The documentary record of the New Communist Movement in the 1970’s presents a rich tapestry of groups, collectives, organizations, “pre-party formations”, and even parties, struggling to master the Marxist-Leninist tradition as they interpreted it and apply it to the conditions of their work.
Many of these groups were local collectives which arose out of the mass struggles of the 1960’s and subsequently turned to Marxism-Leninism in the 1970’s as these mass movements began to ebb. Some of these groups managed to develop strong ties in the workplaces and communities in which they worked and had a significant public presence. Others operated in a semi-clandestine fashion, through union caucuses and/or as fractions in “mass organizations.”
Some of these New Communist Movement groups were overwhelmingly white; others, however, were composed predominantly of people of color, such as the Revolutionary Workers League, the August 29th Movement, Wei Min She, El Comité, the Japan Town Collective and I Wor Kuen.
While aware of the developing party-building projects of the Communist League, Revolutionary Union and October League (documented in subsequent sections of EROL), the vast majority of these smaller groups chose not to join in any of them. The larger organizations may have decried what they perceived as the “local-circle mentality” of these smaller groups, but they were unsuccessful in overcoming it.
Documenting the history of the smaller anti-revisionist groups in the New Communist Movement in this period is particularly challenging because many of them focused on local organizing and eschewed involvement in national debates about party-building, the national question, the united front, etc.; produced little printed material; or otherwise chose to keep a low public profile.
Family Tree Chart of U.S. Anti-Revisionism, 1956-1977 by the Communist Workers Group (Marxist-Leninist)
The Asian Study Group (ASG) was formed in the early 1970s by Jerry Tung, who had formerly been a member of the Progressive Labor Party. Initially, ASG consisted primarily of Asian-Americans in New York's Chinatown. In 1976, the group changed its name to the Workers Viewpoint Organization (WVO) when it merged with a group in Philadelphia called Yellow Seeds. WVO launched Asian-Americans for Equal Employment and actively competed with other Chinese Marxist-Leninist groups in the community.
Through its participation in national party building activities including, for a brief time, the “Revolutionary Wing”, WVO was able to attract members from other groups, including some active former members of the Revolutionary Workers League.
In October 1979, with several hundred members, WVO would change its name to the Communist Workers Party.
Short History of Yellow Seeds in Philadelphia, 1972-1977
Better Defender of the Bourgeoisie than the Bourgeoisie Itself – On the ’Communist’ League
Marxism or American Pragmatism? The Right Opportunist Line of the R.U.
The Boston Forced Busing Plan: The Dialectics of Bourgeois Formal Democracy and Fascism
Degenerate Culture and the Women’s Question
Yellow Seeds newspaper, 1972-1975
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The August 29th Movement (ATM) was a Chicano New Communist Movement organization that took its name from the historic August 29, 1970 Chicano Moratorium against the Vietnam War in Los Angeles. It was formed at a Unity Conference in May 1974 from the merger of the August 29th Collective of Los Angeles, California; the East Bay Labor Collective of Oakland, California; La Raza Workers Collective of San Francisco; and a collective from Albuquerque, New Mexico.
The ATM published a pamphlet, “Fan The Flames: A Revolutionary Position on the Chicano National Question,” in 1975. The document argued that Chicanos living in the Southwestern United States were an oppressed nation, rather than an oppressed national minority, as was argued by most other New Communist Movement organizations.
The August Twenty-Ninth Movement published a newspaper, Revolutionary Cause, and a theoretical journal, The Red Banner.
In 1978, ATM merged with I Wor Kuen to form the League of Revolutionary Struggle.
History of the August 29th Movement
Fan the Flames. A Revolutionary Position on the Chicano National Question
Selected Speeches presented at forums by the August 29th Movement, 1974-1975
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The Colorado Organization for Revolutionary Struggle (Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought (COReS (M-L-M)) was a regional multi-national anti-revisionist group that was formed in 1974. It had its origins primarily in the Chicano national movement and its headquarters in Denver. COReS sponsored a number of forums in Denver with other party building organizations in the latter half of the 1970s.
Speech at the Denver Party Building Forum, March 1977
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El Comité began in 1970 as a Puerto Rican community action group in Manhattan’s West Side. Over the course of the next several years, it transformed itself into an anti-revisionist Marxist-Leninist organization and in 1975 changed its name to El Comite-Movemiento de Izquierda Nacional Puertorriqueño (El Comité-MINP).
