Working Class Calendar

St. Louis Race Massacre (1917)

Sun Jul 01, 1917

!Image

Image: East St. Louis Race Riot headline from the St. Louis Globe-Democrat on Friday, July 6th, 1917. It reads "100 NEGROES SHOT, BURNED, CLUBBED TO DEATH IN E. ST. LOUIS RACE WAR" [blackpast.org]

--- On this day in 1917, white mobs in East St. Louis began indiscriminately killing black people, burning down homes with the families trapped inside, killing more than a hundred people in one of the bloodiest race riots of the 20th century.

Racial tensions had begun to increase in February, when 470 black workers were hired to replace white workers who had gone on strike against the Aluminum Ore Company. The use of all-white workforces and using non-white strikebreakers was an often used tactic to break working class solidarity.

At a city council meeting, angry white workers lodged formal complaints to the mayor of East St. Louis about black migration to the city. After the meeting ended, rumors of an attempted robbery of a white man by an armed black man began to circulate through the city.

In response, white mobs formed and rampaged through downtown, assaulting any black people they could find. The mobs also stopped trolleys and streetcars, pulling black passengers out and beating them on the streets and sidewalks.

On this day in 1917, the racial violence resumed at a fever pitch, with white mobs gunning down men, women, and children and burning down the homes of black families with them trapped inside. More than one hundred people were killed.

A year after the violence took place, a federal investigation of the conduct of the city government concluded that police officers fled the scenes of arson and murder, abandoning their posts and refusing to answer calls for help. Less than a dozen white people were sentenced to prison for crimes related to the riot.

---

• Date: 1917-07-01
• Learn More: www.blackpast.org, www.smithsonianmag.com.
• Tags: #Riots.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Willem Arondeus Executed (1943)

Thu Jul 01, 1943

!Image

Image: Willem Arondeus on the island of Urk. Photo from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum

--- Willem Arondeus was an openly gay Dutch artist and anti-fascist who, after destroying a Nazi surveillance office, was executed on this day in 1943, stating as his last words "Tell the people that homosexuals can be brave!"

Before the war, Arondeus was a visual artist, illustrating poems and painting murals. He later became an author, publishing two novels with his own illustrations and publishing a biography of the painter Matthijs Maris.

Arondeus was active in the anti-Nazi resistance, helping forge documents to protect persecuted groups. A major obstacle to the success of this forgery was the Municipal Office for Population Registration, an Amsterdam office that contained millions of identifying records for Jews and others wanted by the Gestapo.

Arondeus and other members of the resistance bombed the office on March 27th, 1943, subduing the guards via injection, and succeeding in destroying approximately 800,000 documents. Arondeus was arrested on April 1st.

Although he refused to give up the rest of his team, his notebook was found and a majority of the group were also arrested. On June 18th, Arondeus and fourteen others were tried and sentenced to death. Ardoneus pleaded guilty and took the full blame, which may have contributed to two members receiving clemency.

Before his execution, Arondeus made a point of ensuring the public would be aware that he and two other men in the group were gay, asking an acquaintance to "Tell the people that homosexuals can be brave!" Sometimes, this quote is translated as "The people would know that gays are no cowards!" or "Tell the people that homosexuals are not by definition weak".

---

• Date: 1943-07-01
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, legacyprojectchicago.org.
• Tags: #Queer, #Fascism.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Lambing Flat Riots (1860 - 1861)

Sun Jun 30, 1861

!Image

Image: An of-the-era white interpretation of what happened at the Burrangong goldfields, "Might versus Right", by Samuel Thomas Gill, c.1862-1863. Photograph: Samuel Thomas Gill/State Library of NSW [theguardian.com]

--- On this day in 1861, the worst violence of the Australian Lambing Flat Riots occurred when a mob of 3,000 white people attacked 2,000 Chinese miners and drove them off the Lambing Flat, destroying and looting their encampments.

The race riot came out of more than a decade of ethnic tensions between Chinese and European-born miners in Australia, tensions that became systematic violence the previous few years.

The violence was in part triggered in part by the Australian government rejecting a proposed restriction on Chinese immigration, as well as a false rumor that a new group of 1,500 Chinese people were en route to the area.

Despite the government's initial reject of an anti-Chinese immigration bill, the Lambing Flat Riots led the New South Wales government to pass the Chinese Immigration Act in November 1861, severely limiting the flow of Chinese people into the colony.

---

• Date: 1861-06-30
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.britannica.com.
• Tags: #Riots.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Congo Crisis (1960)

Thu Jun 30, 1960

!Image

Image: Patrice Lumumba in 1960 [theafricareport.com]

--- On this day in 1960, the Republic of the Congo became independent from Belgian colonizers, beginning a four year period of civil war which killed approximately 100,000 people, including the country's first Prime Minister, Patrice Lumumba. The complex period of political strife is known as the "Congo Crisis".

