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{{short description|Communist political party}}
{{Refimprove|date=February 2010}}
{{Infobox political party {{Infobox political party
|name = Progressive Labor Party | name = Progressive Labor Party
| abbreviation = PLP
|logo = ]
| logo = Logo PLP.svg
|colorcode =
| logo_size =
|leader = ] and leaders of local collectives
| colorcode = Red
|foundation = 1961
| leader =
|ideology = ] ]
| foundation = {{start date and age|1962|1}}
|headquarters = ], New York
| ideology = {{ubl|]|]|]|]}}
|international = various countries in ] and ]; ], ], ]
| headquarters = ], ]
|website =
| newspaper = ''Challenge''
|country =
| position = ]
| international =
| colors = {{Colorbox|Red}} ]
| website = {{URL|http://www.plp.org/}}
| country = United States
}} }}
{{Communist parties}}
The '''Progressive Labor Party''' (originally the '''Progressive Labor Movement''' and often referred to as '''PL''') is a ] ] based primarily in the ]. It was formed in the fall of 1961 by members of the ] (CPUSA) who felt that the ] had betrayed communism and become ] and ]. Founders also felt that the CPUSA was adopting unforgivably ] positions, such as ], ] and hiding communist politics behind a veneer of reform-oriented causes.


The '''Progressive Labor Party''' ('''PLP''') is an ] ] ] in the ]. It was established in January 1962 as the '''Progressive Labor Movement''' following a split in the ], adopting its new name at a convention held in the spring of 1965. It was involved in the anti-] movement of the 1960s and early 1970s through its ] faction of ].
The party advocates a "fight directly for communism" that includes limited aspects of the ] but virulently rejects the standard conception of the ] economic transition-stage as a mistake of the 'old movement'. Its revolution would be followed immediately by a ]-ruled, moneyless society, with policy to be administered by hundreds of millions of workers through Party locals worldwide, coordinated through several tiers of membership meetings and forums. It hopes to recruit these numbers "''before'' the revolution", a phrasing they use to provide contrast to what they say was the habit of past communist parties to recruit the mass of its members ''during and after'' their revolutions, the latter of which they consider a failed strategy. The party has also stated numerous times and in numerous contexts, mostly in regards to ], how "workers must never again share power with class enemies" the way they did during the original movement.


The PLP publishes a fortnightly newspaper, ''Challenge''.
Accordingly, PLP's greatest point of pride is how much it considers itself to have evolved in a positive direction away from the old communist movement. It constantly criticizes many aspects of the ], and also criticizes itself in relation to how closely current policies may resemble past failed ones, which it calls "right opportunism." While still taking cues from the past revolutionaries it admires, the party sees itself as being at the forefront of a new type of working class communist liberation that will truly carry the revolution through to fruition for the first time. It also espouses a unique approach to the issue of the ], saying that instead of separate communist parties in each country, the revolutionary organization should be one monolithic, multiracial, cross-cultural PLP, with branches and collectives all over the globe.


== History ==
To accomplish its goal of communism, the party feels it first must recapture the power and influence that the ]-era CPUSA once had — i.e., being the largest and most politically influential communist party in the country — and to combine that influence with its mix of ]-tinged communist thinking, thereby making a new "mass party of the working class" that can gain momentum across the entire world.{{Citation needed|date=April 2010}}
=== Establishment ===
]
The PLP began as an organized faction called the Progressive Labor Movement in January 1962.<ref name=Staff4129>House Committee on Internal Security, "Staff Study: Progressive Labor Party," in ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings Before the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session: April 13, 14, and November 18, 1971 (Including Index).'' Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972; pg. 4129.</ref> It was formed in the aftermath of a fall 1961 split in the ] (CPUSA) that saw the expulsion of left-wing labor activists ] (1926–2011) and ].<ref name=Bacc427>Edward J. Bacciocco, Jr., "United States of America," in Richard F. Staar (ed.), ''], 1972.'' Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1972; pg. 425.</ref> Before his expulsion, Rosen was a prominent CPUSA functionary, serving as District Organizer for upstate New York from 1957 and Industrial Organizer for all of New York state from 1959.<ref name=PLPHistory>Progressive Labor Party, ''Progressive Labor,'' vol. 10, no. 1 (Aug.-Sept. 1975).</ref> An initial organizational meeting was held in December 1961, attended by 12 of the approximately 50 current and former CPUSA members identifying themselves as the "Call group".<ref name="PLPHistory" /> Rosen delivered a political report to the ]-inspired group urging the establishment of a new ] in the United States to replace the CPUSA, which was characterized as irredeemably "]".<ref name="PLPHistory" />


The organization remained amorphous in its first months, publishing ''Progressive Labor''—initially a monthly newsletter—and engaging in small-scale discussions. An organizational conference was called by the editors of ''Progressive Labor'' to be held in New York City in July 1962.<ref name="PLPHistory" /> This gathering, held at the ], was attended by 50 people from 11 different cities and served to launch a formal organization, the Progressive Labor Movement.<ref name="PLPHistory" /> Rosen again delivered the main political report to the gathering, calling for the writing of a program and development of a network of clubs and affiliated mass organizations in order to win supporters for a new ] movement.<ref name="PLPHistory" /> Given the small size of the fledgling organization, formation of a political party was deemed unpropitious. The name "Progressive Labor Movement" was selected to emphasize the organization's early and transitional nature.<ref name="PLPHistory" /> The Progressive Labor Movement was finally reconstituted as the Progressive Labor Party at a founding convention held in ] on April 15–18, 1965.<ref name="Bacc427" /> A 20-member National Committee was elected,<ref>Testimony of Herbert Romerstein in House Committee on Internal Security, ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings Before the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session: April 13, 14, and November 18, 1971 (Including Index).'' Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972; pg. 4052.</ref> and Rosen became the party's founding chair.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/1960-1970/rosen.htm | title=Comrade Milt Rosen, 1926-2011 Founding Chairperson of PLP, Great 20th Century Revolutionary | access-date=19 September 2014}}</ref> Organizational headquarters were established in New York City.<ref name="Staff4129" />
In spite of this revolutionary fervor however, PLP's most recent self-assessment of its political line is noticeably reflective, and even somewhat sober, <ref></ref> stating that "he most significant error our Party made was to underestimate the significance of the old movement’s collapse." The party praises its own 1980s analysis as what enabled them to be 'advanced' enough to survive the ], alleging that "these advances were vital ideological contributions to the arsenal of revolutionary communism."<ref></ref> But while "we correctly identified the restoration of capitalism in the former Soviet Union and China" (see ] and ] for what is meant here), the party says that through the years its own ranks "failed...to understand the devastating consequences that this development would have on the revolutionary process world wide and the new life it would breathe into U.S. imperialism. In the decade and a half since the Soviet Union’s voluntary break-up, U.S. rulers have received a blank check to wreak murder and mayhem in the ], ], Iraq, and elsewhere. The end of socialism, and the...removal of the USSR as a key rival imperialist superpower, also enabled the U.S. rulers to dodge many of capitalism’s inevitable contradictions. Even more critical," the party writes, "it has had a chilling effect on ] all over the world." It is perhaps clear via this document that the extent of PL's "long-range view" for communist revolution is much longer now than at any time in the past.<ref></ref>


