Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for the 1946 film adaptation of James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice.
This is the way Peter Paul Markin told me the story one night many years ago when we were, well, let's leave it at feeling no pain. Who he first heard it from I don't remember but here it is as best as I could take it down in my notebook at the time:
Yah, sometimes, and maybe more than sometimes, a frail, a frill, a twist, a dame, oh hell, let’s cut out the goofy stuff and just call her a woman and be done with it, will tie a guy’s insides up in knots so bad he doesn’t know what is what. Tie a guy up so bad he will go to the chair without a murmur, the electric chair for those not in the know or those not wound up in the love game with a big old knot very tightly squeezing him. That is he will not murmur if there is such a merciful chair in his locale, otherwise whatever way they cut the life out of a guy who has been so twisted up he couldn’t think straight enough to tie his own shoes, or hers.
Here’s the funny part and you know as well as I do that I do not mean funny, laughing funny, the guy will go to his great big reward smiling, okay half-smiling, just to have been around that frail, frill, twist. dame, oh hell, you know what I mean. Around her slightly shy, sly, come hither scents, around her, well, just around her. Or maybe just to be done with it, done with the speculation, the knots and all, six-two-and even he would go back for more, plenty more, and still have that smile, ah, half-smile as they lead him away. Yah, guys just like Frank.
Frank Jackman had it bad. [But you might as well fill in future signatures, the Peter Paul Markins, the Joshua Lawrence Breslins, and every corner boy who ever kicked his heels against some drugstore store front wall, name your name, just kids, mere boys, when they started getting twisted up in knots, girl knots, and a million, more or less, other guys too, just as easily as Frank, real easy]. Yah, Frank had it bad as a man could have from the minute Miss Cora walked through that café door from the back of the house, the door that separated the living quarters from the café, a cup of joe in her hand. Just an off-hand plain plank door, cheaply made and amateurishly hinged, that spoke of no returns.
She breezed, Frank thought later when he tried to explain it, explain everything that had happened and how to anyone who would listen, trade winds breezed in although this was the wrong coast for that, in her white summer frilly V-neck buttoned cotton blouse, white short shorts, tennis or beach ready, maybe just ready for whatever came along, with convenience pockets for a woman’s this-and-that, and showing plenty of well-turned, lightly-tanned bare leg, long legs at first glance, and the then de rigueur bandana holding back her hair, also white, the bandana that is. Yah, she came out of that crooked cheapjack door like some ill-favored Pacific wind now that he had the coast right, some Japan Current ready, ready for the next guy out. Jesus.
I might as well tell you, just like he told it to me, incessantly told it to me like I was some father-confessor, and maybe I was, before he moved on, it didn’t have to finish up like the way it did. Or start that way either, for that matter. The way it did play out. Not at all. No way. He could have just turned around anytime he said but I just took that as so much wind talking, or maybe some too late regret. Sure there are always choices, for some people. Unless you had some Catholic/Calvinist/Shiva whirl pre-destination Mandela wheel working your fates, working your fates into damn overdrive like our boy Frank.
Listen up a little and see if Frank was just blowing smoke, or something. He was just a half-hobo, maybe less, bumming around and stumbling up and down the West Coast, too itchy to settle down after four years of hard World War II Pacific battle fights on bloody atolls, on bloody coral reefs, and knee-deep bloody islands with names even he couldn’t remember, or want to remember after Cora came on the horizon. He was just stumbling, like he said, from one half-ass mechanic’s job (a skill he had picked in the Marines) in some flop garage here, another city day laborer’s job shoveling something there, and picking fruits, hot sun fruits, maybe vegetables depending on the crop rotation, like some bracero whenever things got really tough, or the hobo jungle welcome ran out, ran out with the running out of wines and stubbed cigarette butts. He mentioned something about freight yard tramp knives, and cuts and wounds. Tough, no holds barred stuff, once tramp, bum, hobo solidarities broke down, and that easy and often. Frank just kind of flashed that part of the story because he was in a hurry for me to get it straight about him and Cora and the hobo jungle stuff was just stuff, and so much train smoke and maybe a bad dream.
Hell, the way he was going, after some bracero fruit days with some bad hombre bosses standing over his sweat, the “skids” in Los Angeles, down by the tar pits and just off the old Southern Pacific line, were looking good, a good rest up. Real good after fourteen days running in some Imperial Valley fruit fields so he started heading south, south by the sea somewhere near Paseo Robles to catch some ocean sniff, and have himself washed clean by loud ocean sounds so he didn’t have to listen to the sounds coming from his head about getting off the road.
Here is where luck is kind of funny though, and maybe this is a place where it is laughing funny, because, for once, he had a few bucks, a few bracero fruit bucks, stuck in his socks. He was hungry, maybe not really food hungry, but that would do at the time for a reason, and once he hit the coast highway this Bayview Diner was staring him right in the face after the last truck ride had let him off a few hundred yards up the road. Some fugitive barbecued beef smell, or maybe strong onions getting a workout over some griddled stove top, reached him and turned him away from the gas station fill-up counter where he had planned, carefully planning to husband his dough to make the city of angels, to just fill up with a Coke and moon pie. But that smell got the better of him. So he walked into that Bayview Diner, walked in with his eyes wide open. And then she walked through the damn door.
She may have been just another blonde, a very blonde frail, just serving them off the arm in some seaside hash joint as he found out later, but from second one when his eyes eyed her she was nothing but, well nothing but, a femme fatale. Frank femme fatale, fatal. Of course between eyeing, pillow-talk dreaming, and scheming up some “come on” line once she had her hooks into him, which was about thirty seconds after he laid eyes on her, he forgot, foolishly forgot, rule number one of the road, or even of being a man in go-go post-war America.
What he should have asked, and had in the past when he wasn’t this dame-addled, was a dish like this doing serving them off the arm in some rundown roadside café out in pacific coast Podunk when she could be sunning herself in some be-bop daddy paid-up hillside bungalow or scratching some other dame’s eyes out to get a plum role in a B Hollywood film courtesy of some lonely rich producer. Never for a minute, not even during those thirty seconds that he wasn’t hooked did he figure, like some cagey guy would figure, that she had a story hanging behind that bandana hair.
And she did. Story number one was the “serve them off the platter” hubby short-ordering behind the grill in that tramp cafe. The guy who, to save dough, bought some wood down at the lumber yard and put up that crooked door that she had come through on first sight and who spent half his waking hours trying to figure how to short-change somebody, including his Cora. Story number two, and go figure, said hubby didn’t care one way or the other about what she did, or didn’t do, as long as he had her around as a trophy to show the boys on card-playing in the back of the diner living rooms and Kiwanis drunk as a skunk nights. Story number three was that she had many round-heeled down-at- the-heels stories too long to tell Frank before hubby came along to pick her out of some Los Angles arroyo gutter. Story number four, the one that would in the end sent our boy Frankie smiling, sorry half-smiling, to his fate was she hated hubby, hell-broth murder hated her husband, and would be “grateful” in the right way to some guy who had the chutzpah to take her out of this misery. But those stories all came later, later when she didn’t need to use those hooks she had in him, didn’t need to use them at all.
Peter Paul Markin Interlude One: “I swear, I swear on seven sealed bibles that I yelled, yelled from some womblike place, at the screen once I saw her coming through that door for him, for Frank, to get the hell out of there at that moment. This dame was poison, no question. Frank stop looking at those long paid for legs and languid rented eyes for a minute and get the hell out of there to some safe hobo jungle. Hell, just walk out the diner, café or whatever it is door, run if you have too, get your hitchhike great blue-pink American West thumb out and head for it. There’s a hobo jungle just down the road near Santa Monica, get going, and tonight grab some stolid, fetid stews, and peace.”
But here is where fate works against some guys, hell, most guys. She turned around to do some dish rack thing or other with her lipstick-smeared coffee cup and then, slowly, turned back to look at Frank with those languid eyes, what color who knows, it was the look not the color that doomed Frank and asked in a soft, kittenish voice “Got a cigarette for a fresh out girl?” And wouldn’t you know, wouldn’t you just know, that Frank, “flush” with bracero dough had bought a fresh deck of Luckies at the cigarette machine out at that filling station just adjacent to the diner and they were sitting right in his left shirt pocket for the entire world to see. For her to see. And wouldn’t you know too that Frank could see plain as day, plain as a man could see if he wanted to see, that bulging out of one of the convenience pockets of those long-legged white short shorts was the sharply-etched outline of a package of cigarettes. Yah, still he plucked a cigarette into her waiting lips, kind of gently, gently for rough-edged Frank, lit her up, and dated her up with his eyes. Gone, long-gone daddy gone, except for dreams, and that final half-smile.
Peter Paul Markin Interlude Two: “I screamed again, some vapid man-child scream, some kicking at the womb thump too, but do you think Frank would listen, no not our boy. You don’t need to know all the details if you are over twenty-one, hell over twelve and can keep a secret. She used her sex every way she could, and a few ways that Frank, not unfamiliar with the world’s whorehouses in lonely ports-of-call, was kind of shocked at, but only shocked. He was hooked, hook, line and sinker. Frank knew, knew what she was, knew what she wanted, and knew what he wanted so there was no crying there.”
Here is what is strange, and while I am writing this even I think it is strange. She told Frank her whole life’s story, the too familiar father crawling up into her barely teenage bed, the run-aways, returns, girls’ JD homes, some more streets, a few whorehouse tricks, some street tricks, a little luck with a Hollywood producer until his wife, who controlled the dough, put a stop to it, some drugs, some L.A. gutters, and then a couple of years back some refuge from those mean streets via husband Manny’s Bayview Diner.
Even with all of that Frank still believed, believed somewhere from deep in his recessed mind, somewhere in his Oklahoma kid mud shack mind, that Cora was virginal. Some Madonna of the streets. Toward the end it was her scent, some slightly lilac scent, some lilac scent that combined with steamed vegetable sweat combined with sexual animal sweat combined with ancient Lydia MacAdams' bath soap fresh junior high school crush sweat drove him over the edge. Drove him to that smiling chair.
He had to play with fire, and play with it to the end. Christ, just like his whole young stupid gummed up life he had to play with fire. And from that minute, the lit cigarette minute, although really from the minute that Frank saw those long legs protruding from those white shorts Manny was done for.
And once Frank had sealed his fate (and hers too) on that midnight roaring rock sandy beach night when the ocean depths smashing against the shore drowned out the sound of their passion everybody from Monterrey to Santa Monica knew he was done for, or said they knew the score after the fact. Everybody who came within a mile of the Bayview Diner anyway. Everybody except Manny and maybe somewhere in his cheap jack little heart he too knew he was done for when Cora, in her own sensible Cora way, persuaded him that he needed an A-One grease monkey to run the filling station.
The way Frank told it even I knew, knew that everybody had to have figured things out. Any itinerant trucker who went out of his way to take the Coast highway with his goods on board in order to get a full glance at Cora and try his “line” on her (Manny encouraged it, he said it was good for business and harmless, and maybe it was with them) knew it. Knew it the minute he sat at his favorite corner stool and saw a monkey wrench-toting Frank come in for something and watch the Frank-Cora- and cigar-chomping Manny in his whites behind the grille dance play out. He kept his eyes and his line to himself on that run.
Damn, any dated –up teen-age joy-riding kids up from Malibu looking for the perfect wave at Roaring Rock (and maybe some midnight passion drowned out by the ocean roar too) knew the minute they came in and smelled that lilac something coming like something out of the eden garden from Cora. The girls knowing instinctively that Cora lilac scent was meant for more than some half-drunk old short order cook. One girl, with a friendly look Frank’s way, and maybe with her own Frank Roaring Rock thoughts, asked Cora, while ordering a Coke and hamburger, whether she was married to him. And her date, blushing, not for what his date had just said but because he, fully under the lilac scent karma, wished that he was alone just then so she could take a shot at Cora himself.
Hell even the California Highway Patrol motorcycle cop who cruised the coast near the diner (and had his own not so secret eyes and desires for Cora) knew once Frank was installed in one of the rooms over the garage that things didn’t add up, add up to Manny’s benefit. And, more importantly, that if anything happened, anything at all, anything requiring more than a Band-Aid, to one Manny DeVito for the next fifty years the cops knew the first door to knock at.
Look I am strictly a money guy, going after loot wherever I could and so I never got messed up with some screwy dame on a caper. That was later, spending time later. And maybe if I had gotten a whiff of that perfume things might have been different in my mind too but I told Frank right out why didn’t he and Cora take out a big old .44 in the middle of the diner and just shoot Manny straight out, and maybe while the cop was present too. Then he /they could have at least put up an insanity or crime of passion defense. Not our boy though, no he had to play the angles, play Cora’s evil game.
These two amateurs gummed up the job every which way, gummed it so that even a detective novel writer would turn blush red with shame. Murder is, from guys that I know who specialize in such things, make a business out of taking guys out for dough, an art form and nothing for amateurs to mess around with. They tried one thing, something with poison taken over a long time that couldn’t be traced but Manny was such a lush it didn’t take. Then they tried to get him drunk and drown him off of Roaring Rock but that night around two in the morning about sixty kids from down around Malibu decided to have a cook-out after their prom night. In the end they just did the old gag that the cops have been wish to since about 1906 and conked him, threw him in the car, drove to the Roaring Rock and pushed him and the car over the cliff. Jesus, double jesus.
Peter Paul Interlude Three: “Frank, one last time, get out, get on the road, this ain’t gonna work. That poison thing was crazy. That drunk at the ocean thing was worst. The cops wouldn’t even have had to bother to knock at your door. Frank on this latest caper she’s setting you up. Who drove the car, who got the whiskey, who knew how to trip the brake lines, and who was big enough to carry Manny? Why don’t you just paint a big target on your chest and be done with it. She just wants the diner for her own small dreams. You don’t count. Hell, I ain’t no squealer but she is probably talking to that skirt –crazy (her skirt) cop right now. Get out I say, get out.”
If you want the details, want to see how she framed him but good and walked away with half the California legal system holding the door open for her, just look them up in the 1946 fall editions of the Los Angeles Gazette. They covered the story big time, and the trial too. That’s just the details though. I can give you the finish now and save your eyes, maybe. Frank, yah, Frank was just kind of smiling that smile, what did I call it, half-smile, all the way to the end. Do you need to know more?
