The Communist Plan to Conquer America to be by Inciting Anarchy via Black Racism & Anti-Gentilism

Workers Library Publishers,an arm of the Communist Party, originally published this pamphlet in 1928; a template for inciting racism and labor strife among other torments in American culture. They have been splendidly successful amongst the innocent, trusting, and uninformed Americans. This pamphlet is quite scarce in the original. We scanned this from the original booklet.

THE COMMUNIST FIGHT FOR THE NEGRO CAUSE...how it began, Communist publication

  AMERICAN

NEGRO PROBLEMS
  

AMERICA NEGRO PROJECT
WORKERS LIBRARY PUBLISHERS
35 East 125th Street New York
 
  THE WORKERS LIBRARY

No. 1-THE TENTH YEAR-The Rise and Achievements of Soviet Russia (1917-1927)
By J. LOUIS ENGDAHL . . . 10 CENTS
No. 2-THE COOLIDGE PROGRAM-Capitalist Democracy and Prosperity Exposed
By JAY LOVESTONE . . . 5 CENTS
No. 3-QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS TO AMERICAN TRADE UNIONISTS-Stalin's Interview with the First American Trade Union Delegation to Soviet Russia . . . .25 CENTS
No. 4-I 928-The Presidential Election and the Workers
By JAY LOVESTONE . . . 20 CENTS
No. 5-THE TROTSKY OPPOSITION-Its Significance for American Workers
By BERTRAM D. WOLFE . . . 25 CENTS
No. 6-WHY EVERY MINER SHOULD BE A COMMUNIST.
By JOHN PEPPER . . . 5 CENTS
No. 7-THE COMMUNIST NUCLEUS-What it is; How it Works
By M. JENKS. . . 15 CENTS
No. 8-WHY CO-OPERATION? ---Consumers Co-operative Movement in the U. S. A.
By GEORGE HALOMEN . . . 10 CENTS
   
Copyright 1928
WORKERS LIBRARY PUBLISHERS, INC
Foreword

THE COMMUNIST FIGHT FOR THE NEGRO CAUSE   The two major capitalist parties, the Republican and Democratic, and their small brother, the Socialist Party, have an unwritten "gentleman's agreement" on the Negro question. According to this sacred "gentleman's agreement," which no capitalist politician has dared to violate in the present election campaign, there is no Negro question in the United States, there are no problems of social and political equality, no questions of discrimination against the Negro masses. 

During the whole course of the election campaign there has been only one political party which has had the courage to violate this "gentleman's agreement" to keep a deathly silence on the Negro question. The Workers (Communist) Party of America has come out in its election platform and in its whole election struggle as the fearless champion of the Negro masses.

The southern states are stirred up by the political struggle of the communist speakers and organizers for the Negro masses. Communist anti-lynching leaflets are being distributed everywhere.

The candidates of the Communist Party are everywhere putting up a courageous fight for the full social and political equality of the Negro race.

The meetings of the Communist Party have been broken up in Arizona, in Texas, in Delaware, and in other southern states, because the communist spokesmen dared to tackle the Negro question and were bold enough to call the Negro workers to their meetings.

The Ku Klux Klan, the American Legion, the forces of police and other organs of governmental terrorism are mobilized everywhere against the communists, because the Communist Party is the only party of the working class and of the oppressed Negro masses.

One, if not the most outstanding, feature of the election campaign of 1928 is the fact that communist speakers, organizers, and candidates for President, vice-president, and Governor are being jailed everywhere because of their uncompromising struggle for the Negroes.

To this brief foreword to the following essay on some of the basic Negro problems in America, we wish to add the principal demands for the oppressed Negro masses as embodied in the Platform of the Workers (Communist) Party of America:

1. Abolition of the whole system of race discrimination. Full racial, political, and social equality for the Negro race.

2. Abolition of all laws which result in segregation of Negroes. Abolition of all Jim Crow laws. The law shall forbid all discrimination against Negroes in selling or renting houses.

3. Abolition of all laws which disfranchise the Negroes.

4. Abolition of laws forbidding intermarriage of persons of different races.

5. Abolition of all laws and public administration measures which prohibit, or in practice prevent, Negro children or youth from attending general public schools or universities.

6. Full and equal admittance of Negroes to all railway station waiting rooms, restaurants, hotels, and theatres.

7. Federal law against lynching and the protection of the Negro masses in their right of self-defense.

8. Abolition of discrimination practices in courts against Negroes. No discrimination in jury service.

9. Abolition of the convict lease system and of the chain-gang.

10. Abolition of all Jim Crow distinction in the army, navy, and civil service.

11. Immediate removal of all restrictions in all trade unions against the membership of Negro workers.

12. Equal opportunity for employment, wages, hours, and working conditions for Negro and white workers. Equal pay for equal work for Negro and white workers. J. P.

American Negro Problems

By JOHN PEPPER

The Negro question in America must be treated in its relation to the liberation struggle of the proletariat against American imperialism. The struggle against white oppression of the Negro masses is a tart of the proletarian revolution in America against capitalism. The American working class cannot free itself from capitalist exploitation without freeing the Negro race from white oppression. What Marx said about the United States is still true:

"Labor cannot emancipate itself in the white skin where in the black it is branded."

At the same time the Negro question in the United States of America must be treated in its relations to the huge Negro masses of farmers and workers oppressed and exploited by white imperial-inn in Africa and South America, The Negroes of the United States are the most advanced section of the Negro population of the world and can play a decisive role in helping and leading the liberation movement of the Negro colonies. Within the Negro population of the United States, the Negro working class is destined to be the vanguard of all liberation movements and may become the vanguard of the liberation movement of the Negro peasant masses on an international scale.

A NEGRO PROLETARIAT APPEARS

The industrialization of the agrarian south of the United States, the concentration of a new Negro working-class population in the big cities of the east and north, and the entrance of the Negroes into the basic industries on a mass scale, have been changing, in the last few years, the whole social composition of the Negro race in America. The appearance of a genuine Negro industrial proletariat creates an organizing force for the Negro race, furnishes a new working-class leadership to all Negro race movements, creates the possibility for the Negro workers under the leadership of the Communist Party to assume the hegemony of the Negro liberation movement, strengthens immensely the fighting possibilities for the emancipation of the Negro race and increases the importance of the Negro question for the revolutionary struggle of the American proletariat.

American imperialism oppresses in the most terrific way the nearly 11 million Negroes who constitute not less than one-tenth of the country's total population. White capitalist prejudice considers the Negro race a "lower race," the born servants of the lofty white masters. The racial caste system is a fundamental feature of the social, industrial and political organization of the United States.