=== 1960s ===
==Early history of the party==
] for New York State Senate in 1965]]
Although it disdains ] as an end, the Progressive Labor Movement was quick to make use of the electoral process as a vehicle for propaganda, launching an effort to gain the signatures of 5,000 registered voters in New York City to put a PLP candidate on the ballot for the November 1963 election of the ].<ref name=Staff4136>"Staff Report" in ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings...'' pg. 4136.</ref> Although it did not manage to place its candidate on the ballot, the proto-PLP distributed more than 100,000 pieces of party literature in conjunction with the electoral campaign.<ref name=Staff4136/>


The PLP remained of modest size throughout the decade. It did not publicize its membership, but federal income tax returns filed in 1967 and 1968 provide a reasonable proxy. The PLP formally existed as a publishing partnership listing Milt Rosen and the party's 1965 candidate for ], ], as partners.<ref name=Returns>"Review of PLP Income Tax Returns," in House Internal Security Committee, ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings...'' pg. 4447.</ref> These returns showed income and expenditures of about $66,000 in 1967 and about $88,600 in 1968, with the partners claiming no income from the ostensible business relationship.<ref name=Returns />
As it broke away from the CPUSA amidst the ], PL made it clear that it wanted to advocate ] openly and aggressively among the ]. Recruitment increased as the ] intensified: though it started as several ] based on the ] early on, the group then became inspired enough by the ] to wind up with many of its student-aged members going to ] to break the ]. Defiance of the ban resulted in a congressional investigation before the ] at which the students banged on desks and ] HUAC, shouting pro-communist slogans and generally causing too much disruption for the proceedings to continue. These actions prompted protests from other groups that would ultimately destroy HUAC's ability to hold hearings at all.


During the 1960s, the PLP followed the international political line of the ] and was described by commentators as "]".<ref name=Bacc427 /> The organization carved out a niche in the ], with its ] faction acting as rivals to the ] faction within ], a part of which (RYM 1) later evolved into the ].<ref name="Washington Post">Dylan Matthews, </ref>
PL also founded the university-campus-based May 2 Movement (M2M), which organized the first significant general march against the ] in ] in 1964. But once the ] (SDS) came to the forefront of the U.S. leftist activist political scene in 1965, PLP dissolved M2M and entered SDS, working vigorously to attract supporters and to form party clubs on campuses. By 1965 PLP had also attracted sufficient membership that it changed its designation from 'Movement' to 'Party'.


The PLP made extensive use of ]s (front groups) from its earliest years, through which it spread its ideas, raised funds and recruited new members.<ref name=Staff4135>"Staff Report" in ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings...'' pg. 4135.</ref> Among these were the ] (1963–64), which organized travel to post-revolutionary ]; the ] (1964), organized in response to racially oriented ]; the ] (M2M, established 1964), organized in opposition to the ]; and other short-lived, issue-driven front groups.<ref name=Staff4135 />
Within a few years, the nascent party had become the largest communist faction within SDS and a major player in the student movement's internal politics. Their politics were received with either disgust or admiration within SDS, but no one denied their massed presence and vigorous work in working class neighborhoods. When a ] policeman, Gilligan, killed an unarmed black youth in Harlem, the neighborhood ], and PLP led these riots and its leaders were arrested and arraigned for this activity. Against that politically polarizing backdrop within the already intense worldwide movement against social injustice, various anti-PLP SDS factions took to developing their own interpretations of communist ideology and formed what it named the ] (RYM), while PL, in its own right, was busy organizing its supporters into their ] (WSA) from 1966-69. The competing SDS factions did not get along peacefully; clashes between them were chronic and bitter, and would ultimately result in an irrevocable split of SDS into separate organizations and, shortly thereafter, the expiration of SDS itself.


=== 1970s ===
By the middle of the sixties the party was arguing that its experiences from the Harlem rebellion onward had slowly convinced them to abandon advocacy of ] as a politically appropriate route to workers seizing ], but it did not set out this new conviction in official Party doctrine until 1969, when it came out openly with an organization-wide document called ''Revolutionaries Must Fight Nationalism''. , immediately controversial, reached the conclusion that all ], both ]-based nationalism and ethnic nationalism among oppressed minorities, was ultimately ] &mdash; that it was akin to ] at home, like with the ], and weakened any communist character of national-liberation struggles abroad, ].
The PLP ended its previous political line supporting the ] and broke with the ] in the spring of 1971 with the publication of an internal discussion bulletin for party members detailing eight points of disagreement with the Chinese regime.<ref name=CPCLIne>"Progressive Labor Party Line on Communist China," in House Internal Security Committee, ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings..." pg. 4431.</ref> These related to the softening of China's foreign relations towards ], ], ], ], and the United States, its "complete elevation of the ] as the revolutionary group in the United States" and its "total collusion with every nationalist fake the world over, from ] to ]".<ref name=CPCLIne />


