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.
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An Injury To One Is An Injury To All!-Defend The Occupy Movement And All Occupiers! Drop All Charges Against All Occupy Protesters Everywhere!
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Fight-Don’t Starve-We Created The Wealth, Let's Take It Back! Labor And The Oppressed Must Rule!
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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!
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Markin comment:
This foundation article by Marx or Engels goes along with the propaganda points in the fight for our communist future mentioned in other posts in this space.
Marx/Engels Internet Archive-The Communist League
A congress of the League of the Just opened in London on June 2, 1847. Engels was in attendance as delegate for the League's Paris communities. (Marx couldn't attend for financial reasons.)
Engels had a significant impact throughout the congress -- which, as it turned out, was really the "inaugural Congress" of what became known as the Communist League. This organization stands as the first international proletarian organization. With the influence of Marx and Engels anti-utopian socialism, the League's motto changed from "All Men are Brothers" to "Working Men of All Countries, Unite!"
Engels: "In the summer of 1847, the first league congress took place in London, at which W. Wolff represented the Brussels and I the Paris communities. At this congress the reorganization of the League was carried through first of all. ...the League now consisted of communities, circles, leading circles, a central committee and a congress, and henceforth called itself the 'Communist League'."
The Rules were drawn up with the participation of Marx and Engels, examined at the First Congress of the Communist League, and approved at the League's Second Congress in December 1847.
Article 1 of the Rules of the Communist League: "The aim of the league is the overthrow of the bourgeoisie, the rule of the proletariat, the abolition of the old bourgeois society which rests on the antagonism of classes, and the foundation of a new society without classes and without private property."
The first draft of the Communist League Programme was styled as a catechism -- in the form of questions and answers. Essentially, the draft was authored by Engels. The original manuscript is in Engels's hand.
The League's official paper was to be the Kommunistische Zeitschrift, but the only issue produced was in September 1847 by a resolution of the League's First Congress. It was First Congress prepared by the Central Authority of the Communist League based in London. Karl Schapper was its editor.
The Second Congress of the Communist League was held at the end of November 1847 at London's Red Lion Hotel. Marx attended as delegate of the Brussels Circle. He went to London in the company of Victor Tedesco, member of the Communist League and also a delegate to the Second Congress. Engels again represented the Paris communities. Schapper was elected chairman of the congress, and Engels its secretary.
Friedrich Lessner: "I was working in London then and was a member of the communist Workers' Educational Society at 191 Drury Lane. There, at the end of November and the beginning of December 1847, members of the Central Committee of the Communist League held a congress. Karl Marx and Frederick Engels came there from Brussels to present their views on modern communism and to speak about the Communists' attitude to the political and workers' movement. The meetings, which, naturally, were held in the evenings, were attended by delegates only... Soon we learned that after long debates, the congress had unanimously backed the principles of Marx and Engels..."
The Rules were officially adopted December 8, 1847.
Engels: "All contradiction and doubt were finally set at rest, the new basic principles were unanimously adopted, and Marx and I were commissioned to draw up the Manifesto." This would, of course, become the Communist Manifesto.
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The Communist League
Circular of First Congress to Members, June 9, 1847 [333]
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Written: June 1847;
Source: MECW Volume 6, p. 589;
First published: Gründungs dokumente des Bundes der Kommunisten (Juni bis September 1847), Hamburg, 1969;
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The Congress to the League
Dear Brothers!
The First Congress of the League, which was called last February by the Central Authority (Halle) [334] and opened on June 2 here in London, has concluded its deliberations. In view of the whole position of our League, its sessions could not be public.[335]
But it is incumbent on us, members of the Congress, to make them public for you in retrospect, by at least giving you a survey of our proceedings.
This is all the more our duty as the Central Authority in office up to now had to render account to us, and we, therefore, have to tell you how far the Congress was satisfied with this rendering of account. We must also do so, because we have added an article to the new Rules which makes all legislative decisions of the Congress subject to the vote of the individual communities ; hence, for this part of our decisions at least, there are two reasons why we owe you a statement of the grounds for them.
After checking credentials the previous Halle had first to give the Congress an account of its conduct of office and to report on the state of the League. The delegates declared themselves completely satisfied with the way in which the Halle had looked after the interests of the League and had made a start with its reorganisation. That point was thereby disposed of. We take the following brief summary from the report of the Central Authority and from the original letters submitted to the Congress.
In London our League is strongest. Freedom of speech and of association immensely facilitates propaganda and gives opportunities to the many able members to use their character and talent for the greatest good of the League and the cause. For this purpose the League uses the German Workers’ Educational Society, and also its branch in Whitechapel. Members of the League also take part in the Fraternal Democrats,[336] the French communist discussion clubs,[337] etc.
The previous Paris Halle itself realised in how much better a position the London League would be to take over the central leadership of the affairs of the League. The security of all documents and of members of the Central Authority itself is nowhere else as great as here. During its proceedings the Congress had opportunity enough to see that the London communities have a sufficient number of competent people who can he entrusted with the supreme executive authority of the League. It therefore decided that the Central Authority should remain in London.
In Paris the League has much declined in recent years.[338] The regional and Halle members have for a long time occupied themselves only with quarrels about formalities and alleged breaches of the Rules instead of looking after the affairs of the whole League or of its regions. In the communities similar time-wasting, superfluous and divisive trifles were dealt with. At most they discussed the old questions which have been talked over again and again, ever since Weitling’s Garantien, to the point of boredom. In the Paris League itself there was no sign of the slightest progress, not the slightest concern with the development of the principle, or with the movement of the proletariat as it was proceeding in other localities of the League, and outside the League. The consequence was that all those who were not satisfied with what they were offered inside the League looked outside the League for further enlightenment. This need for enlightenment was made use of by a literary knight of industry and exploiter of workers, the German writer Karl Grün. This individual had sided with communism when he noticed that there was money to be made by communist writings. After some time he found that it was dangerous to continue to declare himself a Communist and found occasion to resign in the new book b,,, Proudhon on the economic contradictions, which he himself had translated into German. This Grün used the economic statements in this otherwise quite insignificant book as the basis of lectures which he gave in Paris for League members. These lectures were attended by two kinds of people: 1. those who had already enough of communism in general; 2. those who hoped perhaps to get from this Grün enlightenment on a number of questions and doubts never resolved for them in the community meetings. The latter were fairly numerous and consisted of those members of the Paris communities who were the most useful and the most capable of development. For a. time this Grün succeeded in dazzling even a number of these with his phrases and his alleged immense learning. The League was thus split. On one side was the party which had exclusively dominated the Halle and the region, the party of the Weitlingians; on the other side were those who still believed one. could learn something even from Grün. These soon saw, however, that Grün expressed definite hostility to the Communists and that all his teaching was quite unable to replace communism. Heated discussions took place during which it became clear that almost all League members remained loyal to communism and that only two or three defended this Grün and his Proudhonist system. At the same time it was revealed that this same Grün had defrauded the workers, as was his wont, by using 30 francs, the sum collected for the Polish insurgents [339] for his private purposes, and had also wheedled several hundred francs out of them for the printing of a miserable pamphlet about the dissolution of the Prussian Provincial Diet. But enough; the majority of Grün’s former listeners stayed away and formed a new party which was mainly concerned to develop further the communist principle in all its implications and in its connection with social relations. By this split, however, the organisation of the League fell to pieces. In the course of the winter the Central Authority sent an emissary who restored the organisation as far as possible. But soon the quarrels arose again; the three different parties and principles were irreconcilable. The party of progress succeeded with the aid of the Weitlingians in removing from the League the three or four stubborn Grünians who had declared themselves openly against communism. But then, when it came to the election of a delegate to the Congress, the two parties clashed in the regional meeting. The split became incurable, and in order at least to achieve an election, the three communities in which the party of progress was most strongly represented resolved to separate from the two communities on which the main strength of the Weitlingians rested and to elect a congress delegate for themselves at a general meeting. This was done. The Weitlingians were thereby provisionally removed from the League and the number of League members was reduced by one third. After examining the reasons advanced by both parties, the Congress declared its agreement with the action of the three communities, because the Weitlingian party had everywhere held up the League in its development; this had also been experienced both in London and in Switzerland. The Congress resolved unanimously to remove the Paris Weitlingians from the League and to admit the delegate of the Paris majority [Engels] to the Congress.
Hence, the number of League members in Paris has been greatly reduced; but, at the same time, obstructive elements have also been removed, and, through the struggle, minds have been quickened to renewed activity. A new spirit is making itself felt, and a completely new energy. The police persecutions seem more or less to have ended; they were in any case not directed against the party which is now victorious and from which only one member was expelled, but struck Grün’s party almost alone, proof that information of the Prussian Government was at the bottom of the whole persecution, as will be shown presently. And if the government has dispersed the public meetings at the Barrière, this too mainly hits the Grünians who made loud speeches there and inveighed against the Communists, because here, of course, the Communists could not freely reply to them. Hence, the League is in far better shape in Paris now than at the time when the Halle resigned. We are less numerous but we are united and have capable people there.
In Lyons the League has regular members who seem to be very active for the cause.
In Marseilles we are also established. We have received the following letter about the membership there: “The position of the Marseilles League is not too good. Encouragement by letters would not help much; we shall try to arrange for some of us to go there this autumn and to organise the League anew.”
The League has succeeded in gaining a firm footing in Belgium. Brussels has a competent community whose members are Germans and Belgians and who have already founded a second community in large among the Walloon factory workers. In that country the prospects for the League are quite encouraging, and we hope that at the next congress Belgium will already be represented by several delegates.
