May Day: Chicago

CHICAGO, May 1 — Friends from the Midwest gathered in Chicago on April 28 to celebrate and learn about communism at the Progressive Labor Party May Day dinner. The comrades and friends of PLP who attended the dinner were educated and entertained by a host of encouraging poems, speeches, songs and skits presenting the history of May Day. There was one common theme: Communism is the answer to smashing the ruling class worldwide!

May Day is a time to encourage veteran comrades and gain new ones as we fight back against the bosses and capitalism.  The dinner was a true celebration of workers’ rights. It was a sign that the red flag will forever be held high as the working class builds an international communist movement, led by PLP, to destroy this dark night of capitalism with a red dawn of communism.

Picking up where Saturday’s dinner left off, we organized comrades and friends to march today in Union Park at the citywide May Day March. The turnout for this event has unfortunately dwindled since the massive demonstration of 2006, when a million workers marched through downtown Chicago to demand immigrant rights reform. Even though attacks on workers have only intensified due to the global economic crisis, this year’s march turned out about 2,000 two thousand marchers. 

As usual, there were many reform groups on hand, selling their watered-down approach to class struggle. Many advocated alternative paths towards legalization, proposing a “progressive” way for immigrant workers to provide for their families under capitalism. PLP supports struggles of immigrants and all workers to fight capitalism’s attacks on their living conditions. At the same time, we expose these groups’ reformism and make the call for worldwide communist revolution to destroy the bosses’ artificial, racist borders.

Our contingent was small but multi-racial, heavy with black workers and students. Our uncompromising line for communist revolution struck a chord with nearby marchers, who readily took up our militant chants and CHALLENGE as well. Throughout the march, comrades gave speeches pointing out that Obama and Romney are two sides of the same coin, with similar stances on racist deportations, police brutality and murder, and widening imperialist war. Both of the bosses’ political parties, Republican and Democrat, also support the massive police presence at peaceful rallies like the May Day march. They are revving up their forces for potential clashes with protesters at the Chicago NATO summit in late May. 

Whether the demonstration is small or large, PLP can use these rallies to sharpen workers’ political perspectives, and our own. We can use them to expose the racist and sexist failures of capitalism and the necessity of an international communist alternative. We fight for a day when workers can celebrate May 1 more proudly than ever, when capitalism and its endless wars have finally been eradicated from the face of the earth.