****************************************************************** People's Tribune (Online Edition) Vol. 20 No. 8 / February 22, 1993 P.O. Box 3524, Chicago, IL 60654 Email: jdav@igc.org ****************************************************************** +----------------------------------------------------------------+ PHONY 'TOWN HALL' MEETING PAVES WAY FOR MORE AID CUTS! DETROIT -- No one in America should miss the real message of President Clinton's "town hall" meeting. He came to the state where Michigan Governor John Engler has chopped 90,000 people off General Assistance. He didn't mention that the same governor has been named to a task force to advise him on "welfare reform"! While Clinton talked about "shared sacrifice", seniors and public aid recipients outside the TV studios had a "town hall" meeting of their own. They demanded that Clinton publicly repudiate Engler and deal with the hunger, homelessness and death that the Michigan welfare cuts have brought. That Clinton would seek the advice of this Republican hatchet man is fair warning to every American who is out of work and headed for the welfare rolls: President Clinton is going to "sacrifice" _you_! Don't let him get away with it! Across this country, demand the removal of "Scissorhands" Engler from _any_ task force advising the President! Demand jobs, not cuts! See stories 2 and 3 for more. +----------------------------------------------------------------+ INDEX to the PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE (Online Edition) Vol. 20 No. 8 / February 22, 1993 Editorial 1. MARYLAND GOVERNOR'S ATTACK ON THE POOR MUST BE FOUGHT News 2. MICH. GOVERNOR WHO DESTROYED WELFARE NOW ADVISING CLINTON! 3. THE VOICES PRESIDENT CLINTON DIDN'T HEAR: GOV. ENGLER MUST GO! 4. L.A. STRIKE DEADLINE NEARS: BUDGET CUTS HURT DISABLED KIDS Focus on Sears Layoffs 5. LEGISLATOR DEMANDS SEARS RE-PAY TAX BREAKS: 6. SEARS WORKERS TELL THEIR STORY 7. ALABAMA'S HOMELESS: SEARS SHUTDOWN VICTIMS WILL JOIN THEM SOON Columns and features 8. LOS ANGELES -- THERE'S A WAR GOING ON 9. 'NO FREEDOM W/O EQUALITY': THE FUTURE OF THE AMERICAN DREAM 10. TAX ABATEMENTS: THE GET-RICH-QUICK SCHEMES OF THE ELITE 11. CALL TO FORM ORGANIZING COMMITTEES... 12. DRAFT PROGRAM FOR THE ORGANIZATION OF REVOLUTIONARIES 13. ABOUT THE PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE ****************************************************************** 1. EDITORIAL: MARYLAND GOVERNOR'S ATTACK ON THE POOR MUST BE FOUGHT By Mike Brand An economic system like ours which cannot provide decent jobs or feed, clothe and house its people cannot last long. When robots and electronics perform tasks that people used to be paid to do, unemployment is inevitable. The politicians defend this system by blaming its victims. They say that it is our fault that we are poor. There is something wrong with us, they say, not the system that cannot take care of us. Welfare recipients, especially AFDC mothers, are being blamed for the economy falling apart. Maryland Governor William Donald Schaeffer proposed in his report to the Legislature that mothers on welfare should be given birth control and that men coming out of prison should be given vasectomies in order to reduce welfare costs. Supposedly this would be voluntary, but when someone is faced with a reduced DSS check or remaining in prison if they don't go along, there is nothing voluntary about it. Schaeffer's plans are part of a growing attack against AFDC mothers for having babies. Several states have already passed laws punishing poor women for having children. Many more states are discussing such legislation. According to this kind of thinking, the reason why we are in such bad economic shape is not that there are no decent jobs for us, it's that the poor are having sex, getting pregnant and having children. As feminist historian Rickie Solinger puts it, "It revolves around the capacity in this culture to blame women and their reproductive capacity for the problems of society... What we still see in New Jersey and Wisconsin and all the states that are trying to punish women for having babies, as if it weren't for woman's sexuality we'd have a great society." Proposals like Schaeffer's are as dangerous as they are ignorant. They are rooted in a history of prejudice and lies as old as slavery. While Schaeffer, Clinton, and other politicians try to inflame what the governor of Delaware calls "the understandable anger" of employed workers against pregnant, unemployed women, the real danger grows that young women, denied real health care, will suffer from the effects of unwanted, possibly unsafe, birth control devices such as the Norplant implants which already are encouraged for young mothers in Baltimore. Literature is being passed out by the city's health department to scare girls into having the implants. Yet there is no research on the effects of these implants on teenagers. And, according to the research that has been done in Europe among women in their late twenties, more than half of the women suffer abnormal bleeding. City Councilman Carl Stokes says he opposes "providing Norplant to teenage girls in Baltimore City Public schools" and is holding public hearings on the subject. But the forces pushing such plans are powerful and organized. Much work must be done to defeat them. ****************************************************************** 2. MICH. GOVERNOR WHO DESTROYED WELFARE NOW ADVISING CLINTON! By Allen Harris What was Michigan governor John Engler doing on October 1, 1991? On that day