The Congo had been colonized by Belgium since the late 19th century, a process initiated by King Leopold II of Belgium, who was frustrated by Belgium's lack of international power and prestige.

A nationalist movement within the Belgian Congo began to gain momentum in the 1950s, consisting of rival factions such as the Mouvement National Congolais (MNC), of which Patrice Lumumba (shown) was a leading figure, and Alliance des Bakongo (ABAKO), led by Joseph Kasa-Vubu.

Following major riots in Stanleyville and Léopoldville in 1959, a Round Table Conference in Brussels was held in January 1960, with leaders from all the major Congolese parties in attendance.

Congolese leaders were successful in negotiating their independence to be granted within months, formally winning their independence from Belgium in late June. Within days, violence between white and black communities broke out, and the country descended into a civil war between rival political factions. Some factions, supported by powerful mining interests, began seceding from the newly founded Republic of Congo.

The United Nations sent in peacekeeping troops, which were initially welcomed by Lumumba and the central government with the idea that the UN would help suppress the secessionist states. Viewing the secessions as an internal political matter, the UN refused to use its troops to assist the central Congolese government against them.

Lumumba also sought the assistance of the U.S. government, led by Dwight D. Eisenhower, who refused to provide meaningful military aid. He then turned to the Soviet Union, which agreed to provide weapons, logistical and material support, which the state promptly used against the secessionists.

Despite Lumumba's public proclamations that he was not a communist, the United States viewed the acceptance of aid with alarm, and Lumumba became a target of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) surveillance. Lumumba was captured and, on January 17th, 1961, executed by Belgian-assisted forces.

The factional conflict continued in the wake of Lumumba's death, with fighting and intervention coming from Western states, the United Nations, and various political groups inside the Congo.

In 1964, a group known as the Simbas initiated a rebellion based on egalitarian ideals and witchcraft. In November 1964, the Simbas rounded up the remaining white population of Stanleyville, holding them hostage in the Victoria Hotel to use as bargaining tools with the Armée Nationale Congolaise (ANC).

To recover the hostages, Belgian parachute troops were flown to the Congo in American aircraft. More than 70 hostages and 1,000 Congolese civilians were killed in the rescue mission, but the vast majority of hostages were evacuated.

Following chaotic elections in 1964, Joseph-Désiré Mobutu took power in a military coup, assuming sweeping powers and instituting widespread political repression. Mobutu, who had played a key role in Lumumba's execution, ruled until 1997, enjoying support from the United States, France, Belgium, and China.

---

• Date: 1960-06-30
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.blackpast.org.
• Tags: #Colonialism, #Independence.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Henry Gerber (1892 - 1972)

Wed Jun 29, 1892

!Image

--- Henry Gerber, born on this day in 1892, was a German-American queer rights activist who, in 1924, founded the first American pro-homosexual organization, known as the "Society for Human Rights" (SHR).

Gerber was in Passau, Bavaria, moving to the United States in 1913. In 1917, Gerber was briefly committed to a mental institution because of his homosexuality.

When the U.S. declared war on Germany, Gerber was forced to choose between becoming interned as an enemy alien or enlist in the Army. Gerber chose the latter and served in the Army for approximately three years.

During his time in Germany, Gerber learned about the sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld's advocacy to decriminalize and normalize homosexuality. He also traveled to Berlin, which had a thriving gay subculture.

Inspired by Hirschfeld's work, on December 10th, 1924, Gerber founded the Society for Human Rights, the first pro-gay organization in the United States. A black clergyman named John T. Graves signed on as the organization's first president while Gerber and six others were listed as directors.

Gerber set out to expand the Society's membership beyond the original seven, but had difficulty interesting anyone other than working class queer people in joining. More affluent members of Chicago's gay community refused to join his society, not wanting to ruin their reputations by being associated with homosexuality.

The Society was only a chartered organization for a few months before police arrested Gerber and several other members. Gerber was subjected to three highly publicized trials, and his defense, while ultimately successful, cost him his life savings.

Unable to continue funding the Society, the group dismantled, and Gerber left for New York City, embittered that the more affluent gays of Chicago had not come to his aid for a cause he believed was designed to advance the common good.

> "Is not the psychiatrist again putting the cart before the horse in saying that homosexuality is a symptom of the neurotic style of life? Would it not sound more natural to say that the homosexual is made neurotic because his style of life is beset by thousands of dangers?" > > - Henry Gerber

---

• Date: 1892-06-29
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.nps.gov.
• Tags: #Birthdays, #Queer.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Kwame Ture (1941 - 1998)

Sun Jun 29, 1941

!Image

--- Kwame Ture, born on this day in 1941 as Stokely Carmichael, was a prominent civil rights activist, serving as "Honorary Prime Minister" of the Black Panther Party and later organizing with the global Pan-African movement.

Ture was a key leader in the development of the Black Power movement, first while leading the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), later serving as the "Honorary Prime Minister" of the Black Panther Party (BPP), and then as a leader of the All-African People's Revolutionary Party (A-APRP).