Monday, August 13, 2012
*From The Pen Of Vladimir Lenin- From “Left-Wing Communism: an Infantile Disorder (1920)-Should we Participate in Bourgeois Parliaments?
Click on the headline to link to the Lenin Internet Archives.
Markin comment:
This article goes along with the propaganda points in the fight for our communist future mentioned in other posts.
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With this now-classic work, Lenin aimed to encapsulate the lessons the Bolshevik Party had learned from its involvement in three revolutions in 12 years—in a manner that European Communists could relate to, for it was to them he was speaking. He also further develops the theory of what the "dictatorship of the proletariat" means and stresses that the primary danger for the working-class movement in general is opportunism on the one hand, and anti-Marxist ultra-leftism on the other.
"Left-Wing" Communism: an Infantile Disorder was written in April, and the appendix was written on May 12, 1920. It came out on June 8-10 in Russian and in July was published in German, English and French. Lenin gave personal attention to the book’s type-setting and printing schedule so that it would be published before the opening of the Second Congress of the Communist International, each delegate receiving a copy. Between July and November 1920, the book was re-published in Leipzig, Paris and London, in the German, French and English languages respectively.
"Left-Wing" Communism: an Infantile Disorder is published according to the first edition print, the proofs of which were read by Lenin himself.
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Should we Participate in Bourgeois Parliaments?
It is with the utmost contempt—and the utmost levity—that the German "Left" Communists reply to this question in the negative. Their arguments? In the passage quoted above we read:
"... All reversion to parliamentary forms of struggle, which have become historically and politically obsolete, must be emphatically rejected" [[__ Rjc: Could be incomplete here; check __]]
This is said with ridiculous pretentiousness, and is patently wrong. "Reversion" to parliamentarianism, forsooth! Perhaps there is already a Soviet republic in Germany? It does not look like it! How, then, can one speak of "reversion"? Is this not an empty phrase?
Parliamentarianism has become "historically obsolete". That is true in the propaganda sense. However, everybody knows that this is still a far cry from overcoming it in practice. Capitalism could have been declared—and with full justice—to be "historically obsolete" many decades ago, but that does not at all remove the need for a very long and very persistent struggle on the basis of capitalism. Parliamentarianism is "historically obsolete" from the standpoint of world history, i.e., the era of bourgeois parliamentarianism is over, and the era of the proletarian dictatorship has begun. That is incontestable. But world history is counted in decades. Ten or twenty years earlier or later makes no difference when measured with the yardstick of world history; from the standpoint of world history it is a trifle that cannot be considered even approximately. But for that very reason, it is a glaring theoretical error to apply the yardstick of world history to practical politics.
Is parliamentarianism "politically obsolete"? That is quite a different matter. If that were true, the position of the "Lefts" would be a strong one. But it has to be proved by a most searching analysis, and the "Lefts" do not even know how to approach the matter. In the "Theses on Parliamentarianism", published in the Bulletin of the Provisional Bureau in Amsterdam of the Communist International No. 1, February 1920, and obviously expressing the Dutch-Left or Left-Dutch strivings, the analysis, as we shall see, is also hopelessly poor.
In the first place, contrary to the opinion of such outstanding political leaders as Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, the German "Lefts", as we know, considered parliamentarianism "politically obsolete" even in January 1919. We know that the "Lefts" were mistaken. This fact alone utterly destroys, at a single stroke, the proposition that parliamentarianism is "politically obsolete". It is for the "Lefts" to prove why their error, indisputable at that time, is no longer an error. They do not and cannot produce even a shred of proof. A political party’s attitude towards its own mistakes is one of the most important and surest ways of judging how earnest the party is and how it fulfils in practice its obligations towards its class and the working people. Frankly acknowledging a mistake, ascertaining the reasons for it, analysing the conditions that have led up to it, and thrashing out the means of its rectification -- that is the hallmark of a serious party; that is how it should perform its duties, and how it should educate and train its class, and then the masses. By failing to fulfil this duty and give the utmost attention and consideration to the study of their patent error, the "Lefts" in Germany (and in Holland) have proved that they are not a party of a class, but a circle, not a party of the masses, but a group of intellectualists and of a few workers who ape the worst features of intellectualism.
Second, in the same pamphlet of the Frankfurt group of "Lefts", which we have already cited in detail, we read:
"... The millions of workers who still follow the policy of the Centre [the Catholic "Centre" Party] are counter-revolutionary. The rural proletarians provide the legions of counter-revolutionary troops." (Page 3 of the pamphlet.)
Everything goes to show that this statement is far too sweeping and exaggerated. But the basic fact set forth here is incontrovertible, and its acknowledgment by the "Lefts" is particularly clear evidence of their mistake. How can one say that "parliamentarianism is politically obsolete", when "millions" and "legions" of proletarians are not only still in favour of parliamentarianism in general, but are downright "counter-revolutionary"!? It is obvious that parliamentarianism in Germany is not yet politically obsolete. It is obvious that the "Lefts" in Germany have mistaken their desire, their politico-ideological attitude, for objective reality. That is a most dangerous mistake for revolutionaries to make. In Russia—where, over a particularly long period and in particularly varied forms, the most brutal and savage yoke of tsarism produced revolutionaries of diverse shades, revolutionaries who displayed amazing devotion, enthusiasm, heroism and will power—in Russia we have observed this mistake of the revolutionaries at very close quarters; we have studied it very attentively and have a first-hand knowledge of it; that is why we can also see it especially clearly in others. Parliamentarianism is of course "politically obsolete" to the Communists in Germany; but—and that is the whole point—we must not regard what is obsolete to us as something obsolete to a class, to the masses. Here again we find that the "Lefts" do not know how to reason, do not know how to act as the party of a class, as the party of the masses. You must not sink to the level of the masses, to the level of the backward strata of the class. That is incontestable. You must tell them the bitter truth. You are in duty bound to call their bourgeois-democratic and parliamentary prejudices what they are—prejudices. But at the same time you must soberly follow the actual state of the class-consciousness and preparedness of the entire class (not only of its communist vanguard), and of all the working people (not only of their advanced elements).
Even if only a fairly large minority of the industrial workers, and not "millions" and "legions", follow the lead of the Catholic clergy—and a similar minority of rural workers follow the landowners and kulaks (Grossbauern)—it undoubtedly signifies that parliamentarianism in Germany has not yet politically outlived itself, that participation in parliamentary elections and in the struggle on the parliamentary rostrum is obligatory on the party of the revolutionary proletariat specifically for the purpose of educating the backward strata of its own class, and for the purpose of awakening and enlightening the undeveloped, downtrodden and ignorant rural masses. Whilst you lack the strength to do away with bourgeois parliaments and every other type of reactionary institution, you must work within them because it is there that you will still find workers who are duped by the priests and stultified by the conditions of rural life; otherwise you risk turning into nothing but windbags.
Third, the "Left" Communists have a great deal to say in praise of us Bolsheviks. One sometimes feels like telling them to praise us less and to try to get a better knowledge of the Bolsheviks’ tactics. We took part in the elections to the Constituent Assembly, the Russian bourgeois parliament in September-November 1917. Were our tactics correct or not? If not, then this should be clearly stated and proved, for it is necessary in evolving the correct tactics for international communism. If they were correct, then certain conclusions must be drawn. Of course, there can be no question of placing conditions in Russia on a par with conditions in Western Europe. But as regards the particular question of the meaning of the concept that "parliamentarianism has become politically obsolete", due account should be taken of our experience, for unless concrete experience is taken into account such concepts very easily turn into empty phrases. In September-November 1917, did we, the Russian Bolsheviks, not have more right than any Western Communists to consider that parliamentarianism was politically obsolete in Russia? Of course we did, for the point is not whether bourgeois parliaments have existed for a long time or a short time, but how far the masses of the working people are prepared (ideologically, politically and practically) to accept the Soviet system and to dissolve the bourgeois-democratic parliament (or allow it to be dissolved). It is an absolutely incontestable and fully established historical fact that, in September-November 1917, the urban working class and the soldiers and peasants of Russia were, because of a number of special conditions, exceptionally well prepared to accept the Soviet system and to disband the most democratic of bourgeois parliaments. Nevertheless, the Bolsheviks did not boycott the Constituent Assembly, but took part in the elections both before and after the proletariat conquered political power. That these elections yielded exceedingly valuable (and to the proletariat, highly useful) political results has, I make bold to hope, been proved by me in the above-mentioned article, which analyses in detail the returns of the elections to the Constituent Assembly in Russia.
The conclusion which follows from this is absolutely incontrovertible: it has been proved that, far from causing harm to the revolutionary proletariat, participation in a bourgeois-democratic parliament, even a few weeks before - the victory of a Soviet republic and even after such a victory, actually helps that proletariat to prove to the backward masses why such parliaments deserve to be done away with; it facilitates their successful dissolution, and helps to make bourgeois parliamentarianism "politically obsolete". To ignore this experience, while at the same time claiming affiliation to the Communist International, which must work out its tactics internationally (not as narrow or exclusively national tactics, but as international tactics), means committing a gross error and actually abandoning internationalism in deed, while recognising it in word.
Now let us examine the "Dutch-Left" arguments in favour of non-participation in parliaments. The following is the text of Thesis No. 4, the most important of the above-mentioned "Dutch" theses:
When the capitalist system of production has broken down, and society is in a state of revolution, parliamentary action gradually loses importance as compared with the action of the masses themselves. When, in these conditions, parliament becomes the centre and organ of the counter-revolution, whilst, on the other hand, the labouring class builds up the instruments of its power in the Soviets, it may even prove necessary to abstain from all and any participation in parliamentary action."
The first sentence is obviously wrong, since action by the masses, a big strike, for instance, is more important than parliamentary activity at all times, and not only during a revolution or in a revolutionary situation. This obviously untenable and historically and politically incorrect argument merely shows very clearly that the authors completely ignore both the general European experience (the French experience before the revolutions of 1848 and 1870; the German experience of 1878-90, etc.) and the Russian experience (see above) of the importance of combining legal and illegal struggle. This question is of immense importance both in general and in particular, because in all civilised and advanced countries the time is rapidly approaching when such a combination will more and more become—and has already partly become—mandatory on the party of the revolutionary proletariat, inasmuch as civil war between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie is maturing and is imminent, and because of savage persecution of the Communists by republican governments and bourgeois governments generally, which resort to any violation of legality (the example of America is edifying enough), etc. The Dutch, and the Lefts in general, have utterly failed to understand this highly important question.
The second sentence is, in the first place, historically wrong. We Bolsheviks participated in the most counterrevolutionary parliaments, and experience has shown that this participation was not only useful but indispensable to the party of the revolutionary proletariat, after the first bourgeois revolution in Russia (1905), so as to pave the way for the second bourgeois revolution (February 1917), and then for the socialist revolution (October 1917). In the second place, this sentence is amazingly illogical. If a parliament becomes an organ and a "centre" (in reality it never has been and never can be a "centre", but that is by the way) of counter-revolution, while the workers are building up the instruments of their power in the form of the Soviets, then it follows that the workers must prepare—ideologically, politically and technically—for the struggle of the Soviets against parliament, for the dispersal of parliament by the Soviets. But it does not at all follow that this dispersal is hindered, or is not facilitated, by the presence of a Soviet opposition within the counter-revolutionary parliament. In the course of our victorious struggle against Denikin and Kolchak, we never found that the existence of a Soviet and proletarian opposition in their camp was immaterial to our victories. We know perfectly well that the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly on January 5, 1918 was not hampered but was actually facilitated by the fact that, within the counter-revolutionary Constituent Assembly which was about to be dispersed, there was a consistent Bolshevik, as well as an inconsistent, Left Socialist-Revolutionary Soviet opposition. The authors of the theses are engaged in muddled thinking; they have forgotten the experience of many, if not all, revolutions, which shows the great usefulness, during a revolution, of a combination of mass action outside a reactionary parliament with an opposition sympathetic to (or, better still, directly supporting) the revolution within it. The Dutch, and the "Lefts" in general, argue in this respect like doctrinaires of the revolution, who have never taken part in a real revolution, have never given thought to the history of revolutions, or have naively mistaken subjective "rejection" of a reactionary institution for its actual destruction by the combined operation of a number of objective factors. The surest way of discrediting and damaging a new political (and not only political) idea is to reduce it to absurdity on the plea of defending it. For any truth, if "overdone" (as Dietzgen Senior put it), if exaggerated, or if carried beyond the limits of its actual applicability, can be reduced to an absurdity, and is even bound to become an absurdity under these conditions. That is just the kind of disservice the Dutch and German Lefts are rendering to the new truth of the Soviet form of government being superior to bourgeois-democratic parliaments. Of course, anyone would be in error who voiced the outmoded viewpoint or in general considered it impermissible, in all and any circumstances, to reject participation in bourgeois parliaments. I cannot attempt here to formulate the conditions under which a boycott is useful, since the object of this pamphlet is far more modest, namely, to study Russian experience in connection with certain topical questions of international communist tactics. Russian experience has provided us with one successful and correct instance (1905), and another that was incorrect (1906), of the use of a boycott by the Bolsheviks. Analysing the first case, we, see that we succeeded in preventing a reactionary government from convening a reactionary parliament in a situation in which extra-parliamentary revolutionary mass action (strikes in particular) was developing at great speed, when not a single section of the proletariat and the peasantry could support the reactionary government in any way, and when the revolutionary proletariat was gaining influence over the backward masses through the strike struggle and through the agrarian movement. It is quite obvious that this experience is not applicable to present-day European conditions. It is likewise quite obvious—and the foregoing arguments bear this out -- that the advocacy, even if with reservations, by the Dutch and the other "Lefts" of refusal to participate in parliaments is fundamentally wrong and detrimental to the cause of the revolutionary proletariat.
