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National Lawyers Guild
Contents
- 1 Soviet front affiliate
- 2 Mission
- 3 History
- 4 Communist affiliations
- 5 Activism
- 6 NLG Members Listed in Congressional Hearings/Reports
- 7 NLG 1979 National Convention
- 7.1 Reception by PFOC and WUO Members and Supporters
- 7.2 37th National Convention Attendees
- 7.3 Groups that Attended the Convention
- 7.4 Members Who Helped Provide Logistics
- 7.5 Foreign Visitors
- 7.6 Podium Committee Members Who Helped Run the Convention
- 7.7 Welcoming Speeches
- 7.8 Workshop Leaders and Participants, Friday Night
- 7.9 Workshops and Presentations, Speakers and Participants, Saturday Night
- 7.10 NLG National Officers-Elected at this Convention
- 7.11 Resolutions Passed at the Convention
- 8 50th Annual NLG Convention 1992
- 9 GUILD PROJECTS
- 10 NLG PUBLICATIONS
- 11 NLG CHAPTERS
- 12 International issues
- 13 Modern times
- 14 National Executive Committee
- 15 Members as identified from various sources
- 16 Supporter of the New American Movement
- 17 Peoples College of Law of the National Lawyers Guild
- 18 Moratorium NOW!
- 19 Solidarity with Sept. 24 FBI Raid Activists
- 20 References
The National Lawyers Guild is based in New York, NY and was organized with the assistance of the Communist International in 1936 as a legal action front operated by the Communist Party USA.[1][2][3]. It is the largest U.S. affiliate of the Soviet-controlled International Association of Democratic Lawyers.[4]
Soviet front affiliate
The National Lawyers Guild has long been and remains a member of the old Soviet front organization, the International Association of Democratic Lawyers[5].
While there are small numbers of Maoists, Trotskyites and independent Marxist "New Leftists" in the organization, the NLG's international positions and real domestic control lies with the supporters of the Soviet and Cuban Communist regimes. During the 1970s, the NLG's cooperation with the Cuban government has escalated markedly.[4]
Mission
The National Lawyers Guild is openly socialist:[6]
- The National Lawyers Guild is an association dedicated to the need for basic change in the structure of our political and economic system. We seek to unite the lawyers, law students, legal workers and jailhouse lawyers of America in an organization that shall function as an effective political and social force in the service of the people, to the end that human rights shall be regarded as more sacred than property interests.
- Our aim is to bring together all those who recognize the importance of safeguarding and extending the rights of workers, women, farmers, people with disabilities and people of color, upon whom the welfare of the entire nation depends; who seek actively to eliminate racism; who work to maintain and protect our civil rights and liberties in the face of persistent attacks upon them; and who look upon the law as an instrument for the protection of the people, rather than for their repression.
History
Founded in 1936, the National Lawyers Guild was the nation’s first racially integrated bar association.
- The first Guild lawyers supported President Roosevelt’s New Deal, assisted the emerging industrial labor movement, and opposed the racial segregation policies of the American Bar Association and the larger society. During its 65 year history, the NLG has been an important part of the American people’s struggle for real democracy, for economic and social justice, and against oppression and discrimination based on race, ethnicity, immigration status, class, gender or sexual orientation. Consistent with its commitment to ensuring fairness and equality for all people, law students, non-lawyer legal workers and inmate legal experts are full members. The Guild elected its first African-American president in the early 1950s and its first female president in the 1960s. The first legal worker president was elected in 1996.
Communist affiliations
Originally the National Lawyers Guild was as a spin-off of the International Labor Defense, a Communist front started in 1925 as the U.S. branch of the International Red Aid, a worldwide Soviet-backed group founded in 1922.[7]
In 1940, the NLG President, Russell N. Chase, was also the attorney for the Communist Party USA in Ohio
The NLG became affiliated in 1946 with the International Association of Democratic Lawyers, another Soviet front. Guild members have been prominent in communist and far-left causes and organizations in the U.S. and have represented such clients as the Weather Underground, Students for a Democratic Society, the Cuban Government, atom spy Morton Sobell, Soviet agent Judith Coplon etc.
At the Guild's convention in Austin. Texas, in 1973 concluded with the singing of communist anthem, "The Internationale."<ref.Communists inside the Democratic Party, page 32</ref>
As at March, 1982, the Guild was the principal legal bulwark of the CPUSA, its fronts and controlled unions.[4]
Activism
In the 1930s, NLG lawyers helped organize the United Auto Workers (UAW), the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) and supported the New Deal in the face of determined ABA opposition. In the 1940s, Guild lawyers fought against fascists in the Spanish Civil War and WW II, and helped prosecute Nazis at Nuremburg. Guild lawyers fought racial discrimination in cases such as Hansberry v. Lee, the case that struck down segregationist Jim Crow laws in Chicago and entered our culture as Lorraine Hansberry’s “A Raisin in the Sun.” The Guild was one of the non-governmental organizations (NGOs) selected by the U.S. Government to officially represent the American people at the founding of the U.N. in 1945.
As at 1982, major NLG activities include defense of revolutionaries and militant extremists charged with violent crimes, litigation against law enforcement intelligence units, and providing legal advice in advance of demonstrations with civil disobedience-in effect acting as co-conspirators in violating the law.[4]
Trial lawyers
In the late 1940s and 50s, Guild members founded the first national plaintiffs personal injury bar association that became the American Trial Lawyers Association (ATLA), and pioneered the storefront law offices for low-income clients that became the model for the community-based offices of the Legal Services Corporation. During the “McCarthy era,” Guild members represented the Hollywood Ten, the Rosenbergs, and thousands of victims of the anti-communist hysteria. Unlike all other national civil liberties groups and bar associations, the Guild refused to require “loyalty oaths” of its members and the NLG was labeled “subversive” by the government.