Ture was one of the original SNCC freedom riders of 1961 under the leadership of Diane Nash. He became a prominent voting rights activist in Mississippi and Alabama after being mentored by Ella Baker and Bob Moses.

The FBI harassed and slandered him through the COINTELPRO program, leading Ture to flee to Africa in 1968. While there, the U.S. government continued its surveillance of him via the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

While in Africa, he adopted the name "Kwame Ture" to honor Sékou Touré and Kwame Nkrumah, who he began collaborating with. Three months after his arrival in Guinea, Ture published a formal rejection of the Black Panthers, condemning them for not being separatist enough and for their "dogmatic party line favoring alliances with white radicals".

Ture spent the last thirty years of his life campaigning internationally for revolutionary socialist Pan-Africanism via the All-African People's Revolutionary Party (A-APRP). In 1998, Ture died of prostate cancer at the age of 57, cancer he claimed was deliberately given to him as a means of assassination.

> "If a white man wants to lynch me, that's his problem. If he's got the power to lynch me, that's my problem. Racism is not a question of attitude; it's a question of power. Racism gets its power from capitalism. Thus, if you're anti-racist, whether you know it or not, you must be anti-capitalist." > > - Kwame Ture

---

• Date: 1941-06-29
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.npr.org.
• Tags: #Pan-Africanism, #Civil Rights, #Birthdays.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Stonewall Uprising (1969)

Sat Jun 28, 1969

!Image

Image: Police force people back outside the Stonewall Inn as tensions escalate the morning of June 28th, 1969. Photo by Joseph Ambrosini [Wikipedia]

--- On this day in 1969, the Stonewall Uprising began when NYC Police raided the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village. As cops arrested homosexuals and drag queens, the crowd fought them, trapping police inside and lighting the Inn on fire.

In the 1960s, New York City Robert Wagner Jr. initiated an anti-gay campaign in preparation for the 1964 World's Fair. The city revoked the liquor licenses of gay bars and undercover police officers worked to entrap as many homosexual men as possible.

The Stonewall Inn is a prominent gay bar in Greenwich Village, New York City, then owned by the Genovese crime family and lacking a liquor license. The night of the Stonewall Uprising, approximately 200 patrons were in the bar, and four undercover cops were present before the raid was initiated.

As cops shut the bar down and began arresting patrons, a crowd began to gather outside. A scuffle broke out when a butch woman in handcuffs (thought by many to be Stormé DeLarverie but accounts differ) fought with police for ten minutes as they attempted to arrest her.

After she shouted to bystanders "Why don't you guys do something?", an officer picked her up and heaved her into the back of the wagon and the crowd turned violent, attempting to overturn police cars and slashing their tires, and throwing debris at the cops, some of whom became trapped in the Inn.

Some members of the mob lit garbage on fire and stuffed it through the broken windows, setting the bar on fire with police and some detainees inside. A tactical police force was deployed to free the officers, beating the crowd as they mocked police with impromptu kick lines and ironic chants.

When the violence broke out, women and transmasculine people being held down the street at The Women's House of Detention joined in by chanting, setting fire to their belongings, tossing them into the street below, and chanting "gay rights".

The uprisings continued for several nights afterward, with thousands showing up outside the bar. Black drag queen and radical queer rights activist Marsha P. Johnson was seen climbing a lamppost and dropping a heavy bag onto the hood of a police car, shattering the windshield.

Members of the Mattachine Society, a gay rights organization which had taken to respectability politics, were embarrassed by the behavior at Stonewall. Randy Wicker, who had marched in the first gay picket lines before the White House in 1965, said "screaming queens forming chorus lines and kicking went against everything that I wanted people to think about homosexuals...that we were a bunch of drag queens in the Village acting disorderly and tacky and cheap." Others were glad to see the closing of Stonewall Inn, perceived as a "sleaze joint".

Despite this backlash, some participants of the annual Mattachine Society picket on July 4th were emboldened. Several same-sex couples held hands as they marched despite protests from lead organizers of the picket, generating more press attention for the event than usual.

The Stonewall Uprising was a watershed moment in the history of queer liberation, to the extent that some studies of LGBT history in the U.S. are divided into pre- and post-Stonewall analyses.

> "It was a rebellion, it was an uprising, it was a civil rights disobedience - it wasn't no damn riot." > > - Stormé DeLarverie

---

• Date: 1969-06-28
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.zinnedproject.org.
• Tags: #Queer.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Mark Clark (1947 - 1969)

Sat Jun 28, 1947

!Image

--- Mark Clark, born on this day in 1947, was a member of the Black Panther Party (BPP) who was assassinated by the Chicago Police Department alongside Fred Hampton in 1969.

Clark decided to join the Black Panther Party after reading their literature and the Ten Point Program, later organizing a local chapter in Peoria, Illinois.

At the age of 22, Clark and Hampton were assassinated by the Chicago Police Department when they raided Hampton's apartment. Clark was shot in the heart and died instantly.

