and their Spartacus letters underway in Honduras involving more overridden. At this point if Congress movement now for massive labor/black had to be distributed clandestinely. But than 7,000 U.S. troops. Units of the (which he dubbed "outer space") passed patrols in Howard Beach. So they have two years later, on May Day 1916,Karl National Guard are flown in for "road­ a billfor motherhood, Reagan would no an article in their paper, the Bulletin, Liebknecht was addressing a crowd of building," the USS Iowa pounds away doubt reject it as a "budget-buster"! one of the most disgusting apologies for to 000 in Berlin who were chanting with its 16-inchers to "soften up" the The administration iscoming apart at . the racist killers in Howard Beach I've "Down with the war!" So things can beaches for amphibious landings by the the seams. SecretaryofState Shultz told ever read. They take out the Spartacist change very quickly. And if war is the Marines. Up next are helicopter assaults a Congressional committee that the CIA League for our statement that this is a mother of revolution, imperialist war is and a parachute drop by the 82nd continued discussions with the Iranians "deeply racist country." That is simply the mother of socialist revolution. Airborne, and a war'game on "border after a State Department.spokesman restoration." true. Why do they want to deny reality? Now the Bolsheviks went into World Because they're opposed to mobilizing supposedly terminated talks in mid­ As for U.S. invasion plans, they have War I with a revolutionary vanguard December; and that he had to cable the long been drawn up and are now , to stop these racist attacks. As James party, with its cadres tested in the 1905 Cannon, the founder of American Kuwaiti government to countermand a finalized. But there's a major hitch: due Revolution, in the experience of the CIA request that they release Khomeini­ to post-Vietnam manpower cuts, fully Trotskyism, said of the "colorblind" underground struggle during the repres­ social democrats of his day, who like the ite airplane bombers. Meanwhile, the· half the combat and support units will sion, in resisting the wave of social CIA's contra mercenaries are the subject have to come from the National Guard WL were covering for, or were them­ patriotism at the outbreak of the war. selves, job-trusting labor fakers, these of at least seven different criminal and Reserves. These are not 20-year-old That was decisive for the victory of the investigations for everything from would-be Rambos but the family men of pseudo-socialists have nothing at all to .Russian October Revolution. But in offer black people. weapons smuggling, drug .trafficking middle America, and once they start Germany, Liebknecht and Luxemburg and money laundering to larceny, coming home in body bags it will create Okay, SQ it's been six years of were assassinated in January 1919,their Reaganism. But I'm glad to say that burglary and murder. And now there a political explosion at home.Not even movement defeated in part because they are revelations of Angolagate, with CIA LBJ dared try that: according to Col. recent developments look like the had not assimilated the key question of Reaganites are self-destructing pretty fly-by-night airlines funneling arms to Herbert Schandler (The Unmaking ofa the vanguard party in time. So we must South African puppet Savimbi through President: Lyndon Johnson and Viet­ fast, and we want to help this along-In learn from history. And we of the our paper, Workers Vanguard, we're Zaire (the former Belgian Congo) with nam [1977]), Johnson figured that Spartacist tendency seek to forge that the cooperation of President Mobutu, mobilizing the Reserves represented writing about "Contragate Murder party of world socialist revolution. Plots," "Shuttlegate," KAL-Q07-gate­ installed by the CIA in 1965 after "the elusive point at which the costs of Finally, let me read a. quote from the agency arranged for the 1961 mur­ Vietnam would become unacceptable to let's keep those "gates" coming, folks. Trotsky: Reagan also seems to be losing his der of Congolese independence leader the American'people...." So he reject­ marbles, or should I say losing his jelly "Put aside the incidentals which devel­ Lumumba. ed General Westmoreland's 1967-68 es­ beans. But they're still obsessed with opments have overcome, and we can, "How many dead Lebanese will it calation plans and resigned himself to with full justification, place our work take to run Contragate off the front defeat. But not Reagan-he thinks he "taking back Nicaragua." And they may for the Fourth International under the ~adio just try it. As we'vesaid more than once, sign of the 'three L's,' t~at is, under the pages?"asked Pacifica commenta­ has a "mandate" for an anti-Soviet war this government is crazy, war crazy. But sign not only of Lenin, but also of tor Travis T. Hip, adding that for drive leading to nuclear Armageddon in if they do, they'll find out that the Luxemburg and Liebknecht." purposes of whipping up anti-Arab our time. Vietnam syndrome is still there. The We'd like you to join us.• hatred in the American public, "those Accompanying this imperialist war hostages are probablyworth a great deal drive abroad is the war at home, against more dead than alive from the White workers, minorities, immigrants, the House viewpoint." The pattern is by t poor. And just as the Challenger's A Spartaeist pamphlet 25 now all-too-familiar. In January 1986, rocket launchers kept hurtling skyward Reagan started ranting about "flaky" following the explosion that disinte- Qaddafi and ordered Americans to continued on page 12 leave Libya. When Congress turned down Reagan's contraaid bill in March, he sent the Sixth Fleet to provocatively . enter Libyan-claimed waters in order to CORRECTION draw fire and attack Soviet-installed The last paragraph of the article SAM missile sites. Following the "Howard Beach: Black Victims on convenient bombing of a Berlin disco in Trial," (WV No. 420, 23 January) early April, the U.S. bombed Tripoli in contained a garbled sentence. Re­ a raid timed to