Victory! Florida prisons lift ban on ‘Militant,’ Indiana fight continues
https://themilitant.com/2021/06/05/victory-florida-prisons-lift-ban-on-militant-indiana-fight-continues/
BY BRIAN WILLIAMS
Vol. 85/No. 23
June 14, 2021
Another victory! On May 27 the Militant was informed by Charles Huber,
the new chair of the Florida Department of Corrections Literature Review
Committee, that the ban on five consecutive Militant issues from March
imposed by the Century Correctional Institution there was overturned.
“The LRC met 5/24,” Charles Huber wrote Militant attorney David
Goldstein. “All of the Militants you mentioned were approved. They will
be released to the inmates.”
These impoundments, which the Militant first learned about in early May,
involved a far-reaching attack on the right of the paper to present its
political point of view, targeting 11 articles prison authorities deemed
“inadmissible.”
These articles covered important struggles by working people, from the
union-organizing drive at Amazon in Alabama to the strike being waged by
steelworkers against Allegheny Technologies Inc. They also objected to
the paper’s reports on the readers contributing all or part of their
government “stimulus” checks to the Militant and Socialist Workers Party.
Each article, the rejection notices from Century prison officials
claimed, “encourages, riot, insurrection, rebellion, organized prison,
disruption of the institution.”
“The victory in rolling back this ban is a victory for the rights of our
readers behind bars and of the constitutional rights of freedom of
speech and of the press,” said Militant editor John Studer. “We will
fight against all impoundments. And most of the time, as here, we’re
successful.”
‘Militant’ fights ban in Indiana
Fight Indiana prison ban on the ‘Militant’
Email jFerguson1@xxxxxxxxxxx or alevitt@xxxxxxxxxxx. Send a copy to
themilitant@xxxxxxx
In Indiana, Kevin “Rashid” Johnson, incarcerated at the Wabash Valley
Correctional Facility in Carlisle, has been denied two Militant issues
that report on gains made by workers and farmers in Cuba through making
and defending their socialist revolution in the early 1960s. Authorities
said they didn’t like a photo run in both issues — it accompanied an
article in English in one, and the same article in Spanish the following
issue — because it showed “images of guns.”
At issue is a well-known historical photo of Cuban militia members
celebrating after the defeat of the U.S.-organized attempted mercenary
invasion at the Bay of Pigs in April 1961.
Johnson is a leader of the New Afrikan Black Panther Party. He informed
the Militant that while prison officials claim they bar photos of guns,
they show and rent television movies that depict guns and gun violence,
for example “The Courier” and “Monster Hunter.” The Militant fought
successfully to reverse impoundments of his paper last year and in 2019.
“I’m very surprised to hear that Johnson is not being given his paper,”
said George Blue, a former prisoner who lives in Michigan City, Indiana,
in a phone interview May 29. “I’m sending a letter to protest this.”
Blue was first introduced to the Militant while incarcerated at the
federal prison in Leavenworth, Kansas, in the late 1950s, and has been
reading the paper ever since.
After being transferred to a prison in Atlanta in the early ’70s, “I got
a couple issues of the paper and no more,” Blue said. “Then one day a
guy told me, ‘George, in the library there are Militants with your name
on it.’”
Blue got in touch with the American Civil Liberties Union to challenge
why he wasn’t getting the papers. Prison officials “didn’t know what to
say so they gave them to me,” he said.
“I’ve learned a lot from the Militant,” Blue said. “Prisoners in the
federal system all respected the Militant, which is what upsets the
officials.”
Front Page Articles
Refinery workers fight ExxonMobil lockout
Iranian rulers seek to tighten grip, advance Mideast clout
SWP: ‘Workers need a fighting class-struggle road forward’
Worldwide caravans demand: End US embargo against Cuba!
Victory! Florida prisons lift ban on ‘Militant,’ Indiana fight continues
Biden $6 trillion budget won’t end jobs crisis, will push up prices
Feature Articles
Alabama miners rally, win solidarity in strike battle
Also In This Issue
Liberals claim teaching math reinforces white supremacy
Thanks to all! SWP ‘stimulus’ fund will help build the party
SWP attacked at Louisville rally over call to recognize both Israel,
Palestine
Manchester bus drivers strike pushed back bosses’ attack
Belarus dictator forces plane down, seizes protester
Back iron ore workers strike in north Quebec
Campaign to expand reach of ‘Militant,’ books, fund goal April 24 - June
29 (week five)
Editorials
Workers need our own party, a labor party
On the Picket Line
Striking Quebec meatpackers march for wages, respect
Coffee workers in UK win international solidarity
Books of the Month
Mighty rise of unions in 1930s posed need for a labor party
25, 50 and 75 years ago
Corrections
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--
Irvin D. Yalom “Truth," Nietzsche continued, "is arrived at through
disbelief and skepticism, not through a childlike wishing something were
so! Your patient's wish to be in God's hands is not truth. It is simply
a child's wish—and nothing more! It is a wish not to die, a wish for the
eveastingly bloated nipple we have labeled 'God'! Evolutionary theory
scientifically demonstrates God's redundancy—though Darwin himself had
not the courage to follow his evidence to its true conclusion. Surely,
you must realize that we created God, and that all of us together now
have killed him.” ― Irvin D. Yalom, When Nietzsche Wept