In Germany we had several communities in Berlin which this spring were suddenly dispersed by the police. League members will have seen from the newspapers that a meeting of workers directed by League members was cancelled by the police, an enquiry was held, and as a result several leading members were arrested. Among the arrested was a certain Friedrich Mentel, a tailor born in Potsdam, about 27 years old, of medium, stocky build, etc. This man, who had formerly been in London and Paris, and in the latter place had belonged to Grün’s party and turned out to be a maudlin sentimentalist, and had, by the way, in the course of his travels got to know the situation in the League pretty accurately, was unable to stand up to this little ordeal. This time too it was seen that the weak-mindedness and vagueness of such sentimentalists can find final satisfaction only in religion. Within a few days this Mentel let himself be completely converted by a priest and twice during his arrest took part in the farce of Holy Communion. A Berlin member writes to us as follows: “...he told in court about the communities in Paris, London, Hamburg and Kiel (all of which he had visited himself) and gave the addresses to which Herm. Kriege sent his Volks-Tribun to Berlin. To somebody else, he said to his face: ‘Did 1 not sell you these books? Did we not go to meetings at such and such an address? Are you not a member of the League of the just?’ And when the answer to everything was ‘No’, Mentel said: ‘How can you answer for this before God the Almighty and All-knowing?’ and other such stupidities.” Fortunately, Mentel’s baseness did not succeed in confusing the other accused, so the government had no alternative but to let the arrested be acquitted for the time being. Clearly, this Mentel’s denunciations are closely connected with the persecutions of the German Communists in Paris. We can only congratulate ourselves that the Grünian Mentel regarded the Grünians themselves as the real leaders of the League and denounced them. Thereby the real Communists were in general protected from the persecutions. Naturally, the entire Berlin circle was disorganised by these events. However, knowing the competence of the members there, we are hopeful that the reorganisation of the League will soon be effected.
Hamburg is also organised. But the members there have let themselves be somewhat intimidated by these persecutions in Berlin. The contacts were not broken for a single moment, however.
The League is also established in Altona, Bremen, Mainz, Munich, Leipzig, Königsberg, Thorn, Kiel, Magdeburg, Stuttgart, Mannheim and Baden-Baden. In Scandinavia it is also already established in Stockholm.
The position of the League in Switzerland is not as satisfactory as we might wish. Here the party of the Weitlingians was dominant from the beginning. The lack of development in the communities in Switzerland was particularly evident, on the one hand in their inability to bring the long-standing struggle with the Young Germans[340] to a conclusion, and on the other hand in their religious attitude to the Young Germans and in the fact that they let themselves be exploited in the vilest manner by most despicable knights of industry, such as, for instance, the solemn Georg Kuhlmann of Holstein. As a result of police measures the League was so disorganised in Switzerland that the Congress decided to take extraordinary measures for its reconstitution. The success and the nature of these measures can, of course, only later be made known to the communities.
Concerning America, we must wait for more detailed news from the emissary whom the Central Authority has sent there, before a precise report can be given of the final shape of the League’s conditions there.
From this report and from the League letters produced two things emerge: firstly, that when the London Halle took over the leadership, the League was indeed in a difficult position, that the previous Central Authority’ had not at all attended to the duties incumbent on it; that it had utterly neglected to hold the whole together, and that in addition to this disorganisation of the League, elements of opposition had gradually germinated even in the individual communities themselves. In these circumstances, which threatened the existence of the League, the London Central Authority at once took the necessary measures: sent out emissaries, removed individual members who were jeopardising the existence of the whole, re-established contacts, called the general congress, and prepared the questions to be discussed there. At the same time it took steps to draw into the League other elements of the communist movement who until then had stood aside from it,[341] steps which were highly successful.
After settling these questions the Congress had to make a review of the Rules. The result of these deliberations lies before the communities in the new Rules, all the articles of which were accepted unanimously, and which the Congress moves should be finally adopted. In justification of the changes made, we make the following observations:
The change of name from League of the just to Communist League was adopted because, firstly, the old name had become known to the governments through the infamous treachery of that Mentel, and that in itself made a change advisable. Secondly, and chiefly, because the old name had been adopted on a special occasion in view of special events [342] which no longer have the slightest bearing on the present purpose of the League. This name is therefore no longer suited to the time and does not in the least express what we want. How many there are who want justice, that is, what they call justice, without necessarily being Communists! We are not distinguished by wanting justice in general — anyone can claim that for himself — but by our attack on the existing social order and on private property, by wanting community of property, by being Communists. Hence there is only one suitable name for our League, the name which says what we really are, and this name we have chosen. In the same spirit we have altered the traditional names Gau and Halle, which we took over from the political societies and the German character of which produced a disturbing impression given the nature of our anti-nationalist League which is open to all peoples; these names have been replaced by words which really mean what they should mean. The introduction of such simple, clear names serves also to remove from our propagandist League the conspiratorial character which our enemies are so keen to attach to us.
The necessity to re-call the Congress, now called for the first time, to re-call it regularly and to transfer to it the entire legislative power of the League subject to confirmation by the communities, was unanimously recognised without discussion. We hope that in the provisions laid down in this respect we have hit on the points which mattered and through which the effective work of the Congress is ensured in the interest of the whole.
As to the omission of the headings, which insofar as they contained legal provisions are replaced by certain articles of the Rules, and insofar as they contained general communist principles are replaced by the Communist Credo, this gives the Rules a simpler and more uniform shape and has at the same time led to a more precise definition of the position of each particular authority.[343]
After the Rules had been dealt with, various proposals were discussed which had been prepared either by the Central Authority or put forward by individual delegates.
First of all, there was discussion of one delegate’s proposal to call a new congress in six months time. The Congress itself felt that, as the First Congress, which has been called and had met at a time when the organisation of the League was flagging, it had to regard itself above all as an organising and constituent assembly. It felt that a new congress was needed to deal thoroughly with the most important questions before it; since at the same time the new Rules had fixed the next congress for the month of August, so that there would be barely two months interval, and since it was also impossible to defer the Second Congress until August 1848, it was decided to call this Second Congress for Monday, November 29 of this year, here in London. We did not let ourselves be deterred by the bad time of the year any more than by the new costs. The League has survived a crisis and must not fight shy of an extraordinary effort for once. — The new League Rules contain the necessary provisions for the election of delegates and so we hope that a large number of circles will send delegates to the Second Congress.
The proposal of the same delegate to set up a special fund for emissaries also found general approval. — The point was made that our League has at its disposal two kinds of emissaries. Firstly, those who are sent out at the expense of the League with special missions to certain localities, either to establish the League in areas where it does not yet exist, or to organise it again where it is in decline. These emissaries must necessarily be under the direct control of the Central Authority. — Secondly, workers who are returning to their own homes or have to make other journeys. Such workers, often very capable men, could be used to the greatest advantage of the League for visits to many communities not far from their travel route, if they are reimbursed on behalf of the League for the additional expenses caused thereby. Such occasional emissaries can, of course, only be under the direct control of the circle authority and only in special cases be placed under the control of the Central Authority. Hence, the Congress decided to instruct the Central Authority to demand from every circle authority a certain financial contribution every three months and from these contributions to set up a fund for sending out emissaries of the first kind. Further, to instruct the circle authorities more than previously to use capable members leaving on journeys as occasional emissaries in the manner described and to pay the additional travelling expenses in advance from their own funds. In very special cases the circle authorities can apply to the Central Authority for a contribution for this purpose; whether this financial application is granted, is, of course, decided by the Central Authority. Every emissary is responsible to the authority which has supplied him with funds and must report to it.
All of you will see how necessary it is to organise propaganda through emissaries and to subject it to central leadership. We hope that our decisions, taken after mature consideration, will meet with your approval and that they may be attended by good success for the cause.
The next question was that of the organ of the League; it was recognised without discussion how necessary such a publication is. It was also readily understood that the paper could appear only in London, and that it should not appear more often than weekly and not less often than monthly. — Title, motto and format were agreed and you will be acquainted with them through the specimen number to be published in July. A commission is in existence to act for the editorial board pending the journal’s publication; then an editor, who also has already been appointed, will take over the direction in co-operation with the Commission. This considered, the Congress came to the question of costs. Firstly, various things are needed to complete the printing equipment, in particular an iron press, for which the Central Authority was instructed to call for a contribution from the circles. But then the costs were calculated. It was found that at 2 pence,=4 sous,=2 Silbergroschen,=6 Kreuzers for every weekly issue of one sheet the number of subscribers required to cover the costs would be greater than we can rely on with certainty at present. A monthly paper without an editor would be able to exist with fewer subscribers, but would not fulfil the League’s requirements. But whether we would be able to get the number of subscribers needed for a weekly paper was, as we have said, too uncertain for us to enter into the necessary engagements. We therefore resolved as follows: To start with, a specimen number will appear in July free of charge. Then the individual communities will have to send word through their circles how many members they have, for the Congress has decided that at least as long as the journal is a monthly, every member pays for one copy, but every community receives only one, and the remainder are distributed free. League members must, moreover, make enquiries regarding the number of copies which can with certainty be sold in their area, gather subscribers and report on this, too. Then in November, taking account of the notices received by the Central Authority, the Congress will take further decisions and if possible launch the journal before the New Year. In the meantime the London printing press will be used to print pamphlets. [344]
Finally, the question of the Communist Credo. The Congress realised that the public proclamation of the principles of the League was a step of the greatest importance; that a credo which in a few years, perhaps months, might no longer suit the times and no longer correspond to the spirit of the majority, would be as harmful as a suitable credo would be useful; that this step had to be considered with particular care and must not be taken too hastily. Here, just as on the question of the League organ, the Congress became aware that it could not act definitively but only in a constituent role, that it had to give new food to the re-awakening life in the League by discussion on the plan of a credo. Hence, the Congress resolved to draft this plan and to submit it to the communities for discussion, so that proposals could be formulated for amendments and additions to be submitted to the Central Authority. The plan is appended. We recommend it for serious and mature consideration by the communities. We have tried on the one hand to refrain from all system-making and all barrack-room communism, and on the other to avoid the fatuous and vapid sentimentality of the tearful, emotional Communists[345]; we have, on the contrary, tried always to keep firm ground under our feet by the constant consideration of the social relations which alone have given rise to communism. We hope that the Central Authority will receive from you very many proposals for additions and amendments, and we will call on you again to discuss the subject with particular zest.
This, dear Brothers, is the survey, the outcome, of our deliberations. We would very much have liked to have definitively settled the items before us, to have founded the League organ, to have proclaimed the communist principles in a credo. But in the interest of the League, in the interest of the comm[unist] movement, we had to set limits to ourselves here, we had to appeal anew to the majority, and to leave it to the second Congress to carry through what we have prepared.
