Friday, October 31, 2014

ELECTION DAY, November 4:

One Million Massachusetts Workers Need the Right to Earned Sick Time!

 

Raise Up Massachusetts, which is leading the campaign, writes:

This weekend will mark 30 days from Election Day and we have a lot of work to do. We’re planning canvasses across the state and we need you to join us. So far, our canvasses have been great successes: volunteers have been able to talk to dozens of voters a shift and have meaningful conversations that have spread the message of our campaign.  But as we get closer to Election Day (again, we’re only 30 days out!), we need to start talking to even more voters every weekend. You can either sign up for an event near you, or if you there’s nothing close, sign up here to set up canvassing in your neighborhood.

 

Our friends at Massachusetts Peace Action are pitching in:

You can join Massachusetts Peace Action's work on this effort in several ways. 1) Volunteer for shifts at regional call centers in many towns around the state using the state of the art HubDialer system, which guarantees many contacts with voters.  2) Use your own phone and a computer at home to do a shift using HubDialer (after simple web based training in using the system).  3) Call from an old fashioned paper list. 4) Join door to door canvasses to reach likely supporters.  5) Reach out to family, friends, co-workers and in your community to those and ask them to sign a pledge a vote for Yes on 4.


And DORCHESTER PEOPLE FOR PEACE is committed to turning out at the polls for Question 4 on Election Day – and also for our local ballot QUESTION 5 to say “we want to get big money out of our politics!”

 

Sharon Bilodeau (sgbilodeau@gmail.com / 617-504-1645) writes:

We need your help on Election Day, November 4. Can you cover a morning or evening shift (or both)? Can you work the same shift you worked in September? Would you like a new time and place? Were you busy on Primary Day but can work Election Day?  Please email at sgbilodeau@gmail.com or call me at 617-504-1645
Here are the ballot questions:
1. Earned Sick Time. Our ally, New England United for Justice, has been working for the right to earned sick time for all Massachusetts workers for seven years. In November it will be a binding question on the ballot. Many people haven't heard about it but will support it if we let them know.

2. Getting Big Money Out of Politics. Recent Supreme Court decisions have allowed billionaires and corporations to spend unlimited amounts in elections, treating corporations as ‘Persons’ with free speech rights. To show that our elected officials that voters do not agree, Sydney and Hayat led a drive that put a non-binding question on the ballot in Dan Cullinane’s district. The ballot question calls for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to saying that corporations are not people and money is not a form of speech – it must be regulated in political campaigns.

The polling places are, in priority order with double precincts and heavier-voting precincts first: 
Dorchester Academy (the former Woodrow Wilson School), 18 Croftland St, Codman Hill (Ward 17, Precincts 4 and 11)
Mildred Avenue School, Mildred Ave, Mattapan (Ward 17, Precinct 10 and Ward 18, Precinct 2)
Lower Mills Library, Richmond St (Ward 17, Precincts 13 and 14)
Groveland Community Room, Franklin Field (Ward 18, Precincts 1 and 4)
Chittick School, 154 Ruskindale Road between Cummins Highway and River St (Ward 18, Precincts 6 and 21)
Adams Street Library, near Ashmont St (Ward 16, Precinct 8)
Florian Hall, 55 Hallet St (Ward 16, Precinct 11)
Charles H. Taylor School, 1060 Morton St (Ward 17, Precinct 12)
Mattahunt School, 100 Hebron St (Ward 18, Precinct 3)
Hassan Apartments, 705 River St (Ward 18, Precinct 5)

The shifts are:  7-9 am, 5-8 pm (or 5-7 if you can't stay the whole time)

Please sign up now so we can cover all these polling places. And thanks!  

As The 100th Anniversary Of The First Year Of World War I (Remember The War To End All Wars) Continues ... Some Remembrances-Poet’s Corner  

RUSSIA--AMERICA


A wind in the world! The dark departs;
The chains now rust that crushed men's flesh and bones,
Feet tread no more the mildewed prison stones,
And slavery is lifted from your hearts.

A wind in the world! O Company
Of darkened Russia, watching long in vain,
Now shall you see the cloud of Russia's pain
Go shrinking out across a summer sky.

