(Originally published in the February 2009 issue of Mundo Obrero, a publication of the Communist Party of Spain.)
"Supporting the Palestinian people's struggle for self-determination is a duty of Israeli communists."
The Communist Party of Israel (CPI) and its electoral front Hadash (Democratic Front for Peace and Equality) were the only political forces in Israel that confronted the massacre perpetrated by the Tzahal (IDF), the Israeli armed forces, in Gaza in January. Regrettably, the "major media" have not accurately represented the magnitude of the protest within the State of Israel against the war. The massive scale of the non-stop mobilization all over that Middle-Eastern country during those three weeks is shown by the huge demonstration of 130,000 in the city of Sakhnin, held at the initiative of the High Representative Committee of the Arab-Palestinian population in Israel, a week after the criminal offensive began; and the demonstration held in the city of Tel Aviv on another day, which drew 20,000 demonstrators, many of them carrying red flags.
Mundo Obrero interviewed CPI Secretary General Mohammed Nafa'h, a writer from the Druze village of Beit Jann, in order to acquaint the public with the positions of the Israeli communists. The interview was conducted in the party strongholds in the city of Haifa on the last day of January, thanks to the collaboration of Efraim Davidi.
The Communist Party of Israel celebrates its 90th anniversary this year. The party is one of the three organizations that trace their lineage to the Palestine Communist Party since the late 1940s, the other two being the Palestinian People's Party and the Jordanian Communist Party.
The CPI has a three-deputy parliamentary fraction in the Knesset (Israeli parliament) and several mayors, including the mayor of the "Arab capital" of Israel, the city of Nazareth, where the CPI has governed for the last 32 years. It also has a significant presence among students and trade unionists.
In the last municipal elections in November, Communist MK Dov Khenin obtained 36% of the votes in the city of Tel Aviv, against the Labor mayor who received 51%. The CPI, Marxist-Leninist, is the only party in Israel in which Jews and Arabs are equally important members, and the party publishes the only daily Arabic-language communist newspaper in the Middle East, Al Ittihad (Unity), and a Hebrew weekly newspaper Zo Haderekh (The Path).
Mundo Obrero: Since the 28th of December, the Communist Party has called demonstrations around the country against the Israeli military aggression on the Gaza Strip. What is the position of the Communist Party of Israel on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict?
Mohammed Nafa'h: Since 1947, our party has advocated the position of "two states for two peoples" and supports the Palestinian people's right to self-determination, i.e., the Palestinians' right to a free and sovereign state in the territories occupied by Israel in June 1967, with East Jerusalem as its capital. We also demand the dismantlement of the Jewish settlements in the territories and the solution to the question of the Palestinian refugees in accordance with the UN resolutions.
MO: And on the situation in the West Bank and the "wall of shame"?
MN: Israel must withdraw to the ceasefire lines prior to the war of June 1967 and dismantle the wall, which we call in Hebrew and Arabic: the apartheid wall.
MO: How do you coordinate your activism against the assault on the Palestinian people, in this case in Gaza, with social, anti-war, and campus-based movements?
MN: First, we try to establish the broadest possible alliances, as it is clear that the Communists aren't the only ones opposed to the Israeli occupation. Second, we try to coordinate street protests with political consciousness raising and "practical" solidarity: sending clothes, food, and other humanitarian aids. The fact that more than 700 have been arrested in the demonstrations, from Nazareth and Haifa in the north to Be'er Sheva in the Negev desert, shows that many people have been moved to action by so much death and disaster. Finally, it means that we act in coordination with forces of the Palestinian Left. Traditionally, with the Palestinian Communists, but the day before the attack, knowing that its commencement was imminent, we got together in the city of Ramallah with the leaders of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and the (Communist) People's Party in order to join forces. We held discussions with them again the day after the Israeli withdrawal.
MO: How would you explain, to foreigners, the fact that over 70% of the Israeli population support or justify the Israeli military attacks on Gaza that have killed more than 1,300 Palestinians, 90% of whom were civilians according to some humanitarian organizations?
MN: Regrettably, a large part of the Israeli population has been deceived by the fallacious official propaganda that defined the colonial war in Gaza as an "act of self-defense." Censorship and self-censorship of the local media contributed to this. TV viewers in Israel did not see the dreadful scenes on their screens that people in Madrid or Barcelona saw night after night. Furthermore, Hamas's adventurist policy and its repeated provocations also contributed to turning the mostly poor civilian population of southern Israel into victims of missiles launched from Gaza. Many times, we have said that we support the struggle against the occupation, the political, mass struggle of the Palestinians, but we condemn attacks on the civilian population on either side of the border. Time and again, we have reiterated that there is no military solution to the Palestinian problem, the only solution is the end of the occupation and the creation of a Palestinian state. We have expressed this position before, during, and after the criminal attack perpetrated in January.
