IN THIS ISSUE -PRISON INTERVIEW WITH LOS SIETE -LIBERATION WOMEN'S UNION -IIC ACTION NOVEMBER 1969 $'92 25~ VOL. 5 NO. 10 -MUNIBLACKCAUCUS

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THE MOVEMENT PRESS BULK FlATE 4.•. POSTAGE 330 Grove Street PAID Mr. & Mrs. Grant Cannon San Francisco, California 94102 Sail Franc:l_. Calif. 4907 Klatte Road P..-mlt No. Cincinnati,' Ohio 45244 TORTURE IN BRAZIL

EDITORS NOTE: The following document was smug­ gled out of Brazil. The brother who sent it to us requested that we do "everything within our power to translate it and seek to have it pUblished broadly". OLEO STRUT IS RECRUITING Since he gave no address or suggestions on how we might help, we assume that we can best show our solidarity with our brothers and sisters struggling The Oleo strut is looking for new staff members. oppressive nature of the Army. against imperi.alism in Latin America by building The strut is a GI coffeehouse located in Killeen', The Oleo Strut staff is a collective. We live in one a front against imperialism inside the monster. Texas near Fort Hood. As well as the regular ac­ house and all work every day at the Strut. We have tivities of a GI coffee house, we hope to have a been working as a collective for 4 months and have been DOCUMENT NO, 1 radical bookstore, combination military law and varyingly successful. Within the collective is a wo­ radical books library in tIE near future. men's caucus. We discuss all problems and polit­ On (date, late 1969), two sisters ("A" and"B" , Killeen is a small town with a population of ical questions that arise. We discipline ourselves both respected educators) were arrested by the SS 35,000 people totally dependant on the Army for individually and from the collective we discipline agents of the Brazilian "X" Army at (hour), and its income. Fort Hood itself is a 39.000 man Armored ourselves as a group and criticize -each other for required to give the whereabouts of their brother Post staffed largely by Viet Nam returnees. There mistakes we make as staff members. ("C", a student leader). It is clear that they knew is no basic training, and almost everyone is just ­ We feel that our most important work is devel­ nothing, for they had not seen their brother in more waiting to get out. Because Fort Hood is a riot oping GI organizers who are laying the groundwork than twel Ve months. They were then taken to the head­ control center and discipline is threatened by Nam for a mass movement in the Army. One of the best quarters of the "X" Army, in (address); upon entering vets, the propaganda and coercion are heavy. A lot organizing tools that has been established at Fort a large room, they saw some 40 men torturing 5 or of guys seek escape in dope. In fact, a whole cult has Hood is the Fatigue Press which is put out by the 6 people. Fifteen or twenty of them (ofthe torturers ­ been developed around it. GIs. 5 to 8 for each prisoner) were visibly under the in­ For two reasons we have a firm understanding that In conclusion then, we are looking for people (mp.n, fluence of alchohol, - a Dantian scene very similar no one on the staff will use drugs in Killeen. The first women, or couples) who are willing to: to the GESTAPO, The two were mistreated, kicked and most obvious is that it is a bust - an easy one l)make a commitment of at least six months, hope­ and slapped. They were threatened with having their and one that will close the strut forever. The second fully starting in October or November, or as soon as clothing removed (one man, the most inebriated, is equally important and is the reason that we talk possible. called insistently for the "strip-tease" to begin ­ against drugs to the guys who come to the Strut'. 2) do shit work in the coffeehouse. indicating the frequency of this sort of treatment). , Use of drugs in the Army is as destructive as ghetto 3) learn about military law and counsel on court­ On the morning of the same day, "D" died when use of drugs. Guys are trying to escape the fact that martials and CO applications. when blown to bits by a bomb which he had been they are in the Army and spend all their time getting 4) learn and make changes according to the demands carrying. His roomate f' E" ...was taken to the same high instead of organizing. And of course the Army made by the working situation in Killeen and the Army. torture site; they wanted to know where his friend would rather court-martial a guy for dope than pol­ 5) view their work as long-range, and not look for had held his meetings. He was nude and was placed itics. regular victories. This is organizing, not activism and in "pau-de-arara" (tied hands and feet, arms around In an attempt to break down the barriers between takes patience. ' his knees in a sitting position, and then hung from the GIs and the civilians, we have learned that short 6) talk politics with guys in the Army and keep the ceiling by a pole passed under the knees - in this hair and a «straight appearance" have increased the studying and learning new ways to build a movement. , case he apparently was mishandled in a sitting po­ ability of the GIs to talk and relate to us on an equal If you feel that this is the kind of work you want sition on the floor); in this position, they forced basis. Our insistence on combatting the drug culture to do, please write us immediately, so that we can his chest so far back that it lacerated - the boy here does not mean that we feel that people in the begin discussions about joining the staff. Tell us about cried and screamed. After having been made to watch cities should have reached the same conclusions. yourself and what you have been doing, and we will this scene, "A" and" B" were again questioned about Rather, we are looking for people willing to change describe in greater detail the work that goes on in the the whereabouts of "C", They did not know. the surface of their life style to fit a small town and the Strut. Write to: OLEO STRUT, 101 Avenue D Then they were shown the canvas sack which Killeen, Texas 76541 contained the pieces of "D". One of the soldiers doing the beating jumped on top of the sack saying, "He ;doesn't deserve respect, communists ought to be treat­ 'ed like this. He opened the sack, and seeing that '" A" was the most impressionable, he left the boy's remains at her feet and threatened to cook a piece of his body and force her to eat it if she did not THE MOVEMENT 1s publlsbed ammtbly by THE MOVEMENT PRESS, 330 talk. Grove -street, san Francisco, California 94102--(415) 626-45'7'7 Seeing that with physical and psychological torture SUbscriptions -- $2.50 per year; $3.00 foreign (no Canadian posta.l money they were not getting any information, they tried order Please.) something else, they tortured one sister in front of the other. They put "B" in an electric chair, placed Joseph A. Blum and Arlene Elsen Bergman, EdItors her little fingers in electric sockets and began,to give her shcoks. "B" intuited that" A" was going to Staff:' L~coln Bergman, Renee Blum, Gary Grimshaw, Frank CleCiorka, cry and began to take the shocks passively, For­ Jerry Densch, ComalaDa smith, Terry Cannon. POW: Jeff segal tunately for them, the case of "E" was more serious, and it was decided to free them and to send for" E' s" ,Chleaco Staff: Room 204, 162 N. cUnton, Cblcaco, Wlnols 60606--(312) 32'7- girlfriend to be tortured in his presenCe. ThUS, without 3681~ , having their presence, their declarations or protests registered, they left, their treatment having been interrupted. 'Los Angeles staff: Ken Cloke, Bob Niemann, Mike DaviS, Judy Davis. 165'7 Federal Avenue, Los Angeles, California 90025 -- (213) 478-9509 .

,Detroit Staff: NOC, Box 9571 North End Station, Detroit; Michigan 48202. THIS ISSUE IS DEDICATED TO THE SISTERS AND Bulk orders at special rates available at all offices. , BROTt-fERS WHO STRUGGLE'D IN CHICAGO TO BRING THE WAR HOME

JOHN SINCLAIR WRITES FROM PRISON

Dear Brothers and Sisters, through proper methods of thinking and 'you don't do anyone' any good except the because we don't accept their authority.

-~ My transfer to Marquette has been methods of work. As Che, Guevera said, State; , I never used to be "political" eIther, postponed at least a few weeks, but they "In Revolution one wins or dies" - Mao The time for shucking and jivJ.Dg is but the pigs still attacked, beat, ar­ are determined to send me there as soon won! So did Fidel. As we know, Fidel over. Those' people who care about their' rested and jailed me because I like to as they can. A plgfromtthe Corrections started with 83 men, lost all but 12, brothers and sisters in their hip com­ get high, go to dances, fuck and have a Dept. in Lansing came here to talk to and took those 12 men Into the moun­ munities are going to have to ,starf or­ good time. I was in the House of Cor~ me last Friday and told me how much I tains to get it together. 5 years later the ganizing and spreading the word, of rection In i966 for smoking dope before would like It up thereand that they COUld­ People's Liberation Army marched tri­ ARMED LOVE. Meaning, I love you I ever heard of Mao Tse-tung, but I, n't, possible send me into the general umphantly in Havana and set up the Peo­ all, but if you try to force me to live didn't know why the pigs hated me so.. prison population in Jackson because I pie's Revolutionary Government, proving under your fascist state I will blow Now I know that all of us had better would surely organize the prisoners to that If'can be done. your head off. find out. revolt against the prisonauthorities, and Here In Amerika the conditions are And the people who aren't ready for The White Panther Party will hold a they couldn't take a chance on that. So different but the need is the same- to this might as well get ready for the mass meeting for all interested young I'll be shipped UP to Marquette P rison In establish a people's party and a govern­ concentration camps, because I'll see people in the near future--I urge every­ the UpperPeninsula sometimenext month. ment of the people, by the people, and you there. The police are not playing one out there to attend this meeting and Then I'll be able to have my typewriter for the people. A lot of us have felt that ~""they are moving to seize control listen to what my brothers have to say. and get some work done. we can just "drop out" from the pig's of the, cities (check out Wayne County There should be a chapter in every school It's really important now that the society and • do our thing" within the Roman Gribbs running for Mayor of and town In Amerika; as Mao says, people out there start organizing to !decadent corpse' of Amerika, but let Detroit and Washtenau County Sherrif "It is up to us to educate the people". defend themselves against the approach­ me testify that it don't work. You can't ,Doug, .Harvey's total disregard for the I'll see you all soon. All Power to the 'ing' police state and to warn the broad «do your thing" in jail, and ifs impos­ legal' government of Ann Arbor), and People! n:asses of the people about the fascist sible to be "free" when the pig is the unholy alliance of J. Edgar Hoover, terror that is upon us. People are going beating and carrying away you brothers Nixon, Atty.General John N. Mitchell, STP (Serve the People) to have to start egllcating themselves and sisters. and new Supreme Court Judges, plus John Sinclair (P"olitical Prisoner) and their br-otbersand sisters sowe won't And "LOVE/PEACE" by itself ,either the CIA, is serious about getting rid be unprepared when the shit comes down. as a slogan or a lifestyle, won't do it of long-haired dope-smoking revolution­ (Two weeks after this letter was writ­ - Chairman Mao's • Red Book" (Quot. either because as Eldridge Cleaver put ary youth. ten, John Sinclair was moved to Mar­ ations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung) is It, you can be sitting up there tripping And they don't care if you are"polit­ quette Maximum Security Prison. His the best study gUide, as Mao has proved and the pig will come up and beat your ical" or not-- they know our way of life appeal to be let out on bail was denied that the people's liberation can be won head in and carryyou offto prison, where is a definite threat to their control just ,by the Michigan Supreme Court.

PAGE 2 MOVEMENT NOVEMBER 1969 <1> ­<1> I-< 1Il ~ Z ~ v:l >. ,Q :go Po<

THE RULING CLASS.. STILL HAS ITS ASS

is the renewal of the Japanese":US security Treaty nations", "influence of anti-trust legislation on A thousand people are gathered in Washing­ which comes up for ratification in 1970. The treaty international trade and investments" ,and"developing ton Square in San Francisco. Forty to fifty is central to continued US domination (economic, feasible alternatives to free coIlective bargaininl!' SF tac squad members stand across the street military, and political) in Asia. Through the treaty, and strikes·. Their discussions indicated that Japan grants the US "the use by its land, air, and the only way to close the worlds "income gap" in full riot gear. More mounted tac squad are naval forces of facilities in Japan". If the treaty was through private enterprise - private profit. poorly hidden on side streets. The demon­ is renewed it wiIl insure the US continued main­ They were most interested in creating a man­ strators began moving up Columbus Street to tenance of its 100 military facilities in Japan, its agerial class, the problems of economic nationalism, command headquarters, transport depot for troops, the disaffection of the young and the propagation of march on the Fairmont Hotel-meeting place storage of weapons (including CBW and nuclear), the sociaIly-consciousrhetoric of neo-imperialism. for the International Ruling. Class-but we supply depots for Viet Nam and bases for its twice HoIland's Dick Stikker, Secretary-General of NATO kept to the sidewalk, chanting and passing out daily B- 52 bombing missions to Vietnam flown from from 1961 to 1964 , urged against the "pessimis~ic leaflets to the curious bystanders. Okinawa. With its massive military presence, the fear of revolution - the fear I am so sure that each Japanese economy is virtuaIly dependent on the US of us in this haIl experiences every day when he The motive force behind ourorganizingwas that. military spending as a key factor in the economy. opens his newspaper and reads about...open resist­ the International Ruling Class had no right to meet The Asian-American Political Alliance, the Red ance to every form of establishment." here or anywhere else. We did massive education Guard of Chinatown, and SDS staged a demonstra­ around who these imperialists are and what op­ tion at the docking of the destroyer"Amatsukaza" BROWN WALKOUT pression they're responsible for, both at home and on September 5. The action was a good build-up abroad. We pushed for people to join us to "kick for the IIC the following week and focused attention Months ago, Latinos got together in Denver the ass of the ruling class" and stop their "festival on th e American-Japanese Security pact. Some and planned a high school walk-out for Sept.16th of thieves" . Japanese tycoons on their way to the IIC were to be coordinated throughout the Southwest around After five weeks of organizingfor the International on board the ship. They were met by 75 people the demands of bi-lingual education and self-de­ Industrial Conference, only 600 of the expected and the SF Mime Troupe all with flags , picket termination for brown people. SDS worked with Los 3000 or 4000 showed up. One local underground signs, and the Japanese National Anthem. Siete de La Raza urging white students to join paper caIled it a "farce staged by brontosaurs". The international impact ofthis demonstration was in solidarity with and support of Latino demands. On the basis of the turnout and the impotence important. Japanese students and workers are Safeway was a focus after students left school people felt in the face of the pigs on the first day planning to shut their country down to prevent because they are still selling grapes and because of of the week's actions, many people wrote the whole the ratification of the security pact. Ours was the heavy use of DDT and otherpesticides on thing off as a flop. This was wrong. The IIC actions greeted as the first action taken by the movement produce which is .menacing' the lives and health accomplished several positive things and also forced . in the US in direct solidarity with the movement of farm workers and consumers. us to analyze our mistakes in a way that should " in Japan. The demonstration was carried in the The IIC and Latino walkout had originally. been be useful in the future. media throughout Japan and the Zengukaren looks planned separately but when it was discovered that forward to co-ordinated actions and alliance -in­ the times planned for the actions were the same JAPAN WEEK- struggle against the ratification of the 1970 security' and that Ernest Arbuckle, president of the board of pact. Safeway Stores, Inc., was on the policy board of the The IIC was officiaIly scheduled as part of IIC, plans were <:oordinated. Actions led by brown a two-week trade and culture fair known as Japan I.I.C. people with White' participation went on throughout Week. Behind a facade of friendship, the Japanese the region. Richmond had a successful walkout culture was used as a rip-off to seIl products and The IIC was scheduled during the latter halfof the (see article in -this issue) The majority ofthe Third cover up the real economic motives behind the festive Trade Fair to enable Japanese businessmen to World students walked out of Mission High in SF. occasion. The trade fair was planned and pUIled off attend both. Seven hundred top level business leaders to picket 4 Safeways in the Mission district. San by American businessmen with participation of a from over 60 countries gathered at the fourth Leandro-Hayward saw over 1000 students walk out in few big Japanese businessment with American in­ quadrannual meeting. The meetingwas co-sponsored support of the demands. Threatened by a walkout vestments. Japanese-Americans were excluded from by the Stanford Research Institute, a major govern­ th e San Jose city council planned a 5 hour raIly in the the planning committees and played no part in ment contractor specializing in military and coun­ the city stadium marking the Mexican Independence the Trade week. . t.er-insurgency research, and the National Industrial day. Eight to ten thousand students attended the While $1.4 million dollars was being spent on Conference Board, a private organization dedicated to raIly. As there was not originaIly a lot of impetus this trade and tourist promotion, Japanese and Chi­ the glorification of "private enterprise". for a walkout, the power structure unwittingly aided nese Americans worked in the sweatshops of China­ The policy board included 28 of the heaviest ruling in the spreading of Brown consciousness.' The town for less than a doIlar an hour. Nothing was class businessmen representing such corporations actions were successful and laid the foundation for ever said about the detention of Japanese during as Chase Manhattan Bank, Royal Dutch Shell, US co-ordination and support of Los Siete de la Raza. World War II nor about the recent destruction of Steel, AT&T, Standard Oil, Bank of California, Union Japanese homes and businesses to build the new Carbide, IBM and Safeway Stores. 2/3 of those at­ Japanese Trade and Cultural Center in San Fran­ tending were from other capitalist countries or from ORGANIZING FOCUS cisco. neo-colonies. David RockefeIler, Rodger Blough, Ernest Arbuckle and Edgar Kaiser et.aI. met to We directed the main thrust of our organizing But why all the- fuss over Japan? The Japanese discuss problems and techniques of expanding the efforts towards recruiting working class people, ex­ and US economies are interlocked to the extent that multi-national corporate control over the resources, peciaIly youth, to participate in the IIC demonstra­ one cahnot make advances without the other. Japan markets and peorles of both the Third World and the tions. SDS worked with the newly formed high school is the second largest market after Canada for industrialized countries. Students Union for both the IIC and the Latino walkout. US goods, the largest US market for agricultural The opening of school was only a few days before the goods and an important target for US investments. Although the conference's theme was "Closing the IIC, so studentorganizing was limited. High schools This doesn't include the essential indirect US trade World's Income Gap", the businessmen jabbered in and junior colleges were the targets of intensive of imports of raw materials to Japan from Asia the jargon of "cost structures, profit centers, and leafletting at registration and the beginning of and Latin American companies owned by the US. Like­ management of change". All of the world's prob­ classes. We worked with youth on the streets, on wise, the US is the largest importer of Japanese lems were seen as technical rath:!~ than political. local"strips" as well as the more well-known areas goods accounting for 30% of Japanese exports. Topics of discussi00nt out to participants be­ of Haight Street and Telegraph Ave. But even immediately more important than ex­ fore the conferen;.;.e included such gems as "re­ panding trade with Japan and the development of moving impediments to private foreign investment", CONTINUED ON P. 18 San Francisco as the "WaIl Street of the West" "modern day "Capitalism'S role in the developing NOVEMBER 1969 / MOVEMENT--- 'PAGE 3 UNION OF REVOLUTIONARY WOMEN by Mary Lou Greenberg "The thesis must clearly point out that real freedom for women is possible only through communism. The inseparable connection between the social and human position of the woman, and private property in the means of production, must be strongly brought out. That will draw a clear and ineradicable line of distinction between our policy and femin­ ism. And it will also supply the basis for regarding the woman question as a part of the social question, of the workers' problem, and so bind it firmly to the proletarian class struggle and the revolution." -Lenin, in a conversation with Clara Zetkin, 1920. "Women have been put down long 'enough. We're tired of getting the lowest wages and the crummiest work; of being used as strike-breakers, as a cheap supply of labor, and as unpaid servants in the home. We're tired of working for other people who just get richer while we get poorer. We want a society where workers work for themselves, not bosses; wh"ere women and men, black, brown, yellow, and red, are treated equally on the job, in the community, in the home, and in the schools; where jobs are available for all and each person is guaranteed food, clothing, shelter, health care, child care, and a good standard of living. We believe that only when workers instead of bigshot bosses run society and the govern­ ment will women as well as men be free. We know that women cannot be fully free until ALL working people are free, but we must unite now and begin to fight for our freedom." -Opening statement of the Liberation Women's Union Program. PHOlb/BARBARA ROTIlKRUG

