Politics of the United States (From Sea to Shining Sea)

The main political parties of United America.

The American Workers Party (AWP)

American Workers Party (AWP)
Spanish name	Partido de los Trabajadores Americanos (PTA)
Founder	National Convention of Unity
National Secretary	Sarah Leslie (first) Mark Adams (last)
Slogan	Of, by and for the Working People
Founded	1929
Dissolved	December 24, 1991
Merger of	Socialist Party of America (SPA), Communist Party USA (CPUSA), Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), Farmer–Labor Party (FLP), Socialist Labor Party of America (SLP) Proletarian Party of America (PPA), and left-wing of the Progressive Party
Preceded by	American Workers' Association (1928-1929)
Succeeded by	American Communist Party (ACP), People's Democratic Socialist Party (PDSP) and Liberal Democrats (LD).
Headquarters	Chicago Commune
Newspaper	The Daily Worker (daily tabloid), The People (daily broadsheet), Workers' Unity (weekly magazine), New Masses (weekly magazine)
Student wing	Students for an Industrial Democratic Society (SIDS)
Youth wing	Young Workers League of America (YWLA)
Women's section	Federation of Working Women's Clubs (FWWC)
Trade union and labor section	Workers Alliance of America (WAA)
African American section	American Negro Labor Congress (ANLC)
Ideology	Marxist, later multi-tendency Marxist and Socialist.
Political position	Centre-left and left
Official colours	Red
Election symbol
Party flag

The American Workers Party (AWP, Spanish: Partido de los Trabajadores Americanos PTA) established in 1929, was the governing Marxist political party of the USRA from the country's foundation in the Revolution of 1932 until it was dissolved in 1991.

Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, American people began turning to socialist and communist due to the economic crisis. The failed American Revolution of 1925, death of the charismatic socialist leader Eugene V. Debs and the unsuccessful presidential campaigns and later death of Robert M. La Follette put the American left and reformist in a dire position. All attempts to rebuilt and unify the America left came to fruition in 1928 with the formation of the American Workers' Association (AWA), a loose alliance between workers' councils, labor unions, and left-wing organizations and political parties. In addition, the Socialist Party of America (SPA), Communist Party USA (CPUSA), Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), Farmer–Labor Party (FLP), Socialist Labor Party of America (SLP), Proletarian Party of America (PPA), and left wing of the Progressive Party agreed on forming a Joint Action Committee.

Later in Wall Street of Crash of 1929 marked for many a new phase in class struggle in the US so the AWA and the Joint Action Committee agreed to call a National Convention of Unity were the American Workers Party (AWP) was established.

In 1929, its members elected schoolteacher and communist militant, Sarah Leslie, as leader of the AWP. Under her leadership, the AWA was united into a new political party: the American Workers Party. Shortly afterward, the Stock Market Crash of 1929 occurred, starting the Great Depression. This boosted the popularity of the party, which outgrew in adherence and new militants both the Republican and Democratic parties by the end of 1931. Leslie urged that through a revolution to overthrow capitalism and give ownership of the means of production to the working class. This, combined with discontent of the government due to its failure to give jobs and welfare relief to its citizens, caused the United States to erupt into revolution in 1932.

In the Second American Civil War (1932-1936), the AWP was the leading force and under its leadership were main combating revolutionary forces formed - Workers Militias and the Workers Revolutionary Army. Its militants staffed the majority of the provisional Revolutionary Committees of liberated territories.

After the Triumph of the Revolution

In 1937, delegates to the III National Convention of Chicago or the Convention of the Victory assembled to discuss the party program, the report of the National Secretary and vote a a new National Executive Committee taking in account that most of its members died in the Revolution and its membership had been provisionally co-opted.

Sarah Leslie at her opening speech to the delegates stated: Brothers and Sisters. This Victory is Our Victory. It's the triumph of the workers (...) the poor, of our dead comrades, (...) We can now begin to build socialism in America. It is the task of our generation as it was 1776 to the forebears of our Young Republic, of Lincoln after ending slavery, of (interrupted as delegates loudly cheer and rise to sing the Internationale).