During the 1970s, the PLP began to shape its activity around racism in the United States, forming a mass organization called the Committee Against Racism (CAR).<ref name=Klehr1977>Harvey Klehr, "United States of America," in Richard F. Staar (ed.). ''], 1977.'' Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1977; pp. 500-501.</ref> A CAR convention held in New York City in July 1976 drew 500 participants.<ref name=Klehr1977 /> The organization made use of aggressive ] tactics against its perceived opponents, disrupting presentations by the controversial psychologist ] and the physicist ] in the spring of 1976.<ref name=Klehr1977 /> The CAR were the most vocal of the hostile critics of the sociobiologist ]. The organization picketed in Harvard Square and handed out flyers calling for demonstrations against sociobiology, which in their view was being used to defend individuals and groups responsible for racism, war, and genocide.<ref>Ullica Segerstråle. ''Defenders of the Truth: The Battle for Science in the Sociology Debate and Beyond''. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2000; pp. 21-22.</ref> In 1977, the organization, now renamed the ] (InCAR), made headlines by disrupting an academic conference by pouring a pitcher of water on Wilson's head while chanting "Wilson, you're all wet".<ref>Wilson, Edward O. 1995. ''Naturalist.''</ref>
The new position was greeted with open hostility and even rage among most of the non-PLP-supporting SDS, especially RYM, who interpreted it as anti-working class and even implicitly ] and refused to accept it. RYM thought that PL was categorically rejecting the political right of groups of everyday people to ]. PL's attempted explanations that it was the political, not the personal, side of nationalism that it was rejecting were also refused by their opposition. The rage on RYM's end and continued defense of the position on PL's end could not, and did not, hold SDS together for long.


=== Structure ===
In the end, the PL/WSA wing did indeed win majority support at the 1969 SDS national convention in ]. RYM, as it turned out, had teamed with the ] to engage in deceptive tactics in the conference which deflated their political reputation and lessened the political impact of the split.<ref></ref> However, the ] still successfully usurped the SDS name and public face through 1970 despite its defeat at the conference, and retained control of the SDS National Office until it decided to dissolve it, close the headquarters, and break off to become a violently revolutionary organization on its own. PLP alone ultimately did not have the strength to lead the SDS chapters it had successfully kept going, and so its wing buckled and collapsed a few years later — although not before a new group, the ] (CAR), was formed to replace it. CAR was composed at first of mostly WSA student members and the black and Hispanic workers in the off-campus neighborhoods that had been recruited to WSA; over time it expanded somewhat and also founded chapters in other countries.<ref></ref><ref>]</ref>
]
According to the constitution adopted at the time of the PLP's formation in 1965, membership was open to anyone at least 17 years old who accepted the program and policies of the party, paid dues and required assessments and subscribed to party publications.<ref name=Staff4131>"Staff Report" in ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings...'' pg. 4131.</ref> Supreme authority within the organization was to be exerted by national conventions, held every two years.<ref name=Staff4131 /> The convention was to elect a National Committee to handle matters of governance between conventions.<ref name=Staff4131 /> The PLP's primary party unit was the "club", organized either on a shop, territorial, or functional basis.<ref name="Staff4131" /> All party members were required to be active members of a club and bound by the principles of ], in which decisions of higher bodies were considered binding on participants in lower bodies.<ref name="Staff4131" /> During the 1960s, new members were additionally required to undergo three months of ideological training, usually in small group settings in individual houses.<ref name="Staff4136" />


Owing in part to the significant economic and extensive time requirements expected of its members, the PLP has since its inception been a small cadre organization, with an "estimated hard-core membership" of about 350 in 1970, supplemented by numerous sympathizers.<ref name="Staff4131" /> Members during the 1960s were predominantly from white, middle-class backgrounds, shunned drug use, and tended "to dress neatly and wear short hair", according to a 1971 ] staff report.<ref name="Staff4131" />
Even so, the general crisis of the entire United States ] by 1975 only accelerated the eventual failure of PLP's ability to hold on to the SDS name and orientation. As tensions increased, PLP's remaining campus members and supporters were known to engage in particularly heated shouting matches and even occasional mutually provoked fistfights with ] and ] the ], as well as other smaller groups that would occasionally try to intimidate them, ]. Also, the party experienced internal split-offs; several significant PLP collectives left as the seventies progressed. While not reduced to being inoperable or insignificant, it shrank and became more fractious even as it ratcheted up its work. According to , "the majority of the ] chapter had left in 1974" and in April 1977 "70% of the ] chapter of PLP" also left the organization, "just about the only remaining one with significant mass work" (O'Brein, ''Five Retreats''). Meanwhile, some of the party's more widely influential members drifted away as well, including ], PLP's vice chairman and ] branch leader, who presumably could not reconcile his own politics to that of PLP's rejection of nationalism in 1969.


=== Publications ===
Though in the 1960s PL was widely regarded as the torch-bearer of ] within SDS, it had never really seen itself as a hard-line follower of ]; indeed, even early on, PLP's political line differed sharply from Maoism on fundamental points. It was briefly the subsidized ] to China, but broke that relationship in 1967 and reacted particularly harshly to the news of Mao meeting with President ] in 1972, denouncing Mao as ]. Claims to Maoism in the United States thereafter passed to other groups, most notably the ]. Briefly in the early 1970s, PLP continued to offer limited tacit support to the ] in a fraternal party relationship.
During the 1960s and 1970s, the PLP published a magazine called ''Progressive Labor,'' which first appeared as a monthly before shifting to quarterly and later bimonthly publication.<ref>Testimony of Alma Pfaff, in House Committee on Internal Security, ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings Before the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session: April 13, 14, and November 18, 1971 (Including Index).'' Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972; pg. 4047.</ref> The press run of ''Progressive Labor'' circa 1970 was approximately 10,000.<ref name=Rom4054>Romerstein in ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings...'' pg. 4055.</ref> The party also published ''],'' a publication likewise issued at changing intervals over the years.<ref>Pfaff in ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings...'' pg. 4048.</ref> In 1970, the press run of this publication was approximately 75,000, according to the estimates of government investigators, with many of these copies unsold.<ref name=Rom4054 />


''Challenge'' remains in production today as a biweekly, issued under the same covers with its parallel ] counterpart ''Desafío.'' The PLP also produces a semiannual theoretical magazine, ''The Communist.''
==Changes in thought, direction, and approach==


During 1963 and 1964, the PLP also produced a theoretical magazine called ''Marxist-Leninist Quarterly.''<ref name=Staff4133>"Staff Report" in ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings...'' pg. 4133.</ref> This publication was terminated and merged with ''Progressive Labor'' magazine in 1965.<ref name=Staff4133 /> A West Coast publication called ''Spark'' was also produced from 1965 until early 1968.<ref name=Staff4133 />
In the early 1980s the party went beyond opposing nationalism and began to more aggressively develop new political positions that were radically different from any other known version of ]. Chief among these was the argument that ], the accepted transition-phase between ] and communism in ] theory, was the primary reason behind the reversal of workers' power in the ] and ] and should be abandoned. While seeming excessively radical to some, this position in fact flowed logically from the party's prior rejection of Mao's concept of ], dismissed by the party as a reactionary "three-stage theory" of first New Democracy, then socialism, then communism. With PLP's subsequent rejection of the ''socialist'' stage as equally unnecessary and reactionary, PL's proletarian struggle was reframed as a "fight directly for communism" wherein these intermediate stages would be shunned in favor of widespread understanding and acceptance of fully communist ideology among the masses from the outset.