play live on the evening ferring to the recent escalation of'. network news. This was a deliberate racist terror in the U.S., the sen­ attempt to assassinate Qaddafi but they tence should have read: "A vicious 25~ (16 pages) 75¢ (32 ~ages) 75¢ (32 pages) only succeeded in killing his 15-month­ attack on anti-Klan marchers in old daughter and innocent civilians. Forsyth, Georgia dramatically un­ Make checks payable/mall 10: Sparlaclsl Publishing ce., Box 1377 GPO, NY, NY 10116 Now everybody admits that the U.S. derlined this point." government simply fabricated its story 6 FEBRUARY 1987 11 Water Cannon at 40° Below in Minnesota Battle Over ,Troops to Central America On Thursday night, January 22, a of MPs and civilian cops using night­ demonstration of some 500 people sticks. The actions at Fort Snelling converged on Fort Snelling Air Base reflect a split among U.S. rulers over the outside Minneapolis to protest the Pentagon's deployment of National sending of Minnesota National Guards­ Guard units in their military buildup men to Central America. The troops against Sandinista Nicaragua. In 1986, were scheduled to lift off the next state governors of Maine, Vermont, morning for u.s. military "exercises" in New Mexico, Washington, Ohio and AP Honduras called "Blazing Trails '87." Arizona refused to permit Guard in preparation for a U.S. invasion is with Nicaragua" (New York Times, 16 But as ladders went up to scale the "training" in Honduras. Last November called "training." With the same subter­ September 1986). Yet this same Gover­ chain-link fence topped with barbed Congress passed the Montgomery fuge, the Pentagon used Guardsmen in nor Babbitt, who is now angling for the wire that surrounds the military section Amendment stripping governors of any the 1983 Grenada invasion, and Air Democratic vice-presidential nomina­ of the Minneapolis-St. Paulairport, Air say in the matter. But in late January, National Guard tankers refueled the tion, used the Guard to break the bitter Force police suddenly turned fire hoses Minnesota governor Rudy Perpich sued F-ills that struck Libya last April. The Phelps Dodge strike in Morenci in on the demonstrators. But even this the Department of Defense, Air Force, issue is vital to Washington, because 1983-84. And Minnesota Democratic drenching in the bitter cold (the wind Army and top Pentagon officials to following elimination of the draft after "Farmer-Labor" governor Perpich, chill factor stood at 40 .degrees below reassert state control over Guard Vietnam,' the National Guard now who brags he is an Iron Range miner's zero) didn't -stop the protesters, 22 of training. constitutes 44 percent of all Army son, called out the National Guard whom were seized by police. "I hope It's one more instance of how the combat units. Incredibly, while sinking against striking Hormel meatpackers in that they were amazed the people still Reagan administration, with the con­ billions into "Star Wars," the Pentagon Austin last year. The same military kept going over," said a spokesman for nivance of Congressional Democrats, is trying to run an imperial military forces to be used against the Sandinistas the Pledge of Resistance, a liberal civil. has squirmed around U.S. laws to run machine with "weekend warriors." are used by the U.S. ruling class against disobedience group. its dirty war in Central America. The Liberal Democratic governors struck American workers. If Midwest labor It was the second time in a month that president can always federalize Guard a cheap pose against Reagan's unpopu­ had beaten back National Guard strike­ hundreds protested at the air base. In units, but has to report this to Con­ lar war moves by blocking use of the breaking at Hormel, it would have been the predawn darkness of January 3, gress, which would then have to take a National Guard in Central America. a blow against the U.S. war drive in activists who climbed the fence and position. So for mutual convenience, Arizona governor Bruce Babbitt de­ Central America. headed for planes warmingtheir engines use of National Guard soldiers to pave nounced Reagan's "dangerous and Anti-imperialism abroad means hard on the runways were attacked by dozens Honduras coast-to-coast with airfields wrong" policy of "direct confrontation class struggle at home.•

In addition, special "State Defense into concentration camps. Coordinated is no longerjust barroom bragging, but Reagan ... Forces" are to be set up, and these "Garden Plot" action was' taken after serious calculation by a war crazy civilian "deputies" along with military the May 1970 bombing of Cambodia, regime. The massive invasion of black (continued from page 11) forces would receive hundreds of tons of when National Guard units shot down Grenada, wanton air raids against small arms and ammunition. After the demonstrators at Kent State(after being Qaddafi's Libya-they'd like to have a grated the space shuttle a year ago, "exercise," anticipating the NSC's sent against striking Ohio Teamsters). A military strike against somebody every right-wing reaction is still lurching "Iranscam," half the weapons would be year later, antiwar protesters in Wash­ week, from Nicaragua to the Persian forward even as the administration siphoned off for shipment to the ington, D.C. were illegally arrested en Gulf. plummets out of a six-year orbit under Nicaraguan contrast The existence of masse and held in underground parking They may be crazy enough to think the weight of its own venality, stupidity REX-84 has been confirmed by high­ garages. The head of Operation Cable they can still get away with it, butthere's and lies. Thus in the midst of the Iran/ level sources inside. FEMA. One told Splicer, appointed by Meese as Califor­ been a big objective change in this Contragate investigations, Republicans Sheehan that only those who "wore a nia governor Reagan's deputy for "law country. The polls show the American on the Senate Foreign Relations Com­ population is disaffected. Eighty per­ mittee elected as their leader Jesse cent think the president's lying on Iran/ Helms, a raving anti-Communist