he cut 95,000 unemployed people off General Assistance (GA). No wonder more than one million people signed recall Engler petitions. As a member of a National Governors Association panel on welfare reform, Engler is now advising President Clinton. Because of the 1991 GA cuts, homelessness skyrocketed in Michigan. The tent cities and shanties of homeless people that sprung up that winter were known as "Englervilles." Michigan has served as a laboratory for the kind of "welfare reform" that the capitalist class wants to undertake in the United States. It's a reform that gets rid of the "safety net" programs. It's a reform that kills. General Assistance originally was set up to support the unemployed until they could be called back. The capitalists who run the government came up with this because at that time such a program was in their interest. Now companies, like GM, keep turning out their products while laying off their workers. Every day thousands of workers are replaced by machines. The unemployed never will be needed again. That's why the government is killing GA in Michigan and many other states. To accept John Engler as an advisor on welfare reform is a slap in the face to every homeless person, every unemployed person and every still-employed person in the land. The very people who defeated George Bush and elected the former Arkansas governor. ****************************************************************** 3. THE VOICES PRESIDENT CLINTON DIDN'T HEAR: GOV. ENGLER MUST GO! Leaders Speak Out [The PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE asked people from Michigan and around the country what they thought about Governor John Engler advising Bill Clinton on welfare reform. Here are some of those comments.] Maureen Taylor, State Chairman, Michigan Welfare Rights Organization: "Both Governor Engler and President Clinton speak of the need for all Americans to share the pain of our economic times. Governor Engler has introduced mass starvation and increased homelessness among the poor and has introduced increased wealth and prosperity among the rich. When we control the resources of this state and this America, hunger and homelessness will be words from our past. Governor Engler and all who support him will share that same historical footnote." Carey Rogers, Michigan Welfare Rights Organization, former GA recipient in Detroit: "Governor Engler has regarded the poor as non-people. With a wave of an executive wand he made 95,000 people disappear and claimed that they didn't exist anymore. We do exist and will fight for his demise." Nazarre Milton, age 7, from Detroit: "Governor Engler cheats. He steals money from the poor and fixes up his office. The governor is supposed to help the poor, but Governor Engler is helping himself and his rich friends." Nitza Vera, Citywide Welfare Advocacy Network and The Coalition for Welfare Rights, New York, New York: "It's apparent what they want to do -- put more homeless people on the street. It's fine if they want to cut welfare, but then they have to give people jobs. No one wants to be on welfare. They have no choice. They should use all the money they spend on training to create jobs. I'd like to see Engler try to apply for welfare ... see how he likes it." +----------------------------------------------------------------+ February 4,1993 Dear Hillary: I can't believe you, as Board Member of the Children's Defense Fund, could possibly acquiesce to your husband's appointment of Governor John Engler to a 10-member task force on welfare reform! It would be like appointing Hitler to a human rights commission! Governor Engler is despised by over half the population of Michigan for his cruel and oppressive treatment of the poor and the mentally and physically handicapped. He cut 90,000 of the poorest of the poor right off the welfare rolls without even providing medical care for them! Our homeless rates have tripled since he has been in office. He is nothing short of a MONSTER!!! We Democrats can't wait to vote this Neanderthal Republican out of office in 1994. But now President Clinton gives Engler credibility by appointing him to a prestigious welfare task force! I can't believe it!! Sincerely, Maggie Tyson +----------------------------------------------------------------+ ****************************************************************** 4. AS STRIKE DEADLINE NEARS, L.A. TEACHER SAYS BUDGET CUTS HURT DISABLED KIDS By Anthony D. Prince EAST LOS ANGELES -- Five hundred handicapped students and their teachers at the Alfonzo B. Perez Center are balancing the state budget -- on their backs. "They've cut out just about all of our field trips," says special education teacher Ruth Prince Buell, furious at Governor Pete Wilson for slashing $2 billion from the California school budget. "They can't go anywhere because we can't afford the [wheelchair accessible] lift buses." Buell, like 20,000 other angry Los Angeles school teachers, has voted to walk out on February 23. The immediate issue is a total of 12% in wage cuts imposed by the L.A. Board of Education. But it goes deeper than that. "I have spent over $1,000 of my own money on my students," says Buell who has taught here for 12 years. "Every teacher in L.A. spends their own money on things like paper, pencils, supplies. We do it unconsciously, it's almost become a way of life. You saw on "20/20" how the military has warehouses and warehouses of stuff they will never use. _They_ don't suffer for materials!" Buell points out that under Public Law 93 every child in