A wind in the world! Our God shall be
In all the future left, no kingly doll
Decked out with dreadful sceptre, steel, and stole,
But walk the earth--a man, in Charity.

       *       *       *       *       *

A wind in the world! And doubts are blown
To dust along, and the old stars come forth--
Stars of a creed to Pilgrim Fathers worth
A field of broken spears and flowers strown.

A wind in the world! Now truancy
From the true self is ended; to her part
Steadfast again she moves, and from her heart
A great America cries: Death to Tyranny!

A wind in the world! And we have come
Together, sea by sea; in all the lands
Vision doth move at last, and Freedom stands
With brightened wings, and smiles and beckons home!

_John Galsworthy_

Thu, Oct 02, 2014 11:36 AM

Help Massachusetts Peace Action support the Yes on 4 -- Raise Up Massachusetts campaign, because...

One Million Massachusetts Workers Need the Right to Earned Sick Time!

On November 4, Massachusetts voters can vote Yes on 4 to allow workers to take sick time without losing their jobs.

With our help, RaiseUp Massachusetts won an $11/hr minimum wage in the legislature. Now is the time to win the right to earned sick days on the November ballot. This is a basic part of a social justice agenda. Join the Massachusetts Peace Action team supporting Raise Up Massachusetts in the last month before the November 4 election!

The business interests who prevented the earned paid sick days bills from passing the legislature are poised to spend millions in ad campaigns designed to confuse the issue. Raise Up Massachusetts plans to contact tens of thousands of less frequent voters who are likely to directly benefit, to expand the electorate and clarify any confusion.
You can join Massachusetts Peace Action's work on this effort in several ways. 1) Volunteer for shifts at regional call centers in many towns around the state using the state of the art HubDialer system, which guarantees many contacts with voters.  2) Use your own phone and a computer at home to do a shift using HubDialer (after simple web based training in using the system).  3) Call from an old fashioned paper list. 4) Join door to door canvasses to reach likely supporters.  5) Reach out to family, friends, co-workers and in your community to those and ask them to sign a pledge a vote for Yes on 4.
Raise up logoPlease click here to join in the Raise Up Campaign by volunteering for a shift making calls or reaching out to your friends, neighbors, and family in support of YES on 4-- the ballot question establishing earned paid sick days.
Raise Up Massachusetts is fighting to ensure earned sick time for workers across the state.  For nearly 1 million workers in Massachusetts, staying home to care for themselves or a sick child could mean losing their job. The ability for workers to care and provide for themselves and family members should be a right, not a privilege, and now is the time to make it a reality for working families. Click here to volunteer for one or more shifts contacting voters or to get YES on 4 committments in your community.as part of our Peace Action team.
Read more about our Yes on 4 campaign here!
John Ratliff In solidarity,
John Ratliff
Massachusetts Peace Action
Economic Justice Coordinator



Join Massachusetts Peace Action - or renew your membership in advance for 2015!  
Dues are $40/year for an individual, $65 for a family, or $10 for student/unemployed/low income.  Members vote for leadership and endorsements, receive newsletters and discounts on event admissions.  Donate now and you will be a member in good standing through December 2015!  Your financial support makes this work possible!
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Tue, Oct 28, 2014 02:44 PM

November 4th is not the end of 15 Now in Boston or New England. We are continuing to fight for working people to receive a real living wage of $15 with new, exciting campaigns in the new year! Get in touch to get involved.

CONTACT
15NowNewEngland@gmail.com


Like us on Facebook 

Follow us on Twitter










Let's Make History:
 Vote Yes for $15 an Hour!
Tuesday, November 4th
At Your Polling Station
The 10th Suffolk State Rep District has the ability to make history next Tuesday, November 4th. By voting 'Yes' on Ballot Question 5 - for a $15 an hour minimum wage, the 10th Suffolk will be standing up for all working people in Boston, the state of Massachusetts and the US in saying that we want a real living wage for all workers.

