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OAKLAND SEVEN INDICTED!

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FIVE of the indicted Oakland Seven, leftto right: Mike Smith, Steve Hamilton,Frank Bardacke, Reese Erlich and TerryCannon. Not pictured are Bob Mandeland Jeff Segal.

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NASHVILLE COPSATTACK BLACKS

THE MOVEMENT PRESS4A9 14TH STREETSAN FRANCISCO,CA, 94103

'~irJqaaiferbof'-SNCCln Atlaiiii,,' rG-eorgfar',-January:'~"51968. SNCC indicates that there+'h~sbeerfa'complete newsblackout on the story that follows.

On Wednesday, January 16th, two policemen were shot in Nashville, Tenn., one killed,the other wounded, following an incident which is still not very clear. The Nashvillepress has reported that 5 black men were involved in the shooting incident and that"black power" literature was found in the car. The 5 men were reported to be fromCincinnati, Ohio.

Starting the' next day, the press in that city immediately began to carry headlines andstories blaming SNCC and Stokely Carmichael for the shooting. One headline said:"SNCC Starts Murder Campaign;" on the front of one Nashville daily it was falsely an­nounced that "Stokely Carmichael is in Nashville:' Stories and headlines such as thesehave continued all week. It is known that one such victim to be

The infamous Nashville Police Chief "questioned" was horribly beaten duringSorace has used 'the white press attack his "visit" with the police. Another, ato convince the Nashville community that, former SNCC~Chairmanin Nashville, wasit is necessary for white folks to arm them- taken from the jail to the prison farm,selves against the "murderous" black where his"Afro" hair style was cut, andmilitants, and that the police force must then he was released.get more and better "riot" equipment Using these tactics, Police Chief Soraceto deal with US. has succeeded in frightening the Nashville

Police, armed with "riot" weapons, black community and is adding names tohave flooded the North Nashville black his' 'list" of black folks that he labelscommunity and completely taken control "subversive:'of the area. They have picked up over 70 We remind black folks in this countryblack people, including 30-40 students that it was Sorace who went to Washingtonfrom the Fisk and Tennessee State A.&I. to "testify" with his stories and "reports"campus. They are also picking up anyone on SNCC, Stokely Carmichael, "blackwho " looks" militant, who wears their power advocates," and the liberationhair natural, or anyone they just take a school in Nashville. The government isnotion to pick up. using this "testimony" to build their case

These brothers and sisters have been against SNCC and against all of US. Wetaken to the police headquarters or jails, remind you that certain "law-makers"and "questioned," without benefit of legal from Tennessee have asked that Stokelycounsel, and without being able to com- Carmichael be deported from the Unitedmunicate with anyone. The interrogation States or tried for "treason:'lasts anywhere from a few hours to a We would also remind you that Nash-day, with the cops getting a complete ville is only one example of what the manrun-down on the personal life and polit- is doing to us from New York City toical views of those questioned and their Oakland, California, from North to South,friends. and alI around. ...

How "Conspiracy" WorksAll seven are charged under the law

which makes it a felony to conspire tocommit a misdemeanor: in this case,conspiracy to commit the various mis­demeanors which occurred in Oaklandduring October Stop The Draft Week-­obstructing sidewalks, public nuisance,trespass, and obstructing police officers.The indictments also charge "ten overtacts", alleging that the seven "did con­spire, confederate and agree together",in meetings held between Sept. 27 andOct,17, to commit the follOWing acts:

--Reese Erlich, on Oct. 5, did arrangea meeting at Wesley Foundation, Ban­croft and Dana Streets;

--Jeff Segal, on Oct. 7, distributed andprinted leaflets and maps of Oakland toorganize demonstrations at the OaklandInduction Center on Oct. 16, 17 and theremainder of the week (during which at­temps were made to shut down the center):

--On Oct. 8, Mike Smith met with other

Talk of repression is anything but talk these days.Taking their cue from the Boston indicttnents against Dr. Spock, Reverend Coffin and

:he others of the Boston Five, Alameda County D.A. J. Frank Coakley has securedmdictments from the Grand Jury against seven of the organizers of the October Stop TheDraft Week in Oakland, on charges of "conspiracy:' The Grand Jury, meeting in'Oak­land, issued the indictments on January 24, after an "investigation" of the demonstra­tion which included the subpoenaing of radical Bay Area printers, sympathetic UC facultymembers who refused to testify, and the testimony of UC Dean J an Blais and a UC poli­tical cop.

The Oakland Seven are: Frank Bardacke, a graduate student in political science atUC, Berkeley: Reese Erlich, recently suspended from UC for anti-draft activities oncampus and subsequently elected to the student government: Steve Hamilton and MikeSmith, both former UC students dismissed for campus anti-war activities: Bob Mandel,who withdrew from UC to spend full time on anti-war work: Jeff Segal, national officerand traveller for SDS: and Terry Cannon, formerly of SNCC and an editor of the MOVE­MENT. All but Bardacke were 01' the SIDW Steering Commit~ee,.

The indictments were instigated by J. parties in Lafayette Square, Oakland, andFrank Coakley, Oakland's D.A., a well- demonstrated the use of a wooden stickknown rascist and reactionary, who com- as a club:mented that he had been trying to "get --On Oct. 9, Bob Mandel and Mikethese guys" for a long time. For a look Smith opened a checking account in theat CoakleyS previous criminal record, see name of Stop The Draft Week at thep. 3. Wells Fargo Bank in Berkeley;

--On Oct. 14, Steve Hamilton met withothers in Lafayette Square and walked tothe Induction Center with them:

--On the same day Terry Cannon demon­strated use of wooden clubs to others inLafayette Square:

--On Oct. 15 Frank Bardacke directeda walk of others from 23rd & Grove Sts.,Oakland, to the Induction Center;

---On Oct. 16 Bob Mandel hired and paidbuses .to assemble at Bancroft and Tele­graph Aves., Berkeley to carry personsto Oakland;

--On Oct. 17 Mike Smith directed per­sons at Sproul Plaza on the UC campus tomdve to the induction center.

Still unaware of the exact charges, thefive defendants who were in the Bay Areaon Jan. 25 held a brief press conferenceand surrendered to the DA's office', JeffSegal, who is currently battling the Chicagocourts concerning his draft refusal, andTerry Cannon, who is on a cross-countryspeaking and organizing tour for TheMovement, were unavailable for im-

CONTINUED ON PAGE 3

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FEBRUARY 1968THE Movr~M£NT----------------...;,;,;;;.,;";,;.;,;;;;;,.;.;"".;;;",;,,.,;;,,;.PAGE 2

EDITORIAL APROPOSAL FOR SELF-DEFENSE

CONSPIRACY AT IOWA

WHERE WEIRE ATLast month the Movement celebrated its third birthday. The growth and change in

the paper over those years reflects the growth and change in the radical movementit serves. We began as the monthly newsletter of California Friends of SNCC. Fora long time the paper was edited by one man, who built up contracts, wrote andsolicited articles, and did layout and mailing with the help of a few part time work­ers. Politically, the Movement and the movement were concerned almost exclusive­ly "with civil rights. We wrote par tly for the white liberal who supplied the fundsand partly for the black people and their white allies who worked in the south.

Today the Movement is published by an independent editorial group, based in SanFrancisco anct made up of people who have been involved in struggles in variousparts of the country' during the last several years. Following the black people's dec­laration of independence, the beginning of the Black Power movement, the paperredefined its role. For a time it attempted to act as a buffer between the blackmovement and the white community. Now, as both militancy and patient efforts atorganizing have grown in the white community, the Movement has "gone white."We continue to cover and analyze the movement for black liberatiort, but becausethe fate of white radicals and the fate of America is so c10sely tied to what happensin the black movement, recent issues of the paper have emphasized articles writtenby white people engaged in struggles day to day, on the campuses and in the com­mUnities.

Our role is to link committed organizers and potential organizers, and to bringthem news and analysis which will help them continue their work. We are not pro­fessional journalists, but people in a movement trying to communicate our commonstruggles and problems. .

Around the country the movement is under increasing attack as the establishmentnot only fails to solve but daily increases the basic problems confronting the Ameri­can people. With the present attacks we badly need organs of communication. Weneed to relate our everyday political experiences. We must learn from each others'successes and failures.

If we are to continue to provide the means through which this communication cango on, the Movement needs your support. We need more than just a check. In May oflast year we made a plea for funds. The response was encouraging and allowed us topublish for the last several months. Today once again we are in financial distress.We are in that distress partly because our last plea was answered only with short­run help. We paid our debts, but we failed to get the kind'of long-range support thatonly the movement can give us.

WHAT WE NEED

In the past year, the paper has considerably broadened its coverage. We would liketo expand that coverage and begin to pUblish twice a month. We would like to increasethe circulation of the paper as we increase the number of times we print. But in orderto reach more people more often we need a stronger financial base. Most of our moneycomes from individual subscriptions. But most of our circulation comes from bulksubscriptions. People who take bulk subscriptions sell or give away the paper where~y 'WOrk. W~ need more people to take bulk subscriptions to help .the paper reachtheir friends. We also need..peoplewbo read the paper~ly through a bulk" sub­scription to bUy an individual subscription.

We need people to become friends of the MOVEMENT and contribute money regular­ly, each month. If many respond, each pledge need not be large.

We must cover the increases in printing cost and postage that have just takeneffect. We need money if we are to expand, and we need money to pay one or twostaff members. As of now nobody on the Movement staff is paid, although a few workfull time.

Finally we need the people who are working across the country, trying to move thiscountrY,to write about their experiences.

This month our editor, Joe Blum, has left for a trip around the country to talk topeople about the movement and the paper's role in that movement. Traveling with himis Terry Cannon, the founder of the paper, and Mike James, a community organizer!for JOIN and Chicago Movement staff. Their job is to meet with people and find outwhat they think of the MOVEMENT. They are attempting to build coni [acts and getcommitments to write and to distribute the paper. They want to know why people readIthe paper, what they like, what they think should be stressed, where we have mademistakes, how we can improve. They want to meet with small groups of people and toattend meetings of organizations. We will take seriously what people say to them andattempt to make the MOVEMENT indispensible to those engaged in struggle. It willonly be indispensible if you make it so. That's the kind of support we are asking fornow.

Cop shoving demonstrator during anti-Dow action at University of Iowa.

By Arlene Eisen BergmanThe last three issues of the Movement

have carried front page stories about theincreaSing repression and persecution ofradicals. The conspiracy indictment ofthe Oakland Seven is the latest in astring of attempts to crush radical ac­tivity which all point to the urgent needfor self-defense. The proposal that fol­lows is a modest one which is not meantto substitute for long-term organizingof the JOIN type. This proposal is ad­dressed to students who plan to stay inschool yet continue part-time militantpolitical activity.

Militant students insist that they won'tbe intimidated by the latest crackdown.But we don't want to amass' a list ofmartyrs. It is becoming increasingly ob­vious that even peaceful demonstriitorswill be clubbed and maced. And anyonein leadership position stands a good chanceof facing felony charges. These are seri­ous threats that can only be met bycareful planning and organization - mili­tant declarations, vaseline ~nd motor­cycle helmets are not enough. '

Need AlliesWe need allies. We must translate the

widespread d if f use disenchantment oflarge numbers of non-movement-type peo­ple into active articulat'e support for ourattempts to disrupt and resist th~ warmachine.

In planning and organizing for the nextanti-draft week or any other mass actiona campaign against our ownisolation musthave first priority. This means that themasses of people who will demonstrateshould take part in organizing the cam­

,paign from the very beginning. They don'tjust come to the' last meeting for instruc­tions. They become precinct workers, let'ssay, two months in advance. They go doorto door explaining our position personallyto people.

