BY NAOMI CRAINE
BIRMINGHAM, Alabama - "Ask not what you can do for `your country.' Ask what you can do for your class" was the theme of a southern regional socialist conference held here December 20-21.

The weekend began with a visit to the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. This museum offers a vivid depiction of the system of racist segregation that existed throughout the southern United States into the mid-1960s and battles that brought it down. One thing that comes through in the exhibits there is what social force has the power to change the world. As the story of the civil rights movement unfolds, you see the Black working class coming into action, especially in the series of confrontations in this city in 1963 that became known as the Battle of Birmingham.

This area remains an industrial center today, with steel mills dotting the city and its suburbs, and coal mines in the surrounding region. Many of those who participated as youth in struggles of 1960s are still here, working in the factories and mines. A couple of these fighters were among the those who came to conference.

In all, 237 people participated in the two-day event, which was hosted by the Young Socialists National Committee and Socialist Workers Party branches in Atlanta, Birmingham, Houston, Miami, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Washington, D.C. Of those who came, 46 were under 27 years old. More than half of the participants were members of industrial trade unions. This included many socialist workers and young socialists who are members of the International Association of Machinists (IAM), who held a meeting to discuss their political work, as well as participating in the main conference sessions.

100 years of anti-imperialist struggle
The main themes of the conference were captured in banners hung around the main meeting hall. One of these read, "1998: The year of the 100th anniversary of the anti-imperialist struggle in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. `A rifle, a grenade, and a land mine for every Cuban.' Sovereignty, socialism, internationalism. Venceremos!" Like all of the banners, it was bilingual in English and Spanish.

Conference coordinator Meg Novak, a member of the United Steelworkers of America and the Young Socialists National Committee, chaired the opening session and introduced Mary- Alice Waters, the first speaker.

Waters, editor of the magazine New International, said that Washington rose as an imperialist power 100 years ago with the Spanish-American war, in which U.S. troops invaded Cuba and seized Puerto Rico, Spain, and Guam from its declining Spanish rival. This same imperialist reality, Waters said, and the resistance it breeds, is the starting point for revolutionaries today.

The Second Declaration of Havana, the manifesto of the Cuban revolution issued in 1962, gave an eloquent description of the miserable social conditions facing the toilers of Latin America and the struggle against them. Thirty-six years later, every word in this revolutionary document rings true to the capitalist disorder growing in the world today.

Waters pointed to the growing vulnerability of the world capitalist system, from the spreading economic crisis in Asia to Brazil and other countries of Latin America. Washington uses these crises to force open markets to U.S. capital, but in doing so simply ensures that the U.S. imperialist colossus sinks its tentacles more deeply into powder kegs around the world.

In this world the Cuban revolution takes on particular weight. It is the one place where the working-class both holds state power and has a communist leadership that reaches out for others who want to carry out revolutionary struggle around the world. Waters spoke about the significance of several recent gatherings in Cuba, including the conference hosted by the Communist Party of Cuba October 21-23 on "Socialism as the 21st Century Approaches." This event, which included representatives of political parties and organizations from throughout Latin America and many other countries, initiated a discussion on the necessary and sufficient program for a regroupment of revolutionary forces fighting to confront the rulers and imperialist masters. (A comprehensive report on this meeting was published in the Nov. 24, 1997, Militant.)

The opening report to that conference, presented by José Ramón Balaguer, a member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba, contained not one note of pessimism, Waters said. Balaguer pointed to the deepening crisis of the capitalist system and stated that socialism is "the only alternative to guarantee the survival of humanity." He spoke of the need for a revolutionary struggle for state power - a different perspective than that of many in the room. And he stressed the importance of building broad alliances - a united front - in response to capitalist austerity drives and attacks on working people's living standards, open to all those who agree to struggle on these fronts without compromising their principles to imperialism.

Siren call of economic nationalism
Jack Barnes, national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party, gave the second main talk at the conference, titled "The Siren Call of Economic Nationalism and Washington's March toward Fascism and War." Barnes pointed to the crisis the capitalist rulers are facing that fuels political polarization and the growth of rightist forces, and will eventually push them towards war.

The rulers don't march directly toward war, Barnes said. Wars have to be prepared and sold to the working class. Part of this is breaking down workers' resistance to nationalism, which begins with emotional appeals over economic conflicts. This economic nationalism is promoted by the trade union officialdom and petty-bourgeois left.

As political polarization increases, fascist forces begin to organize, playing on the fears and uncertainties of workers and the middle classes. Rightist politician Patrick Buchanan is once again increasingly referring to Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin and the investment brokerage Goldman Sachs - names that are obviously Jewish - in his demagogic attacks on the "banking elites" he accuses of being corrupt and at the root of social and economic problems. This was especially true in the six weeks leading up to when the White House came a hair's breadth from unleashing a massive bombing campaign against Iraq in mid- November, Barnes noted.

