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Vol. 71/No. 15      April 16, 2007

 
25, 50 and 75 years ago
 
April 16, 1982
“If we have to fight we will,” British Defense Secretary John Nott declared April 4, as the largest British fleet assembled since World War II prepared to sail for Argentina. The British war moves were in response to the Argentine government’s decision to take possession of the Malvinas Islands (called the Falkland Islands by the British). Several thousand Argentine troops landed on the Malvinas April 2, an action that enraged the British ruling class. Although the islands rightfully belong to Argentina, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher denounced the Argentine move as “an act of unprovoked aggression,” and Nott vowed to “restore British administration to the Falklands even if we have to fight.”

April 15, 1957
A week of fighting the police and army has ended in Santiago, the capital of Chile. It began with students protesting a bus fare increase in the inflation-wracked country. Police brutality, including the killing of a 23-year-old girl student, brought on a general strike of students and the outpouring of workers against the police and bus company. Martial law was declared. Casualties were 18 dead, 500 wounded, 1,000 arrested. The right to freedom of the press was another casualty. Eighteen, including two leaders of a central labor union, have been exiled to the remote interior of the country. On April 8 the government lowered bus fares back down to the old rate.  
 
April 16, 1932
The three New York marine workers—Soderberg, Bunker and Trajer—who have been on trial for the past three weeks in the Court of General Sessions, were found guilty by the jury after five hours’ deliberation on Monday, April 11. The men were charged with a conspiracy to dynamite barges in the New York harbor in a struggle between the boat owners and the Boatmen’s Union.

One of the chief factors in the result of the trial was the flagrant unfairness manifested by Judge Allen in his rulings. For all who were present in the court room, the trial was a graphic illustration of class justice, and likewise of the fallacy that militant workers can get a fair trial in the courts of capitalism.  
 
 
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