Ballot Question 5 is an advisory question that can serve as a referendum on not just the minimum wage but on the need for substantial changes in living standards for working people. A strong showing for a 'Yes' vote can serve as a building block for future movements in the city and state that emphasize the needs of working people over corporate profits

To make the strongest campaign for $15/hr, we need your help in the ballot box but also at the polls. Please contact us if you are able to help build the movement by standing out at polling stations throughout the district next Tuesday.

We've got an opportunity to make a historic impact for the Fight for 15 movement. Let's do it!

Get one of these fantastic yard signs to show your support today!
Upcoming Events 
Build 15 at the Polls!
November 4th
All Day

Join the Vote Yes on 5 campaign at the polling stations on election day November 4th. Stay all day and talk to folks about why they should support $15/hr or just take a shift!

Please contact us if you can help!
TOMORROW!!!
Build the Campaign for Question 5!
For a $15/hr minimum wage
October 18th - 1:00 PM 
West Roxbury Public Library


The 10th Suffolk State Representative District, comprising West Roxbury, South Brookline and Roslindale, has a unique opportunity to make an impact for a $15/hr minimum wage in Boston.

On November 4th, the 10th Suffolk will have the historic opportunity to vote 'Yes' on an advisory ballot question to support the adoption of a $15 an hour minimum wage. 

A strong 'Yes' vote would have a major impact on the discussion around and campaign to fight for $15 and other issues facing working people in Boston. The 10th Suffolk has the ability to be at the forefront of this.

Join us on Saturday, October 18th, to come out and discuss with your neighbors how to make the strongest possible impact for $15 in the district. We need as many supporters and volunteers as possible to make this reality!
 

Get Involved with Vote Yes on 5 today!
15NowNewEngland@gmail.com
Facebook.com/votefor15minwage - www.15Now.org
910-639-3948

***Johnny Boy, Indeed-Alfred Hitchcock’s Suspicion




DVD Review

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

Suspicion, starring Cary Grant, Joan Fontaine, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, 1941

The twentieth century, the triumphant “age of democracy,” at least in the developed West was not a particularly good time for properly trained elite school gentlemen, assorted nobles, and wayward royalty as the stresses of war, the masses, and the vigor of more secular states did in more empires than one could shake a stick at from Russia to Britain and France and broke up empires without regret. They, those sullen gentry, especially daunted second sons and certainly forlorn third or more with no hope inheriting more than a piss-pot, those degreed nobles who could neither hold onto their estates against a fellahin world or pay the damn mortgage after successive generations of entailment, social if not legal, those “kings” among men working as dime a dozen waiters in Parisian cafes or huddled in some backwater corner reliving their former splendors to a bored world all had that insufferable proper training, good breeding and only hanging with the best café society.

But the twentieth century (and now extending into the twenty-first) besides bringing fellahin uprisings and democratic veneers was preeminently the “age of the cash nexus” as well and that little problem of entailed estates, social or legal, and mortgaged to the hilt princely residences required more that some nodding acquaintance with fellow blue-bloods before selling the family silverware for one last blast before the streets.  All of this by way of introducing a stellar British example of the wayward proper gentry left adrift in the twentieth century (and extending into the twenty-first for the progeny), Johnny A., (no full last name needed as his is emblematic of the breed), and his self-imposed financial problems in the film under review, Suspicion.  Oh yes, since this film does not hinge on some left-wing sociological analysis and has the imprimatur of Sir (belatedly Sir) Alfred Hitchcock, a director known for mudding the waters with some off-hand intrigue and suspense before resolving all doubts, has the smell of murder in the air, murder most foul if certain imaginations are allowed to get the better of the situation.      

Here’s why we can speak candidly of murder, murder most foul. Our boy Johnny A. (played to a tee by Cary Grant who seems to have been born to fill such ruined high bred, good fellow well met, gentry cinematic roles), all good breeding and manners was a sporting man, a serious sporting man who had run out of possibilities with the known gentry but who still had those nagging problems of owing every Tom, Dick, and Harry around. And one of those Tom, Dick, and Harrys is his friendly bookie who is looking for his dough when Johnny boy’s nags ran out. See he figured that if Johnny had won he would have to have paid out so fair is fair. And Johnny is smart enough to see that if he wants to live another day to make that surefire bet that will get him on easy street that he must agree with such a proverbial thought.