The statement above represents the initial attempt replaced by a program which guarantees ~'ii adequate and poor women. 'of a group of Bay Areawomen to make the connections income for everyone".We must stop the taxingofpoor At the same time this summer, women whose partic­ ,that Lenin saw necessary, between the exploitation and and working women and men and' make the big pation in the small WL groups had been limited oppression of women and the exploitation and op­ corporations pay instead. ' ,or non:existent, but who were deeply concerned with pression of all working people. the position of women as part of their commit­ This connection has, of course, beeR made before: PERSONAL TO POLITICAL ment to building a revolutionary movement among the by some women's liberation groups who use it to workers and youth in this country, were beginning to show why organizing women around the issues of The first thing we did upon coming together this feel the need, in Lenin's words, for an "appropriate women's liberation is inherently "revolutionary", sum mer was work out this program and demands. body" to concentrate on the conditions and needs of and by radical and left groups which are now tacking Some of us had participated in and were still in­ wome~ " " on "women's issues" to their platforms, but basically volved with small groups Hn the existing women' p Through' a common need to create such an organ­ forgetting about them after that. liberation movement. We had gained an understanding ization which would concentrate on organizing non­ The Liberation Women's Union is attempting to do of the social--rather than individual--causes offemale professional workin g women, wives of working men, something which neither of these approaches has so oppression and,exploitation throughparticipatingin one and, women on welfare, we began meeting together. far done. That is, to organize women on the basis or another of the small women's groups, the most Unlike some' groups which initially form around a of their real needs as women and, through a working common organizational form of the WL movement so general idea and then after a period of time evolve class-oriented program and series of demands, to, far. a programmatic approach to organizing, We felt the relate each issue and specific struggle to the overall We recognized that some middle-class women may necessity to begin work immediately on a program class struggle. ' indeed be made aware of the inherently exploitative and demands around which we could unite women and Lenin recognized the need for"appropriate bodies" and oppressive nature of U.S. monopoly capitalism from which an organization might grow. to carryon work among women, "special methods through first becoming aware of and understanding Most ,of us already were members of specific of agitation and forms of organization". "That is not their own person oppression as women. We had also' organizations and/or collectives, for instance the feminism, that is practical, revolutionary expediency.. seenthatthis was not inevitable. Those middle-class Bay Area Revolutionary Union; SDS; a collective in That is why it is right for us to put forward demands women- who DID make the connection, whose con­ Hayward doing working class organizing; women's favorable to women•. practical conclusions which we sciousnesses supposedly had been raised from an liberation groups which had begun to seriously talk have drawn from the burning needs, the shameful individual to a social level of understanding, were about organizing working women; San Francisco humiliation of women in bourgeois society, defenseless by and large unable to fight their oppression except Newsreel, etc. ' and without rights." on a purely personal level--1.e., moving into a We all had at least an elementary understanding commune, divorcing their husbands, taking off their of Marxism, and were united on the necessity of TEN DEMANDS bras, uncurling their hair, etc. socialist revolution led by the working class. In a In fact when some of these women began to seek series of meetings we worked out' an initial program Briefly, the demands of the LWU are: ways of acting outside the small group- - for instance and series of demands which were discussed by the protesting job discrimination, or participating in an whole group, re-drafted, and discussed again. At­ 1) EQUAL WORK AT EQUAL PAY, inclUding no racial anti-war protest--they were sometimes discouraged tendence kept increasing, and at each meeting new or sexual discrimination in hiring, promotion, or pay and warned against being co-opted by the male left. women came. At this point no publicity has been given scales. I n some parts of the WL movement, those who sug­ to the group except through word of mouth. It was 2) FREE, 24-HOUR, CHILD CARE CENTERS FOR ALL gested such action were suspected of being agents obvious, though, that a number of women weremov­ CHILDREN.! ' for male-dominated groups. . ing in the same direction and felt a need to share ~) :, I SHARING HOUSEHOLD WORK. "Household work In addition, we .were quite aWare that any move­ experiences and work together in a disciplined, is not just "women's work". It should be shared by ment which purports to seek liberation for a con­ directed way around women's issues. all family members." siderable segment of society, in this case ·half the 4) FREE, EQUAL AND REAL EDUCATION, including population, must address itself to the needs of the COLLECTIVES OF WOMEN no more "tracking" by sex, race or economic class. poorest sectors of that group if it is to succeed in "We demand that schools teach about the role women its intent. Radical historian William L. O'Neill had After the first version of the program had been have played in history; we demand that they, tell pointed out, in an article in Dissent entitled, "Fem­ finalized (on the basis of our experience with it, about the struggles of American working people and inism as a Radical Ideology,'" that the early feminists it may go' through several more versions), we began about the struggles of poor and oppressed people "invariably refused to admit that differences in station discussing organizational questions. There are seven everywhere." among women were of any importance;"Equal rights basic geographical areas around the Bay represented. 5) FREE, COMPLETE HEALTH CARE, including for women did not mean the same thing to a factory Between 50 and 75 women attended at least one of free birth control information to all who wish it; safe girl that it meant to a college graduate" . the program-discussing meetings, and all geograph­ free abortions to women who want them; no forced Despite the fact that this article was widely cir­ ical areas have been represented at all meetings. sterilization of anyone. culated in at least several small WL groups and that The group is predominantly white, although a 6) CONTROL OVER PERSONAL' RELATIONSHIPS, many women realized that our' experiences with Chicano woman active in the brown movement has including equal rights for all women and men, married and understanding of the needs of working and lower participated from the beginning, and an early meeting or unmarried, and for all children born in or out of class women were, at best, limited, there was was held with two Black Panther women. Most of marriage. little, if any, attempt made to find out what we did us in LWU come from middle class and student 7) AN END TO BRAINWASHING. "We demand an nbt know and to make the WL movement serve all backgrounds; most are now working in non-pro­ end to the degrading image of women on TV, in the women instead of just a privileged few. (The several fessional type jobs - in factories, clerical work, movies, in books and in advertising. We will not forces and splits within the general WL movement are communications,etc. - or will be working in the be brainwashed any longer into buying things that just well defined in the McAfee- Wood article, "Bread near future; others are doing work in their com­ make big businessment richer." and Roses" , in the June 1969 LEVIATHAN). munities or on state college or junior college cam- 8) SELF-DETERMINATION FOR NATIONAL MIN­ . 'The org:iIlizational 'structure is complicated: in ORITY AND THIRD WORLD PEOPLES. 'AN APPROPRIATE BODY a couple of these areas there are several separate 9) AN END TO U.S .. IMPERIALIST WARS OF AG­ but close-working groups participating, plus several GRESSION. It was therefore clear that within the existing "independent" women. A steering committee has been 10) CONTROL OVER SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS, in­ dlfuse WL movement an aiternative was needed for set up, composed of representatives from each cluding ·We demand that the courts, police and other middle-class women who'wanted to activelyfight for geographical area, which will assist communications social institutions such as national, state, and local women's liberation as a part of the overall revolu­ between groups, schedule plenary meeting, and discuss government stop oppressing the people. The present tionary movement, as well to make the ideas of wo­ in detail the proposed structure, aims and activities inadequate and degrading system of welfare must be men's liberation work in the interests of working of the LWU. PAGE 4 MOVEMENT NOVEMBER 1969 At this early stage, the organization exists pri­ and specific demands is extremely limited at present. entire body. In addition, we expect members to marily to exchange information between groups and Our work so far has shown that it is a very useful combat male supremacy and male chauvinism in individuals already engaged in organizing women' tool for making contacts with other women who are all aspects of personal behavior and political work. Our eventual goal is to assist in creating a revo­ already organized and who are likewise looking for For instance, we must not hesitate to assume pos­ lutionary mass organization of women with a working women with whom to unite. We are currently ex­ itions of leadership or voice our opinions in any class perspective which will at the appropriate time perimenting with ways of utilizing the program and our other, mixed (male and female) collectives and join with similar organizations to forge a reVOlutionary efforts will vary from area to area at present. A organizations we are 'in. We must be on our guard party in this country. condensed form of the program, similar to the against conciously or unconsciously responding in To move toward this goal, we must form collec­ one included earlier in' the article with a list of bourgeois, "feminine" ways to male actions or state­ tives of women, organized around a revolutionarypro­ contact phone numbers, will be printed on the backs ments We must combat the ideas of male chauvinism gram and series of demands. At the present time, of leaflets issued for specific actions of general in ourselves as well as in males, and we must dress separate LWU collectives are not meeting in all propaganda purposes. For instance, the LWU will and act in ways that do not further our sexual ob­ areas due to different existing situations and needs. 'participate as a group in the Nov. 15 Get-Out-of­ jectification. We must actively raise the oppression and For instance, in one area there are several working Vietnam march in San Fr'ancisco and will distribute exploitation of women as it relates to capitalist class community groups and organizations already a LWU leaflet along the way. For the future, we are exploitation and oppression of all people, and we must existing. Women from these groups are represented 'anticipating simultaneous organizing around one key never separate the fight for women's liberation from on the LWU steering committee, participate in general . demand in each geographical area. the fight for the liberation of all people. LWU actions, and may use the program in their organ­ In addition to general organizing, we will par- izing work, but at this time do not plan to form a 'ticipate as individuals or as a group in specific ac­ CRACKING THE FOUNDATION separate LWU collective or chapter. In other areas, tions to support the struggles of other women--on separate LWU collectives are already forming. picket lines, in Welfare hearings, in demonstrations We have found already that the question of women's for support of political prisoners, etc. LWU women liberation can be one of the most difficult to raise ACTION·STUDY have walked the picket line with strikers and their in general political work. We have also found that wives in the current Pittsburge-Des Moines Steel once raised, it leads to increased political conscious­ Whatever organizational form finally evolves, the strike in San Jose and will support the strikers and ness of both men and women. The idea that wives success or failure of the LWU will depend on whether their wives in whatever way we can--from providing have a right to attend their husband's union meetings, or not it is able to organize actions around the demands babysitters to participating in demonstrations at the for instance, increases the political awareness of the and truly serve the people.,-in this case, working and plant. We plan to be able to mobilize large numbers women and makes them feel that they are a part of poor women. of women on short notice for supportive demonstra­ workers' struggles, too. It also helps expand the con­ In addition to exchanging information, the LWU will tions or other action whereever and whenever such cept of "worker", and puts union struggles into a focus on two areas: study and action. The steering support is need ed in the Bay Area. We also hope broader social context. committee has prepared a reading list and several it will be possible to form alliances with Black In the process of tearingdown--or at least cracking­ study plans for use as each area needs. Many of Panther and Chicano women for mutual support. the institutions of male supremacy (for instance, all­ the women are already involved in stUdy groups which male unions with their attendent ideas that union meet­ focus on the works of Marx, Lenin and Mao; for those CONSCIOUSNESS & KARATE ings are for men only; that women shouldn't be on who are not and for new members of the organiza­ the picket line; that women aren' t "workers"; that tion, special study groups will be set up. Along with Two other areas are also important in the devel­ unionizatiQn isn't necessary for women), the found­ basic revolutionary literature, we will study the opment of a strong, revolutionarywomen' s movement: ations for male chauvinism wUl also crumble. When history ofwomen' s and labor movements in this country each LWU member is expected to learn some form men see that women can be helpful on a picket line, andcurrent WL pUblications and literature. of self-defense (we are in the process of locating they wUl begin to change their ideas of women as ' In the area of action, we will conduct propaganda karate instructors); and each woman who is serious meek, docile, and servile creatures. Once released addressed to women on women's .issues and on anti­ about bUilding such a movement must take the ideas from the ideas of male chauvinism and the prac­ imperialist issues in general (for instance, the fall of women's liberation seriously in her own personal tices of male supremacy, men and women can unite anti-Vietnam War moratoriums and mobilizations); life, The LWU hopes to be a disciplined organiza­ to fight the common enemy. and plan actions around particular issues in each tion in expecting members to participate in study The Liberation Women's Union is actively seeking area and the LWU demands. and self-defense classes and be responsible to the the participation of, or alliances with, other women Our experiences with organizing around a program organization for carrying out decisions made by the who basically agree with ,our approach and program. We wUl also unite with other women on areas we can agree on, and we welcome comments and crit­ --1 icisms. For more information on the LWU and a , complete copy of the program and demands, write. JOlY 23ft! IJEFEIISE I Mary Lou Greenberg, c/o The Movement.

The July 23rd Defense Committee is desperately in need of funds. We organized to assist in the legal defense of the five Black people who were indicted in the Glenville Shoot-out in 1968, when three policemeD and one civilian were k1lled. The first person to be tried was Ahmed (Fred Evans) who was convicted and sentenced to die in the electric chaJ.r. Unfortunately, the Defense Committee did not get into fUll swing unW the time of Ahmed's conviction. Ahmed was defended by court-appointed attorneys stanley Toliver and Charles Fleming. Although the court normally pays about $3,500·. to EACH attorney for a, case such as this, these lawyer~ received that amount altogether. Mr. Toll1ver's share was immediately seized for income taxes. Mr. Fleming is facing possible charges because the Committee sent him $200 after he had applied for his state fee. Ahmed's case is being appealed. We urgently need money to be able to pay for this legal service. Non-Du (Lathan Donald) is presently on trial. He, too, has court-, appointed ." attorneys. These lawyers have been hostile to the Committee and went so far as ask the judge to make us leave the courtroom. It is obvious that the Committee is extremely liml.ted in the kind of defense for Non-Du due to the hostility and lack of cooperation from his attorneys. The most obvious fact is that the JULY 23rd DEFENSE COMMITTEE NEEDS MONEY TO PAY COMPETANT AND COOPERATIVE LAWYERS. The third defendant, Alfred Thomas, has been committed to Lima State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. The Committee does not have the money to provide competent and cooperative psychiatric help for him, that is, if he really needs it. Two more young mf:!n are awaiting trial. .It is not uncommon for Blacks and poor people to be left in jail and forgotten. Although the Committee has not been able to provide private legal counsel so far, th·-a Committee has been and continues to be most diligent in bringing public attention to the case of the Glenville Five. WHAT WE HAVE DONE

1) We challenged the Seminar on Violence in America at Case-Western Reserve University to take a position on Ahmed's case. OUr actions caused quite a stir on the campus. 2) We held People's Court so that the people could hear for themselves the facts of a drunken police orgy in Glenville on July 23, 1968, when people were shot, property stolen, and women molested by the Cleveland police. 3) As a result of the testimony heard at People's Court from eye witnesses, we tried to petition Country Prosecutor John T. Corrigan. He refused to see us and instead issued an injunction to keep us out of the county courthouse. When we appeared, unaware of the injunction, we were attac~ed by the police, beaten, sprayed with gas, and thrown into jail. Twenty-six members of the July 23rd Defense Committee and supporters were tried and convicted for contempt of court and given stiffer sentences and fines than is usually handed down «('ruel and unusual punishment). Our total bond is $40,000 and our sentences ranged from ten days to one year in prisonl 4) We appealed to Third World nations at the United Nations. W'= were suc­ cessful in having the family of,~r.Aklli Danielli, Ambassador from the Republic of Tanzania to the United Nations, come to Cleveland and visit with us and celebrate the first anniversary of the Glenville Shoot-out. other Third World nations have agreed to visit and identify with us. 5) Mr. James Form3,n, author of the Black Manifesto, came to Cleveland as guest of the July 23rd Defense Committee. He spoke at the First Baptist Church in Shaker Heights. He read the Manifesto to hundreds of p.-aople at Sunday ser­ vices and called for support of the July 23rd Defense Committee and the Glenville Five. 6) W'~ are an active part of Operation Black Unity. We have people on the picket lines in front of McDonald's hamburger restaurants every day.

THE JULY 23rd DEFENSE COMMITTEE IS O~ THE CASE. THE JULY 23rd DEFENSE COMMITTEE DESERVES YOUR FINANCIAL SUPPORT.

