revolutionary action movement (ram) - Michael Schwartz Library

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enormous working class . The factors, such as income, employment and education,
that are used by analysts to differentiate one class from another,
are absent from the RAM documents with the exception of professions . Middle
class blacks are teachers and preachers . The black working class is
presented in the context of the development of Western capitalism .
African-
American workers, like other workers in the U .S ., benefit from imperialism .
But they live a dual existence in the sense of being a super-exploited "subproletariat"
in the U .S . and the beneficiaries of U .S . imperialism's domination
internationally of other people of color . 19
Black workers were presented as potentially very powerful . In We Can
Win! (1964), the author stated that the defeatism of the black community
must be destroyed .
Blacks must recognize the power they have as a people
and as workers . They have the potential to strike in three vital areas :
first,
they can stop the machinery of the government because of their high
employment in certain key government agencies ; second, they can hurt the
economy because of their employment in key industries, such as, steel and
auto ; and third, they can unleash violence in the cities of the North and
South . 20
This theme was developed further in
"Depression, Part III," an article
published by RAM cadre in Detroit . In it they stated that black people had
to use the power of black labor and the black masses against the system, to
resist it and if necessary to break and destroy 'it . 21 The article stated
191, The African American War of National Liberation," Black America ,
(Summer/Fall 1965), p . 4 .
2D "We Can Win," Black America , (Fall 1964), p . 1 .
21 "Depression, Part III," Black Vanguard , Volume 1, November 5, (August
1965), p . 23 .