MO: In 2003, there was an attempt to assassinate the former secretary general, Issam Makhoul, by placing a bomb under his car, though miraculously his life was saved. Why did the perpetrators want to kill him? What is it like to live as the "enemies" of Zionist politics in the State of Israel?
MN: It is no secret that the democratic spaces in Israel are threatened by the government as well as extremist right-wing groups, officially "out of control," but everybody knows who is in charge of them. During the protests in recent weeks over 700 demonstrators were arrested, and some are still under detention until their trials. Right-wing groups attacked our events, causing injuries, while the police were "looking the other way." The war has unleashed a truly racist campaign against the Arab population under the leadership of the chauvinist party "Yisrael Beiteinu" (Israel Is Our Home) of the racist Avigdor "Yvette" Lieberman. In other words, there is a real danger that the Israeli society is advancing into the fascist direction, whose first victims will be the Arab-Palestinian national minority and the consistent left-wing sectors.
MO: Do you have contacts with Jewish communists living outside Israel and do they share your rejection of the Israeli policy of war against the Palestinian people?
MN: Our party does not claim to be "Jewish" or "Arab." Ours is a class-based party that makes no ethnic or religious distinctions. We have close ties with all pro-peace and progressive Jewish activists and organizations in Europe, Latin America, North America, and Australia. The Israeli leadership seek to galvanize the Jewish communities around the world into adopting their colonialist positions, but there are large Jewish sectors, organizations as well as individuals, that disagree with them and are even fighting against this colonialist policy. Not every Jew is a Zionist, neither in the rest of the world nor even in Israel.
MO: What relations do you have with the Communist Parties in Palestine, Syria, Iraq, Egypt, Turkey, Lebanon, and Jordan?
MN: Our party has close relations and frequent contacts with Communist Parties and workers in the Middle East. Primarily with the Palestinian Communists, with whom we have closely collaborated since the beginning of the occupation in 1967, bringing all kinds of material and political support. Do not forget that supporting the Palestinian people's struggle for self-determination is an international duty of Israeli communists. We also maintain ties with the Tudeh Party of Iran, and last year we published a joint declaration of the Communists of the United States, Iran, and Israel warning that an attack on Iran would bring the region a tragedy of major consequences. The Communists of the Middle East get together at least once a year.
MO: What are the hidden objectives of the government behind the attack on Gaza and what relation does this show of force have with the next Israeli general elections in February?
MN: The Israeli government tried to deal a blow to Hamas, but what it did was to victimize all Palestinians in Gaza, particularly civilians. The objective is clear: to try to deepen the existing division — which is unfortunate — among the major Palestinian factions to postpone the creation of an independent state. In the ruling Kadima and Labor parties there are those who believed that the colonial war would bring some political gains in the upcoming elections. But the only beneficiaries have been the racist, far-rightist parties.
MO: What are the main points of your program for the elections?
MN: When we began the parliamentary election campaign, once the municipal elections were finalized in November 2008, we thought that we could present a program that we would characterize as "against the current": against capitalism, against the occupation, against privatization, against globalization, and against racism, and for the rights of working men and women, for equality of the Arab population of Israel, for a healthy environment, for the rights of gays and lesbians. We called this program "a new socialist agenda for Israel." But with the criminal war and its terrible consequences in January, we had to abandon the plan and invest all our human resources, which are considerable, and all our material resources, which are meager, in the struggle against the war and its domestic consequences: particularly racism and fascism. Anyway, we make clear that capitalism engenders the occupation, oppression, and racism. Faced with the international capitalist crisis, which is hitting Israeli workers hard, the next government that gets elected won't last in power for long. Its fall will be due to the multiple crises that beset Israel: the crisis of the occupation, the capitalist crisis, the crisis of political leadership thanks to their bribes and kickbacks, and the ideological crisis of Zionism. All these situations will open up a new period of social and class struggles and new resistances to the occupation. Many young people look to the Communist Party and understand that we are marking a new path and presenting a real choice facing the crisis, the multiple crises. We are very much concerned about the present, but our commitment to the future is firm. This will be a future of peace and social justice.
-----
English translation reposted from mrzine.monthlyreview.org.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Interview with Mohammed Nafa'h, secretary general of the Communist Party of Israel
from: PWW
Senate panel approves Solis as labor secretary
from: PWW
(AFL-CIO Blog) One week after postponing a confirmation vote on Hilda Soli as secretary of labor, the Senate Health Education, Labor and Pensions Committee today approved on a voice vote President’s Obama’s choice to lead the Labor Department and sent the nomination to the full Senate for confirmation. That vote could come tomorrow.