Press Distorts

We cannot depend on the pre,ss, as wehave in the past, to communicate for us.Of course, they distort our ideas and ac­tions. But even the relatively favorablecoverage that we occasionally get cannotgain us much support. People have beentrained to have a certain set response toanything they read or hear in the massmedia. What comes through to them isremote, uncontrollable; unrelated to any­thing that has personal meaning to them.The reaction is usually "Oh, they're atit again" (pass the ketchup) - whetherthe news is of bombing, police brutality,demonstrating or presidential speech­making.

This is why the most important part ofa campaign to gain support would be door­to - door canvassing. Once inside some­one's home, the purpose would be to ex­plain as openly and sincerely,as possibleour views of the war and why we think thedemonstration in the offing deserves sup­port. There can be no rigid line - alotdepends on initial reactions. But we shouldalways keep in mind that our primarygoal is to explain ourselves, without beingapologetic or compromising. (yVe are notout to get the most votes possible, butto beunderstood). While the campaign would

A grand jury "investigation" followinga December 5 protest against Dow Chem­ical recrUiting on the University of Iowacampus has resulted in a number of seri­ous indictments and arrests. Seven of theanti-war activists, mostly U of Iowa stu­dents, have been arrested on charges ofconspiracy and three mQre were at thesame time charged with resisting arrest.These are in addition to a number of ar­rests on the day of the demonstration.but include the conspiracy arrests thatday of two people who, having been in thepossession of walkie-talkies, were easytargets for the cops. The seven arecharged with having "conspired and con­federated with a wrongful and maliciousintent to do an -injurious act to the po­lice."

The police have not yet been charged

be defined by a specific event, whateverrapport that we established would spill­over into related activities in Chicago,for instance.

Of course, if we are received enthu­siastically, we can escalate our requestsfrom' 'please try to understand" to' 'wouldyou sign a petition of support, come to oneof our meetings, take part in this cam­paigning, demonstrate?" We might askpeople to contribute money, but this is notour central goal. Super-markets, laun­der-mats, restaurants and other publicplaces should be saturated with clear in­formational leaflets. With a little imagina­tion many other techniques to gain supportcould be used. All political campaigns donot have to be electoral campaigns.

Such a campaign would serve a doublepurpose. It would communicate more ef­fectively "what we're at again" and why.This is only the first step toward gainingactive support -It would only mean per­haps that next time Mayor Alioto of San'Franciscp would not have the nerve to callus "neo-fascists" to justify his own bru­tality. But there's a chance (we don't knowcause we haven't tried) that the next timeour numbers will be a greater after a cam­paign like this or that district attorneysand police chiefs would restrain them­selves in anticipation of a loud outcry fromthe community in our support.

Good Practice

The organization of this kind of cam­paign would have another purpose. Cam­paigners would meet regularly to exchangeexperiences and new techniques developedin practice. In trying to communicate ourown position to "outsiders" we can clarifyour own ideas and learn new organizationaltechniques. Each precinct worker becomespart of the demonstrating organizationthe start and has a personal stake in par­ticipating (each new supporter the cam­paigner enlists helps to p~otect the cam­paig-Eer). _o,u.r ownrLn!._~nd file wouldhave a meaningfui part to p1a-y in"ft"aaicaIactivity on a long term-basis. Such, par­ticipation might help to democratize 0t¥"own internal organization.

It is partly our fault that potential sup­porters tell us "I agree with your goals,but not with your means" or, "Sure, thesystem is brutal, but you must be peace­ful." We must give more than lip serviceto overcoming these attitudes. As long aswe remain so isolated, we cannot effec­tively resist repression of ourselves, letalone fight our larger struggle. .....f"''' ~., .,."..

~I MUSLIM PRISONERS ~GET MINISTER

_ ATLANTA (Liberation News Service)_- - Muslim prisoners at the Federal_

I

Penitentiary in Atlanta will finally Ob-Itain their own Muslim minister Glt gov­ernment expense, according to a rulingfiled in Federal District Court January12. The ruling is the successful result

_of a hard fight by black groups for full__rights for black prisoners. _....~ MI'~ ~~..

with conspiracy and confederating to doan injurious act to the demonstrators,despite the careful planning and intentobviously involved in their coming fromthroughout Iowa, armed with clubs andmace, and the subsequent violence per- "petrated upon many of the non-resistingdemonstrators by them.

The beatings, macings and arrests ty­pical police handling of recent anti-wardemonstrations throughout the countryresulted in much more support for thedemonstrators than had been seen on ademonstration there November I, when 108protestors were arrested. This new sup­port is thought to have brought about thenew wave of repression in an attempt tostamp out what must appear, to mostIowans; like the onset of the Revolution.

+-

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STOP THE DRAFT WEEK CONSPIRACY CHARGES Con't from page 1

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Earl's

MOVEMENT CARS GETTENDER LOVING CARE

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VOLKSWAGEN

1830 SAN PABLO AVE.BERKELEY

ing Newsom to prison on an unrelatedrobbery charge. and he constantly proddeCthe Adult Authorities never to releaSENewsom. It later became known that thE.prosecution had suppressed evidence.

So . . . the names of the victims haVE'been changed, but J. Frank Coakley reomains. These are only the highlights of c.

distinguished law enforcement career. Hh:activities during the Free Speech Movemen.and the Vietnam Day Committee actions a':Berkeley are well documented. CoakleY'1past record also indicates a fondness fOlconspiracy charges.

At present his office is handling the Hue)Newton' case. as well as the conspiraqindictments of the Oakland Seven for Stor:the Draft Week. .....

effort to repress political speech and ac­tion in the US.

Bettina Aptheker charged that if thereis a conspiracy, it is by the US govern-

. ment, and not by youthful draft pro­testers." Referring to the conspiracycharges, she said "They didn't conspireto break laws, but to stop the war. Ifthat is illegal, damn it to hell. If thereis a conspiracy," she went on, it is aconspiracy to crush the anti-war move­ment, and it is taking place in Oakland,in Washington, in the CIA and in the Pen-tagon." .

Militant anti-war activists through­out the Bay Area are responding to thesenew attempts at intimidation and sup­'press1M-by~slng~ceorman-­anti-war activities and by organizing anintensive political defense campaign forthe Oakland Seven. Funds for the defenseare needed, and contributions should besent to:

Stop The Draft Week Defense Fund233 Lake DriveBerkeley, California 94708 •

No picture of the recent conspiracy in­dictments in Oakland would be completewithout some mention of the past recordof Oakland's D.A., J. Frank Coakley.

Coakley made his prosecution debut in1944. At the time he was a legal officerin the Navy. A munitions ship blew up inPort Chicago and over 300 people werekilled. Most of the dead were black men,brought from the South to work. There wasa work stoppage after the. explosion, overunsafe working conditions. Fifty black menwere prosecuted by the ·Navy for mutiny,and J. Frank handled the case.

Coakley attempted to prove an organiZ­ed conspiracy. The men received up to 15years in prison. Said J. Frank, "Any manso depraved as to be afraid to load ammu­nition deserves no leniency." ThurgoodMarshall was an observer at the trial andwrote a report describing it as an instanceof- the Navy's discrimination.

As i?istrict Attorney of Oakland, Coak~eycontinued true to form. Perhaps his mostnotable past case was the trial of an 18year old plack man, JerryNewsom, for"murder. Newsom, who worked as a shoe­shiner, was accused of killing a white Oak­land pharmacist and his black assistant.

ln the Newsom case, Coakley and hiscohorts failed to get a conviction, evenafter three trbls. Two ended with hungjuries, and one conviction was reversedby the California Supreme Court.

Coakley did s!Jcceed, however, in send-

THE CRIMINAL RECORDOF

J. FRANK COAKLEY

ousness of the coming struggle, theppssible need to be more secretive. "Thisisn't a game" he emphasized. "Thissystem will strike back when attackedwhere it is vulnerable."

The follOWing day an even larger rallyheard several speakers call for continued

.protest and resistance as a means ofshoWing support for Huey Newton and forthe Oakland Seven.

Karen Koonan, an active member of theSTDW s tee l' in g committee, smilinglycharged the DA and Grand Jury with malechauvinism, and challenged them to arresther also. She emphasized the need to re­late to the rest of society to build strengthfor the movement.

Bobby Seale of the Black Pantherscalled DA Coakley a "racist dog," but healso called for militant blacks and anti­war whites to join forces, commenting:'·'I'm not going to argue black and white;I stopped being a racist a long time ago."He tied the tripling ot' police forces andthe increase of troops in Vietnam to the

THE MO \T~~~J1:~ 'I I'

Protest, anger, determination to resistthe dual tactics of intimidation and re­pression, and a strong defense committee,have marked the reaction to the indict­ments. Top Bay area lawyers have begunworking on the defense. (Attorney Garry,defending Huey Newton, is first of allattacking the legitimacy oftheGrandJury,charging it is biased and, for black' andpoor people, certainly not a "jury oftheirpeers".) The UC campus responded withtwo days of rallies, at which bail anddefense money was raised.

At the rally Thursday, when the indict­ments were announced, philosophy pro­fessor Richard Lichtman spoke of the im­portance of continuing to do battle againstthe system, "a system", he commented,"we have to bring down." He spoke of theforce and violence used by the systemagainst those who break its rules & whomit terms criminal. But questioning theconcept of criminality, Lichtman noted,"This system does not think it criminalto burn villages With napalm, but does thinkit criminal to stand in certain place~ andprotest that act." He warned of the seri-

they were harassing the defendants." Thefive were finally released sometime after4 P.M.

Defense Committee

CLEVELAND DRAFTUNION RAIDED

CLEVELAND -The office of the Cleve­land Draft Resistance Union was brokeninto over the weekend of January 21. Cashand checks totaling about $100 were taken,along with a set of files including legalinformation, clippings, correspondence andinquiries on individual draft cases. Thepersonal contact file was not in the officeat the time.

Also taken were some papers on thedesk which included the names and phonenumbers of a few of the people involvedin direct action in Cleveland.

The raid was apparently a direct at­tempt to cripple the Draft Union's workand perhaps also to get information forfuture prosecution. It was a professional- possibly an inside - job. Five lockswere opened in the process of getting intothe office building and the suite of offi­ces.• It was the second time since this sum- ­mer that Draft Union offices had beenraided. Blacks against the Draft, a CDRUlocal, was broken into in September andits office-apartment left a shambles.

The Draft Resistance Union believe thatthis raid will be followed by trumped­up indictments or McCarthy-like investi­gation.

The offices of the Local Peace Mobili­zation and the Student Mobilization werealso broken into. ...

Buddy SteinKaren Wald

Lincoln BergmanJeff Segal

Gayle MarkowJerry Densch

THE MOVEMENT is publishedmonthly by The Movement Press,449 14th Street, San Francisco,California 94103, 626-4577.EDITORIAL GROUPJoe BlumTerence CannonBapbi CieciorkaKaren Jo KoonanBrooks Penney;JUlie Miller

Arlene E. BergmanLOS ANGELESBob Neimann1657 Federal Ave.·#5Los Angeles, Calif. 90025478-9509CHICAGO EQITORIAL GROUPEarl Durham Sue MunakerTony Henry Linda MurryJoe Horton Ann O'BrianNoel Ignatin Paul RupertMike J ames Mike SharonObed Lopez Patrix SturgisStaughton Lynd Ron Watkins

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4533 N. Sheridan Rd.Chicgo, 111. ,60640334-8040SUBSCRIPTIONS$2 per year, individual copies; $7 perhundred per month, bulk sub­scriptions.

