Workers Vanguard No 848 - 13 May 2005

7/29/2019 Workers Vanguard No 848 - 13 May 2005

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WfJlillEliS "NfilJ'lilJ oeNo. 848 " i ; ; C ~ J ~ C ' 7 ~ 1 13 May 2005

Mobilize Labor Power toFree Mumia Abu-Jamal!On April 23, some 350 workers. students, socialists, fighters for black rightsand opponents of the racist death penalty

turned out in Harlem in defense of deathro\V political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal.Commemorating Jamal's 51 st birthday(24th behind bars). the demonstrationwas initiated by the. International Concerned Family and Friends of MumiaAbu-Jamal (lCFFMAJ), the NYC FreeMumia Abu-Jamal Coalition. and theInternational Action Center (lAC). Asimilar protest was held in the Bay Area.The Spartacist League and Labor BlackLeagues participated in the April 23protests. In New York City. we marchedwith a 50-strong Revolutionary Contingent under the Partisan Defense Committee banner: "There Is 1\,)0 Juqice inthe Capit;lli:,L Courts-Free Mumia AbuJamal Abolish the Racist Death Penalty!"As the leaflet building for our contingentunderlined:

"The notoriou, frameup of Mumia AbuJamal symholizes what the harharic.racist death penalty is all about in capitalist America. The capitalist forces of'law


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Defend Professor Joseph Massad! site for the misnamed "Students for Academic Freedom"-campus shock troopsfor racist neocon David Horowitzcrowed that the Times editorial "suggeststhat the crisis caused by politically-biasedradical teaching in the universities (especially in the Humanities and Social Sciences) has now become so pervasive andso obvious that even the mainstreammedia organs are expressing alarm" ("TheCrisis in the Universities Goes Mainstream." 18 April).New York Times Calls forPolitical Purge at Columbia And then there's the liberal Natioll. Ina piece that ,vas supposed to be sympathetic to the witchhunted professors,.Scott Shennan manages to gi\'e credcnceto the witchhunters (see "The MideastComes to Columbia." Nation. -+ April).He paints Massad as a "dogmatic" man"who traffics in absolutes" and who frequently unleashes "a steady stream ofinflammatory anti-Zionist rhetoric." AsMassad noted in a reply to the Nation (16May): "Would calling the United Statesduring segregation or South Africa duringapartheid racist countries also be considered 'inflammatory' anti-American oranti-South African rhetoric?" Meanwhile.Sherman goes after Columbia professorHamid Dabashi for "shrill and carelesswriting" because of a passage recountingthe hell Dabashi went through in anIsraeli airport, claiming that the passage "can easily be construed as antiSemitic" (see "For a Fistful of Dust:

As active participants in the fight todefend Columbia University professorJoseph Massad from a Zionist crusade todrive him and all defenders of the Palestinian people out of academia, we'vegrown accustomed to the racist howls ofNew York City's gutter press. But it is aconsiderable escalation when the grandedame of American publishing, the selfimportant "paper of record," the NewYork Times. argues with studied dispassion for a political witchhunt.

For the Times. Middle East studies atColumbia is "out of contro!.' and thepaper applauds the university administration's decision to strip the department ofpower to appoint and promote faculty onthe pretext of "strengthening its scholarship." The Times editorial retails as factthe claim of one student. which theinvestigative panel found "credible," thatMassad kicked her out of class for denying Israeli atrocities-without even noting that Massad denies the incident tookplace. In fact, a 3 May letter to Columbia president Bollinger signed by 20 former students of Massad states that theaccusations by the student "are unequivocally false and that the findings of theAd Hoc Committee pertaining to themare incorrect."

Under the headline "Intimidation atColumbia" (7 April), the Times fumes thatColumbia University "botched the handling of this emotionally charged issuefrom the start." The Times is roiled that apanel appointed to investigate charges ofintimidation by professors in the MiddleEast and Asian Languages and Culturesdepartment (MEALAC) included "threemembers who had expressed anti-Israelviews." The betterto wrap its bias in thecloak of evenhandedness, the Timesacknowledges that the targeted professorsalso have "legitimate complaints": "Theirclasses were infiltrated by hecklers andsurreptitious monitors. and they receivedhate mail and death threats."

The Times editorial goes on by concluding with a call to vet professors onthe basis of their political views-apolitical purge:"But in the end. the report is deeplyunsatisfactory because the panel's mandate was so limited. Most student complaints were not really about intimidation. but about allegations of stridentlypro-Palestinian. anti-Israeli bias on thepart of several professors. The panel had

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TROTSKY

Vietnam Was a Victory!Two, Three , Many Defeats forU.S. Imperialism!April 30 marked the 30th anl1iver.\orr ofthe militar ... \'ictory ()f Vietnam's workers

und peasants against US . imperialism andits South Vietnamese puppetforces. This l\ ' (/S(/ victory j(n' the exploited ([lid oppressedillternationall .... serving j(n' rears to sta ... thehalld of American imperialism arollnd theworld. III celebratioll of this annil'ersary. Ireprint below excerpts from our statementhailing the entrY of the North Vietnamese

LENIN

military and the South Vietnamese National Liberotioll Front into Saigon. After 1975.in its drive to strangle the Vietnamese Rel'Olution. US. imperialism subjected devas-tated Vietnam to all imperialist embargo. Washington helped arm Pol Pot's KhmerRouge forces in Cambodia after his ollster from pmrer by Vietllamese force s ill J979.which ended a r e i g n ~ m a r k e d by mass murder and wholesale destruction of urbana r e a s ~ t h a t proved to be not eren the most deformed type of workers state (see "OustGenocidal Pol Pot Gangfrom UN!" WV No. 338. 23 September 1983).MAY 4 - 0n April 30 the armed forces of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV)and the National Liberation Front (NLF) rode triumphantly into Saigon as leaders ofthe defeated puppet regime and thc South Vietnamese bourgeoisie fled the country byevery available means. The military victory of the DRV NLF marks the end of 30 yearsof civil ,war against colonialism and imperialism and their local allies. It means theoverthrow of capitalist rule in South Vietnam, a historic conquest for the working people of the entire world and one which must be unconditionally defended by classconscious workers against imperialist attack.

We hail this stunning defeat of U.S. imperialism, the first in a major war during thiscentury, and greet the victory of our class brothers and sisters in Indochina with inter-

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! . ~ ! ! ' ! f ! J ! . . ' l ! l ! . l ! l ! I f . ! . IRECTOR OF PARTY PUBLICATIONS Alison Spencer

EDITOR: Alan WildeEDITOR, YOUNG SPARTACUS PAGES: Rosemary PalenqueCIRCULATION MANAGER: Jeff ThomasEDITORIAL BOARD: Kathleen Harris (managing editor). Helene Brosius (letters editor),Linda Jarreau (production manager). Bruce Andre, Jon Brule, Helen Cantor, Paul Cone,George Foster, Walter Jennings, James Robertson. Joseph SeymourThe Spartacist League is the U.S. Section of the International Communist League(Fourth Internationalist).Workers VanguarJ (lSSN 0276-0746) published biweekly. except skipping three alternate Issues in June. July andAugust (beginning wltr omitting the second Issue In .June) and skipping the last Issue In December. by the SpartaclstPublishing Co 299 Broadway. Suite 318 New York NY 10007. Telepho ne (212) 732786 2 (Editorial) (212) 7327861tBuslness) Address all correspondence to: Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10116. E-mail address:[email protected] subscriptions: $10.00'21 issues Penodlcals postage paid at New York NY POSTMASTER: Send addresschanges to Workers Vanguard. Box 1377 GPO New York. NY 10116Opinrons expressed In signed articles or letters do not necessarily express the edltonal viewpoint.The closing date for news in this issue is 10 May.

No. 848 13 May 2005

" ,,' .......................Jason Bello/Columbia SpectatorColumbia University professor JosephMassad, victim of ongoing Zionistwitchhunt.no mandate to examine the quality andfairness of teaching. That leaves the university to follow up on complaints aboutpoliticized courses and a lack of scholarly rigor as part of its effort to upgradethe department. One can only hope thatColumbia will proceed with more determination and care than it has heretofore."

The conservative New York SIII1. whichhad been leading the pack of tabloids howling for Professor Massad's blood, greetedthe Times editorial with its own, headlined: "Welcome to the Fight." The Web

A Passage to Palestine" by Hamid Dabashi, AIAhram Weekly, 23-29 September2004). Dabashi's reply to the Nationstands up well:"Accusing me of 'shrill' writing at atime when from Boston to Philadelphia.from New York to Jerusalem. and fromthe United States to Israel. militantmobs like the one organized at Columbia

continued on page J0

nationalist proletarian solidarity. The struggle against the imperialists' Vietnam war hasalso been a major task of socialists in the imperialist centers. dominating the politicalexperience of a whole generation of young aspiring revolutionaries. And it is as fellowcombatants in the international class struggle that we warn the Indochine se masses thatthey must piace no confidence in their Stalinist leaders.The victory in Vietnam. like that in Cambodia two weeks earlier when the KhmerRouge took Phnom Penh. belongs to the heroic worker and peasant fighters in Indochina who have struggled resourcefully and tenaciously for decades in order to breakthe grip of imperialist domination and capitalist exploitation on the peninsula. Butwhile a victorious social revolution has occurred. the struggle to establish revolutionaryand inte rnation alist worke rs states in the region is far from over. ...What has been created in South Vietnam and Cambodia are deformed workers states,qualitatively equivalent to the degenerated workers state which emerged in Russia withthe consolidation of the Stalin-led bureaucracy. The ruling bureaucracies of the deformedworkers states are narrowly nationalist in outlook, attempting to balance precariously between imperialism and the working class. Based on the property forms of a workers state,they occasionally put up a limited and distorted defense of the social conquests achievedby the overthrow of capitalism in order to preserve their own privileged position.But because their rule is based on the political expropriation of the working class,these petty-bourgeois bureaucratic castes are incapable of mobilizing the proletarianmasses for an international revolutionary assault on the bastions of world capitalism.since it would simultaneously mean their own demise. The Stalinist rulers in Hanoi.Saigon and Phnom Penh must be overthrown by a workers' political revolution led by aTrotskyist party in order to establish the organs of proletarian democracy and opcn theroad to socialism. All Ind ochina Must Go Communist!