So what is a hard-pressed man about town to do? Well here was Johnny’s scam (guys like Johnny spent many a sleepless night working out the details of such plans rather than face the prospect of gainful employment which would lead to nightmares). Or what looks to an untrained eye like an easy scam He “hit” on this dowdy spinsterly rural gentlewoman, Lina (played by Joan Fontaine, who as the film progresses remarkably loses that dowdiness, loses it all the way to an Oscar), who also has plenty of breeding, very good manners and, some dough, although as a 1940s woman she is not expected to use her obvious intelligence beyond the knitting table. Oh yes she is also looking for a man to sweep her away (although she did not know it). See Johnny, all bluster and sweet sweep her off her feet moves, figured to marry her and live off of her largess like any proper squire. Which he did, both swept her off her feet and married her. Nice work Johnny and good luck on easy street.

 

Well not quite. The problem was Lina’s father, a gentleman of the old school, who had insured Lina’s spinsterly future by keeping her on a short leash, a yearly allowance and not any real dough. And once he passed on later in the film, to show one final kick in the shins distain for Lina’s choice of husband, he left Lina with a thimble full of good thoughts but no dough. Oops, Johnny.            

Once Johnny figured out the score (after running up the bills on the expectation of fatherly largess) he of course decided to go to work, nothing too heavy maybe managing some well- established estate, and make something of himself. Make a crestfallen Lina proud. Hold on, have you been reading this plotline, Johnny was a sport not a worker bee and so the only work he was doing, his only gainful employment, was scratching away at every scheme he could figure out to keep the creditors from the door, or worse. And that is where murder, murder most foul, really where suspicion of such deeds comes in. A series of events unfolds which look very much like somebody is being set up for murder, murder by the book if you want to know, and that somebody is Lina. At least as Johnny grows distant, as untoward things begin to happen that is what Lina believed her fate to be.

That series of unexplained coincidences from the mysterious death of Johnny’s partner in a real estate scheme just before it was to be completed by a party, or parties unknown, to those various suspense-building untoward things happening to Lina drives the last part of the film. Remember too Johnny was a sport, a con man, a flimflam man and not built for murder. Know this as well, if you can believe this about sporting Johnny, in the end, despite his financial problems and whatever drove him to pull his scams on her he actually loved his Lina. Go figure, right.     

On The 155th Anniversary Of The Heroic Captain John Brown-Led Fight For Black Liberation At Harper’s Ferry-Josh Breslin’s Dream    

 

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

 

I remember a few years ago my friend and I, Josh Breslin, from the old working- class neighborhoods of North Adamsville, a town south of Boston, were discussing the historical events that helped form our political understandings back in the early 1960 since we were, and are, both political men driven by historical examples as much as by the minutia of organizing principles. And while we have diverged on many of the influences since then as we have a fair degree of differences on the way to change the world and what agencies can do that (basically working within the current political system or moving over to the base of society and organizing from the ground up within or outside of the system depending on circumstance) we both agreed whole-heartedly that one of our early heroes was old Captain John Brown and his heroic efforts with his small integrated band of men at Harper’s Ferry down in what is now West Virginia but the just Virginia, a slave-holders stronghold. As we discussed the matter more fully we found we were hard pressed to explain what first captured our attention and agreed that then would have not had the political sense then to call Brown’s actions heroic although we both understood that what he did was necessary.

 

See, coming up in a mainly Irish working-class neighborhood we were always aware, made particularly aware by grandfathers who had kindred over there in those days, of that heroic struggle in Easter 1916 that was the precursor to the long sought national liberation of Ireland from the bloody British. So when we first studied, or heard about John Brown we instinctively saw that same kind of struggle. Both of us also agreed that we had had back then very strong feelings about the wrongness of slavery, a wretched system going back to Pharaoh’s time if not before, although Josh was more ambivalent about the fate of black people after Civil War freedom than I was since there was in his household a stronger current of anti-black feeling around the civil rights work down south in those days than in mine. (Strangely my father, who was nothing but a corn liquor, fast car, ex-coal miner good old boy from down in Kentucky was more sympathetic to that struggle that Josh’s Irish grandfather whom Josh could never get to call black people anything better than “nigras.” At least we got my father to say “Negro.” Jesus.)                