America is entitled to an education "in the least restricted environment." She says cuts in the number of teacher aides violates that law. "It means I can't take the kids out of their wheelchairs as often as I'd like, it means there are too many kids in the class." Buell points to the bigger picture underlying the teacher's fight. "First of all there is a depression going on. We have people who lived in homes that they owned who are now on welfare. Our real adversaries are Sacramento, the government and Governor Pete Wilson." Buell refuses to condemn the kids who have been shut out by the system. "If I were a teenager today I wouldn't go near a school, I'd be a dropout. If we don't educate them they are going to be out on the streets where they are going to be in the gangs. Maybe they'll get an even better education there! Look at what they put on the walls -- they're finding a way to read and write anyway!" Buell concludes, "If there was an earthquake or other natural disaster they'd find the funds. Well, this is an _educational_ disaster, a _cultural disaster_! No teacher in L.A. wants to strike but we don't know what else to do." ****************************************************************** 5. LEGISLATOR DEMANDS SEARS RE-PAY TAX BREAKS: 'The worst public policy decision that we have ever made!' By Anthony D. Prince CHICAGO -- Illinois State Representative Clem Balanoff remembers the massive tax breaks given Sears in 1989 that paid for its new world headquarters. At the time, Balanoff fought bitterly against caving in to Sears' threats to move out of Illinois and destroy 7,000 jobs. Now -- tax breaks safely tucked away, shiny new headquarters completed -- Sears has announced the elimination of over 50,000 jobs nationwide! "They got 20 years of property and real estate taxes lifted," the outspoken Balanoff told the PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE. "That's over $61 million. "It was a program [tax increment financing] that was only supposed to apply to depressed areas. Go out there to Hoffman Estates [Sears' wealthy suburban headquarters]: it isn't what _I_ would call 'economically blighted.'" Responding to the Sears job cuts, Balanoff is working on legislation that would force the company to repay the tax breaks at once. "Although there was no written commitment from Sears, they have completely reneged on what they said at the time," says Balanoff, whose 35th Representative District on Chicago's Southeast Side has experienced massive layoffs in steel and other industries. He insists that public funds should go to _create_ jobs, not to corporations that destroy them. "Enough is enough," he told the PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE. "We have to stop giving welfare to the very wealthy, to corporate America. A lot of my fellow legislators told me that they had made a deal with Sears. I told them I had made a deal, too -- with the people I represent." It isn't the first time, nor will it be the last, that this son of a steelworker has tangled with the rich and powerful of Illinois. The feisty young legislator successfully fought Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley over an airport that would have destroyed 8,000 homes in his district. And he's locked horns with big business over toxic dumping. "We organize people to fight for themselves," says Balanoff. "There is outrage all across the state of Illinois and we are going to try and rescind all tax breaks that were given Sears. But, realistically, the only way we can do it is if the citizens raise hell." [To contact Rep. Balanoff, call 312-978-1000.] ****************************************************************** 6. SEARS WORKERS TELL THEIR STORY Cody Henry spent 17 years as a porter and stock worker at Sears' gigantic building on Chicago's West Side. The "Big Store," where 20,000 once worked, was shuttered soon after Sears Tower was built in the early 1970s. The surrounding North Lawndale community, where Henry raised his family, began a long slide into poverty and economic ruin. He recalls his fellow workers. "I kept in touch with a lot of them when the catalog operation shut down," he says. "I imagine a lot of them lost their jobs." Asked what he thinks about the tax breaks that Sears got and the thousands more jobs they are now destroying, Henry adds, "Personally to my better judgment, they shouldn't get the break if they can't keep people working." +----------------------------------------------------------------+ Vickie Coleman wrote a letter to Sears officials to protest closing of the suburban Chicago store. After reading it 61 of her fellow workers signed also. Together, they represent 474 years of employment at Sears. "I am very mad at the government right now," she says, angry that the state of Illinois gave millions in tax breaks to Sears to preserve jobs. "We're talking about a multi-million dollar tax break. If you took that money and split it up among the 50,000 people who are going to lose their jobs, it wouldn't be much, but it would help." Coleman bitterly points to the $9 million in salary and benefits handed to Arthur Martinez, the Sears executive who engineered the massive job cuts. "You could pay 600 people $15,000 a year with that money," she says. "That's more than the stock guys made here." +----------------------------------------------------------------+ The PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE, the newspaper of the National Organizing Committee, urges all Sears employees whose jobs have been eliminated