-"Capitalist Class Rule Smashed in Vietnam. Cambodia'"WV No. 68. 9 May 1975

Telegram to "0 Chi MinhThis cablegram was sellt on the day the US. air attacks against North Vietl/a11/

\I'ere begun.President Ho Chi Minh.Democratic Republic of VietnamHanoi, North Vietnam:

Sunday, 7 February 1965

Spartacist in fullest solidarity with defense of your country against attack by UnitedStates imperialism. Heroic struggle of Vietnamese working people furthers the American revolution. Spartacist Editorial Board

>, * * * *Ha\ana. Cuba

We would like to thank you for the copy of your telegram to Presidcnt Ho-chi-Minhthat you kindly sent us.We. South Vietnafnese, specially are deeply moved by the heroic and powerfulmovement of American Ncgroes, students. workers. employees and personalities demanding the end of the aggressiYe war of US imperialism in South Vietnam and of theUS attacks against the territory of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. and supportingthe just struggle of our people.Wc would like to [take] this opportunity to exprcss [to] you our deepest thanks and tosend you our best greetings. Ly-van-Sau,[South Vietnam National Liberation Front]

WORKERS VANGUARD


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B o s t o n H o l o c a u s t j ) M ' ~ R 1 i r i a l Police Ensure Vile Fascist Provocation

On May 8, the 60th anniversary of theday the Soviet Red Army smashed Hitlerite fascism, a heavy police mobilization protected a dozen neo-Nazi "WhiteRevolution" scum and attacked leftistanti-fascist protesters. The action tookplace outside Boston's Faneuil Hallwhere a Holocaust (Shoah) memorialevent was taking place. Protected byscores of riot cops, mounted police andmotorcycle cops, the fascists paraded forgenocide, raising blood-chilling signslike "Six Million Lies" and "There's NoBusiness Like Shoah Business!"The police savagely bloodied antifascist protesters and arrested one youngblack man, Jerome Higins, after he wasassaulted by a rabid white supremacist.The Partisan Defense Committee offeredto help post bail for Higins and issued aprotest letter demanding that "the outrageous charges of affray and disturbing thepeace be dropped and that Jerome Higinsbe released immediately."Our non-sectarian class solidarity withanti-fascist victims of police violence inno way lessens our political differences

class. The Massachusetts governor, theBoston mayor. a Massachusetts Congressional delegation, and Israeli and Germanconsulate officials were in attendance.Given this confluence of interestsbetween the memorial organizers andthe government, and given the massivedeployment of police force to protect this

event-and the fascists outside it-therewas no opportunity to stop the neo-Nazisin the street. Thus, we did not join in thefalse heroics of a small number of leftistswho went directly up against riot policeescorting the fascists down CongressStreet.The capitalist media played its role in'preventing an outpouring of oppositionto the fascists with a press blackout onthe Nazi provocation that was lifted onlytwo days before the event. Similarly,they blacked out the location of the fas

cists' rally the day before in nearbySomerville, which forced the closure of apublic library there.Criminally, the Zionist organizers ofthe Holocaust commemoration equatedthe neo-Nazis with anti-fascist protesters.

WV Photo

do anything. We had already worked outa plan of escape. But at that moment Idecided-We must not simply escape.We must destroy the fascists and thecamp."For these Zionists to attack the communists, anarchists and other anti-fascistsis to ignore the message history delivered, as attested to eloquently by GermanLutheran Pastor Niemoller. His wordsare inscribed on the Holocaust Memorial monument: "They came first forthe Communists, and I didn't speak upbecause I wasn't a Communist. Then theycame for the Jews, and I didn't speak upbecause I wasn't a Jew. Then they camefor the trade unionists, and I didn't speakup because I wasn't a trade unionist. Thenthey came for the Catholics, and I didn'tspeak up because I was a Protestant. Thenthey came for me, and by that time no onewas left to speak up."

Zionist neocons help map policy forthe Christian fundamentalist Bush regimein support of Israeli policy, from oppression of the Palestinians to the occupationof Iraq. At home, these racist Zionistsview struggles for black rights as some

May 8: Anti-fascist picket at Faneuil Hall (left). Heavy cop mobilization protects fascists (right).about how to fight the fascists. On May 8,we mobilized supporters and joined a defacto united-front protest of a few hundred people with Progressive Labor (PL),Workers World (WWP), the InternationalSocialist Organization (ISO) and others ina picket line outside Faneuil Hall. AsMarxists, we fight against illusions pushedby the reformist left to rely on the capitalist state to outlaw the fascists, and wealso oppose a strategy of bravado, of losing confrontati9ns between small groupsof protesters and overwhelming policeforce. Both false strategies spring fromthe same source: a denial of the critical importance of mobilizing the socialpower of the working class in struggle,and a touching faith in, or indifference to,the murderous force of capitalist staterepression.

The Yom HaShoah commemoration inFaneuil Hall was sponsored by the JewishCommunity Relations Council (JCRC),a Zionist coalition that includes the AntiDefamation League, B'nai B'rith International and the American Jewish Congress.The stated purpose of JCRC is to build "abroad network of support for Israel in itsquest for a secure and lasting peace." Thispolitical purpose meshes with the perspectives of the Bush administration andthe current interests of the U.S. ruling

The JCRe's "special update and instructions for Sunday" stated, "Sadly, weexpect protests at this event by a neo-Naziorganization and counter protests by ananarchist anti-fascist group ... Please donot engage or acknowledge the demonstra-tors in any way. Any engagement will helpgive the protesters the very publicity tha tthey want and help them circulate theirmessage of hate" (emphasis in original).This equation of neo-Nazis witb theirintended victims obscenely mucks themessage of the moving New EnglandHolocaust Memorial monument, wherethe May 8 commemoration concluded.Six glass towers, etched with six millionnumbers representing numbers tattooedon the arms of six million Jews killed inthe Nazi Holocaust, rise from a walkwayindicating the names of the death campsand recalling the facts about the Jews,communists, Gypsies, homosexuals andothers who perished in the Holocaust.Smoke rises from embers. Quotes fromHolocaust survivors are displayed. including this. from Alexander Pechersky.a captured Soviet Red Army soldier. wholed the prisoner revolt at Sobibor camp:"From our barracks we could see the gaschambers. A heart-rending crv of won'1enand children reached us (her-e. We wereovercome by a feeling of helplessness.There we were. watching and unahle to

kind of local intifada to be met with staterepression. We have warned that thisZionist alliance with profoundly antiSemitic Christian fundamentalist forcesin America will redound against the Jewish people-as fascist Billy Roper's"White Revolution" neo-Nazi provocation in Boston revealed.

In the days leading up to the protest,our Boston comrades widely distributedthe last issue of Workers Vanguard withits article, "Boston: Reformist LeftIgnores Fascist Danger-For a WorkingClass Strategy to Fight Fascist Provocations" (WV No. 847, 29 April). As thearticle stated: "The fascists, though fewtoday, must not be ignored. They must bestopped-driven away through masslaborlblack mobilizations of all the fascists' intended victims, centrally relyingon the power of the working class. Thisperspective. which the Spartacist Leaguehas fought for. has successfully kept thefascists from gaining ground in a numberof metropolitan areas." Key to this strategy is the Marxist understanding that it isthe power of the organized working classthat can neutralize the forces of the statein the struggle against the fascists.

Our comrades chanted outside FaneuilHall: "Defeat of busing paved the way forfascist Nazis and the KKK!" Since the

defeat of busing in the J970s. black peopIC' gays. Arabs. Asians. and Jews havefaced an escalation of racist attacks inBoston. In recent years there. the fascistshave felt emboldened enough to wadeinto leftist demonstrations called indefense of Palestinians, gay rights andagainst the occupation of Iraq.

On May 8, we insisted on politicaldebate within the framework of antifascist unity on the picket-line protest. Atone point, Workers World led the chant:"Fascism-Shut it down! Racism-Shutit down!" When they continued, "Zionism-shut it down!"-in a context wherethe Nazis were threatening a Holocaustmemorial event-we countered, "NoNazi final solution! For Arab-Hebrewworkers revolution!" and "Auschwitzwe will not forget!" Our supporters alsoraised placards and chanted in defense ofthe Palestinian people and demanded"Israeli Troops, Settlers Out of the Occupied Territories!" This was too muchfor Progressive Labor. which denies thenational rights Clf the oppressed Palestinians. They dispatched a honcho to warn us(to no avail) that we would have to leavethe protest if we continued to "disrupt"!

Our placard. "Genocide is not debatable!" took aim at the false view that thefascists are like right-wing ideologues.No! They are action groups that "speak"with the lynch rope and recruit to a program of genocide and racist terror. In"normal" times. when the bourgeoisiefeels secure in its class rule. it keeps itsunruly fascist dogs on the leash. But inperiods of deep social crisis. when openclass warfare explodes, the bourgeoisielets loose its fascist gangs to try to crushthe workers movement with blood and terror. The fascists are the organized expression of the despair and fury of the pettybourgeoisie, hopelessly squeezed betweenthe two classes with real social power. thecapitalists and the working class.