The Solis nomination was announced in December, and her confirmation hearing took place Jan. 9. But Big Business groups and a number of Republican senators have loudly, and at times almost hysterically, complained about Solis’ long record of support for working families and unions.
Committee Chairman Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) has called Solis “a tireless champion for working families.”
After eight years of the Bush administration’s Department of Labor under Elaine Chao—trashing workers’ rights, weakening workplace safety rules, ignoring wage and hour violations and siding with Big Business at about every juncture—the idea of a labor secretary siding with workers must be terrifying to some.
Most of the criticism centers on Solis’ support of the Employee Free Choice Act, which she has co-sponsored in the House. Republican senators have even suggested that if confirmed, Solis should be barred from advocating for the restoration of workers’ rights to form a union and bargain for a better life, as the bill provides.
Says AFL-CIO President John Sweeney:
"Senate Republicans can’t just oppose a secretary of labor because she supports working Americans and favors curbing excessive corporate power."
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Update on striking workers at MSU
Comrades,
Laborers Local 499 will be at the Corner of Birch Rd and Shaw Lane (near the Breslin Center) from 7am until 2pm throughout the week. So stop on by and support the Laborers in their struggle against Sandborn Construction and the use of non union labor on campus. Don't forget to tell them you're from the YCL!
In Solidarity,
-Peter
Laborers Local 499 will be at the Corner of Birch Rd and Shaw Lane (near the Breslin Center) from 7am until 2pm throughout the week. So stop on by and support the Laborers in their struggle against Sandborn Construction and the use of non union labor on campus. Don't forget to tell them you're from the YCL!
In Solidarity,
-Peter
ACLU: Protect student voting rights in Michigan. Take action today!
State Representative Rebekah Warren is introducing a bill in the House that would eliminate needless barriers to student voting.
* Urge your state representative to tear down obstacles to student voting here >>
Rogers' Law, adopted in 1999, was passed presumably to stop voter fraud. In reality, it has made it more difficult for college students to cast a legitimate ballot. The law requires that a voter's driver's license address be the same as on their voter registration card. So, a student who has kept their permanent home address on their license often learns - too late - that they must travel home to vote instead of being able to cast their ballot on campus.
Legislators should support a voting system that encourages the greatest level of participation possible. Students are more likely to vote if they can cast their ballot on campus, yet Michigan law continues to make this needlessly difficult.
* Take action here: Urge your state representative to co-sponsor Rep. Warren's bill to fix "Rogers' Law" >>
We can't do it without you,
ACLU of Michigan Action Alert Team
Picket with Striking Workers at MSU Today
Forwarded from the Wrong for Michigan: Truth about the Right to Work Scam facebook group:
Come join the Michigan Laborers' as they picket Sandborn Construction at Michigan State University.
Meet up: 6:45am on the corner of Kalamazoo and S. Clippert St near the Nature Walk (near the Steakhouse and Admiral Gas Station)
Picket Location: On the Corner of Birch Rd and Shaw Lane (near the Breslin Center)
Picket Time: 7am - 2pm
If you can't make it first thing in the morning, come join us whenever you can.
Picketers will receive a free orange Laborers' T-shirt!
Contact me if you have any additional questions...see you there!
Solidarity!
Jon Byrd
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Comrades,
We must come out and support Laborers Local 499 in their struggle against Sandborn Construction! Laborers 499 have gone on strike several times against the non union Sandborn Construction and the use of non union labor by the University. Students groups and unions such as the Young Democratic Socialists and Graduate Employees Union have played a big role in helping the Laborers win their previous fights, and now is not the time to stop.
Organized labor as a whole as been under constant attack during the last 8 years of the Bush regime, and especially in our State due to the auto crisis. With the Employee Free Choice Act coming to Washington within the year, unions will soon be under more pressure from the far-right and big business. Supporting our brothers and sisters on the picket line now will help us develop ties to labor, and let them know they still have allies on campus for their current and upcoming fights.
In Solidarity,
-Peter
Come join the Michigan Laborers' as they picket Sandborn Construction at Michigan State University.
Meet up: 6:45am on the corner of Kalamazoo and S. Clippert St near the Nature Walk (near the Steakhouse and Admiral Gas Station)
Picket Location: On the Corner of Birch Rd and Shaw Lane (near the Breslin Center)
Picket Time: 7am - 2pm
If you can't make it first thing in the morning, come join us whenever you can.
Picketers will receive a free orange Laborers' T-shirt!
Contact me if you have any additional questions...see you there!
Solidarity!
