The fascists and the state:
United against the people

The appearance — with exceptional media coverage — of the Ku Klux Klan 
(KKK) in Australia recently makes the following article by David Lethbridge 
in People's Voice, "Canada's leading Communist newspaper", 
especially relevant.

On May 9, 1998, the KKK held a rally in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Significantly, 
it wasn't just any Klan mob: it was the American Knights of the Ku Klux 
Klan run by Jeff Berry, the fastest growing KKK faction in North America 
today.

These violent, gun-toting ideologues of fascism target people of colour, 
Jews, gays, abortion-providers, and immigrants.

Back in 1994, Berry committed fraud and theft against an elderly woman in 
Indiana. He took her for about $3,500 worth of roof-replacement and car 
repairs, work which he never actually bothered to do.

But when the case came to trial, three charges were dropped, and he was put 
on probation for a fourth. According to the prosecutors, Berry had become a 
drug informant for the state.

Two years later Berry beat up a man who had rented a house from him, and 
was also arrested for receiving stolen property. When the police went to 
Berry's house, they found a number of weapons, including a MAC-90 semi-
automatic rifle, in direct violation of his probation order.

But the charges were dropped. Around the same time, he was arrested for 
rioting and resisting the police. But when the case got to court, the 
prosecutors again dropped all felony charges when Berry pleaded guilty to 
mere "obstruction of traffic" and "disorderly conduct".

In January 1998, Berry's American Knights were given permission to march on 
the birthday of Martin Luther King, in Memphis, where King had been 
assassinated. Anti-racists demonstrated, and the police filled the streets 
with tear gas.

In March 1998, the American Knights filed a lawsuit against the city of 
Cicero, Illinois, for denying them a parade permit. Gutlessly, the town 
caved in and promised to spend $10,000 to mail Klan literature to every 
home in the community.

Two months later, the Klan were in Ann Arbor. This time, the city spent 
$137,000 of public money to help out the racists.

The police met the Klan outside of town and chauffeured them straight to 
city hall in five white vans. The KKK hurled their vicious message from 
behind bullet-proof glass and an eight-foot (2.4-metre) chain link fence, 
set up at city expense with riot police there to protect them.

A police helicopter floated above, and police spies were strategically 
located with video cameras ready to film the demonstrators.

Thugs like Jeff Berry and his Klan get what they want, and they get it from 
the state.

So, what's new? After all, it's not news that the state, in both the USA 
and Canada, has, let us say, a special relationship with the fascists.

Not so long ago, Bill Wilkinson's Invisible Empire KKK held a cross-burning 
on board the US Navy's USS America, wore Klan robes on the 
Independence, and provoked racial incidents on the Concord.

Wilkinson, who had been a member of Naval Intelligence, was also an active 
FBI informant.

In Canada, William Lau Richardson, a former CIA operative whose previous 
Canadian jobs had involved building a bomb to be planted in a union 
activist's car, and spying on Chilean exiles, was parachuted into the 
Canadian Klan by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to infiltrate and spy on 
left-wing groups.

These are only two examples from a file too thick to print.

What's new is that in Ann Arbor, the state is actively engaged in a 
witchhunt against anti-Klan activists, and in Canada, CSIS — the Canadian 
Intelligence and Security Service — is stepping up its spying activities 
against anti-racists.

When Berry's Klan came to Ann Arbor, 600 activists, largely organised by 
the National Women's Rights Organising Coalition and Anti-Racist Action, 
showed up to vigorously protest. Some rocks were thrown and a few windows 
were broken.

So far, 21 people have been arrested, ten of whom are charged with felonies 
that carry a possible ten-year sentence! Nine of the defendants facing 10 
years in prison are charged with rioting based on allegedly "throwing rocks 
at windows".

Another activist facing 10 years is being charged with "incitement to 
riot". Still others are charged with "damaging a police fence".

NWROC leaders Jessica Curtin and Shanta Driver are particularly being 
targeted.

So far, one defendant has gone to trial. Ryan Lang, who was 15 at the time 
of the demonstration, was indicted for felony rioting.

The state wanted to jail him for ten years. The jury deliberated for less 
than an hour and found him innocent. Other trials are forthcoming.

Yes, Lang was innocent. But what about the district attorney? What about 
the state itself? When and where will these utter bastards be brought to 
justice?

Because trying to jail a 15-year-old boy for standing up to the Klan is a 
crime in itself. To try to smash the people's resistance against racism and 
fascism by launching a political witchhunt is a crime against the people, 
and it will not be forgotten.

Here in Canada, CSIS says it has "opened files" on anti-racist activists 
who made "violent threats". CSIS is concerned about "strident exchanges and 
violent clashes" between racists and anti-racists.

Make no mistake, the US state and the Canadian state think nothing of 
spying on dissenters and hiring thugs to build up racial tensions. They 
think nothing of assassination and torture, particularly when it takes 
place out of sight in some distant satellite country that they either 
support or set up in the first place — Pinochet's Chile, Suharto's 
Indonesia, Fujimora's Peru, and all the rest.

But to throw a rock! To damage a fence! To utter a threat! Well, this must 
be punished severely.

After all, says the state, even the fascists have a right to speak from the 
steps of city hall, or the rooftops of police stations, or the meeting 
rooms of public libraries. After all, we are civilised people!

And so trying to toss a 15-year-old in prison for 10 years is hardly 
barbaric when one considers that the rights of Nazis are at stake!

But we do not forget the police murders of Fred Hampton and Bobby Hutton of 
the Black Panther Party. We do not forget Lee Otis Johnson, of the Student 
Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, who got 30 years for giving a police 
informant a joint.

We do not forget John Sinclair, the key organiser of the White Panther 
Party in Detroit, sentenced to 10 years for giving two joints to an 
undercover cop. We do not forget Robert "Tex" Gentles, who was murdered by 
guards in the Kingston Penitentiary.

We do not forget Leonard Peltier and Mumia Abu-Jamal. We do not forget the 
endless stream of racist police brutality that has gone on for decades.

When the state wants to silence progressive opposition, when it wants to 
gag those who call out against oppression, or put chains on the raised fist 
of liberation, it will always find a way to do it. Nothing is easier than a 
frame-up.

That's why we have to come to the defence of the ARA and the National 
Women's Rights Organising Committee, in Ann Arbor. Get in touch at

www.umich.edu/~nwroc.

The fraudulent tactic of trying to separate the charges against the 
protestors from the state's own complicity in supporting the Klan and 
engaging in political frame-ups simply must not stand.

Free all political prisoners! Fighting racism is not a crime, supporting 
anti-racists is our duty.