from Contragate, ,60 percent oppose contra North Carolina who revels in the aid, and now they've even released a company of strutting Latin American Gallup poll showing that last summer dictators. The steel companies and 51 percent of the public thought there airlines and packing house bosses are was too much hype in the "terrorism" still trying to rip up the unions, scare. And not only is the "Vietnam demanding whopping givebacks and syndrome" still with us, the American locking out the workers, running plants ruling class has acquired one hell of an with scabs and running down strikers on immune deficiency over military adven­ the picket lines. And the racists are on a tures in the Third World. As early as rampage of lynch mob violence from December, they couldn't get any spon­ Chicago to Georgia to New York City. sors for Reagan's TV birthday party The Reagan administration's war bonanza, and now even Chrysler has against "the enemy within" takes par­ pulled its flag-waving "born in Ameri­ ticular aim at the democratic rights of The Reagan Bible: Old he know that he knew that he .ent It-and when ca" ads from ABC's crazed anti­ the American people. For starters, did he forget? communist Amerika mini-series. Reagan, Meese & Co. have a plan to Everyone has recognized this regime round up and imprison 400,000 "illegal small red Christian cross, or crucifix enforcement," was Louis Giuffrida, who as a gang of liars and psychopaths, yet aliens" in concentration camps upon a pin, on the lapel of their suits-were at the time NSDD 52 was issued in 1984 for years people just ate it because they U.S. invasion of Central America. This even allowed through the metal security was head of FEMA. And the assistant were intimidated and saw no way to was exposed in a Florida civil suit filed doors on the fifth floor of the FEMA attorney general who ordered the May fight. Now, however, as the Reaganauts last year by the Christie Institute (see building" where the operation was 1971 roundup in D.C. was Wiliiam are still going hell-for-leather, their "Contragate Murder Plots," WV No. headquartered. Sheehan also reveals Rehnquist, now Supreme Court chief incompetence and weird double-dealing 420, 23 January). A December 15 that these "State Defense Forces" are justice. becomes increasingly grotesque. Noone affidavit by lawyer Daniel Sheehan already being secretly constituted in The American ruling class cannot ever expected to see on a medical reveals the existence of National Securi­ Texas, Louisiana and Alabama, signing bear the truth, that the Vietnamese readout for this administration big ty Decision Directive 52, signed by up ultra-rightist mercenary and "sur­ workers and peasants defeatedthe U.S. spikes of mental activity, what with Reagan in April 1984, that authorized vivalist" paramilitary forces. " imperialist army on the battlefield. The Reagan's penchant for sleeping through the Federal Emergency Management This is the same gang who 15 years Reaganites subscribe to the "stab-in­ cabinet meetings and the like; but today Administration (FEMA) to undertake a ago were' up to their eyeballs in the-back" theory that they "won" the it's gone practically linear-brain dead. secret nationwide "readiness exercise" "Operation Garden Plot"-the Nixon war on the battlefield, but were betrayed And as the American bourgeoisie gets called "REX-84." Deputizing all De­ Pentagon's equivalent of the FBI's by peaceniks and pinko liberals at the jitters, there could be explosions of partment of Defense personnel and the COINTELPRO and the CIA's Opera­ home. This, of course, was-also Hitler's struggle challenging these abusive ex­ National Guard would bypass the Posse tion CHAOS. This scheme, and its explanation of why Germany lost ploiters and oppressors, who stand for Comitatus Act, which denies the mili­ California adjunct, "Operation Cable World War I. And like Hitler, they have unbridled greed like no other govern­ tary the power to arrest. And the detain­ Splicer," centered on joint training declared war on labor, the left, minori­ ment in decades. But for those struggles ees can be held at ten military bases, exercises of military, police and spy ties and democratic rights. But the _to emerge victorious there is one central including Fort Drum, New York; Fort agencies to put down political demon­ American public has not bought their need, for a Bolshevik party like the one Benning, Georgia; Camp Krome, Flori­ strationsand, in the event of a declara­ agenda. Now they are going down, fast, Lenin and Trotsky led to victory against. da; Fort Chaffee, Arkansas and Van­ tion of martial law, to round up black and as as they go down they're getting a tsarist regime that rivals Reagan's in denberg AFB in California. nationalists and Vietnam-war protesters twitchy as hell. Talk of "nuking Russia" every index of social depravity.• 12 WORKERS VANGUARD Racist Hail General William Tecumseh Sherman's Liberation of Georgia! Attacks ••. (continued from page 1) After the march, not even its organiz­ ers are trying to claim it achieved any sort of victory against racist terror in Forsyth or anywhere else.The Southern Christian Leadership Conference has written federal agencies to determine "whether" lily-white Forsyth County discriminates against blacks in housing and hiring, while others emphasized the need to focus back on such Reaganite concerns as teen pregnancy, "black on black" crime, and drugs. SCLC head Joseph Lowery rammed it home last summer with his obscene statement that "the new KKK is killer krack and koke." And Atlanta mayor Andy Young, just back from preaching the virtues of Coca-Cola capitalism to impoverished black African states, insists that the Library of Congres; Library of Congress way to deal with Klan terror is through Union General Sherman (left) 'broke back of Confederacy in his march from Atlanta to Savannah in late 1864. "job training programs" for the mur­ derous scum (Atlanta Constitution, 28 this room would want to go try to have a Luther King Day, and he told the wants in this country. What we need isa January). , cup of coffee in a