AROUND THE WORLD Washington for jobs, peace, and freedom on August 27 along with a half million other working people are all part of the process that is deepening the political consciousness of many workers.
Furthermore, there is no way to know in advance which unions will move for-
NEW SPANISH ABORTION LAW ward first and over what issues.
For instance, in the late 1960s and early 1970s a rank-and-file movement DOES LITTLE FOR WOMEN rose up in the oldest industrial union in the United States - the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA). That movement became so powerful that it overthrew the entrenched bureaucracy and established important elements of rank-and-file control over the coal-miners' union.
How did it begin? Mine workers built a movement around health and safety. In response to the deadly illness, "Black Lung," miners demanded federal health and safety legislation. The top union leadership reluctantly supported the movement but refused to lead the fight against the coal operators necessary to win these demands.
During this movement, new leaders who favored democracy in the UMWA began to come forward. Although the bureaucracy used force and violence attempt to beat back the movement, eventually the bureaucratic caste was thrown out - not just at the top, but throughout the UMWA. Democratic forms of functioning - many of which existed on paper but had been abused by the bureaucracy - were given life blood and new ones instituted for the first time since the union was founded in the late 1800s.
This revolution in a major industrial union was an unprecedented development, something not seen since the rise of industrial unionism in the 1930s.
The democratic forms established by the mine workers - which will not nec. essarily be the same in other unions when their bureaucratic castes are overthrown - have continuously been utilized by the miners to defend their interests. Many a local, regional, and national leadership has been removed by the ranks when they felt these leaderships were not effectively fighting the coal operators.
The miners' experience places them in 26
On Thursday October 6, the parliament in the Spanish state passed a bill introduced by the ruling Socialist Party (PSOE) to legalise abortion in certain cases. These cases were rape, danger to the life of the mother and deformation of
The limitations to this new law have just been graphically illustrated. Bilbao women who had abortions between 1968 and 1976 have just been given sentences by the Supreme Court ranging from 140 dollar fines to over twelve years in prison.
These women had originally been acquitted by a lower court because of their 'state of necessity', that is, their
The Supreme Court, in ruling this decision, interpreted the new
Ironically, the case of the Bilbao 11 was the original catalyst to the abortion movement in the Spanish state - which resulted in the PSOE feeling under pressure to go some way to liberalising the
The first Bilbao trial opened in 1979 after a number of delays. It provided a focus for a widespread campaign. Thousands of women and men signed a public document stating that they had had an abortion, or helped women to obtain one. Demonstrations were held, international observers invited, and lawyers paraded through the streets of Bilbao in protest.
This trial was suspended, as was the second in 1982. Only in March 1982 was the verdict finally given. It marked a turning point in Spanish law, and seemed to be a victory not only for the women on trial but Spanish women in general. The Bilbao judge defined the 'state of necessity' as an extenuating circumstance, and said that the 'right to life' protected in the constitution did not include "juridical protection of life in formation'. A remarkable ruling in a Catholic country.
The Supreme Court upheld the acquittal of four women, while finding the other five guilty. It also increased the previous sentences on the woman abortionist and the man accused of helping another woman to get an abortion.
The Madrid Abortion Rights Commission and other feminist organisations immediately attacked the sentence, pointing out it showed how little the new law would do to help the vast majority of Spanish women who want abortions. Only 3 per cent of the women who have abortions in the Spanish state each year will be helped by this law. Otherwise they will continue to have illegal abortions on their kitchen tables, risking trials and prison sentences, or, if they can afford it, flying to London or Amsterdam. The promised PSOE's 'new course' has not yet done much for women.
International Viewpoint 28 November 1983
SUCCESSFUL SWISS
ANTI-MISSILES DEMONSTRATION
The last few weeks have seen huge demonstrations in many European countries against the installation of the Nato missiles (see article in this issue on page 13).
Such a demonstration also took place in Switzerland on November 5, as the major action in a Day of Action for Peace. Our Swiss comrades sent this report.