FEBRUARY 1968

mediate surrender. but indicated throughtheir lawyers they would do so in thenear future.

Make It Bigger & Better

KJK MEMORIAL ISSUE

Speaking for the entire Seven, Bardackesaid they viewed the charges as one morestep in the attempted repression of anti­war forces. Their only "crime", he de­clared, was to advocate militant actionagainst the war. Our only response, hestated, should be that we continue to doour anti-war work, and step it up andmake the nex~_STOW bigger and better."

Bail, originally set at $6250 apiece,was lowered Fr~day morning to $1250,

~ anda-;waiting bail bondsman expec-ted tohave the defendants out of jail in timefor them to join a 2 o'clock rally sup­porting Huey Newton, Black Panther Min­ister of Defense indicted by the sameGrand Jury on charges of murdering apoliceman. But in typical, brazen harrass­ing tactics, the Sheriff's office had the fivetransferred from the holding jail in theOakland Courthouse to the jail compoundat Santa Rita, some distance outside ofOakland. There, despite the availabilityof the bondsman, they were re-booked,strip-searched, sprayed with insecticide,and put in the compound. The guardsduring this time, according to attorneyAlex Hoffman, "giggled and made it clear

PAGE 4 fHE MJVi:<::v1ENT FEBRUARf 1968

THE DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION

A CHALLENGE TO ORGANIZERSRennie Davis, one of the founders of SDS, was in the Bay

Area last month. The Movement took that opportunity totalk to him about the new mood in the country and thedirection of the movement in the coming year. Davis wasonce the director of ERAP and an organizer for JOIN untillate in 1966. Since then he has been the director for theCenter for Radical Research. He recently returned froma trip to North Vietnam.

be allowed to come to Chicago, so longas they give their support to a policyof ending racism and the war. I favorletting the delegates meet in the Inter­national Amphitheater and making ourdemands and the actions behind thosedemands escalate in militancy as the Con­vention proceeds and as the TV's drumint,o everyone's home that we're movingtow'lrds a Johnson-Nixon "choice". Iwould like to see us be able to carry ourincredible, imaginative actions evenagainst Chicago's blanket injunction thatwill prohibit all demonstrations. Evenagainst the two l;S Army regiments thatwill be "protectin~" the convention, Iwould like to see the delegates confrontedby masses of people each day, organizedperhaps by that constitu,ency which leadsa particular struggle--one day for edu­cation, one for we lfarp. , one for women.one for black people, and so on.

- CONTINUED ON PAGE 11

Sophisticated MovementThere should be elbow room in Chicago

for a national youth festival, a women'sarmy marching on the US troops, severalthousand people who call "their" dele­gate promptly at 7:00 am and midnight toask to meet him to discuss the issues ofwar and race, doctors who march on thetroops demanding to speak to the dele­gates about the children of Vietnam; etc.,etc. I would like, in other words, for usto create a more sophisticated movementmachinery for this late August meetingthan we have previously had and whichwe need as we enter this new period.I would hope that this machinery wouldbe .used by the widest possible politicalforces opposed to the war, that it wouldbe used to appeal broadly to the Ameri­can people, not just to ourselves, butthat it be used in the end to release thereal power of our many forces in a new

keep his lead and sail through the Re­publican Convention. McCarthy's can­didacy has little chance of catching fire.And Kennedy seemingly has no primarystrategy at all. We shall see. lf the Re­publicans give Americans no "choice"on the issue of the war, and the Demo­crats, whose convention follows the Re­publican's, go to Chicago with Johnsonfully in control, millions of people aregoing to feel doors closing on their highschool conception of American democracy,millions are going to be asking, whatnow? The question of what the movementsays to such people at this time shouldguide our planning for the confrontation,in my view.

I think we can do better than attemptingto prevent the convention from takingplace, as some have suggested by closingdown the city on the first day of pre­convention activity. The delegates should

THE MOVEMENT: What do you see hap­pening at the Demo­cratic Convention?

DA VIS: Forthis particular action, I believewe will be guided in part by Establish­ment events and political factors not yetknown. There is every indication today thatNixon, the Republican frontrunner, will

the militancy and the new tactics makethe acts tremendously important to Viet­nam and other people's movements aroundthe world, useful in changing the image ofblacks toward white students, importantfor the education and consciousness oftheparticipants, and appealing to certain--notall--segments of the American population.This last by-product--who we appeal to andwhom we alienate--is important and, asI suggested before, should give directionto our strategy. It should guide our think­ing, for example, at the Democratic Con­vention this August.

Democratic Convention

of such a program is already begin­ning to form, I think. There will beseveral evaluatative conferences and plan­ning meetings in the anti-war move­ment at the beginning of the year. Thesegatherings might begin by comptcmiseona specific period of days for the "inter­national days of resistence, 10 days toshake the Empire", etc. The spring re­sistence will be followed by several callsfor local organizing drives in the earlySummer. The summer organizing activity,for many people, will be capped by theChicago Democratic Convention demon­stration--the most massive confrontationof the war-makers yet. The fall will seea new wave of local organizing--in anti­johnson, anti-Nixon campaigns, aroundlocal war crimes tribunals, in workingclass black and white communities, on thecampus for the resistence etc. If the twoeandidates' get through the campaign andthe election is actually held, I feel cer­tain that the movement will greet the newPresident in Washington with a specialinaugural message of our own.

As I say, these five or six eventsor programs represent only a shadowYoutline of what can be seen coming. WhatI consider to be our task is the sharpen­ing of such an outline, making it asspecific as possible, making it absolutelyclear how one participates, and findingnew means of communicating its contentto the young people of this country. Itrequires that we define ways that the or­ganizers of mass confrontations can assistin the recruitment of people who will joinlocal organizing projects. It demands thatwe develop a political relationship amongpeople active at the two levels of work, soas to make possible a new interpretationto Americans of the road we are follow­ing in the next period, a strategy specificenough that "uninvolved radicals" mightsee ways to get on that road and stay onthat road.Organizing More Relevant

Now between the two emphases of themovement, I have always seen localorganizing as the more relevant. The mostdifficult work, though in my view the mostimportant, is the organization of specificconstituencies that can offer a communityradical political education, power to com­bat effectively certain self-interest is­sues, a forum for people sl::eking newdefinitions for their lives and their work,and a method for relating the specificconstituency to other parts of the move­ment. I have tended to regard nationaldemonstrations as relatively insignificantin comparison to the task of creatingpermanent local organization. I see usmoving from strong local projects toregional structures to some kind of func­tional equivalent to a radical nationalparty. That scenario is a whole interviewin itself.

Those of us who have held this viewand made this emphasis in our work,however, should recognize that demon­strations, especially in the past four tofive months, have exhibited in severalinstances a new power for radicaliZingthose involved and terrorizing thoseagainst whom the power is directed. Both

Until the InaugurationThe dozen months from now until the

Presidential inauguration is one suchperiod tbat could be filled in with anational program. The shape or outline

THE MOVEMENT: What do you think the major concerns of the movement'are? Wheredo you see the movement going? There seems to be a "new mood" inthe white movement. How do you see that?

DAVIS: A "new mood" in the country and the movement is evident, extending inmy opinion, significantly beyond Oakland, Madison and \White hall, beyond the mobile,half-organized, half-spontaneous white demonstrators who in the last four months havemade it plain to anyone who reads a paper that some at least are getting damn serious.Behind the people who may be comprising a kind of front line, a more general moodexists, fed by the deep public insecurity about the war and the cities. It's mostly young,mostly immature politically, mostly rep-resenting, in my view, a mass surfacingof radical instincts. I've met recentlysome of its representatives--in Iowa:Champaign, Illinois: Williamsburg, Vir­ginia--and have several impressions.johnson, not us, is the organizer and toa considerable extent the political edu­cator of these people. And the relation­ship of the organized movement to thehuman beings who shape the' 'new mood"is both tenuous and limited. We plug inwith them at national peace rumbles likethe October mobilization, then we unplug.

Now you ask about the major concernsand direction of the movement. My con­cern is how does the conscious, organ­ized part of our movement, the peoplewho for the past four years have becomecomfortable in a language alien to mostAmericans, the people who have con­

,solidated radical organizations, developed" ~tbelr ",Unes", and engaged themselves

seriously .in debate about' ttrei'~ta'tfve

radicalness of organizing around the draftversus organizing around welfare or con­fronting centers of imperialism versuscenters of induction, how do theseradicals now open themselves to thepotential of the' 'new mood".

I believe this question should help guideour direction as a movement.THE MOVEMENT: Could you be more

s p e c if i c about thedirection you see?

DAVIS: Among radicals, there have beentwo major emphases of activity--that whichsupports and works for massive demon­strations and confrontations of the Es­tablishment: and that which supports andworks for the creation of permanent,radical organization, organization built ona day-to-day basis, generally around peo­ple's self interest issues, generally fromthe bottom-up. The argument about whichemphasis one should make is of greatimportance and must and will be con­sidered again and again. But this polarityof tendencies has tended to limit closecooperation between organizations andpeople acting out the two emphasis andthereby limit the possibility of a coopera­tive strategy, which I believe we musthave if the movement is to provide direc­tion to those hundreds of thousands whoare getting their liberal philosophiesrubbed raw by johnson's open applica­tion of that philosophy's darker principals.

I believe it would be helpfUl to definespecific national objectives and a nationalstrategy of work for the movement forgiven periods of time--a perspective thatrepresents the compOSite programs of thesignificant left organizat~'Jns and includesnational calls for both local organizingand national confrontations, a nationalprogram that could be more widely com­municated than any single communica­tions network could now manage. It wouldrequire a new Willingness to push eachother's thing and a new openness amongpeople with different emphases of work.

FEBRU,.\RY 1968 T'-IE ,~OV~~MENT PAGE 5

RUSK AT THE FAI RMONT

PEACEFUL DEMONSTRATIONS NOT ALLOWED

8: 'and Victor's brother Esequiel, fatherof 10, new hardships have appeared asthe families, out of money and withoutsupport, have run out of food supplies. Afood raising drive has begun in Albuquer­que by the Alianza and some gringo allies.The Alianza's General Office -1010 3rdSt. NW, Albuquerque, NM 871 01 - has putout a call for assistance in raising moneyfor the bond, for food, for other defenseexpenses. Appeals from other Alianzaleaders for telegrams, petitions, letters,actions and demonstrations of support andsolidarity have been made to people aroundthe country. Protests have been receivedfrom MAPA in California, from H. RapBrown in SNCC's name and others. Much,much more is needed -for a real crisisis looming and in many ways this is becom­ing the Selma of La Raza's struggle forfreedom in the Southwest. Protests to theGovernor, the courts, etc. are sought.

On January 19 District Judge Joe AngeI,who signed the bond revocation order lastJanuary 3, refused a defense ,motion topostpone the preliminary hearings for thetrial set for January 29 ij Rio ArribaCounty because of the unfavorable climate.And so justice goes merrily on itf' wayto the gas chambers in the Colonial South­west as new repressiun dnd a thinly veiledpolice state sets in behind the facade oflaw and order.

At least 62 people were arrested and .beaten in the Fairmont demonstration.The Fairmont Defense needs money andwitnesses. lf you were present, you maybe able to provide some vital informa­tion or testimony. Witnesses and con­tributors should call Attorney Joe Ryanat WE 1-7363 or the Peace and Free­dom Party, 55 Colton St. San Francisco(431-0383).

-- ---------

'Rap Brown, LeRoi Jones ­$1.50 each.

