The Racial Problem: Conflict in the U.S.A.
Our comrades in North America are making most effective use of the radio in putting over the case for Socialism. They recently broadcast a talk over WBCN in Boston on the current racial disturbances in the United States. We believe that this on-the-spot Socialist analysis will be of interest to our readers and have pleasure in reproducing it below.
It took place in Birmingham, Alabama. Thousands filled the streets, hundreds of Negroes were jailed. The police and firemen used water and vicious dogs on the marching men, women, and children who practiced, as they marched, the doctrine of non-violence. Then an agreement was reached by the Negro spokesmen and the committee of the “white power structure ” made up of a group of “white” civic and business leaders.
A week before, swarms of Negroes overwhelmed the police lines and swept through the downtown area, so state troopers were called in to reinforce the local police.
After Birmingham was quiet for a few days the “white” activists struck, They bombed houses in the dead of the night of May 10, also a motel where many of the Negro leaders were staying. The reaction was a renewed frenzied wave of emotion. Mobs roamed the streets smashing windows, overturning cabs and seeking revenge. The situation finally was subdued but not until President Kennedy sent some 3,000 Federal troops to the area and alerted the national guard.
Whether the situation in Birmingham, Alabama, breaks out anew or remains quiet, there still will be the large question that the events in that city are bringing into focus. Where is the racial problem in the United States heading?
Throughout these remarks, when we refer to Negroes, we have in mind the overwhelming majority—the exploited Negro workers. Their interests are basically as one with the workers everywhere. There is a small section of the negroes who are capitalists (some millionaires, but mostly petty capitalists) and these have a common interest with their fellow capitalists, regardless of colour, country or creed.
This is the fourth of a series and we welcome this opportunity to make our case known to you, our listeners. We have limited funds as we are supported only by our membership and sympathizers. However, we are expending our funds and our energies in this manner because we seek your attention and your support.
Capitalism is beset with all kinds of problems. Last week we focused our attention on war, and we would be pleased if those who listened would communicate with us so that we might know how you feel. Tonight we will deal with the Racial Problem.
We maintain that it is not enough to be informed. It is important to have a point of view. We cannot be indifferent to our fellows having segregation forced on them, treated like inferiors, denied equal opportunities, and worse. We maintain that prejudice is basically economic. There are more than twice as many Negro workers unemployed as there are so-called White workers out of work. The question of racial discrimination is rooted m economic prejudice.
Why are more Negroes unemployed? Why is there an unemployment problem? It is our thesis that unemployment is inexcusable. That the profitability of the capitalist arrangement is dependent on having unemployment, as well as on other factors. The employers need a reserve army of men and women out of work for two good reasons:
In order that those who are working will properly respect their jobs and fear the loss thereof, and
To keep wages in check.
Supply and demand would send the price of labour-power (wages) soaring if there were not millions of workers looking desperately for job openings. For the capitalists it is a good thing to have their workers hungry and apprehensive and not too independent. This, incidentally, is another illustration of the conflict of interests that separates society into classes.
What does the worker want? He wants employment . . . steady . . . at top pay.
What does the boss want? He wants a labour pool available in order to select his workers and at wages that are as low as possible. The more workers competing for each job, the lower will be the rate that the employer will have to pay.
And the thing that marks off our contemporary times is the wholesale introduction of automation. What does this do? It throws out of work and into the street those workers whose skills are displaced by these new monster machines. The expression in economic statistics is no longer unemployment, but—disemployment. In the steel industry alone hundreds of thousands are out of jobs and due to these new methods and machines they will never be recalled. These new processes in the mass production industries that displaced labour (which, of course, is the primary reason for their introduction) have now created a level of unemployment that has remained constant for many years. It will go higher, it cannot go lower.
Now it seems that we have strayed from our subject. Not so. As a matter of practice the first group to be affected by disemployment is the unskilled worker. As a matter of reality, the Negroes make up a large percentage of the unskilled population. And the viciousness of the circle becomes even more acute because the Negroes are the first and the worst affected. They are the first to be fired and the last to be hired.
Our contention is that capitalism breeds unemployment. Just as my colleague demonstrated last week that war is inevitable, given the relationship of rival, competitive nations, we maintain that racial discrimination can only be eliminated when we get rid of capitalism with its prejudice-breeding competition for jobs.
