Happy Birthday, Malcolm X
1992 1992-05Read it in the scan (PDF at ETOL), page 21 →
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20 SOCIALIST ACTION MAY 1992 If Malcolm X had lived he would be 69 years old this month.
Bor on May 21, 1925, the militant Black leader was gunned down by assassins on Feb. 21, 1965. His untimely death left a leadership void in the Black community that has yet to be filled However, his ideas live on with today s Black youth, who wear with pride ball caps embroidered with a simple "X The subject of numerous booksand now a movie directed by Spike Lee-Malcolm X's message of winning Black liberation by any means necessary" has a wider audience than ever Michael Lange, an acting instructor at Merritt College in Oakland, Calif., is currently on a campus tour in which he portrays Malcolm X giving bis speeches.
Be sure to see the June issue of Socialist Action for coverage of Lange's tour and the response of students to Malcolm X's speeches.
the editors under the U.S. Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade. That period was one of a youth radicalization, but it was also one of relative economic stability for the capitalist class. This country's rulers could afford to grant a concession to the women's movement, which followed on the heels of the civil rights and the anti-Vietnam War movements, in order to dampen the growing discontent among working people.
Today, however, the situation is different. Government and employer attacks against women, oppressed minorities like Blacks and Latinos, and labor have taken place in a period of economic stagnation. The capitalist rulers are no longer inclined to grant democratic concessions like abortion rights. In order to protect their dwindling rate of protit, they are forced to drive down our living standards, civil rights, and democratic rights.
Can't represent everybody
In this context, women cannot expect the Supreme Court to hand them abortion rights—we must be prepared to take them.
As the organizers of the April 5 march pointed out, women need a vehicle to carry our fight for equality into the electoral arena. Women need a political party to represent our interests. But contrary to the march organizers' message, the Democrats are not that party.
A party that truly represents women cannot also represent the wealthy capitalists ed nationally.
For example, of the nearly one million people who marched on April 5, an estimated 75 percent were from outside the Washington, D.C., area. How many more millions of people could be mobilized to demonstrate on the same day in major cities in their local areas, involving every state in the country?
During the Vietnam War, nationallycoordinated local actions, such as the International Days of Protest, were important independent actions. They mobilized millions in the street and provided focal points for education and organizing in every community nationwide.
Another key task of the women's movement is militant defense of family planning clinics. The events in Buffalo, N.Y., show that there is great understanding within the movement of the need to intensify defense of the patients and health-service providers at abortion clinics. The movement now understands that the events in Wichita, Kan., where the anti-abortion fanatics actually closed clinics, preventing women from getting health services, must never be allowed to happen again.
The tasks of the women's movement are great. They require the broadest support among the population as a whole in order to win. The April 5 Mobilization for Women's Lives shows that broad support exists and can be mobilized and expanded.