diner in Forsyth Klansman, "I will join you in a lawsuit workers / party, and I'm not talking We print below sections of a presenta­ County right now. And if you look at all because if College Park deny you the about a party that calls people out to tion by a Spartacist spokesman at a of the calls for this march, it talks about right to march, they are usurping your vote likecattle every couple of years. I'm January 27 SL public forum in Atlanta, supporting the Constitution, getting our constitutional right, and I will stand by talking about a party that takes up and exposing the role of the Democratic constitutional rights; nobody men­ your side and' march with you." This is organizes the defense of working peo­ Party misleaders in derailing the fight tioned racial equality, racial integration. not particularly new for Hosea Wil­ ple. It's got to be a party that stands for against racist terror. This was not a repeat of the civil rights liams. Remember, he supported Ronald revolutionary integrationism. It can't be movement in that sense. Reagan when he ran for office the first the kind of party that believes that Another point about this march, and time around. And he also put forward a racism will be ended in this country by * * * this sort of gives you the character of it, bill when he was a state legislator to get some kind of deal with capitalism. What happened in Forsyth County is that there was an intention at least­ Lester Maddox a pension. But then you Capitalism liveson racism. And the only this past weekend was organized on all the crowd WC;lS much bigger than they have Jesse Jackson. When he was at the way to end racial oppression in this sides by the Democratic Party. Jesse expected-of trying to control and po­ press conference that the march was country is going to be by smashingthe Jackson didn't show up, but he certainly lice the participants. So Hosea Wil­ called at, he said that one of the reasons capitalist system. helped organize the march. You had two liams was saying Friday night that he we want to march is to "love those who The point about a place like Forsyth people that may well be contenders for hoped that it wouldn't go over 5,000, hate us, to understand the oppressed County, it's not a situation where you the Democratic presidential nomination because he was afraid of a crowd bigger marching, plus the Senators. The Dem­ than 5,000. We happened to overhear ocratic Party governor of this state part of a marshals' meeting for this organized the troops. And the ex­ march, and the marshals were told that Democratic Party governor of this state, people were to maintain silence. In the Lester Maddox, was over talking with paper ~ome of the,marshals' leaders the Klan and giving them speeches. I'm were quoted as saying the reason they sure most of the Klansmen were Demo­ wanted people to maintain silence was crats, too. The Democratic Party or­ that they did not want any provocation ganized all sides of what happened this to come from the black side. That meant past Saturday, so it sort of brings to that people were hushed up from singing KKK racists mind Malcolm X's statement.He said a civil rights songs. Ifthere were any loud riot in Forsyth Democrat is really a Dixiecrat. noises, people were supposed to-and I County. A lot of people went to Forsyth don't believe this happened-drop to County this past Saturday because they their knees. Also, the marshals were told wanted to be able to make some kind of that if there was anybody in the crowd statement against the Klan. They felt who began to present an alternative like what had happened was a genuine agenda, in other words, of maybe trying and the oppressor." could simply send in hundreds of flatbed atrocity that should be addressed at to do something about the Klan, that The whole idea of nonviolence sets trucks. Because" after they left, that there was going to be a van to pick up people up for attack by the Klan. It's an situation would go back to what it was. and deal with these people in no invitation to Klan attack. So during the What you need is a modern-day version uncertain terms. It's unclear who they first march up into Forsyth County, of General Sherman'sarmy. Sherman were going to be turned over to once people were going to be sc.reened before took his army and cut a 50-mile-wide they were put in- this van. they got on the bus to make sure they path between Atlanta and Savannah. Coretta King, in commenting on the had no violent tendencies. I'm sure the That broke the back of slavery and march a couple of days before it Klan read that in the Atlanta Constitu­ made a major contribution to winning happened, said, "Weare going to be tion lind they figured, good, they're the Civil War. What you need is a nonviolent and do what we are sup­ putting a bull's eye on themselves. workers government, in which the posed to do.... Then we're going to If people have illusions in the Demo­ working class rules and intransigently leave." The march manifesto said, "To cratic Party, then they're going to be goes after smashing racist reaction. And reaffirm that this isa nation governed by worrying about what the ruling class it's not necessarily going to be pretty.