23rd demonstration.The Fairmont demonstration r a i s e s

some important questions that must be

MJrMJr MJr~ ~~

vent $emi_8PODtaneQ'Is C!PWQDstration§..that might occur under such conditions?At this stage, the fight is far too serious,repression too evident, for us to be let­ting people "take to the streets" un­prepared, simply because a handy targetappears.

Demonstrations are an important partof the movement. and can serve as catylyst.educator, and, if done correctly, one ele­ment of power. But if demonstrations are

. to serve as advance, rather than self­destruction, care must be taken. Thechoice left to us is to cease demonstra­ting, or to make damned sure we areready. Each protest, each target, each actof resistance from now on must be care­fully weighed and worked out. -analyzedand prepared for in advance. •

discussed. lf it is true that no adequatepreparation could be made, is it not per­haps our responsibility to limit or pre-

CONTINUESby appealed promp.tly to the US SupremeCourt.

On the evening of January 18, as thesixteen defendants were prepared to postbond that has been raised, they learnedthat an additional charge and bond hadbeen fixed. District Judge James Scabor­ough announced that Santa Fe D.A. Alfon­so "Uttle Joe McCarthy" Sanchez hadcharged all defendants with" assault withintent to kill" as a result of the shootingof State Cop Nick Sais last June 5th dur­ing the Tierra Amarilla uprising. Scar­borough ordered the defendants to remainin jail until they could post an additional$10,000 cash bond or $20,000 propertybond. This for an ill retired man; Reies'·teenage son and daughter: men whosefamilies have run out of money and food.Since the defendants heard the new chargesthey have begun a hunger strike in the StatePen at Cerrillos, New Mexico.

The wives and families ofthe defendantsappeared at the Governor's office January20 to protest. The Governor claimed thathe had "nothing to do with their arrestsor being in prison." The governor forgotthat it was he who hysterically screamedon "J anuary '3rd that the bonds should berevoked and all the freedom fighterspicked up.

In the case of several defendants: To­bias Leyba: Victor Dominguez, father of

HARRASSMENT

Need EducationSuch organization could be constantly

educating and radicalizing new people,pulling them into the movement. And itmight also serve to re-educate the oldactivists and deepen their understandingof what they're doing. Those groups whichnow exist - both permanent and ad hoc ­have been failing in this task.

Minimally, perhaps, we could train apermanent self-defense squad who would'function as monitors at all demonstrations.as has been done in LA since the June

going organization which would keep usinformed and prepared, helping to elimi­nate the chaotic character of last minuteaction.

..... -

Posters by Ervin Cobbsavailable from The Movement

in this direction. We must begin to developthe tactics and training to enable us toseparate cops as they separate us, to sur­round and stop those who attack us.

Lack of organization and strategy wasaccompanied by lack of political directionand education. In New York, the SOScontingent had a well-developed anti­imperialist which came across in at leastmovement and left-press reporting ofthe event. Cle~rly, SOS was not able tocommunicate this perspective to the massof the demonstrators at the Hilton, butthe idea did come across in leaflets andnewspapers.

It can be argued, that given the shortnessof time, no adequate preparation couldhavebeen made for this demonstration. Weclearly need a political-practical and on-

Need OrganizationBut far more important than bodily prep­

aration, there was no organization. Forexample, there were no monitors. At atime when the term "monitor" no longermeans the person who tells you to walkin single file, but the person responsiblefor co-ordinating your movements to pro­vide maximum safety and effectiveness,monitors are indispensable.

In Oakland SlDW there were some signsof the movement being able to protect andrescue people from the cops. In SF peoplewatched helplessly as the cops - who arewell-trained and almost always operate asa unit - scattered and isolated, beat andarrested. There were a few occasions ofindividual heroism in protecting others,and cases of bricks and bottles being usedto prevent or limit beatings. But the move­ment as a whole showed no co-ordination

TIJERINA

The attempts by the State of New Mexicoto turn back the Mexican liberation move­ment by legally tangling up the AlianzaFederal de los Pueblos Ubres and remov­ing Reies Lopez Tijerina from action hastaken some new turns since the last reportin THE MOVEMENT Uanuary).

On January 16 the State Supreme Courtin Santa Fe handed down its "speedydecision" on the revocation of bond forthe twenty June 5 defendants who were re­arrested in an attempt to frame ther(l for'the January 2 murder of Rio ArribaCounty cop and jailer Eulogio Salazar.The Supreme Court ruled that 16 of the20 defendants could be released if theyposted another bond - $2,500 from anauthorized surety company or $5,000 ifPlirsonal surities are secured. The courtmagnanimously ruled that District Attor­ney Joe Angel had no right to grant baillast summer to Reies Lopez Tijerina: toJuan Valdez; to Tobias Leyba, fath~r andsole support for not only his 16 childrenbut also his 90 year old grandmother;or to Baltazar Apodaca, in his 70's andin poor health. These four will be heldwithout bond until the trial. Albuquerque'lawyer Lawrence Tappia, a defense attor­ney, announced that this decision will

JAMES A. KENNEDY from Albuquerque,New Mexico

In both cases, there was a high-levelemotional response to Rusk - an easilyindentifiable e n e m y'. This responsebrought out more numbers than just "hard­core" demonstrators. In both cases Ruskwas speaking at an exclusive hotel, sym­bolic of the corporate elite which feedson the imperialism of which the war inVietnam is a part. In both cases bloodwas used as a symbol, and real bloodwas the response of the cops. In NewYork; people had longer to prepare andwere somewhat better organized. But inboth, real direction and leadership inutilizing safe and effective tactics wasmissing. ._

True, in San Francisco there was anextremely short time in which to prepare.But those of us who have been active ....;.especially in Oakland SlDW - cannotafford to hide behind this excuse. In theday or day-and-a-half in which we knew­of Rusk's appearance, no attempt was madeto get together and discuss the demonstra­tion fully. TIle reasons for and implica­tions of a demonstration: the rationale be­hind it: the best strategy and tactics:communication with the crowd and thepublic through news media: self-defense,and the other important questions werenever hashed out.

Someone put out a leaflet, encouragingpeople to come and be prepared, and therest. of us decided on no more than toattend the demonstration. Most went ill­prepared personally, even those who knewbetter. A few more helmets. None carriedshields or wore protective clothing. Nonewore or carried vaseline or wet clothsas protection against mace.

By Karen Wald

Compare New YorkThe unpreparedness and naivete with

which even experienced demonstratorswent into this demonstration requiresanalysis. It may be important to note theparallels -and the differences between the,Rusk demonstration at the Hilton Hotel inany and the one at the Fairmont in SanFrancisco.

~., .,., .,~

The bursting of a blood-filled balloonwas the signal and the excuse for SanFrancisco police to brutally break up apeaceful anti-war picket on January 11.The picket was held at the FairmontHotel, where Dean Rusk addressed ameeting of the Commonwealth Club, aconservative businessman's organization.

After allOWing the picketing to continuefor some time, the police moved in,helmeted for riot-duty. The police linemoved - slowly at first - then breakinginto a run, beating and arresting anyonewho fell or ran too slowly. The policeknocked down and arrested people asmany as 4-6 blocks from the Fairmont.People were kicked, clubbed, and maced.

The church (Grace Cathedral) offeredno sanctuary. Demonstrators who soughtrefuge there were at first afforded pro­tection by a priest backed'up by TV cam­eras. But later, when the cameras weregone, the police ignored the priest andentered the Cathedral, arresting thoseseeking shelter.

The initial response of the demonstra­tors to the brutal police assault wasshock, amazement, fear, then anger. Once

'the shock was overcome, people beganto scream. Finally, finding stones, sticks,and bottles in the- street, people began tothrow things. These actions, comingAFTER the police attacks which provokedthem, were later cited as the cause of thepolice assault. Actually, the only actionthat preceded the attack was the sym­bolic bursting of the blood-filled bal­loons.

-were arrested. But others, new people,people who happened by to join a peacefUlpicket for a while were also arrested.And some people were just waiting for abus, or walking outside their home.

San Francisco's Mayor, Alioto, a "lib­eral" Democrat elected last Novemberwith, strong labor support, called thedemonstrators "neo - fascist student"types and praised the police for theirefficiency. He cited the blood on the Fair­mont door as the triggering incidentfor the attack. Alioto w,\s quoted in theJanuary 13 Oakland Tribune as saying,"Any charges of police brutality in thelight of this situation is totally false •..if charges of police brutality are broughtup by. any of those arrested ... they wouldnot have enough evidence to support suchallegations."

It was the Mayor who, several hoursbefore the demonstration, gave instruc­tions to the police to clear away the dem­strators no matter how peaceful theywere.

Choice ofVictimsThe selection of victims was a combi­

nation'of political pin-pointing of activistsand arbitrary chan'Ce. 'Berkeley activists­pointed out by the Berkeley "red squad"

A very straight corporation lawyer,was arrested 4 blocks away" beaten,maced and thrown into the. paddy wagon.There, his continued screams about his"rights" and that he "didn't DO any­

'thing ," prompted the response from an-other arrested demonstrator, "Of courseyou did something." "No, I didn't doANYTHING'" "You were arrested,weren't you?" "Yes, but ..." "Thenyou must have d(llIe something." "No, Ididn't do ANYTHINGI" insisted the law­yer. still not understanding. "You stu­pid motherfucker" disgustedly spat outthe demo,lstrator, •'NONE of us did any­thingl"

--------~~ ~.,

PAGE 8 THE MOVEMENT FEBRUARY 1968 FEB-By Noel Ignatin

Many white radiC"lls have begun to talk about the need to organize working classwhites. As one active movement figure put it, "We now see that the people we used torefer to as 'working class fascists' are the very ones we have to reach."

As we all know a large share of the credit for this new attention on the part of whiteradicals belongs to SNCC. Of course, even before SNCC took its stand on black power,there were some people, such as SCEF and JOIN, who felt that the main task for white

radicals was organizing other whites. But SNCC, by telling its white supporters that theirrole should be organizing whites for the black people to form coalitions with, pushedthousands of people into a new awareness.

In my opinion, this new awareness is healthy.However, along with this new and correct realization has come the baggage of old,

unchallenged and incorrect concepts which, if allowed to prevail, will certainly undo anypositive work in this field.

RUSK

By Kar

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climax in the railroad strike of 1877, can'be traced to the failure of Americanlabor, as a whole, to join with black laborin the South to preserve the democraticadvances of the Reconstruction Era. In hisgreat work, " Black Reconstruction", DuBois put forward ideas which should makeus all think long and hard. On page 353 hewrote, "The South, after the war, pre­sented the greatest opportunity for a realnational labor movement which the nationever saw or is likely to see for manydecades. Yet the labor movement, withbut few exceptions, never realized thesituation. It never had the intelligenceor knowledge, as a whole, to see in blackslavery and Reconstruction the kerneland meaning of the labor movement in theUnited States."

The defeat of Populism was due to itstendency to compromise with, and ulti­mately capitulate to white supremacistpressure to "abandon the Negro" ~ee

Woodward biography of Tom Watson onthis subject.)

The halting of the labor movement'sadvances at the end of the 1930's, and itsreversal and defeat in the years afterWorld War II, was due to the same failureto challenge white supremacy. lf anyonedoubts this, let him consider why the CIa,after having organized U.S. Steel, GM andGE by 1940, paused on the brink of theSouth and turned back, permitting itselfto be co-opted by the Roosevelt Ad­ministration.