For its part, the ISO promoted the liethat: "In 1994. the last time Nazis tried tohold a demonstration here, hundreds ofactivists ran them out of town" (SocialistWorker Online, 6 May). The truth is thatfascist would-be fUhrer Richard Barrettrallied and succeeded in recruiting abouta score of white racist youth to join himon the steps of South Boston HighSchool, under the protection of an army ofriot cops, SWAT teams and federal marshals, while the reformist left willinglywent into police pens. On 23 October1999 in New York City, the ISO opposedour successful mass laborlblack mobilization to stop the Klan. Instead, they builta "demonstration for tolerance" with Latino cops and Democratic Party politicianScott Stringer, who offered to get theKKK a permit!

As last Sunday's events make clear, itis necessary to see clearly the role of thestate, and its relationship to the fascists.As we wrote in our last issue:"Our revolutionary strategy is to mobilizethe power of the working class independ-ently of the state and independently of itsclass enemies. the capitalist parties ofracism and war. Democrats as well asRepublicans. The working class needs togain strength and self-contidence in organizing for its own interests. learning how.in action. it can lead all sectors of theoppressed in common struggle. We fightfor burning necessities. like the need tosmash racist segregation. in such a way asto show that the only genuine solution isthe overthrow of capitalism and the creation of a workers government."_

For Labor/Black Mobilizations to Stop the Fascists!.

13 MAY 2005 3


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SYC Leads Prates"t Against ROTCOn April 16, while halfway across theworld U.S. imperialism continued its bru

tal neocolonial occupation of Iraq, dozensof people came out to protest the ReserveOfficers Training Corps (ROTC) at UCBerkeley. On hand for Cal Day, UC Berkeley's annual open house, thousands ofprospective students and parents filled thecampus and saw a loud and visible protestUC Berkeley

built under the demands "'ROTClMilitaryRecruiters Off Campus!", "All U.S.Troops Out of Iraq, Now!", "Down WitliAnti-Gay Discrimination in the Military!"Energetic protesters marched in frdntof ROTC's tables chanting "ROTC recruiters, imperialist looters, off campusnow!" as observers cheered in solidarity.A spokesman for the Spartacus YouthClub, which initiated the demonstration,explained why ROTC deserved the hostile reception:

"Military recruiters and ROTC are directappendages of the military machine thatexists to defend the American imperialistruling class. ROTC recruits are the nextgeneration of military officers who oversee and direct U.S. invasions and occupations, like Iraq and Afghanistan ... TheSpartacus Youth Club opposes the extension of the repressive apparatus of thecapitalist state onto college campusesand high schools ... We say: ROTC, military recruiters off campus now'"

ISO Missing in Actionvation for protesting ROTC, at the CANconference the ISO took a course ofaction that perfectly befits its reformistpolitics. They maneuvered, unsuccessfully, to keep our motion from being presented to the body and gave a steadycascade of lame excuses as to whythey couldn't endorse, participate in orbuild the protest. Then, when they sawthat we had rallied real support for theaction, they tried to save face by votingin favor of our proposal! Their unsavory arguments included that we weregoing over BSTW's head (though BSTWhad already endorsed a Cal Day antiROTC action at a February meeting); thatresources were too tight to even send outan e-mail; and that some are "uncomfortable" working with us. Ultimately, ourproposal, though it failed to achieve amajority, split the conference delegates,with five in favor, five opposed, and fourabstaining.

Anyone who opposes the occupation ofIraq should oppose ROTC and militaryrecruiters on college campuses. The U.S.ruling class has sent tens of thousands ofyoung men and women to kill and die toprotect the interests of U.S. imperialism inIraq. ROTC is the military's program oncollege campuses to convert students intomilitary officers, enticing prospective students by promising to payoff a goodchunk of their school fees.The international working class musttake a side with the Iraqi peoples. Insofar as the opposition forces aim theirblows against the imperialist occupiersand their lackeys-and not in criminalsectarian violence against other sectorsof the population in Iraq-we stand fortheir military defense. At the same time,we are intransigent political opponentsof the bourgeois-nationalist and reactionary woman-hating clerical forces thatare behind much of the so-called Iraqiresistance. We stand for the defeat of theU.S. imperialists in their predatory warsagainst neocolonial countries like Iraqand fight for class struggle against U.S.imperialism at home. We demand theimmediate, unconditional withdrawal of

all U.S. troops and their allies' Downwith the colonial occupation!In addition to some onlookers and afew students met by SYCers while supporting the AFSCME service workersstrike a few days earlier, some activistswith the Berkeley Stop the War Coalition(BSTW) joined the protest. Notably

absent was the International SocialistOrganization (ISO), which did everythingit could to demobilize the protest.A week before the protest, the SYCintervened sharply into the April 9regional Counter-Recruitment Conference of the Campus Antiwar Network(CAN) calling on CAN (in which theISO is centrally involved) to endorse andhelp build the anti-ROTC mobilizationa concrete step that students could takeagainst the imperialist war machine.Because the imperialist military upholdsthe exploitation and oppression of working people across the world, student protests against military recruiters andROTC point to the need for students tomobilize behind the power of labor,which alone can uproot the capitalist system that gives rise to imperialist war.Faced with an anti-imperialist moti-

Behind the ISO's inane excuses liestheir hostility to revolutionary truth-tellerslike the SYC-they're right that we makesome people uncomfortable. We makethose who simply want to refurbish thesullied image of U.S. imperialism uncomfortable because we point out that thissystem can't be made to serve the interests of working people and the oppressedthrough mass pressure and false "unity,"but needs to be destroyed and replaced

Columbia Students ProtestNOT DNE MANW O M A ~ / 6 A ~

OR . srRAlbliT,fDt( THf.IMf'ERIALlSIJ

MII.11Ad -

Walker/NY Times Young SpartacusSpartacists at 1965 Columbia University rally against ROTC (left). Spartacus Youth Club at May 6 protest against proposed return of ROTC to Columbia (right).From Vietnam to Iraq, Spartacists have opposed military recruiters on campus as part of struggle against U.S. imperialism.

University SenQte Votes AgQinst ROTCMAY 6-The Spartacus Youth Clubjoined nearly a hundred students today inprotesting the proposed return of theReserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC)to Columbia University. The speakout andrally took place in response to a UniversitySenate meeting scheduled to vote a resolution recommending the reinstatementof ROTC on the campus. In a small butimportant victory. the Senate voted overwhelmingly against the recommendation.ROTC was kicked off Columbia University in 1969, while the U.S. was waging its losing war against the VietnameseRevolution and following militant studentprotest and campus occupations againstthe war and for black rights. The intersection of - the struggle against racistU.S. imperialism and the fight against theracial oppression of black people is exemplified on the campus by the Black Stu-4

dents Organization'S Malcolm X Lounge- the former ROTC lounge which wasoccupied and renamed by black studentsin 1968.Pro-imperialist forces at Columbiahave been lobbying hard for several yearsto bring back ROTC. In March 2004, theUniversity Senate established a studentfaculty Task Force on ROTC to study astudent proposal to restore ROTC. TheTask Force was evenly split on whetherROTC should return to Columbia University by the 200617 school year, but wasalmost unanimous in favoring ROTC'sreturn if there were no longer discrimination against gays in the military. In counterposition to the liberals who haveargued that ROTC would be acceptable ifnot for the military's anti-gay discrimination, the SYC has sought to rally studentsin opposition to ROTC on the basis of

opposition to bloody U.S. imperialismand its military. By its very nature, theimperialist military reflects in concentrated form all the social oppressionintrinsic to the capitalist class rule itdefends-racist, sexist and anti-gay.

The Spartacus Youth Club addressedtoday's rally, receiving cheers and applause for the following remarks:"ROTC is a direct appendage of thebloody U.S. imperialist military machine,recruiting officers to oversee imperialistslaughter of the kind being carried outunder the brutal neocolonial occupationof Iraq. The Spartacus Youth Club opposes the direct use of the university bythe imperialist military and urges studentsto protest ROTC and military recruiters aspart of the struggle to defend the Iraqipeople against the U.S. occupiers. Downwith the colonial occupation of Iraq! All

U.S. troops out of Iraq now! While weoppose all forms of racial and sexual discrimination in society, including in themilitary, we know that no amount ofreform is going to change the fundamental purpose of the bloody, imperialist U.S.military-to uphold the capitalist systemof racism, exploitation and war. Thatsystem cannot be reformed to be mademore humane or democratic. That's anillusion that organizations like the International Socialist Organization promote,including by welcoming DemocraticParty politicians, capitalist politicians,onto the platforms of their antiwardemonstrations, preaching unity with theenemy of working people, and unity withthe very class whose system breedswar and racism. We say: Only socialistrevolution can end imperialist war! Andonly the working class fighting independently of the capitalist class enemy candestroy imperialism once and for all!Break with the Democratic Party! Build arevolutionary workers party! ROTC offcampus now!".

WORKERS VANGUARD


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with a socialist society. The ISO tried tosabotage the anti-ROTC protest becauseits heavy dose of revolutionary. workingclass-centered politics was a threat totheir attempts to keep things "comfortable" for bourgeois liberals.

For years at Berkeley (and elsewhere).the ISO has not considered it a priority toprotest military recruiters on campus:they have boycotted every SY C antiROTC united-front protest for. the lastfive years. However. coming off lastNovember's court ruling overturning theSolomon Amendment. which denied federal funding to colleges that don't allowmilitary recruiters. and growing studentactivism on this issue. the ISO has nowfound a mOYement "pointing the wayforward for the antiwar movement as awhole" (Socialist Worker, 18 February).Of special appeal to the ISO is the legalistic strategy of getting military recruitersbanned on the basis of their anti-gay discrimination. This was laid ou t by theISO's Elizabeth Wrigley-Field in herReport on the Youth Ami- War Movement:""Before the [Solomon Amendment] courtruling. activists could drive recruiters away...by surrounding the recruitment tableand chanting against i t -but they couldnot get the military banned as policy"(www.lefthook.org. 13 December 2004).

