BY NAOMI CRAINE

NEWARK - Socialist Workers Party branches and Young Socialists chapters in New York and New Jersey are taking steps to strengthen the organization, functioning, and striking power of the communist movement in this area. In a series of meetings in late October and early November, they discussed the world and U.S. political situation and how, by organizing to meet the opportunities to build a proletarian party and communist youth organization today, the communist movement can prepare itself to lead the larger class battles to come.

The discussions in New York and New Jersey followed recent meetings of the National Committees of both the SWP and YS, as well as a meeting of the party's national trade union leadership. These meetings examined the direction of the bipartisan offensive against the working class led by Clinton administration; the assault on democratic rights, including government police probes; and the employers' continued drive to amass greater profits at the expense of workers. The political situation today creates openings to recruit and demands more disciplined functioning and proletarian norms by party branches and socialists functioning in the trade unions.

The top priorities following the meetings here are to help bring to a successful close the Young Socialists drive to recruit 80 new members by December 1 and building the regional educational conferences sponsored by the SWP and YS November 29- December 1. (See ad on front page.)

One of the main questions the socialists grappled with was why bolshevik norms of organization are necessary to organize the working class and its allies in a revolutionary struggle to replace the capitalist government with one of workers and farmers. Today, this requires local party units capable of responding to political developments, organized fractions of socialist workers carrying out common work in the industrial unions, and functioning units of a communist youth organization.

The socialist workers decided they could better organize themselves along those lines by reorganizing their branch structure in the area to two units, one in New York and the other in Newark. Previously there were three branches in Brooklyn, New York, and Newark. Two dozen members of the New York and Newark branches are moving across the state line as part of setting up new branches that are roughly the same size, as are several members of the Young Socialists. Some half dozen socialist workers from the area will also be moving to other cities to help build the communist movement.

A delegation from the SWP's national trade union committee met and worked with socialist workers in the area who are members of five industrial unions - the International Association of Machinists; Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers; United Auto Workers; Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees; and United Transportation Union - to discuss how to improve their collective functioning and communist work in the trade unions.

At the same time, leaders of the Young Socialists met with the New York and Newark chapters of that organization and adopted measures to bring their organizational forms in line with their political goals. These include holding weekly decision-making meetings, electing executive committees and organizers rather than coordinators, and building the YS as a proletarian youth organization. The SWP and YS decided that where their members are working jobs in factories, mines, or mills and are in the same union, they will meet together to collectively decide the course of their political work on the job and in the union.

Communist workers and youth also decided to continue 24-hour defense of the Pathfinder Building, which houses the offices of Pathfinder Press, its printshop, and the Militant. This defense, carried out over the last six years, has also protected the Pathfinder mural - a six-story depiction on the south wall of the building of the revolutionaries Pathfinder publishes and other working-class fighters from around the world. The mural, which was completed in 1989, has now been covered over in order to halt water seepage and structural damage to the building. `The Changing Face of U.S. Politics'
Dennis Richter, a rail worker and leader of the party's national trade union committee, gave a report here to the final meeting of the members of the SWP and YS in the district November 3. Over the previous two weeks, he said, socialist workers in five unions "discussed the importance of going back and looking at what communist trade union work is, and to our handbook, The Changing Face of U.S. Politics - Working-Class Politics and the Trade Unions." The book, by SWP national secretary Jack Barnes, describes the experience of the working class over the last two decades, and reflects the hard-earned lessons drawn from the activity of the organized class-conscious and revolutionary-minded section of that class.

Richter cited a report to the 1979 SWP convention reprinted in the book, which explains that the goal of communist workers in the unions "is quite simple: to do everything possible to transform the American unions, as Trotsky explained, into `instruments of the revolutionary movement of the proletariat.' What we do is aimed at advancing toward revolutionary unions as combat organizations of the American working class. In the process of doing this, we'll build the irreplaceable political instrument of our class - a revolutionary party of industrial workers."

Over the past decade, Richter said, branches and industrial union fractions of the party retreated in their functioning and political work on the job. This was due to setbacks the working class suffered under the blows of the ruling class offensive. Along with that retreat came a slide in the norms of the party units. Fraction and branch meetings became less political, mass work and union work less directed through democratic and centralized organization, and habits of discipline and attention to detail eroded.

Although there are not rapid political developments going on, he said, there is enough happening in the class struggle to simultaneously transform this functioning and to recruit a new generation to the communist movement.

Using The Changing Face of U.S. Politics - along with issues of the New International magazine that contain the main strategic lessons of the communist movement over the last 20 years - is especially important today because of workers' resistance to the employers' attacks and the attraction of a layer of youth to communist politics. These facts open the possibility for communists to reconquer the lessons contained in these documents.

Describing the current political situation, Richter said, "The ruling class has a big job in front of it that won't be accomplished without giant struggles involving massive violence: the employers will drive to fundamentally alter the relations between capital and labor to lay the basis both to raise the average profit rate and to increase the mass of profits.