to call or write us with your story. GET IN TOUCH. CALL 312-486-3551 OR WRITE PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE, P.O. BOX 3524 CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 60654. +----------------------------------------------------------------+ ****************************************************************** 7. WHAT ALABAMA'S HOMELESS KNOW: SEARS SHUTDOWN VICTIMS WILL BE JOINING THEM SOON By Mobile Union Chapter for the Homeless MOBILE, Alabama -- When the Sears Telecatalog Center opened in Mobile just five years ago, it was heralded by the press and politicians as a boom for the area's economy. Hundreds of new jobs would be available to local residents! Over 5,000 people put in applications. As it turned out, the vast majority of the jobs were part-time and near minimum wages. Many workers had to supplement their incomes with food stamps and other government assistance. Nevertheless, all the jobs were filled and people depended on the incomes to try to survive. These jobs also provided no benefits because they were only part-time. With no other income to the households, many of the Sears workers found themselves among the 25 percent of Alabama households with incomes below $10,000 per year. To add insult to injury, when Sears recently announced that it was cutting its work force by 50,000, it was revealed that 1,200 jobs in the Mobile area alone would be eliminated. There is no safety net left for the Sears workers who will lose their jobs. Like the hundreds of thousands of workers before them who have lost their jobs, they are facing the stark reality of being homeless. It was out of conditions such as this that a group of homeless and formerly homeless people came together in Mobile this past October to form the Mobile Union Chapter for the Homeless. We have already begun to contact other organizations throughout the country who are fighting for survival and for permanent solutions to the problems we face. If you would like more information on our efforts here in Mobile or if you or your organization would like to contact us, please write to: Mobile Union Chapter for the Homeless, P.O. Box 40043, Mobile, Alabama 36640. We would like to thank the PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE for allowing us to use the paper to help break our isolation and link up with other groups fighting for survival. ****************************************************************** [Below are excerpts from an article submitted by Dino, a Los Angeles writer who is a founding member of the Homeless Writers Coalition. He is a available as a speaker to your group or organization. For more information, contact the People's Tribune Speakers Bureau, 310-428-2618.] 8. LOS ANGELES -- THERE'S A WAR GOING ON. By Dino In April (1992) here on the streets of Los Angeles, there was a war going on. It was like any war any place else in the world. It had its people's army and its people's enemy. And our army is young men like Damian Williams, Henry Watson and Antoine Miller of the L.A. Four, along with young men like Thurman Woods, who is now in prison for the shooting of a fireman during the first day of the uprising, and hundreds of other young men of all colors who are now prisoners of the war that is taking place on the streets of Los Angeles daily. These young men are prisoners of war, not gang members, robbers or killers. They are in prison because they stood up and fought for what they believe to be right. These young men were soldiers doing their job, as the American soldiers do their job all over the world. Only their job is to kill and destroy for what America believes to be right, and this they do wherever they go, and in April it was Los Angeles. Because now America has no more use for the working class American, because the robots and computers have replaced man in the work force. So now America must make you believe that the poor people are now the enemy, and all of America got to see the American army march on the oppressed and poor people of Los Angeles. But the war on the poor didn't begin on the streets of Los Angeles in April. The war began a long time ago, when this system first placed property over people. And it started as all of America's wars begin, with the old divide-and-conquer trick. Yes, they played upon our religions... Then came the Black, White, Chicanos game... But now the game is different. It's a class thing, it's the rich-man, poor-man game where the rich tell the working class that still have jobs, "You have to work for a living, so you shouldn't have to support those that have no job." And after you are divided into races, classes, and religions, then come the sanctions, where they cut off the support of those that are no longer useful and leave them to starve. This is known as budget cuts. Then they come in with their pitiful little handouts of food and money and attempt to control those that understand that this is war, and after that comes the drugs, and brute force. Then it's all about control, maintain and hold. Rodney King's beating, although racially motivated, had very little to do with race. It was all about control. There's a war going on. Now, in order to keep their control, maintain their oppression and hold the people down, they must keep the lie of a free nation alive. And the only way they can keep this lie alive is to crucify the L.A. Four and hang Thurman Woods. And they will keep this lie alive even if they have to turn on their own. They will even destroy the lives of the four police officers that beat Rodney King in order to save that lie. However it's done, they must keep their faith and destroy the faith of all young warriors that make a stand against them, so that the people's army will appear to stand alone. But they are not alone, for we, the people that know that there is a war going on, will be their strength. And you had better know that there is a war going on, because that war is against you, the working class of America. ****************************************************************** 9. 