Let us spend a moment on the subject of racial prejudice. We might start by asking ourselves: What is “race “? Because of the factor of time we will content ourselves with making a few general observations on the question and immediately refer anyone who wants to explore thus subject further to our literature list in The Western Socialist. It might be of interest to those of our listeners who have never heard of the World Socialist Party that we are part of an international group of organizations that have in common a Declaration of Socialist Principles. There is besides our own party, the Socialist Parties of Canada. Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, and the World Socialist Party of Ireland. One of the Principles which unite us is particular apropos at this time: . . “The emancipation of the working-class will involve the emancipation of all mankind without distinction of race or sex.”
So once again, what is “race”? Biologically, there is no such thing as race. If ever there was such a concept, modern investigation discloses that the mixing and mingling of the human animal homo sapiens, through the centuries and over the continents has completely sullied the purity of any grouping. The colour of a man’s skin, the shape of his head, the thickness of his lips, the kinkiness of his hair, his height, his weight only proves how varied is Man. In Hawaii the mixing process of different groupings is in its infancy and already it is nigh impossible to identify any individual. In Brazil the Indians and the Europeans and the Negroes are so fused that there is no Indian problem. Nor is there a European problem or a Negro problem. In the United States where chattel slavery existed until 1865, the Negroes were imprisoned in one sector of the country. Upon their legal release at the end of the Civil War and all the way up until the events in Birmingham, they have still remained imprisoned by economic shackles. This may be a good time to define slavery.
It was Shakespeare who wrote: “He who owns the means by which I live, owns my very life.” The southern Negro escaped from chattel slavery into wage slavery. Under the former he worked for a master from sun-up until sun-down and in return he received his grub, hand-me-down rags and a roof over his head. Under the wages system, the worker toils by the clock for a boss in return for which he gets an amount of money, which barely enables him to buy food, clothing and shelter to maintain himself and his family, so that he can go back to repeat the -process. Most workers will resent the description of their lot as slavery. And we answer that none are so blind as those who will not see. This is not the time for too much elaboration but suffice it to say that the government statistics support this description. Average wages of the industrial workers faithfully match the cost of living index.
Following the Civil War some Negroes came North looking for freedom and opportunity. However, with few exceptions, most were herded into ghettos— Harlems and South Ends—and in the competition for the available jobs, they were always the scapegoats. They were forced to accept menial work as servants, as elevator operators, dishwashers and worse.
Today the situation is aggravated by events taking place elsewhere. The world is in turmoil. The drive to exploit every possibility on the part if imperialist nations finally has caused Africa to explode. What formerly was anti-colonialism now is a demand for independence. The Negroes now constituting approximately 10 per cent, of the population in the United States are showing signs of being fed up with being pushed around. They are still segregated, not only down South where the vestiges of the past persist, but in the North as well. And they resent it. The Negroes are segregated but they are not ex-communicated. They listen to TV and read newspapers. Every channel of communication flashes the injustice of their lot. Some turn to extremes such as the Black Muslim movement. Others are influenced by the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) and many other groups. It is the Socialist analysis that to get rid of so-called race prejudice there is only one method, to get rid of its cause, capitalism. There is no other way.
Previously we related the fact of unemployment and tied it in with competition for jobs breeding prejudice. How do the current political leaders deal with this7 Their approach is tragically ludicrous. How do they propose to reduce unemployment? By reducing taxes! With the reasoning that this will give the economy a shot in the arm, stimulate business and, lo and behold!, unemployment will be lessened This is like throwing the tide back by using a bucket.
The alternative that we propose is Socialism. Under Socialism the causes of race-prejudice will no longer exist. The entire population will co-operate in producing all the things required by society. Each person will contribute, irrespective of differences, what he is able to society—and will take from society what he needs. Under Socialism competition between human beings will cease to exist. Privilege will be abolished. People will live in harmony.
This is one of the few opportunities we have to underscore an important element in the Socialist case. Usually we get involved in answering away so many misconceptions about Socialism that we fail to bring home the fact that we stand for world co-operation—common ownership and democratic control. And in the language of every Socialist the expression Comrade is used, not in the derisive sense it has come to mean due to the distortion of our ideas when seen through the caricature in the U.S.S.R., but is a manner of addressing our brothers, joined in the greatest job in the world today, the job of educating and organizing for a Socialist world.