A-Infos (en) US, Charleston Five/ Black History Month

[Lorenzo Ervin <komboa@yahoo.com>]

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      A - I N F O S  N E W S  S E R V I C E
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LETTER OF SUPPORT FOR THE CHARLESTON 5
from International Committee to Support
the Chattanooga 3

Dear Sisters and Brother, Comrades in the Struggle:

The Chattanooga 3 defendants, Lorenzo Komboa Ervin,
Damon McGee and Mikail Musa Muhammad, who were
recently convicted in a racially and politically
contrived frame-up case in Chattanooga, Tennessee,
extend their total support and solidarity with the
Charleston 5 frameup victims. This racist prosecution
of Black southern labor activists, just shows us once
again how entrenched racism is still in the South,
even in the 21st century, and that Southern
politicians still have a great deal of power over the
legal and judicial machinery over the state. 

Like the Chattanooga 3 case, these five activists are
being singled out for a malicious prosecution because
of their race and labor activism. It shows us why the
labor movement is still so weak in the South, it is
brutally suppressed by political and police
repression. This prosecution is designed to intimidate
the workers and silence them from fighting for their
rights. It is an old familiar story, and we are fully
aware of its importance.

We hope that everyone will support the Charleston
Five, but understand that their case, and that of the
Chattanooga Three is so typical of the kind of racism
and violations of civil/human rights that still goes
on in the South, with impunity. You must understand
that the repression of three civil rights activists in
Tennessee on "disruption charges" for a demonstration
at city hall, and five labor activists in South
Carolina  on "incitement to riot" charges after a
strike, are totally bound-up  and to secure justice
for us all, we must wage a united fight for justice.
It is with that in mind that we offer our support to
the Charleston 5. 

Lorenzo Komboa Ervin,
Chattanooga 3 Defendant

For more information about the Chattanooga 3 case,
please visit: http://sf.indymedia.org/lke.php 


> From: "NPC" <philnpc@Op.Net>

 Subject: Charleston Five/ Black History Month
 Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2001 20:37:26 -0500
 
 We're forwarding this message from the Baltimore IAC
 to our Philadelphia list, because Philly activists
 should support
 the Charleston 5 too:

..........................................................
 Dear friends and members,
 
 At our last meeting a very important resolution was
 passed regarding the
 Charleston 5.  
 As you are aware, the last community & student forum
 was dedicated to the
 fight against racism in the post office on February
 8.  This date also
 marked the anniversary of the "Orangeburg Massacre".
 
 We have generally not sent out long messages, but in
 lieu of Black History
 Month, we felt that the support resolution and the
 information it contains
 is a contribution to the spirit of this month. 
 Please read and distribute.
 
 Also, many of our members have family roots in South
 and North Carolina, as
 do many people living in Baltimore.  As a result of
 reciting this history,
 members of the group were able to share their own
 important memories.
 
 WHO ARE THE CHARLESTON 5
 
 In the biggest frame-up in years specifically
 directed against the labor 
 movement, five members of the International
 Longshoreman's Association (ILA) 
 in Charleston, South Carolina are facing jail on
 phony "felony rioting" 
 charges. Among them is the president of ILA local
 1422, Ken Riley.
 
 The ILA represents dockworkers at ports along the
 the Atlantic seaboard and 
 Gulf Coast.
 
 These charges are an attempt by the old Strom
 Thurmond racist political 
 machine to crush the overwhelmingly African American
 dockworkers' union in 
 Charleston.
 
 South Carolina is a low wage haven for corporations
 around the world. Less 
 than 3% of the workers there are organized into
 unions--the lowest 
 percentage of the fifty states. A worker in Michigan
 is 12 times as likely to 
 get union wages, union benefits and union protection
 than anyone employed in 
 the Palmetto State.
 
 This attempted frame-up is a preemptive strike
 against future union 
 organizing drives. Not only in South Carolina, but
 throughout the South.
 
 These charges stem from the attempt of Nordana
 Lines--a big Danish ship owning 
 outfit--to break its contract with the ILA in
 Charleston. Nordana tried to 
 load its ships by using non union workers who would
 be paid a fraction of 
 what ILA members get.
 
 The ILA members fought this by engaging in mass
 picketing. This activity is 
 supposedly protected under the first amendment of
 the constitution.
 
 The response of the South Carolina authorities was
 to mobilize their state 
 and local police forces to try to break the union.
 On Jan. 20 last year, 600 
 cops--in helicopters, on horses and in
 cars--attacked union members.
 
 Among those clubbed was Brother Riley. This attempt
 at strikebreaking failed. 
 But the racist South Carolina state government is
 going ahead to try to 
 railroad these local labor leaders to jail.
 
 South Carolina Attorney General Charles Condon says
 he wants "jail, jail and 
 more jail" for them!
 
 AFL-CIO President John Sweeney has called for
 support to be given to these
 union 
 brothers.
 
 This attack is also very dangerous because it's
 aimed at predominately 
 African American union locals that have played a big
 role in Charleston's 
 Black Community for decades. 
 
 Starting with Philadelphia, at least half of the
 workers in the ports south 
 of New York are African American. Under slavery,
 unloading ships--always a 
 dangerous job--was considered a job reserved for
 slave labor.
 
 Some of the ports--like Charleston and Savannah,
 Georgia--the dockworkers 
 were overwhelmingly Black.
 
 In Philadelphia, Ben Fletcher--an African American
 leader of the 
 IWW--organized the dock workers there.
 
 The only reason that New York was an exception is
 because of the pro-slavery 
 insurrection that broke out there on July 13,
 1863--little more than a week 
 after the Battle of Gettysburg. Two orphanages
 filled with Black children 
 were set on fire. To this day it's uncertain how
 many African Americans were 
 lynched.
 
 This pogrom in Manhattan was no more spontaneous
 than the "anti-busing" 
 protests in Boston would be a century later. Both
 were the result of racist 
 agitation by important sections of the capitalist
 class.
 
 Yet by 1960--before containerization got rid of
 thousands of jobs--there were 
 5,000 African American dockworkers in the Port of
 New York.
 
 These ILA locals in the South were fortresses of the
 Black working class. 
 They played a vanguard role in the civil rights
 movement. This was 
> particularly the case with the dockworkers in
 Norfolk, Virginia.
 
 The racists want to crush these dockerworker union
 locals out of existence. 
 They see the danger of the "bad example" they set
 for workers wanting a 
 union. They fear them being used as springboards to
 organize millions of 
 workers throughout the South.
 
 They also hate the fact that in many of these ports
 Black and white workers 
 have fought together against the bosses. The master
 class knows that in 
 1892--at the height of the populist movement--Black
 and white workers went on 
 a general strike in New Orleans. 
 
 Such unity of poor and working people spells their
 doom.


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