Jon Byrd
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Comrades,
We must come out and support Laborers Local 499 in their struggle against Sandborn Construction! Laborers 499 have gone on strike several times against the non union Sandborn Construction and the use of non union labor by the University. Students groups and unions such as the Young Democratic Socialists and Graduate Employees Union have played a big role in helping the Laborers win their previous fights, and now is not the time to stop.
Organized labor as a whole as been under constant attack during the last 8 years of the Bush regime, and especially in our State due to the auto crisis. With the Employee Free Choice Act coming to Washington within the year, unions will soon be under more pressure from the far-right and big business. Supporting our brothers and sisters on the picket line now will help us develop ties to labor, and let them know they still have allies on campus for their current and upcoming fights.
In Solidarity,
-Peter
Friday, February 6, 2009
Two Black workers who made history
from: PWW
BALTIMORE — Helen Evans was turning the pages of an album of photos of her father, Joseph P. Henderson, when her eye fell on a picture of him as a Laborers union organizer in Washington, D.C., during the 1940s.
Henderson had been a chauffeur for “Underwear King” P.H. Hanes in Winston-Salem, N.C., she told a visiting reporter. “Daddy kept asking him for a raise and Hanes refused,” she said. “My father had a friend who got him a construction job in Washington, D.C. Daddy jumped at the opportunity.”
When Hanes learned that he was losing the handsome driver of his Cadillac limousine he was furious. “Hanes told him, ‘What do you want? I’ll pay anything,’” Helen said, laughing at the memory. “Daddy told him, ‘It’s too late. I’ve got another job.’”
So Henderson moved with his family to the nation’s capital. He was smart and energetic and soon the Laborers union recruited him as an organizer. He was signing up so many of his fellow workers that he became a target for revenge. Returning home from a meeting, one night, shots rang out, barely missing Henderson.
“They were trying to kill or intimidate my father. But they couldn’t scare him. He just went right on organizing,” Evans recalled.
Coming full circle
It wasn’t all terrorism. The labor movement was surging at that time. The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) was organizing millions in the steel, auto and other basic industries. Labor gave crucial mass support for President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal and helped elect and reelect Roosevelt. Henderson’s talents were not overlooked by people in high places.
The phone rang one day and it was the White House inviting Henderson to come for a visit. “Eleanor Roosevelt was requesting his presence,” Helen Evans said. “They told my father Mary McLeod Bethune was going to be at the White House that evening. They wanted him to come over.”
Helen Evans smiled at that bright memory and its special meaning today. President Barack Obama had just invited labor leaders to come to the White House to see him sign several executive orders to “level the playing field” between labor and management. “Daddy must be smiling. We have come full circle,” she said.
Organizing at Bethlehem Steel
By 1945, the CIO had signed Joe Henderson up as an organizer. They sent him to Baltimore where he got a job at ARMCO Steel and later at Bethlehem Steel’s Sparrows Point mill. Henderson recruited 1,300 workers to the United Steelworkers of America, mostly African American workers segregated in the coke oven department of the giant mill.
Henderson was a determined and resourceful foe of Beth Steel’s racist job practices. During a memorial for Joe Henderson at USWA Local 2609 in Dundalk, May 5, 1996, steel union leader Bernard Parish, spoke movingly of Henderson’s leadership in that fight.
For many years, Parish told the crowd, his father, Charlie Parish, had struggled to win promotion to millwright at Sparrows Point. Repeatedly, the company rejected him. One excuse was that Charlie Parish lacked the skills and knowledge to become a millwright.
“Joe and a white worker, Bill Wood, taught my father how to read blueprints so he could pass the exam and become a millwright,” Parish said. Charlie Parish would go to the Henderson home where the three steelworkers pored over blueprints until Parish could quickly decipher them. Parish went on to make history as the first Black millwright at Sparrows Point.
Both Henderson and Wood were members of the Communist Party of Maryland, an organization then waging a determined struggle to win job equality.
Of witchhunts and black lists
Henderson, his close friend, George A. Meyers, who had been president of the Maryland-D.C. CIO, were hauled before witchhunt hearings and blacklisted from the steel and other basic industries during the 1950s. Meyers spent four years in federal prison under the infamous Smith Act. Bill Wood’s brother, Roy Wood, also went to prison on the same trumped up charges.
Blacklisted, Joe Henderson and George Meyers became partners in installing awnings on houses in and around Maryland. For as long as they lived, both were deeply engaged in the struggles of organized labor, against racism and for world peace. Both continued as leaders of the Communist Party USA until they died.