El Comité-NINP was active in the New Communist Movement, including party building activities, until it disintegrated in 1984.
Three Years Later...[On the Suspension of UNIDAD LATINA]
El Comite/MINP: Its Formative Assembly
M.I.N.P.-El Comité Celebrates its Tenth Anniversary
Presentation of the First Secretary of MINP-El Comité [at the 10th Anniversary Celebration]
Editorial: O.E.M. – A Critical View
Editorial: Another “Communist Party” Founded
Editorial: OEM: A Year of Progress
First Assembly: Program for the Coming Period
First Assembly Dedicated to Outgoing Leader
Outgoing First Secretary Leaves. Says Goodbye To Organization
Message from the Central Committee
El Comité-M.I.N.P. Completes its First Assembly
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Editorial: On the Chinese Invasion of Vietnam
Statement on the Division in M.I.N.P.-El Comité
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The Committee for Scientific Socialism (M-L) was a small, secret anti-revisionist group in Washington, DC that had its origins in the white anti-war left in that city.
A Proposal Concerning the General Line on Party-Building for the Communist Movement in the U.S.
History of Two-Line Struggle on Party-Building
RWL and OL: Two Wings of Same Bird
Expose OL’s All-Unity, Bourgeois Stand; Build Proletarian Unity Through Intensified Struggle
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The Communist Collective of the Chicano Nation (CCCN) was a small group located in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It began publishing an irregular newsletter, El Amanecer rojo (Red Dawn) in April 1973.
The CCCN argued, following Stalin’s definition, that a Chicano nation existed in a part of the U.S. southwest, namely New Mexico, Southern Colorado, and Southwestern Texas.
The CCCN participated in the Conference of North American Marxist-Leninists held by the Communist League and others in May 1973 at which it presented a theoretical paper on the Chicano National Question.
Presentando “El Amanecer Rojo”
Conference of North American Marxist-Leninists
Report to the Communist Collective of the Chicano Nation on the Chicano National-Colonial Question
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I Wor Kuen (Righteous and Harmonious Fists) took its name from a peasant organization that fought to expel foreigners from China during the so-called “Boxer Rebellion.” Founded in 1969 by second-generation Chinese Americans in New York’s Chinatown, it adopted a 12-point program Platform and Program, similar to those previously issued by the Black Panther Party and the Young Lords. It also advocated Mao Zedong thought and engaged in militant struggles in the community. It also started publication of a bi-lingual newspaper, Getting Together.
In 1971, I Wor Kuen became a national organization when it merged with former members of the San Francisco-based Red Guard Party, a group which was founded in February 1969 and disbanded in July 1971. Also influenced by the Chinese Cultural Revolution and the example of the Black Panther Party, the Red Guard Party had espoused Mao Zedong thought, advocated armed struggle and viewed itself primarily as a military rather than a political organization. By 1971, this focus on military rather than political organizing and other contradictions led to the Party’s break-up, but a group of former militants went on to join I Wor Kuen.
In 1972, to broaden its base and to reach out to community members unwilling to support an explicitly communist organization, I Wor Kuen created the Chinese Progressive Association which, after several years, had branches in New York, Boston and Los Angeles. 1972 also saw I Wor Kuen briefly participate in the National Liaison Committee, a joint party building effort of the Revolutionary Union, the Black Workers Congress, and the Puerto Rican Revolutionary Workers Organization [for more on the National Liaison Committee and IWK's relation to it see here].
Throughout the 1970s, I Wor Kuen frequently clashed with other Marxist-Leninist groups active in Chinese communities across the country, including Wei Min She and the Asian Study Group/Workers Viewpoint Organization.
In 1978, I Wor Kuen merged with the August 29th Movement to found the League for Revolutionary Struggle (Marxist-Leninist).