"What the rulers can't avoid is a frontal assault on the industrial working class," he continued. "They look around and say, `We have low interest rates, low inflation, stagnant or declining wages, and a fairly stable economy. But we haven't even come close to what we need to accomplish.' There is a wing of the ruling class that wants to push faster and harder and there are companies willing, like General Motors is right now, to take a strike in order to push workers back further."

The day before, GM reached a tentative national contract agreement with the United Auto Workers (UAW). Workers at GM plants in Indianapolis and Janesville, Wisconsin, were still on strike over local issues, particularly demanding relief from massive overtime work. These walkouts were settled over the next few days, with the company pledging to hire a few more workers at the struck facilities.

The national contract allows GM to eliminate some 35,000 jobs over a three-year period, close several plants, and pay lower wages to workers in new parts operations. Nevertheless, company officials say the pact doesn't do the job of putting GM on par with its competitors in terms of labor costs and productivity. The number-one U.S. automaker also recently took a strike at its Canadian plants, before signing a contract where the Canadian Auto Workers members gave similar concessions. War of position between classes
Richter said that although there are few strikes or labor battles now, there is "a giant war of position going on between the classes. This war is not so clear from the outside. It's one that doesn't always break out into the open. It's like watching someone doing isometric exercises. You have two sides pushing against each other, even though it may not look like there is much tension or energy being exerted."

As the employers probe workers' resistance and test how far they can push, the reelection of President William Clinton "will represent a continuation of his administration leading the bipartisan assault on our social wage and our living conditions," Richter said.

"Clinton claims he is the great supporter of the downtrodden," the SWP leader said. "The Republicans want to march down the field 100 yards to the right, and Clinton says, `No! You have to bring it back 40 yards.' So after organizing to push 60 yards to the right, he's hailed by groups on the left and the union officialdom as someone who's defending working people!" The coming bipartisan assault on Medicare is a prime example of this.

The tension and desire to stand up and fight by working people often breaks through the surface. Richter pointed to Leland, Mississippi, where 400 people turned out to protest the death of Aaron White. At first police said the Black worker was shot by cops near the town of 6,300. Later they changed the story, claiming White committed suicide. Authorities declared a state of emergency and imposed a 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. curfew after some residents pelted police cars with stones.

Another, more sustained, sign of this resistance is the rise in struggle against national oppression by Chicanos and Mexicans, which could be seen in the fighting spirit and youthfulness of the October 12 march on Washington for immigrant rights. It is also reflected in a series of skirmishes by packinghouse workers, particularly Latinos, in the Midwest against immigration raids and the conditions they face on the job.

Because of this resistance among workers and youth whose first language is Spanish, a few of whom are joining the communist movement, Pathfinder Press has made the top priority of its Spanish-language publishing program to produce an edition of The Changing Face of U.S. Politics in Spanish. Several workers at the November 3 meeting enthusiastically became the first of the many volunteers that will be needed to translate, typeset, and proofread the material for this book. That work has already begun.

As part of responding to the rise in the struggles by Chicanos and Mexicans throughout the southwest, Laura Garza, who was the SWP candidate for U.S. vice president, will soon be moving from New York to Houston.

In addition, leaders of the YS and other socialist workers from New York and elsewhere are moving to Des Moines, Iowa, to strengthen the communist movement there, and to Morgantown, West Virginia, where for the first time in over a decade some of the coal mines have begun hiring young workers.

The morning after the meeting, rail worker Simone Berg and Mike Galati, who works in Pathfinder's printshop, took off for Des Moines to join a week-long sales team to reach meatpacking workers with the Militant, Perspectiva Mundial, and Pathfinder books. Young Socialists recruitment drive
Young Socialists leader Jack Willey also gave a report to the meeting in Newark, summing up the conclusions of the YS leadership delegation. He reported on the Young Socialists drive to recruit 80 new members between July 11 and December 1. The effort is picking up steam, he said. In at least three cities, workers joined the YS after meeting a co-worker who is part of the communist movement. Several other new recruits are also young workers who met socialists campaigning on the streets or at political meetings. Other new YS members include youth who helped lead protests in defense of affirmative action and immigrant rights in California, students who organized meetings for Socialist Workers candidates to speak at their schools during the election campaign, and others. "Chapters report running into small groupings of young fighters attracted to communist politics," Willey added. "In some places this has resulted in recruitment of two or more people at a time.

Six youth have joined the YS in the New York/New Jersey area since the recruitment drive began in July.

"As we start to recruit larger numbers to the Young Socialists, we keep running into a big problem," Willey said. "We started anew in building a communist youth organization two years ago. We began with politics, not with organization. Now there is a gap between our political line and organizational norms.... The YS is extremely inefficient as a result of our lack of bolshevik norms and methods of organization."