The III National Convention approved the policy of Consolidation, Unity, and Strengthening of the Revolutionary Forces as the National Revolutionary Task of the historical moment after the armed and political triumph of the Revolution. Thus, the main task and duty of the AWP, party workers and sympathizers would be to consolidate the power of the people's and workers councils, the political and legal normalization of liberated territories by means of republican constituent assemblies of the former US states, the purge and expropriation of capitalist and enemies of the revolution. To work for the unity of all the workers, allies and the economic organizations. The strengthening of the duties and power of workers association and republican (former US State) governments in order to rebuild the economy and begin the social reforms already enacted in the liberated territories.

In 1940, the anarchists, that keep separate organizations, agenda and were the main dissent voice to the political action of the AWP, were declared by AWP mass media and resolutions as obstructionists and saboteurs to the National Tasks and to undermine class solidarity by means of their propaganda and press. The cause of anarchism was not helped when its fighting organization started bombing campaigns, disobedience, violent disruption and wildcat strikes at factories, workshops and cooperatives, legislatures and executive organs. The flaming point came with open calls for the Armed Forces to revolt and return to the spirit of 1932. Based on these actions a wide purge in National and Republican governments was officially sanctioned. Followed by a series of show trials and kangaroo courts against anarchist members that were widely publicized and spreading to the labor movement were anarchist dissidents were thoroughly expelled.

The IV National Convention of 1941 received the report of the First Five-Year Plan and its eminent success. The renewal of the Consolidation, Unity, and Strengthening of the Revolutionary Forces policy was unanimously approved and a warning was launched to the anarchist to either joint the revolutionary majority or suffer its exclusion. This warning was later historically considered as a blank cheque for the repression of anarchism by the State security apparatus.

It was also approved a resolution to expel from the Party of uncommitted militants (later applied to Anarchist in the AWP), Blue sympathizers and opportunists. For this purpose, internal party commissions would review post 1936 affiliations and ideological conformity.

The Prairie Socialists presented a motion to extend cooperatives to major industries or at least allow a similar governance as in cooperatives. The notion was narrowly defeated but divided the Party between Central-Planners, Cooperationists and Workers' Participation. It was approves a motion of establishing a revolutionary co-partners. This in part to calm down political rifts in the South between AWP and the Revolutionary Party over the establishment of local autonomy and the immediate end of segregation.

Factions of the AWP

In its founding, the AWP was the merger of several ideological and political groups and traditions some having strong regional following: Marxist-Leninist, Marxist-Trotsky, several Marxists tendencies, Social democracy, Farmer-Labors (i.e., Prairie Socialists), De Leonists, left-wing populists, civil rights movement, Christian left, trade unionists, Black liberation movement, IWW (Wobblies) and anarchists. The former until the 1940s when they were expelled and put on the limits of legal opposition.

Later tendencies included feminism, social/state planners and ecologists.

Anna Nikolaev (1921-1981). National Secretary of the AWP (1967-1979) and President of United America (1979-1981). Died in aircrash of Pan-Am SST 140.

The factions of the AWP were shaken up by the publication of the discussion document The Reform of the Party in Society authored by Anna Nikolaev that called to rethink the relationships of the Party within Government and with Society. The Old Guard and social/state planners were against abandoning the overall role of the AWP being challenged by wide myriad of factions like feminist, ecologist and new workforce labor activist that were the main supported of Nikolaev's bid for leadership of the AWP.

Dissolution of the AWP

In 1991, after it was dissolved, its three major factions became the American Communist Party (ACP), the People's Democratic Socialist Party (PDSP), and the Liberal Democrats (LD).

Organization and Leadership of the AWP

The highest policy and decision making and political authority of the AWP is the National Convention. It meets every four years, but extraordinary meetings of the National Convention can be called by the NEC or by a third of the State Executive Committees. The National Convention elects the National Secretary and the National Executive Committee (NEC). The NEC is the main governing and administrative body of the AWP.

