FREE THE LAST OF THE OHIO SEVEN

ONE OF THE OHIO 7 -RICHARD WILLIAMS- RECENTLY DIED IN PRISON. THAT LEAVES JAAN LAAMAN AND TOM MANNING STILL IN PRISON. IT IS THE URGENT DUTY FOR THE INTERNATIONAL LABOR MOVEMENT AND OTHERS TO RAISE THE CALL FOR THEIR FREEDOM. FREE ALL CLASS WAR PRISONERS


The Ohio7, like many other subjective revolutionaries, coming out of the turbulent anti-Vietnam War and anti-imperialist movements, were committed to social change. The different is that these were mainly working class militants who were formed by participation as soldiers in the Vietnam War itself. Various members were convicted for carrying out robberies and bombings. However, their actions were not crimes from a working class perspective. Without going into their particular personal and political biographies I note that these were the kind of subjective revolutionaries that must be recruited to a working class vanguard party if there ever is to be a chance of bringing off a socialist revolution. In the absence of a viable revolutionary labor party in the 1970’s and 1980’s the politics of the Ohio 7, like the Panthers and the Weathermen, borne of despair and but also desperation to do something in aid of the Vietnamese Revolution and other Third World struggles . Their actions in trying to open up a second front militarily without a mass base proved to be mistaken but, as the PDC has noted, their actions were no crime in the eyes of the international working class.
The lack of a revolutionary vanguard to attract such working class elements away from adventurism is rendered even more tragic in the case of the Seven. Trotsky noted in his political obituary for his fallen comrade Kote Tsintadze that the West has not produced such fighters who went through all the phases of struggle for the Russian Revolution. What a revolutionary party could have done with subjective revolutionaries like the Seven points to a resolution of the problem.


Finally, I would like to note that except for the Partisan Defense Committee and their own defense organizations – the Ohio 7 Defense Committee and the Jaan Laaman Defense Fund the Seven have long ago been abandoned by those New Left elements and others, who as noted, at one time had very similar politics. At least part of this can be attributed to the rightward drift to liberal pacifist politics but some must be attributed to class. Although the Ohio 7 were not our people- they are our people. All honor to them. As James P Cannon, founder of the International Labor Defense forerunner of the Partisan Defense Committee, pointed out long ago –Solidarity with class war prisoners is not charity- it is a duty. Their fight is our fight! LET US DO OUR DUTY HERE. RAISE THE CALL FOR THE FREEDOM OF LAAMAN AND MANNING IN YOUR ORGANIZATION, SCHOOL OR UNION.

YOU CAN GOOGLE THE ORGANIZATIONS MENTIONED ABOVE- THE PARTISAN DEFENSE COMMITTEE- THE OHIO 7 DEFENSE COMMITTEE- THE JAAN LAAMAN DEFENSE FUND