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STOP US WAR ON NICARAGUA SOCIALIST ACTION JUNE 1987 3 editorial which ran in all the Hearst newspapers. Quoting the CIA-financed Washington Times, he stated:

"The leftist organizers of the Mobilization for Justice and Peace in Central America and South Africa received according to the Washington Times, $3 million from Nicaragua's communist dictator Daniel Ortega. The latter had been given the money by Libya's Col. Khadafy to finance nationwide protests and demonstrations in this country against President Reagan's Central American and South African policies."

Of course, the truth is just the opposite. These reactionaries were alarmed precisely because the protests were so broadly sponsored and so massively attended. As Maureen Fielder, co-director of the Catholic Quixote Center, wrote in a widely published response to Jeane Kirkpatrick:

"This mobilization has generated more right-wing attack than any since the Vietnam War—not because it espoused the 'hard-left' politics Kirkpatrick charged, but precisely because it was a mainstream mobilization of people who represent the moral force and numbers to change U.S. policy in Central America." (San Francisco Chronicle, May 13, 1987)

Strong labor participation The April 26, 1987, New York Times reported that the Washington, D.C., "event drew substantial support from labor unions, with possibly a third of the marchers bearing union placards or insignia."

Over 100 union-sponsored buses came from New York City alone. Entire cars on the 18-car train which brought demon -strators from Boston were reserved by trade unions. Local unions in other cities which had never organized for an antiwar or anti-apartheid protest before also filled buses for this march.

Actual labor participation in the Western States march was much smaller, largely because the International unions placed most of their emphasis on the Washington, D.C., action. But, nonetheless, some important gains were made on the West Coast.

Eight Northern California labor councils endorsed the demonstrations, with the San Francisco Labor Council donating office space for a Mobilization staff member to coordinate labor outreach.

All this occurred despite an extensive campaign to discourage labor participation in the national demonstrations. [See article by Jeff Mackler on page 4.] April 25 showed that it is possible to successfully mobilize beyond the relatively have labored during the past five years.' Democratic presidential candidate Jesse Jackson said, "It's time not only to march together, but to coalesce and vote to -gether... If we stand together and vote together, we can win together."

But relying on Democratic or Republican politicians is the opposite approach that was used to make April 25 a successs. The mobilization was a grass-roots, issueoriented movement which appealed to people regardless of their party or candidate preference.

And despite the claim by Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition that it is a social protest movement, its attempt to reform the Democratic Party prevents it from playing an active day-to-day role in the struggles of working people.

Both parties are simply electoral machines designed to promote the interests of the ruling rich and to steer dissent away from mass actions. That's why William Randolph Hearst Jr. could conclude his red-baiting attack on the April 25 mobilization by making an appeal to stay off the streets.

"Demonstrations held these days," Hearst wrote, "imply lack of confidence in, if not a threat to, our form of democratic government. The place to demonstrate is at the ballot box with your vote."

The Rainbow Coalition was only recently reactivated for the 1988 elections. This reveals, once again, that its priority is to work to reform the Democratic Party-rather than to mobilize the American people.

The Rainbow Coalition's last "action" was in 1984, when it worked overtime to channel the Black and "disenfranchised" 008 90 voters into supporting Walter Mondale for president—even after Mondale made it clear that he, too, would have invaded Grenada and that he would quarantine Nicaragua.

What next?

Building national and local mobilizations involving masses of people in action, like the demonstration on April 25, can force the government to retreat from its reactionary policies.

Working inside the Democratic or Republican parties has the opposite effect. Both capitalist parties defend the profits of big business over the needs of the majority.

The policies of war, racism, and poverty go beyond Ronald Reagan. They are bipartisan-expressing the interests of the ruling rich as opposed to the needs of working people and their allies.

Contra funding and aid to the repressive regimes in Central America has been approved by a Democratic-controlled Con -gress, which has also consistently failed to pass full sanctions against the apartheid regime in South Africa.

The power of the antiwar movement will be retained and increased by maintaining a clear focus on mobilizing people around the issues of the national mobilization. Resisting efforts to dissolve the movement Socialist Action/Tina Beacock into a campaign committee for some liberal candidate will be the key challenge in the months ahead.

The movement's links to young people in high schools and universities can be strengthened by organizing teach-ins, rallies, and picket lines exposing the lies and deception of the government's policies.

The strong participation and commitment of working people and trade unionists to the antiwar movement can be deepened by emphasizing.that U.S. corporations shut down plants and break unions in this country only to resettle in other countries, where U.S.-backed dictators have imposed slave-labor working conditions.

American workers have a stake in opposing U.S. interventions and in upholding a high standard of working conditions everywhere in the world.

The momentum of April 25 should be directed toward activities in the fall aimed at educating and involving new layers of workers and youth. This is the best preparation for the next big mobilization of the American people.

Carl Finamore was co-staff director of the April 25 Western States Mobilization for Peace, Jobs and Justice.

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Beacock Socialist Action/Tina