Vol. 81/No. 4      January 23, 2017

 

Attica censorship ‘a danger to all who care
about freedom’

 
The New York State Department of Corrections has so far failed to answer any of the three appeals filed by the Militant seeking reversal of the unconstitutional impoundment of issues of the socialist newsweekly at Attica Correctional Facility. The first appeal was filed Nov. 3 after prison officials informed the Militant of its decision to bar subscriber Jalil Muntaqim from receiving the Oct. 3 issue of the paper, which had a front-page article on the 45th anniversary of the historic Attica prison rebellion.

According to Department of Corrections rules, its Central Office Media Review Committee must rule within three weeks of the receipt of an appeal. But they have not informed the Militant of any ruling and have not returned phone calls from the Militant’s attorney David Goldstein from the prominent civil liberties law firm Rabinowitz, Boudin, Standard, Krinsky & Lieberman.

Prison officials also impounded two other issues sent to Muntaqim, a former Black Panther and co-founder of the Jericho Movement, a group that works to win amnesty for political prisoners in the United States. Those two issues ran articles on the appeals the Militant filed challenging the prison’s censorship. Goldstein appealed both those impoundments.

Muntaqim was placed in solitary confinement last year after Attica officials accused him of encouraging gang activity in comments he made during a Black history class he taught to fellow inmates. He is appealing those charges.

The Militant has received support for its fight against censorship from a wide variety of organizations and individuals.

“The attempt to silence The Militant’s voice represents a danger to anyone who cares about freedom of thought, inquiry and expression,” wrote the Riverside Church Prison Ministry Jan. 7. “Censorship that is motivated by a belief that suppressing information allows for greater control and domination denies the fact that such censorship can also plant seeds of alienation and dissent.” Riverside Church is a well-known and respected institution in New York’s Harlem, with a long history of involvement in the fight for civil rights.

John Zippert, co-publisher and editor of the Greene County Democrat in Eutaw, Alabama, called on Attica and New York officials to “allow prisoners access to the Militant newspaper and other materials currently blocked.”

Zippert has a long history in the fight for civil rights, from when as head of the student government at City College of New York he joined the Selma to Montgomery protest battle in 1965 to the fight of small farmers to survive in the South. His paper, he writes, reaches “3,000 residents of Greene County and surrounding Black Belt areas.”

“We have numerous subscribers in jails and prisons in Alabama and other states that read our paper,” he wrote. “We strongly urge the Attica and New York prison officials to stop their unconstitutional and unacceptable actions, which violate our national standards of freedom of speech, freedom of the press and free access information for everyone, including the incarcerated.”

Among others who have called on Attica to reverse the censorship of the Militant are the American Friends Service Committee; the Gathering for Justice and Justice League NYC; Mothers and Families, New Market, Alabama; National Lawyers Guild; New York Civil Liberties Union; Pen America; Yusef Salaam, one of the Central Park Five; San Francisco Bay View monthly; and Heather Ann Thompson, author of Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy.

The reasons Attica censors have given for impounding the Militant are quite a reach. Prison authorities claimed that the pages in the Oct. 3 issue with articles on the 1971 Attica prison protests could “incite rebellion against government authority.” They banned the Oct. 31 issue on the pretext that reporting on the Militant’s plans to appeal the censorship decision “could incite disobedience.”

The Nov. 21 issue was banned because Attica claimed that a small image of the Oct. 3 front page used to illustrate the article on growing opposition to the censorship “could incite violence against prison staff.”

Goldstein in his appeal notes that “no reasonable, fair minded review” could conclude that any of the articles in the Militant advocate violence, rebellion or disobedience.

“The delaying tactics of the New York Department of Corrections just give us time to win broader support,” said Militant managing editor Naomi Craine. “We won’t stop until Attica rescinds its illegal, unconstitutional censorship and gives all of the impounded issues to Jalil.”
 
 
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Mumia Abu-Jamal wins fight for medical care behind bars
US prison population drops to 10-year low
Oppose rulers’ use of death penalty!
 
 
 
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