 

A couple of week after that conversation Josh called me up from California one night where he was attending a professional conference near San Jose and told me that he forgot to tell me about what he called a “dream” he had had as a kid concerning his admiration for John Brown. Of course that “dream” stuff was just Josh’s way of saying that he had sketched out a few thoughts that he wanted to share with me (and which will undoubtedly find their into a commentary  or review or something because very little of Josh’s “dream” stuff fails to go to ink or cyberspace). Some of it is now hazy in my mind since the hour was late here in the East, and some of it probably was really based on stuff we had learned later about the Brown expedition like how Boston Brahmins and high abolitionists like George Stearns secretly funded the operation or Brown’s attempts to get Fredrick Douglass and Harriet Tubman on board (neither name which we would have known very much about then), and some of the stuff was probably a little goofy since it involved Josh in some hero worship. Since he will inevitably write something on his own he can make any corrections to what I put down here himself. Know this though whenever I hear the name John Brown mentioned lately I think about Josh’s telephone call and about how the “old man” has held our esteem for so long. Here is what I jotted down, edited of course, after that conversation:   

 

From fairly early in my youth I knew the name John Brown and was swept up by the romance surrounding his exploits at Harper’s Ferry. I would say that was in about the sixth grade when I went to the library and read about Abraham Lincoln before he became president and how he didn’t like what John Brown did because he knew that that action was going to drive the South crazy and upset the delicate balance that was holding the Union together. Frank though thinks it was the seventh grade when we were learning about the slavery issues as part of the 100th anniversary of the start of the American Civil War and his name came up as a “wild man” out of some Jehovah Calvinist burning bush dream who was single-handedly trying to abolish slavery with that uprising. Was ready to “light the spark” to put out the terrible scourge of slavery in the land with some spilled blood. That slavery business, if you can believe this really bothered both of us, especially when we went to a museum that showed the treatment of slaves and the implements used to enforce that condition down South. And I remember one time going to the Museum of Fine Arts and saw how old Pharaoh used his slaves to build those damn pyramids to immortalize himself. Yeah, the hell with slavery, any kind.   

I think I am right thought about when I first heard about the “old man” because I know I loved Lincoln, loved to read about him, loved that back then we celebrated his birthday, February 12th, and we got the day off from school. Loved that Lincoln was basically forced at the governmental level to implement Brown’s program to root out slavery once the deal went down and he was merciless about its extermination once he got “religion” on the matter. Of course neither I nor Frank would have articulated our thoughts that way then but we knew “Massa Lincoln” was on the right side of the angels in his work as much as he hated to burn down the South in the process. But there was no other way to get the damn issue resolved and I think that is what he learned from the Captain whether he gave credit to the man or not. By the way this I do know that while we celebrated Lincoln’s birthday in the North as the great emancipator and Union-saver Frank once told me a story about one of his cousins down south and how when he mentioned that he had Lincoln’s birthday off that cousin said “we don’t celebrate that man’s birthday down here,’’ in such a way that Frank began to understand that maybe the Civil War was not over. That some people had not gotten the word)   

I knew other stuff back then too which added to my feel for the Brown legend. For example, I knew that the great anthem of the Civil War -The Battle Hymn of the Republic- had a prior existence as John Brown’s Body, a tribute to John Brown and that Union soldiers marched to that song as they bravely headed south. Funny but back then I was totally unaware of the role of the Massachusetts 54th Regiment, the first black regiment raised although with white officers when Father Abraham gave the word, whose survivors and replacements marched into Charleston, South Carolina, the heart and soul of the Confederacy, after the bloody Civil War to the tune of John Brown’s Body. That must have been a righteous day. Not so righteous though and reflecting a very narrow view of history that we were taught back then kind of fudging the very serious differences back in Civil War times even in high abolitionist Boston was not knowing thing number one about Augustus Saint-Gauden’s commemorative frieze honoring the men of the 54th right across from the State House which I passed frequently when I went on to Boston Common.