Southern activism
In the 1960s, the Guild set up offices in the South and organized thousands of volunteer lawyers and law students to provide legal support for the Civil Rights Movement long before the federal government was involved. Guild members represented the families of murdered civil rights activists Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman, who were assassinated by local law enforcement members of the Ku Klux Klan. Guild-initiated lawsuits brought the Kennedy Justice Department directly into the Civil Rights struggle in Mississippi and challenged the seating of the all-white Mississippi delegation at the 1964 Democratic Convention. Guild lawyers defended thousands of civil rights activists who were arrested for exercising basic rights and established new federal constitutional protections in ground-breaking Supreme Court cases such as: Dombrowski v. Pfister, which enjoined thousands of racially-motivated state court criminal prosecutions; Goldberg v. Kelly, the case that established the concept of “entitlements” to social benefits which require Due Process protections; and, Monell v. Dept. of Public Services, which held municipalities liable for brutal police employees.
Taking on the government
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Guild members represented Vietnam War draft resisters, antiwar activists and the Chicago 7, after the 1968 Chicago Convention. NLG offices in Asia represented GIs who opposed the war. Guild members argued U.S. v. U.S. District Court, the Supreme Court case that established that Nixon could not ignore the Bill of Rights in the name of “national security” and led to the Watergate hearings and Nixon’s resignation. Guild members defended FBI-targeted members of the Black Panther Party, the American Indian Movement, the Puerto Rican independence movement and helped expose illegal F.B.I and C.I.A. surveillance, infiltration and disruption tactics (called COINTELPRO), that the U.S. Senate “Church Commission” hearings detailed in 1975-76 and which led to enactment of the Freedom of Information Act and other specific limitations on federal investigative power. The NLG supported self-determination for Palestine, opposed apartheid in South Africa, at a time when the U.S. Government still called Nelson Mandela a “terrorist” and began the fight against the blockade of Cuba. During this period, NLG members founded other important civil rights and human rights institutions, such as the Center Constitutional Rights (CCR), the National Conference of Black Lawyers (NCBL), the Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute in Berkeley, San Francisco’s New College School of Law and the Peoples Law School in Los Angeles.
An interesting book which contained selected writings from many NLG leaders and members is "Radical Lawyers: Their Role in the Movement and in the Courts", Jonathan Black, Editor, Avon Books, paperbook version, 1971. Those who contributed works to this book were:
- Jonathan Black - Introduction
- Kenneth Cloke
- Michael E. Tigar
- Henry di Survero Henry diSurvero
- Beverly Axelrod
- Richard Wasserstrom
- Kathy Boudin
- Brian Glick
- Eleanor Raskin
- Gustin Reichback (sic)
- George W. Crockett, Jr
- The Panther 21 - NY Black Panther Party (BPP) members
- Charles R. Garry
- Howard Moore
- Maryann Weissman
- Tim Coulter
- Frank Bardacke
- Michael Kennedy
- Stephen Wexler
- Faith A. Seidenberg
- Brenda Fasteau
- Carol Goodman
- Paul Harris
- Florynce R. Kennedy Flo Kennedy
- Nancy Stearns
- Arthur Kinoy
- Paul Biderman
- Walter Schneir
- William Kunstler
- Gerald Lefcourt
- Jonathan Lubell
This list constitutes one extremely important group of writings by individuals who led the following groups and activities:
- Communist Party USA (CPUSA)
- National Lawyers Guild (NLG)
- Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) created later from the CPUSA and NLG
- National Emergency Civil Liberties Committee (NECLC)
- The Free Speech Movement early-mid 1960s
- SLATE organization at the University of California, early 1960s
- Anti-HCUA protests in California - 1960s
- Students for a Democratic Society (SDS)
- Weather Underground Organization (WUO) aka Weathermen
- Womens' Liberation Movement
- Abortion Rights Movement
- National Committee for Independent Political Action (NCIPA) in the 1980's
- Black Panther Party legal support team
NLG Members Listed in Congressional Hearings/Reports
All these attorneys were identified as Communist Party USA members and some as Soviet operatives and spies in sworn congressional testimonies which are listed for each individual in the referenced report.[8]
- John J. Abt - NY, (later the second husband of Communist Party USA member and Soviet operative, Jessica Smith)
- George B. Andersen- CA
- Selma Mickel Bachelis - CA
- Harriet Bouslog - HA
- Maurice Louis Braverman - Baltimore, MD
- John Caughlan - WA
- Frank J. Bonner - NY
- Benjamin Dreyfus - CA
- Bertam Edises - (CA)
- Pauline Epstein - CA
- J. Allan Frankel - CA
- David M. Freedman - NY
- Charles R. Garry - CA (He is the Black Panther Party attorney that Hillary Clinton worked for on the New Haven torture-murder trial of Alex Rackley. He was also one of the marxist attorneys for marxist Rev. Jim Jones, his Peoples Temple and mass murder in Guyana known as Jonestown. The other attorney for them was Mark Lane, one of the weirdest, leftist attorney in the business, and best known for his two far-out and near-fraudulent books "Rush to Judgment" and, especially "Conversations With Americans" which was torn apart as largely made up of lies by leftist Vietnam correspondent Neil Sheehan.)
- Richard Gladstein - CA
- Aubrey W. Grossman - (CA)
- Abraham Isserman - NJ
- Leon Josephson - NJ ("identified as having been a Communist and agent of Soviet Russia as far back as the late 1920's")
- Harry M. Justiz - NY
- Charles J. Katz - CA
- Seymour Mandel - CA
- Ben Margolis - CA
- John T. McTernan - CA
- John W. Porter - CA
- David Rein - D.C. (His wife Selma Rein has also been identified as a member of the CPUSA
- Allan R. Rosenberg - MA
- Rose S. Rosenberg - CA
- Samuel Rosenwein - CA
- Richard L. Rykoff - CA
- Harry Sacher - NY
- Hyman Schlesinger - PA
- Esther Shandler - CA
- Robert J. Silberstein - (NY)
- Laurence R. Sperber - CA
- Fred H. Steinmetz - CA
- Jack Tenner - CA
- Robert E. Treuhaft - CA (Hillary Clinton worked under him along with Charles R. Garry on the New Haven Black Panther trial). His wife Decca Treuhaft was a well known author under the name of Jessica Mitford)
- Abraham Unger - NY
- Doris Brin Walker - CA., aka Mrs. Mason Roberson and aka Doris Marasse
- Nathan Witt - NY, He was part of the CPUSA and Soviet spy ring Witt-Pressman with ties to identified Soviet spy Alger Hiss
NLG 1979 National Convention
A special 20 page report by Information Digest in 1979 focused on the National Lawyer Guild and its "37th National Convention" held in San Francisco, February 15-19, 1979.