---

• Date: 1947-06-28
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.washingtonpost.com.
• Tags: #Birthdays.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Founding of the IWW (1905)

Tue Jun 27, 1905

!Image

Image: The IWW logo

--- The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), founded on this day in 1905 in Chicago, Illinois, is an anti-capitalist and internationalist labor union whose slogan says "An injury to one is an injury to all!"

The IWW promotes the concept of "One Big Union", and contends that all workers should be united as a social class to supplant capitalism and wage labor with industrial democracy.

The IWW was officially founded in Chicago, Illinois on June 27th, 1905. A convention was held of 200 socialists and radical trade unionists from all over the United States who opposed the policies and politics of the more moderate American Federation of Labor (AFL). In particular, the IWW opposed the American Federation of Labor's acceptance of capitalism and its refusal to include unskilled workers in craft unions.

The IWW's founders included many historically important labor activists and socialist thinkers, including "Big Bill" Haywood, James Connolly, Daniel De Leon, Eugene V. Debs, Thomas Hagerty, Lucy Parsons, Mary Harris "Mother" Jones, Frank Bohn, William Trautmann, Vincent Saint John, Ralph Chaplin, and many others.

---

• Date: 1905-06-27
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, iww.org.
• Tags: #Socialism, #Labor, #IWW.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Helen Keller (1880 - 1968)

Sun Jun 27, 1880

!Image

--- Helen Keller, born on this day in 1880, was an American socialist author and disability rights advocate who became the first deaf-blind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree. Keller was subject to FBI surveillance for most of her life.

In 1909, Keller joined the American Socialist Party and campaigned for its candidates, including Eugene V. Debs, the SP leader who ran for U.S. president from his prison cell in 1920.

Keller supported striking workers, including those murdered in the 1914 Colorado Ludlow Massacre, calling owner John D. Rockefeller a "monster of capitalism." She defined herself as a "militant suffragist", campaigning for women's right to vote because she believed this was linked to the struggle for socialism.

Contemporary critics either lambasted Keller for her radical politics or attempted to neutralize her as a "wonder woman". In a 1924 letter to a U.S. Senator, Keller wrote "So long as I confine my activities to social service and the blind, they compliment me extravagantly, calling me 'arch priestess of the sightless,' 'wonder woman,' and a 'modern miracle.' But when it comes to a discussion of poverty, and I maintain that it is the result of wrong economics - that the industrial system under which we live is at the root of much of the physical deafness and blindness in the world - that is a different matter!"

By the time Keller died in 1968, at the age of 87, she had been under FBI surveillance for most of her adult life.

---

• Date: 1880-06-27
• Learn More: www.workers.org, en.wikipedia.org.
• Tags: #Socialism, #Birthdays.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Pine Ridge Shootout (1975)

Thu Jun 26, 1975

!Image

Image: An FBI "Wanted" poster for Leonard Peltier [muscarelle.wm.edu]

--- On this day in 1975, a shootout occurred at Pine Ridge Reservation between two FBI agents and members of the American Indian Movement (AIM), leading to the conviction of activist Leonard Peltier for murder in a dubious trial.

The shootout began when FBI agents Ronald A. Williams and Jack R. Coler, driving two separate unmarked cars, began following a red pick-up truck that matched the description of an indigenous man wanted as a suspect in a recent assault and robbery of two local ranch hands.

After tailing the vehicle, Williams reported that they were under fire from its occupants and would be killed if reinforcements did not swiftly arrive. Their next radio dispatch said that both men had been shot.

After being wounded, the agents appeared have been shot execution-style. One member of AIM, Joseph Stuntz, was also fatally shot.

After being extradited from Canada through a witness statement later revealed to be false, indigenous rights activist Leonard Peltier was convicted for murder in a highly contentious 1977 trial, involving contradictory statements from the FBI and recanted witness statements. Peltier was sentenced to two consecutive terms of life imprisonment.

---

• Date: 1975-06-26
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, montanapioneer.com.
• Tags: #Indigenous.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Olive Morris (1952 - 1979)

Thu Jun 26, 1952

!Image

--- Olive Morris, born on this day in 1952, was a Jamaican Black Panther, squatter's rights activist, and founder of the Brixton Black Women's Group who died prematurely from illness at the age of 27. When Morris was nine years old, she and her brother, Basil, left their maternal grandmother in Jamaica and joined her parents in Lavender Hill, South London.

On November 15th, 1969, Morris was beaten and sexually harassed by London police for interfering when they were beating Nigerian diplomat Clement Gomwalk for existing while black outside "Desmond's Hip City", Brixton's first black records store. Basil described her injuries from the incident, saying that he "could hardly recognize her face, they beat her so badly".

Olive later became a member of the youth section of the British Black Panther Movement (later called the Black Workers Movement), along with activists such as Linton Kwesi Johnson, Clovis Reid and Farrukh Dhondy. Olive was also a founding member of the Brixton Black Women's Group.