In Western Europe and America, parliament has become most odious to the revolutionary vanguard of the working class. That cannot be denied. It can readily be understood, for it is difficult to imagine anything more infamous, vile or treacherous than the behaviour of the vast majority of socialist and Social-Democratic parliamentary deputies during and after the war. It would, however, be not only unreasonable but actually criminal to yield to this mood when deciding how this generally recognised evil should be fought. In many countries of Western Europe, the revolutionary mood, we might say, is at present a "novelty", or a "rarity", which has all too long been vainly and impatiently awaited; perhaps that is why people so easily yield to that mood. Certainly, without a revolutionary mood among the masses, and without conditions facilitating the growth of this mood, revolutionary tactics will never develop into action. In Russia, however, lengthy, painful and sanguinary experience has taught us the truth that revolutionary tactics cannot be built on a revolutionary mood alone. Tactics must be based on a sober and strictly objective appraisal of all the class forces in a particular state (and of the states that surround it, and of all states the world over) as well as of the experience of revolutionary movements. It is very easy to show one’s "revolutionary" temper merely by hurling abuse at parliamentary opportunism, or merely by repudiating participation in parliaments; its very ease, however, cannot turn this into a solution of a difficult, a very difficult, problem. It is far more difficult to create a really revolutionary parliamentary group in a European parliament than it was in Russia. That stands to reason. But it is only a particular expression of the general truth that it was easy for Russia, in the specific and historically unique situation of 1917, to start the socialist revolution, but it will be more difficult for Russia than for the European countries to continue the revolution and bring it to its consummation. I had occasion to point this out already at the beginning of 1918, and our experience of the past two years has entirely confirmed the correctness of this view. Certain specific conditions, viz., (1) the possibility of linking up the Soviet revolution with the ending, as a consequence of this revolution, of the imperialist war, which had exhausted the workers and peasants to an incredible degree; (2) the possibility of taking temporary advantage of the mortal conflict between the world’s two most powerful groups of imperialist robbers, who were unable to unite against their Soviet enemy; (3) the possibility of enduring a comparatively lengthy civil war, partly owing to the enormous size of the country and to the poor means of communication; (4) the existence of such a profound bourgeois-democratic revolutionary movement among the peasantry that the party of the proletariat was able to adopt the revolutionary demands of the peasant party (the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, the majority of whose members were definitely hostile to Bolshevism) and realise them at once, thanks to the conquest of political power by the proletariat—all these specific conditions do not at present exist in Western Europe, and a repetition of such or similar conditions will not occur so easily. Incidentally, apart from a number of other causes, that is why it is more difficult for Western Europe to start a socialist revolution than it was for us. To attempt to "circumvent" this difficulty by "skipping" the arduous job of utilising reactionary parliaments for revolutionary purposes is absolutely childish. You want to create a new society, yet you fear the difficulties involved in forming a good parliamentary group made up of convinced, devoted and heroic Communists, in a reactionary parliament! Is that not childish? If Karl Liebknecht in Germany and Z. H?glund in Sweden were able, even without mass support from below, to set examples of the truly revolutionary utilisation of reactionary parliaments, why should a rapidly growing revolutionary mass party, in the midst of the post-war disillusionment and embitterment of the masses, be unable to forge a communist group in the worst of parliaments? It is because, in Western Europe, the backward masses of the workers and—to an even greater degree—of the small peasants are much more imbued with bourgeois-democratic and parliamentary prejudices than they were in Russia because of that, it is only from within such institutions as bourgeois parliaments that Communists can (and must) wage a long and persistent struggle, undaunted by any difficulties, to expose, dispel and overcome these prejudices.
The German "Lefts" complain of bad "leaders" in their party, give way to despair, and even arrive at a ridiculous "negation" of "leaders". But in conditions in which it is often necessary to hide "leaders" underground, the evolution of good "leaders", reliable, tested and authoritative, is a very difficult matter; these difficulties cannot be successfully overcome without combining legal and illegal work, and without testing the "leaders", among other ways, in parliaments. Criticism -- the most keen, ruthless and uncompromising criticism—should be directed, not against parliamentarianism or parliamentary activities, but against those leaders who are unable—and still more against those who are unwilling -- to utilise parliamentary elections and the parliamentary rostrum in a revolutionary and communist manner. Only such criticism—combined, of course, with the dismissal of incapable leaders and their replacement by capable ones—will constitute useful and fruitful revolutionary work that will simultaneously train the "leaders" to be worthy of the working class and of all working people, and train the masses to be able properly to understand the political situation and the often very complicated and intricate tasks that spring from that situation. *5
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Footnotes
[*5] I have had too little opportunity to acquaint myself with ’Leftwing’, communism in Italy. Comrade Bordiga and his faction of Abstentionist Communists (Comunista astensionista) are certainly wrong in advocating non-participation in parliament. But on one point, it seems to me, Comrade Bordiga is right—as far as can be judged from two issues of his paper, Il Soviet (Nos. 3 and 4, January 18 and February 1, 1920), from four issues of Comrade Serrati’s excellent periodical, Comunismo (Nos. 1-4, October l-November 30, 1919), and from separate issues of Italian bourgeois papers which I have seen. Comrade Bordiga and his group are right in attacking Turati and his partisans, who remain in a party which has recognised Soviet power and the dictatorship of the proletariat, and yet continue their former pernicious and opportunist policy as members of parliament. Of course, in tolerating this, Comrade Serrati and the entire Italian Socialist Party [28] are making a mistake which threatens to do as much harm and give rise to the same dangers as it did in Hungary, where the Hungarian Turatis sabotaged both the party and the Soviet government [29] from within. Such a mistaken, inconsistent, or spineless attitude towards the opportunist parliamentarians gives rise to "Leftwing" communism, on the one hand, and to a certain extent justifies its existence, on the other. Comrade Serrati is obviously wrong when he accuses Deputy Turati of being "inconsistent" (Comunismo No. 3), for it is the Italian Socialist Party itself that is inconsistent in tolerating such opportunist parliamentarians as Turati and Co.
[28] From its foundation in 1892, the Italian Socialist Party saw a bitter ideological struggle between the opportunist and the revolutionary trends within it. At the Reggio Emilia Congress of 1912, the most outspoken reformists who supported the war and collaboration with the government and the bourgeoisie (Ivanoe Bonomi, Leonida Bissolati and others) were expelled from the party under pressure from the Left wing. After the outbreak of the First World War and prior to Italy’s entry into it, the I.S.P. came out against the war and advanced the slogan: "Against war, for neutrality!" In December 1914, a group of renegades including Benito Mussolini, who advocated the bourgeoisie’s imperialist policy and supported the war, were expelled from the party. When Italy entered the war on the Entente’s side (May 1915), three distinct trends emerged in the Italian Socialist Party: 1) the Right wing, which aided the bourgeoisie in the conduct of the war; 2) the Centre, which united most of party members and came out under the slogan: "No part in the war, and no sabotage of the war" and 3) the Left wing, which took a firmer anti-war stand, but could not organise a consistent struggle against the war. The Left wing did not realise the necessity of converting the imperialist war into a civil war, and of a decisive break with the reformists.
After the October Socialist Revolution in Russia, the Left wing of the I.S.P. grew stronger, and the 16th Party Congress held on October 5-8, 1919, in Bologna, adopted a resolution on affiliation to the Third International. I.S.P. representatives took part in the work of the Second Congress of the Comintern. After the Congress Centrist Serrati, head of the delegation, declared against a break with the reformists. At the 17th Party Congress in Leghorn in January 1921, the Centrists, who were in the majority, refused to break with the reformists and to accept all the terms of admission into the Comintern. On January 21, 1921, the Left-wing delegates walked out of the Congress and founded the Communist Party of Italy.
[29] Soviet rule was established in Hungary on March 21, 1919. The socialist revolution in Hungary was a peaceful one, the Hungarian bourgeoisie being unable to resist the people. Incapable of overcoming its internal and external difficulties, it decided to hand over power for a while to the Right-wing Social-Democrats so as to prevent the development of the revolution. However, the Hungarian Communist Party’s prestige had grown so great, and the demands of rank-and-file Social-Democrats for unity with the Communists had become so insistent that the leaders of the Social-Democratic Party proposed to the arrested Communist leaders the formation of a joint government. The Social-Democratic leaders were obliged to accept the terms advanced by the Communists during the negotiations, i.e., the formation of a Soviet government, disarmament of the bourgeoisie, the creation of a Red Army and people’s militia, confiscation of the landed estates, the nationalisation of industry, an alliance with Soviet Russia, etc.
An agreement was simultaneously signed on the merging of the two parties to form the Hungarian Socialist Party. While the two parties were being merged, errors were made which later became clear. The merger was carried out mechanically, without isolation of the reformist elements.
At its first meeting, the Revolutionary Governmental Council adopted a resolution on the formation of the Red Army. On March 26, the Soviet Government of Hungary issued decrees on the nationalisation of industrial enterprises, transport, and the banks; on April 2, a decree was published on the monopoly of foreign trade. Workers’ wages were increased by an average of 25 per cent, and an 8-hour working day was introduced. On April 3, land-reform law was issued, by which all estates exceeding 57 hectares in area were confiscated. The confiscated land, however, was not distributed among the land-starved and landless peasants, but was turned over to agricultural producers’ cooperatives and state farms organised after the reform. The poor peasants, who had hoped to get land, were disappointed. This prevented the establishment of a firm alliance between the proletariat and the peasantry, and weakened Soviet power in Hungary.
The Entente imperialists instituted an economic blockade of the Soviet Republic. Armed intervention against the Hungarian Soviet Republic was organised, the advance of interventionist troops stirring up the Hungarian counter-revolutionaries. The treachery of the Right-wing Social-Democrats, who entered into an alliance with international imperialism, was one of the causes of the Hungarian Soviet Republic’s downfall.
The unfavourable international situation in the summer of 1919, when Soviet Russia was encircled by enemies and therefore could not help the Hungarian Soviet Republic, also played a definite role. On August 1, 1919, as a result of joint actions by the foreign imperialist interventionists and the domestic counterrevolutionaries, Soviet power in Hungary was overthrown.
Markin comment:
This article goes along with the propaganda points in the fight for our communist future mentioned in other posts.
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With this now-classic work, Lenin aimed to encapsulate the lessons the Bolshevik Party had learned from its involvement in three revolutions in 12 years—in a manner that European Communists could relate to, for it was to them he was speaking. He also further develops the theory of what the "dictatorship of the proletariat" means and stresses that the primary danger for the working-class movement in general is opportunism on the one hand, and anti-Marxist ultra-leftism on the other.
"Left-Wing" Communism: an Infantile Disorder was written in April, and the appendix was written on May 12, 1920. It came out on June 8-10 in Russian and in July was published in German, English and French. Lenin gave personal attention to the book’s type-setting and printing schedule so that it would be published before the opening of the Second Congress of the Communist International, each delegate receiving a copy. Between July and November 1920, the book was re-published in Leipzig, Paris and London, in the German, French and English languages respectively.
"Left-Wing" Communism: an Infantile Disorder is published according to the first edition print, the proofs of which were read by Lenin himself.
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Should we Participate in Bourgeois Parliaments?
It is with the utmost contempt—and the utmost levity—that the German "Left" Communists reply to this question in the negative. Their arguments? In the passage quoted above we read:
"... All reversion to parliamentary forms of struggle, which have become historically and politically obsolete, must be emphatically rejected" [[__ Rjc: Could be incomplete here; check __]]
This is said with ridiculous pretentiousness, and is patently wrong. "Reversion" to parliamentarianism, forsooth! Perhaps there is already a Soviet republic in Germany? It does not look like it! How, then, can one speak of "reversion"? Is this not an empty phrase?
Parliamentarianism has become "historically obsolete". That is true in the propaganda sense. However, everybody knows that this is still a far cry from overcoming it in practice. Capitalism could have been declared—and with full justice—to be "historically obsolete" many decades ago, but that does not at all remove the need for a very long and very persistent struggle on the basis of capitalism. Parliamentarianism is "historically obsolete" from the standpoint of world history, i.e., the era of bourgeois parliamentarianism is over, and the era of the proletarian dictatorship has begun. That is incontestable. But world history is counted in decades. Ten or twenty years earlier or later makes no difference when measured with the yardstick of world history; from the standpoint of world history it is a trifle that cannot be considered even approximately. But for that very reason, it is a glaring theoretical error to apply the yardstick of world history to practical politics.
Is parliamentarianism "politically obsolete"? That is quite a different matter. If that were true, the position of the "Lefts" would be a strong one. But it has to be proved by a most searching analysis, and the "Lefts" do not even know how to approach the matter. In the "Theses on Parliamentarianism", published in the Bulletin of the Provisional Bureau in Amsterdam of the Communist International No. 1, February 1920, and obviously expressing the Dutch-Left or Left-Dutch strivings, the analysis, as we shall see, is also hopelessly poor.
In the first place, contrary to the opinion of such outstanding political leaders as Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, the German "Lefts", as we know, considered parliamentarianism "politically obsolete" even in January 1919. We know that the "Lefts" were mistaken. This fact alone utterly destroys, at a single stroke, the proposition that parliamentarianism is "politically obsolete". It is for the "Lefts" to prove why their error, indisputable at that time, is no longer an error. They do not and cannot produce even a shred of proof. A political party’s attitude towards its own mistakes is one of the most important and surest ways of judging how earnest the party is and how it fulfils in practice its obligations towards its class and the working people. Frankly acknowledging a mistake, ascertaining the reasons for it, analysing the conditions that have led up to it, and thrashing out the means of its rectification -- that is the hallmark of a serious party; that is how it should perform its duties, and how it should educate and train its class, and then the masses. By failing to fulfil this duty and give the utmost attention and consideration to the study of their patent error, the "Lefts" in Germany (and in Holland) have proved that they are not a party of a class, but a circle, not a party of the masses, but a group of intellectualists and of a few workers who ape the worst features of intellectualism.
Second, in the same pamphlet of the Frankfurt group of "Lefts", which we have already cited in detail, we read:
"... The millions of workers who still follow the policy of the Centre [the Catholic "Centre" Party] are counter-revolutionary. The rural proletarians provide the legions of counter-revolutionary troops." (Page 3 of the pamphlet.)