• law. No disregard for the law, of mindless illegalbehavior, willbe tolerat­ edor condoned anywhere in the United States." This is with William Bradford SPARTACIST LEAGUE/U.S. LOCAL DIRECTORY Reynolds [who is the Number Three National Office: Box 1377 GPO, New Ycrk, NY 10116 • (212) 732-7860 man in the Justice Department] march­ AP ing at the head of the march! These Atlanta Detroit Norfolk Coretta Scott King joins hands ,with kinds of controls, and what actually Box 4012 Box 441794 Box 1972, Main PO Reagan racist George Shultz. ended up happening on Saturday Atlanta, GA 30302 Detroit, MI 48244 Norfolk, VA 23501 some level. We went down and sold reminded me of this, which sounds likea Boston Los Angeles Oakland almost 600 pieces of literature to people fairly good description of what hap­ Box 840, Central Sta. Box 29574, Los Feliz Sta. Box 32552 participating in the demonstration, pened at this march: Cambridge. MA 02139 Los Angeles, CA 90029 Oakland, CA 94604 which isquite high salesfor us. And they "They controlled it so tight, they told (617) 492-3928 (213) 384-9716 (415) 839-0851 those Negroes what time to hit town, were interested in what we were saying Chicago Madison San Francisco about the nature and character of that how to come, where to stop, what signs to carry, what songs to sing, what Box 6441, Main PO c/o SYL, Box 2074 Box 5712 demonstration. speech they could make, and what Chicago, IL 60680 Madison, WI 53701 San Francisco, CA94101 So what did the' march leadership speech they couldn't make; and then (312) 663-0715 (608) 257-8625 (415) 863-6963 want out of this thing? First of all, they they told them to get out of town by wanted -to help refurbish the image of sundown. And everyone of those Toms Cleveland New York Washington, D.C. Georgia, the South, and in particular was out of town by sundown." Box 91037 Box 444, Canal St. Sta. Box 75073 the United States. For example, Hosea That's Malcolm X talking about the Cleveland, OH 44101 New York, NY 10013 Washington, D.C. 20013 Williams was quoted as saying, "This is 1963 March on Washington. (216) 621-5138 (212) 267-1025 (202) 636-3537 America, this is not South Africa." So what was going on? Partly it was to Well, in reality American life is much maintain the unity of the Democratic Toronto closer to South African life than he Party-it was the hand across the TROTSKYIST LEAGUE Box 7198, Station A would like to admit. And then look at National Guardsmen to the Dixiecrats. OF CANADA Toronto, Ontario M5W 1X8 ' the results of the march-nothing's So that Hosea Williams was debating (416) 593-4138 really changed. I don't think anybody in one of the Klansmen on TV on Martin 6 FEBRUARY 1987 13 Geronimo Pratt -16 Years Behind Bars Former Panther Leader Fighting for 'Black Freedom The time is now for labor, minorities, signature of the Reagan years. would be a big victory for all the victims surrounded the Panther headquarters and all enemies of racist injustice to rally Why was Geronimo Pratt singled out of Reagan reaction today. where Pratt was living, as helicopters to the fight. for freedom for America's for government murder attempts and circled overhead. They subjected the foremost class-war prisoner-Elmer "legal murder"? Pratt is behind bars Courageous Fighter for house to a five-hour barrage, and "Geronimo" Pratt.. Framed for a mur­ because he dedicated his life to the cause Black Freedom riddled Pratt's bed-pinpointed by an der he did not commit, and could not of black freedom, which is an insepara­ informer's blueprint-with bullets. have committed, the former Los An­ ble part of the working-class struggle for Geronimo Pratt comes from southern Pratt survived only because he was geles Black Panther Party leader has emancipation from the yoke of capital. Louisiana. As he told WV in an inter­ sleeping on the floor due to his war spent more than 16 years behind bars­ Many working people active in the view at San Quentin, "I grew up in Klan wounds. Having failed to kill him, his including eight years in solitary con­ struggle for black freedom in the 1960s country, fighting the Klan," which would-be murderers arrested him for finement-s-in the racist hellholes of remember Panthers like Pratt who were victimized his family and killed a close "conspiracy to assault policemen"! Folsom and San Quentin prisons. either murdered or dragged in chains friend (see "Geronimo Pratt Speaks The cop conspiracy was so blatant America's racist rulers triedto kill Pratt, through the courts of injustice and from San Quentin," WV No. 382, 28 that even an overwhelmingly white jury as they killed so many of the best gagged behind prison walls for daring to June 1985). Like tens of thousands of threw out the charges. Yet Pratt was fighters for black freedom. When they stand up to the racist rulers. The fight black 'youth, he was sent to the front jailed on more minor weapons charges. failed, they locked him up, tried to against racial oppression and the hard- lines to kill and be killed in imperialism's His wife Saundra-eight months preg­ dirty, losing colonial war in Vietnam. As nant and also a Panther member-was a much-decorated combat veteran, Pratt returned to the States opposed to American imperialism and determined to contribute to the struggle against the racist enemy at home. After enrolling in college in Los An­ geles, he was among those who gravi­ tated to the Black Panther Party, which represented the most militant expres­ sion of 1960s black nationalism. It Los Angeles, taught, as had Malcolm X, that black. December people had the right and the duty to 1969: defend themselves against racist vio­ Protesters lence. Befriended by the founder of the jam L.A. Hall L.A. Panthers, Bunchy Carter, Pratt of Justice became a leader of the Black Panther demanding Party after Carter was assassinated. freedom AP for Pratt and Pratt was immediately targeted by the notorious murder and frame-up Geronimo Pratt (1971) was targeted other arrested for "neutralization" by cop/FBI Panther "Counterintelligence Program" (COIN­ conspiracy. leaders. TELPRO), which FBI directorJ. Edgar Hoover assigned the. mission to "dis-: "mysteriously" shot in the head, her rupt, misdirect, discredit and otherwise body dumped on an L.A. freeway; no neutralize the activities" of black activist arrest was ever made in her murder. groups. Of the 29~ COINTELPRO While Pratt was in jail on the weapons assassinate his character;and used every won gains ef the labor movement­ operations against black groups, 233 charges, the government subjected him means in the attempt to break his spirit. these are "crimes" in the eyes of the were against the Panthers, BPP offices to a "legal" lynching. Using the "testi­ But Geronimo Pratt remains unbowed, ruling class. were smashed, hundreds' railroaded to mony" of one. Julio Butler-an LAPD unbroken, and deeply committed to the Who, after all, benefits from the prison, and 38 Panthers were killed agent and FBI informer who lied on the cause of the oppressed. continued