Morris also squatted at 121 Railton Road, Brixton in 1973. This squat became a hub of political activism and hosted community groups such as Black People Against State Harassment. The building was also the site of the Sabarr Bookshop, one of the first black community bookshops in the area. The site subsequently became an anarchist project, known as the 121 Centre, which existed until its eviction in 1999.

In 1979, Morris died prematurely from non-Hodgkinson's lymphoma at the age of 27.

---

• Date: 1952-06-26
• Learn More: libcom.org, en.wikipedia.org.
• Tags: #Birthdays.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Lois Gibbs (1951 - )

Mon Jun 25, 1951

!Image

--- Lois Marie Gibbs, born on this day in 1951, is an environmental activist whose advocacy began after discovering that her 5-year-old son's elementary school and neighborhood in Niagara Falls, New York was built on a toxic waste dump.

After this revelation, she formed the Love Canal Homeowner's Association, and began fighting at the local, state, and federal level for action, framing the issue as one of children's health. After years of struggle, the waste finally began to be cleaned up, and 833 families were eventually evacuated.

She continues to work with the organization, now renamed the Center for Health, Environment, and Justice (CHEJ).

---

• Date: 1951-06-25
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.goldmanprize.org.
• Tags: #Birthdays.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

George Orwell (1903 - 1950)

Thu Jun 25, 1903

!Image

--- George Orwell, born on this day in 1903, was an English democratic socialist author. His experiences in the Spanish Civil War led him to rabidly oppose Soviet communism, views expounded upon in Animal Farm and Homage to Catalonia.

Orwell's work is characterized by polished prose, social criticism, opposition to what Orwell called "totalitarianism", and support for democratic socialism.

As a writer, Orwell produced literary criticism, poetry, fiction, and polemical journalism. Among his most famous works are his allegory for the Soviet Union "Animal Farm" (1945) and the dystopian novel "Nineteen Eighty-Four" (1949). Orwell is also noted for his first hand-account of the Spanish Civil War, "Homage to Catalonia" (1938).

In "Homage to Catalonia", Orwell writes about fighting for the Republican faction, describing in detail the ways in which the anarchist movement re-structured their economy and military to be more egalitarian. He was shot in the throat but survived, declared unfit for service, and returned to England to recover.

Orwell's experiences with anarchist and Bolshevik movements in Catalonia made him a vehement anti-communist later in life. In 1949, shortly before he died, Orwell prepared a list of notable people he considered unsuitable as possible writers for the anti-communist propaganda activities of the British government.

The action drew widespread criticism from other left-wing figures; Scottish journalist Alexander Cockburn referred to the notebook as "a snitch list" and noted Orwell's homophobia and racist comments on various individuals on the list as demonstrative of his bigotry.

Despite his vehement opposition to the Soviet Union and associated communist movements, Orwell continued to identify as a democratic socialist and authored essays such as "The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius" (1940) that advocated for socialism, as Orwell understood it, in the United Kingdom.

---

• Date: 1903-06-25
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.pakistantoday.com.pk.
• Tags: #Communism, #Socialism, #Labor, #Birthdays, #Anarchism.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Carl Braden (1914 - 1975)

Wed Jun 24, 1914

!Image

--- Carl Braden, born on this day in 1914, was a left-wing trade unionist, journalist, and activist who was charged with sedition by the state of Kentucky after purchasing a home in an all-white neighborhood on behalf of a black family. He was married to Anne Braden, a prominent civil rights activist in her own right.

In 1954, to sidestep the residential race segregation in Louisville, Kentucky, the Bradens purchased a house in an all-white neighborhood and deeded it over to the Wades, an African-American family who had been unsuccessfully seeking a suburban residence. White segregationists responded by burning a cross in the yard, shooting into the home, and eventually destroying the building entirely with dynamite.

For his role in the affair, Carl Braden was charged with sedition, his work for racial integration being interpreted as an act of communist subversion. He was convicted on December 13th, 1954 and sentenced to fifteen years in prison.

Immediately upon his conviction, Carl Braden was fired from his job and blacklisted from local employment. He served seven months of his sentence before he was released on a $40,000 bond, the highest bond ever set in Kentucky up to that time.

On appeal, Carl's case made it to the Supreme Court (Braden v. United States, 1961), which ruled that Braden's conviction was constitutional, although this was later overturned.

In 1967, the Bradens were again charged with sedition for protesting the practice of strip-mining in Pike County, Kentucky.

---

• Date: 1914-06-24
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, snccdigital.org.
• Tags: #Birthdays.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Radom Riots (1976)

Thu Jun 24, 1976

!Image

Image: Workers' protests in June 1976 in Radom. [tvpworld.com]

--- The Radom Riots began in Poland on this day in 1976 when tens of thousands of people began protesting and rioting in response to government increases in the price of food, chanting "We want bread and freedom" and fighting with police. This uprising took place in the context of social unrest throughout the country.