This report, which will be put online in the future if there are no copyright issues, was written by at least some people who were at the convention and had access to registration and/or attendance lists, agendas, task force programs, etc. so it is more credible than a report written solely from the outside. Its sections were:
- Introduction
- Early History
- NLG and Terrorism
- Convention Attendance
- Convention Logistics
- Convention Activities
- Workshops and their leaders
- NLG National Officers
- Resolutions
- Appendices - including a roster of persons playing leading roles in the NLG convention and its organization, workshops and task forces; a list of NLG publications; the NLG national projects; and the present list of 77 NLG chapters (nearly illegible)
- Persons Identified as Participating in the Activities of the NLG 37th National Convention (phonetic)
The introduction from the report has been reprinted below:
- "The National Lawyers Guild NLG, a coalition of Old Left Communist Party USA CPUSA members and supporters, Castroites, Maoists and other New Left Activists, held its 37th national convention in San Francisco, February 15-19, 1979."
- "The NLG convention reaffirmed the NLG's commitment to continue serving as the key U.S. support group for foreign and domestic Marxist-Leninist, revolutionary and terrorist movements. During the plenaries, caucuses, workshops, task force and committee meetings, support was expressed - and in some cases practical measures planned - to aid revolutionaries and terrorists from the Middle East, Iran, West Germany, Nicaragua and other countries as well as such violence-oriented U.S. groups as the American Indian Movement, the Black Panther Party, Puerto Rican Socialist Party, Fuerzas Armadas de Liberacion Nacional (Puerto Rican marxists in the U.S.), United League of North Mississippi and the Weather Underground Organization."
Reception by PFOC and WUO Members and Supporters
On Feb. 16, 1979, a reception was held at Stuart Hanlon's Law Office by NLG members associated with the Weather Underground Organization WUO and its above ground arm the Prairie Fire Organizing Committee and a "splinter group" known as the May 19 Communist Organization to honor a leftist Steve Guerra of theMovimiento de Liberaciion, a former coordinator of the National Committee Against Grand Jury Abuse, a Guild project, and Myrna Salgado, National Committee to Free Puerto Rican Prisoners of War.
Sponsors of the event, as listed by ID, were:
- Dennis Cunningham - Chicago People's Law Office and member of the CP front, NCAHUAC/HISC
- Mike Deutsch - Chicago People's Law Office
- Mara Siegel
- Centro Legal de La Raza of Oakland, CA
Persons present from the PFOC and the John Brown Book Club which distributes the PFOC's theoretical journal, "Breakthrough":
- John Brown Book Club - a front for the WUO/PFOC
- October 30th Committee in Solidarity with Puerto Rico - SF, CA
- Committee in Solidarity with Puerto Rican Independence CISPRI - Brooklyn
- a Chicago coalition known as Interim Committee in Solidarity with the Puerto Rican Revolutionary Independence Struggle consisting of:
- NCFPRPOW - Chicago
- PFOC - Chicago
- Sojourner Truth Organization, "a small extremist Trotskyist splinter group headed by Noel Ignatin
Support for the release of Puerto Rican terrorists was expressed and, according to ID,
- "The reception's principal purpose was to urge NLG activists to become involved in organizing a national movement to 'support the armed clandestine independence movement' by pressing for the release of":
- William Morales
- two Puerto Ricans who participated in the armed takeover of the Chilean consulate in San Juan, P.R. on July 3, 1978:
- Wydia Ester Cuevas and
- Pable Marcano Garcia, "and of course the four remaining National Party terrorists serving sentences for the attempted assassination of President Truman and shooting Congressmen in the 1950's".
Literature available included that supporting FALN bomber William Morales
37th National Convention Attendees
- Robert Altman - Southern Prisoners Regional Defense Fund
- Joan Andresson - CRLS Los Angeles
- Chris Arguedas - CCR, NY
- Mike Avery - Boston
- Linda Backiel - Grand Jury Project of the NLG
- Nina Balsam - St. Louis
- Dennis Banks - AIM
- Francisco Barba
- Ted Barrows
- Phyllis Bennis - Los Angeles i.e. the Anti-Israel Lobby, PLO Lobby, supporter of Hanoi, and IPS
- Judith Berkan - Puerto Rico Project, San Juan
- Joan Black
- Bill Blum - (William Blum, NB: There are several William Blum names on the Left, including a former congressional staffer and author; all attempts will be made to clearly identify those we mention)
- Patty Blum
- Conci Bokum - San Francisco
- Vernon Bellecourt - AIM
- Leonard Boudin - NY (id. CPUSA member and possible Czech spy)
- Sam Buffone - Houston
- Elizabeth Bunn - Detroit
- Bob Burkett - Los Angeles
- Jeanne Busacca - Southwest RVP
- Humberto Camacho - United Electrical Union, UE
- Al Canfora - The Call, the official paper of the Maoist Revolutionary Communist Party RCP and student wounded at Kent State University May 1970
- Paul Centolella
- Ellen Chapnick - NY
- Judy Chomsky - Philadelphia (relative, possibly daughter of Noam Chomsky
- Marilyn Clement - CCR NY
- John Clinebell - WA
- Jeff Cohen
- Robert Cohen - Puerto Rico Project, NY (possibly with the pro-Sandinista Nicaragua Network
- Matt Coles
- Sandy Colliver - Berkeley
- George Conk - NJ
- Grant Crandall - RVP-South, Charleston, WV
- Penny Crandall - Charleston, WV
- Candy Culin - National Office (NLG), NY
- Theresa Cooper - BALSA
- Dennis Cunningham - Chicago (Peoples Law Office, NCAHUAC/HISC, NCARL
- Buck Davis - Detroit
- Emily De Falla - San Francisco
- Karen Detamore - Philadelphia
- Mike Deutsch - Chicago
- Hank di Suvero - LA, one of the leaders of the Maoist-oriented faction within the old CPUSA/supporters
- Jim Douglas - Seattle
- Alan Dranitzke - D.C.