Buchanan also professes more and more agreement with the AFL-CIO officialdom's chauvinist, America First arguments in opposing "fast track" trade policies and the North American Free Trade Agreement. Following the Clinton administration's failure to win fast track trade authority in Congress, Buchanan heralded the president's defeat as the "first triumph of a blazing new nationalism."

Building a party of worker-bolsheviks
"80 years of the Russian Revolution: Worker-Bolsheviks enter history. The first triumph of a blazing new internationalism" read another of the conference banners.

The October 1917 Russian Revolution brought something new into world, a new social type, Barnes said, the worker- bolshevik. It was the first time the working class succeeded in taking state power and holding it. The greatest scandal of the October revolution was that for the first time in history it was led by a party whose membership and leadership were composed overwhelmingly of workers. The Bolsheviks were convinced that workers would be the bearers of culture and human solidarity, and acted accordingly.

The Bolsheviks were considered by the "left" to be extremely conservative for concentrating on propaganda work among individual workers, in the factories, and their insistence on giving revolutionary answers to every question.

Today, the most crucial place for communists to be is still among workers, developing habits of doing politics with workers like the original worker-bolsheviks. Systematic weekly propaganda work on the job, along with selling socialist literature at plant gates and in the Black community and other working-class neighborhoods, is what prepares communists for when the imperialists go to war and to take advantage of any revolutionary openings to lead working people to take state power.

If they don't do this, Barnes said, socialist workers will be dragged into capitulation to the imperialist rulers through adapting to the campaigns of the petty-bourgeois left and the trade union bureaucracy. Without a weekly rhythm of work rooted in the working class, socialists can find themselves drawn into activities like rallies and conferences opposing NAFTA and other trade deals, or the trade union officialdom's protectionist campaign against "sweatshops" in other countries.

There was an initial round of discussion after each of the main presentations. The second morning of the conference there was a meeting of Young Socialists members and other youth, followed by classes. At same time, members of the International Association of Machinists met to discuss these questions as they are reflected in their work in the union.

`Who will change the world?'
The most popular class at the conference was "Who will change the world? The Battle of Birmingham and the fight to end racist segregation." This was presented by Stephen Bloodworth and Derek Bracey, both workers in Birmingham.

Bloodworth reviewed the defeat of the slavocracy through the U.S. Civil War and the period of Radical Reconstruction, when Blacks in the South led the fight for land and political power. The defeat of Radical Reconstruction in the 1870s led to the establishment of Jim Crow racist segregation and allowed Washington to emerge as an imperialist power. He also described the unceasing resistance by Blacks to brutal racist repression throughout the period of legal segregation.

Bracey described the civil rights movement from 1955-1966 that succeeded in smashing Jim Crow, focusing especially on the Battle of Birmingham. It is fighters like the youth and workers who led that fight who will be in the vanguard of the coming American revolution, he said.

Michel Prairie, a leader of the Communist League in Canada, noted that the civil rights struggle of Blacks in the United States had a profound impact in the development of the Quebecois struggle for independence in Canada.

Tom Leonard, a longtime socialist who worked as a commercial seaman in the 1940s and 50s, gave a class on "War, immigrant workers, and the transformation of the working class in the United States - lessons from World War II, Korea, and the Maritime unions." In his presentation and answering questions, Leonard described some of the political work he and other socialists carried out during and after World War II in the maritime unions. He explained the positive effect of the coming together of workers with different nationalities and experiences coming into unions, and described the impact of Jim Crow segregation and racist attitudes promoted by U.S. military and bosses.

Diana Newberry, a member of the Young Socialists National Committee, and Chris Remple from Pittsburgh presented the third class, on "Cuba, Iraq, and the working-class campaign against imperialist war." This discussion took up the question of how worker-bolsheviks prepare for war by what they do every day. This idea was captured in part by one of the banners adorning the conference hall that read, "Confront Washington's march toward fascism and war! Build the Socialist Workers Party and Young Socialists!"

In the discussion at that class, one participant reported favorably a comment by one of her co-workers that, "It's not Saddam Hussein who suffers from sanctions but Iraqi people." Another participant in the class pointed out that this accepts notion that there's something "we" Americans should do to "deal with" the Iraqi regime. It's something that must be answered by communists with the unequivocal position of "U.S. hands off Iraq."

Since some of the main political points were barely touched on in the discussion on the presentations the first day, conference organizers decided to take another round in the final session, followed by a conference summary by Jack Barnes.

In his conclusion, Barnes noted that Cuban revolutionaries insist on combining communist traditions and politics with the fighting traditions of the country they're in. It's those experiences and traditions that point to who will be in the forefront of those who will come into the fight to change the world. For socialist workers in United States, he said, the most important of the conference banners in marking the 100th anniversary of anti-imperialist struggle was the one reading, "Celebrate the vanguard role of the Black struggle in the 20th century. Organize to eliminate racism and national oppression in the 21st."

The discussion on these themes will continue at the international socialist conference and convention of the Communist League in Canada, which will take place January 1 - 4 in Toronto, as well as at a west coast regional conference that will be held in Seattle Jan. 24 - 25.  
 
 
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