That morning, workers at multiple factories across Radom went on strike. By 11 am, thousands of protesters surrounded an administrative building in the city.

After waiting for an official decision on the issue of food increases for several hours, the crowd broke into the building, which had been evacuated, looting and setting it on fire and barricading the surrounding streets.

Because the state did not plan on Radom having an uprising of this size, police forces were initially overwhelmed and reinforcements did not arrive until later that afternoon.

Approximately 20,000 people battled with police forces. 198 people were wounded, 634 arrested, and several were killed. A few weeks after the uprising, a Roman Catholic priest died after being beaten by police, having joined the rioters and criticized the government in his sermons.

Despite the government crackdown, the price raises were reversed within 24 hours. The 1976 workers' protest against official economic policy was a watershed moment in dissent against the Polish People's Republic.

---

• Date: 1976-06-24
• Learn More: libcom.org, en.wikipedia.org.
• Tags: #Riots, #Protests.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Taft-Hartley Act (1947)

Mon Jun 23, 1947

!Image

Image: A massive 1947 union rally in Madison Square Garden. A large sign reads "MR PRESIDENT: VETO THE HARTLEY-TAFT SLAVE-LABOR BILL"

--- On this day in 1947, the Taft-Hartley Act became U.S. law after a heavily bipartisan vote, greatly restricting the legal rights of organizing workers during an unprecedented wave of strikes after World War II.

The Labor Management Relations Act of 1947, better known as the Taft-Hartley Act, was enacted despite the veto of President Harry S. Truman, with many Democrats defecting from the party line to support the union-busting measure.

The Act was introduced in the aftermath of a major, unprecedented wave of strikes in the aftermath of World War II, from 1945-1946. Strikes were strongly repressed during World War II to not hamper the war effect. When the wartime restrictions ended, millions of workers across the country went on strike.

The Taft-Hartley Act prohibits unions from engaging in "unfair labor practices." Among the practices prohibited by the act are jurisdictional strikes, wildcat strikes, solidarity or political strikes, secondary boycotts, secondary and mass picketing, closed shops, and monetary donations by unions to federal political campaigns. The Act also allowed states to pass right-to-work laws banning union shops.

A pamphlet supporting a third, progressive party, published in 1948, had this to say on the vote:

"Every scheme of the lobbyists to fleece the public became law in the 80th Congress. And every constructive proposal to benefit the common people gathered dust in committee pigeonholes. The bi-partisan bloc, the Republocratic cabal which ruled Congress and made a mockery of President Roosevelt's economic bill of rights, also wrecked the Roosevelt foreign policy. A new foreign policy was developed. This policy was still gilded with the good words of democracy. But its Holy Grail was oil...

The Democratic administration carries the ball for Wall Street's foreign policy. And the Republican party carries the ball for Wall Street's domestic policy. Of course the roles are sometimes interchangeable...

On occasion President Truman still likes to lay an occasional verbal wreath on the grave of the New Deal. But the hard facts of roll call votes show that Democrats are voting more and more like Republicans. If the Republican Taft-Hartley bill became law over the President's veto, it was because many of the Democrats allied themselves to the Republicans."

---

• Date: 1947-06-23
• Learn More: jacobinmag.com, www.counterpunch.org.
• Tags: #Labor.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

June Days Uprising Begins (1848)

Fri Jun 23, 1848

!Image

Image: "On the barricades on the Rue Soufflot, Paris, 25 June 1848 (1848-49)", a painting by Horace Vernet [Wikipedia]

--- On this day in 1848, more than 40,000 French workers initiated the June Days Uprising after the state closed National Workshops that provided work to the unemployed, causing 10,000 casualties and 4,000 workers to be deported to Algeria.

The National Workshops had only been formed a few months earlier, when, on February 25th, a group of armed workers interrupted a session of the provisional government to demand "the organization of labor" and "the right to work".

In late June, the Second Republic began planning to close the workshops, leading to a national uprising. In sections of the city, hundreds of barricades were thrown up. The National Guard was sent in to quell the rebellion, and workers seized weapons from local armories to fight back.

The violence, which lasted just three days, resulted in more than 10,000 casualties and 4,000 participants to be deported to Algeria. Among the dead was Denis Auguste Affre, Archbishop of Paris, killed while trying to negotiate peace with an angry crowd.

The rebellion was successfully crushed, and the episode put a hold on revolutionary ambitions of radical Republicans at the time. In its aftermath, the French Constitution of 1848 was adopted, mandating that executive power be wielded by a democratically elected president.

The first president under this framework was Napoleon Bonaparte, who dissolved the constitution during his first term in office.

---

• Date: 1848-06-23
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.britannica.com.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Nigerian General Strike (1945)

Fri Jun 22, 1945

!Image

Image: A depiction of labor leader Michael Imoudu

--- On this day in 1945, a general strike involving 42,000 - 200,000 workers began in Nigeria, starting with railway workers, later spreading to other nationalized industries and enjoying solidarity from private sector workers.

