CHICAGO, March 19—On Monday, March 12, PL’ers joined a group of other anti-racists rallying in front of the county building to demand bail for Tyrone Williams, a Black worker arrested for expressing his outrage at the courtroom injustice of the fascist judge in the pretend trial of killer cop Jason Van Dyke. A speech by a Progressive Labor Party member, who had been arrested for similar reasons, explained the racist nature of the entire capitalist system and its courts.
From the rally we proceeded to the offices of the chief Cook County judge, who refused to meet with us. Nevertheless, before leaving we expressed our demands -- drop the charges or at least set bond for Tyrone and release him. A few days later Tyrone was indeed released on $3,000 bond, but only after a week in jail.
With many other anti-racist fighters we have been packing the courtroom in our sustained attempts to prevent Van Dyke’s exoneration for killing Black teenager LaQuan McDonald in 2014 at point blank range, with no fewer than sixteen bullets. Throughout the entire struggle, we PL’ers have proclaimed our communist understanding that there can be no justice for workers under the capitalist system, but only through revolution for a system that puts workers’ needs first.
PLP has been active in the movement against police terror in Chicago, terror that is always directed against the working class – primarily against Black but also against white members of our class.
Racist judge and courts strike again
The U.S. court system was set up by the slave-owning founders to dispense injustice for the working class. But Judge Vincent Gaughan, the fascist goon put in charge of Van Dyke’s fake trial (with its predetermined exoneration), has ruled with a level of viciousness beyond even the usual. He has held a number of anti-racist fighters in contempt of court, including the comrade who spoke at the rally, who had the nerve to snap his fingers in the courtroom last June.
On March 8, Gaughan had Norman Hall, a Black worker, arrested for holding his hand up to ask a question. It was then that Tyrone, a member of the police reform movement, was also arrested when, in his fury at Norman’s arrest, he simply blurted out, “What?” Just like that, two more Black workers were dragged deep into the bosses’ criminal injustice system and held in county jail without bond.
Through such travesties does the capitalist class wield their state power over us. While the system lets a racist killer-cop roam free on bond for two and a half years, the judge imprisons two Black workers for the “crime” of being justifiably infuriated. Norman and Tyrone now face devastating consequences: loss of freedom, loss of jobs, legal fees, fines, possible probation, and the strong possibility of never being able to find work again. Meanwhile, the legal system tries to figure out how to absolve the murdering cop without incurring mass rebellion, as in Ferguson, Missouri.
Workers organize fighting response
We salute our fellow anti-racist fighters and those workers everywhere committed to organizing our class in the face of fascist terror. The bosses’ ability to build the fascism they need, to mobilize the working class as soldiers in their inter-imperialist rivalry, will only be limited by the size and political leadership of the mass anti-fascist international movement. Actions such as our packing the courtrooms will develop into bigger and bolder ways to sharpen the struggle and build class consciousness. Each action we take now is part of our march toward a worldwide mass revolution for a working-class led communist society that will sweep all racist trash into the dustbin of history.
A communist society can and will smash all forms of racism, because it will have destroyed the root of oppression and exploitation on which racism rests: the capitalist profit system. In the revolutionary Soviet Union, communist leaders and the working class outlawed racism in all its forms—not just in written laws but in actual practice! Similarly, a communist society led by PLP will create a world where racist killers and crimes will be crushed quickly and severely.