In the three great eras of struggle 1have cited, probably the three gre..ltestin post-Civil War history, in the finalanalysis the matter came down to this:the power structure was able to solve itsproblems with the white workers' 'withinthe family", by offering them privileges.By accepting these privileges, the whiteworkers turned their back not merely on

CONTINUED ON PAGE 10

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the white-skin privilege, white workershave generally preferred to unite with theboss to maintain their privileges ratherthan unite with the black people to destroyall privilege.

And this is the rub for our movement.History shows that, whenever masses ofwhite poor have been radicalized andbrought into struggle, the power structurehas been able to hold out the crumb ofthe white-skin privilege, br~aking anydeveloping coalition and struggle.

-'

'-~--~.-.........,~,

.....,

"

~'!-:!~ II';;'---

Why Others FailedThe defeat of the great struggles of

the labor movement, which began after thedepression of 1873 and reached their

and determined result of the operatiO{l'of certain blind laws, as something in­stitutionalized, beyond the control, rightnow, of any sector of the people involvedin its workings.

Those who argue thus should considerthe follOWing question: if the bosses arealways screaming about high labor costs,why don't they simply hire the cheapestlabor there is, namely black and brownlabor 7 The reason is that, for the bosses,the few cents an hour they would savein wages would be far outweighed by thegrowth in working class solidarity thatwould follow if all workers were on ex­actly the same footing. (For informationon how the color line was erected in asingle industry, in this case the cottonmill industry in the South, for the pur­pose of buying off the poor whites, seeW. j. Cash's classic "The Mind of theSouth" or Broadus Mitchell's "The Riseof Cotton Mills in the South" .)

Certainly, national oppression goeshand-in-hand with imperialism, but thatis not to say that it is an institution, orthat it should in any sense be consideredtoo deeply entrenched to be challenged.White supremacy exists simply becausesufficient numbers of white people, in­cluding white workers, have not beenrallied to fight it - black people havenever stopped fighting it. And the reasonwhy white workers have not fought whitesupremacy, have in fact acquiesced inand cooperated with it, is that they enjoytheir privileged status.

No Self-Interest CoalitionsNow, my point of disagreement with

the approach I summarized earlier isthis: I don't believe it is possible to build·

. coalitions of black and white on the basisof the self-interest of each, if the self­interest of the whites means the main­

. tainance of white supremacy and the white­skin privilege.

1 would state, from my own experience,as a worker and my travels amongworkers, that there are very few w1)iteworkers who would object to having theNegroes "brought up to our level." Mostwhite workers would be pleased if all theblack people had a decent job and a placeto live, as good as the whites' anyhow.

But if there are not enough jobs to goaround, then the great majority of whiteworkers are quite willing to invoke theirprivilege and say "me first", thus makingthem active partners in the exclusionand oppression of the black people.

Under the system of private profit, allworkers compete in the sale of theirlabor power; yet their general tendencyis to unite. However, because the com­petition between black and white workersis no~ an equal one, but is weighted by

...-

{

LEARN THE LESSONS OF U.S. HISTORY

Thus, while the ordinary white workersare severely exploited, they are alsoprivileged. White supremacy is a dealbetween the exploiters and a part of theexploited, . at the expense of the rest ofthe exploited - in fact, the original sweet­heart agreement I

Some may argue that it can't be calleda deal, since most of those participatingon either side are not conscious of wherethey fit in, that it is more accurate toconsider white supremacy as the simple

Exploited But Privileged

Among many radicals who have begunto tackle seriously the task of orgimiz­ing working class whites there is an ap-

. proach which shows that we - the move­ment as a whole - have failed to learnthe lessons of U.S. history, and specif­ically the lessons of past experiences inlarge movements of downtrodden whites.

The approach I am criticizing I wouldsummarize as follows: find the issueswhich immediately affect the people weare trying to reach, and which they feelmost keenly. Organize around these is­sues and, as the people are drawn more

'into struggle in their own interest, theywill come to see, with our help, who aretheir friends and enemies. Specifically,coalitions between poor white and blackwill develop from each fighting for hisown Ifself-interest" and coming to seethat there is a common enemy, the richwhite man.

I think there is no need to cite docu­ments for the above, as everyone in­volved will recognize it as a fair sum­mary of a very popular approach.

I don't think it can succeed.What is the greatest barrier to the

development of working class conscious­ness and soli'aarity in the U.S.7 Whitesupremacist thinking, both now and inthe past.

White supremacist thinking, while it ispart of a mind-set, is not a pure ques­tion of ideology. It has real roots in thepractice of white supremacy. the gen­eral oppression of blacks by whites.

The Al Capones who run this C()untryhave made a deal with the labor officials

•.,...,..---- an<i:-through them, with the totality ofwhite working people. The terms of thedeal, which was a long time in the work­ing out, are simply these: you whiteworkers support us in our enslavementof the non-white majority of the earth'spopulation, and we will reward you witha monopoly of skilled jobs, education andhealth facilities superior to those ofthe non-whites, the opportunity to oc­casionally promote one of your numberout of the laboring class, social privilegesand a whole series of privileges befit­ting your white skin.

By john Bancroft

THE DANGERS OF MACE

PAGE q

of the eyes and cataracts. However, Wyethdid not report these effects to the FederalDrug Administration until November 1965,at which time all testing of the chemicalwas suspended.

In an October, 1966, meeting in NewYork; the N.Y. Academy of Sciencesassailed the FDAforwithdrawingthec~m­

pound altogether and issued a formal re­quest for reinstatement as a contro~led

investigational drug. On December 12,1966, . .the FDA acqUiesced on conditionthat its approval was obtained before anyplans were undertaken. There was goodreason: Use of DMSO will be restricted tocutaneous application in serious condi­tions •.• for which no satisfactory therapy ­is now available .•• Patients must be ful­ly informed of the effects of DMSO inanimals and told of the possibility thatthese may occur in humans •.• Damageto major organs .•. has occurred in lab­0ratory animals when massive doses ofthe drug were administered and, in somecases, when doses close to clinical levelswere used. Damage to embryos also wasobserved .•. Adverse reactions attributedto DMSO have ranged from headaches anddizziness -to dermatitis and ulceration ofthe skin.

(FEDERAL REGISTER, 12/23/66)

one around who has in mind a strategy forbeginning radical activity in this area.'

Uncertain Future

Pittsburgh's future is _quite uncertain.One of the largest things in the offing isthe McCarthy campaign, which has real­ly turned on the liberals and adult peacegroups in town. These groups were horri­fied by the NCNP circus in Chicago, havebeen talking about little else since, andplan to be very careful about who theyassociate with in the future. They willprobably be able to enlist the more con­servative members cf the _student peacegroup in their activities. The more radicalstudents will be uninterested in the Mc­Carthy thing, and will probably have mostof their time taken up with resistanceceremonies and activities, which havea way of being self-perpetuating: moredraft cards turned in at church, inductionrefused, support rallies, legal defensecommittees, fund-raising, etc.

The only thing that could save Pitts­burgh from being confined to McCarthy-­type activities and narrow student resis­tance activities would be an orgall-izingeffort outside these confines which caughton in a big way. Thus, if full-time 01'­

,ganizing with high school students orwith labor, for example, produced some­thing tangible in the way of anti-war.or other radical activity, it would probab­ly be possible to convince more studentsand maybe even some adults to devotemost or all of their time to such work.Bat until such organizing is more success­ful and shown to be vital, it is likely thatPittsburgh radical activity will be'meagreand confined mainly to anti-war actionsdirected toward people already opposed tothe war••

"Stee l Tforker" 1 '/iood Cut

Recently, an organic chemist who had ac­cess to the ,General Ordinance EquipmentCompany . (the Pittsburgh manufacturerof Mace) specification sheet informedthis writer that Mace contained dimethyl­sulfoxide - DMSO - an industrial solventwhich is a byproduct of the pulp andpaper industry. A few years ,ago, medicalresearchers discovered that DMSO dis­plays the remarkable, ability to instantlypenetrate skin tissue, providing immed­iate absorption and circulation for anydrug it carries.

Since 1964, DMSO has had a comp~~x

and controversial history. Its remark­able ability to "permanize" other drugshas led medical researchers in malariacontrol to suggest that it might be usedto. impregnate the skin with insect repel­lent for long periods of time. From itsexperimental use with schizophrenics, ithas been diSCovered that DMSO might con­trol the chemical pe:letration of brain tis­sue and thus alter the transmission ofnerve signals. In September 1964, WyethLaboratory, which had been testing DMSOfor possible distribution as a miracle"carrier" for heart patients and otherswho require emergency drug treatment,first noted DMSO' s dangers. In experimen­tal animals it caused severe,eye c.:.amage:abnormal changes in the refractive index

By Beverly Leman

Blacks & European Ethnics

All of this leaves out the two groupswhich comprise a majority of the peoplein Pittsburgh: the European ethnics andthe black people.-In the case of the-blacks(about 20% of the city), there is consider­able activity along civil rights lines, andeven some black-power activity in thehigh schools, neither of which I feel com­petent to report on. On the anti-war front,every so often white student radicals dis­cussing plans will get excited and agreethat they know black guys who want to doanti-draft stuff. But it always turns outthey are all thinking of the same (one)black guy, who it turns out ;s not 8t allinterested (not surprisingly) in talking toghetto kids about student-type resistanceactivity. As far as the European ethnics(about 35% of the city), ~here is simply no

STANLEY KOPPEL

Youth Leadership Club of the Irene Kauf­man jewish Center to conduct a studygroup about Vietnam. The group wasmade up of aDout 20 middle-class highschool kids. The sessions varied great­ly in 'their success. The kids' eyes swamand attendance dropped off when suchthings as the Geneva Accords were dis­cussed, but on such matters as dissentand the domino theory, quite lively discus­sions occurred. The seminar ended justbefore Christmas. Most of the kids re­mained unchanged in their rabid anti­communism, but they did become mod­erately opposed to the war. A few of themexpressed interest in some sort of anti­war activity, which hopefully will followin the next few months. A similar studygroup will probably be g i v e n to theMother's Day Out (I) group of the Uni­tarian Church.

THE MOVEMENT

Three attempts have been made toreach into non-student non-adult-peace­group activities in PittSburgh. In an inte­grated working class area called'Hazel­wood, anti-war work was begun by a feworganizers and a large group of Pitt stu­dents during the summer. They startedwith a canvassing project which found,according to the project, 83% of the peopleagainst the war. A few attempts weremade at organizing such anti-war sen­timent, but failed for two reasons. First,it ended up with white students dealingwith black people (featuring a scene inwhich a black guy walked up to a blackbasketball game, stopped it, and an­nounced, "This here gir1 (white) wantsto talk to you guys about the draft").And secondly, the project failed becauseall the students went back to school andstopped work.

A labor project was started by twoorganizers and several volunteers, fea­turing a leaflet which tied in the warwith anti-strike action. It was handed out·mainly at the several steel plants here.At the bottom was a "for further infor­~ation . . ." coupon, addressed to Viet­nam Summer. Some response, about halffrom black people, was received. Thefollow-up on this action consisted of sev­eral pamphlets sent and then a ca'n froma local Labor for Peace group. A city­wide meeting of this group is planned forFebruary.

The attempt to work with the middle­class materialized in one instance. Anorganizer got ten weeks' access to the

About this time, Arlo Tatum of the Cen­tral Committee For Conscientious Objec­tors blew through town, spoke on draftreSistance, and said that to him it seemedthat turning in one's draft card was theonly meaningful political and moral thingto do, and that while this might land youin jail for five years, you could do morehonest anti-war work when you get out.In the wake of the "We Wont' Go" fizzleand the Dow failure, there was a ratherdesperate feeling, especially an:ong theleadership, that "we have to DO some­thing." Given this situation, Tatum madequite an impression, since turning in one'sdraft card was certainly doing something.Anyone arguing that as an isolated actionit was politically irrelevant and martyishwas silenced with, "Well, what else isthere to do that means anything?"