Please send contributions to July 23rd Defense Committee, P.O. Box 2404, East Cleveland, Ohio 44112

WUbur Grattan, National Chairman, Mae Mallory, Assistant Chairman Photo by SF Newsreel

NOVEMBER 1969 MOVEMENT PAGE 5 -1

muni black caucus right on time he's still basically in the same shape. Perhaps you can leadership refused to accept it, so the problem still The Black Caucus has organized bus drivers accumulate more material goods than another member exists and hasn't been dealt with. ~ the San Francisco Municipal Railway of the working class, but we say fuckthat, you're still being exploited, still being placed in expendable cat­ UNION iSSUES (MUNI). The Caucus was formed about six egories, like being sent to Vietnam, so we relate to months ago when a strike situation made the class struggle. MOVEMENT: What other issues have you raised since We understand that there's a particular problem the time? many workers dig the misleading role played when talking to people who are making $4.00 an hour, by the union leadership. This is an interview different than when talking to people who aren't making DUCHO: There's the question of by-laws. The local anything. When you're talking to a brother on the street ·leadership has quoted them in and out of context on with Wilbert Powe and Jose Wilson of the every issue that came up. Members of the black Central Committee of the Muni Black Caucus who don't have a job, then he's gonna tell you what he know, what he's doing, where he's been, how he caucus went to the union office, and requested our and with Ducho, the advisor to the Muni came to be where he is. The things that he'll tell copies of the bY-laws, which is the right of every union Black Caucus. you will point right back at the system. member. The president was out of town, so we talked It gets more difficult when you deal with people with the Secretary Treasurer. He saidwe couldn't have who have a high school diploma and even two or three a copy because they were all out, and some more were MOVEMENT: Why are you involved in organizing years of college, who have been pre-programmed into at the printers., On further questioning he didn't know transport workers? Do you see the transportation an acceptance of the American way of life. We have to the name of the printer, when the by-laws had been industry as strategic? deal with people according to their background and sent. He said only the President had this information. where they come from...learn whether they come from We knew the Secretary Treasurer, who signs all the JOSE: We didn't pick the transportation industry to a petty bourgeois background or whether they've always vouchers, all the papers would have this information, organize. As workers in the transportation industry, been the brothers on the block. To begin with, when so we knew he was lying. We put out a flyer to this we decided to organize where we were. There's we talk to people individually, then we have to learn effect telling what had happened. And found out no one only one difference between a worker in a General how they relate to the the, black liberation struggle, had ever had any by-laws. Motors plant and one in transport, the type of work and how they relate to whether or not there should They came up with a copy of some Old proposed they do. We're all workers. We 'aren't concerned be changes at Muni. But without being mechanical, by-laws, but they'd never been approved by either the about this being a stretegic stronghold, as far as we have to relate to them in accordance to their class International or the membership like they're supposed shutting the city down. We were concerned about background and class conciousness. to be. Nothing had been done. the fact that, as workers, we saw that we were being Because of the questons that W(~ raised. and the exploited and we wanted to put an end to this exploit­ MOVEMENT: How did the Black Caucus develop? questions raised by many drivers, the union was forced ation. into coming 'up with by-laws. And before they could JOSE: The black caucus was' fomed by black bus­ do this, at a union meeting th~ acting President had to MOVEMENT:. What's the. work like, what :l;re ,the drivers who were fed up with the way the union wasn't state clearly that there were no by-laws. At the next people like, what kinds of things do you have to take representing them. A strike was called for the purpose union meeting, a month later, by-laws suddenlyap­ account of in your organizing strategy? of the 1800 platform employees going out in support peared. They came out of the sky. They had never of some benefits for 150 miscellaneous employees been before the membership for approval. The, situation WILBERT: Up until last year, the turnover of people who are also in the union. That was about six months was clear, and so this was one areawhere we raised leaving the job on the Muni railway was well over ago. the awareness ofour fellow union members, where they 50 percent. This is because ofthewayMuni is run, and because the union does not meet the needs and desires SOLIDARITY VS. RACISM of the workers there. We just got some new buses here in San Francisco. A few. They say its because DUCHO: When we started there was a lack of interest the public didn't vote to get new busses. They turned on some workers' part as to what we were doing and it down twice. We understand why people would vote quite a lot of confusion among older workers who against any goddamn thing that Muni wanted because were upset that a caucus was being formed on Mun­ of the way that Muni is run. We' reworking with sched­ icipal Railway property. They couldn't see the signif­ ules that are outdated, with equipment that's obsolete. icance of a caucus when they felt that the union was People don't get the service that they should. So working in.. the best interest of all the workers. This naturally when a proposltion comes up on the ballot confusion came particularly from some older. black that Muni should get new busses, people just turn their workers who had struggled in the union for a long time back on it. in an effort to 'gain some leadership positions in the Muni Railway is dictatorial, not only to theworkers, union. There's a black local union President now. He but to the people ofsan Francisco. We have to deal with campaigned on the populanty' of the black 'POWer the membership of our local, 250A, andwehave to, as movement, and was elected by the majority of black revolutionaries, fight on all fronts, to meet the needs workers on the property, there being about 60 to 65 of the public. The riding public sees the driver as percent black busdriverso another part of the bus, not as another working person. This president is an opportunist, and he has not Also, the bus drivers are politically immature, they performed adequately for the president of a union of have nothing to tell the peopl.e about what the drivers such size. But when the black caucus started, there are ,doin~ because the union isn't working in their was a feeling that we were racists, that we were trying interests or the interests of the people. to form a new union, that we were trying to disrupt and divide the union, which is not so at all. So we had began to ask the questions, and began to learn that MOVEMENT: Muni's a non-profit corporation? to educate the other workers as to the purpose and there are certain things that they are entitled to, and function of the caucus, and why there was a need for things that the union leadership is doing in their name JOSE: Supposedly. Run by the city. The citizens of ~ne;, ; that are lies. San Francisco pay for the Muni Railway, so anytime anything comes up about the Muni, it is important WILBERT:There was opposition to the name Black WILBERT: We also worked on the rules that apply to the people. But it hasn't met the needs of the Caucus. We ran a leaflet on that, how we understand to probationary employees. They're rigid. For exam­ people. ' that in a racist system people are easily racist ple, if you're sick and you're a probationary employee oriented and about how if they judged our practice you can only be off 14 days. More than that and you're WILBERT: As far as the Muni Railway being profit they'd find that racism wasn't a factor in the black terminated. Nobody can determine when their body's or non-profit, if they're working with the city, the caucus. There is no antagonistic racism between black going to heal Some members of Local 250A were goddamned city is profitable, the government is a and white drivers. But the leadership that came in , dismissed for this and the Black Caucus took the case, profitable organization. Non-profit ain't nothin under the legend of black power in 1967 perpetuated went all the way to the Civil Service Commission, and but a myth. We know where Muni gets its orders the same program as the white leadership. That's got the jobs blick. from, the city has been brought to a point by pig why the union leadership attacks us. Alioto where fascism is rampant. RAISING CONSCIOUSNESS We have to work with bus drivers who are making JOSE: Not long after we started we worked on acase 4 dollars and 15 cents an hour. Some of them think, where a cable car driver was forced to come back to MOVEMENT: You've also started a newspaper>? we're getting more money. In fact they get less. Think work with his foot wrapped up, using a cane. We took about the surtax that's been extended since the Nixon the case to his union representative and pushed it. We administration has been in power. As workers get pay also wrote it up. He was a white worker. We needed DUCHO: Right. A lot of the information we have increases, they have more taxes to pay. something like that to break down the thought of racism, gathered we were unable to disseminate at the union because of the name of the organization. hall because of rules that the leadership brought up CLASS STRUGGLE to limit us in the amount of time we can speak. We WILBERT: The Central Com mittee of the Black Caucus had. to put out a newspaper. We put it out with informa­ MOVEMENT: is there a problem, with the workers is black. Understand something: the caucus was formed tion coming from the workers, from other drivers, making $4.15 an hour raising the level of conciousness by black bus drivers but its on the same lines as any questions that they ask, questions they're not getting and struggle? Some people would say they're too hooked revolutionary organization that wants solidarity. The any answers to, situa:tions that exist in various div­ into the system to become revolutionary? Central Committee is black, but anybody can join. We isions of the Muni. Also things that go down at the have white members. union meeting, because some drivers work nights and WILBERT: We relate to class struggle, and whether are unable to attend, and they have no other way of a proletarian is making $4.15 an hour or $ 2.00 an hour, DUCHO: We came into being when the union was trying knOWing what's going on in the union, The leadership to put forth a strike position for the total membership doesn't even put out a paper. The last issue we put out involving these 150 miscellaneous employees. There's was the fourth, and before that we put out some fliers. a dual nature to the question of the miscellaneous employees. They're in the union partly for their own MOVEMENT: What's the response to the paper been? advantage on the one hand, and on the other keeping them in the union increases membership and gives the DUCHO: Very favorable from the workers. We're local leadership some prestige. The miscellaneous putting out information they have sought, and there was employees are supervisory personnel. A lot of the no source before. We're now better able to see what the grievances between management and platform employ­ workers want, because when they read the paper they ees stem from these supervisorypersonnel, such as have com ments, questions, criticism. We can then know inspectors and dispatchers. Now how in the hell can how to improve, we can learn about specific incidents, the union operate in the best interest of both the check them out, and report on them to the drivers. platform employees and the miscellaneous employees. Because of the paper, more drivers are beginning to It's a divided house. The supervisory personnel really understand the purpose and needs ofthe caucus. We've could care Jess, because they have management to de­ also had two rallies for the purpose of informing the fend them and don' t need the union for that. We say drivers why there's a black caucus. the union is using these miscellaneous employees, while inadequately representing the platform employ­ MOVEMENT: In specific union work, how do you relate ees. We've raised this with the union, asked them to grievances about unsafe busses, or privileges for mis­ take it to the International Convention. The local cellaneous employees, to the black liberation struggle? NOVEMBER 1969 PAGE 6 MOVEMENT - JOSE: Before the drivers can relate to black liberation, being workers and being programmed to take the money they make and go out and buy the commodities other workers produce, we have to show them that the conditions under which they work are exploitative conditions. When we've raised the awareness of explotiation, we can also extend that to show where the community unrest comes from. It comes from the system. The union leadership of all international unions works hand in hand with ·the bosses. And the bosses, in turn, control the'governllient. We have to show them that the union is not working in their interests because the past history of the union shows they have not lived up to the constitutions and promises they laid down for rank and file workers. We have to show how the leadership of the unions has never had the interests of the workers in mind, and have always related to the workers as expendable when it comes to the bosses, because they were getting theirs offthe top.

WILBERT: We have to get people to relate to change, and for us, change means revolution. It's the same process of education that goes down on the job as goes down in the community. When people understand what they are being SUbjected to in their own com­ munities, then surely they'll understand what hhey're being subjected to on the job. As revolutionaries it is our duty to raise these questions. It's the same struggle going on at Muni as in the community. The people in the society who have money are the same people who become International presidents, and the people in the community who have inadequate living conditions are the people who become platform em­ ployees. We want to raise the level of awareness on the job so that drivers can go into the community and deal with it.

MOVEMENT: What's your organization strategy? Do you want to take over the leadership of the local, "d ::r or agitate, or what? o 8' C' WILBERT; No, we're riot agitators, we're revolution­ '< aries. We relate to raising the political consciousness ~rst ~ of the workers there, mainly at in terms of (') ::r conditions on the job. Why don't you have all new o busses, instead of a few? Why are we still using schedules that are ten years old when we know that in the past ten years this city has changed tre­ mendously as far as transportation goes. We have to understand first that we have to have a strong base locally, to move from. When we raise the level of consciousness of the membership to the point where they can put forth a strong localleadership, then what­ ever comes down from the International)hat local lead­ ership will be able to combat.

BLACK CAUCUS PROGRAM

I MOVEMENT: The Black Caucus has a 7 point program: JOSE and WILBERT (1. to r.) What is it? support him if he will work in the interest of the California. Other than that we' have no bonafide WILBERT: The first point is that the Black Caucus. workers. coalitions at this time. We are working with people will attack all forms of discrimination and racism in several different locals, and we are constantly among workers. Immediately upon any of this shiti MOVEMENT: Does the Caucus itself run candidates? making contact with people who are having problems being perpetrated by the International, the local lead­ within their local unions and are trying to come up with ership, or th~ boss, we'll be there to fight it and WILBERT: Should members and central committee strategy and tactics to handle the problems. explain how racism goes against the interests of the people run for office? Membersaskuswhywe haven't, In New York City there's a revolutionaryelementin workers. when we've raised so many questions about how fucked the Transit workers union who are trying to start an The second point is that the Black Caucus is against up things are. We say that our main purpose is to independant union because of the shit that's coming the individual acceptance of special privileges and raise the consciousness ofthe workers, and then they'll down between the TWV and the Transit Authority. We favoritism. We understand how Toms and lackeys are vote for men among themselves who are not oppor­ keep in touch with them, although at this time we developed, by getting special privileges. By getting jobs tnists, and who understand the necessity for strong don't intend to split the union out here or start an that have less work to them. And people get these pos­ unions. If the membership wanted us to represent independent union...but, we're revolutionaries and itions because of their loyalty to the policies of the them, and a partiCUlar situation arose where we felt we'll do what's necessary. union leadership. With the union leadership working this would serve their needs then we wouia. 'fhe only for its own and the bosses advantage, they need whole union leadership is up for election in May and PANTHER TIES some workers within the workers to perpetuate their this is what the cuacus is about right now, raising the position. We haveworkers in Local 250Awhoare Toms political consciousness of the members so that when and lackeys. When the black caucus runs down a people come campaigning for different positions, they progressive line or expose something, these work@Ts will be able to judgewhether they'll serve them or not. MOVEMENT: What's the relationship to the Black run some madness to confuse the membership. And they Panther Party? get paid for this. We're against special privileges. JOSE: One way we can do that is specify exactly Period. what our black president now is doing that's not in WILBl:;RT, Imyself am a member ofthe Black Panther the workers' interests, That way they'll understand Party, an d these other brothers here on the Central JOSE: To add to that. The special privileges don't come clearly that when he says, "I'm doing this for you", Committee are very dedicated brothers and practice down so much from the union leadership, but from the he's not. the Party ideology, the ten point platform and program bosses. The bosses set up theseso-calledspecial duty of the Party. That's what our relationship is with jobs. Its a special privilege to be in the dispatchers DVCHO: The fifth point of the program is that we the Party, we feel we are one, and if that shakes office, you do less work and make the same money as reject all rumors or hearsay that are not given the anybody, well right on. Our objective is to show platform employees. These jobs am given to people who official word of the Caucus. We had to make this point people by practice what our politics are, and they are adhere to policies set down by the management and because of all the rumors being spread about us and the politics of the rank and file exercising their right these policies are endorsed by the union by the mere what we stood for among the drivers. That's another to change the system, the politics of revolution in this fact that the union does not attack this practice. We reason why we came out with the paper. country, and the politics of oppressed people all over say; if there's an opening for a dispatcher then there the world gaining liberation from this imperialist pig should be examinations given for dispatcher. We say JOSE; The sixth point is that the caucus does not that we here in Babylon are strategically close to. open up the ranks. Not using a position to play on recognize the union as being above contructive crit­ favoritism and cause dissension among the workers. icism. Criticism is to be administered in an educational MOVEMENT: What kind of repression has the caucus The bosses play that game: divide and conquer. manner, not to destroy, but to build and strengthen.' faced? Through criticism we expose the union leadership and WILBERT; The third point of the program is the educate. WILBERT; We started in March. In April they Black Caucus will actively support all unions working The seventh point is that it is not the intention of started their repression. George Brady, then the in the best interest of the workers. We don't support a the Black Caucus to disrupt the workings of the chairman of the cuacus, was terminated, under the union that turns its back on its membership, just grievance procedures, which this union with honor has wrong rule. They tried to get rid of him on the because the membership is politically ignorant. If achieved in the past. Every grievance that comes forth grounds he had been absent more times than he was the leadership of a union sees the membership is from the membership to the extent that the union has allowed in six months. We picked this shit uP, took ignorant politically, and it is educating the mem­ dealt with it and the members were satisfied, we say it up to the Civil Service Commission, and showed bership, and struggling together with it, we support it. right on to that. The objective of the Black Caucus is he was terminated for his political beliefs. They had to unite the workers for the purpose of bringing to give his job back. At union meetings they tried to MOVEMENT: Have you supported any unions in this about positive and concrete changes in the laws, rules shut us up, and refused to recognize us on the floor. 'area? conditions, and thier application. When laws, rules and policies do not serve the workers, we altack them. JOSE; One time Lennard Airriess, the International JOSE-: Notany specific union. There have been worirers Representative, called up the police and told them from many local unions that we have stood in sol- MOVEMENT: Are there black caucuses in other there were two Black Panthers in the office, when idarity with. I transport unions? What about link ups with other black The fourth point of the program is that the Caucus caucuses? will support or select members seeking political of- CONTINUED ON P. 19 fice in the union after we've run a background survey WILBERT: Right now we have a working coalitionwith of his history, union activities, sincerity. then wewill the Black Panther Caucus of the V.A W. in Fremont. NOVEMBER 1969 ; MOVEMENT--"l'AGE7 YBUN6 ~ElRB5 MEiVE IN NEW lEiRK