- Dick Elden - LA
- Eugene Eisner - NY
- Bruce Ellison
- Mike Eng
- Linda Erickson - Eugene, Ore
- Marge Fargo - National Jury Project
- Roger Finzel - NY
- Alan Freeman - Minnesota
- Peter Gabel - New College of Law
- Kit Gage - Southern Regional Office (NLG), Atlanta
- Kathy Galvin - Boston
- Naftali Garcia - Puerto Rico
- Peggy Gannon
- Lynn Gellenbeck - Cincinnati
- Bob Gibbs
- Ann Fagan Ginger - Berkeley
- Abby Ginzburg - DC (apparently the same person as the award-winning documentary maker) NLG 1979 V.P. and U.S. Government employee
- Amy Gladstein - NY
- Larry Glodine - SF
- Ron Good
- Bill Goodman - Detroit
- Ernie Goodman - Detroit
- Victor Goode - NCBL
- Kathy Gmeiner - National Office
- Sunny Graff
- Marsha Greenfield - Michigan Legal Services Detroit
- Sam Gross - SF
- Susan Gzesh - Migrant Legal Services St. Paul
- Jeff Haas - Chicago
- Sasha Harmon - Seattle
- Barbara Handschu - Mideast RVP Buffalo
- Paul Harris - SF (1979 NLG president)
- Jack Hartog - D.C.
- Neil Herring - LA
- Luke Hiken - LA
- Barbara Hoenig - LA
- Nancy Hormachea - Houston
- Jackie Huber - D.C.
- Nan Hunter
- Julie Hurwitz - SF
- David Kairys - Philadelphia (also NECLC
- Elizabeth Kane
- Ann Kanter - Sacramento
- Craig Kaplan - president, Association of Legal Aid Attorneys, NY, District 65
- Dennis Keating - Oakland
- Mike Krinsky - NY
- Janet Kropp - LA
- Robb Kropp - LA
- Jeff Kupers - SF
- Mary Kaufman - NY (an old CPUSA supporter)
- Holly Ladd
- Jim Larson - SF
- Jim Leach - San Jose
- Jeff Lewis - CRLA Project
- Jan Leventer - Detroit
- Joe Lipofsky - NY
- Regina Little - NJ, treasurer, National Organization of Legal Services Workers
- Craig Livingston - Newark
- Eddie Luban - Boston
- John Mage - SF
- Michael Maggio - D.C. (associated with the SWP)
- Holly Maguigan - Philadelphia
- Ann Manley - Columbus
- Ben Margolis - LA (id. CPUSA member)
- Maryann Massenberg - United Legal Workers
- Dan Mayfield - National Office
- Hal Mayerson - NY
- Judy Mead - D.C.
- Steve Metalitz - Charleston, SC
- Lewis Meyers - NCBL
- Jeanne Mirer - Detroit
- Marva Moore - president, Boalt Hall BALSA and NLG, Berkeley
- Carol Oppenheimer - D.C.
- Doug Parr - Oklahoma City
- Tim Plenk - Portland, OR
- Martin Popper - NY, id. CPUSA member
- Vernell Pratt - Seattle
- John Quigley - Columbus
- Victor Rabinowtiz - NY, id. CPUSA member
- Jane Rasmussen - Puerto Rico Project
- Marge Ratner - NY
- Michael Ratner - NY (future NLG president)
- Andy Reid - Menominee Defense/Offense
- Dennis Riordan
- Jim Roberts - Illinois
- Patti Roberts
- Catherine Roraback - New Haven
- Melinda Rorick - PFOC and NLG - Native American Committee
- Rand Rosenthal - Rutgers, Camden
- Jordan Rossen - UAW
- Peter Rubin - SF
- David Rudovsky - Philadelphia
- Betty St. Clair - NY
- Steve Saltzman - Cleveland
- William Schaap - D.C. - Covert Action Information Bulletin, OC5
- Peter Schey - LA
- Liz Schneider - CCR NY
- Susan Schneur - Detroit
- Judy Scott - Detroit
- Frank Shoichet -Seattle
- Jeff Segal - D.C.
- Evelyn Shapiro - Vanguard Foundation
- Mara Siegel - Chicago
- Al Sigman - CRLA Project
- Gary Silberger - LA
- Laurie Slavin - EEOC - US Govt
- Keith Snyder - D.C.
- Carol Sobel - LA
- Dick Soble - Detroit
- Doug Sorensen - CONAS
- Tony Steel - SF
- Beverly Stein - Portland, OR
- Bill Steiner - MALDEF LA
- Ken Stern - Denver
- Joe Stewart - D.C.
- Carol Stickman
- Kay Stubbs - D.C. and an organizer of the Washington Office on Latin America WOLA a pro-marxist support group for Latin American marxists/terrorists/movements
- Rita Swencionis
- Ann Taylor
- Mary Alice Theiler - Seattle
- Eugene Tomine
- Church Turchick - Minneapolis
- Kathy Tumber - Detroit
- Margaret Van Houten - Philadelphia
- Robert Van Lierop - NY, marxist filmmaker specializing in communist movements in southern Africa
- Kayla Vaughn - St. Louis
- Frank Viehman - Denver
- Alan Vomacka - Houston
- Doris Brin Walker - SF and id. CPUSA member
- Mike Ward - SF
- Gloria Weil-Herrera - LA
- Doron Weinberg - SF
- Ebbie Weiner - SF
- Patricia Weiss-Fagan - Former member of the staff of the Center for International Policy
- Judy Wilson - SF
- Mike Withey - Seattle
- Barbara Wolvovitz - Rutgers
- Diane Wood - SF
- Evette Wyman
- Kate Yavenditti - SF
- Eli Zaretsky - (became far-left member of the LA City Council)
- Karlin Zweig - Boston
Groups that Attended the Convention
ID identified the following organizations as having attended this NLG convention:
- Communist Party USA
- New American Movement
- Socialist Workers Party - Trotskyist
- Spartacist League - Trotskyist
- Partisan Defense Committee - a front of the Spartacist League SL
- International Socialists
- Communist Party, Marxist-Leninist, "Peking-line" (i.e. Maoist) led by Mike Klonsky
- Revolutionary Communist Party - Maoist, led by Robert Avakian
- Workers Viewpoint Organization - Maoist
- Communist Party USA Marxist-Leninist, Maoist, formerly the Marxist-Leninist Organizing Committee
- Communist Labor Party - Maoist
- Anti-Imperialist Caucus, NLG - Maoist
- Rob Kropp - Anti-Imperialist Caucus candidate for president of the NLG, member of the pro-Red Chinese U.S.-China People's Friendship Association USCPFA versus the NLG's choice, Paul Harris who won
Members Who Helped Provide Logistics
Logistics Planning Committee:
- Linda Sloven
- Conci Bokum
- Jeff Kupers
- Julie Hurwitz
- Patti Blum
- Patti Roberts - president of the San Francisco chapter
Foreign Visitors
- Luu - Communist Vietnam's UN Ambassador
- Jorge Gallardo Fernandez - Vice President of the Cuban Institute for Friendship Among Peoples ICAP
- Candelaria Rodriquez Hernandez - National Union of Jurists Cuba - scheduled but did not attend
- Kurt Gronewold - attorney for West German Red Army Fraction terrorists - unable to attend
- Petra Rogge - law partner of Gronewold, unable to attend
Another associate of Gronewold and Rogge, Ranier Koncke was indicted in Germany along with Rogge in supplying information to Gronewold which he distributed to RAF clients and defense lawyers.