So a BostolJ-type church ceremony,rather impressive if you go for that sortof' thing, was put together on December4th. Nine guys turned their cards in,(A majority of them were padding: peoplewit:h---C.O. ~status, discharges, or peoplewho had already turned their cards in).An adult support group was qUickly form­ed, complete with an "aiding and abett­ing" statement. Perhaps more important,enough of the leadership of the studentpeace group (two or three) participatedto create the feeling for the rest thatthis was really the thing they should do. Atthe Sf.me time, however, most were un­willing to do so, so that it now looks asif a kind of paralysis will set into thestudent group, in which draft resistancewill become the action of the brave elite,while any other type of action will beconsidered ineffective and hypocriical.

Reaching Out

Card Tum-Ins

TO BUILDAMOVEMENT

PITTSBURGH·GROPINGATTEMPTS

FEBRUARY 1968

We Won't Go

Pittsburgh is a long way from theshut-down streets of Oakland, JOIN ac­tivities in Chicago, and the urban gueril­la bands in New York. This is a tra­ditionally reactionary city, which did notgo Democratic until 1936, and which wasstill at the height of McCarthyism in itspolitics and its university in the late1950's. The city sports a contingent ofadult peace groups, some fledgling uni­versity-reform and anti-war activitiesat Pitt, and a few part or full-time or­ganizers who are trying to move intoother areas of the city. Uttle in theway of new tactics or success has oc­curred in Pittsburgh, yet the situationhere is worth reporting because it maybe fairly indicative of the mediocre stateof the movement in most parts of thecountry.

Meanwhile, the student peace group atPitt - led primarily by the "We Won'tGo" signers - embarked on a series ofuniversity campaigns: secret research,ROTC, and most prominently, anti - re­cruiting action. The Dow campaign causeda crisis in the peace group because itbrought about a startling realization:"Education" was in many ways a mis­leading goal, because the simple fact was _that a vast majority of the students atPitt wanted the Dow and other recruitersthere, knew that this was vital to theirfuture careers, and were not about to be"educated" out of thinking so. Giventhis fact, the group realized that in thefuture it would either have to drop suchcampaigns, or face up to the fact that itsactions were sure to alienate a majorityof the campus. This came as a surpriseto most members of the group, eitherbeca\lse they had come from campuses inwhich a majority of the students wereagainst such things as Dow, or becausethey had thought "education" was thesolution to any such situation. Anotherdiscouraging episode in this campaign wasthe realization that many of our precious"allies" on the faculty became class ene­mies on this issue: one liberal professorstated flatly that as a member of theuniversity disciplining committee he wouldpush for our expulsion if anyone sat-inin the placement office.

Draft Activities

To start with draft activities: fourmonths ago about 20 guys, all Pitt stu­dents, gathered in a living room anddrew up a rather typical •'We won't go"statement. There was the usual split be­tween the pacifists and the politicoes, ane!the statement was made general enoughto accommodate both. Whether to sign

- """tIie'statemenL-w.-as a b-ig decision for'many'in the group. Only last spring sev­eral of them had felt that they wouldnever sign such a thing, because theydidn't want to ruin their careers, not tomention going to jail. Even at the timeof the signing, there were middle-of­the-night calls in which people, on sec­ond thought, asked that their name bescratched from the list.

Plans were laid for action by thegroup. Some wanted to leaflet inductioncenters, with an aim to doing draft coun­seling. Others wanted to speak and workwith existing middle-class groups, withhigh school kids, PTAs, and churches.With a few exceptions most of these plansfizzled out, primarily because most sign­ers viewed their action as a one-shotaffair.

.•

PAGE 10 fHE MOVf.~;,1E'IT FEBRUARY 1968

LESSONS OF HISTORY Con't from page 8-

,0'

their black brothers, but on the classstruggle, and renounced their right to asay in their destiny.

Of course the acceptance of privilegeand the maintainance of white supremacywas not in the interest of either white orblack workers I The result of the over­turning of Reconstruction and the defeatof Populism is the impoverished Southof today. The result of the CIO's wrongturn in 1940 is the deteriorating con­ditions of labor and the oleomargarineunions which dominate in every industry.

The ending of white supremacy does notpose the slightest peril to the real in­terests of the white workers, but to theirfancied interests, their counterfeit in­terests, their white-skin privileges.

Renouncing Privilege

Once again the signs point to an upturnin the militancy of the American workers,including the whites. And once again thewhite workers will be faced with a choice:unite with the black people for our com­mon interests, including the defeat ofwhite supremacy and the repudiation of thewhite-skin privilege; or unite with the'boss to maintain them.

Solidarity between black and white re­quires more from the white than a will­ingness to "help the Negroes up if itdoesn't lower us any." It requires a will­ingness to renounce our privileges, pre­cisely to "lower ourselves" in order thatwe can all rise up together. If anyone saysthat it will be difficult to get the whites torenounce their privileges, I readily con­cede the difficulty - whoever said itwould be east to make a revolution? Butis anyone thinks it is possible to skipthis renunciation and to build coalitionsbetween blacks and whites who want tomaintain their privileges, I will point to1877, 1904 and 1940, and say that if thistask is not tackled and achieved, we willsee the same thing over again: the crisiscomes, conditions worsen, the workingpeople are radicalized, and then-defeat,because the white-skin privilege and its

~__~~ ideology were not specifically,directly, consistently and courageouslydenounced and renounced, in words and indeeds.

Tactics

Now, what does all this mean for ourtactics? I have some suggestions:

(1) in all our work we should bring thequestion of white supremacy to thefore. Thus in opposing the VietNam

.war, we should especially expose itas a racist, white supremacist war,an extension of U.S. genocidalpolicies toward Indians and Afro­Americans.

(2) we should discover. and take advan­tage of every opportt(nity to point outto white workers the \llature of thewhite supremacist de<i\ and showthem how it operates a~inst themby tying them to their en'emy, thebosses.

(3) for my third suggestion, I can dono better than to quote a memowritten in June 1966 by Anne Bradento the Southern Student OrganizingCommittee:

"Now, the pendulum seems to be swing­ing the other way, and more and morewhite people are deciding they must reachthe white Southerner ...

"I am glad they are deciding this.\ "What I disagree with is the conceptthat they will organize these poor whiteSoutherners completely apart from theNegro movement -- and figure that some­where down the road, maybe severalyears hence, maybe they'll get togetherin some sort of coalition.

" I don't think it can work that way...

Blacks Organize Whites

"Again to be specific, if you are goingto engage in a project (rural or urban)to organize poor white people, I can seehow it might be desirable (and it mayhappen whether you think it is desirableor not) for' Negroes to be organiZing theblack people in that community into anindependent organization. But when you goto and organize the white people I thinkyou have to say to them in front, fromthe very word go, that if they are goingto be effective and solve their problemsthey are going to have to team up withthose black people over there and findterms that are acceptable to the blackpeople to do it on, and I think you shouldgo to these white people with teams ofblack and white organizers working to­gether.

"White people may not be able to workin organizing Negro communities and may-

, be should not -- for all the reasonsstated recently ... But I think black or­ganizers are urgently needed to work inwhite communities.

"In other words, I am saying that Ithink you have to confront the whiteSoutherner you are trying to reach withthis whole question of racism and whatit has done to him from the very be­ginning.

•'Some may say this is impossible -­it will frighten him off and you'll neverget to him. I am not saying it will beeasy. We will fail many times. But I thinkwe must begin trying in the beginningbecause I think if you wait it will getharder as time goes on and not easier.

"In fact, if you begin to organizegroups of white people without tacklingthis issue in a very concrete way, I thinkthe problem is much greater than that YOu(will just be wasting your time. I thinkyou may be creating a Frankenstein...

"As I understand it, Saul Alinsky hadthis experience in Chicago. He organizedNegroes on the Southside -- and he or­ganized the Back-of-the-Yards movementwhich was all white and poor and veryoppressed. The Back-of-the-Yards move­ment became very strong and effectivein fighting its own oppression -- butlater it was the backbone of a movement

to keep Negroes out of that part ofChicago •..

•'What I am saying is that we musttry to avoid such mistakes by beginningin the very beginning to try to convincewhite people that their interest lies inteaming up with Negroes -- even if theNegroes want and are forming their ownorganizations. And if we hope to con­vince them, we must confront them withthe issue as we start -- because it willget harder as people get more organized,stronger in their own organization, moresolidified, etc,"I think Ann Braden's suggestions forSouthern organiZing apply with equal forcethroughout the country.

(4) we should find and put forwardslogans and issues which make con­crete the repudiation of privilege,and which are tied in as closely aspossible with building unity andwinning real benefits. For example,in a shop which is not organized, in­stead of trying to organize a unionaround the demand of straightsen i 0 r it Y (an obvious white-skinprivilege, since it was the boss whodecided whom to hire first), weshould try to rally the workersaround a demand like the following:a contract provision that at no timein a layoff could a greater propor­tion of Negroes be included thantheir proportion in the plant. Anotherprovision might be that workers inthe most dangerous, dirtiest de­partments (usually Negroes) receivea special seniority bonus. I thinkthese demands would appeal to thesense of fair play of working menand women.

LikeSDS Draft Position

An excellent example of the practicalapplication of my thesis is the SDS posi­tion on the draft, of opposing the draft and,at the same time, denouncing the n-5student deferment as a racial (and class)privilege whose only purpose is to dividethe anti-war movement, and not merelydenouncing it, but calling upon all studentsto renounce it. I don't want to attributethe totality of my views to SDS; I merelyapplaud their stand as the only honest oneunder the circumstances.

I don't claim to have the best tacticalsolutions to the problem I raise. But I dosay that if all of us in the movement don'tfind ways to win the white workers torepudiate their white-skin privileges andoppose white supremacy, then we mightas well, as one of my friends says,"piss on the fire and summon the hounds,"because the hunt is over.

At this point the main thing., in myopinion, is to create a wide-spread aware­ness among white working people of thenature of the white supremacist deal. Iam confident that the American workingclass, which gave. birth to May Day andInternational Worn e n's LJ·1\'. whichdeveloped and creatively aiJplied tit"tactics of the sit-in 5trike, r v'.lng picketsand the slow-LioWl., will be 3.1'1f' to comeup with plenty of ways to repudiate adeal once they have decided it is in their

interest to do so.

Too Moralistic?

In discussing my thesis with movementpeople, I have s'ometimes encountered theobjection that my approach is a moralisticrather than a materialistic one, that itrelies on idealism rather than "self­interest". To this I answer as follows:

(I) The "moralistic" John Brown madea far greater contribution to thestruggle of labor than all of thesophisticated "Marxists" in thepre-Civil Wat labor movement (andthere were some, even then) whoshied away from directly opposingchattel slavery because, they felt,"the workers wouldn't go along."

(2) As a worker I resent the prejudice,common among student radicals,that the w.orkers can only be movedby narrow economic considerationswhile they, the students, are radicalsfor reasons of idealism. I point tothe thousands and thousands of whiteworkers who marched off to war forthe Union singing, .,As He died tomake men holy, let us die to makemen free," And I would predict thatthe next few years will show that thegreat acts of heroism on the partof the working people will be calledforth not by demands for a nickelan hour but by the •'idealistic" ,"moralistic" slogans of the solidar­ity and humahity of labor.