At Republic (former State) the AWP is organized in a Regional Convention that elects delegates to the National Convention and elects Republican (former State) Executive Committee

A District Convention that elects delegates to the Regional Convention and also elects the District Executive Committee. Below it there is a Local Convention and Local Executive Committee. The Branch that is the basic political organization.

Its affiliated organizations: Students for an Industrial Democratic Society (SIDS), Young Workers League of America (YWLA), Federation of Working Women's Clubs (FWWC), Workers Alliance of America (WAA) and American Negro Labor Congress (ANLC) have their own structure that is similar to the the one of the AWP and name delegates to the National Convention.

National Conventions (NC): I (1929), II (1931), III (1937), IV (1941), V (1945), VI (1949), VII (1953), VIII (1957), IX (1961), X (1965), XI (Extraordinary 1967), XII (1971), XIII (1975), XIV (1979), XV (Extraordinary 1981), XVI (1985), XVII (1989), XVIII (Extraordinary 1990) and XIX (Extraordinary 1991).

National Secretary of the AWP
Name	Portrait	Term	Notes
Sarah Leslie		1929-1957	Elected in NC I (1929), reelected NC II (1931), NC III (1937), NC IV (1941), NC V (1945), NC VI (1949) and NC VII (1953).
Aubrey Roberts		1957-1961	Elected NC VIII (1957).
Emmanuel Winters		1961-1971	Elected NC IX (1961) and reelected NC X (1965).
Anna Nikolaev		1967-1979	Elected NC XI (Extraordinary 1967), reelected NC XII (1971) and NC XIII (1975).
Michael González		1979-1982	Elected NC XIV (1979) and reelected NC XV (Extraordinary 1981).
Jennifer Sampson		1982-1985	Named interim National Secretary by the vote of the National Executive Committee (NEC) until the next NC.
Glenn Robledo		1985-1989	Elected NC XVI (1985).
Mark Adams		1989-1991	Elected NC XVII (1989), reelected NC XVIII (Extraordinary 1990) and NC XIX (Extraordinary 1991).

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The Revolutionary Workers and Farmers Party

Revolutionary Workers and Farmers Party (RWFP) / Revolutionary Party
Founded	1934
Split from	American Workers' Party
Headquarters	Birmingham, Alabama
Ideology	Black Nationalism, Marxism, Revolutionary socialism and Anti-racism
Political position	Left
Official colours	Red      Black
Election symbol
Party flag

In the struggle against the plantation system of the South, the Negro people are necessarily the chief driving force. The liberal "remedies" which shy away from the fundamental economic changes indispensable for the democratic transformation of the South, ignore this crucial fact and, with it, they ignore the special character of the social and political struggle of the Negroes.

The Revolutionary Workers and Farmers Party (RWFP) was established during the Second American Revolution. The RWFP advocates for a Black Nationalism, Revolutionary socialism and anti-racism.

The RWFP has regional following in the Black Belt (Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina) and outside of it in Oklahoma and the commune of Chicago.

The origins of the RWFP can be traced to the beginnings of the Second American Revolution in the southern states of the former United States. The violent backlash of white supremacists and Blue Partisans in the first weeks of the revolution, when local black communities started to organized their self-defense in the Black Militias. Besides protecting and engaging in minor military operations they also started to take over farms and factories and the machinery of local government. Thought, not advocating for socialism and the revolution, many of the members of the militia, organizers and partisans had taken part in the efforts of the communists to organize sharecroppers, so they were familiarized with a basic Socialist theory and slogans.

In the spring of 1933, a large number of black militants and organizers of the AWP resigned from the said organizations, due to their lukewarm support for a radicalization of the revolutionary struggle in the South and organized themselves in the Black Revolutionary Brotherhood of the South (BRBS).

