Gloria Richardson, fighter for Black rights, Freedom Now Party

Vol. 85/No. 30 - August 16, 2021
Meeting in Chester, Pennsylvania, hosted by Freedom Now Committee, March 14, 1964, to form Black rights group ACT. From left, Lawrence Landry, Chicago school boycott leader; Gloria Richardson; comedian Dick Gregory; Malcolm X; and Stanley Branche, committee chair.

Gloria Richardson, a leader in the fight for Black rights in the U.S., died July 15. She was 99. As head of the Cambridge Nonviolent Action Committee in Cambridge, Maryland, an affiliate of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, she led…


All out in solidarity with Warrior Met miners on strike!

Vol. 85/No. 30 - August 16, 2021

Statement by Róger Calero, Socialist Workers Party candidate for New York City mayor, Aug. 4. Solidarity is needed to reinforce the strike by 1,100 miners at Warrior Met Coal and build on support they received at their rally in Brookwood,…


25, 50 and 75 Years Ago

Vol. 85/No. 30 - August 16, 2021

August 19, 1996 The following statement was issued July 31 by Socialist Workers Party candidates for U.S. president and vice president, James Harris and Laura Garza. Capitalizing on the explosion of Trans World Airlines flight 800 with the loss of…


Freedom Rides built fight to topple Jim Crow segregation

Vol. 85/No. 29 - July 26, 2021
Freedom Riders Ken Shilman, left, and Joe McDonald being escorted by authorities out of “colored waiting room” at Trailways bus station under arrest in Jackson, Mississippi, June 2, 1961. They were among hundreds thrown in jail. Inset, Jimmy Allen Ruth, who died last month at 83, was Trailways driver who volunteered to take Freedom Riders from Nashville, Tennessee, to Jackson.

This year marks the 60th anniversary of the Freedom Rides, one of the high points of the Black-led proletarian civil rights struggle that overturned Jim Crow and decisively changed social relations in the U.S. Despite U.S. Supreme Court rulings in…



Rose Knight, 50-year-long builder of communist movement in UK

Vol. 85/No. 29 - July 26, 2021

LONDON — Rose Knight, a 50-year veteran of the communist movement, died June 26 after a yearslong illness. She was 76. Knight was a founding member of the Communist League in 1988 and served on the party’s Central Committee in…


Teamsters strike Bellingham Cold Storage in Washington state

Vol. 85/No. 29 - July 26, 2021

BELLINGHAM, Wash. — Some 110 forklift drivers, members of Teamsters Local 231, went on strike July 1 at the Bellingham Cold Storage and processing facility here near the Canadian border. The company forced the walkout by making an insulting “offer”…


Quebec laws divide French, English-speaking workers

Vol. 85/No. 29 - July 26, 2021
Protest against Law 21 in Montreal, 2019, that bans public sector workers from wearing religious symbols at work. New Bill 96 introduced in National Assembly in May would limit access to English in schools, government matters, at a time French-English bilingualism has increased.

MONTREAL — Under the pretext of defending “Quebec’s values,” the government of the Coalition for the Future of Quebec here introduced a bill in the National Assembly May 13 that attacks workers’ rights. Bill 96 claims to “curb the decline…


After 10 weeks on strike, Olymel meatpackers seek new talks

Vol. 85/No. 29 - July 26, 2021
Olymel meatpackers carry “on strike” banner in Quebec City march July 7 demanding bosses negotiate a new contract. Bosses seek to keep steep wage cuts imposed on workers in 2007.

MONTREAL — Over 250 striking meatpackers, members of the Union of Olymel Workers at Vallee-Jonction, marched to the Labour Ministry in Quebec City July 7 to demand the arbitrator take steps to end the bosses’ refusal to negotiate. More than…


Kansas: Frito-Lay strikers win community support

Vol. 85/No. 29 - July 26, 2021

Over 600 members of Local 218 of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers union, who went on strike at the Topeka, Kansas, Frito-Lay plant July 5, are winning widespread solidarity in the area. The bosses there are notorious…