Re: A Question for the Moderator

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In a message dated 7/31/2004 7:33:32 PM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:   >As I recall DuBois and James Jackson produced the best articles on the national question (especially as it regarded African Americans) for PA in the 1950s, all of which broke with the "Black-belt thesis" and the concept of regional autonomy, though they continued to argue for self-determination. In fact, about 10 years before he officially joined the CPUSA, DuBois, according to some, is said to have authored the Party's official position on the question in an article he wrote in 1951 -- the title of which escapes me and I can't find my copy of it.<   Joel Wendland   Comment   Yes . . . I still read Political Affairs on line.   A part of my political history is tied to the CPUSA . . . through the old Communist League and before than the California Communist League and before that the Provisional Organizing Committee (POC) . . . that break with the party over the question of Stalin Contributions and the Negro Question. The theoretical presentation of issues tends to blind us of the historical moment and context or environment. Montgomery had exploded and most revolutionaries understood that the social and political equality of the African Americans was key to the revolutionary line of march.   One must remember that this was the period of Nikita Khrushchev and the 20th party Congress of the CPSU. These sharp theory and ideological battles create a polarity and no one can stand adrift or outside whatever poles become crystallized. It is not a question of one side having all the answers or being "right" and the other side being all wrong. If life was that simply none of us would really have to study the issues closely and master the meaning of language and words.   The California Communist League was formed on the basis of the Watts Rebellion in 1965 in Watts. The League of Revolutionary Black Workers or rather what would become the League took shape on the basis of publishing the newspaper "Inner City Voice" and factory leaflets on the heels of the 1967 Rebellion in Detroit . . . 1968. In the summer of 1969 . . . maybe 1970 I had go a part time job at Wayne State University and had been hanging in the offices of the League for about two years. The CPUSA book store was a couple of blocks from Wayne Campus and I use to live in the bookstore.   After the split in the League - around 1971 . . . we joined up with the California Communist League on the basis of their presentation of what was then called the Negro National Colonial Question. Their presentation made sense to what we where experiencing as industrial workers . . . not African Americans. The LRBW was a federation with groups and factory circles at every conceivable scale of development.   Those who criticized some our actions toward factory gate distributions focused on black workers tend to be people that have never done a factory gate distribution, worked in large scale industry, have never been elected to anything in life or for that matter have any experience in the flow of the social movement.     I listen and keep stepping. They remind me of the guy who has never played baseball but also have the answer for what every player should have done . . . after the game is over. We are not involved in a spectator sport.   What made us receptive to communism was the history of the CPUSA in the factories and their book store . . . although as a mass we could not accept the proposition of a peaceful transition to socialism . . . after the 1967 Detroit Rebellion and the little written about explosions in Detroit and Highland Park in 1968.   Our demand was never for self determination of African Americans as a theory proposition or political policy . . . because it simply does not make sense. This was a demand more in tune with the Republic of New Africa or the Nation of Islam. Self determination for African Americans means electoral rights and voting blacks into political office or Black Power. Our slogans were "Black Workers Power" and we were very clear we did not mean the black bourgeoisie or the black petty bourgeoisie or what in history had been called the "Talented Tenth."   The LRBW was formed almost at the exact moment of the political rupture of the workers and black bourgeoisie. The reason I did not join the CPUSA was its lack of militancy and its position on the Negro Question as well, as opposition to the Nikita Khrushchev polarity within the International Communist Movement. We sided with China in the polemics and their were some Maoists within our group as well as followers of Leon Trotsky . . . but our basis of organizational unity was victory to the workers in their current struggle.   The point is this . . . if Lenin is the index for the slogan self determination of nations and the African American people are not a nation . . . what is one talking about other than the bourgeois ideology of race. Regional autonomy for African Americans begs the question . . . what region of America? The South? What about the Anglo American people of the South?   It gets deeper because the Black Belt is not the South as a region . . . but a distinct economy center of gravity. One has to read Stalin . . . all of Stalin on the national factor and ask themselves "what is he describing or attempting to describe?"   One does not have to agree with Stalin or Marx for that matter . . . but what is being described? For instance I lived in Atlanta Georgia for a while and "Atlanta is the city that is to far South to be North and to far North to be South."   Atlanta was a financial and transportation center in its genesis within the context of Georgia being a penal colony or what is called in Marxist literature a "Border Region."  The political solution that Marxists in the oppressing nation look at for a border region is somewhat different that that of a nation. This is so because you are dealing with a somewhat different center of economic gravity and history formation.   Those comrades who scream bloody murder and cry crocodile tears over Chechnya - self determination . . . do not understand what they are looking at and I have to be very careful . . . because we cannot continue to step on peoples feet.   See . . . no one can get around Stalin and he will forever be the bone in the throat of the communist movement that cannot be swallowed or spit up. Anti-Stalinsim in American history is always tightly linked with anti communism, white chauvinism and anti-Russian sentiment . . . because that is how the political polarity evolved on earth and America.   This question of moving large masses of people in the Soviet Union or what in American history is called the "Trail of Tears" . . . or on the scale of world history social engineering . . .  which is a product of industrial logic has its distinct players in Soviet history.   One man can make a difference but one man . . . Stalin . . . or anyone else can do nothing on their own and anyone elected to anything in their life understands this elementary political fact of life. Ain't no damn superman.   There is not yet a forum to engage these important issues in the North of the American Union because of the anti-Marxists approach of the theorists of race that believe themselves to understand the presentation of the national and national-colonial question.   Self determination runs everyone into the bourgeoisie and reaction and every single national factor on earth has to be ascertained separately and concretely.   When one is faced with a complex situation and cannot discern all its features you follow the class logic. "Where are the workers . . . proletarians . . . what are they talking about and what is their direction."   Ones passion and communism keeps them in front of the curve. We are actually fighting bad leaders and bad people with evil intentions.   Melvin P.