It is now for you, dear Brothers, to prove that you have the cause of the League, the cause of communism, at heart. The League has emerged victorious from a period of decline. Apathy and laxity have been overcome, the hostile elements which had arisen in the League itself have been eliminated. New elements have joined it. The future of the League is secure. But, dear Brothers, our position is not yet such that we can for one moment relax our efforts; all wounds are not yet healed, all gaps have not yet been filled, many painful effects of the struggle we have gone through can still be felt. Therefore the interest of the League, the communist cause, still demands of you a short period of the most strenuous activity; therefore for a few months you must not even for a moment weary in your work. Extraordinary circumstances demand extraordinary effort. A crisis such as our League has gone through, a crisis in which we had first to fight the fatigue caused by the heavy pressure of German and other police harassments and, even more, caused by the hope of an early improvement in social conditions apparently receding ever further from fulfilment; a crisis, furthermore, in which we not only had to fight the persecutions of our enemies, of governments either dominated by or allied to the bourgeoisie against us, but in which we found enemies in our midst who had to be fought and rendered harmless, with regard only for the threatened position of the League, for the menacing disorganisation of the entire German-speaking Communist Party, without any consideration of persons; Brothers, one does not recover from such a crisis overnight. And even if the existence of the League, the strength of the organisation, is re-established, there will have to be months of unceasing work before we can say: We have done our duty as Communists, our duty as League members.
Brothers! In the firm conviction that you will feel the importance of the situation as much as we do; in the firm conviction that you will nevertheless be fully equal to these difficult circumstances, we confidently appeal to you, to your enthusiasm for the cause of the community! We know that the bourgeoisie’s infamous lust for gain leaves you hardly a moment to work for the cause; we know that it presses down to the lowest limit even the miserable wage it gives you for your hard work; we know that just now famine and the slump in business weigh on you especially heavily; we know that it persecutes you, imprisons you, ruins your health and endangers your lives if you find time and money despite all to work for the interest of the community; we know all that, and in spite of everything we have not hesitated for one moment to appeal to you for new financial sacrifices, to call on you to redouble your activity. For we ourselves would have to withdraw from the whole movement, blushing and ashamed, if we did not know that the men who elected us to decide on the good of the whole, will vigorously and unhesitatingly put our resolutions into practice; if we did not know that there is no one in our League for whom the interest of the Communist Party, the overthrow of the bourgeoisie, the victory of the community is not his very own, his dearest interest; if we did not know that people with sufficient determination to organise a league which exposes them to great dangers are also determined and steadfast enough to defy these dangers and to make this League great and mighty over the whole of Europe; if we did not know, finally, that such people are the more courageous, the more active, the more enthusiastic, the greater the obstacles they face.
Brothers! We represent a great, a wonderful cause. We proclaim the greatest revolution ever proclaimed in the world, a revolution which for its thoroughness and wealth of consequences has no equal in world history. We do not know how far it will be granted to us to share in the fruits of this revolution. But this we know, that this revolution is drawing near in all its might; this we see, that everywhere, in France as in Germany, in England as in America, the angry masses of the proletariat are in motion and are demanding their liberation from the fetters of money rule, from the fetters of the bourgeoisie, with a voice that is often still confused but is becoming ever louder and clearer. This we see, that the bourgeois class is getting ever richer, that the middle classes are being more and more ruined and that thus historical development itself strives towards a great revolution which will one day burst out, through the distress of the people and the wantonness of the rich. Brothers, we all hope to live to see that day, and even if last spring we did not get the chance to take up arms, as the letter of the Halle predicted we might, do not let that disconcert you! The day is coming, and on the day when the masses of the people with their solid ranks scatter the mercenaries of the capitalists: on that day it will be revealed what our League was and how it worked! And even if we should not live to see all the fruits of the great struggle, even if hundreds of us fall under the grapeshot of the bourgeoisie, all of us, even the fallen, have lived to be in the struggle, and this struggle, this victory alone is worth a life of the most strenuous work.
And so, farewell!
In the name of the Congress,
Heide [Wilhelm Wolff]
Secretary
The President,
Karl Schill [Karl Schapper]
London, June 9, 1847
This space is dedicated to the proposition that we need to know the history of the struggles on the left and of earlier progressive movements here and world-wide. If we can learn from the mistakes made in the past (as well as what went right) we can move forward in the future to create a more just and equitable society. We will be reviewing books, CDs, and movies we believe everyone needs to read, hear and look at as well as making commentary from time to time. Greg Green, site manager
Friday, October 12, 2012
From The Pen Of American Communist Party Founder And Trotskyist Leader James P. Cannon-The decision to join the trotskyist camp in 1928
Click on the headline to link to the “James P. Cannon Internet Archives.”
*************Markin comment on founding member James P. Cannon and the early American Communist Party from the “American Left History” blog:
If you are interested in the history of the American Left or are a militant trying to understand some of the past mistakes of our history and want to know some of the problems that confronted the early American Communist Party and some of the key personalities, including James Cannon, who formed that party this book is for you.
At the beginning of the 21st century after the demise of the Soviet Union and the apparent ‘death of communism’ it may seem fantastic and utopian to today’s militants that early in the 20th century many anarchist, socialist, syndicalist and other working class militants of this country coalesced to form an American Communist Party. For the most part, these militants honestly did so in order to organize an American socialist revolution patterned on and influenced by the Russian October Revolution of 1917. James P. Cannon represents one of the important individuals and faction leaders in that effort and was in the thick of the battle as a central leader of the Party in this period. Whatever his political mistakes at the time, or later, one could certainly use such a militant leader today. His mistakes were the mistakes of a man looking for a revolutionary path.
For those not familiar with this period a helpful introduction by the editors gives an analysis of the important fights which occurred inside the party. That overview highlights some of the now more obscure personalities (a helpful biographical glossary is provided), where they stood on the issues and insights into the significance of the crucial early fights in the party. These include questions which are still relevant today; a legal vs. an underground party; the proper attitude toward parliamentary politics; support to third party bourgeois candidates; trade union policy; class war defense as well as how to rein in the intense internal struggle of the various factions for organizational control of the party. This makes it somewhat easier for those not well-versed in the intricacies of the political disputes which wracked the early American party to understand how these questions tended to pull it in on itself. In many ways, given the undisputed rise of American imperialism in the immediate aftermath of World War I, this is a story of the ‘dog days’ of the party. Unfortunately, that rise combined with the international ramifications of the internal dispute in the Russian Communist Party and in the Communist International shipwrecked the party as a revolutionary party toward the end of this period.
In the introduction the editors motivate the purpose for the publication of the book by stating the Cannon was the finest Communist leader that America had ever produced. This an intriguing question. The editors trace their political lineage back to Cannon’s leadership of the early Communist Party and later after his expulsion to the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party so their perspective is obvious. What does the documentation provided here show? I would argue that the period under study represented Cannon’s apprenticeship. Although the hothouse politics of the early party clarified some of the issues of revolutionary strategy for him I believe that it was not until he linked up with Trotsky in the 1930’s that he became the kind of leader who could lead a revolution. Of course, since Cannon never got a serious opportunity to lead revolutionary struggles here this is mainly reduced to speculation on my part. Later books written by him make the case better. One thing is sure- in his prime he had the instincts to want to lead a revolution.
As an addition to the historical record of this period this book is a very good companion to the two-volume set by Theodore Draper - The Roots of American Communism and Soviet Russia and American Communism- the definitive study on the early history of the American Communist Party. It is also a useful companion to Cannon’s own The First Ten Years of American Communism. I would add that this is something of a labor of love on the part of the editors. This book was published at a time when the demise of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe was in full swing and anything related to Communist studies was deeply discounted. Nevertheless, for better or worse, the American Communist Party (and its offshoots) needs to be studied as an ultimately flawed example of a party that failed in its mission to create a radical version of society in America. Now is the time to study this history.
****************James P. Cannon
The decision to join the trotskyist camp in 1928
May 27, 1959
This is a letter sent to Theodore Draper, a historian of the American communist movement.
The entire series of letters sent from Cannon to Draper has been published under the title "The first ten years of American communism" by Lyle Stuart Inc, in 1962.
It was later reprinted by Pathfinder Press.
It seems to me that I have already written myself out on "The Birth of American Trotskyism"-in which I played the central role because I just happened to be standing there at the time and there was no one else to do it. I couldn't add much to what I have already written in the History of American Trotskyism, in my letters to you, and in the big article - "The Degeneration of the Communist Party-and the New Beginning" in the Fall, 1954 issue of Fourth International. That's my case. If I were to write about it again I could only repeat what I have already said.
You'll find a better and fuller exposition there than I could write again today. I have the faculty, which for me is a happy one, of pushing things to the back of my mind once I have written them out. In order to write a fresh report on the origin of American Trotskyism, I would have to force myself back into a semi-coma, recalling and reliving the struggle of 31 years ago. That is too much for me to undertake again.
* * *
The only thing I left out of my extensive writing about that period, which I try to leave out of all my writing, was the special element of personal motivation for my action-which cynics would never believe and research workers never find in the files and cross-indexes. That is the compulsion of conscience when one is confronted by an obligation which, in given circumstances, is his alone to accept or to evade.
In the summer of 1928 in Moscow, in addition to the theoretical and political revelation that came to me when I read Trotsky's Criticism of the Draft Program of the Comintern, there was another consideration that hit me where I live. That was the fact that Trotsky had been expelled and deported to far-away Alma Ata; that his friends and supporters had been slandered and expelled and imprisoned; and that the whole damned thing was a frame-up!
Had I set out as a boy to fight for justice for Moyer and Haywood in order to betray the cause of justice when it was put squarely up to me in a case of transcendent importance to the whole future of the human race? A copy-book moralist could easily answer that question by saying: "Of course not. The rule is plain. You do what you have to do, even if it costs you your head." But it wasn't so simple for me in the summer of 1928. I was not a copybook moralist. I was a party politician and factionalist who had learned how to cut corners. I knew that at the time, and the self-knowledge made me uneasy.
I had been gradually settling down into an assured position as a party official with an office and staff, a position that I could easily maintain-as long as I kept within definite limits and rules which I knew all about, and conducted myself with the facility and skill which had become almost second nature to me in the long drawn-out factional fights.
I knew that. And I knew something else that I never told anybody about, but which I had to tell myself for the first time in Moscow in the summer of 1928. The foot-loose Wobbly rebel that I used to be had imperceptibly begun to fit comfortably into a swivel chair, protecting himself in his seat by small maneuvers and evasions, and even permitting himself a certain conceit about his adroit accommodation to this shabby game. I saw myself for the first time then as another person, as a revolutionist who was on the road to becoming a bureaucrat. The image was hideous, and I turned away from it in disgust.