The Workers (Communist) Party of America, in its fight against imperialism, must recognize clearly the tremendous revolutionary possibilities of the liberation movement of the Negro people. Today the "solid south," the millions of Negro farmers of the "black belt," living under the most oppressive conditions, "half-feudal, half-slave" (Lenin) constitute one of the props of American imperialism. It is the basic duty of the Communist Party to develop all revolutionary possibilities of the Negro race, to transform the "solid south" and the "black belt" from "reserves of forces for the bourgeoisie into reserves of forces for the proletariat" (Stalin). The Communist Party must consider itself not only the Party of the working class generally, but also the champion of the Negroes as an oppressed race and especially the organizer of the Negro working-class elements. The Communist Party cannot be a real Bolshevik Party without being also the Party of the liberation of the Negro race from all white oppression.

THE SOLID SOUTH-AN AMERICAN COLONY

The Negro tenant farmers, sharecroppers, and agricultural workers of the south are still, despite all the pompous phrases of "freeing the slaves," in the status of virtual slavery. They have not the slightest prospect of ever acquiring possession of the land on which they work. By means of a usurious credit system they are chained to the plantation owners as firmly as plantation slaves. Peonage and contract labor are the fate of the Negro cotton farmers. The bankers of the east and the south are increasingly becoming the landowners. The landowners, who are at the same time the merchants, having a monopoly of marketing the crops of the Negro tenant farmers, and of the government in the south, rule over the Negroes with a merciless dictatorship.

The most backward half-feudal, half-slave methods of exploitation by the plantation owners, are merged in the south with the most modern forms of capitalist exploitation by the huge trusts and banks of financial capital. No other section of the American toiling masses feels the ruthless capitalist dictatorship of the much-vaunted American bourgeois democracy more than the oppressed Negro masses. The Negroes of the south are disfranchised politically. Sheer force prevents the Negroes from exercising their so-called political rights. Lynch law is the law over the Negroes. The terror of the Ku Klux Klan is the constitution for the Negroes. Most infamous segregation policies prevail everywhere against them. The white masters try to reduce the Negroes to illiteracy.

The "black belt" of the south, with its starving and pauperized Negro farmers, and Negro agricultural working masses; with its Jim-Crowism, its semi-feudal status and its political system still bearing the earmarks of the period of slavery, constitutes virtually a colony within the body of the United States of America. The super-profits extracted from this Negro "colony" are one of the most important sources of the growth of American imperialism; the oppression of the Negro race is one of the most important bases of the government apparatus of American capitalism. The prejudices created in the minds of large sections of the white workers against the Negroes are the most dangerous obstacles to the unity of the American working class.

CLASS DIFFERENTIATION OF THE NEGROES

A sharp class differentiation has taken place in the Negro population in recent years. Formerly the Negro was in the main the cotton farmer in the south and the domestic help in the north. The peasantry (the Negro farm owners, the share-croppers, the Negro tenant farmers) and the agricultural workers are still the largest stratum of the Negro race. Out of eight million Negroes in the south, there are six million still on the land. In the big cities and industrial centres of the north there is concentrated to a growing degree a Negro working-class population. There are already one and one-half to two million Negroes in industry in the north. At the same time there is a rapid development of a Negro petit-bourgeoisie, a Negro intelligentsia and even a Negro bourgeoisie. The very fact of segregation of the Negro masses creates the basis for the development of a stratum of small merchants, lawyers, physicians, preachers, brokers, who try to attract the Negro workers and farmers as consumers. There is no Negro industrial bourgeoisie. Predominance of white trusts restricts the young and weak Negro bourgeoisie to the fields of trade and second-rate banking.

It would be a major mistake to overlook the existence of class differences among the Negroes, especially the crystallization of a Negro bourgeoisie. There were in 1924, 73 Negro banks, carrying an annual volume of business of over 100,000,000 dollars. There are 25 Negro insurance companies; 14 of these have assets totalling 6,000,000 dollars and during 1926 alone paid over 3,000,000 dollars in claims. This Negro bourgeoisie is closely tied up with the white bourgeoisie; is often the agent of the white capitalists. Economically the Negro banks are often part of the Federal Reserve System of banking.

Politically the Negro bourgeoisie is participating, to a growing degree, in the so-called "commissions for inter-racial cooperation." These committees exist in eight hundred counties of the south and are spreading all through the "black belt." But the ideala~tica1 and organizational bearer of the national racial movement of the Negroes is today rather the intelligentsia and petit-bourgeoisie.

PROLETARIANIZATION AND PAUPERIZATION OF THE FARMER

There is a growing process of disintegration going on among the Negro farmers. Ever larger sections are transformed into agricultural workers (2,000,000) and hundreds of thousands of Negro farmers and agricultural workers desert their lands and migrate to the big cities and industrial centres. This migration is not only to the industrial centres and big cities of the east and north, I but also to the rising industrial centres of the south. There is even migration from the plantations to the villages of the south where there is a non-agrarian Negro population of about two millions.

Lenin pointed out back in 1913, as one of the foremost characteristics of the southern rural areas, the fact that "its population is deserting it." The disintegration of the Negro peasantry means partly proletarianization of the Negro share-croppers, partly pauperization of the Negro masses. In the past the south has had a stratum of "poor whites," today it is developing a new statum of "poor blacks"- driven completely outside the process of production.

The southern plantation owners and their government have tried to hold the Negro farmers and agricultural workers in the southern cotton fields by force, but even their brutal terror has not been able to stop the mighty migration from the Cotton plantations to the industrial centres. This migration is an "unarmed Spartacist uprising" against slavery and oppression by a capitalist and feudal oligarchy. The Negro has fled from the south, but what has he found in the north? He has found in the company towns and industrial centres of the north and cast a wage slavery virtually not better than the contract slavery in the south. lie has found crowded, unsanitary slums. He has exchanged the old segregation for a new segregation in the worst sections of the cities. He is doing the most dangerous, worst-pad, unskilled work in the steel, coal and packing industries. He has found the racial prejudice of a narrow white labor aristocracy, which refuses to recognize the unskilled Negro worker as its e1tial. He has found the treachery of the bureaucracy of the A. F. of L., which refuses to organize the Negro workers into trade unions; he has found betrayal by the renegade Socialist Party which capitulated completely to white chauvinism. The lynchings of the south have their counterpart in the race riots of the east. The employing class deliberately arouses the racial hatred and prejudices of the white workers against the Negro workers with the sinister aim of splitting and dividing the ranks of the working class, thereby maintaining the exploitation and oppression of both the white and Negro workers.

"A cropper is a tenant who works the land for his landlord without supplying any of the working capital, but he might a1most as well be regarded as a laborer who accepts a share of the crop as his wages . . . The payment for their services in the form of a share of production rather than in the form of a stated weekly or a monthly wage is the part of a plan whereby the landlord is able to insure himself of their continued services throughout the season. In other words, while tenancy in theory represents mere/v a method of holding possession of the land, in practice it sometimes works out into a method of obtaining laborers to work on the land." Goldweiser and Truesdell "Farm Tenancy in the United States." Census Monographs IV. Washington, 1927).