'THERE CAN BE NO FREEDOM WITHOUT EQUALITY': THE FUTURE OF THE AMERICAN DREAM By John Slaughter [The author is available as a speaker. Contact the People's Tribune Speakers Bureau at 312-486-3551 or 310-428-2618.] ATLANTA -- The state of Georgia is currently embroiled in a controversy over whether the Confederate battle flag should remain as the state flag. The supporters of the flag maintain that to remove it would be an affront to our Southern history and heritage. The truth is that there is no "Southern" history that does not place the African-American at the heart of it. Take the African- American out of the South and the "South" as such ceases to exist. The same goes for American history. The African-American has been -- and will be in the future -- at the center of every major movement that has shaped our history. Unfortunately, that history has been marked by the inequality of the African-American worker, and the answer to the systemic problems that plague this country must address the pivotal question of inequality. The African-American built the South, even though it was a laboring force held in bondage by a cruel plantation system that was calculated to work a field hand to death in an average of seven years. The plight of the poor white was also tied to the fate of the African-American, as they could not compete with labor that was in chains. The plantation system itself, founded upon manual labor, could not compete with a rising industrial capitalism in the North, and the outbreak of the Civil War was inevitable. When labor in bondage was set free, they demanded that the reconstruction of the South could only be completed by the complete breakup of the plantations. This was the meaning of "40 acres and a mule." But the capitalists of the North could not abide any transfer of private property, even of the defeated plantation elite, and they conspired to return them to power as long as they would be willing servants of capital. With a vengeance that included the lash and the lynch-rope, the African-American was driven back into the near-slavery of sharecropping. For nearly seven decades they endured, until the industrial revolution finally came to the South. With the mechanization of agriculture, the African-American suddenly became expendable, and the great migrations began, both to the industrial centers of the North and to the new industrial cities of the South. The hands that built the old South were now building the new South, as well as forming the core of the industrial workforce in the North. Always on the bottom, always the last hired and the first fired, they were at the heart of the industrial expansion that took place after World War II. Today our society is once again undergoing a process of transformation, and once again the African-American is at the heart of that process. Today production is being fundamentally altered by technology that is not simply labor-saving devices, but that permanently replace human labor. The African-American -- always the last hired and first fired -- is once again at the core of this new class of permanently unemployed that society is unable to house, feed, clothe, educate or care for. Freedom is a concept that has always been at the heart of the American dream. But who is free who has no home, who has no job in a society where human worth is measured by how much money you have? Who is free who has no access to health care, who is denied the education for the new era into which we are entering? Clearly we are entering a new period in human history, in which technology provides us with the means to eliminate poverty forever, but in which we now are bound by a system which cannot deliver even the basic necessities of life. We are entering an epoch of social revolution where the question of material equality and the question of freedom are inseparable. Freedom means nothing to those held in bondage by poverty today. Freedom is defined by the right to a good job, to a home, to education and health care. Society can and must be organized to eliminate poverty and to provide material equality for the class that is now the victim of the current system. The entire history of this country revolves around the struggle of the African-Americans to secure their freedom and equality. Today history is being made by a new class that is destined to take their destiny in their hands and make the American dream a reality. This new class of have-nots come from every section of society: They are Hispanic, African-American, Native- American and white. The revolutionary fight for their survival is already underway, and the unity of this class in their fight against a common enemy is essential. That is why the fight for the equality of the African-American lies at the heart of the struggle for the emancipation of our class. +----------------------------------------------------------------+ New book chronicles history of Alabama Black Belt _New Battles Over Dixie: The Campaign for a New South_ is a gripping human drama