Everything goes to show that this statement is far too sweeping and exaggerated. But the basic fact set forth here is incontrovertible, and its acknowledgment by the "Lefts" is particularly clear evidence of their mistake. How can one say that "parliamentarianism is politically obsolete", when "millions" and "legions" of proletarians are not only still in favour of parliamentarianism in general, but are downright "counter-revolutionary"!? It is obvious that parliamentarianism in Germany is not yet politically obsolete. It is obvious that the "Lefts" in Germany have mistaken their desire, their politico-ideological attitude, for objective reality. That is a most dangerous mistake for revolutionaries to make. In Russia—where, over a particularly long period and in particularly varied forms, the most brutal and savage yoke of tsarism produced revolutionaries of diverse shades, revolutionaries who displayed amazing devotion, enthusiasm, heroism and will power—in Russia we have observed this mistake of the revolutionaries at very close quarters; we have studied it very attentively and have a first-hand knowledge of it; that is why we can also see it especially clearly in others. Parliamentarianism is of course "politically obsolete" to the Communists in Germany; but—and that is the whole point—we must not regard what is obsolete to us as something obsolete to a class, to the masses. Here again we find that the "Lefts" do not know how to reason, do not know how to act as the party of a class, as the party of the masses. You must not sink to the level of the masses, to the level of the backward strata of the class. That is incontestable. You must tell them the bitter truth. You are in duty bound to call their bourgeois-democratic and parliamentary prejudices what they are—prejudices. But at the same time you must soberly follow the actual state of the class-consciousness and preparedness of the entire class (not only of its communist vanguard), and of all the working people (not only of their advanced elements).
Even if only a fairly large minority of the industrial workers, and not "millions" and "legions", follow the lead of the Catholic clergy—and a similar minority of rural workers follow the landowners and kulaks (Grossbauern)—it undoubtedly signifies that parliamentarianism in Germany has not yet politically outlived itself, that participation in parliamentary elections and in the struggle on the parliamentary rostrum is obligatory on the party of the revolutionary proletariat specifically for the purpose of educating the backward strata of its own class, and for the purpose of awakening and enlightening the undeveloped, downtrodden and ignorant rural masses. Whilst you lack the strength to do away with bourgeois parliaments and every other type of reactionary institution, you must work within them because it is there that you will still find workers who are duped by the priests and stultified by the conditions of rural life; otherwise you risk turning into nothing but windbags.
Third, the "Left" Communists have a great deal to say in praise of us Bolsheviks. One sometimes feels like telling them to praise us less and to try to get a better knowledge of the Bolsheviks’ tactics. We took part in the elections to the Constituent Assembly, the Russian bourgeois parliament in September-November 1917. Were our tactics correct or not? If not, then this should be clearly stated and proved, for it is necessary in evolving the correct tactics for international communism. If they were correct, then certain conclusions must be drawn. Of course, there can be no question of placing conditions in Russia on a par with conditions in Western Europe. But as regards the particular question of the meaning of the concept that "parliamentarianism has become politically obsolete", due account should be taken of our experience, for unless concrete experience is taken into account such concepts very easily turn into empty phrases. In September-November 1917, did we, the Russian Bolsheviks, not have more right than any Western Communists to consider that parliamentarianism was politically obsolete in Russia? Of course we did, for the point is not whether bourgeois parliaments have existed for a long time or a short time, but how far the masses of the working people are prepared (ideologically, politically and practically) to accept the Soviet system and to dissolve the bourgeois-democratic parliament (or allow it to be dissolved). It is an absolutely incontestable and fully established historical fact that, in September-November 1917, the urban working class and the soldiers and peasants of Russia were, because of a number of special conditions, exceptionally well prepared to accept the Soviet system and to disband the most democratic of bourgeois parliaments. Nevertheless, the Bolsheviks did not boycott the Constituent Assembly, but took part in the elections both before and after the proletariat conquered political power. That these elections yielded exceedingly valuable (and to the proletariat, highly useful) political results has, I make bold to hope, been proved by me in the above-mentioned article, which analyses in detail the returns of the elections to the Constituent Assembly in Russia.
The conclusion which follows from this is absolutely incontrovertible: it has been proved that, far from causing harm to the revolutionary proletariat, participation in a bourgeois-democratic parliament, even a few weeks before - the victory of a Soviet republic and even after such a victory, actually helps that proletariat to prove to the backward masses why such parliaments deserve to be done away with; it facilitates their successful dissolution, and helps to make bourgeois parliamentarianism "politically obsolete". To ignore this experience, while at the same time claiming affiliation to the Communist International, which must work out its tactics internationally (not as narrow or exclusively national tactics, but as international tactics), means committing a gross error and actually abandoning internationalism in deed, while recognising it in word.
Now let us examine the "Dutch-Left" arguments in favour of non-participation in parliaments. The following is the text of Thesis No. 4, the most important of the above-mentioned "Dutch" theses:
When the capitalist system of production has broken down, and society is in a state of revolution, parliamentary action gradually loses importance as compared with the action of the masses themselves. When, in these conditions, parliament becomes the centre and organ of the counter-revolution, whilst, on the other hand, the labouring class builds up the instruments of its power in the Soviets, it may even prove necessary to abstain from all and any participation in parliamentary action."
The first sentence is obviously wrong, since action by the masses, a big strike, for instance, is more important than parliamentary activity at all times, and not only during a revolution or in a revolutionary situation. This obviously untenable and historically and politically incorrect argument merely shows very clearly that the authors completely ignore both the general European experience (the French experience before the revolutions of 1848 and 1870; the German experience of 1878-90, etc.) and the Russian experience (see above) of the importance of combining legal and illegal struggle. This question is of immense importance both in general and in particular, because in all civilised and advanced countries the time is rapidly approaching when such a combination will more and more become—and has already partly become—mandatory on the party of the revolutionary proletariat, inasmuch as civil war between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie is maturing and is imminent, and because of savage persecution of the Communists by republican governments and bourgeois governments generally, which resort to any violation of legality (the example of America is edifying enough), etc. The Dutch, and the Lefts in general, have utterly failed to understand this highly important question.
The second sentence is, in the first place, historically wrong. We Bolsheviks participated in the most counterrevolutionary parliaments, and experience has shown that this participation was not only useful but indispensable to the party of the revolutionary proletariat, after the first bourgeois revolution in Russia (1905), so as to pave the way for the second bourgeois revolution (February 1917), and then for the socialist revolution (October 1917). In the second place, this sentence is amazingly illogical. If a parliament becomes an organ and a "centre" (in reality it never has been and never can be a "centre", but that is by the way) of counter-revolution, while the workers are building up the instruments of their power in the form of the Soviets, then it follows that the workers must prepare—ideologically, politically and technically—for the struggle of the Soviets against parliament, for the dispersal of parliament by the Soviets. But it does not at all follow that this dispersal is hindered, or is not facilitated, by the presence of a Soviet opposition within the counter-revolutionary parliament. In the course of our victorious struggle against Denikin and Kolchak, we never found that the existence of a Soviet and proletarian opposition in their camp was immaterial to our victories. We know perfectly well that the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly on January 5, 1918 was not hampered but was actually facilitated by the fact that, within the counter-revolutionary Constituent Assembly which was about to be dispersed, there was a consistent Bolshevik, as well as an inconsistent, Left Socialist-Revolutionary Soviet opposition. The authors of the theses are engaged in muddled thinking; they have forgotten the experience of many, if not all, revolutions, which shows the great usefulness, during a revolution, of a combination of mass action outside a reactionary parliament with an opposition sympathetic to (or, better still, directly supporting) the revolution within it. The Dutch, and the "Lefts" in general, argue in this respect like doctrinaires of the revolution, who have never taken part in a real revolution, have never given thought to the history of revolutions, or have naively mistaken subjective "rejection" of a reactionary institution for its actual destruction by the combined operation of a number of objective factors. The surest way of discrediting and damaging a new political (and not only political) idea is to reduce it to absurdity on the plea of defending it. For any truth, if "overdone" (as Dietzgen Senior put it), if exaggerated, or if carried beyond the limits of its actual applicability, can be reduced to an absurdity, and is even bound to become an absurdity under these conditions. That is just the kind of disservice the Dutch and German Lefts are rendering to the new truth of the Soviet form of government being superior to bourgeois-democratic parliaments. Of course, anyone would be in error who voiced the outmoded viewpoint or in general considered it impermissible, in all and any circumstances, to reject participation in bourgeois parliaments. I cannot attempt here to formulate the conditions under which a boycott is useful, since the object of this pamphlet is far more modest, namely, to study Russian experience in connection with certain topical questions of international communist tactics. Russian experience has provided us with one successful and correct instance (1905), and another that was incorrect (1906), of the use of a boycott by the Bolsheviks. Analysing the first case, we, see that we succeeded in preventing a reactionary government from convening a reactionary parliament in a situation in which extra-parliamentary revolutionary mass action (strikes in particular) was developing at great speed, when not a single section of the proletariat and the peasantry could support the reactionary government in any way, and when the revolutionary proletariat was gaining influence over the backward masses through the strike struggle and through the agrarian movement. It is quite obvious that this experience is not applicable to present-day European conditions. It is likewise quite obvious—and the foregoing arguments bear this out -- that the advocacy, even if with reservations, by the Dutch and the other "Lefts" of refusal to participate in parliaments is fundamentally wrong and detrimental to the cause of the revolutionary proletariat.
In Western Europe and America, parliament has become most odious to the revolutionary vanguard of the working class. That cannot be denied. It can readily be understood, for it is difficult to imagine anything more infamous, vile or treacherous than the behaviour of the vast majority of socialist and Social-Democratic parliamentary deputies during and after the war. It would, however, be not only unreasonable but actually criminal to yield to this mood when deciding how this generally recognised evil should be fought. In many countries of Western Europe, the revolutionary mood, we might say, is at present a "novelty", or a "rarity", which has all too long been vainly and impatiently awaited; perhaps that is why people so easily yield to that mood. Certainly, without a revolutionary mood among the masses, and without conditions facilitating the growth of this mood, revolutionary tactics will never develop into action. In Russia, however, lengthy, painful and sanguinary experience has taught us the truth that revolutionary tactics cannot be built on a revolutionary mood alone. Tactics must be based on a sober and strictly objective appraisal of all the class forces in a particular state (and of the states that surround it, and of all states the world over) as well as of the experience of revolutionary movements. It is very easy to show one’s "revolutionary" temper merely by hurling abuse at parliamentary opportunism, or merely by repudiating participation in parliaments; its very ease, however, cannot turn this into a solution of a difficult, a very difficult, problem. It is far more difficult to create a really revolutionary parliamentary group in a European parliament than it was in Russia. That stands to reason. But it is only a particular expression of the general truth that it was easy for Russia, in the specific and historically unique situation of 1917, to start the socialist revolution, but it will be more difficult for Russia than for the European countries to continue the revolution and bring it to its consummation. I had occasion to point this out already at the beginning of 1918, and our experience of the past two years has entirely confirmed the correctness of this view. Certain specific conditions, viz., (1) the possibility of linking up the Soviet revolution with the ending, as a consequence of this revolution, of the imperialist war, which had exhausted the workers and peasants to an incredible degree; (2) the possibility of taking temporary advantage of the mortal conflict between the world’s two most powerful groups of imperialist robbers, who were unable to unite against their Soviet enemy; (3) the possibility of enduring a comparatively lengthy civil war, partly owing to the enormous size of the country and to the poor means of communication; (4) the existence of such a profound bourgeois-democratic revolutionary movement among the peasantry that the party of the proletariat was able to adopt the revolutionary demands of the peasant party (the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, the majority of whose members were definitely hostile to Bolshevism) and realise them at once, thanks to the conquest of political power by the proletariat—all these specific conditions do not at present exist in Western Europe, and a repetition of such or similar conditions will not occur so easily. Incidentally, apart from a number of other causes, that is why it is more difficult for Western Europe to start a socialist revolution than it was for us. To attempt to "circumvent" this difficulty by "skipping" the arduous job of utilising reactionary parliaments for revolutionary purposes is absolutely childish. You want to create a new society, yet you fear the difficulties involved in forming a good parliamentary group made up of convinced, devoted and heroic Communists, in a reactionary parliament! Is that not childish? If Karl Liebknecht in Germany and Z. H?glund in Sweden were able, even without mass support from below, to set examples of the truly revolutionary utilisation of reactionary parliaments, why should a rapidly growing revolutionary mass party, in the midst of the post-war disillusionment and embitterment of the masses, be unable to forge a communist group in the worst of parliaments? It is because, in Western Europe, the backward masses of the workers and—to an even greater degree—of the small peasants are much more imbued with bourgeois-democratic and parliamentary prejudices than they were in Russia because of that, it is only from within such institutions as bourgeois parliaments that Communists can (and must) wage a long and persistent struggle, undaunted by any difficulties, to expose, dispel and overcome these prejudices.
The German "Lefts" complain of bad "leaders" in their party, give way to despair, and even arrive at a ridiculous "negation" of "leaders". But in conditions in which it is often necessary to hide "leaders" underground, the evolution of good "leaders", reliable, tested and authoritative, is a very difficult matter; these difficulties cannot be successfully overcome without combining legal and illegal work, and without testing the "leaders", among other ways, in parliaments. Criticism -- the most keen, ruthless and uncompromising criticism—should be directed, not against parliamentarianism or parliamentary activities, but against those leaders who are unable—and still more against those who are unwilling -- to utilise parliamentary elections and the parliamentary rostrum in a revolutionary and communist manner. Only such criticism—combined, of course, with the dismissal of incapable leaders and their replacement by capable ones—will constitute useful and fruitful revolutionary work that will simultaneously train the "leaders" to be worthy of the working class and of all working people, and train the masses to be able properly to understand the political situation and the often very complicated and intricate tasks that spring from that situation. *5
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Footnotes
[*5] I have had too little opportunity to acquaint myself with ’Leftwing’, communism in Italy. Comrade Bordiga and his faction of Abstentionist Communists (Comunista astensionista) are certainly wrong in advocating non-participation in parliament. But on one point, it seems to me, Comrade Bordiga is right—as far as can be judged from two issues of his paper, Il Soviet (Nos. 3 and 4, January 18 and February 1, 1920), from four issues of Comrade Serrati’s excellent periodical, Comunismo (Nos. 1-4, October l-November 30, 1919), and from separate issues of Italian bourgeois papers which I have seen. Comrade Bordiga and his group are right in attacking Turati and his partisans, who remain in a party which has recognised Soviet power and the dictatorship of the proletariat, and yet continue their former pernicious and opportunist policy as members of parliament. Of course, in tolerating this, Comrade Serrati and the entire Italian Socialist Party [28] are making a mistake which threatens to do as much harm and give rise to the same dangers as it did in Hungary, where the Hungarian Turatis sabotaged both the party and the Soviet government [29] from within. Such a mistaken, inconsistent, or spineless attitude towards the opportunist parliamentarians gives rise to "Leftwing" communism, on the one hand, and to a certain extent justifies its existence, on the other. Comrade Serrati is obviously wrong when he accuses Deputy Turati of being "inconsistent" (Comunismo No. 3), for it is the Italian Socialist Party itself that is inconsistent in tolerating such opportunist parliamentarians as Turati and Co.