The witchhunt had nothing to do with “violent overthrow of the government.” It had everything to do with corporate America’s vicious drive to decapitate organized labor. Helen scoffed at the Cold War caricature of her father. “If a family in Turner Station was about to be evicted, Daddy would go over and pay their rent,” she said. “If they were hungry, he would buy food for them,” she said. “He was not a violent man. He was full of love for people.”
Another unsung hero
Ben Careathers (pronounced CaRUTHers) was another “unsung hero” of steel labor, also an African American and like Joe Henderson a lifelong member of the Communist Party USA. Careathers moved to Pittsburgh from his birthplace near Chattanooga, Tennessee in the 1920s. In 1937, he got a job as a laborer at the Jones & Laughlin steel mill in Pittsburgh. He joined the Communist Party, impressed with their consistent fight against racism and their stand in support of industrial unionism in which all workers in a given industry belong to the same union.
Battle of Little Steel
This was the period of the battle to unionize J & L, Republic Steel, Youngstown Sheet & Tube, and other steel companies misleadingly called “Little Steel.” United States Steel had agreed to sign a contract with Steel Workers Organizing Committee. But Republic Steel boss, Tom Girdler, had announced that his mills would be unionized over his dead body. On Memorial Day 1937, Chicago police opened fire on striking Republic Steel workers at a peaceful picnic. Ten people were killed in this massacre.
This was the atmosphere when Philip Murray, chairman of the Steel Workers Organizing Committee, recruited Careathers to organize Jones & Laughlin steelworkers in Aliquippa, Pa. The town was patrolled night and day by Andrew Mellon’s private army of gun thugs. SWOC organizers had been arrested, beaten, and driven out of town.
Art Shields, the great labor reporter, tells Careathers’ story in his autobiography, “On the Battle Lines.” Said Careathers, “I didn’t register at a hotel like the organizers before me. I dressed like a steelworker and went in while the plant was changing shifts and the streets were crowded. I boarded with a Black family that knew me. I met with small groups of workers quietly. And I soon had a high stack of signed membership application cards.”
Careathers took the union cards, hundreds signed by African American workers, to CIO headquarters.
“I gave them to Clinton Golden, the regional director,” Careathers said. “He rushed into Murray’s office. I can still hear him yelling: ‘Look at what I’ve got Phil!’” Careathers had signed up more than 2,000 J&L workers into SWOC, later renamed United Steelworkers of America. It was part of the immense struggle that ended with complete victory for the USWA.
Frame up
But again corporate America struck back. Careathers tells the story in his own words in a powerful pamphlet, “The Frame-up of Benjamin Lowells Careathers.” It consists of his opening statement at his Smith Act trial May 18, 1953. Again, the phony charges were that he and his fellow defendant, Steve Nelson, a veteran of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade who was wounded while fighting fascism in Spain, were conspiring to teach and advocate the violent overthrow of the government by force and violence. A higher court threw out the charges against Careathers but Nelson spent over two years in prison.
“This charge we deny,” Careathers told the jury. “Force and violence is a weapon of reaction, of fascism….The Southern plantation owners use force and violence against the Negro people to keep them and their political machines in power. Communists advocate the bringing about of social change by peaceful means.”
Communists on SWOC staff in 1936 and 1937 gave “everything that we had to organize the powerful United Steelworkers of America,” Careathers continued. The real conspiracy, he charged, was the drive by the witchhunters to smash the USWA using anti-communism as a cover.
Careathers conviction was later overturned by the higher courts. But he and other Communist union organizers were driven from the labor movement and some were jailed. The labor movement went into a long downward slide. Only in recent years has it made a dramatic comeback although still it has far, far, to go.
Honoring Black workers
In this new, hopeful atmosphere, Black workers like Joe Henderson and Ben Careathers can be honored during African American history month for the major contribution they made to the freedom struggles of Black people, indeed, all working people.
greenerpastures21212@yahoo.com
Joe Henderson
Henderson had been a chauffeur for “Underwear King” P.H. Hanes in Winston-Salem, N.C., she told a visiting reporter. “Daddy kept asking him for a raise and Hanes refused,” she said. “My father had a friend who got him a construction job in Washington, D.C. Daddy jumped at the opportunity.”
Ben Careathers' "Frame-up" pamphlet cover.
Ben Careathers
“They were trying to kill or intimidate my father. But they couldn’t scare him. He just went right on organizing,” Evans recalled.
Coming full circle
It wasn’t all terrorism. The labor movement was surging at that time. The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) was organizing millions in the steel, auto and other basic industries. Labor gave crucial mass support for President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal and helped elect and reelect Roosevelt. Henderson’s talents were not overlooked by people in high places.
The phone rang one day and it was the White House inviting Henderson to come for a visit. “Eleanor Roosevelt was requesting his presence,” Helen Evans said. “They told my father Mary McLeod Bethune was going to be at the White House that evening. They wanted him to come over.”