about Southern politics and economics. Author John Slaughter, who grew up in the piney woods of rural Alabama, was personally involved in the civil rights movement in the '60s and the voter registration battles of the '70s and '80s. _New Battles_ is set upon the stage of Southern history, but the issues it deals with go far beyond the Mason-Dixon line. If you are concerned about what is happening in this country and you are searching for solutions, you must read this book. John Slaughter is available to speak to your class or group about his new book and the unfolding struggle for the South and the nation. Contact the People's Tribune Speakers Bureau, P.O. Box 5412, Compton, California 90224, tel. 310-428-2618. _New Battles Over Dixie_ is available in bookstores and from the publisher, General Hall Inc., Dix Hills, New York. +----------------------------------------------------------------+ ****************************************************************** 10. THE GET-RICH-QUICK SCHEMES OF THE ELITE By Larry Regan GARY, Indiana -- Any time that a company is so powerful as to employ 50,000 people and then, overnight, just dismantle the lives of those people, well, it's a day that we have to hang our heads in shame. These companies are getting tax abatements and economic development funding from the powers that be, the "community leaders." If they really had the community in mind they would force these companies to pay back all the appropriate taxes and the penalties. These companies are coming in receiving the abatements, and after the tenure of the tax abatement is reached they skip town and go to another place with the same blackmail scheme. We are paying up to $87,000 per job for these agreements -- when the companies live up to them at all. A company may come in and enter an agreement to hire an additional 40 people and the fact is that they may only hire four. Then the company says, "We're not guilty of misrepresentation because we are not creating jobs but _preserving_ jobs." These are just get-rich-quick schemes of the elite and they should not be allowed to get away with it. President Clinton should establish a special prosecutor and prosecute the offenders, collect the taxes, interest and penalties they owe, and use the money to create jobs in this country! Talk about clearing up the deficit! They better start taking the money from the silk-lined pockets of these greedy capitalists who have so much they'll never know what to do with it. [Larry Regan is the former president of Steelworkers Local 1014 and a member of the National Organizing Committee.] ****************************************************************** 11. CALL TO FORM ORGANIZING COMMITTEES... ...to establish an organization to educate, organize, and finally lead the masses in the inevitable transformation of our society Sisters and brothers, The American people are under attack! Our communities are under siege. In the cities, the rural areas and the reservations from Selma to Watts, conditions are all the same. Jobs are minimum wage and factories continue to close. Unemployment benefits are a joke and welfare benefits can't feed our children or pay our rent. Some of us are forced to live in the streets like animals. Our communities are flooded with drugs and alcohol. Our children have no future. The police arrest, beat and kill us. The politicians and their political parties don't represent us. They are tied by a thousand threads to the real estate developers, the banks, the rich, the powerful and the rest of the capitalist class. A system that cannot feed, clothe and house its people does not deserve to continue to exist. We can and must organize to replace it. How? By preparing the people to take this country from the exploiters and run it in our interest. This calls for a national organization that will: * Root itself among the oppressed, the exploited, the homeless and the hungry of all colors and nationalities. * Develop a national long-range vision, strategy and plan for victory. * Educate the people on the situation we face, who the enemy is and how to fight. * Coordinate the varied scattered fights so that we can have an impact. * Build a structure that is in line with our local and national needs. * Develop the tools necessary to win: publications, schools, cadre, etc. This organization would be made up of the leaders of our scattered fights; those who want to develop a national analysis, strategy and resources; those unwilling to compromise with a system of exploitation, hunger and misery; those who want to win. Having discussed the Open Letter written by Marian Kramer and General Baker, we, the undersigned, call upon all who understand this need to join us and form Organizing Committees to establish an organization of revolutionaries. In the spirit of Nat Turner, John Brown, Sojourner Truth, Joaquin Murrieta, Chief Crazy Horse, Lucy Parsons, Albert Parsons, Malcolm X and others too numerous to mention, we make this call. Abdul Alkalimat, Nacho Gonzalez, Ethel Long-Scott, John Slaughter, Leona Smith You can contact the National Organizing Committee at P.O. Box 477113, Chicago, Illinois 60647 or call (312) 486-0028, or e-mail jdav@well.sf.ca.us +----------------------------------------------------------------+ The PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE Editorial Board is proud to inform our friends and readers that we are one of the publications of the National Organizing Committee. The PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE will make available