[28] From its foundation in 1892, the Italian Socialist Party saw a bitter ideological struggle between the opportunist and the revolutionary trends within it. At the Reggio Emilia Congress of 1912, the most outspoken reformists who supported the war and collaboration with the government and the bourgeoisie (Ivanoe Bonomi, Leonida Bissolati and others) were expelled from the party under pressure from the Left wing. After the outbreak of the First World War and prior to Italy’s entry into it, the I.S.P. came out against the war and advanced the slogan: "Against war, for neutrality!" In December 1914, a group of renegades including Benito Mussolini, who advocated the bourgeoisie’s imperialist policy and supported the war, were expelled from the party. When Italy entered the war on the Entente’s side (May 1915), three distinct trends emerged in the Italian Socialist Party: 1) the Right wing, which aided the bourgeoisie in the conduct of the war; 2) the Centre, which united most of party members and came out under the slogan: "No part in the war, and no sabotage of the war" and 3) the Left wing, which took a firmer anti-war stand, but could not organise a consistent struggle against the war. The Left wing did not realise the necessity of converting the imperialist war into a civil war, and of a decisive break with the reformists.
After the October Socialist Revolution in Russia, the Left wing of the I.S.P. grew stronger, and the 16th Party Congress held on October 5-8, 1919, in Bologna, adopted a resolution on affiliation to the Third International. I.S.P. representatives took part in the work of the Second Congress of the Comintern. After the Congress Centrist Serrati, head of the delegation, declared against a break with the reformists. At the 17th Party Congress in Leghorn in January 1921, the Centrists, who were in the majority, refused to break with the reformists and to accept all the terms of admission into the Comintern. On January 21, 1921, the Left-wing delegates walked out of the Congress and founded the Communist Party of Italy.
[29] Soviet rule was established in Hungary on March 21, 1919. The socialist revolution in Hungary was a peaceful one, the Hungarian bourgeoisie being unable to resist the people. Incapable of overcoming its internal and external difficulties, it decided to hand over power for a while to the Right-wing Social-Democrats so as to prevent the development of the revolution. However, the Hungarian Communist Party’s prestige had grown so great, and the demands of rank-and-file Social-Democrats for unity with the Communists had become so insistent that the leaders of the Social-Democratic Party proposed to the arrested Communist leaders the formation of a joint government. The Social-Democratic leaders were obliged to accept the terms advanced by the Communists during the negotiations, i.e., the formation of a Soviet government, disarmament of the bourgeoisie, the creation of a Red Army and people’s militia, confiscation of the landed estates, the nationalisation of industry, an alliance with Soviet Russia, etc.
An agreement was simultaneously signed on the merging of the two parties to form the Hungarian Socialist Party. While the two parties were being merged, errors were made which later became clear. The merger was carried out mechanically, without isolation of the reformist elements.
At its first meeting, the Revolutionary Governmental Council adopted a resolution on the formation of the Red Army. On March 26, the Soviet Government of Hungary issued decrees on the nationalisation of industrial enterprises, transport, and the banks; on April 2, a decree was published on the monopoly of foreign trade. Workers’ wages were increased by an average of 25 per cent, and an 8-hour working day was introduced. On April 3, land-reform law was issued, by which all estates exceeding 57 hectares in area were confiscated. The confiscated land, however, was not distributed among the land-starved and landless peasants, but was turned over to agricultural producers’ cooperatives and state farms organised after the reform. The poor peasants, who had hoped to get land, were disappointed. This prevented the establishment of a firm alliance between the proletariat and the peasantry, and weakened Soviet power in Hungary.
The Entente imperialists instituted an economic blockade of the Soviet Republic. Armed intervention against the Hungarian Soviet Republic was organised, the advance of interventionist troops stirring up the Hungarian counter-revolutionaries. The treachery of the Right-wing Social-Democrats, who entered into an alliance with international imperialism, was one of the causes of the Hungarian Soviet Republic’s downfall.
The unfavourable international situation in the summer of 1919, when Soviet Russia was encircled by enemies and therefore could not help the Hungarian Soviet Republic, also played a definite role. On August 1, 1919, as a result of joint actions by the foreign imperialist interventionists and the domestic counterrevolutionaries, Soviet power in Hungary was overthrown.
From Occupy Homes MA-Boston-Attention people facing foreclosure or in foreclosure: Don't let the Bank push you out!
From Occupy Homes MA-Boston-Attention people facing foreclosure or in foreclosure: Don't let the Bank push you out!
Important information
If you are the former owner or a tenant in a foreclosed building, you can fight for your home after foreclosure. If you have received an eviction notice from the Bank, DO NOT MOVE! Do not accept "cash for keys" payments without consulting with Occupy Homes MA or an attorney.
To all residents: If you live in a building that has already been foreclosed or where a foreclosure seems likely, call us at Occupy Homes at 617-524-3541 or come to any meeting of the City Life every Tuesday night, 6:15 pm, at 284 Amory St. in JP (near Stonybrook Station on Orange Line). You can fight the eviction.
Don't panic. Don't move. Organize! Join Occupy Homes MA
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Tufts Library - Canoe Room
46 Broad Street, Weymouth
6:00 PM
Mortgage companies have been unwilling to do meaningful loan modifications for homeowners in trouble. To owners: If you financed your home during the real estate bubble, chances are the value of your home is much less than the value of the mortgage. In that case, a "meaningful loan modification" is one that reduces principal owed.
To owners and tenants: After foreclosure, lenders evicted about 2400 households in Boston in 2008. About 77% of these households were tenants. AM these evictions were "no fault," because foreclosing lenders refuse to accept rent. They sit on vacant property after foreclosure and our neighborhoods decline.
Occupy Homes MA is dedicated to uniting tenants and former owners in foreclosed buildings in order to protect our homes and neighborhoods against giant mortgage companies and banks.
For more information, call Occupy Homes MA: 617-249-4359 - Email: SouthShoreOccupy@gmail.com
Important information
If you are the former owner or a tenant in a foreclosed building, you can fight for your home after foreclosure. If you have received an eviction notice from the Bank, DO NOT MOVE! Do not accept "cash for keys" payments without consulting with Occupy Homes MA or an attorney.
To all residents: If you live in a building that has already been foreclosed or where a foreclosure seems likely, call us at Occupy Homes at 617-524-3541 or come to any meeting of the City Life every Tuesday night, 6:15 pm, at 284 Amory St. in JP (near Stonybrook Station on Orange Line). You can fight the eviction.
Don't panic. Don't move. Organize! Join Occupy Homes MA
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Tufts Library - Canoe Room
46 Broad Street, Weymouth
6:00 PM
Mortgage companies have been unwilling to do meaningful loan modifications for homeowners in trouble. To owners: If you financed your home during the real estate bubble, chances are the value of your home is much less than the value of the mortgage. In that case, a "meaningful loan modification" is one that reduces principal owed.
To owners and tenants: After foreclosure, lenders evicted about 2400 households in Boston in 2008. About 77% of these households were tenants. AM these evictions were "no fault," because foreclosing lenders refuse to accept rent. They sit on vacant property after foreclosure and our neighborhoods decline.
Occupy Homes MA is dedicated to uniting tenants and former owners in foreclosed buildings in order to protect our homes and neighborhoods against giant mortgage companies and banks.
For more information, call Occupy Homes MA: 617-249-4359 - Email: SouthShoreOccupy@gmail.com
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Peter Paul Markin’s War- Circa 1969-An Explained Interlude
Shaved-head, close anyway, too close to distinguish that head, mine, or rather private soldier government- issue mine on loan after drafted 1969 drafted purgatories and anguishes, go, not go, go, not go, not go, go, jail, not jail, go, from the ten-thousand, no one hundred-thousand other heads, all shave-headed. No way that close-cropped head, or those ten thousand, no, one hundred thousand others , would survive the Harvard Square (square is right), Village, burned-over Haight-Ashbury night as anything but soldier tourists looking at long-haired freaks smoking dope in some impromptu Kasbah or some vagrant common lawn.
But that wistful thought is so much ancient history, so much bad karma, ghost danced against ancient painted cavern-etched shamanic bad karmic night, as is the certitude, the absolute certitude, after only three, hell, one for truth, but three, on more, half-humid, half ground frozen (and I know, know from close observation just minutes ago after having “done ten” that half frozen) southern winter days (Georgia, hell-bent segregated Georgia places like Albany and Augusta, if not Atlanta) that go, no go, jail, not jail, Canada or wherever, was decided the wrong way and that life from here on in would get quirky (nice way to put it, right, put it just short of facing phantom firing squads).
Start. Four in the morning madness but this time not falling into too much to dream sweet good night but cursing some stoolie “orderlie” who has just kicked off my blanket cover and yelled, yelled if you can believe that, right in my ear that if I was not up before he turned his head to yell at some other shaved- head across from my bunk that I would be “doing ten (or was it one hundred, or one thousand)” in front of the whole company of fellow raw recruits on some sweet red clay Georgia earth, frozen okay, when the sun came up.
Naturally the trap was set for me, yankee abolitionist doughboy me, as he, some confederate of Stonewall Jackson or one of those lost johnnie reb greybeards, could turn his ugly government-issue head bunk away before I could even uncover that frizzy green blanket and so I was to be parlayed, relayed, surveyed and displayed before a motley of bleary eyed raws and done. An example, a horribly example of slovenliness that would get some rolling hills hayseed Ohio farm boy too scared to say yessir or no sir, some Kentucky un-shoed hills and hollows (ya, I know hollas) toothless illiterate dragged from mother womb coal veins, or some jet black ebony angel New York City street corner boy caught up in the court system, some petty larceny count to his credit, and warned, judge-warned, into the service, killed for lack of speed. Yes, that go, no go thing went the wrong way, way wrong, as I sensed those phantom firing squads closing in.
At peek of light, no food in stomach, no eyes, no open eyes, and in bare tee-shirt, white government-issued and two sizes two big just then, I fall down to the earth, spitting mud-flecked red clay, spitting dust, spitting, spitting out the stars over Alabama (oops Georgia, all these southern red clays seem so very much the same, or would on further inspection) that portent no good, no earthy good. Cold, cold cold as only a day time hot winter place can be night cold.
And I do “ten.” And then that ten, or the cold red clay doing of that ten, started a mental civil war between one government-issued private soldier and one warring government. Of such incidents great wars, and great struggles against war, swarm the earth, although the latter less frequently than one would suspect. Or hope.
Then those DNA-etched righteous furies kick-assed with my brain, those old time grandmother Catholic Worker stop the goddam wars and stop them now (exactly quoting Irish “shawlie” grandma wisdom, or else) reared their pug ugly (ur-government-issued ugly) head. And that shave-headed (as if shave-headed-ness had exposed on its surface for all the world to see as if written out longhand all the quaint, if shadow, last night I had the strangest dream, stop the war madness covered up by long-haired no thoughts and no risks ancient thoughts) red clay foam-flecked private soldier dreamed of crusades and leading great crusades, and marching men back into barracks and locking doors against the killing fields.
And arguing with sneer-snickering (remembering only no sir or yes sir) Ohio farm boys, Kentucky rednecks hell-bent on tunnel-rat-dom like some great cosmic chain held them together, and black as night New York City street-wise (well, half-wise)corner boys this-if this is not murder, if this is not to slay, then what is? Come and face the phantom firing squads too, come cry out to high heaven against the madness, the madness of men, and madnesses stopped by men, by little no “no siring” men.
The die is cast, not as usual truthfully cast, not pure warrior in the frozen ground red clay night, not massive warrior-king leading home swords turned into plowshare armies, solitary avenging angel cast, but cast. Dreams of running away to elysian fields (or mudded Woodstock farm mires), dreams of lost love (of girls left behind and of secret betrayals), dreams of not doing this or that youth-desired thing keep rearing back and certain character flaws, certain wise guy, small town corner boy (unknown to black knight New York City corner boys all wide-eyed) know-it-all cut corners character flaws stream in the hot, humid, footsore march.
But in the end the drumbeat tattoo beats his beat, and fate.
Wild dreams, senseless wild dreams follow, follow in succession, day and night. Time has no measure, no measure at all and calendars only form fear for burning red eyes. Angels rage at hell’s door to no avail. Rant, mere rant against the barb wired fix. Sweats, real human sweats, ever present sweats in small airless rooms. Rooms not picked by man, or fit. The days of rage, rage against the light, and then the glimmer of the light. Fame, maybe unearned nickel and dime fame, as poster boy for break-out soldiers crying against the high hellish anguished night and murders, murders called by their right name. Then, that exact moment , those phantom firing squads turn to dust, ashes really, and free.
But that wistful thought is so much ancient history, so much bad karma, ghost danced against ancient painted cavern-etched shamanic bad karmic night, as is the certitude, the absolute certitude, after only three, hell, one for truth, but three, on more, half-humid, half ground frozen (and I know, know from close observation just minutes ago after having “done ten” that half frozen) southern winter days (Georgia, hell-bent segregated Georgia places like Albany and Augusta, if not Atlanta) that go, no go, jail, not jail, Canada or wherever, was decided the wrong way and that life from here on in would get quirky (nice way to put it, right, put it just short of facing phantom firing squads).
Start. Four in the morning madness but this time not falling into too much to dream sweet good night but cursing some stoolie “orderlie” who has just kicked off my blanket cover and yelled, yelled if you can believe that, right in my ear that if I was not up before he turned his head to yell at some other shaved- head across from my bunk that I would be “doing ten (or was it one hundred, or one thousand)” in front of the whole company of fellow raw recruits on some sweet red clay Georgia earth, frozen okay, when the sun came up.