EDITOR'S NOTE: The Young Lords Organization is spreading. It was saying things like that Lords burn down ees, construction and heath code en­ first established in Chicago (see May, June and July 1969 issues of the schools, and the Lords are a gang. The forcement. hospital thing is coming along pretty 10) Any community, union, or workers MOVEMENT). Now the YLO is building in New York City, where over a well. organization must support all the points million Puerto Ricans live. of this program an d work and fight for HOSPITAL CONTROL that or be shown as what they are­ The following is an interview with Yoruba, Minister of Information enemies of the poor people of East from New York. Parts of the interview were originally in LNS; other (Ten Point Health Program of the Young Harlem. parts are special to the MOVEMENT' Lords Organization) I) We want total self-determination of all The other thing is schools, we've been MOVEMENT: What is the history of the hitting on is the poverty pimps in the health services in East Harlem (El doing alot of college and high school Lords in New York':? community. See, if we take the position Barrio) through an incorporated Com­ organizing. The high schools have been that the Barrio and the ghetto is a colony, munity-Staff Governing Board for Met­ going pretty well, what we've been trying YORUBA: We've been working under­ then these anti-poverty agencies and pov­ ropolitan Hospital. (Staff is anyone and to push is a Third World Students ground in New York since January and erty pimps are outposts, like Fort Savage everyone working at Metropolitan). Party. The big organizingproblems have we surfaced around July. The first issue or Fort Courage in the West when the In­ 2) We want immediate replacement of been the technical schools, the voca­ we picked on was garbage in the streets. dians were trying to take care of some all Lindsay administrators by com munity tional schools. They keep the students Since it was the most visible, it was the business; they're the man's eyes and ears and staff appointed people whose practice isolated so they don't even know what's easiest to organize around. What we did in the colony. When we brought the march has demonstrated their commitment to happening .outside the school. They live was take the garbage and throw up bar­ uptown, these jive pigs cut out. They said serve our poor community. in the community and that'swhere we can ricades in the street using the garbage, this is an East Harlem demonstration, but 3) We demand immediate end to con­ get to them, but a vocational school which served a dual purpose: one, it ef­ that's jive, it was a welfare' demon­ struction of the new emergency room is a penitentiaryworse than other schools fectively symbolized that the Barrio is stration. So the people saw where that until the Metropolitan Hospital Com­ The object of the school is to make you a colony, and we were able to barricade was at. And it's hard for the poverty munity-Staff Governing Board inspects obsolete before you get out, sotheytrain off parts of the colony. And the second pimps to show their faces in the com­ and approves them or authorizes new you for a job, by the time you get out thing was the whole garbage issue, dirty munity now. What thy're trying to do how plans. . it's mechanized. It kills off our people, streets, and it breeds rats. It picked up is buy us out, we've gotten strange 4) We i/ant employment for our people. and that's the killd of institution that keeps very little attention the first couple of offers from people who want to pick up All jobs filled in El Barrio must be filled the ghetto a ghetto. One of the things weeks, but then it kept on just snow­ our rent, and Lindsay's aides coming by residents first,usingon-the-jobtrain­ we're pushing is how the government, balling. We WOUld. have fifteen Lords around wanting to set up interviewswith. ing and other educational opportunities the pigs, keep the ghetto a ghetto. in the beginning doing it and about three Lindsay and the Young Lords. Lindsay as bases for service and promotion. hundred street people coming in, and 'it was supposed to make three appear­ 5) We want free pUblicly supported health FILMS TO POLITICS blows the pigs' minds. If you're good you ances in East Harlem because tbis is an care for. treatment and prevention. WE can do your thing and then melt into election year, but the work has gotten WANT AN END TO ALL FEES, MOVEMENT: What kind of day to day the community. That's ~hat we've been out to him that East Harlem is kind of 6) We want total.decentralization--block work is going on in the community? able to do, and they can't tell Puerto hot. So he hasn't shown up. health officers 'responsible to the com­ Ricans apart, it's fantastic. We've also been working at Metro­ munity-staff board should be instituted. YORUBA: We've been instituting a com­ Right after the garbage thing, we moved politan Hospital organizing the workers 7) We want "door-to-door" preventive munity political education (P. E )class. into welfare. We were working with the and the community people aound the health services emphasizing environ­ We show Newsreel films that rangefrom mothers on that, and we had people on isslle of the lay advisory board that ment and sanitation control, nutrition, "Off the Pig" to films on Venezuela. the Lower East Side working on that, the' city was trying to push on our drug addiction, maternal and child care We take the people through changes, blow at P.S 15. We had an action of the people for the hospital. After the school and senior citizen's services. their minds, show them people laughing people, then we blocked the Triboro thing last year, people are pretty hip 8) We want education programs for in Cuba, show them Bobby Seale saying Bridge complex on 125th St., and then to what a lay advisory board is: a all the people to expose heaith problems- . he's not a racist and then we run a P. E, what we did was fantastic. We took the bunch of jive middle class people sitting s;mitation, rats, poor housing, malnu­ class right on that. And they're coming people from East Harlem and marched on the board giving recommendations to trition, police brutality, pollution, and off pretty good. We're trying to offset up 125th St. into Harlem. You see, for a somebody who mayor may not take them. other forms of oppression. the image that the pigs have given us. long time the man runs his divide and What we're trying to institute is a com­ 9) We. want total control by the Met­ The pigs work in collusion, and the game conquer game in the colony by telling one munity-staff governing board. Last Wed­ ropolitan hospital community-staff gov­ they're trying to play for the march in person you're Puerto Rican and telling nesday, we had a meeting withthe East erning board of the budget allocations, Chicago is saying that the Lords are-a someone else you're black, and there­ Harlem Health Council and we presented medical policy along 'the above points" gang. They thing they can run the same fore you two are different. Well, that's a ten point program that they passed. So hiring, firing, and salaries of employ- game here so they're trying to say that jive, because everybody's on welfare what we've got to do now is beat the the Lords are a gang. But gangs haven't and e.,ierybOdy's poor;" and everybody adniinistration" at organizing tlie. people:" been around New York .for almost fif­ should be fighting on the same side of the Since they're ip the hospital what they've teen years. The people are hip to tl'je fact revolution.. So we took them up f25th­ "been doing is Jiocking Lords' froin going :that we feea Kids in the morning; we have" St. which was a symbolic thing, and for into the Hospital, and the second thing is a free breakfast program, and they think, the first time a lot of those mothers ,~~~ well if they're a gang why do they feed saw an organized group of blacks, and kids? . we brought them to the reclamation site ~ 'We had and we stayed there for a while and we three Breakfast for School Children pro­ came back when the pigs started busting grams going on in New York. One is heads cause we scared shit out ofthem. being run jointlywith the Panthers at 116th We had cut across their precinct lines by Street in El Barrio (Spanish Harlem), and goin~~p l25th St. another we run jointly along with street And the people saw where the jive was people on the Lower East Side. We had at, because one of the things we've been a third, but we were thrown out 'cause the director of the place on lloth Street said we walked in in the mornings with shotguns.

MOVEMENT: What sort 9f work do you do in' your P, E classes?

YORUBA: What we try to do is take stuff like Marx and Lenin and try to translate it into street language. So maybe they can't catch what Marx is saying, but when one of us runs it down to them, they can dig on dialectical materialism. That will work for a sixty year old mother of the kids in liberation school. CONTINUED ON P. 13

PAGE 8 MOVEMENT NOVEMBER 1969 , •

EDITOR'S NOTE: Six of Los Siete, the seven they just wanted to get anybody. Just to get in their They.started recruiting in the high schools and in . Latin ·brothers accused of murdering a pig, licks. the streets. They started recruiting the brothers. You could get financial aid for going to this program have been in jail for the last five months.· NELSON: Another time the pigs shot someone in and good classes. You didn't need a high school Their trial will begin in less than a month. As . the Mission just for yelling • pig" • Before we got .diploma - you just go up there and get tutored. they await trial, their sisters and brothers on popped, the harassment, of brown people was really heavy. The pigs had declared war against the broth­ MOVEMENT;was it at that time that you had the outside have been organizing the Bay Area­ ers down in the. Mission District. About a month an organization called COBRA? Brown community to defend the seven and before the bust, an· article came out in the news­ themselves. Los Siete organization provides paper about how the merchants were being terror­ MARIO: Yes, it's still there. Before it used to be ized by the brothers down in the Mission. Well, the Brown Heritage Club. Then we had this strike the Mission District of San Francisco with a . nothing like that ever happened. The proof is that because the administration at CSM wasn't meeting breakfast program, free medical and legal aid, . this woman who owns a store down at 20th and Mis­ oUr demands. Alot· of students had todrop out because political education,·and a newspaper (for de­ sion;.- the name is. II Anne and Daughters", well she the administration wasn't giving the bread for the came with one of her daughters and apologized to program. They were also trying to pick our coun­ tails see MOVEMENT, Aug. 1969). us, because she· knew· it .was all lies. After that, selors. We wanted our own. That' swhenwe changed After some hassle with the pigs, we were the pigs were going by in unmarked cars and taking the name of the organization to the COBRAS. (It . able to interview the brothers in jail. We pictures of the brothers standing outside, so that stands for Confederation of Brown Race for Action) they could show them to the other shifts that come My brother, Tony, was the chairman of it. rapped for several hours with Nelson Rodri­ on to ·harass the people that they seenon the streets. guez, Mario Martinez, Tony (Rudolfo) Mar­ As far as I know, none of the merchants in the MOVEMENT: Tony, you want to talk some more tinez, Jose Rios, Bebe (Danilo) Melendez and Mission never gave any work to any of us, in­ about COBRA? cluding any of the brothers on the block. And as Pinky (Gary) Lescallet. The seventh accuSed far as I ~ow, nobody ever terrorized anybody. TONY: COBRA came about because the struggle brother, Gio Lopez, is in parts unlmown. I guess they just wanted to clean up the streets was getting pretty heavy over the Program. stu­ of .so-called bums, who are really our oppressed dents were dropping out. The administration wasn't FREE LOS SIETE! brothers~ . taking care of the needs of the students. They MOVEMENT: Would you rap a little about what you were continually taking out counselors and trying to were into before the bu§t? TONY: None of the brothers I knew had a good infiltrate the program by putting in people who steady job. I've been down there ever since I came worked for the administration. So when the strike JOSE: I was in high school and trying to get out to the United States about 8 years ago, and I don't starte d everybody came into a common front, of school. I was intending to go to the College of know of anybody having jobs for more than a month. We had the strike and due to the strike we got San Mateo (CSM) when the new semester started. I don't think there's more than two or three brothers new counselors and a new ethnic studies depart­ I was really looking forward to attending college who have jobs working for the merchants in the 'ment. (for a story on the San Mateo strike, see and staying in college - trying to talk to the people Mission. So they had no right to harass them and Movement, Feb. 1969) while in school, rather than just being out in the call them terrorists, .cause there weren't any acts . After the strike, COBRA started building its ideo­ streets. Because I could see for myself that there .of terrorism. Maybe there were a few crimes, logy towards recruiting more people to be students• was a lot of people who were sort of like giving but that always happens. So actually, before we all got busted, we were up. I was sort of like giving up myself. But Mario involved in a heavy recruitment program to .get and .NelsQn were talking to me. I heard that they had SAN MATEO STRUGGLE brothers from the block to be students. We talked a good program up at CSM to all the brothers we grew up with and tried to make I was going to Balboa High School before I got MOVEMENT: What were the rest of you into before them see how many lies had been put to them and that busted. You know, the education in high school is the bust? they needed education so they could understand the not so good. The classes I wa s taking weren't whole political spectrum of the country. We re­ interesting, so I wanted to give it up. Once I heard MARIO: Before this thing happened I was attending cruited al ot of people and COBRA grew alot. about the Program at CSM, I decided to stay in the College of San Mateo. We got involved in this Now the organization is doing alot in our defense. high school and try to get along till I could go to program that was teaching us what the system had They're doing alot to get people involved in pol­ CSM. been hiding from us. We started learning the itical activities. truth about the system, and about our people. They see that for all these years our people HISTORY OF HARASSMENT We started learning about our identity. have been denied many things. None of our people Before, in high school, they taught us a whole have really got educated. You look up statistics But most of the time I stayed in the Mission bunch of lies - that's the reason why alot of us and they will tell you that Brown people in this state District. The brothers there have to constantly didn't make it through high school. Only one of us and in this nation are the ones that are at the deal with the pig harassment. You know, the pigs ever graduated from high school. There were many bottom of the scale. Black people have risen up just park in front of you and take out their shotguns reasons. The teachers weren't right. We didn't know a little, but only because of their political struggle. and they make a big thing about goingtoarrestsome­ that till we went to CSM and could compare the So once our people become politically aware, they one. All the people see what's going on. classes taught by them and the classes taught by can begin to struggle and do something about the I remember a couple of nights before everything our people. That makes a real big difference, cause things that are going on. came down. There was some pig walking by this in one class you hear about "this great people" and The philosophy of the College Readiness Program friend of ours - someone in the group caned out in another class you find out about how "this great was really built, under the leadershipof Bob Hoover. • pig" - so the pig turned around -and s~arted people" is a big lie. The philosophy spoke to self-determination which is chasing us. They caught this friend of mine and they something our people lack. It's been forgotten for started beating him and beating him - blood was MOVEMENT: Could you explain more about the a long time - not necessarily forgotten - but it's Program at San Mateo? coming out of his head. The only reason why they CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE· started clubbing him was cause someone said • pigs". But they didn't really know who it was, MARIO: The program started out with black people. NOVEMBER 1969 MOVEMENT PAGE 9

I...- .:z::a= - -;- --+ ..~ I

own people the many lJroblems and solutions to the have to raise all these questions, How we do it problems, we will get someplace. has gotta be decided by the people. So if we do the petitions and they're denied, maybe we'll have to look TONY: Like in the strike in San Mateo. It was for other solutions. Maybe we're gonna have to create started by black and brown students, We made a community force to be in charge of watching the the administration change a little. police so that they don't make no cruel acts a­ Another thing we have learned from black people gainst the people. Maybe we will have to have a is the tactics of pressure.The Man is not gonna lot of demonstrations. give nothing that he don't want to give, because this society works for a so-called majority - now MOVEMENT: Is there a problem with "brown this majority is well-off, but we are not well­ capitalismn ? off, so therefore we have to make it work for us. Black people have shown us that the only way TONY: I read in the paper the other day how they society is gonna give way is by putting pressure have a program that is financed through the EOC on them. so this is what we try to do- it happened where they"re trying to build brown capitalism in San Mateo, Ilnd they gave way, because we put in the brown communities. But, it goes back to the pressure on them. The administration would never same thing. Black capitalism is gonna work for a have moved unless our people forced them to move. certain fracion of the black people, like right now We had to put the pressure on them. So we have there's a black bourgeoisie - but those people don't learned that we have to teach our people that we care about the rest of their people. We see this really have to take matters into our own hands. program of brown capitalism as another tactic The facilities to take care of our people are going to of dividing and conquering the people. Because they have to be built by us. They can never by built gonna give money to certain people - the people they by the Man because the Man is' gonna run them feel can make it - the people who they feel are good their way, a way to oppress us. and those people are just gonna get the money for Any program that is financed by the government themselves. . is gonnagive their ideology - it's not gonna really CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11 take care of the people. In the communities right MOVEMENT: How do you relate to the problem of now, we have a lot of programs, a lot of clinics cultural nationalism? and stuff. If you go to the programs they have, 'MARIO: OUr people need education. We're in the like the programs Alioto is talking about where he TONY: We see the cultural problem of black people Mission and hear things like people wanting to gives a chance to .young people to work in his and brown people to be different because the culture join the Green Berets - There are many examples administration, those programs are financed by the of brown peopleisnationlilistic from the beginning, of this ignorance in the streets - You see all these .federal government - so the ideology of those pro­ because our families are real close - sothat we have guys turil1ng to ,drugs. They don't see that that grams is their ideology. It doesn't relate to our always kept our culture.within our communities. So is no help and only oppresses us more. . needs, It's a program where you go and maybe you that hasn't been too much of a problem. get 60 bucks a week and then you go horne and half MOVEMENT: Most of you corne, from Central the time you don't have to work. That kind of pro­ BROWN UNITY America. How do you relate the oppression and gram will never get our people anywhere, because struggle of the people there to here? it's not teaching them nothing. . The only problem we encounteredwas that of unity, . the whole masses uniting to confront the problem•. BEBE: The Yanqui imperialist tuns everything RAISING LEVEL OF STRUGGLE Now that we've got our people together, the van­ down there. Like I went back to' there in'63. guard of our people has realized that ties have to They got the American Fruit Company down there.. Many brown people, young people, have seen that be made. with black and even white people. White The people and country don't have the chance to this is a viol~nt society. The only way you gonna get' people are also oppressed, maybe in different produce their own crops so they could .profit off of the things is' with violence. Maybe a lot of people ways, but they're still oppressed. There are alot it. They got all these Rockefellers and all these other don't like this, I doubt if anybody really wants to of white people working for us in the defense. So people down there, just making profit off the people be .violent - but nevertheless, we see it. This Is we do see the necessity and we encourage it. Most and land that isn't theirs. Up here, it's the same way. a violent society, so therefore we .have-to act in of the young people on the block think that the enemy' They make money off of us. They tell us they'll violent ways. Whether an armed struggle has to 1s the regular white guy on the block too. They try give us $1.35· to work at this damn Neighborhood be done, I guess we'll have to get prepared for that. · to blame their'oppression on him. So wetry to make Youth Corps. They tell you to dig a ditch and that If we don't have to engage in armed struggle, well them see that he's not the enemy. We think we're ditch might become a resevoir some day and all you we'll be prepared for that too. Were gonna really getting someplace by educating them through got paid for it was $1.35. OUr people has more know;. make sure our people are in schoolS, so that if we. different methods to see who their enemy really is. ledge than that. They tell us "that's all you're good don't have to engage .in armed struggle, we can be for" - we need more lawyers, we need more sure we'll. be represented by professionals, by MARIO: We still have some of that problem, though, professors and teachers and so forth. The system. people who know the needs and corne from the people Just like the problem of the US organization and up here just don't let the brown people have a with those needs and will be able to take care of the Black Panthers. The Panthers don't think that the chance. Th e grape boycott and Los Siete de la Raza them. thing will corne down so that black people fight every has awakened a lot of people up - we tell them ­ whitey they see..shoot ern all down. They see that "You' re better than the Man tells you". You can do MOVEMENT: How does that process go in deciding the black people alone can't get no place in this something - something for your people. Whether or not armed struggle is necessary? How · country. They have to unite - they have to create. are the issues raised? · unity with all the oppressed.masses, because of the BLACK AND BROWN UNITY situation where the capitalist people are oppressing TONY: One of the biggest issues raised is by the all the lower class.es. ~. '. MOVEMENT: How is the coaliton between Los Siete police. In our communities, just like in the black The problem we have had, th e crown people, is and thf Panthersgoing? communities, the pigs who patrol our commun­ that most of the foreigners - those from Central ities, don't corne from our communities. He comes and South America - think about nationalism. Every­ TONY: The struggle is a class struggle ofoppressed into our community, harasses people, does violent body is nationalistand they go back to their country. people. Black people and brown people are both op­ things to the people and is never seen by the people. Before we used to think as El Salvadorians. I'm pressed - maybe not in the same ways, but the So slowly" we· have realized that there is a need for from El Salvador and "thars what's happening, system uses the same tactics. The young people com~unity . control of the police department. Now that's all' there is to it". We were taught by this have finally, little by little, overcome the man's we feel that thepol1cemenwho patrol the community system that black people were inferior' to us! divide and conquer game. should live in the community, because then theY yellow people a little above that. None of us can' We have learned a lot from the black people. can see the needs of our people and can move ever be as goOd as white. We've encountered all We have learned from the many tactics they have towards solving those needs. these problems. . used in the struggle. The Black Panthers have One problem especially is with the chicano Move­ helped the movement for Los Siete a lot. They MOVEMENT: Do you think it's really possible to ment, which is just strictly from Mexico. With have done this, because they have realized that petition and get community control of pigs? Chicanos, you know, if you're white,' sometimes they're not the only ones who are oppressed, because you can't talk to them guys. All they see is we are oppressed in the same manner. We have to NELSON: Not really. people from Mexico and nobody else, This is bad build an ideology so that all people can be united ­ because they are alienating themselves. That' s not.just brown people, but black people too. TONY: It's good for the people to engage in those where this term "brown people" carne about where We have had to overcoine a lot of pr'oblems within activities of petition to gain community control of you can unite all the people of brown color, that brown people before we got to the stage we're at pigs. But they wUl never give way to this. We includes the people of Hawaii, Samoa, the Islarids. now. Before the movem ent used to be just Chicano ­ could have the whole brown community petition and We see too that it can't just be brown people ­ so-called Mexican Americans - they were leaving I don't think they would allow it. It's good because it has to be all the oppressed classes - whether a lot of brown people out. Finally, we overcame that it will show the people that the police department they be white or whatever color they be. when the "brown" term carne about, everybody of won't do it that way - they want to build their brown descent became united. Then the next step system their way. The petitions will show that KNOW YOUR ENEMY was to move to get united with black people. Now the community will have to find other means to we're united on many fronts with black people. get real community control. MOVEMENT: We've talked a lot about education, but haven' t talked about your own education since you've NELSON: That kind of relates to the Salvador­ MOVEMENT: What are some other ways you are ·been in jail. Have you learned much here? _ Honduras war. You knOw that in El Salvador there's raising the consciousness of the people? a monopoly of 14 fam1l1es. Salvador is a pretty small BEBE: Well, you know' the library here only has country and most of the peasants have to migrate MARIO: We have to teach the people that we just rinky-dink rejects from the library.They don't to Honduras because there's twice as much land can't turn our backs on our people and go into the really have too many books that you could right­ and the people like to get ahead. Well, the Honduran system, and just go along with their materialist eously absorb knowledge out of. As far as learning, government stereotypes their people into telling values, a horne and a car. Through teaching our we generally discuss things about our people. Brother them "they'vecorne to invade our country". That's people, we can get the$e professionals, these doc­ Tony here usually tells us' about class struggle their old divide and conquer game again. Just like tors that are needed for our community - lawyers and how the movement for La Raza was going when .here. The people over there are still fighting each that are needed. We have t