I never deceived myself for a moment about the most probable consequences of my decision to support Trotsky in the summer of 1928. I knew it was going to cost me my head and also my swivel chair, but I thought: What the hell-better men than I have risked their heads and their swivel chairs for truth and justice. Trotsky and his associates were doing it at that very moment in the exile camps and prisons of the Soviet Union. It was no more than right that one man, however limited his qualifications, should remember what he started out in his youth to fight for, and speak out for their cause and try to make the world hear, or at least to let the exiled and imprisoned Russian Oppositionists know that they had found a new friend and supporter.
In the History of American Trotskyism, p.61 I wrote:
"The movement which then began in America brought repercussions throughout the entire world; overnight the whole picture, the whole perspective of the struggle changed. Trotskyism, officially pronounced dead, was resurrected on the international arena and inspired with new hope, new enthusiasm, new energy. Denunciations against us were carried in the American press of the party and reprinted throughout the whole world, including the Moscow Pravda. Russian Oppositionists in prison and exile, where sooner or later copies of Pravda reached them, were notified of our action, our revolt in America. In the darkest hour of the Opposition's struggle, they learned that fresh reinforcements had taken the field across the ocean in the United States, which by virtue of the power and weight of the country itself, gave importance and weight to the things done by the American communists.
"Leon Trotsky, as I remarked, was isolated in the little Asiatic village of Alma Ata. The world movement outside Russia] was in decline, leaderless, suppressed, isolated, practically non-existent. With this inspiring news of a new detachment in far-away America, the little papers and bulletins of the Opposition groups flared into life again. Most inspiring of all to us was the assurance that our hard-pressed Russian comrades had heard our voice. I have always thought of this as one of the most gratifying aspects of the historic fight we undertook in 1928-that the news of our fight reached the Russian comrades in all corners of the prisons and exile camps, inspiring them with new hope and new energy to persevere in the struggle."
In Moscow, in the summer of 1928, I foresaw such a possible consequence of my decision and action. And I thought that that alone would justify it, regardless of what else might follow. Many things have changed since then, but that conviction has never changed.
From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin-Motorcycle Days, Circa 1958
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Jody Reynolds performing his teen angst classic Endless Sleep.
Yes, 1958 was a good time to be a motorcycle boy, a de facto, de jure wild boy according to the chattering, clueless, disapproving parents of the time, especially the parents of impressionable teenage girls (and not just teenage girls either if they, the parents, had had a clue what was going on over at State U with the twenty somethings, including their Janie, when the music and liquor got going and the wild boys showed up to get it on). Of course parents didn’t count, count for much anyway, when trends, moods, and what was cool got discussed in front of night time mom and pop variety stores where corner boys of all descriptions and attitudes held forth. Or after school, high school of course lesser grades need not bother to show up except maybe in early morning to get some candy bar or other sweet to get them through until growing time lunch, Doc’s Drugstore where all manner of high school boy and girl went for a soda and snack but mainly to hear some latest tune, maybe some hot Jerry Lee wild boy mad man thing, seventeen times in Doc’s amped up super juke box. In those quarters motorcycle wild boys were cool, if maybe just a little dangerous.
And maybe just slightly illegal too as their parents’cops (as part of that parent-police-teacher-priest-politician-hell-maybe even mom and pop variety store owner authority continuum) frowned, no more than frowned, when some local detachment of the Devils’ Disciples’ roared through the Adamsville Beach boulevard night. The sight of flashing blue lights on the boulevard usually meant one thing. Some wild boy had his exhaust system too loud, or he wasn’t wearing a helmet, or he switched lanes without signaling, or maybe for just being ugly, cop’s eyes ugly, or some lame thing like that. Those small civic sins only added to the mystique though. Especially on sultry summer nights when the colors passed turning every guy’s eyes, even mine, to listen to that power and to set every girl, impressionable or not, to thinking, thinking Wild Boy Marlon Brando thinking about what was behind that power.
See before Tom Wolfe and Hunter Thompson put everybody straight about the seamy side of motorcycle life, life-style motorcycle life with its felonies and mayhem, Marlon and his wild boys (and maybe throw in James Dean and his “chicken run” cars although they were a little too tame to be as revered as the motorcycle boys were) had cleaned up the wild boy scene, made it okay to an easy rider, made it sexy. Not the weekend warrior flip turns and wheelies and then Monday morning back to the bank stuff but real alienated Johnnies just like you and me. Old Marlon had made alienated wild boys cool. Old sexy white tee-shirt, maybe a pack of Luckies rolled up one sleeve, a cap rakishly turn at an angle on his head, but mainly an attitude, an attitude of distain, hell, maybe hatred, toward that ever present authority that told every kid, every boy and girl that you had better take what you can when you can because it won’t be there long. And that slight snarl that accompanied every word. Yah, cool, cool daddy cool.
And the girls, wells, they were doing that wondering, wondering about what was behind that power thrust, as those leather jackets and engineer boots roared by. To the detriment of their date while sitting in the front seat of his father’s borrowed plain vanilla boxed tail fin car that he had had to almost declare a civil war to get for the evening and promise to mow some future lawn as compensation. Jesus. Or worst, infinitely worst, seeing that metal, chrome and fire pass by after her date, her car-less date, had just walked her over to the beach to sit on that cold seawall. Her eyes flamed red, as she almost flagged down some local easy rider as he passed by just to get some kicks, and maybe freedom.
It wasn’t always low-down grunges who occupied the flamed night either. Every town probably had it story, many more that one, of some wild boy motorcycle boy who rules the roost, who took what he needed, or better, wanted and said the hell with civilization. Yah, a real outlaw, an outlaw way outside the system like North Adamsville wild boy James Preston, a guy they still talk about, although not when tender ears are around. Back in 1957, maybe 1958 that was all the talk, all the talk that counted like I said when Pretty James Preston got his chopper. Damn, I can still hear that explosion when he gunned that pedal even now.
See, Pretty James Preston (and nobody called him, as far as I know, anything else except that exact designation) had Elvis-like looks to go with his outlaw snarl. Dark hair combed back like Elvis (but don’t ever use that comparison, not if you don’t want to fight, fight whip chains fight just so you know), black kind of Spanish eyes, long and tall, wiry some would say, but tough as a kid from the wrong side of the tracks could be. Nobody messed with Pretty James Preston (see, hell, even fifty years or more later I still call him that just in case, just in case his chain-wielding ghost is still around). So tough that he, around ordinary citizens, was almost civilized. He could afford to be and because it cost him nothing in his world calculus that was that.
So naturally every high school girl, even women since at that time Pretty James Preston was about twenty-one, had some tough nights up in her lonely room thinking about that wild boy. Now maybe not everyone, okay, North Adamsville was not that small a town but let’s say any girl (or young woman) who thought she had a shot, or maybe half a shot, at his favors was having sweaty summer nights. Even Mimi Murphy, my girlfriend, my faithless girlfriend. Now Mimi was maybe not the dish of the town, with her flaming red hair and her slender, maybe skinny is better, body but she had a certain something, a certain, smile, a certain style about her that made some guys who you would never ever think would give her a second look (like I did to my delight) were intrigued by her. Including one Pretty James Preston.
One summer night after I walked Mimi, yes, car-less walked, Mimi over to the seawall down at the Seal Rock end of old Adamsville Beach I (we) heard that roar, that roar that meant only one thing- Pretty James Preston was coming down the boulevard full throttle. I turned around and before I knew it there he was stopped in front of us as we sat on the seawall. I swear I don’t remember him saying word one to Mimi (or me). Maybe a nod, maybe they had some secret karmic thing, I don’t know. All I know is that the queen of Sacred Heart Church (Roman Catholic) for number of novenas said in the old days, some white veil presence, one of the smartest girl in our class and, probably the closest thing we had to a quirky girl in our class walked over to Pretty James Preston and his strange and powerful Vincent Black Lighting and straddled herself on back of the bike. And into the night they roared.
But see that strange bike, that British-made exotic Vincent Black Lightning (which later proved to have been stolen, not by Pretty James but someone else, and then ferreted over from England to take its place in North Adamsville lore) was the undoing of Pretty James Preston (although not to hold you in suspense not of Mimi Murphy). Pretty James Preston was leading kind of a double life. Let me explain, or try to, the way I heard it from some sources that I trusted (not Mimi, for I never really saw her to speak to after that fateful night).
In order to keep up his bike, his chopper Pretty James Preston robbed, robbed persons, places and things if you like. Not around North Adamsville since he was too well known (although after it was all over a few people around town admitted that he had robbed them, robbed them at gun-point and they were too scared to say anything. Maybe true, maybe not.). But around, a gas station here, a mom and pop variety store there, a couple of department stores, a few wealthy homes over in Millsville. Not much but steady.
Then one day we heard that Pretty James Preston had stepped up his act. Banks, or rather a bank, the Granite City National Bank branch over in Braintree. And that was his downfall. Somehow he bungled the job, or some alarm went off, or some rum brave cop got religion and before he could get out the door Pretty James was shot, shot six ways to Sunday. Dead, DOA, done. The only thing left to say is that somebody thought they saw a skinny, long haired, redheaded girl in a leather coat and dungarees standing across the street from the bank and when they turned around after looking away upon hearing the shots the girl were gone. They later found the Vincent Black Lightning over in the Adamsville projects kind of mashed up. The red-headed girl, my Mimi, was not seen around town again. (Rumors, small rumors swirled for a few months about her fate, some reported that she was in a convent up North, others that she was holed up doing tricks in some high –end whorehouse in Boston but I never got very far with the few leads I had and soon gave it up.) Yes, Pretty James Preston was an outlaw from his first to last breath. And you wonder why they still talk about him with hushed breath.
The music too befit the motorcycle wild boy time of end of time times, the times when it seemed every little mishap in some godforsaken corner of this wicked old world turned into a major crisis causing everybody at some invisible authority’s urging to head for the air raid shelters and keep their heads down. And their butts up. Jerry Lee wild man piano stuff, always ready to break out, jail break out ever since he popped the question in high school confidential, Chuck leering at sweet little sixteens and you know what I mean, Eddie Cochran giving us a summer time blues anthem to hang our hopes on, and all kinds of one hit wonders trying to put a dent in our angst, our special teen angst that was ready to boil over, to break out and be free. Free from that invisible hand authority.
No wonder the wild boys had a field day. Those impressionable girls, maybe Mimi too although we never talked about such things, jesus no, worried they would never get to “do it” but were fearful to “do it” nevertheless in that Pill-less world. And guys hoping that the girls were worrying about not “doing it” before the world exploded egged them on although not with as much concern as necessary about consequences. The wild boys, those easy riders, though said “take no prisoners” and that was attractive, that and that promise of power that had many a girl restless late at night.
