First Published: The Call, Vol. 6, No. 37, September 26, 1977.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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As the demonstrators listened outside the Chicago Association of Commerce, the speaker called loudly for an end to forced busing and demanded “quality neighborhood education.”
Was it a protest by the Bogan Mothers, the local segregationist organization? Was it the KKK or National Socialist Party? No, it was a demonstration organized inside the first convention of the National Workers Organization (NWO).
The NWO was founded by the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) this month to establish an alternative to the trade unions. But under the influence of the RCP, the National Workers Organization appears to be infected with the same white chauvinism that has served to corrupt the present trade unions and that has long been fomented by the top international bureaucrats.
In all fairness to the people who took part in the demonstration, reports are that many were manipulated into participating. They weren’t told ahead of time that it was going to be an anti-busing demonstration.
As one delegate reported: “During the convention we (NWO) decided that we should hold a demonstration in front of the Chicago Association of Commerce to protest racist attacks by Nazis on a group of Black children that are being bused to a white school and to support their right to go to that school.
“At the demonstration an RCP speaker delivered a long speech that attacked the busing plan. That was picked up by the media and when the Chicago Sun-Times came out that evening it had an article on page 2 which said: ’More than 1,000 persons demonstrated against the voluntary school busing.’”
The delegate added, “Many of us were furious about this because it was the opposite of what we were demonstrating about, but the RCP defended the article and said it was right.”
It appears that RCP didn’t allow any discussion within the NWO convention on the question of school desegregation and busing. At the same time they tried to use the crowd who gathered at the meeting to push their pro-segregationist, anti-busing line.
The RCP leaders are doing a good job of educating people about themselves through negative example.