May Day: 'Build Black/Brown unity'

On April 4, the 40th anniversary of the assassination of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., New York Councilperson Charles Barron hosted an important press conference on the steps of City Hall to promote the necessity for Black and Brown unity, as well as workers rights, in preparation for a May Day march and rally in New York City. May Day, or International Workers Day, will take place at Union Square in Manhattan starting at 12 noon on Thurs., May 1.

New York City Councilperson Charles Barron, pointing finger, at April 4th news conference. Photo: Roberto Mercado

Barron, along with community, anti-war and labor activists from the Black and Latin@ movement, paid tribute to the legacy of Dr. King, who was felled by an assassin’s bullet in 1968 in Memphis, where he had come to support a sanitation strike. A number of the speakers made the point that if Dr. King were alive now, he would oppose the war in Iraq, foreclosures, evictions, attacks on immigrants, layoffs, etc.

Speakers included Councilperson Melissa Mark-Viverito; Harlem tenant organizer Nellie Bailey; Larry Holmes, Troops Out Now Coalition; Teresa Gutierrez and Walter Sinche, May 1st Immigrant and Worker Rights  Coalition; Brenda Walker, NYC Solidarity Coalition with Katrina and Rita Survivors; and Charles Jenkins, second vice president, Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, NYC Chapter, who emceed the press conference.

Part of the press release reads, “We gather to condemn the mass raids, arrests and deportations of immigrant workers. Let us also condemn the shocking yet telling reality that today almost half of the more than 2 million people in this country’s prisons are African Americans. When we talk of the media’s demonization of Latino immigrant workers, especially the undocumented, let us also talk about the demonization of Rev. Jeremiah Wright for telling it like it is.” Go to www.May1.info and www.1mayo.info for more information about the May Day rally and march.

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