At the same times the Black Militias started to coordinate themselves in a Army Staff for more ambitious military actions such as taking over Birmingham, Alabama. The administration of basic services, foods, shelter, health and orphans was transferred to the Southern Civil Administration, that by all accounts became the de facto government in the black liberates areas. The BRBS began to provide most of the staff of the Black Administration and helped in training and draft black soldiers deserting the US Army. In 1934, the BRBS took a vote to widen its appeal and reconsider its revolutionary practice in a more coherent theoretical framework. Harry Haywood, an early critic of the CPUSA on issues over race, drafted the main theoretical platform - The Tasks of Marxism and Black Liberation in the Present Revolution, that became the basis for the formation of the RWFP.

In the Summer of 1934, at the newly liberated city of Birmingham, delegates from the Black Militias, BRBS, Administration and liberated territories founded the RWFP. The previous months the BRBS had issue an invitation to create a more expedient political and revolutionary organization for the growing Black liberation in the South. The invitation was critics by several leader of the AWP and more moderate Black leaders. The RWFP, the organized vanguard of the Black Liberation (the non official motto), took over most political dimension of the Black Militia and Black Administration. Its founding Congress voted to collaborate and coordinate with the AWP, the provisional governing councils in liberated territories and the workers militias, but keeping its liberty of action and the administration of the black liberated areas.

Tensions with the provisional executives of the workers republics of Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina due to the swift land reform and collectivization pushed in the the Black Areas by the RWFP and the autonomous command and actions of the Black Militias lead to broker a deal in establish what would later became the Autonomous Regional Communities or colloquially the Black (or Negro) Communes.

The unconditional stance against racism and segregation put the RWFP several times at odds with local and republican authorities in the Southern Republics, party functionaries and leadership of the AWP and managers of local state farmers.

Membership to the RWFP was open only to blacks. However in the 1950s the Smith Administration considered this condition unconstitutional and pushed for its change. Larry Smith, being himself a previous militant of the RWFP until 1946. The National Congress of 1961 approved to open membership, especially to poor white farmers, to all that adherent to Political and Theoretical Platform regardless of race and had previously been a member candidate for a year.

The Farmer–Labor Party

Farmer–Labor Party (FLP)
German name	Bauern- und Arbeiterpartei
Spanish name	Partido Campesino-Laborista
Split from	American Workers' Party
Headquarters	Minneapolis
Newspaper	Agrarian Justice and United Farmer
Cooperative movement	Cooperative Organizations Union
Republican and local associations	Farmers' Association
Ideology	Populism, Progressivism, Cooperative movement and Social democracy
Political position	Center-left
Official colours	Yellow
Election symbol

The National Farmer–Labor Party or Prairie Socialists as large following in the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma, and sizable parts of Montana, Wyoming, Missouri, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, and western and southern Minnesota. Also influential in Canadian Prairies (Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta). The NFLP was established over the issue of cooperative ownership and economic planning of the Great Prairies. Starting as a tendency since the times of the establishment of the AWP it slowly embraced the cause of farmers and cooperatives. It challenged several times the policies of the agricultural quotas of the central planning and enlargement of the state farms complex.

It definitely split from the AWP on the eve of the republican elections of Nebraska and Kansas were it won the Governorship and the legislature under its own electoral ticket. As a tendency of the AWP it was already a majority in the said states.

The American Communist Party (ACP)

American Communist Party (ACP)
Spanish name	Partido Comunista Americano
Founded	December 24, 1991
Split from	American Workers' Party
Ideology	Marxist
Political position	Centre-left and left
Official colours	Red
Election symbol

The American Communist Party (ACP), founded in 1991 after the dissolution of the AWP. The ACP is considered to be left. Although Marxist and radical socialist in its official declaration, the ACP has two main informal factions that identify themselves with Leninism or Trotskism. In its basic statutes and party declarations the ACP considers it self to be the inheritor and historical continuation of the AWA, AWP and the political legacy of Sarah Leslie.