So no wonder as well some young thing in the Jody Reynolds’ song Endless Sleep , maybe worried about getting pregnant after she let lover boy go further than she (and he) expected decided to go down to that sunless beach and let old Neptune have his way with her. And he, lover boy, maybe with a wild boy sensibility on the surface but more the weekend warrior when the deal went down, went looking for the dizzy dame, his dizzy dame and left old Neptune in the lurch. And many years later, maybe in some dream remembrance, they would throw the old records on the turntable, amp up the teen angst, the teen alienation, then sit back and listen to maybe the last minute in the 1950s when free-wheeling rock and roll blasted the night away. And the motorcycle boys held forth in the thundering night.
Thursday, October 11, 2012
From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin-From The "Ancient Dreams, Dreamed" Sketches- To Joyell Davin In Lieu Of A Letter- With J.E.D. In Mind
Joshua Lawrence Breslin comment:
**********
Freight train, freight train going so fast,
"No, Steve and I are not together anymore since he split to “find himself” on some freight train heading west, heading west fast away from me, I think. But you don’t want to hear that story, and besides we have to push on against this damn war, Steve or no Steve and his goddamn freight smoke-trailing dreams.” What Joyell didn’t say was that she was half-glad, no quarter-glad, Steve had split since the last couple of months had been hell. A fight a day it seemed, two a day at the end.
“Who is that guy over in the corner, that green corner coach, the guy with the kind of wispy just starting to fill out brown beard, and those fierce piercing goy blue eyes, that I just passed? I’ve not seen him around before,” Joyell asked herself and then Marge Goodwin, expecting Marge the crackerjack organizer of everything from antiwar marches to save the, and you can fill in the blank, to know all the players. Moreover Marge and Joyell got along well enough for Joyell to ask such a question, “girl talk,” they called it between themselves although to the “men”this was a book sealed with seven seals since the “correct” thing was to put such girlish things back in prehistoric times, four or five years ago okay. Joyell also sensed that since Marge’s “thing” with Jim hadn’t worked out they had something in common, although nothing was ever said. Nor would it be.
And as she found herself catching herself taking more and more of those telltale peeks she noticed, noticed almost by instinct, almost by some mystical sense that he was“checking” her out, although their dueling eyes had not met. Then, after Jim had finished giving the opening address about what the conferees were trying to do, this Frank Jackman stood up quickly without introduction and started talking, in a firm voice, about the need to up the ante, to create havoc in the streets, and in the army camps. And do it now, and with some sense of urgency. But he said it all in such way that everybody in the room, all forty or fifty of them, knew, or should have known, that this was not some ragtag wispy–bearded fly-by-night “days of rage” kid spirit, freshly bell-bottom pants minted, but some kind of revolutionary, some kind of radical anyway, who had thought about things a lot and wasn’t just a flame-thrower like she had seen too many of lately, including Steve, before he went to find himself.
When Frank was done he looked, half-looked really, quickly in her direction like he was seeking her, and just her, approval. And like he needed to know and know right this minute that she approved. She blushed, and hoped it did not show. And hoped that she had read his look in her direction correctly. But before that blush could subside she blushed again when out of nowhere this Frank gave her a another look, a serious checking out look if she knew her “movement” men, not a leer like some drunken barroom guy, or “come on, honey,” like a schoolboy but a let’s talk high “ism”talk later, and see what happens later, later. Maybe this umpteenth conference would work out after all.
In the previous sketch, “The New Course,” mention was made that sometime
Peter Paul Markin would tell how he met that semite princess from Manhattan. This sketch, suitably name changed is essentially the story of their meeting and their fire next time. **********
Freight train, freight train going so fast,
Freight train, freight train going so fast,
Please don’t say what train I’m on,
So they won’t know where I’ve gone.
-Chorus from ancient folk blues artist Elizabeth Cotten’s Freight Train.
As this story unfolds, Elizabeth Cotten’ s Freight Train, in an upbeat Peter, Paul and Mary-style version complete with Bleecker Street reference, is being covered just then near the well firewood- stocked, well-stoked fireplace of the great room in a hard winter, February version, snow-covered rural New Hampshire old time religious order assembly hall by some upstart urban folkie a long way from his home and a long way from that 1960s folk revival minute that then had had even jaded aficionados from the generation of ’68 clamoring for more.
Meanwhile, the front hall entrance adjacent to that great room where that old-time folkie and his old-time tune are being heard by a small early-bird arrival gathering crowd who never tire of the song, and who this night certainly do not tire of being close by the huge well stocked, well-stoked fireplace where the old brother, hell, let’s give him a name, Eric, Eric from Vermont, okay, is holding forth is starting to fill with more arrivals to be checked in and button-holed. The place, for the curious: the Shaker Farms Peace Pavilion (formerly just plain vanilla Shaker Farms Assembly Hall but the “trust fund babies” who bought and donated the site, ah, insisted in their, of course, anonymous way on the added signature) the scene of umpteen peace conferences, anti-war parlays, alternative world vision seminars, non-violent role-playing skits, and personal witness actions worked out. A handy hospice for worn-out ideas, ditto frustrations, and an off-hand small victory or two.
That very last part, that desperate victory last part, is what keeps the place afloat, afloat in this oddball of a hellish anti-war year 1971 when even hardened and steeled old-time peace activists against the Vietnam War are starting to believe they will be entitled to Social Security for their efforts before this bloody war is over. Hence the urgency behind this particular great room fireplace warm, complete with booked-in urban folkie singer, umpteenth anti-war conference. But onward brothers and sisters and let us listen in to the following conversation overheard in that now crowded front hall:
“Hi, Joyell, glad you could make it to the conference. Are you by yourself or did you bring Steve with you?” asked Jim Sweeney, one of the big honchos, one of the big organizational honchos and that is what matters these dog days when all hope appears to have been abandoned, these now fading days of the antiwar movement trying yet again to conference jump start the opposition to Nixon’s bloody escalations and stealthy tricky maneuvers.
“Good to see you too, Jim,”answered Joyell, who said it in such a singsong way that she and Jim Sweeney, obviously, had been in some mystic time, maybe some summer of love time before everything and everybody needed twelve coats of armor, emotional armor, just to move from point A to point B, more than fellows at one of those umpteen peace things. Joyell knew, knew from some serious reflection last summer, that she had put on a few more armor coats herself and, hell, she was just a self-confessed rank and filer. Their “thing” had just faded though for lack of energy, lack of high “ism” politics on Joyell’s part unlike frenetic Jim, and for the cold, hard fact that Jim at the time wanted to devote himself totally to the “movement” and could not “commit” to a personal relationship.
“Jesus, can’t any guy commit to anything for more than ten minutes,” Joyell thought to herself. From the weathered look on his face Jim was still in high thrall to “saving the earth”although rumor had it that Marge Goodwin, ya, that Marge Goodwin, the “mother”of organizers ever since she almost single-handedly called out the national student strike in 1970, almost had her hooks into him, into him bad from all reports.
"No, Steve and I are not together anymore since he split to “find himself” on some freight train heading west, heading west fast away from me, I think. But you don’t want to hear that story, and besides we have to push on against this damn war, Steve or no Steve and his goddamn freight smoke-trailing dreams.” What Joyell didn’t say was that she was half-glad, no quarter-glad, Steve had split since the last couple of months had been hell. A fight a day it seemed, two a day at the end.
Reason: Steve too was not ready to “commit” to a personal relationship what with the whole world going to hell in hand-basket (his expression). Besides they all had plenty of time, a life-time to get “serious” and, forbidden words, “settle down.” Here is where the quarter-glad part comes in. Steve was getting in kind of heavy with some Weathermen-types and while that did not cause an argument a day between them it didn’t help. Joyell half expected to hear that Steve, Steve the meek pacifist, a freaking meek Catholic Worker guy just a couple years before, blew up something, or got blown up. Jesus, she thought, was I that hard to take, hard to get along with.
“I’m sorry to hear that Joyell. Maybe when we get a break later we can talk.” Of course, and maybe for the same Steve smoke-trailing-freight-dream-escape-seeking-the-great-American be-bop night reason, or maybe a heroic end traced out since boyhood redemptions reason, Jim and Joyell never would meet later, as Jim would be tied up, well, tied up in whatever organizational thing he was honcho of these days. Their time too had irrevocably passed. And now, and from here on in, this is Joyell’s time, her story, her voice as she enters the spacious but cold, distant from the well-stoked fireplace cold, conference room to the left of the great room with its rickety elongated table weighted down with timeless banging against ten thousand flickered night dreams, scarecrow chairs that caused more than one modern arched-back to falter helplessly, and unhealthy air, air make rank from too many spent speeches, and spent dreams.
*******“Who is that guy over in the corner, that green corner coach, the guy with the kind of wispy just starting to fill out brown beard, and those fierce piercing goy blue eyes, that I just passed? I’ve not seen him around before,” Joyell asked herself and then Marge Goodwin, expecting Marge the crackerjack organizer of everything from antiwar marches to save the, and you can fill in the blank, to know all the players. Moreover Marge and Joyell got along well enough for Joyell to ask such a question, “girl talk,” they called it between themselves although to the “men”this was a book sealed with seven seals since the “correct” thing was to put such girlish things back in prehistoric times, four or five years ago okay. Joyell also sensed that since Marge’s “thing” with Jim hadn’t worked out they had something in common, although nothing was ever said. Nor would it be.
“Oh, that’s Frank Jackman, the anti-war GI who just got out of the stockade over at Fort Shaw last week and he is ready to do some work with us,” volunteered Marge. Later that evening Joyell would hear from a reliable source that Marge had gotten, or had tried to get, very familiar with the ex-army soldier resister. Marge had a thing for“heroic” guys. Heroic guys being guys like Jim, Joan Baez’s hubby, David Harris, who had refused draft induction, the Berrigan Brothers who were getting ready to do time for draft board record destruction (although she, Marge, couldn’t get that damn Catholic trick part that drove their actions) and now this Frank Jackman who had done a year, a tough soldier non-soldier year, some of it in solidarity, in the stockade for refusing go to Vietnam (and refusing to wear the military uniform at one point). Joyell also heard from another source that evening that it was no dice between Marge and Frank.