I was then, however, other than aware of the general narrative of Brown’s exploits and a couple of songs and poems neither familiar with the import of his exploits for the black liberation struggle nor knew much about the specifics of the politics of the various tendencies in the ante bellum struggle against slavery of which he represented the extreme activist left-wing. I certainly knew nothing then of Brown’s (and his sons) prior military exploits in the Kansas ‘proxy’ wars against the expansion of slavery. Later study filled in some of those gaps and has only strengthened my strong bond with his memory. Know this, as I reach the age at which John Brown was executed I still retain my youthful admiration for him. In the context of the turmoil of the times he was the most courageous and audacious revolutionary in the struggle for the abolition of slavery in America. Some 150 years after his death I am proud to stand in the tradition of John Brown. [And I am too, brother!-Frank]

If one understands the ongoing nature, from his early youth, of John Brown’s commitment to the active struggle against slavery, the scourge of the American Republic in the first half of the 19th century, one can only conclude that he was indeed a man on a mission. As various biographies point out Brown took every opportunity to fight against slavery including early service as an agent of the Underground Railroad spiriting escaped slaves northward, participation as an extreme radical in all the key anti-slavery propaganda battles of the time as well as challenging other anti-slavery elements to be more militant and in the 1850’s, arms in hand, fighting in the ‘proxy’ wars in Kansas and, of course, the culmination of his life- the raid on Harper’s Ferry. Those exploits alone render absurd a very convenient myth by those who supported slavery or turned a blind eye to it and their latter-day apologists for the institution about his so-called ‘madness’. This is a political man and to these eyes a very worthy one.

For those who like their political heroes ‘pure’, frankly, it is better to look elsewhere than the life of John Brown. Like them without warts and with a discernible thrust from early adulthood that leads to some heroic action. His personal and family life as a failed rural capitalist would hardly lead one to think that this man was to become a key historical figure in any struggle, much less the great struggle against slavery. Some of his actions in Kansas (concerning allegations of the murder of some pro-slavery elements under his direction) have also clouded his image. However if one looks at Kansas as the start of the Civil War then all the horrible possibilities under the heat of battle mitigate some of that incident although not excusing it anymore that we would today with American soldiers in places like Afghanistan and Iraq busting down doors and shooting first. However, when the deal went down in the late 1850’s and it was apparent for all to see that there was no other way to end slavery than a fight to the death-John Brown rose to the occasion. And did not cry about it. And did not expect others to cry about it. Call him a ‘monomaniac’ if you like but even a slight acquaintance with great historical figures shows that they all have this ‘disease’- that is why they make the history books. No, the ‘madness’ argument will not do.

Whether or not John Brown knew that his military strategy for the Harper’s Ferry raid would, in the short term, be defeated is a matter of dispute. Reams of paper have been spent proving the military foolhardiness of his scheme at Harper’s Ferry. Brown’s plan, however, was essentially a combination of slave revolt modeled after the Maroon experiences in Haiti, Nat Turner’s earlier Virginia slave rebellion and rural guerilla warfare of the ‘third world’ type that we have become more familiar with since that time. 150 years later this strategy does not look so foolhardy in an America of the 1850’s that had no real standing army, fairly weak lines of communications, virtually uninhabited mountains to flee to and the North at their backs. The execution of the plan is another matter. Brown seemingly made about every mistake in the book in that regard. However, this is missing the essential political point that militant action not continuing parliamentary maneuvering advocated by other abolitionists had become necessary. A few more fighting abolitionists, including Frederick Douglass, and better propaganda work among freedman with connections to the plantations would not have hurt the chances for success at Harper’s Ferry.