Helen Evans smiled at that bright memory and its special meaning today. President Barack Obama had just invited labor leaders to come to the White House to see him sign several executive orders to “level the playing field” between labor and management. “Daddy must be smiling. We have come full circle,” she said.
Organizing at Bethlehem Steel
By 1945, the CIO had signed Joe Henderson up as an organizer. They sent him to Baltimore where he got a job at ARMCO Steel and later at Bethlehem Steel’s Sparrows Point mill. Henderson recruited 1,300 workers to the United Steelworkers of America, mostly African American workers segregated in the coke oven department of the giant mill.
Henderson was a determined and resourceful foe of Beth Steel’s racist job practices. During a memorial for Joe Henderson at USWA Local 2609 in Dundalk, May 5, 1996, steel union leader Bernard Parish, spoke movingly of Henderson’s leadership in that fight.
For many years, Parish told the crowd, his father, Charlie Parish, had struggled to win promotion to millwright at Sparrows Point. Repeatedly, the company rejected him. One excuse was that Charlie Parish lacked the skills and knowledge to become a millwright.
“Joe and a white worker, Bill Wood, taught my father how to read blueprints so he could pass the exam and become a millwright,” Parish said. Charlie Parish would go to the Henderson home where the three steelworkers pored over blueprints until Parish could quickly decipher them. Parish went on to make history as the first Black millwright at Sparrows Point.
Both Henderson and Wood were members of the Communist Party of Maryland, an organization then waging a determined struggle to win job equality.
Of witchhunts and black lists
Henderson, his close friend, George A. Meyers, who had been president of the Maryland-D.C. CIO, were hauled before witchhunt hearings and blacklisted from the steel and other basic industries during the 1950s. Meyers spent four years in federal prison under the infamous Smith Act. Bill Wood’s brother, Roy Wood, also went to prison on the same trumped up charges.
Blacklisted, Joe Henderson and George Meyers became partners in installing awnings on houses in and around Maryland. For as long as they lived, both were deeply engaged in the struggles of organized labor, against racism and for world peace. Both continued as leaders of the Communist Party USA until they died.
The witchhunt had nothing to do with “violent overthrow of the government.” It had everything to do with corporate America’s vicious drive to decapitate organized labor. Helen scoffed at the Cold War caricature of her father. “If a family in Turner Station was about to be evicted, Daddy would go over and pay their rent,” she said. “If they were hungry, he would buy food for them,” she said. “He was not a violent man. He was full of love for people.”
Another unsung hero
Ben Careathers (pronounced CaRUTHers) was another “unsung hero” of steel labor, also an African American and like Joe Henderson a lifelong member of the Communist Party USA. Careathers moved to Pittsburgh from his birthplace near Chattanooga, Tennessee in the 1920s. In 1937, he got a job as a laborer at the Jones & Laughlin steel mill in Pittsburgh. He joined the Communist Party, impressed with their consistent fight against racism and their stand in support of industrial unionism in which all workers in a given industry belong to the same union.
Battle of Little Steel
This was the period of the battle to unionize J & L, Republic Steel, Youngstown Sheet & Tube, and other steel companies misleadingly called “Little Steel.” United States Steel had agreed to sign a contract with Steel Workers Organizing Committee. But Republic Steel boss, Tom Girdler, had announced that his mills would be unionized over his dead body. On Memorial Day 1937, Chicago police opened fire on striking Republic Steel workers at a peaceful picnic. Ten people were killed in this massacre.
This was the atmosphere when Philip Murray, chairman of the Steel Workers Organizing Committee, recruited Careathers to organize Jones & Laughlin steelworkers in Aliquippa, Pa. The town was patrolled night and day by Andrew Mellon’s private army of gun thugs. SWOC organizers had been arrested, beaten, and driven out of town.
Art Shields, the great labor reporter, tells Careathers’ story in his autobiography, “On the Battle Lines.” Said Careathers, “I didn’t register at a hotel like the organizers before me. I dressed like a steelworker and went in while the plant was changing shifts and the streets were crowded. I boarded with a Black family that knew me. I met with small groups of workers quietly. And I soon had a high stack of signed membership application cards.”
Careathers took the union cards, hundreds signed by African American workers, to CIO headquarters.
“I gave them to Clinton Golden, the regional director,” Careathers said. “He rushed into Murray’s office. I can still hear him yelling: ‘Look at what I’ve got Phil!’” Careathers had signed up more than 2,000 J&L workers into SWOC, later renamed United Steelworkers of America. It was part of the immense struggle that ended with complete victory for the USWA.