PAGE 12 MOVEMENT NOVEMBER 1969 -..

they're in this thing, and they're cool, They're not calling themselves Young young'lords Lords, but they're Lords. So like we have a good estimation that in another month and a half we'll be able to say that every­ CONTINUED FROM PAGE 8 one in the Barrio is a Young Lord. We've been doing P.E, since January, It's picking up. I Just got" a call today since the Lords first came off. You from a guy out in Queens that there's just walk into a crowd and start rap­ a group of Puerto Ricans out there that ping, Sometimes people will come over want to start a branch. And the same to you and say why are you wearing a thing's happening in the South Bronx beret or why are you wearing a button and the Lower East Side and Brooklyn. that says "Tengo Puerto Rico en mi People in New Jersey and Connecticut Corazon", why do you say you have are also coming into the thing, Puerto Rico in your heart, We just pick The pigs work two ways around that up from there, bust thing. The first thing they tried to do was they dealt repression on the peo­ ,, A\, ple. We have had several actions in the MOVEMENT: When you first started street, mini-riots, mini-rebellions and talking about this garbage issue, it the pigs didn't touch the Lords hardly, rtf~' reminded me of a discussion that was but the people were the ones who were going on in the Movem,mt a few years getting busted and getting their asses ago around the ERAP community organ­ kicked. So what we did, for the first cat ,~',\ Io izing projects. They had the idea that that was busted in our action, we mobil­ $ you could move from the garbage cans ized about a thousand people from the i': .\" to socialism, but ended up being hung '''' '\< Vl community, marched up tothepig pen ~. up on garbage cans. How do the 'Lords and we demanded that he be set free, and ., r···f..•...... :r.••.... ;,:M,,""'""... . [ see an issue like garbage collection he was, The pigs were scared shit. Then ~... strategically, in terms of raising the they knew that this was a differend kind ,~' ...... level of struggle? of a power they had to deal with, this .to. '...... • ', ~ .,~ . ... . wasn't a jive little organization that .~ '. . 1,\ ., YORUBA: I never heard of ERAP before. wears jackets running around like a gang. But what we saw in the Young Lords So what they're trying to do now sinee who'll say, Yeah, man, I'm with you. an effort, and that's good, they still got a was that yeah, garbage collection is a they realize that we can stand up and say That's why sisters are so beautiful _ long fucking way to go. RYM II comes out reform issue. Right now, Pretty Pig Off the Pig and we got the little kids once you've' got a sister, you've got of a bag a lot of the time like they're Lindsay has used our garbage thing as a in the street saying Off th e Pig, what a Lord for life. a reaction to Weatherman, and Wea­ campaign issue. The trick is to use a they're trying to do how, is they're therman comes out of a bag where reform issue for revolutionary purposes. trying to off us. We got the word out to MOVEMENT: What is the international they have to be more militant than So we used Chairman Cha Cha's line the community and they're defending us. position of the Young Lords? militant. There's no need for that. The about observation and participation, and When we walk down the street at night working class people don't have to be involved the people in struggle - dumpin' we're able to walk' into an apartment, YOR UBA: The Young Lords Organization told about militancy because they live THE garbage in the streets, while we knock on the door and say in Spanish, is a revolutionary vanguard, and as with it, and they are potentially the most laid down a rap as to WHY we were doing excuse me, I'm a Young Lord, I'm being such we belie\Africa, the off the garbage action? moon if necessary. MOVEMENT: What kind of things could MOVEMENT: What is the relation be­ you see white radicals doing? YOR UBA; When we first started with the tween the Young Lords and other Puerto, BIRTH OF A NATION garbage, we had a hard core of people Rican groups in NYC? INTERNATIONALISM who had been together in different forms MOVEMENT: How do the Lords feel YORUBA; They're going to have to since January. Some were college, but YORUBA; Most of the other Puerto about relating to middle-class whites? most were off the blocks. At that time Rican, or Latin groups, because we are' start going into working class commun­ we met on roofs, parks, apartments ­ a Latin vanguard, that exist in New York YORUBA: Young Lords as an organ­ ities, and I know some people who are doing this so that's why I say there is anywhere, Whenever we took to the are poverty pimps, the anti-poverty ization believes that coalitions and work­ streets, we were able to see who could bloodsuckers that came up like pimples ing alliances are necessary among all hope, taking a job as a worker, taking function and who couldn't. That was prac­ after all the rebellions. We relate groups that are dedicated to fighting the up residence in the community and not coming out with politics, not hitting tice. From that practice, and because a to MPI (Movement Pro Independence), man and getting rid ofthis mother-fucker few of us had been in ttl! struggle before, and not those mothers/cause they got someone on the head with politics, just in a re'volutionary manner along sOlJIld 't~at we laid out a basic· theory, and dug how,,, " to be affed, Linasay gaveo' em orders 'to",', • Marxist-L~ninisf principles, bec.ause we , getting 's6 ypq, can make ,friends they related to that. Combining theory bUy us off, but we threw 'em' out.' can't'do' it alone. Young Lords can't do with a person, start rapping, have a beer, with practice, we were able to eliminate The type of Latin organizations we relate it alone,Young Patriots can't doit alone, go out with him, go bowling, whatever the duds. to mostly are the Social Clubs on the SDS can't do it alone. We've got to hang they do. Do whatever the people do, I think this is the way they trained the Viet Then, after getting the word out to the street, or youth clubs, or welfare moth- together and we've got to resolve our people 'bout the Young Lords, we were ers - grassroots people, contradictions in the struggle, because Minh. When Ho Chi Minh was training able to set up an office. From there, we the cadre, he said go out to the tribal revolutionary marriage will only occur people, go out to the people in the rice moved on to other programs. MOVEMENT; In New York City the main in revolutionary struggle. Remember paddies, and if they file their teeth down industry is the garment industry and the flick U Birth of a Nation"? We're MOVEMENT; What kind of trouble have most of the workers there are Black going through that now, the birth of a to the gums, you file your teeth down to the police been giving you? and Puerto Rican. Have the Lords 'nation, the birth of a world because I the gums. You 'cannot talk about the working class unless you become part made any moves towards organization-in -take an inter-nationalist view of the PEOPLE'S PATROL thp. sweatshops? ' of their struggle. Huey says we are struggle, (1' m really turned on by the con- camels to be ridden upon by the people, cept of an American Revolution II, and I but they've got to stop mouthing it and YORUBA; We were expecting a raid YORUBA; Nothing definite yet - that's don't see that as just being a Patriot's on the office last week, so what we've a motherfucker of a job. But some of us start doing it, the'y have got to start living thing, I think the Patriots are there in working class conditions and not been doing is getting out to the people. have People that work in the garl)1ent as a catalyst to turn on the rest of The people in the Barrio are just up, canter, and we've been getting good living so much off the movement. The the mother country, Last year, the na- . movement has a way of insulating you really up in arms about this whole thing, feedback from cats that work there tion was being formed in the mother Saturday night (Sept.20), a friend whowe who've been digging on us in the street. from a lot that's going down, country, its birth pangswerestarting in For a long time SDS, which is the called Loco, was murdered by another Eventually, we'll have to. the mother country at the Chicago Demo­ brother. He was trying to stop a fight symbolic organization, has come across cratic Convention. Whites were getting as a campus-based organization. It's so the guy decided to cut him up. He MOVEMENT: Let me switch the topic. their asses kicked, and they were feeling was stabbed four times, and the pigs Whatever oppression Puerto Rican men time to get back to the working class and it the way Blacks and Puerto Ricans ,relating more to the street people. came, and they let him bleed in the suffer, Puerto Rican women suffer two have felt it every day. I cried when I street. He died in the back of the pig times over.Have the Young Lords in new saw that shit on TV, and I had a lot of IN CHICAGO' car, they didn't get the ambulance or any­ York begun to deal with women's op­ good friends up there who got their asses MOVEMENT: Recently the YLO partici­ thing, And seven detectives came down pression? whipped. What makes me sadder is that pated in the demonstrations in Chicago. drunk to check it out and instead of in­ some groups can still talk about marching What happened? vestigating, they were trying to write a YORUBA; Young Lords all over been down the street to end the war in Vietnam, ticket out for a brother who had only trying to deal with it. Dig, I'm not when they can see where things are at. YORUBA: Well, I have to exclude the one headlight on his car, So what hap­ tryin' to excuse the brothers, but it's Weathermen, 'cause we wern't involved pened w.as, what we've been trying to push been hard for cats to deal with the fact THE HOPE OF THE WORLD in their thing. But the Young Lords, out for a long time is a people'S patrol, that we ain't in this for the money, Panthers and RYM II were supporting an underground movement of the people much less tellin' him that there's more In a way, Weatherman ( a tendency each other. Thursday we were at the on the block in the Latin community, to a woman than a piece of pussy. Dig, within SDS) is trying to combat that when Federal Court Building and hospital similar to the way Panthers started out Latin women have to deal with this macho they talk about white militancy, and trying demonstrations. Friday we leafletted' in Oakland. We came up against a lot syndrome. She's been trained since birth to up the white militancy. I think they're on the Albizu Campos March Saturday. of cynicism about the whole thing, pat­ to wait on her man. In New York though, going at it ass backwards, but I dig the Campos was a Puerto Rican indepen­ rolling the streets against the pigs is we found a very down street sister ­ direction they're coming out of. Middle dence leader, and a hero of our people, a completely foreign idea in New York. and literally that means FIND - who class whites have all kinds of disad­ We tied that in with the assassination of But we sold it. And with what happened didn't know shit from Marx, but knew vantages not only relating to people in the Wilfredo Perez, a membe'r'C;f'the Latin over the weekend, we've been able to or­ she wanted to struggle. She was liber­ colony but relating to white working Kings Organization, which stopped gang­ ganize cadre easily, Now we've got about ated every which way, she IS liberated, class. I've found that it's easier for an banging?and became political once they five tight blocks, and there's about two always been known on the block for being Italian who's working in the factory whO'll saw the Lords taking care of business. hundred people that will be moving next free. She ate the cats up whenever they making sixty bucks a week to relate to The March Saturday was great. We week some time on these patrols. They're came out with any shit, you know? me than it is for him to relate to someone had close to 1500 people, Old, young, a total underground movement. We relate But then she became a Rally Lord, in SDS, who has all the best intentions RYM II, LORDS, gangs - everybody. It it to an iceberg, most of the iceberg 'cause she couldn't be fUll time, That's in the world. It's almost like some kind was the first time Chicago witnessed a is underwater but part of it is above been our problem - keeping the sisters, of a patronizing attitude, and this year mass march for Campos, and the first -' water, that would be like the Young Lords Because of their peculiar oppression, '69-' 7C I think is going to be a crUcial time anyone ever marched on Division' office and the people that you see in berets they can't work full time. And if we get year for the mother country and for the Street, where the Puerto Ricans a '-e at. and shit like that. to the mothers, their husbands kick our movement in it, because what I see Then the rally at Humboldt Park topped ass. So we've been accused of male happening with RYM II and Weatherman things off beautifully. The pigs were EVERYONE IN THE BARRIO chauvinism. We're not. Cats that have it they're trying to make some kind of scared shitless at seeing so many spies, are dealin' with it, and cats who have a turn back to their own working class. niggers, longhairs, PEOPLE, in one What's good about it is that we're not eliminated most of it get on the other They've been working for a long time in place, loving each other, revolutionary - getting other Lords, but we got people brothers, Lately, we've been attracting the colony and talking about Free Huey love, dig, and being one. It blew the right off the block, these are working some heavy sisters. That's also because and Free the New York 21, but now it's fascists' minds, what little they have men, they got families to support, women, sisters tend to lay in the cut and dig­ time to talk about freeing the cat who's to blow, and gave us all one big high. housewives, they're in their forties, and if you're for real, rather than a guy working in the factory, They're making NOVEMBER 1969 MOVEMENT PAGE 13 EDITOR'S NOTE: Debate over adventurism has been II raging in the movement, mostly in connection with discussions of the National SDS Actions in Chicago. Having established the general Marxist propositions, let us turn to the Russian revolution. Let us recall the We think that this piece by Lenin sheds some fresh historical development of the forms of struggle it produced. light on the subject. (By the way, when Lenin uses First there were the economic strikes of workers (1896-1900), the term "Guerrilla Warf~e" he is referring to what then the pol.itical demonstrations of workers and students we call "heavy street fighting," he is not talking about (1901-02), peasant revolts (1902), the beginning of mass guerrilla warfare as defined by Mao, Ho, Giap and political strikes variously combined with demonstrations Che.) (Rostov 1902, the strikes in the summer of 1903, January 9, 1905), the all-Russian political strike accompanied by local As we go to press, people are just returning from cases of bal'l'icade fighting (October 1905), mass barricade Chicago and have not had time to carefully analyze fighting and armed uprising (1905, December), the peace­ and evaluate the actions. Since the bourgeois and ful parliamentary struggle (April-June 1906), partial mili­ movement press is full of accounts ofwhat happened, tary revolts (J une 1905-J uly 1906) and partial peasant we have decided to wait until we can publish a useful revolts (autumn 1905-autumn 1906). and honest analytic story of that struggle. Such is the state of affairs in the autumn of 1906 as con­ cerns forms of struggle in general. The "retaliatory" form of struggle adopted by the autocracy is the Black-Hundred The question of guerrilla action is one that greatly interests pogrom, from Kishinev in the spring of 1903 to Sedlets our Party and the mass of the workers. We have dealt with in the autumn of 1906. All through this period the organisa­ this question in passing several times, and now we propose tion of Black~Hundred pogroms and the beating up of Jews, to give the more complete statement of our views we have students, revolutionaries and class-conscious workers con­ promised. tinued to progress and perfect itself, combining the violence of Black-Hundred troops with the violence of hired ruffians, going as far as the use of artillery in villages and towns and merging with punitive expeditions, punitive trains a!