Podium Committee Members Who Helped Run the Convention
- John Quigley- out-going National Vice President, NLG
- Debbie Weimer - NLG National Office in NYC
- Conci Bokum - SF
- Jeanne Busacca - Southwest Regional VP (RVP)
- Karen Detamore - incoming Northeast RVP
- Marsha Greenfield - Detroit
Welcoming Speeches
- Patti Roberts - President of the host S.F. NLG chapter
- Henry DiSuvero (Henry diSurvero) - outgoing National President and Maoist-oriented in his ideology
- Catherine Rorabach - past NLG President, Keynote speech
- Holly Near - marxist folksinger, Indochina Peace Campaign - entertainment (barred from attending the XIth World Youth Festival in Havana, July 1978, because she was a lesbian.
Workshop Leaders and Participants, Friday Night
Gay Rights: Referendums & Community Organizing
Immigration: Refugee Status & Political Asylum
- Patty Blum - Co-chair
- Mike Maggio - Co-chair Michael Maggio
- Nancy Hormachea
- Peter Schey - Los Angeles Legal Services Foundation
Adding Injury to Insult - "to explore the provacative (sic) political and legal questions concerning potential actions (in the field of occupational safety and health) against employers, manufacturers, doctors, clinics, and federal and state agencies"
Weber: Legal and Mass Responses
- Gene Eisner Eugene Eisner - counsel, District 65 Distributive Workers of America
- Jack Hartog
- Laurie Slavin - EEOC
- Jeanne Mirer
Fascism and the First Amendment
Organizing Around Environmental Issues
- Steve Metalitz - Charleston, S.C.
- Tim Plenk - Portland, Ore. (aided Trojan Decommissioning Alliance, Pacific Life Community)
- Beverly Stein - Portland, Ore. TDA, PLC
Native American and the Struggle for Natural Resources
Abortion/Sterilization Abuse
Guild F.B.I. Lawsuit
- Leonard Boudin - (id. CPUSA member)
- Michael Krinsky
Legal Aid and Defender Office Organizing
- Craig Kaplan - president, Association of Legal Aid Attorneys of New York City, an affiliate of District 65 DWA
- Mary Ann Massenberg - organizer for the United Legal Workers of California
NLG International Committee presentation on Vietnam and Cambodia. The Chinese invasion of Vietnam was defended for the Maoists of the Anti-Imperialist Caucus by:
- Al Canfora - CPML Communist Party Marxist-Leninist, and Kent State University protester, 1970
"Struggle in Tupelo" presentation re supporting the "militant" United League of North Mississippi by the LNG and NCBL. Main speaker was:
- Lewis Myers - NCBL national counsel and an attorney with the North Mississippi Rural Legal Services
Workshops and Presentations, Speakers and Participants, Saturday Night
Mercenaries - "geared towards persons working with solidarity groups and other types of anti-imperialist organizations"
- Ernie Goodman (Ernest Goodman) - past NLG president, former counsel for the CPUSA's Michigan District; long CPUSA front record
- Marva Moore - president of the Boalt Hall chapters of the NLG and the Black American Law Students Association BALSA
- Michael Maggio - D.C. NLG Chapter
NLG National Officers-Elected at this Convention
- Paul Harris - "I come from an old left background and a new left experience". Founder, 1966, NLG chapter at Boalt Hall since the 1950's; organized other NLG chapters at other California law schools with Ken Cloke; law clerk for Albany, GA. civil rights lawyers C.B. King, and a federal judge. Founder of the Community Law Office in San Francisco. An initiator of the "Black Rage" psychiatric defense and co-counsel with Michael Kennedy for Black Panther Party chairman Huey Newton in his recent trials for assault and murder (not convicted in two trials). NLG national leader since 1975. Harris stated at the time,
- "I believe that capitalism strikes on all fronts. At times the cutting edge may be selective service and military work, at times criminal defense, at other times it could be two or three areas. Without approving a 'scattergun' approach, I will support Guild member working in any area of conflict with the state***."
- Abby Ginzburg - National Vice-President, U.S. Government employee, Department of Labor - Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Previously a member of Paul Harris's Community Law Office collective. Joined the NLG in 1972 while at the Hasting School of Law. Member of the NLG's DC Executive Board and International Committee. Member of the Guild's trip to Red China and said/wrote that: "International work has played a very significant role in the recent paste, in part because of our increased understanding of the nature and scope of U.S. imperialism". (ID, p.12 of report)
- Steve Saltzman - National Treasurer. Legal Aid Society of Cleveland since 1974. Aided the leftist Teamsters for a Democratic Union
Sunday meeting of the Middle East Subcommittee was quiet after several years of contention between pro-PLO and pro-Israel factions. The PLO faction was led by Bill Schaap, D.C. NLG chapter president and "a leader of Philip Agee's Covert Action Information Bulletin group. William Schaap was one of those who presented a very anti-Israel report on their trip there in 1977.