BERNE — 60,000 people at Berne is equivalent to almost 400,000 people in Bonn, the capital of West Germany. It is an unchallengeable fact that an important step forward has been made. The success of the first big demonstration on December 5, 1981 has been considerably broadened and consolidated. No longer can the peace movement be talked of as a simple flash in the pan' animated by a desire to imitate what is going on elsewhere, or as being 'manipulated by Moscow'
There are several reasons for the ongoing nature and consolidation of the movement. The young and working people of Switzerland feel that they are directly affected by the stationing of Cruise and Pershing II missiles in Europe. An opinion poll carried out by Swiss German television showed that 48 per cent of the people asked thought that the installation of the missiles should be put back to give more time for the US-Soviet Geneva negotiations. In French-speaking Switzerland 42 per cent were of the same opinion.
The same poll showed that 42 per cent thought that the Swiss government should pursue a more active peace policy, while 48 percent considered that Cruise and Pershing II missiles would make no positive contribution to their security. These results confirm the correctness of the demands put forward in the Day of Action.
It should be noted that the bourgeois International Viewpoint 28 November 1983 parties and the Federal Council have intheir slanders against the peace movement. The most striking example of this attitude was the communiques of the Radical Party, and of the Society of Swiss Officers, attacking the day for its unilateralism, as the SS20s were not mentioned in the platform of demands.
In reality, and interviews with many superior officers show this, the official policy of the Federal Council is to welcome the deployment of Cruise and Pershing. In that sense, the unilateralism of the platform on this point is only the product of the official policy.
We can say, without fear of contradiction, that the official policy of the Federal Council, and government, of lining up with Nato, has met with a rebuff. The real significance of the demand for 'a more active peace policy' is to question this agreement with warmonger Reagan's
An agreement that could also be noted in a series of other areas, such as detriment of social spending, repression of conscientious objectors, and the desire to build new army practice ranges as at
The overall crisis of the system, the sharp rise in imperialist military intervention in the dependent countries, the frenzied austerity policies of the bourgeois governments, all these factors also underly the peace mobilisations. to struggle for a different future than struction of humanity.
We think that repercussions from the day of action. We will see the opening of a still broader debate, and a lot more activity in the arena of the social, military and foreign policy of the present bourgeois parliamentary majority. This is a positive step.
### FRENCH
ANTI-RACIST MARCH The horrific killing on November 15 of a young Arab by four young men travelling with a sergeant to join the Foreign Legion underlines the increasing danger discrimination that North African immigrants face today in France.
In the last two years racist attacks have claimed some 60 victims. same time the far-right have been increas ing their scores in municipal elections from 9 per cent to 17 percent.
The Socialist Party-Communist Party government have not combatted increasing racism through implementation of Mitterrand's election promises: to give immigrants the right to vote in municipal elections, issue ten-year combined work and residence permits (rather than the present complicated system of three different types of residence permit and two for the right to work), and regularise the situation of the sans papiers (without
It is in response to this situation that an anti-racist march for equality is presently traversing France. Thirty marchers left Marseilles on October 15 They will make their way through the big cities and industrial areas of eastern France, including Grenoble, Lyon, Dijon, Lille and Amiens, to Paris where there will be a national demonstration on December 3.
The march was originated by a charitable organisation concerned with refugees and those in need, the CIMADE, and a local association of public housing residents, SOS Avenir Minguettes. It is now supported by all the big anti-racist and immigrant organisations.
A spokesperson of CIMADE explained the reasons for the march at a press conference on October 13, "There is still no equality, despite the anti-racist laws there is no equality in real life, for example, in being allowed to stay in the country where one has lived for ten years. When Will we get a single [work and residence] card?'
As the march makes its way through France it is being met by local demonstrations, forums or days of action on anti-racism, activities that are also being undertaken to prepare the mobilisation for December 3 in Paris.
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