This source thought it was that Marge, always getting what Marge wanted when it came to “movement men,”figured this guy would just cave in and take the ride. Not this guy, no way, not after taking on the “big boys” over at Fort Shaw. No dice, huh. That’s a point in his favor. But that was later fuel.
“Oh, that’s why his beard is so wispy and he is wearing those silly high top polished black boots and that size too big Army jacket with those bell-bottomed jeans. He certainly has the idea of what it takes to fit in here,” Joyell figured out, figured out loud. Marge just nodded, nodded kind of dismissively that she was right. And then left to do some organization business setting up the evening’s work.
And then suddenly, she, Joyell Davin (suitably Americanized, naturally, a couple of generations back), freshly-damaged in love’s unequal battles but apparently not ready to throw in the towel, got very quiet, very quiet like she always did when some guy caught her eye, well, more than her eye tonight, now that Steve was so much train smoke out in the cornfields somewhere. Maybe it was the New York City armor-coated brashness, hell Manhattan grow-up hard and necessary brashness required in a too many people universe, and learned from her very opinionated father, that her quietness tried to rein in at times like this so guys, guys like this Frank, wouldn’t be thrown off. But whatever it was that drove her quietness she was taking her peeks, her quiet half- peeks really, at this guy. With Steve, and a few other guys, it was mostly full steam ahead and let the devil take the hinter- post. This time her clock said take it easy, jesus, take it easy.
And as she found herself catching herself taking more and more of those telltale peeks she noticed, noticed almost by instinct, almost by some mystical sense that he was“checking” her out, although their dueling eyes had not met. Then, after Jim had finished giving the opening address about what the conferees were trying to do, this Frank Jackman stood up quickly without introduction and started talking, in a firm voice, about the need to up the ante, to create havoc in the streets, and in the army camps. And do it now, and with some sense of urgency. But he said it all in such way that everybody in the room, all forty or fifty of them, knew, or should have known, that this was not some ragtag wispy–bearded fly-by-night “days of rage” kid spirit, freshly bell-bottom pants minted, but some kind of revolutionary, some kind of radical anyway, who had thought about things a lot and wasn’t just a flame-thrower like she had seen too many of lately, including Steve, before he went to find himself.
When Frank was done he looked, half-looked really, quickly in her direction like he was seeking her, and just her, approval. And like he needed to know and know right this minute that she approved. She blushed, and hoped it did not show. And hoped that she had read his look in her direction correctly. But before that blush could subside she blushed again when out of nowhere this Frank gave her a another look, a serious checking out look if she knew her “movement” men, not a leer like some drunken barroom guy, or “come on, honey,” like a schoolboy but a let’s talk high “ism”talk later, and see what happens later, later. Maybe this umpteenth conference would work out after all.
So our Joyell was not surprised, not surprised at all, when during the break, the blessed break after two non-stop hours of waiting, Francis Alexander Jackman (that’s what he was called from when he was a kid and it kind of stuck but he preferred simply Frank) came up behind, tapped her gently on the shoulder to get her attention, introduced himself without fanfare or with any heroic poses, and thanked her for her work on his behalf.
“What do you mean, Frank?”she asked, bewildered by the question. “Oh, when your Peace Action committee came up to Fort Shaw and demonstrated for my freedom,” he replied in kind of a whisper voice, very different from his public voice, a voice that had known some tough times recently and maybe long ago too, but that soft whisper was what she needed, needed to hear from a righteous man, just now. The shrill of Steve’s voice, and a couple of others in her string of forgotten luck, still echoed in her brain.
“That was you? I didn’t make the connection. I didn’t know that was you, sorry, that was about a year ago and I have been going non-stop with this antiwar march and that women’s lib things. Were you in the stockade all that time?” she continued.
“Yah,” just a yah, not forlorn or anything like that but just a simple statement of fact, of the fact that he had needed to do what he did and that was that, next question, came that soft reply like this Frank and she were on some same wave-length. She was confused, confused more than a little that he had that strong effect on her after about five minutes of just general conversation.
Just then Marge, super-organizer but, as Joyell had already gathered intelligence on by then, not above having the last say in her little romances with the newest heroes of the movement, or trying to, called to Frank that Stanley Bloom, the big national anti-war organizer, wanted his input into something. But before he left soft -whispering still, calm still, unlike when he talked, talked peace action talk, he mentioned kind of kid-like, bashful kid-like, and maybe they could meet later. Joyell could barely contain herself, and although she usually acted bashfully at these times, kind of a studied bashfulness starting out, even with Steve and some of the movement guys, she just blurted out, “We’d better.” He replied, a little stronger of voice than that previous whisper, “I guess that is a command, right?” And they both laughed, laughed an adventure ahead laugh.
Later came, evening session complete, as they were sitting across from each other in the great room, the great fireplace room where Eric was going through his second rendition of Freight Train to get the room revved up for his big stuff. Frank came over and asked, back to whisper asked, if Joyell would like to go outside for a breath of fresh winter air. Or maybe somewhere else, another room inside perhaps if she didn’t like the cold or snow. No second request was necessary, and no coyness on her part either with this guy, as she quickly went to the coat rack and put on her coat, scarf, and boots. And so it went.
They talked, or rather she talked a blue streak, a soft-spoken blue streak like Frank’s manner was contagious, and maybe it was. Then he would ask a question, and ask it in such a way that he really wanted to know, know her for her answer and not just to ask, polite ask. As they walked, and walked, and as the snow got deeper as they moved away from the pavilion she kind of fell, kind of helpless on purpose fell. On purpose fell expecting that he might kiss her. But all he did was pick her up, gently but firmly, held her in his arms just a fraction of a second, but a fraction of a second enough to let her know, and let her feel, that they had not seen the last of each other. And just for that cold, snow-driven February night, as war raged on in some distance land, and as she gathered in her tangled emotions after many romantic stumbles and man disappointments, that thought was enough.
From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin-From The "Ancient Dreams, Dreamed" Sketches-The New Course
The great Mandela cried, cried to the high heavens, for revenge against the son’s hurt, now that the son had found his way, a strange way but a way. Freed from mental prisons and placed in solitary barred, steel-barred root rooms to wager his personal bet, bet of his life, on freedom. Freed from manacle shackled past get aheads, go aheads, keep your head down to get ahead, eyes straight forward, no lefts or rights, hell, no, meet some nice working-class girl, find some forty years, a pension, and a gold watch, and produce, produce what. And prison freed from now sour bourgeois dreams, bobby (kennedy) dreams, okay, okay but that is what they were and one need not be a Marxist (or marxist) to know that road led to perdition and without even trying.
Yah, and that road, that blessed bobby road, represented the character flaw, that certain tilting to the winds instead of against them like some old baby boy donkey ride Sancho Panza and his pal and all the windmills in Holland or Palm Springs could not change that. Yah, free, prison free and his dream hair grows a little longer each day and his dream beard begins to be bushy like some old time Old Testament archangel avenger of hurts, his own first and the other hurts. And like some righteous John Brown, just to name a name, a Calvinist avenger name, blown out of Kansas prairie fires and set smack daub in Harper’s Ferry hellholes he cultivates that long flow hair and beard, dreamed.
But a dame, pardon me, 1971 women’s consciousness-raising and righteous too, a woman always comes with it, the dream hair and beard. One hard night, one tossed night some apparition out of a Puritan dream, all quakerly and severe, he saw some Croton-on-the-Hudson vision. A woman passed momentarily in fierce struggles, fierce outside the walls struggles, not noticed, not noticed until that night, not pretty, not blonde, not, well, not everywoman, but fierce, fierce in about six difference ways and maybe, just maybe capable of fierce loves.
Another hard night, tossed too, a free-form dream of Chicago, hog butcher to the world, wheat fields and wholesomeness just beyond in now no longer John Brown-like prairies. A daughter, some brown-eyed, brown-haired, brown-skinned semite butcher’s, a kosher butcher, maybe, daughter, who spoke of spirit dreams, and wrote blue-eyed poems and of goyim sillies, and he was happy, happy that she wrote of fierce blue-eyes just when he had been ready to throw in the towel. And then that certain character flaw, that fidget, that endless fidget, neither left or right, came in as he tried to have the whole world. Imagine that, imagine some fierce blue-eyed boy could shake all that, and forget those blue-eyed words in that blue-eyed poem. And shake (and forget) to endless sorrows. Hell, damn, hell.
This last time, the last restless night, came one out of hell Manhattan and one thousand and one anxieties, neuroses, and her own father time hurts. No righteous Hudson puritan or Midwestern semite daughter she. No, princess semite she. What a pair they will be. Remind me to tell you sometime how they met, dream met, in some snowy do-good cabin/assembly hall build to curse the darkness of one thousand wars and one hundred fights against those damn wars. And for a minute she, he, they were happy, happy in each other’s vagrant landless company. Then certain madnesses came forth. And short dope snorts, and peyote dream buttons, all mixed in sometimes blank, sometimes the door of perception but I just cribbed that, not the perceptions the thought, okay.
What a ride, lord, what a ride, and lusts and screams and crazed rants were just a little part of it before that damn fidget, what, redhead, blonde, dirty blonde, path crossed his way.
And fame, local lore fame, built out of impossible combinations of minute fortitude, hour righteousness, and day of reckoning, day of reckoning and passing with flying colors. And a certain swagger came to his feet in the high heaven black Madonna of a night. But no such feeling can (or, truth, should), last too long and in that Black Madonna night he began to fidget, fidget just a little. Some fidget ignited by refused dreams of white picket fences, dogs, and two point three kids (exactly two point three he never tired of saying as she, the Black Madonna, reddened at the thought). And he, he made for great leaps, and straw dogs. Hell it could have been easy, very easy but she couldn’t see it that way, and he didn’t except when he needed her refuge, lovingly or just shelter.
And on those shelter days no cigarette hanging off the lip now (she would not allow it see, not cool and it aggravated her condition, whichever one it was at the time. So no Winston filter-tipped seductions, no need, and no rest except the rest of waiting, waiting on the days to pass until the next coming, and the next coming after that.
Ah, sweet Mandela, turn for me, turn for me and mine just a little. He cursed the darkness on those days, and the light too, for he had made that leap that he only heard about in his head when he had had a few dreams and was feeling warrior king brave to take on all comers, tricky dick, vance packard, spiro agnew, hell even sparring a norman mailer now that they were on the same side (or at least he thought they were on the same side, same side advertising for themselves and their heroics, their armies of the night collective moment). And dreams of being right, ha.
