Vol. 77/No. 21      June 3, 2013

The Militant calls on readers to write up incidents of harassment, threats or attacks on those helping win new readers to the socialist newsweekly, as well as on Socialist Workers Party candidates and their backers. Send such reports to help the party prepare to defend its exemption from being forced to hand over the names of supporters to the U.S. government’s Federal Election Commission, providing a potential “enemies’ list” for spy agencies, cops, bosses and rightist thugs. The SWP is beginning now to prepare for the next FEC hearing after the November 2016 elections.

The SWP victory in winning continued exemption — the fruit of the party’s decades of participation in the struggles of working people and of its battle-tested ability to respond to attacks by the rulers and their political police — is the first successful pushback by working-class forces against the bosses and their government in recent years.

This victory flies in the face of the aims of the rulers who attack our rights because they recognize from well over a century of struggles and revolutionary uprisings of working people that today’s initial stirrings of working-class solidarity and resistance portend big class battles ahead that will challenge their rule.

This drives the growing trend in the U.S. government toward greater use of executive power — a trend that has accelerated under the Obama presidency. The centralization of power in the executive office goes hand in hand with the chipping away at workers rights on many fronts. Examples this week include secret probes to harass the press and use of the IRS to target conservative political opponents of the current administration — under the same rubric of “disclosure” and “transparency” as the SWP’s FEC battle.

Help spread the word about the recent victory for the working class against “disclosure” and help the SWP prepare to defend it.
 
 
Related articles:
White House targets political opponents and reporters
Victory in disclosure fight strengthens workers’ ability to organize independent working-class political action
‘Injury to one is injury to all’ guides Socialist Workers Party in battles against government attacks
 
 
 
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