imprisonment of Geronimo outright. This government murder stand about his relationship to those From Howard Beach to Forsyth Pratt? Whose interests are served by machine had Pratt in its cross hairs.Tn a agencies-a 197I trial framed Pratt for County to Contra Costa County, racists massive union-busting, by the picket­ January 1985 court hearing on Pratt's the 1969 murder of a Santa Monica are attacking and killing black people. line murders of strikers like oil worker petition for a new trial, the former head schoolteacher (an antiwar activist). The murderous lynch-mob racist attacks Greg Goobic and longshoreman Jack- of the L.A. "Anti-Extremist Squad 2" The FBI "lost" its wiretaps proving must be stopped and they can be . son Taylor? The Reagans, the' Edwin admitted straight out about Pratt: "We that Pratt was 500 miles away at the lime stopped, by mobilizing the power of Meeses, and the bosses they represent! wanted to render him ineffective." of the crime, visiting Panthers in an labor!black defense. Working people After so many bitter defeats, labor and On 4 December 1969, a massive cop! Oakland house heavily bugged and know that the racists take their cue from minorities need victories-which can FBI raid on Chicago Panther head­ under surveillance by the feds. At the the White House, which-aided and only be won through struggle. The fight quarters murdered Fred Hampton and January 1985 hearing, Wesley Swear­ abetted by the Democratic Party-ha! to free Geronimo Pratt now is more Mark Clark in cold blood as they slept ingen, a retired high-level FBI agent trampledunderfoot the limited and even urgent than ever, as a vital part of the in their beds. Four days later the police who was active in COINTELPRO-type the token gains of the civil rights fight against racist terror, union-busting death squads came for Pratt in L.A. In a operations, came forward to testify that movement. The government bombing and the wholesale assaults on the rights pre-dawn raid hundreds of LAPD he saw wiretap logs of four telephones of the black MOVE commune in of us all that make up the domestic Metro Squad and SWAT team com­ proving' that Pratt could not have Philadelphia, incinerating eleven black component of the anti-Soviet war drive. mandos, armed with M-60 machine committed the Santa Monica murder. people, five of them children, was the A victory in the fight for Pratt'sfreedom guns, tear gas launchers and dynamite, As Swearingen flatly stated: "Pratt was set up." From Day One the murderous ven­ detta against Pratt has been orches­ trated by a conspiracy at the top levelsof government. The CIA weighed in with a secret report on Pratt, sent by then-CIA director Richard Helms to the Nixon White House in August 1970. The criminals who run this country, having railroaded Pratt to prison, are dead set on keeping him there. And chiefamong them is Reagan's sinister attorney general and Contragate co-conspirator Edwin Meese. . Meese oversaw the State of Califor­ Ilia's campaign to wipe out the Black Panthers when Reagan was governor. Meese still says of a bystander shot UPI . AP down during a "People's Park" protest Panthers led away in shackles after murderous assault on their headquarters by 300-strong LAPD death squad. in Berkeley: "James Rector deserved to 14 WORKERS VANGUARD Down with Meese/FBI COINTELPRO Frame-Up! Freedom Now for Geronimo Pratt! Partial List of Endorsers Elizabeth Grim••, Jamaica, NY Leonard Post, Attorney, Oakland, .CA James grimes, Railroad Clerk, TWULocal100,' Jamaica, NY Abba Ramos, ILWU Local 6: Oakland, CA JoNlna Abron, Oakland, CA Eathen Gums, Jr., LegistativeChairman, lAM & AW Local Dr. J.W. Reid, Psychologist, Instructor, Merritt College: Afro-American Cultural Society, MerrittCollege,' 739: Oakland, CA Oakland, CA Oakland, CA Bruce Haldane, Commissioner, Berkeley Police Review AI Richmond, San Francisco, CA All African People's RevolutIonary Party, Washington, D.C. Commission: Berkeley, CA Wilson C. Riles, Jr., Member of Oakland City CounC1I,' Miguel Angel, Instructor, Mexican~American/Latin American Stuart Hanlon, Attorney, San Francisco, CA Oakland, CA Studies,' Laney College, Oakland, CA Karin Hart, Contractual Vice President, CWA Local 9415: Pete Rockwell, Printer, BATU Local 21, CWA: Oakland, CA Richard M. Aokl~ M.S.w., Counselor and Instructor, Merritt EI Cerrito, CA AI Rossi, President, United Teachers of Oakland, AFT Local College: Oakland, CA John Holmes, Secretary, Hayward Daily Review Chapel, 771, AFL-CIO: Oakland, CA Dr. Cecelia L. Arrington, Ethnic Studies Chair, Merritt BATU Local 21, CWA! Oakland, CA Jim Ryder, Business Agent, ILWU Local 6: Oakland, CA College: Oakland, CA Dr. Linus A. Hoskins, Professor, Howard University,' Richard Salvucci, Assistant Professor, University of Willie Lee Bell, Recording Secretary/Human Rights . Hyattsville, MD California: Berkeley, CA Chairman, lAM & AW Local 739,' Oakland, CA Jane Jackson, Oakland, CA Malcolm Samuels, Service Representative, Hotel Employees, Michael Berry, President, University of California Student Dr. E. Roy John, Director, Brain Research Laboratories, Restaurant Employees and Bartenders Union Local 28,' Association: Berkeley, CA New York University: Mamaroneck, NY Oakland, CA AI Broussard, Executive Board/Trustee, ILWU Local 10: RandyJohnese, Senior FieldRepresentative, SEIULocal535,' Bill Sato, Instructor, Asian Studies Department: Laney San Francisco, CA Oakland, CA College, Oakland, CA Bob Brown, Organizer, All African People's Revolutionary Edward Kartsen, Spartacistcandidate for Manhattan Borough Charles Schwartz, Professor of Physics, University of Party, Washington, D.C. President, 1985, New York, NY California,' Berkeley, CA Henry A. Bryant, Chair, Ethnic Studies Department, Laney Larry Kinslow, President, lAM & AW Local739,' Oakland, CA Dan Siegel, Co-Chair, New Democratic Movement,' College: Oakland, CA Walter Lippmann, Chair, Human Rights Committee, SEIU Oakland, CA Saflya A. Bukhari, Black Community News Service,' Local 535: Los Angeles, CA Donald A. Smith, Trustee (Executive Board), NALC Branch New York,NY Cassandra L6pez, President, Oakland