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Title: New ABC Fed Forms
Author: brad
Date: 1995
Language: en
Topics: Anarchist Black Cross, Love and Rage Revolutionary Anarchist Federation
Source: 1995 Aug/Sep issue of L&R. Retrieved on 2016-06-13 from https://web.archive.org/web/20160614072413/[[http://loveandrage.org/?q=node/3][loveandrage.org]]2

brad

New ABC Fed Forms

On May 6–7, there was a conference organized by three ABC

collectives—Claustrophobia ABC from DC, Nightcrawlers ABC from NY, and

New Jersey ABC. The conference was hosted by Claustrophobia ABC in DC,

and was also attended by members of Baltimore ABC, 4^(th) World ABC from

New Jersey, and other anarchist prison activists from Pennsylvania and

New York.

The purpose of the conference was to solidify a new regional ABC

federation that had informally begun with the three sponsoring

collectives in Dec. 1994. We left the conference with unforeseen

results, well beyond what we had initially set out to achieve.

We decided against forming a regional federation, instead opening it up

to any ABC groups in North America who agree with our federation’s

politics and criteria for membership. Instead of basing our membership

on a particular region, we united on common political activities and a

structure to accomplish it. There are ABC groups in our region who will

not participate in this federation because of differences of opinion

about the politics and structure of such an ABC federation. So in

actuality this federation would not include all the groups from our

region anyway, such as Brooklyn ABC or 4^(th) World ABC.

A Discussion Bulletin was produced about a month prior to the

conference, which included 2 proposals for how to build ABC. One

proposed by Nightcrawlers was fairly general, proposing that we be

thorough in outreach and follow-through to people who show interest in

ABC, and proposing a regional speaking tour. The other proposal, from NJ

ABC and Ojore Lutalo (a New Afrikan Anarchist Prisoner of War), was a

detailed structure proposal for a new federation. This is the proposal

that we ended up mostly talking about, and it is what we adopted, with a

few minor changes.

The PAC / Lutalo proposal was controversial within all the other groups

before the conference. At least some members of each group had strong

reservations with it. But after discussion all day Sunday around the

proposal, everyone there agreed to adopt the proposal, with only a few

minor changes. The proposed structure reflected a lot of thought about

how to deal with many of the problems facing ABC groups, and it seemed

that most of the concerns people had with the proposal were more about

how things were said or about potential dangers, not concerns about what

the actual proposal said.

The proposal seems clearly designed to “draw a line” of demarcation

between ABC groups who are able to make a long- term commitment to

revolutionary politics and action, versus groups that don’t last very

long or are inconsistent. It also caters to a very specific definition

of what constitutes “revolutionary politics,” which put off some people.

The way the proposal was presented in the discussion bulletin included

vague attacks on some other ABC groups, which also probably caused some

of the initial skepticism toward the proposal. But once we all got to

talk through it face-to-face, it became clear that we had the unity

needed to start the new ABC Federation.

The new federation is organized like this: ABC groups will be organized

in a two-tier system. Branch Groups will be those groups who have been

together consistently for a year, who file regular reports to the ABC

Bulletin, who contribute money monthly to the War Chest (a fund to

provide financial assistance for political prisoners and POWs), and who

agree to function according to Lorenzo Komboa Ervin’s 15- point and

Lutalo’s 4-point programs regarding prisoner support work. Support

Groups consist of new groups or those groups who, for whatever reason,

cannot meet the criteria to become a Branch Group.

Prisoners are also structured into the new federation. A five-member

Committee of Prisoners, consisting of political prisoners or POWs, will

offer guidance and direction for the ABC Federation. Members of this

Committee will have one-year terms. As of the conference the membership

of the Committee had not been finalized, although Ojore Lutalo and

Sundiata Acoli have volunteered to be on it. Prisoners who are not POWs

or political prisoners who want to be part of the ABC can form “Prisoner

Solidarity Committees” which support and work with the activities of the

federation, but don’t necessarily have to be anarchist. We also left

open the possibility that organizations or collectives of prisoners can

become Branch Groups if they meet the same requirements as groups on the

outside.

Since the conference, Baltimore ABC and Brew City Anti-Authoritarian

Collective have decided to become Support Groups in the new federation.

It still remains to be seen how other ABC groups will decide to relate

to this new federation. Those of us who have joined the federation

believe it will help to create consistency, reliability, and increased

effectiveness among ABCs, qualities most ABC groups have been

notoriously lacking in the past.