\d Let us begin from the beginning. What are the fundamental so forth. demands which every Marxist should make of an examina- Such is the principal background of the picture. Against . tion af the question of forms of struggle? In the first place, this backgl:Ound there stands out-unquestionably as Marxism differs from all primitive. forms of socialism by something partial, secondary and auxiliary-the phenomenon not binding the movement to anyone particular form of to the study and assessment of which the present article is struggle. It recognises the most varied forms of struggle; devoted. What is this phenomenon? What are its forms? and it does not "concoct" them, but only generalises, organ­ What are its causes? When did it arise and how far has it ises, gives conscious expression to those forms of struggle spread? What is its significance in the general course of of the revolutionary classes which arise of thems'elves in the the revolution? What is its relation to the struggle of the course of the movement. Absolutely hostile to all abstract working class ol'ganised and led by Social-Democracy? Such formulas and to all doctrinaire recipes, Marxism demands an are the questions which we must now proceed to examin-e attentive attitude to the mass struggle in progress, which, after having sketched t~e general background of the picture. as the movement develops, as the class-consciousness of the The phenomenan in which we are interested is the armed masses grows, as economic and political crises become acute, struggle. It is conducted by individuals and by small groul,ls. continually gives rise to new and more varied methods Some belong to revolutionary organisations, while others of defence and attack. Marxism, therefore, positively does (the majority in certain parts of Russia) do not belong to not reject any form of struggle. Under no circumstances does any revolutionary organisation. Armed strugg'e pursues two Marxism confine itself to the forms of struggle possible and diOerent aims, which must be strictly distinguished: in the in existence at the given moment only, recognising as it does first place, this struggle aims at assassinating individuals, that new forms of struggle, unknown to the participants of chiefs and subordinates in the army and police; in the the given period, inevitably arise as the given social situa­ second place, it aims at the confiscation of monetary funds tion changes: .. In this respect Marxism learns, if we may both from the government and from private persons. The so express it, from mass practice, and makes no claim what­ confiscated funds go partly into the treasury of the Party, ever to teach the masses forms of struggle invented by "sys­ partly for the special purpose of arming and preparing for tematisers" in the seclusion of their studies. We know-said an uprising, and partly for the maintenance. of persons en­ Kautsky, for instance, when examining the forms of gaged in the struggle we are describing. The big expropriations social revolution-that the coming crisis will introduce (such as the Caucasian, involving over 200,000 rubles, and new forms of struggle that we are now unable to the Moscow, involving 875,000 rubles) went in fact first foresee. . and foremost to revolutionary parties-small expropriations In _the second place, Marxism demands an absolutely go mostly, and sometimes entirely, to the maintenance of historical examination of the question of the forms of strug­ the "expropriators". This form of struggle undoubtedly be­ gle. To treat this question apart from the concrete historical came widely developed and extensive only in 1906, i.e., situation betrays a failure to understand the rudiments of after the December uprising. The intensification of the polit­ dialectical materialism. At different stages of economic evo­ ical crisis to the point of an armed struggle and, in partic­ lution, depending on differences in political, national-cul­ ular, the intensification of poverty, hunger and unemploy­ tural, living and other conditions, different forms of struggle ment in town and country, was one of the important causes come to the fore and become the princi pal forms of struggle; of the struggle we are describing. This form of struggle was and in connection with this, the secondary, auxiliary forms adopted as the preferable and even exclusive form of social of struggle undergo change in their turn. To attempt to struggle by the vagabond elements of the population, the answer yes or no to the question whether arw particular lumpen proletariat and anarchist groups. Declaration of means of struggle should be used, without making a detailed martial law, mobilisation of fresh troops, Black-Hundred examination of the concrete situation of the given move­ pogroms (Sedlets), and military courts must be regarded as ment at the given stage of its development, means completely the "retaliatory" form of struggle adopted by the autocracy. to abandon the Marxist position. These are the two principal theoretical propositions by which we must be guided. The history of Marxism in West­ III ern Europe provides an infinite number of examples corro­ borating what has been said. European Social-Democracy The usual appraisal of the struggle we are desc:ibing is at the present time regards parliamental"lsrn and the trade that it is anarchism, Blanquism, the old terrol'lsm, the union movement as the principal forms of struggle; it recog­ acts of individuals isolated from the masses, which demoral­ nised insurrection in the past, and is quite prepared to recog­ ise _the workers, repel wide strata of the population, dis- nise it, should conditions change, in the future-despite the ,organise the movement and injure the revolution. Examples opinion of bourgeois liberals like the Russian Cadets and in support of this appraisal can easily be found in the events the Bezzaglavtsi. 110 Social-Democracy in the seventies re­ reported every day in the newspapers. jectedthe general strike as a social panaeea, as a means But are such examples convineing? In order to test this, of overthrowing the bourgeoisie at one stroke by non-po'tit­ let us take a locality where the form of struggle we are ical means-but Social-Democracy fully recognises the mass examining is most developed-the Lettish Territory. This is political strike (especially after the experience of Russia the way Novoye Vremya (in its issues of September 9 and in 1905) as one of the methods of struggle essential under 12) complains of the activities of the Lettish Social-Demo­ certain conditions. Social-Democracy recognised street bar­ crats. The Lettish Social-Democratic Labour Party (a sec­ ricade fighting in the forties, rejected it for definite reasons tion of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party) regu­ at the end of tht> nineteenth c.entury, and expressed complete larly issues its paper in 30,000 copies. The announcement rea_dines,> to rcviSI~ the laUn!' view'uttd to admit the expedi­ columns publish lists of spies whom it is the duty of every ellcy of hal'rieade fighting after the experience of Moscow, decent person to exterminate. People who assist the police which, in the words of K. Kautsky, initiated new tactics are proclaimed "enemies of the revolution", liable to execu­ of barricade fighting. tion and, moreover, to confiscation of property. The public NOVEMBER 1969 is instructed to give money to the Social-Democratic Party actions, for condemnation and curses are absolutely incapa­ only against signed and stamped receipt. In the Party's ble of putting a stop to a phenomenon which has been engen­ latest report, showing a total' income of 48,000 rubles for dered by profound economic and political causes. It may be the year, there figures a sum of 5,600 rubles contributed objected that if we are incapable of putting a stop to an ab­ by the Libau branch for arms which was obtained b'y expro­ normal and demoralising phenomenon, this is no reason priation. Naturally, Novoye Vremya rages and fumes against why the Party should adopt abnormal and demoralising this "revolutionary law", against this "terror government". methods of struggle. But such an objection would be a purely Nobody will be so bold as to call these activities of the bourgeois-liberal and not a Marxist objection, because a Lettish Social-Democrats anarchism, Blanquism or terror­ Marxist cannot regard civil war, or guerrilla warfare, which ism. But why? Because here we have a clear connection be­ is one of its forms, as abnormal and demoralising in gen­ tween the new form of struggle and the uprising which broke eral. A Marxist bases himself on the class struggle, and not out in December and which is again brewing. This connection social peace. In certain periods of acute economic and polit­ is not so perceptible in the case of Russia as a whole, but ical crises the class struggle ripens in to a direct civil war, it exists. The fact that "guerrilla" warfare became wide­ i. e., into an armed struggle between two sections of the peo­ spread precisely after December, and its connection with ple. In such periods a Marxist is obliged to take the stand of the accentuation not only of the economiC crisis but also civil war. Any moral condemnation of civil war would be of the political crisis is beyond dispute. The old Russian absolutely impermissible from the standpoint of Marx­ terrorism was an affair of the intellectual conspirator; today ism. as a general rule guerrilla warfare is waged by the worker In a period of civil war the ideal party of the proletariat combatant, or simply by the unemployed worker. Blanquism is a fighting party. This is absolutely incontrovertible. and anarchism easily occur to the minds of people who have We are quite prepared to grant that it is possible to argue a weakness for stereotype; but under the circumstances of and prove the inexpediency from the standpoint of civil an uprising, which are so apparent in the Lettish Territory, war of particular forms of civil war at any particular mo­ the inappropriateness of such trite labels is only too obvious. ment. We fully admit criticism of diverse forms of civil The exampIe of the Letts clearly demonstrates how incor­ war from the standpoint of military expediency and absolute­ rect, unscienti fic alld unhistorical is the. practice so v.ery common among us of analysing guerrilla warfare without ly agree that in this question it is the Social-Democratic practical workers in each particular locality who must have reference to the circumstances of an uprising. These circum­ stances must he borne in mind, we must reflect on the pecul­ the final say. But we absolutely demand in the name of the iar features of an intermediate period between big acts of principIes of Marxism that an analysis of the conditions of insurrection, we must realise what forms of struggle inevi­ civil war should not be evaded by hackneyed and stereo­ tably arise under such circumstances, and not try to shirk typed talk about anarchism, Blanquism and terrorism, and the issue by a collection of words learned by rote, such as that senseless methods of guerrilla activity ,adopted by are used equally by the Cadets and the Novoye Vremya-ites: some organisation or other of the Polish Socialist Party anarchism, robbery, hooliganism! at some moment or other should not be used as a bogey It is said that guerI"illa acts disorganise our work. Let us when discussing the question of the participation. of the apply this argument to the situation that has existed since Social-Democratic Party as such in guerrilla warfare in December 1905, to the period of Black-Hundred pogroms general. and martial law. What disorganises Jhe movement more in The argument that guerrilla warfare disorganises the such a pedod: the absence of resistance' or' organis~d'guertina mo¥einent must be regarded critically. Every new form of warfare? Compare the centre of Russia with her western bor­ struggle, accompanied as it is by new dangers and new ders, with Poland and the Lettish Territory. It is unquestion­ sacrifices, inevitably "disorganises" organisations which are able that guenilla warfare is far more widespread and far unprepared for this new form of struggle. Our old propagandist more developed in the western border regions. And it is circles were disorganised by recourse to methods of agitation. equally unquestionable that the revolutionary movement Our committees were subsequently disorganised by recourse in general, and the Social-Democratic movement in partic­ to demonstrations. Every military action in any war to a ular, are more disorganised in central Russia than in the certain extent disorganises the ranks of the fighters. But western border regions. Of course, it would not enter our this does not mean that one must not fight. It means that heads to conclude from this that the Polish and Lettish So­ one must learn to fight. That is all. cial-Democratic movements are less disorganised thanks to When I see Social-Democrats proudly and smugly declar­ guerrilla warfare. No. The only conclusion that can be drawn ing"we are not anarchists, thieves, robbers, we are superior is that guerrilla wadare is not to blame for the state of disor­ to all this, we reject guerrilla warfare",-I ask myself: ganisation of the Social-Democratic working-class move­ Do these people realise what they are saying? Armed clashes ment in Russia in 1906. and conflicts between the Black-Hundred government and the Allusion is often made in this respect to the peculiarities population are taking place all over the country. This is an of national conditions. But this allusion very clearly betrays absolutely inevitable phenomenon at the present stage of the weakness of the current argument. If it is a matter of development of the revolution. The population is spontane­ national conditions then it is not a matter of anarchism, ously and in an unorganised way-and for that very reason Blanquism or terrorism-sins that are common to Russia often in unfortunate and undesirable forms-reacting to this as a whole and even to the Russians especially-but of phenomenon also by armed conflicts and attacks. I can under­ something else. Analyse this something else concretely, gentle­ stand us refraining from Party leadership of this spontane­ men! You will then find that national oppression or antag­ ous struggle in a particular place or at a particular time onism explain nothing, because they have always existed because of the weakness and unpreparedness of our organi­ in the western border regions, whereas guerrilla warfare has sation. I realise that this question must be settled by the been engendered only by the present historical period. There local practical workers, and that the remoulding of weak are many places where there is national oppression and allt-ag_ and unprepared organisations is no easy matter. But when onism, but no guerrilla struggle, which sometimes develops I see a Social-Democratic theoretician or publicist not dis­ where there is no national oppression whatever. A concrete playing regret over this unpreparedness, but rather a proud analysis of the question will show that it is not a matter smugness and a self-exalted tendency to repeat phrases of national oppression, but of conditions of insurrection. learned by rote in early youth about anarchism, Blanquism Guerrilla warfare is an inevitable form of struggle at a and terrorism, I am hurt by this degradation of the most time when the mass movement has actually reached the point revolutionary doctrine in the world. of an uprising and when 'fairly large intervals occur between It is said that guerrilla warfare brings the class-conscious the "big engagements" in the civil war. ,proletarians into close association with degraded, drunken It is not guerrilla actions which disorganise the move­ riff-raff. That is true. But it only means that the party of ment, but the weakness of a party which is incapable of tak­ the proletariat can never regard guerrilla warfare as the only, ing such actions under its control. That is why the anathe­ or even as the chief, method of struggle; it means that this mas which we Russians usually hurl against gnerrilla actions method must be subordinated to other methods, that it go hand in hand with secret, casual, un organised guerrilla must be commensurate with the chief methods of warfare, actions which really do disorganise the Party. Being in­ and must be ennobled by the enlightening and organising capable of undorstanding what historical conditions give influence of socialism. And without this latter condition, rise to this struggle, we are incapable of neutralising its all, positively all, methods of struggle in bourgeois society deleterious aspects. Yet thtJ struggle is going on. It is engen­ bring the proletariat into close association with the various dered by powerful economic and political causes. It is not non-pl"Oletarian strata above and below it and, if left to the in our power to eliminate these causes or to eliminate this spontaneous course of events, become frayed, corrupted and struggle. Our complaints against guerrilla warfare are com­ prostituted. Strikes, if left to the spontaneous course of plaints against our Party weakness in the matter of an events, become corrupted into "alliances"-agreements be- uprising. , tween the workers and the masters against the consumers. Parliament becomes corrupted into a brothel, where a gang What we have said about disorganisation also applies to ".­ demoralisatioll. It is not guerrilla warfare which demoral­ of bourgeois politicians barter wholesale and retail "national --- ises, but unorganised, irregular, non-party guerrilla acts. freedom", "liberalism", "democracy", republicanism, anti- We shall not rid oi.ll'selves one least bit of this most unques­ tionable demoralisation by condemning and cursing guerrilla CONTINUED ON P. 19