The Cuba Subcommittee had as its key members:
- Victor Rabinowitz - id. CPUSA member and registered agent for Castro's Cuba
- Leonard Boudin - id. CPUSA member and registered agent for Castro's Cuba
- Mike Krinsky
- Alan Dranitzke - (D.C. NLG chapter)
- Hal Mayerson
- Bill Schaap
- Ellen Chapnick - also of CAIB
Resolutions Passed at the Convention
The following is a list of some of the resolutions passed at the convention:
- Expansion of the Police Crimes Task Force to the National Committee on Government Repression and Police Crimes.
Defined "police crimes" as "surveillance, infiltration, disruption and harassment of political groups"
- Will coordinate NLG work with the:
- Center for National Security Studies (CNSS) - a far-left project of the Fund for Peace led by former White House staffer Morton Halperin who would later become an adviser to President Bill Clinton. Also a member of the ACLU
- Campaign for Political Rights (CPR) - formerly the Campaign to Stop Government Spying (CSGS) - a coalition of communist, communist fronts, and far-left organizations who comprised the heart of the Anti-Intelligence Groups Anti-Intelligence Lobby
- American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) - Program on Government Surveillance and Political Rights, co-chaired by the NLG leader Margaret Van Houten, a veteran of "Counterspy magazine (of the Organizing Committee for the Fifth Estate (OC5) (OC5E)
- American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) whose Surveillance Program at Harvard University was run by key CPUSA identified member of their security unit, Frank Donner
- Resolution in support of the Iranian revolutionaries led by the Islamic psychopath Ayatollah Khomeini. Called for sending a "message of solidarity to the Iranian people by way of Radio Iran".
- "Whereas the heroic struggles of the Iranian people have succeeded in crushing the Shah's U.S.-backed regime; Whereas a large segment of the Iranian people have taken up arms to defend the achievements of their revolution; Whereas the revolution in Iran today is a major defeat for U.S. imperialist policy throughout the world***."
- The Military Law Task Force, involving Bill Schaap included a resolution for the NLG to block any congressional reinstatement of Selective Service registration, stating:"the objective of such plans is to increase the ability of U.S. imperialism to mobilize to protect corporate interests worldwide against national liberation and other struggles which could jeopardize those interests;" as well as a resolution to support the U.S. withdrawal from military bases in the Philippines that "serve as a visible support for the Marcos dictatorship and as springboards for U.S. military intervention in Southeast Asia, Asia and the Middle East."
- "A resolution backing an NLG move to take control of the Legal Services Corporation by selecting and recommending candidates for the post of the president of the corporation in cooperation with the NCBL and La Raza lawyers association was adopted unanimously."
50th Annual NLG Convention 1992
The NLG held its 50th annual convention in Chicago on August 15, 1992. Not much information on this affair appeared in print but there were two articles in the CPUSA newspaper, People's Weekly World, August 15, 1992, that provided a good insight into it. The first article was entitled "Lawyers Guild Convention: 'Tough times are all alike'", PWW, Page 6, by Herb Kaye (aka Herb Kransdorf).
The article focused on a workshop, "Sustaining Our Political Work in Tough Times", and featured old NLG attorneys "who played major roles in defending labor's rights in the turbulent struggles of the 1930s." Those who spoke included:
- John McTernan - former regional director of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in Northern California, and an identified member of the CPUSA for decades
- Eugene Cotton - Chicago lawyer, former counsel for the CPUSA-influenced and later dominated Packinghouse Workers Union which merged with the Amalgamated Meat Cutters Union, also CPUSA dominated, and "is now part of the [[United Food & Commercial Workers Union)" (as of 1992).
- Ernest Goodman - formerly a (NLRB) attorney, who "later worked with Maurice Sugar (id. CPUSA member) of the UAW in defending the GM sit-in strikers."
- Irving Meyers - Chicago
- Ann Fagan Ginger - now head of the Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute, basically a CPUSA front, and also an identified member of the CPUSA for decades.
Of interests was McTernan's statement crediting the "militant industrial unions of the Communist-led Trade Union Unity League (TUUL) with providing much of the leadership that was able to stand up to the employer-sponsor terror of the time."
Another article by Kaye in the same edition of the PWW was entitled "Lawyers Guild supports Cuba, Palestine sovereignty." It was the "Palestine" issue and a NLG trip/report on Israel and human rights in 1977 that created a major split among some of the Jewish members of the Guild who felt that it was decidely one-sided against Israel. This convention explicitly supported the Palestinians, as Kaye wrote in the final paragraph of the article, reproduced immediately below.
"Palestinian rights were reaffirmed in a resolution that called for the U.S. "to halt all loans and economic aid to Israel and boycott all Israeli products" until Israel withdraws completely from the Occupied Territories, stops all settlements there, ends human rights violations against Palestinians, complies with the 1949 Geneva Convention and U.N. resolutions concerning the Occupied Territories, recognizes the necessity of a two-state solution and the Palestinians' right to self-determination, including choosing representation by the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and any other elected representatives."
Other resolutions supported "Cuban sovereignty", "an end to the embargo and to the restrictions against travel to Cuba", as well as reaffirming "support for the independence of Puerto Rico from U.S. colonial domination and for the release of all Puerto Rican political prisoners and prisoners of war."
Among those attorneys who participated in the convention were:
- Prof. Derrick Bell - Harvad law professor "fired for protesting the university's failure to hire an African American woman law professor on a tenured track. Bell is presently visiting professor at New York University Law School (NYU)."
- Prof. Gerald Horne - University of California at Santa Barbara, African American history professor "and candidate for U.S. Seante on the Peace and Freedom Party (PFP) ticket." (The PFP had long been under CPUSA control). Horne was a publicly self-identified member of the CPUSA.
A march by 100 convention delegates went to the offices of the Stepan Chemical Co., "where the delegates protested Stepan's documented pollution of the air and water in Brownsville, Texas, and Matamoros, Mexico."