What is not in dispute is that Brown considered himself a true Calvinist “avenging angel” in the struggle against slavery and more importantly acted on that belief. (Strange, or maybe not so strange now, both Frank and I who grew up upright Roman Catholics gravitated toward those photographs of Brown with his long unkempt beard as some latter day Jehovah and I remember Frank had a photo on the wall in his room with just such a photograph from I think a detail of the big mural in the State House in Kansas.) In short Brown   was committed to bring justice to the black masses. This is why his exploits and memory stay alive after over 150 years. It is possible that if Brown did not have this, by 19th century standards as well as our own, old-fashioned Calvinist sense of pre-determination that he would not have been capable of militant action. Certainly other anti-slavery elements never came close to his militancy, including the key Transcendentalist movement led by Emerson and Thoreau and the Concord ‘crowd’ who supported Brown and kept his memory alive in hard times. In their eyes he had the heroic manner of the Old Testament prophet. This old time prophet animating spirit is not one that animates modern revolutionaries and so it is hard to understand today the depths of his religious convictions on his actions but they were understood, if not fully appreciated, by others in those days. It is better today to look at Brown more politically through his hero (and mine, as well) Oliver Cromwell-a combination of Calvinist avenger and militant warrior. Yes, I can get behind that picture of him.

By all accounts Brown and his small integrated band of brothers fought bravely and coolly against great odds. Ten of Brown's men were killed including two of his sons. Five were captured, tried and executed, including Brown.  He prophetic words upon the scaffold about purging the evil of slavery in blood proved too true. But that demeanor in the face of defeat was very appealing to me back then.  I have learned since that these results, the imprisonments or executions are almost inevitable when one takes up a revolutionary struggle against the old order if one is not victorious. One need only think of, for example, the fate of the defenders of the Paris Commune in 1871 when that experience was crushed in blood after heroic resistance. One can fault Brown on this or that tactical maneuver. Nevertheless he and the others bore themselves bravely in defeat. As we are all too painfully familiar with now there are defeats of the oppressed that lead nowhere. One thinks of the defeat of the German Revolution in the 1920’s. There other defeats that galvanize others into action. This is how Brown’s actions should be measured by history.

Militarily defeated at Harpers Ferry, Brown's political mission to destroy slavery by force of arms nevertheless continued to galvanize important elements in the North at the expense of the pacifistic non-resistant Garrisonian political program for struggle against slavery. Many writers on Brown who reduce his actions to that of a ‘madman’ still cannot believe that his road proved more appropriate to end slavery than either non-resistance or gradualism. That alone makes short shrift of such theories. Historians and others have also misinterpreted later events such as the Bolshevik strategy that led to Russian Revolution in October 1917. More recently, we saw this same incomprehension concerning the victory of the Vietnamese against overwhelming American military superiority. Needless to say, all these events continue to be revised by some historians to take the sting out of there proper political implications.

From a modern prospective Brown’s strategy for black liberation, even if the abolitionist goal he aspired to was immediately successful reached the outer limits within the confines of capitalism. Brown’s actions were meant to make black people free. Beyond that goal he had no program except the Chatham Charter which seems to have replicated the American constitution but with racial and gender equality as a cornerstone. Unfortunately the Civil War did not provide fundamental economic and political freedom. Moreover, the Civil War, the defeat of Radical Reconstruction, the reign of ‘Jim Crow’ and the subsequent waves of black migration to the cities changed the character of black oppression in the U.S. from Brown’s time. Nevertheless, we can stand proudly in the revolutionary tradition of John Brown, and of his friend Frederick Douglass.

I used to fervently believe that if Douglass had come on board as Brown had urged the chances for success would have been greater, at least more blacks (mostly free blacks and not plantation blacks for obvious reasons) and more radical whites who could have been mobilized as a result of all of the events of the 1850s especially the struggle against the Fugitive Slave Act and the struggle against the imposition of slavery in Kansas. Now I am not so sure that Douglass’ acceptance would have qualitatively changed the outcome. He went on to do yeoman’s work during the Civil War articulating the left black perspective and organizing those black regiments that shifted the outcome of the war at a decisive point. In any case honor the memory of old Captain John Brown and his heroic band at Harper’s Ferry.         

 
November 11-16: National days of action against the new US wars in the Middle East.  Watch for details.

 

http://justicewithpeace.org/files/u414/LeftistMarchingBand.jpgTuesday, November 11

Armistice / Veterans Day Parade and Vigil

We will gather between 12:00 pm (noon) and 12:30 pm on the corner of Charles and Beacon Streets.
1st Parade steps off at 1:00 pm – our parade will follow the same route then we will continue to Faneuil Hall for our Armistice / Veterans Day for Peace Event.

