Remember Black August
Workers World says: ‘Free them all!’
The month of August holds special meaning for the Black Liberation struggle. This August marks the 407th anniversary of the arrival of the first ship of Africans brought in chains to the shores of the British colony of Virginia in 1619. This August marks 250 years of the enslavement underlying the establishment of the U.S. settler-colonial state, with its injustices, brutality and institutionalized crimes against humanity.
The legacy of enslavement continues today in this white-supremacist, capitalist society — and is intensified by the Trump administration.
But August is also a time to commemorate the Black Resistance struggle, from the Haitian Revolution of 1791-1804 to the Nat Turner Rebellion in 1831. From the Fugitive Slave Law Convention of 1850 to the Underground Railroad that ran from the late 18th century to 1865. From the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters in 1925 to the March on Washington in 1963, the Watts Uprising in 1965 and the National Prison Strike from Aug. 21 to Sept. 9 in 2018.
Freedom fighters who were born in August include Marcus Garvey, Fred Hampton and Russell Maroon Shoatz, while several died in that month, notably W.E.B. Du Bois, Huey P. Newton and Jonathan Jackson. Jackson was killed Aug. 7, 1970, while attempting to free the imprisoned Soledad Brothers, including his brother, Black Panther Party leader George Jackson. On Aug. 21, 1971, prison guards executed George Jackson. His assassination sparked the heroic Attica Prison Rebellion in September 1971.
Joann Little, a Black woman imprisoned in North Carolina, was acquitted in August 1975 due to self-defense for killing a white guard attempting to rape her.
WW continually writes about the Black Liberation Movement and its heroes. Our Tear Down the Walls section supports political prisoners — past and present, at home and abroad.
We say “Free the immigrants!” — the 66,000 jailed in Immigration Customs and Enforcement detention facilities and those deported to brutal prisons abroad. Our newspaper demands the release of the thousands of Palestinian men, women and children tortured and jailed in Israel’s dungeons, with Washington’s support. Free them all!
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