(3) the repudiation of the white-skinpri'vilege is in the interests, bothshort and long range, of the whiteworkers, and the only problem is tohelp them (and some of our radi­cals) see it.

"Working Class" & "Poor"

Just one more point. I notice that I usethe terms "working class" and "poor" ina somewhat inter-changeable manner,which might offend some people who seemto regard them as two separate. non­overlapping categories. In this regard,perhaps I might be permitted to citepersonal experience. As recently as sixyears ago, I was running~in a sweatshop for $1:~hour.~y._I am more highly skilled and better paid;I. make $3.65 per hour. (According tothe government, tbat is almost enough tomaintain a family of four, exactly what Ihave, at what they call a "minimum ade-quate" standard of living.) Between thetwo extremes I have had various spellsof unemployment, with and without com­pensation. Judging by certain develop-ments within the economic sphere, suchas the British devaluatfon of the poundand the U.S. unfavorable balance of pay-ments, I fully expect, within the next fewyears, to be glad to work again for $1.15an hour, if I can get it. While I canclearly see the difference between a badjob and one that's not so bad, and be-tween an unemployed worker and an em-ployed one, I can't see a difference be-tween working class and poor, except,perhaps, that there are other people be-sides workers who are poor. ...

NEW LEFT VISITS CAMBODIA Continued fro~ page 7currency exercises, for it is apparentlyworthwhile to have many people virtuallyunemployed in the hope of making afew sales a day,

The role of foreign currency then,should not be understood in terms of itspower over others but in terms of thenumber of people who can afford to spendtheir time trying to get some of it. Thereare not only many shops for the foreign­ers, but also over-staffed hotels andrestaurants, many more pedicabs thancan be continually employed, and chil­dren haWking cigarettes, magazines andnewspapers.

That economic circumstance makes iteasy to understand the colonialist frameof mind that mistakes the interest of thepedicab driver in the fare for interest orrespect for the person. But though thatis readily overcome by New Leftie::: inAsia, there are still many ways in whicha kind of honkie arrogance goes with them,and much of learning. about Cambodiawas learning about that arrogance. Wewere surprised, for example, when hav­ing toid someone we were "from Ameri-

ca," he asked with a straight face if that

was North or South America. I was sur­prised when a young night clerk in thehotel didn't know the postage for a letterto Germany because he didn't know what~ontinent it was on, but then I recalled~ome of our discussions.

~sson of Cambodia

In subtle 'ways, we were still thinkingof the rest of the world as teeminghordes madly trying to ape We s t erntechnology and style and assumed thatthe doings of the West were somehowcentral to their lives. And it is even pos­sible from reading the reports of revo­lutionary governments like Hanoi to thinkthat the Third' World sees success orfailures in Western terms. The lesson ofCambodia is that this simply is not so. Asiaunderstands the W est because it wascolonized by the West, and it under­stands perhaps better than we do our­selves the aggressiveness and arrogancethat underlies our cultare. But it rejectsthat aggressiveness for itself and looks

to the West only in terms of how it mightharm the way of life that already exists inCambodia.

The War

The war is only forty miles away fromPhnom Penh, and at night you can watchthe fires caused by shelling along theborder. There are' constant declarationsfrom the government about the war and theAmerican plans against Cambodia - oneof the rumors circulating in Phnom Penhduring our stay was that the Americansplanned to bomb Sihanoukville, Cam­bodia's deep-water port on the Gulf ofSiam 0;1 the precext of stopping armsshipmellts to the NLF (Sihanouk re­sponded to Westmo,eland's charges bysuggesting that if the US was seriousabout stopping arms flow, they shouldbomb the USSR and China). While wewere in Phnom Penh, the papers an­nounced the beginning of a program inall provinces for training guerilla regi_ments; at the same time, the paperI'

were .running a serialized history of

national insurrections (guerilla move­ments) in Cambodia in the last cen­tury.

And the people will respond to the gov­ernment's call if the invasion comes,but in a way the proclamations are asirrelevant to the people as the sunglassesin the shops. They understand the danger.of the West in a much deeper sense thanany government statement could suggestbecause they have seen Western colonialrule and know that livjng in this world islike livi.ng in a house with a lunatic on theloose. We knew they understood the in­sanity of the West when we watched theNLF guerilla dance troupe perform askit for an audience in Phnom ['~nh thatshowed American GI's trying to seduceVietnamese village women defending theirhomes by doing the twist -the audienceroared with appreciation. "yestern geni­tal arrogance, Western cultural depra­vity, Western military brutality all flow­ed together in the skit and .struck homewith those people. As. I sat there, I

CONTINUED NEXT PAGE

FEBRU ARt 1969 THE MOVEMENT PAGE II

RENNIE DAVIS Con'" from page 4

CAMBODIA Con't from p·1 0"SUBVERSIVE" ATTACK

ON DU BOIS CLUBS

and significant way at the time that J ohn­son is nominated,. turning the delegatesback into the amphitheater as they at­tempt to leave, demanding that the Amer­ican people be given a choice, demand­ing that thev reconsider a .decision notin the national interest, a decision thatcan only lead to the funeral of the demo­cratic policies that support racism andthe war, should carry not only us, butthousands of Americans into an active'boycott of the elections and giant show-.down in Washington to prevent the in-'auguration next January.

Priorities

lHE MOVEMENT: Do you feel that na­t ion a 1 confrontationssuch as you envisionfor the DemocraticConvention detractfrom your own priorityof organizing locally?

DAVIS: Yes, in part. The DemocraticConvention will have mixed results forlocal building. Since most people in themovement are not organizers, it is saidthat a national action allows non-organ­izers to find a role. I believe it alsoreinforces the idea that one's role is togo to demonstrations rather than buildradical organizations day -to-day. Andpressure mounts among the actual day­to-day organizers to respond to the calland fit their local needs into the nationalstrategy of the moment.THE MOVEMENT: Why then do yOll ac­

tively support buildingthe machinery youcalled' for in prep­aration for the Demo­cratic Convention con­frontation?

DAVIS: The confrontation will have mixedresults for local organizing and highlyimportant consequences in other ways. Ibelieve it is important for what we can sayto Americans at this time. I believe it isvery important to Vietnam. And franklyI see it as a possible turning point for the~ai\d-the...mo-v:ement.

If the Convention confrontation can beplaced in a broader strategy, it canperhaps induce many people to take uporganizing pOSitions. Can the DemocraticConvention focus have a relationship toan over-all white organizing drive be­ginning in the summer? Can SDS, the Stu­dent Mobilization, the Resistance, theYoung Christian Movement provide thenetwork for recruitment and the resourcesfor training and direction to make possiblenew white projects in dozens of com­munities leading up to the DemocraticConvention and then continuing beyond it.Can the anti-war movement, identifiedpublicly as people who organize nationaldays of resistance, or Washington marchesor bank accounts for NY Times adver­tisements, be com e associated moredirectly with efforts to build powerlocally?

I'm interested personally in ,working

thought back over the countless argu­ments with liberals 1 had been throughwhen I tried to counter those neat" spheresof influence" type arguments ir. whichCambodia is just another space wheresomeone places a pawn and realizes that itis enough to know that those people inCambodia understand their lives in avery different way. In 'the long run, theirperception is much more impor~ant as afactor than all the slick theories pro­duced in US academe.

US Will MoveIt seems clear now that the US will move

against Cambodia, though it may delayuntil the International Control Com mis­sion has dome some of the reconnaisanceand cleared some helicopter landi.ng areas.But the force that will move people to de­fend themselves in Cambodia is prevalentthroughout Southeast Asia. ThaEand nowhas 12 provinces under martial law,which means population relocation andpolice terror is underway; Laos is facedwith a 30,000 man Pathet Lao force (ac­cording to the New York TIMES even)that has been taking concerted actions in

for the Democratic Convention challengebecause it's being held in Chicago--areally arrogant thing for Daley to do-­and 'because I want to work more directlywith the anti-war movement as an or­ganizer, and this offers me a way to do

just that. One of the challenges to or­ganizers is how the enormous energyand numbers of people who are opposedto the Vietnam war can be directed to­wards building organization which haspermanency, power and radical posture longafter Vietnam. .

Beyond Vietnam

THE MOVEMENT: How does the Viet­nam issue become theissue of imperialismand how should theant i-war movementorganize to outlast theVietnam war?

DA VIS: SNCC, SDS and the people whomake up the Resistance have been fairlysuccessful. Perhaps they offer approachesto the problem. I would add, as a wayto expand into the constituencies whichperhaps these people are not reaching,the idea of ' 'localiZing the anti-warmovement." Since returning from NorthVietnam, and speaking to more diversegroups than I am accustomed, I have

. been struck by the militancy of suburbangroups, ne..yly organized student com­mittees and clergy peace associationson the issue of the war. People are will­ing to wo::-k as organizers, as well assupport the Resistance, etc., if they believeit will help build pressure to f.'nd the war.These same groups become angry, boredor generally turned off if they are bom­barded with words like imperialism, neo­colonialism, or tightly drawn analysis toothick with Marxist or left slogans.

Not everyone who comes in the frontdoor of the JOIN office in Chicago isopposed to the Democratic Party; themachine and the war in Vietnam. It mayonly be the policeman who beat theirhead or the case-worker who is threaten­ing to cut off support which provides thewill to consider a political act, For theorganizer the problem is to search withthat individual for the process which isthe most liberating and radicaliZing, asthe immediate political act is thoughtthrough and carried out, a process whichcan connect that individual to a largerorganization and more radical program.

If the radicals in the movement are togive leadership to the anti-war movementin its broadest sense, it will not be be­caw'!e we joined the Nationill-Mobiliza­tion to fight for "our-'politics" or de­manded a focus op , 'imperialist targets".We will have to suggest programs andorganize work which aHow people new tothe movement to learn from experiencewho holds power, how decisions aremade, the relationship of the war effortto corporations which operate in everymajor city. There are numerous examples

spite of the continual bombardment fromUS planes. The NLF continues to makeincredi.b Ie offensives in the South, movingnow from the central highlands into theMeko:Jg Delta and 'the coastal plains inthe North, areas that Westmoreland wasclaiming two weeks earlier were beyondNLF control.

Cambodians have not undergone thestruggle for independence that the Viet­namese have been forced to undertake.But they share Wlth the Vietnamese a senseof their own stabHity and identity. Andas the West disintegrates politically, psy­chologically and militarily, that sense ofstability, expressed now as a non-ag­gressive way of life, will become a major.resource for struggle. For that stabilitysprings from an understanding of theterms upoa which life is bearable; anenemy can be quite clearly defined againstthat understanding and fought wIth a ten­acity unknown to men hired to do a job.The jungles of Cambodia are no lessimpenetrable than those of South Viet­nam and the people who rise to fight im­perialism in Cambodia will be cut fromthe same kind of cloth as the NLF.

of such an approach. Let me suggestonly one.

Discovering the War Makers

In those regions of the country wherethe movement is strong in the ghettoes, Iwould like to see organizers develop pro­grams that recruit people basically con­cerned about the napalming children orthe use of indiscriminate US fire poweragainst the civilian population of Vietnam-- the people regarded by some in themovement as too apolitical or too hllman­itarian to work with. The program mightbegin by helping people learn about theexperimental weapons being used in Viet­nam: the Shrike guided missile, the elec­tron bomb, the cluster b()mbs, the cylinderfragmentation bomb and the long line ofincindary weapons, toxic chemicals andpoison gases. Then research could beginon who makes these weapons in the localcommunity--what corporations are in­volved, who sits on the board, where dothey live, what pOSitions of influence inthe community do they hold? The pro­gram would urge people to look into thekinds of weapons that are actually beingused in Vietnam only to learn that the peo­ple who manufacture these weapons thathave been banned by international agree­ment are the, very people who sit on theBoard of Education and the Mayor's Com­mittees in their own cities. This process,I suspect, would radically expand people'sconsciousness and the scope of possibleactivity. Suddenly the war makers be­come real people, the same people, if thegfJetto movement is strong, who are beingattacked by the blacks or poor whitesbecause of rotten schools or urban re­newal. War crime tribunals that put theseindividuals on public trial for complicityin US war crimes might represent stillanother dimension of a process that be­gins with simple moral concerns but al­lows "nice" people to grow politicallythrough their own work and experience.

