1930's student movement holds lessons for today

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In late 1986 and early 1987, students began to rise up in the millions around issues that affected their lives. In France, Spain, Mexico, China, Greece, and even the Soviet Union young people have been making their voices heard.

One feature common to almost all these rebellions was the desire of militant students to link up with the mass organizations of the working class-the trade unions—in order to make their own struggles more effective. In some instances, the support given by the trade unions was a key element in the victories won by the students.

In the United States, student activism has played a significant role in recent history. The militant struggle by the students of the 1960s and '70s played a decisive role in ending the U.S. war in Southeast Asia.

The mass demonstrations of that period, however, took place in a country still experiencing the last phases of a post-war economic boom.

The majority of the American working class at that time still subscribed to the "guns and butter" theory. This line, advocated by the U.S. government and the AFL-CIO officialdom, pledged union support for "guns" abroad in return for "butter" and small concessions at home.

Although there were small exceptions, the organized labor movement on the whole took an ambivalent and even hostile attitude toward the student antiwar demonstrations. Because of this, students of the '60s did not look to the American working class as a powerful ally for their Little-known chapter There is, however, a little-known chapter in the history of the American student movement in which the students looked to the American working class for inspiration and example. This period was the 1930s.

The campus of the 1930s had a different look than the campus of today. The prosperity and reforms which allowed the children of working people onto the campuses in recent decades did not exist then.

The students of that time were primarily 4 SOCIALIST ACTION I middle and upper class in origin. But in the early '30s—the lowest point in the Great Depression-the prospects of a lucrative professional career upon graduation were almost non-existent.

These students were largely shocked and confused by the poverty and apparent hopelessness of the world around them. Although some student organizations existed, there was little student coordination nationwide. But students were looking for a way to fight back.

A turning point came in 1932.

That year, 15,000 coal miners in Harlan County, Ky., were involved in a strike led concern of tions from state to state denounced the deputies' actions and took up the cause of the miners.

First student strikes The first student strike took place later that year in New York. Reed Harris, editor of the Columbia University Spectator, regularly wrote pieces which denounced R.O.T.C., defended the Harlan strikers, and took up other popular causes.

In one issue, Harris struck a problem which rubbed the school administration the wrong way. He claimed the cafeteria was being run for profit rather than for the needs of the students.

Harris was immediately expelled. The reaction was tremendous, and activists saw an opportunity to mobilize their fellow students.

Four thousand students from various New York colleges rallied to a mass meeting which issued a strike call. At Columbia, 1400 students went on strikeover 75 percent of the student body.

Another major concern of students in the '30s was war and how to stop it. Beginning in 1932, activists started organizing national conferences to debate the best way to fight against militarism and war.

From these discussions came the call for the first national student peace strike. Actions were set for April 13, 1934. Students were to leave classes at mid-day for one hour and hold mass antiwar meetings. Twenty-five thousand students responded across the country.

These strikes were to become an annual event. In 1935, 175,000 students responded to the peace strike. In 1936, the figure had climbed to 500,000. And in 1937, 1 million students struck around the country.

American Youth Congress

Throughout this period, the American student looked to the American worker for inspiration. The great general strikes in Minneapolis and San Francisco in 1934, and the strike wave of 1937 gave students confidence that they were not alone in their struggle.

The labor struggles of the time affected the students' consciousness. Students identified with the working class and began to put forward demands which challenged capitalism in their platforms and programs. eliminate war and poverty. But this potential was never realized.

The upsurges of the '30s never developed a conscious political expression. The opportunities for building an independent labor party based on the unions which would fight for the needs of workers, students, and all oppressed people were not taken advantage of.

Instead, the reformist misleaders of the workers' movement channeled the militancy of the workers and students into Roosevelt's "New Deal" Democratic Party.

Roosevelt, despite his rhetoric, defended capitalism—a system which depends on wars and exploitation for its very survival.

A major force that pushed this proRoosevelt orientation was the Young Communist League, which supported the Soviet bureaucracy. The YCL had played a positive role in the early '30s. But as Stalin moved toward détente with the U.S. government, the YCL's radicalism died down.

The Stalinists and others succeeded in taking the fight out of the student movement. Slogans against imperialist war were replaced gradually by compromises and support to the Democrats. The movement became co-opted and harmless to the American ruling class.

American youth, in their majority, supported Roosevelt as a "peace candidate" in 1938. Ironically, the same students who declared a few years before that they "would not fight in any war" were killed in the hundreds of thousands by the military policies of a president they helped put into office.

Students rise up again The students of today are beginning to rise up again around powerful issues. In the United States, the anti-apartheid actions of 1985 showed the potential for student activism. Many of today's youth have parents or friends who participated in the '60s student radicalization.

There is a major difference, however, between the '60s and the '80s. Unlike the '60s, the working class today is facing the worst ruling-class attacks in 35 years. The ranks of the labor movement are starting to realize that U.S. imperialist foreign policy can only be maintained at the expense of living standards here at home.

Students and workers are beginning to go into motion around foreign and domestic issues. Examples of this are the mass April 25 antiwar demonstrations in Washington, D.C., and San Francisco.

Young people today, united with labor, have the opportunity to fight for a better world-to fulfill the promise and potential of the '30s.