== See also ==
To PLP, such a strategy of mass participation in communist politics necessitates that current party members build true, deep, honest friendships with workers, rather than viewing such workers simply as potential recruits. In this vein, it advocates "basebuilding," meaning that members should get stable jobs that keep them in touch with the working class — teaching in public school as opposed to private, for example, or working in a welfare office as opposed to a ] — and should enjoy everyday lives while gradually attempting to win their co-workers, friends and family to respect and join the party.
* ]
* ]


== Further reading ==
In terms of its organization, the party has replaced the classic "]" conception of a communist party with that of a "mass party", by which it means that the party should not be an elite of "]" but should be composed of, by, and for the whole working class, where everyone has full knowledge and appreciation of communist principles and action so that they do not allow the party leadership structure to become corrupt. It is one of only a few US-based communist parties to both explicitly struggle towards (in speech and writing) and contain (in its membership and leadership ranks) a multiracial and even majority-nonwhite membership. PL says it believes that revolutionaries cannot claim anti-racism without putting it into explicit practice in their own ranks. Its recruitment strategies within the US typically tend to focus on impoverished and semi-impoverished working class neighborhoods with majority black and Hispanic inhabitants. In general, very little attention is paid to recruiting members out of general conglomerations like ] or ] demonstrations and the like— while it is true that PLP politically has no particular opposition to recruiting from within the activist community, many of its members and leaders seem to dislike it and to refer to it as, at best, not very fruitful, and at worst as a total waste of time much better spent on working full-time with inner-city workers and youth.
* Robert Jackson Alexander, ''Maoism in the Developed World.'' Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2001.
* Leigh David Benin, ''A Red Thread In Garment: Progressive Labor And New York City’s Industrial Heartland In The 1960s And 1970s.'' Ph.D. dissertation. New York University, 1997.
* Leigh David Benin, ''The New Labor Radicalism and New York City's Garment Industry: Progressive Labor Insurgents During the 1960s.'' New York: Garland Publishing, 1999.
* House Committee on Internal Security, ''Progressive Labor Party: Hearings Before the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session: April 13, 14, and November 18, 1971 (Including Index).'' Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972.
* Progressive Labor Party, ''Progressive Labor,'' vol. 10, no. 1 (August–September 1975).
* D.S. Sumner and R.S. Butler (Jim Dann and Hari Dillon). ''The Five Retreats: A History of the Failure of the Progressive Labor Party.'' Reconstruction Press, 1977.
* Mary-Alice Waters, ''Maoism in the U.S.: A Critical History of the Progressive Labor Party.'' New York: Young Socialist Alliance, 1969.


== Historic PLP publications ==
Members are cautioned not to necessarily expect revolution in their lifetimes, but to build for it anyway, so that the working class has the largest and deepest collective participation in revolutionary communist activity and ideas by the time circumstances for such a revolution are ripe. The party still sees the need for a ] and an ]{{Disambiguation needed|date=June 2011}} to defend the new communist society they envision from attack by resurgent ]es, and they utilize the term "]" to refer to this necessity. But since it rejects the socialism stage of communist "struggle", PLP's usage of the term today differs starkly from usage by other communist groups, who generally consider the dictatorship of the proletariat to be synonymous with the classic conception of socialism.
* Bill Epton, ''The Black Liberation Struggle (Within The Current World Struggle)''. Speech at Old Westbury College, February 26, 1976. Harlem: Black Liberation Press, 1976.
* Bill Epton, New York: Progressive Labor Party, 1966.
* Harlem Defense Council, ''Police Terror In Harlem''. NY: Harlem Defense Council, n.d. .
* , ''Organize! Use Wendy Nakashima's campaign for assembly (69 a.d.) to fight back!''. Progressive Labor Party, New York. .
* Progressive Labor Movement, ''Road to Revolution: The Outlook of the Progressive Labor Movement''. Brooklyn: Progressive Labor Movement, 1964.
* Progressive Labor Party, ''Notes on Black Liberation.'' New York: Black Liberation Commission, Progressive Labor Party, 1965.
* Progressive Labor Party, ''Smash the Bosses' Armed Forces. A Fighting Program for GIs..'' Brooklyn, NY: Progressive Labor Party, n.d. .
* Progressive Labor Party, ''Revolution Today, USA: A Look at the Progressive Labor Movement and the Progressive Labor Party.'' New York: Exposition Press, 1970.


==References==
Other than its fight directly for a communist political and economic system, perhaps the biggest change to come from its steep changes in political line is PLP's current belief in a complete and total abolition of money and the wage system immediately upon the seizure of ] by the working class. After PLP's revolution, cash and credit money and all forms of market-based and profit-based exchanges of all types would immediately cease (or if the world were already in shambles due to world war, would simply not be restarted). Members argue that wage differences based on type of work and the retention of a certain amount of ] and ] under socialism was what led it to turn back into ] with time. They see the immediate abolition of money, wages, and other ] elements as an approach that would more easily enable workers to adopt a sense of communist culture, ethics, and morality. Meanwhile, PL fiercely opposes the ] espoused by past communists, which it points out placed more emphasis on achieving ] in socialist societies than it did on actually winning the working class to communist ideology and practice, particularly in the cases of the ] and the ]s. PLP argues that communism should have been the glue that held these societies together, rather than abundance. In part, the party states:

{{quotation|Who is to say what "abundance" really is? Many working-class people in the U.S. probably live at a higher standard of living than Marx might have predicted -- better health care, longer life span, shorter workday, indoor plumbing, electricity, cars, etc. All of those material things constitute "abundance" on one level, yet we know that it is not enough, because we know of the potential for a better world. We also know that most of the world doesn't even have a fraction of what many U.S. workers have. But even if the whole world lived at this relatively "abundant" level, we would still be fighting to smash the system. The "abundance" by itself does not, and cannot, eliminate selfishness and class divisions.|}}

PLP thinks of itself as having been born out of "]" and from that mindset takes several interesting positions regarding the 20th-century communist movement. They believe that the political and economic choices of ] extend back to ]'s ] and were ultimately endemic to the Soviet Union's entire history — i.e., the history of socialism and its concessions to capitalism, which in PLP's view cannot lead to communism. Therefore, they say, regardless of the leader in question, and regardless of whether or not s/he made good political advances in the country or towards the communist movement as a whole (which they believe Stalin did, especially against the ]), mistakes were made that were common to all of those leaders, because the faulty theory of socialism was common to all of them. PLP attacks the ] and any "Great Leader" status as anti-working class, and pledges that the elimination of the socialist stage, the retention of the armed dictatorship of the working class to defend against a comeback by the ]es, and "confidence in the working class" from the beginning that they can fully understand and utilize openly communist ideas collectively, without having to look to a great figure (or figures) for guidance, will signal much deeper and more profound strides towards communism than socialism could ever have hoped to achieve.