Among the protesters were:
- Roberto de la Cruz - organizer for the Service Employes International Union (SEIU)
- Teresa Mendez Garcia - from Matamoros
GUILD PROJECTS
An attachment to the Information Digest special report on the NLG
- The National Labor Project
- The National Immigration Project
- The National Committee on Women's Oppression
- The International Committee - "coordinated Guild activity in support of national liberation movements throughout the world"
- The Committee on Native American Struggles
- The Police Crimes National Committee
- The Puerto Rico Legal Project
- The Anti-Death Penalty Project
- The Grand Jury Project
- The National Prison Committee
- The Minority Legal Resources Task Force
- The Legal Services Task Force - trying to unionize it
- The Military Law Task Force
- The Gay Rights Task Force
- The Housing Task Force
NLG PUBLICATIONS
Practice Manuals
- Representation of Witnesses Before Federal Grand Juries
- Raising and Litigating Electronic Surveillance Claims and Cases
- Immigration Defense Manual
- Police Misconduct Litigation Manual
Guild Newsletters:
- Immigration Newsletter - National Immigration Project
- QUASH = grand Guild Grand Jury Project
- Labor Newsletter - National Labor Committee
- Women's Newsletter - NCWO
- Military Law Task Force Newsletter - available c/0 Frank Munger Antioch School of Law, Wash. D.C.
- Puerto Rico Project Newsletter - Puerto Rico Project
Other Guild Publications:
- The Puerto Rican Journal of Human Rights - Puerto Rico Project
- Guild Practitioner - Guild Practitioner
- Law for the People - law student organizing handbook
- A Brief Introduction to Cross Examination - by Oliver Rosengart, NYC NLG chapter
- The Jury System: New Methods for Reducing Prejudice - National Jury Project
National Lawyers Guild: 853 Broadway, Room 1703, New York New York 10023[9]
NLG CHAPTERS
Extremely poor quality copy making it almost impossible to identify some chapters and individuals named
International issues
Opposition to Nuclear Weapons
In the 1980s, the Guild pioneered the “necessity defense” and used international law in support of the anti-nuclear movement and began challenging the use nuclear weapons under international law. This eventually resulted in the World Court declaration that nuclear weapons violate international law in a case argued by Guild lawyers more than a decade later.
The NLG has produced a handbook for NLG lawyers involved in mass defense of anti-nuclear demonstrators; and NLG chapters nationwide have been active in providing aid to antinuclear power and disarmament demonstrators. The NLG is a member of the June 12 Disarmament Coalition.[4]
Immigration
The NLG National Immigration Project began working systematically on immigration issues, spurred by the need to represent Central American refugees and asylum activists fleeing U.S. sponsored “terror” Nicaragua and El Salvador. The Guild organized “People’s Tribunals” to expose the illegality of U.S. intervention in Central America that even more widely known as the “Iran-Contra” scandal. The Guild prevailed in a lawsuit against the F.B.I. for carrying out illegal political surveillance of legal, activist organizations, including the Guild.
Modern times
In the 1990s, Guild members mobilized opposition to the Gulf War, defended the rights of Haitian refugees escaping from a U.S.- sponsored dictatorship, opposed the U.S. embargo of Cuba and began to define a new civil rights agenda that includes the right to employment, education, housing and health care. Legal theories for holding foreign human rights violators accountable in U.S. courts based on early 19th Century statutes were pioneered by Guild lawyers. The Guild began developing an analysis of the impact of “globalization” on human rights and the environment several years before the Seattle demonstrations, and our members have played an active role opposing NAFTA and in facilitating and supporting the growing movement for “globalization of justice. As the 20th Century came to a close, the Guild was defending anti-globalization, environmental and labor rights activists from Seattle, to D.C., to L.A. Guild members were playing an active role in encouraging cross-border labor organizing and in exposing the a buses in the maquiladoras on the U.S.-Mexico Border. The NLG’s Project for Human, Economic and Environmental Defense (HEED) and the Committee on Corporations, the Constitution & Human Rights began working on “globalization” issues[10].
National Executive Committee
Executive Officers[11]
(This list was on the NLG's website in 2010)
Please Note: The EXECUTIVE COUNCIL of the NLG is made up of the Executive Officers of the NLG and the Executive Director of the NLG National Office. All members of the Executive Council are also members of the National Executive Committee.
- David Gespass, President Birmingham, AL
- Russell Bloom, Executive Vice President Berkeley, CA
- Carol Sobel, Executive Vice President
- Roxana Orrell, Treasurer
- Rachel Rosnick, Student Vice President Pittsburgh, PA
National VPs:
- Thom Cincotta, Cotuit, MA
- Steve Gotzler, Philadelphia, PA
- Dan Spalding, Oakland, CA
National Legal Worker VP:
Co-Jailhouse Lawyer VPs:
- Mumia Abu-Jamal SCI Greene Waynsesburg, PA
- Mark Cook
National Student VPs:
- Rachel Rosnick Pittsburgh, PA
- Samantha Godwin Washington, D.C.
