Rennie Davis
Renard (Rennie) Davis was one of the "Chicago Seven" from the 1960s and 70s.[1]
Davis was arrested in one while protesting the Vietnam War during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.[2]
North Vietnam
Rennie Davis wrote a November 1967 article in the Hyde Park-Kenwood Voices article about his visit to communist North Vietnam with Tom Hayden.
Hyde Park-Kenwood Voices
In January 1969, the Chicago radical newspaper, Hyde Park-Kenwood Voices, listed those who had helped produce its first 16 monthly issues as "writers, researchers, photographers, artists and clerical workers".
The list included Rennie Davis[3]
People's Peace Treaty
The People's Peace Treaty (PPT) was a fraudulent document of "peace" between the leftist-led National Student Association (NSA) of the US and several North Vietnamese communist "student" fronts, as well as with the [[National Liberation Front/SV], the political wing of Hanoi's Lao Dong Party in South Vietnam and the Lao Dong Party of North Vietnamese itself.
The organization behind this "peace treaty" placed a nearly full page ad in the New York Times (NYT) of March 7, 1971, Sunday edition, Page 7, starting with a quote by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, August, 1959 which said "People want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of their way and let them have it." [The quote was referring to the Captive Nations of the Soviet Bloc, North Korea and Red China (which had just invaded Tibet and conquerred it).
A list of "endorsers" of the PPT included:
- Rev. Daniel Berrigan, S.J.
- Rev. Philip Berrigan, S.J.
- Rennie Davis - May Day Collective
- David Dellinger Dave Dellinger - People's Coalition for Peace and Justice (PCPJ).
More on the People's Peace Treaty and its communist history can be found in several House Internal Security Committee hearings entitled "National Peace Action Coalition ((NPAC) and People's Coalition for Peace & Justice (written on the hearing volume as Peoples Coalition for Peace & Justice, (PCPJ), 92nd Congress, 1st Session, Parts 2 and 3, 1971.
New American Movement genesis
The concept of the New American Movement originated soon after the disintegration of Students for a Democratic Society in Chicago in 1969, when John Rossen, a one-time district organizer for the Communist Party USA and then the landlord of the SDS offices, distributed a number of pamphlets calling for a new revolutionary force based on a combination of Marxism and American nationalism, and organized the Johnny Appleseed Movement for Peace and Human Rights.
Rossen's ideas gave birth to two groups. Chicagoan Jeremy Rifkin took over Rossen's pamphlets and and graphics to form the People's Bi-centennial Commission, in which Rossen remained active until at least 1975, while another group developed other aspects.
Rossen's influence with the early New American Movement remained at least through the end of 1971, contributing an article to the first issue of NAM's newspaper New American Movement dated September-October 1971.
In January 1971, Rossen's ideas were adapted by three former SDS activists - Theirrie Evelyn Cook, one of the negotiators of the People's Peace Treaty with the Vietcong; Michael P. Lerner and Charles "Chip" Marshall, then enjoying a brief notoriety as leader of the Seattle Liberation Front, then trial for inciting a riot in response to the contempt citations in the Chicago 8 Conspiracy Trial. The three Seattle organizers circulated papers call1ng for the creation of a new revolutionary party which they then termed. the New American Community Party.
In the late winter of 1970 and into the the spring of 1971, this group worked closely with Rennie Davis in developing plans for the Washington, D.C. Mayday disruptions in support of the Vietnamese communists, with Lerner and Marshall becoming active leaders National Mayday Collective. The Mayday organization provided· the New American Community Party with the opportunity to reach a large segment of the radical community and to receive input from New Left theoreticians such as Douglas Dowd and Staughton Lynd.
New members were gained and the name New American Movement began to be used.[4]
References
- ↑ "January 17, 1970: Jerry Rubin Brings the Chicago Noise to Seattle"
- ↑ Brief History Of Chicago's 1968 Democratic Convention
- ↑ Hyde Park-Kenwood Voices, January 16 1969, page 4
- ↑ THE NEW AMERICAN MOVEMENT, HON. LARRY McDONALD OF GEORGIA. IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, Thursday. September. 4 1975, page 97