THE SLOGAN OF SELF-DETERMINATION

The Workers (Communist) Party of America puts forward correctly as its central slogan: Abolition of the whole system of race discrimination. Full racial) social and political equality for the Negro people. But it is necessary to supplement the struggle for the full racial, social and political equality of the Negroes with a struggle for their right of national self-determination. Self-determination means the right to establish their own state, to erect their own government, if they choose to do so. in the economic and social conditions and class relations of the Negro people there are increasing forces which serve as a basis for the development of a Negro nation (a compact mass of farmers on a contiguous territory, semi-feudal conditions, complete segregation, common traditions of slavery, the development of distinct classes and economic ties, etc., etc.). It is true, the Negro people in the United States

have not their own language as distinct from the language of the oppressing white nation; but there is a certain amount of special Negro culture; there is still alive the Common, deep-rooted tradition of the bitter centuries of slavery; there is developing a new Negro literature and press.

First of all, we must consider the compact Negro farming masse of the "black belt" as the potential basis for a national liberation movement of the Negroes and as the basis for the realization of i/s right of self-determination of a Negro state. Despite growing migration to the north, in 1920 there were still over 3,000,00 Negroes who constituted a majority of the population in 219 counties over a contiguous area in the "black belt." There are many national movements of the Negro city petit-bourgeoisie and intelligentsia. The fact that the most important mass movement of this kind, the Garvey movement, was a sort of Negro Zionism and ha such reactionary, extremely harmful slogans as leaving the Unite States and back to Africa, should not blind us to the revolutionary possibilities of the Negro national liberation movements of the future. It is unquestionable that first of all the Negro farmers can be the basis of a Negro national liberation movement of the future, despite the fact that today the Negro farming masses of the south are so oppressed that they do not, yet show any signs of national awakening.

The Negro national liberation movement has tremendous revolutionary potentialities, despite the fact that at the outset its bearer will likely be the rural and urban petit-bourgeoisie. Lenin has stated: "There can be no doubt that all nationalist movements cannot be but bourgeois-democratic movements." But the knowledge of this fact did not prevent Lenin and the C. I. from recognizing the tremendous unexhausted revolutionary possibilities of the national liberation movement of the colonies and oppressed nations and races generally. As the national liberation movement grows, the Negro proletariat will play an increasing role in it and will struggle for the hegemony over it. There is a certain amount of assimilation going on among the Negro industrial workers in the north and east. The Negro worker works shoulder to shoulder with the white worker in the factories and plants, but at the same time it is necessary to recognize that there is practically no social contact between these workers. The social and residential segregation of the Negro workers in the north is complete and manifests an increasing tendency. Veritable Negro cities are being created in Harlem, New York, and on the south side of Chicago. This segregation of the Negro working class creates an economic basis for the development of a Negro petit-bourgeoisie even in the north and east, which loads additional exploitation onto the backs of the Negro workers and as a result of this distinct development, strengthens the basis of the Negro national movement in the north and east.

The Workers (Communist) Party of America must come out openly and unreservedly for the right of national self -determination for the Negroes, but at the same time the Communist Party must state sharply that the realization of this self-determination cannot be secured under the present relations of power under capitalism. National self-determination for the Negro is a bourgeois- democratic demand but it can be realized only in the course of the proletarian revolution. The abolition of the half-feudal, half-slave remnants in the south will also be only "a by-product" (Lenin) of the general proletarian revolution. It would be a ma/or mistake to believe that there can be any other revolution in imperialist America, in the country of the most powerful, most centralized and Concentrated industry, than a proletarian revolution.

 The Communist Party of America must recognize the right of national self-determination for the Negroes and must respect their own decision about the form of the realization of this self-determination. The Negro Communists should emphasize in their propaganda the establishment of a Negro Soviet Republic.

AGAINST WHITE CHAUVINISM

Not only the labor aristocracy but large sections of the American working class as a whole are permeated with white chauvinism. 'White chauvinism reflects itself in various forms even in some sections of the Communist Party itself. Individual comrades and even some local organizations have yielded occasionally to the racial prejudices of the white workers and retreated, instead of waging a courageous struggle against it. (Gary, Detroit, St. Paul, Harlem). The C. E. C. of the Communist Party of America stated in its resolution of April 30th that "the Party as a whole has not sufficiently realized the significance of work among the Negroes and that such work should be considered not as a special task of the Negro comrades, but as one of the special revolutionary tasks of every communist, of the whole Party."

It is imperative to begin outside and inside the Communist Part a relentless campaign of self-criticism concerning the work among Negroes. All signs of white chauvinism must be ruthlessly uprooted from within the ranks of the Communist Party. In this aggressive fight against white chauvinism, the Party must carry on a widespread and thorough educational campaign within the Party utilizing for this purpose to the fullest possible extent, the Party schools, the Party press and the public platform to stamp out all forms of antagonism or even indifference among our white comrades towards the Negro work. This educational work should he conducted simultaneously with broad campaigns to draw the white workers and the poor white farmers into the struggle for the support of the demands of the Negro workers and tenant farmers.

The struggle against white chauvinism must be combined wit the struggle for genuine internationalism in the ranks of the working class and in the ranks of the Communist Party. The Communist Party of America must emphasize in all its campaigns the solidarity of the white and black workers. In the ranks of the Communist Party there can be no place for nationalism. The Communist Party must be the Party of internationalism.

TASKS OF THE COMMUNISTS IN NEGRO WORK

The appearance of a Negro industrial proletariat on a growing national mass scale makes it imperative that the main emphasis of the Party work should be placed on these new proletarian forces. The Negro workers must be organized under the leadership of the Communist Party and drawn into joint struggle, together with the white workers. The Party must understand how to link up all racial, national demands of the Negroes with the economic and political struggles of the workers and poor farmers. Much more emphasis than before must be laid on the trade-union organization of the Negroes. The Party must penetrate all existing Negro trade unions. It is a basic task of the Communist Party to organize the Negroes into trade unions. In all the work of organizing the unorganized carried on under the leadership of the Communist Party, we must insist upon the inclusion of Negro workers with white workers in the newly organized trade unions. In the existing trade unions, the Party must fight for the admittance of Negro workers. Where the labor bureaucracy refuses to admit Negroes, it is the duty of the Communist Party to organize Negro trade unions. At the same time the principle of one union for each industry, embracing white as well as Negro workers, should be the aim of the Communist Party.

The importance of trade-union work imposes special tasks upon the T. U. E. L. The T. U. E. L,. has neglected the work among the Negroes, notwithstanding the fact that these workers are objectively in a position to play a very big part in carrying through the programme of organizing the unorganized. Greater contact must he established between the T. U. E. L. and the Negro masses. The T. U. E. L. must become the champion of the rights of the Negroes in the old unions and in the organizing of new unions for Negroes and whites, as well as separate Negro unions.

