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	Workers Vanguard No. 882	8 December 2006

PDC Rallies: Mobilize Labor! Free Mumia!

The Partisan Defense Committee and Labor Black Leagues sponsored rallies in Chicago, Los Angeles, Oakland and New York City in October in an ongoing effort to revitalize the fight to free death row political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal. Beginning in Chicago on October 13, the rallies drew student and political activists, fighters for black rights and militant trade unionists around the slogans: “Free Mumia Now! Mumia Abu-Jamal Is an Innocent Man! Mumia Abu-Jamal’s Life Is in Danger—Mobilize Now! Abolish the Racist Death Penalty!”

The racist capitalist rulers of this society have long wanted to see Mumia dead because they see in him the spectre of black revolution. A former Black Panther spokesman, later a MOVE supporter and award-winning journalist known as the “voice of the voiceless,” Mumia was framed up on false charges of killing Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner on 9 December 1981. The U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia is expected within months to determine what lies next for Mumia: reimposition of his death sentence, entombment in prison for life, or further legal appeals. This underscores the urgency of the mobilizing efforts of the PDC, a class-struggle legal and social defense organization associated with the Spartacist League, and the LBLs, which are fraternally allied with the SL.

The events were capped by an October 28 rally in Harlem that drew more than 250 people and featured an important debate on what way forward in this struggle (see “For a Class-Struggle Fight to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal!” WV No. 880, 10 November). The PDC’s Erica Williamson, who chaired the rallies, stressed, “If Mumia is to be freed, it will take the mobilization of the masses, centrally labor, to champion his cause in outrage and on the basis that this was a case of a political frame-up through and through.” This class-struggle perspective is counterposed to the efforts of liberals and reformist “socialists” who based their protests on calls for a new trial for Mumia, appealing for “justice” from the same capitalist courts that railroaded Mumia to death row and have reconfirmed his frame-up conviction at every step. As Don Cane put it in his speech for the Labor Black League at the October 19 Los Angeles rally:

“The mobilization of the masses of workers here and internationally is what is needed to stay the hand of the executioner and unlock the prison cell. In 1995 the first death warrant was issued for Mumia’s execution. It was the mobilization worldwide of millions, centrally workers along with death penalty abolitionists and civil libertarians, that stayed the executioner’s hand. Today we need the same type, if not more massive mobilizations, not just to save Mumia’s life, but to free Mumia. We are building these rallies today as a crucial step toward labor-centered, mass united-front mobilizations that can bring that pressure to bear.”

Key to revitalizing the fight for Mumia’s freedom is understanding that support for his cause has been demobilized over the years by those who preached reliance on the courts and capitalist politicians. At the October 21 Oakland rally, a Spartacist League comrade explained that behind the call for a new trial for Mumia and the call to free him stood “two different strategies, one based on sowing illusions in the very courts that railroaded an innocent man to death and the other based on mobilizing the only social power that can stand up in defiance of that system, the social power of the multiracial working class.”

Addressing both West Coast rallies was the PDC’s Valerie West, who for years had worked alongside Stuart Hanlon and others in defense of framed-up former Black Panther Geronimo ji Jaga (Pratt). In Oakland, Hanlon refuted those who appeal for a new trial for Mumia and not his immediate freedom. He began by conveying Geronimo’s appreciation for the PDC’s efforts on his behalf prior to his finally being released in 1997 after 27 years in prison. Hanlon said that Geronimo’s message to the rally was: “Free Mumia,” not “Get a new trial” and “Trust the courts.” Hanlon emphasized that “we never said, ‘a new trial for Geronimo.’… He didn’t get a fair trial the first time; he wasn’t going to get one the second time.” He continued: “Do you ask for a new trial or do you ask for freedom? That’s the stupid debate that lawyers engage in. The reality is, you ask to free Mumia now.”

A number of Black Panther veterans attended the rallies. Students from area campuses, and some who came from long distances, made plans to hold events back at their campuses featuring the PDC video, “From Death Row, This Is Mumia Abu-Jamal.” The rallies collected over $2,300 for Mumia’s legal defense.

Mumia sent taped greetings to the rallies, and a statement was read from Mumia’s son, Jamal Hart, who is himself imprisoned as a result of a police vendetta stemming from his efforts on his father’s behalf. Addressing the audience in Oakland, Lydia Barashango, Mumia’s sister, remarked, “I believe if it were not for you, Mumia would be dead. The courts, the lawyers, they do their work and they do a monumental job of trying to work with the tools that they have to work within the system. But we know the system doesn’t always work, it’s not always fair…. The fight is in the street.”

The rallies stressed the importance of mobilizing on the basis of the overwhelming evidence of Mumia’s innocence, including the confession of Arnold Beverly that he, not Mumia, shot Faulkner. As the PDC’s Jon Piper put it in his speech in Chicago (see “Mumia Abu-Jamal Is an Innocent Man!” WV No. 879, 27 October): “None of the courts have allowed Beverly’s evidence to be heard because it is too hot to handle. It exposes that Mumia’s frame-up is not just some aberration of a rogue cop or a bad judge, but the result of the workings of a whole ‘justice’ system whose real purpose is the repression of workers, minorities and the poor on behalf of the capitalist rulers.”

Hundreds of prominent individuals, labor activists, civil libertarians and organizations internationally have signed on to a PDC statement titled, “We Demand the Immediate Freedom of Mumia Abu-Jamal, an Innocent Man,” which cites the Beverly evidence. To date, that statement has appeared in the Nation, the Harlem-based Amsterdam News, the Chicago Defender and the San Francisco Bay View.

Henry Walton, host of the KPFK Labor Review radio program in Los Angeles, described how Mumia’s case “changed me from being one of those liberals, back in the ’80s, when this first started, who said, ‘Let’s give him a fair trial,’ to now understanding that we’ve got to free an innocent man because he’s not going to get a fair trial from this system. There is no such thing.” Standish E. Willis, chair of the Chicago chapter of the National Conference of Black Lawyers, explained that “these courts are not for working people. They are for people who have property and they are there to protect private property and protect the people that run this country.” Also speaking in Chicago were Bernard Branche of the Labor Black Struggle League, WVON radio host Cliff Kelley and Mike Elliot, chair of the Education Committee of United Auto Workers Local 551. Elliot remarked, “They want to silence the voice of Mumia Abu-Jamal and the voices of those that support him because our voices speak volumes about the state that we live in, the state of America.”

It was an important advance that the rallies were addressed by a wide range of union activists and officials. In Los Angeles, Jesse Smith, president of the African American Caucus of SEIU United Healthcare Workers-West spoke to why labor should take up Mumia’s cause when it “doesn’t involve adequate wages or fair benefits.” He answered: “Labor must be concerned about this issue because it is an issue of injustice.” In Oakland, Brenda Blannon of SEIU Local 616 read a June 13 statement declaring that the local’s executive board had voted unanimously to call for freedom for Mumia, and Chris Fisher of AFSCME Local 444 noted his union’s 15-year-long support for Mumia.

Also addressing the Oakland rally were Josué Cobos of the Day Labor Program and Raymond Horne, trustee of Glaziers Local 718 in San Francisco. All expressions of labor solidarity with Mumia are welcome. But as the LBL’s Tom Cowperthwaite, a member of Transport Workers Union Local 100, told the Harlem rally, “We need to turn those names of unionists on petitions, those motions, those resolutions into labor protest and strike action” (See “‘Strike!’ and ‘Free Mumia!’ Should Ring Out in the Same Breath,” WV No. 881, 24 November).