Progressive Political 2200,' Pasadena, CA Kathleen Cleaver, New Haven, CT , Alliance'; Executive Board member, Oakland Education Spartaclst League Leroy Collier, President, NALC Branch 2200, Pasadena, CA Association/CTAINEA: Oakland, CA MarjorieStamberg, Spartacist candidate for NYC Mayor, Michael J. Cox, Division Chief Steward, CWA Local 9415: Froben Lozada, College Instructor, MerrittCollege: 1985, New York, NY Berkeley, CA . Oakland, CA. DavidStewart, ExecutiveBoard, ILWU Local 10'; Coalition of David Creque, Vice President, United Teachers of Oakland, Joseph A. Lucas, President, ILWU Local 10: Black Trade Unionists: San Francisco, CA AFT Local 77t: Oakland, CA San Francisco, CA Lloyd K. Vandever, President, UE Local 1412: Oakland, CA Margot Dashiell, Instructor, Laney College: Oakland, CA; Conrad Lynn, Mid-Hudson Regional Courisel, NAACP,' Ben Vlsnlck, Executive Board, Oakland Education Berkeley Black Caucus' Nanuet, NY Association/CTA/NEA: Kensington, CA Ronald V. Dellums, UnitedStates Congressman, Berkeley, CA R.W. Major, Lecturer, Black Studies Department,' Nancy G. Walker, President, Board of Supervisors,' Erben Dennis, Office Manager, Oakland Progressive Political San Francisco State University, San Francisco, CA San Francisco, CA . Alliance: Oakland, CA John Martin, Secretary-Treasurer, Hotel Employees, Sam Wellbaum, Lecturer, San Francisco State University,' Stephen P. Dunn, Directorof Research, Highgate RoadSocial Restaurant Employees and Bartenders Union Local 28: San Francisco, CA Science Research Station: Berkeley, CA Oakland, CA Donald C. Wheeldln, Member, Geronimo Pratt Committee, Kay Eisenhower, Secretary, SEIU 616: Oakland, CA Howard Moore, Jr., Attorney, Oakland, CA ACLU: Pasadena, CA Rev.Graylan S. Ellis-Hagler,Co-Pastor, Church of the United Jane Bond Moore, Attorney, Oakland, CA Terry P. Wilson, Associate Professor, University of Community,' Roxbury, MA NALC Branch 2200, Glendale, CA California: Berkeley, CA Ethnic Studies Department, Laney College,' Oakland, CA Glenn R. Nance, Chairman, Afro-American Studies,' Jeff Woo, Treasurer, CWA Local 9410: San Francisco, CA Candice Francls-Sebahtu, Lecturer, African-American City College-San Francisco, San Francisco, CA Evelyn M. Wyatt, Executive Board, CWA Local 9410: Studies Department,' Universityof California,Berkeley, CA Morton Newman, Business Agent, ILWU Local 6,' San Francisco, CA - Richard S. Fraser, Democratic Socialists of America: San Francisco, CA Michael Zlnzun, Chairman, Coalition Against Pollee Abuse,' Los Angeles, CA New York Labor Black League for Soclai Defense, Los Angeles, CA Dr. Bernardo Garc!a-Pandavenes, Chair, Foreign Language New York, NY 'Organization listed for identification purposes oniy. Department,' Laney College, Oakland, CA Victor Pamlroyan, BUSiness Agent, iLWU Local 6,' John George, Alameda County Supervisor, Oakland, CA Oakland, CA We want to make it very clear that these endorsers do not Stanley Gow, Executive Board member, ILWU Local 10: Deborah A. Plater, Vice President, lAM & AW Local 739: necessarily agree in any particular way with the call by the San Francisco, CA Oakland, CA initiators of this demonstration printed on page 16.

cial in this fight.. Labor and community support (see endorsement list above) is gathering for the February 21 Oakland, California demonstration initiated by the Partisan Defense Committee and the Bay Area Labor Black League for The fact of you coming together that to be a militant fighter for black Social Defense, demanding "Freedom liberation is not to be a criminal. in workers demands for Justice Now for Geronimo Pratt! Down with shows a degree of recognition that I sincerely urge you to come out Meese/FBI COINTELPRO Frame-Up!" really frightens the manipulators of and take a stand against injustice, labor as they are helpless when faced against the real terrorists-the Rea­ As underscored in Geronimo's Janu­ with the raw awesome power of the gan Regime. The workers in that ary 28 statement from San Quentin, worker. So I want to urge you to fascist land called South Africa are printed here, mobilizing the power of continue to educate yourselves to leading in the.struggle to overthrow labor and the oppressed is key to the these COINTEL-type schemes and that evil empire. Let their glaring February 21 demonstration. The work­ learn of the many victims of that example continue to inspire and en­ ing class can place no confidence in the secret war so to better defend courage us onward••• bosses' courts. Mass class-struggle de­ yourselves. In the spirit of Tecumseh••• fense is needed to free our fighters from For years we were, depicted as the bars of the class enemy's prisons. gangsters and criminals because we Geronimo The case of Geronimo Pratt must be a were militant fighters in the Black San Quentin Prison rallying point for all those who burn Liberation Movement. My freedom Tamal, CA with indignation at oppression and would be a victory and a statement 28 January 1'87 WV Photo injustice. Geronimo is in prison because Geronimo', wife Ashakl with their he fought for us. Now we must fight for children Shona and Hlrojl. him. die." The blood of Pratt's comrades like prison far longer than the time a real capitalist racism before the world's eyes. ALL OUT ON FEBRUARY 21! Bunchy Carterand Little Bobby Hutton murderer would have served. Pratt's cause is the cause of workers and oppressed throughout the world and all FREEDOM NOW FOR (gunned down in West Oakland) is on While in prison Pratt has provided those concerned for democratic rights. GERONIMO PRATI! Meese's and Reagan's hands. Precisely , himself with a university-level educa­ The continued imprisonment of Geron­ because ofMeese's bloody"accomplish­ tion-with a focus on American histo­ imo Pratt exposes the lie that there are ments" in the war against the Panthers ry, and particularly the history ofblacks no political prisoners or human rights and antiwar protesters, Reagan picked violations in the U.S. From frame-ups and American Indians. He has worked of black activists to sending arms to him to be U.S. top cop, so that he could to