Frame up
But again corporate America struck back. Careathers tells the story in his own words in a powerful pamphlet, “The Frame-up of Benjamin Lowells Careathers.” It consists of his opening statement at his Smith Act trial May 18, 1953. Again, the phony charges were that he and his fellow defendant, Steve Nelson, a veteran of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade who was wounded while fighting fascism in Spain, were conspiring to teach and advocate the violent overthrow of the government by force and violence. A higher court threw out the charges against Careathers but Nelson spent over two years in prison.
“This charge we deny,” Careathers told the jury. “Force and violence is a weapon of reaction, of fascism….The Southern plantation owners use force and violence against the Negro people to keep them and their political machines in power. Communists advocate the bringing about of social change by peaceful means.”
Communists on SWOC staff in 1936 and 1937 gave “everything that we had to organize the powerful United Steelworkers of America,” Careathers continued. The real conspiracy, he charged, was the drive by the witchhunters to smash the USWA using anti-communism as a cover.
Careathers conviction was later overturned by the higher courts. But he and other Communist union organizers were driven from the labor movement and some were jailed. The labor movement went into a long downward slide. Only in recent years has it made a dramatic comeback although still it has far, far, to go.
Honoring Black workers
In this new, hopeful atmosphere, Black workers like Joe Henderson and Ben Careathers can be honored during African American history month for the major contribution they made to the freedom struggles of Black people, indeed, all working people.
greenerpastures21212@yahoo.com
WORLDNOTES – February 14, 2009
from: PWW
France: Unions mount general strike
Protesting failure by the government of conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy to protect jobs and support consumer buying power while bailing out banks, eight national unions in a rare manifestation of unity launched a day-long general strike Jan. 29. Unions reported a million workers stayed away from their jobs.
Although the work stoppage by transportation and public service workers proved disruptive rather than paralyzing, Sarkozy held off suggesting as he did last year that general strikes pass unnoticed in France. The BBC reported that an opinion poll for Le Parisien indicated a 69 percent level of public support for the strikers. Forecasts place unemployment in France next year at 10 percent.
Russia: Missile bases on hold
The Financial Times reported last week that in response to indications the United States will not place anti-ballistic missiles in Eastern Europe, Russia has shelved plans to station cruise missiles in Kaliningrad, near Lithuania. Igor Yurgens, spokesperson for Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, declared, “In announcing they would close Guantánamo and get out of Iraq in 16 months, they made gestures. This is our gesture. We will wait now until Obama articulates his position on the missile shield.”
The Bush administration had been preparing a missile base in Poland and a radar system in the Czech Republic, ostensibly to defend against missiles launched by Iran. Popular protests erupted in Eastern Europe and Russian leaders voiced blanket condemnation.
Egypt: Rail strike shuts down transport
Trains throughout Egypt came to a standstill Jan. 29 as 62,000 signalmen and switch operators went on strike for less than a day, the second time in a week. Officials of the Egyptian National Railway were said to have gone back on promises to discuss worker grievances.
The strikers told Daily News Egypt they want wages equivalent to those of train drivers, as well as bonuses and overtime pay. They are also protesting inaction by their state-controlled union.
Labor reporter Per Bjorklund explained that railroad management has exploited differences among railroad workers divided by job category. Strike organizing is frequently left to a changing cast of railroad workers. A common front on demands rarely materializes.
Chile: Left coalition takes shape
The Humanist and Communist parties and two Socialist Party offshoots announced Jan. 28 that at a convention in March they would devise a common program and choose a single candidate for presidential elections next December. In a statement, leaders cited dangers posed by the world economic crisis and Latin American hopes raised “by governments of the left … independent of U.S. imperialist policies.”
Later, Communist Party leader Guillermo Teillier called for “profound changes so that Chile’s enormous inequality is ended, so we can be owners of our riches.” (www.pcchile.cl)
The French news agency AFP said former President Eduardo Frei, a Christian Democrat projected as candidate of the center left Concertación coalition, faces token opposition in December from millionaire Sebastián Piñera of the rightist Alliance for Chile.
China: Leader discusses challenges
Premier Wen Jiabao told the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland Jan. 27, “We are facing severe challenges in China, including shrinking global demand, overcapacity in some sectors, and rising unemployment in urban areas.” He foresaw protests and social unrest.
China’s trade unions are helping retrain and find new jobs for millions of migrant workers forced by the downturn to return home, People’s Daily reported. The Ministry of Finance said it will help create jobs in government infrastructure and environmental protection projects.
Wen Jiabao pointed to “an unsustainable model” in western societies of low savings and high consumption and “blind pursuit of profit” on the part of U.S. and European banks. The government initiated a $586 billion stimulus program last November.