The labor action was one of the largest strikes in colonial African history at the time, and took place in the context of an inflationary crisis and a callous colonial government, who issued a statement blaming the public for their own grievances:

"Unless the public is willing to do without, or reduce the consumption of commodities which are scarce, or to substitute other commodities for them, instead of taking the least line of resistance and buying (regardless of value and price control) in the black market, no benefit will result from increasing cost of living allowance."

In response, a worker's communiqué stated "the situation can no longer be sustained...not later than Thursday, June 21st, 1945, the workers of Nigeria shall proceed to seek their own remedy with due regard to law and order on the one hand and starvation on the other".

The general strike took off on June 22nd and continued for 45 days. Nigerian labor leader Michael Imoudu (shown) played a key role in initiating the strike.

---

• Date: 1945-06-22
• Learn More: libcom.org, en.wikipedia.org.
• Tags: #Labor, #General Strikes, #Colonialism.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Subcomandante Marcos (1957 - )

Wed Jun 19, 1957

!Image

Image: Subcomandante Marcos smoking a pipe atop a horse in Chiapas, Mexico, 1996. Photo by Jose Villa. [Wikipedia]

--- Rafael Vicente, also known as "Subcomandante Marcos", is a Mexican insurgent, former military leader, and spokesman for the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) who was born on this day in 1957. Before joining the EZLN, Vicente was a college professor at the Metropolitan Autonomous University in Mexico.

The EZLN was founded in the Lacandon Jungle in 1983, initially functioning as a self-defense unit dedicated to protecting Chiapas' Mayan people from evictions and capitalist encroachment on their land. While not Mayan himself, Marcos has often served as the group's spokesman.

Marcos led the EZLN during the 1994 revolt and the subsequent peace negotiations, during a counter-offensive by the Mexican Army in 1995, and throughout the decades that followed. In 2001, he led a group of Zapatista leaders into Mexico City to meet with President Vicente Fox, attracting widespread public and media attention.

> "In the cabaret of globalization, the state shows itself as a table dancer that strips off everything until it is left with only the minimum indispensable garments: the repressive force." > > - Subcomandante Marcos

---

• Date: 1957-06-19
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, books.google.com.
• Tags: #Birthdays.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Justice for Janitors Strikers Attacked (1990)

Fri Jun 15, 1990

!Image

Image: Los Angeles police officers beating a striking worker in a Justice for Janitors shirt with billy clubs, 1990

--- Justice for Janitors (JfJ) is a social movement that fights for the rights of janitors (caretakers and cleaners) across the US and Canada. Justice for Janitors includes more than 225,000 janitors in at least 29 cities in the United States and at least four cities in Canada. Members fight for better wages, better conditions, improved health-care, and full-time opportunities.

On this day in 1990, the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) attacked immigrant janitors who were striking for the right to organize in Century City, making two women miscarry, hospitalizing dozens, and jailing sixty more. Police initially claimed to be defending themselves, however TV footage was aired that undermined this claim.

Despite the violence, workers voted unanimously to return to the scene of the attack and continue their protest. Janitors eventually won the right to form a union, doubling their pay and benefits. This victory gave significant momentum to the JfJ movement and led to successful protests by and organizing of janitors around the country.

---

• Date: 1990-06-15
• Learn More: www.thenation.com, en.wikipedia.org.
• Tags: #Labor, #Protests.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Che Guevara (1928 - 1967)

Thu Jun 14, 1928

!Image

Image: Ernesto Guevara, Argentinian politician, Minister of Industry for Cuba (1961-1965) during an exclusive interview in his office in 1963. Photo credit to Renee Burri [magnumphotos.com]

--- Ernesto "Che" Guevara, born on this day in 1928, was an Argentine communist revolutionary, physician, military leader, and author who fought in the guerilla war against Fulgencio Batista and helped lead the new communist government.

Ernesto was born to an upper-class Argentine family of pre-independence Spanish (i.e. Basque and Cantabrian) and Irish ancestry. Referring to Che's restless nature, his father noted "the first thing to note is that in my son's veins flowed the blood of the Irish rebels".

In 1950 and 1951, he embarked on two continent-wide motorcycle journeys throughout South and Central America, observing poverty and poor working conditions that left a deep impression on his worldview. He later published a memoir of these experiences called "The Motorcycle Diaries", dubbed by Verso Books as "Das Kapital meets Easy Rider".

In 1956, Che Guevara sailed to Cuba to aid in the struggle against Batista, narrowly surviving an attack by Batista's forces after they landed on the island. He became a major figure of the Cuban Revolution, promoted by Fidel Castro to Comandante of a second army column.

Following the Cuban Revolution's success, Guevara performed a number of key roles in the new government. These included reviewing the appeals and firing squads for those convicted as war criminals during the revolutionary tribunals, instituting agrarian land reform, helping spearhead a successful nationwide literacy campaign, serving as both national bank president and instructional director for Cuba's armed forces, and traversing the globe as a diplomat on behalf of Cuban socialism.