Naturally the trap was set for me, yankee abolitionist doughboy me, as he, some confederate of Stonewall Jackson or one of those lost johnnie reb greybeards, could turn his ugly government-issue head bunk away before I could even uncover that frizzy green blanket and so I was to be parlayed, relayed, surveyed and displayed before a motley of bleary eyed raws and done. An example, a horribly example of slovenliness that would get some rolling hills hayseed Ohio farm boy too scared to say yessir or no sir, some Kentucky un-shoed hills and hollows (ya, I know hollas) toothless illiterate dragged from mother womb coal veins, or some jet black ebony angel New York City street corner boy caught up in the court system, some petty larceny count to his credit, and warned, judge-warned, into the service, killed for lack of speed. Yes, that go, no go thing went the wrong way, way wrong, as I sensed those phantom firing squads closing in.
At peek of light, no food in stomach, no eyes, no open eyes, and in bare tee-shirt, white government-issued and two sizes two big just then, I fall down to the earth, spitting mud-flecked red clay, spitting dust, spitting, spitting out the stars over Alabama (oops Georgia, all these southern red clays seem so very much the same, or would on further inspection) that portent no good, no earthy good. Cold, cold cold as only a day time hot winter place can be night cold.
And I do “ten.” And then that ten, or the cold red clay doing of that ten, started a mental civil war between one government-issued private soldier and one warring government. Of such incidents great wars, and great struggles against war, swarm the earth, although the latter less frequently than one would suspect. Or hope.
Then those DNA-etched righteous furies kick-assed with my brain, those old time grandmother Catholic Worker stop the goddam wars and stop them now (exactly quoting Irish “shawlie” grandma wisdom, or else) reared their pug ugly (ur-government-issued ugly) head. And that shave-headed (as if shave-headed-ness had exposed on its surface for all the world to see as if written out longhand all the quaint, if shadow, last night I had the strangest dream, stop the war madness covered up by long-haired no thoughts and no risks ancient thoughts) red clay foam-flecked private soldier dreamed of crusades and leading great crusades, and marching men back into barracks and locking doors against the killing fields.
And arguing with sneer-snickering (remembering only no sir or yes sir) Ohio farm boys, Kentucky rednecks hell-bent on tunnel-rat-dom like some great cosmic chain held them together, and black as night New York City street-wise (well, half-wise)corner boys this-if this is not murder, if this is not to slay, then what is? Come and face the phantom firing squads too, come cry out to high heaven against the madness, the madness of men, and madnesses stopped by men, by little no “no siring” men.
The die is cast, not as usual truthfully cast, not pure warrior in the frozen ground red clay night, not massive warrior-king leading home swords turned into plowshare armies, solitary avenging angel cast, but cast. Dreams of running away to elysian fields (or mudded Woodstock farm mires), dreams of lost love (of girls left behind and of secret betrayals), dreams of not doing this or that youth-desired thing keep rearing back and certain character flaws, certain wise guy, small town corner boy (unknown to black knight New York City corner boys all wide-eyed) know-it-all cut corners character flaws stream in the hot, humid, footsore march.
But in the end the drumbeat tattoo beats his beat, and fate.
Wild dreams, senseless wild dreams follow, follow in succession, day and night. Time has no measure, no measure at all and calendars only form fear for burning red eyes. Angels rage at hell’s door to no avail. Rant, mere rant against the barb wired fix. Sweats, real human sweats, ever present sweats in small airless rooms. Rooms not picked by man, or fit. The days of rage, rage against the light, and then the glimmer of the light. Fame, maybe unearned nickel and dime fame, as poster boy for break-out soldiers crying against the high hellish anguished night and murders, murders called by their right name. Then, that exact moment , those phantom firing squads turn to dust, ashes really, and free.
From "OCCUPY HOMES MASSACHUSETTS"- No Homeowner Need Stand Alone!-Organize Now!
Click on the headline to link to the Occupy Quincy website for more information about Occupy Homes MA.
Stand Together-Occupy Homes Ma-Stop 'the banksters' Foreclosures and Evictions
OCCUPY HOMES MA
Next Meeting Scheduled For Tufts Library, Broad Street, Weymouth, August 21 2012-6:00 PM- Check out directions and details on our Facebook page-Occupy Homes MA.
WANT ASSISTANCE OR MORE INFORMATION?
OccupyHomesMA@gmail.com
617-249-4359
*********
Are you facing FORECLOSURE?- YOU ARE NOT ALONE!
Stand up with other homeowners who are fighting with us.
Want more information?
Contact us by email at OccupyHomesMA@gmail.com
or call us at 617-249-4359
The homeowner's meeting is intended to be a support group
specifically for those in the foreclosure process.
ATTEND A HOMEOWNERS MEETING TO
Develop Solidarity and Support:
We urge people to leave their shame at the door. We work to end the stigma and isolation of individual foreclosure and eviction cases by uniting homeowners.
Learn Your Rights:
You don't have to move just because the bank says so. We empower people to know their rights and advocate for themselves.
Organize with Occupy Homes MA:
Community members and activists are ready to stand with you. Let’s build mass resistance to defend your home and break the stranglehold the big banks have on our neighborhoods.
************
Want to get involved?
Participate!
Fight back! A movement working for the 99% must be shaped and formed by all those who participate. All decisions on the direction and scope of the struggle are democratic.
Organize!
Build powerful communities! Identify issues affecting our neighborhoods, and work together on solutions.
Mobilize!
The best tool of the 99% is our numbers, and our ability to work together. Plan public actions, protests, and home defense.
Educate!
Become educated and teach others about the nature of the foreclosure crisis, and ways empowered communities can begin to solve it.
************
Excerpt from...
Keeping House: Local Organizations Collaborate to Help Boston Residents Stay in Their Home Post-Foreclosure
Noelle Swan Spare Change News
When Jeril Richardson checked out of the hospital after he was hit by a car in 2009, he returned home to find that his landlord had not been keeping up with mortgage payments and the bank was foreclosing on his Hyde Park home.
Canvassers knocking on his door told him about City Life Vida Urbana, a community organization that would help him to fight to stay in his home. Nearly three years later, Richardson still lives in the house, pays rent to the bank, and is saving to purchase the property.
Every weekend, students and community volunteers from Project No One Leaves hit the streets in an effort to reach tenants and homeowners facing foreclosure to inform them of their rights during and after the foreclosure.
"We try to get there before eviction agents come knocking and telling them to leave immediately," said Chris Larson, senior at Tufts University who helped to coordinate a chapter of No One Leaves at Tufts.
In recent years, keeping up with new foreclosures has become a daunting task, said Chas Hamilton, a third-year law student and current president of the board for Project No One Leaves at Harvard Law School. "In a given week, there might be 30 new foreclosures listed in Boston proper."
"Then there are properties that they did not get to in weeks past because canvassers ran out of time, people weren't home, or their just weren't enough cars to get to all of the neighborhoods." Volunteers for No One Leaves chart foreclosure postings listed in local newspapers and real estate publications.
Listings are grouped into geographic zones of the city and mapped out. Each week, a dozen or so volunteers gather at the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau in Cambridge, split up into groups of two to five depending on the number of cars available, and try to get out to as many properties as they can in three hours.
"The real message that we try to deliver is that foreclosure is not the end. It's the beginning of this very long battle," Larson said.
http://sparechangenews.net/news/keeping-house-
local-organizations-collaborate-help-boston-residents-
stay-their-home-post-forecl
********
WHY Occupy Homes MA?
OCCUPY OUR HOMES
Far too many homeowners are facing foreclosure. The need is greater than the capacity to help. City Life along with a team from Harvard Law is mentoring Occupy Homes MA as we create this new chapter to help homeowners on the South Shore. We are here to:
STOP FORECLOSURES
This is a people's movement that is building across Massachusetts. Homeowners did not create the crisis we are in, and homeowners are no longer going to face the shame of foreclosure and eviction alone. We are here to:
STOP EVICTIONS
The police should serve and protect the 99%, not assist the big banks with eviction. We will organize the community and resist eviction. Knowledge is power; they cannot easily put you out on the street - we want to help you, we won't let them!
HOUSING IS A HUMAN
There are 18 million empty homes in the U.S.
Help us, to help you by saying: "NOT MY HOME!"
Stand Together-Occupy Homes Ma-Stop 'the banksters' Foreclosures and Evictions
OCCUPY HOMES MA
Next Meeting Scheduled For Tufts Library, Broad Street, Weymouth, August 21 2012-6:00 PM- Check out directions and details on our Facebook page-Occupy Homes MA.
WANT ASSISTANCE OR MORE INFORMATION?
OccupyHomesMA@gmail.com
617-249-4359
*********
Are you facing FORECLOSURE?- YOU ARE NOT ALONE!
Stand up with other homeowners who are fighting with us.
Want more information?
Contact us by email at OccupyHomesMA@gmail.com
or call us at 617-249-4359
The homeowner's meeting is intended to be a support group
specifically for those in the foreclosure process.
ATTEND A HOMEOWNERS MEETING TO
Develop Solidarity and Support:
We urge people to leave their shame at the door. We work to end the stigma and isolation of individual foreclosure and eviction cases by uniting homeowners.
Learn Your Rights:
You don't have to move just because the bank says so. We empower people to know their rights and advocate for themselves.
Organize with Occupy Homes MA:
Community members and activists are ready to stand with you. Let’s build mass resistance to defend your home and break the stranglehold the big banks have on our neighborhoods.
************
Want to get involved?
Participate!
Fight back! A movement working for the 99% must be shaped and formed by all those who participate. All decisions on the direction and scope of the struggle are democratic.
Organize!
Build powerful communities! Identify issues affecting our neighborhoods, and work together on solutions.
Mobilize!
The best tool of the 99% is our numbers, and our ability to work together. Plan public actions, protests, and home defense.
Educate!
Become educated and teach others about the nature of the foreclosure crisis, and ways empowered communities can begin to solve it.
************
Excerpt from...
Keeping House: Local Organizations Collaborate to Help Boston Residents Stay in Their Home Post-Foreclosure
Noelle Swan Spare Change News
When Jeril Richardson checked out of the hospital after he was hit by a car in 2009, he returned home to find that his landlord had not been keeping up with mortgage payments and the bank was foreclosing on his Hyde Park home.
Canvassers knocking on his door told him about City Life Vida Urbana, a community organization that would help him to fight to stay in his home. Nearly three years later, Richardson still lives in the house, pays rent to the bank, and is saving to purchase the property.
Every weekend, students and community volunteers from Project No One Leaves hit the streets in an effort to reach tenants and homeowners facing foreclosure to inform them of their rights during and after the foreclosure.
"We try to get there before eviction agents come knocking and telling them to leave immediately," said Chris Larson, senior at Tufts University who helped to coordinate a chapter of No One Leaves at Tufts.
In recent years, keeping up with new foreclosures has become a daunting task, said Chas Hamilton, a third-year law student and current president of the board for Project No One Leaves at Harvard Law School. "In a given week, there might be 30 new foreclosures listed in Boston proper."
"Then there are properties that they did not get to in weeks past because canvassers ran out of time, people weren't home, or their just weren't enough cars to get to all of the neighborhoods." Volunteers for No One Leaves chart foreclosure postings listed in local newspapers and real estate publications.
Listings are grouped into geographic zones of the city and mapped out. Each week, a dozen or so volunteers gather at the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau in Cambridge, split up into groups of two to five depending on the number of cars available, and try to get out to as many properties as they can in three hours.
"The real message that we try to deliver is that foreclosure is not the end. It's the beginning of this very long battle," Larson said.
http://sparechangenews.net/news/keeping-house-
local-organizations-collaborate-help-boston-residents-
stay-their-home-post-forecl
********
WHY Occupy Homes MA?
OCCUPY OUR HOMES
Far too many homeowners are facing foreclosure. The need is greater than the capacity to help. City Life along with a team from Harvard Law is mentoring Occupy Homes MA as we create this new chapter to help homeowners on the South Shore. We are here to:
STOP FORECLOSURES
This is a people's movement that is building across Massachusetts. Homeowners did not create the crisis we are in, and homeowners are no longer going to face the shame of foreclosure and eviction alone. We are here to:
STOP EVICTIONS
The police should serve and protect the 99%, not assist the big banks with eviction. We will organize the community and resist eviction. Knowledge is power; they cannot easily put you out on the street - we want to help you, we won't let them!
HOUSING IS A HUMAN
There are 18 million empty homes in the U.S.
Help us, to help you by saying: "NOT MY HOME!"
The Latest From The Partisan Defense Committee-Free The Class-War Prisoners-Support The Striking Greek Steelworkers!-Victory to he Hellenic Halyvourgia strikers!
Click on the headline to link to the Partisan Defense Committee website.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
**********
Support The Striking Greek Steelworkers!-Victory to he Hellenic Halyvourgia strikers!
Workers at the Greek steel plant Elliniki Halyvourgia have been on strike for nearly nine months, in struggle against layoffs and cuts in wages and hours. On June 20, the PDC sent a letter of support stating, "We join pith workers internationally who have expressed solidarity with you. Your strike is in the forefront of the (Struggle against the austerity being imposed on not only the working people of Greece but also the working 'class of all Europe. The European Union and the capitalist rulers of each country seek to make the workers 'sacrifice' in order to maintain their profits during the years-long economic crisis." We concluded, "Victory to he Hellenic Halyvourgia strikers! No wage cuts, hour reductions, or layoffs! Immediate reinstatement of all the workers! Down with capitalist austerity! Workers of the world unite!"
The address for solidarity letters is:
17thKmNEOAK
Elleniki Halyvourgia
Asproprygos 19300, Greece
Fax number: 011-30-210-557-8360
Telephone: 011-30-210-557-0829
Donations in support of the steel strikers should be sent to: National Bank of Greece IBAN:GR40011020000000 2006 2330152 BIC/Swift Code: ETHNGRAA Account holder: Dimitris Liakos
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
**********
Support The Striking Greek Steelworkers!-Victory to he Hellenic Halyvourgia strikers!