Cuba: Social security is revised
A new social security law took effect last week following nationwide workplace discussions and National Assembly approval. The change comes in the context of economic reform measures presently underway in Cuba.
Women’s retirement age increased from 55 to 60 and men’s from age 60 to 65. A draft version of the law had set retirement as beginning at ages 62 and 67 respectively.
To qualify for retirement, workers must have completed 30 years of service, according to www.cubanow.net. The law takes effect gradually for individuals close to retirement age, to allow for planning. Young people without parents continue to be protected through completion of university or professional training.
World Notes are compiled by W.T. Whitney Jr. (atwhit@roadrunner.com)
AP
A steel worker from the nearby ArcelorMittal plant of Fos-sur-Mer shouts slogans during a protest march in Marseille, France, Jan. 29. French workers fearful about the global economic crisis held a nationwide strike.
Protesting failure by the government of conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy to protect jobs and support consumer buying power while bailing out banks, eight national unions in a rare manifestation of unity launched a day-long general strike Jan. 29. Unions reported a million workers stayed away from their jobs.
Although the work stoppage by transportation and public service workers proved disruptive rather than paralyzing, Sarkozy held off suggesting as he did last year that general strikes pass unnoticed in France. The BBC reported that an opinion poll for Le Parisien indicated a 69 percent level of public support for the strikers. Forecasts place unemployment in France next year at 10 percent.
Russia: Missile bases on hold
The Financial Times reported last week that in response to indications the United States will not place anti-ballistic missiles in Eastern Europe, Russia has shelved plans to station cruise missiles in Kaliningrad, near Lithuania. Igor Yurgens, spokesperson for Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, declared, “In announcing they would close Guantánamo and get out of Iraq in 16 months, they made gestures. This is our gesture. We will wait now until Obama articulates his position on the missile shield.”
The Bush administration had been preparing a missile base in Poland and a radar system in the Czech Republic, ostensibly to defend against missiles launched by Iran. Popular protests erupted in Eastern Europe and Russian leaders voiced blanket condemnation.
Egypt: Rail strike shuts down transport
Trains throughout Egypt came to a standstill Jan. 29 as 62,000 signalmen and switch operators went on strike for less than a day, the second time in a week. Officials of the Egyptian National Railway were said to have gone back on promises to discuss worker grievances.
The strikers told Daily News Egypt they want wages equivalent to those of train drivers, as well as bonuses and overtime pay. They are also protesting inaction by their state-controlled union.
Labor reporter Per Bjorklund explained that railroad management has exploited differences among railroad workers divided by job category. Strike organizing is frequently left to a changing cast of railroad workers. A common front on demands rarely materializes.
Chile: Left coalition takes shape
The Humanist and Communist parties and two Socialist Party offshoots announced Jan. 28 that at a convention in March they would devise a common program and choose a single candidate for presidential elections next December. In a statement, leaders cited dangers posed by the world economic crisis and Latin American hopes raised “by governments of the left … independent of U.S. imperialist policies.”
Later, Communist Party leader Guillermo Teillier called for “profound changes so that Chile’s enormous inequality is ended, so we can be owners of our riches.” (www.pcchile.cl)
The French news agency AFP said former President Eduardo Frei, a Christian Democrat projected as candidate of the center left Concertación coalition, faces token opposition in December from millionaire Sebastián Piñera of the rightist Alliance for Chile.
China: Leader discusses challenges
Premier Wen Jiabao told the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland Jan. 27, “We are facing severe challenges in China, including shrinking global demand, overcapacity in some sectors, and rising unemployment in urban areas.” He foresaw protests and social unrest.
China’s trade unions are helping retrain and find new jobs for millions of migrant workers forced by the downturn to return home, People’s Daily reported. The Ministry of Finance said it will help create jobs in government infrastructure and environmental protection projects.
Wen Jiabao pointed to “an unsustainable model” in western societies of low savings and high consumption and “blind pursuit of profit” on the part of U.S. and European banks. The government initiated a $586 billion stimulus program last November.
Cuba: Social security is revised
A new social security law took effect last week following nationwide workplace discussions and National Assembly approval. The change comes in the context of economic reform measures presently underway in Cuba.
Women’s retirement age increased from 55 to 60 and men’s from age 60 to 65. A draft version of the law had set retirement as beginning at ages 62 and 67 respectively.
To qualify for retirement, workers must have completed 30 years of service, according to www.cubanow.net. The law takes effect gradually for individuals close to retirement age, to allow for planning. Young people without parents continue to be protected through completion of university or professional training.
World Notes are compiled by W.T. Whitney Jr. (atwhit@roadrunner.com)
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