Then one day some news came from above, no, hell no, not that above, the above of mundane chain-of-command drop down and let you know freedom day was near. Anti-climactic, anticlimactic for a man who expected to grow old in stir, and kind of dug it (excuse beat reversion memory of Harvard Square leavings when he thought this world would be some literary break-out and not righteous avenger of hurts, did I said his own first of all. If he didn’t, he lied).
Free at last but with a very, very sneaking feeling that this was a road less traveled for a reason, and no ancient robert frost blasted two roads to guide one… Just look at blooded Kent State, or better, blooded Jackson State. Christ.
From The Pen Of American Communist Party Founder And Trotskyist Leader James P. Cannon-On the1948 Wallace Campaign
Click on the headline to link
to the “James P. Cannon Internet Archives.”
*************Markin comment on founding member James P. Cannon and the early American Communist Party from the “American Left History” blog:
If you are interested in the
history of the American Left or are a militant trying to understand some of the
past mistakes of our history and want to know some of the problems that
confronted the early American Communist Party and some of the key
personalities, including James Cannon, who formed that party this book is for
you.
At the beginning of the 21st
century after the demise of the Soviet Union
and the apparent ‘death of communism’ it may seem fantastic and utopian
to today’s militants that early in the
20th century many anarchist, socialist,
syndicalist and other working class militants of this country coalesced to form
an American Communist Party. For the most part, these militants honestly did so
in order to organize an American socialist revolution patterned on and
influenced by the Russian October Revolution of 1917. James P. Cannon represents
one of the important individuals and faction leaders in that effort and was in
the thick of the battle as a central leader of the Party in this period.
Whatever his political mistakes at the time, or later, one could certainly use
such a militant leader today. His mistakes were the mistakes of a man looking
for a revolutionary path.
For those not familiar with
this period a helpful introduction by the editors gives an analysis of the
important fights which occurred inside the party. That overview highlights some
of the now more obscure personalities (a helpful biographical glossary is
provided), where they stood on the issues and insights into the significance of
the crucial early fights in the party. These include questions which are still
relevant today; a legal vs. an underground party; the proper
attitude toward parliamentary politics; support to third party bourgeois
candidates; trade union policy; class
war defense as well as how to rein in
the intense internal struggle of the various factions for organizational
control of the party. This makes it somewhat easier for those not well-versed
in the intricacies of the political disputes which wracked the early American
party to understand how these questions tended to pull it in on itself. In many
ways, given the undisputed rise of American imperialism in the immediate
aftermath of World War I, this is a story of the ‘dog days’ of the party.
Unfortunately, that rise combined with the international ramifications of the
internal dispute in the Russian Communist Party and in the Communist
International shipwrecked the party as a revolutionary party toward the end of
this period.
In the introduction the
editors motivate the purpose for the publication of the book by stating the
Cannon was the finest Communist leader that America had ever produced. This an
intriguing question. The editors trace their political lineage back to Cannon’s
leadership of the early Communist Party and later after his expulsion to the
Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party so their perspective is obvious. What does
the documentation provided here show? I would argue that the period under study
represented Cannon’s apprenticeship. Although the hothouse politics of the
early party clarified some of the issues of revolutionary strategy for him I
believe that it was not until he linked up with Trotsky in the 1930’s that he
became the kind of leader who could lead a revolution. Of course, since Cannon
never got a serious opportunity to lead revolutionary struggles here this is
mainly reduced to speculation on my part. Later books written by him make the
case better. One thing is sure- in his prime he had the instincts to want to
lead a revolution.
As an addition to the
historical record of this period this book is a very good companion to the
two-volume set by Theodore Draper - The Roots of American Communism and Soviet
Russia and American Communism- the definitive study on the early history of the
American Communist Party. It is also a
useful companion to Cannon’s own The First Ten Years of American Communism. I
would add that this is something of a labor of love on the part of the editors.
This book was published at a time when the demise of the former Soviet Union
and Eastern Europe was in full swing and anything related to Communist studies
was deeply discounted. Nevertheless, for better or worse, the American
Communist Party (and its offshoots) needs to be studied as an ultimately flawed
example of a party that failed in its mission to create a radical version of
society in America. Now is the time to study this history.
****************
James P. Cannon
On the1948 Wallace Campaign
‘A Diversion & An Obstacle’
In 1948, Henry A. Wallace, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s vice president from 1941 to 1945, ran for president on the Progressive Party slate. Wallace’s campaign posed many of the same political issues for leftists as Ralph Nader’s recent presidential bid. In 1948, some members of the then-Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party/U.S. (SWP) argued for backing the Wallace campaign, but the majority, led by James P. Cannon, firmly rejected this. The James P. Cannon Inernet Archive would like to thank the International Bolshevik Tendency for providing the text for this speech. The following text is excerpted from Cannon’s remarks on the question at the SWP National Committee’s February 1948 plenum:The Wallace party must be opposed and denounced by every class criterion. In the first place it is programmatically completely bourgeois, as all the comrades have recognized. Its differences with the Republican and Democratic parties are purely tactical. There is not a trace of a principled difference anywhere. And by principled difference I mean a class difference.
A reasonable argument could be made for the support of Wallace’s movement in any circle of American capitalism. The fundamental issue that he is raising is the question of policy towards the Soviet Union. Wallace’s policy can be just as much a preparation for war as the Truman-Marshall program. Just as much. It is a matter of opinion as to which is the most effective way of preparing war against the Soviet Union—whether by an outward effort to reach agreement by concessions in order to prepare better and put the onus of responsibility on the Soviet Union before the fight starts, or by the rough and tumble “get tough” policy of Truman and Marshall. At any rate it is a tactical difference within the camp of the bourgeoisie.
It would be very, very bad and demoralizing if we would allow for a moment the antiwar demagogy of Wallace to be taken by any member of our party as something preferable to the blatant aggressiveness of Truman and Marshall. That would be nothing less than the preparation of the minds of party members for “lesser evil” politics—based on the theory that one kind of capitalist tactics in the expansion of American imperialism is preferable to another, and that the workers should intervene to support one against the other.
If I read the documents correctly, the argument is made by the Chicago comrades that the capitalists do not support Wallace and therefore it is not a capitalist party. I think it is quite correct that all, or nearly all, of the monopoly capitalists at the present moment oppose Wallace. That is not decisive at all as to the class character of the party. The class character of the party is not determined by the class that supports the party at the moment but rather by the class that the party supports. In other words, by its program. That is the decisive line.
…
The class character of the party is determined first by its program; secondly by its actual policy in practice; and thirdly by its composition and control….The control of the Wallace movement rests in the hands of Wallace and those he supports. He determines the candidates and he determines the program. To talk about getting into the movement to change its program and get another candidate—that’s absurd! The program and the candidate are presented to you in a finished package: Wallace for President, and Wallace’s program. He made a speech in Cincinnati where he took up the challenge. He said: “Yes, I accept the support of the Communists, but when they come into our movement they don’t come in to support their program—they support our program.” He was quite right.
Of course you have only to look around to see that the bulk of Wallace’s organized support at the moment is Stalinist—the Stalinist party, Stalinist-dominated unions, Stalinist front organizations, etc. But these Stalinist unions in the Wallace movement function as supporting organizations and not as controlling powers. They roughly play the same role toward Wallace’s wrapped-up, pre-determined program as the PAC and the Political Committee of the AFL will play in the Truman movement….They represent far more workers than the Stalinists in the Wallace camp, but that still doesn’t make the Democratic Party a labor party.
The same is true about the Wallace movement. Get into the Wallace movement and change its program and candidate? Even from a practical point of view it seems to be completely utopian. The whole movement is organized on the basis of the candidacy of Wallace and his program. To join the formation and holler for a different program, a different man—this seems to contradict the whole premise of the movement. They would say to you: “If you’re not a Wallace man, why do you join the Wallace movement?” It would be a very difficult question to answer.
The Wallace movement has another ugly side to it. It appears as a one-man Messiah movement. He is the head of a “Gideon’s Army” throwing the bible at his adversaries. That, it seems to me, is the worst kind of substitute for independent political action by the workers’ own organizations. Wallace’s Messiah movement is a diversion and an obstacle in the way of a labor party. Support for it cannot be considered for a moment. On the contrary, it must be exposed and fought.
…
America’s Two-Party System
The traditional two-party system in the United States has been very well suited for normal times. The ruling capitalists couldn’t ask for anything better than this system which absorbs shocks and grievances by shifting people from one bourgeois party to another. But that system can blow up in time of crisis. The aggravation of the crisis which we all see ahead can shake up the whole American political situation, so that the old two-party system will no longer suffice to serve the needs of the American bourgeoisie.
The Democratic Party is a badly shaken organism already. The whole structure can fly apart in times of crisis. It is quite evident now that the AFL-CIO scheme to deliver the labor vote once more to the Democratic Party is meeting strong resistance, even if this resistance is more passive than active. That seems to be one of the undisputable factors of the present political situation. The AFL and CIO chiefs may raise five, ten or even fifteen million dollars for the election campaign. But there is no confidence among them that they can get out the labor vote for Truman as they did for Roosevelt.
The less it becomes possible to mobilize the workers’ votes for one or the other of these two old bourgeois parties, the more impelling and powerful will become the urge of the workers to found a party of their own or to seek a substitute for it. That mood of the workers will create a condition wherein American capitalism will objectively require a pseudo-radical party to divert the workers from a party of their own. This development, in my opinion, will most likely precede the development of a mass fascist party. America will most likely see a new radical bourgeois reform party before the development of American fascism on a mass scale.
That is what really happened in the Thirties, in a peculiarly distorted form. Roosevelt revamped the Democratic Party to serve the role of a pseudo-radical, “almost” workers party. By that he choked off entirely, for the period, the development toward an independent labor party. The Roosevelt “New Deal” became a sort of American substitute for the social program of the old, social democracy. Is a repetition of that performance likely within the framework of the Democratic Party? I doubt that very much. I think there can be only one Roosevelt episode. The whole trend since his death has been in the other direction.
Next time, the role played by Roosevelt—which was a role of salvation for American capitalism—will most likely require a new party. In the essence of the matter that is what Wallace’s party is. Wallace is the, as yet, unacknowledged, candidate for the role of diverting the workers’ movement for independent political action into the channel of bourgeois politics dressed up with radical demagogy which costs nothing. That is what we have to say, and that’s what we have to fight—vigorously and openly, and with no qualifications at all. We have to be 100% anti-Wallaceites. We have to stir up the workers against this imposter, and explain to them that they will never get a party of their own by accepting substitutes.