Like virtually all groups descended from ], however, the party supports a positive interpretation of Stalin's legacy. Most members, while allowing that "errors" were made, expressly deny the view of him by mainstream scholars as mass murderer and tyrant, claiming that his leadership helped defeat ], that the numbers killed by the policies in his era were far fewer than the many millions widely accepted, and that the rest resulted from a combination of the ], famine, and ]. Typically, PLP also defends killings unrelated to these factors as ultimately justified to protect the ]'s ] against spies, ] elements, ], and other class enemies. It should again be noted, though, that PLP sees the "lessons" it takes from the past (and the past itself) as only a general blueprint from which to construct a revolution in the future, not as a political safety-net in which to take refuge. In keeping with their Maoist roots, PLP emphasizes action over theory, with study of the latter being education for the former. In this way, they claim to be 'forward-thinking' in ways that other communist groups with similar roots, in their opinion, are not.

=="Inter-imperialist rivalry"==

] and ] strategies, members say, have been proven wrong despite all valiant attempts to make them work by forces genuinely fighting for communism; they say that such forces' alliances with "]" bosses and/or fake-left groups for short-term gains has been one of the main weaknesses of the old communist movement. They cite as evidence for this the fall of the ] to ] and the assassination of ] in ], among other examples. So, rather than focus energy on participation in (or creation of) leftist coalitions, as it sees most other groups claiming ] doing, PL prefers to steadily strengthen its own political standing and recruitment via its basebuilding strategy.

On the circumstances that would lead to revolution, PLP looks at the world situation believing that the primary ] today is&mdash;unfortunately&mdash;between various groups of competing ] for world domination, or "inter-imperialist rivalry," rather than between workers and bosses, or (as Maoists claim) between imperialism and national-liberation movements. It recognizes the weakness of the ] at the present stage in history and notes that ] has presently replaced communism as the driving force in the worldwide popular left. But the PLP simultaneously sees an inexorable economic and political decline of the U.S. versus other capitalist powers, like China and the ] (EU), and dwindling of necessary imperial resources around the world like ]. The party thinks that cutthroat competition over such resources will inevitably lead to a third world war. that such a war, while it will bring much suffering and death for workers, will also be the catalyst for a great new communist revolution, provided enough people are won to the party's ideas before and during such a conflict.

In line with its ] politics, while firmly denouncing the "]" policies of the ], the party also criticizes both the Palestinian ] and the ] because of what it sees as these movements' reactionary nature; that the most they will do is put another capitalist government in power and establish new domination by local bosses, and dependency on non-US imperialists such as the European Union.

And in response to the ], the party has continued its overall fight against the ideas and policies of the US ruling class, organizes workers into mainstream unions from which it then tries to lead ]s, berates cops and ] strategies, and unreservedly criticizes US President ] for being yet another example of the rulers fooling the people with an impressive-seeming figurehead, in the tradition of ] and ] (the latter of whose "]" policies it had mercilessly blasted as racist "]").

PL upholds what some might consider a ] vision of a mass-based communism, one that it claims was the true spirit of the ] sabotaged by Mao's ], reactionary elements within the ], and Mao's own political weaknesses. It believes it "stands on the shoulders of giants" but can also learn a lot from their mistakes, "to get it right the next time."

Despite the nature and intensity of its work and the fact that it sees itself as advocating a new type of communism inspired by but still separate from the old, the party has remained small throughout its history, staying relatively stable at an estimated few thousand active members, and neither gaining nor losing significant numbers along the way. Because of internal PLP security, it is not possible to get a public declaration of whether the estimate of a few thousand members includes members in countries other than the U.S. or members in the military forces and other non-public work. Generally, there is a consensus among members that "members lists", or even a general knowledge of specific or general membership size among participants, is both unnecessary and dangerous to the party's internal security in relation to ] under capitalism. It would seem recently, however, that PLP has begun to increase its international work as it continues to face what it acknowledges is a comparatively stagnant and underdeveloped working-class militancy situation in the United States, and also amidst its own continued lack of steady growth in party membership even as it approaches the 50-year anniversary of the original PLM's formation.

==Present-day activities==

In May 2010, the Party claimed to have seeded a study-group club in the ] of the ]. It is unknown whether PL has played any significant openly communist part in the ] or the similar protests happening around the US in response to parallel initiatives by other state governors, other than the innately apparent situation of several PLP members being active in the participant unions themselves as members, recruiting individual union members to participate in and perhaps join the party and/or participate in party marches and rallies. In late February 2011 upon the ], PL and also called the mainstream media's characterisation of the revolution as nonviolent "lies", asserting instead that revolutionary violence and even a quasi-communistic or at least genuinely populist spirit saturated the entire process. It therefore seems apparent that PL does support the overall ] spirit of the revolutions in ], ], ], ] etc., even while at the same time (and in characteristic fashion) it qualifies its support somewhat with their classic worry that these revolutions will be quickly co-opted by the forces of the ruling elite and/or that full-fledged capitalism will be inevitably (re)established and popular control and collective self-determination will fade.