The ISO has thus sought to rally students around a "realistic" campaign-theBSTW coalition, in which the ISO isheavily involved. issued a "classroom

EuropeanUnion...(continuedjrolll page 1)was called by the European Trade UnionConfederation (ETUC), following an initial call by the European Social Forum(ESF) last October in London. That ES Elike those before it. was a popular front,a class-collaborationist confab featuringtrade-union bureaucrats and representatives of various reformist workers parties, as well as bourgeois liberals, Islamicclerics. a speaker from the Iraqi puppetgovernment, and so on. It was fundedby London's Labour government. ETUCgeneral secretary John Monks recentlydeclared: "We are very much in favour ofthe Constitution."While most French trade-union bureaucrats who mobilized for the Brusselsdemonstration saw it as a platform topromote a "no\' vote on the Constitution,they fundamentally share Monks' visionof a "social Europe" under capitalistrule. They would also have no quarrelwith his chauvinist statement at theBrussels demonstration that, "We don'twant Europe to become America."Attacks sucq as the Bolkestein Directive-which has now been put on holduntil after the French referendum-weredevised before the European Constitution, and others will follow, whatever theoutcome of the referendum in France.The key to stopping them lies throughclass struggle by the working class.As our comrades noted in Le Bolche-vik (March 2005):"Today the bourgeoisies of West Europeseek to dismantle what remains of thewelfare state. a series of concessions

such as national health insurance. retirement pensions and public services-that

SYC Class SeriesCHICAGO

Tuesday, May 31, 7 p.m.Germany 1923 and the CominternUniversity of ChicagoCobb Hall, Room 2145811 S. Ellis Ave.Information and readings: (312) 563-0441or e-mail: [email protected] MAY 2005

announcement paragraph" that makestheir reformist program clear: "The military's 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' policy violates the Campus' anti-discriminationpolicy. This provides us with an opportunity to pressure our administration todo the right thing and get the militaryrecruiters of f ou r campus." The ISO andBSTW place their faith in the sameuniversity administrations that run thecampuses in the interests of the capitalistsystem. This role is demonstrated by

were instituted in order to calm workingclass militancy in the period followingthe Soviet victory of 1945. The bourgeoisie is hardly predisposed to spendmoney on improving the condition ofthe masses unless it is forced to. and,since the counterrevolution in 1991-1992which dcstroyed the Sovict degeneratedworkers state. it has been seeking to takeback these concessions in order toincrease its competitiveness against itsri\'als. It is necessary to fight toothand nail against these attacks. As longas capitalism exists, the fight to winreforms and to prevent their dismantlingwill remain permanently on the agenda.The task of a revolutionary party is,starting from the relentless struggle todefend the gains and social conquests ofthe workers and oppressed. to bring tothe workers an understanding of thenecessity for workers revolution."We print below a translation of an article published in Le Bolchevik No. 171

(March 2005), newspaper of the LigueTrotskyste de France, section of theInternational Communist League.

LLBOLCHEVlifSJLast June. the heads of state of theEuropean Union agreed on a draft European Constitution. Chirac announcedthat on May 29 he would hold a referendum on it, hoping through a plebiscite toconsolidate his authority, which has beendamaged by three years of savage attacksagainst workers and minorities and byrivalries within [Chirac's] UMP. The PSand the Greens, hoping to be re-electedto government in 2007. have called for a"yes" vote to show their respectabilityand loyalty to the basic foreign policychoices of the French bourgeoisie.

Against this new joint campaign bythe PS. the Greens and Chirac, we callfor a "no" vote because we are againstthe capitalist EU. an alliance centeredon the main European imperialist powers to improve their competitivenessagainst their American and JapaneseTivals. Such an alliance can only be at theexpense of the multiethnic working classin Europe and of those under the boot ofneocolonialism.

Our principled opposition to capitalistEurope differentiates us from the French"left." Disregarding the bourgeois party ledby Chevenement, some ultrachauvinistsectors of the PCF and Pierre Lambert'sParti des Travailleurs (PT-known particularly for its "defense of the Republic," that

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EuropeanUnion...(continued from page 5)to "travel" in France-as long as he neverstops, because he has no right to stayhere.We consider that the European Unionis a reactionary imperialist consortium,and we recall Lenin's prescient words inAugust 1915:"Of course, temporary agreements arepossible between capital ish and between

states. Jn this sense a United Statesof Europe is possible as an agreementbetween the European capitalists .. butto what end') Only for the purpose ofjointly suppressing socialism in Europe,of jointly protecting colonial bootyagainst Japan and America."The European Union:From an Anti-Soviet Allianceto an Imperialist Consortium

The origins of the European Union goback to the 1950s when the West European imperialists, led by the U.S., sought"through improved economic cohesion, toconsolidate their alliance against theSoviet Union. In spite of its degeneratio'n,as a parasitic bureaucratic caste led byStalin appropriated political power starting in 1924, the Soviet Union remained aworkers state based on the expropriationof the capitalists and the collectivizationof the means of production, resultingfrom the Octobef 1917 Revolution. Thatis why we Trotskyists defended the SovietUnion, and it is why the imperialistswanted to destroy it in order to regainunlimited access for their investment capital throughout East Europe.

Our principled opposition to bothNATO, which was a military allianceagainst the Soviet Union. and to its economic corollary. the European EconomicCommunity [forerunner of the EUJ.flowed from our 'defense of the SovietUnion. The character of the EuropeanUnion changed with the counterrevolutionary destruction of the Soviet Union in1991-92. France and Germany, two separate imperialist powers with two distinctand rival bourgeoisies. are seeking toimprove their joint coordination-andare maneuvering with capitalist Russia,among others-with the sole aim of pursuing their respective interests. Obviously, Germany. which is stronger thanFrance, is the dominant partner in thisrelationship. In December 1989, only amonth after the fall of the Berlin wall.[French president] Mitterrand negotiatedwith German chancellor Kohl a deepening of economic relations between Germany and France, the two main WestEuropean powers. through an agreement.in principle, to create a common currency. This was supposed ' to become aweapon in a monetary war against theinternational hegemony of the dollar. Itbecame the euro.However, under the pressure of theAmerican imperialists, whose economy isconsiderably more dynamic and whose

6

UBOLClIEVId,_ ... URNon a 'Union europeenne capitalisteet sa " Constitution" !

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7/12

for them, the Mexican peasants of Chiapas arose on 1 January 1994, the dayNAFTA went into effect. At the time, theentire French left, and the LCR in particular, solidarized with the Zapatista uprising against NAFTA.Today, these same leftists-who, attimes, still cynically call themselves"Zapatistas"-are expressing their satisfaction that Poland is joining the EU andare demanding that Turkey do the same!NAFTA is not the EU. but the inclusion ofPoland-and, in the future, Romania andpossibly Turkey-will deepen the oppression of workers and peasants in thosecountries. As our German comrades ofthe Spartakist-Arbeiterpartei Deutschlandsdeclared (Spartakist No. 156, Fall 2004):"During the negotiation, over joining theEU, the. European imperialist', rai sed aseries of criteria for entry that represcnted a program of brutal social attacks.For example, in Poland the mining sectorwas 'rendered competitive: that is, miners were laid off ell masse and pits wereclosed. Unemployment compensation isso low that it is insufficient for survival.Today, in the historically important mining region of lelenia G6ra (where theunemployment rate is above 40 percent),one can find many mines in the forestwhich were dug by laid-off miners digging with spades in search of coaL ... This is the result of the counterrevolution, which was led by Solidarnosc inPoland."

However, it is the question of Turkeywhich, above all, has triggered hystericalprotests. [The fascist] Le Pen, [the farrightist] De Villiers, [the neo-Gaullist]Sarkozy, [the Socialist] Fabius and theirilk go berserk at tne idea of 70 millionTurkish and Kurdish Muslims being able

countering American supremacy in theregion. While the left declares itselfpro-Europe and internationalist, evenvoting "no" on the draft Constitut ion,they actually serve as a left cover forFrench chauvinism. They simply have adifferent approach on how to strengthentheir own bourgeoisie, while hoping toget a few crumbs for the French working class.Apparently, many Kurdish workers andpeasants imagine that the European Unionwill bring an end to age-old nationaloppression. Nothing could be more mistaken. Not only will the European Unionnot accept the partition of Turkey. Syria,Iraq and Iran for the purpose of formingan independent Kurdish republic, buteven in the most advanced countries ofthe European Union, the national question has not been resolved. Irish Catholicsare oppressed in Northern Ireland, as areBasques in Spain and France, not tomention the Corsicans and the colonialoppression in Guadeloupe and elsewhere.As for Greece, an EU member for nearly25 years, it continues to oppress Turks,Slavo-Macedonians, Albanians, Roma anda multitude of other minorities.Factory Relations and the FightAgainst Racism and Chauvinism

Today many workers feel threatenedby plant closures by companies seeking to move their operations to EastEurope, Turkey, the Chinese deformedworkers state or elsewhere. Since theunion bureaucrats accept the capitalists'viewpoint. they necessarily buy into the

" ' ~ ~ b : > = , : ",,,,' ~ ~ _AP

Basque demonstrators demand, "N o to the arrest warrants." For the right ofself-determination fo r the Basque people, in both Spain and France!to enter the EU. In fact, people of Muslimand North African origin in France arealso targeted by this rotten racist campaign. But this is not a reason to be forTurkey's entry into the EU, as is claimedby LO and the LCR. who find themselvesin a bloc on this question .. with C hiracand the French PCF. Alain Bocquet, thehead of the PCF parliamentary fraction in the National Assembly, repeatingChirac's arguments, clearly expressed thereasons why the chauvinist PCF is forTurkey's entry:"In the view of Europe preferred by theCommunists, proceeding along this roadis better than having an isolated Turkeyat the doors of Europe. Otherwise. Turkey will be prey to several possible outcomes. The tirst one is the rise of Islamicfundamentalism-recall in this regardthat Turkey, a mainly Muslim society. is,as far as its institutions are concerned, asecular state. A second possibility isintensified militarism-the army is animportant pillar of Turkish society. providing a means for social advancement.And the third possibility is the danger ofa pro-Atlantic shift, since the U.S. stillconsiders the maintenance of Turkeywithin the framework of NATO as a strategic objective of the first ordt'r."