Summary
The slogan: “Build An Independent Labor Party!” is a slogan for the class mobilization of the workers. In some incomprehensible way this seems to have been transformed in the minds of some comrades as a mere demand to break the two-party system of the capitalists. This is not the same thing at all. It means merely a bourgeois party shake-up and not a class alignment.
Now, a break-up of the two party parliamentary system in America is undoubtedly a good thing. It destroys the fetish of the trade union bureaucracy to the effect that it is impossible to operate on the political field outside the traditional pattern. Splits in the two old bourgeois parties are bound to shake up the labor bureaucracy, loosen things up and create a more favorable situation for agitation for the formation of a labor party. But this break-up of the two-party system and splits in the bourgeois parties come about under the pressure of social crisis. These are not our tasks. Bourgeois parties are not the arena for our operation. Our specific task is the class mobilization of the workers against not only the two old parties, but any other capitalist parties which might appear.
…
The opposing comrades admit that we would have to pay a price to work inside the Wallace party. The admission price is just simply this: Get in there and rustle votes for Wallace for president. If you won’t pay that price you cannot get in. You have no grounds even to haggle, because it is a Wallace for President movement. That is a price we cannot pay, because it is a price of principle. It is against our principles to solicit votes for bourgeois candidates under any circumstances. It vitiates the whole concept of independent working class political action.It is wrong to assume that the Wallace party has a great future—that it is certain or nearly certain to become a future labor party. And it is doubly wrong to say, “This is the last chance to get in,” or something approximately of that sort. A mass labor party in the United States, by its very nature, couldn’t be a closed corporation….
Influence in mass parties is not determined by how long you have been there, but how much force you have. If we are in the unions and have forces there, we will be a power in any labor party formation that arises, the moment we join it, roughly in proportion to the strength of our forces in the unions and the general propagandistic power of our press.
…
LaFolette’s 1924 Campaign
We had an experience in 1924 in this country of a third party headed by Senator LaFollette, which was quite different from the Wallace movement in this respect—that it had a much broader base of support in the labor movement. Instead of merely one small sector of the trade union movement supporting it, as is the case with the Wallace party, LaFollette’s party was supported officially by the AFL and by the Railroad Brotherhoods, and even by the Socialist Party, which gave up its traditional independence. The Communist Party ran its own candidates and for the first time put itself on the national political map. The Socialist Party traded its independence for the privilege of going along with this bourgeois movement supported by the workers. They broke for the first time their traditional principle of no combinations with bourgeois parties and no support of bourgeois parties. That was an important stage in the degeneration of the American Socialist Party. They gave a finger to the LaFollette movement; eventually the bulk of the Social Democrats gave their whole hand to Roosevelt.
UFAA Public Assembly
Save the Date
UFAA Public AssemblySaturday, October 27, 2012
INN World Report
56 Walker St, New York, NY 10013 | Map
Public Assembly
Update 10/9: Please RSVP if you plan to attend the October 27 Public Assembly. This will be a great help to us in planning for the event.
UFAA Public Assembly
October 27, 2012
12-6pm
INN World Report
56 Walker Street, NYC | Map
About UFAA and the Public Assembly
Austerity – the imminent, existential threat to the American people. No matter the outcome of the November elections in the US, working families will be thrown over the proverbial “fiscal cliff” in the name of debt and deficits. Cutting Social Security, Medicare and other threads in our fragile social fabric is not only grossly unjust – it won’t work! The so-called “Grand Bargain” threatens to unleash a death spiral of unemployment and poverty which our nation is not certain to survive.
Organizing to defend our economic rights. It is for this reason that we must organize now to mobilize effective opposition to the impending austerity offensive; agitate to shift the burden of the economic depression onto Wall Street oligarchs; and to build momentum toward a genuine political revolution of, by and for the people.
Not a conference – an assembly! The UFAA Public Assembly on October 27 will not be “just another conference” that ends when the doors close. Participants will hear proposals from distinguished speakers, engage in floor debate, and vote on vital strategic matters. The UFAA intends to build on Wisconsin and Occupy – with decisions, demands and action.
Assembly formatAddresses(90+ minutes) A series of brief addresses, both live and recorded, from distinguished representatives. Proposals and Debate (4+ hours) A moderated presentation of proposals, live debate and votes. For example, “what is the more effective demand – a 1% Wall Street sales tax, or a more progressive income tax?” All persons representing proposals acceptable to the American public are invited to attend and debate. Disruptive behavior and tactics will not be tolerated. | Key issues Will includeProgramConcrete demands for political & economic reform. Organization An organic coalition with organized centers of leadership. Strategy Identifying our immediate strategic needs, and a roadmap for success. Leadership Developing and attracting political leaders to our coalition. | Make your voice heardWe want to hear from:
|
Veterans and Allies Arrested in New York as Afghanistan War Enters Year 12
Veterans and Allies Arrested in New York as Afghanistan War Enters Year 12
Twenty-five people, most of them U.S. military veterans, were arrested while laying flowers at a war memorial in New York City Oct. 7. They were engaged in a peaceful vigil to honor those killed and wounded in war and to oppose the U.S. war in Afghanistan as it entered its 12th year.
The vigil was held at Vietnam Veterans Memorial Plaza in lower Manhattan and began with a program of music and speakers including Vietnam veteran Bishop George Packard, Pulitzer Prize-winning war correspondent Chris Hedges, and Iraq combat veteran Jenny Pacanowski. At 8:30, the protesters began reading the names of the New York soldiers killed in Vietnam who are commemorated at the plaza and the military dead in Afghanistan and Iraq.
At 10:15 pm, the police informed the group that the park was officially closed and that if they remained they would be arrested. Many chose to continue reading names and laying flowers until they were handcuffed and taken away. One of the arrestees was Word War II Army combat veteran, Jay Wenk, 85, from Woodstock, NY.
The veterans had four aims:
Former VFP President Mike Ferner said, “I bet a lot of the arresting officers tonight were also military veterans; a number of them didn’t look too happy with the job they were told to do.”
“War is a public health problem, not only because of those killed directly, but also for the lingering trauma it causes,” said leading health care activist Dr. Margaret Flowers. “Ending war would be a good preventive health care measure.”
Poet Jenny Pacanowski read part of her poem “Parade,” which began “The funeral procession from Syracuse airport to Ithaca NY was over 50 miles long./Dragging his dead body through town after town of people, families and children waving flags./The fallen HERO had finally come home./I wonder how many children who saw this, will someday want to be dead HEROS too./I did not wave a flag that day or any day since my return.” She went on, “I live in a dream called my life. Where the good things don’t seem real or sustainable./I live in the nightmares of the past called Iraq and PTSD that never run out of fuel./Is it better to be dead hero?/Or a living fucked up, addicted, crazy veteran?”
“As long as we keep exposing the truth about these wars, then these people will not have died in vain,” said VFP board member Tarak Kauff.
Link to poem read by Mike Hastie
Link to poem read by Jenny Pacanowski
Link to more photos by Ellen Davidson
Link to Nate Goldshlag’s video of reading of names
Link to Nate Goldshlag’s video of Mike Hastie getting arrested
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Iraq vet Javier Ocasio
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Kevin Zeese
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Watermelon Slim
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Jenny Pacanowski
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Doo-Occupy “Oh Holy Planet”
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of David Rovics
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Mike Hastie
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Doo-Occupy “The Pretty Ugly”
Link to Sandi Bachom’s video of Chris Hedges
Link to Sandi Bachom’s video of GI resister Sgt. Micah Turner
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Tarak Kauff
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Paul Appell
The vigil was held at Vietnam Veterans Memorial Plaza in lower Manhattan and began with a program of music and speakers including Vietnam veteran Bishop George Packard, Pulitzer Prize-winning war correspondent Chris Hedges, and Iraq combat veteran Jenny Pacanowski. At 8:30, the protesters began reading the names of the New York soldiers killed in Vietnam who are commemorated at the plaza and the military dead in Afghanistan and Iraq.
At 10:15 pm, the police informed the group that the park was officially closed and that if they remained they would be arrested. Many chose to continue reading names and laying flowers until they were handcuffed and taken away. One of the arrestees was Word War II Army combat veteran, Jay Wenk, 85, from Woodstock, NY.
The veterans had four aims:
- Demand an end to the 11-year war in Afghanistan
- Demand an end to all U.S. wars of aggression
- Remember all those killed and wounded by war
- Stand up for our right, and duty, to assemble and organize
Former VFP President Mike Ferner said, “I bet a lot of the arresting officers tonight were also military veterans; a number of them didn’t look too happy with the job they were told to do.”
“War is a public health problem, not only because of those killed directly, but also for the lingering trauma it causes,” said leading health care activist Dr. Margaret Flowers. “Ending war would be a good preventive health care measure.”
Poet Jenny Pacanowski read part of her poem “Parade,” which began “The funeral procession from Syracuse airport to Ithaca NY was over 50 miles long./Dragging his dead body through town after town of people, families and children waving flags./The fallen HERO had finally come home./I wonder how many children who saw this, will someday want to be dead HEROS too./I did not wave a flag that day or any day since my return.” She went on, “I live in a dream called my life. Where the good things don’t seem real or sustainable./I live in the nightmares of the past called Iraq and PTSD that never run out of fuel./Is it better to be dead hero?/Or a living fucked up, addicted, crazy veteran?”
“As long as we keep exposing the truth about these wars, then these people will not have died in vain,” said VFP board member Tarak Kauff.
Link to poem read by Mike Hastie
Link to poem read by Jenny Pacanowski
Link to more photos by Ellen Davidson
Link to Nate Goldshlag’s video of reading of names
Link to Nate Goldshlag’s video of Mike Hastie getting arrested
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Iraq vet Javier Ocasio
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Kevin Zeese
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Watermelon Slim
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Jenny Pacanowski
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Doo-Occupy “Oh Holy Planet”
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of David Rovics
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Mike Hastie
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Doo-Occupy “The Pretty Ugly”
Link to Sandi Bachom’s video of Chris Hedges
Link to Sandi Bachom’s video of GI resister Sgt. Micah Turner
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Tarak Kauff
Link to Crystal Zevon’s video of Paul Appell
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