every resource at hand to aid in the building of organizing committees in every state, city, and community. While we will be a publication of the National ~Organizing Committee, our pages are open to everyone who has a story to tell, everyone who has a plan for victory. The only requirement is adherence to the statement of purpose on page 2. Fighters for a new tomorrow: Make our pages a bold indictment against an economic system which has forgotten and does not care about you. Use our pages to put forth plans for victory. Use it to link with sisters and brothers across the country fighting the same enemy. Alone, we become prey to our enemies. Together we are invincible! +----------------------------------------------------------------+ ****************************************************************** 12. DRAFT PROGRAM FOR THE ORGANIZATION OF REVOLUTIONARIES This is an era of revolutionary change. Electronic technology is replacing human labor with computers and robots. Human labor is becoming worthless to a system that values only what it can exploit. The economic revolution is turning millions of people in this country into economic refugees. This system answers our cries of need with blows of terror. It offers unemployment, hunger, homelessness, welfare cuts, the AIDS epidemic and the plague of drugs. The government is turning from neglect to attack -- police murder and arrest of the youth, immigration raids, forced sterilization, and other forms of terror The millions this system has thrown out face two choices -- either accept destruction and murder or set out to overturn this system. Technology is powerful enough to end hunger, homelessness and all want -- but only if it is seized from the exploiters and organized in the interests of those this system has discarded. We are an organization based on the people this system doesn't need, the gravediggers of exploitation. Those this system has discarded have begun a revolution -- a revolution for food, homes, jobs, education, health care, freedom from police terror and drugs. Now is the time to organize and politicize the revolution that is shaking up this country. We will get only what we are organized to take. Our program is based on the revolutionary potential of those who have to fight this system in order to live. The decisive step today is to broaden and intensify the activities and influence of their movement. Based on this movement for survival, we will educate and organize revolutionary fighters from all sectors of society to wage war on the capitalist system. We call on you to join us in carrying out this program of action and education: Our program is to end poverty by seizing abandoned housing, and fighting to secure food, health care and whatever else we need to survive. Our program is to put an end to the state terror by confronting the government through mass mobilization -- in the courts, in the streets, by any means necessary. This organized action makes it possible for the millions who are being displaced, discarded and attacked by capitalism to be prepared, organized and trained to lead in overturning the whole system. Our program is to educate the millions of fighters with a blueprint of what they are fighting for and what it will take to build that kind of society. +----------------------------------------------------------------+ Now is the time to act. The National Organizing Committee calls upon everyone who wants to carry out this program to join us in building local organizing committees to build an organization around this program. Our task is not to be a debating society, but to be a coordinating body of active revolutionary leaders firmly rooted in militant mass forms of struggle. We intend to combine all of our efforts into one common effort, to unite our many specific demands around a general program for revolutionary change. We need you to join us in organizing committees in every city and rural community, on every battle front, to assist in spelling out how this program can be carried out. This draft program is being issued by the National Organizing Committee. General Baker, chairman. Contact the National Organizing Committee at P.O. Box 477113, Chicago, Illinois 60647 or call 312-486-0028. The signers of the Call to form Organizing Committees are available to speak. Call or write for more information. People's Tribune Speakers Bureau P.O. Box 5412 Compton, California 90244 310-428-2618 +----------------------------------------------------------------+ ****************************************************************** 13. ABOUT THE PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE The PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE, published weekly in Chicago, is devoted to the proposition that an economic system which can't or won't feed, clothe and house its people ought to be and will be changed. To that end, this paper is a tribune of the people. It is the voice of the millions struggling for survival. It strives to educate politically those millions on the basis of their own experience. It is a tribune to bring them together, to create a vision of a better world, and a strategy to achieve it. Join us! Editor: Laura Garcia Publisher: Lenny Brody To help support the production and distribution of the PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE, please send donations, letters, articles, photos, graphics and requests for information, subscriptions and bundles of papers to: PEOPLE'S TRIBUNE P.O. 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