-L'HulI lal l i te. 9 FebruaryWhen French leftists take up the ideathat the European Union will bring freedom to the Kurds and democracy toTurkish workers, they only demonstratetheir profound illusions in the supposedly progressive character of their ownbourgeoisie . Such illusions disarm theworking class and prevent it from waging revolutionary class struggle. Bocquet's declaration goes to the heart of thequestion of Turkey's entry into the EU -13 MAY 2005

need for their own national enterprisesto increase their competitiveness onthe world market. They thus sign dealafter deal dismantling hard-won gainsin terms of wages, hours and workingconditions.The capitalists seek to turn the workers' anger against their class brothers

of other nationalities abroad and withintheir own country. That is why we insistthat the fight against these attacks by thebourgeoisie, including factory closings inthe name of increased competitiveness,can only be carried out if accompaniedby an uncompromising fight againstracist terror and chauvinism. Full citi-zenship rights for everyone in this coun-try! As our German comrades wrote(Spartakist No. 157, Winter 2004-2005):

"As a result of capitalist counterrevolution in the DDR and East Europe. theGerman bourgeoisie today has at its disposal a vast reservoir of unemployedskilled workers. and it is trying to exportunskilled jobs to countries where the rate.of profit is significantly higher. TheTurkish and Kurdish workers remain alarge strategic component of the workingclass in Germany. but the racist Germanleaders have less and less economic needfor a large part of the Turkish and Kurdish population. particularly the secondand third generation, for whom there areno jobs. They are viewed by the rulingclass with racist contempt as well as fearas the tinder for a social explosion." .

During last October's powerful OpelBochum strike in the industrial bastionof the Ruhr, our German comradesreported in the same Spartakist:

'There are also a lot of discussions aboutthe Opcl factory in Gliwice. Poland. We

"-- -On a a \0\ rac\ste contre \es )tunesqui portent \e .fouldrdld r O t ~ ? , ~ c\toyennete pour tous \Q.S inniqres!\\ueralion feMMes revolution sodanstet

Le BolchevikLTF contingent in 14 February 2004 demonstration against Chirac's banningheadscarves in schools. Banners read: "N o to Racist Law Against Youth Wh oWear the Headscarf! Full Citizenship Rights fo r All Immigrants! For Women'sLiberation Through Socialist Revolution!"

did not hear any open anti-Polish chauvinism. Nevertheless. there was a moodof 'We couldn't compete with the wagesthat they have over there.' And whyshould t h e y ~ Workers in Germany musthelp workers in Poland to fight for decentwages and working conditions againstthe greed for capitalist profits which wasunleashed by the counterrevolution. Forthis, a revolutionary party is necessary.based on a program of internationalistclass struggle. Ultimately, only a plannedeconomy under the control of the working class can eliminate the glaring economic and social differences betweenvarious countries."It is on the basis of this perspective thatwe raise our slogan of a Socialist United

States of Europe. Only by overthrowingthe bourgeoisies of Europe through workers revolutions is it possible to proceedtoward a socialist society, superseding theframework of nation-states.The LCR and the PCFRehabilitate theSocial Democrats

The joint campaign by the PCF and theLCR for a "no" vote is the LCR's contribution to restoring the image of Frenchsocial democracy. which has been seriously tarnished-particularly in the caseof the PCF-by its five years of dirtywork in the [PS-led] Jospin government. They manage to rehabilitate Laurent Fabius, spokesman within the PS fora "no" vote. who has long personified"neoliberalism" in the PS thanks to hissavage attacks on the working class whenhe was Mitterrand's prime minister inthe 1980s. In the 1986 legislative elections (which he lost to Chirac), Fabiuseven bragged that, "It's our turn to dothe 'dirty work'" (s upplement to Le Bol-chevik No. 68, 8 December 1986) However, Red (January 2005), the newspaper of the LCR's youth group, theJCR. relates the following fable about the

anti-Constitution "reformists" (obviouslyincluding Fabius):"This Constitution divides the former'Plural Left' [the name of the 10spingovernment's popular-front coalition]between the social-liberals who are infavor of it and the reformists, who understand that with this Constitution therewill no longer be any room for anysocial policy. The task of revolutionariesis thus to further this contradiction in('rder to trigger a movement of politicalreorganization which we. from the sideof the revolutionaries. will try to drawtoward the radical left."

In fact. the PCF and the LCR are counting on a large number of "no" votes inorder to negotiate with the PS, after the referendum. a better distribution of seats inthe next "left" alliance for the 2007 elections in view of entering the capitalistgovernment. A Fabius-Buffet governmentemerging out of a victory for a "no" votewould be as tiercely anti-working-class asits predecessors. This would be true even ifit had the LCR's Krivine as a governmentminister (or, more likely, an undersecretary) and even with a member of the JCRas secretary of youth and sports (their comrade Miguel Rossetto has already been acapitalist minister in Brazil for two years),whatever the good intentions (or in anycase, the fine words) of these reformists.There is no other way to administercapitalism than to attack the workers.What is needed is a fight to overthrow thewhole capitalist system through workersrevolution.We are voting "no" on this referendum, but. above all, we warn the workersagainst the maneuvers by the LCR andthe PCF to reconstitute a new "PluralLeft" governmental coalition. Down withclass collaboration! Join our fight fo r atruly internationalist communist party inFrance, section of a reforged TrotskyistFourth International!.--- SPARTACIST LEAGUE/U.S.--Local Directory and Public Offices

Web site: www.ici-fi.org E-mail address:[email protected] Office: Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10116 (212) 732-7860

BostonBox 390840, Central Sta.Cambridge, MA 02139(617) [email protected] 6441, Main POChicago, IL 60680(312) [email protected] Office:Sat. 2-5 p.m.222 S. Morgan(Buzzer 23)

Los AngelesBox 29574, Los Feliz Sta.Los Angeles, CA 90029(213) [email protected] Office: Sat. 2-5 p.m.3806 Beverly Blvd., Room 215New YorkBox 3381, Church St. Sta.New York, NY 10008(212) [email protected] Office:Sat. 1-4 p.m.299 Broadway, Suite 318

OaklandBox 29497Oakland, CA 94604(510) [email protected] Office:Sat. 1-5 p.m .1634 Telegraph3rd FloorSan FranciscoBox 77494San Francisco, CA [email protected]

TROTSKYIST LEAGUE OF CANADA/LiGUE TROTSKYSTE DU CANADATorontoBox 7198, Station AToronto, ON M5W 1X8(416) [email protected]

VancouverBox 2717, Main P.O.Vancouver, BC V6B 3X2(604) [email protected]


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Mumia...(continued from page 1)

Democratic and Republican Parties, wantMumia dead because they see in this eloquent journalist. MOVE supporter andformer Black Panther Party spokesman asymbol of defiant opposition to their system of racist oppression."The demonstration was followed byan indoor rally where some 350 peoplegathered. Speakers at the indoor rally included Pam Africa of ICFFMAJ: RachelWolkenstein, counsel for the PDe: blackDemocratic Party politician and formerNew York City mayor David Dinkins:Brenda Stokely, president of AFSCMEDC 1707: New York City councilman BillPerkins: and Larry Holmes of the Workers World Party's lAC.Many of those at the indoor rally werelooking for a way forward to fight for

Jamal's freedom. What was unique aboutthis event was the all-too-rare clash ofpolitical views and strategies on precisely this question. On one pole was theopen embrace of trust in the justice ofthe American court system promoted byDinkins and the lAC: on the other wasthe class-struggle perspective offered byWolkenstein, the PDC and the SL. As ourleaflet stated: "In our defense of Mumiawe have supported pursuing all availablelegal avenues open to fight for his freedom and against the death penalty. Butwe have always promoted the understanding that the fight to free Mumiamust be independent of the racist capitalist state, which has worked for years toframe him up. It is this Marxist understanding that differentiates our programfrom those who rely on a legalistic strategy, building illusions that the capitalistcourts are fair,"Pam Africa introduced Wolkenstein,citing her efforts in obtaining evidence ofMumia's innocence and, speaking of thePDC. emphasized: "For years their position has been one that Mumia is innocentand to hell with a triaL" Africa added,"That's absolutely true, but we have people who are not ready to move that way."She encouraged rally participants toobtain the PDC pamphlet MlIl71ia Ahu-Jamal Is an Inllocent Mall!, containingaffidavits by Wolkenstein, Mumia, hisbrother William Cook and Arnold Beverly, in which Beverly admits that he, notJamal, killed Philadelphia police officerDaniel Faulkner in 1981. That day, wesold 109 copies of the pamphlet andanother 150 pieces of Marxist literature.Wolkenstein's speech was greeted withapplause and a standing ovation becauseit struck a chord with the predominantlyblack audience, many of whom werelongtime political activists. It underlinedthat it is necessary to mobilize the socialpower of the working class on behalf ofJamal, independently of all capitalist parties. She explained the role of the capitalist state as an institution that exists todefend the interests of the ruling capitalist class against working people and theoppressed, and why it is so dangerous topeddle illusions in the state. As our flyerstated: "The courts, the cops, the prosecutors and the military make up the state

8

BUNDLES AVAILABLE!Evidence Explodes Frame-Up:Declarations and affidavitsof Mumia Abu-Jamal,Arnold R. Beverly, R9-chelWolkenstein and othersprove that death row politicalprisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal isan innocent man.Published September 2001Bundles: (includes postage)10 copies - $525 copies - $10Single copy: $.50 (32 pages)Order from/pay to:Partisan Defense CommitteeP.O. Box 99, Canal Street StationNew York, NY 10013

