When Maoists confronted the Klan

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

NY Times, October 25, 2003
ABOUT NEW YORK
Remembering When Maoists Met the Klan
By DAN BARRY

THE Bermanzohns are in their 50's now, and the old chants and slogans do 
not come so readily to mind. The couple blended years ago into the 
middle-class anonymity of Park Slope, where they raised two daughters and 
joined the local food co-op. On weekends their thoughts turn to that modest 
upstate getaway.

But if they ever forget their past, Paul's left hand is always there to 
remind them. It sits in his lap; limp, useless.

Besides their place upstate, the couple share bitter claim to a forgotten 
moment in history. Many people recall that on Nov. 4, 1979, militants 
seized the United States Embassy in Iran and took 66 Americans hostage. But 
who remembers what happened the day before, in Greensboro, N.C.?

The Bermanzohns do. Sally and Paul Bermanzohn were members of a Maoist 
group back then, organizing textile workers and advocating the replacement 
of capitalism with a "dictatorship" of workers ? by violence if necessary. 
"But there was no sense that we were taking up arms," recalled Ms. 
Bermanzohn, sipping tea in their apartment. "We just felt connected to 
revolutionary movements around the world."

The group had just dropped the benign name of the Workers Viewpoint 
Organization in favor of the Communist Workers Party. In hindsight, Ms. 
Bermanzohn said, "It was a big mistake to use the word."

By 1979, the country was weary of Vietnam War era protest and turmoil. But 
a local resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan presented the Communist Workers 
Party with a chance for some traction. One of the party's leaders taunted 
the Klan while announcing a "Death to the Klan" rally in Greensboro. "We 
invite you and your two-bit punks to come out and face the wrath of the 
people," said the leader, a doctor named Paul Bermanzohn.

The other day that doctor sat in an armchair, his hand dead in his lap. "I 
think we were too brash," he said. "It was a mistake to call them out that 
way."

full: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/25/nyregion/25ABOU.html

Louis Proyect, Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org


~~~~~~~
PLEASE clip all extraneous text before replying to a message.