Regional VPs:
- Renee Sanchez, Far West
- Ranya Ghuma, Baltimore, MD
- John Philo, Detroit, MI
- Tony Paris, Detroit, MI
- Molly Armour, Highland Park, IL
- Jeff Thomson, Montpelier, VT
- Carl Williams, Roxbury, MA
- Peggy Herman, Seattle, WA
- Kenneth Kreuscher, Portland, OR
- Azadeh Shahshahani, South
- Sean McAllister, Southwest
- Brian Vicente, Southwest
- Robert Schmid, Texas-Omaha
- James Branum, Norman, OK
Committee Representatives:
- Radhika Miller, Alexandria, VA - International Committee
- Jeanne Mirer, New York, NY - International Committee
- Susan Scott, Inverness, CA - International Committee
TUPOCC:
- Tory Gavito
- Marc Tizoc-Gonzalez, Oakland, CA
Mass Defense:
- Carol Sobel, Santa Monica, CA
- Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, Washington, DC
Labor and Employment:
- Daniel Gross, New York, NY
Military Law Task Force:
- Dan Mayfield, San Jose, CA
Queer Caucus:
- Raul Aguilar, San Francisco, CA
Anti-Racism Committee:
- Michael Flynn, Oakland, CA
Prison Law Project:
- Alissa Hull, New York, NY
Anti-Sexism Committee:
- Aliya Karmali, San Francisco, CA
National Police Accountability Project:
- Brigitt Keller, Boston, MA
Members as identified from various sources
These are being entered as they are found, alphabetically
E:
- Vicki Erenstein - NLG[12]
S:
- Steve Saltzman - National Treasurer, NLG[13]
Proposed Committee Members (2010-2011)
the following were listed on a ballot for the NLG New York City Chapter Officers & Executive Committee Members:[14]
Proposed Chapter Officers:
- President Susan V. Tipograph
- Vice Presidents Beth Baltimore
- Mark Taylor
- Treasurer Robert J. Boyle
Proposed Executive Committee Members:
- Susan Barrie
- Bruce K. Bentley
- Nora Carroll
- Antonia Cedrone
- Leanne R. Davis
- Lamis Deek
- Deborah Diamant
- Steve Dobkin
- Hillary Exter
- Elizabeth M. Fink
- Aaron David Frishberg
- Alexandra M. Goncalves-Peña
- Polly Halfkenny
- Joel R. Kupferman
- Yetta G. Kurland
- Pat Levasseur
- Tara Levy
- Sally Mendola
- Daniel L. Meyers
- Gideon Orion Oliver
- David B. Rankin
- Jeffrey Rothman
- Jennifer Sang
- Ann M. Schneider
- Heidi J. Siegfried
- Barbara Small
- Martin R. Stolar
- Stephanie Morin Taylor
- Garrett Wright
Supporter of the New American Movement
In 1981, Karen Dubinsky, Chairperson, Ontario Federation of Students; the Pittsburgh Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild; the Socialist Community School Bookstore of Los Angeles; Bonnie Lambert and Marshall Mayer; Mary Clarke and Ben Clarke were listed as supporters of the New American Movement.[15]
Peoples College of Law of the National Lawyers Guild
Established in late 1974, and official operating in 1975, the Peoples College of Law (PCL) was an open project of the National Lawyers Guild, and was located in Los Angeles.
Please go to its own Keywiki page, "Peoples College of Law" for more information on this "college".
Moratorium NOW!
On Sept. 17, 2008, the Moratorium NOW! Coalition to Stop Foreclosures and Evictions sponsored a rally at the Michigan State Capitol, demanding the State Legislature enact SB 1306, a two-year foreclosure moratorium bill. Represented at the rally was UNITE HERE, Change to Win, United Auto Workers, Service Employees International Union, American Federation of Teachers, Green Party of Michigan, Detroit Greens, the Cynthia McKinney presidential campaign, Students for a Democratic Society, National Lawyers Guild, Workers World Party, Food Not Bombs, Critical Moment, Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice, Michigan Welfare Rights, Call ’Em Out, Latinos Unidos of Michigan, Grand Rapids Latino Community Coalition, Joint Religious Organizing Network for Action and Hope, Adrian Dominican Sisters & Associates for Peace. The following led or spoke at the rally: Sandra Hines and Abayomi Azikiwe of the Moratorium NOW!; Kris Hamel; Reverend Ed Rowe, Central United Methodist Church; State Representatives Gabe Leland, Shanelle Jackson, Bettie Cook Scott and Steve Tobocman; State Sen. Martha G. Scott; Rubie Curl-Pinkins and her daughter Nikki Curl; Jerry Goldberg, people’s attorney and coalition leader; Juan Daniel Castro, Grand Rapids Latino Community Coalition; Linette Crosby; Larry Holmes, a leader of the Troops Out Now Coalition; Robert Pratt of UNITE HERE; and Rosendo Delgado of Latinos Unidos of Michigan.[16]
Moratorium NOW! is affiliated with the Bail Out the People Movement and is controlled by the Workers World Party. The organization's office is located at the Central United Methodist Church and holds meetings there.[17][18]
Solidarity with Sept. 24 FBI Raid Activists
The Committee to Stop FBI Repression lists National Lawyers Guild as one of the organizations that has issued a statement of solidarity in support of the activists raided in the September 24, 2010 FBI Raids.[19]
References
- ↑ Special Committee on Un-American Activities House Report 1311, on the CIO Political Action Committee, March 29, 1944, p. 149
- ↑ National Lawyers Guild: Legal Bulwark of the Communist Party, House Report 3123, House Committee on Un-American Activities, September 21, 1950; Sept. 17. 1950
- ↑ Communist Legal Subversion: The Role of the Communist Lawyer - Report, February 16, 1959, HCUA, House Report No. 41, 86th Congress, 1st Session
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 The War Called Peace: Glossary, published 1982
- ↑ http://www.iadllaw.org/en/members
- ↑ http://nlg.org/aboutus/history.php
- ↑ Communists in the democratic party, page 31
- ↑ Communist Legal Subversion: The Role of the Communist Lawyer - Report, House Report No. 41, HCUA, Feb. 16, 1959
- ↑ ID, May 4, 1979
- ↑ http://nlg.org/aboutus/history.php
- ↑ http://nlg.org/aboutus/board.php
- ↑ "Daily World", Sept. 27, 1980, p. 13, "N.Y. Peace Council city-wide conference"
- ↑ "THE WREE-VIEW", April-June 1979 issue, Vol. 4, No. 2, p. 4
- ↑ NLG New York City Chapter: Proposed Committee Members (2010-2011) (accessed on Feb. 14, 2011)
- ↑ 10th Anniversary Booklet for the New American Movement, 1981
- ↑ International Action Center - Boston: People tell Michigan legislators: ‘MORATORIUM NOW!’ (accessed on Feb. 10, 2011)
- ↑ Pan-African News Wire File Photos on Flickr: Members of the Moratorium NOW! Coalition attending a meeting at the Central United Methodist Church on Nov. 20 in Detroit, Nov. 20, 2010 (accessed on Feb. 10, 2011)
- ↑ International Action Center - Boston: People tell Michigan legislators: ‘MORATORIUM NOW!’ (accessed on Feb. 10, 2011)
- ↑ Committee to Stop FBI Repression: Solidarity Statements (accessed on Oct. 6, 2010)