Parade at noon; rally 3:00 pm

Faneuil Hall • Boston

Attention Veterans & Peace Activists

Please Join Veterans For Peace and The Leftist Marching Band for
Armistice / Veterans Day Peace Parade and Peace Event

 Houses of Worship throughout Massachusetts will Ring Bells for Peace at 11:00 am, November 11th

Armistice Day / Veterans Parade for Peace & Faneuil Hall Peace Event

Veterans for Peace will proudly walk behind the first parade on Armistice / Veterans Day in Boston. We honor and celebrate the original intention for Armistice Day – a Day of Peace. 

Veterans from different eras will recite original works of Poetry, Prose and Song

 

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BOMBING AND BIGOTRY:

The Wars Abroad, the Wars at Home

 

Martin Luther King: “The bombs that are falling [overseas] are exploding in our cities”

 

BPD Petitions - Please Sign & Share!

Many of you have already signed the ACLU petition to the BPD calling for three key reforms. The petition is now online here: End Racially Discriminatory Police Practices in Boston (for residents of Boston) and Support the Movement to End Racially Discriminatory Police Practices in Boston (for people who aren’t residents of Boston).

We encourage you to please sign one of these two petitions and share widely among friends and supporters!

 

The Targeting of Young Blacks By Law Enforcement

While the election of Barack Obama as president may have seemed to some to herald a new era in American race relations, the killings of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida, made clear that one of the venerable flash points in race relations—the police (or in the case of Sanford, self-appointed police) killings of young black men—is very much still with us. Discriminatory police treatment of African Americans remains one of the hardiest perennials in American life, as the “stop-and-frisk” tactic that New York’s police force employed against young blacks until just last year made clear.  More

 

L.A. confrontation highlights relationship between Zionism and anti-black racism

On 18 October 2014, a self-professed “racist” pro-Israel counter-protester at a Block the Boat action in Los Angeles told black Palestinian solidarity activist and radio personality Margaret Prescod to “take your Ebola a*s and get out.” …That Zionists are open about their racism is not surprising. Their support for the ethnocratic state of Israel is doubtless, at least in part, motivated by this racism. As journalist Rania Khalek has noted, Zionism “enable[s] Israel’s genocidal ambitions” by normalizing this racism within an ethnoreligious-supremacist political philosophy. Zionism’s hyper-nationalism inspires egregious stereotypes that lead to the demonization and subsequent dehumanization of entire peoples. The same racist (il)logic that leads to the generalization of all Palestinians as “terrorists” leads to seeing all people of African descent as having Ebola…  Racist Zionist protesters like these remind one that the Palestinian solidarity movement is a fundamentally anti-racist movement.   More

 
Upcoming Events 
Build 15 at the Polls!
November 4th
All Day

Join the Vote Yes on 5 campaign at the polling stations on election day November 4th. Stay all day and talk to folks about why they should support $15/hr or just take a shift!

Please contact us if you can help!



Build the Campaign for Question 5!
For a $15/hr minimum wage
October 18th - 1:00 PM 
West Roxbury Public Library


The 10th Suffolk State Representative District, comprising West Roxbury, South Brookline and Roslindale, has a unique opportunity to make an impact for a $15/hr minimum wage in Boston.

On November 4th, the 10th Suffolk will have the historic opportunity to vote 'Yes' on an advisory ballot question to support the adoption of a $15 an hour minimum wage. 

A strong 'Yes' vote would have a major impact on the discussion around and campaign to fight for $15 and other issues facing working people in Boston. The 10th Suffolk has the ability to be at the forefront of this.

Join us on Saturday, October 18th, to come out and discuss with your neighbors how to make the strongest possible impact for $15 in the district. We need as many supporters and volunteers as possible to make this reality!
 

Get Involved with Vote Yes on 5 today!
15NowNewEngland@gmail.com
Facebook.com/votefor15minwage - www.15Now.org
910-639-3948