It is one of the biggest tasks of the 'Workers Party to extend its activities to the "Solid South," the beginning, of which has been made in the election campaign.

The Party was not able to carry on any work among the Negro farmers and agricultural workers of the "black belt." It is the duty of the Party to study and analyze the conditions of the Negro farming masses, to work out demand to meet their situation, to organize special Negro farmers' organizations as well as organizations of the agricultural workers. It i necessary that the Party should establish new district organization in the south, especially in the most important industrial centres. The Party organizations in these industrial centers of the south should b the bearers of the educational and organizing work of the Party among the Negro farmers and agricultural workers.

The fight against segregation, lynching, and political disfranchisement of the Negroes, must be organized. It is necessary to help the Negro masses to organize themselves for active resistance and self defense against the lynching terror of the Ku Klux Klan and similar terroristic gangs of the white bourgeoisie. 

The I. L. D. which so far has almost completely neglected work amongst the Negro masses, must hereafter put in the forefront of its propaganda, agitation and activities, energetic campaigns against lynching and juridical oppression of the Negroes.

The communists must participate in all national liberation movements of the Negroes, which have a real mass character. The existing national organizations and movements of the Negroes are today under the domination of the Negro petit-bourgeoisie and even their bourgeoisie. The aim of the Communist Party must be to fight for the hegemony of the working-class elements in the national liberation movement. The basic task of the communists is to form working-class organizations for the Negro proletariat and agricultural workers, and farmers' organizations for the Negro farmers and to turn these organizations into energetic integral forces of it whole class struggle. The communists must not forget for moment that the struggle for the national liberation of the Negro includes the relentless struggle against the Negro bourgeoisie and the struggle against the influence of the petit-bourgeoisie over the Negro proletariat. It is permissible to form a united front (f 1 example in the form of a Negro Race Congress) of the working class elements with the petit-bourgeois elements. The policy of the communists within this united front must be:

(a) To free the working class from the ideological and organizational influence of the petit-bourgeois elements.

(b) To begin the struggle for the leadership of the working class.

The communists must bear in mind that the alliance of the Negro working class with the Negro petit-bourgeoisie can be maintained only under the following conditions:

(a) A revolutionary fight of the petit-bourgeoisie for Negro race demands against American imperialism.

(b) No obstacles by the petit-bourgeoisie against the special class demands and organizations of time Negro workers and exploited farmers.

The communists must under no circumstances merge their organization with the petit-bourgeois organizations and must reserve for themselves fullest rights of criticism and propaganda.

The American Negro Labor Congress which is still very weak, must he reorganized and activized. The communists working within this organization should try to make it serve as an intermediary mass organization, as a medium through which the Party can extend its work among the Negro masses and mobilize the Negro workers under its leadership. After careful preparatory work which must be started at once, another convention of the American Negro Labor Congress should be held. For this convention a carefully worked-out program should be prepared. It should contain not only demands of the Negro workers, but also the agrarian demands of the farmers and agricultural workers.

The Negro miners' relief committee and the Harlem Tenants League are examples of united front organizations, which may be set up as a means of drawing the Negro masses into struggle. But these organizations can be considered only as a beginning. The communists working within these organizations should try to broaden them, and similar committees should be organized in other Negro centers. In every case the utmost effort must be made to combine the struggle of the Negro workers with that of white workers and to draw the white workers' organizations into such united front campaigns.

One of the greatest shortcomings of the work of the American Party among the Negroes is the lack of sufficient Party cadres among the Negro comrades. The next and most important task of the Party in this respect is the selection and education of a cadre of Negro communist workers. The proletarian character of the Negro Party leadership must be brought forward more clearly than before.

At the same time the proletarian Negro intellectuals must be utilized to the full. It is imperative to utilize all Party schools in the U. S. A. and abroad to train Negro comrades as leaders and for special work among the Negro farming masses.

The activities of the Negro comrades should not be confined exclusively to the work among the Negroes, but they should participate in the general Party work. 

Simultaneously white comrades must be specially trained for work among the Negroes. The Negro Champion must be published regularly. Every effort must be made to develop it into the mass organ of the Negro workers and working farmers. The general Party press must be utilized to its full extent for propaganda among the Negroes. A regular Negro news service must be built. 

The utmost effort must be made to attract Negro workers and Negro agricultural laborers as members into the Communist Party. The present Negro membership of the Communist Party is inadequate to fulfill the great tasks before it. A special recruiting campaign for Negro workers should be initiated in connection with the general economic and political campaigns of the Party. In the present election campaign, wherever possible Negro communist candidates should be nominated in the important Negro centers.

The Negro question in the United States must be treated in its relation to the general international Negro problem. The question of a Negro World Congress should be considered but it can be realized only if a Negro working-class leadership in the Congress can be secured. One aim and purpose of the work among the Negroes in the U. S. A. should be to organize them as the champions of the Negroes all over the world, against imperialism. A strong Negro movement in the U. S. A. will be able to influence and direct the Negro movement in all those backward parts of the world where the Negroes are oppressed by the various imperialist powers.


As testimony to the Communist affection for this destabilizing publication, they've published it as a resource document on their own site!

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Will America's Revolution be another French Terror? - *7min. vid*

Let's hope not. For one thing France is today, and in a shorter time, more socialist than we are. Our Constitution for individuals' liberties is superior, yet "we the people" send people to represent us who denigrate it, and tolerate its decay and abuse. Second, while violence may be thought of as an alternative, today we have the UN which could summon world troops to our soil expeditiously to crush us. Ron Paul has pointed us in the right direction, but will we snore on, and look to the problem of Government for the solution?

Would you deny that America is well on its way to creating her very own "committee of public safety"?

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              Oh ye of the Third Estate, take heed!

What About the French Revolution?

Friday, November 18, 2011 – by Staff Report
from The Daily Bell

We are increasingly believers in "directed history" – history that's coordinated by a power elite intent on creating one-world government. We've written a good deal about the directed history we're seeing as regards Occupy Wall Street. We think that the movement has been set up to be divisive and ultimately to reinforce the power of the state. Out of chaos ... order.


That's probably the reason the movement has no agenda. The people at the top who are manipulating the movement know what they want to achieve and are doing so in order to trigger increased social discord. The ultimate aim, perhaps, is to enhance world government. We've explained the parallelism here: VIDEO: Parallels Between Early 20th Century and Present Are Scary.

But there are even more parallels. The Tea Party movement in America was organic to begin with. It was a bit like the American Revolution. But having observed the American Revolution, the power elite of the day (from what we can tell) fomented the French Revolution.

That's how long the modern conspiracy to set up world government has been going on, in our view – about 300 years, maybe since the founding of the Illuminati. The American Revolution, manipulated as it may have been, ultimately was in a sense anti-government and focused on individual freedom.