The People's Democratic Socialist Party (PDSP)

People's Democratic Socialist Party (PDSP)
Spanish name	Partido Socialista Democrático Popular (PSDP)
Founded	December 24, 1991
Split from	American Workers' Party
Ideology	Social Democracy and Progressivism
Political position	Centre-left
Official colours	Red
Election symbol

The People's Democratic Socialist Party (PDSP), founded in 1991 after the dissolution of the AWP. The PDSP is considered to be left and left of centre and advocating Social democracy and Democratic socialism. As the ACP, the party considers itself to be the inheritor of the political legacy of the AWA and AWP, the historical struggle of the working class and the legacy of Sarah Leslie. However it is critical of the authoritarian and bureaucratic trends of the AWP and government.

The Liberal Democrats (LD)

Liberal Democrats (LD)
Spanish name	Demócratas Liberales
Founded	December 24, 1991
Split from	American Workers' Party
Ideology	Social liberalism, Classical liberalism and Economic liberalism
Political position	center to center-left
Official colours	Blue
Election symbol

The Liberal Democrats (LD), founded in 1991 after the dissolution of the AWP. The LD is considered to be center to center-left. It LD it is official statements and party press does not consider itself to be the continuation of the AWP or its legacy. The LD is critical of the history of the AWP and the legacy of Leslie Sarah. The LD as usually allied with the DemRep at local and republican level elections and government coalitions.

The Loyal, The Tolerated and The Underground Opposition

Democratic-Republican Party (DemRep - DRP)
Spanish name	Partido Demócrata-Republicano
Founded	1941
Preceded by	Republicans and Democrats
Youth wing	Young DemRep
Ideology	American nationalism, social liberalism, States' rights, social conservatism, right-wing populism, economic liberalism and private property rights.
Political position	Right
Official colours	Blue
Election symbol

Former Republican and Democrats illegal and dissolved since December 1936 along several capitalist organizations such as the Chambers of Commerce, American Legion, employer's associations, National Civic Federation, Citizen's Alliance, Lions, Rotaries, etc.

What was left of the Republicans and Democrats merged in the Democratic-Republican Party or started the clandestine American Liberty League (ALL). The DemReps, tough not officially recognized would run candidates under the DemRep, DRP, Democratic-Republican labeled tickets thanks to the independent electoral lists that by law the labor unions or cooperatives could use.

Mutual Solidarity Front (SF)
Spanish name	Frente de Solidaridad Mutua
Founded	1968
Ideology	Anarcho-communism, libertarian socialism and anarcho-syndicalism. Civil rights and Anti-racism platform
Political position	Left
Official colours	Red      Black
Election symbol
Party flag

After Anarchists were outlawed in 1940-1941 many would continue to exist as underground organization and cells. Infighting began when some split into a group wiling to collaborate within the AWP as loyal and constructive opposition and submitted to party discipline and another completely opposed to the State and party.

Their fighting organizations would take terrorist actions and guerrilla warfare that were counter attacked by the Vanguard Battalions of the Armed Forces and Internal Security Section III of Vigilance of Internal Left Counterrevolutionary Activities. Although small in scale the extent of this black war and the violation of civil rights by both sides and illegal detentions of anarchists militants and supposed accomplices would only be known to public in the 1960s in series of newspapers reports and accounts and the Political Openness that would release official files of IS-Section III.

As a political entity anarchists establish the Mutual Solidarity Front (MSF) that was organized with the help of the Mexican Anarchist Federation as a joint electoral platform. The Front brought together most of the political, labor and cultural organizations that for the first time could work in the open and not in the semi-legal situation, they had before the Political Openness. It also marked the return from their exile in Mexico of various well know and historical activists and intellectual of the 1950s.

Due to their constant harassment and violation of civil rights that the MSF would also incorporate as part of their program Civil rights and Anti-racism. One immediate demand would be the de-establishment of the legal revolutionary terror that enabled from the 1940s to the mid-19600s the State Security apparatus and courts of justice the persecution of so-called anti-revolutionaries to the left.

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