The first issue of the Militant was dated Nov. 15, 1928. To celebrate 75 years of uninterrupted publication, the Militant launched this column a month ago with articles on the history and contributions of the paper as the voice and organizer of the communist movement.

Last week’s selection, an article by Harry Ring based on an interview with Cannon, explained how the Militant got its name. The previous two articles were excerpts from “A Short History of the Militant” by SWP leader Joseph Hansen, who also served as the paper’s editor at various times. Hansen explained how expelled leaders of the Communist Party launched the paper “in opposition to the Stalinist faction that had been placed in command of the Communist Party under a Kremlin ukase.”

The principal goal of this column has been to urge and aid the preparation of public forums in every single city where the paper is distributed celebrating the paper’s 75 years in the struggle for socialism (see listings below).
 

As reported last week, the issues of November 7 and November 14 were held up by the Post Office authorities. Since then the November 7 issue has been destroyed at the Post Office on orders from Washington, and the issue of November 21, which carried a report and protest against these arbitrary actions, has likewise, been held up. We have learned from attorneys of the Post Office Department that The Militant has been subjected to these persecutions because of its editorial policies and criticisms of the administration.

The Militant thus has the honor of being the first workers’ paper to suffer a reactionary attack on the freedom of the press, just as the Trotskyist movement was singled out for the first prosecution under the notorious anti-labor Smith Act. But the Trotskyists are hit only because they are the spear-head of militant resistance to the developing reaction. These attacks against the Trotskyists are, in essence, aimed at all workers rights and against the labor movement as a whole. The entrenched reactionaries are feeling their way toward a general assault on the constitutional rights of free speech and free press. They want to silence all criticism.

The arbitrary, bureaucratic violations of The Militant’s mailing rights is only the latest in a series of actions against the Trotskyist movement in the United States during the past year. They all fit into the same pattern….

To cap these crimes, news of these suppressions has itself been suppressed. The managers of the paper were not notified of the suppressions and were informed of them only after they had inquired concerning the non-delivery of the paper. None of the big capitalist papers has published reports of this blow against the freedom of the press.

Thus Trotskyists have been the first to be indicted and tried under the infamous and unconstitutional “gag” act of Poll-Tax Representative Howard Smith…. The Militant is the first labor paper to suffer suppression since this war began. Finally, the authorities have tried to suppress the news of this….  
 
Promises and performances
In a featured article in the N.Y. Times, Sunday September 21, 1941 Roosevelt’s Attorney-General Biddle was quoted as saying: “Insofar as I can, by the use of the authority and influence of my office, I intend to see that civil liberties in this country are protected; that we do not again fall into the disgraceful hysteria of witch-hunts, strike-breakings and minority persecutions which were such a dark chapter in our record of the last world war.”

We could quote similar declarations of intent from President Roosevelt and other high officials in his administration.

These declarations flagrantly contradict the policy of persecution initiated by Roosevelt’s administration against our movement. Despite their promises Roosevelt and his aides have set their feet upon the path of persecution blazed by the Wilson administration in the last war. President Roosevelt takes off where Wilson left off: Attorney-General Biddle, with his raids and persecutions, imitates Attorney-General Palmer; Post Master General Walker suppresses socialists and labor papers like his Democratic predecessor, Burlesson: OWI head Davis suppresses the news of our suppression like propaganda minister Creel during the last war. They “use the authority and influence” of their offices, not to protect civil liberties, but to abridge them. Persecutions speak louder than promises…

Roosevelt’s Department of Justice knows precisely what we stand for. The leaders of our party explained our program and policies in full detail to the judge, prosecutors and jury at the Minneapolis Trial. This testimony has been published and distributed in thousands of copies to workers all over the country, all over the world in fact.

Our program and our record demonstrate that we Trotskyists are anti-fascist to the core. We are unremitting fighters in the interests of labor. We fight for the preservation of all democratic rights and civil liberties, against every form of inequality and injustice. As revolutionary socialists, we are principled opponents of the Roosevelt administration and criticize it from the standpoint of the socialist and labor movement.

These are our crimes in the eyes of the administration, and they add to their crimes in attacking us for them. The Roosevelt regime claims to oppose fascism but it collaborates, when expedient, with the fascists. It claims to be defending the four freedoms while trying to deny these freedoms to its political opponents. We Trotskyists, however, are defending democratic rights here at home against Roosevelt’s assault upon them. We are fighting for the freedom he hypocritically pretends to be safeguarding.  
 
Warning to the labor movement
But we are not defending these rights for ourselves alone. We are fighting on behalf of the entire labor movement in the United States. We are only the first to be attacked. If the government can put through these initial moves without a wide protest, prosecution of others will surely follow.

