People of the world, unite and defeat the U.S. aggressors and all their running dogs! People of the world, be courageous, and dare to fight, defy difficulties and advance wave upon wave. Then the whole world will belong to the people. Monsters of all kinds shall be destroyed. – Mao Zedong
International Worker’s Day, also known as May Day, is the day that proletarian fighters the world over, from the Philippines to India, from Portland to New York, take to celebrate and remember our comrades lost in the struggles of the past centuries, and reach out to and join with those still struggling, like us, across the world, to realize the world-historic task of the proletariat and all progressive humanity, that of overthrowing the forces that inhibit the development of humanity and threaten to wipe us off the face of the Earth, and then constructing the socialist order, struggling through to Communism. We Marxist-Leninist-Maoists struggle because we refuse to die, and we refuse to watch humanity die. It is a day of festivities, a day of remembrance, a day of solidarity, a day of reflection, a day of affirmation of proletarian values. It is the day of the proletariat. Thus, we celebrate, along with millions of others. Democratic, progressive and revolutionary elements working with Progressive Youth Organization (Saint Louis), Serve the People – Saint Louis (for clarification – not affiliated in any way with other organizations in other cities working under the “Serve the People” name), Socialist Alternative, Latinos en Axión, Democratic Socialists of America, Socialist Party, USA, Earth Defenders Coalition, Green Party, USA, Student-Worker Alliance, and the International Marxist Tendency will come together to celebrate and rebel on May Day, 2017, in Saint Louis.
May Day 2017 is particularly important because of the conditions we, proletarian revolutionaries and democratic, progressive elements in the United States, and particularly in Saint Louis, find ourselves in. At the national level, the fascist Trump and his clique is currently in the process of using all of the forces and tools available to him as President of the Amerikkkan Empire to roll back what trifling reforms and concessions the masses have been able to wring from this fascist system over decades through struggle. He threatens and attacks our undocumented migrant comrades. Klansman Jeff Sessions is currently preparing to step up the war on black and brown working class people in the legal sphere. Trump is also beating the war drums against the Syrian, Afghan and North Korean people, launching several dozen missiles at a Syrian airbase in response to a chemical weapons attack spuriously attributed to the Assad government, threatening to attack the DPRK, and using the “Mother of All Bombs” weapon of mass destruction, developed during the war on the Iraqi people under the Bush II regime, to unsuccessfully attempt to cow and frighten the Afghan people under the pretext of “fighting ISIS”. We see fascists organizing openly and boldly in our streets, on our campuses, and in our neighborhoods, leaving flyers and leaflets everywhere, holding open demonstrations, posing with weapons, and taking all of the desperate steps of those who know that their historical day in the sun is rapidly coming to an end. This does not frighten us, this steels our resolve and our determination to expand the mass movement and the Communist movement in our city. Every trench of combat and every trench of struggle is or will be soon filled with stern, disciplined and resolute proletarian fighters and mass activists. The spirit of Ferguson, 2014 was reawakened and rekindled by the ascension of Trump to power. Not stifled, nor put out.
In Saint Louis, the reactionary pushback has developed along several lines, and our work has developed or will develop accordingly to deal with it. Comrades in Progressive Youth Organization, Student Worker Alliance, and Socialist Alternative have been in the forefront of waging struggle against reactionary actions taken against adjunct workers at Saint Louis University, Washington University, and other universities and building student-worker solidarity, along with organizing against fascist harassment and intimidation of students and staff on several campuses in our area, especially at Webster University. This has gained coverage in several media outlets and subsequent expanding of the student movement. There has been sharp line struggle between organizations and many individuals involved in the movement over which path to take, that of conciliation and reformism, solely legal struggle and rapprochement with the police and their system, or that of militancy, mass organization, and mass action. The result of this struggle has been the entrenching of the revolutionary line, the confirmation of the correctness of the revolutionary line through practice, and the defeat of the reactionary reformist line through practice as well. Correct line develops through struggle with incorrect lines, and the triumph of the revolutionary line here bodes well for the future of the revolutionary movement. The principle of unity-struggle-unity within the movement is one that should be remembered and used, along with the principle of “curing the sickness to save the patient”. To really serve the people, we must be able to both struggle with each other and unite with each other, both on a principled basis. Unprincipled peace and unprincipled and merciless struggle are both wrong. We struggle for unity, we unite for struggle. One cannot exist without the other. On the environmental front, we have seen comrades in EDC (Earth Defenders Coalition) gain national and international attention through their consistent militant actions and mass organizing against the presence of radioactive nuclear waste from the Manhattan Project era at a local landfill in Bridgeton. The result of these consistent actions, many of which have involved direct confrontation with reactionary politicians and blockading of roads and buildings, has been consistent exposure of these government frauds before the masses and more and more people becoming involved in the struggle for environmental justice. In Ferguson, comrades of STP-STL, founded in January of this year, are consistently expanding their activity (a tutoring program along with a road servicing program is currently being planned), working with and developing firm links to the broad masses, and developing mass activists from among the people of this area. A truly mass organization must involve the participation of the people, otherwise it is a masquerade, a formalistic thing, not a living thing. This is the principle that we must always remember to apply. If every current member of STP-STL drops dead tomorrow, the masses must be able to continue the work.
In closing, we extend revolutionary greetings to all genuine revolutionary elements in the country and on planet Earth, from the city that righteously burned in 2014 in outrage for the police murder of Michael Brown, the city that brought you the general strike of 1877, the city that refuses to die, the city of struggle, Saint Louis.
Dare to Struggle, Dare to Win!
Saint Louis Revolutionary Collective 