The party still vociferously pursues activities opposing racism, some of which are quite militant, even if not all such activities cross the line into violence (which some do){{Citation needed|date=April 2011}}. Members who work as teachers, for instance, target policies ] that they consider racist, single them out for being so, and sometimes try to launch campaigns involving both teachers and students to oppose those measures (such as ]s in schools, or increased police presence in front of or inside school buildings). In society more generally, the party claims that the best way to consistently and tangibly prove its ] nature, given that it does not support ], is to fight racism physically, through ]{{Citation needed|date=April 2011}}. It led a street battle in ] in 1975 that broke apart the briefly influential mass anti-] group ], and repeatedly targeted ] and similar ] through the 1990s, particularly once '']'' came into vogue{{Citation needed|date=April 2011}}. The PLP ] ] (InCAR) at an academic conference in 1977 famously poured a pitcher of water on sociobiologist ]'s head while chanting "Wilson, you're all wet".<ref>Wilson, Edward O. 1995. ''Naturalist''. ISBN 0-446-67199-1.</ref> In the 1980s the ] told the ] that "it's because of those commies in InCAR and PLP that our boys are afraid to come out in public wearing their hoods." In 1999, when the KKK tried to hold a rally in ], a member (misidentified in the media as public school teacher Harvey Mason, but actually public school teacher Derek Pearl) made headlines by infiltrating the Klan members' protest space and using it to . More recently PLP has also targeted the ] and ]{{Citation needed|date=April 2011}}.

Today, at least in the United States, the party continues to be most widely known among the general public for its wilfully confrontational and often violent stance of ] against ] and ] groups. Whenever an organized opposition to a racist or fascist rally has not yet been planned, PL will often organize and lead one. The party takes open and intense pride in being the "only organization publicly known for advocating both communism and militancy" in the US. It is also active in anti-] work, ], ], and various types of basic industry, including ]. The ] ] had an open PLP member who was its president for one term and, though he has since retired, for many years exercised substantial leadership and influence in the Local.

Rebuilding in ] has also become a staple of the party yearly "Summer Project" work in the months of July and August, particularly among US East Coast collectives{{Citation needed|date=April 2011}}.

The party makes a point of celebrating ] with public marches every year. Historically it held its own marches, on the Saturday closest to the first day of May, to accommodate 5-day-per-week working schedules. This closest-Saturday tradition meant that PL's May Day rally sometimes, but not often, fell on 1 May itself. Today, however, PLP has largely melted itself into the more general ]-centered International Workers Day marches which claim themselves (since the first such event, in 2006) to be part of a rebirth of an International Workers Day celebration in the United States. PL often marches in these situations the same way they tend to march at rallies they organize themselves — chanting loudly for communist revolution and forming a sea of red flags. Members chiefly claim that involving themselves in the more general marches, rather than hosting their own, gives them more maneuverability, and also more visibility, amongst the larger segments of the working class. Both the historical party-run marches from the 1970s through the early 2000s, and the current marches in which the party now participates as contingents, have always largely been in its most active cities for political activity and recruitment — ], ] and ]. However, smaller supporting May Day marches sometimes have occurred in less prominent cities and towns{{Citation needed|date=April 2011}}. Globally, PLP supporters typically take part in the rest of the world's much larger May Day events as contingents.

PL's biweekly ] is '']'' and the parallel ] counterpart ''Desafío'', as well as a semi-annual theoretical ], ''The Communist''. In particular, the party's 2005 document is said to be the most up-to-date representation of overall Party ]; prior to this, its ''Road To Revolution'' documents had acted in that ]-type capacity. The party has not published a new ''Road To Revolution'' document with party-wide endorsement since ''Road To Revolution IV'' in 1982, which marked the start of its pledge to "fight directly for communism" and disown the idea of socialism. There still exists a ''Road To Revolution 4.5'' published in 1996, but support for this document has in recent years been withdrawn by the majority of leading PLP political figures and its contents have been disavowed.

==Notes/citations==
{{Reflist}} {{Reflist}}
Klehr, Harvey (1990) Far Left of Center: The American Radical Left. New York: Transaction Publishers. p.&nbsp;88.


== External links ==
==Further reading==
* {{Official website|http://www.plp.org/}}
* Benin, Leigh David. ''A Red Thread In Garment: Progressive Labor And New York City’s Industrial Heartland In The 1960s And 1970s.'' Ph.D. diss. New York University, 1997.
* Benin, Leigh David. ''The New Labor Radicalism and New York City's Garment Industry : Progressive Labor Insurgents During the 1960s.'' Garland Studies in the History of American Labor Series. 330 pages. Garland Publishing. November, 1999. ISBN 0-8153-3385-4.
* (document 4 of 5 in series) chronicles the last tumultuous days of the original Students for a Democratic Society and the rise of the Revolutionary Youth Movement and PL's Worker Student Alliance as the two principal SDS factions. Claimed to have been written by an undercover federal agent at the proceedings.
* Sumner, D.S. and R.S. Butler (Jim Dann and Hari Dillon). ''The Five Retreats: A History of the Failure of the Progressive Labor Party.'' Reconstruction Press, 1977. ISBN (????)
* . Review of PLP album of contemporary revolutionary songs. Published on Thursday, April 13, 1972. The ]. Retrieved October 8, 2005.
* Waters, Mary-Alice. ''Maoism in the U.S.: A Critical History of the Progressive Labor Party.'' ], New York, 1969.

==Historic PLP publications==
* Ault, Paul, Bill Epton, et al. eds. ''Progressive Labor'' vol. 3, no. 4, March 1964. Progressive Labor Movement. Brooklyn, NY. 1964.
* Epton, Bill. ''The Black Liberation Struggle (Within The Current World Struggle)''. Speech at Old Westbury College, Feb. 26, 1976. 26 pages. Harlem: Black Liberation Press, 1976. Stapled paperback, cover illustrated by Tom Feelings.
* Epton, Bill. ''We accuse; Bill Epton speaks to the court''. Progressive Labor Party, New York. 1966.
* Harlem Defense Council. ''Police Terror In Harlem''. NY: Harlem Defense Council, nd . 12 pages. Stapled paperback pamphlet. Photos.
* . ''Organize! Use Wendy Nakashima's campaign for assembly (69 a.d.) to fight back!''. Progressive Labor Party, New York. .
* Progressive Labor Movement. ''Road to revolution: the outlook of the Progressive Labor Movement''. PLM, Brooklyn. 1964.
* Progressive Labor Party. ''Notes on black liberation''. Black Liberation Commission. Progressive Labor Party, New York. 1965.
* Progressive Labor Party. ''ILWU report''. Trade Union Commission of the Progressive Labor Party, Berkeley. .
* Progressive Labor Party. ''Smash the bosses' armed forces. A fighting program for GIs. Defeat racism and anti-Communism—build GI-Worker Alliance—Smash the bosses' use of the Army against workers at home and abroad''. Progressive Labor Party, Brooklyn, NY. .
* Progressive Labor Party. ''Nixon mines North Vietnam ports, threatens world nuclear war. Workers and students must say NO with a GENERAL STRIKE!!''. Progress Labor Party, Boston. .
* Progressive Labor Party. ''PL red line newsletter''. vol. 1, no. 4. Campus Progressive Labor Party, . .
* Progressive Labor Party. ''Revolution Today, USA: A look at the Progressive Labor Movement and the Progressive Labor Party.'' Exposition Press, New York, 1970.