International Action Center raisescall for "New Trial" at April 23 march.We say: There is no justice in thecapitalist courts.apparatus which uses bourgeois law andforce to protect the profit system. Thestate is not neutral and does not functionin the interests of black people, the working class, immigrants or other oppressedminorities. Without this understanding, itis impossible to wage an effective struggleto free Mumia."Wolkenstein also laid bare the evidenceof Mumia's innocence, centered on Beverly's confessions and mounds of supporting evidence. This evidence was suppressed by Jamal's former lead counseLLeonard Weinglass, and his "legal strategist." Daniel Williams. The pursuit of thisevidence on the one hand and its suppression on the other reflected within thelegal team the clash of strategies overwhat social forces must be mobilized tofree Jamal: reliance on the good graces ofthe capitalist courts embodied in the callfor a "new trial for Mumia" or reliance onthe social power of the working class,including through protest actions basedon the multiracial labor movement.A report on the April 23 raIly post ed onthe Workers World Party's Web site (27April) was entitled "Harlem Says 'FreeMumia'," just as one side of the signsthey carried at the protest called to freeMumia. However, their real program wasdisplayed on the other side of the s ign-as seen in the photograph accompanyingtheir article-which called for a "newtrial." Workers World and the lAC are trying to corral those who want to fight forJamal's freedom behind a call that reinforces illusions in the state. The WWParticle motivates the rally by citing the"urgent need to continue building broad,mass pressure on the repressive judicialsystem to grant Abu-Jamal a new tria\."

We are fighting to mobilize the socialpower of the multiracial labor movementnot only to free Mumia, but to get rid ofthis barbaric and murderous capitalist system of hunger, imperialist war, poverty,racist cop terror and vicious attacks onworkers, women, gays and immigrants.Since our inception we have fought forintegrated class struggle and for the per-

P P . .r t i dn De f en eD o . .n l i t t eeSeptember 2001 Pamphlet

Mumia Abu-JamalIs an Innocent Man!

AffidaVit of Rachel WolkenstelnAffidaVit of Arnold A. BeverlyDeclaration of Mumra Abu-JamalDeclarations of William CookAffidaVit of Donald HcrsmgDeclaration of Lmn Washington.AHldavJl of Tern Maurer-Carter

, ; ~ l/( lIh'fIJltilE ,M' ,iI.,l\.. Emoor"#,f;jf FAAtft.fIPI 'f: : ! " F m I ! W ! M I k . , ! ~ :

Free Muml. Now!

spective of revolutionary integrationism,combatting every manifestation of discrimination against black people andfighting to eliminate the oppression ofblacks-which is the bedrock of Ameri.can capitalist society-through a proletarian socialist revolution. Our programof black liberation through socialist revolution is based on the fact that the capitalist rulers have fomented anti-blackracism historically not only to keep blackpeople in their SOc called "place" but toprevent revolutionary unity of the working class against the capitalists.In her remarks at the indoor rally,Brenda Stokely expressed solidarity fromthe Million Worker March. New YorkCity Labor Against the War and DistrictCouncil 1707. vowing: "We will continuethis fight until none of us has a breath tocontinue fighting." Such proclamationsby trade-union leaders cannot be merewords. The social power of labor must bemobilized in action, on the streets. to freeMumia Abu-Jama\. I f undertaken throughthe mobilization of labor. the struggle tofree Mumia would represent a big step inthe struggle to overturn this whole racist,capitalist system.The April 23 rally took place a fewmonths after a presidential election accompanied by an escalating assault on democratic rights. The Democrats have moved

,


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I rca11: \\ ant lu thanK especially PamAfrica for the imitation to speak hereand expose the truth about Mumia' s legalcase. to speak of the dangers that face us.In three weeks it will be 20 years sincethe racist murder of MOVE members andfive MOVE children when a bomb wasdropped on their Osage Avenue home inPhiladelphia. The bomb was dropped bythe FBI, the ATF and the Philadelphiapolice. The May 13, 1985 Mother's Daymessage to MOVE by the capitalist statewas: "Attention, MOVE. This is America." The criminals in the government gotaway with their murder, with not even a

slap on the wrist. Ramona Africa went tojail for years for the crime of survivingthe racist holocaust. This is not unrelatedto Mumia's case. because when the statelocked up Mumia on death row in1982, they took off the street a powerfuldefender of the MOVE organization.It was imprisoned MOVE memberswho in 1987 asked the Partisan DefenseCommittee to take up Mumia's defense.Nine MOVE members had been foundguilty for the killing of a Stakeout policeofficer during the August 1978 policeattack on the MOVE Powelton Villagecommune, but the cop was killed by policecrossfire. The MOVE members were sentenced to 30 to 100 years, and their legalchallenges have been thrown out of court.

These cases, as well as Mumia's, speak tothe basic truth that there is no justice in thecapitalist courts [applause]. Capitalist justice means 'just us."I was part of Mumia's legal defenseteam from 1995 through June 1999, incharge of the defense investigation. Itwas this investigation that led to findingArnold Beverly and obtaining his confession that he shot and killed police officerDaniel Faulkner on Decemb er 9, 1981. Iresigned from the legal team along withJon Piper when his lead attorney, Mumia'slead attorney at the time, Leonard Weinglass, and co-counsel Dan Williams precluded Mumia from presenting this evidence of Mumia's innocence in thecourts. The facts of this investigation, asPam said. are in my affidavit. I will highlight those things in a moment.My work fighting for Mumia's freedom did not begin with the legal team, butstarted years before, in 1987, as part ofthe PDC fight to free class-war prisonersincluding Geronimo ji Jaga (Prall). It'simportant to understand that our principles. our work, is based on principles ofnon-sectarian, c1ass-


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Mumia IsInnocent...( ulltilllled fWIl puge 9)confirms that at the time of Faulkner'sshooting. the commanding officer of thepolice division. the chief of the homicidedivision and one Inspector Alfonzo Giordano v,ere all under investigation on federal corruption charges. Not coincidently.these cops were the chain of command inFaulkner's case. And Giordano knew whoMumia was. More on this in a bit. Thosecops were worried about possible policeinformants. Three federal investigationsinto police corruption, including the mob,were underway at the time Faulkner wasmurdered. Police working as FBI informants were viCtims of hits in the early '80s.A federal prosecutor acknowledged tous that they had a police informant,one whose brother was also a cop, likeFaulkner. These federal investigations alsomean that the FBI has plenty of knowledgeof what happened in Philadelphia CenterCity on December 9-information theyhave refused to release.

Beverly states there were undercovercops and others in uniform at the l oc a- .tion to make sure the hit happened and tohelp Beverly make his getaway. This confirms the testimony of William Singletarythat cops were immediately on the scene.Marcus Cannon. another witness, saidtwo undercover cops were on the sceneduring the shooting. Again, confirmationof Beverly.

Inspector Giordano: ranking officer onthe scene, central witness against Mumiaat the preliminary hearing after the arrest.He not only \\ as one of the cops underinvestigation for corruption, but he wasFrank Rizzo's man. right-hand man, involved in the daily surveillance of theBlack Panther Party members in the '60sand early '70s. and he led the police;takeout team in the 1970s attack on the'hilly Black Panther Party. Giordano waslOlice supervisor of the year-long siegef)f the MOVE Powelton Village house. He

Massad...i continued from page 2)

Business School: multimillion-dollar establishments like Hillel at Columbia:complicitous presidents like Bollingerand Shapiro. ,upported by their boards oftrustees and militant millionaire clubsamong the Columbia and Barnard alumni; advocates of torture like Alan Dershowitz; racist propagandists like Daniel Pipes; anti-intellectual vigilanteslike Martin Kramer; organized cells atColumbia medical, business and lawschools; a bagful of tabloids in Manhattan; Jack-the-Ripper journalists likeDouglas Feiden and Jacob Gershman; adeceitful propaganda machine like theGoliath Project: a minister and his ministry in Israel; city. state and federal politicians seeking higher office here in theUnited States are all ganging up and calling for the heads of two Arabs and aMuslim in post-9/1l New York is quitean achievement for The Nation, one thatI will not forget or forgive."

Academic Freedom andMcCarthyite WitchhuntsA perceptive article by Juan Cole, a

professor of Middle Eastern and SouthAsian history at the University of Michigan, stripped the veneer off the 7 Aprileditorial in the Times:"The New York Times editorial is amongthe more dangerous documents threatening higher education in America to haveappeared in a major newspaper since theMcCarthy period, when professors weretired for their views on economics .... TheTimes' invocation of 'scholarly rigor' is

Moving?To receive Workers Vanguardwithout interruption please let usknow at least three weeks beforeyou move. Send your new andold address to:

10

Spartacist Publishing Co.Box 1377 GPONew York, NY 10116

Beverly and Hersing's statements alsosupport the testin1l'ny ,)1' Pamela Jenkinsand nO\\ Ywtte Willianb that key prosecution \\itness Cynthia White \\as boththreatened and accorded fa\ors to lie onthe \\ i t n e s ~ stand and sa; she ~ a w Mumiashoot Faulkner.

Young spartacusNew York City, Aug ust 1995: Partisan Defense Committee initiated emergen cyunited-front protest in defense of Mumia Abu-Jamal after death warrant wassigned.

