First Published: People’s Tribune, Vol. 3, No. 16, July 15, 1976.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
Copyright: This work is in the Public Domain under the Creative Commons Common Deed. You can freely copy, distribute and display this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line as your source, include the url to this work, and note any of the transcribers, editors & proofreaders above.
Look at all the candidates running for office around this country.
Which of them represent your needs, your interests, the needs of the entire working class?
When you complain to your elected representative about the lack of jobs, about cutbacks in medical services, education, care of the elderly, or about unsafe working conditions, discrimination in jobs and housing, or about the needs to cutback the military budget, nothing happens. It’s easy to see why.
Most politicians are members of the capitalist class themselves, or representatives of that class working as lawyers for law firms handling the interests of major corporations like General Motors or Union Carbide. The income of the average politician runs into hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. How can we expect people like this to represent the working class?
We can’t, no matter what promises they make!
The working class of this country needs a forum for its demands, it needs a representative of the working class elected to major public office to voice the needs and desires of the workers in this country. In a country like the United States, with a working class more than 150 million strong, it is a crime that not one single worker representing our class holds major public office.
For these reasons, the Communist Labor Party campaigned to get on the ballot in Michigan, and plans to run General Baker for the Michigan State Legislature from the Ninth District (Highland-Park-Detroit).
General Baker is one of the finest sons of the working class in this country, a well-known fighter among the auto workers in Michigan and around the country. When you are furious about rats in your home, about the poor quality of education your child is getting, about lack of work, or speed-up; about high taxes; General Baker knows what it means too. He has felt speed-up and unemployment, he has experienced the policeman’s club and jail, he has seen the poor schools and rats, and knows what it is to strike and stage a walkout. But most important, General Baker is dedicated to eliminating these problems and fighting for a better country and society for his children. This is what he has spent his adult life doing. Capitalist politicians make promises and then sit on their hands and collect big money. A revolutionary worker, a communist like General Baker, acts!
In order for the Communist Labor Party to run General Baker more than 5000 votes are needed in the special primary scheduled in Michigan for August 3rd. The capitalists are attempting to block General Baker with this special primary, but the working class must show that it will not tolerate such blatant violation of your civil and political rights. You need a real elected representative; the working class needs a fighting voice. Vote Communist Labor Party on August 3rd! Get your friends, co-workers and family to vote. Keep the Communist Labor Party on the ballot: Elect General Baker in November.