English: The Third Estate carrying the
Clergy and the Nobility on its back
Français : Le Tiers-État portant le
Clergé et la Noblesse sur son dos.

The French Revolution was set up deliberately to be "pro-government" – or pro-force at any rate. It was designed to defuse classical liberalism and freedom by proposing that government in the hands of an expert technocracy could "perfect" society and humankind.

Post revolution, between 1789 and September 1791, the French National Assembly reformed the ancient regime. They accomplished this with six basic statements, according to the website Modern European Intellectual History. Here are three of six. We've substituted the word "bankster" for "clergy" and "monarch" ...

•the abolition of special privileges of BANKSTERS through the legalization of equality (August 4, 1789)

•they subordinated BANKSTERS to the State. In November 1789, the National Assembly confiscated all BANKSTER property. And in early 1790, they passed the civil constitution, which reduced the power of the BANKSTERS who were now selected and paid by the State

•in September 1791, the National Assembly drew up a constitution, something it had been trying to do since June 1789. The constitution of 1791 specified such liberal ideas as limited BANKSTERS and full equality before the law

"Populist" movements like the French Revolution rarely end well because they are expressions mostly of anger and envy. They are not rational. They eat their own. That's what happened then as the movement began with the idea of overthrowing the regime and ended up by trying to "perfect" society using the power of the state.

Here is a Wikipedia summary:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_revolution

The French Revolution (1789–1799), sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' (La Grande Révolution), was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years. French society underwent an epic transformation as feudal, aristocratic and religious privileges evaporated under a sustained assault from radical left-wing political groups, masses on the streets, and peasants in the countryside. Old ideas about tradition and hierarchy - of monarchy, aristocracy and religious authority - were abruptly overthrown by new Enlightenment principles of equality,citizenship and inalienable rights.

The French Revolution began in 1789 with the convocation of the Estates-General in May. The first year of the Revolution saw members of the Third Estate proclaiming the Tennis Court Oath in June, the assault on the Bastille in July, the passage of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen in August, and an epic march on Versailles that forced the royal court back to Paris in October. The next few years were dominated by tensions between various liberal assemblies and a right-wing monarchy intent on thwarting major reforms.

A republic was proclaimed in September 1792 and King Louis XVI was executed the next year. External threats also played a dominant role in the development of the Revolution. The French Revolutionary Wars started in 1792 and ultimately featured spectacular French victories that facilitated the conquest of the Italian Peninsula, the Low Countries and most territories west of the Rhine – achievements that had defied previous French governments for centuries.

Internally, popular sentiments radicalized the Revolution significantly, culminating in the rise of Maximilien Robespierre and the Jacobins and virtual dictatorship by the Committee of Public Safety during the Reign of Terror from 1793 until 1794 during which between 16,000 and 40,000 people were killed. After the fall of the Jacobins and the execution of Robespierre, the Directory assumed control of the French state in 1795 and held power until 1799, when it was replaced by the Consulate under Napoleon Bonaparte.

After the Napoleonic Wars and ensuing rise and fall of Napoleon's First French Empire, a restoration of absolutist monarchy was followed by two further successful smaller revolutions (1830 and 1848). This meant the 19th century and process of modern France taking shape saw France again successively governed by a similar cycle of constitutional monarchy (1830-48), fragile republic (Second Republic) (1848-1852), and empire (Second Empire) (1852-1870). The modern era has unfolded in the shadow of the French Revolution. The growth of republics and liberal democracies, the spread of secularism, the development of modern ideologies and the invention of total war all mark their birth during the Revolution.

Below is a short video narrative of the French Revolution. It is simple and direct and written apparently by a high school student. We recommend it for the blunt arc of its narrative, even if it contains some factual flaws. Young people, not being so sophisticated their elders, sometimes see more clearly ...

(Video from byustudent2012's YouTube user channel.)

source: TheDailyBell

The Great Fear and the Great Faith

1st pub by CV 10.29.12

By Rev. R.J. Rushdoony

Otto J. Scott, in Robespierre, The Voice of Virtue, calls attention to all important phenomenon of the French Revolution, The Great Fear.

FedGov Agents Violate US & State Constitutions, again - by Snooping, Harassing Residents of Three States

We are certainly not one to be tolerant of anti-American radicals agitating violence or terrorist acts regardless of their political philosophies.

But, the threat we see here is the unlawful trampling of our Constitution by federal law enforcement of a state's sovereignty. The elected state representatives of these three-named states, Washington, Idaho, or Oregon with their inaction violate their own sworn oaths of office. In fact, why also have the duty-obligated county sheriffs not expelled or arrested these trespassing federal agents?

To us, it is a greater threat to our rule of law whereby our law enforcement entities respond as commanded by their corporate sponsors, and not to their voters' rights to protection of rights and property. Let them tell us. We need to know.

Has Your State taken Steps to Reclaim Your Sovereign Land from the Fed Government? Why not?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Anti-oil sands activists in the U.S. are getting visits from the FBI

Alexander Panetta

WASHINGTON — The Canadian Press

Last updated Saturday, Feb. 07 2015, 7:35 AM EST

Unexpected visitors have been dropping in on anti-oil activists in the United States — knocking on doors, calling, texting, contacting family members.

The visitors are federal agents.

Opponents of Canadian oil say they’ve been contacted by FBI investigators in several states following their involvement in protests that delayed northbound shipments of equipment to Canada’s oilsands.

A lawyer working with the protesters says he’s personally aware of a dozen people having been contacted in the northwestern U.S. and says the actual number is probably higher.

Larry Hildes says it’s been happening the last few months in Washington State, Oregon and Idaho. He says one person got a visit at work, after having already refused to answer questions.

“They appear to be interested in actions around the tarsands and the Keystone XL pipeline,” Hildes said in an interview.

“It’s always the same line: ‘We’re not doing criminal investigations, you’re not accused of any crime. But we’re trying to learn more about the movement.“’

He’s advised activists not to talk — and they mostly haven’t. That lack of communication has made it a little complicated to figure out what, exactly, the FBI is looking for.

The bureau hasn’t offered too many clues.

One agent left his name, number, and the following message in a voicemail for Helen Yost of the group Wild Idaho Rising Tide: “I work with the FBI. Could you give me a call back — I would appreciate it.”

Is anti-oilsands activity an actual focus of the FBI investigation, or is it merely incidental? The bureau won’t say.

What it will say is that it only investigates potential crimes, not political movements.

“The FBI has the authority to conduct an investigation when it has reasonable grounds to believe that an individual has engaged in criminal activity or is planning to do so,” said FBI spokeswoman Ayn Dietrich.

“This authority is based on the illegal activity, not on the individual’s political views.”

But activists say oil sands opposition appears to be the common thread among people being contacted. Police have been in touch with people from different groups, who in some cases don’t agree on much, but one thing they share is mutual participation in the so-called megaload protests.