History of the Red Guard Party
Black Panthers, Red Guards, and Chinamen: Constructing Asian American Identity through Performing Blackness, 1969-1972 by Daryl J. Maeda
Yellow Power: The Formation of Asian-American Nationalism in the Age of Black Power, 1966-1975 by Jeffrey O. G. Ogbar
The First Issue of Getting Together
Red Guard Program and Rules by the Red Guard Party
Reply to the “Asian Contingent Solidarity Statement”
Opportunism in the Asian Movement – Wei Min She/Revolutionary Union
On Wei Min She’s “Reactionary Line”
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The Japan Town Collective (also known as the J-Town Collective) was a Marxist-Leninist organization in San Francisco’s Japan Town neighborhood (Nihonmachi). It was founded in 1971 by former members of the Red Guard Party. Initially the group was active in the anti-Vietnam War movement and solidarity campaigns on Japanese issues, particularly the anti-military base struggle in Okinawa. The organization was also very active in anti-gentrification struggles in the neighborhood through the Committee Against Nihonmachi Evictions (CANE).
The Japan Town Collective operated a community center in the neighborhood, involved itself in labor organizing, conducted study groups in Marxism-Leninism, and published a newspaper, New Dawn.
As differences developed in the New Communist Movement in 1975-6, particularly over Chinese foreign policy, the Japan Town Collective experienced sharp internal struggles with many cadre looking to I Wor Kuen for leadership. The resulting turmoil in the organization resulted in its disappearance by late 1975.
New Dawn Rising: History and Summation of the Japan Town Collective by Ray Tasaki
Left Meets Right [on a J Town Collective article on Angola] by Carl Bloice
Response to the Communist Party, USA: Defenders of Soviet Aggression have no just ground by the J-Town Collective
The Guardian’s “Russian Exceptionalism” and “socialism of a new type”
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Speech at the Denver Party Building Forum, March 1977
The League of Struggle (M-L) was formed in San Diego in 1974. For much of its history it functioned as a secret organization. In 1975, it decided that party-building was the central task of U.S. Marxist-Leninists. During this period it was close to the August 29th Movement, but in the following year it decided that its theoretical-political orientation was closer to the Workers Viewpoint organization.
The History of the League of Struggle
Position on Central Task–Party Building
Position on the International Situation
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The Lexington Communist Collective (LCC) began as a Marxist study group in the fall of 1972, which later reorganized itself as a communist organization. In 1973, the LCC joined the party building effort of the American Communist Workers Movement (M-L) and was one of the groups that formed the Central Organization of U.S. Marxist-Leninists (COUSML) later that year. In July 1974, some of the former members of the LCC broke with COUSML and refounded the LCC.
Statement Presented at the Denver Party Building Forum, March 1977
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Few New Communist Movement organizations were affiliates of foreign anti-revisionist groups. The Marxist-Leninist Organization of the United States of America (MLOUSA) was a exception to this rule.
It was the U.S. sister organization of the Marxist-Leninist Organization of Britain (MLOB), a group that was created in the late 1960s out of elements from the first major UK anti-revisionist organization – the Committee to Defeat Revisionism for Communist Unity [for more on the MLOB see here].
While the MLOUSA had its own publications – a newspaper, the Workers’ Tribune and a theoretical journal, Proletariat – many of its major articles were reprints of its British sister organization. It also distributed MLOB publications such as Red Front, Red Vanguard and Class Against Class in the United States.
Like the MLOB, the MLOUSA sided with Liu Shao-Chi in the Chinese Cultural Revolution, which it viewed as a counter-revolutionary attempt to restore capitalism in China. To publicize its position, the MLOUSA reprinted the MLOB’s Report on the Situation in the People’s Republic of China in Proletariat.
The MLOUSA was ahead of its time. As early as 1972, it was predicting that China was moving toward an alliance with U.S. imperialism and that only Albania maintained a principled Marxist-Leninist position. These views would taken up by a variety of other anti-revisionist groups later in the 1970s.
Founded in the early 1970s and based in San Francisco, the MLOUSA seems to have disappeared a few years later.
Draft Declaration of the Marxist-Leninist Organization of the U.S.A.
Workers!! Beware of Wolves in Sheep’s Clothing!
A New Comintern Marxist-Leninist Is Being Born! by the Marxist-Leninist Organisation of Britain, Marxist-Leninist Organization of Germany and Marxist-Leninist Organization of the U.S.A.