Guevara left Cuba in 1965 to foment revolution abroad, first unsuccessfully in Congo-Kinshasa and later in Bolivia, where he was captured by CIA-assisted Bolivian forces and summarily executed.

> "At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality." > > - Che Guevara

---

• Date: 1928-06-14
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, www.marxists.org.
• Tags: #Communism, #Birthdays.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Harvey Milk (1930 - 1978)

Thu May 22, 1930

!Image

Image: **

--- Harvey Milk, born on this day in 1930, the first openly gay elected official in the history of California, serving on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. "If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door."

Although Milk was among the most pro-LGBT American politicians at the time, politics was something he came to later in life, after his experiences in the counterculture movement of the 1960s.

In 1972, Milk moved from New York City to the Castro District of San Francisco and took advantage of the growing political and economic power of the neighborhood to promote his activism. Milk unsuccessfully ran for office three times, but finally won a seat as a city supervisor in 1977.

Milk was assassinated after only eleven months in office by Dan White, a disgruntled ex-supervisor and former police officer. During Milk's short time in office, he sponsored a bill banning discrimination in public accommodations, housing, and employment on the basis of sexual orientation. After his death, Milk became an icon in San Francisco and a martyr for the gay community.

> "If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door." > > - Harvey Milk

---

• Date: 1930-05-22
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, milkfoundation.org.
• Tags: #Birthdays.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

Vietnam Veterans Throw Medals Back (1971)

Fri Apr 23, 1971

!Image

--- On this day in 1971, more than 800 veterans collectively tossed their medals, ribbons, discharge papers, and other war mementos on the steps of the U.S. Capitol as part of a multi-day demonstration against the Vietnam War. The protest, titled "Operation Dewey Canyon III" was organized by Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW), one of the most influential anti-war organizations in the U.S. at that time.

The event began on April 19th with a march led by Gold Star Mothers (mothers of soldiers killed in war), more than 1,100 veterans marched across the Lincoln Memorial Bridge to the Arlington Cemetery gate. On April 22nd, John Kerry, as VVAW spokesman, testified against the war for two hours in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

The event ended on April 23rd, 1971, with more than 800 veterans throwing their combat ribbons, helmets, and uniforms on the Capitol steps, along with toy weapons.

---

• Date: 1971-04-23
• Learn More: www.history.com, en.wikipedia.org.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

U.S. Invades Iraq (2003)

Thu Mar 20, 2003

!Image

Image: Iraqi women and children line up for a security check by British soldiers on the outskirts of Basra, as they try to flee from this southern Iraqi town on March 30th, 2003. (Anja Niedringhaus, via apnews.com)

--- On this day in 2003, Iraq was invaded by the U.S. and a "coalition of the willing", including the U.K., Australia, and others. The invasion and subsequent military occupation killed more than one million people and displaced 9.2 million Iraqis.

The invasion came after the U.S. government lied about Iraqi President Saddam Hussein possessing "weapons of mass destruction", including a now-infamous appearance at the United Nations by then Secretary of State Colin Powell, in which he falsely stated "Indeed, the facts and Iraq's behavior show that Saddam Hussein and his regime are concealing their efforts to produce more weapons of mass destruction".

On March 20th, a coalition of forces led by the United States invaded Iraq. The day afterward, 76% of Americans approved of military action against Iraq, according to a March 2003 Gallup poll.

The invasion and subsequent military occupation caused widespread death, disease, and displacement for the people of Iraq. According to Brown University's Costs of War project, since 2003, more than 9.2 million Iraqis have been displaced, and more than 300,000 people have been killed as a direct result of violence. In 2007, Opinion Research Business (ORB) estimated that more than one million people have died as a result of the war.

Kurdish feminist Houzan Mahmoud opposed the invasion, speaking at a London anti-war rally in 2003. In a 2017 interview, she stated:

"I asserted my opposition to the war on Iraq, despite the fact of being Kurdish and someone who has suffered immensely under Saddam's regime. I still didn't think that any foreign intervention was going to improve our lives. I also emphasised that this war will only bring more terrorism because it will strengthen political Islam, i.e. Islamism...

There is no doubt that we all wanted an end to Saddam's totalitarian regime, but I was opposed to foreign invasion. In this region we don't have a good experience with foreign interventions and colonialism throughout history. Imperialist powers invade, destroy and support or install puppet regimes to serve their interest only. Look at Iraq and Afghanistan — since the invasion we are faced with much more terrorism, instability, poverty, displacement and mass migration of people. There is a humanitarian disaster and an endless tragedy of war and bloodshed."

---

• Date: 2003-03-20
• Learn More: apnews.com, en.wikipedia.org, watson.brown.edu, www.reuters.com, medium.com.
• Tags: #Imperialism, #Terrorism.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org