The New York and Newark chapters concluded that "we need to function collectively, meet weekly, and have our structures reflect our political goal: leading young people to join the revolutionary battles of the working class and its allies to overturn the government of the final empire and open the fight for socialism," Willey explained.

"We discussed the difference between coordinators, which have existed since the formation of the Young Socialists [in 1994], and organizers. The former is a social democratic concept, the latter a bolshevik one," he continued. "The New York chapter voted to form an executive committee that is responsible for organizing all the members to carry out the decisions of the chapter meetings on a week-to-week basis. This is a leadership committee," elected by the chapter membership. One of its members will be the organizer.

"The only way that a communist youth organization will gain the discipline and organization" it needs, Willey said, "is to model itself after the proletarian party, and to adapt the party's method of organization according to the needs of the YS."

That's one reason why strengthening the political functioning of the SWP branches and trade union units is so necessary today, Richter stated. "The health and welfare of the Young Socialists is directly determined by what the party does and becomes." Proletarian habits and discipline
"In the last few months, we've been confronted with a series of probes on our democratic rights by the ruling class," Willey said, pointing to another reason the communist movement needs to reconquer proletarian habits and discipline. "The economic assault, including several different laws that have been passed, brings with it attacks on democratic rights. This includes the `antiterrorism' bill, the `anticrime' bill, and the various pieces of anti-immigrant legislation. There are other measures that aim to criminalize youth, such as attempts to force drug testing on those who are getting their driver's license, and imposing curfews.

"The probes include the call I received from a man stating he was from the Treasury Department inquiring about the U.S. Cuba Youth Exchange," which Willey participated in last summer, he said. "It includes the FBI interrogating employees at TWA [TransWorld Airlines] after the crash of Flight 800, and in the months after that, continuing interrogations by government agencies of workers at JFK airport."

The TWA investigation highlighted the importance of communist workers functioning collectively and discussing politically what is happening at their workplace and industry. In his report, Richter noted, "The FBI went into action right after the crash and began to put pressure on the workers there and called IAM [International Association of Machinists] members in for questioning. The fraction [of socialist workers in the IAM] met and had a discussion on our stance of not talking to the FBI. `Need to take ourselves seriously'
"But then the fraction stopped working its way through this," Richter continued, "coming back to it in the concrete situation workers at TWA face, and what it means tactically on the job. What does a communist worker do when told by a boss that they have to speak to the FBI? You have to be prepared and help prepare others before it happens. You have to know what you're going to say, to know what your rights are."

Organizing the defense of the Pathfinder building is a crucial piece of forging the kind of movement needed today, Richter added. "We are dangerous people," he said. "The rulers take us seriously. We need to do the same for ourselves."

The rail worker recalled, "Participating in a defense guard was one of my first political actions as a Young Socialist Alliance member" in New York in the early 1970s. "We had to defend the Communist Party mayoral candidate at Columbia University against clubs and bats" wielded by the National Caucus of Labor Committees, a grouping led by Lyndon LaRouche that called itself Marxist but was on the road to becoming fascist. The attack was part of "Operation Mop-up," in which this outfit carried out physical assaults on members of the Socialist Workers Party and Communist Party. "The way we organized our defense showed me that the type of organization I was in was serious about what it set out to do," Richter said.

The SWP and YSA - the predecessor of today's Young Socialists - carried out a victorious 15-year lawsuit against the FBI and other government cop agencies for spying and disruption against the communist organizations. In the course of the trial, the government was forced to admit scores of burglaries against the offices of the SWP and YSA. Richter pointed to this as another example of why a 24-hour defense guard is a conquest for the workers movement.

Willey described how socialists in North Carolina got a taste of the future a few months ago at a forum on fascism that they organized with some youth in Ashville. Several ultrarightist skinheads came into the meeting, wearing spiked brass knuckles and mace, and stated they were fascists.

Willey quoted a report by Diana Newberry, a YS leader who was in North Carolina at the time. "They were out for recruitment," Newberry wrote. "They very calmly and sanely talked about their family, the decay of society and to their ideas of saving the white race.... This is a brief picture, but it's important to keep these things in mind when they happen because we will face it more in the future."

Willey agreed, adding, "It drives home once again the importance of the YS catching up on the proletarian habits and norms of functioning," such as being prepared to defend any meeting you organize.

The reorganized SWP branches and YS chapters in the New York/New Jersey area have plenty of work to dive into. SWP and YS members are involved in building a tour for Cuban writer Norberto Codina in the New York area November 17-24, which will be an opportunity to work with youth and workers attracted to the socialist revolution in Cuba (see itinerary on back page). The tour can be part of communists' "work in defense of the Cuban revolution, and how we can use it to explain an example of workers in power," Richter said.

At these events and through the rest of the Militant subscription drive, they will be working to recruit to the Young Socialists and build the regional socialist educational conference that begins in Washington, D.C. November 29.  
 
 
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