The Militant(logo) 
    Vol.60/No.6           February 12, 1996 
 
 
25 And 50 Years Ago  

February 12, 1971
PHILADELPHIA - High school students throughout this city are waging a major campaign to win their basic democratic rights. As part of this struggle, over 350 participated in a student rights demonstration on Jan. 14. The predominantly Black demonstrators demanded that all cops get out of the schools, that school administrators end the victimization of political activists, and that the student bill of rights recently passed by the Philadelphia Board of Education be implemented immediately for all students, junior high, elementary, parochial, and suburban included.

The militant tone of the rally was expressed by several speakers who tied in the concept of student rights with Black control of the Black community. Bobby Stewart, a student who was suspended and transferred from a predominantly Black high school for his political activity, expressed the view that the bill of rights, although vague and inadequate, could be used as a stepping-stone. Stewart stated that it is necessary for students to make the document more than just a piece of paper, to turn it into a vehicle for struggle.

The idea of the Jan. 14 rally for student rights was initiated by a November conference of the Philadelphia SMC [Student Mobilization Committee]. The SMC, together with high school presidents and members of student governments, students from parochial schools, the Free Press (a local radical paper), and other individuals formed a group called the Students Rights Coalition for the Jan. 14 Action. Although this group represented many diverse views, students came together on one issue, the issue of student rights.


February 9, 1946 SANTIAGO, Chile, Jan. 29 - The capitalists last night opened a brutal offensive against the people of Chile, an offensive characterized by extreme violence. At eight p.m. in the heart of Santiago, the government of the Democratic Alliance (Popular Front), headed by the bourgeois Radicals, stained its hands in workers' blood.

Nation-wide workers' demonstrations were called to protest the anti-democratic measures of the bourgeois Radical party, which a few day previously had dissolved the Nitrate Workers Union in the province of Tarapacá. The demonstrations were called in support of the strike of 12,000 nitrate workers in the North of Chile.

These workers in turn had struck because the government in addition to dissolving two of their unions also declared a state of siege in the province and placed the area under military rule, taking over a number of union headquarters with armed troops.

The nitrate workers had demanded the lowering of the prices of food, clothing, etc., which have been skyrocketing in the company stores despite an agreement with the unions fixing prices at a lower level.

The five-day strike of these workers in the North brought out the rest of the workers in the entire nitrate industry.

When the demonstration began in Santiago, the Carabineros (National Police), after openly provoking the crowd, began firing with rifles and machine-guns. The workers replied with stones, sticks, fist blows and angry shouts.

 
 
 
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