Workers at the Greek steel plant Elliniki Halyvourgia have been on strike for nearly nine months, in struggle against layoffs and cuts in wages and hours. On June 20, the PDC sent a letter of support stating, "We join pith workers internationally who have expressed solidarity with you. Your strike is in the forefront of the (Struggle against the austerity being imposed on not only the working people of Greece but also the working 'class of all Europe. The European Union and the capitalist rulers of each country seek to make the workers 'sacrifice' in order to maintain their profits during the years-long economic crisis." We concluded, "Victory to he Hellenic Halyvourgia strikers! No wage cuts, hour reductions, or layoffs! Immediate reinstatement of all the workers! Down with capitalist austerity! Workers of the world unite!"
The address for solidarity letters is:
17thKmNEOAK
Elleniki Halyvourgia
Asproprygos 19300, Greece
Fax number: 011-30-210-557-8360
Telephone: 011-30-210-557-0829
Donations in support of the steel strikers should be sent to: National Bank of Greece IBAN:GR40011020000000 2006 2330152 BIC/Swift Code: ETHNGRAA Account holder: Dimitris Liakos
The Latest From The Partisan Defense Committee-Free The Class-War Prisoners-The Latest In The Lynne Stewart Case-Free Lynne Stewart!
Click on the headline to link to the Partisan Defense Committee website.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
*************
Free Lynne Stewart
On June 28, the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the vindictive 10-year prison sentence against Lynne Stewart. As Workers Vanguard wrote at the time of her conviction: "The verdict gives the government a green light to prosecute lawyers for the alleged crimes of their clients, thereby shooting the basic right to counsel to hell" (Workers Vanguard No. 842, 18 February 2005). Opponents of the "war on terror" assault on democratic rights must demand: Free Lynne Stewart now! In its ruling the Second Circuit repeatedly cited Stewart's "lack of remorse" as a key motivation for upholding the sentence. Stewart's husband Ralph Poynter told Workers Vanguard: "They're angry because she's not bent or bowed." The Partisan Defense Committee has contributed to Stewart's defense and encourages others to do the same. Donations can be sent to: Lynne Stewart Organization, 1070 Dean Street, Brooklyn, New York 11216. Letters can be mailed to: Lynne Stewart, #53504-054, FMC Carswell, Federal Medical Center, P.O. Box 27137, Fort Worth, TX 76127.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
*************
Free Lynne Stewart
On June 28, the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the vindictive 10-year prison sentence against Lynne Stewart. As Workers Vanguard wrote at the time of her conviction: "The verdict gives the government a green light to prosecute lawyers for the alleged crimes of their clients, thereby shooting the basic right to counsel to hell" (Workers Vanguard No. 842, 18 February 2005). Opponents of the "war on terror" assault on democratic rights must demand: Free Lynne Stewart now! In its ruling the Second Circuit repeatedly cited Stewart's "lack of remorse" as a key motivation for upholding the sentence. Stewart's husband Ralph Poynter told Workers Vanguard: "They're angry because she's not bent or bowed." The Partisan Defense Committee has contributed to Stewart's defense and encourages others to do the same. Donations can be sent to: Lynne Stewart Organization, 1070 Dean Street, Brooklyn, New York 11216. Letters can be mailed to: Lynne Stewart, #53504-054, FMC Carswell, Federal Medical Center, P.O. Box 27137, Fort Worth, TX 76127.
The Latest From The Partisan Defense Committee-Free The Class-War Prisoners-The Latest In The Mumia Case-Free Mumia Now!
Click on the headline to link to the Partisan Defense Committee website.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
********
Free Mumia
July 2 marked 30 years since a nearly all-white jury declared former Black Panther spokesman and MOVE supporter Mumia Abu-Jamal guilty in the killing of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner on 9 December 1981. One day later, on the eve of the 4l of July, the jurors sentenced Mumia to death, based explicitly on his political views and activities as a champion of black freedom and eloquent voice for the oppressed. Finally removed from death row, Mumia was transferred to Mahanoy prison in Frackville, Pennsylvania, where he was vindictively thrown into solitary for seven weeks before finally being released into the general prison population on January 27. On July 9, PDC representatives visited Mumia. With the restraints of death row finally lifted, Mumia is allowed six hours a day outdoors and is getting all the exercise that he can. For the first time since we started visiting Mumia in 1987, Mumia and our representatives could embrace and sit side by side. Compared with the death row conditions under which Mumia lived for 30 years, the more ordinary hell of America's prison is an improvement. But it is a crime that this innocent man has spent even a day behind bars. We remain dedicated to searing the cause of Mumia's fight for freedom into the consciousness of the working class, radical youth and opponents of black oppression. Free Mumia now!
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
********
Free Mumia
July 2 marked 30 years since a nearly all-white jury declared former Black Panther spokesman and MOVE supporter Mumia Abu-Jamal guilty in the killing of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner on 9 December 1981. One day later, on the eve of the 4l of July, the jurors sentenced Mumia to death, based explicitly on his political views and activities as a champion of black freedom and eloquent voice for the oppressed. Finally removed from death row, Mumia was transferred to Mahanoy prison in Frackville, Pennsylvania, where he was vindictively thrown into solitary for seven weeks before finally being released into the general prison population on January 27. On July 9, PDC representatives visited Mumia. With the restraints of death row finally lifted, Mumia is allowed six hours a day outdoors and is getting all the exercise that he can. For the first time since we started visiting Mumia in 1987, Mumia and our representatives could embrace and sit side by side. Compared with the death row conditions under which Mumia lived for 30 years, the more ordinary hell of America's prison is an improvement. But it is a crime that this innocent man has spent even a day behind bars. We remain dedicated to searing the cause of Mumia's fight for freedom into the consciousness of the working class, radical youth and opponents of black oppression. Free Mumia now!
From #Un-Occupied Boston (#Un-Tomemonos Boston)-What Happens When We Do Not Learn The Lessons Of History- The Pre-1848 Socialist Movement-Auguste Blanqui 1848-Parisians!
Click on the headline to link to the Occupy Boston General Assembly Minutes website. Occupy Boston started at 6:00 PM, September 30, 2011.
Markin comment:
I will post any updates from that Occupy Boston site if there are any serious discussions of the way forward for the Occupy movement or, more importantly, any analysis of the now atrophied and dysfunctional General Assembly concept. In the meantime I will continue with the “Lessons From History ’’series started in the fall of 2011 with Karl Marx’s The Civil War In France-1871 (The defense of the Paris Commune). Right now this series is focused on the European socialist movement before the Revolutions of 1848.
****
An Injury To One Is An Injury To All!-Defend The Occupy Movement And All Occupiers! Drop All Charges Against All Occupy Protesters Everywhere!
********
Fight-Don’t Starve-We Created The Wealth, Let's Take It Back! Labor And The Oppressed Must Rule!
********
A Five-Point Program As Talking Points
*Jobs For All Now!-“30 For 40”- A historic demand of the labor movement. Thirty hours work for forty hours pay to spread the available work around. Organize the unorganized- Organize the South- Organize Wal-Mart- Defend the right for public and private workers to unionize.
* Defend the working classes! No union dues for Democratic (or the stray Republican) candidates. Spent the dough instead on organizing the unorganized and on other labor-specific causes (good example, the November, 2011 anti-union recall referendum in Ohio, bad example the Wisconsin gubernatorial recall race in June 2012).
*End the endless wars!- Immediate, Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S./Allied Troops (And Mercenaries) From Afghanistan! Hands Off Pakistan! Hands Off Iran! U.S. Hands Off The World!
*Fight for a social agenda for working people!. Quality Healthcare For All! Nationalize the colleges and universities under student-teacher-campus worker control! Forgive student debt! Stop housing foreclosures!
*We created the wealth, let’s take it back. Take the struggle for our daily bread off the historic agenda. Build a workers party that fights for a workers government to unite all the oppressed.
Emblazon on our red banner-Labor and the oppressed must rule!
***********
Auguste Blanqui 1848-Parisians!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Translated: for marxists.org by Mitch Abidor;
CopyLeft: Creative Commons (Attribute & ShareAlike) marxists.org 2004.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If there is still time, open your eyes at the polling booth to the peril that threatens you: Paris is condemned and its sentence is being carried out by the hands of a reaction that was able to everywhere recruit accomplices in and instruments of its vengeance.
Under the pretext of disencumberment, of public order and even of humanity, every day the capital is being emptied of the working class. A fatal measure! A death measure!
With the exception of a small handful of rich idlers the entire city only lives only thanks to the workers: without workers there is no more consumption, and thus no more business! The mass of retailers would fall into ruin, big business and industry would follow them into the abyss, and the faction that represents the victorious past would applaud the ruin of this Paris that it abhors because it has changed the face of the world.
Merchants, landlords, don’t second these evil designs; leave behind your terrors and fears. What do the people ask for? To live in happiness through their labor, and interest orders you to support this just demand, for your profits come from the people, you earn them as a result of their consumption. Don’t let appearances fool you! In the ocean of affairs, spending on luxury items is but a drop of water. For every person who lives off the gold of the rich nine live on the centimes of the poor. Between you and the workers there is solidarity.
But be just! The people have suffered for too long! They no longer can nor will suffer under the harsh conditions made for them by the rapacity of the moneyed. They ask for a more equitable ones, and it is this demand that is rejected with violence, with fury...They persist, they claim to drive them to ask for mercy, they are hunted down through famine...But they don’t surrender! They will advance, shaking the dust from their feet. Their property doesn’t tie them down them, and they are already leaving. And Paris, without any people, will enter its agony.
When the grass grows green between the cobblestones it will be too late for you merchants without business and landlords without rent to cry in the doorways of your closed up shops and your deserted houses! You will have order just as in Milan or Warsaw, and you will perhaps find that the rolling of cannons on the streets is not worth as much as that of trucks and carts.
There remains one chance for salvation: that you freely join the people in order to ensure that they receive what they ask for, i.e., well-paid work and, above all else, the choice of representatives who will want to accomplish these tasks without any delay and at whatever cost, carry out this task.
It isn’t enormous; it suffices to not remain prostrated before capital and to render them that good will they showed for an instant after the events of February. Above all, don’t forget that your mortal enemy is provincial reaction. You know where to find it, for it doesn’t hide itself.
With its saber high it is leading the charge on Paris. Remember the sinister phrase of Isnard, a representative of one of the small towns: “If Paris dares attack national sovereignty travelers will soon search the banks of the Seine in an attempt to find the place on which Paris stood.”
This phrase is the key to the situation. Isnard and his ilk wanted to suffocate the great city in the hothouse of the army, and history is there to show us that their triumph would have ended with the carving up of France. They failed, and the holy city made of us the first people in the world.
Paris, the capital of intelligence and labor, is the true national representative body, the gigantic and majestic congress where the whole country, through the elite of its united children – writers, artists, workers, scientists, industrialists – is ceaselessly occupied in making shine the labor of its grandeur and prosperity.
Reaction aims to paralyze the nation by cutting off its brain. Parisians! It’s up to you, rich and poor, to prevent France from being decapitated and to hold back the hand that the parricides raise against their mothers!
Think of this at the polling booth.
Auguste Blanqui
Dungeon of Vincennes
September 15, 1848
Markin comment:
I will post any updates from that Occupy Boston site if there are any serious discussions of the way forward for the Occupy movement or, more importantly, any analysis of the now atrophied and dysfunctional General Assembly concept. In the meantime I will continue with the “Lessons From History ’’series started in the fall of 2011 with Karl Marx’s The Civil War In France-1871 (The defense of the Paris Commune). Right now this series is focused on the European socialist movement before the Revolutions of 1848.
****
An Injury To One Is An Injury To All!-Defend The Occupy Movement And All Occupiers! Drop All Charges Against All Occupy Protesters Everywhere!
********
Fight-Don’t Starve-We Created The Wealth, Let's Take It Back! Labor And The Oppressed Must Rule!
********
A Five-Point Program As Talking Points
*Jobs For All Now!-“30 For 40”- A historic demand of the labor movement. Thirty hours work for forty hours pay to spread the available work around. Organize the unorganized- Organize the South- Organize Wal-Mart- Defend the right for public and private workers to unionize.
* Defend the working classes! No union dues for Democratic (or the stray Republican) candidates. Spent the dough instead on organizing the unorganized and on other labor-specific causes (good example, the November, 2011 anti-union recall referendum in Ohio, bad example the Wisconsin gubernatorial recall race in June 2012).
*End the endless wars!- Immediate, Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S./Allied Troops (And Mercenaries) From Afghanistan! Hands Off Pakistan! Hands Off Iran! U.S. Hands Off The World!
*Fight for a social agenda for working people!. Quality Healthcare For All! Nationalize the colleges and universities under student-teacher-campus worker control! Forgive student debt! Stop housing foreclosures!
*We created the wealth, let’s take it back. Take the struggle for our daily bread off the historic agenda. Build a workers party that fights for a workers government to unite all the oppressed.
Emblazon on our red banner-Labor and the oppressed must rule!
***********
Auguste Blanqui 1848-Parisians!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Translated: for marxists.org by Mitch Abidor;
CopyLeft: Creative Commons (Attribute & ShareAlike) marxists.org 2004.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If there is still time, open your eyes at the polling booth to the peril that threatens you: Paris is condemned and its sentence is being carried out by the hands of a reaction that was able to everywhere recruit accomplices in and instruments of its vengeance.
Under the pretext of disencumberment, of public order and even of humanity, every day the capital is being emptied of the working class. A fatal measure! A death measure!
With the exception of a small handful of rich idlers the entire city only lives only thanks to the workers: without workers there is no more consumption, and thus no more business! The mass of retailers would fall into ruin, big business and industry would follow them into the abyss, and the faction that represents the victorious past would applaud the ruin of this Paris that it abhors because it has changed the face of the world.
Merchants, landlords, don’t second these evil designs; leave behind your terrors and fears. What do the people ask for? To live in happiness through their labor, and interest orders you to support this just demand, for your profits come from the people, you earn them as a result of their consumption. Don’t let appearances fool you! In the ocean of affairs, spending on luxury items is but a drop of water. For every person who lives off the gold of the rich nine live on the centimes of the poor. Between you and the workers there is solidarity.
But be just! The people have suffered for too long! They no longer can nor will suffer under the harsh conditions made for them by the rapacity of the moneyed. They ask for a more equitable ones, and it is this demand that is rejected with violence, with fury...They persist, they claim to drive them to ask for mercy, they are hunted down through famine...But they don’t surrender! They will advance, shaking the dust from their feet. Their property doesn’t tie them down them, and they are already leaving. And Paris, without any people, will enter its agony.