educate young prisoners, often reactionary Afghan mullahs,· blood­ Spartacist League spearhead the all-out assault on the beginning by teaching victims ofghetto thirsty Nicaraguan contras and South Public Offices most fundamental democratic, civil and schools how to read and write. He has Africa's puppet Jonas Savimbi, the U.S. human rights. government is an enemy of the world's -MARXIST UTERATURE­ remarried, and with the benefit of working people. It is essential to wage Geronimo Pratt has steadfastly re­ conjugal visits has two children, ages an international campaign to expose Bay Area fused to "admit his guilt" for a crime he four and seven. The barbarity of this violation of human rights now. A Fri.: 5:00-8:00 p.m., Sat.: 3:00-6:00 p.m. successful fight to free this class-war 1634 Telegraph, 3rd Floor (near 17th Street) did not commit. His untiring efforts to imprisonment of an innocent man­ Oakland, Califqrnia Phone: (415) 839-0851 win freedom are an inspiring model of whose only "crime" is that he dares to prisoner would be a great blow to Reagan and his reactionary social and dignity and determination. As he says, fight for justice-keeps him separated Chicago political agenda. We look to you to join Tues.: 5:00-9:00 p.rn., Sat.: 11:00a.m.-2:00p.m. "My mother didn't raise a murderer. ... from his wife, children, and aged mother the fight to free Geronimo Pratt, and to 161 W. Harrison St., 10th Floor I'm going to survive, and I'm going to to whom he is deeply devoted. publicize throughout the world this Chicago, Illinois Phone: (312) 663-0715 example of racist capitalist injustice." expose the truth. I'~ going to be .In a letter to the Association ofSoviet New York City completely exonerated." Citing Pratt's Lawyers and TASS, the Soviet press Having recently won the right to Tues.: 6:00-9:00 p.rn., Sat.: 1:00-5:00 p.m. courageous refusal to perjure and frame ~ appeal for a new trial, Pratt stands atan '41 Warren St. (one block below agency, the Partisan Defense Commit­ Chambers St. near Church St.) himself, and viciously smearing him as a tee wrote: extremely important point in the cam­ New York, N.Y. Phone: (212) 267-1025 "danger to the community," the parole "We seek your assistance in bringing the paign against his frame-up conviction board had vindictively kept him in case of this militant fighter against and imprisonment. Mass protest is cru- 6 FEBRUARY 1987 15 W'/iNE/iS "NfifJ,/iIJ

Demonstrate: Noon, Saturday, Feb. 21! Oakland City Hall Plaza Park (~~~~S=nf~O~;~~b~:;I,

Labor, Minorities, Anti-Racist Fighters Demand:

I• The Partisan Defense Committee and Labor Black League for Social Defense call on the Bay Area labor movement and all enemies of racist injustice to rally in defense of Geronimo Pratt. Pratt is a decorated Vietnam vet and former Black Panther leader who has been rotting in prison for 16years for a crime he did not and could not have committed. He is the victim of the FBI's COINTELPRO campaign that physically exterminated the Black Panthers; The FBI and other police authorities have suppressed evidence that proves his innocence. The state has treated Pratt like fugitive slave Dred Scott who the court decided in 1856 "had no rights that a white man is bound to respect." , But like African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela, Pratt remains unbroken, committed to the liberation of all the oppressed and to continuing the fight for his own freedom. Pratt has consistently refused parole based on admission of guilt. He is currently imprisoned in San Quentin where he is pressing his fight for freedom in the federal courts. He recently won the right to appeal to a federal Court of Appeals for a new trial. Pratt's fight for. freedom must be labor's cause­ backed by mass protest. Working people and all the oppressed must rally to put an end to this hideous racist frame-up. The gang of warmongering liars and labor-hating racists in the White House, Reagan, - Meese & Co., oversaw the murderous war on the I Panthers in California. Pratt is behind bars for the I same reason Reagan/ Meese put PATCO leaders in leg Geronimo Pratt In San Quentin, March 1985. irons and conspired with black Democrat Goode to drop a bomb on black Philadelphia and massacre ington, D.C. labor together with its allies mobilized to enemies of racist injustice must rally to defend. this MOVE. They want to crush any opposition to their stop Klan/Nazi racist provocations. Bay Area labor heroic class-war prisoner: racist, union-busting anti-Soviet war drive'. Freedom and minorities mobilized to keep Ray Palmiero and for Pratt would be a blow against Reagan reaction Lauren Mozee from going to jail for defending their.. DOWN WITH MEESE/FBI when "Ronbo" is reeling from Iran/Contragate. picket line from a racist scab assault during the 1983 COINTELPRO FRAME-UP! Labor has the power. From San Francisco to Wash- phone strike. Now Bay Area labor, minorities and all FREEDOM NOW FOR GERONIMO PRATT!

Partisan Defense Committee, P.O. Box 5555, San Francisco, CA 94101 Labor Black League for Social Defense, P.O. Box 751, Oakland, CA 94604 For more information: (415) 839-0852

1. Endorse the demands and the demonstration! 6. Send telegr:ams .and letters demanding Pratt's freedom! Sample text and addresses below: . 2. Come to the demonstration with your co-workers and family! "I/we demand freedom now for Geronimo Pratt. Down with 3. Send money now! Make checks payable to Partisan Defense Meese/FBI COINTELPRO frame-up!" Committee earmarked "Geronimo Pratt Demonstration." Send to Send to: PDC, P.O. Box 5555, San Francisco, CA 94101. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, U.S. Courthouse 4. Take Pratt's case to your union or community organization! 450 Golden Gate Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94102 For copies of this leaflet calj (415) 839-0852. California State Parole Board, District Parole Office 759 South Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94110 5. Help us distribute leaflets! Call us at (415) 839-0852. re: Parole Hearing for Elmer Geronimo Pratt for April 1987

16 6 FEBRUARY 1987