PAGE 15 VICTORY OR DEATH, MAdOR IIT.I

by Karen Wald "Guerrilla warfare in Bolivia is not dead; it . has just begun." -Inti Paredo, Special Message to Tricontinental following Che's death. "The lackeys of Uncle Sam must not be given time to gloat over their triumphs. The homage due our dead comrades must be paid in the, form of a new imperialist defeat, of '"\ many actions throughout our America: the America of the guerrilla struggles." -Antonio Paredo, on the death \L ;l\ of his brother. ~' r! f In the early morning hours of Sept. 9,13 vehicles '.:r- carrying a total of 60 assorted· police and army j agents surrounded a small house on :Santa Cruz street l, ,; ':~ in La Paz where Guido'" Inti" Peredo,'chiefof the ELN " .. ' (Ejercito de Liberation Nacional, or National Lib­ 'eration Army) of Bolivia and one of the few remaining survivors Of Che's guerrilla band, was asleep. Latertb.at ~tnorning the government forces sprang their attack," and after a furious forty-minute gun gle...Guerrilla warfare is the, most effective and people have another slogan: VICTORY OR DEATH. battle Inti lay dead. correct method of armed struggle. But no death can mean that the people will abandon Bernardo Martinez, who rented the apartmentwhere "For this reason, as long asthereisa single honest their struggle. Inti was staying, was wounded and in jail. A number of man in Latin America, guerrilla warfare will not "My brothers died in the primt' of their youth: soldiers were wounded. die." .Coco, before he had reached' 29; Inti, a iittle over The ruJing Bolivian regime announced it was taking As if to echo his words, fighting broke out in the 31. The revolution had matured them t.o the point extreme, measures of security (read: new acts of streets of La Paz and Sucre, Bolivia, as students of converting them into Latin American leaders.' repression) throughout the country. demonstrated in honor of Inti, proclaiming the the "Inti's death does no more than exact the promise The regime's official version is that Inti's gun ELN still Jives. In the capital during the night of revolutionary struggle on this continent. (an M-I rifle according to one report; a Browning of September 10 young members of the University "The efforts of our Brazilian and Uruguayan, pistol according to another) jammed, and that he threw of San Andres Law School marched through the Venezualan an!! Colombian comrades, of all our a grenade which rebounded off a wall of the room in streets, shouting "Glory to Inti Peredo," "Long Live brothers of the Latin American struggle, must be which he was found, killing him. the ELN," "Death to the Murderous Army", and The next morning his brother Antonio, from his redoubled in this moment to speed up the downfall similar slogans. of imperialism." exile in Santiago, Chile, told a Prensa Latina re­ After a large rally in which a number of people porter: "The Bolivian government, as if shamed by After Che's death, Inti wrote: ~ays spoke in honor of the fallen ELN chief, the youths oc­ "Let the imperialists and their lackeys' withold its murders, always that revolutionaries perish cupied the streets and blockaded traffic on the main by self-immolation. I think that the news of the death' their songs of victory, because the war has not avenue. ended, it has just begun.. of my brother Inti is true, but that he fell fighting, Students from the teachers' college also demon­ "We will return to the mountains! and was not the victim of (his own) grenade." strated, blocking an avenue in the Mirafiores section. Inti's death, Antonio asserted, "will not mean the "Bolivia will again resound to our cry of Before they'left they scrawled various messages of VICTORY OR DEATH!" end of armed struggle in Bolivia. The leadership of support for the guerrillas and homage to Inti Peredo. the struggle fell into Inti's hands by a, quirk of In Sucre a number of students and four cops were fate, but there are and there will be rnanyleaders ready wounde.d when the pigs intervened to repress a similar to struggle ceaselessly and to liberate their country. demonstration by the students of that city. The out­ irC··ilC":r:··:t.:"Ii'-:t:'·:r:":t:":!i":t:":r=ns.n:r=":r:":t:":r:"C!:":r:" "if Che's death did not mean (asJIlany-thoug'ht) the •••,t••••t;•••~ ;e••;tt••••t•••""""" " t, t, "" 1 final blow to the liberation struggle, much iess will breaks of violence in the str~ts continued. this happen with the death of my brother," The Bolivian government,perfiaps fearing the strong Antonio wasn't putting his brother down with this sympathies that the people have for Inti and the guer­ statement, but rather following Inti's own words, re­ rillas, has been trying to dilute its bloody role with flecting his brother's sense of humility, common to the milk of human kindness now that Inti has been most of the revolutionaries. successfully disposed of. Minister of the Interior In Inti's message to the Tricontinental following Eufronio Padillaque, when he announced Inti's death, Che's death, in which he took up the task of defending said he did' so "with pain". The Bolivian regime has VENCEREtlDS the fallen leader's concepts of guerrilla struggle as offered to let Antonio go to La Paz to reclaim his "the most effective· and surest method of seizing brother's body, He has turned down the offer, saying, power," the new ELN chief spoke of his new role: "I won't go because my return would .allow the Bolivian "I do this without in the least considering myself government to assume a t humanitarian' guise". 'the immediate successor of Che Guevara: Being The following day (SepLll) when news of Inti's death Che's successor would be an undeservedly high was final, Antonio again spoke to the the revolutionary ,5RtGAOE honor for me. I am rather acting in my capacity as press: an accidental heir to the last and most valuable teach­ "The ELN, founded' by Comandante Ernesto Che ings of the greatest revolutionary genius of Latin Guevara, has suffered the harshest reverses in the America." revolutonary history of our time, in the death of its most couragious leader.s. "This is not by chance, for it shows that the men GUERRILLA WARFARE WILL NOT DIE who lead our movement have always been in the front The Venceremos Brigade has been reorganized. ~- Before the plan was for 300 people to cut cane in But the fact remains that Inti was generally ac­ line of fire and, on the other hand, that yankee im­ knOWledged as the new leader of the revolutionary perialism is putting all its resources into play in Cuba. Now the plan is for 600 to go. The people struggle in Bolivia, and just as they did when Che BoliVia, since they know itisthenervepoint where the going will be working with the Centennial Youth !:lied, many will jump to say that Inti's death marks greater part of the future of Latin AmerJca will be Column:-50,000 young Cuban volunteers. Those the end of guerrilla war in Latin America. They will decided. people who join the Brigade will be able to concretely claim further that this new death is evidence that "In its short life the ELN has accumulated great show their solidarity with the Cuban people and the experience, paid for very dearly. But it will finally guerrilla warfare is the wrong tactic for Latin fact that not all Americans aim to des'troy the Cuban America. But Inti refuted this himself in his mes­ lead to the victory.ofthe Bolivian people and, with th'eir -- victory, to that of the peoples of our suffering con­ revolution.. sage to the Tricontinental; referring to the setbacks, The deadline for applications has been extended to the many deaths, especially that of Che, he noted: tinent. October 28, 1969. The application itself has been "But these painful events, far from frightening us, "Inti became for some a watchword, for others a strengthen our revolutionary awareness, increase our legend, and for imperialism a nightmare. This was simplified. Write immediately to: Brigade, PO Box determination to fight for a just cause; make it so because his words and his actions were a challenge 643, Cathedral Station, New York 10025. .stauncher; and forge...new fighters and leaders, who to the stupid assertions that the death of Che sig­ will honor and pay homage to those who have already nified the defeat of the guerrilla struggle in Latin fallen. America. "Inti's death will make imperialism -- aped by its I.;e;.:t;••~.,~••;t.;••;.t.;••~••~..~.,:.t:.,~••~••:.t:.,~••:.t:••:t;••~...~. "Our single and final goal is the liberation of Latin 1,:;:.:;:t,:;:t,~.,:;:,t:;:":;:t,~u:;:tt~tt:;:tt~tt2,t:;:,,:;:":;:":;:"~·1 America.. ,We are convinced that the dream of Bo­ puppets in Latin America and, curiously, by the re­ livar and Che...will be attained through armed strug- visionists -- again repe'at this same phrase, But the PAGE 16 MOVEMENT NOVEMBER 1969 ethiopia .Iiberated Assab, far to the South on the Red Many people have heard of Ethiopia, LIBERAnON FRONT but few know that there is a large, well Sea, recently refused to pay taxes to developed, and successful national lib­ A few of the reports on the Eritrean the Addis Ababa collectors and said that eration movement fighting there. When Liberation Front say that it is Muslim their tax money had gone to the new the press talks of' Ethiopia, they talk led.Religious tensions are one aspect government. mostly about the Emperor, Haile Sel­ of Eritrea (40% Christian, 40% Muslim, In .th e cities, the people lead a'dual chewing gum they have managed to rip aissie, and see him as a great peace­ 20% animist) but the struggle for nat­ life. On the surface there is a feigned off from the post exchange at Kagnew­ maker, and one of the world's great ional liberation has succeded in uniting adoration for the Emperor, but under­ the post exchange at Kagnew Station, statesmen. In fact he has been makingwar .many of different religions,while re- neath there is loyalty to the Front. which is a large American military on the people of Ethiopia for years; ligious fears and prejudices have faded. Recently, there have been a series of "communications" base near the city of in fact he' is' one of the world's great By the time that Eritrea was declared destructive explosions and some hijack­ Asmara. butchers. a colony in 1962, the former governer ings ofEthiopian Airlines Boeing 707' s. In the rest of Ethiopia there is also The war in Ethiopia has gone almost of Eritrea, who is a Christian, had gone a plane was destroyed while on the resistance. The e-mporer's army has completely unreported, yet the few underground and today he is the Vice ground at an airport in Frankfort, Ger­ been forced to shoot and kill large crowds reports written recently describe the sit­ President of the Eritrean Liberation many, and at Karachi airport, it hap­ of students and to maintain a reign of uation as a fundamentally revolutionary Front. pened again. These acts are an effort terror across the countryside. Thous­ situation, that involves an unresponsive of the Eritrean Liberation Front to sands of student rebels have been jailed, oppressive ruling regime propped by demonstrate their strength, to bring many schools have been closed, and more foreign support, against a popular guer­ the world's attention to their struggle, demonstrations are expected in the rilla movement. and to hurt the profit and prestige of coming months. the Addis Ababa regime. Haile Selasiie recently visited the Un­ ited States, and was greeted with all the ERITREA PEOPLE'S WAR bullshit that the President, whoever he The guerrilla movement is based in may be, reserves for dictators. More Eritrea, which is the Northeastern por­ All of Ethiopia is poor and hungry U.S, aid, perhaps larger numbers of tion of what is called Ethiopia, and in­ aside from the ruling military clique. U.S. troops will no doubt be forth­ cludes all of the coastal area on the Only one person in 20 can read and coming, as the United States frantically Red Sea. Eritrea was an Italian colony write, per capita income is extremely seeks to bolster its decaying world during the 19th and 20th centuries, up to low. Medical care is for the most system of ojlpression. But meanwhile the World War 11. The inland section, which part non-existent, and food is scarce. Eritrean Liberation Front is waging was formerly known as Abysinnia, had Eritrea's 1.6 million people suffer most people's war with such wide popular been an Italian colony for onlyfiveyears of all, and recently natural disaster has support that it'appears likely, espec­ when the war ended. The Emperors of The regular forces of the Front range contributed to their misery. In the cities ially if their struggle is supported around inland Ethiopia always coveted Eritea's . from between 10,000 and 30,000 men of Eritrea, children of the poor run the world, that their resistance will seaports at Massawa and Assab, as well' and the Front now controls the through the streets trying to sell the be Victorious. as the milk and oil which several cities countryside of Eritrea. The Front has produce. But the Emperors historically succeeded in defeating or isolating the were never able to totaUy conquer Er- major part of the Ethiopian Army. An itrea. entire infantry division of 8000 men, After World War 11 and the defeat ofthe trained by the United States has been mo- Italians, the big powers who won, an<:\ thebilized, and two squadrons of American U,N., gave to Ethiopia what she had never warplanes have been trying unsuccess- been able to win by force; Eritrea. The fUlly to defeat the guerillas. United Nations formal arrangement was . The United States gives the imperial "'fllllzllI, f,o", led that Eritrea would have federal status, regime inAddis Ababa, renoWned for its that is independent, but within a national decadence and obscene extra,vagence, federation with . the inland regions. In more economic aid than it gives to any 1962 Ethiopia cancelled the federal sta- other African country. So called U.S. tus, and declared Eritrea an Imperial advisors are involved in the fighting, and Editors Note; The. struggle never stops. Herels what a brotperorganized while Colony. Since 1962 the Eritrean National the United States has admitted that as in the hospital withhepititus~ Liberation Front has waged aprotracted early as 1965 a U S. helicopter, manned . guerrilla struggle against Haile Selas- by U;S~ pilots, was shot down ·while sie's regime in Addis Ababa. In 1962 flying a reconaissance miSsion against· the Emperor decreed that Eritrea would the guerrillas. Yet. the people in' Eri~ lose its flag, its parliament, and every trea look to the Front as their govern- other semblance or symbol of indepen- ment, and the guerillas move through .HEPITITS SIx ON STRIKE HEPITITIS SIX ON STRIKE HEPITITIS SIX ON STRIKE dence. . a countryside which once was known for All shops' on Eritrea are required to barbaric and fierce tribesman and war- display the Emperor's portrait. Green riors who were hostile to outsiders, but sweaters are forbidden because green which now welcomes,feeds, and enter- TO; Mafioso Alioto and his running dog lackies of San Francisco - imperialist is the national color of Eritrea. Eri- tains the guerillas. The. fierceness re- center of the West... . trea's native languages, among them mains, but many of the warrior tribes- Tigre and Tigrinja, are prohibited, and men, known as Shiftas, Join the Liber- ~ Whereas the inmates of the hep ward of Laguna Honda hospital have been con­ Amharic, which is the language of the ation . Front, and are transformed into sistently deni~ proper' medical care and attention as listed below - we declare Emperor's tribe, is th e only official disciplined guerilla soldiers. a generalstrikeuntU such conditions are rectified. language. In 1962 the Eritrean civil The. front has set up five revolu- service was virtually liquidated. The tionary districts in which its own cadre We demand food of quality and quantity fit for the consumption of human beings Ethiopian military and secret service serve the needs and help solve the --we get three lousy cOld' meal!! supplemented by peanut butter, jelly and stale have replaced. the Eritrean police, and civil disputes of the people. In the bread--tbis they call their high protein diet for hep patients. The same lousy mass arrests and tight surveillance have Western and central regions of Erit- Shit that all patients are forced to eat. led to the establishment of detention rea, the government is visible: courts, camps throughout the countryside, which town meeting,. and mutual aid societies We demand proper sanitation and health supplies. OUr bedding is chaAlred only once are known euphemistically as "forti- go abouttheirwork convened under trees a week (one patient was forced. to sl,eep ·on blood-soaked sheetsUDtil.b1s changti1g fled hamlets". Even the sheiks around the city of day came up). There are never clean towels, pajama tops, ice water, nor health supplies. Gener3J. Cleanliness suffer»·becausddI. the overloadwork conditions forced t*************************************************······· on the employees. We demand proper medical aid and attention. Patients are denied medicines when fil·$ they need them and forced tospendhours suffering until the • schedUIecP' times. Some Switcll ,. Fi,IIt supplies cannot be obtained at all. .

Visiting hours are limited fro m 2-4 pm - thus denying the majority of our San Francisco (LNS) - American Gl's two ex-Marine NLF advisorswere killed' vast friends and relatives, all working people, the right visit us. are joining the military forces of the last April in a patrol skirmish near Phu to . Provisional Revolutionary Government. .Bat. Located north-east of Khe Sanh, Phu (PRG) Recent figures quoted in the San Bai i~ the largest US Marine base near OUr reasons for being here are to obtain proper medical and health attention so we can return our jobs and help provide for our !am111es - yet our basic right to Francisco Chronicle show desertions in the DMZ: it is an extremely important to the field are running at the rate of ten communications base. The'Marine Corps proper medical aid is being denied, denied becausewe come from poor and working a day. was able to identify the two" traitors" but class fam1lles and must rely on state medical services and welfare, which is Those deserters who would rather would not release their names. inadequate for human survival. If we were rich capitalists or their well-paid switchAND fight join up with the PRG, Some GIs who desert in the field do not lackies. we coUId afford to bUy proper medical aid - just like the rich Can afford to bringing with them detailed knowledge of want to join the liberation forces, and buy anything they want in this society - but we're poor and working class, and as how to work American equipment and merely roam the countryside trying not such are doomed to fight intheir imperialistwars and pay their taxes•••BASTA YA... how American units operate. There have to get caught. The PRG often nelps such been reports of misdirected artillery persons find housing and food, expecting Mafioso Alioto oinked by Friday on a state hospital inspection tour and alter and helicopter fire in the Mekong Delta nothing in return. sticking his snout in the door',he oinked ·OK, passit." We the inmates say NO _ because deserters used stolen radios to According to a June report in the Ok­ ON STRIKE, SHUT IT DOWN. We unite with all poor and working people of the cut in on Army frequencies. inawa Morning Star Journal, there are world in our common struggle against US Imperialism and its avaricious bus­ The PRG derives the greatest benefit· at least 3,000 AWOL Gl's hiding out in inessmen, its demogogic politicians, and its fascist pig cops. from the intelligence reports these GIs Saigon alone. Many recently returned receive, according to SOLIDARITY, a San Vietnamese veterans have reported a POWER TO THE PEOPLE Francisco newsletter run by eX-GIs.' As higher estimate to SOLIDARITY editor long as two years ago the US-Saigon Fred Chard...they figure 5,000 to be FREE HUEY P. NEWTON command was astounded that the National a more realistic number. FREE BOBBY SEALE Liberation Front would know of B-52 For deserters wishing to leave Viet­ FREE LOS SIETE strikes more than 24 hours in advance. It nam, the PRG offers assistance in reach­ FREE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS confused them because strike timeswere ing countries which do not recognize the never diVUlged to the Saigon troops. The tradition of US service deserters, in­ FREE THE HEPITITIS SIX NLF also found out about attacks flown cluding Sweden, Japan, Cambodia and from Okinawa, Thailand and Guam. Thailand. An estimated 300-500 desert­ The majority of the deserters choose ers have received such assistance from Send high-protein food, bedding, contributions and good vibes to Ward M-6 to stay in the rear areas so that they will the PRG to date. Laguna Honda HOliPital, 731-9993 not have to fight their countrymen. But