Those are the intermittent highway blockades set up the last few years to complicate the enormous, football-field-sized shipments of processing equipment up to the oilsands.

Yost said only two people from her group participated in that anti-oil sands action — and those are the people who’ve been contacted by the FBI. She has refused to co-operate.

The other person, Herb Goodwin, was visited at home by an FBI agent and a veteran detective from the local police force in Bellingham, Wash. He said the federal agent told him: “We’re here to ask whether you’ll answer some questions for us about Deep Green Resistance.”

That group, DGR, calls itself a radical environmental movement that believes the biggest problem with the planet is human civilization itself. It proposes a shift back from agriculture to a hunter-gatherer horticultural lifestyle.

It also proposes a four-step program called decisive ecological warfare, a long-term plan calling for the sabotage and dismantling of planet-harming infrastructure.

The group has repeatedly stated that it wouldn’t participate itself in any such actions. But Lierre Keith, one of its founders, laid out the plan in a speech last year at an environmental conference at the University of Oregon.

“I would vastly prefer to wage this struggle non-violently,” Keith said. “But my blogging will not bring forth the necessary numbers. So given a realistic assessment of what we actually have, the only viable strategy left that I can see is direct attacks against infrastructure. In the plainest terms, we need to stop them.”

There was some controversy about inviting her to the conference. Other groups wanted her event cancelled because of her views on transgender people — Keith dismisses the notion that a sex change can undo someone’s gender perspective.

Hildes said the FBI tried asking people about that Oregon speech. Since Yost’s group was among those voicing opposition to DGR, she believes the FBI might be trying to sow division in the movement.

The Canadian government said it wasn’t involved in any U.S. law-enforcement effort. A spokesman said it was aware of the megaload protests, but hadn’t discussed them with any American agency.

Goodwin said he won’t stop protesting. He’s among the nearly 100,000 people who have signed a pledge to engage in civil disobedience, should the Obama administration approve the Keystone XL pipeline.

He called it a life mission to help thwart the development of the oilsands in Canada and the Bakken fields in the U.S. “If we don’t stop that stuff we’re never going to convert to alternative energies that don’t pollute the atmosphere,” he said.

via theglobeandmail

Book Exposes the Effort to Introduce Radical Political Philosophy into K-12 Classrooms

1st. published by CV on 30 Nov. 2011 

by Education Action Group 
 

MUSKEGON, Mich. – We’ve always known that teachers unions are very political organizations, and many of their more radical members are active in left-wing causes.
That’s their right, as long as they pursue their activities after school.

But more and more American K-12 teachers are bringing their politics into the classroom, brazenly acknowledging their effort to indoctrinate and recruit a new generation of radical, anti-American students.

“The long period of self-censorship among educators regarding class and labor issues may no longer hold,” wrote radical educator Rob Linne in his book “Organizing the Curriculum.”


“We cannot claim to be teaching for social justice if we ignore the class warfare being waged all around us. Bringing labor into the arena of K-12 education will undoubtedly meet political resistance, but an increasing number of educators are motivated to take up the challenge.”

That frightening approach to teaching is what motivated Education Action Group to publish a new book titled “Indoctrination: How ‘Useful Idiots’ are Using Our Schools to Subvert American Exceptionalism.”

You can watch a short promotional video for the book by clicking here.

The book, authored by EAG Chief Executive Officer Kyle Olson, with assistance from staffers Ben Velderman and Steve Gunn, is available on Amazon.com.

It explores dozens of examples of radical public school teachers and their politically active unions taking liberty with our children by teaching left-wing philosophy as fact.


It also illustrates how radical left-wing think tanks around the nation are producing and distributing special lesson plans that attack the fundamentals of American society and plant the seeds of class warfare in young minds.

In his foreword for the book, FOX News contributor and former Clinton advisor Dick Morris bemoans the fact that educators are willing to brainwash young minds before they have the ability to fully understand and judge issues on their own.

“We have become accustomed to hearing American history and politics misinterpreted by leftist university professors,” Morris writes. “But (now) we see the insidious indoctrination at the elementary and secondary levels. At least university students can think for themselves.

(The book) explains how 7- and 8-year-olds are taught to embrace an atheistic, leftist philosophy virtually from the time they enter school.”

I, Tomato
The book clearly illustrates that teachers unions want to create a future class of organized labor activists or sympathizers.

A curriculum produced by the radical California Federation of Teachers is called “ Golden Lands, Working Hands.”

To reverberate with its adolescent audience, the lesson features a rap video with the lyrics, “The age of railroads meant mass transportation, but did rich men make the trains of our nation? Psych! It was the working people who laid the tracks. And see who did the work and got the job done. While lazy lone ranger was out havin’ fun.”

After the minimum wage line, the cartoon character in the video falls in the grave he just dug for himself, then a pig rises out of a pile of money bags. There is nobody in the video defending the “pig” who invested the money to build the railroads and create the jobs. That would have destroyed the whole purpose of the lesson.

Younger students are not immune from these very political “lessons.”

There is a popular story/lesson plan for young children titled “I Tomato.” The main character, a tomato plant, tells readers about the loving care it received from various migrant workers, and how it was mistreated by being sprayed with pesticides.

The story gives full credit for food production to the field workers – “Juana, Dolores and Rajib; Finoy and Carlos, Connie, Lupe, Marcos and Jose Manuel – it is to them I owe my life and you owe your tomatoes.”

That’s great, but what about the investor who risked his savings to establish the farm, hire the workers and provide the necessary materials to grow the tomatoes? No mention of him.

But the kids do get a union promo at the end of the story:

“Many farm workers belong to a union,” the story says. “Do you know what a union is? If you were a worker, would you want to belong to a union? How can you find out if your fruits and vegetables were picked by union workers?”

The book also discusses Chicago teacher Kati Gilson, who taught her preschoolers about her 2011 trip to Madison to protest the collective bargaining policies of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. She also taught them new words like “strike,” “collective bargaining,” and “negotiate.”

“My preschoolers understand what a protest march is and why it is important,” Gilson wrote.

“As we gear up for what looks like a big battle it is important for us to teach our children and families why we are taking a stand.”

Is this what we pay school taxes for?

What would the Black Panthers do?

Many radical teachers obviously want their students to disapprove of the United States and mistrust their government.

One chapter in the book explores the growing pattern of teachers leading elementary children to recite the Pledge of Allegiance to the Earth, instead of America. One educator, Rosalie Tyler Paul of Maine, wrote a piece calling for everyone to reject love of country and embrace globalism.

“We can see that the nation is not the parcel most in need of our loyalty and allegiance,” Paul wrote. “The purpose and courage we need can be found better in Earth citizenship that in nationalism.”

Wayne Au, a former Seattle high school teacher, wrote about teaching his students the story of the violent Black Panthers and their “Ten Point Program,” and encouraging students to develop their own lists of political priorities, based on modern issues.