When the grass grows green between the cobblestones it will be too late for you merchants without business and landlords without rent to cry in the doorways of your closed up shops and your deserted houses! You will have order just as in Milan or Warsaw, and you will perhaps find that the rolling of cannons on the streets is not worth as much as that of trucks and carts.
There remains one chance for salvation: that you freely join the people in order to ensure that they receive what they ask for, i.e., well-paid work and, above all else, the choice of representatives who will want to accomplish these tasks without any delay and at whatever cost, carry out this task.
It isn’t enormous; it suffices to not remain prostrated before capital and to render them that good will they showed for an instant after the events of February. Above all, don’t forget that your mortal enemy is provincial reaction. You know where to find it, for it doesn’t hide itself.
With its saber high it is leading the charge on Paris. Remember the sinister phrase of Isnard, a representative of one of the small towns: “If Paris dares attack national sovereignty travelers will soon search the banks of the Seine in an attempt to find the place on which Paris stood.”
This phrase is the key to the situation. Isnard and his ilk wanted to suffocate the great city in the hothouse of the army, and history is there to show us that their triumph would have ended with the carving up of France. They failed, and the holy city made of us the first people in the world.
Paris, the capital of intelligence and labor, is the true national representative body, the gigantic and majestic congress where the whole country, through the elite of its united children – writers, artists, workers, scientists, industrialists – is ceaselessly occupied in making shine the labor of its grandeur and prosperity.
Reaction aims to paralyze the nation by cutting off its brain. Parisians! It’s up to you, rich and poor, to prevent France from being decapitated and to hold back the hand that the parricides raise against their mothers!
Think of this at the polling booth.
Auguste Blanqui
Dungeon of Vincennes
September 15, 1848
The Latest From The Partisan Defense Committee-Free The Class-War Prisoners-The Latest In The Radical Activist Carlos Montes Case
Click on the headline to link to the Partisan Defense Committee website.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
***********
The Carlos Montes Case
We have previously written in our newsletters about Carlos Montes, targeted by the FBI for his long history of leftist political activism. Montes had recently worked with the committee to Stop FBI Repression, which was formed to defend 23 Midwestern leftists, antiwar organizers and union activists targeted by the FBI since September 2010 for the "crime" of solidarity with the oppressed in Latin American and the Near East. On May 17, 2011, Montes' Alhambra home was invaded by the FBI and the Los Angeles Sheriffs SWAT team who ransacked the house, taking his computer, computer files and cell phone. Montes was arrested on a pretext of violating a firearms code and charged with six felonies. In vastly expanding the state's repressive powers in the name of the "war on terror" over the last decade, the capitalist government has slashed fundamental rights of association and speech. On September 28, 2011, the PDC wrote a letter to the County of Los Angeles District Attorney demanding all of his belongs be returned immediately and that all charges be dropped.
The court case against Montes ended on June 5 when Montes pleaded "no contest" to one count of perjury in exchange for the local District Attorney dropping the three remaining felonies against him. Although Montes will receive no prison time, he now must serve three years of formal probation, which will keep him under the thumb of the capitalist state, and 180 hours of community service. He is also prohibited from possessing any weapons. Montes had faced up to 18 years in jail. While we welcome the fact that Montes will not be imprisoned, the onerous penalties that he has been saddled with are not a "victory against repression" as his supporters have trumpeted. In fact, what transpired there is nothing but the regular workings of the American criminal justice system. Cops and prosecutors routinely level bogus serious felony charges threatening decades in prison to compel plea agreements to lesser charges.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
***********
The Carlos Montes Case
We have previously written in our newsletters about Carlos Montes, targeted by the FBI for his long history of leftist political activism. Montes had recently worked with the committee to Stop FBI Repression, which was formed to defend 23 Midwestern leftists, antiwar organizers and union activists targeted by the FBI since September 2010 for the "crime" of solidarity with the oppressed in Latin American and the Near East. On May 17, 2011, Montes' Alhambra home was invaded by the FBI and the Los Angeles Sheriffs SWAT team who ransacked the house, taking his computer, computer files and cell phone. Montes was arrested on a pretext of violating a firearms code and charged with six felonies. In vastly expanding the state's repressive powers in the name of the "war on terror" over the last decade, the capitalist government has slashed fundamental rights of association and speech. On September 28, 2011, the PDC wrote a letter to the County of Los Angeles District Attorney demanding all of his belongs be returned immediately and that all charges be dropped.
The court case against Montes ended on June 5 when Montes pleaded "no contest" to one count of perjury in exchange for the local District Attorney dropping the three remaining felonies against him. Although Montes will receive no prison time, he now must serve three years of formal probation, which will keep him under the thumb of the capitalist state, and 180 hours of community service. He is also prohibited from possessing any weapons. Montes had faced up to 18 years in jail. While we welcome the fact that Montes will not be imprisoned, the onerous penalties that he has been saddled with are not a "victory against repression" as his supporters have trumpeted. In fact, what transpired there is nothing but the regular workings of the American criminal justice system. Cops and prosecutors routinely level bogus serious felony charges threatening decades in prison to compel plea agreements to lesser charges.
The Latest From The Partisan Defense Committee-Free The Class-War Prisoners-Hand Off OccupyLA Ghost Dance Sidewalk Chalkers!-Hands Off All Occupy Protesters!
Click on the headline to link to the Partisan Defense Committee website.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
*********
July 31- Hands Off OccupyLA and All Occupy Protesters!
During the last two months OccupyLA has protested the ongoing harassment of the homeless in increasingly gentrified downtown Los Angeles by demonstrating and writing slogans on the sidewalk in water-soluble chalk. On July 12, the police attacked OccupyLA and the Downtown Los Angeles Art Walk in response to this non-crime of writing on the sidewalk with chalk. Hundreds of officers in riot gear clubbed art patrons with batons, fired on the crowd with rubber bullets, bean bags and tear gas and arrested 17 on charges ranging from vandalism to assault with a deadly weapon. On July 20, the PDC wrote a letter to the County of Los Angeles District Attorney demanding that the charges be dropped. We concluded our letter, "These latest vindictive arrests by the LAPD are intended to silence and intimidate all those who would protest the economic desperation of the masses. Drop all the Charges!"
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
*********
July 31- Hands Off OccupyLA and All Occupy Protesters!
During the last two months OccupyLA has protested the ongoing harassment of the homeless in increasingly gentrified downtown Los Angeles by demonstrating and writing slogans on the sidewalk in water-soluble chalk. On July 12, the police attacked OccupyLA and the Downtown Los Angeles Art Walk in response to this non-crime of writing on the sidewalk with chalk. Hundreds of officers in riot gear clubbed art patrons with batons, fired on the crowd with rubber bullets, bean bags and tear gas and arrested 17 on charges ranging from vandalism to assault with a deadly weapon. On July 20, the PDC wrote a letter to the County of Los Angeles District Attorney demanding that the charges be dropped. We concluded our letter, "These latest vindictive arrests by the LAPD are intended to silence and intimidate all those who would protest the economic desperation of the masses. Drop all the Charges!"
The Latest From The Partisan Defense Committee-Free The Class-War Prisoners-Free Leonard Peltier
Click on the headline to link to the Partisan Defense Committee website.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
*********
On July 25, U.S. Magistrate Judge Jeremiah J. McCarthy rejected yet another attempt by class-war prisoner Leonard Peltier to access FBI files pertaining to probable FBI infiltration of the American Indian Movement and the efforts to frame this courageous fighter for Native American rights. This is the latest in a decades-long cover-up on the part of the capitalist rulers. In 2001, in response to requests under the Freedom of Information Act and lawsuits, the U.S. government admitted it had withheld a staggering 142,579 pages of evidence of its secret COINTELPRO efforts to persecute and convict Leonard. In 1986, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a trial jury could have acquitted Mr. Peltier if records improperly withheld from the defense had been made available. We continue to demand the freedom of Leonard Peltier, now unjustly incarcerated for more than 36 years.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
*********
On July 25, U.S. Magistrate Judge Jeremiah J. McCarthy rejected yet another attempt by class-war prisoner Leonard Peltier to access FBI files pertaining to probable FBI infiltration of the American Indian Movement and the efforts to frame this courageous fighter for Native American rights. This is the latest in a decades-long cover-up on the part of the capitalist rulers. In 2001, in response to requests under the Freedom of Information Act and lawsuits, the U.S. government admitted it had withheld a staggering 142,579 pages of evidence of its secret COINTELPRO efforts to persecute and convict Leonard. In 1986, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a trial jury could have acquitted Mr. Peltier if records improperly withheld from the defense had been made available. We continue to demand the freedom of Leonard Peltier, now unjustly incarcerated for more than 36 years.
The Latest From The Partisan Defense Committee-Free The Class-War Prisoners-Free Sundiata Acoli!
Click on the headline to link to the Partisan Defense Committee website.
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
********
22 May 2012
Partisan Defense Committee P.O. Box 99, Canal Street Station, New York, NY 10013
email: partisandefense@earthlink.net www.partisandefense.org
Contact: Kevin Gilroy (212) 406-4252
Free Sundiata Acoli!
The following letter was sent on 22 May to the Chairman of the New Jersey State Parole Board:
Dear Sir:
The Partisan Defense Committee once again joins with those supporting the release of the political prisoner Sundiata Acoli. Given that Mr. Acoli is innocent of the crime for which he was convicted, is now a 75-year-old having survived 39 years of incarceration with no disciplinary reports for many years, there is absolutely no reason that he should be denied parole.
We are well aware that a common ploy used to deny parole to political prisoners is that they are said to "lack remorse" for their alleged crimes. But Mr. Accoli is an innocent man who, along with two of his companions, was a victim of a New Jersey state trooper attack in May 1973. As a former Black Panther, Mr. Acoli had long been targeted by the FBI's notorious COINTELPRO program.
We feel it is an injustice that Sundiata Acoli was incarcerated at all much less for 39 years. We call for his release.
**********
July 31, 2012
We have just received a copy of a post sent out by Sundiata Acoli informing his supporters that he was denied parole again. Sundiata's case was referred to a three-member panel to determine the size of his "hit" (the amount of time before becoming eligible for a parole hearing again). On May 22, the PDC sent a letter to the New Jersey State Parole Board on behalf of Sundiata stating, "We feel it is an injustice that Sundiata Acoli was incarcerated at all much less for 39 years. We call for his release."
Reposted from the American Left History blog, dated December 1, 2010.
Markin comment:
I like to think of myself as a fervent supporter of the Partisan Defense Committee, an organization committed to social and political defense cases and causes in the interests of the working class and, at this time of the year, to raising funds to support the class-war prisoners’ stipend program. Normally I do not need any prompting in the matter. This year, however, in light of the addition of Attorney Lynne Stewart (yes, I know, she has been disbarred but that does not make her less of a people’s attorney in my eyes) to the stipend program, I read the 25th Anniversary Appeal article in Workers Vanguard No. 969 where I was startled to note how many of the names, organizations, and political philosophies mentioned there hark back to my own radical coming of age, and the need for class-struggle defense of all our political prisoners in the late 1960s (although I may not have used that exact term at the time).
That recognition included names like black liberation fighter George Jackson, present class-war prisoner Hugo Pinell’s San Quentin Six comrade; the Black Panthers, as represented here by two of the Omaha Three (Poindexter and wa Langa), in their better days and in the days when we needed, desperately needed, to fight for their defense in places from Oakland to New Haven; the struggle, the fierce struggle, against the death penalty as represented in Mumia’s case today; the Ohio 7 and the Weather Underground who, rightly or wrongly, were committed to building a second front against American imperialism, and who most of the left, the respectable left, abandoned; and, of course, Leonard Peltier and the Native American struggles from Pine Ridge to the Southwest. It has been a long time and victories few. I could go on but you get the point.
That point also includes the hard fact that we have paid a high price, a very high price, for not winning back in the late 1960s and early 1970s when we last had this capitalist imperialist society on the ropes. Maybe it was political immaturity, maybe it was cranky theory, maybe it was elitism, hell, maybe it was just old-fashioned hubris but we let them off the hook. And have had to fight forty years of rear-guard “culture wars” since just to keep from falling further behind.
And the class-war prisoners, our class-war prisoners, have had to face their “justice” and their prisons. That lesson should be etched in the memory of every pro-working class militant today. And this, as well, as a quick glance at the news these days should make every liberation fighter realize; the difference between being on one side of that prison wall and the other is a very close thing when the bourgeoisie decides to pull the hammer down. The support of class-war prisoners is thus not charity, as International Labor Defense founder James P. Cannon noted back in the 1920s, but a duty of those fighters outside the walls. Today I do my duty, and gladly.
********
22 May 2012
Partisan Defense Committee P.O. Box 99, Canal Street Station, New York, NY 10013
email: partisandefense@earthlink.net www.partisandefense.org
Contact: Kevin Gilroy (212) 406-4252
Free Sundiata Acoli!
The following letter was sent on 22 May to the Chairman of the New Jersey State Parole Board:
Dear Sir:
The Partisan Defense Committee once again joins with those supporting the release of the political prisoner Sundiata Acoli. Given that Mr. Acoli is innocent of the crime for which he was convicted, is now a 75-year-old having survived 39 years of incarceration with no disciplinary reports for many years, there is absolutely no reason that he should be denied parole.
We are well aware that a common ploy used to deny parole to political prisoners is that they are said to "lack remorse" for their alleged crimes. But Mr. Accoli is an innocent man who, along with two of his companions, was a victim of a New Jersey state trooper attack in May 1973. As a former Black Panther, Mr. Acoli had long been targeted by the FBI's notorious COINTELPRO program.
We feel it is an injustice that Sundiata Acoli was incarcerated at all much less for 39 years. We call for his release.
**********
July 31, 2012
We have just received a copy of a post sent out by Sundiata Acoli informing his supporters that he was denied parole again. Sundiata's case was referred to a three-member panel to determine the size of his "hit" (the amount of time before becoming eligible for a parole hearing again). On May 22, the PDC sent a letter to the New Jersey State Parole Board on behalf of Sundiata stating, "We feel it is an injustice that Sundiata Acoli was incarcerated at all much less for 39 years. We call for his release."
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