There is more. much more. V,'hat is thesignificance of the Bewrly e\idence andwhy has it been suppressed" There is asimple answer-that it exposes the fraudthat the American legal system can provide justice. It demonstrates that there's aunity of purpose of the cops. prosecutionand courts to uphold the capitalist rulers'interests. It makes it clear that the injustice to Mumia was not the action of onerogue cop, or prosecutor. or judge. but theentire functioning of the capitalist systemof injustice [applause]. Williams' book,Executing Justice, denouncing this evidence, has been used by the D.A. and thebourgeois courts to reject evidence ofBeverly's confession and the supportingevidence. That book, and that book alone,has been used to deny this evidence.

knew just who Mumia was. He was thecop who first reported that Mumia's gunwas found on the street, some 12 minutes after cops were already there. Hearranged the supposed identification of. Mumia by the cab driver, Robert Chobert.who was promised favors and protectedby the police. Giordano is the cop whobeat Mumia in the police van and saidthat Mumia had confessed there to shooting Faulkner. Giordano never testified atMumia's trial. In fact, he resigned fromthe police force the day after Mumia'strial was over. In 1986 he copped a pleaon federal charges based on his receivingtens of thousands of dollars in illegal payoffs during the 1979-80 period and didn'tspend any time in jail.Beverly states that Faulkner was firstshot in the back. and then he shot Faulkner in the head before Mumia ever goton the scene. Mumia was shot by an arriving police officer. Beverly says. Homicide cops on the scene told the medicalexaminer's office that Mumia was shot byan arriving police officer. Beverly stateshe had a .22 calibre. The available ballistics and blood evidence at the scene iscontrary to the prosecution's frame-up

really a thinly yeiled demand that professors follow what it defines as an acceptable. 'fair' pedagogical line."But as soon as the 'fairness' of viewsis made the criterion for retaining ateacher. the door is opened to witchhunts and chaos. No two students willagree on what is a 'fair' view of a controversial issue."-"'The New McCarthyism:'www.truthout.org, 22 AprilBollinger. an "expert" on the First

Amendment, stated at a faculty meetinglast October, 'The First Amendment doesnot apply to the university because it is aprivate institution" (London Review ofBooks, 17 February). This statementreceived little publicity. But it had best benoted. Democratic rights must be foughtfor. In the struggle at Columbia today, theSpartacus Youth Club has fought againstreliance on the university administration.

Archreactionaries and racists view theNew York Times as some kind of "commie"paper, while Zionists denounce it as "proArab" because it occasionally reports anIsraeli atrocity. By emboldening the neocons screaming for Arab blood at Columbia, the Times may well find itself a futuretarget of these very same forces.Yet it is precisely now-and historically-that a paper like the Times is valuable to different wings of the rulingclass because of the aura of respectabilityit lends a witchhunt. Although JosephMcCarthy's coarseness offended thenTimes publisher Arthur Hays Sulzberger, Sulzberger hated communism more.and so emphasized "the need for theorderly administration of loyalty oathsand other procedures" (Susan E. Tiff andAlex S. Jones. The Trust [1999]). TheTimes even refused to run a paid addemanding commutation of the death sentences for Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.The Times fired employees who exercisedtheir Fifth Amendment right against selfincrimination during the witchhunt.

More recently. the Times was runningarticles about how the paper was fooled

version. The trajectories are wrong. Itsupports more than one shooter of Faulkner, that a gun other than Faulkner's orMumia's was used, that the bullets andbullet jackets found do not fit the prosecution's story. Mumia's wounds do not fitwith him being shot by Faulkner. TheStakeout officer who purportedly foundMumia's gun testified at trial that the bullets in Mumia's gun were a differentmake than listed on the ballistics report.

Beverly said that he was wearing a greenarmy jacket that night. William Singletaryhad said that the shooter used whatsounded like a .22 and that the shooter waswearing a green army jacket. Billy Cooksaid Freeman was wearing a green armyjacket and he ran away from the scene.Additionally, two police officers at thetime said that the shooter was wearing agreen army jacket. as did another civilianwitness. But Mumia wore a red quiltedski jacket with wide vertical blue stripes.and Billy Cook wore a blue Nehru-stylejacket with brass buttons. This evidence-Singletary's, Beverly' s-couldalso confirm that the shooter ran away.and it was a shooter in a grecn armyjacket.

by the Bush administration's claims of"weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq.The Times went along with these claimsbecause. notwithstanding its political differences with the neocons and Bush administration. the Times shares with themthe same bourgeois class interests. Evennow. the Times whitewashes U.S. warcrimes in Iraq, crowing that in Falluja, acity devastated by American bombardment last year, "things are almost back tonormal"' (26 March)!

In 1977, when the Spartacus YouthLeague initiated a united-front campaign to keep imperialist war criminal Henry Kissinger from a teachingpost at Columbia, the Times editorialized against anti-Kissinger students andfaculty. The response by the SYL in aletter to the Times (which they didn'tprint but which we produced as a leaflet) stands up well today with regardto defense of Professor Joseph Massad.We wrote, "While smearing the antiKissinger forces at Columbia as witchhunters, your editorial advocates a neoMcCarthyite 'loyalty oath' as the sole

This should make clear to all of us herewhat we need to do to free Mumia. Thatthe courts will not move, whether on thegrounds of a racially biased jury selection, which was true, or that he wasn'tallowed to represent himself in violationof his constitutional rights, which wastrue, or in the face of the prosecutorial misconduct, which is enormous. And whatI've said to you, and what you knowalready, is only the tip of the iceberg.None of this will happen, the courts willnot move without the force of an international mobilization of the masses, andcentrally based on the labor movement.

That Mumia is innocent is the truth.That the capitalist state has spent decadesframing him up is the truth. Putting itslying. corrupt class- and race-biased forcesto see Mumia dead is what they're allabout. But we need to use the truth aboutMumia's case. only some of which I andother people have been able to talk to youabout. to bring out more powcr. socialpower, to fight for victory and freeMumia. Free Mumia! [Applause.]_

political criterion for university professors!" At issue is not an abstract conception of 'freedom." but a struggle onbehalf of class interests. As we statedin "Right-Wing Thought Police AssaultFree Speech on Campus" (WV No. 842.18 Februarv):"The attempted castration of intellectualdissent is an attack on all opposition tothe ruling-class agenda. Today it is particularly aimed at those who oppose thebloody occupation of Iraq and voice outrage at the genocidal 'collective punishment' of the Palestinian people byIsrael's Zionist rulers. Middle East studies departments. including distinguishedscholars. are among the prime targets ofcampus witchhunts. But the same forcesthat would like to see campuses inhabited solely by white frat boys in khakisalso want to see a union-free workforcethat they can more brutally exploit. Theyseek a docile, regimented society, all thebetter to send the sons and daughters ofthe working people to serve as cannonfodder in U.S. imperialism's wars abroadwhile ripping up even the most minimalgains of previous class and social struggles at home."Stop the witchhunt! Defend ProfessorMassad!_

I!n'lU'tlZllU?Zt'l,]Marxist Working-Class Biweekly of the Spartacist League

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MOVE ...(col1tinlledfrom page 12 )decision all over again, knowing what Iknow now, I \\ ould make the same decision because I think we cannot permit anyterrorist group, any revolutionary groupin this city, to hold a whole neighborh oodor a whole city hostage."

We communists forthrightly said thatWilson Goode was a black front man forReagan racism. We pointed out: "The liberals now apologize for this calculatedobliteration of a black neighborhood-todo otherwise requires a break from thewhole myth of the 'new black power'at the voting booth, organized throughthe Democratic Party of George Wallaceand Jesse Jackson. That is why we arenow witnessing the obscene spectacleof the black establishment supportingGoode amid the screams of black babies"("Philly Inferno: Racist Murder!" WVNo.380. 31 May 1985). As for Jesse Jackson,he saw in the charred remains of people'slives a chance to push a little black capitalism. Jackson called o n Goode to ensurethat black contractors got a share of therebuilding of the homes destroyed! As wewrote in our 31 May 1985 article:

"Wilson Goode and the firebombing ofWest Philadelphia are the ultimate proofthat the black Democratic mayors are thefront men for Reagan's war on blackpeople. In the 1960s as the ghettosburned with black rage and frustration,black mayors were installed in many ofAmerica's big cities to put out the tIres.But LBJ's firemen are now Reagan'sarsonists. It is left to the c o m m u n i ~ t s togive organized expression to the felt outrage of the black people in the face ofthis bloody cop massacre and to fightfor the elementary right of black selfdefense against the racist terrorists."In contrast to the reformists. the Spartacist League sought a way to ensure thatMOVE would not be made into isolatednon-persons and to ensure that they

would be defended. Though we did nothave a branch in Philadelphia, when weheard that there was to be a demonstration there oli30 May 1985, we sought tomobilize a hundred of our supporters insolidarity with the MOVE victims. But atthe last minute, we pulled out when theMOVE organization. for utterly justifiable reasons. said it would not attend.A liberallleft lash-up, involving the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) and thebourgeois Consumer Party, called the"Citizens' Committee for Justice andHumanity," arrogantly and outrageouslydebated whether or not to even al1O\vMOVE survivors to be present at their socalled protest! By keeping MOVE out,they were doing Goode' s and the cops'work trying to head off a real protestagainst the gruesome atrocity.

Much to the outrage of the SWP et a!.,we issued a statement. which the Phila-delphia Inquirer (31 May 1985) accurately described: 'The Spartacist League,for one, put out a news release from NewYork City announcing that it would notattend because there was no indicationthat 'MOVE will be defended or giventhe respect tl).eir martyrdom demands'."

The small demonstration was a travesty. One Shafik Abu-Tahir. who introduced the speakers, said that organizers"wanted it to be made very clear to thecity administration and the City of Philadelphia that we are not marching today insupport of MOVE" (Piziladelphiu DlIilyNells. 31 May 1985).

The ultrareforl1list U.S. CommunistParty labeled MOVE an "anti-social cultgroup" that "obviously had become amenace to the community:' as it bemoaned some of the extreme measurestaken against them. The SWP for its partwas allied with spokesmen for the proGoode types ,,:ho were shocked by the"excessive" force and concerned for the"respectable" residents whose houseswere destroyed. These reformists sat ontheir hands when Goode appeared beforethe Coalition of Black Trade Unionists.Later. at a meeting for Puerto Ricanrights, after the chair called for a momentof silence for MOVE. Goode got up andmade a sniveling statement which theMilitant printed without comment.13 MAY 2005

UPIIn vendetta against MOVE, nearly 600 Philadelphia police besieged theirPowelton Village commune in 1978.

