[Marxism] Did Trotsky urge voting for Black Democrats?

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

I was rather startled to see Marxism list subscriber Joaquin Bustelo 
state that “Trotsky specifically urged voting for a Black Democrat under 
certain conditions.” Joaquin, a brilliant and wise former member of the 
Socialist Workers Party, has dispensed with much of the dogma that 
marked this one-time very influential group but I cannot go along with 
his recent “re-thinking” around support for the Democratic Party. I want 
to take this opportunity, therefore, to actually review what Trotsky 
said and also to relate it to electoral questions facing the left today.

Joaquin first alluded to Trotsky and Black Democrats in reply to a 
subscriber whose hostility to the Democratic Party is about as deep as 
my own:

 >>This is, of course, the old SWP schema of “class lines” in elections. 
It is not a Marxist nor Leninist position. Marx and Lenin both voted for 
capitalist parties (on occasion) and Lenin specifically advocated 
calling for a vote for bourgeois-imperialist “social-democratic” and 
“Labour” parties as part of a tactic to undermine their base among 
working people. Trotsky specifically urged voting for a Black Democrat 
under certain conditions.<<

Since I have already challenged Joaquin on Marx and Lenin’s positions, I 
did not want to repeat my arguments. But Trotsky’s alleged support for 
“voting for a Black Democrat” was a new one on me. When I asked Joaquin 
to provide a citation for this, he replied:

 >>The passage occurs in the Pathfinder book, Leon Trotsky on Black 
Nationalism, and in the discussion on the creation (backed by the SWP) 
of a Black organization. Trotsky posits this group could sponsor or back 
candidates for office. He says we would propose revolutionaries, but of 
course we might lose. If a Black Democrat is nominated, we could support 
that candidate, making clear we support “the Negro,” not the Democrat, 
which I understand to mean, as an expression of our support to the 
democratic right of Black people to political inclusion and 
representation, not an endorsement of the specific views/outlook/program 
of this Black candidate. The SWP editors of the Pathfinder edition add 
to this a footnote to the effect that Trotsky MEANT provided this “Negro 
Democrat” ran as an independent candidate on the ballot. I think the 
footnote is bullshit. Trotsky, neither here nor elsewhere, presents 
anything to indicate he is in the slightest aware of or concerned about 
the minutiae of U.S. election laws of ballot practices.<<

Since this seems so counter-indicative to everything that Trotsky ever 
wrote about electoral politics, I decided to stop by the Columbia 
University library at lunch and take a look at the Pathfinder book, 
something I haven’t done in over 10 years. (The last time I referred to 
it was in order to prepare an article on the national question.)

The reference to Black Democrats occurs in an April 11, 1939 article 
titled "Plans for the Negro Organization". As Joaquin points out, the 
SWP was trying to help launch a new group that sounds quite a bit like 
what Malcolm X was trying to do with the Organization for Afro-American 
Unity. In fact, this article was written just 6 days after “A Negro 
Organization” that laid out the perspectives for this new initiative. He 
felt that the Trotskyists alone could provide the impetus since "None of 
the parties can now assume such a task because they are either 
pro-Roosevelt imperialists or anti-Roosevelt imperialists."

full: 
http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2008/10/10/did-trotsky-urge-voting-for-black-democrats/

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