One successful student wrote, “We want the mask of capitalism lifted and economic classes disbanded,” and “The enslavement of the middle of the lower classes by the bourgeoisie must end.” Au praised the student’s work for its “relentless attack on corporate America.”

Even school math lessons are not immune. One chapter of the book refers to “The Guide for Integrating Issues of Social and Economic Justice into Mathematics Curriculum,” by Jonathan Osler.

In his guide, Osler suggests giving a lesson about mathematical averages using casualty numbers from the war in Iraq. He suggests teaching probability by having students explore the probability that a police traffic stop will target a person of color. He also calls for a geometry lesson based on “environmental racism” that would require students to “determine the density of toxic waste facilities, factories, dumps, etc. in the neighborhood.”

Way to go, Mr. Osler. Instead of teaching a generation of youngsters to appreciate their nation and the freedom they have to make their lives better, you want to create an angry bunch of revolutionaries who are determined to destroy the very system that makes it possible to work for change.

As one blogger who reviewed our book wrote, “Olson shows that kids are being taught everything but what parents are sending them to school to learn. This is a solid book, but it’s shocking in what it uncovers.”

JULIAN BOND of the Radical Left - THE MAN UNDER THE HOOD NAACP Chairman of the Board

  JULIAN BOND - THE MAN UNDER THE HOOD  

~ Numerous affiliations with Communist groups & their subversive agendas - - most profiled elsewhere on this blog ~

  JULIAN BOND was born on January 14, 1940 in Nashville, Tennessee, son of Julia Washington and Horace Bond. He married Alice Clapton. He attended but did not graduate from Morehouse College.

Testimony from Victims of New York’s Draft Riots, July, 1863

Saturday, May 28, 2011

Testimony from Victims of New York’s Draft Riots, July, 1863 

“If It Were Not For My Trust in Christ I Do Not Know How I Could Have Endured It”: Testimony from Victims of New York’s Draft Riots, July, 1863

Between July 13 and 16, 1863, the largest riots the United States had yet seen shook New York City. In the so-called Civil War draft riots, the city’s poor white working people, many of them Irish immigrants, bloodily protested the federally-imposed draft requiring all men to enlist in the Union Army. The rioters took out their rage on their perceived enemies: the Republicans whose wealth allowed them to purchase substitutes for military service, and the poor African Americans—their rivals in the city’s labor market—for whom the war was being fought. On July 20, four days after federal troops put down the uprising, a group of Wall Street businessmen formed a committee to aid New York’s devastated black community. The Committee of Merchants for the Relief of Colored People Suffering from the Late Riots gathered and distributed funds, and collected the following testimony.

Abraham Franklin

This young man who was murdered by the mob on the corner of Twenty-seventh St., and Seventh avenue, was a quiet, inoffensive man, 23 years of age, of unexceptionable character, and a member of the Zion African Church in this city. Although a cripple, he earned a living for himself and his mother by serving a gentleman in the capacity of a coachman. A short time previous to the assault upon his person he called upon his mother to see if anything could be done by him for her safety. The old lady, who is noted for her piety and her Christian deportment, said she considered herself perfectly safe; but if her time to die had come, she was ready to die. Her son then knelt down by her side, and implored the protection of Heaven in behalf of his mother. The old lady was affected to tears, and said to our informant that it seemed to her that good angels were present in the room.

 Scarcely had the supplicant risen from his knees, when the mob broke down the door, seized him, beat him over the head and face with fists and clubs, and then hanged him in the presence of his mother.

While they were engaged, the military came and drove them away, cutting down the body of Franklin who raised his arm once slightly and gave a few signs of life.

The military then moved on to quell other riots, when the mob returned and again suspended the now probably lifeless body of Franklin, cutting out pieces of flesh and otherwise mutilating it.

Peter Heuston.

Peter Heuston, sixty-three years of age, a Mohawk Indian, with dark complexion and straight black hair, who has for several years been a resident of this city, at the corner of Rosevelt and Oak streets, and who has obtained a livelihood as a laborer, proved a victim to the late riots.

His wife died about three weeks before the riots, leaving with her husband an only child, a little girl named Lavinia, aged eight years, whom the Merchants' Committee have undertaken to adopt with a view of affording her a guardianship and an education. Heuston served with the New York Volunteers in the Mexican War, and has always been loyal to our government. He was brutally attacked on the 13th of July by a gang of ruffians who evidently thought him to be of the African race because of his dark complexion. He died within four days at Bellevue hospital from his injuries....

Wm. Henry Nichols

Died July 16th, from injuries received at the hands of the rioters on the 15th of July.

Mrs. Statts, his mother, tells this story:—

The father of Wm. Henry died some years ago, and the boy has since, by good behavior, with persevering industry, earned his own living; he was a communicant of the Protestant Episcopal Church, in good standing. I had arrived from Philadelphia, the previous Monday evening, before any indications of the riot were known, and was temporarily stopping, on Wednesday, July 15th, at the house of my son, No.147 East 28th street.

At 3 o’clock of that day the mob arrived and immediately commenced an attack with terrific yells, and a shower of stones and bricks, upon the house. In the next room to where I was sitting was a poor woman, who had been confined with a child on Sunday, three days previous. Some of the rioters broke through the front door with pick axes, and came rushing into the room where this poor woman lay, and commenced to pull the clothes from off her.

Knowing that their rate was chiefly directed against men, I hid my son behind me and ran with him through the back door, down into the basement. In a little while I saw the innocent babe, of three days old, come crashing down into the yard; some of the rioters had dashed it out of the back window, killing it instantly. In a few minutes streams of water came pouring down into the basement, the mob had cut the Croton water-pipes with their axes. Fearing we should be drowned in the cellar, (there were ten of us, mostly women and children, there) I took my boy and flew past the dead body of the babe, out to the rear of the yard, hoping to escape with him through an open lot into 29th street; but here, to our horror and dismay, we met the mob again; I, with my son, had climbed the fence, but the sight of those maddened demons so affected me that I fell back, fainting, into the yard; my son jumped down from the fence to pick me up, and a dozen of the rioters came leaping over the fence after him. As they surrounded us my son exclaimed, “save my mother, gentlemen, if you kill me.” "Well, we will kill you," they answered; and with that two ruffians seized him, each taking hold of an arm, while a third, armed with a crow-bar, calling upon them to stand and hold his arms apart, deliberately struck him a heavy blow over the head, felling him, like a bullock, to the ground. (He died in the N.Y. hospital two days after.) I believe if I were to live a hundred years I would never forget that scene, or cease to hear the horrid voices of that demoniacal mob resounding in my ears...,. continued

Israelis: "Ni&&ers go home!" *vid*

Do you still 'stand up for the Israel state', or Judaism?
 
