revolutionary action movement (ram) - Michael Schwartz Library

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Minister Malcolm's statements convinced Marshall and Stanford to do
independent organizing . Stanford drafted a position paper titled 'Orientation
to a Black Mass Movement, Part One' and circulated it among the
black left in Philadelphia, stating that :
Organizers must be people who can help masses win victories around
their immediate problems . Organizing should be centered around
Black youth with the objective of building a permanent organized
structure . . . .
. . . the organizing of the black working class youth should be
the primary concern for the black revolutionist because the
black working class has the substained resentment, wrath and
frustration toward the present social order, that if properly
channeled can revolutionize Black America and make Black
America, the vanguard of the world's black revolution . Within
the black working class, the youth constitute the most militant
and radical element . Therefore, effective mobilization and
channeling of their energies will function as the catalyst for
greater militancy among African-Americans
Stanford went to visit Mrs . Ethel Johnson, who had been a co-worker with
Robert Williams in Monroe, North Carolina, who was then
residing in
Philadelphia . Mrs . Johnson read the paper and later told Stanford she
would help him organize in Philadelphia .
Stanford continued to circulate
his position paper getting various activists opinion of it . But as time
passed he was still reluctant to start a group of his own .
Freeman returned to Philadelphia for the Christmas holidays .
At a
meeting with Marshall, he harangued Stanford for not having organized .
It
was decided at that meeting to organize a study group in January of 1963 .
Towards the end of 1962, Marshall and Stanford called together a group of
black activities to develop a study/action group .
Within a month's time, key black activists came into the
study/action
group . Two central figures were Stan Daniels and Playthell Benjamin . After
6Max Stanford, Orientati on of a Black Mass Movement . (Philadelphia ;
Unpublished RAM documents, 1962), p . .