Workers World Party also rushed toalibi Goode; their then-leader Sam Marcywished to assure everyone that "MayorGoode was merely informed of theplanned assault and was not a participantin the plans." This was a lie. Goode was anactive participant in the more than yearlong planning. He gave the phone authorization for dropping the bomb on May 13after pausing for 30 seconds. Later. Workers World and its front groups organizeda Philly "March Against Racism" whosecall did not mention MOVE at all and hadnot the slightest criticism of Goode.

WV PhotoRamona Africa, survivor of 1985MOVE massacre.The motive of all these political cowards was to minimize the massacre andtherefore the complicity of black Democrat Goode. The Philly firebombing wasa warning to all black people, and not justblack people: 'don't get out of line, youcould be next!The reformists flinched in the face ofthe blasts of Reagan's anti-Soviet wardrive; most so-called leftists ran for coveras Reagan ran Cold War II . and so endedup in the camp of the equally anti-Soviet

Democratic Party. The capitulation ofthese forces that pretended to speak forsocialism had important negative consequences. Instead of crystallizing inchoateanger and horror over the atrocity into anindictment of the actual government killers, the fake leftists let the killers ott' thehook and contributed to an atmospherewhere white mobs chanting "MOVE!MOVE!" could rampage through segregated Southwest Philly and then firebomb the homes of a black and integratedcouple.A few left groups. notably the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) and Progressive Labor (PL). did take a stand indefense of MOVE at the time. In her compeiling book. published in 1987. Atten-tion MOle.' This Is America.'. MargotHarry. a staff writer for the RCP's paper.makes a convincing case that MOVEmembers including children were shot bycops while trying to escape and were laterdragged into the inferno. PL. for its part.announced a demonstra tion in Phi lIy onMay IX. But when \ve ott'ered to buildand participate in it, PL characteristicallyrefused and had a little sectarian demonstration entirely of their own . They werelater self-critical in C ~ w l l e n g e about how

insignificant it was.)The Spartacist League exposed the

MOVE massacre at a New York Cityforum on II July 1985, where we gave aplatform to spokesmen who were thensupporters of MOVE to speak of their bitterness at the murder of their family members. This forum upheld the Leninist mandate that the party of the proletariat mustbe a tribune of the people, leaders who cangive a voice to all the oppressed. But evenhere we were confronted with oppositionfrom supposed leftists. A speaker from theminuscule League for the RevolutionaryParty (LRP) rose to denounce the meetingas a "sham" and "disgusting" because itdidn't polemicize against the victims!About what'J! These were courageouspeople whose families were slaughtered,whose homes were destroyed, whosebrothers and sisters were already imprisoned, and who in the midst of their agonywere being shunned by the "respectable"sellouts. In any case, who could havethought Marxists had much in commonpolitically with a back-to-nature grouplike MOVE? To attack them wouldhave been obscene. But that's what theLRP did. They went into print grotesquely reflecting Goode's animus againstMOVE, writing that its "lifestyle understandably alienated many neighbors" andthat "MOVE's isolation opened it up for apolice siege" (Proletarian Revoilition,Summer 1985). The equally tiny Bolshevik Tendency rushed to solidarize not withMOVE but with the LRP. intimating vilelythat the victims of racist cop terror were incollusion with the cops! Their revoltingarticle on the July forum was entitled."SL's Cop-Baiting Celebrity-'PowerfulTestim ony' ... to the Police."Eight years after the MOVE massacre.on 19 April 1993. Democratic presidentBill Clinton and his attorney general.Janet Reno. unleashed the BATF againstthe integrated Branch Davidian religiousgroup near Waco. Texas. Like MOVE. theTexas group upheld the right of citizensto armed self-defense. Reno ordered theslaughter of 86 innocent men. women andchildren. If the MOVE massacre was thesignature of the Reagan years, the Wacomassacre was the bloody mark of Democrat Bill Clinton. The flames of Wacoilluminated the basic truth that the capitalist state. whether run by Republicansor Democrats. is a deadly enemy of workers and the oppressed.A Conspiracy of Terror

The MOVE bombing had a precedent:on 31 May 1921. the heart of black Tulsa,Oklahoma was obliterated by police bombsdropped from airplanes. The police killedat least 75. mostly blaek people. and over4.000 black people were thrown into concentration camps. This \vas part of a wa\'eof ruling-class racist terror that soughtto crush militant black soldiers returningfrom World War 1. who were ready todefend themselves against lynch lawwhile seeking social equality. Americancapitalism feared such a movement, especially the real possibility that it could linkup with Communists inspired by the1917 Bolshevik Revolution. Dec ades laterthat same capitalist hatred of the possibility of blacks and Reds linking strugglesalso drove much of the government's

relentless assault against the Black Panther Party and other radicals in the 1960s.

The capitalist state. including itsblack-robed "justices." consists at itscore of armed bodies of men whose jobis to enforce the property r i g h t ~ of theruling class. In Philadelphia, which hasthe largest concentration of black peoplein a very white state. and where palpableracism predates the American Civil War,this truth comes home with a vengeance.The Philadelphia police have a history ofracist bonapartism under Frank Rizzo.They focused on smashing black radicalism, especially the Black Panthers.MOVE and the eloquent black journalistMumia Abu-Jamal.The infamous Stakeout unit whichplayed a promin ent role in the cop assaulton MOVE in 1985 was fashioned in theturbulent '60s by then-deputy policecommissioner and future mayor FrankRizzo in response to the 1964 eruption ofthe city's huge black ghetto. This mobileunit of sharpshooters and the politicalpolice in the Civil Defense Unit (renamedthe Civil Affairs Unit) staged a 1970 raidon the Black Panthers' offices. The sameStakeout unit surrounded the PoweltonVillage MOVE house during the monthsof siege prior to August 1978. They sawMumia as he entered the compound toconduct radio interviews. They seethedwith hatred for his sympathetic coverageof the victims of their brutal policies.When the MOVE 9 were sentenced forthe death of a cop killed by the policecrossfire. it was Mumia who exposed thegross injustice. Several days after the verdict, the presiding judge. Edwin MaImed.was on a local radio show. Mumia calledin and asked the judge. "Who shot JamesRamp?" MaImed replied. "I haven't thefaintest idea."

It was important for the cops' vendettaagainst MOVE to have Mumia silenced.On the night of 9 December 1981, MumiaAbu-Jamal was shot. arrested and framedup on false c h a r g e ~ of killing policemanDaniel Faulkner. The first cops to arriveon the scene were Stakeout squad members; the highest ranking officer wasInspector Alfonzo Giordano, a formerStakeout commander. They knew exactlywho Mumia wa,; they had been trying toget him for years. as we have meticulously documented in many articles (see.for example. "Philly Cops' Reign of Terror." Black History (fnd the Class Strug-gle No. 15. August 1998). Six monthslater. in a kangaroo court presided over bythe notoriously racist judge Albert Sabo.Mumia was sentenced to death-anddespite massive evidence of his innocence, he remains on death row.We continue to fight to make sure theworkers movement unde rstands the atrocity of Osage Avenue on 13 May 1985.Like the KKK killing of five leftistsin Greensboro in 1979. the murders ofeleven MOVE members including theirchildren must not be forgotten. We fightfor revolutionary struggle based on theindependent mobilization of the exploitedand oppressed against all wings of theracist rulers to avenge the MOVE martyrsand win black freedom. All the MOVEprisoners and Mumia Abu-Jamal must befreed' Black liberation through socialistrevolution!

Black History No.3$.75 (32 pages)Order from/pay to:Spartacist Publishing Co.Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 1011611


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WIJII/(EIIS """'111)Racist GovernmentBombed Black Philadelph la"Attention, MOVE. This is America."

This ultimatum boomed through a Philadelphia police bullhorn at dawn on 13 MayInS, opening a hideous siege and themass murder of eleven members of theMOVE commune. including five children.MOVE. a mostly black back-to-naturegroup, had been in the Philly cops'gun sights for years. The cops bombedMOVE's home 20 years ago, burningdown the neat Osage Avenue neighbor- .hood of black homeowners and torchingover 60 densely packed row houses, leaving hundreds homeless. It was a crimeworthy of the U.S. imperialists or Nazi SSduring World War II.

Ronald Reagan. fresh from salutingNazi SS graves in Bitburg, his attorneygeneral Edwin M e e ~ e , the FBI. the Phillycops and black Democratic Party mayorWilson Goode were all responsible."Reagan, Cops, Black Mayor-They'rethe Terrorists-Philly Inferno: RacistMurder!" we headlined (WV No. 380, 31May 1985). Today, 20 years later. the statecontinues its vendetta against MOVE andits most eloquent defender, Mumia AbuJamaL who was framed up and sent todeath row in 1982. We must keep alivethe memory of what happened-the surviving victims are still being punished.and the criminals in government are stillterrorizing black America.

The Philadelphia police's targeting ofMOVE goes back to the mi d '70s. Beginning in early 1978, the police besiegedMOVE's Powelton Village commune,launching, in August, a 600-strong policeattack. In the barrage of police gunfire,one member of the Philadelphia PoliceDepartment's notorious "Stakeout" squadwas killed by crossfire. The vicious policebrutality captured on tape and the frameup trial of MOVE members for that deathkept the city on edge for months. NineMOVE members were sentenced to 30 to100 years. MOVE continued to vociferously protest this frame-up over the years,while the cops were still out for blood.

On 13 May 1985, at 5:27 p.m., the headof the Philadelphia Bomb Disposal Unitdropped a large satchel charge from a helicopter onto the roof o

Workers Vanguard No 848 - 13 May 2005

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