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The Revolutionary Workers League (RWL) was formed in January 1974 from Marxist-Leninist elements active in the Youth Organization for Black Unity a nationwide student/youth organization, the Malcolm X Liberation University in Durham, North Carolina, Abdul Alkalimat’s People’s College, and the African Liberation Support Committee. At its birth, it was the largest black Marxist organization in the New Communist Movement.
While continuing to organize around support for African liberation movements and struggles in Black communities, in the period 1975-6, the RWL went through a series of internal struggles over its relationship to other new communist movement groups. Some leaders wanted the RWL to orient toward the October League and its party building process. Others favored collaboration with the Revolutionary Union as it moved toward the formation of the Revolutionary Communist Party. But the line that ultimately won out oriented the RWL toward the Puerto Rican Revolutionary Workers Organization (PRRWO), the Workers Viewpoint Organization (WVO) and the August 29th Movement, who were loosely grouped together as the Revolutionary Wing. However, sharp differences developed within the Wing itself [for more on this see here] and ultimately, while some cadre left the RWL to join WVO, in 1977, the RWL consolidated organizationally with PRRWO to create the U.S. Leninist Core.
The Rise and Fall of the Revolutionary Workers League by Ron “Slim” Washington
Steeled in Struggle – History of the Two Line Struggle in the RWL
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The San Diego Organizing Committee (Marxist-Leninist) was a small Marxist-Leninist group formed in the summer of 1975. In late 1977 it dissolved with its members joining the Workers Congress (Marxist-Leninist).
S.D.O.C. Introductory Statement
SDOC (M-L) Comments: Uphold Our International Leadership!
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Seize the Time was a small Marxist-Leninist collective in Moutain View, California active from 1973 to some time in the early 1980s when it merged with the League of Revolutionary Struggle.
Seize the Time on the Principal Contradiction
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The Socialist Organizing Committee was formed in 1975 in Orange County, California out of a variety of groups and individuals who came out of the white new left. These included independent Marxist-Leninists, members of a Left History study group, students and teaching assistants from the University of California-Irvine, petty bourgeois intellectuals off campus, county workers, and workers in factories and the skilled building trades.
Later that year, SOC joined the New America Movement (NAM), where it struggled to promote a Marxist-Leninist line. A year later, SOC left NAM and became an independent Marxist-Leninist collective.
The History of the Socialist Organizing Committee
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Venceremos began as a Chicano political organization in Redwood City, California in early 1969. In 1971, a split developed in the Revolutionary Union [documented in Red Papers 4]. As a result of the split, over half of the Bay Area Revolutionary Union, led by H. Bruce Franklin, one of the RU’s founders and including all the collectives from South San Francisco through Sunnyvale and some in San Jose, merged into Venceremos. The expanded organization was active in youth organizing, factory organizing and anti-imperialist struggles on Bay Area campuses.
Venceremos advocated armed self-defense, community control of the police, and reform of the prison system. To these ends, the group’s members engaged in a variety of activities, including working in prison education programs and running candidates for the Palo Alto City Council.
Venceremos broke up in 1972. Some of its former members went on to found the San Francisco Marxist-Leninist Organization in 1973, which the following year merged with the San Francisco-based League for Proletarian Revolution.
It is Right to Rebel. Local Cadre Leave the Revolutionary Union
It Is Right to Rebel, Self-Criticism
The Bruce Franklin Affair by Rachelle Marshall
Why Stanford is Trying to Fire Bruce Franklin
Bruce Franklin Talks on Revolution
Venceremos Central Committee, circa December 1971
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Wei Min She was a Marxist-Leninist Organization based in the San Francisco Bay Area. It had it origins in the Asian Community Center (ACC), which had been created by the Berkeley Asian American Political Alliance in March 1970. In 1972, the ACC decided to become an explicitly revolutionary, anti-imperialist organization and renamed itself Wei Min She (Organization of the People).
Initially primarily a community-focused group, active in labor and neighborhood struggles in San Francisco’s Chinatown, Wei Min She gradually developed into a Marxist-Leninist cadre organization.
In 1973-74, Wei Min She had sharp differences with I Wor Kuen, the other Marxist-Leninist group active in San Francisco’s Chinatown. In this same period it drew close to the Revolutionary Union, ultimately merging with it when the RU became the Revolutionary Communist Party in 1975.
Asian Contingent Solidarity Statement by Wei Min She and others
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