I believe anti-war acdvity of this sort -­and there are many other examples--be­gins to suggest to various movement con­stituencies in a city new kinds of politicalrelationships we have not seen signif­icantly at a local level.

Repression

THE MOVEMENT: We've been readingreports coming intoour office of peopIesupoened, arrested orinvestigated all overthe country. It appearsthere is a coordinatedeffort to intimidate and'infiltrate every pro­test organization. Infact, it appears thatthe Administration isextremely afraid forit's convention nextsummer and will bemaking moves to re­press those involved

The Subversive Activities Control Board(S.A.C.B.) is conducting hearings againstthe DuBois Clubs, beginning on Feb. 5 inNew York. The hearings are part of thesame proceedings begun against the DuBois Clubs in March 1966.

The hearings will be conducted underthe provisions of the "new" McCarranAct, signed by LBJ on Jan. 2, 1968.The new legislation is designed to takethe "unworkable" kinks out of the oldMcCarran Act. Provisions for punishmenthave been improved and expanded.

It is now possible for the governmenttolabel any organization a "communistfront" by producing a stool pigeon whowill simply charge that one or morepeople in the leadership of the organiza­tion are members of the Communist Par­ty.

The new act also overcomes the prob­lem of the governments previous inabilityto force an organization to register as a"front:' The solution is characteristic:after the SACB conducts its k a n gel' 0 0

court, the government registers for youlThe new act retains its nightmare pro­

visions concerning "detention" camps for

in the con v e n t ion, strategy. How shouldthe movement respondto these events?

DAVIS: While the movement is still smalland generally overly preoccupied withtalking to itself, these .limitations everyday are breaking down, as new people,fed up and disgusted, turn to us fordirection and work, or igr.ore us andcreate exciting political communities oftheir own. It seems to me that there isevery reason. to believe that conditionsare with those who want the movementto be vastly broadened.

The Viet Cong believe that the UniteeStates has been militarily defeated i!South Vietnam and that the question ojNLF victory is a question of time. John·son--or for that matter all public can· .didates for President--appear unpreparecto accept a military defeat, at least forsome time. So, as sickening as it is,every sign points to a long war ancgreater and greater loss of Americanlives. Thus far, the only response of theAdministration to the black ghetto revoltshas been to improve police tacticS, train­ing and manpower. So, every sign pointstowards more intense black-police war­fare in our cities. And finally the reportsfrom the inner circles of internationalfinance capitalis,m point with horror to thesoftening of currency, the new protectivetariffs in the US and the rising US pricelevel, signs which even conservative econ­omists now claim point toward economicslump or worse in this country. It seemsthe very conditions we deplore harbor thepotential for a vast swelling of our move­m ent and our power, as the war, riotsand recession converge on ordinary peo­ple.

Need Positive View

This reading of conditions makes it im­perative, I believe, that we develop afreshand positive view of the role we may playin this country and the world. We are notthe Communist Party in the middle partof this century. We must not face re­pression by taking the defensive, by send­ing large numbers of people undergroundor seeking to protect otn;:.selvesbL~ _ing what we stand for at our public trials.I believe we must turn every trial intoa trial of the system, that we should fightoff paranoia as much as possible 0.8 re-pression comes and that we should seekthe widest support for our actions and forour right to hold and express our con-victions. ~'m calling not only for a polit-ical strategy of~ openness, but amongourselves for a psychologicalframe-workthat allows us to turn outward ratherthan inward as the going getf. rough. Theescalation of the war in Vietnam hasonly strengthened the Vietnamese struggleas they turn each stage of the escalationinto a new response to their own people.The escalation of the war of repressionin the United.States might be seen as thatkind of org'anizing possibility for us.

+-

"subversives:'The hearings come at a critical time

The government has already launched ;full scale attack on the black communityas well as major efforts at repression 0

the anti-war movement and left in 'general. Its attack on the DuBoIs Clubs i:part of this larger climate. HUAC hear·ings are scheduled to begin soon againsa number of movement organizations.

A press release from the DuBois Clubstates: "We are determined to do everything in our power to resist this attack 0

democratic liberties of all Americans an:to prevent the government from broadeniniits attack on the 0uBois Clubs to an attacJon the entire movement:'

The DuBois Clubs have requested tho.people and organizations help in the fol·lowing ways: Issuing press releases show·ing your organizations opposition to th'hearings; helping to mobilize the protesactions to take place on Feb. 5 and throughout the hearings; sending telegrams anletters to Johnson and Atty. Gener0.1 Ramsey Clark dem'l1nding an end to SACB hearings •.md the repeal of the new McCarraAct.

,PAGE 12 THE MOVEMEN'r FEBRUARY 1968

fILM REVIEW

IIINSIDE VIETNAMII IS/

REAL

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Photo: Julius Lester

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SUPREME COURT RULESMcCULLAN CAN'T USE

STOLEN DOCUMENTSThe Supreme Court has ruled that

documents stolen from poverty workersin Eastern Kentucky cannot be turnedover to the McClellan Committee. TheBraden's, McSurely's and Mulloy hadbeen charged with sedition in Kentucky.The court threw the charges out. ThenMcClellan, the red-baiter, wanted toget his crack at them. McClellan's casewould have rested on the stolen docu­ments, The Supreme Court ruling meansthat the McClellans of this~v wi U ./have a harder time1n~...;.hey' -have to get their evidence honestly.

STATE

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sort of the Kennedy-'Fulbright thing, hesmiles, you know, protest at the polls.

. No, draft card burning isn't his sort ofthing. And now that he is captured, hewants the war over. Because he is ourAmerican and he doesn't like being incon­venienced with a broken leg and arm, holedup in North Vietnam. He is a strangespecimen. He is part of the agit-propdrama again. He doesn't believe in whathe has done; he doesn't know what he hasdone.

And my friend's child. after the filmis over says: but you're not supposed to

.bomb hospitals, its one of the rules. Andhow do you explain that the rules aredrawn up to entangle us in a web of illusion.that the rules are the gUidelines of goodtheater, with re-election the payoff in­stead of box office receipts. A nightmareAlice in Wonderland of rules, where wemust go to movies such as this to findreality. •

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MALCOLM Xand CHE GUEVARA

And then, . like a surreal dart. a realanti-personnel bomb is dropped on us aswe see The American again. a pilot lyingin a hospital bed. two weeks -after he has .been downed by Vietnamese rifles. Whoisthis man - this killer who does not knowthat he kills? He tells us that he dropshls bombs from such high altitudes thatit is hard to see what you hit. Sure, heused anti-personnel bombs, sure he says,the Vietnamese have been real friendlyto him. They've treated him well we aretold. What's his position on the war? Oh,

American POW

created, and the real ways the Viet­namese have solved them. There is nosense of despair - for here is a strong,organized people with the indefatigabledetermination to survive, not Singly, butas a people. Their most important weaponis themselves - hands, minds, skill­machinery gets bombed into oblivion, butpeople run into fmc holes -and live. Viet­namese women~-'men, children; villagerswith Catholic crosses around their necks.Drums beating, bells ringing - warningsof planes coming with bombs, big bombs,and small "anti-personnel" bombs. Vil­lages destroyed, homes obliterated, limbs'broken, bellies torn open, chil<ken mourn­ing for a dead mother, singing girls andboys, flutes playing in the evening aspeople work, as rice is planted, as grainis harvested. Bicycles loaded with rocksto- repair roads on which transport toHanoi takes place as soon as the sun sets.Vietnam, real, whole, alive.

IiIAnT POSTE-HSI

By Ellen Estrin

There is a despair in our movement sometimes, a feeling that no matter what we dothe war will continue, that our actions are some sort of parody on resistance. thatwe are part of a play by an absurdist playwright. I often feel that US politics is more"agit-prop" than real, Johnson and the other Administration figures create politicalcrises in order to gain a political eff~ct; they attempt to solve the.crises for their ownaggrandisement. That was the situation with the Bay of Tonkin, and the new Puebloincident.

Different people react differently tothese agit-prop <kamas, some folksbelieve them as they are reported, andothers take a leap of faith (while doubtingtheir reality), because to not accept theAdn)inistration's version of the eventwould force .them to doubt all else, the"democratic way", the morality of Amer­ica. We, who habitually do not believe theofficial tales, often tend to dismiss theincidents because we don't know what todo about them.·· Usually we say: "therethey go again, 'the bastards." Other timeswe go out into the streets and get ourheads cracked open, because we can'tallow our anger to be totally submerged.We try "organizing", demonstrating,paper writing. Yet it'is within the frame­work of despair. Can we really stop thewar? Can we really bring on a revolution,or do we do these things because to notfight would be a kind of death?

1 usually avoid reading the news reportson Vietnam in the daily press. They areso strangely repetitive, as if they werewritten by rote. perhaps by a computer.in order to fill the space allotted to thewar on page two. How many did they say

.died today? How many mythological wordswere spoken, b.ombs dropped, hills taken?Vietnam becomes another unbelievablecreation of the bad playwrights who wecall the United Stc.tes Government. It iseasier to think of it that way.

Vietnam Is Not Playacting--- ----50 it comes as a shock to be con­

fronted with Vietnam as a reality, as acountry of people fighting daily con­frontations with the enemy, who is theUnited States. It is a shock to compre­hend that the Vietnamese are playing nogames at all, and that the bombs whichwe read about (in total numbers of mis­sions flown daily), <kop on them - andinjure them, and destroy their homes.For us it may be an absurdist drama. towhich we respond with posters whichread' 'make love not war", or rock songslike "Hot Damn Vietnam". or demon­strations where we flee down Nob Hillwhile cops shoot mace at us. But to theVietnamese, this drama is their life.

Felix Greene's movie on North Viet­nam is more impressive than anything hehas done so far. He communicates anamazing amount of information about howthe North Vietnamese fight their end ofthe war. For the first time 1 understoodhow they survive, and why they are un­defeatable - short of total annihilation.Greene shows us how every member ofthe population is being trained not only inhow to survive the bombings, but alsoin guerilla warfare, in the event of a US'g r 0 u n d invasion, US troops would bepowerless in a ground war, that is madequite clear.

The film is also a political commenton national liberation. Greene does notforget that Vietnam is still in the processof consolidating its own revolution, itsliberation from thousands of years offoreign intervention and rule (first theChinese, then the French then theJapanese, the French again, and now theUS).

We see our "enemy", these deep-eyedchil<ken, the teen-age youth brigadeworkers gigglin~as they scramble upfroma ditch to go back to work after a bomb­ing attack, the slim legged women plant­ing rice, with mud molded ar.ound theircalves. A single rose sits on the frontof the combat hat of one Vietnamese girl.

I enclose $ __ check if

~ M~~~ ~': SUbScrlbe~

Human TacticsBut the film is more than a series of

hum an interest vignette s. Greenedescribes tactical aspects of North Viet­namese defense so that we get a feelingfor the kinds of problems the war has

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