If The Militant can be suppressed, any CIO or AFL paper can be likewise suppressed. If our party’s candidates are not given their electoral rights, other parties can be similarly disfranchised. If the leaders of Local 544-CIO can be convicted under the Smith “Gag” Act, this law will be used against other militant trade-union leaders. If the FBI can succeed in their frame-ups against us, they will extend the frame-up system to others.

The persecution against the Trotskyist movement is simply the first steps towards an all-out campaign against the militants in the trade unions and the civil liberties of all working-class critics of the administration. The workers have already been denied the right of collective bargaining and the right to strike. Are they now to be deprived (by the powers that be) of the elementary right to express their convictions, to criticize the acts of the government and the reactionary plots of the profiteers, to defend their interests even in words? Wages have been frozen. Are civil liberties also to be frozen? The cost of living is mounting daily. Is the wave of reaction to be permitted to rise along with it?
 

Celebrate Militant’s 75th anniversary

Below is a listing of the events to celebrate the Militant’s 75th anniversary we have received by press time. All Militant distributors indicated this is an initial list of speakers and that more may be added. Unless otherwise noted, the events will be held at the Pathfinder bookstore in each city. For the address and phone number see the directory printed on page 8.

ALABAMA
Birmingham
Sunday, November 23, Dinner 3:00 p.m. Program 4:00 p.m.
Speakers: Brian Taylor, former Militant staff writer; Ezekial Hameen, longtime supporter of the Militant and owner of LaVase Restaurant.

CALIFORNIA
San Francisco
Saturday, November 22, Reception 6:00 p.m., Program 7:00 p.m.
(Location to be announced)
Speakers: Dennis Richter, Mark Gilsdorf, Emily Paul.

Los Angeles
Friday, November 15, Dinner 6:00 p.m. Program 7:30 p.m.
Speakers: Wendy Lyons, Socialist Workers Party; Harry Ring, Militant staff writer, editor, and contributor for over five decades.

FLORIDA
Miami
Saturday, November 22, Dinner 5:00 p.m., Program 6:00 p.m.
Speakers: Seth Galinsky, former Militant correspondent in Nicaragua; Nicole Sarmiento, Young Socialists.

Tampa Saturday, December 6, 7:30 p.m.
Speakers: Karl Butts, Socialist Workers Party; Francis Sesler, plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit by Black farmers against the USDA; Rudolfo Valentín, member of the Carpenters Union.

ILLINOIS
Chicago
Friday, November 14, Program 7:30
Speakers: Maurice Williams, former Militant staff writer; Rebecca Williamson, Young Socialists; Bert Hestroeffer, member of Teamsters Local 142; Keith Griep, member of UFCW Local 538 on strike against Tyson Foods.

IOWA
Des Moines
Saturday, November 15, Dinner 6:30 p.m., Program 7:30 p.m.
Speakers: Joe Swanson, Andrew Pulley.

MASSACHUSETTS
Boston
Sunday November 23, 2:00 p.m. Speaker: Laura Garza.

MICHIGAN
Detroit
Saturday November 15, Dinner 6:00 p.m., Program 7:00 p.m.
Speakers: Ilona Gersh, Osborne Hart, Maurice Williams.

MINNESOTA
St. Paul
Saturday, November 15, Dinner 6:30 p.m., Program 7:30 p.m.
Speakers: Augustina Borreal, meat packer and participant in United Food and Commercial Workers organizing drive at Dakota Premium Foods; Becky Ellis, reported for the Militant on antiwar and women’s rights fights in the South in the 1960s and 70s; John Pines, Young Socialists; Tom Fiske, Socialist Workers Party.

NEW JERSEY
Newark
Saturday, November 22, Dinner 6:30 p.m., Program 7:30 p.m.
Speakers: Paul Mailhot, Patrick O’Neill.

NEW YORK
Manhattan
Friday, November 21, Dinner 6:30 p.m., Program 7:30 p.m.
Chaired by Argiris Malapanis, editor of the Militant. Speakers: Martin Koppel, Militant staff writer and editor of Perspectiva Mundial; Naomi Craine, former Militant editor; Stu Singer, former Militant staff writer.

OHIO
Cleveland
Friday, November 21, Dinner 6:30 p.m., Program 7:30 p.m.
Speakers: to be announced.

NEBRASKA
Omaha
Friday, November 21. (Time and Location to be announced.)
Speakers: Lisa Rottach.

PENNSYLVANIA
Philadelphia
Friday, December 5, 7:30 p.m.
Speakers: John Staggs, John Studer, Hilda Cuzco.

TEXAS
Houston
Saturday, November 22, Buffet 5:00 p.m., Program 6:30 p.m.
Speakers: Tom Leonard, Jacquie Henderson, Brian Williams, Tony Dutrow.

WASHINGTON
Seattle
Friday, November 21, Program 7:30 p.m.
Speaker: Chris Hoeppner.

WASHINGTON, D.C.
Saturday, November 22, Dinner 6:30 p.m., Program 7:30 p.m.
Speakers: to be announced.

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