NOVEM.I:S~R 1969 MOVEMENT' PAGE 17 This political and tactical confustion was most • • evident in our attempts to organize youth. Working class organizing was less confused because most of the local collectives relating to the working class I. I. c. put out their own literature relating the IIC bBS SIETE actions to concrete struggles in the plants. If CONTINUED FROM PAGE 3 educational material directed toward youth had had CONTINUED FROM PAGE 12 a basis in concrete struggles or had fit into a long­ education. That's not to say that we have stopped, We did mass work through leafleting, talking to er range strategy, the confusion and diffuseness because there are a few books here we can get people and participating in struggles. OUtreach might have been overcome. that are pretty good that relate to us, that can and community work centered around city needs and For example, in Berkeley, we could have related broaden our ideology. the PG&E rate increase hearings. SDS worked with the IIC to the People's Park issue (still very much the Research Organizing Committee in S.F. to raise alive). One of the reasons we failed to tie the IIC MARIO: It's not just a matter of books. There's alot the issue of the attempt to turn S. F. into the "Wall demonstrations into a long range program or we can learn from the people here - the other pris­ street of the West~ by increasing taxes, forced strategy was because we had no strategy. The region oners and the guards themselves. evictions and moving people out of the city to had formed specifically around the IIC plans, so We've been studying the oppressor and their tools, make room for big office buildings and apartments tactics for the IIC became elevated to strategy. you know, the guards. From the time we came here, for these working in them. Industry is being moved 'In the frenzy of demonstration mobilization, we had they were offering us the gas every time they passed to Uie suburbs and the Third World communitiesare no time to seriously discuss long range perspectives. us, but now they sometimes talk to us. We kind of being pressed out of the city. ( The 400,000 or so posters and literature reflected rap to them -I have with some of them -and you see Pacific Gas and Electric was holding rate increase the lack of political and tactical focus. They were more how this system has brainwashed their ways. hearings at the same time. People were turned on to full of demands and a constantly changing schedule Some of our leaders say you must not fraternize with SDS, when they found us relating directly to their of actions for the week. Rather than simple at­ the enemy, but you haveto learn aboutthe enemy. You needs. The political focus for this work was the tractive material likePantherposters with a slogan have to know where he stands. You have to know racism of PG&E , the exclusion of non-whites from and acall , posters and literature for the IIC were him to know where his weak points are to attack him. recent training classes, the corporate control of cluttered and confusing. This confusion was re­ We have also learned from the inmates here. We PG&E, its profiting off the Vietnamese war and flected by SDS peoplewho didn't know the week before talk to the white inmates, we talk to the black the IIC The response was encouraging for further which actions were priorities and when and, where all inmates, to everybody. We have a lot in common ­ projects of ·this kind around taxes and community of the actions .were coming off. we're all locked up .. needs. You have these so-called jailhouse lawyers. The IIC. served as a political focus and follow KICK THE ASS OF THE RULING CLASS There's one right next door to us and this man has up on the factory organizing that had been going a lot of knowledge - he's been to Cuba. We learn on during the summer. SDS had taken an active Many of the people who showed up-Monday were a lot from him. He's white, but we have all these role in strikes against the J,I.Case Farm Mach­ from Berkeley and San Francisco. Theywerebattle things in common. Like, I don't see no colors no inery Company, Dow Chemical in Pitsburgh (Calif­ tested and had long experience fighting pigs; they had more, I see and feel oppression, but I can't see ornia) and Fritzi's (a garment factory that controls all faced the tac squad several times. Few felt like th e colors. Before I did. Before I was from El sweatshops in San Francisco). We also did educa­ coming out to be surrounded by pigs, cameras and Salvador and everything else was different. But tional work at canneries and plants in San Jose, guns, and tearing ass right under the Man's highly after you're here a while, this color thing fades Kaiser Hospitals, Longshore, etc. .mobilized forces. A mass line calling for 'storming away. The last SDS Regional Office and organization fell the Fairmont when everyone knew it couldn't happen apart two years ago due to lack of interest and with such small forces would be suicidal So we POLITICAL PRISONERS participation. Since that time only local chapters made a collective decision at the Park not to parade and ad hoc organizations have pulled together to In the streets or attack the pigs. TONY: Many of us have learned about political pull off actioIfs like stop the Draft Week and the But Thursday night taught a lesson on confront­ prisoners. The other day I was reading that the April 3rd Movement in Stanford against the SRI. ation. After we called for stopping the conference SF State College cases were coming up to court. SDS, in fact, has never been the initiator or leader on Monday, the pigs mobilized and had the area JUdge Kennedy said that these are not political of any major action on the Bay Area. completely surrounded. After 3 days of peacefUl cases, because they were being tried not for their A regional conference in Richmond at the be­ action, the pigs expectednothing and were completely way of thinking but for their actions. ginning of August brought together 500 peopple ill-prepared for people running through the streets But after talking to all the inmates, you begin including several working class collectives, the Thursday night breakingwindows and chanting. There to realize that the term "political prisoner" is MOVEMENT, Newsreel, LEVIATHAN , and local were about 30 busts but peoples' spirits were lifted a very broad term that includes a lot of people. chapters to form a Northern California Region with some action against the pigs. They were thrown There are people here who are branded as criminals of Sl;)S. From the inception the perspective was completely off guard and didn't catch up to the because they have robbed something, but when you to use the IIC to co-ordinate existingchapters, make crowd until we had made it about.6 or 7 blocks. The realize they have robbed to survive and then later new contacts through mass work, help weaker chap­ element of surprise, although the action was spon­ on are just made statistics by the system - you ters expand and build a strong region which could taneous and unprepared, turned the tactics back to realize they, in a sense, are political prisoners move in a smooth and functional way. the war of the flea; to hitting in the weakest spot at too. They're tried because of those actions and The building of a regional network and organ­ the ril!'ht timp-. if those actions have anything to do with the power ization was one of the most positive aspects of In the Bay Area, demonstrations have tended structure, then they're political prisoners too. organizing for the IIC. The IIC served ~ a concrete to focus on individuals like Nixon, Johns0l}, or The whole jail, we're all political prisoners, one organizing project which raised the level of under ­ Dean Risk. This was the first time we made an way or another. They all have gone against the standing of the rUling class and its policies and attempt to directly identify the enemy as the im­ power structure, in one way or another. And when brought new people into SDS who wanted to do perialist rUling class. The IIC provided a strategy you're dealing with the power structure, you're something to change this system. Contacts were which raised the issue of the ruling class beyond dealing with the political system. I see this ­ made with junior colleges and high schools where day to day struggles and moved peopl e to think in they have put us behind bars, because of this so­ the movement has been small or non-existent.Demon­ terms of a common fight against a common op­ called crime. But they haven't realized that they're strations do not make an offensive by themselves pressor. teaching us a lot in here. We've seen how all those but by tying the IIC to on-going work the region The IIC was used to begin to build an understanding . pigs react to us. We hear all those remarks and by began to take shape and expand. of imperialism as a unified system ofoppression and their remarks, we see their mentality. The Man Chapters which are traditionally inactive or func­ exploitation both at home and abroad. We stressed has no kind of mentality whatsoever. tioning on a low level during the summer were acti­ ihat the success of our struggle is tied to that of vated..They got out to rap to new people about the the struggles of the Third World, within and without MARIO: The system is the cause of the crime movement, pass out leaflets and build contacts with the US. rate. We've learned from Cuba and China how their other organizations with politics which focused on revolution has solved so many problems - through the ruling class and its policies of racism and WORKING CLASS OUTREACH teaching the people. There's hardly any illiteracy. imperialism. Schools were not in session, so a lot There's no illiteracy in Cuba. Like in here, alot of of work was done arounq factories and in the com mun­ these people see all these things and are ready to do· something about it. But we're at an early ity... The chapters activated over the summer will The organizing done among the working class was serve as strong groups for co-ordinated offensives stage in this country. We have to make a lot more perhaps the most positive aspect of the IIC. We used ., people see. during the coming ~chool year. the IIC to follow up labor contacts made in past We look at this country like an octopus. It's strikes at Standard Oil in Richmond, the candy here that the struggle has to be carried on the THIRD WORLD GROUPS workers strike in Oakland, Bell Telephone workers ., most. In countries like Vietnam and Bolivia, they're in S. F., the Dow strike in Pittsburg (California), striking at one arm - but here iswherethe head of .A coalition of white radical and Thir.d World and the J.I. Case Farm Machinery Co. in San Leandro organizations worked on the. actions, around the all the oppression is. Once we cut the head off, the (in .this strike leaflets were passed out to all the arms won't be doing any harm. Lationo Walkout and the IIC. SDS worked closely plants in the whole city industrial park - this was with Los Siete de la Raza, the Asian-American repeated for the IIC). In addion we picked out several MOVEMEN'T: Is there anything else you want to say? Political Alliance, the Chinatown-based Red Guard, .large plants in specific areas in the Bay Area the Haight Commune, Women's Liberation groups for leafletting. We paid special attention to plants NELSON: We want to thank the people for,g.iving us and the newly formed High School Student Union. .where there were already contacts or SDS people The organizations involved actively participated in a their support and helping in our liberation. working or where strikes were coming up in the POWER TO THE PEOPLE. steering committee which co:'ordinated the activ­ next 6 to 9 months. We leafletted theaters where ities of all the groups involved. It set up a legal "progressive" movies were playing. We leafletted defense network and medical aid groups. The coal­ BEBE: We used to be on A5 and there was this pig with fake money with a big picture of a pig in the who just got back from Vietnam. One day he iton worked smoothly and had almost complete middle and information about the IIC on the back. agreement around political strategy and issues for just walked by and told me, ·what is your people Inseveral places we got union support,and they gonna do when you get gassed?" Well, you know, the actions. drew up and distributed their own leaflets. The differences arose over tactics when SDS it kind of shocked me, so I told him, • Well, you was criticized as adven.turistic to want to march We learned essentially two things from factory know, the same thing you'll be doing when your to the Fairmont when fewer than expected people leafletting. First, factories were not leafletted indis­ house is burning.~ POWER TO THE PEOPLE ,showed up for the rally in Washington Square. criminately. Several ofthe largest companies partic­ ipating in the IIC were singled out where SDS people' !lARD LESSONS were working or where there was advance work done, mainly strike support. Every attempt was made to After the letdown Monday when only about 1/3 bring workers to regional labor committee meetings stration. With a lot of work there was little acutal to 1/4 of the projected people showed up, a lot and to involve them in the fall actions, worker participation ( the whole strike committee of weaknesses were revealed. Both politically and Second, a single leaflet for mass distribution is from one strike showed up on Thursday night). tactically, there was a smorgasboard mentality: seriously inadequate. A series of leaflets are needed There seems to be a contradiction here but it is "here are our demands and a list of actions: beginning with a concrete analysis of corporate not as great as it may appear. Mobilization of take your pick~. Political demands were raised structure of the place being leafletted (profits, workers was planned for Thursday and no work to include occupation forces out of Vietnam, and the SUbsidiaries, foreign holdings and working con­ was done to mobilize for Monday. The level of ghetto, support for the NLF and PRG, liberation for ditions) raising the anti-imperialist, anti-racist discontent and strikes and SDS work is just be­ Black and Third World Peoples in the US, free. all demands of the IIC and finally a leaflet motivating ginning - the IIC was a beginning and there 'was political prisoners, end the war-tax, tax the corp­ and showing the importance of coming to the demo­ no discouragement. The fact thatany working class orations, stop the oppression and exploitation of stration to protest the company's policies and people showed up Thursday night was a positive women and end the raping of the land for profit. ruling class oppression. sign. This does not mean that the student work To go with this set of political demands was five We got the best response to our leaflets and will take second place or be abandoned. But it days chucked fUll ofdemonstrations. Criticism of this raps about IIC from white hip workers and from does mean that the response was enthusiastic and political and tactical approach was summed up in Black and' Brown workers. The only apathy or shows a positive direction for more work in this biting satire by one of the local underground pres­ rejection came from women and older workers. area. ses with a cartoon calling for the protesting of In. some places there was a lot of enthusiasm but By Don Monkerud "absolutely everything~ at "absolutely everytime~. the workers wound up not coming to the demon- Northern Calif. SDS, Regional Staff PAGE 18 MOVEMENT NOVEMBER 1969 '" latinos walkout MUNI Richmond California. The home of Standard Oil. Black, brown, CONTINueo FROM PAG.E 7 and working whites. A racist school· board, and no money for the wehad gone down to check on the eligibility list for schools. the International convention. He failed to say we were september 16th was the date set for Ii hassled Chicano parents who came to get dues paying members of the local. The pigs came and nationwide walkout of chicano youth at their children. That only made the par­ heard our side of the story and they had to leave. The National Chicano Youth Conference ents more angry. The parents organized Airriess hasn' t attended a union meeting since then. held in Denver last March. That date, in and succeeded in having all the charges the Bay Area, coincided with a wide dropped, and in getting all students who DUCHO: One month at the union meeting we took a series of demonstrations at the Inter­ suspended from school back in. camera and a tape recorder. At the.next meeting rules nation Industrialists Conference in San In organizing the action in Richmond, were announced for the first.timebanning tape re­ Francisco. The target of the Richmond reliance was placed on the masses of corders and cameras. And there were other similar demonstrations was Safeway stores, students. Students, not non- stUdents, rules designed at the last minute and forced down which was prominently represented at wrote the leaflets, determined the nature· the throats of the membership, including a rule that the Conference, which continues to sell of the demonstration. Being familiar with says no literature or materials can be disseminated California grapes and has been hit by other students and. the schools, they at the union hall. We see this directed at the caucus, many boycotts, and rips off everyone. had to take the leading role. Not all and indicating its effectiveness, trying to hinder the. In Richmond, several hundred high aspects of the demonstration were per­ education we've been carrying out. But we don't find school, junior high: and elementrary fect, but there would have been no it as being adequate to stop us from what we have to school strudents walked out. At one action except for the leading role of do. Whether or not they say we can bring literature junior high the administration tried to many students. or camera is one thing. Whether we'll stop doing it keep students in by locking all the gates. And the leading role played by women. is another. By that time, large numbers of students Brown women, at several key points in were already in the streets, and when the demonstration pushed ahead· and JOSE: Our personal experiences with workers are they got to that junior high, students acted as the vanguard. At one school, a continuous, day to day thing. And we are engaged from inside would run out, and climb several hundred students were milling in struggle with brothers who have adjacent ideas over the fence to join the ones outside. around in the schoolyard undecided about with the Black caucus, and we sometimes have Jailbreak. whether to walk out a gate flanked by contradictions on the methods with which to deal with At one school, one girl had gotten left deans and teachers taking names. It was problems. behind and ·didn't know how to catch up, the women who broke the indecision, who so she called her mother, who came and walked defiantly through, and the rest DUCHO: There's been quite a bit of work done and we picked her up to drive her to the demon- . soon followed. When there was a brief have made some progress, but we still have a long stration. There were many Chicanos argument and tussle at the door of the way to go. Power to the People. among the marchers, but also many SliIeway tbat was entered, it was the black and white allies. They marched", women who knocked the manager aside with raised fists down to a local Safe­ and led the rest of the student s to the -- ·way. Seeing few policemen on the streets grapes. they rushed into the Safeway, threw all The ideathatthis was part of a planned the grapes on the floor and stomped all nationwide action helped bring the reality NEW BULLETIN over them. The action went off smooth­ of a brown liberation movement home to ly and the march continued. many students. By tying in Safeway, the ~What are the alternatives to the growing ideological The march passed another high school, boycott, and the meeting ofthe imperial­ fragmentation in the New Left? Can the white work­ gaining strength, and then headed for an­ ists, the enemy was well defined. By I ing class be mobilized to fight for working class inter­ other Safeway. When themarchwasafew making Safeway, as a local arm of im­ ests? Are increasing black demands at the root of, blocks away from the store, pigs moved perialism, the target, there was support in and started bustingChicano students. from large numbers of.black and white black-white worker alienation? Do all white workers Many students were busted on so-called kids. This unity was a big step in enjoy the "white privilege"? Is all Nationalism re­ truancy raps. others managed to get schools that last spring were the scene actionary? away, and rr.ade it to the Safeway, where of heavy racial fighting. they found that the manager had locked Students grasped the situation, and The Ad Hoc Committee for a Marxist-Leninist Party, the store. For a time pigs continued began learning how to move in a dis­ USA, explores these and other questions in the cruising, busting any brown youth they ciplined way against the enemy. And current issue of Ad Hoc Bulletin (Marxist-Leninist). could, including one Chicano who was they're on the move. riding in a car with a city official ob­ Get your copy by enclosing 25ti to Ad Hoc Commit-, serving the arrests. tee for a Marxist-Leninist Party, USA, Box 6193, Later, at the police station the pigs by Doug Monica Chicago, Illinois, 60680, or Box 1035, Church Street Station, New York, New York, 10008. l ~. ._--I I~e·n in CONTINUED FROM PAGE 15 clericalism, socialism and all other wares in demand. A a1 acts restricted to a very short time and to a very small newspaper becomes corrupted into a public pimp, into a area. It is absolutely natural and inevitable that the up­ •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• means of corrupting·the masses, of pandering to the low iIi~ rising should assume the higher and more complex form of a • stincts of the mob, and so on and so forth. Social-Democracy prolonged civil war embracing the whole country, i.e., an • knows of no universal methods of struggle, such as would armed struggle between two sections of the people. Such a ·: -- shut off the proletariat by a Chinese wall from the strata war cannot be conceived otherwise than as a series of a .... standing slightly above or slightly below it; At different few big engagements at comparatively long intervals and a 31:. periods Social-Democracy applies different methods, al­ large number of small encounters during these intervals• 0 -It) ways qualifying the choice of them by strictly defined ideo­ That being so-and it is undoubtedly so-the Social-Demo­ .... C'1• logical and organisational conditions.* crats must absolutely make it their duty to create organisa­ ~ tions best adapted to lead the masses in these big engage­ :IE ments and, as far as possible, in these small encounters as 1&.1 -f-4 IV well. In a period when the class struggle has become accep.­ z .. ..:> ~ I .1 N- tuated to the point of civil war, Social-Democrats must make :e The forms of struggle in the Russian revolution are dis­ it their duty not only to participate but also to play the lead­ 0 ~ tinguished by their colossal variety compared with .the bour­ ing role in this civil war. The Social-Democrats must train > geois revolutions in Europe. Kautsky partly foretold this and prepare theil' organisations to be really able to act as :IE 0 in 1902 when he said that the future revolution (with the a belligerent side which does not miss a single opportunity exception perhaps of Russia, he added) might be not so much .of inflicting damage on the enemy's forces. :e III ~ t- a struggle of the peopl!3 against the government as a struggle This is a difficult task, there is no denying. It cannot be 1&.1 ~ between two sections of the people. In Russia we undoubtedly accomplished at once. Just as the whole people are being re­ 0: .:1: ... -f-4 lr. II In see a wider development of this latter struggle than in the trained and are learning to fight in the course of the civil s...... o _~ bourgeois revolutions in the West. The enemies of our revo­ war, so our organisations must be trained, must be recon­ .... lution among the people are few in number, but as the strug­ structed in conformity with the lessons of experience to be en II) gle grows more acute they become more and more organised equal to this task. QI 0 C) =' c:l. and receive the support of the reactionary strata of the bour­ We have not the slightest intention of foisting on prac­ enX geoisie. It is therefore absolutely natural and inevitable tical workers any artific~al form of struggle, or even of decid­ .•en S ... N_ that in such a period, a period of nation-wide political ing from our armchair what pal't any particular form of strikes, an uprising cannot assume the old form of individu- guerrilla warfare should play in the general course of the • .LI.I .... 0 civil war in Russia. We al'e far from the thought of regard­ .. .. l< v QI ~ - • The Bolshevik Social-Democrats are often accused of a frivolous ing a concrete assessment of particular guerrilla act ions as m e to: passion for guerrilla actions. It would therefore not be amiss to recall indicative of a trend in Social-Democracy. But we do regard - Z~ that in the draft resolution on guerrilla actions (Partiiniye Izvestia, it as our duty to help as far as possible to arrive at a correct No.2, and Lenin's report on the Congress) the section of the Bolsheviks who defend guerri lla actions suggested the following conditions for their theoretical assessment of the new forms of struggle engen­ recognition: "expropriations" of private property were not to be per­ dered by practical life. We do regard it as our duty relent­ iI II t5! III mi tted under any circumstances; "expropriations" of government prop­ lessly to combat stereotypes and prejudices which hamper III II: erty were not to be recommended but only allowed, provided that they the class-conscious workers in correctly presenting a new en : ~I; were controlled by the Party and lheir proceeds used for the needs of and difficult problem and in correctly approaching its t:a ~ an uprising. Guerrilla acts in the form of terrorism were to be recom­ =II u mended against brulal government officials and active members of solution. ::t ~ • - the Black Hundreds, but on condition that 1) the sentiments of the :(1) masses be taken into account; 2) the conditions of the working·class Pro/elary, No.5, Published according- to movement in the given locality be reckoned with, and 3) care be September 30. 1906 tbe Prolelary text • taken that the forces or the proletariat should not be frittered away. ••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• The practical difference between Ulis draft and the resolution which was adopted atlhe Unily Congress lies exclusively in the fact that "expropriations" of government property are not allowed.

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