==External links==
*
* , a 2005 report reflecting the current world outlook and political line of PLP
* *


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Latest revision as of 23:13, 10 December 2024

Communist political party
Progressive Labor Party
AbbreviationPLP
FoundedJanuary 1962; 63 years ago (1962-01)
HeadquartersBrooklyn, New York
NewspaperChallenge
Ideology
Political positionFar-left
Colors  Red
Website
www.plp.org
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The Progressive Labor Party (PLP) is an anti-revisionist Marxist–Leninist communist party in the United States. It was established in January 1962 as the Progressive Labor Movement following a split in the Communist Party USA, adopting its new name at a convention held in the spring of 1965. It was involved in the anti-Vietnam War movement of the 1960s and early 1970s through its Worker Student Alliance faction of Students for a Democratic Society.

The PLP publishes a fortnightly newspaper, Challenge.

History

Establishment

Former CPUSA Buffalo District Organizer Milt Rosen was the primary founder of the Progressive Labor Party

The PLP began as an organized faction called the Progressive Labor Movement in January 1962. It was formed in the aftermath of a fall 1961 split in the Communist Party of the United States (CPUSA) that saw the expulsion of left-wing labor activists Milt Rosen (1926–2011) and Mortimer Scheer. Before his expulsion, Rosen was a prominent CPUSA functionary, serving as District Organizer for upstate New York from 1957 and Industrial Organizer for all of New York state from 1959. An initial organizational meeting was held in December 1961, attended by 12 of the approximately 50 current and former CPUSA members identifying themselves as the "Call group". Rosen delivered a political report to the Cuban Revolution-inspired group urging the establishment of a new communist party in the United States to replace the CPUSA, which was characterized as irredeemably "revisionist".

The organization remained amorphous in its first months, publishing Progressive Labor—initially a monthly newsletter—and engaging in small-scale discussions. An organizational conference was called by the editors of Progressive Labor to be held in New York City in July 1962. This gathering, held at the Hotel Diplomat, was attended by 50 people from 11 different cities and served to launch a formal organization, the Progressive Labor Movement. Rosen again delivered the main political report to the gathering, calling for the writing of a program and development of a network of clubs and affiliated mass organizations in order to win supporters for a new revolutionary socialist movement. Given the small size of the fledgling organization, formation of a political party was deemed unpropitious. The name "Progressive Labor Movement" was selected to emphasize the organization's early and transitional nature. The Progressive Labor Movement was finally reconstituted as the Progressive Labor Party at a founding convention held in New York City on April 15–18, 1965. A 20-member National Committee was elected, and Rosen became the party's founding chair. Organizational headquarters were established in New York City.

1960s

The PLP made periodic forays into electoral politics, including a run of Bill Epton for New York State Senate in 1965

Although it disdains parliamentarism as an end, the Progressive Labor Movement was quick to make use of the electoral process as a vehicle for propaganda, launching an effort to gain the signatures of 5,000 registered voters in New York City to put a PLP candidate on the ballot for the November 1963 election of the New York City Council. Although it did not manage to place its candidate on the ballot, the proto-PLP distributed more than 100,000 pieces of party literature in conjunction with the electoral campaign.

The PLP remained of modest size throughout the decade. It did not publicize its membership, but federal income tax returns filed in 1967 and 1968 provide a reasonable proxy. The PLP formally existed as a publishing partnership listing Milt Rosen and the party's 1965 candidate for New York State Senate, Bill Epton, as partners. These returns showed income and expenditures of about $66,000 in 1967 and about $88,600 in 1968, with the partners claiming no income from the ostensible business relationship.

During the 1960s, the PLP followed the international political line of the Chinese Communist Party and was described by commentators as "Maoist". The organization carved out a niche in the anti-Vietnam War movement, with its Worker Student Alliance faction acting as rivals to the Revolutionary Youth Movement faction within Students for a Democratic Society, a part of which (RYM 1) later evolved into the Weather Underground.

The PLP made extensive use of mass organizations (front groups) from its earliest years, through which it spread its ideas, raised funds and recruited new members. Among these were the Student Committee for Travel to Cuba (1963–64), which organized travel to post-revolutionary Cuba; the Harlem Defense Council (1964), organized in response to racially oriented rioting in Harlem; the May 2nd Movement (M2M, established 1964), organized in opposition to the Vietnam War; and other short-lived, issue-driven front groups.

1970s

The PLP ended its previous political line supporting the Cultural Revolution and broke with the People's Republic of China in the spring of 1971 with the publication of an internal discussion bulletin for party members detailing eight points of disagreement with the Chinese regime. These related to the softening of China's foreign relations towards Cambodia, North Korea, Romania, Yugoslavia, and the United States, its "complete elevation of the Black Panther Party as the revolutionary group in the United States" and its "total collusion with every nationalist fake the world over, from Nasser to Nkrumah".

During the 1970s, the PLP began to shape its activity around racism in the United States, forming a mass organization called the Committee Against Racism (CAR). A CAR convention held in New York City in July 1976 drew 500 participants. The organization made use of aggressive direct action tactics against its perceived opponents, disrupting presentations by the controversial psychologist Arthur Jensen and the physicist William Shockley in the spring of 1976. The CAR were the most vocal of the hostile critics of the sociobiologist E. O. Wilson. The organization picketed in Harvard Square and handed out flyers calling for demonstrations against sociobiology, which in their view was being used to defend individuals and groups responsible for racism, war, and genocide. In 1977, the organization, now renamed the International Committee Against Racism (InCAR), made headlines by disrupting an academic conference by pouring a pitcher of water on Wilson's head while chanting "Wilson, you're all wet".

