language meetings with striking workers set up by the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, and participated with Chicano activists in protests against the victimization of immigrant workers from Mexico. Pedro Vásquez, the SWP candidate for U.S. Senate from Texas, is a respected leader of the Chicano movement.
The special oppression of women has been another area in which the SWP candidates have spoken out as leaders in the fight for human rights. Both Camejo and Reid participated in the 8,000-strong Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) to the U.S. constitution held Illinois, this May. Both SWP candidates were introduced from the platform at the rally. Message Whether they are speaking to trade unionists, to unemployed Black youth, to women demanding equal rights, to Puerto Ricans struggling for bilingual education, or to Chicanos protesting terrorization by immigration police, the SWP candidates have one clear, direct message: American capitalism is in crisis; the ruling class is attempting to solve this crisis at the expense of the working class; the attacks on Blacks, women, oppressed layers of the working class are an expression of this crisis; and it is necessary for the workers to unite and to organize independently to fight these attacks.
Above all, it is necessary for the working class to break politically with the capitalist class and form its own party to fight for its interests. To further this goal the socialist candidates call for the unions to form a labor party.
Looked at from a broader point of view, the success of the American Trotskyist movement in the 1976 election campaign reflects the cumulative impact of the role played by the SWP and YSA throughout the radicalization of the 1960s and 1970s. By participating in and helping to lead the antiwar movement and the women's liberation movement while the other tendencies on the left defaulted, the SWP and YSA farm for the passage of the Springfield, WOn the ballot and other specially On the ballot:
Arizona California Colorado Illinois Indiana lowa Kentucky million apiece.
WYO NEB KANS Legend Louisiana Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi - New Hampshire New Jersey difficulties are involved in getting on the ballot in the USA. Each state government has its own laws California, SWP candidates had to get 300,000 signatures before they were allowed ballot status.
independents. In Missouri, the SWP was ruled off the ballot after collecting 25,000 signatures. One president of the American Civil Liberties Union.
on the ballot in 28 states New Mexico Texas New York Vermont North Dakota Virginia Ohio Utah Pennsylvania Rhode Island South Dakota Wisconsin The SWP candidates have managed to get on the ballot in the 28 states marked above. Formidable establishing various ingenious obstacles for opposition parties seeking a place on the ballot. In Even when all the signatures are collected, the authorities try to sabotage the campaigns of of the signatures 'invalidated' by the scrutineers was that of Roger Goldman, the eastern Missouri Financing their campaigns is also a problem for opposition candidates. They do not get a cent from public funds, although the Democratic and Republican campaigns benefit to the tune of $43.6 anti- boycottists, 'otzovists", ultimatists, conciliationists, partisans of 'proletarian culture', partisans and opponents of the communists.
Committee never dreamed of demanding that an opponent 'abandon factional methods' if the opponent held that the policy of the Central Committee was false. Patience the 1950s tion Another theme SWP campaign gles of the MASS C campaign have taken Such The American for president of the Stalinists.
Washington Washington, D.C.
explain activity this campaigns the 1930s, and new respect after the long isolation of This same process is currently being repeated to some degree in the Black liberation movement, particularly around the issue of busing and school desegregarunning through the is its internationalism.
Camejo and Reid have spoken out against the racist repression in South Africa and Israel, making solidarity with the strug class and the op pressed around the world part of their The success of the socialist campaign has attracted the attention of right-wing terrorists as well as of those interested in fighting against injustice and exploitation In Pasadena, California, Nazi thugs have shot out the windows of the SWP campaign headquarters; similar armed attacks place in Denver. In Los Angeles, the SWP campaign headquarters was the target of a bomb attack terrorism, however, has never proved effective in stopping the spread of party is running its own election campaign this year. Gus Hall, the CP's candidate, is currently on the ballot in eighteen states and the District of Columbia. Hall also ran in 1972, less-thansatisfactory results from the point of view Many of the CP's members have been immersed in the Democratic party for so long that they are resistant to the idea of running their own campaign. This would why much of Hall's campaign year has been devoted to speaking before CP clubs and making declarations for the Stalinist press.
Behind Hall's concern with presenting a CP alternative in the elections is the effect that the SWP's 1972 and 1976 presidential have had within the broad radical movement. This year the Stalinists launched their biggest electoral effort since but the SWP campaign has made a qualitatively greater impact.