Israeli Zionists took to the streets with ISIS-style flags, chanting “niggers go home” at an anti-African rally in Tel Aviv following an Israeli High Court ruling to close the Holot detention center. Israel has faced international scrutiny for it’s treatment of refugees, most of whom hail from Africa.  Both the Israeli government and public have fought to deport as many refugees as possible, claiming that they threaten the Jewish identity of the country.

Published on Oct 6, 2014

My footage from an anti-African rally by Jewish Israelis in Tel Aviv on October 5, 2014

Violence Erupts As Hong Kong's Leader Threatens To Use "All Necessary Measures To Restore Social Order"

Having tried (unsuccessfully) to break up the pro-democracy protesters in the heart of Hong Kong using local triad gangs (as opposed to the optics of actual police), it appears the Chinese government is rolling back from its "wait-and-see" approach and becoming more aggressive once again. Hong Kong's Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying, as DPA reports, demanded protesters end their blockade of major roads by Monday, or the government will take "all necessary measures to restore social order." Tensions continue to rise, with clashes breaking out sporadically, as the protesters have broken off talks with the government. As fears of another Tiananmen square debacle loom, former Hong Kong governor Chris Patten noted, "I cannot believe it would be so stupid as to do anything like send in the army."

At least 37 people were injured yesterday in the violence, taking the number of those hurt throughout the protests to 131, health officials said.

Theseare not the images the world has come to think of with regard to Hong Kong...

Following yesterday's non-police triad-based pro-government gangs attacks...

Hong Kong's Secretary for Security Lai Tung-kwok Saturday said 19 people were arrested on Friday when clashes broke out between Occupy Central protestors and anti-Occupy people.

Clashes happened in Mong Kok and Causeway Bay, two major commercial areas of Hong Kong, from Friday afternoon to early Saturday morning, leaving some citizens and police officers injured.

In regard to queries that the police were not capable of handling the clashes in time, Lai explained that as the crowd grew bigger in Mong Kok, fights scattered in different locations, making it more difficult for the police to deal with them.

Of the 19 people arrested, eight of them are suspected to have triad backgrounds, according to Lai.

"We do not approve any of this violence. Hong Kong is a lawful society. Every citizen in Hong Kong should abide by the law. Nobody wishes to see what has happened yesterday," he said, adding that the police would faithfully and truthfully enforce the law with patience.

Which led to dialogue with the government to cease...

"The government and police have allowed triads and thugs to use violence to attack peaceful protesters, cutting off the road to any conversation, and should be responsible for any fallout that results," the Hong Kong Federation of Students said in the posting on its Facebook page titled "Road to Dialogue Must be Shelved."

It appears the government is firming its position once again... (as DPA reports,)

Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying calls on pro-democracy protesters to end their blockade of major roads by Monday, adding that the government will take "all necessary measures to restore social order."

In a video message, he says access roads to government headquarters must be opened by Monday to allow civil servants to return to work, and that roads on Hong Kong Island must be cleared so that schools can re-open.

*  *  *

"I am indeed very concerned about the clashes we have seen in Mong Kok," Carrie Lam, the city's second-highest ranking official, told reporters yesterday. "These protests on the streets have great vulnerability to turn into critical violence between the protesters and the anti-protesters."

The last British Governor of Hong Kong, Chris Patten, has some strong opinions on the way ahead for Hong Kong,

It is not wholly true to say that the eyes of the entire world are on Hong Kong. They would be, of course, if people in mainland China were allowed to know what is happening in their country's most successful city. But China's government has tried to block any news about the Hong Kong democracy demonstrations from reaching the rest of the country – not exactly a sign of confidence on the part of China's rulers in their system of authoritarian government.

Before suggesting a way forward for Hong Kong's ham-fisted authorities, three things need to be made clear. First, it is a slur on the integrity and principles of Hong Kong's citizens to assert, as the Chinese government's propaganda machine does, that they are being manipulated by outside forces. What motivates Hong Kong's tens of thousands of demonstrators is a passionate belief that they should be able to run their affairs as they were promised, choosing those who govern them in free and fair elections.

Second, others outside of Hong Kong have a legitimate interest in what happens in the city. Hong Kong is a great international center, whose freedoms and autonomy were guaranteed in a treaty registered at the United Nations. In particular, the United Kingdom, the other party to this Sino-British Joint Declaration, sought and received guarantees that the survival of Hong Kong's autonomy and liberties would be guaranteed for 50 years.

So it is ridiculous to suggest that British ministers and parliamentarians should keep their noses out of Hong Kong's affairs. In fact, they have a right and a moral obligation to continue to check on whether China is keeping its side of the bargain – as, to be fair, it has mostly done so far.

But, third, the biggest problems have arisen because of a dispute about where Hong Kong's promised path to democracy should take it, and when. No one told Hong Kongers when they were assured of universal suffrage that it would not mean being able to choose for whom they could vote. No one said that Iran was the democratic model that China's Communist bureaucracy had in mind, with the Chinese government authorized to exercise an effective veto over candidates.

In fact, that is not what China had in mind. As early as 1993, China's chief negotiator on Hong Kong, Lu Ping, told the newspaper People's Daily, "The [method of universal suffrage] should be reported to [China's Parliament] for the record, whereas the central government's agreement is not necessary. How Hong Kong develops its democracy in the future is completely within the sphere of the autonomy of Hong Kong. The central government will not interfere." The following year, China's foreign ministry confirmed this.

The British Parliament summarized what had been said and promised in a report on Hong Kong in 2000. "The Chinese government has therefore formally accepted that it is for the Hong Kong government to determine the extent and nature of democracy in Hong Kong."

So, what next?

The peaceful demonstrators in Hong Kong, with their umbrellas and refuse-collection bags, will not themselves be swept off the streets like garbage or bullied into submission by tear gas and pepper spray. Any attempt to do so would present a terrible and damaging picture of Hong Kong and China to the world, and would be an affront to all that China should aspire to be.

The Hong Kong authorities have gravely miscalculated the views of their citizens. Like the bad courtiers against whom Confucius warned, they went to Beijing and told the emperor what they thought he wanted to hear, not what the situation really was in the city. They must think again.

Under the existing plans, there is supposed to be a second phase of consultations on democratic development to follow what turned out to be a counterfeit start to the process. Hong Kong's government should now offer its people a proper second round of consultation, one that is open and honest. Dialogue is the only sensible way forward. Hong Kong's citizens are not irresponsible or unreasonable. A decent compromise that allows for elections that people can recognize as fair, not fixed, is surely available.

The demonstrators in Hong Kong, young and old, represent the city's future. Their hopes are for a peaceful and prosperous life in which they can enjoy the freedoms and rule of law that they were promised. That is not only in the interest of their city; it is in China's interest, too. Hong Kong's future is the main issue; but so, too, is China's honor and its standing in the world.

*  *  *

For some context - this is the scale of the protests...

h/t @WilliamsJon

View article...