Structure

PLP members in 2006

According to the constitution adopted at the time of the PLP's formation in 1965, membership was open to anyone at least 17 years old who accepted the program and policies of the party, paid dues and required assessments and subscribed to party publications. Supreme authority within the organization was to be exerted by national conventions, held every two years. The convention was to elect a National Committee to handle matters of governance between conventions. The PLP's primary party unit was the "club", organized either on a shop, territorial, or functional basis. All party members were required to be active members of a club and bound by the principles of democratic centralism, in which decisions of higher bodies were considered binding on participants in lower bodies. During the 1960s, new members were additionally required to undergo three months of ideological training, usually in small group settings in individual houses.

Owing in part to the significant economic and extensive time requirements expected of its members, the PLP has since its inception been a small cadre organization, with an "estimated hard-core membership" of about 350 in 1970, supplemented by numerous sympathizers. Members during the 1960s were predominantly from white, middle-class backgrounds, shunned drug use, and tended "to dress neatly and wear short hair", according to a 1971 House Internal Security Committee staff report.

Publications

During the 1960s and 1970s, the PLP published a magazine called Progressive Labor, which first appeared as a monthly before shifting to quarterly and later bimonthly publication. The press run of Progressive Labor circa 1970 was approximately 10,000. The party also published Challenge, a publication likewise issued at changing intervals over the years. In 1970, the press run of this publication was approximately 75,000, according to the estimates of government investigators, with many of these copies unsold.

Challenge remains in production today as a biweekly, issued under the same covers with its parallel Spanish language counterpart Desafío. The PLP also produces a semiannual theoretical magazine, The Communist.

During 1963 and 1964, the PLP also produced a theoretical magazine called Marxist-Leninist Quarterly. This publication was terminated and merged with Progressive Labor magazine in 1965. A West Coast publication called Spark was also produced from 1965 until early 1968.

See also

Further reading

  • Robert Jackson Alexander, Maoism in the Developed World. Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2001.
  • Leigh David Benin, A Red Thread In Garment: Progressive Labor And New York City’s Industrial Heartland In The 1960s And 1970s. Ph.D. dissertation. New York University, 1997.
  • Leigh David Benin, The New Labor Radicalism and New York City's Garment Industry: Progressive Labor Insurgents During the 1960s. New York: Garland Publishing, 1999.
  • House Committee on Internal Security, Progressive Labor Party: Hearings Before the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session: April 13, 14, and November 18, 1971 (Including Index). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972.
  • Progressive Labor Party, "The History of the Progressive Labor Party – Part One," Progressive Labor, vol. 10, no. 1 (August–September 1975).
  • D.S. Sumner and R.S. Butler (Jim Dann and Hari Dillon). The Five Retreats: A History of the Failure of the Progressive Labor Party. Reconstruction Press, 1977.
  • Mary-Alice Waters, Maoism in the U.S.: A Critical History of the Progressive Labor Party. New York: Young Socialist Alliance, 1969.

Historic PLP publications

  • Bill Epton, The Black Liberation Struggle (Within The Current World Struggle). Speech at Old Westbury College, February 26, 1976. Harlem: Black Liberation Press, 1976.
  • Bill Epton, We Accuse: Bill Epton Speaks to the Court. New York: Progressive Labor Party, 1966.
  • Harlem Defense Council, Police Terror In Harlem. NY: Harlem Defense Council, n.d. .
  • , Organize! Use Wendy Nakashima's campaign for assembly (69 a.d.) to fight back!. Progressive Labor Party, New York. .
  • Progressive Labor Movement, Road to Revolution: The Outlook of the Progressive Labor Movement. Brooklyn: Progressive Labor Movement, 1964.
  • Progressive Labor Party, Notes on Black Liberation. New York: Black Liberation Commission, Progressive Labor Party, 1965.
  • Progressive Labor Party, Smash the Bosses' Armed Forces. A Fighting Program for GIs.. Brooklyn, NY: Progressive Labor Party, n.d. .
  • Progressive Labor Party, Revolution Today, USA: A Look at the Progressive Labor Movement and the Progressive Labor Party. New York: Exposition Press, 1970.

References

  1. ^ House Committee on Internal Security, "Staff Study: Progressive Labor Party," in Progressive Labor Party: Hearings Before the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session: April 13, 14, and November 18, 1971 (Including Index). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972; pg. 4129.
  2. ^ Edward J. Bacciocco, Jr., "United States of America," in Richard F. Staar (ed.), Yearbook on International Communist Affairs, 1972. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1972; pg. 425.
  3. ^ Progressive Labor Party, "The History of the Progressive Labor Party – Part One," Progressive Labor, vol. 10, no. 1 (Aug.-Sept. 1975).
  4. Testimony of Herbert Romerstein in House Committee on Internal Security, Progressive Labor Party: Hearings Before the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session: April 13, 14, and November 18, 1971 (Including Index). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972; pg. 4052.
  5. "Comrade Milt Rosen, 1926-2011 Founding Chairperson of PLP, Great 20th Century Revolutionary". Retrieved 19 September 2014.
  6. ^ "Staff Report" in Progressive Labor Party: Hearings... pg. 4136.
  7. ^ "Review of PLP Income Tax Returns," in House Internal Security Committee, Progressive Labor Party: Hearings... pg. 4447.
  8. Dylan Matthews, "The Washington Post picked its top American Communists. Wonkblog begs to differ," Washington Post, Sept. 26, 2013.
  9. ^ "Staff Report" in Progressive Labor Party: Hearings... pg. 4135.
  10. ^ "Progressive Labor Party Line on Communist China," in House Internal Security Committee, Progressive Labor Party: Hearings..." pg. 4431.
  11. ^ Harvey Klehr, "United States of America," in Richard F. Staar (ed.). Yearbook on International Communist Affairs, 1977. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1977; pp. 500-501.
  12. Ullica Segerstråle. Defenders of the Truth: The Battle for Science in the Sociology Debate and Beyond. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2000; pp. 21-22.
  13. Wilson, Edward O. 1995. Naturalist.
  14. ^ "Staff Report" in Progressive Labor Party: Hearings... pg. 4131.
  15. Testimony of Alma Pfaff, in House Committee on Internal Security, Progressive Labor Party: Hearings Before the Committee on Internal Security, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session: April 13, 14, and November 18, 1971 (Including Index). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972; pg. 4047.
  16. ^ Romerstein in Progressive Labor Party: Hearings... pg. 4055.
  17. Pfaff in Progressive Labor Party: Hearings... pg. 4048.
  18. ^ "Staff Report" in Progressive Labor Party: Hearings... pg. 4133.

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